The Rich Roll Podcast - The Power of Community for Transformation

Episode Date: August 18, 2014

100 EPISODES! Wow. I can't believe how amazing this podcast journey has been. Over the last week, I have been flooded with inquiries on social media – so who is going to be the special guest for the big episode 100? A lot of speculation. Big names getting thrown around with anticipatory question marks. I understand the appeal. But this landmark has me sentimental. Thinking a lot about what was going on in my life when I made the decision to start this show. And when perceived through this lens, there is only one person appropriate to sit across from me for 100 — the same person who sat across from me for #1. Julie Piatt. The wheel turns. We come full circle. Revisit. Reflect. Give thanks. And move forward. So much has changed since November 2012 when the show launched. To take a quantum leap forward, we must connect with and better understand the past. So I went back and listened to that very first offering — for the first time since I recorded it. Admittedly rough. Unpolished. Nervous energy, echo chamber audio and uncertainty converging in a vacant warehouse on an organic farm on the north shore of Kauai. Just me, Julie, a couple really bad mics and no expectations or idea as to where this leap would land. And yet I was dumbstruck by just how much the show has stayed true to the seed I planted that day. I vividly recall that day. My son Tyler and my nephew Harrison jerry-rigging their musical equipment to manage the audio. I remember the theme music they wrote and recorded in the warehouse just hours before the first show — a riff they came up without much thought and always intended as “temp” until they wrote something better. Julie and I sitting across from each other, wondering just what we might talk about. Two years later and I'm astonished at just how little has changed. Today Ty (who is now my producer and the guy behind all the show music) and Harrison strummed guitars and checked audio levels as I set up in our garage. That temp theme music still begins each episode. And Julie and I still stare across at each other before every show we do together, wondering just what the conversation might bring. But what really struck me about that first episode is that my improvised introduction and meandering thoughts, words, intentions and aspirations for what the show might become mirror exactly what the show has indeed become 100 episodes and hundreds of recorded hours later — compelling long-form conversations with inspiring, paradigm busting minds and personalities in health, wellness, nutrition, fitness, entrepreneurship, creativity and spirituality with one singular goal – to help you discover, uncover, unlock and unleash your best, most authentic self. Although I know I have gotten better at this, I still consider myself rather amateur behind the mic. But I’m proud of the show we’ve built. A show that has promoted dialog around new ideas. A toolbox of inspiration and education for transcending your circumstances. A platform for unlocking your inner potential – in whatever form that may be – by introducing and discussing new (sometimes controversial or fringe) ideas with the hope that you will take what resonates with you and not only use it, but share it. The Power of Community I send the show out into the ether every week. But it's you, the audience, who has taken what alone is nothing more than an inert digital file comprised of ones and zeroes — and fertilized it. A seed you have fostered into something much bigger and more important than a simple weekly .mp3. Something remarkable: Community.

Welcome to the Rich Roll Podcast, episode 100. 100 episodes. I can't believe it. Today, we're joined by Julie Pyatt. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, people. My name is Rich Roll. Welcome to my podcast, The Rich Roll Podcast. Thanks for stopping by episode 100. I can't believe it. It's been an amazing journey. It's been a long road, and I couldn't be more pleased and happier to be coming at you for the 100th time. If you're new to the show, what do we do here? Well, each week I bring to you the best, most forward-thinking paradigm, busting minds in wellness, fitness, athleticism, nutrition, diet, spirituality, creativity.

What else? Entrepreneurship with one goal in mind, to help you unlock and unleash your best, most authentic self. So here we are today. Episode 100, Julie. Rich Roll. You were late on the mic there. You told me to sit out while you did that thing. I know. I kept it short today.

You're not in this part. I kept it short today. You're not in this part. So sit back. A lot of anticipation about who's going to be the 100th guest, who are you going to have on? And on like Facebook and Twitter and stuff like that, people like saying, I hope it's this person. I hope it's that person. And to me, it's like, yeah, it would be cool to get some super fancy guest for episode 100. But, you know, this is a moment of reflection, right? To me, it means like, all right, well, let's like look back on the journey that got us here and let's take it full circle all the way back to episode one. Well, I'm honored that you invited me to be the hundredth guest. I hope I live up to everyone's expectations.

Right. Is it Scott Jurek? Is it Brendan Frazier? Who's it going to be? No, it's my wife again. It's the person who's sleeping with Ritual. Yeah. And episode one was just you and I sitting in a warehouse, banging it out. And before we get into kind of what we're going to talk about today, I wanted to just quickly say that we have some exciting stuff happening right now. Our app, the Ritual podcast app just launched. Amazing. Exciting. now, our app, the ritual podcast app just launched amazing, exciting yesterday, which is super cool. Um, and, uh, people are like, well, why do you need an app? Like most people listen to the podcast

on iTunes or Stitcher or one of these other podcast aggregators. They don't, they don't necessarily go to my website and click the play button. They get it, you know, on their mobile device or wherever. And if you're accessing the show that way, you know full well that you can only listen to the most recent 50 episodes. And now we're at 100, which means half of the catalog is inaccessible in the palm of your hand. So we came up with this app. It's our answer to that question and that demand. And what it is, is it's totally free. It's for iOS only. So you can use it on your iPhone or your iPad. If there's enough demand, we'll develop an Android version. But right now it's just for iOS users and it's completely free.

And this version one is really just a podcast player and it allows you to easily access the entire catalog of shows all the way back to episode one. Super simple. You just scroll down and go to the bottom and there it is. And so that way people can be on the treadmill or in the car or wherever and easily go back to our earlier days, you know, because the audience has grown so much. I'm sure there's a lot of people out there that haven't listened to any of those episodes. So it's pretty cool. It'd be interesting to listen to this one and then go back to the first one. Well, that's what I was getting to because actually that was the first thing that I did when the app went live is I went back and listened to episode one.

How was it? It was very... Was it rough? It was interesting. It was a little rough. Yeah. I mean, you know, I prefaced it by saying, look, I don't know what I'm doing. You know, we were in a warehouse in Hawaii. It's super echoey and my diction is bad. I'm stumbling over my words and, you know, it wasn't exactly as polished. It's not nearly as polished as it is now, but it's the same tone and the same vibe.

And it was interesting to go back in here and go, oh, I kind of still do the same intro now that I did then just off the cuff. That's really become the theme and the touchstone of the show, which is kind of accessing your most authentic self. And at the time I had no idea what the show would become. We were just starting, but I said very clearly, like, this is not a triathlon training podcast. This isn't going to be about how to get six pack abs. This is about something bigger. This is about long form conversations with inspiring people who come from all different walks of life and bring all sorts of different ideas to the table so that we

can get, you know, a broad spectrum of knowledge and tools and inspiration that you can take or leave depending upon what resonates with you with the goal in mind of trying to access a better, more authentic version of yourself. Right. And that, and I said it then, and that's still how we opened the show, which is sort of cool because at that time, you know, it could have developed into something completely different, but it's really stayed tried and true to those. You were more tapped in than you knew. Yeah, maybe. I don't know. That's right. I definitely, I, not you know, it could have developed into something completely different, but it's really stayed tried and true to those roots. You were more tapped in than you knew. Yeah, maybe.

I don't know. That's right. I definitely, not that I know what I'm doing now. I don't proclaim to be an expert at this. You know, we're in our garage. We have the, it's a beautiful day. It's hot out. We have the garage door rolled open.

There's a breeze blowing through here and it's making noise. And, you know, it's not exactly like we're in a hermetically sealed radio studio. And I like it that way. You know, you can hear the motorcycle. It's Saturday morning. Here comes one right now. Exactly. Yeah, whenever we record a podcast on Saturday morning, it's just a plethora of motorcycles driving by.

And this is going to post tomorrow. Usually, you know, I record the episodes with the guests well in advance of posting. But this is really going to go up right after we complete this conversation, essentially. It's exciting. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment, an experience that I had that quite literally saved my life.

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go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. So back to the app. So the app, you know, eventually we're going to create future iterations of that that will have premium upgrade content like recipes and videos and stuff like that that you'll only be able to access through the app uh as and and and you'll have to sort of upgrade to get the the earlier episodes of the show but right now it's totally free you can listen to all the shows so get it while it's free and tap into all those earlier episodes and hear the evolution of the show, I suppose, right?

That's great. And all that came about because we received the support of a community member, actually a podcast fan, right? Yeah, that's right. I mean, you know, today's theme, you know, Julie and I talked ahead of time about what we wanted to share on this 100th episode. And I think community is a great subject matter to delve into and kind of go deep into. And we're going to do that in a little bit.

But, yeah, it started when, you know, our family, we were going through a bit of a rough patch or I would say a time of relative uncertainty about what our future held. You know, I had sort of done the book tour thing. The book had run, not really run its course, but the sort of early stages of kind of getting the book out there had been, that chapter was kind of over and it was about, well, what's next? And we weren't sure, you know, what we were going to be doing. We weren't sure we were going to be able to stay in our home. We were actually entertaining the possibility of moving out of Los Angeles and living somewhere else like Austin or Asheville, North Carolina. And we got a call from somebody that I had met who was a fan of the book, who, uh, who happened to live in Hawaii and was working

on some interesting business ideas and invited our family to come out and live on the North shore of Kauai on his property, on his piece of land, which is a working organic farm called Common Ground. And so that's what we did for three months. We relocated and lived in these yurts and it was an amazing experience. And I think sort of being on island and a little bit kind of disconnected from mainstream society had a lot of pluses in terms of creating a crucible for self-reflection and slowing things down enough where we could kind of get in touch with what we wanted our mission to be, good or bad. And there's a lot that came out of that experience. I mean, when we went there, we thought maybe we were just going to be there forever or maybe just come back and move our house out and move back to Hawaii. We didn't know what we were doing. But the podcast was really born out of a desire to connect and create community. I think I was

feeling, you know, I'm used to being in the flow of life. I like to go to New York City. I like, you know, being connected to people. And I I like to go to New York City. I like being connected to people. And I was feeling a little bit disconnected out there and had always been interested in starting a podcast. And I think the timing was just right where the motivation and the willingness kind of converged to make me sit down and figure out how exactly do you do this on a sort of tactile, logistical way and get an episode up. No, it definitely, it provided the space for us to do it. And, but energetically, Kauai was always an extremely dear place to me. And I felt that energy connected to the place

where we live to Jai over many, many, many years. And so if you pull back and look at it, I feel like, of course, we started the podcast there, and we were able to infuse it with a beautiful healing energy that's very, very powerful that comes from that sacred land. And I don't think it's an accident, of course, as I don't feel anything in my life is an accident, accident, of course, as I don't feel anything in my life is an accident. But I think it was a beautiful little reprieve that we had, because we had experienced a tremendous amount of stress and pressure. And I call it this friction of alchemy when you're having transformation that, you know, constant grinding on your energy field, where some days you almost feel like you can't take it anymore. But you have to remind yourself that there's something in the friction. You need the friction for the transformation. So if you're feeling the stress or you're feeling the pressure or the

energy, you can remind yourself that you're about to undergo a transformation and that that can remind yourself that you're about to undergo a transformation and that that exact process is necessary or the transformation would not be possible. So I feel like we were brought to Kauai in very loving arms and set up for a few months to kind of recover a little bit and also to anchor the energy of this podcast. And that was all done through the guidance and support and community of Chris Jabe and Common Ground. Yeah, for sure. And, you know, it's easy to forget the amount of pressure that we were under at the time. And I don't think that at that time, we could have foreseen where we're sitting now. You know, I think that we both had a sense that we had a purpose in this sort of plant power evolution, revolution movement, and plenty of

things to say, and a healing energy, and a willingness, and a desire, and a capability of connecting with people, and serving in a way to inspire and educate. But I don't think we could, we couldn't foresee the specifics of what that would be. And, you know, sometimes you can't see the forest for the trees. And at the time we were under unbelievable financial pressure. You know, we were on the precipice of financial. Like when you say we were entertaining, relocating, we were seeing what was going to happen to us.

