Good Life Project - Julian Gilliam (LOGIK) | How to Embrace Your Inner Outlier & Change Culture

Episode Date: May 12, 2022

What if, instead of trying to fit in and be accepted, you embraced and harnessed the power of your inner outlier? How could you leverage different experiences and environments to turn the parts of you that no one else can replicate from a potential source of exclusion into a superpower and differentiator? In today’s episode with my guest, Julian Gilliam, who goes by the artist name, LOGIK, we explore these ideas in the context of LOGIK’s upbringing, living in 9 different places and having to constantly adapt, to his work as both a change-maker and creative innovator in the world of advertising and media, a Creative Director for Google, as an artist and painter who creates stunning lifesize works, and has recently been making giant waves in the world of art, community, Web3, and NFTs.And all the while, he’s done it by immersing himself in different experiences and cultures, including Japanese art and language, studying the dynamics and often unspoken social context, then rather than trying to fit in, bringing his full self, often as an outside and outlier, to the quest to create incredible moments of innovation, emotion, and awakening.I’m fascinated by LOGIK’s complexity as a skilled artist, the powerful direction he’s taking NFTs and the decisions he’s currently making as he steps fully into this brand new digital creative world. Toward the end of our conversation, at around the hour mark, he brings us to a point of how art and digital collide in a way that changes the relationship between art and collectors. This was a particularly potent part of the conversation in that, LOGIK reveals his philosophy around building a solid foundation as an artist and also building the relationships and structure needed to support longevity for the projects you’re undertaking. He truly brings a new lens to the creative life and how to bring together many people, voices, and communities to both drive change and support expression.You can find LOGIK at: Website | InstagramIf you LOVED this episode you'll also love the conversations we had with Lisa Congdon about building a career in the arts as an outlier.Check out our offerings & partners: My New Book SparkedMy New Podcast SPARKED.Visit Our Sponsor Page For Great Resources & Discount Codes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If I had started my journey based on monetary gain, I would have capped out a long time ago. I wouldn't have been logic. I wouldn't have been able to create the things I would have been creating because I would have been creating at the mercy of the bottom line, the dollar, what people like. Versus enjoying the idea of learning, enjoying the idea of tinkering, the idea of creating a stage for myself just so I can go do it, right? That had no financial kickback immediately. So what if instead of trying to fit in and be accepted, you embraced and harnessed the power of your inner outlier? How could you leverage different experiences and environments to turn the parts of you that no one else can replicate from a potential source of exclusion into a superpower and differentiator? So in today's episode with my guest, Julian Gilliam,

who goes by the artist name Logic, we explore these ideas in the context of his upbringing, living in something like nine different places before leaving high school and having to constantly adapt. And then we move through his work as both a changemaker and a creative innovator in the world of advertising and media and technology, eventually becoming a creative director for Google before leaving to really devote himself full time to be an artist and a painter and a maker and a creator who creates these stunning life-size works and has recently been making giant waves in the world of art community, Web3 and NFTs. And we talk about his grand vision for that space. And all the while, he's done it by immersing himself in different experiences and cultures, including Japanese art and language, which he fell in love

with as a kid, studying the dynamics and often unspoken social context. And then rather than trying to fit in, bringing his full self, often as an outsider and an outlier, to the quest to create incredible moments of innovation, emotion, connection, and awakening. I have been fascinated by Logic's complexity as a skilled artist, the powerful direction he's taking in the world of Web3, and the decisions he's currently making as he steps fully into his brand new creative world. And not just steps fully into it, but literally imagines and works it into existence. And towards the end of our conversation, around the hour mark, he actually brings us to a point of how art and digital are colliding in a way that is profoundly changing the relationship between art and collectors. And this was a particularly potent part of the conversation in that Logic reveals his philosophy around building

a solid foundation as an artist and also building the relationships and the structure needed to support longevity for the project you're undertaking. He truly brings a new lens to the creative life and how to bring together many people, voices, and communities to both drive change and support expression. So excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. If you're at a point in life when you're ready to lead with purpose, we can get you there. The University of Victoria's MBA in Sustainable Innovation is not like other MBA programs. It's for true changemakers who want to think differently and solve the world's most pressing challenges. From healthcare and the environment to energy, government, and technology, it's your path to meaningful leadership in all sectors.

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Flight Risk. Yeah, super excited to dive in. I know you spend a lot of time going deep into the world of art and creativity and expression and of teasing with three these days, and I definitely want to circle around to that. I'm so curious about sort of like the moments and the steps and the experiences along the way that have and continue to shape you. So I think it'd be interesting to take a bit of a step back in time. I know born and raised St. Louis. What I understand also, you moved a whole lot when you were a kid, bouncing from place to place to place,

something like nine different schools. And I'm so fascinated by that experience because I've talked to some people who have had a similar experience, not infrequently because they're like folks are in the military or something like that. And it's like they're constantly dropping into a new space and having to adapt and having to. And for some people, it makes them really withdrawn and just super self-reliant and internal and contemplative. And for others, it's almost like it does the exact opposite. It's like, it makes you super

extroverted and just an observer of social dynamics. I'm curious what your experience of that was. Yeah, man, it was probably the latter, but it's like a, I guess a mixture of both where I don't really wait on people to do stuff. Uh, kind of, like, because I just realized I didn't rely on people because a lot of the, especially my makeup as a child, I felt like a visitor. I never felt like a constant in a group, whether it was school, whether it was, like, with my family members, whether with the friends that I had. I felt like my friends, it would be a group of three and I would be the fourth musketeer or something, you know? Like, I was never always around. So, like, just moving around a bit, a bit of it had to do with my parents just trying to find a proper education system and trying to figure it out as like two black parents without a college degree, you know, wanting more and better for themselves. And they were just kind of like figuring it out.

And, you know, recently they didn't even know. Like I kind of like internalize why I am the person I am. And they didn't know how it was affecting me because they were just trying to, you know, figure shit out. So it's kind of like a blessing. I used to like look at the show Hey Arnold and just like look at Hey Arnold and Gerald and them with envy almost because it felt like they had this neighborhood of kids and they can always see each other and they can go like to walk down the street to the diner and I just feel like I

never really had those opportunities but as I got older I kind of saw how it affected me in the way that I create or I'm able to travel around and not feel like I'm leaving something behind it's a good thing or a bad thing because I think I'm terrible with the family situation. As I get older, I start to cherish family more because I spend so much time trying to get away from St. Louis or always on the move. I literally felt like the person, you remember this cartoon, it's not necessarily like a character, but it's always a character with a stick and then their clothes are in a blanket on the edge of the stick. That's how I felt for a big part of my life of my life so yeah man it really made me very independent uh and it allowed for me to observe like those social dynamics especially moving when i moved to the boondocks and i had a conversation with my homie richard the other day i don't know if

you ever seen the show the boondocks where riley and Huey live in a predominantly white neighborhood where my friend Richard who's a white guy was like yeah because we consider the boondocks the sticks right like far out no no people around but I was like yeah but for black people it's like there's no other black families around there's no we're far from everything else right so it's like these these layers of uh social cues that you only learn by going back and forth between environments, right? Like you get to see people's sense of humor is different. You get to see people are relying on specific trends and stuff like that. And just me moving around, I never was beholden to a specific standard of the way people thought or the way they approached

things. I was a kid in high school or in middle school. I was playing Magic the Gathering. I was playing World of Warcraft. I was playing AU basketball. I was designing websites. I was with the black kids. I was with the white kids. I was in honors classes. You know what I'm saying?

I was in art class. I was all over the place. And I was always just like a – I played all the sports, football, basketball. And I just got to see or just be a part of all these different, I guess, these reference points. And I'm light-skinned, too, so then white people feel more comfortable, especially in St. Louis, around light-skinned people versus dark-skinned people. It's very weird. You get to see light-skinned privilege and all these things kind of transpire, and it really informs a lot, right? And then it really, I guess, my parents moved me to a

predominantly white neighborhood that's called Baldwin, Missouri, or West County for better education. And I'll end on this because I grew up in Ferguson. And the school I was supposed to go to was Riverview High School. They lost their accreditation around the time I became a senior in high school. And only then can you see, like, it was like night and day. Like, the white school that I went to that had all the funding where we had this thing called the DSEG program, which is like the desegregation program. We bus black kids from the city to our high school. And then I lived in a county. So it was like this really weird dynamic where I remember being in class and a teacher handed out all these updates for the city buses.

