Good Life Project - Ani DiFranco, Zoe Boekbinder, Nathen Brown | The Prison Music Project

Episode Date: October 15, 2020

In 2010, folk-singer and songwriter Zoe Boekbinder (http://zoeboekbinder.com/) visited New Folsom Prison for the first time. What they thought would be one interesting day turned into a decade-long collaborative project. Boekbinder visited the prison often over the next five years; performing and teaching music workshops quickly turned into the beginnings of collaborations with writers and musicians who were incarcerated within New Folsom's walls. Boekbinder collaborated on the first of these songs with Alex Batriz, and following that, was approached by many more writers about collaborations. This was the seed for the Prison Music Project and the culminating album, Long Time Gone, produced by Ani DiFranco. Out now on Righteous Babe Records, the album features work by nine incarcerated (and formerly incarcerated) writers.The profits of Long Time Gone (https://amzn.to/31Y5phb) sales will benefit communities impacted by mass incarceration and the funds will be administered by the Southern Center for Human Rights. The contributing writers will decide, collectively, what projects will be funded. The writers own their work and will profit from royalties.You can find Prison Music Project at:Prison Music Project Website : https://www.righteousbabe.com/pages/prisonmusicproject-------------Have you discovered your Sparketype yet? Take the Sparketype Assessment™ now. IT’S FREE (https://www.goodlifeproject.com/sparketypes/) and takes about 7-minutes to complete. At a minimum, it’ll open your eyes in a big way. It also just might change your life.If you enjoyed the show, please share it with a friend. Thank you to our super cool brand partners. If you like the show, please support them - they help make the podcast possible. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today's conversation is unusual to say the least. My guests are musician and activist, Ani DiFranco, singer, songwriter, and composer, Zoe Bookwinder, and writer and performer, Nathan Jackson Brown. There's also a fourth guest who joins in very unexpectedly towards the end, and in a way none of us saw coming when we began recording. Adding powerful context to the conversation, you'll have to listen to understand what actually happened. Our focus, what started as a curiosity, when Zoe was invited to give a concert to incarcerated men in solitary confinement at New Folsom Mac Security Prison, we explore how that

experience would not only forever change them, but evolve into a 10-year collaboration where they kept going back to not just perform, but also understand the reality of the prison experience today. And without ignoring what brought these men to the facility, many with life sentences that began running in their late teens also endeavor to see their humanity, their own personal evolution and fuller stories, both personal and societal, that contributed to their circumstances. Zoe began to not only perform, but also listen and teach and facilitate collaborations that encouraged people to share and write poems and stories and lines to be rapped or sung.

One of those people was Nathan, who at the time was in the last few years of his sentence and has since returned home and works every day to rebuild his life, his work, and in his words, give his kids something to believe in. This is where Ani enters the picture. So Zoe wanted to find a way to tell the stories they were hearing, as well as focus a spotlight on awareness about the state of mass incarceration and open people's eyes to the human stories and the idea of restorative justice, which has become this really fascinating area of growing conversation. So they teamed with Ani to launch the Prison Music Project with the intention of bringing the words

being written behind the walls of New Folsom out into the studio, then partner with a wide range of musicians and performing artists to record them, culminating in their first release, Long Time Gone, which offers a powerful set of gritty, real, and vulnerable tracks.

Also, we'll share a bit of music from the project along the way. So one final word before we dive in. This conversation is incredibly personal for each guest in their own way and may land as incredibly personal for you. The issues are complex and the stories you'll hear shared are emotional and at times challenging. I urge you to stay with them.

As you'll hear, one of the things we explore is how problematic binary thinking, good or bad, right or wrong, black or white, often is. How it never quite reflects the complicated full spectrum truth of the human condition and how all too often it leads to inequity and harm rather than justice, connection, and restoration. Which is exactly why as we all step deeper into a season where we're all being asked to re-examine so many assumptions about systemic inequity, society, race, restoration, and justice, it's important to at least plant the seeds that allow us to see

each other's humanity as the foundation of every conversation and decision. And it's hard to plant those seeds until we allow ourselves to see and know the fuller community of people, especially those who've lived profoundly different lives than us and whose choices and support systems have influenced decisions and outcomes that are also often a world away from the life you and I may know. Really excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever.

It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet

black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary mayday mayday we've been compromised the pilot's a hitman i knew you were gonna be fun on january 24th tell me how to fly this thing mark walberg you know what the difference between me and you is you're gonna die don't shoot if we need them y'all need a pilot flight risk So I'm really excited just to sort of bounce between the three of you. The first album, I went, wow, so powerful, so amazing. Just such an awesome, I can't wait to kind of like deconstruct the story and the stories behind it with you.

Zoe, while we kind of kick it off with you, it probably makes sense to just kind of like dive into just before you started actually even showing up at Folsom before any of this happened. What were you up to? Because it sounds like you were you were out in the world doing work as singer songwriter folk singer just sort of starting my career I quit this band that I was in with my sister called Vermillion Lies and we were like this vaudeville very theatrical kind of cabaret it was in that that cabaret renaissance that happened with like the Dresden Dolls and all of that world. We were in that world. And then I quit that band with my sister and then started doing my own thing. And right around the same time, I started going into the prison. So I had just really started playing my solo music out in the world when I brought it into New Folsom. Yeah. At that point in your life, what was music to you or for you? It felt like, and it still feels like, it has always felt like as soon as I found it,

it was like, oh yeah, I can't not make this. This is not a choice I'm making. This just pours out of me. I'm going to make it whether I share it with people or not. But turns out, I really love to share it with people. But at the time, I really wanted to write about things outside of myself, social issues, political issues, environmental issues and i never really could figure out how to do it in a way that felt good it always felt kind of contrived or luxury or yeah it felt way too vulnerable for sure somehow way more vulnerable than singing about my broken heart amen to that zo. Political songs are hard. So hard. But it was working in the prison and working on those songs that brought me to that.

Over many years, it took a long time for me to be able to write my own. And collaborating with folks who are impacted by incarceration, just their lives and their own stories are you know it's like a social issue because incarceration is a social issue so just writing about their own experience it is a political song so being a part of those collaborations i think opened that door for me which i'm grateful for we're um i guess honey and zoe were were you on each other's radar at that point or were you kind of just doing your separate things? Any awareness of each other or did that happen later on? I mean, I certainly knew who she was. I did not know who Zoe was yet until she walked into my living room. Yeah, that was a bunch of years later.

