January 9, 2025 • 24 mins
Welcome to this episode of Author Nation, where we explore the art of writing with clarity and purpose. Join host Melody Ann and guest Leslee Hall as they discuss how to use plain words to deliver powerful messages. Discover accessible writing techniques that will transform your writing and help you connect with your audience.
Want to finally publish your book and start making money from it? Download my FREE guide - The Publishing Decision: How to Choose the Best Path for Your Book! here: http://authornation.online/publishing
Key Takeaways:
Don’t miss this chance to elevate your writing skills and share your unique voice with the world! Read the notes at Plain Words, Powerful Messages | Accessible writing techniques - Author Nation.
Want to finally publish your book and start making money from it? Download my FREE guide - The Publishing Decision: How to Choose the Best Path for Your Book! here: http://authornation.online/publishing
Key Takeaways:
- Learn how to write with impact by simplifying your language for broader accessibility.
- Discover the importance of identifying your core message to enhance reader engagement.
- Explore practical strategies to separate emotional reactions from logical thinking in your writing.
- Gain insights on how personal experiences can enrich your storytelling and resonate with readers.
Don’t miss this chance to elevate your writing skills and share your unique voice with the world! Read the notes at Plain Words, Powerful Messages | Accessible writing techniques - Author Nation.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hey, everyone, welcome to Authonation. Today we're diving into expressing
yourself through words as an artist. I'm your host, Melody Anne,
and I'm here to guide you towards actionable insights and
strategies that will help you write with purpose but also
connect with your readers, because that's what you really want
to do. An AutoNation where we always equip you with
(00:30):
the resources you need. So go check out authonation dot
online and you'll find a library of resources that you
need right now. So, whether you're sleeping your morning coffee
or winding down after a long day, or like my
guest on the road, settle in and talking about guests,
let me introduce him from the Southern United States. Leslie
Hall is a former athlete turned pro musician with a
(00:55):
degree and background in corporate finance. He's made his living
and his way across the United States musically via various bars, clubs, restaurants,
and theaters. From the elevation of those stages, he's been
gifted with an extended gaze into the human condition, the
best and the worst of it. In his darkest season
(01:18):
of his own life, he found a trail to inner peace,
to true freedom and turned his curse into blessings, tracking
our inner animal. His book is his attempt to share
that blessing. Let's welcome Leslie. Hey, Leslie, how are you today?
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Out of wonderful?
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Yeah, you're always on the road, aren't you? Right?
Speaker 3 (01:43):
This is.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Exactly so exactly, So tell first thing, tell us a
little bit about yourself, like what kind of music you
play in, and then what inspired you to write this book?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:58):
I am really a rock and roll but I come
from the Gulf Coast of Alabama, way down in the
southern tip, and for me, it was moving to Nashville
once upon a time, so I kind of got immersed
into the country music world. I'm currently on the road
with a country music friend of mine helping him handle
(02:19):
his business, an artist named Larry Fleet. And we've been
we've been in fourteen countries this year and all over
the United States, and.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
I'm very happy to be headed home for the holidays.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
And I get to stay in one place for a
little bit and sleep at zero miles an hour. That's
always a nice thing. So I couldn't be more excited
about it right now.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Yeah, that's good. It's always good. You know what traveling
is wonderful and there's nothing like coming home at That's
how I feel most.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Definitely. My home is in Alabama.
Speaker 3 (02:56):
It's where all my family is and where I grew
up and my playground. I have a bunch of beaches
and swamps and bays and rivers and stuff. So I
get to get home and kind of recenter myself before
we take off again next year.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
And so that sounds brilliant. So what inspired you to
write a book?
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Well, I've, for whatever reason, I've been kind of a
lighthouse for a lot of my friends and family when
when things aren't going their way, they come talk to
me and we kind of sorted out. And that led
to being very frustrated about figuring out what might be
the right thing to do and then having them not
(03:38):
do it to you know, do the thing that that
felt the right thing to do, you know, do the
path of least resistance, type of stuffy. But it wasn't
until I kind of fell into some own my own trouble.
I moved to Nashville in twenty twelve and with the
girl that I thought I was going to marry, and
(04:00):
that didn't work out, and that led me to I
believe that it should I believe once you found your mate,
you made it work. You know, that was the example
that I'd seen, But that wasn't the case. And so
that was the little skill of them in my own
belief system that made me think, what other things do
I have that I believe to be true? But maybe
(04:23):
they're not universally true? And so that made me start
to take a real look at the world, you know,
through a through an open minded lens, because clearly I
wasn't I wasn't right about this.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
What else have I been wrong about?