It's not like we weren't. Yeah, it wasn't like we had a lot of choice. We were like, oh, I think I'll move too. It was kind of got to that point where it was like we have no option. We were in a dire situation financially, and we weren't sure what we were going to do or how we were going to see our way out of it. And we had to, there were only so many things in the kind of tactile world that we could do to get our house in order. And beyond that, it was really a process of having to, you know, be in that canoe without a paddle and live in faith and pay attention to the

universe and, you know, try to make the next best choice and trust that, you know, somehow we're going to see our way through this and be taken care of. And it was very, very challenging. And even we didn't actually make the choice. The choice was offered to us. So I remember Saul Ray calling me and hiring me to chef for his Thai massage yoga teacher training retreat in Santa Barbara. teacher training retreat in Santa Barbara. And I had had this deep conviction all of my life, all the 10 years that we've been at this house, that I was going to create this healing center here and a place for children. And I felt it in my bones and I knew it. And yet all outward appearances were to the complete contrary. So we felt we were at the end of the road. Saul Ray called and hired me.

And I remember leaving for Santa Barbara, and it was actually Ojai, and saying to you when I was out the door, there is no way that we are being moved from this house without an opportunity being presented. I said, it's not possible. It's not possible with the level of commitment we've given with our heart and soul. And so I left and I went to cook for Saul. And I just said to myself, I was in the kitchen and I said, okay, I'm out of vision. I'm potential of my being in the kitchen this week. And that's what I did. I just dived into the recipes and I fully served. And something was with me because some of the retreat participants were opting out of their classes to stay with me in the kitchen. And literally everything I was making, people were weeping and saying,

this is the best thing I've ever tasted before. And I really think that that came out of my devotion and my commitment to serve. Like I just was on my knees and I said, use me as a channel, and I'm just serving and that's all I'm doing. And I remember you sending me an email or a text saying, check your email. And that was during that retreat that I read the email from Chris Jade that said, I read Finding Ultra and I want to talk to you and Julie about an email that she sent me four years ago. And he was in our house 10 days later and

we were on our way to Kauai. Suddenly we were living in a yurt. Yeah, I know. It all happened like super fast. It was completely surreal. But yeah, service is always the solution. It's always the way out of your head and your own personal drama. And that's the first thing that you learn in sobriety and in recovery, is that when you're caught up in your own head, in your own little problems, in your own little world, and you can't see your way out of it, the solution is to pick up the phone and call an alcoholic who has one day of sobriety or two days of sobriety or anybody else who might be suffering and try to offer a hand and help that person out. And every single time that I've ever done that, that has, usually it helps me more than the other person.

You stay detached from the results of whatever you're offering. But just to give of yourself selflessly is almost, you're giving yourself selflessly, but there's also kind of a selfish aspect to it. Because if you want to stay sober, you have to do that. And if you want to solve your problems, service is the solution. So it's almost like there's a selfish selflessness to it, I suppose. But, but, you know, the bottom line, like the takeaway is, if you're going through a hard time, and you're suffering, or you're feeling like you're a victim, or whatever the condition is, just go help someone else out. It doesn't and it doesn't mean you have to go to a soup kitchen all day. It can be something simple.

It's like looking somebody in the eye at the register at the grocery store and saying hello and asking them how their day is and meaning it or just something simple just to get out of your own self and invest yourself in somebody else in this weird spiritual equation. That's always the solution. It is. And I feel that in instances where you have a dream that's been seemingly taken away, then suddenly that's not an option, whatever it is in your life. At that point that it's gone, it's like for me, I had my attention on this house and on this community that I was going to build at this house.

And then when I got to that point in the road that it was clear, at least clear at the time, that it looked like chances were that was not going to be happening, I suddenly was completely empty, even though I had had a worthy mission. And even though I will, in fact, realize that now, and we'll talk more about that. But at that moment, I was empty because I didn't even have that conviction that I had had my whole life. I had nothing. So I said, okay, if I have nothing, then what do I do? I'm just serving. And then I was very empty. You have to wrestle with the ego. The ego attaches itself to whatever it can. So the

ego attachment to continuing to live in this house or the ego attachment to whatever dream or idea you had about a community and how that relates to your sense of identity and the attachments that you have to that and then having to surrender that, right? You have to like, let, let that go. Well, that was done, you know, that was done many, many, many years prior. This was just, I felt it in my cells and I thought this particular thing was going to transpire. And when, when it was no longer on the table, I was completely empty. There was nothing for me to even have my attention on except for, okay, I'm serving in the moment. This is what I'm doing. And so the power of selfless service,

when you're really that empty is massively exponentially greater than if you say, I'm going to go, you know, carry somebody's groceries right now or something like that. So I think it's the emptiness. And so I'm sharing this because if anybody out there has been, if their dream or something that they felt very clear about is no longer in their life, it's very, very powerful to use this opportunity of the emptiness to be a clear channel. It's a little bit like what you wrote about in that MindBodyGreen blog post the other day. My sacred moment. Right.

Sort of recognizing a painful situation in your life as an opportunity and how to see your way through it to leverage it to create a foundation for future growth as opposed to kind of devolving into some kind of shame spiral victimhood over it? Well, to me, it's very clear. It's the only intelligent thing to do. I mean, we have, you know, all kinds of experiences in a human life and a lot of those are joyful and exalted. And then a lot of those are completely traumatizing and devastating. And so all things are sacred. The life is sacred. And so, you know, it is a power of perception to use your, you could call it imagination, and apply a spiritual perspective to everything in your life. And if you do that, you will experience much more than you ever realized, than you ever dreamed. So how do you do that?

Well, like for instance, I'm trying to think which traumatizing event I should share about. Careful. Well, my, no, my, my astrologer calls. Overshare. Exactly. Trying to hold something back. No, my astrologer calls my chart blood, guts, and glory. And it's actually, you know, kind of true actually.

So, you know, just everything that happens in life, like we'll just take the house for instance. It's like I had to, I held the vision for many, many, many years. And then when there was literally nothing else that I could do, I offered her back. I said, okay, this isn't for me to decide. And so you offer that at the feet of something, something greater than you are. And, uh, I recognize that there is a greater plan that I am involved in that is leading me. And so, um, it's this, it's this balance of holding, I say, hold on loosely, you know, you hold on loosely to the intention. I mean, this one with

the house was a very big one. And I mean mean I fought for this for five years and everybody was advising me not to do it everybody thought I was crazy and that I would never persevere so this is this was truly a life mission this is not like you know oh I want a shiny red bike and I don't want to let go of it but for me you know every single every single thing in your life, like, you know, someone was sharing with me, I think Stu Bone was sharing with me, he had a really traumatizing event. And he was cycling actually with a guy all day. And after they split off, the gentleman actually had an accident. It was very severe, like very, very, very severe. And Stu called me and was very rattled about it. And, you know, what, what choice do you have in, in those circumstances?

There's no bright side of the street that you can say, oh, well, you know, it was meant to be, or, or, you know, it'll get better or he'll walk again. You, you literally have to see it as a sacred moment. And I said to Stu, don't take that beauty away from him by see him in his full spiritual power and know that this is a sacred moment. And then this is part of his journey. And then love him and hold all the space that you can for him. But don't, if you view it as this is a tragedy, then you're putting more of that sort of downward energy into it. So it's almost the respect that each being creates their own life path. And some of those experiences are really wonderful and uplifting. And some of those experiences are really wonderful and uplifting and some of those experiences are very very traumatizing and all are sacred all are divine yeah i talked about this subject with

preston smiles which uh we haven't posted that interview yet that that's coming up in i don't know a couple weeks, but this idea that no matter what, uh, it's windy, everything's blowing in here. Uh, no matter what sort of transpires in your life that on some level conscious or unconscious or, you know, otherworldly you have created that in your life, even if it's, you know, I was walking across the street and I didn't do anything wrong and I got hit by a car. You know, Preston's perspective is that there's something going on in your life on some level that brought that into your life. And that's a pretty controversial, kind of gnarly position to take because, you know, it's sort of like, well, he didn't do

anything wrong. Like, how could you, how could you say that you're basically blaming this person and, and, and telling them to take responsibility for something to which they seemingly had no relationship to having it occur. It's not blaming, blaming though. It could be not this, it could be thousands of lifetimes. It could be another lifetime that you had. So it's like everything is cause and effect. So it's like, yes, you are the sum. You are sitting exactly where you are in your life because of everything that has happened in your entire experience, including past lifetimes. But not everybody believes in past lifetimes. Well, that's their problem.

Well, that's their problem. That would be a very sad existence because... Well, people have different ideas about that kind of stuff. So I don't want to get too attached to one sort of dogmatic perspective of spirituality over another on that. That's dogmatic? Well, yeah, because not everybody agrees on that. But I think that's dogmatic. Well, yeah, because not everybody agrees with that there. You know, a Christian would say that that's not, that's not the way that it is. I think in, I think in a lot of Christian, um, theology there, there's a talk of past lives. Yes. All right. Well, not every religion subscribes to that. That's all. That's

the only point that I'm making. Right. All right. But I think that, uh, you know, kind of in a tactile real world way of, of managing and dealing with that, the suffering comes from judgment, right? Like if you're judging a scenario that's, that's happening to you, good or good or bad. Well, if you get hit by a car, that sucks, right? And you're going to be, you're going to be judging it. You're going to be feeling that way. But at some level, it's like no matter what it is, I mean, I'll use my experience of my first marriage, of being in a battered relationship, being physically abused. And it was not until, and I had an extreme amount of pain about that,

extreme amount of, because I'm not a violent person, and I found myself trapped in this relationship as a young girl, and I couldn't get away, and no matter how many times I broke up, he would find me, and he would be waiting outside my work, and it was always pulling on my pity and my sympathy of who he was, and I should forgive him, and all this kind of stuff. And this went on for, it was a seven-year karmic experience that I had. And it was not pretty and it was scary.

And it would go in and out of normalcy and then back in. And in my recovery from this situation as a young woman, it wasn't until I took responsibility for my part in the relationship that I was truly free. I could have spent my whole life making a whole story in my head and, and in talking to people about how wronged I had been and how, you know, horrible this relationship was. But the truth of the matter, net net, is that I was in the relationship with him. I had something to learn from that experience. And so, um, it took me a little while. Um, but I, I worked it out and I got the lesson and I never repeated that relationship again in my life. The

boy's father was, yeah, to be clear, let clear, let's make sure that people understand that you're not talking about Luke Hyatt. This is somebody else. Right. This was not the boy. This was an early, early relationship. So it's important. And I had even friends that refused to be friends with... I remember this girl that I was really good friends with. She basically broke up with me and told me that I would repeat the pattern for the rest of my life. And so she couldn't be friends with me. And I never repeated that pattern again. It was part of my self-mastery. I learned it. I learned the lesson. It was a karmic debt. It is what I believe. And we had

some stuff to work out. And even since then, I haven't seen him physically. We do not choose to see him physically. But I have met him in my dream state and in other altered states. How did those conversations go? They were great. You know, they were great. It was like, I forgive you, I forgive myself, and we're cool. And everything's fine. And I don't feel myself to be any better than he is or any worse than he is. We simply played a part in a

lifetime experience together. And I learned a tremendous amount from this experience. And this in fact was maybe, I mean, I've always been spiritually inclined since I was a little child. So I've been, you know, catching rides to church with the neighbors and in all different kinds of religions. Don't ask me how this happens when I had parents. You just came out of the womb like that. Yeah, I just was like that. But I will say that during this very dark time where I was trapped in this relationship is when I started meditating and actually having some communion with, you know, actually Jesus, some, you know, beings. And actually that was my first

experience. And so sometimes, and I would say oftentimes, humans won't stop this hamster wheel. There's too much external stimulus. And especially if you have, if you live a life of privilege and you have things taken care of, right? So you can have all your accoutrements around you so that you can give yourself the illusion that you're good, like you're pretty cool. You're never going to go deep. You're never going to get down on your knees because you're too safe in that middle ground.

So that's what I'm talking about. I'm not saying that I want anybody to be in pain. That's not what I want. I have great compassion for human suffering. This life is not easy. There are just incredibly horrific things happening on the planet. I do not take any of this lightly. However, all of these experiences in life are opportunities to access deeper

levels of ourselves. And we are much more than a human body. We are much more than that. Well, and I think everybody, even if you, you know, are well-to-do financially and live in a gated community and have your very safe SUV and your nice cushy job and your two kids and all that kind of stuff, you're not immunizing yourself from the realities of life and the pain that comes with that. I mean, I think everybody experiences some level of suffering at some point. You can't escape this existence without that. So of course, yeah, not willing pain on anybody, of course, but to recognize that those are opportunities to grow and that growth is what we're here to do. And certainly in my case,

like the only time I grow is when I'm in pain. Like all these sort of painful things that have happened to me, some of which I've learned from and some of which I still resist learning from, you know, they're just, they're opportunities, I think. Right? Yes, they are. So taking it back from, you know, they're just, they're opportunities, I think. Right. Yes, they are.

So, uh, so taking it back to, you know, this divine moment or this precious moment to seize upon it. Um, and this idea of, of reserving judgment upon it, you know, I think that if you, it's that idea that we don't have all the information, right? We don't know the true reason why this is happening and we're impulsively led to judge it as good or bad or tragic or whatever. We're just wired that way, but to the extent that we can try to reserve that judgment and explore it and perceive it as more of an opportunity

than something that is more about you being a victim, then I think the greater opportunity you have to learn and grow from that. Well, and also to just know that, you know, there is a greater force and that we're all part of that. And, um, I mean, I think, I think I'm spiritually inclined because I don't like suffering as much, you know. And maybe you'd say that I want help. I want help. And so for me, spiritual context makes my life meaningful and makes it just deeper. um, just deeper. And so when I have that, it broadens the playing field so much more that it lifts me out of any depression because I always see the playing field so much more expanded

beyond this planet, beyond this solar system. Um, it's a, it's a large game life. It's very, very large. And, you know, we're just humans on one planet here and it's, it's school, you know, it's a learning. The whole reason we're here is for self-discovery is to find that thread back to our home. And we're all, the home is the same for all of us. Yeah. I wonder what it would be like if instead of all the advertisements and billboards and television commercials that you see that are all driving you to accumulate things and this inherent message of sort of buy and ye shall be happy, like, you know, or, you know, let's all strive to live this life of comfort and ease. And that's the path to happiness. What if that was all inverted and all of the messaging everywhere you went was about like letting go and surrender and going inside? You know, I think on some level, I suppose, you know, Eastern cultures are more about that.

But they're not, you know, living this capitalistic type society where we're bombarded with stimulus and messages. But wouldn't it be hilarious if like all the TV commercials were like about that. Like, I wonder what our society would look like. That would be a great movie. Why don't you write that? Where everybody, yeah. Like it's just, everything is, is like the opposite. That'd be amazing. It was all about like giving your stuff away. We wouldn't have as much fun. We wouldn't have as many traumatic experiences to really work through. I know. I know. Well, it's funny because,

you know, intuitively everybody knows that, that on an intellectual level, that all this stuff is not, you can't take it to your grave and it's not what makes you happy. And you know, how many times do you hear, you know, the story of the old person on their deathbed who just says, I wish I didn't go to the office so much. And I wish I'd, we can hear that a million times and we still don't change our, we go, oh, that's interesting. And then we just go do what we're doing. And we do, we make the same mistakes over and over again. So what is it that we can't, you know, take that, take that intellectual understanding and put it into, you know, practical application in our life? Why is our, why do we struggle with that so much, you think, as a culture? Well, I think the ego wants to survive, you know, and it wants to think

that it's it, that it, that that's what's happening, which is really so ridiculous because I'm sitting here with you. I mean, one of the things that we're sharing about today, and we're going to start talking about our family is, you know, I've been a mother for more than 19 years. I mean, how is that possible? And here, you know, my parents just moved to town and they're in their nineties, you know, and this is a complete, it's completely idiotic that we don't discuss death from the time we're born. I mean, and start preparing to die. I mean, it's all coming. Like no, no one is escaping it, no matter how big their Hummer is or no matter how famous they are. And also happiness keeps eluding us also, no matter how famous, no matter how much you realize, no matter how much stuff.

So, you know, the only intelligent option is to develop a spiritual connection, in my opinion. Yeah, and it's kind of heightened this week because of what happened with Robin Williams. Yeah, beloved, beloved artist. Such a, you know, such a love, such a gigantic ball of talent. of such a gigantic ball of talent. And it's so shocking when somebody like that, who from our sort of uninformed external perspective, like had everything, right?

Probably more money than he could ever imagine spending and multiple homes and a gigantic talent and beloved by everybody and just, you know, exploding with humor and the ability to make people laugh and improve their day. And if somebody like that could be suffering on such a profound level that they felt the need to take their own life, it's shattering to our worldview. Right. Or our self-view. Yeah.

About, well, if they have all those things and they're not happy, then really do those things in fact provide happiness? Do they get you there? Yeah, and we're talking about somebody who suffered terribly from addiction. And, you know, it's easy when people sort of get into recovery and then that becomes becomes like they're drinking and using becomes something of the past. And you think, well, that was just in the past, but you live with it all the time. And he relapsed and continued to struggle after having been sober for decades and decades. 20 years or something.

And was really having a hard time. And when you combine that with depression, that's a pretty potent combination. And what is the solution to that? You know, it's not going to be found in medication. I mean, you know, I don't have an opinion on medication to deal with depression. I think it helps a lot of people, but I think that ultimately, you know, somebody who's suffering from that combination of addiction and alcoholism and depression, combination of addiction and alcoholism and depression, you know, that's a big stone to push up a mountain. And I'm just compassionate and sad about it. Very much. And I hope wherever he is, he can feel the tremendous, tremendous love that was shared. Just, you know, it was staggering. I don't think I've ever seen that much love, you know, given after someone's passed.

It was really staggering. Right. Mark Maron had interviewed him on his WTF podcast back in 2010. And the day the news came out, he reposted that interview and he did a intro where he kind of talked about his experience, his experiences with Robin and he was choked up, like he was crying the whole time. And when you listen to the interview, it's the only interview with Robin Williams where I really heard him be himself and open up and he sounded authentic and real and like kind of vulnerable. And he had a willingness to kind of

talk about things that you don't hear him talk about in typical interviews because he's got the clown mask on all the time, right? The guy's like on, you know, his volumes turned up to 10 every time you see him on television. And this was a very different version of him. And it's funny because they joked about suicide in the interview and it was just, it was devastating to hear. And I think it, it, it really kind of dovetails nicely into this discussion that we want to have about, about community and in particular community versus isolation, because, you know, I don't, I never met Robin Williams. I don't know what his life was like, but I would have to imagine on some

level that, that, you know, he was feeling, he must've been feeling alone on some level that he must have been feeling alone on some level and isolated, which is the condition of the alcoholic and is certainly a symptom of depression on some level. And I think it really heightens my awareness about the importance of supportive community as integral to happiness in your life, or at least satisfaction, a sense of belonging and a sense of just general well-being. Right. And also, you know, real like physical community, not only Twitter and Facebook community, but actual real live body community. Right. Yeah. And it's the more invested we are in social media, the more isolated we become in the 3d world. Right. You know, cause we think we're connected. I don't know. I mean,

it is kind of interesting. I have to say that, um spiritual person, as a spiritual warrior person who, you know, I often feel isolated. And I think a lot of times healers feel very isolated because we're always like sort of the strange one that's like has this other reality than everybody else at the party. And I do have to say, I mean, I really want to thank really from my heart, everybody who took the time to send me a message on any of the social media platforms. There have been times in our process where those messages meant everything to us. So I'm not so quick to just say that by connecting through this platform, we're, you know, we're, we're missing community because in our case, I think we're in fact gaining real community. And the thing that's really interesting about it is I feel almost like we put out our,

we kind of put our, out our authentic heart, you know, in a very raw, real way, a very vulnerable way. And somehow that, that note, that sound that we sent out, that's going around the world, people are coming to it that are like-minded. So I don't feel, I do feel like our community, the podcast community is really our community. And that's a lot of times when I meet them, when I go with you, you know, on your book tours and, you know, go to events and I see these people, I really do want to give them a hug because I feel like they're ours. But, but there's also that other side of then, you know, being an illusion and feeling like, you know, the person that's liking your Instagram photo is in fact, that's like, that's the, the substitution for, you know, your friend who lives in the city where you, where you are. Yeah. I mean, it's,

it's about your perspective on it and how you balance it in your life, I think. But I, you know, I agree with you. You know, it's, it's funny. We were at, we had dinner last night. It was Trapper's birthday. We went to, we went to Cafe Gratitude and in walked Travis Brewer, you know, who we've had on the podcast. He's a friend of ours. Hey Travis. Hey Travis, what's up if he's listening. And it was great to see him. And what's funny is that, is that I almost didn't have to say like, Oh, you know, what's going on? Cause I haven't seen him in, I don't know, a month or something. I knew what he was doing. I knew it cause I follow what he's doing online. Like, so I actually knew where he had been and I'd seen these cool

pictures that he was posting. And I had a frame of reference to just pick up and connect in a shorthand, you know, and with respect to strangers out there, you know, certainly the messages that we've gotten as a result of the podcast or the book or whatever are, they're incredible. You know, the idea that, you know, through this microphone sitting in our garage, we have the ability and the power to create community through connecting with like-minded people who are on the vibration or feeling this particular, you know, vibration, whether it's niche or, or, or mainstream or what have you is not to be underestimated. And it's a beautiful thing. And I think given that this is our 100th podcast, it's important to pause and thank everybody and

honor this audience, this community that's come together voluntarily around these ideas and created a dialogue around that. And I believe, and it's the reason that we're doing this, that this has the power to shift consciousness, to improve lives. And it's a beautiful thing. And I, it's a responsibility and I don't take it lightly. And, and, um, And all of you, everybody who listens, whether you message us or not, I mean, we don't always, we're not always able to get back to everybody, but you all have been a massive part of this transformation. And then you're going in your own lives and having your own transformation. It's just exponentially, you know, moving and vibrating higher and higher.

Yeah. And I had this idea that kind of in honor of the 100th episode, but I wanted to put it out there to you guys that if there's people out there who have been impacted by the show and have made changes in their life, I mean, I know there are, because we get tons of emails about this. We'd like to hear those stories. And I think what would be cool is if you feel comfortable sharing that in the comment section on the episode page on my site, that would be great. If you want to be anonymous about it, send us an email through the website on the contact page. And Julie and I are going to go through them and we're going to pick like three of them and send you guys some cool stuff in the mail, you know, just as like a thank you, really, you know, as a thank you for listening and to honor, you know, the changes that you've made in your life, which is huge.

You know, anytime you make any change in your life, that's a big deal. And I think it deserves to be recognized and appreciated. And I'd like to appreciate the people out there that have taken the message to heart and have really worked hard to improve their condition. That's right. What do you think about that idea? I think that's a good idea. I think it's great. We do more of that. All right. So we'll pick three. So shoot them over. Three seems like such a small number. I know, but you know. We can't send it to everybody. We can't see. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, we'll do more of this kind of stuff. But right,

we'll do three this week and we'll see how it goes. Okay. Awesome. That sounds good. back to community and this idea of a virtual community versus 3d community is that my prompt yeah start talking start talking when i stop talking then i start okay no so i get to interrupt you yeah i know that it's your's your show. And I'm cool with that. It's okay. Well, we're waiting for your show. There's a lot of talk. There's not a lot of action around that. I'm just, yeah, I know. I'm getting on it. I have a homeschool revolution that I'm launching next week. So it's just a small thing. But anyway, yeah. So community, I would have to say for us, I really felt like we started our very powerful community with the birth of our fourth child, Jaya.

And there was something about that experience that solidified us as one unit. And after that experience, I didn't feel a separate, even though we had come from blended families. So the boys had a different dad and then Rich and I had, I had Mathis. Rich didn't have Mathis. I had Mathis, but we did it together, of course. A little bit, a slight amount, not that much. But then when we had Jaya, it was this surreal experience. And it came about because I had all of my children in the hospital with the same doctor, Dr. Scott Surden. Some of you probably know him out there. If you're going to have your baby in the hospital, he's the best guy to have your baby with. He's really an amazing guy, educated at Yale, totally mellow, just a

sweetheart. And I'm extremely grateful for his presence in my life and for being with me during those times. But so early on, when I was, when I first became pregnant, I went in to see Scott and I said, Scott, I would like to have a water birth. And he immediately shut me down and told me that that was absurd and that my baby may drown and that I was not to do that. And I was not as aware as I am now. And so I did what he told me. Water birth is when you like have it in the bathtub, right? Yeah. Or in a, or in a, in a pool. Why did you want to do that? Because it's cool and awesome. Why wouldn't you want to do that? I don't know. No, I wanted to do it because, you know, water is soothing during labor. And then when you actually have the baby, the baby's released into the water. So it's sort of like a gentler entry. Don't they get water in their lungs? No, honey, like get informed.

I don't know. No, this is a very much more common practice now. And if I had asked the same today, I would have had all my babies in water birth, but that's not what happened. So anyway, so lucky for me, I have, while I have very excruciatingly painful pregnancies in that I am literally sick. I have four good meals when I find out I'm pregnant and then I'm literally sick the entire time. So sick that I'm aware when I'm sleeping that I'm sick. But I have this wonderful blessing of having very easy births. So I had both of my boys with Scott very easily. I did get an epidural, so I didn't do it naturally. And then I got pregnant with Mathis and entertained doing it at home.

And you had had a friend who actually lost his wife during childbirth and you felt, it seems so shocking cause you know, we don't think that this doesn't happen anymore, but it tragically happened. And, and, um, and so you didn't want me to have a home birth. You, you know, you were like, we're too far from the hospital. We live, we live very far from the closest hospital. Part of that was informed by just the isolation. If something was to go wrong and we had to rush to the hospital, it would take us a long time to get there. And I think that enhanced the risk of doing something like that. That's right. And then when I got pregnant with Jaya and then Mathis was, you know, we shot our film Down Dog. I was dilated to four when we started shooting and you begged me not to go into labor

over the next three days. I was drinking wine by the monitor to stop the labor. That's prescribed by my doctor, by Scott. So anyway, so we basically wrapped. We took the film to Universal the next day, and then we went to Cedars, and we had the baby. And Mathis came with one push. She was just, she was ready to go. So then Jaya came around, and I was pregnant, and the boys said to me,

the boys had been in the room for Mathis, but at the time of delivery, they had made them leave. And so the second they found out that I was pregnant a fourth time, they said, mom, we're in the room and we're not leaving. And that's it. So from the very beginning, I knew it was going to be a family birth. I spoke to a friend of yours actually, who had had a very arduous home birth with like you know 25 plus hours of labor and and finally we decided that I would in fact go to back to Scott again and just have the baby the way that I normally do and somehow we managed to go to Cedars with all of our instruments

we were put in a room the boys played music I was dilated to four as I always am. And we were lying around in there and we had our amazing friend, Stacey Turk, Stacey Isabella Turk, come and actually shoot these editorial black and white photos of our entire birth experience., it was without reserve, one of the most magnificent experiences of my life to have my children there at the birth of our family member changed the dynamic of our family and really bonded us together in a way that we had not accessed prior to that experience. Yeah, it was certainly a long way from the days of the dad handing out cigars in the lobby of the hospital. I mean, we were in a hospital room, but it was a big room and it was sort of decorated to make it feel more like a home sort of vibe, like it had a couch in there

and stuff like that. And yeah, we were all in there. And I think what happens is, and this is changing, but traditionally you're just at the will and the whim of the doctors and the nurses if you go in uninformed about your birth, and you don't realize how many decisions are made, choices are made in the process of delivering a baby that you actually have more say about or influence over than you might recognize. You know, hospitals are set up to, you know, provide the service, but also to immunize themselves against lawsuits and, you know, all that kind of stuff. So they end up doing a lot of things to kind of cover their ass, you know, that maybe are not always the best thing. And, you know, I'm not a doctor and I'm

not passing judgment on it at all. But I think that if you were to go into a situation, a hospital situation, have a birth 10 years ago and say, I don't want this, I don't want that, I don't want you to rush the baby away as soon as it's born, they would just tell you to take a hike, like this is the way we do it. And now they're much more open,

at least in, I mean, look, we're in Los Angeles, right? So I don't have experience outside of that. But I think that the more you can inform yourself, the more you realize that you can be empowered about the birth experience being the way that you want it. And the upshot of that is that we did go in and because of your relationship with Scott, we were able to say, this is the way we want to do it.

And instead of them shutting us down, they made it work for us. And so we were all in there. And I think it was unique in that regard, because even when family members go in, when the actual birth aspect of it is happening, is in motion, then maybe the little kids leave or it kind of clears out, right? But we stayed in for the whole shebang. Yeah, it was, it was surreal. It was amazing. And actually I'm, uh, I'm, I just had the beautiful, beautiful, uh, gift of having, um, those images made into a video by Stacy.

Um, and, uh, I'd like to post the link with this podcast. Yeah, I'll just embed it on the episode page for this show on the website. That's right. And it's extremely intimate. It's definitely personal, but I really feel that... Is it an overshare? I don't think so. It might be for some. It might be for some. No, I really feel like it was an extraordinarily beautiful experience. And the images are just breathtaking of seeing. It's the whole family dynamic and the way that she shot it was in such an editorial. You don't feel her presence in the room at all. And I've cherished these photographs my whole life and I've wanted to share them with people and, you know, the time didn't present itself. And I really feel that this aspect of family, of really going into the core of what your family unit is and really giving that a lot of love and attention and importance in your life.

I think it's one of the key gifts and the key ways that we can experience a more expanded life. And for me, it was really the beginning of of community and of course i had my family before but there was something about this experience that we all were there together um it just changed us and and so i i would like to share it and um um and i hope that it touches you and i i hope that you are inspired by it right Right. And Stacey's phenomenally talented. The photos are beautiful. It's a great video.

So yeah, we'll definitely share that. And thanks Stacey for putting that together. But what about people that are listening that don't have kids or they're not married or they're single and, you know, on this theme of community building and the importance of bringing and soliciting community into your life? Well, I mean, I think there's many ways to find your family. And, you know, many of us have not easy experiences with our family of origin or our birth family. And we can find those communities or what I like to call our soul family in other ways. You know, they're for in other arenas of expression

or sharing, you know, other communities, spiritual communities, plant power communities. So there's a lot of other ways that you can experience more of an extended family experience, you know, by going out in your community. I mean, I'm not really speaking from huge experience in this area. So it's kind of a little,

it's a little awkward for me because I come from this family. This is my thing. Right, but we have, I think that you made the important point, which is that you can create your own communities and you can choose your soul family, right? And just in our example,

we have communities in our life that are distinct. Like I have my recovery community and you have your meditation community. It doesn't have to be, you can have these sub communities in your life. And I think that social media platforms provide a great opportunity for community building, not just virtually, but in real life, like with Facebook groups or whatever. You can find the people in your area that are interested in the things that you're doing, and you can create community that way.

But I think that if you want to be fully expressed in your life, the important idea is that you cannot do that alone. Whether you're training for a marathon or trying to lose 10 pounds or, you know, write a book or whatever it is that you're trying to actualize or express in your life, these are not individual pursuits, even if they appear to be so on paper, like they take, it requires support. You need support to achieve these things, community to achieve these things. You need like-minded people around you who believe in you. You need accountability. And all of these things are indicia of community, right?

Very much so. And it's this idea of, on top of that, sort of appointing a council within your community. I like to call it your board of advisors. I like to call it tribal council. Your tribal council. Yeah. Everybody needs a board of advisors and those people fill different roles for you, right? So I have certain people that I call for advice for stuff on business, others for recovery, others for health and nutrition, others for fitness. But I know who those people are in my life and they know that they serve that role too.

And they probably have their own board of advisors and all that kind of thing. Like it's this interlocking web of support, but I rely on those people. And I'm very aware that I cannot make progress on my own. And my instinct, especially my alcoholic instinct, is to isolate and try to do it myself and be a control freak. And when I'm doing that, I'm not operating on my highest frequency. It's only by letting people in and allowing people to help me and asking for help which i don't like to do uh is when i can make a quantum leap that's right ritual remember that

all right ask for help what's wrong with your voice you have a frog in your throat i don't know yeah i mean you can't you can't do it alone and i think that that building community is the wind in your sails and it's also, um, the accountability on a positive and a negative wavelength, right? Like a positive influence in the sense that they want you to succeed and they're there to support you in that. And also negative accountability in the sense that if you flake or veer left, they're going to call you out on it and hold you accountable to that. So you stay the line because you don't want to be on the receiving end of that. Right. That's one way. What's another way? No, they inspire you by, um, they inspire you to, to live authentically because of who they are. So there's no pain, there's no repercussion. Well, that's the positive aspect of it. But for me, it's like, well, I don't want to disappoint them either. You know,

the people pleasing, whatever, you know, that character defect aspect of me is, but, but you can't, you can't deny that that is part of the human psyche. Maybe, you know? Yeah, maybe. I mean, it's okay. That's good. That's one way. one way definitely you're not impressed I don't know no I would say you know go in and and and connect with your own your own voice and operate from that point rather than want not to disappoint other people to be your motivation for yeah I understand that but I'm just recognizing that there is a... It's nice to have accountability. Yeah. The best accountability is with your own self. That would be the best one, in my opinion. But I really do, I would like to get back to families because I didn't really express on that. And because that is the platform from where I'm sharing, that's what I know. That's what's

authentic to me. And the reason that I wanted to share, you know, this, these amazing photographs and in this music video, that's also set to a song actually called held so sweetly. And it's a love song that I originally wrote for an Indian master guru of mine, actually for Yogananda. And then later it really became about my children, which are my real gurus. So I feel like recognizing and remembering that the most important community that you have is your family. I'm talking about parents that have children that have families, and that have this kind of life experience. Because cultivating that is what is going to allow you the greatest opportunity for expansion, much more than your work, your business, and these kind of endeavors. And I really, really, really feel that there is a beautiful gift that we all experience by creating food, preparing food and meeting around a family table as a part of our lifestyle. And what do you think it is about your relationship with your kids that is

different from what you see out in the world typically? Well, again, I mean, I think it all starts from a spiritual perspective. And that is that I know that I have been with them before. We are not just mother and child now in this life. And so I feel my past experience with them. I also know that no one is less than, or, you know, any better or any worse than I am. So even though I birthed them and they're younger in age and I had to feed them and change their diapers and stay up late with them. And, you know, the human is so completely at the, you know, at the, at the whim of the parent, you know, the baby can't do anything. But even though that, that is the condition where, in which we're together, I never,

I never felt myself older or wiser or better or more entitled than they are. So my children are beans, they're full, they're full life forms that, and as is everybody. And so I meet them that way as a parent, as more of a guide. I, I agreed we have this contract that I will be their mother this lifetime, but I think we transcend those barriers. And I think that that's expressed and very evident in the fact that I play in a band with my two older boys and have for the last eight years. And when we play music, we're not mother and son anymore. It's kind of something different than that. It's kind of something different than that. And how does that mash up when, you know, a child is going left on you or, you know, the daily sort of things that occur when you're raising children?

I mean. Well, when you even say that a child is going left on you, like that implies that you're a parent and you're going to control it into doing what you want because you're the parent. And I don't parent that way. I parent with, I'm, I'm strong. I'm not, um, I'm not, uh, you know, I don't have a problem speaking up or saying what I mean or, or saying something if I feel somebody's out of balance. Um, and, and actually neither do my children. So, so especially even with the girls, um, uh, there's a lot of back and forth. I mean, if you walk by our house, you know, you might hear some of it. Um, so I'm not,

but they know who's boss. I mean, Oh, well, yeah, of course they know who's boss, but, um, I guess, I don't know. I mean, they, it's funny because sometimes they ask me if it's okay, if Rich has it, has a cookie and he's standing right there. I know. They're like, mom, can Rich... You understand that your mom is not in charge of me. Do you get that part? I'm not sure you do. That's right. I don't know what that is. Well, it's just, yeah, you know, kids have a perspective of their parents that they're sort of like the God, you know, the goddess energy. And, and yet, you know, even with Mathis, I mean, we, you know, we push that boundary between the two of us. And

one of the most beautiful things that I love about her is she is quite something, she's quite an energy. And we push up against each other, like, you know, there'll be some yelling and some pushing back. And we know we're, I'm, I always have to remind her where that boundary is because she's very strong. And yet we can have this whole expression that's pretty intense. And literally 30 seconds later, she'll walk by and kiss me on the forehead. Like, we don't hold, it doesn't mean that to us. It means she's a very strong being and she requires a lot of me. And sometimes I'm okay with that. And sometimes I'm like, I need, you know, I need this boundary or you need to need

this boundary. Um, that's very masculine energy though, because usually the, the feminine energy holds onto that kind of stuff and carries around a resentment. And whereas guys are much more likely to let stuff like that go. And, you know, that's a guy thing. Like they get in a fight and, you know, half an hour later they're hanging out and it's no big deal anymore, whereas girls tend to hold on to stuff. Yeah, it's true. It can be true, but, you know, your girls are not typical girls at all. Like they don't fit into really, you know, that paradigm as much, I don't think.

And it's also, it's actually a present perspective. It's a more expanded perspective of being in the now. Because if you're in the now, you're not holding on to something. So I would say that for everybody can experience that by being present, more present. And, you know, Mathis and I, we've just had to do that our whole life. I mean, your girls are strong. It's your genes. Well, I think...

Girls are like ultra girls. But I think behind it is this idea that Mathis knows that if you're angry with her or there's something that needs to be discussed in a stern fashion, that that's not an indictment on your feelings towards her or your relationship with her. It's just whatever is specifically happening now. And you're not, uh, commenting on how much you love her, right. Or, or don't love her. Well, and I would have to say that, um, you know, I serve my children. Uh, they are a top priority in, in my life. And when I say I serve my children, I don't mean that I run around and, and around and design their life with activities and don't live my life. I'm not a proponent of that. I don't do that at all. But I leave them, I sort of leave them alone to their own experience. And I will stand for them with everything that I have. When I see if they have something that they want to

express, if they have, you know, something that they need to be protected from, they know that I am, I will be there for them, like to the end of the earth. And it's that kind of devotion that they feel from me that allows me to say, you know, to say something intense to them and just, you know, and they say it back. I mean, but I don't have a relationship with them like, oh, you can't say that to me because I'm your mother. Oh no, they can. So it's a, it's a back and forth that we have. And, uh, um, and I feel extremely blessed that all of them chose me to be their mother and that, um, we're in this amazing community of our family with you. And, um, I'm, I'm forever grateful, eternally grateful for this experience. Well, I think you've done a great job also of kind of carrying this theme of the podcast

or of our lifestyle into the, the lives of our children in the sense that, you know, we can't just be on this mic saying, you know, unlock your best life and, you know, try to do what you can to pursue your dreams and then not allow that space in your children, right? By saying, no, you know, that's later in life. You can't do that right now. You have to do this. And you've been able to instill in them a sense that they not only can pursue their dreams, but that's what they should be doing above all else, right? And,

and supporting that and using that as, uh, the sort of structure around which to build an educational model. So, for example, Mathis recently has become really into fashion design, and we've been supporting that by giving her mentorship and providing her with what she needs to learn about that and express it. And she's super into it, and she created this dress for when we had our wedding vows renewed. And she just had an article about her in the Malibu Times, which was amazing. Like she's being reinforced by outside society for really what is these seeds that you've planted in her and allowed to flourish, which is really cool to see. And it really validates this model of child rearing

and homeschooling that you're so passionate about, I think. Well, I don't know. I mean, I don't know if it's genetic or I don't know if I planted the seed or I don't know if she just saw me and then saw something. I don't know exactly how that works. Well, I'm not talking about her interest in fashion design. I'm talking about her sense of self and her confidence to pursue what she's interested in and the support that we try to give her and all our kids in their different varieties and forms and interests.

Yeah. And so, I mean, to speak to that, I really feel like we all need to leave our kids alone a little more. all need to leave our kids alone a little more. And, you know, we, we, uh, we have children and then we instantly think we have to start teaching them all these things. And we get out the flash cards and we get out the videos and we start comparing them against another kid. And are they, you know, are they reading as many books as that kid? And do they like math as much as the neighbor kid? And it starts there. And I really feel like everybody needs some space to find out who they are. And this happens through spontaneous play, creativity, being out in nature, having a lot of space around them. I mean, I didn't know what I wanted to do

when I graduated from my first university. And here and here we're, you know, we're already shoving information at, at small children at a very, very young age. In my experience, the reason that I, uh, that I adapted this way of being is that Mathis came into my life and she didn't fit into any structure. So I literally had had this pretty smooth sailing with the older boys and everything had been, you know, I mean, it'd been a journey, but you know, not anything sort of extraordinarily extreme. And then here I am about to parent my third child and she shows up and nothing that I know works for her. Absolutely zero. So I had to throw away all my past experience. And I always say that I had to surf Mathis like a wave. I had to simply feel how she was in the moment and then

see how I could serve her best. And so I left her alone a lot. I gave her boundaries. I was there for her many, many, many years, eight years. We spent a lot of time together. And what's happened is all of her imbalances, all of her extreme tendencies have balanced. She found something that she's passionate about and she's able to apply it with focus. But I have to say, I protected her because in the school system she was suffering. And that kind of system that exists today, the one that was based on an industrial age, the one Sir Ken Robinson speaks so passionately against, was not good for her. And it's not good for many, many, many children.

And many of you out there are agreeing with me right now because the children that are coming into our world are different today than when we were in school. And the world's different. The world is much different. And so because of my experience with Mathis, I have developed actually a homeschool model that I'm going to be launching. Actually, I have my first meeting next week. I have developed actually a homeschool model that I'm going to be launching. Actually, I have my first meeting next week. I'm presenting to a group of parents, and I'm making the plea to create community around conscious education. And I use the word education because I want to be understood. But what I really would like to say is remembrance,

because I really truly believe that all of us have everything we need within our own hearts. And we simply need to access that and connect with that. And then everything will be really all right. Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, you know, in Mathis's case, you know, it wasn't like we had this dream of homeschooling. We tried, we had her in all different kinds of schools and it just, it was a square peg in a round hole every time. And the real kind of tipper tipping point for me is just after she'd be at a certain school for a couple of weeks or a couple of months and having her come home looking deflated because she's a, she's like a wild hair up your ass.

Like she's, you know, she's strong and she has a sense of self and an opinion. And, you know, she likes to dress up in whatever way she wants to dress up and she's, you know, standing tall in that. And then to see her come back, like a wilted flower is that's unacceptable, you know? And I had that experience in school and it was just too painful to watch. And, and that's unacceptable, you know, and I had that experience in school and it was just too painful to watch. And, and that's where we really bonded over it because for me, I'm coming from a traditional schooling background that I was successful in to some extent. And, and I'm very traditional in that regard. And so for me, the idea of entertaining homeschool is something that I've had to acclimate to. And it hasn't been always easy for me because I have to overcome my preconceived ideas about

what education is and how kids should be taught and et cetera, et cetera. And really has forced me to look at things from a different perspective. And the real tipping point, like I said, was just seeing Mathis in that state and realizing that that was not acceptable, that we just could not as parents allow that to continue. And I think there's a lot of parents that are having that experience, seeing their kid and just not knowing what to do next. Like, what is the solution to that? And it's, and you know, part of it, you can, you can say, well, part of it is just growing up. It's socialization. That's what, just what happens. But, you know, I think that it is really important to try to protect the fragile self-esteem of a young person because the sort of ripple effects and ramifications of a destroyed sense of self at an early age manifest in extremely negative ways later in life. And I've

seen it time and time again with a lot of people. So across the board. And I mean, the one, if I have one mission of the school, the mission of the school is to preserve the self-esteem of each child. It's solely that. And so, and the other thing is, is what I want to say to people out there is, is first of all, no one else is coming to change this for you. We have to change it. We are the parents now. And, you know, I have a 19 year old, an 18 year old, a 10 year old and a seven year old. I still have a seven year old. I mean, I'm still right in the thick of all these school years. Um, and, um, I just, I had this hit me very, very hard, you know, and feel very passionate about it very, very deeply about this because

I kept looking around the community and looking at all these amazing people that I was meeting everywhere and so my model um the the the base is six families but I'm actually um I'm actually calling for 12 families to join me in this homeschool revolution we are going to have a complete online platform so that I can share all over the planet, share and inspire and ignite other people to do the same thing. The name of the revolution is called Jai Seed, which Jai Seed was the name of our first cookbook.

But really, Jai Seed was the name of a whole body of information I received during meditation. And it means Jai or Jai, depending on how you pronounce it. I'm pronouncing it wrong, but we like how Jai sounds. So that's what we do. In Sanskrit, it means victory. And then the seed, of course, can mean very many different things. The seed of a plant, the seed of a child, a seed of creation, but the seed contains already all the information necessary inherently within it, right? The seed is potential. The seed has all that blueprint inside of it. All it needs is nurturing. And you don't need to, you know, get involved in what's outside the seed to make it actualize to the species of plant that it was.

It has everything within. And so the name of the revolution is called Jai Seed. And, um, it's a, it's based on, on six foundational pillars. Um, one is, uh, um, spirituality and meditation. I, I just can't, there's no mincing words about it so that someone feels okay. It's like, we are spiritual beings having a human experience. That is what's happening. And whether you know that or not is your own journey, but that is what's happening. So meditation is a core pillar foundation of the school. The second thing is creativity. So creativity in all things, meaning not just art and music and dance, which all of those are very dear to me and very important, but creativity in anything, creativity

in nuclear science, creativity in physics, creativity in math, anything that you're doing, because it's creativity is what is going to allow us to receive the quantum messages that are going to transform our world. Because right now on a linear, just taking the linear information we have, it's not that great. We don't really have all that many options. Right. And I think it was, was it Einstein who said, you cannot solve a problem with the same intention or frequency that created it. And the way out of that is to instill creativity, because it's through creativity that you're going to be able to perceive, develop,

and implement a new solution or a new perspective, right? Like if you're just following the ABCs, then that does not do very much for getting you to think outside the box. It's the same idea that, you know, in art school, when you're a little kid or you're in, you're an art class and they don't like you drawing outside the lines and it's sort of like, well, actually they should be encouraging you to draw outside the lines because it's the people that draw outside the lines that are the ones that are able to see things other people can't. And they're the ones that end up becoming Elon Musk and solving the world's problems because they can see solutions in a way that other people can't. Exactly. to create a whole new generation of people who have that acuity to be able to look at a problem differently than we have traditionally been looking at these situations that we're in.

Because if you look across the board, it ain't so good politically, economically, our health care system, the environment, our food, like everything. like every, everything, you know, we're, we're entrenched in a cultural situation, a social situation, uh, where there's so much momentum behind these systems that were put in place so long ago, you know, every, everything from the way, you know, the federal reserve acts and the way dollars are printed up, uh, you know, to our system of government, which is, you know, sort of become something that I'm not so sure it was originally intended to be, you know, across, it doesn't matter any example that, that you, that you raise. There's so much entrenched energy behind perpetuating these systems, many of which don't fit the modern paradigm that we now find ourselves in. And so how do you change the system? Well, you need to have not just one person, but a whole

generation of people who are able to look at things differently and create community around that, which then creates a new energy that can develop an equal opposing momentum. And that's how change is going to happen. That's beautifully put. Thank you. That's amazing. Anyway. Yeah, no. And what we're doing is we're not allowing for the evolution in our children. And so we're getting children that are coming in that are wired differently, that don't learn the way that we're forcing them into this system. And then if they don't fit in, then we're medicating them. We're going, okay, give them a pill and let's get them to fit in. Or we put them in a special education class

and then they're immediately labeled as less than or problematic or different. And then there's a stigma that then gets internalized into that child and becomes extremely damaging. Right, and they're not going to share. They're not going to go in deep and they're not gonna share because they've already been disrespected. They've been not cared for. And so they're gonna, in many ways,

start expressing in a not positive manner. And the other key thing with a lot of these new energetic kids is that they are leaders. They are not followers. And if they are uncared for, they have a capacity, they have a very strong, powerful energy. They have a capacity to express that in a negative way. If they're not cared for, if you, if, if you're not nurturing it

correctly. So the other, um, the other foundational pillar. So, you know, creativity is huge. I mean, it's a big, big part of the model and also what I feel is going to be one of the most fun experiences and make it an amazing way to live with your children and experience life today now with your kids, which is what we really should be caring about. Another foundational pillar is being storytellers. So, you know, it's about filming everything and sharing this over the internet, you know, in a very, very, uh, expanded way because we want to ignite other people to start doing the same thing. You know, I'm one community here in Malibu area. Um, my hope is that through this online community, we're going to be able to access with other communities all over the world. And in fact,

build a network of like-minded homeschoolers that are doing amazing things and caring for our kids in this way. The next foundational pillar, of course, is plant-based lifestyle, plant-based nutrition. Now, of course, if there's one person who, you know, feels like they need some kind of meat for a specific reason, that would be an exception. But overall, you know, we are looking to live authentic, creative lives and to be harmoniously connected with our planet. And at this point on the planet, it's just not responsible or loving or harmonious to be eating meat. Sorry, you've been not that blunt on the show, but there's just too many environmental factors at this point. We know water, number one.

And so we are going to be a plant-based movement. And then, I don't know, did I say five? The last one is travel and pollination. Oh, no, there's two more. Travel and pollination, because travel is our greatest teacher. And again, through connecting with these like-minded communities across the planet, I hope to be building this network where we, in fact, travel to Argentina and visit a whole another community. And those kind of experience change lives.

Because when you go, we know from doing yoga retreats in Italy and also in the Caribbean and Mexico, going on a journey with people to another land and experiencing, you know, a kind of education and seeing the world. That is the most powerful teacher. It's just amazing. And then finally, I want to call it conscious commerce because we are self-sustainable. We are in the world. are self-sustainable. We are in the world. And we are operating in a business way, in a harmonious, non-harmful, non-manipulative manner, really sharing authentically. We're going to be sharing our curriculums, our ideas, our inspiration, different things that come from the children.

And that's very, very important. I also am going to be crowdfunding for this. And the reason I am is because I feel like it's a perfect forum to spread the message. And so I feel very, very aligned and very harmonious with that choice. And so I'm working on all that. So that's why I haven't done the podcast yet. Right. So you got your hands full. I have my hands full, but open source, open source, homeschool revolution. Yeah. So global movement. It's, it's pretty exciting. I mean, for me as a being, it's like, I've basically right now I've worked my entire life. My, my entire life experience has prepared me for this moment that I'm going to be sharing,

that I'm sharing now and that I'm sharing next week. And it's not really stressful. It's kind of, it feels like I just had a nice glass of water. I feel fulfilled and I'm also not attached. Like I'm, you know, I'm, I'm putting the net out there and I'm looking for this tribe. And I know people from my life that I've thought were possible candidates. And I also know that they may not be the ones, like I'm literally looking for those unique 12. And if there are people listening to this that live in the area, is this open? Please email me. All right. So get in touch with Julie. Yeah. Get in touch with me. What's the date of the?

Go to srimati.com or you can Facebook me, Srimati Music on Facebook. The event is next Saturday, right? Yeah, but this is next Saturday, but not to worry because there'll be other events. This is just sort of my first presentation and I'm working. I'm finishing my book up. I'm editing 500 pages right now, but this is a section of my book and so I'm fine tuning this. And so it will be almost like a book two of the book book. What else do you have going on in your free time? I'm married to an ultra-endurance athlete, Rich Roll, who requires a lot of care.

A lot of attention. A lot of high-maintenance attention, for sure. You're really the finishing. We're finishing up another draft of our cookbook project, which is pretty exciting. And we just shot like a little promo video for it project, which is pretty exciting. And we just shot like a little promo video for it yesterday, which is pretty cool. Yeah. And so we're not sure the trajectory of the book yet. We don't have a release date or anything like that. I had said earlier that it was looking like January, but it may be longer because of certain recent developments that I'll keep you apprised of,

but that I'm going to be cagey about right now. We can't discuss it. But it's all good. It's exciting. The book is amazing. I wish I could just put it out right now because it's so freaking awesome. I know. But good things to those who wait, right? And what are you doing today? You're going off to a meditation retreat. Yes. Actually, Tyler and I, after we finish the podcast, Tyler and I are going to swing

over and pick up June. June, the master gardener, and we're going to drive up to Santa Barbara. We're going to a three-day retreat with His Holiness Vidya Dishananda. And it's a celebration. She's going to sit around and eat dal and meditate. I don't think so. And chant mantra. We're going to chant a lot. Actually, I'm singing a solo piece, a Krishna chant. A Krishna.

I'm learning how to speak Sanskrit properly. You are. A Krishna. Ancient language. Krishna. You should learn how to write it. I'd like you to learn how to write it. Oh my God.

Maybe I would have to definitely channel some power from a past life in order to do that. I'm sure. I'll work on it. See if I can do it. It can't be easy. It doesn't look easy at all. It's actually, according to His Holiness, you can't, you really can't even study Sanskrit. I don't know if I said that right.

Sanskrit on like a scholarly level because it's a language that has to be experienced. And as a realized saint from the high Himalayan caves, he has meditated over 50,000 hours in the caves in the Himalayas. It seems impossible, but I know that he's the guy I want to be meditating with, that I'm sure about. And I'm pretty sure also that everybody else who says that they're an expert on meditation is not an expert. After I met him, I would have to say, you know, I mean, I have one technique that has served me that I share, but the subject is vast. Let's just say that. But what about Sanskrit? Uh, it has to be experienced. Oh, it has to be experienced. It's experiential. Okay. So then that's another, that's another level of wisdom. So, you know, it's the same thing about life experience and, and, um, uh, you know, when you're sharing from an authentic place, you're sharing because you had the experience, not because you read about it in a book and then you're telling somebody about it.

So experiencing Sanskrit, it's actually, they're all sacred tones and they have harmonic frequencies. And actually, it's actually an experience in a sound, in a word, if you can imagine that. But it's amazing. But the idea being that the harmonic resonance of uttering this word has some kind of energetic impact on your psyche or your soul. Is that essentially what you're saying? Definitely. That's pretty cool. It's pretty amazing.

So it's almost like, because they say it's the first language, right? Yes. So it's like it came down from the aliens or something like that. What's so incredibly just magnificent is when he chants, first of all, he chants like no other being I've ever heard in my life. But when he actually speaks the language and chants, it sounds like this magical cosmic language. It's quite amazing. It's out of like Lord of the Rings or something like that. Yeah, it's like better. It's just crazy. It's so gorgeous. And he says, we are all Sanskrit because it is the first language of this realm. Realm, there I use the word realm.

How awesome is that? Yeah, it's cool. So, and, you know, he's not, I've been trying to get him to come on the podcast. Yeah, I mean, he'd make a great podcast guest, actually. He may do it at some point. He's super dialed in on his nutrition information and everything. Like, the difference between that guy and some of these other guys that I've met is that he's very much in the world. He's this, like you say, cosmic professor.

And he can pontificate for hours and hours and hours on basically any subject that you give him. So he's a natural talker. I think he would be good. No, he'd be amazing. Is he going to come on? What's his deal? He said not yet. His mission is to preserve the ancient Sanskrit teachings in every aspect.

We are not allowed to post anything. There's no social media allowed. But isn't sort of spreading awareness and consciousness in that regard, a way of preserving it by creating a record. And if he's on the podcast and talking, then I'm not, I'm not twisting his words. Like he can say what he wants to say and that creates more preservation for his ideas. Yeah. And that's why, that's why I think he hasn't said an outright no to me, but it's not the time he's, um, he's very, uh, very, very transparently authentic in what he's doing and spirituality in this country and other countries have, has been, um, you know, made a

kind of a, a, a farce in a lot of ways. I mean, I've had a lot of those journeys and I mean, I'm, I cherish all of those journeys, so I wouldn't trade them for anything, but you know, I can't say they were in perfect resonance, you know? And so he's, he's being extremely responsible and it's, and it's cool and it feels really good because he's, he's pure. Right. So, so are you going to sleep on the floor? No, I'm not. I love my bed. No, I mean, you're going, no, I mean, at this retreat, what are you doing? Like, I don't even know what's going on, honey. I'll be back in a few days. All right. Don't, don't you worry. Don't worry your head. No, no, I'm, I don't know. I'm sleeping on the

roof. I'm going, uh, I'm going to a place to the retreat and I'm sure they'll have a bed there for me. It's gonna be fine. All right, cool. Okay. What else is coming up? I actually wanna say, I just wanna say one thing about childbirth

because I'm sharing this very intimate video. No, it's not a video. Well, yeah, it is. It's still images and video. I wanna make sure that new parents and new mothers out there understand that, you know, there is no perfect birth experience, like according to the book, like you're not a better mother if you had, if you, you know, did it naturally and you did it at home, or if you breastfed until the child is four years old, or all of these rules and things that you read about.

And everybody's different and everybody has a unique experience. And whatever that experience is, of course, breast milk is best. Of course, I advocate taking our power back into child birthing practices. I mean, when did women give all this power away to men and doctors, male doctors and also doctors, to determine how we have our children?

I mean, it's absurd when you think about it. In my own experience, I didn't break those paradigms. I didn't break through those experiences. And I had a very blended experience. So I had a block, but I was dilated a lot. I didn't have any problem in childbirth, but yet I was very sick during the entire pregnancy. Another person may have had natural labor and had the child completely naturally.

I had a big challenge with nursing my first two boys. I only made it probably two months. And then I made it probably eight months with my girls. I will tell you that it did not affect my ability to bond with my boys at all. And as a matter of fact, I have a much closer relationship with them than most parents. So what I'm just saying is whatever life gives you, you know, whether you end up with a C-section, whether you end up, you know, nursing for three years or four years, it's your own experience and apply that divine perspective to it, honor it as such, and you're going to be fine. All right. Beautifully said.

Somebody asked me that. I'm sorry, Twitter person. I can't remember your name right now. What did they ask you? They asked me to talk about childbirth and someone who's about to become a new parent. And we were already thinking about doing this. So I said, thank you. I will do it. And now I'm forgetting the beautiful person's name right now. It's Twitter panel. If you remember it, I'll put it in the show notes. Oh, okay.

Cool. All right. Awesome. Cool. Well, I think we did it. Is that it? Yeah. So what's the dearest thing that you find in community for you?

I know it's your show, but I'm just going to ask this question. The dearest thing that I find in community? Strength. You know, it's power. You can't, you know, as one person, you can only do so much. But with a community, you can do anything. And I think that we overlook that, you know, we're in our cars, we're in our houses, you're in an apartment building, you don't know

your neighbors, there are people all around us and we unnecessarily isolate ourselves. And then we think we're connected because we're on staring at our phone on Facebook when there are people right in front of us. And I think that it's incumbent upon us to reach out and create that 3D community of real people that you can rely on, that you're willing to invest in, that you're willing to share on a deep level and be vulnerable with, because those are the people that are gonna come to your on a deep level and be vulnerable with because those are the people

that are gonna come to your aid when you need it. And likewise, you need to do the same for others. And that bond that's created by doing that is incredibly empowering. And it's saved my life. It's allowed me to do many, many things in my life I didn't think I was capable of. And every time I think that I can do these things alone is when I'm starting down the road to

failure. So I can't overstate it enough. It's beautiful. What about you? I would say for me, it's, it's love and connection. You know, just just it makes life more meaningful when you have it to share with other people. And, you know, I have to say that, you know, our children are a part of our marriage, you know, and I think that's why we renewed our vows. It's without them, we wouldn't be who we are. And without, similarly, without all the podcast fans, without everybody that's in this plant power movement,

without everybody that's reached out to us, we wouldn't be who we are. And it's like in those moments of darkness where we thought everything we were doing, we were questioning everything. We thought, oh my gosh, like, what are we doing? We would always receive a message from someone that would share their experience

and it would get us through another day. And without that, I don't think we would have made it. And so, you know, really, truly from, from our hearts and our souls, you know, we, we recognize you, the community at large and you are dear to us and we do feel connected to you. And even if we don't know you, you know, your name or your face, we don't take this experience for granted ever for one moment. And you're all extremely dear to us. And so thank you so much for joining with us. For sure. And, you know, so much has changed since episode one, and yet so many things are the same.