And she just she didn't even ask who lived in the city she just gave them to all the black kids in the classroom and then i like raised my hand i was like uh i don't live in the city but you didn't ask susan or whatever if she lives in it you know it was like this whole and i'm like i'm like 14 you know like i'm like 14 like looking at this the way this stuff is like set up that was the first time i ever got a c in class but uh yeah man just even when i moved to this this neighborhood we had water polo in my high school we had water polo we had ice hockey we had you time I ever got a C in class. But yeah, man, just even when I moved to this neighborhood, we had water polo in my high school. We had water polo. We had ice hockey. You can get halfway certified in Cisco networking in high school, like all types of stuff. And when you go to back to where I'm from and we don't have water polo, we don't even have a swimming pool. I don't

even know what field hockey is. We lacrosse we had lacrosse I ain't never even heard of lacrosse and it was like these things that then I get to reflect on where I came from in my my extended family and you get to see all the shortcomings that happen just based on reference points or understanding just certain advantages or having a conversation about certain things that does not exist in your community and how far that goes in your everyday conversation and then even more and I'll and this is what I'll definitely end on, is one of the things that informed me because you got this white is right situation, especially in St. Louis, it's only white and black people. There's no in-between. And when I moved to the boondocks or the county,

I realized that just because they had all these resources that who was considered the alpha brace or whatever, wasn't happy either. Like, even with all the resources, the financial, I guess, advantage or whatever, people are still living this blueprint situation of life, right? So it's like, on both sides of the tracks, less resources, black people trying to figure their shit out and white people with abundance of resources, black people trying to figure their shit out. And then white people with the abundance of resources and they still don't have this shit figured out. So at the end of the day, I just realized like no one has the answers. And then I just kind of like hence me being called logic and me having to unlearn everything I was learned.

I was taught, et cetera, et cetera. So it just gave me a lot of perspective that when you look at me being a black man from St. Louis, Missouri, and I look at just that experience being like one in a million and how that gave me so much leg up to, and like me moving out to the boondocks, I went to LAN parties. I would design LAN parties when you take your computer to a warehouse and hook up on the same network. I played World of Warcraft because I got exposed to those things. I started designing websites, uploading shit to FTP servers before Squarespace, selling web hosting, selling domains that I bought for $5, I mean, for $8, for $200, you know, digital assets. All these things that, like, helped gave me the leg up to even just be able to navigate Web3 when we get into that conversation that otherwise, if I never moved to those environments, I never would have been exposed to those things. Yeah, I mean, it's so interesting. And hearing you talk about them now,

it's actually really interesting. Part of my curiosity is you look back now and you have all this, it's almost like you have this metal lens, this like broad perspective. You're like, oh, this is sort of like, these are the layers of what was going on, like a more nuanced understanding.

And it's sort of like a reflection of like, oh, well actually in the moment, it may have been this. But when I look back at it, these are all the different things that were really happening that I learned. I'm curious, do you feel like that's more of sort of like you reflecting over time? Or were you the kid who was actually that really rare kid who was so self-aware in the moment that a lot of these things, a lot of these observations are actually coming to you in real time when you're like you know in 12 13 14 15 16 oh yeah no it kind of creeps me out how aware of a 15 16 year old i was like i was painting and drawing on traditional you know mediums yeah i mean traditional canvases like paper or whatever

and then i realized that because i was on forums and stuff like this that I needed to learn how to do digital artwork because I lived in a county and I couldn't talk to people. So it was like my way of learning. I stole Photoshop, ripped it off the Internet. I'm self-taught and I started learning flash animation. I started navigating these spaces. I really started putting puzzle pieces in play a long time ago, almost to the point I was so observant. By the time I was a sophomore in high school, I used to play Division I basketball my freshman year. And then I ended up going to a junior college for a year and a half to try to either go back to a Division I school and play or

go to an art school, which is, I ended up going to the art school. But so yeah, I've always been kind of creepily aware of what was happening to me. Yeah. I mean, it's so unusual. I'm sure you get that, like, now. That's actually really unusual at any age, let alone as a kid. You used a really interesting word also. You said, I felt like a visitor in all groups.

And it sounds like, you know, there was this feeling like you could step into almost any group, but you never felt like you were actually, like, a genuine sense of belonging and all of them, almost like you were like, you're on a trip. It's like, I'm going to take it. I'm going to take a trip over to this group or to this group or to this group or this group. But did you feel any genuine sense of belonging, like who you are as you are in any one group or community? Uh, not really. Cause it was always in the back of my head. Uh, it took me a while to like, fall in love with the fact that that's the way I am and that's okay. Um, you know, just because it felt like people had insider jokes, right? Like they had inside jokes that I didn't understand or like, uh, they just had some type of camaraderie that I wasn't a part of.

Maybe, maybe it was just me internally, but I'm, I'm sure it's just something I couldn't put my finger on. And for me, I think also I got bored or I was too curious to just stay in one spot because you see a lot of people use each other as a crutch as far as pretty much, um, they support each other, each other's opinions often. So there's no discourse, right right and even if it's discourse or whatever i just i like the variations and the different perspectives from different people and i just always in this also i think this almost kind of haunts me too where i feel like i can't relax because i'm looking at everything as intentional learning i'm looking at everything as like i'm a sponge like like i like dumb shit because i it's something in the dumb shit that

you learn about people, right? Or learn why the world moves the way it moves. The same way you learn about smart people. Maybe I learn what I don't like the most from certain situations. And those type of things, I think it kind of almost created a divide in the way of me just kind of relaxing and being present. Or I am present, just not in the way of like the way I think people just kick their feet up, you know, kick their shoes off and kick their feet up. So it's something like that as I've dated, you know what I'm saying?

Like I think it affects that. Like people, you know, value family time and all this stuff where I don't really hold. Again, I had to become very, I had to be very intentional about taking time out to call my sister. And it's not because I'm being neglectful I just been I just get into these like these uh hyper focused situations where maybe I can't even it's almost hard to differentiate or discern the difference between just chilling the hell out and not looking at everything as a a science project or uh something where I can just have a value to apply to my artwork or my next

move. So I think that, that, that is one of the things where I've never really felt comfortable and just had to own the fact that I'm a loner and that's okay. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, but I, I would imagine that probably caused a certain amount of pain, like throughout a lot of your life. It's funny, as you were just describing sort sort of like that that mo of just constantly almost like in scan mode it's like you're constantly trying to figure out like what can i learn from this what does that mean how do i interpret it how do i bring it into like my understanding of the world this for some reason this buddhist parable popped into my head as you were describing it and it was a i'm going to get a little bit wrong but but basically it's like you you know, like a thousand Buddhist monks are sitting in front of

like one great teacher who holds up a flower in front of all of them and doesn't say a word. And then all of the monks are sitting there trying to figure out what does it mean? What does it mean? And they're like, and, and there's one out of the thousand who's just sitting there smiling. And the teacher recognizes in that person that that is the one person who gets it. And it was the person who wasn't trying to interpret, like, what does this represent? Like, but just simply had the capacity to be present and enjoy the beauty of it without having to actually deconstruct it. And I think we can get so in our heads in trying to like deconstruct everything and

code everything. And sometimes it's because it's survival. Sometimes it's because it's joy. Sometimes because we're trying to build or create something. But I wonder if sometimes you feel like that orientation, which it sounds like you have a lot of, it pulls you out of sort of like this, this ability to just be present and see and be with and enjoy beauty in the moment. Yeah, because when I look at beauty, I'm even breaking down the beauty of it already.