Speaker 3 (04:39):
And so from my stages and travels and just interactions
with people, I just would listen to hear their story.
And there was one particular guy I played in downtown
Nashville for eight years, and I was just the world
would come int Ashville and I would interact with him.
(05:03):
There was one guy that would come back around was
fairly regularly at the bar that I played at, and
I noticed one night he was showing his phone to
the bartender and the manager and trying to condense this story.
But as it turned out, he aspired to be a chef.
(05:25):
He worked at McDonald's, but he aspired to be a chef,
and he was showing off pictures of a dessert that
he had made, and the bartender there and the managers
were really lifting him up in that moment.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
So I'm just kind of watching this take place. I
didn't know what was happening, so I asked whenever the whole.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Scene was done, and they told me, and I said, so,
you mean to tell me he just came in here
and rolled over and got his belly scratched and then
went on about his way, and they said, yeah, I
guess that's what happened. And I thought about it for
a minute, and I thought, if I took every dude
I've ever known and every dog I've ever known, I
bet you I could find a one to one personality
match there. And that was kind of the first idea
(06:06):
that I had towards there's an animal inside of us.
So that that led me kind of to start looking
around on the internet to see what kind of information
was out there, and.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
It led me.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
I got ghosted by a girl that I was really
interested in and that I didn't believe that should happen either,
So I finally texted her and I said, I know
you're in a weird spot. If you get to a
better spot in the future, you know, feel free to
holler at me. Then she immediately replied thank you, and
I thought, man, I've cracked this code.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
I must have cracked the code.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
So that led me again onto the Internet to see
if anybody else was having that.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Same trouble, and that's where the rabbit hole began.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
I soaked up a whole bunch of information that led
me to men's coaches, that led me to feminists, to psychology,
to philosophy, to evolutionary biology, to the Bible and Ted Talks,
and I just started really assimilating this information. And then
(07:13):
it was really evolutionary biology that really got me on
the trail. And it just dawned on me that if
I imagine myself through an animal lens, my behavior makes
a lot more sense and only crap.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
So does the rest of the world.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
So I really started thinking about what does that actually mean?
What does it mean that we are animals and what
does the animal trek through this life, through this world?
And I realized that animals just have two jobs, and
us to survive and reproduce. We have five biological senses
(07:50):
to interpret our surroundings, our environments, and most of us
are just walking through life, through our environments, bumping into things,
you know, chasing rewards and running from pain. And even
when the even when our brain tells us we should
(08:10):
do something, sometimes that thing is not the right thing
to do.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
It doesn't feel the best, or it's scary or something
like that.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
The reward we seek on the other side, but we
can't break through that fear to get to that reward
because the animal is going to go into avoid pain.
The animal doesn't like to be afraid, and so I
kind of my goal was to separate the human from
the animal and introduce them to.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Each other, because that's what happened for me.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
And the minute I realized that there were two factions
in there, the human and the animal, and they were
both fighting for time in the driver's seat, I started
learning to be able to articulate how the animal felt
versus just feeling it, started be able to experience my
own emotions and to be able to separate the two
(09:04):
from the human and the animal, and started to be
able to act a lot more in my own best
interest and to renegotiate the damning behaviors that I had
the animal training.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
If you will, yeah, really started to bring about.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
Some precision in the way that I could navigate my
life and the way that I could interact with others,
and I could I could see their struggle and what
their motivation was, and then I could.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Go meet them where they were and help them come along.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
Yeah, and you turned to go ahead. Yeah, so you
turned in. So, you know, after you did this for yourself,
you thought, Okay, I'm going to write a book or
or like what was that like?
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Commediately it was you know, I started talking to my
friends and family about it. And I was playing in
downtown Nashville at this point extensively, and I had a
real extended work family there, all the bartenders, all the
other musicians, the security guys, and all that sort of stuff,
not to mention the people that would come in, you know,
day in and day out.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
And listen to music. And I would interacte with those guys.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
And as you might imagine, in that environment, there's a
lot of turmoil, especially in social lives and love lives,
and people would still come to me wanting to help
sort it out, and it would take me a while
to give them the language that I wanted to be
able to use to take them from miles zero to
(10:36):
mile fifteen, so that we could start having the real conversation,
you know. And I was thinking about it, Maybe I
need to write this down, you know. I you know,
I had kind of daydreamed about writing a book when
I was younger, but I never had anything to say.