Yeah. So you end up going to New Folsom, which for those who don't know what that is, describe what was it. And when you're showing up on the first day, what do you think that you're going there to do? What do you think your commitment is? I'm going there to play three concerts. Yeah. So New Folsom Prison, that's this nickname. The official name is California State Prison Sacramento. And it's right next to the famous Folsom Prison, which is lower security. New Folsom is new. It's a newer, very plain looking concrete facility, three yards, houses about 3,000 people, non-consensually. And it's a men's prison, though, as hopefully most of the listeners know, the prison system, the criminal justice system misgenders people a lot. So there were women, trans women inside the prison as well. So I just

want to mention that when I call it a men's prison. Yeah, and I was there, I committed to playing three concerts. And I'd heard about them in advance, through the person who ran this program there, he brought in artists to perform and teach workshops and stuff. And so I was there to perform. And I was going to play in a library, two libraries on two separate yards. And then the one concert, we were in contact for a few months before I went in. And every couple weeks, he'd email me like, Are you sure you want to do this one concert? This is the one for men in solitary confinement. Are you sure you want to do this one? It's really intense. And I've never been one to shy away from something that might be, yeah, like emotionally challenging, or I don't want to hide a reality from myself, a reality of our society. I want to see it all, even if it's ugly,

maybe especially if it's ugly, because I want to know what we're up against. I want to know why we're fighting and to be able to see it and experience it in that way. Yeah, I mean, it is intense, but it's helpful. So I said yes, even though he kept checking in. And I kept thinking, well, you're asking me again, if I really want to do this one concert. Okay. So yeah, that's I, I didn't know really what to expect, even though he told me, but it's different to hear, to hear him describe it. And he told me, you know, you're going to be playing for these people in cages they'll be in these little cages when you play for them in this little room

and it just doesn't matter how much you hear a description of that seeing it is a totally different thing i mean you know how you feel when you see an animal in a cage? It's a human being. So it's just like ample, you know, when you go to the zoo and you're like, man, that animal looks really sad. Well, you can identify with a human way more than you can identify with an animal. And it's just like, I mean, I think it's a, yeah, it's, I think it's traumatizing to be in that environment, even when you're not the person who's being caged. And so I think about prison staff, too. Just anyone who has to be in an environment where that level of dehumanizing for everyone, which is not to diminish the fact that it is obviously much, much worse and much more unfair for the incarcerated people. Yeah. And Nathan, I think it probably makes sense to bring you in because Zoe is basically describing what Zoe sees from the outside looking in as your lived experience for 17 years.

Right. So you, I know I've heard you describe coming up, you were pretty much in and out of some kind of system from the age of 12. Yeah. Tell me more. I mean, as far as me coming up, I mean, product of a broken home, left to my own devices, basically, from a young age. I mean, don't get me wrong.

When my mother seen me doing wrong stuff, I was disciplined appropriately from her mindset at that time. But, you know, I just had to get slicker, basically, so she didn't have to see me. But it became normal. I can't even explain what it means to me to, when I hear people talk about, like Zoe, when she says seeing like you said seeing it from the outside it's like after so long all that becomes like when zoe was explaining the seeing people in cages i've been in so many cages that it's like that's outside wreck like zoe sees it like it's dehumanizing and putting us in cages and having to see us worse than animals, actually, because you can relate to a human being a little bit more or a lot more than you can relate to an animal. But to us, it's like this is outside wreck. This is a release from the cell.

You know, I mean, from being stuck in the cell, we get to go outside now. And while it's still in a cage, it's outside, it's fresh air. So it's like any breath of fresh is a release to us when we're there that long, because everything else is just normal. So a cage is like you being stuck in the house on quarantine for three months, and then finally being able to go out and have dinner at a restaurant. That's our feeling of going to a cage to go to yard after being locked down for three months. It's like, wow, we get to go to the yard for an hour and walk around this 8 by 12 cage but we get to go outside yeah i mean it's interesting that to hear the two different perspectives and zoe described it as you know

like it well you can imagine how you feel when you see an animal behind a cage it's a human behind a cage and and i wonder if that's why i think a lot of people who have never known somebody who's been incarcerated, who have never been in the situation, who are so far removed from it in their everyday lives, actually don't want to think about it or don't want to actually sit down and have a conversation with somebody who's been through this experience. Because I think when you're forced to confront the fact that, yes, these are people who very often, sometimes they're wrongly incarcerated, sometimes they're not, sometimes they've made major mistakes sometimes. But underneath it all, there's a human story. And when you're forced to confront that, I think most people just don't want to. Well, yeah. And personally, that's one of my major issues, not with music, but why I do my YouTube as well is because I feel like so many people don't realize that we're more than just a person that committed a crime. We're more than just a piece of paper. And while I say it all seems normal to us being in there, it's not normal. It's just normal because

it's the situation that we've been forced to live. The lucky ones of us make the best out of it. The unlucky ones are the ones always had to perform for it who are in these big cages in Washington because they just can't handle it. And it gets too rough and it gets rough for all of us. And like, unfortunately myself, a lot of times I took it out with violence to handle it. Like, you know, just it's not normal. We just, it was our new normal, unfortunately. And it's not good. It's not okay. It's left lifelong remnants that will never go away. I don't even like being in the house too long, to be honest.

I like being outside all the time, period. And there's a lot of people that, honestly, I have a circle of people that I believe after dealing with me and hearing it from my side and just open their eyes to a lot more stuff that they didn't expect someone with my background to be able to articulate or to be. I mean, like, obviously I've beaten a lot of statistics, not the odds. I'm going to say I beat a lot of the statistics. Statistically, people who served as much time as me don't usually make it in society. Uh, but it's all about the drive in my opinion. You know, you gotta, I looked at my 17 and a half years and they're like, this is what I'm doing for now. This is not who I am. And, uh, the things I have to do in here will be things that I have to do to survive because I am in a jungle in effect. And I'm

either going to be food or I'm going to survive. And I have remorse now for some of the things I had to do due to the rules of the environment I was in, but I've only dealt with CDCR, California Department of Corrections. And the R's, there's no rehabilitation, but they put us in situations that you're, you're either, like I said, you're either going to be food or you're going to survive. And then they portray the picture to the outside world that it's us doing this stuff, not us defending ourself against situations you put us in. It's like if you know that a black guy got in a fight with a white guy and you release four white guys that are racially motivated and you release one black guy, what do you think is going to happen? You set us up for failure on so many different ways, psychologically, physically, and then punish us for defending ourselves or punish us for

attacking you guys. You know what I mean? Or whatever may happen as a result of what you initially instituted, then we become the bad guys. And the press release says black inmate attacks officer or press release says white inmates attack officers. It doesn't say, but control officer released four black inmates to attack one white inmate. White inmate goes to the hospital. His cellie comes out and attacks the same officer. They don't say all that. All they'll say is the officer was attacked by a white inmate goes to the hospital. His cellie comes out and attacks the same officer. They don't say all that. All they'll say is the officer was attacked by a white inmate. It's situational, man.