But I think that goes into, I had a conversation on Clubhouse a couple months ago. And I think it has my relationship with money or my relationship with success as a black man, to be honest. You know, me being able to break those things down at 15, 16 years old and then just moving back and forth when you see abundance of resources in one group and then you go to the other one and resources are less than. You see your family living on Section 8 on one side and then you see you have something figured out where you can break the the cycle the cyclical nature of what I was supposed to feel like I'm supposed to be a part

of forever and then you see family members or friends and family where you're from still stuck in that and my aspiration is to create my own version of the Disney that's pretty fucking big I don't have capital for that I don't have capital for that. I don't have uncles that are lawyers. I don't have those. Not saying everybody does, but, like, what does that mean? And for me, that was like, if you think about it, Disney's the only person in the entire world where we say we're going to Disney World or Disneyland. No one's batting an eyelash at how amazing that is, right? Like, you're going to a person's world on our planet. And what does that mean?

That's like 360 immersion. And what does that mean? That's like 360 immersion and not even that we're going to, then before I even get there, we talk about financial freedom, not even being able to, there was a moment I was like, I want to get to a point where I'm not even counting my twenties. Now you get to the point. Also you have to be, I have to be a realistic and realize where I come from. Like how people look at me when I come into the room, they don't expect shit. Like you will never know me walking around. Like what does a creative director do Google look like? Me now, I guess, you know, a former one, but before then it was like, there was nothing of this nature that looked like me that didn't have to conform to what these

structures were. So for me, I had to be a different type of monster. I had to be like the coldest monster in the world. Like, you know what I mean? Like I had to, I had this, I have this painting where I wrote this quote. It's like, here I am thinking no one gets it when it could be me going crazy for no reason. And it's like this whole thing of like, how can I stop? Like, even when I travel, when I went to Europe, I went on a trip to Paris. I'm enjoying Paris, but I could never travel just to go look at the beach. I went to meet up with people that run boutiques,

photographers, blah, blah, blah. When I went to Japan, I didn't just go to Japan. I went to Japan to shut the fuck up, to get perspective, to inform my artwork, to inform the stories that I want to create, the ones I want to push out on film, the ones I want to push out of my animations, the ones I want to push out of my paintings. And no one's going to take me to these places. No one's going to say, and it's like, it sucked.

That's why my name is Logic, man. It's like I had to really, really take myself to school, you know, like, and taking macroeconomics so I can see how money works. I learned, I'm speaking Japanese to expand my, broaden my horizons. And it's like, it sucks because I feel like I can be leaving, I guess, something on the table as far as me just enjoying, you know? But then it's like, I love this shit, but it's almost like, like I said, it could be me just going crazy for no reason. Like maybe I'm just doing too much. So yeah, man, it's like a constant battle

to be honest but it's like when I see where I come from it's like no one else is going to do it the way I'm going to do it yeah you know what I mean and I'm the one that could pass the bread bag pass the alpha bag pass the you know and it sucks but I don't necessarily feel like I have to do it but it feel like it makes sense like I have like I have to personally in like yeah you I think you get what I'm putting down yeah it's like it's almost like a sense of calling like this is like something that you're compelled you probably like this type of thing where we can't even necessarily understand like exactly or peace out like what's happening but there's an impulse there's like a drive inside of you that says and maybe it's maybe it's this for now maybe it's this season of life maybe it

like it changes over time but like in this moment it's sort of like this is what i aspire to this is what i aspire who i aspire to be what i aspire to create and like you see the vast amount of effort and work and just like things that are going to go into getting you there. And for you, it's like every interaction, every experience is another data point that helps you take a step forward to create that thing that's in your head that just like has to be created. Yeah, but it's kind of scary, though, because not scary because I didn't even know I was doing it. But it goes into my dating situation, too. But like I wouldn't want to go home for christmas because i don't like i learned like holidays are hallmark situations like they come around so fast we spend so much time with our money and our energy and our mental the things that we focus our time and

energy on for something that comes and goes tomorrow and something that somebody else created and my whole thing you know regardless of me you can call me scrooge but it's really everything valentine's day whatever and i'm like yo like you know, regardless of me, you can call me Scrooge, but it's really everything, Valentine's Day, whatever. And I'm like, yo, like, you know, we can create our own holiday. Like, we can, like, literally create our own language. We can create our own holiday. We can use this time and energy and resources that we spend for these man-made holidays to start a business or to do whatever it is, but this, so it almost made me jaded in the point where like, uh, like I get invited to a family gathering and I just get the

heebie-jeebies because I'd rather stay in my studio because I'm like, I'd rather just see you on Tuesday. You know what I'm saying? I'd rather just give you a gift on Thursday for no reason than to like work up and give all this stuff for this moment. I get people are designated, you know, for time off of work, et cetera, et cetera. But it was like I had to change the way I looked at all this stuff, the way look at debt, look at responsibilities, look at the things that I was trying to like operate, like all these man-made issues or inhibitors. Like who would you be without the without all of this these things and you know

it makes me almost look kind of like anti-social amongst my family or friends or whatever or like I don't care but it's almost like I'd rather build this empire I'd rather build this thing that's on the last and then I'm trying to work on balance because I do like I said I'm trying to be brought back into like let me give a of days to actually go home and just chill out and not, you know. So that is a thing. That is a thing. You know, I often wonder if we have seasons, you know, and those seasons could last for weeks. They could last for years of our lives, right?

Where we're sort of, we're intentionally out of balance. Well, I'm almost two decades in, so you let me know. It's a long season, man. No, I hear you. But I think the seasons often match sort of like the grandness of whatever vision is associated with that season. It's sort of like, how big, how bold, how much change are you looking to create? And how long do you need to be in this mode? But the question always comes back to you, right? So you devote so much of yourself to this and you say no to so much other stuff. And on the one hand, it's like you described, if you just look at it in your rational brain,

it's like, I just don't get why this is more valuable to me in my own personal nourishment than this other thing that I'm doing now. That's one thing. But I often wonder if so many of us give up on stuff where we actually really would like to be there, you know? Um, and we say no to it because we're so focused on this thing. Um, and I think, I think there's like this difference right there, right? You know? Yeah. And you know, I'm curious now also, you know, you, you describe your folks as, I guess it sounds like neither of them had college degrees,

so they were just, they were heads down doing the best they could trying to take care of the family, moving around, doing like putting you in the best schools they could, working really hard to do what they wanted to do. I wonder also, I got to imagine you being as present like you reflect on like is that part of the drive that you have to sort of like to completely reimagine the way that you step into adulthood and affect people around you a thousand percent well both my parents went back to college at the age of 30 or so yeah so they always like preach don't wait to don't wait till you late like us to do this get it out the way blah blah blah and honestly i'll tell them like i only got my college degree is because it made my mom happy and uh but that's the that's what they did for me right they put me in a position to have that perspective right which they looking at like my dad didn't

understand what was happening my dad's very practical person and he was like the way i was moving man i'm like yo fuck this job do this job and i'm like super reckless with i knew i had you know i had to believe in who i believe in you know that goes into the logical thing me being logic and everything i was doing is like yo that doesn't make sense why are you doing that scary creepy you know uh you might want to keep that job and i'm like yo dad fuck this job respectfully excuse my french but then moving around like my dad's a hustler, you know? Like, he's the oldest of five brothers and, you know, single mother household. My mom has a couple brothers and sisters. She never met her father, and just the way they kind of navigated and moved around,

you got to see the way people perceive my parents, right? Like, people would think my parents made a lot of money in relation to what the rest of my family made. And my dad would always make this comment when we'd go over to my uncle's house, and he'd be like, you know your uncle make more money than me. But it was like money management, right? He was talking about money management. And like, because everyone would think he made more money, but my dad just managed his money a lot better. And like my dad worked at his job and then he built computers on the side and while he's building computers I'm designing websites at the

age of 14 15 16 and I learned a lot from we'll just be in the office to like two in the morning one in the morning I'm designing he putting stuff together so he and he was like the person who he coached me in basketball that was and they moved. So I got to see them never be complacent or, like, stand still. And, you know, my dad always, you know, through sports, and, you know, you just have the relentless nature of, you know, losing and winning, losing and winning, learning that you're not actually losing, you know what I'm saying? It's just like those learning opportunities.

Oh, yeah, I just played a shitty game. And then you learn what you could have did and no it's not the end of the day i'm into the uh it's just not the end of everything and then my mom on the other hand she was very uh i guess almost in a militant nature about me doing well in school like my mom would have me up to two in the morning uh she'll rip a whole paper up and make me write it over like you know she was on some stuff like that and then so i had the best of both worlds and uh just even with that like my mom when i used to have to do like book reports as we were moving around like i went to a bro i went to a catholic school for a year and i didn't even know what catholicism was i remember i was in fourth grade my teacher leaned over to me she was like uh before

we were at a mass and before people went up to get communion or whatever, she's like, are you Catholic? I had never heard this word a day in my life. And I was like, no. And then I saw the kids go up for crackers and juice and I was pissed. I didn't say I was Catholic. I was hungry as hell in the morning. But when I got to see all these things, I went to Catholic school for some odd reason because they didn't want me to go to the school system in the neighborhoods that I was in. And I know they were breaking my neck to have me and my sister go there. I went to a Christian school for a minute. And just doing all these things, I just got to see a lot, man. And when I used to be in school doing the lessons,

as they were moving around trying to figure stuff out, my mom and my dad, my mom was very cognizant of me knowing about my history. So when we have, everyone remembers book reports. When we had to do book reports, I remember pulling something off the shelf at the library. And it was like some random ass story. And she's like, no, we're not doing it. And which was crazy because this goes into like the idea of like, it's really tough because my mom wanted me to know about my history so she had this she went from her job where somebody had all of these books of

influential black people for like or african-americans for like like a couple centuries you know like from back in the 1800s all the way up to like the present day at that time and these things were like literally like seven pages at most, but they were small font, and she made me do book reports on a different person, and she would just have me forge the page numbers, like 47 pages, 37 pages, and she would just make me pick somebody new every book report, which kind of sucked because I wanted to do more imaginative books.

I don't even know, nonfiction, fiction, whatever, but she wanted to make sure that I knew where I came from or else I wouldn't have learned it, you know? So it was like those things, those things informed who I am, whether it's the sports, my mom gone call about me learning, uh, not being a dumb ass, you know? Uh, so yeah, man, they really, they really did that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it sounds like they were just super invested in you becoming, you know, like a human being with sort of like a real understanding of where you came from and strong values in the world. And it's no doubt it definitely feeds into the way that you're just sort of like

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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. So you end up going to Columbia College in Chicago, study animation, film, video.

I know before that you've been exposed to anime, to sort of like Japanese cartoons and sort of like really understood, oh, wow, this is different than what I'm seeing in a lot of sort of like the Disney animation. And which makes me really curious because you've shared a few times just like, okay, so part of my big vision is sort of like create the next generation of Disney, right? But it seems like Disney, in terms of the context of what Disney World is and what it represents, literally stepping into a world. Totally get that. In terms of like your lens on what drew you, it sounds like so much more strongly to anime versus traditional sort of

like US based or Disney based creation. It sounds like you were much more drawn to the stuff that was coming out of Japan. But it was the idea of like creating this world around it that millions of people could step into that drew you to sort of like the business structure of a Disney. So it's almost like you're bringing these things together. Yeah, yeah, that's a good one. My dad worked for a movie distribution company. Like they used to create ads.

They were called Sight and Sound. So they would do stuff on the radio. And also like they would do stuff on the radio. And also Blockbuster would actually get their movies from my dad's company that he worked for. So I would get all these promotional copies, which, again, added to me being perceived by my cousins or family members as having a lot of money. But I would get the movies before they even went to Blockbuster. And we would just have crazy movie nights. And I think that informed a lot of, uh, me being exposed to a lot of different mediums. Uh, like my, we had a wall, like we had walls of movies and they were set. They were, my dad had them all organized by genres. He had a horror movies over here. He had the, uh, the black movies over here. He had the black movies over here. He had

the Disney movies, you know what I'm saying? The anime. He even had some hentai stuff hidden away somewhere because he just had access to all this stuff. Because I remember opening up an anime box and he was like, nah, that one's not for kids. But it was the thing i i didn't really like musicals man i just didn't really i like fast forward the musical part i just didn't really i just wasn't tapped in the way you know for that and disney did a lot of that the thing that i really care i liked more about it was man he hit you on all points toys the the didn't my dad, him working there, I was able to go to Disney World at the age of 10. I went to Universal Studios. I got slimed, bro.

You know what I'm saying? I got slimed. What kind of kid in the 90s? That was a dream. It tastes like applesauce. I know that for a fact. What does that do to a person's mental? I was able to see these things and go to these things.

I saw Kenan and Kel's little work uh their little cubby box in universal studios it was wild and i love movie production i used to make my cousins act in my films when they used to come over on this little and i would edit on two vcrs i would edit the the fucking clips a blank on one and a tape on another playing stop and record on the VCRs. But the thing about the anime situation was the, like, you watch Dragon Ball, it literally started from Goku being a child. Like, he's landed and now he's like three grand, he's like a great, great grandfather. What kind of shit is that?

Like, that's an entire, but then when you look at a lot of lot of the other animes, a lot of them have stories that do that. They're constant, that and that long. And one of the things more so about Japanese culture that I had an affinity for was the attention to detail, the attention to detail, whether it's fashion, whether it's cartoons, or even service. In 2018, I quit my job in the middle. I knew I was getting another job, but I told my job I wasn't coming back and I wandered around for 33 days and I just didn't just stay in Tokyo. I went to Kyoto, Osaka, Hiroshima, Himeji, Miyajima, and a few others. And it was just like, I just literally went there to just be able to fly on the wall and understand what it is that I'm looking at. And then you kind of learn that the reason why the attention to

detail is so high is because in America, our grades can always fluctuate, right? Like you can go from an 85 to a 92 or a 92 to 75, and you're always on this fluctuating scale, so you can slack off and just pick it back up in the 11th hour. But in Japan, you start at 100%, and you get dox points. You lose points. You don't get them back.

You lose them. You see what i mean like yeah it's a different in the way you approach the way you the way you do things it's always like you don't tip in japan is already expected like to have good service here like you're not working hard unless you're getting paid out so it's like these different things you get to learn about different people i mean about the way people approach life so if my whole entire reference point as to how i'm supposed to act in a restaurant or act walking down the street or knowing that you can make coffee 10 different ways it informs the way it allows for you to have much more to bring to the table and you and then i'm more confident about the stories i'm able to tell like Like if we look at Disney, like, and again, me being a black man, I don't want to just

make quote unquote black art because when I make art, it's art made by a black dude, you know, like it's inevitable. So how can I gain that perspective to understand the things that I'm feeling is something that resonates with other people in different places. So Disney for me, the way it's like misogynistic and all that stuff, I have an issue with that. Again, it was per the times, but it was more so like the blueprint, right? The idea, like you said, walking into it. And on this, man, it was just like the anime thing, man.

It just, what I'm creating might not even look like Disney. It might not even look like anime. But the thing is, it gave me a feeling and a direction in how big this shit can get. And with that power, you can create institutions. Like if I was Disney, I can have institutions. I can create different type of elementary schools. I can create different type of middle schools. Like I already have a nonprofit organization that's called Chiba Center.

That's a Japanese language school for black and brown people. And that's with me with a little bit of money. You know what I'm saying? Like you can do so much with influence. And that's the type of world I'm talking about. One at 18 and up Euro can walk in and really get that, get the truth and resonate with dope shit. Yeah.

It's very lofty, you know what I'm saying? Theorial, but it's working out. It's crazy. Yeah. I mean, it's amazing. It's really cool to see the way that you're drawing on all these different worlds to sort of like to figure out in real time how they how do they inform each other? How do we piece them together? And like, where does all that stuff that's been out there in the world intersect with like your own personal vision, your own artistic expression, your own sort of picture of what you want the world to look like?

You know, which is interesting to me because you so even with all that going on around you and in you, and certainly you're circling back to it in a powerful way in the last couple of years especially, you're deepening into your own art, and you're sort of learning, okay, so who am I? How do I want to express myself just as an individual too? What's the medium? Where are the channels?

How do I develop my skill and my craft? And then you make this really interesting decision coming out of school, which is let me step into the world of advertising. And I was curious from the outside looking in and you spend a chunk of time in there, right? You start out at Common Ground, then you end up at Havas for a while and then Blast and then Leo Burnett, where then you end up actually creating this sort of, I guess, namely it was kind of like a sub-agency almost, or like this inter-agency, sub-agency type of thing. And you're rising up and building your chops

as an art director, and it sounds like having a lot of influence and opening the conversations in these spaces. I was just, I was really curious about the decision to step into that space, like as your next step, and to spend a chunk of years. Like, what was the thing that drew you to that? And it seems your next step and to spend a chunk of years, like what was the thing that drew you to that? And, and it seems like you also looked at that, that time and said, okay, um,

this is another way for me to just learn a ton of stuff because I still have this bigger vision in the back of my head. And how can I leverage each one of these opportunities, not just to develop my own skills, but to really, to keep refining the vision of what I want to create in the world? Again, this is me from the outside looking in and saying that's what looked like was happening. I'm so curious what was actually happening from the inside out. Man, it was so many things. It was so many things. I didn't know what advertising was until I did this internship called the Marcus Graham

Project. And Marcus Graham is named after Eddie Murphy's character in this movie called Boomerang, right? He was a creative director. And at that time, it wasn't a lot of black creative directors. So that's what the program is modeled after. I think they're about to do their 15th or 20th anniversary. I think it's 15th. Yeah. And I was there in 2012 and I lived in Dallas, Texas for an entire summer. And we're a pop-up advertising agency. And through that there in 2012 and I lived in Dallas, Texas for an entire summer. And we're a pop up advertising agency. And through that, we got interviewed by a few agencies afterwards. And I got hired by a black owned agency called Common Ground. It's called 1035 now. And at that moment, I was still I was in my junior year at Columbia and I had one more year left and I was getting my degree in animation and film and video. And, um, I knew that I didn't want to work for animation studio, which is, I just knew I didn't want to work for animation

studio. Cause I was like, wait, if I work for animation studio, I'm only in charge of making the background. Wait, if I work for animation studio, I'm only in charge of making three characters for the entire thing. It's like way too specialized for your brain. Yeah, bro. I was going to be in there going crazy. Wait, I'm'm dropping paint bucket i'm coloring all the hell no like hell no i can't do this but i didn't even have to put that type of energy out into the to the universe because the universe kind of just served that up and for me there was two parts right it was one yes it was like a university in which i got paid right like i got paid to learn. I learned about processes.

I got to see the homies because I'm in the underground art scene. I see the homies do something with no budget and it gets millions of views. And then I see something with a million dollar budget that get like 300 views with paid advertising. It's like the craziest stuff. It was like, yo, like I know some scrappers, like some of the most innovative people that that can't that don't have the business acumen to work in these places that are way they'll run creative. They're in creative circles around the people behind in these desks. Right. And that informs a lot. It shows you it lets me know my value as well. But one of the things and it's kind of fucked up is almost like the same reason I got my degree. Right.

Like besides my mom and make my mom happy is you can't take that shit from me. And me, again, having these reference points, like, when I was in, like, I remember I was in high school. I was a freshman. And I had the highest grade. Like, you had your student number, and then they would have, they'd post your grades up, and I had, like, a 98.7. And the next one behind me was, like, a 95.

And somebody was like, who has a 98.7 and the next one behind me was like a 95 and somebody's like who has a 98.7 or whatever I was like that's me and he like this dude he lived on my block too he looked me in my eyes and like dead face like that's not you you know what I'm saying like it can't that can't be your grade like what and I'm like just sitting here like man because I used to like skip I was a fucking math whiz back in the day I can do that shit in my head and I just oh we got a test today like I didn't study I math whiz back in the day. I can do that shit in my head. And I used to, oh, we got a test today? I didn't study. I just knew.

I could do it. I can just see the numbers. And when you're navigating these things, whether it's like I'm going to a nightclub or a restaurant and they're looking at me like I'm crazy, don't let me in, or charging me extra at the door or whatever, however you want to look at these social hierarchies, I knew that's how it is in corporate America. And I also know that's how it is if I'm trying to create my own version of Disney for somebody to shut the fuck up and let me speak.

So for me, it was more so like these badges of approval of showing competency because when you see a black dude or whatever, oftentimes we get the less service because they don't think we don't tip or they think you walk into an expensive store, you don't get service because they don't think we don't tip or they think we don't have the uh you walk into an expensive uh store you don't get service they don't think you can afford the clothes etc i understand like this way and then don't let me grow my hair out you know what i'm saying like you know you know they think on whatever those preconceived notions are but i understand this i understand the psychology of people to a default, you know, and I understand like me working at Havas. It juices you up. Oh, wow, you work in corporate America and you do this art stuff?

And then I got to Leo Burnett, right? And then I created Naomi and I was able to use these structures. My thing was like infiltrating structures and using their resources to do what I wanted. You start to realize like when I said when I lived in a county, again, it's informed, all this stuff informs everything. When I was living in a county in a predominantly white neighborhood, they have all these resources, but they're not taking advantage of them. And then, you know, then I'll back around from, like, we have no resources, but we making

the coldest music. We making, we got the coldest style with nothing. Like, we are resourceful. It's hip hop coming from nothing. It's hip-hop coming from nothing. It's the most nuanced culture in the world. So then when I was working at Leo Burnett, I'm like, yo, we on the 47th floor or whatever floor we were on. And we got all these empty spaces, like unused spaces, and people just going to work and going home. I started activating in the building. I started bringing, I'm like, yo, we downtown in Chicago, high rise,

looking over the Chicago River, whatever, and no one utilizing it. So I started activating inside those spaces. You know, furthermore, it's like I took the lack of people expecting stuff from me to my advantage, you know. I check my boxes. They check their black box, and I'm checking. I'm printing my prints to sell at the studio. I mean, at the place. And then I started to realize me learning all this stuff that everything's about a keen perspective and being able to speak honestly and with conviction about it and also being able to, you know, the power of influence. is that what I read? Basically, somebody has a suggestion or whatever. You might not agree, but it's like you know how to work with them so they can still agree to do what you want to do.

But my point is, I started just to innovate. And I knew about intentional learning and the things that would set me apart. Like me going to South by Southwest at 23 years old with $200 in my pocket. And being there, because you got to see what commercials and social media, especially at that time, was all based on pop culture. And you got to see that they were just kind of cherry-picking stuff off the top of blog posts or everything was derived from, it was like bastardized from Complex Magazine or Juxtapose or whatever.

And then that was their reference as to who's high, what kind of conversations we're about to have. So me, I spent my little $200 to go to South by Southwest, six people sitting and sleeping in the room, but I got to see culture pop. I got to go to a place where you see Mac Miller walking around, Kendrick Lamar, and then you got to see people from all over the world travel to this place. Then you go to Art Basel, the same thing. I got to see how money move. I got to see why this is high, why this is even trending on any type of network. And when you're in these business meetings and everybody's talking about what they've heard and you're talking about, yo, I was there, you know, how are you going to combat that? So these type of things, then you kind of start to see the stuff

work. And then all I had to do was learn how to pitch it better, learn how to, you know, say things more concise and get my points together and see okay what's important to this person and you and it was like gold bro it was like you can't replace somebody life lived right like oh when I was in Japan oh when I was in Europe and somebody who also went to Japan went as a fucking tourist I didn't go as a tourist I didn't go to New York as a tourist I went to get into the shit I went to go not to go to the Statue of Liberty, but I went to go see whoever, whoever do they think and wherever. And you got to see like, oh, yeah, but the culture is kind of moving this of this, bro. To be honest, I don't care about none of these titles. I don't care about none of these places. It was all about getting my foot in the door,

achieving what I want to achieve, showing competency for white America, because that's what they see on paper. They see my black ass, no expectations, but you see the Google thing, now we can talk, right? So now it's like, for me, it was, I had to spend a decade just to do that. You understand? And I had to do that and realize why every time I worked at an agency, I had to count my time and hours.

Why am I here? And I had to look at my track record. I didn't stay at an agency longer than two and a half years or three years because I remember it was my black agency and I got the game I was making like 36,000 a year and I'm like 24 years old and I started trying to innovating uh our social media strategies and stuff like this and I went in I was like yo I'm just trying to be able to buy another drink at the bar because I only get one it's not even about the drink I'm looking at my co-workers like I don't even understand how they doing this like I paid my little 15 and I'm tapped out and I paid my little $15 and I'm tapped out. And I remember my boss at the time, the person who was looking over me, he was like, you got another job offer? I was like, no.

He's like, you have anybody checking after you? I was like, no. He's like, then why would we pay you more? And he spoke for another hour. He didn't have to say anything, right? He didn't have to say anything. He spoke for another hour. I ain't hear shit else.

He said, I heard that. I came back a week later with $20,000 more offer and they couldn't match it. And then I was like, Oh, that's how it works. Yeah. Right. And then I figured that out. And, uh, yeah, man, basically to your point, bro, it was just another degree, man. That should have just a badge for me to get my foot in the door, which Google did numbers in the web three world, right? Like, Oh my God, he's a creditor at the Google. Let's shut up. Let's say whatever. Then you hear a black person black person black woman especially a black woman speak she say something she'll get no play no no response no feedback and then somebody else come and speak

and say the same question or whatever and now all of a sudden the question is relevant so you get to see these power and titles you get to see these powers and you know what i'm saying it's very interesting yeah i mean it had to be so fascinating especially like from these powers and you know what I'm saying? It's very interesting. Yeah. I mean, it had to be so fascinating, especially like from your context, right? You know, which is going to be like radically different than if I showed up like in the exact same companies, you know I'm just going to ride it for as long as I can. I'm going to, I'm going to go up the ladder. I'm going to work towards partnership, whatever it is, and kind of like stay there. And you show up with a totally different mindset. You're like, okay, so how do I work this system? Which brings me to sort of like the last couple of years for you, right? Because you, you tap out of that a couple of years back. And now what it feels like is you're like, you're no longer looking at, you're kind of looking at all these structures. And you're like, okay, so I get it.

I've lived in them. I figured out how to navigate them. I figured out how to leverage them. I've learned a ton about them, about the different power dynamics, the different players, about what works. And you reach a moment where you're like, okay, so it's no longer about how do I work these existing systems. It's about how do I create something entirely new? Like how do I actually define the structure myself? Is that what's going on inside?

Because that's what it looks like. Man, I think the beautiful thing is I didn't wait until I was done to do it. Yeah. Or to start, right? I got let go from Havas actually. And it was like a blessing because when i got let go two weeks later i got a job offer of 25k more or 30k more right and then i had to do less work you know like it was like i would show up to work with paint on my clothes and stuff like that you know in my hands like because i just got in at 4 a.m from doing a mural at a at a ping pong

place or whatever right and my whole thing was I just can't let these structures win. Like, I know I have to identify why I'm here. And I've always been like, I'll be working in corporate America. Then, you know, that same Tuesday, I'm doing a talk at the Apple store about my journey. And a lot of artists or people try to hide these things from their employers. And for me, I was like, if I got to hide it, then those are the places for me, first and foremost, because you have to believe what you have is valuable,

that what you're doing is going to bring something special to the pot. So that thing, like, my thing was always, I don't wait until I'm ready to start. Like, you do that, that's the most discouraging shit ever because when you start, you're going to be waiting for results the entire time, right? Like, when is this going to come up? So, my whole thing was I already identified slow and steady years ago. 16 years old, I identified slow and steady years ago.

You know what I'm saying? Like, every shot at the board counts, whether it's a big thing or a little thing. I used to throw events in St. Louis. I used to throw events in Chicago. I'm doing live paintings at Soho House. I'm doing live paintings at the Jordan store. My first thing, man, it was like, I understood. People don't reverse engineer people's stories. Everyone look at like, oh, they just popped up and they were who they were. That's false as hell. So even, what was this, five, six years ago, like I understood. Like I'm not a rapper.

I don't sing. I wasn't a keynote speaker. Like how is anybody going to know what I want to say? And it's very easy to look at your friends who get picked to get to shoot in the pit at 2 Chainz concert or Tori Ma's concert. And you're like, I shoot photos. Why nobody pick me? And then you see some other people doing murals at the Jordan store or whatever. I'm like, I do, I paint. Why nobody picking me? And then you realize like, did I put myself in position to know the people who put me in that position? Did I, or put me in to put me on to the bill? Did I, did I even do, did I even make it

known that I even do these things? Like? And did I even do it for me? You know what I'm saying? I forget people forget to do it just because they fucking want to do it versus the bottom line. So one of the things was I went outside on Michigan Avenue with two of my homegirls who are musicians. One was playing, what's that, the big joint, not the cello. Like the stand-up bass or something? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

She was playing that joint. And then my friend Kiara, she was singing, doing voice loops. And then I was out there painting. And about 7 p.m. comes around. It gets a little dark. They, like, we're going to wrap it up. I can still catch the light from, like, the little Nike, the little store sign or whatever on my canvas. I'm like, I'm going to paint a couple more hours.

And then as I'm painting, this lady walks up to me and she's like, and this is my first time. I was like, in my thing, what I taught to myself is I'm going to create a stage for myself. That is what I'm going to do, create a stage for myself. I'm going to go out and paint. And the first time I did this, a woman walks up. She's like, this is nice. I was like, thank you. She's like, how old are you?

I'm like, I was like 25. She's like, what size shoe are you wearing? I was like, about a 12. She's like, this is amazing. I'm the Nike ref of the midwest and we got an event this weekend you should definitely come through just like that right now i'm paying for the jordan i'm paying for jordan i'm paying for nike and it was just me putting myself out there and giving a fuck about what i want to do first versus like asking why or when my turn and i say all that

to say man it's like um i didn't wait you know what I'm saying? Like when when I left Google three weeks ago, wasn't like, OK, now it's time to be logic. You know, like it was always just like part of me working at Google. I think they seem all my art. They seem what I've done. They seem not only me creating Naomi, but they seem that I'll be in these streets and I'm innovative and I take I take initiative. It's not like based on assignments. And I think that's when, you know, we always try to relegate ourselves to what we think the status quo is or what people are expecting. And the whole time it's like these people

in these corporate structures don't know shit. Like they just do their job. They fulfill their duties, no matter what level you're on. Yeah, it's brilliant people at Google, but they just people at the end of the day. Not to shit on it, it's a brilliant place. I learned a lot.

But when you start putting things on pedestals and start kind of putting your perspective or with who you are to the side based on what you think it is when you realize it's just people and ideas running around with their head cut off trying to figure shit out and and then when you realize that it makes the game so much more enjoyable it makes it more fun and it lets you relax a little bit and have confidence in who the motherfucker you want to be and who you are at the moment. So my point is like at this moment, because I went on leave, man. I went on a sabbatical when I was working at Google for my last three months. And then when it was time for me to return, I opted out of it. And that went into me like going all in on Web3. Like I was like living

on Clubhouse. I was like, because I told you I play World of Warcraft, right? People get gold in the game and then they were selling the gold on eBay. I was like, bro, that's a cryptocurrency. You know what I'm saying? Like I bought the domain for FileLetter. I bought a FileLetter domain called Plota. I get a $200 offer on it. I pay $8. That's a digital asset. Bro, you talking about provenance. We talking about cryptocurrencies. We talking about I can prove that all this stuff I got on Instagram. I can own it and say limit, say less.

But that only happened because of where I was able to move. My parents moved me to, to go to LAN parties for me to be exposed to graphic designers and Counter-Strike 1.6 and Steam and World of Warcraft. All those things informed just by that simple move. Yeah. And it's also, you know, part of what you're saying here also is like, you didn't wait, you know, like you were, yes, you were doing this thing and it looked like, okay, so this is my mainstream thing. This is the thing that's paying my rent. And at the same time, you're outside of that. You're building everything else in real time. You're not waiting to sort of say, let me do my time here.

And then once I'm done and I have a certain amount of money made or a certain amount of cachet or certain pedigree, then I'm going to be ready to go and do the thing that really I'm like I'm here to do. You're saying to yourself, no, like this is my university. It just happens to be paying my rent at the same time. But I'm not going to actually step away from all these other things that fill my heart and nourish me. I'm going to do them all at the same time so that when it's time for me to actually step into that as my main thing,

I'm not starting from zero. Like now I'm like, this is already a fast moving train. You just got to like step into it and like push the gas harder at that point. Yeah. And Jonathan, to your point, man, I think I never looked at it as like this or that. It was like me working in this was a part of my life. It was part of me being an artist, right? It wasn't like, and people don't know people like if those things didn't inform me as a person, if they didn't improve me by being on set, using somebody else's million dollars to learn about there's 50 people on set doing what I'm telling them to do to get this experience.

So when I do my own movies, when I do my own shit, then I know how to do this. If those things didn't inform that, I wouldn't be there. That's what I think the difference is. I tried to optimize every single thing that I was doing, and I didn't look at it. It was like, oh, this is my job. I was very mindful about how much time I spend at these places. I was very mindful of why I was there and what it did for me. And then I was out or, you know, and in a form, my social circles, you know what I'm saying?

And improve my social circles. And when I would travel, like when I would go to L.A. to do a commercial or wherever, I would stay three extra days or I would go three days extra and I would go do photo shoots. I would go I would like download Tinder and find people in L.A. and then I would go shoot them in L.A. Like I would do these things because it was like, I can't afford to go to LA on my own dime, but I'm going for this. And I got per diem and all this stuff. Y'all got to fly me in anyway.

You got to fly me back. So I'm gonna come in two days earlier, come in three days later. I got that link up with the homies out there. I use it as a, like, again, you scratch my back.

I'm gonna scratch yours. Yeah. It's like it all worked together into this seamless thing. Yeah. That brought you to scratch yours. Yeah, it's like it all worked together into this seamless thing that brought you to this moment. Whether you're in your running era, Pilates era, or yoga era, dive into Peloton workouts that work with you. From meditating at your kid's game to mastering a strength program,

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Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. 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. 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 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. Brought up a couple of different times now, you know, a couple of terms that have become like really buzzy these days, NFTs, Web 3.0, you know, and like, it's almost like you can't blink, you can't turn a corner without bumping into those things.

And, you know, we've had a couple of like really interesting people and conversations around this on the podcast. We had Micah Johnson on. I'm like a huge fan. I'm so fascinated by what he's doing with Aku World. Tom Bilyeu, who's building, you know, sort of like this new studio in that world. And it's such an interesting moment for people who are both artists, but also people who have this vision of creating sort of like something at this at this sweet spot between art between community between enterprise where it's all coming together right now and like i

feel like we're at this point of inflection where it's it we're hitting a tipping point there's mass exposure to this world um anyone can type in any of these things online and pretty quickly you know like they can read a million tutorials to figure out what they are. I'm really, I'm fascinated by how you're leveraging like this world and this moment, you know, um, because you've at, at this point you step into it, you know, like you're, you're a really accomplished, skilled artist, you know, like your work alone without even stepping into the world of NFTs is just super powerful. It's layers and layers and layers. So you can stand in front of it. Any person can stand in front of something that you've created and feel something. And I

always feel like that's really powerful when it comes to art. You know, you're at this moment where you're like, okay, so there are a lot of directions that I could take. Like when I'm stepping into just like, it's me now front and center. How do I do this? Like, what's the structure that I wrap around it? I'm curious about your choice to say, well, this brand new world, like of NFTs and of Web3 is the way that I want to step into it because it seems like you're doing it. And also you brought up earlier, you basically lived on Clubhouse for a chunk of time. Um, which seems like, you know, I often feel like people don't credit clubhouse in the explosion of this world. People are talking about discord as a place where everyone's building community now, but clubhouse was like this early match that lit the fire.

And now it's sort of like, you know, the fire's moved, moved on to a certain extent, but, um, you stepped into that world and i was just sort of like watching i'm like in fact i think i first discovered you and your work like back in the day where sort of like maybe a year ago or so like on clubhouse where it's just like everyone was on there 24 7 so i'm just really curious like when you think about sort of like this moment and how you're leveraging these new technologies what's going on in your head like what really matters to you about this moment about what you head like what really matters to you about this moment about what you're saying yes and no to and about this vision that you actually want to want

to create oh man um i saw the light man like when i when i when i spoke about me learning about the provenance and origin that was just like a tip like the tippity-tip of the iceberg. Royalties, tippity-tip of the iceberg, right? Proving out additions. There's only 50 of these ever. Tippity-tip of the iceberg. Most people stop there, though. Most people stop at that point. They stop at the pretty picture aspect.

But me, like I've been working with programmers since, again, I was 15, 16 years old, right, using ActionScript and getting websites designed, I mean, getting websites coded that I designed for clients and communicating and learning that basically is a set of variables on, like, I learned about the smart contract. Like, when I learned about the smart contract

and how deep that rabbit hole goes, man, it fucked my head up, like, in a great way. When I started learning, like, if this happens and this happens and if this doesn't happen, then that that happens and so on and so forth you really get to and i'll and i'll explain what that means in a second you really get to like open up that you can create ecosystems like you can create things that affect other things and i'm not just talking about an nft that token gates you to get to something you can you can change the whole way the whole

landscape and how your collectors interact with that specific art piece or just you as a person. And the more, I think the more that you know, the more well off you are. And the way I see Disney, the way I'm seeing these feature films, it seemed like that shit, I was going to have to be like 45 to 50 to do this, right? Like based on resources, based on waiting every two weeks for somebody to pay me my money you know what i'm saying based on the little clout deals that brands try to give you for a couple bands here a couple bands there like that shit that's slow money like i was like

yo this is crazy that this exists because what i mean is uh i did my first three drops on nifty gateway right and i did a i did a test run um one of my my first three drops on Nifty Gateway, right? And I did a test run. My first one of one is called Breakfast. And my dev and I had like 10 days to pull this off or whatever, but me finishing the art and him doing these things. But basically my piece, Breakfast, rotates between day and night every 12 hours. So 12 hours is daytime, and then you come back, it could be nighttime. And the reason why it does that is because it embellished my story about the cyclical nature in which low-income neighborhoods have, you know,

food deserts, low-income schools, over-policing, et cetera, et cetera. And I was like, wow, that's crazy, right? And then I came up with this other crazy idea that I won't say on here because literally in a week or two, I'll see a bastardized version of it on the internet. But on the blockchain, so I saw that after I dropped those three pieces and I spent a lot of time in the room, unless you like a blower or a bee pool or whatever, you have to like find collectors every time you did a drop. And I was like, that's exhausting. Like that sounds exhausting. And I've been in this game for a long time. I'm like, I'm not about to do that, right?

Because a lot of people just kind of found their, like, stride in NFTs or found out that they're artists, which is fine. But I've been doing this shit for a minute, you know? And I'm like, I'm not here just to be taking, just to be stabbing in the dark, seeing what sticks. I'm like, fuck that. So I created this project called The Plug. Are you familiar with The Plug?

I am, yeah. So for those who don't know, in short, basically I'm teaching staking without talking about staking. So the longer you hold my NFT, the more juice you get. There's a battery pack on there that starts at 1% when you purchase it, and every 60 days it charges up 1%, 17%, 33%, all the way up to 100%. Now, if you sell my NFT before it gets to 100%, it reverts back to 1% on a secondary market. And if you hodl it to 100%, it evolves to its third and final stage, and it'll stay like that

forever on the blockchain. Now, the reason why this is important is because I dropped 888 of these. I have 545 collectors and I have my collectors built in who want to see me win. So every time I drop, I have essentially 545 collectors that want to either get one of my one-on-ones or my next project, or will hopefully share it out. But for me, I'm able to gamify my collectors because I can isolate everyone's ETH addresses based on their rankings, how long they supported me as an artist. Now, when I'm able to carve something like this out, this bought me time. It bought me time and space. It educated collectors on patience.

You know what I'm saying? It showed that I'm in it. And also, again, I'm always about this. And maybe it's like I got PTSD or something. It showed my competency on a blockchain. And I felt that was important because now I'm getting the nerds' attention. I'm speaking to the culture because we know what the plug is. You know what I'm saying?

Like you become the plug. You got a plug for that. You got the plug to get in the party. You got a plug to get the weed. Whatever you need, you got the plug. And to become the plug, you need time and a game. So for me, a lot of these things it was like when i said that this shit wasn't sustainable because we've seen macaulay

cogan we've seen little bow wow we've seen uh jaleel white who played urkel we saw that that the way they had their lifestyles were not sustainable because they didn't have legs underneath their like their personas it wasn't and have longevity built in a lot of the projects we see don't have longevity built in now when i when i'm creating this this show this gave me so much more confidence to create my own version of disney because literally i'm about to drop an animation series called the adventures of black man i already got five episodes done and those things were on my ipad labeled as practice you know what i'm saying like because i didn't have nowhere to put it but on instagram like now it's like i can drop a thousand episodes imagine owning every all like if you can own all of tim burton's first five animations or you can own the first season of hey arnold or rug

rats or whatever and you can actually own them hoes and there there's only 10,000 of them or 5,000 or 1,000. So it really allowed for me to realize, like, in all true full transparency, I made my salary and bonus in two hours with the plug, right? In two hours, I saw it. It went up, and it was the most crazy thing. And I didn't have to wait a year for Google to pay me or somebody to tell me that this is how much I'm worth and this is how much you're going to give me. The people got to dictate where they put their dollars.

So with me creating the project that I have coming up that isn't the plug, it's going to make the plug look like child's play. So here I am thinking I got to wait until I'm 45 to 50 to create these things. Now I can create, I can drop the animation series that I have that I did on my iPad and essentially generate enough revenue to continue making my own animation studio, get the investments that I need or supporters or partnerships or whatever. I kind of stand away from the investment part. I'm on a thousand percent ownership. But when you start to move into these places, it helped me realize like, yo, I have cachet built in. I have history built in. You know what I'm saying? I got trial and error built in and I got them corporate entities built in to my name to support, again, my competency or my understanding of not only tech or marketing or whatever, but somebody had to, they hired them for some reason. That's what people know. Let's hear what he has to say.

So it really just transformed and made me, this thing that's been keeping me up late at night for almost two decades, a reality. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, everything. It's like, you get to, you get to play in all these different spaces. And here's sort of like this new, new structure that brings them all together. And at the same time, and which is like, it kind of blew my mind when I saw what you did with the plug,

because like you were describing, and I think like one of the big missed things that people really don't get into is this like the world of NFTs. Like the heart of it is these things called smart contracts, which is not just a piece of art anymore. It's literally like you can create,

you know, like this, all of these different levels of engagement, interaction, and access, and can create, you know, like this, all of these different levels of engagement, interaction and access and extra stuff and eligibility. And that goes along, you know, with ownership that just completely changes the psychology of what's happening. And fundamentally, at the end of the day, it takes the gatekeepers out of the equation. It's you and the people that you are like inspiring, moving in service of. And it's, it's this relationship that is just, it kind of puts you, you know, in the power seat. So it's been really interesting because when you watch how different people are

stepping into the space and then I watch what you're doing, you're doing some really interesting, different things. And I was like, huh, I had no idea you could do something like that until I see you do it. I'm like, that is fascinating to me. Like the artist in me is fascinated. The entrepreneur in me is fascinated. The person who wants to bring people together and build community, help others is fascinated. And I think it's just so cool the way that you're stepping into this space and super excited to see where you go from here i know you keep teasing sort of like what's coming up so i'm gonna be waiting for it but i think like uh we should probably start to wrap this conversation up also so come in full circle here in this container of a good life project if i offer up this phrase to

live a good life what comes up? And I had this idea that I was going to create a blog for every financial level that I was at. So I had like one called Three Figures. I think I was two. I was thinking of my egos too. I was like, I'm going to do four figures, even though I probably only seen a thousand, maybe a half a time, right? So I had like three figures, four figures, five figures, right? And then the ultimate one was R27F. And really R27F, row to seven figures, meant row to happiness. Because most people are like, oh, if I only had a million dollars, my life would be fine.

I'm like, no, you still be miserable. You still be, you know what I'm saying? Because you're not having honed in on who you are or what you want. And I think I've spent a lot of time trying to find out what does that mean? What does happiness mean? I find myself to be a very happy fucking person. Very rare am I depressed. Very rare am I like twiddling my

thumbs with something like i don't know what to do and it was like how can i navigate these things only doing what the fuck i want to do and not saying that i don't like some self i mean i'm a leo too so you know i gotta check sometimes i could be overly selfish maybe a little bit but maybe it comes with the thing that i'm trying to create, right? But for me, I think when you said a good life, I think that's people having the utmost happiness. I do a thing called NFTs for the Culture every Thursday. I also do one that's often, it's called How to Make It as an NFT Artist, which was formerly How to Make It as an Artist on Clubhouse.

And then I created an NFT artist thing because, you know, buzzwords, et cetera. And I created this a long time ago. And oftentimes, you know, people, they take the idea of how to make it as a financial situation. And in my rooms, when I reset, I just say, welcome to how to make it as an NFT artist. And I just want to reiterate that how to make it in no way, shape, or form is exclusive to monetary gain. Because if I had started my journey based on monetary gain, I would have gassed out a long time ago. I would have capped out a long time ago. I wouldn't have been logic. I wouldn't have been able to create the things I would have been creating because I would have been creating at the mercy of the bottom, the bottom line, the dollar, what people like versus enjoying the idea of learning, enjoying the idea of tinkering,

the idea of creating a stage for myself just so I can go do it, right? That had no financial kickback immediately. So for me, the good life is really doing what you want to do to your heart's content. You know, bring people into the fold, make them happy, whatever. But the good life is, what is it that makes you joyous? And I know that's kind of like taking it in a different way, but it's really like that's what it is, just doing what you want to do and not being confined or bogged down by the expectations of others or societal norms because that shit's fake.

That's what traveling does to you. You go to Japan, people drink coffee different. They ride a bike different. You go to France, the service sucks, but it's not about the service. It's because they want you to take time and eat and enjoy people. But then you go to Japan, they fill your drink up before it even reaches the bottom. But it's like when you do these, you get a 360 perspective on what life can and could be or what it should be or what you want it to be. So I get to pick and choose the things that, like for instance, I don't let my friends pour their own drinks.

I pour the drinks for them. But I learned that only by traveling and seeing things. So for me, man, it's just about doing what you want to do to your heart's content and not compromising your integrity and who you are because of somebody else and their insecurities. Thank you. Yeah, man. Hey, before you leave, if you love this episode, say that you'll also love the conversation we had

with Lisa Congdon about building a career in the arts as an outlier. You'll find a link to Lisa's episode in the show notes. And of course, if you haven't already done so, go ahead and follow Good Life Project

in your favorite listening app. And if you appreciate the work that we've been doing here on Good Life Project, go check out my new book, Sparked. It'll reveal some incredibly eye-opening things about maybe one of your favorite subjects, you, and then show you how to tap these insights to reimagine and reinvent work as a source of meaning, purpose, and joy. You'll find a link in the show notes, or you can also find it at your favorite bookseller now. Until next time, I'm Jonathan Fields, signing off for Good Life Project. 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. 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. 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.