And then, you know, I was a musician and I
write songs. I don't write books. But I thought I
started thinking, maybe I should try to write this down.
(10:56):
So in late twenty nineteen, I was trying to calculate,
what is my slowest month of the year. Maybe I'll
take that month off and focus on trying to write
this down. And then, you know, three months later, COVID
happens and we get shut down in Nashville, and I think, well,
I'm never going to have another opportunity like this, hopefully
(11:17):
at least hopefully, you know, So let me try to
take advantage of this, and let me let me turn
this this blessing into into a this curse into a blessing.
And so I started thinking about how how would I
write it?
Speaker 2 (11:32):
And so I developed a few rules for myself.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
The first was I had to write it like I
would speak it, because that was my goal to be
able to speak it. I had to keep it short
enough that it wouldn't be a chore for folks to read,
it wouldn't be insurmountable for the average person. I had
to use plain language. I had to use stories and
examples and stuff. I didn't want to use any any
(11:59):
research terms, any scientific talk, because I wanted to keep
it accessible to whoever needed it. And a lot of
people that a lot of folks that need this kind
of perspective shift. They're they're in some sort of pain,
they're in some sort of survival mode, and they're not
going to be interested in reading a bunch of scientific jargon,
(12:21):
you know. So it was important for me to talk
in and plain language and just with stories and examples
from my own life and from the world that I've seen.
And so once I kind of had those rules, I
kind of sat down and what, you know, what are
the goals of it, you know, to give the reader
the language.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
That we want to use to to salt this thing out.
And so I just started from you know, what is
what is an aniable? What what is what.
Speaker 3 (12:51):
Is their existence their experience in this world? What are
their jobs? What are their struggles? What are their fears
and how does that translate to us? And then what
does it mean to be human?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
After what?
Speaker 3 (13:02):
What access do we have that the that the regular
animal out there doesn't have? And there are some higher
functioning tools that the animal doesn't have at its disposal,
logic and reason time in an abstract form, and morality
and language is a big one.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
You know animals.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
Animals don't have command of language, you know, they communicate
nonverbally with sounds and signals and body language and that.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
And if you think about it, most of our communication
is nonverbal, a lot of it. And you can change
the tone of the words that you say to give
an entirely different message. And so I tried to lay
it out to where we could see what an animal
was and then recognize our similarity with that animal, and
then understand what the higher functioning tools are that only
(13:53):
the human has access to, so that when we have
these animal reactions, the the motion, all these chemicals that
flow through us to motivate these actions that the freeze, fly,
or fight, those are the three levers for the animal.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
The human, through logic and reason and those those higher
reaching tools, has more options.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
But until we know that we don't know it, you know,
it's it's hidden so much in plain sight that we
can't we can't necessarily see it. And so my idea
was just to illuminate that, to amplify the message that
we are animals and humans and they're both riding around
in there, and if we can learn to facilitate communication
(14:40):
between the two, we can have much more peace. We
can understand why the animal is motivated to be mad
at this or be sad about this, and we can
have some agency on what to do about that. Rather
than being forced along our path by the energies and
the emotions that we're given through our environ we can
(15:01):
have some agency and designing that environment and choosing the
way that we react to whatever given stimulus we encounter
along our trek through our life.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, question to you, you talked about having stories in it,
and you travel a lot, So are these like real
stories and names change? Like how did you how did
you pull your experience from traveling as a as a
musician into kind of stories in the book.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
There are there are tons of examples in there.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
A lot I tried to pull from my own life
because I knew I had permission to talk about those.