And it's horrible. It's terrible. Yeah. And I think it's important to create some context here because there will be people listening to this and understanding, I think, what you're trying to share here and the quality of what you experience in a max prison that never reaches the public side. And then there'll be people listening who are saying, well, but you did something really bad to get you in there. So, you know, like this is what it's like. And I think there's an important frame to offer, which is that, yes, like we said in the beginning, a lot of the reason why people go into the system

are because there was an act that was done that is sometimes really, really bad. But what that doesn't take, and this is not about forgiving that or condoning it or just saying, let's forget about it. This is about saying, okay, that is one thing that is part of a larger story that this individual has lived.

And let's look at the larger story both at what led up to that moment how we as a society enable or disable that that and then what happens to this individual once they're in a system where in theory there is some form of not just punishment but torture rehabilitation happening. Okay. Yeah. But I can actually cite, I was just watching a documentary on a prison. I believe it's in Sweden. When you first walk in, the guard shakes your hand and welcomes you to the prison and puts you in a place. They walked into the unit. The correctional officer was sitting on a couch with the inmates, with the people serving time, doing their time. And then the interviewer

asked him, well, why is it so friendly? The officers are friendly with the inmates. And the officer, the sergeant who was in charge of the unit said, their punishment is being not going home. It's not our job to punish them. They've already been punished by the courts. They're here. They can't go home. Why should we treat them any more badly, any different than I would treat another person in society? Their punishment is being here. My job is to make sure they stay in here, not to torture them, not to inflict any kind of harm on them. It's just to make sure they stay here. That's my job. And I was like, wow, I wish I could have did my time there. I wish the guys that I've met that have been institutionalized and the violence is riddled into their head. And these guys are killers

walking around in flip flops and shower shoes, hanging out, smiling, nice, polite, no aggression. There was no aggression in the room. And I was like, that's how it could be. I mean, that's a better way. I mean, I know a lot of us are trying to get, a lot of people would like to see no prisons at all, but that if it got to be prison, it should be like that. It's not breeding people to be released into society with the mentality of kill to be food. That's all they set you up to be in a level four period. And you're either going to do what they want you to do, or you're going to keep your mental focused, do what you got to do, get through it and come home, hopefully. But it's not that easy. It's not that easy. And it hasn't been easy for me. It hasn't been easy. I've been out six years, but it hasn't been easy mentally, mentally, out six years, but it hasn't been easy mentally. Mentally, physically, it's nothing. But mentally, every day I got to keep myself in check.

Because the old tries to revert the old every time a little slight or a person says the wrong thing, what I perceive to be the wrong thing, my mind automatically starts sweating and I feel my attention pull up. And but I control it. You know, I self meditate, not self medicate, self meditate, you know, and it's been working out for me. It's been working out for me, thankfully. Which I think kind of brings us back into the story, right? Because, you know, part of that is, is developing outlets that are different and developing skills, coping skills, coping skills, management

skills, and also ways to express emotion and feelings that are channeled in a different way. And so we drop into Zoe coming into prison, right? And saying, okay, so I showed up originally to do a couple of workshops. And then like the assumption was like, I do this and then I'm out. But that in fact is not what happens. Yeah, I was there to play concerts, actually. It wasn't even workshops. So it wasn't even, there wasn't even a much opportunity for like a back and forth or, yeah, not much opportunity for conversation

because I just performed. Though the guy who ran the program suggested that I ask the audience if some of them wanted to perform too. So luckily, I did that first time get to see some performances, some displays, I suppose, of work written by folks who were incarcerated there. But just, I mean, the experience and the small conversations I was able to have before and after the concerts, which were super brief, because I was playing three concerts in a short amount of hours in different sections of the prison. So there's a lot of walking and showing ID and gates opening and all of this stuff in between. That experience was so,

you know, 10 years later, I don't even, I still don't really know how to describe it or talk about it. It was, it's completely changed my life, changed my awareness, opened my eyes. But I also didn't process it for a long time, really. I remember, like, I knew that I would go back a lot. Like, I left the prison and I just knew. I was like, you know, going in that day, I thought that was going to be a one-off thing. But when I left, I knew I'm going to go back as much as I can. And I was going back for like a year and a half. I was going back often, playing concerts, teaching workshops. And maybe a year and a half later, I'm on tour.

And somebody at some house I'm crashing at, somebody puts on this documentary about solitary confinement. And almost as soon as this documentary starts, I start weeping like I've never wept watching a movie before. And throughout the whole documentary, like my body is like, you know, and your whole body is shaking because you're crying so hard. And you can't see because there's so many tears that for like an hour and a half and it occurred to me like I've never really let Nathan and I have talked about this there's like a wall you have to put up including when you're going into the prison as a volunteer or a staff member whatever to be able to see people in that amount of it dehumanized in that way and suffering it to that degree there's just this wall you have to

build in order to sustain going in over and over again and seeing it over and over again, there's this distance, there's this protection, there's this armor. And somehow watching a documentary of something I had seen in person many times, that was the space where, oh, now, because when I'm in the space, I have to be very controlled. And then I can't show emotion or they probably won't let me back in and the guards will, you know, have judgments about me and whatever,

whatever the thing. Yeah. So there was just this catharsis in, in this moment where I was, you know, where I could, it was safe to do it. It's a very interesting experience.

Yeah. So you knew really early on that this was not a one-off, that this was going to be something where you would keep going back. But I guess you didn't know what that would look like in the beginning. me go and perform for and maybe spend the slightest bit of time getting to know some of these people turns into something more interactive something more educational where you start to realize like oh it's not just me coming here to share my writing and my music but these are human beings with stories and and writers and musicians and people who have their own things inside of them that they want to get out and i guess guess something clicks, which is, well, maybe I can help be a catalyst for that as well. Yeah, it became pretty clear to me. I mean, I think on that first visit that the thing that I was in there to offer that felt actually really valuable.

