Summer Jean | Unschooling - Living Without the Need to Prove Yourself - Self Directed

Episode Transcript
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Jesper Conrad (00:10):
We're together with Summer Jean.
And first of all, Summer,welcome.

Summer Jean (00:15):
Thank you.
It's nice to see you again.

Likewise.
And for the people watching,normally I have my wonderful
wife next to me, but we are inTarragona, Spain, where we are
hosting what we call WorldSchool Village, which is a giant
event where we have invited alot of world schoolers, and we
are around 40 families withteens who all are unschooled,

(00:40):
homeschooled, world schooltravelers who live in the same
place for a month.
And my wife is super busy withthat event.
She's the main one running it.
But I really wanted to get anepisode recorded this week.
So here we are, just me andyou, Summer.

That sounds amazing and so cool what you guys are
up to.

It is a, I would say, overwhelming, fantastic
experience because a lot of thehomeschoolers out there, and you
have probably felt that growingup or know that kind of
feeling.
Many of them they meet so manylike-minded people in the same
place.
And I think we have more than40 teams around the same age,

(01:23):
just hanging out, chatting, nobullying, just relaxed and
enjoying life and talking.
That's beautiful.
It is amazing.

And when we when I was uh when I was a kid, my
older brothers, when they wereteenagers, they got to go to
NBTSC, not back to school camp.
And like back in the early dayswhen it was new, when Grace
Llewellyn was still leading itherself and everything.
So my older brothers were someof the early members of Not Back
to School Camp.
And that was cool.

(01:52):
And I always wanted to go whenI got old enough, but then my
family moved to Hawaii and itjust never worked out for me.
But it was a hugely impactfulexperience for them to get to be
around so many other kids whocame from alternative or
different kinds of families anddifferent kinds of education and
upbringing, even though therewas this vast, vast range

(02:13):
between like my family's styleof like not doing schooling and
other families' styles.
I mean, everyone, it's such avast, vast range, right?
Because the education is onlylike this tiny, tiny part of the
wider world of parenting andrelating to children and
everything.
So even though the range was sohuge, there were certain

(02:35):
elements of just being togetherwith other kids that aren't in
that system that was hugelyconnective and very like
reassuring for them and reallylike gave them a lot of
confidence because we didn'thave a lot of people in our
immediate life, you know.
Like when I was young,homeschooling was barely heard
of, let alone like what peopleare calling unschooling now or

(02:57):
self-educated or whatever.
There's so many terms.
And so it was really cool forthem to meet so many other kids
that had at least that were atleast different from the the set
system of public schooling,even if it wasn't quite like our
family.
Just that it was different wasa way that we could relate to
other kids that we met who, youknow, um didn't follow

(03:20):
curriculum or you know, just hadsome different kind of freedom
or structure in their in theireducation.
And so that was really so it'sbeautiful what you're doing.
I think it's really importantum for so many families to have
to be able to get together andconnect and the kids and for the
parents just to be like we'renot alone.

Yeah, it's really sometimes I get very easily
emotional, and I actually had acry about it today when I talked
with my kids because I just gotso happy uh thinking about
seeing some of these teens aweek ago and then seeing the now
interact, and you can just seethe ease of life in them and how

(03:59):
they relax in each other'spresence presence, and it just
made me really, really happy.
Uh so I think yeah, yeah.
Somewhere, I've beenconsidering some questions, and
and one of them is um this it'snot philosophical, but it is for

(04:20):
me who have been in the systemof public schooling, even though
I, in many ways, compared tomany other people, are kind of
rebellious in the way that Ididn't want to go to university,
even in a country where it'spaid and you even get a salary
for taking it.
I wanted to make movies andcreative projects and all that.

(04:40):
So I just went ahead and hadwhat people would call six to
seven gap years uh before it didanything.
But I still run around withthis little uh productive um
mindset that I need to beproductive somehow.
And and sometimes when I lookat my old the oldest of the ones

(05:02):
who have been homeschooled, wealso have a wonderful daughter
who's 26, but the oldest of theones who has been home
unschooled and homeschooled,he's very good at enjoying life
and just being alive.
Um and part of me is envious,and I can also, as a parent, be
afraid.

(05:23):
Will he figure out to make anincome and all that?
And then the other part of meis considering how must it be to
grow up without this constantnagging of you need to create a
career, you need to beproductive, your life needs to
look like this for you toproduce.

Yeah, you have to, yes, you have to you have to
justify your existence withproductivity.

Yeah, yeah.
And even though, as I said, Itold my story of kind of being
rebellious and doing a lot ofstuff, I still have this
justification towards myself,but I don't see it in the same
way in my son and you who havebeen uh unschooled all the way.
I'm curious where you are onthis um on if you also have it
under your shoulder sometimes,or how you're handling it.

No, it's a it's a beautiful thing to consider, and
it is philosophical.
And I've contemplated thatquite a bit, and I have
discussions about this with mymom.
And I think that to some extentit's unavoidable because we're
in this modern society, and it'sso it permeates everything.
Like you can't really, I don'tthink that you can raise
children without that affectingthem to some degree.

(06:34):
But I think you can lessen thedegree.
And yeah, I think that schoolhas a huge, huge bit of that.
But I got some of it myselfsimply from the family I grew up
in, from the relatives that Iwas around, from the parents of
my friends, from it'severywhere.
It's from TV and movies andeverything, everything is

(06:54):
pushing this narrative that youhave to, that your value is in
what you can produce as far asmonetary success.
So it's not even what you canproduce, like, look at this
amazing piece of art that Icreated.
It's like, yeah, but how muchcan you sell it for?
That's what's gonna matter.
Because that painting only hasvalue if someone's willing to
pay a certain amount of moneyfor it.

(07:15):
So we've put everything ontoit's all about what it's what
its value in dollars is insteadof just its like spiritual
value, it's emotional value,it's like all of these other
things.
And so I definitely have thatprogramming as well.
But I have noticed when I lookaround, I mean, I'm I'm 37 now.
And um, like you described meas being unschooled, and that is

(07:39):
still accurate if you're goingby the original definition of
unschooling.
What I say is the truedefinition of unschooling,
because the guy who actuallymade it up made it, made up the
term unschooling to apply tosomething he'd already kind of
formulated, and he's the firstone to make that connection.
So unschooling, according toJohn Holt, who created the term,

(08:01):
is actually um child-directedlearning or self-directed
learning, child-led learning orself-directed learning.
That's basically that's thelike the absolute core
definition.
So when I use the termunschooling, that's what I mean.
And that means 100%.
It means there is no adultimplemented learning activity

(08:23):
whatsoever.
There's no pushing on the adultside.
There's no, I would say, yes,guiding maybe, but there's no
actual like you're gonna do thisat this time, ever from an
adult.
There's no required learning oradult-implemented learning, I
would say.
So I just want to say thatbecause I see a lot of things
today that are saying, oh, weunschool sometimes.

(08:45):
That's not a thing.
That's called homeschooling.
If you're doing the weekend, ifyou're doing any kind of adult
implemented learning, it's someform of homeschooling.
Unschooling means there's noschooling perpetrated on the
child.
So you can't unschool certainsubjects or unschool sometimes,
or that's not that's not howthat works in my world.