You know, when I was listening to the first episode this morning, it was Tyler and our nephew Harrison sitting right next to us as we recorded the first one. our nephew Harrison sitting right next to us as we recorded the first one. And it was Tyler and Harrison that came up with the theme music for the show, which they wrote in an hour in Hawaii. And I thought this will just be placeholder until they have the time to think of something different or they want to improve it. And we're at episode 100 and it's still the theme music. And just before recording this episode, they were here in the garage, strumming the guitar and setting up the audio equipment in the exact same way that they were doing on episode one, which is a beautiful thing, right? And now Tyler produces the show and it's Tyler that does all the music, the interstitial music and edits the show and gets it up on the site.

And I love the fact that we've kept that in the family like that, which is, again, goes back to community. That's beautiful. So there you have it. So there you have it. All right, you guys. To echo Julie Srimati, thank you for taking this leap and going on this journey with us.

I promise you the next 100 episodes will be better than the first 100 episodes. We're going to continue to improve the show and to grow it as best we can. So thank you for listening. Thank you for your support. Thank you for telling a friend. Thank you for using the Amazon banner ad at ritual.com. Thank you for all the social media posts and for sharing the show on Instagram, which I love. That's still my favorite when people take pictures of Instagram saying I'm running or I'm here, I'm sitting on it, you know, by a lake, you know, listening to the podcast or whatever, it's so cool to get a visual of that. And it really hammers home, like, just how amazing this community can be. And I dig it.

So thank you, guys. bit more, go to srimati.com, S-R-I-M-A-T-I, S-R-I-M-A-T-I.com and get the Rich Roll podcast app. I'm so excited about this. You can just click on the app store on your iPhone and search Rich Roll and it'll pull it right up. Or there's direct hyperlinks on my website on the page for this episode. And I also just posted a blog post about it today. We're offering 15% off on your plant power provisions purchases starting today through Wednesday. I'm not sure exactly what time it expires. I'm not sure exactly what time it expires, but if you want more information on how to get that rebate, subscribe to my newsletter at richroll.com and you'll get the email blast that'll give you the code that you need to get the discount or go to my site, richroll.com and I have a blog post

up where it gives you everything that you need for that. one more thing. And if any of the families, um, like Stacy's work and feel drawn to it, um, you can contact her through ribbon head. We'll have the links down there. She's an extraordinary family photographer. She takes amazing, amazing, amazing family images. And she's photographed our family for over 20 years. Yeah. She's, she's been with us for a long time and I'll put her, her website's ribbonhead.com, but I'll put a link up to that in the show notes. So dig that. Um, in terms of, uh, accessing your best, most authentic self, maybe you want to check out my online course at mind, body green, the art of living with purpose. It's about how to unlock. It's about how to go within.

It's about how to develop a deeper connection and relationship with yourself. It's about goal setting and it's about goal achieving. And you can find that at mindbodygreen.com. We also have our ultimate guide to plant-based nutrition online course also at mindbodygreen.com. Both of these courses are multiple hours of streaming video and online community and downloadable tools. And they're pretty cool. So you could dig on that again. Thanks for all the support. Thanks for telling a friend. Thanks for all the donations. We appreciate that using the Amazon banner at a ritual.com. And I'm going to leave you guys with an assignment for next week. You didn't know how to do this.

You don't even listen to the podcast. I've been giving people homework at the end. I love that. See, if you listen to the podcast, then you would know. If I listen to the podcast, then I wouldn't be launching a homeschool revolution next week. All right. No, so the assignment. Your dinner wouldn't be ready.

Right. Well, okay. Make sure my dinner's ready. Okay. ready. Right. Well, okay. Make sure my dinner's ready. Okay. So it would be great if everybody this week reached out to somebody and started to exercise their muscles in terms of developing their own community, right? So cool. Start, take out a piece of paper and write down who you want to be on your board of advisors. I think that's a good way to start. It's a great way.

Who are the people in your life that are living lives that you aspire to, that you respect, the people that you look up to, the people that have a certain level of knowledge or acumen or acuity that you would like to model, that you aspire to have? And write those people down. Maybe they're people that you work with or live down the street, or maybe they're, they're sort of more people that you don't know, but you would like to know. But I would say shoot for the stars, write down that list of people and figure out a strategy for how to connect with them more deeply. You know, maybe just call that guy up and say, Hey, I want to, I want to go out to dinner with you. I need some

advice. Can you help me out? I'm struggling with this thing in my job or my career. I'm trying to figure out what I'm going to do next, whatever. Like start to allow yourself to rely on other people to light your path. Can I share one more thing? Yeah. So when we were at Catalyst Week last week, we had this reciprocity circle. Oh yeah, that's a cool story. Yeah, I just want to do the good now. He's not mad at me.

It definitely, no. He was like, that was my end. It plays into the assignment, right? No, exactly. So Amanda Slavin, who is the founder of Catalyst Creative, it's a community, it's actually an event company and they host these creative weeks and speaker series weeks in Las Vegas in the new downtown project, which is founded by Tony Shea of Zappos. And the boys and I went a couple of weeks ago, we performed there and we were part of this amazing week with like 50 other artists. And the final day we met in a room and Amanda said, okay, we're going to do a reciprocity circle. And everybody was like, what's that? So we got in a circle and everybody got to go around

and share like three minutes or less with the community and literally ask for help. You know, I need help with this. I need help with, you know, what could be whatever. And I have to say the experience was completely transformative. It was the deepest bonding experience I've ever had in a group. And also the synchronicities were crazy. Like someone would say, you know, I want to dance, but I want to do it, you know, in a purple room and I want to be eating cupcakes. Like something that just was totally stupid. You were like, there's no way. And then someone in the group would go, I have that.

You know, my roommate does that. I know the guy that you need to talk to. It was uncanny, like across the board, every single person. And actually I got, Amanda wrote an article in the Huffington post yesterday. And she, she mentioned me because there was a, one of our, one of our group, Ethan, who's this incredible, incredible artist. And he's a singer and he's, you know, he's just incredibly engaging and he has a garment company, but he had separated himself from the garment company and any of its marketing. And so he was asking for ideas on how to build his business. And I was just like, dude, like, I want to know everything about you. I want to know who your friends are, what you're eating for breakfast. Like, what's your favorite music?

I want to hear you sing. Like, where are you like behind this garment company? Right. Like, why is he not the face of that? Like the most interesting thing about the garment company is him. And he wasn't able to see that, or he wasn't able to allow himself to be that. Exactly. And so I gave him a little kind of, you know, mama, like, you know, direct advice, you know, I kind of just told him and then I said, and, you know, and don't waste time and do it immediately because he has all the skill to do it. He doesn't have a learning curve. He's naturally like that. And so Amanda was sharing about him and in this article and, um, his name is, of course, I can't remember his last name. It's like lips. It's L I P T Z.

I'll put a link to the article. Sorry, Ethan, I said your last name wrong. I'm sure. But, but anyway, um, it was just incredibly bonding and it was amazing for me because I took my boys, Tyler and Trapper, and then Harrison also joined us. So I had my, my band with me and they all participated in the circle and it was extremely transformative for them. So they, they got all these community members in Los Feliz, these people that they connected with that are going to mentor them and help them. And as a mother, it was like, we left Las Vegas and we, we literally sang the entire way home. We were singing at the top of our lungs for five hours. You were the only people leaving Las Vegas uplifted and feeling

enlightened by the experience. We didn't drink or smoke or gamble. We ate, oh, we ate beautiful raw food there at the downtown project. Yeah, what's happening in downtown Las Vegas is pretty cool. And I think I've talked about it before on the show, but just to recap really quickly, Tony Hsieh, who's CEO of Zappos.com, which is sort of, it was bought by Amazon, but it's sort of like an Amazon service. They specialize in shoes. They moved their corporate headquarters into the old city hall building in downtown Las Vegas off the strip, like way, you know, in a different part of town that has sort of become decrepit and downtrodden. And he's trying to revitalize it and breathe new life into it. And he spent like 200 million of his own dollars and bought up like six square blocks of this downtown sector.

And he's trying to create like a startup-friendly environment and breathe young, new, youthful energy into this place. And he's bought all these like gigantic sculptures from Burning Man. So there's like a fire breathing praying mantis in this container park. And there's, you know, kids riding around on fixie bikes. Like it's not what you would imagine Las Vegas to be. And there's startups happening there and there's a vitality and a sense of energy and it's still early in the process, but it's inspiring because basically, you know, at its core, he's saying, I want to, I want to create a different version of community the way that I see it. And he's putting his money where his mouth is. And Catalyst Week is, is really an extension of that to bring in inspiring, interesting people to experience what's happening in downtown Las Vegas and to share and to use Amanda's term.

What does she call it? Collision. You know, like these people are colliding and then these ideas get exchanged and then, and then, you know, as a result of that, uh, things happen. And a good example of that is that I had Robin Arzon on the podcast last week and I met her at Catalyst Week and she was a huge hit on the podcast. People dug her. I didn't know who she was before Catalyst Week and we had never met. And I'm so glad to have her in my life. And I'm super proud to be able to share her story with this audience. So that's just a small example of many things that are happening there. But I think in the terms of the reciprocity circle,

you know, to have Tyler, like our son say, I need help with this and to have somebody with experience and what he's interested in say, hey, I'll help you with that. Like, I'm going to hook you up, you know, is invaluable. It's really a special, cool thing. That's amazing. And actually, the listener is going to be great because Amanda Slavin is going to be a guest on the podcast coming up very soon. That's right. I think we're sitting down next week.

Yeah, she's amazing. And it's so inspiring. And nothing but goodness comes out of these weeks. It's, it's really, it's really quite something. And again, it's community, right? So all the more reason to appoint your boy to board of advisors, maybe create your own reciprocity circle in your own way. Let us know how it works out. All right, you guys. Thanks so much. That's it for episode 100. I can't believe it's been 100.

And you know what? We're going to blink and then there's going to be 500. It's so amazing. That's what I'm feeling. All right? Thanks, honey. Thanks for all your amazing work, Rich, on the podcast. It's been incredible.

And you've done an amazing job on this podcast. Thank you. I want to just thank you. Thank you. And thanks for being my sometime co-host and guest today. You're welcome, honey. And that concludes episode 100. There we go. Peace. Plants. Namaste.