And I think music is valuable. And especially when you're performing your own music, you're, you know, there's this emotional nakedness that happens that gets people to trust you in a different way. And in prison, that's, that's a very valuable thing. Because as I said, there's all these emotional walls up. So it is valuable. And I got that. But mostly what I felt like I wanted to be in there to offer was just human interaction, and interaction with someone from the outside who just was going to treat these people like human beings instead of like, animals or worse, or less than. And so I was more interested in teaching workshops and doing song circles and things where we could talk and interact and share more. And so that's what I ended up doing for almost five years. Yeah. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist,

whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised.

The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him.

Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk. die don't shoot if we need them y'all need a pilot flight risk so as you're going back and forth and it's becoming more of this collaborative process and you're you're like it's funny i think a lot of times we think we're going somewhere to give because we are in a position where we can and and we kind of quickly realize oh no like this is this is we are receiving as much if if not more than we ever anticipated. And in fact, it's not even it's not our role to be that person who bestows something. So as you're doing this over a period of years and starting to realize this is something bigger, how does the conversation begin between you and Ani? Well, I knew that, you know, my audience was pretty small

at the time, still not huge. But especially then, and I was also thinking about quitting music at the time, and I just hadn't really been sustaining my audience. And I, you know, I was the holder of this material and these stories. And I knew it's like just like this sacred role that i had very a lot of pressure a lot of responsibility and i knew that the platform i had was not the max that i wanted this to reach and i was thinking of who i could bring in to this that that had a bigger audience and an audience that would appreciate it, and even more so someone who would be interested in doing that.

And a friend of mine actually suggested and said, well, doesn't Ani DeFranco live in New Orleans? And yeah, as soon as they said it, it was like, well, yeah, obviously that is who I should ask to do this. And we had never met before, but we had a friend in common, have, and he put us in touch. And I, yeah, I just called as a stranger and left a voicemail that said, Hey, uh, you know, this is who I am. This is what I'm doing. Do you still have that voicemail? a yes person to the world. But actually the first step was for me to hear some of the material. Our mutual friend, Brian said, I have this friend, Zoe, blah, blah, blah, told me the story. And I'm like, Oh God, you know, looking at my list of things to do, which is longer than my leg. And

I said, wow, that sounds cool. Uh, can I hear some of it? And the instant I heard the demos, I was just like blown away. Just like, wow, there's something really, there's something really happening here creatively and like spiritually, you know? So it was like, okay, well, I guess you got to come over. And I didn't know. Yeah, we got to spend the next six years of our life now turning this into a record somehow. Yeah, when I first asked you and we were first talking about it, we were theorizing about how long it would take. And I think we were saying a month or two. Yeah, yeah, right. Which is just very funny

after a while we we just the running joke was like we're on prison time like we have to like every half all the writers on this record i can't even imagine what time becomes for you, Nathan, for those 17 years and how much you have to live in the moment or just or live in your purpose or just not watch that clock, you know? And so that became sort of the way of the record, too. Yeah. You know, whatever schedule we thought we we had eventually we just know there's no more schedules this is and it's going to happen for as long as it's going to happen and it's beyond our control fact yeah yeah i mean it sounds like it originally um when zoe reads out to you on it you're kind of like okay this sounds cool and valuable and i got a lot of stuff to do and and a lot of my own stuff

and a lot of other projects going on so there has to be something musical and story driven that is powerful enough for me to say no to something that's already on my really really long list when that happens so you you reach back out to her and say well let me hear what you've got i'm curious i don't know if you can even I don't know if you can even tap back into this, but I'm curious what it was that you heard, villain, that made you say. Nate's genius. You gotta do it. The brilliance.

I mean, yeah. I'm guessing there was a demo called Villain somewhere there, right? That's my song. Yeah, there's some. Our song. That's right,. Our song. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, just a really vital collaborative.

There was a vitality to the collaboration. Like different people came with their stories from their spleens, from their souls, just offering, again, like becoming vulnerable, you know, through this sharing, which in prison, as you were telling us, is like, it's just a revolutionary act in and of itself. I imagine, I don't, I wasn't in the room, you know, when these collaborations initiated, but I don't know. I just imagine stepping forward and offering bits of your self is, you know, there's a peril that I can't imagine, though I do that on the outside, you know. Anyway, the peril, the precipice, the vitality of the intersection of Zoe and this person and that person and this person and Zoe's melodic sense,

which I love just so delicious and bringing these little, you know, there was just, you know, it's like, what do you, what do we say in music? You know, it was happening. There was something happening. You can just, it's hard to, because when it's happening, it is a different thing every time. But you feel it when there is something vital happening. And that's just what I felt. I just felt like there was a lot being brought from all sides and offered.

And I wanted to help from my side. Yeah. And you mentioned Zoe's voice on it, which brings up another really interesting sort of complexity here, right? Which is that Zoe is going in and out and they're working with the people who are incarcerated and developing the language and the writing, but at the same time, they can't record in the actual facility, right? So it's a matter of sort of like going in. And so you're, you know, like, effectively gathering, right, collaborating and gathering, and then bringing it outside of the walls. So I'm curious, when Ani, you, what did you actually hear? Yeah, yeah, I heard Zoe's voice,

singing, singing the words. And, you know, that in and of itself is fascinating oh yeah juxtaposition and i think we sort of you know i mean out of necessity the writers themselves i mean there were so there ended up being a few uh vocals recorded over the phone um so the writers themselves actually performed you know some of the raps where it's just like, it's just so specific. And so the flow of, you know, it's just, you have to do this. Nobody can imitate. And so, you know, we had to just accept some lo-fi vocals. And then, but then, you know, I was fascinated immediately by that sort of juxtaposition just of masculine and feminine, I guess I'll say, you know, and shaking that up. And what does it do to your brain when you hear a feminine voice deliver a masculine story? Do you open to it more readily or do you look at it different? Do you open to it more readily? Or do you look at it different?