You know, there are some some other stories where names
were left out, you know, just kind of more generalized,
more summarized type of thing to get the point across,
but not you know, no intent to to shame or
(16:00):
embarrass anyone, you know, exactly. There's a couple of chapters
in there. The girl that I mentioned that I moved
to Nashville with that ultimately broke my heart, and that
pain was ultimately my teacher. You know, she and I
are actually still very good friends, even this has been
(16:21):
ten years ago now ten years plus, and we still
are involved in each other's lives and you know, our
positive source for each other. But I got pretty pretty
raw with our relationship and the ending and the depression
that I had fallen into, and how I was able
to dig myself out of that, hopefully so that someone
(16:44):
else that's in that same spot can use those same
ideas in that perspective, the human animal perspective, to dig
themselves out.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Yeah. I've definitely read books that they gave me a
path forward, right, that's what.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
You're talking about.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Read your book and they can say okay, and now
I can see, now I can see a path forward.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
To gain some sort of agency over the over one's
own emotions, one's own path in their life, to be
able to design it rather than just wind up wherever
it is you wind up because the winds of time
are going to blow us around. Either we can find
our steering mechanism of our own vessel and steer into
(17:27):
the wind or steer out of the wind as we
need to, or we're gonna get blown around by those
winds and we're going to wind up in places that
we didn't intend to wind up.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
And those places may be prosperous or they may be painful.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
And I just want to shine this light so that
we can have some agency over.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Where we steer.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah, because you sometimes we end up in places we
didn't actually need to end up, and we didn't even
want to be there, and then we were there, and
then it can be really hard to get out of
those places. I wanted to ask about your music in
the book, right, so you're you're a touring musician, and
you know, so you could you could have written songs
(18:08):
about it, and I get why you wrote a book.
It's like, yeah, you can't really you know, if somebody's struggling,
you can't really well sit down, I'll sing you a song.
Right But is there an interplay between the book and
the music you're writing right now?
Speaker 2 (18:22):
There certainly is. I have.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
I have a I have a song in the pipeline
right now called Slip the Chain, which slip the Chain
and if you can imagine an animal being chained up
in the yard, never knowing beyond the fence and.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
The ability to slip out of that.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
Chain and see the world. Like you said, it's you know,
if someone is struggling, music can be a therapeutic tool,
and a lot of people use it that way, and
that puts me in that position to have those conversations
effort for whatever reason, I've heard the naked truth about
(19:05):
thousands of people at this point, you know, I'm able
to touch on their emotions and bring that out and
they want to share it with me.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
And at one point I was a little.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
Burdened by that, but then I realized that this is
a gift. I get to know people on a far
deeper level than the average person does.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
Yeah, I love it, so I do too.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
I've always been inter interested in it, and now I'm
super interested in them and I can hopefully, you know,
have that opportunity that that organic opportunity to share this
light that I see. I try to wait till I
have permission from the universe to talk about it, but
you'd be surprised how easily the universe gives that permission.
(19:52):
So yeah, even on the I was on a plane
just a couple of days ago and the two people
I was sitting in between, we ended up having a
human animal talk and I was able to share and
share some light with those guys, both struggling in different ways,
but I was able to say, Hey, you know, I
have this resource if you if you'd like it, feel
(20:14):
free to check it out.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Yeah, and talking about that Leslie, I'm just going to say,
you know, connect with Leslie. So on on Instagram human
animal theory, do you say just about the book or
do you put your music on there as well?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
That one is just about the book and ideas kind
of surrounding it. I'm just in the process of building
it stretched pretty.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Full these days.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
And so my personal Instagram that that does have a
little bit of music more about life is this Leslie
Jackson Hall h A L.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
I'll get that.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
That's my personal Instagram. They're a little more you know,
full of life.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Not just the book.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Thank you. And as we wrap up, where do we
find the book?
Speaker 3 (21:01):
The book is on Amazon. I've also done an audio version.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
I read it myself.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Actually, there was a real synergy of skills there. I
was able to record the entire audio book by myself.
I didn't have to hire any of that out. I
did have a friend of mine, my good friend Stephen,
did the mastering on it to get the levels right where.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
They needed to be for audible and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
But I was able to produce the whole thing just
right there in my apartment in Nashville, Tennessee.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
So yes, well, I guess in the music world you
have the equipment you need to produce an audio book, right.
I've never thought about that, But there's a lot of
crossover there, same equipment and editing skills.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
There's a lot of crossover between the music space and
the book space that I was pleased to find. And
at the end of the day, it's a product to
be packaged to be marketed, you know what I mean,
And that's a book or an album, whatever the case
may be.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Exactly. Well, thank you Leslie for for coming so the
human human animal theory on Instagram is all about the book.
Leslie Hall on Instagram is all about Leslie and his music.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Jackson.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Sorry, Leslie, part of me, Leslie Jackson Hall. I will
make sure that is in the description and I will
also grab a link for the do A website, Leslie, Okay, okay,
working on When you have it, let me know and
I'll pop that in the description as well. Perfect. Thank
you so much for coming, Leslie. I've really enjoyed chatting
(22:35):
with you. It's it's been it's been so much fun. Likewise,
and thank you everyone else out there for joining us
today on Authornation Interviews. I hope this conversation has been
inspiring and and fun because I've I've really enjoyed it. Good.
Remember to visit authoration dot online to find the resources
(22:58):
you need to be a non fiction author. And we
always want your feedback and we always want your support.
So if you've enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving comment,
leaving a review, and don't forget to share it with
somebody who needs to be inspired to write the book
that they have they've had that light bulb moment in
their life after a lot of research and just you know,
(23:21):
as Leslie does you know, seeing the world in a
very raw form, which I think is an amazing way
to gather information. To take that raw form of life
and commingle it with research as Leslie's been talking about.
I think that's amazing. So keep writing, keep creating, and
continue to share your unique stories with the world
Speaker 2 (24:00):
And
Hey, everyone, welcome to Authonation. Today we're diving into expressing
yourself through words as an artist. I'm your host, Melody Anne,
and I'm here to guide you towards actionable insights and
strategies that will help you write with purpose but also
connect with your readers, because that's what you really want
to do. An AutoNation where we always equip you with
(00:30):
the resources you need. So go check out authonation dot
online and you'll find a library of resources that you
need right now. So, whether you're sleeping your morning coffee
or winding down after a long day, or like my
guest on the road, settle in and talking about guests,
let me introduce him from the Southern United States. Leslie
Hall is a former athlete turned pro musician with a
(00:55):
degree and background in corporate finance. He's made his living
and his way across the United States musically via various bars, clubs, restaurants,
and theaters. From the elevation of those stages, he's been
gifted with an extended gaze into the human condition, the
best and the worst of it. In his darkest season
(01:18):
of his own life, he found a trail to inner peace,
to true freedom and turned his curse into blessings, tracking
our inner animal. His book is his attempt to share
that blessing. Let's welcome Leslie. Hey, Leslie, how are you today?
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Out of wonderful?
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Yeah, you're always on the road, aren't you? Right?
Speaker 3 (01:43):
This is.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Exactly so exactly, So tell first thing, tell us a
little bit about yourself, like what kind of music you
play in, and then what inspired you to write this book?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:58):
I am really a rock and roll but I come
from the Gulf Coast of Alabama, way down in the
southern tip, and for me, it was moving to Nashville
once upon a time, so I kind of got immersed
into the country music world. I'm currently on the road
with a country music friend of mine helping him handle
(02:19):
his business, an artist named Larry Fleet. And we've been
we've been in fourteen countries this year and all over
the United States, and.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
I'm very happy to be headed home for the holidays.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
And I get to stay in one place for a
little bit and sleep at zero miles an hour. That's
always a nice thing. So I couldn't be more excited
about it right now.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Yeah, that's good. It's always good. You know what traveling
is wonderful and there's nothing like coming home at That's
how I feel most.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Definitely. My home is in Alabama.
Speaker 3 (02:56):
It's where all my family is and where I grew
up and my playground. I have a bunch of beaches
and swamps and bays and rivers and stuff. So I
get to get home and kind of recenter myself before
we take off again next year.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
And so that sounds brilliant. So what inspired you to
write a book?
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Well, I've, for whatever reason, I've been kind of a
lighthouse for a lot of my friends and family when
when things aren't going their way, they come talk to
me and we kind of sorted out. And that led
to being very frustrated about figuring out what might be
the right thing to do and then having them not
(03:38):
do it to you know, do the thing that that
felt the right thing to do, you know, do the
path of least resistance, type of stuffy. But it wasn't
until I kind of fell into some own my own trouble.
I moved to Nashville in twenty twelve and with the
girl that I thought I was going to marry, and
(04:00):
that didn't work out, and that led me to I
believe that it should I believe once you found your mate,
you made it work. You know, that was the example
that I'd seen, But that wasn't the case. And so
that was the little skill of them in my own
belief system that made me think, what other things do
I have that I believe to be true? But maybe
(04:23):
they're not universally true? And so that made me start
to take a real look at the world, you know,
through a through an open minded lens, because clearly I
wasn't I wasn't right about this.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
What else have I been wrong about?
Speaker 3 (04:39):
And so from my stages and travels and just interactions
with people, I just would listen to hear their story.
And there was one particular guy I played in downtown
Nashville for eight years, and I was just the world
would come int Ashville and I would interact with him.
(05:03):
There was one guy that would come back around was
fairly regularly at the bar that I played at, and
I noticed one night he was showing his phone to
the bartender and the manager and trying to condense this story.
But as it turned out, he aspired to be a chef.
(05:25):
He worked at McDonald's, but he aspired to be a chef,
and he was showing off pictures of a dessert that
he had made, and the bartender there and the managers
were really lifting him up in that moment.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
So I'm just kind of watching this take place. I
didn't know what was happening, so I asked whenever the whole.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Scene was done, and they told me, and I said, so,
you mean to tell me he just came in here
and rolled over and got his belly scratched and then
went on about his way, and they said, yeah, I
guess that's what happened. And I thought about it for
a minute, and I thought, if I took every dude
I've ever known and every dog I've ever known, I
bet you I could find a one to one personality
match there. And that was kind of the first idea
(06:06):
that I had towards there's an animal inside of us.
So that that led me kind of to start looking
around on the internet to see what kind of information
was out there, and.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
It led me.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
I got ghosted by a girl that I was really
interested in and that I didn't believe that should happen either,
So I finally texted her and I said, I know
you're in a weird spot. If you get to a
better spot in the future, you know, feel free to
holler at me. Then she immediately replied thank you, and
I thought, man, I've cracked this code.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
I must have cracked the code.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
So that led me again onto the Internet to see
if anybody else was having that.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Same trouble, and that's where the rabbit hole began.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
I soaked up a whole bunch of information that led
me to men's coaches, that led me to feminists, to psychology,
to philosophy, to evolutionary biology, to the Bible and Ted Talks,
and I just started really assimilating this information. And then
(07:13):
it was really evolutionary biology that really got me on
the trail. And it just dawned on me that if
I imagine myself through an animal lens, my behavior makes
a lot more sense and only crap.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
So does the rest of the world.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
So I really started thinking about what does that actually mean?
What does it mean that we are animals and what
does the animal trek through this life, through this world?
And I realized that animals just have two jobs, and
us to survive and reproduce. We have five biological senses
(07:50):
to interpret our surroundings, our environments, and most of us
are just walking through life, through our environments, bumping into things,
you know, chasing rewards and running from pain. And even
when the even when our brain tells us we should
(08:10):
do something, sometimes that thing is not the right thing
to do.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
It doesn't feel the best, or it's scary or something
like that.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
The reward we seek on the other side, but we
can't break through that fear to get to that reward
because the animal is going to go into avoid pain.
The animal doesn't like to be afraid, and so I
kind of my goal was to separate the human from
the animal and introduce them to.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Each other, because that's what happened for me.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
And the minute I realized that there were two factions
in there, the human and the animal, and they were
both fighting for time in the driver's seat, I started
learning to be able to articulate how the animal felt
versus just feeling it, started be able to experience my
own emotions and to be able to separate the two
(09:04):
from the human and the animal, and started to be
able to act a lot more in my own best
interest and to renegotiate the damning behaviors that I had
the animal training.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
If you will, yeah, really started to bring about.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
Some precision in the way that I could navigate my
life and the way that I could interact with others,
and I could I could see their struggle and what
their motivation was, and then I could.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Go meet them where they were and help them come along.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
Yeah, and you turned to go ahead. Yeah, so you
turned in. So, you know, after you did this for yourself,
you thought, Okay, I'm going to write a book or
or like what was that like?
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Commediately it was you know, I started talking to my
friends and family about it. And I was playing in
downtown Nashville at this point extensively, and I had a
real extended work family there, all the bartenders, all the
other musicians, the security guys, and all that sort of stuff,
not to mention the people that would come in, you know,
day in and day out.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
And listen to music. And I would interacte with those guys.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
And as you might imagine, in that environment, there's a
lot of turmoil, especially in social lives and love lives,
and people would still come to me wanting to help
sort it out, and it would take me a while
to give them the language that I wanted to be
able to use to take them from miles zero to
(10:36):
mile fifteen, so that we could start having the real conversation,
you know. And I was thinking about it, Maybe I
need to write this down, you know. I you know,
I had kind of daydreamed about writing a book when
I was younger, but I never had anything to say.
And then, you know, I was a musician and I
write songs. I don't write books. But I thought I
started thinking, maybe I should try to write this down.
(10:56):
So in late twenty nineteen, I was trying to calculate,
what is my slowest month of the year. Maybe I'll
take that month off and focus on trying to write
this down. And then, you know, three months later, COVID
happens and we get shut down in Nashville, and I think, well,
I'm never going to have another opportunity like this, hopefully
(11:17):
at least hopefully, you know, So let me try to
take advantage of this, and let me let me turn
this this blessing into into a this curse into a blessing.
And so I started thinking about how how would I
write it?
Speaker 2 (11:32):
And so I developed a few rules for myself.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
The first was I had to write it like I
would speak it, because that was my goal to be
able to speak it. I had to keep it short
enough that it wouldn't be a chore for folks to read,
it wouldn't be insurmountable for the average person. I had
to use plain language. I had to use stories and
examples and stuff. I didn't want to use any any
(11:59):
research terms, any scientific talk, because I wanted to keep
it accessible to whoever needed it. And a lot of
people that a lot of folks that need this kind
of perspective shift. They're they're in some sort of pain,
they're in some sort of survival mode, and they're not
going to be interested in reading a bunch of scientific jargon,
(12:21):
you know. So it was important for me to talk
in and plain language and just with stories and examples
from my own life and from the world that I've seen.
And so once I kind of had those rules, I
kind of sat down and what, you know, what are
the goals of it, you know, to give the reader
the language.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
That we want to use to to salt this thing out.
And so I just started from you know, what is
what is an aniable? What what is what.
Speaker 3 (12:51):
Is their existence their experience in this world? What are
their jobs? What are their struggles? What are their fears
and how does that translate to us? And then what
does it mean to be human?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
After what?
Speaker 3 (13:02):
What access do we have that the that the regular
animal out there doesn't have? And there are some higher
functioning tools that the animal doesn't have at its disposal,
logic and reason time in an abstract form, and morality
and language is a big one.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
You know animals.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
Animals don't have command of language, you know, they communicate
nonverbally with sounds and signals and body language and that.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
And if you think about it, most of our communication
is nonverbal, a lot of it. And you can change
the tone of the words that you say to give
an entirely different message. And so I tried to lay
it out to where we could see what an animal
was and then recognize our similarity with that animal, and
then understand what the higher functioning tools are that only
(13:53):
the human has access to, so that when we have
these animal reactions, the the motion, all these chemicals that
flow through us to motivate these actions that the freeze, fly,
or fight, those are the three levers for the animal.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
The human, through logic and reason and those those higher
reaching tools, has more options.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
But until we know that we don't know it, you know,
it's it's hidden so much in plain sight that we
can't we can't necessarily see it. And so my idea
was just to illuminate that, to amplify the message that
we are animals and humans and they're both riding around
in there, and if we can learn to facilitate communication
(14:40):
between the two, we can have much more peace. We
can understand why the animal is motivated to be mad
at this or be sad about this, and we can
have some agency on what to do about that. Rather
than being forced along our path by the energies and
the emotions that we're given through our environ we can
(15:01):
have some agency and designing that environment and choosing the
way that we react to whatever given stimulus we encounter
along our trek through our life.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, question to you, you talked about having stories in it,
and you travel a lot, So are these like real
stories and names change? Like how did you how did
you pull your experience from traveling as a as a
musician into kind of stories in the book.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
There are there are tons of examples in there.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
A lot I tried to pull from my own life
because I knew I had permission to talk about those.
You know, there are some some other stories where names
were left out, you know, just kind of more generalized,
more summarized type of thing to get the point across,
but not you know, no intent to to shame or
(16:00):
embarrass anyone, you know, exactly. There's a couple of chapters
in there. The girl that I mentioned that I moved
to Nashville with that ultimately broke my heart, and that
pain was ultimately my teacher. You know, she and I
are actually still very good friends, even this has been
(16:21):
ten years ago now ten years plus, and we still
are involved in each other's lives and you know, our
positive source for each other. But I got pretty pretty
raw with our relationship and the ending and the depression
that I had fallen into, and how I was able
to dig myself out of that, hopefully so that someone
(16:44):
else that's in that same spot can use those same
ideas in that perspective, the human animal perspective, to dig
themselves out.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Yeah. I've definitely read books that they gave me a
path forward, right, that's what.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
You're talking about.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Read your book and they can say okay, and now
I can see, now I can see a path forward.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
To gain some sort of agency over the over one's
own emotions, one's own path in their life, to be
able to design it rather than just wind up wherever
it is you wind up because the winds of time
are going to blow us around. Either we can find
our steering mechanism of our own vessel and steer into
(17:27):
the wind or steer out of the wind as we
need to, or we're gonna get blown around by those
winds and we're going to wind up in places that
we didn't intend to wind up.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
And those places may be prosperous or they may be painful.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
And I just want to shine this light so that
we can have some agency over.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Where we steer.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah, because you sometimes we end up in places we
didn't actually need to end up, and we didn't even
want to be there, and then we were there, and
then it can be really hard to get out of
those places. I wanted to ask about your music in
the book, right, so you're you're a touring musician, and
you know, so you could you could have written songs
(18:08):
about it, and I get why you wrote a book.