(09:06):
So that's where I'm at withthat.
So I was, according to thatdefinition, I was unschooled.
There was no adult implementedacademic learning in my life.
Um, no one ever sat me down andmade me do any kind of
worksheet.
I've never, I've nothing.
I've never opened a textbook,or at least not.
I mean, I've opened a textbookbecause I got curious a few

(09:27):
times, quickly closed them.
And we didn't have acurriculum, we didn't have any
of that kind of thing.
We had a very my mom focused onrelationship and connection.
My mom focused on relationshipand connection.
And she told us, which I'mgoing to bring this back to your
question.
My mom raised us constantlyreminding us that all she wanted

(09:48):
for us was for us to find oursense of rightness in the world,
like to find, to connect with apassion, to do what we loved,
to find our flow.
And she would support us aslong as it needed for us to do
that.
She had no expectations of whatthat would look like for us.
She had no attachment to whatwe would become or or how that

(10:11):
would look.
She had no attachment to ushaving any kind of, you know,
success in the world.
She didn't need us to beimpressive, to get degrees, to
do anything.
She was like, I don't care ifyou're the garbage man.
I just want you to find peace.
I want you to live in a waythat is in alignment with your
own sense of rightness.
Um, so that's the message I gotgrowing up.

(10:31):
And I'm super, super gratefulfor that.
And I think that I knew my mommeant it because of how she
treated me every day.
So it's one thing to think thatconsciously and be like, of
course I want that for mychildren.
And most parents will say that.

Yeah.

It's, you know, and they mean it.
They're not lying.
I know they mean it and there'sgenuine intention.
But the actions and the waythat you speak to your child
every day and the way that youtreat them every day is where
the message is.
That's the message they'regoing to get, not from you
telling them, I just want you tobe happy.
Because then you turn aroundand you say, No, you need to sit

(11:07):
here and you need to completethis math worksheet.
Because if you don't, you'regoing to be a loser.
Like that's what you're tellingthem.
If you don't do what someoneelse thinks you should be doing
and accomplishing tasks set byother people that are important
to other people that you have nointerest in, you might be
uncomfortable with, you mightnot be ready for, it might feel
totally wrong to you.

(11:28):
But if you don't deny your ownsense of rightness and what
feels safe for you and good foryou and comfortable for you, if
you don't crush that, your ownsense of what is right for
yourself and follow someoneelse's direction, some higher
authority somewhere out therealways knows what's better for
you.
And you need to do what theysay, otherwise you're going to

(11:49):
be a failure.
And that's the message thatpeople are telling their kids
every time they make them learnsomething their child has shown
no interest in.
Every time that you're forcingyour child to use their mind in
a way in which they areuninterested in, uncomfortable
with, unready for.
And they're the only ones thatcan know what they're ready for.
You don't get to say.
No one gets to say what anotherperson's internal world is like

(12:12):
or what they're actually readyfor or comfortable with.
Um, and when I say things likethis, I really like to make sure
that people get the point thatI'm saying mentally, because you
know, you still need to washyour dishes and brush your teeth
and like there's things likethat.
But you can think whatever youwant about it.
You're free.
You can feel however you wantabout it, you can think whatever
you want about it.
You can even say whatever youwant about it in my family.

(12:35):
As long as that person, andwhen we get into these kinds of
freedoms, there's like a where'syour freedom, where's my
freedom, where do our freedomsmeet and curb one another's?
Because you might have thefreedom to say like something
really nasty to me, but I havethe freedom to be upset about
that and not want to talk to youfor the rest of the day.
So it doesn't mean there's noconsequences, and kids get to

(12:57):
just say whatever they want andact however they want.
It means that the consequencesare natural.
They have they're actuallynatural, they're not planned out
by an adult.
They're not, there's no adultmanipulating and creating
consequences, even withinthemselves.
I'm gonna react a certain wayso my kid learns a certain
thing.
It's actually just being superauthentic and genuine and

(13:18):
present.
And that's what I got with mymom.
So I got a lot of reallybeautiful support of being in
beingness and not a huge push onthe doing.
And I wasn't purposefullytaught by my mom that my value
is in my productivity and what Ican create, but I still got

(13:40):
some of that programming justbecause I grew up in this world,
and so it happened.
And I think there's a littlebit, and for my older brothers,
this is very much true becausethey're four and seven years
older than me, and they had alot more pressure and influence
from my dad's side of thefamily, which were the ones that
were super, super freaked outabout us, and so there's a lot

(14:02):
of fear-mongering, and it reallygets to you when you're a kid,
and those are the people thatand we would have to spend
weekends like alone.
You know, my parents split up,so there was weekends with my
dad.
So we spent a lot of time alonewith these grandparents and
aunties and uncles.
There was a lot of negativeinfluence, a lot of judgment, a
lot of fear, a lot of criticism,and that got to my older
brothers more than me because Iwas a lot younger.

(14:25):
And by the time I came along,my mom had really detached a lot
more and more from that side ofthe family.
So I didn't get as much of aninfluence.
Then we moved away when I was10, and I hardly saw most of
that family, anyways.
But my brothers got a lot ofit, and I think it really got
under their skin in some ways towhere they almost it almost
increased that feeling thatyou're talking about about

(14:46):
having to do and putting all ofyour value in what you um what
you achieve, like success-wise,according to society.
And I think that my one of myolder brothers for sure really
felt the need to provesomething, like to prove that he
could be successful in thesystem and in the world, even

(15:08):
though we were raised in thisvery different way.
And that I I could really seethat coming from my
grandparents.
There was so much disapprovaland fear and anxiety that my
brother wanted to know, see, Ican be good, I can be
successful, like and defendingmy mom and our way of life.
I think that all of us had alittle bit of a desire to prove

(15:32):
something to the world becausewe were so harshly judged and
criticized for so much of ourlives for being so different and
so weird.
And my mom was very unusual ina lot of ways.
We're not just talking becauseyou know it's all connected,
right?
So it wasn't just education, itwas also like the medical stuff
and it was the spiritual stuff,and it was the health stuff,

(15:53):
and it was the all of thethings.
And so there was a lot ofjudgment, a lot of criticism.
My mom went through a lot.
I mean, we had we had CPS at mydoor.
Grandma called CPS to have ustaken away from mom because we
were being neglected because wewere vegetarian and we were
homeschooled.
And my dad actually and mystepmom took my mom to court and
tried to force us to go topublic public school and get all

(16:14):
the vaccines and do all thestuff.
And so um the fear was real,you know, like we actually as
children experienced things thatmade us realize that we could
actually be taken away from ourmother if we didn't pretend like
we were fine.
And I learned how to tell a lotof tall tales really young out

(16:36):
of survival.
I had to survive.
I had to tell grandma when I'msix, like, oh yeah, no, I'm
sleeping in my own bed becauseif you're six years old and
you're still co-sleeping,something's wrong.
So this is the world I grew upin because 30 years ago in
California, in NorthernCalifornia, 30 years ago.

Yeah, no one.

No, no one.
So it was like my mom wasn'tjust a little weird, like she
was so far to the other end ofthe spectrum from my dad's super
right-wing all American cattleranching family.
And she was this weird hippiechick who decided to do
everything different.
And so they weren't onlyinsulted because they took it as
an offense against their way oflife.

(17:19):
So they actually went afterher.
Like there was a lot.
It's just uh so my mom reallygot crucified, and we were all
deeply affected.
So I think there was a strongurge for us to prove ourselves
against that, against thatworld, against my dad's family,
against my dad himself.
And my older brothers had itmuch worse than I did.
Being men, for one thing, it'svery patriarchal family.

(17:41):
Nobody really cared what I did.
They just wanted me to be cuteand quiet and pretty.
There was no real expectationfor me.
Um, and I rebelled against thatby by like getting really tough
and strong and loud and doingthe opposite and become a glass
blowing artist and stuff.
But I'm really, really gratefulthat I got a little bit less of

(18:02):
that influence than my brothersdid because I can see it in
them.
I can see, especially in one ofmy older brothers, that desire
to prove yourself to the worldand that money being the
mission.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So he makes the most money, he's the most
successful.
And in my opinion, and he wentto college, like he's the one
that went to school.
He went to college, he gotgreat grades.
I remember him telling my momhe got into UC Berkeley, which
is kind of a big deal.
And I remember him calling mymom.
My mom has reminded me of thisquite a few times because she's
like, I don't know how I got akid like this.

(18:39):
It's so funny.
He calls her and he says, Thisis your moment of glory.
Like, I got into UC Berkeley,mom, this is your moment of
glory.
And she was so confused becauseshe was like, I don't care.
Like, why would I care if youget into college or not?
I didn't raise you to likeprove that you could be
successful according to societyand the set standards.

(18:59):
I raised you to find your ownjoy.
And and I really feel like thathad a lot to do with my that
all that negative influence andmy dad's family and just growing
up in that society and all ofthat pressure.
And he's actually like, I uhand I feel like he's the one
that went to college.
He got the degree, he got thedegree in political science, he

(19:21):
works for some fancy startupcompany working on computers
from home.
He's married, they own a house,they have a little girl, they

(20:06):
have a dog, they have theperfect American dream life.
And I was just there visitinghim not that long ago.
And honestly, I think he's themost miserable ahead of all of
us.

Yeah.
But that's the interestingthing, which is what is
happiness and when are we reallyhappy and have many of us learn
to listen to our bodies andwhen we are happy and when life
is good.

Funnily enough, trying to live up to what
success means to other people,like accepting other people's
standard of success, acceptingsociety's standard of his
success.
I know a man here in Mexico.
I live in a gorgeous littlejungle beach town in Mexico.
I know a man here who justwalked out of everything, and he
lives out in the jungle.

(20:53):
I don't know who nobody ownsthe property.
He lives way out in the jungle.
He's made himself like ahammock fortress in this like
tree.
And he's just so happy.
He's one of the happiest guysI've ever met.
And he lives with nothing, andhe walks two miles to come into
town, and then he goes back tohis tree next to the river and
he lights a fire to cook.

(21:14):
And he is the happiest, mostcontent, peaceful person that I
know around.

Yeah, and I almost get anxiety thinking
about it because I even as afree-spirited man who unschool
my kids, uh or with unschoolkids, you don't unschool them
per se.
I'd be like, who would I beable to do that?
But yeah, with the small steps,and I'm trying to remove the

(21:40):
layers one by one.
Since we talked the first timeon our podcast, and people
should go listen to thatepisode.
I found myself a hobby aftermany, many years of not really
finding time for just doing whatwould be looked upon as
nothing.
I whipped with spoons and Ilove making spoons, and often
when I make them, apparently Imake quite pretty spoons.

(22:02):
People are like, oh, shouldn'tyou sell them?
And I'm like, hey man, it takesme five hours to make this one.

Right.

What can you possibly if you should pay it?
I wanted $500 for it.
I will give you the spoon.
I've enjoyed making it, and Igive you it, and you will enjoy
using it.
But but don't insult me bygiving me $20 for five hours of
my time.
I could, I mean, I could workwith whatever if it was, but

(22:30):
just that joy of just sitting inthe sun, relaxing, talking, and
doing stuff.
I'm starting to relearn that,but oh my, it's a big journey.

Starting to uncover like your your own curiosities
that you lost somewhere becauseguaranteed they were showing up
when you were little, but thenyou had to be, you had to
redirect all your energy focusand attention to to focus on
things other people think youshould be focusing on.
And so you lost your own senseof what you like.
I know so many people thatdon't know how to make

(23:02):
decisions.
They don't know how to make achoice, they don't know how to
make decisions, they don't knowwhat they like, they don't know
what they want because they've,especially young people, because
they get out of high school andthey literally have never had a
chance to practice that.
It's always been this is whereyou're gonna be at this time,
this is what you're gonna dowith this time, this is what
you're gonna spend your time.
Like it's all it's all mappedout for them, and even what they

(23:25):
should be thinking about,they're being told what to be
thinking about.

Yeah.

And so they get out of high school.
And I remember this when I wasthat age, and my I had a lot of
friends who were in high school.
And I remember being, I wouldsay any there was a couple
years, especially when I wasabout 20, I think, actually,
because it was like a littleafter high school, you know, and
I was living on the big islandand I was like work trading on
this organic farm type weirdhippie community situation.

(23:52):
And I remember there was a fewother people around me.
I dated one guy who was like23.
He'd gotten out of college, hehad graduated with all the fancy
degrees.
He was the valedictorian in hishigh school.
He had a really like superstrict religious upbringing and
was the good boy, like theperfect golden boy, straight A's

(24:14):
all the way through the wholedeal.
And he got out of college andhe was completely incapable at
life, at basic living.
And then he fell into such anincredible depression because he
had no direction and no one totelling him what to do.
And he literally had no senseof even how where to go within

(24:34):
himself to find what step totake next.
He lost his connection to anykind of motivation or curiosity
or interest or drive at all.
It was gone.
And um, and so it was reallyinteresting because we only we
dated very briefly because I wasthe opposite.
I had never had a problemsaying what I like, what I want,

(24:56):
what my opinion is.
I know exactly how I feel aboutthis, and I'm gonna tell you
all about it.
I have no, I can't relate atall to not knowing.
And my mom had a similarexperience.
My mom somehow, maybe she'sjust a very strong soul.
I don't know.
But when she was married to mydad, and she tells me this story
where she had a conversationwith him, I don't even know what

(25:17):
it was about, doesn't matter.
Where there was some kind ofupset, and she was trying to be
like, Yeah, but what do youthink?
How do you feel?
And he broke down and he waslike, I don't know.
I'm not like you.
I don't know where to go insidemyself to know to find the
answers.
And I feel like that's a reallygreat example of what happens

(25:39):
to so many people in childhoodgoing into the public school
system, and then also just fromthe way parents are parenting
unconsciously, is we strip thatfrom children.
We because I think we're bornwith it.
I think we're all born with it.
With our, we know likes anddislikes and what feels right
and what feels safe, and likeintuition and gut feeling, all
of that's intact.

(25:59):
I believe that's all intact.
And I think we strip it awayfrom children by denying them
the freedom to follow thoseimpulses or explore those
impulses or find out which onesare correct.
And oh, this feeling, does itmean I should do it or not?
Well, I don't know, try.
Okay, oh no, I think that meantI shouldn't have done it.
I'll pay attention to thatfeeling next time.
We don't allow them to developrelationship with their own

(26:23):
signals coming from their ownbody and their heart and their
mind and their gut.
We don't allow them to explorethat relationship and develop
that relationship.
We say, uh-uh, cut that off,develop a relationship with an
outside authority and followthem no matter what, even when
it contradicts your own sense ofrightness.

And this is how we've gotten here.

And this is how, like, I see, I'm a marriage, I
live in Mexico, but I stillfollow a little bit about what's
going on politically in the US.
And I'm not on either side, soI'm not here to argue anything,
but I see so many people thatare just blindly following one
authority or the other.
I don't care what side you'reon, there's so much blind
following going on of whatevernarrative is being put in front

(27:08):
of them.
And and if you sat them downand you questioned how do you
actually feel about this part,they would they wouldn't know.
They would be like, Oh, do youI would be like, Do you agree
with this?
And they'd be like, Yeah, I'dbe like, why?
Well, because so and so said.
Yeah, not because it actuallymakes sense to you or feels
right to you, or like use yourown discernment and sense of
judgment.
Just because someone else isrunning into the ocean doesn't

(27:29):
mean it's safe.
You need to watch the waves,you need to look and see, and
you need to use your ownexperience and your senses and
your everything to make thatjudgment for yourself.
But we don't encourage childrento learn how to do that.
We don't allow them and wedon't need to teach them how to
do that.
We literally just need to allowthem to explore that for
themselves and remind them theyknow.

(27:50):
Ma, I remember moments in mychildhood where I would be like,
Mom, I don't know if I shouldgo.
And she'd be like, Well, nobodyknows, honey.
I don't know either what youshould do.
You're the only one that knowswhat you should do.
And she goes, one of the greatthings she used to ask me is if
you did know, what would be theanswer?

That's a good one.
I like that.

Remind me all the time.
She's like, You do know though.
You always do know.
We all do know, you know, whensomething feels right or not.
Yeah, it's just sometimes wedon't really want to know the
answer, or we're uncomfortablewith the answer, or you know, we
don't want to face it, or wetrust it, or we don't, you know,
there's a lot of differentreasons, but I'm really, really
we haven't or we haven't learnedto listen properly.

One of the things I'm on a path to explore right
now, and I might end up puttingit down in a book, is to relearn
the feedback system that are inour body and mind.
Uh how to live a happy life.
Because if you look at thehormone production and all the

(28:54):
things that are released of goodstuff in our brain, it's like
maybe there's a recipe for thegood life just in our bodies.
For example, singing together,cuddling, all of that releases
oxytocin, which is like ahappiness hormone.
And or when you run or exercisea certain period of time, you

(29:14):
get a little kind dopamine kick.
And it's like your body istrying to tell you, hey, this is
good, do that.

Yeah, and you see that you see that children, you
know, they sing before they cantalk, and they dance before they
can walk, and they all of thosethings, and we forget, we
forget the things that make usfeel whole and healthy, yeah.
Um, because we're told to focuson other things.
And it brings me to um what Ifeel like is literally like the
underlying basic the thing is umwhat you actually believe about

(29:48):
what you are as a human being.
And that's gonna dictate howyou treat children, how you view
children, and how you raisethem and how you educate them is
what you actually believe isgoing on there.
Because my mom she saw herbabies and she was like, Oh,
you're perfect.
You're perfect, whole, andcomplete.
You are already totallyequipped with all of the tools

(30:10):
and intelligence that you'regonna need to live the life that
you're meant for.
My only job is like, is here tojust hold you, support you,
love you, be there for you, holdyour hand, remind you that
you're amazing.
That's it.
She's like, that's my job.
Keep you safe, keep youhealthy, you know, help you stay
in your natural state ofbalance.
But my job is not to controlthe direction.

(30:33):
It was literally just to holdspace for us to find ourselves.
And and that's really, reallybeautiful.
But what I think most peoplethe fear is is like what what
you're talking about is um.
Well, if I do just follow myinstincts, follow my feelings,

(30:53):
listen to my you know,intuition, blah blah blah, I'll
never get anything done.
I'll just eat cake and watchmovies all day, or I'll just
whatever.

Like you're not even a fault cake, or you won't
have a house to sleep in.

You won't have a house, you'll end up homeless,
crazy lady on the street, you'lllike or I'll be in a
straitjacket in a mentalinstitution, or I'll end up in
prison, or I'll do whatever.
That's what you're afraid offor your children.
You are afraid that if youtrust who your child is as a
human being and what they'reequipped with, yeah, that that
somehow they're gonna end uphorrible losers and you'll have

(31:28):
failed as a parent by notforcing them to be good people.
So you actually think what youactually believe, if you admit
it to yourself, you actuallybelieve that there is something
inherently flawed with yourchildren and with yourself at
birth, that something is wrongwith you intrinsically, that you

(32:29):
cannot be trusted.
And you were taught that.
You were not born with thatbelief.
That's not a knowing, that is abelief.
You do not know that to betrue, you believe it to be true
because it was rammed into yourhead so forcefully and so
repetitively your wholechildhood, that you cannot be
trusted.
That left to your own devices,you will be a loser, you'll be

(32:52):
crazy, you're a you'll be araging monster, you'll be out of
control, or you'll just be lazyand weak and stupid, you'll
have no skills, you'll have noabilities, you'll have no
friends, you'll have no job.
Like we that's what peopleactually think.
That's what they think we are,and that's what they think we
are as humans.
But but someone crazy, lazylosers with no motivation, no

(33:15):
intelligence, no, like that'swhat you think.

Yeah.
But someone did just then end uphomeless and all these things.
Oh, you're an okay human being.

It depends on your standard, and that's the thing
is that people have differentstandards and they don't
recognize that they're imposingtheir standards on their
children.
It's like my friend out livingout in the jungle.
His parents probably thinkthey're whole that he's a
horrible loser, that theyfailed, and that he's lost.
But he's happy and he'scontent.
So what's your problem?

(33:45):
And he's not a burden tosociety.
He comes into town and hementors young kids and he and he
tutors like teenagers, and he'samazing.
He's a brilliant, beautifulhuman being.
He just prefers to live withoutmoney and live out in nature
and mind his own business.
And it's like, well, who are weto say that that's not a like a

(34:06):
valid way of living on thisplanet?

Yeah.

So I think it has to do with what's your
standards, what's your judgment.
According to my standards, Ithink I'm doing just fine.
I'm doing fine.
I live in Mexico.
I moved to Mexico.
I was, so I spent, I mean, Ithink I probably told you a
little bit of this before, butfor anybody who's listening, I
was a very successful glassblowing artist for many years
and I had my own business.
I started as a teenager andmaking glass on a torch.

(34:33):
And then I got into furnacework, large-scale fine art,
glass blowing in my 20s.
And then I pursued that careerfor many years and uh worked out
of a couple different hot shopson Maui, Hawaii, and um and
sold my work in fine artgalleries.
So I did pretty well for myselffor quite a while as a glass
blowing artist.
And then, like most people, um,I was deeply affected by all

(34:57):
the lockdowns through COVID, andit changed a lot of things for
me.
Or I should say it sped up alot of things for me.
And long, long story short, butmy mom and I ended up moving
down to Mexico, and I was stilldoing my jewelry business,
glassw, and I have my studiohere in my house, and I do still
do some of that, but through aseries of magical happenings

(35:21):
that I can't quite explain andwould take describing so much.
Um, my mom and I ended upopening our own cafe, and it's a
tea and chocolate cafe.
So it was actually a dream fromwhen I was about 14, and my mom
took me to, it was my 14thbirthday.
My mom took me to the Boulderde Shaugneby tea house with a
couple friends to have high teafor my birthday, and it was the

(35:44):
most magical experience.
And I just decided in thatmoment that I wanted to give
that experience to other people.
I wanted to share that withpeople because it was exquisite,
and I just felt that's how lifeought to be lived, is in that
kind of moment.
And I wanted to share that.
So I told my mom that I wantedto have a tea house and she was

(36:04):
totally on board.
She's like cooked everythingfrom scratch my whole life.
And so over the years, throughmy teen years and everything, we
actually almost did it a fewtimes.

Yeah.

Um, opened a bed and breakfast, or like we even
looked at places for rent, butit was Hawaii and the the prices
are, it was just totally insanein Hawaii, like to try to pull
something like that off and allthe rent tape and all the
everything was just soridiculous.
So it kind of became like ajust a some nice fantasy we had
at some point.
Occasionally we would take itout and dust it off and and and

(36:35):
you know, brainstorm again.
And I had a Pinterest page forit, but it was more like it was
so long now, you know, that itbecame this like dream I had
once upon a time.
And then living here in Mexico,everything just kind of
shifted.
And my mom wanted to start upher chocolate business here
because it turns out there's notreally any good chocolate in
this area.
There's a lot of Canadian andAmerican expats, and they want

(36:58):
their chocolate.
And um, so my mom was like, I'mgonna start making chocolate
again and just selling locallybecause she had a chocolate
business years ago.
And I also love makingchocolate, but I also love
baking sourdough bread and Ilove making different fermented
elixirs and drinks.
And so we stumbled upon thisplace one day, and it happened
to be for rent, and it was thespot that I said I had wanted if

(37:19):
I was ever gonna have a place,even though I knew I would never
have a place.
And then it turns out now it'smy place.
So it's really, really crazy, alot of coincidences, a lot of
magical things kind of comingtogether and happening.
But we're in the third yearnow.
Um, yeah, I've been flows forthe last couple of months
because it's slow in the summer.
I'm reopening on Sunday, andit's called Andanza, and it's a

(37:42):
tea and chocolate cafe in SanPancho, Mexico.
It's like a super magic littletown, beautiful community, very
creative, full of art, full ofeverything.
It's it's uh my mom came hereyears ago and she called me and
she said, I found your town.
And I was like, Yeah, whatever.
And then and then, of course,she was right.
Mom's always right.

Um, uh, but it leads me on to one of the things
that I, along the years, havecome to load or be more curious
about how we can change and whatwe can do to change it.
Is uh the way the nuclearfamily have been like the altar

(38:24):
of good a good life is you livein your own house with your own
kids and your family livessomewhere else.
And now you're starting amulti-generational uh business
with your mom.
Yeah, and for me that's it's anice dream.
Where for some other peoplethey would be like, oh, but your
parents should live somewhereelse, you should have outgrown

(38:45):
them or something.
And I think it's a loss forsociety, for culture that we
remove ourselves from ourfamilies in that sense.

Yeah, definitely, for sure, especially like coming
from American society.
If you just start looking intothe history and why some of
these things were implemented,and you'll see that it was very
carefully organized to destroythe family, to tear the family
apart, and so the state couldraise the children.
So it was industrial revolutionand this whole idea of a

(39:16):
nuclear family living in a houseto begin with, one family
living in one house, and then aman leaving the home to go make
money, yeah, while a womanstayed in the home, isolated,
without community, withoutsupport, without her husband,
without blah blah blah, right?
And then the kids, and then ofcourse, like through the

(39:36):
feminist movement, and don't getme wrong, I'm grateful for a
lot of what was going on there,but there was an agenda to
remove the mother from the homeas well, so that the kids could
go in school.
And the material that wasactually originally intended to
be taught in school was reallyonly like what, two, three hours
in it, or so it was like it wasmaybe two hours, I think,

(39:57):
something like that, and wouldhave taken a couple of years.
And they actually purposelysaid, how can we fill in more
hours?
How can we stretch this out sothat we can actually have more
time with the kids forbrainwashing, basically?
And I'm not making this stuffup.
Like you can look, you canfind, I'll send you links to the
history.
I've got the books, I've gotthe facts.
It's not hearsay, it's not atheory, it's actually legit

(40:20):
historical fact.
And John Taylor Gato, he's theone that you want to listen to
if you want to get into thenitty-gritty history of it all.
He talks about how the publicschool system was very
specifically designed to raisethe next generations of humans
and to have less influence fromthe family and more influence
from the state.
And it was all about creating acompliant workforce that

(40:41):
wouldn't ask too many questionsand would just go along, pay
their bills, pay their taxes,pay their medical, but then not
question, not look at labels,not read ingredients, not any of
that.
And that was the whole pointand the whole purpose.
And it's not even hidden, likeit's there.
You can look it up.
And the thing is, too, is nowyou have a lot of people who are
like, oh, you know, going backto tradition and the nuclear

(41:01):
family and the this going on.
That was not traditionaleither.
That was like a tiny blip inthe 50s where you had
stay-at-home housewives and menwho went away to make money.
Before that, throughout most ofhistory, all over the planet in
many, many cultures, familieslived in communities that were
basically larger families in atown, a village, or whatever.

(41:21):
And then you worked together.
You had family businesses.
It was like, oh, yeah, my dadis the butcher.
So you're raised in the butchershop, and the wife is usually
there and she's helping managethe business, or you have a farm
and the man is working on thefarm, and you're not so
separated from your spouse orfrom your children for so many
hours a day.
So you're actually able to havestronger relationships and

(41:43):
connections.
And it's so weird to me that weexpect a family to function or
get along when they barely spendany time together.
You're all off in differentworlds and different lives with
different people and differentinfluences and all of this.
And then you come home andparents are mad that their kids
are not adopting their values.
Well, dude, they're not evenlike being raised by you,
they're being raised bystrangers.

(42:05):
And then, of course, whywouldn't your kids want to get
out of your house as soon aspossible?
Oh, yes.
Oh, yes, at their own place,and then not want anything to do
with you, and then not, youknow, it's like, and I have my
own family has has we got prettyscattered, you know.
My mom and I are probably theclosest.
My older brothers, like I said,there were they had a bit of a

(42:25):
different life than I didbecause a little bit older, and
then so much influence from mydad, and spending so much more
time with my dad and being boys,which was a very big difference
in my family on my dad's side.
Um, and then my younger brotheris from my stepdad.
So that was a whole notherinfluence.
And so my family was prettythere was a lot of things going

(42:47):
on, a lot of different parts.
So my dad remarried and had mylittle sister who was raised
totally different than we wereby my stepmom.
And so there was a lot of thatgoing on.
So it's not a mystery to me whymy family is scattered.
Like we started out that way.
We were never really um thatfull-on nuclear family.
But my mom and I have havestuck together on and off over

(43:07):
the years.
We've even lived together onand off over the years, probably
more than we should have.
But part of that is because itwas kind of us against the world
in a way.
And um, and it could be, Ithink that there was a lot of
negative and positive aspects ofthat in a sense.
And we've worked through somuch, like as an adult, having

(43:31):
an adult relationship with mymother, like it's a whole
different world.
And we've worked through somuch of that, and we've both
evolved and transformed so muchthrough that.
And we know that we shouldn'tlive together in the same house,
but that's partially becausewe're both very strong women who
like things the way we likethings, and we want things the
way we want things, and we'reboth homemakers, and we're both

(43:52):
we want to be the woman of thehouse.

Yep.

My mom and I both are the woman of the house, and
so it doesn't work out so wellfor us living together, just the
two of us.
But we'd love to be neighborsand share resources.
Yeah, yeah.

But how are you handling the whole thing?
Am I productive enough?
Is it a question that comes toyour mind, or have you actually
just found a life where you'relike, I like doing this, this is
meaningful, and then the wholemoney thing, well, money, yeah,
we need money.

So it was still I've been through I've been
through a lot.
I've been through a lot overthe years with that question in
myself.
And this is where I think likepeople that fear got to me
myself as well, is like wantingto be part of the world, but
feeling like it's not made forme, in a sense.

(44:51):
So I think that that's whatpeople are trying to do
oftentimes is we're trying toraise children to fit into the
society as it is already, andthat's where we're making the
mistake.
And I recognize that in myselfwhere I'm still trying to fit
myself into this because I thinkthat's the only way that I can
have these things that I want.

Yeah.

And telling myself I have to do things the way
other people do things in orderto achieve a certain way.
And in in in some, so it's it'svery, very difficult, I would
say, with the way that modernsociety is set up, for me to
remain true to myself because Ithink so much of it is just
absolutely ridiculous.
Like, um, it's a little morefree in Mexico, which is why I'm

(45:32):
so much happier and morecomfortable here.
Because living in Hawaii, theAmerican government controls.
I mean, down to the part wherelike this beautiful little old
Hawaiian lady can't sell bananabread on the street anymore
because she needs to have acottage food license.
And so she has to go and applyat the county and fill out all
this stuff and do all thispaperwork and pay all these fees

(45:53):
and then be investigated andhave her kitchen checked and so
that she can sell banana breadon the street.
And so I don't want to play thegame.
And that's where it's difficultfor me, is because I don't, I
don't align with, I don't trustthe government.
I don't believe in a lot of, Idon't trust American society,
most modern society.

(46:14):
I don't like the way it's setup, I don't like the systems, I
don't like the things you haveto do to be part of the system.
And it's really hard to be partof it a little bit and live
outside of it a little bit, andit's a weird deal.
But I would rather go throughall the pain and struggle that I
go through than just give inbecause I think it's wrong.

(46:35):
Um, I think a lot of it is iswrong, and I refuse to
participate and play along andplay that game.
And so I left.
I live in Mexico where I canhave a cafe.
No one's breathing down my neckabout any of that.
The rules and regulations hereare so different.
And I felt like in the US theywere so ridiculous and pointless

(46:55):
and arbitrary, and you're notallowed to question them, and
they're unchangeable.
And if you want to do this, youhave to pay all these things
and you have to fit into thisbox and you have to go through
all these hoops and all thisstuff for like for what to be
myself, to bake bread?
Like, I can't just bake breadat my house and sell it to my
neighbor.
It's illegal.
Yeah, I'm sorry.

(47:16):
No, that's bullshit.
I don't want to be part of thissystem.
So I and I don't want to raisekids to fit into that either.
I don't want to raise childrenand teach them that you need
permission to go to the bathroombecause that's setting them up
to need permission to give theirneighbor a loaf of bread or to
grow tomatoes in your yard or tocatch your own rain in the

(47:39):
backyard.

Yeah.

I'm sorry, no, that's wrong.
You don't get to tell me if Ican drink the rain coming out of
the sky, okay?
Like, I'm not gonna play thisgame.
So when you ask this kind ofquestion, that's where I go with
it.
I'm just like, no, I live inand out of this world.
Like, I have to play parts ofthe game in order to participate

(48:03):
to some extent, but I'm thisclose to joining my friend in
that tree in the jungle becausethis is getting ridiculous.
I'm this close.
Because no, I don't want toaccept credit cards at my cafe.
I want to be cash only.
I want to be a cash-basedbusiness because that's like
between you and me.
You want to pay for somethingand I want to sell it to you,

(48:23):
and that's between us.
I don't think a bank should bemaking any money off of that.
So, can you just live accordingto your sense of rightness in
this society?
You might have to leave.
You might have to leave.
I don't know.
And maybe that's what peopleare really afraid of, and that's
why we keep controllingourselves and controlling our
children because we're tooscared.
We're too scared to stand upand say no and do our own thing

(48:47):
because we're gonna lose a lot.
There's a lot to be lost, and Iget that, and it's scary.
But we all have our threshold,right?

(49:29):
We all have our threshold islike how far will you go before
you're you can't do it anymore?
How far, how much will youparticipate in this?
What I think is just wrongness,um, as far as people
controlling other people and allof this.
Because to me, it's the same.
Public school is just amicrocosm of the greater
authority dictating.

(49:49):
But some and I don't it doesn'teven matter like what how you
want to live.
I'm not even you want to livehowever you want to live, just
leave me alone.
Yeah, and that's some reasonit's difficult for me to live
according to that sense ofrightness, and I have to every
day, it's a struggle because Ihave to check myself.
Am I compromising too much inwhat feels safe and right for

(50:12):
me?
And being productive, I amnaturally a very productive
person.
Do I make a lot of money?
No, I was when I was blowingfine art glass, but now I'm
working probably harder than Iever have, and I'm hardly making
any money.
But I have these interactionswith humans that I see the look

(50:34):
on their face, or I have, and itmakes everything worth it.
It's like I have a differentcalling and purpose that I'm
fulfilling here now, and I'm notmaking a lot of money, but I am
I'm deeply fulfilled in whatI'm doing here.
And I am teaching dance and Iam still doing my some of my
glassware, and I'm just one ofthose people that has like a

(50:56):
million passions and projectsgoing on at any moment.

So do you think that it came from being not
controlled that you have thisperspective of seeing where
other people might been to therules or are not free?
Um it's the real built in.

Yeah, I think partially, partially.
I think that it's it's it'simpossible to know for certain,
right, how much comes from what.
But I would say, from what Ican tell in myself, in my own
personal investigations intothat, because I got super
curious pretty young, why am Idifferent?
For one thing, I think that mymom is an extremely unique

(51:42):
person.
And she did go to public schooland she had a very normal kind
of life, a very normalupbreaking, pretty darn normal
in in most ways.
But both of her parentspossess, I would consider a high
level of intelligence andempathy as well.
And and so my mom was veryunusual from a child, you know,

(52:03):
she made very strong decisionsfor herself as a child and like
became vegetarian at 13 all byherself, not because anyone, no
friends, no family, because shesaw something on TV about
factory farming and the animalswere suffering, and that was it.
She had that kind of that kindof personal conviction, yeah,

(52:25):
unshakeable by others.
And I don't know where thatcomes from.
My grandfather, very similarthough.
So I don't know if there's ahereditary thing going on, but
she had this very strong senseof personal conviction and very
strong sense of her own sense,like of of what I call sense of
rightness, and and was unable.
She says, she's she's like, I'mnot special, I'm not people

(52:47):
would call her, oh, you're socourageous, you're so brave, you
know, for doing thingsdifferent.
And she's like, I don't feellike I am, I'm terrified.
She's like, I don't do itbecause I'm brave.
She's like, I do it because Ifeel like I don't have a choice.
I can't not do what I feel isright.
She's like, I can't know, Ican't unknow what I know, and I
can't not do what I feel isright.
And so I feel similarly.

(53:09):
And I don't know what that isor where that comes from.
And I think that part of it wasfostered in the way that my mom
raised me, yes, but I thinkthat there has to be a maybe a
little bit of it inherently, andI think every human being has a
little bit of it inherently,and then it can kind of go one
way or the other.

Then we compare that lying towards ourselves.
I I remember when I re-foundbeing a vegetarian, yeah, I
stopped lying towards myself onmore on different many more
different levels.
It was as I couldn't accept thedishonesty I had taken.

(53:49):
And people can eat meat and dowhatever they want following
their convictions, but mine wasthat I don't like the kill of
the animal, um, and thenclaiming oh, it's okay, they're
bread to it, or whatever excusesI made for myself when I ate
meat.
Where does that moral-breakingthing go in your life if you

(54:14):
start in one way and accept thatyou don't follow your
convictions?
I'm not talking about eatingmeat or not eating meat.
I'm talking about you have aconviction, you have something
you feel deeply, but youcompromise it for some reason.
Maybe it's to fit in amongpeople, maybe it's to not be the
weirdo when you go to work,whatever it is.

(54:35):
I just felt when I took thatstep and kind of came more in
sync with my convictions on thisarea, I could see how I cleaned
up in many other ways.
And it's consistent.

Yeah, it was kind of like you admitted something
to yourself.
It was always true, but youfinally came to terms with it,
admitted it, and accepted itabout yourself.
The only thing here is I can Ican I'm hearing other people's
voices, like what people mightsay about this conversation.
And I'm I'm recognizing thatit's important to make a
distinction between just likewhat's a true sense of rightness

(55:08):
and like what I just feel likeright now.
Like it's not that's not it'snot the same thing.
And also, it's not about abelief either, because I I very
strongly I love the quote.
It says, never form attachmentsto beliefs that are
unchangeable in the face of ahigher, more sensible truth.
So I find for myself that it'salso very important to be open

(55:29):
to new information changing thatconviction.
So you might have a consciousconviction of, you know, what
that vegetarianism feels rightfor you, but be open to that
changing at some point.
To not like, to not like betyour life on I'll be a
vegetarian forever kind ofthing.
You're just saying that this iswhat feels right for me right
now, and I need to be inalignment with what feels right

(55:51):
for me now.
And that's beautiful.
But and but allowing space fortransformation always.
So when I, and I'm just sayingthat because when I talk about
this, like doing what feelsright for you aside from
whatever da-da-da, I think somepeople are gonna take that to be
like, oh, so you're just gonnado what you think, even when
there's evidence to suggest thatyou're wrong, or that's gonna

(56:12):
be this or whatever.
And I'm that's not what I'msaying.
I'm saying that, like whensomeone says, you know, uh no,
you how do I say this?
It's like when someone givesyou rules and a structure and
they tell you you have to followthis whole structure or you're
gonna be a loser.
All I'm saying is check that.
Check that against what does itdoesn't something just feel a

(56:36):
little funny about that for you?
And then maybe that is whatinvestigate.
That's what I'm saying.
I'm not saying you should juststick to like, oh no, that's all
wrong because it doesn't feelright for me in this moment.
I'm saying like listen andfollow that, and then you can
use your mind still, use yourlogical mind, but when that
little funny feeling comes up,it's just telling you where to

(56:59):
look.
So, like, check it out, do someresearch, which is how I got
into finding out about thehistory of the public education
system, and it's just how I wentall down all of these rabbit
holes.
I'm I'm not really great attalking about certain topics.
Like I'm a lot like my mom.
I'm a deeply feeling person,and I I much more prefer the

(57:21):
emotional and psychologicalaspects of things.
I don't retain facts and dataand and dates and things like
that very well enough to like goand argue about the efficacy of
this or or whatever when itcomes to like politics and
medical stuff and whatever.
Like, I don't get into thosearguments because to me, that's
all on top of something else.
It's all on top of somethingelse.

(57:41):
But I just wanted to say thatthere's a difference between
like what you're saying is likesomething didn't feel right for
you, and then you were willingto look at that and make a
choice and realize this doesn'tfeel right for you.
And it's not about like you'renot denying anyone else's
experience, you're not sayingthis is right for wrong for

(58:03):
everybody else, and you're alsoum not just denying probably
whatever evidence comes up thatmight say, eh, maybe you should
rethink that one way or theother.

But the interesting part was when I
stopped compromising my moralmorality, um, or my feelings of
my sense of this is right andthis is wrong.
Yeah, when I stop compromisingthat, I think a lot of people
have gotten used to compromisingtheir inner beliefs of of uh

(58:38):
what is good and what is right.
In small labels, yeah, youbeats.
Yeah, one one of my big thingsis I'm sitting here with my
iPhone, something big, and myMacBook Pro, and I know how
they're produced, and I'm I'mhappy still to compromise that
because I love the computer, andat the same time, I'm like, oh

(59:01):
my god, I wish I had a strongerconviction on this and wanted
fair trade inside the wholecomputer world, but I'm not
yeah, yeah.

Like I said, I'm aware that at some point I might
get to I might get to where Ican't do this anymore and I'm
gonna end up in a tree in ajungle.
I don't know.

No, no, no.

I I don't know.
I don't, I don't know.
But before that, Somerji, thenfrom the time that we're tiny,
you know, you you you do, youhave to ignore those things
because it's like, no, you youdon't get to follow that urge to
go be barefoot in the sunshine,even though that's what your
body's craving, that's what yourmind is craving, it's probably
exactly what you need right nowfor your natural development.

(59:40):
You actually have to sit hereand do this math problem.
So we're constantly beingtaught to deny those that those
impulses and those urges andthose what feels right for us
and what our body needs, whatour mind needs, what our
emotional body needs, all ofthat.
Because we think that if weallow our children to just run
out in the sun and play all day,that they'll never be become
anything, they'll never achieveanything and they'll never

(01:00:03):
succeed at anything.
But if you look at, if you justeven just take a two-year-old
or a three-year-old, like theywill display everything you need
to have faith in the humanspirit.
Because I have baby, I've spentso many years in childcare, and
I don't understand how anyonecan think that someone would

(01:00:24):
just grow up to be lazy and donothing if you if you allow
freedom and you focus onemotional well-being and
connection.
Because I mean, kids willliterally push your hand away so
they can climb up the stairsthemselves.
They will push your hand awayso they can feed themselves.
They want to walk on their own,they want to run on their own,
they want to do it themselves.

(01:00:44):
And then they're incrediblythrilled when they gain a new
skill and they become morecapable.
And if we just stop controllingthat process, it'll continue.
I don't know why we think thatat a certain age we have to come
in and derail that process.
It's already happening.
They learned how to walk andhow to talk, and they would do
that even if you tried to stopthem, they would do that.

(01:01:06):
They would do that and theywill learn how to read.
I did because I wantedsomething for myself that had
nothing to do with anybody elseor what anyone thought of me or
what they thought I should bedoing or achieving some success
someday.
It was literally because rightnow, I have a strong enough
desire to find out what happensnext in Harry Potter to overcome
the discomfort of learning howto read.

(01:01:27):
That was it for me now.
That's it.
You know, and guaranteed you'renot going to have a 16-year-old
who's like, no, I'm not gonnaget my driver's license because
I don't know how to read.
They will literally go andteach themselves if they have
to.
You cannot stop the human,human nature and a human desire
for independence andachievement.
We all want to achieve, we wantto build, we want to create.

(01:01:49):
We are natural born creators.
Now we've created theseridiculous systems to try to
monetize those creations intosomething we call money that
then we can tax and we can doall of this stuff.
But but we're natural borncreators.
And yeah, maybe you won't havemoney making wooden spoons, but
I'm super happy for you that youfound your a creative outlet

(01:02:11):
for yourself because it'simportant for your health and
well-being.

Jesper Conrad (01:02:15):
It is.
It is.

Summer Jean (01:02:16):
I don't know what I would be.
I am, that's what I do.
I make things ever since I wastiny.
That's all I do is craft andmake and build and play with
fire.
I was pyro obsessed, and I'm sograteful that I had a mom that
trusted in my innate nature andmy abilities enough to allow me
to explore that at a young age.
She bought me matches and madesure I was safe.

(01:02:36):
You can play with fire, butlet's do it right here in the
fireplace while I'm in the room.
And then as I got older and Igot more safe and more
comfortable with it, I wasallowed to have fires in the
yard.
I got to build little fires inthe yard and cook on them and do
my own thing.
And I was a total pyro.
So was my older brother.
And then I became a glassblowing artist, melting things
in fire.

(01:02:56):
Like there's a reason.
And if I hadn't been allowed toexplore that from a young age,
I wouldn't have developed theunderstanding of that element
and that material and thatsubstance.
Like I knew fire so well by thetime I got into glass blowing
that I got to just skip thefirst year of learning, you
know, because I already hadthis.

(01:03:17):
And people would tell me thatthe first glass blower that I
worked under, oh, I'd alreadybeen working on a torch for a
while.
And I caught onto that reallyquick at 14.
And I'm self-taught bead maker.
And um, and then when I wasabout 20 and I got into a hot
shop and I was working for thisartist as an assistant, I just
was literally like standingthere opening and closing doors,
and then I got into doing alittle bit of myself, and he was

(01:03:39):
shocked.
And he was shocked.
He was just like, I've neverseen one pick seen anyone pick
this up so easily.
Like you're so comfortable inhere.
And I was like, fire doesn'tscare me.
Like I am so comfortable withfire.
I have this relationship withfire.
I know all about how itbehaves, what makes it grow,
what makes it small, what makesit like I already knew all of
that from my own relationshipwith it, my own experimentation

(01:04:01):
through my childhood.
So I'm a safer, I was a saferglassblower right off the bat.
And I was much better at it,like from the beginning than
most people, because I wasallowed that exploration of
something that interested mewhen I was young.
I wasn't told to take that timeand that energy and attention
and focus it on something Ididn't care about.
I was allowed to spend hoursplaying with fire in my front

(01:04:24):
yard.
And I was allowed to spend asmany hours as I wanted doing
little crafting projects.
And then I brought those twothings together.
I brought my love of likefantasy art and crafts and my
love of fire, and I put themtogether.

It's wonderful.

And I couldn't have done that, you know.
I don't know if I'd ever foundthat if I hadn't been, I
everyone else was in highschool.
I remember 14, 15, 16 yearsold, those years.
15 and 16, the same thing.

And you were just burning shit up.

I got well, my mom actually bought me a torch.
I I fell in love with glassbead making, and my mom could
see that this was like not justa passing fancy, but like a
legitimate passion because I wasobsessed.
It's all I could talk about.
Everyone wanted me to shut up.
And so she actually bought meinvested what little like we
were not wealthy, so it was abig deal, and bought me my own

(01:05:14):
equipment and set up a littlestudio.
And I spent, I mean, I was itwas ridiculous, hours and hours
like this, and I self-taught.
Everyone else was in highschool while I was doing this,
learning my craft.
And so then by the time I wasum 16, I started selling my work
to local like gift shops andgalleries, farmers markets,

(01:05:38):
craft fairs, all that kind ofstuff.
And then in my 20s, I had Ididn't know I was good.
I didn't know there wasn't alot of glass makers around, I
wasn't in the community, Ididn't know.
When I got into my 20s and andpeople started taking notice,
um, like posting photos onlineor whatever, and other bead
makers were like, Who are you?

(01:05:59):
And then they'd be like, Ihaven't seen anyone, you know,
like how long have you beendoing this?
And at that point, I'm like 24.
So I'm like, oh, like 10 yearsor something.
And they're like, in your 24.
Like, most people don't getinto bead making until they're
it's usually it's more likewomen over 40.
Yes, is a beading thing.
So then I was getting asked todo tutorials in in bead making

(01:06:20):
magazines and uh and peopletelling me I should enter my
work to win awards and all thisstuff, and and that's all
because I was allowed to obsessand direct all my energy and
attention to perfecting a craftat a very young age instead of
learning lots of random shitthat had nothing to do with the
life I was going to be living.
So I got to focus it all andbecome a master at something

(01:06:42):
really young.
And I'm super grateful forthat.
And I did turn it into abusiness and I did pretty well
with that for a long time.
And it's a business that'sstill going.
Like I still make all thisstuff to send back to the
States.
I still sell to some of thoseglassblowing studios I used to
work at.
And so it's like uh a skill Ihave for life.
And and it's not, and whenyou're young, when you're young

(01:07:05):
and you you don't have to make aliving and you're a teenager,
that's the time you should beobsessing and working on these
bizarre interests of yours, likeinstead of being in school.
Like work on the bizarreinterests, master a weird thing.
Do it when you're young,because then you have that skill
for life, and then you're not40 and wondering what you've

(01:07:25):
done with yourself, and youknow, realizing you had a career
that you hated, and then notknowing what your passion is and
not having any curiosity orenjoyment of anything.
Do I like painting?
I don't even know.
Do I like, you know, like youdon't even know what kind of
interests or skills you havebecause you've just had to been
making money this whole time ata job you don't like.
So yeah, I had to make moneythe whole time, but by the time

(01:07:48):
I had to make money, I alreadyhad a skill set of things I
enjoyed doing.

Yeah.

Things I knew about, things I knew at a level
higher than people older thanme.
I was already an expert incertain things.
And then I'm as I got older andolder, and I got into the hot
glass studio and working withpeople who'd actually gone to
school, like art school, peoplewho'd gone to glass blowing
school, and they're walking upto me and being like, I've never

(01:08:16):
seen anyone use a tool likethat.
Why did you do that?
I'm like, I don't know.
I had a need, the tool wasthere, I figured it out because
no one taught me how to use thattool proper properly.

I love it.
Yeah, so summer, it is time forus to round up.
I really have enjoyed our talk,and I look forward to when we
find time together the nexttime.
For people traveling to Mexicowho wants a good tea and
chocolate experience.
Can you please plug what is thename of the city and again the

(01:08:52):
name of your cafe?
And also if they want to findyour uh glass online, please
share so people can find.

Yeah, so my cafe is in San Pancho, Nayarit, Mexico.
It's about an hour north ofPuerto Vallarta.
So if you're coming to thePuerto Vallarta side, it's not
too hard to get to.
And it's a beautiful, magical,magical little town.
And my shop is called Andanza,and it's right near the beach on
the corner of Plaza del Sol,next to a little wine shop and a
little health food store, andand uh the plaza where all the

(01:09:22):
kids, there's a lot of reallycool homeschool families around
here, too, and very cool likealternative schooling going on
and a lot of really amazing,very family-oriented town,
gorgeous community center withkids all the time hanging out.
It's amazing.
So, yeah, come to Mexico, comecheck it out.
It's beautiful.
And then if you want to checkout my glasswork, I'm mermaid

(01:09:43):
art glass on Instagram and allthose places.
There's not much new going onthere, but you can go and check
out all my my blown glass workand and uh see the studios I've
worked in and and all that kindof stuff.
And I'm hoping to, I wouldreally love to do it someday.
Open my own little hot shophere doing only recycled
material.
And I'd like to teach, I'd liketo share the skill with other

(01:10:06):
young people and just there'snot really a lot of that in
Mexico.
There's not a lot of glass artin Mexico.
There's really only a fewhotshops scattered throughout
the country, and they're mostlyfocused on production glassware.
And I would love to have alittle like art studio where I
could introduce and teach andhave it be from recycled glass
because the material's here,it's free, it's easy.

(01:10:28):
All we need now is some propaneto melt it and a few tools.
And so that's my next projectafter this cafe situation.

It's under control.

Um, Pacho and blow glass with me, which would be
what I would really love.

And we're here in Tarragona, Spain, uh, now a
world school village with the 40families.
And we have actually beendreaming about should we we were
in Mexico in 24, the winter 24.
And I've been consideringshould we go over there again,
spend some months.
Uh I miss the food, I miss thevibe.

(01:11:04):
Yeah.
And why not have a village inyour village?
That could be fun.
It could.
But thanks a lot for your time.
It was a big pleasure.

Thanks, Jasper.

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Summer Jean | Unschooling - Living Without the Need to Prove Yourself

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