Do you hear it differently? I just thought that, I don't know, I thought that was really cool. So we sort of carried that forward with the other singers and a lot of performers that from the outside that we invited to, you know, manifest these songs on record, we leaned feminine. Yeah. So you end up basically saying, okay, so we're going to, as much as we can, have people call and actually record their voices when we feel like it really has to be their voice, right? And then go out to a universe of people who are out there in the world and say, hey, listen, do you want to get involved in this? Many of whom identified as female, which was sort of like carried on that initial thing that you heard when Zoe sent this to you. I'm also fascinated, Nate, Zoe mentioned that some of the things that were being written about in the stories were deeply vulnerable and

personal. And I guess my curiosity is, were these things that could have easily been shared had they been performed by the people who were incarcerated while they were incarcerated to everyone who was actually in there with them? Well, Zoe has a story about the first time I performed part of the song that Zoe put together as villain. And it took, I don't know if I ever, I think it was easier to perform it in front of people who I didn't think actually understood everything it was saying, personally. Because the two pieces that Zoe used of mine, one of the pieces would, well, actually both of them are like, they're deeper than the words that are being used. And to have the understanding of the pieces would well actually both of them are like they're deeper than the words that are being used and to have the understanding of the space i was in when i wrote them like one of them called walls i was trapped and uh it's a crazy thing to think about

that my only constant comfort is a concrete wall i mean so, so yeah, I don't know if I could have, uh, I would have been as comfortable if it wasn't such a secluded group that we were in, uh, when I did actually perform one of mine and then I still didn't perform it looking at it. And when I looked at the wall, which obviously it comes right back around that the wall is my constant comfort. So I faced the wall when I performed that one and I set it to the wall. So I think it came across, obviously it hit a chord with Zoe because that's when it was decided that that one would be used. So why don't we actually share some of the music?

We are going to play one of the songs now from the album. This one is titled Villain. You love to call me a villain You're a bacon, killin', killin' You love to call me a villain You're a bacon, killin', killin' You love to call me a villain You're a bacon, killin', killin' You love to call me a villain Even you remain

Tales locked inside Intricate puzzles Tales of lost lives Your trappist in green grass looks good Sweating bodies running barefoot Wild men you can keep Most of us will never leave But you can't keep out the heat We'll see you next time. You love to call me a villain You're makin' and killin', killin'

You love to call me a villain You're makin' and killin', killin' Cool and constant You put up a solid fight. I press my body against you to escape the heat of the night. Still and silent against my vicious blows, I remain grateful in your shadow Though you are comfort, I'd love to watch you fall Gamblers are still betting and you're still a concrete wall

You love to call me a villain You're makin' a killin' killin' You love to call me a villain You're makin' a killin' killin' You love to call me a villain You're makin' me kill it, kill it You love to call me a villain You're making me kill it, kill it You love to call me a villain

You're making me kill it, kill it I think they did a great job of putting it together. But all these songs need to be listened. All of them need to be listened to more than once. I personally believe you can't listen to them once and think you got the whole story. You didn't. I promise you, if you're listening to me now and you bought the longtime gone album,

please go listen to it again. Cause you're going to hear something you didn't hear the first time on every song and really listen, really, really listen to the words, not just the melodies or the, the background music, listen to the words that not just the melodies or the background music. Listen to the words that are being said.

There's some people pouring their souls out on those tracks, man. I've listened to the whole thing numerous times. Yeah. Yeah, it's big. Yeah, no, I know Ani said she thought it was really interesting hearing different voices expressing the words that were written by people who were incarcerated. I'm curious what it was actually like for you hearing that, actually knowing all the writers personally too.

Okay, so if I'm honest, I got a different actually outlook hearing it come from, like she said, more feminine voices. Like when I hear one of Jacob's songs being sung by a woman, it's like, wait, I know this husky, grusky, fully bearded, aggressive person. And then I hear this sweet voice singing his words that I heard already, but I've heard these words from him with a guitar playing it.

And I'm like, wow, it's like it opens up a whole new door to it. You know what I mean? And it makes it way more, and the crazy thing is it, it makes it relatable. So it makes you listen. Then you get the message

when you don't even realize it was coming. If that makes sense, because you let your wall down on that aspect. I'm so happy to hear you say that, Nate. Absolutely. That's where we're going. Yeah. Yeah.

It's like if you see me, you know, I'm six foot three, 220 pounds, my body's covered in tattoos. When the sun's in my eyes, I can look a little bit aggressive. But but when you hear my song, the song that I took part in with Zoe come across in in in Aaronessa's voice, it's like, wait, this beautiful voice comes through your speakers and you're like, wow, so nice. You don't even realize that message that's coming in with it until you start to click like, whoa, wait. He's punching the wall. Wait, she's punching. Oh, right. This is a convict who wrote this. And then now you're you're open already, though. So it's too late to close back up. Now you really want to understand it more.

So now you're going to go back and rewind it and play it again. And it can be life-changing. Yeah. And I guess, Zoe and Ani, it sounds like maybe that was a part of what you were really trying to do. It wasn't just getting incredible voices and musicians to go and perform this, but to very intentionally create some form of cognitive dissonance, to almost force people to just say, wait, what? To just start questioning what's really happening. Yeah. You know, as from the outsider, I mean, I'm not an outsider to the

record, but I'm an outsider to prison. And so like when I listened down to the record that we all created, the moment of epiphany for me is actually when there are prisoners' voices. Some of the incarcerated writers, two-thirds of the way through the record, towards the end of the record, you just hear them speak because Zoe recorded all kinds of things in any little moment that they could, and conversations, you know, dudes over the phone, just having a really vulnerable moment. So you're listening to the songs, you're listening to the music, you're letting them in. And then you hear the actual voice of one of the writers. And that for me is the moment when it all comes together, like, oh my God, you're me, I'm you,

you know? So for me, it was the opposite. It's like, that was the moment when it all comes together like oh my god you're me I'm you you know so for me it was the opposite it's like that was the moment when it all comes back around and you hopefully we were hoping you know the epiphany in the outside the the person who has no you know even calling people up to say do you want to play on this record we're doing blah blah blah do you want to sing on this record we're doing, blah, blah, blah. Do you want to sing on this record? Even if you're a thoughtful or caring person or maybe progressive person or forward thinking person, if you don't know anybody in prison, if you don't know anybody who knows anybody in prison, if you don't have any experience with the system, there's a journey that you get to an understanding of what it is, you know, like Nate and Zoe have been speaking to. What is the reality? You don't know that.