It's like, yeah, you can't really you know, if somebody's struggling,
you can't really well sit down, I'll sing you a song.
Right But is there an interplay between the book and
the music you're writing right now?
Speaker 2 (18:22):
There certainly is. I have.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
I have a I have a song in the pipeline
right now called Slip the Chain, which slip the Chain
and if you can imagine an animal being chained up
in the yard, never knowing beyond the fence and.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
The ability to slip out of that.
Speaker 3 (18:43):
Chain and see the world. Like you said, it's you know,
if someone is struggling, music can be a therapeutic tool,
and a lot of people use it that way, and
that puts me in that position to have those conversations
effort for whatever reason, I've heard the naked truth about
(19:05):
thousands of people at this point, you know, I'm able
to touch on their emotions and bring that out and
they want to share it with me.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
And at one point I was a little.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
Burdened by that, but then I realized that this is
a gift. I get to know people on a far
deeper level than the average person does.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
Yeah, I love it, so I do too.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
I've always been inter interested in it, and now I'm
super interested in them and I can hopefully, you know,
have that opportunity that that organic opportunity to share this
light that I see. I try to wait till I
have permission from the universe to talk about it, but
you'd be surprised how easily the universe gives that permission.
(19:52):
So yeah, even on the I was on a plane
just a couple of days ago and the two people
I was sitting in between, we ended up having a
human animal talk and I was able to share and
share some light with those guys, both struggling in different ways,
but I was able to say, Hey, you know, I
have this resource if you if you'd like it, feel
(20:14):
free to check it out.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Yeah, and talking about that Leslie, I'm just going to say,
you know, connect with Leslie. So on on Instagram human
animal theory, do you say just about the book or
do you put your music on there as well?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
That one is just about the book and ideas kind
of surrounding it. I'm just in the process of building
it stretched pretty.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Full these days.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
And so my personal Instagram that that does have a
little bit of music more about life is this Leslie
Jackson Hall h A L.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
I'll get that.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
That's my personal Instagram. They're a little more you know,
full of life.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Not just the book.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Thank you. And as we wrap up, where do we
find the book?
Speaker 3 (21:01):
The book is on Amazon. I've also done an audio version.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
I read it myself.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Actually, there was a real synergy of skills there. I
was able to record the entire audio book by myself.
I didn't have to hire any of that out. I
did have a friend of mine, my good friend Stephen,
did the mastering on it to get the levels right where.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
They needed to be for audible and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
But I was able to produce the whole thing just
right there in my apartment in Nashville, Tennessee.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
So yes, well, I guess in the music world you
have the equipment you need to produce an audio book, right.
I've never thought about that, But there's a lot of
crossover there, same equipment and editing skills.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
There's a lot of crossover between the music space and
the book space that I was pleased to find. And
at the end of the day, it's a product to
be packaged to be marketed, you know what I mean,
And that's a book or an album, whatever the case
may be.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Exactly. Well, thank you Leslie for for coming so the
human human animal theory on Instagram is all about the book.
Leslie Hall on Instagram is all about Leslie and his music.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Jackson.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Sorry, Leslie, part of me, Leslie Jackson Hall. I will
make sure that is in the description and I will
also grab a link for the do A website, Leslie, Okay, okay,
working on When you have it, let me know and
I'll pop that in the description as well. Perfect. Thank
you so much for coming, Leslie. I've really enjoyed chatting
(22:35):
with you. It's it's been it's been so much fun. Likewise,
and thank you everyone else out there for joining us
today on Authornation Interviews. I hope this conversation has been
inspiring and and fun because I've I've really enjoyed it. Good.
Remember to visit authoration dot online to find the resources
(22:58):
you need to be a non fiction author. And we
always want your feedback and we always want your support.
So if you've enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving comment,
leaving a review, and don't forget to share it with
somebody who needs to be inspired to write the book
that they have they've had that light bulb moment in
their life after a lot of research and just you know,
(23:21):
as Leslie does you know, seeing the world in a
very raw form, which I think is an amazing way
to gather information. To take that raw form of life
and commingle it with research as Leslie's been talking about.
I think that's amazing. So keep writing, keep creating, and
continue to share your unique stories with the world
Speaker 2 (24:00):
And
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