August 24, 2021 • 56 mins
If you haven’t listen to The Leo Yockey Show yet, this episode is the perfect place to start! Either way, this is a great peak into Leo’s favorite conversations and to look back on some of the greatest moments of the 1st season thus far. Leo also opens up about his true motivation in starting the podcast. Clips include the dark and light side of personality traits, utilizing privilege for good, inserting joy into day-to-day life, staying true to yourself despite society’s expectations, and more!
Note: Season 1 finale will be released next week.
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Featured Guests:
Braxton Fleming; Meghan Q. Barrett; Addie Woolridge; Mwamba Nyanda; Shannon Hay; Lucas Casarez; Valerie Phoenix; Emily Sedgwick
By: Leo Yockey
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:14):
Hello, and welcome to anotherepisode of the Leo Yockey show,
the show where I Leo Yockeyinterview guests about how their
unique life path led them todefine success and fulfillment,
we still have one more episodeto go and season one, I'm
really, really, really excitedfor the season finale. But for
(00:34):
now, we're going to be taking alook back. And some of my
favorite conversations from thisseason. So far, the thing about
these conversations and theseinterviews that I have on the
show is that they're, they'reconversations that I have in
real life all the time. Youknow, so if you're, if you're
(00:55):
brand new, if you haven'tlistened to an episode before,
welcome, this is a great placeto just kind of get caught up
and you can kind of just listenfrom here onward. If you have
been around welcome back. Thankyou for listening. And I think
you'll enjoy this look back andagain to see like, what are the
conversations that I've gotten alot out of, because I bring them
(01:17):
up all the time, you know, Idon't know if I've ever really
talked about like, why I startedthis podcast have i, this week,
I actually hit the six monthmark of when I quit, you know,
my six figure job in tech andbasically said, I'm, I'm not
coming back. And you know, Ididn't know where my life was
(01:37):
going at all. Really. I mean, Ihad ideas for online businesses,
for writing a novel becoming astand up comedian, maybe even
getting into social services.
And I was spinning in all thesedifferent directions. And on top
of all that I was smoking weedway too much every single day.
The times that I would drink,the amount that I would consume
(01:59):
was starting to scare me. And Ididn't really know what I was
going to do. And I was like,man, I have a year until I turn
30. I'm in my last year, my 20sI gotta figure something out,
right? So I started havingconversations with people,
people that in my opinion,actually did have their life
together. And I was like, hey,person that has your life
(02:20):
together? How would you do it?
Why are you doing what you'redoing? What caused you to go
down this path? What makes youcertain that you're on the right
path? I got to figure this outfor myself. And the reality is
that no one really knows, youknow, and I found that
(02:41):
reassuring. But also, I realizedthat I had to do something
right. And so being able to putthese conversations on record
really gave me an anchor. And itforced me to have these
conversations. I couldn't justwander off and and ignore the
fact that I didn't know what Iwanted to do with my life. I had
(03:02):
to really face that every singleweek with every single
conversation with every singleepisode that came out. At this
point, I have a much better viewof where my life is going. You
know, I'll get more into it inseason two. But, you know, I
went from like really having noidea what I'm going to do. By
(03:24):
the time I'm 30 next year to Ithink I have like a decent five
year plan or the beginnings ofit. I'm actually going to sit
down and write all that outtomorrow. And there's so many
lessons that I'm applying fromthis from this podcast. You
know, I've spent a lot of mylife really feeling like I was
(03:46):
always an outsider. And wetalked about that a little bit
in last week's episode withParris Athena, check that out if
you want to she's not going tobe one of the clips in today's
episode is still a greatconversation. I loved every
single episode, regardless ofwhether or not there's a clip in
this episode today. You know,one of the benefits to
constantly feeling like I was anoutsider is that in order to
(04:09):
really connect with people, Ihad to look past those
superficial differences. And Iloved for example, my
conversation with Megan Barrett,who is going to be in this
episode, but not this clip. Andwe were talking about, you know,
how we have similar experiencesof having similar feelings, even
though the circumstances thatgoddess There are so different,
(04:31):
you know, for her it wasbecoming a mother for me it was
transitioning and coming out astransgender and learning to live
life socially accepted as a man,you know, and some of the stuff
that she shared her story reallyhelps me. And I think that
that's really cool. And I love Ilove being able to share this
with the world and I'm about tobe able to set up some stuffs so
(04:55):
that I can share this with withmore people. I keep saying it's
gonna be tough. For the podcastto grow, it's it's seriously
time for the podcast to grownow. And I'm I'm so excited, I
have a source of funding comingin soon that I'm really excited
about feel really good about. Ijust, I cannot say it enough,
(05:15):
thank you for being on thisjourney with me. And just
proving to me, what I alwaysknew is that when people sit
down and share their stories,it's interesting. And there's
always something that we canlearn from it. You know, at the
end of the day, like I've hadpeople who are artists who are
entrepreneurs who are corporateemployees, people from different
(05:35):
gender and racial backgrounds,all of them have had something
universal to say. And I thinkthat that's really powerful. So
anyway, as we gear up and getready for the season finale next
week, I'm really excited toshare with you some of my
favorite clips, some of myfavorite conversations from this
(05:56):
first season. And this podcasthas been such an anchor for me.
And anchors are exactly what wetalked about in this clip with
Braxton. Braxton Fleming. He's ablack trans man that I've been
following for years now. Youknow, his journey, and his
willingness to share so openlyhas been a huge inspiration for
(06:18):
me, both back then. And thenespecially now, I really admire
his commitment to his mission.
And the fact that he even hasone and again, that there's so
many aspects of thatconversation that really helped
me figure out where I'm goingnext. And, you know, this is
this was actually just a little,you know, I asked, I started
asking my guests, if there'sanything else that they want to
(06:40):
add, just in case, there'ssomething that I didn't ask them
that they wanted to talk about.
And this ended up being what hetalked about. So I'm really I'm
really glad that he brought itup. And, yeah, let's get going
with these clips. I hope youlike,
Let's go, you know, fitness ismy stabilizer. I would like to
(07:02):
say it's my meditation time.
It's your anchor. It's myanchor, it's my anchor. Amen to
that. Yes, for sure. If I didnot have the gym, I would be
wild as hell. That's just to behonest with you. Because I
would, I would be way toooverwhelmed. I would be just all
over the place with everything.
(07:22):
It really builds my confidenceto like, you know, I always tell
everybody, you got to stopcaring what people think about
you, you got to just let thatgo. And when I entered that, I
let it all go. And then when Icome out of there, I'm like,
like right now I'm stillsweating from the gym, sweating
talking to you, because I'm sopumped. Like, I'm just so
(07:43):
pumped, I had it, I had a greatstart to my day I went to the
gym, I did what I had to do, youknow, I've been hitting all my
meetings, we're on time foreverything. I got another
meeting at two o'clock,everything is aligned everything
just boom, boom, boom, boom,boom. And when I have that gym
in the morning, I'm ready. I cango all day all night, it doesn't
matter. But without that gym,I'm just not the same. I'm just
(08:05):
not the same person. I just, I'mmore angry, I'm more irritable.
You know, I'm not giving thelove to my family like I should.
I'm more focused on making moneyand doing stupid shit. You know
what I mean? And I anchor downinto the gym, it brings me to a
place where I can connect withGod, I can connect with my body,
in my mind, and once I'm able todo all of that for myself first.
(08:29):
That's why I like to go out at5am because I like to start my
day for me and God. And thenonce I get that out the way that
I can handle everybody else'sproblems, because I handle
everybody else's problems allday long. Yeah. And that's a
lot. So is long as I take mytime for me first before the
kids before my wife beforeanybody, it's just me and God. I
(08:52):
think I can kill it. But if Idon't get that time, I might
kill you. Just kidding.
No, I mean, I think I thinkthat's real. Thank you for
sharing that. Thank you foradding that. Yeah, I mean,
that's a big common theme is theimportance of starting your day
just for you huge common themethat's come up on this show. So
I'm glad to hear that that'spart of your thing as well. All
(09:16):
right, next step, we have MeganBarrett, which I already talked
about her a little bit in theintro, but what I think gets cut
out of the clip because therewasn't enough time is you know,
she was talking about her postpostpartum anxiety which I had
never heard of, I'd only heardof postpartum depression. And so
(09:37):
I asked her kind of what thedifference was and she was
talking about the anxiety thatshe had. Once she became a
mother and especially after shehad her second child, and she's
over here like damn if there's afire in the house like which kid
do I save first and things likethat. Or if her husband's 10
minutes late home from work, youknow, her mind spirals into He
(09:58):
must be in a car. crashing inthe hospital? And what do I do
about bringing my kids to ahospital when there's COVID, and
on and on and on and on thespiral continues if you've had
anxiety, you know what I'mtalking about. And I just
thought that that was sointeresting. And I really, I
really appreciate what she hadto say about what do you do with
(10:19):
her anxiety afterward. And, youknow, the conversation that
ensued is a conversation that Italked about a lot all the time.
Now, here's Megan,I didn't want to go on
medication, and I wanted to dotalk therapy. So I went about
two times before the world shutdown. And then that didn't
happen. And I was home with mykids and trying to find a time
(10:44):
to like dedicate an hour totherapy was giving me more
anxiety than not, and so, um,around June, so maybe like four
months or so after I wasdiagnosed, I decided to go on
medication. And it definitelyhelped me and I think it was the
(11:07):
best choice for me at the time.
But then, I kind of gotten thisit, I would take it at night, it
would make me really drowsy, Ibasically pass out and then wake
up when my son came in at seveno'clock in the morning,
complaining that he wanted milkand to watch Peppa Pig. So then
(11:27):
I basically just kind of it wasgreat because I was able to
sleep which I needed sleep, butI was just kind of using it to
Okay, Now's my time to likecheck out of the world. And
yeah, go to sleep, and then doit all over again tomorrow. And
I started drinking more two,which is not the best with that
medication. And I just I reallygot to this place where I didn't
(11:53):
like myself, as a wife, as amother as a person. You know, I
was just stuck at home with twosmall children that aren't great
conversationalists. And I justfelt really alone and really
isolated. And that was my way ofescaping with, you know, social
media drinking, and themedication. So, while it did
(12:18):
help me, there were other partsthat I contributed to, I have to
take that responsibility thatreally didn't help with the
medication. So towards the endof 2020, when my son turned just
just a little over one, which Ihave to say, as a mother, when
your kids turn one, you kind ofstart feeling like a real human
(12:40):
again, too. And I was just like,you know, it was like I woke up,
I can't even say exactly what itwas, it was just like, I woke up
one day, and I was like, This isit, like, I can't do this, like
my kids deserve much better thanthis. I deserve much better. My
husband does, like I can't bedoing this shit. So that's when
I started waking up early. And Idecided to wean off my
(13:03):
medication as well. And I'm nowback in therapy, which is
amazing, which I highly suggestfor anybody, whether you have
postpartum anxiety, depression,postpartum, whatever, whoever
you are, has been a big light inmy life and making that time for
(13:24):
myself for that, too, and justhaving someone to talk to about
those things. But yeah, I mean,it was definitely one of the
darkest times in my life,there's like a lot of things
that I look back on. I don'tknow if I'd say I regret them.
Because, you know, it brought meto where I am now. But it's,
it's a lot of things that Iwasn't happy about. And I'm not
(13:46):
proud of. I wouldn't change it.
Right, because they all bring ushere. And now. I'm feeling much
better, and I'm able to help alot of people. But you know, at
the time, I definitely think allthe people in my life deserve a
lot better from me.
Yeah, yeah. Well, thank you,thank you for for sharing that
(14:07):
in in such detail. I thinkyou've touched on a lot of
really, really interestingthings. I'm going to bring it
back to you know, when you werefirst kind of going through that
spiral when your husband waslate from work, and now you're
like worried that your child isgoing to have COVID because you
will have to go to the hospital.
You said something that I thinkwas was so key said you felt
like you were kind of goingthrough the step by step like
(14:31):
okay, well, I'm gonna have to dothis, which will cause that and
then this, and you said, Youfelt totally logical, and
totally crazy. And I think youyou touched on something really
important, which is that, youknow, every trait that we have,
as people has kind of like agood and a bad side or a dark
and a light side, you know, likeyou're you're kicking into that
(14:52):
high gear of like, Well whatabout this and then that, and
then what if this happens andwhich kid do I bring and And
what about COVID exposure andhow am I going to handle that?
You know, this is kind of likebeing able to set goals turned
into a monster. Right? Yeah,very
goal oriented person. I do thatall the time.
Yeah, absolutely. And so andkind of the same thing with the,
(15:16):
with, you know, your decision totake medication because you said
something that I think is truefor a lot of people, which is
that finding the time to toactually go and be able to see
that therapist sometimes createsmore anxiety than you had
before. And, you know, so atthat time, that medication
served a very important purposefor you. Because if you couldn't
(15:38):
do therapy or medication, wherewould you be? And of course, the
downside was that it made it alittle bit easier to slip into
more unhealthy habits, likedrinking and being on social
media too much, you know, but itdefinitely served its purpose at
one point, you know, and so itreally kind of speaks to the
complexity of a lot of thesethings. Like it's not just black
(16:00):
and white all the time. You knowwhat I mean? I will never forget
the interview that I had withauthor Addy woolridge. Because
anybody who knows me knows thatI love reading, I think at this
point, I've read something like44 books in 2021, I don't know,
it's, it gets out of control. Soit was really cool for me to be
(16:24):
able to read her new book, hernovel, the checklist, and then
immediately interview her aboutit just a week or two after it
came out. It was such a funexperience. And now I see it is
like almost like a big sisterfigure in my life, whether
whether she wants me or not, shehas me now as a little brother.
And, you know, I just I love Ilove her outlook on work and
(16:49):
goals, and really figuring outexactly what you want to do with
your life. Because I feel likewe have so few images when it
comes to success when it comesto fulfillment. And the reality
is that there's no rules here,we can literally do whatever we
want. So I really appreciateeverything that Addy has shared
(17:12):
with me about joy. And as far asI know, she's the only person
that I have planned to be areturning guest. She will she
will be coming back when shewrites her second book. And if
you're listening to this, nowyou have no choice. You have to
come back when that second bookcomes out.
I've made a podcast official.
But anyway, here's Addy. One ofthe things if anybody's thinking
about making the jump to fulltime creative is that I took a
(17:34):
couple weeks off a few yearsago, and I just decided to live
like I was a writer like allday, right? Which live your life
as if you were a full timewriter, what would your day look
like? And after doing that fortwo weeks, I was like, have I
been wearing the same thing forfour days? Who have I seen
anybody? What like, what did Ido and I realized that like,
(17:57):
that lifestyle wasn't actuallythe lifestyle that I wanted, I
like the structure of having toget up and go somewhere. I love
that sort of structure. And Ijust wasn't as creative in some
ways because I had all day to domy creative work as opposed to a
set time in the morning andsunset time in the afternoon
that I have to sit down andfocus when I had all day I just
kind of didn't do anything, justfor like goofing off.
(18:24):
Yeah, that's totally makessense. And what's so interesting
to me is I feel like so manypeople because I think it's just
human nature we were so hard onourselves all the time. I think
so many people if they were todo the you know, live live as if
for a little bit as like a demowhich by the way, I love that I
love the idea of giving yourselfsome sort of test run you know,
(18:46):
if you have the ability to dothat before diving right in if
you're taking that week tofigure out of this is what you
want to do. And you kind ofrealize in your in your case, it
was kind of an it turned into avery unhealthy schedule in a lot
of different ways because one itwas unproductive to you're not
taking proper care of yourselfand taking care of ourselves is
(19:08):
obviously very important. Ithink a lot of people would have
had that experience of those twoweeks and said Oh, I can't do
this. I'm not a writer. You havethat experience and said Hmm So
I guess writing works better forme more as a side hustle than a
full time thing. And I love thatI love that you were like no I
(19:31):
do want to do this just not inthis way because we get so
caught up in what success shouldlook like and how it should be
done. And that's not the case atall. Like all you should just be
doing you and in your case doingyou and doing it the way that
you want to do it and the waythose best for you. You know
kind of bucks the tradition, butagain, I will just say it over
(19:54):
and over again. Best SellingAuthor you clearly did something
right you know like that doesn'thappen by mistake, you know, so
like you did what worked foryou. And now here you are. And I
think that that's really cool. Ithink there's this weird binary
that people do, where you canonly be one thing. And in
reality, I think all of us aregoing to have seven, eight
(20:14):
careers in our life, right.
And instead of letting a careerkind of define what I do, I sort
of let me decide what I do. Andwhere I spend my time, and I let
this is gonna sound so well. Butlike, there's joy in writing.
For me, it's a really joyfulactivity. So I like to starting
my day with words on the page. Ilike if I'm in a bad place, just
(20:38):
taking 15 minutes and writing alittle bit and kind of
retreating into this mentalworld that I'm building and
giving other people problems andthen solving their problems. And
I think that you can bemultitude, like, you don't have
to be a single thing at a singletime. It's this sort of weird,
like, 1950s version of like, Iam an auto mechanic, and then I
(20:59):
come home, and I eat steak andpotatoes. And that is it. life
has changed. And it's okay to,to have passions and interests
and monetize those or don'tmonetize those, spend your time
where you want to spend it. ButI think recognizing what works
for you. And where you can slotthose little pockets of joy into
your day, or to make your entireday joyful, I enjoy my day job.
(21:21):
So that's great. I also enjoy mywriting career, that is also
great. As long as I can do both,well, why would I stop doing
things I like doing, I shouldn'thave to trade one for the other.
And I don't need to100% 100% and I love I don't
think it's woowoo at all to saythat writing brings you joy. And
I love that he said that, youknow, you try to do it first
(21:43):
thing in the morning. You know,that was that was something that
Marshall touched on to in hisepisode, you know, the first two
hours of his days, give or take,he's he's writing, he's
listening to a beat and writinga song. And I took to that too.
And I've started I am in thebeginning stages of a career in
comedy. And to your point whereyou said, You're like, I tell
(22:03):
people, I'm a writer, who Itfeels weird telling people that
I'm a comedian, I gotta like,kind of get used to that it's
almost like a muscle I have towork. But I think even if you're
not creative, just doingsomething, first thing in the
morning that brings you joy,it's a way to like, fill up your
cup, because the very firstthing you do when you wake up in
(22:25):
the morning is something that'sgoing to make you miserable.
That's gonna kind of set thetone for the whole day. But if
you you know, do somethingbrings you a lot of joy, even if
it's just for 30 minutes, 20minutes, whatever, you know that
traffic jam, getting to workmight not bother you as much
because you've already donesomething for yourself. You
know, it's like, when we'redoing stuff that makes us
miserable. It's like, what'seven in it for me, like, why am
(22:46):
I doing this, but like your daysalready have something cool. So
like, it's a great way to starttoday.
I love that. Yeah. And I alsofeel like just identifying if
you like, again, every job hasproblems, there is no job that
you don't have problems assomebody who likes about their
day job and their personal smallbusiness that they run, I still
(23:06):
run into problems and beingaware of the things that bring
you joy, and finding ways toslot those into like, if there's
a meeting I hate. And I know Ihate it, and I have to go to it.
I know that being outside forfive minutes brings me joy. So I
literally have 15 minutes to goeat a snack outside before I go
into this meeting. So that I'mnot miserable the whole time.
(23:28):
And then when I come out, I gooutside again. And I eat another
snack like, and my life isliterally better because I have
surrounded the things that Idon't want to do with things
that I love to do. And thatboosts my energy. And so I guess
yeah, I just want to encouragelisteners, like identify things
that bring you joy and find waysto slot those into your day.
(23:48):
Even if it's stretching, even ifit's yoga, even if it you know
just little things like makingthat time for yourself and
really feeling that well likeyour personal Well, it's so
important.
A topic that comes up a lot onthis podcast and in my life in
general is that you got to showup, you got to put yourself out
(24:09):
there, because you just neverreally know who's looking for
you who's going to find you andthe people that you're going to
meet. My dad is from Tanzania, acountry in East Africa that a
lot of Americans have never evenheard of. And honestly, there's
not a lot that I know about thecountry in the culture either.
(24:29):
You know, for for whateverreason, my dad did not teach me
much about it. And you know, itis what it is. But I've always
wanted to know more. And thelittle act of adding the
Tanzanian flag to my profiles onsocial media has made it so that
I've been able to meet otherTanzanians because there's so
(24:50):
few of us that just throw in theflag up will will attract
people. And so I've gotten tomeet some technologists from
Tanzania, which is really cool.
And I've also been able to getconnected to Tanzania trans
initiative or TTI, which isawesome. So now I'm talking to
several Tanzanians who aretransgender. Of course, there's
(25:11):
Mwamba. Now, the first time Italked to him wamba, and he told
me about his coming out story.
I'm like, Listen, dude, like,people need to see that, like,
we're all the same man, like,like you're from a country that
not enough Americans have evenheard of, and yet your story,
your coming out story, yourexperience as a trans person,
(25:33):
ring. So true. To me over herein America, it's all the same
man. And visibility iseverything. And I'm really
excited to announce actually,when his episode came out, the
Leo Yockey show ranked numbernine in Tanzania, people were
hearing this, it got out. And Ithink that that's really cool.
(25:56):
And you know, malambo has beenreally pushing the envelope to
make sure that there'svisibility there for them. And,
yeah, it's just been really coolto connect with people who are
from my motherland, I just lovewhat he has to say about why
he's doing what he's doing. SoI'll let you hear it for
yourself, here's Mama,they claim to not have transient
(26:16):
and that, indeed, we struggledoing our own research in, in
Tanzania. So it's like you'rerunning cycles, and not hearing
what trends have to say, ontheir side, I mean, it's nothing
about us, without us, we are notthere at the table to make
(26:36):
decisions to, for us to putourselves to visible lives
ourselves. so that we may be sothat we may have the data, we
need to start doing some action.
So, I see that is there ismissing, that the gap that is
missing, and now, in thecommunity, people are still
(26:59):
suffering, I mean, there is avery big gap missing. in the, in
the, in the in the books, again,community as to the sufferings
cases are not being taken fromthe police. They mean we need
safe house, we need a placewhereby people can run people
can feel secure when people can.
And people can kill that. Giventhat, you know, people can those
(27:25):
people who are from, fromviolence from getting parents
saying people can recover, yes,people can recover from their
tragedies, and we need suchspaces. And now, why now? Number
one is because I have theprivilege to find a resource to
face. So why not now? Well, nowit has been for several years, I
(27:53):
mean, I am the voice, and I'mspeaking with we need it. That
is why we are trying tofundraise so that we may have
for our own people so that theycan survive. I mean, they saw
that they may grow, they maygrow meaningful, they will get
education of causes, they willhave access to libraries, they
(28:15):
will have the space to growtheir talents, they will have
space to have enough use oftechnology. I mean, they can
take advantage of that. We needto build our own people,
starting with a safe space.
Yeah.
(28:37):
possibly my favorite episode torecord in all of season one was
the episode was Shannon hay. AndI think part of it is that I
just think it was so cool tointerview someone from my
hometown. There's so muchlaughter so much love in this
episode. And in a way it's like,through letting all into this
(28:59):
conversation. I'm really lettingeverybody into my background and
where I grew up in my roots. Ijust I love the conversation
that we had. This is actuallythe longest clip by far. All of
the clips are well under 10minutes each, but this is this
is definitely the longest one.
So I'm not even going to give itany further ado, but Shannon
(29:20):
olevia here, Shannon? So did youfind that in doing theater did
it did it always feel likealmost like it just didn't quite
fit? Like Was it something wasit something where like, you
enjoyed it, but it just didn'tquite feel like it like like
you're close, but not quite onthe mark of where you're
(29:42):
supposed to be?
Yes and No, like, the thing Ithink that drove me away from
theater and I think it'ssomething that I think a lot of
people in the LGBTQ communityrelate to is I had a lot of
characters that I related tothat I could that I knew going
in that I wouldn't Never beright for as far as director was
(30:02):
concerned, because I'm five footthree in stacks. And I tended to
relate to a lot of malecharacters. And I was like, I
know I can never, like get thoseparts. Even though I think I'm a
good actor. And I'm a, I'm anokay, singer, I'm not very good.
But this is objective. I'm nottrying to be down on myself. You
know, it's like, it was neverlike plans to go to Broadway or
(30:24):
anything. But just like, it wasreally disheartening. Which is
why I ended up going to improvbecause an improv you can play
whoever the hell you want toplay. Because it's improv, you
just kind of jump into the rolethat you need to take the time.
And that kind of drove metowards realizing more and more
what I liked about boarding and,and comics and things because
(30:46):
you're kind of every character.
When you do that you're actingthrough art. And you're, you
have to kind of put all thethings that you would be doing
on a stage into a drawing. Soyou get to kind of be every
single character that shows upin the show every single
character that shows up in yourscene, like you get to act that
part out. And that was reallyfun for me. And I think that
character work that I I learnedto do in theater is a really big
(31:11):
part of what pushed me into thisparticular career. So I can't
why that person said storyboardartists or just theater kids who
don't want to be on stageanymore.
Yeah. That makes a lot of sense.
I think you touched on a veryinteresting connection here.
Because you know, what, onething that I'm kind of observing
(31:34):
both from my own life, and, youknow, people that I've
interviewed on this podcast, andeven conversations I've had off,
Mike, is that when you're partof the LGBTQ community, LGBTQ
plus community, you know, you,it usually involves a level of
self discovery and selfreflection that a lot of other
(31:59):
people, even if they do it, it,it's not as much of a necessity,
you know, what I mean? Becausethe world is very
heteronormative. And when youfit into that category, you
know, the world is doing a lotof the thinking for you, and a
lot of the refraction for you.
And, you know, so for you, itfeels like some of these things
(32:20):
kind of go hand in hand, right?
You know, because you had, youhad this, you know,
understanding that you wanted tobe able to play certain parts
that, you know, because, again,going back to the hetero
normativity of the world, youwouldn't be able to play, you
know, like, the the leading, youknow, male character in a play
(32:41):
or something like that, eventhough, you know, like, you, you
know, that that is a role thatyou would both feel comfortable
embodying, and would you want toembody, he had, you know, if you
had been in a position wherethat was available to you, maybe
you wouldn't have been able todo this self reflection required
(33:01):
to, you know, to get to thepoint of realizing that, like,
Hey, I'm actually not as intoverbal communication anyway,
like, what are other paths forme, and like you said, you know,
kind of being able to get toembody every character in, in,
you know, storyboard, you know,you kind of get this, like, it's
not the same, but it is like adifferent type of experience,
(33:25):
where, you know, you kind ofsaid before, like, I also get
bored very easily, you know, andyou, you know, you kind of just
mentioned Broadway kind of justbecause, but like a Broadway
actor is playing the same roleover and over and over and over
again, until that show is over.
And even if you're on a like,you know, say you're on a,
(33:48):
you're working on a TV show, asa storyboard artist, you know,
even if you're working on kindof the same characters for a
while, because you get to bouncearound from different characters
throughout, you know, you kindof get this like richness and
variety of experience. And, youknow, it kind of seems like
these things go hand in hand alittle bit, because the fact
that you're able to do that selfdiscovery, you know, you're kind
(34:11):
of able to veer off into this,this path that works better for
you anyway, because you, you,you enjoy presenting things in a
visual way. You know what Imean? Like, like, I'm totally
off base by trying to connectthese two dots together. No, no,
I think you're absolutely right.
Um, I was just, you mentioned,like, being able to bounce
around and kind of it made methink about how, even just on my
(34:34):
last job that I was working on,it was a it's a six character
ensemble show for little kidsand you
know, do you want to tell us Doyou want to share with us? This
is a humble brag. I got to workon Muppet Babies last year.
Yeah, down here. Oh. Legend ofLancaster. Ah, come on.
(34:59):
But yeah, it was Really fun, funexperience and talking about how
you get to kind of bounce aroundand play different characters
every day, or, you know, everyweek or whatever. It's true. And
it really does keep you or keeppeople like me anyway. Intrigued
and like interested because youkind of get to, even though it's
(35:21):
like a little kids show like youstill, actually I kind of like
that it's a little kid showbecause everything is much more
streamlined, streamlined,streamlined. In like, the
characters, personalities,everybody's got a very, very
distinct personality. And, youknow, they have like, very
distinct motivations and verydistinct mindsets. And it's
really, really fun for someonelike me to bounce around and get
(35:45):
to, like, kind of see thingsthrough that character's
perspective. And like,understand that character's
motivations and like, kind ofget to develop how they would
act in the situation or pitch anidea of view and like, how would
they respond that would bestronger for this character that
would be better for this story,and still make sense for that
(36:05):
character and the othercharacters involved. And it was
just, it's, it's almost like,almost like an empathy exercise.
And just learning how differentpeople think and different
people respond to things andmight be babies is such a cute
show for that. Because it's likealways, the moral is like trying
to understand each other better.
And I think that as a storyboardartists, that's kind of what you
(36:27):
get to do.
Yeah, it would actually be fairto say that this podcast would
not be here. If it wasn't forthis next guest, Lucas casarez.
Lucas is my financial planner,which, by the way, I'm pretty
sure I kept calling himfinancial advisor, I probably
should have asked him what thedifference is, maybe he'll be
(36:48):
another repeat guest. Butanyway, when I was really down
and out, and I was starting toget really sick, again from
stress, and hating my job, andnot sure what I was going to do,
Lucas actually told me becauseI've hired him, he he is my
financial planner, and, andalready was at this time, and he
(37:08):
said, Hey, you know, you canafford to quit, right? Like, it
looks like you're really upset.
And you're really hating yourjob. Like, just, you can go if
you want, like we'll figure thisout together. And I did. And,
man, if it wasn't for that, Idon't know if I would have ever
done this podcast. So I guessthank you for returning the
favor, Lucas. And for that tomake sense. If you didn't listen
(37:31):
to his episode, check out thisclip right here with Lucas,
one thing I wanted to tell you,Leo, I've actually written you a
message multiple times. And Ialways deleted it. But since you
brought me on to this podcast, Ithink I should tell you. So you
reached out to me at the end ofNovember. Yeah. And prior to
that local financial planner,here's like, Hey, I see you
(37:54):
hustling. I knew, like you'regood guy. And you're doing good
work. How about I buy levelfinancial planning, I buy your
clients, you come in work for medo financial planning for us.
And I was thinking about itvery, very intensely. But then
sure enough, when I was kind ofgetting to that final part of
that thinking process, and itwasn't because business wasn't
(38:16):
working, things went mostly asplanned. But it was still
stressful for me to like think,well, I still need to grow and
keep growing. And all thesethings. It's I don't know what
was going through my mind at thetime. But yeah, next thing I
know, Leo reaches out and justkind of reminds me of what level
of financial planning is allabout kind of aligning, like who
(38:40):
you want to be. And I Russell,we don't know all these things
just yet. It's a journey andpath. But I decided, Nope,
that's not for me, I'm gonnakeep doing my level up thing I
rely on creating the content.
Within the following five or sixweeks after I talked to you,
Leo, I got six clients, I don'tlike the following eight or
(39:00):
nine. Like all together, I gotlike, I grew more and a month
and a half time period than Idid all of 2020. Like it was
ridiculous. And it was like youstarted that. So I wrote those
messages multiple times. As I dothis feels too weird to like
sign like over a message. But itjust kind of lines up perfectly
with what this podcast is about.
(39:23):
And just that little bit of liketiming, and then just kind of
persistence and pushing pastlike some of that uncomfortable
stuff. I don't know what it was.
But yeah, because I decided tojust say, you know what, like, I
think I'm onto something I thinklike I am on the right path,
even though it hasn't felt thegreatest all the way through. I
think what I'm doing is addingvalue, and that there's a need
(39:44):
in for that. And so, yeah, Ijust want to thank you for for
kind of reaching out when youdid because everything could be
tied to that specific encounter,where we started talking a
little bit more intensely aboutthose types of things.
That's amazing. I was so gladthat you told me that and what a
(40:04):
man, I swear, it seems like whenwe're feeling uncertain about
what we want to do, it seemslike there's like a temptation.
That's always when thetemptation shows up. It's like
you're questioning what you wantto do. And here's this, here's
this offer being dangled infront of you, Hey, I'll buy you
out. Here's security again, youget to your clients. And then as
(40:25):
soon as you said, No, it waslike the floodgates open man, I
don't, I don't know why it isthat that happens. But I do
where it's like, it's likeyou're saying to the universe
like No, I wasn't kidding. Did Istutter? What I said, This is
what I want to do. Like, I'mserious. So that's, that's
really amazing. I've really beenmulling over the some of the
(40:48):
topics from this nextconversation with Valerie
Phoenix. She's the founder andCEO of tech by choice, I think
about change a lot like personalchange, personal development, do
we change? Or do we just kind ofbecome more evolved versions of
who we've always been? andValerie kind of shows us that
(41:12):
our values will kind of stay thesame. And we just get better and
better and better at practicingthose values. You know what I
mean? And that's a veryinteresting conversation. It's
been a very interesting debate.
I've posed the question in acouple of different ways on
Instagram before, and I reallylove everyone's responses. So
yeah, let me know what you thinkof this. Because here here is
(41:34):
that theory and practice withValerie ever done stuff in the
past, like before in yourprevious life, pre tech, where
you were really involved in a ina community or any kind of like
giving pack?
Oh, my god, you're connecting somany dads, I'm just like, oh,
wow, I am very like communitybase and everything I do.
(42:00):
That's why I'm hosting thepodcast. Just call me the
millennial Oprah.
No, I think thinking back tolike, how I grew up, my mom did
daycare. So we had like,anywhere from like, 10 to 15
kids in the house at any giventime. And so I learned a lot of
(42:21):
like, how to be a person from mymom and like modeling how she
worked with the kids and workwith the parents. And she was
very, what is the group want todo? How does the group feel
about this? She was never thetype of person to say like,
Whoa, everyone's going to eatthis. We don't like it, then you
just don't eat. Like that wasjust not the way she handled
(42:42):
things. And so I think that wasmy first understanding of
community. And the way she ranthe daycare, she made us feel
more so like a family versuslike, these are the daycare
kids. They're separate. Like,no, we were all together doing
things. And we had a lot of fundoing it. Um, so I think that's
(43:05):
where that comes from in the waythat I decided to like, be it
show up as leader and the waythat I look at Tech by choice,
because it's pretty much nowthat I think about it, like the
colors we have protect by choiceis actually the same colors that
my mom had for her. Herchildcare logo. So I like your
you'd have no clue like how youthought she just connected right
(43:27):
now. I'm just I've turned intomy mom. Like,
in the best ways, though. Itsounds like Yeah, yeah, I'm
just my mom. And I didn'trealize that until like right
now. Um, yeah, community. It'sjust second nature for me, I
guess.
Yeah. I love that. That's socool. And pardon the pun on
(43:49):
Phnom Penh. But the the colorsbeing the same as the daycare
that's quite a quite a callback.
if I do say so much.
You got you got it. I don't knowhow many other people's gonna
laugh at that.
too. It's funny because wementioned callbacks. So it's a
literal callback. And then it'sit's a pun on the callback
(44:10):
functions is huh. Yeah. Yes. Whotwo nerds just laughed a lot at
that. Yeah. That's really cool.
I love that. So what about incollege? Were you ever involved
in any community stuff incollege?
college I just that was probablythe only time in my life I act
at my age. So there was no nocommunity base anything
(44:33):
happening. But in high school. Iwas a part of a lot of I think I
was a part of almost every clubat our at our high school.
Please don't ask me why or how,but I was. So a lot of community
there. And then I was a part ofthis program called upper bound.
That felt like a second home tome. And we really focused on
like how to get to college andall this other stuff and they
(44:55):
help with like resources andworkshops and classes. You
nobody else Very familiar. Thetech by choice. Okay.
Very familiar. Yeah.
Yeah. So I'm just a repeat of mylife. So yeah.
No, that's, that's good.
Yeah. So I think that wasanother farming community, what
(45:15):
other, I also will know, incollege, I did come back and
like help volunteer for thatprogram, the upper bound
programs, I worked with a lot oflike high school students
getting ready for college. Andthat was a lot of fun. I think I
used to one of my favoritethings that me and my mom would
do together. Growing up isbeauty that relates to life,
(45:39):
events, local events, so beingable to go hang out in the park
and like, get that together. Andso I guess, there's a lot of
aspects of my life that has beenvery community based driven and
stuff like that.
Yeah, that's really cool. So Ithink I touched on it before we
recorded that. One of the thingsthat I was going to try to
(46:00):
figure out remember, I said, Ihave questions that are geared
towards trying to figure outwhy, of all of all the people
that know that these problems intech exist? Why was it you that
started tech by choice? And not?
And not in a like, Who are youto say, but almost the exact
opposite of like, why isn'teverybody feeling like, you
(46:22):
know, empowered to do this? Andthe reason why is because you
already had so much experiencein that you know what I mean?
Like this is, this is just whatyou do, like you are a community
driven person, and you believeso, so close to the core of who
you are in the power ofcommunity and community driven
things that it almost seems likeif you see a need for that
(46:46):
community, it's like you can'tyou can't help but do it because
it is just such a part of whoyou are.
That was so sweet. Are you amotivational speaker too?
Because that definitely made mefeel good.
All right, last, but certainlynot least, is my dear friend
(47:06):
Emily. And my friendship withEmily has always been really
special to me, we met at a jobat a theme park and going to
Disneyland together has been abig part of our friendship, you
know, so there's just a lot oflot of interesting, unique
experiences Emily and I haveshared and we also have been
(47:27):
able to have really interesting,deep conversations, you know,
it's something that I feel likea lot of people don't think
about when it comes to theDisney adults, is if you're
spending a lot of time withsomeone at Disneyland, you're
spending a lot of time with themin lines, you ended up having a
lot of conversations. And Ireally, you know, there were
(47:48):
actually there were so manydifferent opportunities in so
many different episodes. Really,this is a theme that kind of
came up in every episode. Butthis is one of the ones where it
was the most explicitly laid outto know what you want to do in
life, you have to know who youare, and you got to be true to
yourself. I really, reallyappreciate not just Emily, but
(48:13):
really everybody's willingnessto be open and to share all the
different parts of themselveswith me. So that we can really
see that principle in action. Sothat's exactly what Emily nine
talk about. Let's check it out.
When I graduated college, I wasstill living with my parents for
a couple years. And so therewere to me, I had like these
(48:33):
three major things that I neededto fix, because I was an adult
now, and I shouldn't be like atthis stage in my life, I should
be at this stage in my life. Andnumber one was housing, I wanted
to have my own place, or atleast not live with my parents
anymore. Number two was my job.
I wanted a actual like real biggirl job and not like a retail
(48:54):
job. And number three was ourrelationship. And I don't think
I wanted a relationshipnecessarily, because there was
anybody I was particularlyinterested in and like wanted to
be with, like I wanted arelationship because I wanted
that experience that so manyother people in my life had had.
(49:15):
And I felt like I must bemissing out on something by not
having like a long termrelationship with somebody. And
so that kind of, I think made meI don't know if I would say
depressed, but definitely justlike questioning myself and my
self worth. And it really playeda lot into my self esteem, which
(49:37):
wasn't the greatest for me, youknow, as a young adult, and I
think part of that was thatreason and you know, a lot of
people have misconceptions aboutasexuality or like don't
understand that it is aspectrum. So just because you
you know aren't sexuallyattracted to people doesn't mean
(49:58):
that You aren't necessarilyromantically attracted to people
or, you know, you kind of feelalmost like a platonic bond. But
like, it's almost more thanthat, like, Oh, yeah, like, I
want you to be like my person.
But like, I don't necessarilywant to sleep with you. But
like, I want us to not be justfriends, you know. So it's like
(50:18):
this weird, like, in betweenfeeling. So it's difficult. And
you know, there were times whenI was interested in in men and
had crushes on people. And itwas just kind of it was weird,
because it's like, you want tothis, this person. And it was
just kind of messing with myhead a lot. And I think,
(50:39):
realizing that there are otherpeople like me, who have who
experienced the same thoughtsand feelings that I do kind of
made me more comfortable beinglike, oh, okay, well, then,
maybe this isn't something thatI need to be looking for.
Because I feel like now, ifsomebody who wasn't also
somewhere on the asexualspectrum, I don't think it would
(51:01):
work out. And I think I would,that would just give me another
reason to be depressed. Andyeah, I don't need that in my
life. So I think coming to termswith who I am, how has made me
realize, like, oh, like, maybethis isn't one of the three
things that I need to focus on,you know what I mean? Like, I
don't need to focus on this tomake my life better. I can just,
(51:24):
like, cross that off the listand be like, you know, if I meet
someone great, that understandsand kind of feels the same way
that I do. Awesome. If not, nobig deal. Like, I am so happy
and being independent and takingcare of myself. And I think
having another person to sharethat with would just kind of be
(51:44):
like an added bonus if it wereto happen.
Yeah, that totally makes sense.
Thank you for sharing that. Youcut out in some parts of it, but
I think so hopefully, hopefullythe recording recorded okay, but
even. Yeah, man, you just cutout again, I think we got the
the most important stuff, whichis that asexuality is a
(52:05):
spectrum. And honestly, thebiggest clue that maybe you were
asexual was that you kind ofrealize that your desire to have
relationships mostly came fromsocietal pressure, basically,
like, this is what everyone'sdoing. So this must be what I
want. Which is, which is so fun.
(52:27):
Because to me, that's kind oflike the theme of the show of
this show. Even though it's morewith like careers, it's like,
you know, we don't just like, goto college and get good grades
and get a good job. Like, wehave to be a little bit more
creative. Like that was kind ofyour experience, even with your
sexuality was like, you know,it's not just, you know,
graduate from high school, meetsome nice young man and then
(52:47):
marry him and have babies itwas, you know, something wasn't
quite right with that. And youhad to figure that out. And now,
now that you've figured it out,there's you know, that that
nagging feeling of Am I doingsomething wrong is subsided, and
you can you can live your life.
And I think that's great.
Yeah, me too. I'm very, veryhappy, just kind of having that
having the knowledge and knowinglike, you know, I don't need to
(53:10):
waste my time with dating apps.
And I don't need to waste mytime trying to find somebody to
be with for the rest of my life,because that's not my path. And
that's not, you know, it worksgreat for some people, but it
doesn't work for everybody. AndI think a society and just
people on a on a broader levelneed to understand that what
works just because it works fora lot of people doesn't mean it
(53:32):
works for everybody. And youdon't you know, just because
somebody just because someone issingle, long term doesn't mean
that they're unhappy.
All right, thank you so, so muchfor listening to the best of
season one. If you enjoyed thisepisode, please consider sharing
(53:54):
it with someone, especially ifyou think that they would enjoy
one or more of these clips. LikeI said, I started this show
because I like havingconversations, and nothing would
make me happier than to knowthat these conversations that
that we have on the show, areinspiring other conversations
(54:16):
out there in the real world. Soshare it with your friends, make
it your Instagram story. Take ascreenshot of this. Wherever
you're listening to it posted toyour Instagram story, you can
tag me at Leo Yockey LEYOCKE whyit's a great way to let your
friends know what you're intowithout feeling like you're
(54:37):
bothering them or anything likethat. If you really liked it, if
you want to really support theshow, leave me a five star
review original review. Youknow, let me know what you're
into let me know what you likedabout this show. And I do read
these reviews and I and I putthem into consideration and hey,
like when you hit me up and sayI'd love to talk about this, or
(55:00):
I'd love to hear about this. Ijust had someone asked me
recently, if there's a goodepisode about time management, I
was like, oh, there's there's acouple of examples. But now Now
I have that in mind. And I'mgoing to be looking for someone
where we can really get intotalking about time management. I
actually have a couple ofpotential guests in mind for
that. So hopefully, I'll be ableto get them in for season two.
(55:23):
So yeah, let me know like, yeah,season two is coming up. We're
we got one more episode left togo with season one. So okay,
we're not really taking a break,though. So let me let me kind of
break down how this is going togo. We have this episode coming
out today. Yeah, August 24. NextTuesday, August 31, is going to
be the season one finale, whichI just realized, there's some
(55:47):
interesting symbolism to to thatdate. So that that's amazing.
Okay, I'll talk about that nextweek. The week after that
September 7, I'm going to bereleasing the trailer for season
two. So if there's any time thatI'm taking a break, it's then
and then September 14, we'rerolling right into season two,
(56:08):
so it's gonna be good stuff. I'mreally excited for it. I've
actually already recorded all ofthe interviews for the month of
September for the first month ofseason two. It's gonna be
fantastic. We're taking this ina slightly different direction.
It's still gonna be a lot ofreally interesting deep
conversations with a widevariety of people. But I think
(56:30):
you'll like the direction thatwe're going. And so, again,
thank you for being on thisjourney with me. I'll see you
next week for the season onefinale, stay evolving.
Hello, and welcome to anotherepisode of the Leo Yockey show,
the show where I Leo Yockeyinterview guests about how their
unique life path led them todefine success and fulfillment,
we still have one more episodeto go and season one, I'm
really, really, really excitedfor the season finale. But for
(00:34):
now, we're going to be taking alook back. And some of my
favorite conversations from thisseason. So far, the thing about
these conversations and theseinterviews that I have on the
show is that they're, they'reconversations that I have in
real life all the time. Youknow, so if you're, if you're
(00:55):
brand new, if you haven'tlistened to an episode before,
welcome, this is a great placeto just kind of get caught up
and you can kind of just listenfrom here onward. If you have
been around welcome back. Thankyou for listening. And I think
you'll enjoy this look back andagain to see like, what are the
conversations that I've gotten alot out of, because I bring them
(01:17):
up all the time, you know, Idon't know if I've ever really
talked about like, why I startedthis podcast have i, this week,
I actually hit the six monthmark of when I quit, you know,
my six figure job in tech andbasically said, I'm, I'm not
coming back. And you know, Ididn't know where my life was
(01:37):
going at all. Really. I mean, Ihad ideas for online businesses,
for writing a novel becoming astand up comedian, maybe even
getting into social services.
And I was spinning in all thesedifferent directions. And on top
of all that I was smoking weedway too much every single day.
The times that I would drink,the amount that I would consume
(01:59):
was starting to scare me. And Ididn't really know what I was
going to do. And I was like,man, I have a year until I turn
30. I'm in my last year, my 20sI gotta figure something out,
right? So I started havingconversations with people,
people that in my opinion,actually did have their life
together. And I was like, hey,person that has your life
(02:20):
together? How would you do it?
Why are you doing what you'redoing? What caused you to go
down this path? What makes youcertain that you're on the right
path? I got to figure this outfor myself. And the reality is
that no one really knows, youknow, and I found that
(02:41):
reassuring. But also, I realizedthat I had to do something
right. And so being able to putthese conversations on record
really gave me an anchor. And itforced me to have these
conversations. I couldn't justwander off and and ignore the
fact that I didn't know what Iwanted to do with my life. I had
(03:02):
to really face that every singleweek with every single
conversation with every singleepisode that came out. At this
point, I have a much better viewof where my life is going. You
know, I'll get more into it inseason two. But, you know, I
went from like really having noidea what I'm going to do. By
(03:24):
the time I'm 30 next year to Ithink I have like a decent five
year plan or the beginnings ofit. I'm actually going to sit
down and write all that outtomorrow. And there's so many
lessons that I'm applying fromthis from this podcast. You
know, I've spent a lot of mylife really feeling like I was
(03:46):
always an outsider. And wetalked about that a little bit
in last week's episode withParris Athena, check that out if
you want to she's not going tobe one of the clips in today's
episode is still a greatconversation. I loved every
single episode, regardless ofwhether or not there's a clip in
this episode today. You know,one of the benefits to
constantly feeling like I was anoutsider is that in order to
(04:09):
really connect with people, Ihad to look past those
superficial differences. And Iloved for example, my
conversation with Megan Barrett,who is going to be in this
episode, but not this clip. Andwe were talking about, you know,
how we have similar experiencesof having similar feelings, even
though the circumstances thatgoddess There are so different,
(04:31):
you know, for her it wasbecoming a mother for me it was
transitioning and coming out astransgender and learning to live
life socially accepted as a man,you know, and some of the stuff
that she shared her story reallyhelps me. And I think that
that's really cool. And I love Ilove being able to share this
with the world and I'm about tobe able to set up some stuffs so
(04:55):
that I can share this with withmore people. I keep saying it's
gonna be tough. For the podcastto grow, it's it's seriously
time for the podcast to grownow. And I'm I'm so excited, I
have a source of funding comingin soon that I'm really excited
about feel really good about. Ijust, I cannot say it enough,
(05:15):
thank you for being on thisjourney with me. And just
proving to me, what I alwaysknew is that when people sit
down and share their stories,it's interesting. And there's
always something that we canlearn from it. You know, at the
end of the day, like I've hadpeople who are artists who are
entrepreneurs who are corporateemployees, people from different
(05:35):
gender and racial backgrounds,all of them have had something
universal to say. And I thinkthat that's really powerful. So
anyway, as we gear up and getready for the season finale next
week, I'm really excited toshare with you some of my
favorite clips, some of myfavorite conversations from this
(05:56):
first season. And this podcasthas been such an anchor for me.
And anchors are exactly what wetalked about in this clip with
Braxton. Braxton Fleming. He's ablack trans man that I've been
following for years now. Youknow, his journey, and his
willingness to share so openlyhas been a huge inspiration for
(06:18):
me, both back then. And thenespecially now, I really admire
his commitment to his mission.
And the fact that he even hasone and again, that there's so
many aspects of thatconversation that really helped
me figure out where I'm goingnext. And, you know, this is
this was actually just a little,you know, I asked, I started
asking my guests, if there'sanything else that they want to
(06:40):
add, just in case, there'ssomething that I didn't ask them
that they wanted to talk about.
And this ended up being what hetalked about. So I'm really I'm
really glad that he brought itup. And, yeah, let's get going
with these clips. I hope youlike,
Let's go, you know, fitness ismy stabilizer. I would like to
(07:02):
say it's my meditation time.
It's your anchor. It's myanchor, it's my anchor. Amen to
that. Yes, for sure. If I didnot have the gym, I would be
wild as hell. That's just to behonest with you. Because I
would, I would be way toooverwhelmed. I would be just all
over the place with everything.
(07:22):
It really builds my confidenceto like, you know, I always tell
everybody, you got to stopcaring what people think about
you, you got to just let thatgo. And when I entered that, I
let it all go. And then when Icome out of there, I'm like,
like right now I'm stillsweating from the gym, sweating
talking to you, because I'm sopumped. Like, I'm just so
(07:43):
pumped, I had it, I had a greatstart to my day I went to the
gym, I did what I had to do, youknow, I've been hitting all my
meetings, we're on time foreverything. I got another
meeting at two o'clock,everything is aligned everything
just boom, boom, boom, boom,boom. And when I have that gym
in the morning, I'm ready. I cango all day all night, it doesn't
matter. But without that gym,I'm just not the same. I'm just
(08:05):
not the same person. I just, I'mmore angry, I'm more irritable.
You know, I'm not giving thelove to my family like I should.
I'm more focused on making moneyand doing stupid shit. You know
what I mean? And I anchor downinto the gym, it brings me to a
place where I can connect withGod, I can connect with my body,
in my mind, and once I'm able todo all of that for myself first.
(08:29):
That's why I like to go out at5am because I like to start my
day for me and God. And thenonce I get that out the way that
I can handle everybody else'sproblems, because I handle
everybody else's problems allday long. Yeah. And that's a
lot. So is long as I take mytime for me first before the
kids before my wife beforeanybody, it's just me and God. I
(08:52):
think I can kill it. But if Idon't get that time, I might
kill you. Just kidding.
No, I mean, I think I thinkthat's real. Thank you for
sharing that. Thank you foradding that. Yeah, I mean,
that's a big common theme is theimportance of starting your day
just for you huge common themethat's come up on this show. So
I'm glad to hear that that'spart of your thing as well. All
(09:16):
right, next step, we have MeganBarrett, which I already talked
about her a little bit in theintro, but what I think gets cut
out of the clip because therewasn't enough time is you know,
she was talking about her postpostpartum anxiety which I had
never heard of, I'd only heardof postpartum depression. And so
(09:37):
I asked her kind of what thedifference was and she was
talking about the anxiety thatshe had. Once she became a
mother and especially after shehad her second child, and she's
over here like damn if there's afire in the house like which kid
do I save first and things likethat. Or if her husband's 10
minutes late home from work, youknow, her mind spirals into He
(09:58):
must be in a car. crashing inthe hospital? And what do I do
about bringing my kids to ahospital when there's COVID, and
on and on and on and on thespiral continues if you've had
anxiety, you know what I'mtalking about. And I just
thought that that was sointeresting. And I really, I
really appreciate what she hadto say about what do you do with
(10:19):
her anxiety afterward. And, youknow, the conversation that
ensued is a conversation that Italked about a lot all the time.
Now, here's Megan,I didn't want to go on
medication, and I wanted to dotalk therapy. So I went about
two times before the world shutdown. And then that didn't
happen. And I was home with mykids and trying to find a time
(10:44):
to like dedicate an hour totherapy was giving me more
anxiety than not, and so, um,around June, so maybe like four
months or so after I wasdiagnosed, I decided to go on
medication. And it definitelyhelped me and I think it was the
(11:07):
best choice for me at the time.
But then, I kind of gotten thisit, I would take it at night, it
would make me really drowsy, Ibasically pass out and then wake
up when my son came in at seveno'clock in the morning,
complaining that he wanted milkand to watch Peppa Pig. So then
(11:27):
I basically just kind of it wasgreat because I was able to
sleep which I needed sleep, butI was just kind of using it to
Okay, Now's my time to likecheck out of the world. And
yeah, go to sleep, and then doit all over again tomorrow. And
I started drinking more two,which is not the best with that
medication. And I just I reallygot to this place where I didn't
(11:53):
like myself, as a wife, as amother as a person. You know, I
was just stuck at home with twosmall children that aren't great
conversationalists. And I justfelt really alone and really
isolated. And that was my way ofescaping with, you know, social
media drinking, and themedication. So, while it did
(12:18):
help me, there were other partsthat I contributed to, I have to
take that responsibility thatreally didn't help with the
medication. So towards the endof 2020, when my son turned just
just a little over one, which Ihave to say, as a mother, when
your kids turn one, you kind ofstart feeling like a real human
(12:40):
again, too. And I was just like,you know, it was like I woke up,
I can't even say exactly what itwas, it was just like, I woke up
one day, and I was like, This isit, like, I can't do this, like
my kids deserve much better thanthis. I deserve much better. My
husband does, like I can't bedoing this shit. So that's when
I started waking up early. And Idecided to wean off my
(13:03):
medication as well. And I'm nowback in therapy, which is
amazing, which I highly suggestfor anybody, whether you have
postpartum anxiety, depression,postpartum, whatever, whoever
you are, has been a big light inmy life and making that time for
(13:24):
myself for that, too, and justhaving someone to talk to about
those things. But yeah, I mean,it was definitely one of the
darkest times in my life,there's like a lot of things
that I look back on. I don'tknow if I'd say I regret them.
Because, you know, it brought meto where I am now. But it's,
it's a lot of things that Iwasn't happy about. And I'm not
(13:46):
proud of. I wouldn't change it.
Right, because they all bring ushere. And now. I'm feeling much
better, and I'm able to help alot of people. But you know, at
the time, I definitely think allthe people in my life deserve a
lot better from me.
Yeah, yeah. Well, thank you,thank you for for sharing that
(14:07):
in in such detail. I thinkyou've touched on a lot of
really, really interestingthings. I'm going to bring it
back to you know, when you werefirst kind of going through that
spiral when your husband waslate from work, and now you're
like worried that your child isgoing to have COVID because you
will have to go to the hospital.
You said something that I thinkwas was so key said you felt
like you were kind of goingthrough the step by step like
(14:31):
okay, well, I'm gonna have to dothis, which will cause that and
then this, and you said, Youfelt totally logical, and
totally crazy. And I think youyou touched on something really
important, which is that, youknow, every trait that we have,
as people has kind of like agood and a bad side or a dark
and a light side, you know, likeyou're you're kicking into that
(14:52):
high gear of like, Well whatabout this and then that, and
then what if this happens andwhich kid do I bring and And
what about COVID exposure andhow am I going to handle that?
You know, this is kind of likebeing able to set goals turned
into a monster. Right? Yeah,very
goal oriented person. I do thatall the time.
Yeah, absolutely. And so andkind of the same thing with the,
(15:16):
with, you know, your decision totake medication because you said
something that I think is truefor a lot of people, which is
that finding the time to toactually go and be able to see
that therapist sometimes createsmore anxiety than you had
before. And, you know, so atthat time, that medication
served a very important purposefor you. Because if you couldn't
(15:38):
do therapy or medication, wherewould you be? And of course, the
downside was that it made it alittle bit easier to slip into
more unhealthy habits, likedrinking and being on social
media too much, you know, but itdefinitely served its purpose at
one point, you know, and so itreally kind of speaks to the
complexity of a lot of thesethings. Like it's not just black
(16:00):
and white all the time. You knowwhat I mean? I will never forget
the interview that I had withauthor Addy woolridge. Because
anybody who knows me knows thatI love reading, I think at this
point, I've read something like44 books in 2021, I don't know,
it's, it gets out of control. Soit was really cool for me to be
(16:24):
able to read her new book, hernovel, the checklist, and then
immediately interview her aboutit just a week or two after it
came out. It was such a funexperience. And now I see it is
like almost like a big sisterfigure in my life, whether
whether she wants me or not, shehas me now as a little brother.
And, you know, I just I love Ilove her outlook on work and
(16:49):
goals, and really figuring outexactly what you want to do with
your life. Because I feel likewe have so few images when it
comes to success when it comesto fulfillment. And the reality
is that there's no rules here,we can literally do whatever we
want. So I really appreciateeverything that Addy has shared
(17:12):
with me about joy. And as far asI know, she's the only person
that I have planned to be areturning guest. She will she
will be coming back when shewrites her second book. And if
you're listening to this, nowyou have no choice. You have to
come back when that second bookcomes out.
I've made a podcast official.
But anyway, here's Addy. One ofthe things if anybody's thinking
about making the jump to fulltime creative is that I took a
(17:34):
couple weeks off a few yearsago, and I just decided to live
like I was a writer like allday, right? Which live your life
as if you were a full timewriter, what would your day look
like? And after doing that fortwo weeks, I was like, have I
been wearing the same thing forfour days? Who have I seen
anybody? What like, what did Ido and I realized that like,
(17:57):
that lifestyle wasn't actuallythe lifestyle that I wanted, I
like the structure of having toget up and go somewhere. I love
that sort of structure. And Ijust wasn't as creative in some
ways because I had all day to domy creative work as opposed to a
set time in the morning andsunset time in the afternoon
that I have to sit down andfocus when I had all day I just
kind of didn't do anything, justfor like goofing off.
(18:24):
Yeah, that's totally makessense. And what's so interesting
to me is I feel like so manypeople because I think it's just
human nature we were so hard onourselves all the time. I think
so many people if they were todo the you know, live live as if
for a little bit as like a demowhich by the way, I love that I
love the idea of giving yourselfsome sort of test run you know,
(18:46):
if you have the ability to dothat before diving right in if
you're taking that week tofigure out of this is what you
want to do. And you kind ofrealize in your in your case, it
was kind of an it turned into avery unhealthy schedule in a lot
of different ways because one itwas unproductive to you're not
taking proper care of yourselfand taking care of ourselves is
(19:08):
obviously very important. Ithink a lot of people would have
had that experience of those twoweeks and said Oh, I can't do
this. I'm not a writer. You havethat experience and said Hmm So
I guess writing works better forme more as a side hustle than a
full time thing. And I love thatI love that you were like no I
(19:31):
do want to do this just not inthis way because we get so
caught up in what success shouldlook like and how it should be
done. And that's not the case atall. Like all you should just be
doing you and in your case doingyou and doing it the way that
you want to do it and the waythose best for you. You know
kind of bucks the tradition, butagain, I will just say it over
(19:54):
and over again. Best SellingAuthor you clearly did something
right you know like that doesn'thappen by mistake, you know, so
like you did what worked foryou. And now here you are. And I
think that that's really cool. Ithink there's this weird binary
that people do, where you canonly be one thing. And in
reality, I think all of us aregoing to have seven, eight
(20:14):
careers in our life, right.
And instead of letting a careerkind of define what I do, I sort
of let me decide what I do. Andwhere I spend my time, and I let
this is gonna sound so well. Butlike, there's joy in writing.
For me, it's a really joyfulactivity. So I like to starting
my day with words on the page. Ilike if I'm in a bad place, just
(20:38):
taking 15 minutes and writing alittle bit and kind of
retreating into this mentalworld that I'm building and
giving other people problems andthen solving their problems. And
I think that you can bemultitude, like, you don't have
to be a single thing at a singletime. It's this sort of weird,
like, 1950s version of like, Iam an auto mechanic, and then I
(20:59):
come home, and I eat steak andpotatoes. And that is it. life
has changed. And it's okay to,to have passions and interests
and monetize those or don'tmonetize those, spend your time
where you want to spend it. ButI think recognizing what works
for you. And where you can slotthose little pockets of joy into
your day, or to make your entireday joyful, I enjoy my day job.
(21:21):
So that's great. I also enjoy mywriting career, that is also
great. As long as I can do both,well, why would I stop doing
things I like doing, I shouldn'thave to trade one for the other.
And I don't need to100% 100% and I love I don't
think it's woowoo at all to saythat writing brings you joy. And
I love that he said that, youknow, you try to do it first
(21:43):
thing in the morning. You know,that was that was something that
Marshall touched on to in hisepisode, you know, the first two
hours of his days, give or take,he's he's writing, he's
listening to a beat and writinga song. And I took to that too.
And I've started I am in thebeginning stages of a career in
comedy. And to your point whereyou said, You're like, I tell
(22:03):
people, I'm a writer, who Itfeels weird telling people that
I'm a comedian, I gotta like,kind of get used to that it's
almost like a muscle I have towork. But I think even if you're
not creative, just doingsomething, first thing in the
morning that brings you joy,it's a way to like, fill up your
cup, because the very firstthing you do when you wake up in
(22:25):
the morning is something that'sgoing to make you miserable.
That's gonna kind of set thetone for the whole day. But if
you you know, do somethingbrings you a lot of joy, even if
it's just for 30 minutes, 20minutes, whatever, you know that
traffic jam, getting to workmight not bother you as much
because you've already donesomething for yourself. You
know, it's like, when we'redoing stuff that makes us
miserable. It's like, what'seven in it for me, like, why am
(22:46):
I doing this, but like your daysalready have something cool. So
like, it's a great way to starttoday.
I love that. Yeah. And I alsofeel like just identifying if
you like, again, every job hasproblems, there is no job that
you don't have problems assomebody who likes about their
day job and their personal smallbusiness that they run, I still
(23:06):
run into problems and beingaware of the things that bring
you joy, and finding ways toslot those into like, if there's
a meeting I hate. And I know Ihate it, and I have to go to it.
I know that being outside forfive minutes brings me joy. So I
literally have 15 minutes to goeat a snack outside before I go
into this meeting. So that I'mnot miserable the whole time.
(23:28):
And then when I come out, I gooutside again. And I eat another
snack like, and my life isliterally better because I have
surrounded the things that Idon't want to do with things
that I love to do. And thatboosts my energy. And so I guess
yeah, I just want to encouragelisteners, like identify things
that bring you joy and find waysto slot those into your day.
(23:48):
Even if it's stretching, even ifit's yoga, even if it you know
just little things like makingthat time for yourself and
really feeling that well likeyour personal Well, it's so
important.
A topic that comes up a lot onthis podcast and in my life in
general is that you got to showup, you got to put yourself out
(24:09):
there, because you just neverreally know who's looking for
you who's going to find you andthe people that you're going to
meet. My dad is from Tanzania, acountry in East Africa that a
lot of Americans have never evenheard of. And honestly, there's
not a lot that I know about thecountry in the culture either.
(24:29):
You know, for for whateverreason, my dad did not teach me
much about it. And you know, itis what it is. But I've always
wanted to know more. And thelittle act of adding the
Tanzanian flag to my profiles onsocial media has made it so that
I've been able to meet otherTanzanians because there's so
(24:50):
few of us that just throw in theflag up will will attract
people. And so I've gotten tomeet some technologists from
Tanzania, which is really cool.
And I've also been able to getconnected to Tanzania trans
initiative or TTI, which isawesome. So now I'm talking to
several Tanzanians who aretransgender. Of course, there's
(25:11):
Mwamba. Now, the first time Italked to him wamba, and he told
me about his coming out story.
I'm like, Listen, dude, like,people need to see that, like,
we're all the same man, like,like you're from a country that
not enough Americans have evenheard of, and yet your story,
your coming out story, yourexperience as a trans person,
(25:33):
ring. So true. To me over herein America, it's all the same
man. And visibility iseverything. And I'm really
excited to announce actually,when his episode came out, the
Leo Yockey show ranked numbernine in Tanzania, people were
hearing this, it got out. And Ithink that that's really cool.
(25:56):
And you know, malambo has beenreally pushing the envelope to
make sure that there'svisibility there for them. And,
yeah, it's just been really coolto connect with people who are
from my motherland, I just lovewhat he has to say about why
he's doing what he's doing. SoI'll let you hear it for
yourself, here's Mama,they claim to not have transient
(26:16):
and that, indeed, we struggledoing our own research in, in
Tanzania. So it's like you'rerunning cycles, and not hearing
what trends have to say, ontheir side, I mean, it's nothing
about us, without us, we are notthere at the table to make
(26:36):
decisions to, for us to putourselves to visible lives
ourselves. so that we may be sothat we may have the data, we
need to start doing some action.
So, I see that is there ismissing, that the gap that is
missing, and now, in thecommunity, people are still
(26:59):
suffering, I mean, there is avery big gap missing. in the, in
the, in the in the books, again,community as to the sufferings
cases are not being taken fromthe police. They mean we need
safe house, we need a placewhereby people can run people
can feel secure when people can.
And people can kill that. Giventhat, you know, people can those
(27:25):
people who are from, fromviolence from getting parents
saying people can recover, yes,people can recover from their
tragedies, and we need suchspaces. And now, why now? Number
one is because I have theprivilege to find a resource to
face. So why not now? Well, nowit has been for several years, I
(27:53):
mean, I am the voice, and I'mspeaking with we need it. That
is why we are trying tofundraise so that we may have
for our own people so that theycan survive. I mean, they saw
that they may grow, they maygrow meaningful, they will get
education of causes, they willhave access to libraries, they
(28:15):
will have the space to growtheir talents, they will have
space to have enough use oftechnology. I mean, they can
take advantage of that. We needto build our own people,
starting with a safe space.
Yeah.
(28:37):
possibly my favorite episode torecord in all of season one was
the episode was Shannon hay. AndI think part of it is that I
just think it was so cool tointerview someone from my
hometown. There's so muchlaughter so much love in this
episode. And in a way it's like,through letting all into this
(28:59):
conversation. I'm really lettingeverybody into my background and
where I grew up in my roots. Ijust I love the conversation
that we had. This is actuallythe longest clip by far. All of
the clips are well under 10minutes each, but this is this
is definitely the longest one.
So I'm not even going to give itany further ado, but Shannon
(29:20):
olevia here, Shannon? So did youfind that in doing theater did
it did it always feel likealmost like it just didn't quite
fit? Like Was it something wasit something where like, you
enjoyed it, but it just didn'tquite feel like it like like
you're close, but not quite onthe mark of where you're
(29:42):
supposed to be?
Yes and No, like, the thing Ithink that drove me away from
theater and I think it'ssomething that I think a lot of
people in the LGBTQ communityrelate to is I had a lot of
characters that I related tothat I could that I knew going
in that I wouldn't Never beright for as far as director was
(30:02):
concerned, because I'm five footthree in stacks. And I tended to
relate to a lot of malecharacters. And I was like, I
know I can never, like get thoseparts. Even though I think I'm a
good actor. And I'm a, I'm anokay, singer, I'm not very good.
But this is objective. I'm nottrying to be down on myself. You
know, it's like, it was neverlike plans to go to Broadway or
(30:24):
anything. But just like, it wasreally disheartening. Which is
why I ended up going to improvbecause an improv you can play
whoever the hell you want toplay. Because it's improv, you
just kind of jump into the rolethat you need to take the time.
And that kind of drove metowards realizing more and more
what I liked about boarding and,and comics and things because
(30:46):
you're kind of every character.
When you do that you're actingthrough art. And you're, you
have to kind of put all thethings that you would be doing
on a stage into a drawing. Soyou get to kind of be every
single character that shows upin the show every single
character that shows up in yourscene, like you get to act that
part out. And that was reallyfun for me. And I think that
character work that I I learnedto do in theater is a really big
(31:11):
part of what pushed me into thisparticular career. So I can't
why that person said storyboardartists or just theater kids who
don't want to be on stageanymore.
Yeah. That makes a lot of sense.
I think you touched on a veryinteresting connection here.
Because you know, what, onething that I'm kind of observing
(31:34):
both from my own life, and, youknow, people that I've
interviewed on this podcast, andeven conversations I've had off,
Mike, is that when you're partof the LGBTQ community, LGBTQ
plus community, you know, you,it usually involves a level of
self discovery and selfreflection that a lot of other
(31:59):
people, even if they do it, it,it's not as much of a necessity,
you know, what I mean? Becausethe world is very
heteronormative. And when youfit into that category, you
know, the world is doing a lotof the thinking for you, and a
lot of the refraction for you.
And, you know, so for you, itfeels like some of these things
(32:20):
kind of go hand in hand, right?
You know, because you had, youhad this, you know,
understanding that you wanted tobe able to play certain parts
that, you know, because, again,going back to the hetero
normativity of the world, youwouldn't be able to play, you
know, like, the the leading, youknow, male character in a play
(32:41):
or something like that, eventhough, you know, like, you, you
know, that that is a role thatyou would both feel comfortable
embodying, and would you want toembody, he had, you know, if you
had been in a position wherethat was available to you, maybe
you wouldn't have been able todo this self reflection required
(33:01):
to, you know, to get to thepoint of realizing that, like,
Hey, I'm actually not as intoverbal communication anyway,
like, what are other paths forme, and like you said, you know,
kind of being able to get toembody every character in, in,
you know, storyboard, you know,you kind of get this, like, it's
not the same, but it is like adifferent type of experience,
(33:25):
where, you know, you kind ofsaid before, like, I also get
bored very easily, you know, andyou, you know, you kind of just
mentioned Broadway kind of justbecause, but like a Broadway
actor is playing the same roleover and over and over and over
again, until that show is over.
And even if you're on a like,you know, say you're on a,
(33:48):
you're working on a TV show, asa storyboard artist, you know,
even if you're working on kindof the same characters for a
while, because you get to bouncearound from different characters
throughout, you know, you kindof get this like richness and
variety of experience. And, youknow, it kind of seems like
these things go hand in hand alittle bit, because the fact
that you're able to do that selfdiscovery, you know, you're kind
(34:11):
of able to veer off into this,this path that works better for
you anyway, because you, you,you enjoy presenting things in a
visual way. You know what Imean? Like, like, I'm totally
off base by trying to connectthese two dots together. No, no,
I think you're absolutely right.
Um, I was just, you mentioned,like, being able to bounce
around and kind of it made methink about how, even just on my
(34:34):
last job that I was working on,it was a it's a six character
ensemble show for little kidsand you
know, do you want to tell us Doyou want to share with us? This
is a humble brag. I got to workon Muppet Babies last year.
Yeah, down here. Oh. Legend ofLancaster. Ah, come on.
(34:59):
But yeah, it was Really fun, funexperience and talking about how
you get to kind of bounce aroundand play different characters
every day, or, you know, everyweek or whatever. It's true. And
it really does keep you or keeppeople like me anyway. Intrigued
and like interested because youkind of get to, even though it's
(35:21):
like a little kids show like youstill, actually I kind of like
that it's a little kid showbecause everything is much more
streamlined, streamlined,streamlined. In like, the
characters, personalities,everybody's got a very, very
distinct personality. And, youknow, they have like, very
distinct motivations and verydistinct mindsets. And it's
really, really fun for someonelike me to bounce around and get
(35:45):
to, like, kind of see thingsthrough that character's
perspective. And like,understand that character's
motivations and like, kind ofget to develop how they would
act in the situation or pitch anidea of view and like, how would
they respond that would bestronger for this character that
would be better for this story,and still make sense for that
(36:05):
character and the othercharacters involved. And it was
just, it's, it's almost like,almost like an empathy exercise.
And just learning how differentpeople think and different
people respond to things andmight be babies is such a cute
show for that. Because it's likealways, the moral is like trying
to understand each other better.
And I think that as a storyboardartists, that's kind of what you
(36:27):
get to do.
Yeah, it would actually be fairto say that this podcast would
not be here. If it wasn't forthis next guest, Lucas casarez.
Lucas is my financial planner,which, by the way, I'm pretty
sure I kept calling himfinancial advisor, I probably
should have asked him what thedifference is, maybe he'll be
(36:48):
another repeat guest. Butanyway, when I was really down
and out, and I was starting toget really sick, again from
stress, and hating my job, andnot sure what I was going to do,
Lucas actually told me becauseI've hired him, he he is my
financial planner, and, andalready was at this time, and he
(37:08):
said, Hey, you know, you canafford to quit, right? Like, it
looks like you're really upset.
And you're really hating yourjob. Like, just, you can go if
you want, like we'll figure thisout together. And I did. And,
man, if it wasn't for that, Idon't know if I would have ever
done this podcast. So I guessthank you for returning the
favor, Lucas. And for that tomake sense. If you didn't listen
(37:31):
to his episode, check out thisclip right here with Lucas,
one thing I wanted to tell you,Leo, I've actually written you a
message multiple times. And Ialways deleted it. But since you
brought me on to this podcast, Ithink I should tell you. So you
reached out to me at the end ofNovember. Yeah. And prior to
that local financial planner,here's like, Hey, I see you
(37:54):
hustling. I knew, like you'regood guy. And you're doing good
work. How about I buy levelfinancial planning, I buy your
clients, you come in work for medo financial planning for us.
And I was thinking about itvery, very intensely. But then
sure enough, when I was kind ofgetting to that final part of
that thinking process, and itwasn't because business wasn't
(38:16):
working, things went mostly asplanned. But it was still
stressful for me to like think,well, I still need to grow and
keep growing. And all thesethings. It's I don't know what
was going through my mind at thetime. But yeah, next thing I
know, Leo reaches out and justkind of reminds me of what level
of financial planning is allabout kind of aligning, like who
(38:40):
you want to be. And I Russell,we don't know all these things
just yet. It's a journey andpath. But I decided, Nope,
that's not for me, I'm gonnakeep doing my level up thing I
rely on creating the content.
Within the following five or sixweeks after I talked to you,
Leo, I got six clients, I don'tlike the following eight or
(39:00):
nine. Like all together, I gotlike, I grew more and a month
and a half time period than Idid all of 2020. Like it was
ridiculous. And it was like youstarted that. So I wrote those
messages multiple times. As I dothis feels too weird to like
sign like over a message. But itjust kind of lines up perfectly
with what this podcast is about.
(39:23):
And just that little bit of liketiming, and then just kind of
persistence and pushing pastlike some of that uncomfortable
stuff. I don't know what it was.
But yeah, because I decided tojust say, you know what, like, I
think I'm onto something I thinklike I am on the right path,
even though it hasn't felt thegreatest all the way through. I
think what I'm doing is addingvalue, and that there's a need
(39:44):
in for that. And so, yeah, Ijust want to thank you for for
kind of reaching out when youdid because everything could be
tied to that specific encounter,where we started talking a
little bit more intensely aboutthose types of things.
That's amazing. I was so gladthat you told me that and what a
(40:04):
man, I swear, it seems like whenwe're feeling uncertain about
what we want to do, it seemslike there's like a temptation.
That's always when thetemptation shows up. It's like
you're questioning what you wantto do. And here's this, here's
this offer being dangled infront of you, Hey, I'll buy you
out. Here's security again, youget to your clients. And then as
(40:25):
soon as you said, No, it waslike the floodgates open man, I
don't, I don't know why it isthat that happens. But I do
where it's like, it's likeyou're saying to the universe
like No, I wasn't kidding. Did Istutter? What I said, This is
what I want to do. Like, I'mserious. So that's, that's
really amazing. I've really beenmulling over the some of the
(40:48):
topics from this nextconversation with Valerie
Phoenix. She's the founder andCEO of tech by choice, I think
about change a lot like personalchange, personal development, do
we change? Or do we just kind ofbecome more evolved versions of
who we've always been? andValerie kind of shows us that
(41:12):
our values will kind of stay thesame. And we just get better and
better and better at practicingthose values. You know what I
mean? And that's a veryinteresting conversation. It's
been a very interesting debate.
I've posed the question in acouple of different ways on
Instagram before, and I reallylove everyone's responses. So
yeah, let me know what you thinkof this. Because here here is
(41:34):
that theory and practice withValerie ever done stuff in the
past, like before in yourprevious life, pre tech, where
you were really involved in a ina community or any kind of like
giving pack?
Oh, my god, you're connecting somany dads, I'm just like, oh,
wow, I am very like communitybase and everything I do.
(42:00):
That's why I'm hosting thepodcast. Just call me the
millennial Oprah.
No, I think thinking back tolike, how I grew up, my mom did
daycare. So we had like,anywhere from like, 10 to 15
kids in the house at any giventime. And so I learned a lot of
(42:21):
like, how to be a person from mymom and like modeling how she
worked with the kids and workwith the parents. And she was
very, what is the group want todo? How does the group feel
about this? She was never thetype of person to say like,
Whoa, everyone's going to eatthis. We don't like it, then you
just don't eat. Like that wasjust not the way she handled
(42:42):
things. And so I think that wasmy first understanding of
community. And the way she ranthe daycare, she made us feel
more so like a family versuslike, these are the daycare
kids. They're separate. Like,no, we were all together doing
things. And we had a lot of fundoing it. Um, so I think that's
(43:05):
where that comes from in the waythat I decided to like, be it
show up as leader and the waythat I look at Tech by choice,
because it's pretty much nowthat I think about it, like the
colors we have protect by choiceis actually the same colors that
my mom had for her. Herchildcare logo. So I like your
you'd have no clue like how youthought she just connected right
(43:27):
now. I'm just I've turned intomy mom. Like,
in the best ways, though. Itsounds like Yeah, yeah, I'm
just my mom. And I didn'trealize that until like right
now. Um, yeah, community. It'sjust second nature for me, I
guess.
Yeah. I love that. That's socool. And pardon the pun on
(43:49):
Phnom Penh. But the the colorsbeing the same as the daycare
that's quite a quite a callback.
if I do say so much.
You got you got it. I don't knowhow many other people's gonna
laugh at that.
too. It's funny because wementioned callbacks. So it's a
literal callback. And then it'sit's a pun on the callback
(44:10):
functions is huh. Yeah. Yes. Whotwo nerds just laughed a lot at
that. Yeah. That's really cool.
I love that. So what about incollege? Were you ever involved
in any community stuff incollege?
college I just that was probablythe only time in my life I act
at my age. So there was no nocommunity base anything
(44:33):
happening. But in high school. Iwas a part of a lot of I think I
was a part of almost every clubat our at our high school.
Please don't ask me why or how,but I was. So a lot of community
there. And then I was a part ofthis program called upper bound.
That felt like a second home tome. And we really focused on
like how to get to college andall this other stuff and they
(44:55):
help with like resources andworkshops and classes. You
nobody else Very familiar. Thetech by choice. Okay.
Very familiar. Yeah.
Yeah. So I'm just a repeat of mylife. So yeah.
No, that's, that's good.
Yeah. So I think that wasanother farming community, what
(45:15):
other, I also will know, incollege, I did come back and
like help volunteer for thatprogram, the upper bound
programs, I worked with a lot oflike high school students
getting ready for college. Andthat was a lot of fun. I think I
used to one of my favoritethings that me and my mom would
do together. Growing up isbeauty that relates to life,
(45:39):
events, local events, so beingable to go hang out in the park
and like, get that together. Andso I guess, there's a lot of
aspects of my life that has beenvery community based driven and
stuff like that.
Yeah, that's really cool. So Ithink I touched on it before we
recorded that. One of the thingsthat I was going to try to
(46:00):
figure out remember, I said, Ihave questions that are geared
towards trying to figure outwhy, of all of all the people
that know that these problems intech exist? Why was it you that
started tech by choice? And not?
And not in a like, Who are youto say, but almost the exact
opposite of like, why isn'teverybody feeling like, you
(46:22):
know, empowered to do this? Andthe reason why is because you
already had so much experiencein that you know what I mean?
Like this is, this is just whatyou do, like you are a community
driven person, and you believeso, so close to the core of who
you are in the power ofcommunity and community driven
things that it almost seems likeif you see a need for that
(46:46):
community, it's like you can'tyou can't help but do it because
it is just such a part of whoyou are.
That was so sweet. Are you amotivational speaker too?
Because that definitely made mefeel good.
All right, last, but certainlynot least, is my dear friend
(47:06):
Emily. And my friendship withEmily has always been really
special to me, we met at a jobat a theme park and going to
Disneyland together has been abig part of our friendship, you
know, so there's just a lot oflot of interesting, unique
experiences Emily and I haveshared and we also have been
(47:27):
able to have really interesting,deep conversations, you know,
it's something that I feel likea lot of people don't think
about when it comes to theDisney adults, is if you're
spending a lot of time withsomeone at Disneyland, you're
spending a lot of time with themin lines, you ended up having a
lot of conversations. And Ireally, you know, there were
(47:48):
actually there were so manydifferent opportunities in so
many different episodes. Really,this is a theme that kind of
came up in every episode. Butthis is one of the ones where it
was the most explicitly laid outto know what you want to do in
life, you have to know who youare, and you got to be true to
yourself. I really, reallyappreciate not just Emily, but
(48:13):
really everybody's willingnessto be open and to share all the
different parts of themselveswith me. So that we can really
see that principle in action. Sothat's exactly what Emily nine
talk about. Let's check it out.
When I graduated college, I wasstill living with my parents for
a couple years. And so therewere to me, I had like these
(48:33):
three major things that I neededto fix, because I was an adult
now, and I shouldn't be like atthis stage in my life, I should
be at this stage in my life. Andnumber one was housing, I wanted
to have my own place, or atleast not live with my parents
anymore. Number two was my job.
I wanted a actual like real biggirl job and not like a retail
(48:54):
job. And number three was ourrelationship. And I don't think
I wanted a relationshipnecessarily, because there was
anybody I was particularlyinterested in and like wanted to
be with, like I wanted arelationship because I wanted
that experience that so manyother people in my life had had.
(49:15):
And I felt like I must bemissing out on something by not
having like a long termrelationship with somebody. And
so that kind of, I think made meI don't know if I would say
depressed, but definitely justlike questioning myself and my
self worth. And it really playeda lot into my self esteem, which
(49:37):
wasn't the greatest for me, youknow, as a young adult, and I
think part of that was thatreason and you know, a lot of
people have misconceptions aboutasexuality or like don't
understand that it is aspectrum. So just because you
you know aren't sexuallyattracted to people doesn't mean
(49:58):
that You aren't necessarilyromantically attracted to people
or, you know, you kind of feelalmost like a platonic bond. But
like, it's almost more thanthat, like, Oh, yeah, like, I
want you to be like my person.
But like, I don't necessarilywant to sleep with you. But
like, I want us to not be justfriends, you know. So it's like
(50:18):
this weird, like, in betweenfeeling. So it's difficult. And
you know, there were times whenI was interested in in men and
had crushes on people. And itwas just kind of it was weird,
because it's like, you want tothis, this person. And it was
just kind of messing with myhead a lot. And I think,
(50:39):
realizing that there are otherpeople like me, who have who
experienced the same thoughtsand feelings that I do kind of
made me more comfortable beinglike, oh, okay, well, then,
maybe this isn't something thatI need to be looking for.
Because I feel like now, ifsomebody who wasn't also
somewhere on the asexualspectrum, I don't think it would
(51:01):
work out. And I think I would,that would just give me another
reason to be depressed. Andyeah, I don't need that in my
life. So I think coming to termswith who I am, how has made me
realize, like, oh, like, maybethis isn't one of the three
things that I need to focus on,you know what I mean? Like, I
don't need to focus on this tomake my life better. I can just,
(51:24):
like, cross that off the listand be like, you know, if I meet
someone great, that understandsand kind of feels the same way
that I do. Awesome. If not, nobig deal. Like, I am so happy
and being independent and takingcare of myself. And I think
having another person to sharethat with would just kind of be
(51:44):
like an added bonus if it wereto happen.
Yeah, that totally makes sense.
Thank you for sharing that. Youcut out in some parts of it, but
I think so hopefully, hopefullythe recording recorded okay, but
even. Yeah, man, you just cutout again, I think we got the
the most important stuff, whichis that asexuality is a
(52:05):
spectrum. And honestly, thebiggest clue that maybe you were
asexual was that you kind ofrealize that your desire to have
relationships mostly came fromsocietal pressure, basically,
like, this is what everyone'sdoing. So this must be what I
want. Which is, which is so fun.
(52:27):
Because to me, that's kind oflike the theme of the show of
this show. Even though it's morewith like careers, it's like,
you know, we don't just like, goto college and get good grades
and get a good job. Like, wehave to be a little bit more
creative. Like that was kind ofyour experience, even with your
sexuality was like, you know,it's not just, you know,
graduate from high school, meetsome nice young man and then
(52:47):
marry him and have babies itwas, you know, something wasn't
quite right with that. And youhad to figure that out. And now,
now that you've figured it out,there's you know, that that
nagging feeling of Am I doingsomething wrong is subsided, and
you can you can live your life.
And I think that's great.
Yeah, me too. I'm very, veryhappy, just kind of having that
having the knowledge and knowinglike, you know, I don't need to
(53:10):
waste my time with dating apps.
And I don't need to waste mytime trying to find somebody to
be with for the rest of my life,because that's not my path. And
that's not, you know, it worksgreat for some people, but it
doesn't work for everybody. AndI think a society and just
people on a on a broader levelneed to understand that what
works just because it works fora lot of people doesn't mean it
(53:32):
works for everybody. And youdon't you know, just because
somebody just because someone issingle, long term doesn't mean
that they're unhappy.
All right, thank you so, so muchfor listening to the best of
season one. If you enjoyed thisepisode, please consider sharing
(53:54):
it with someone, especially ifyou think that they would enjoy
one or more of these clips. LikeI said, I started this show
because I like havingconversations, and nothing would
make me happier than to knowthat these conversations that
that we have on the show, areinspiring other conversations
(54:16):
out there in the real world. Soshare it with your friends, make
it your Instagram story. Take ascreenshot of this. Wherever
you're listening to it posted toyour Instagram story, you can
tag me at Leo Yockey LEYOCKE whyit's a great way to let your
friends know what you're intowithout feeling like you're
(54:37):
bothering them or anything likethat. If you really liked it, if
you want to really support theshow, leave me a five star
review original review. Youknow, let me know what you're
into let me know what you likedabout this show. And I do read
these reviews and I and I putthem into consideration and hey,
like when you hit me up and sayI'd love to talk about this, or
(55:00):
I'd love to hear about this. Ijust had someone asked me
recently, if there's a goodepisode about time management, I
was like, oh, there's there's acouple of examples. But now Now
I have that in mind. And I'mgoing to be looking for someone
where we can really get intotalking about time management. I
actually have a couple ofpotential guests in mind for
that. So hopefully, I'll be ableto get them in for season two.
(55:23):
So yeah, let me know like, yeah,season two is coming up. We're
we got one more episode left togo with season one. So okay,
we're not really taking a break,though. So let me let me kind of
break down how this is going togo. We have this episode coming
out today. Yeah, August 24. NextTuesday, August 31, is going to
be the season one finale, whichI just realized, there's some
(55:47):
interesting symbolism to to thatdate. So that that's amazing.
Okay, I'll talk about that nextweek. The week after that
September 7, I'm going to bereleasing the trailer for season
two. So if there's any time thatI'm taking a break, it's then
and then September 14, we'rerolling right into season two,
(56:08):
so it's gonna be good stuff. I'mreally excited for it. I've
actually already recorded all ofthe interviews for the month of
September for the first month ofseason two. It's gonna be
fantastic. We're taking this ina slightly different direction.
It's still gonna be a lot ofreally interesting deep
conversations with a widevariety of people. But I think
(56:30):
you'll like the direction thatwe're going. And so, again,
thank you for being on thisjourney with me. I'll see you
next week for the season onefinale, stay evolving.
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