So initially there's a lot of reticence. But these guys are murderers or what did they do? Or the writer of this song, you know, and that's understandable. You know, there are many questions that one has to ask on a journey to understanding something. And so that's what we hoped, you know, that the record would have the effect of taking people who are completely uninformed, you know, about what mass incarceration means. They've heard those words, but they never stopped to, they were never forced to find out what does that mean and what does it look like and what's the reality of it for people. So we were hoping we could fast track that process

over the course of an artistic journey of this record where a listener could come in cold thinking, I mean, these are criminals. These are dangerous people. And by the end of the record go, Oh, okay, wait, there's more to know. There's more to the story. Yeah. And I mean, this also, the album after this 10 year period incubation, finally drops at a moment that nobody planned. But it ends up dropping in this moment of national reckoning and reconsidering and really reexamining what is all of our roles you know in culture in society and um the idea of transformation restoration retribution like how did these things play together and work together in a way how do we consider what is the genuine role and and what's our contribution what is the contribution of people

who've had nothing to do in their minds with the penal system or anybody who might be involved with it you know six degrees out what is our actual contribution to any of the circumstances that might have led people into that system and i think there's so much reckoning going on around that right now that this album drops right into the middle of that national conversation yeah yeah and Yeah. And can I, can I just give my friend Zoe some props here? Because Zoe was the main voice along the journey of producing the record of saying, of staying present in the, you know, I think I, you know, for all of my good intentions and all of my wanting to be a part of the solution and wanting to be an anti-racist in the world and do that work, I know more white people than I do black people, people of color. I would probably just innocently or naively, maybe is a better

word, like start calling my friends who are brilliant singers and blah, blah, blah. And Zoe at every moment was like, let's try to get all people of color on this record. Okay, let's get the writers and their loved ones, the talented people in their lives, empowered and involved in helping bring these stories to people. Let's stay as close to them and their lives and what they're, you know know and not come in you know

and assume a lot of stuff you know as the sort of privileged white you know observer you know so anyway I just appreciate it along the way because I am just I think a little bit more of a babe in the woods when I'm just, oh, people are good and good people are good and let's all do a good thing. And Zoe's like, yeah, in the right way. And that takes constant vigilance. And so thankfully, due to that vigilance,

I think we produce something that is not colonial. Together we produce something that is not colonial. Together, we produce something that is indigenous to the nation that it comes from and the people in it, not just certain people's perspective, you know, a lot of the diversity of perspective that needs to speak to the criminal injustice system in america yeah yeah i think as is part of the big you know this conversation that is happening this reckoning that's happening what we're talking about is the people leading the movement being the people that are impacted by the things we're fighting against and you know this is coming from some you know i'm a white person who's never been incarcerated uh for longer than 18 hours and i think i did about eight so you're you're you're up on me right so that's another story like people who've never

been incarcerated who who ended up in the leading roles of this project which you know hindsight is 2020 whatever there's ways that we are moving forward in this project where you know the next phase there's two next phases of this project there's a podcast and there's a musical theater piece and and what we're talking about now is okay these are just starting what can we do better than we did on the album and more responsibly and that is bringing people who have an experience of incarceration in to the mix in leadership roles from the beginning. And yeah, I feel you know, it's we're all that's the thing is this whole project is about how we are fallible. We are humans,

we make mistakes. And we are not trash because of that. People in prison, us, anyone, our friends, we all make mistakes. And I think we have to figure out how to be comfortable with confronting that and talking about that and learning from that without throwing people away. Because when we think of people as good and bad and as actions as right or wrong, it creates this fear of accountability and growth. Because if we admit that our behavior needs to change, we are admitting we've made a mistake which is admitting we are a bad person and so it really hinders our growth and our ability to learn and become people who have more to offer to our communities and to the movement and i feel a big part of what we are saying with this record, and we're not trying to say anything other than the lyrics of these songs. What we hope is the impact is sort of a blurring of this black and white, good and bad, and a revealing of we are all human and we all cause harm intentionally or unintentionally at times.

And we all have the capacity to grow beyond that. And people do harm at different levels. And that's something to acknowledge. But given that we're all capable of it, it is in all of our best interest to believe in our capacities to be accountable, to learn and grow, to move forward and to leave harmful behavior behind us knowing that we will never reach a destination and we will always be reckoning with you know what we're not doing exactly in the least harmful way yeah i could so one example of zoe's vigilance is the town hall. So we release the record. We do the performance, the record release performance. Finally, it's out there in the world.

But even before that happens, Zoe's like, and then afterwards we have to have a town hall and we have to get public feedback on the project and, you know, invite people to tell us if they felt harmed or what we could have done better or you know feedback and you know stuff like that I thought that level of accountability yeah and man like when you guys were both starting to tell the story of how of the seed the birth of the record it was just was striking me so hard how like the minute something happens,

it normalizes it. The moment it fricking happens, like if it's your parent, the most insane behavior, that's what is, that's what grownups do. And this situation of incarceration in America and the way it's done has been happening for so long. And now it's on a mass scale. And this mass culture of dehumanization, like Zoe said, on both sides, where suddenly there is no empathy. There is no unity. There is no empathy. There is no unity. There is no mutual respect. Like that whole, you know, and then the whole society reflects that, you know, that permeates our whole society and it gets more and more normalized and we all become victims of it. It's like, if we don't stop this,

where it's most acute and really stop and address this cycle, it's going to take us all down. Absolutely. And it's the fastest charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman.

I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die.. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him. We need him.

Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk. I'd like to say one thing before we run out of time. Cynthia, hold on a second. Okay. Sorry. I just got a call from prison. Hey, Cynthia, I'm doing an interview.

I just got a call from prison and I just feel like when this happens in this kind of way, I should just answer because I feel like it's supposed to happen. Does that feel okay? Hold on a sec. Salaam alaikum. Salaam alaikum. What's happening, bro? Brother, I'm just, man, I'm striving for freedom, man.

Striving for freedom. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I'm going to tell Zoe to give you my phone number, man, but there's a blessing that you called today, brother. Yeah, man. I'm telling you. Hey, so hold up. Nathan was saying something, and maybe it'll inspire you to say something.

I just wanted to, okay, so a lot of comments have been said about the album, and we had our town hall, and somebody had something to say about how I was the only person who was incarcerated on that on the forum. I mean, I'd like to everybody who's out there watching or listening to know that without Zoe coming in and doing the footwork, the legwork, this album, it took 10 years to get this album out. Just imagine how long it would have took if it was just a bunch of incarcerated males trying to get it out ourself. That's true. It's even better to hear the standpoint of somebody that's still in the belly, man.

How do you feel about this album, brother? What's your words for that? I haven't heard it personally myself. I heard my track personally, but I haven't heard the album personally myself. I know the brothers who all performed on it. And it's a blessing, man. It's a blessing that the world hear our talents and know that we have something more to offer than what we came here for. Like I was explaining to Zoe, you know, this album right here lets the public hear our story, get a glimpse to our story of who we

are, who we are now, you know? Yes. That's the goal. The goal is to let the people know who we are now, you know? Right. And you are a 100% different person than you were the day you committed your crime. Man, 100%. And you can vouch that I can speak for that because i know you personally

yeah for real for real man yeah it's a blessing man we uh we are on a path that will not stop period you know that's what that's one thing about having a spiritual foundation and having a goal to want to create something do something more than just what we used to do, you know. And it needs to have a new. When you start to want to make a change and do something different, then, you know, got to put people in your life that will help you make those changes and do something different. Yes, sir. I tell you, you know, you're a godsend for a lot of us. Godsend.

Yep. Yep. I take full advantage of my God seeing. This is what we need. You got people on the same wavelength to see a better change for people.

Instead of just locking them up and punishing them. Let's fix the problem instead of just locking us all away in cages. Maybe Zoe's frozen. Got quiet. Yeah, that's a good guy. He's one of the artists.

He's one of the creators on the album, actually. Good man. Sincere, Mr. Sincere. Yeah, he's a totally, like I said before, he's a 100% total different individual now than he was the day I met him, which was a long time ago in prison. So yeah, that's a blessing that he called. It was actually good to hear his voice. Yeah. Yeah. I mean that, that, so it's like, yeah, if you can open up your heart and look at somebody who's maybe committed a violent crime and understand that they are, that doesn't mean they're bad right it just does it means that this is a system that chews people up right and and pushes them over edges and it's it's not a bad person it's a person that's closest to the edge well right and not only that uh one of the

understandings i feel like people should have and that they don't have a lot of is people who have been committing crimes, going to prison, being incarcerated, whatever it may be, are not inherently bad people or, you know, not to use the word bad or good or whatever, but they're not inherently bad people. What needs to be looked into more as well as the mass incarceration, of course. But way back before that as well, people don't even look at the fact that how was this person raised? Like I believe somebody said something about what the parents do is what we become the normal for us now. So if all I grew up with was seeing my uncle sell drugs to get money and and my sister was a prostitute and she did that to get money. And everybody said, you are on welfare. And if you wanted the new shoes,

you got to get out there and get the money however you know how at 12 years old. Well, how else am I going to get money at 12 years old in the ghetto? Nobody's buying the newspaper. You know what I mean? I can't afford a lawnmower, you know, so I can't do those things. So I'm going to do what I see everybody around me doing, even knowing that it's bad. You know, you know, we know right from wrong, but the line becomes a lot more blurred when everyone around you is doing what you're being told is wrong. And I was raised if somebody hits you, you hit them back. Now, I don't raise my children like that because I don't want violence to be the answer for my children. But at the same time, when I was young, that was you come home crying and you got hit. You get hit again. Then you get took out

there to fight whoever hit you. So it's like what becomes the normal is changed in different environments. So people might see someone like myself at a youngster always fighting and all this. But that's how I was raised to handle my problems. I wasn't raised to, oh, let's talk about it. Let's figure out our problems and go on at a peaceful solution, which is what I try to preach now. But that's not what I was taught. That's what I taught myself as an adult. And let's not pretend that another thing that you learned from the get-go probably was you felt, you know, if you're surrounded by the latent rage of a racially and economically oppressive system, of a constant struggle against a much huger crime, that your little,

you know, somebody from the outside who doesn't experience that can say, but look at that perp, but that kid hit that other kid. It's like, okay, but do you understand that kid grew up with a boot on their neck? The story is not clean

and cut and dried as it might seem from far away. Then so many people say, well, you can climb out of that. Lots of people climb up. Well, you're taking the 20 out of a thousand. Okay. Yeah. But there's nobody giving help to those that don't know.

You know what I mean? Don't give me money. Give me education. You know, you can't throw money at a problem. You know, you have to change the psychosis. Yeah. had a problem you know you have to change the psychosis yeah and but a minute you start doing that trying to really get in there and and continue to recognize the humanity even of a quote criminal uh or con you know yeah criminal i think the whole society yeah the whole society then it's like if

you can look at somebody who committed a violent crime and say, okay, but your life still has value, you can turn yourself around. You might have great, incredible, positive things yet to do. Then certainly we could do that for each other. Absolutely. You know, every time somebody tries to do something but doesn't do it quite right or tries to say something but doesn't get it quite right. Certainly, if we can practice that kind of humanity and dehumanizing, not dehumanizing each other, boy, would that come in handy out here? Man. Yeah. And I think it goes back to what Zoe was saying earlier also, right? Which is this idea of getting okay with the fact that we all are brought to our knees, we all make mistakes,

and starting to explore the idea that identity and behavior are not necessarily the same thing, that good people do bad things and say bad things, or people who, quote, consider themselves good, right? And that also we are all products of the bigger families, cultures, communities, entire societal ecosystems within which we live, you know, and it all plays into how we see ourselves, how we see what is right and wrong and good and bad behavior and how we survive in the world, which is why I feel like this conversation is happening at just the right moment in time. This project is, is coming to this stage at just the right moment in time.

And this country is, is reckoning with these questions. Very, very, very beginnings. But I think a lot of people, a lot more people are in this conversation than I've seen in my lifetime. And I don't know.

I hope it continues. I hope we keep deepening into it. And I hope we keep saying, okay, you know, like there, but for God's grace, go I, and understand that as we step into a conversation, you know, we step in there knowing that we are no better than no worse than anybody else in the conversation. And the fact that we may be in different circumstances as we step into the conversation is partly a reflection of our choice, but the things that led us to think, what is the appropriate choice to make, are part of that too. I want to add something. We were talking about what good and we do things that are bad,

we do things that are good, right, wrong, this sort of practice I am working on is kind of throwing out those binary ideas. And I've been reading a lot, educating myself a lot on the theory of restorative justice, which is an alternative form of justice. And, you know, the criminal justice system asks, what was the crime that was committed? Who did it? What's the punishment? There's no question in there about harm. Was someone harmed? The harm doesn't even factor in, let alone who was harmed and how and what they think should happen, what's necessary to repair that. No. So restorative justice asks what happened, who was harmed and how and what can we do to repair that harm and hopefully reduce or prevent future harm. There's nothing about punishment there. There's nothing about a broken rule there because those things don't actually matter. What matters is harm and healing. And that is completely throwing out these binary ideas of good, bad,

right, wrong, crime, punishment. And that's what we really need to embrace. And as communities really embody this accountability process, so that we, regardless of what the government has decided, how the government decides to respond to crime or harm. Instead, we are responding to harm and making the systems of police and prisons obsolete. If we can do this ourselves, respond to harm ourselves and our communities, we don't need prisons and police. And that, to me, is the goal.

That's where to focus and what we need to work towards. I want to tap in. Okay, just talking about the handgap. So I'm going to try to call right back. I want to say something what you were just talking about, Zoe. Okay, yeah, try to call back. All right, right now. Zoe, thank you for that clarification.

And thank you for, again, the reminder that we don't live in a binary world, that we don't live in a world of good and bad and black and white, and that we live in a how you're raised. So it's like, well, what one person may see as a bad thing I'm doing, I'm seeing it as a means of survival. So is it really bad? Or is it way for me to feed my little sister? Cause my mom's out smoking crack somewhere. You know what I mean? Is it a means of survival? The lines get blurred and it, it, it actually in effect takes the good and bad away. And just what are we doing to survive?

And like she said, is there are there people actually being hurt by this? And whoever's being hurt? Are there reconsents that could be made to them to make up for it? Or do we need to lock them away in a cage? Come on, man. Yeah. And like, why did the person cause harm? What were the circumstances in which they did this harm?

And how can we change those circumstances so that they don't have to do that anymore, don't feel that they have to do it anymore? Sincere, you got something to say? Yeah, like my example, like my crime. I was 16 years old. A family member and a family friend got into a fight. The family friend got the best out of the family member of my uncle. Beat him up real bad. Had him looking real bad. Now,

me being a gang member, me having mis... being misdirected with these concepts of love, loyalty, and all this,

I got pissed off. I got mad. I got angry. I was sick of being... So, I shot him three times. He didn't die, thank God.

But they tried me as an adult and then gave me two life sentences. I think it was 16 or 17. They didn't throw me right inside a CDCR. So they didn't think, nobody questioned that. Nobody questioned where did I get this mind frame from

that if a person hurts somebody I love, that I have the right to try to kill him or take revenge or nobody said well let's try to put this kid inside of a let's call and your telephone number will be monitored and recorded or let's put this kid inside of a program

where it can help him so when he does get out he'll have better ways of thinking better ways of coping better ways of handling situations you know so he'll have better ways of thinking, better ways of coping, better ways of handling situations. You know, so we live in an industrial complex type get out. Right now, I know

in this country anyway, CDC prison is really a business, it's a corporation. So they don't think about the mind frame of why you was hurt or why you hurt somebody. They think, okay, here go some somebody, put them in here, let's get this money off their bodies, you know? And I feel until we stop being looked at as a commodity and start looked at as

human, it's always going to be that way. Nobody's going to really care. It's just, you know, the correction and the rehabilitation, you know, it really is just for looks, you know, the correction and the rehabilitation, you know, it really is just for glitz. You know? Yeah, that's the thing is the people in power are not trying to lower the prison population. They're trying to raise the prison population.

Exactly. It's a business. And so when I was talking about the 13th Amendment, you know, as long as that 13th Amendment is in place, they're never going to really, I ain't going to say they're never going to really care. It's going to take a lot for them to change their attitudes about really rehabilitating us and allowing us to come back to society better than what we came. Right.

That's what we have to do on our own. And that's sincere is referring to the, you know, the fact that people cannot be enslaved unless they have committed a crime, and then, and then we can enslave them legally. But it even goes beyond that with prisons, because there's that way of profiting from prison, but there's all these corporations like the one I'm paying right now to talk to you. And all the industries that even in state prisons and federal prisons, there's the healthcare services is is a private industry and the food is private industry all of these there's all these industries that are capitalist and they're of course trying to grow in capitalism because that's what you're supposed to do and in order

for these to grow prison populations have to grow and so it's this whole you know yeah i mean web of industry that is profiting off of human bodies in cages. It feels like we are at a time where this conversation is being had in a much more public way and a lot more eyes are being opened to how do we move forward and what does the future look like if it's different? What are the options that are on the table and how do we move forward? And what does the future look like if it's different? You know, like what are the options that are on the table? And how do we do it in a way that acknowledges where we've all been, acknowledges where each person individually has been and the choices that they've made,

and also ask the question, what is the world in which we want to inhabit moving forward? And how do we want to treat each other and view each other? And how do we, getting back to what you were talking about, Zoe, the word restore and restorative, how do we restore ourselves to a place of shared humanity and recognition of each other's humanity without ignoring where we've all come from,

but agreeing that we all have to move to a different place together? Yeah. It feels like a good place also for us to all come full circle as well. And I always end these conversations with a single question. I'd love to pose it to all of you, including if he has time or a friend on the phone. This is called Good Life Project. So if I offer up the phrase to live a good life,

how does that land with you? What does it mean to you? Freedom. That's it. I think for me, it's unity. It's connection, being connected. Yeah, I think in the same vein, unconditional love, which is not a forgiving or an ignoring of harm. It is just a recognition of humanity. And we can still make choices about how we spend our lives and who with, while having a foundation of love for everyone. Revolutionary love, as Valerie Court would say. Sincere, what do you think? Yeah. I mean, you know, I feel like this. We all have to look at each other

with empathetic eyes. And I think that's a lot of the times that's what's not happening you know because I look at it like this anybody can commit a crime a lot of people have criminal thinking without even really recognizing right and some some is more extreme than others but I thought you know if people looked at it especially when people in power look at it well what if this was my nephew or my daughter or my son? You know, how would I want him to be treated or him to be treated

if the shoe was on the other foot? You know? And so I feel people should look at each other with empathetic eyes and put themselves in our shoes. You know? And until we start looking at each other with empathetic eyes,

man, this injustice is always going to be there you know I think what we're doing now is a step because I'm watching the news and I see people protesting in front of in front of Solano saying there are people up out of here because of COVID-19 people are dying

so I think the more something bad happens, this call and your telephone number will be monitored and recorded. I think, you know, the more something serious happens, people are starting to wake up. And that's what it means. You know, what's happening right now is the voice of the people out there. Because in here, we really don't have a voice.

Or our voice is very limited. So when we have the people out there that say, hey man, let's get these people to try. Let's help them instead of punishing them. You know, that's what's going to happen.

When the public starts speaking up, then the public listens. I want to thank you all. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening.

And thanks also to our fantastic sponsors who help make this show possible. You can check them out in the links we have included in today's show notes. And while you're at it, if you've ever asked yourself, what should I do with my life? We have created a really cool online assessment that will help you discover the source code for the work that you're here to do. You can find it at sparkotype.com. That's S-P-A-R-K-E-T-Y-P-E.com. Or just click the link in the show notes. And of course, if you haven't already done so, be sure to click on the subscribe button in your listening app so you never miss an episode.

And then share, share the love. If there's something that you've heard in this episode that you would love to turn into a conversation, share it with people and have that conversation. Because when ideas become conversations that lead to action, that's when real change takes hold. See you next time. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes.

The Apple Watch Series X, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary.