Your Happy Hour - The words of our worlds

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

Welcome back to Your Happy Hour with Friday Feels!In this episode, we chat to Mauro Henriquez Esquivel, a talented filmmaker and photographer, whose journey started with curiosity and has now led him to be a successful freelancer in the film industry. Mauro shares the importance of self-reflection, kindness, and the impact of language and culture on how we experience each other and the world around us. He also reminded us of the interconnectedness of creativity and emotional expression in embracing change as you follow your passions around the world!What word shapes your reality? Or has it yet to be discovered where you live?Friday Feels is all about having those honest conversations, the power of community for personal growth and taking those actionable steps towards being our authentic selves.Thanks for tuning in! Keep it raw and real out there xYHH is produced by swartkat.co - captured via riverside.fm & shared via rss.com.

It's the Friday feels and we're back with your first sip of the weekend. You're now tuned in to this week's episode of Your Happy Hour. I'm your host Nicole Carmine and it's amazing to have you here joining me this week as we uncover the truths about being a human and a working professional. What are you up to this Friday? Well whatever it is, this moment is just for you. And we're back with another episode of your happy hour in the Friday feel space. And we still talking about this theme called In the Mirrors of the World.

And today I am very privileged to have a wonderful gentleman join me. I asked him if it was okay not to say his surname because it's really hard for me to pronounce and so I Just want to say a big big welcome to you Maro, and I know most people say hey Maro, which is also your website Which I think is so wonderful. So today we get to say that hey Maro. Welcome to Friday fields to the your happy hour Thank you for coming and sharing some of your story. You are a very talented filmmaker, photographer, just an amazing human with I know a wonderful journey and a very kind soul. So I'm really happy to be able to share this space with you today.

So yeah, a big welcome. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Nicole. And let me say that I'm the one that is really thankful about being here. And it's such an honor for me. Thank you. Thank you for the invitation and giving me this space to talk with you. No, it's such a pleasure. And yeah, I mean, I've also gotten to know your journey a little bit. We found each other on a platform called, I think it was Upwork at the time

when I was looking for a videographer and I was still traveling around in France and I know that you come from South America on the one side of the world but you're living on the other side of the world in Australia and you're also working on all these global projects so yeah maybe you just want to tell us a little bit about your journey and how you got to be what you're doing today, where you are and a little bit about what this topic means to you. Okay, my journey, my journey, it's a life journey, actually, because of I always been a curious person. And as a a child I was really curious as well. But when I finished my studies in school and high school, I thought that, okay, I want to study engineering, like mechanic engineering, and I started with that. And then one day I discovered one software

playing around with the computer that is called After Effects that is a really specific software to do animations and motion graphics and it's a really powerful software as well and I don't know why I just create some silly animation like words that moving around the screen something like that something really really simple but that ignited in me like oh this is wonderful this is a really powerful tool and I can do a lot of things I remember that I went to internet and I googled what can I do with After Effects and then I discovered a lot of people that was doing like really awesome and cool effects

and yeah, that's why and when my journey started was a coincidence actually. And then watching videos and talking with people, you know, because when there is a topic that you are really interested in, you start to talk all the day about it or it's my case. I'm really passionate and sometimes I can be even a bit obsessive and all the day talking about that software and then a friend of mine, actually a really, really good friend, at that moment he was starting to run a studio business, music studio business actually.

And he said, hey, there is something pretty new that it's called YouTube and people are starting to upload music videos and I have some singers here and bands that maybe they would be interested in the first music videos because at that time I remember we were talking about... Oh, this is gonna sound like I'm an old man but we were talking about 2006, 2007. And I remember that he said, let's offer to small bands and new artists the options to get a music video. That in that moment, that was only for really big artists.

It's like Britney Spears, Mikey Jackson, people like that be able to just be able to film a music video. So I said okay I can do some effects, what you can do? And he said I can do some music, what about if we bought a camera and just start to play around and try some cool stuff and yeah that was the beginning and then after a few years I discovered myself doing music videos like a serious business about it having a lot of people in charge and after a few years, maybe eight years doing that, I was 25 years old, 26 years old and I was really tired about managing people and running a business. And that moment I said, okay, I fell in love with this profession because I like to be

creative, I like to tell stories and create. And I'm not doing that. I run a business. I'm more worried about taxes, paying bills, and managing people that film me. So, in that moment, I started my career as freelancer, always as a coincidence, because a friend of mine that was at that moment working, another friend that was working with me

in the production company that we opened with my old friend, he said, hey, there is something new that is called Upwork and it looks like a platform that you just post, people post jobs that they need to do and you can go for it and offer your services. And are you heard about it? No, no, I never heard about it and I'm not interested. I have too many things to do. I have a lot of tax to pay, a lot of bills.

And I remember that he said, I will open an account for you and then you will you will say if you have time just go and look around and I remember he created account and installed the app in my phone and I was in a trip traveling in the route and I decided because it was boring to go in the app and check. And I sent one proposal to one of the guys that was offering, I think, there for some, I think that animation services as well. And remembering my first days with the film industry and playing around with After Effects I sent a proposal like, hey I can do this, I did this like few years ago

I've improved a lot, I remember I haven't even a portfolio, it was like really like, I will try a really long shot and let's see what happens with this. And the guy just, I remember that he replied me and said, hey, I really like it. It's exactly what I'm looking for. So you can do this. And again, just for being curious and playing around, I discovered that there was actually in that moment an entire business that was growing about freelancing. And we are talking about, we are talking again, sorry, about 2012 maybe? 2014 something like that.

2014 and again it was a new business, a new field, that platform. At that moment I remember everyone was like talking about be careful, you can be like scammed there and there's a lot of people that is trying to just get money, try to get your bank account number and that kind of things and yeah and that is when my journey started in freelancer in the freelancer world actually because it's an entire world, digital world. And after a few years I said, okay, I will do this. At the same time that I was working with my film production company,

both areas of my life start to grow, grow, grow, grow. At the point I decide, okay, I will give an opportunity to the freelancer business at that moment to try if I can live and I can pay my bills just doing this freelancer job and it was it works actually it worked and so my life now after a few years is divided in two I have my production company and my freelancer work that I'm still working this platform but now I'm in Australia because I have the freedom of moving whatever I want and because I've started to work in this platform, I discovered that I need to improve my English. And I said, okay, what happened? Okay. What happened if I moved to a new country

that they are speaking English and I can improve my English there? So I come into, I came to Australia, sorry. And now I'm in Australia, living, growing a business, a production company as well as Haymower Films and working as a freelancer. So this is my journey in a really simple way to talk it. In the middle, obviously, there were a lot of small or big situations, but yeah, more or less, this is my life. I love how you have just followed the nudges of the universe and I think this is kind of true for a lot of creatives or you know people who are listening that maybe want to be creative. When you kind of go back to that silliness, the playfulness that

like let me just try create something and it's just for you. It's just for you to experiment. I think that's always the best. It's funny, this is how I got into podcasting. I saw this also on a freelancing platform. I just saw this advert and I clicked on it and I was like, I think I can do that. I didn't have any equipment, nothing. I kind of was like, yeah, I'll be able to host and here I am, here I am now many years later

just doing this. I think it's beautiful how you've embraced change. We often talk about this on here, experiential learning and living is really the essence of life in so many ways. Kind of drawing in the theme of the month and you know how have you felt? Have you seen yourself in different ways in the world? And yeah, what does the topic kind of mean to you and your journey that you've told us a little bit about? Yeah, okay. That's a one. You sent me that topic and you sent me the email

proposing it. At the first moment I said, I don't know if this topic, I feel something with this, I can talk about it. But then after, I think that one day, I really start to understand a lot of things about me, and about how I see the world. And that's crazy because it's about the topic. It's the essence of the topic, you know, it's the mirror of the world. Your phrase

was a mirror for me, actually, because I started looking inside with that. And this is a really deep topic and really big as well. So I will try to talk for me. This is my experience, this is my opinion. But the first thing that I have to mention about it is, have you, I'm sure that yes, but have you heard this phrase about we seeing the other people's we see reflected the dark sides of ourselves

yeah, and I always like to think in positive way and I have like phrase that I use every day is to be mad with something quite someone or something it's really easy but to be kind like honestly kind with someone it's really hard I require a lot of brave so So I start to think, okay, what I'm seeing and watching in the other people, the kindness, I'm able to see the kindness in other people because we are living in a moment of the war and I think that it's my opinion as I told you that a lot of bad things and situations, awful situations are happening. And it's hard to see the good ones when the chaos is surrounding us.

So I'm able to do that because I'm not able to do that. It's because the reflection that I'm watching, it's myself that... watching it's myself that what is my kindness where is my my good stuff and it's it's one of the moment when I start to struggling with I struggling yeah because it was like a crisis it It's how I will do to watch and observe the world in a honest way and without any bias. What is the way to do that? There is a method, there is a philosophy. You know, there's this really trending phrases and topics about

what are you thinking and the words that you are using every day is the way that you see the world and how you feel and live the moments. And this comment to me like, okay, I heard this phrase a thousand of thousands of times, I never think deeply about it. I promise you that all these topics are connected, I promise you. I'm doing a really, really long trip, but I promise you that it's connected. And I remember at that point that traveling around Italy I knew a girl that she taught me a really really good word that is solitudine in Italian and in Spanish we have the word soledad that means loneliness but we don't have the positive word for being alone and feeling good.

We don't have that war. That war in Spanish doesn't exist. So, most of the people that speak Spanish, and this is my opinion, this is my research in this moment actually, it's something that I'm writing down and I'm trying to create a movie or a series. I don't know. I will define that in the future. But,

Latin people, Spanish people, people from South America, that is where I'm coming from, we love, spend time together. We are really sustainable people because being alone is not good. Because we are not able to feel like the solitudine. It's loneliness or nothing. And when I discovered that meaningful, that there isn't a lot of language actually in Italy, in Italian, in Portuguese, even in English, it's solitude, I don't know how to pronounce it, but there is a word, this is like a positive word for loneliness. There are cultures that they spend more time alone and they even have good moments. It's good to be with yourself. That is not a problem, it's not bad. You don't have to feel alone. You're just with yourself. When I discovered that word I started to enjoy the moment with myself and in that moment I

realized about the power of the words because if we don't have the word for a feeling we cannot feel it actually and that it's how I see the mirrors of the world. In my opinion, the words are the mirror of the world. And after you sent me that email, I remembered it. I remembered this memory and this moment of my life that I realized about it and I said okay what is happening now that I'm living in a new culture that is so different to us, to South American people. We are in the other part of the world but even with that I don't know when I travel to Europe we are not so different to Europeans.

But yes, from Australian people and from Australian culture, we are so different. One of the things that we always talk with my partner and my friends is that people here, they are really kind, but we feel that they are cold. You know? It's like they are distant. They don't have the same way to share time, to party, to catch up. It's different. So it's like we feel like a distance. But you can notice that everything is good. They are kind. They are nice people.

They are being really nice. But we feel that. I said, okay, maybe there is a war that I need to use like a mirror to understand what is happening there. And I discovered the next. In English, you use the word character in two ways. Use the word character to build your character, to improve your character, and character as a person in a story. Yeah. In Spanish we have the word character, that it's pretty much pretty similar,

but it's just for the personality part, you know, the personality meaning of the word. When we talk about characters of a story, we talk about personajes. It's a different word. So that word in our culture doesn't share meanings. And the difference is, for example, in Spanish we never build our character or improve our character. We forge our character because in Spanish we understand character as a hardware that you cannot change. That comes to you from the moment that you

burn. When you burn you get your character and yes, maybe you can improve it a bit or modify it but it's there and it will come without advice and with any warning because it's part of yourself you cannot change it and in English is like a software Character is something that you can update that you can change it's not part of your hardware so when we are socializing we are using different parts of our system we are socializing with

our hardware and you're socializing sometimes where you're suffer. So that's why we feel this distance and we feel we are. And now that I understand that, as I told you, this is my crazy theories as how I see the world. I don't know if this is true, but for me, in my case, it's easier to understand and empathize than with people, it's easier to see the kindness or to understand the other people that okay this is just a different way because there is a word that we use difference and the meaning on how we understand the personality is different so that is how the topic, the Mirror of the World, work on me.

I absolutely love that you shared this and I think it's just opened up this, it's so interesting to hear these different perspectives and I think when you live and work around the world the way you are doing, opening yourself up to new experiences and discovering new ways of being, you know, through language, through culture. And I feel the same, you know, when I'm here in France and wherever I've been, I feel like you discover the culture by the language.

The language incorporates so much of the person's culture and experience of the world and how they see the world exactly like that. There's a word here, you know, in English we talk about being sensible, which is like you're reliable and you do things in a good way. And then in France you talk about someone is sensible, they're sensitive and it's so easy to confuse the two because they spelt exactly the same and they're very different. So it's just, it's so wonderful when you emerge yourself in a culture like that and you get to experience other people and I think it's brave and I think it's wonderful that you are doing that and that you are finding your way and how you express yourself in the

world. Something that is interesting for me is that because we live in a world that is separated by language and culture what is probably quite similar is the feeling, the intention, the energy that we all share, you know, and that's always true no matter how we express it differently in different ways. I think that the way you hug someone or the way you love is quite similar. So what a journey you've walked and thank you for sharing that with us and you obviously didn't think 10 years ago that you would be where you are now.

Definitely no, no. Actually, that's something that always had been really challenging for me. Like, imagine my life 10 years ahead. It always has been. And even nowadays, when I try to do that exercise it's one of the most frustrating things and tasks that I can do because I see them to grab down my goals and yes I can see my goals but when we will be able to

achieve I don't know I don't know because life for me, it's an adventure. I don't know. I never imagined that I will be living in Australia. I would never imagine that I was being a filmmaker, that I will be a filmmaker. So when I try to do that exercise, it's impossible.

So at this moment, I'm just trying to set goals and say, okay, let's try to do it faster, as fast as I can. Faster than I can, yeah, that's it. So when you think of your goals a year from now, what do you feel, what would we be able to celebrate with you, what do you envision for yourself a year from now? Yes, definitely I want to direct a movie. That's one of my dreams and my biggest goal.

Or maybe some episode, some show, something like that. But definitely that's one of the most big dreams for me. Yeah, definitely directing a movie, it's, it will be awesome. Oh, I can't wait to see it and please keep us updated on when and where and where we can watch it and celebrate it with you and distribute it to the world. I'm sure you will be able to and you have so much talent so please don't ever stop creating and following your nudges through the universe.

And I wanted to actually just use this little moment to say thank you, well firstly to you for sharing but then also to our partners who make this possible, who are very much content creators and passionate about sharing stories in the world like you are, and that's Riversidefm and RSS.com. So if you are a keen podcaster, live streamer or content creator, we invite you to check out both of these platforms who've given us and our audience very graciously a discount, which we can share with you on the socials. So do DM us at fridayfields.co and we'll send you the link.

And just a very quick little slide also into a little section, Maro, that we do called the People, places and spaces. So every week we have a little poll and we think about which person or platform or physical place has the feels that's come across our path. And so this week I wanted to give a shout out to a little coffee shop with a big presence in Phoenix, Arizona and it's really my team member Ashley who discovered them and they have an awesome experience and feel so thank you to Songbird Coffee House in Phoenix and Arizona and they've also really made it easy for me sitting in France to be able to send coffee to Ashley sitting in Phoenix because of the vouchers that they have and this is the beauty of the digital platform

in a space like that. So thank you for sharing your feels with the world and for bringing great coffee to the spaces we all need good coffee to be able to create. And then I on the kind of feeling of gratitude, Mara, we do a thing called the James every week. So it's really just something that's come across your path. Maybe it's been hard, maybe it's been good. So I'll share and then you're welcome to share if you want to as well. So my gem of the week has been really being open to change. We always talk about this, but sometimes when you're working with productions, which we were we were going to have a shoot and everything was kind of coming together, but then it wasn't quite the way we needed it.

And the universe was very quick to show us that we needed to postpone. And sometimes that can be disappointing, but I think a lot of times these things always happen for a reason and you have to be flexible. And it keeps you on your toes, which is always a challenge, but from a production perspective, as you know. But I think just being open to things, being the way they exactly mean to be in the time and space is always important. So we can plan, but we don't know exactly how things will happen. So yeah, that was my gem. Just a reminder for me of that. What's yours Ben? If I have to think right now after the weekend that I have, I can share with you the same topic as how I went to film to Adelaide and we planned really nice and we have a really good plan for a really nice shooting and then we arrived, it was raining as crazy, it was

pouring rain and we were there to film with our main character a real situation that was happening. It's like a championship because they have here in Australia there is a racing mowers actually they use the mowers mowers actually they use the mowers to do gardening they changing and they put inside like really big engines car engines or really big motor bike engines inside and they do like a championship of mowers so we went there to film that and was raining, they will not suspend the event because they are racing and they can't rain with rain. But we cannot film with cameras, lights and bikes behind the rain. So we were there and what we're gonna do. Let's film. So we were all the time in the car waiting for the moment that

the rain stopped for two, three, four, five minutes, whatever, and we jump out of the car. We film as much as we can and then we move the car again. And that was during two days we were doing that. But at that moment I remember this. This weather, I cannot control. We cannot do anything about it. So let's try to take advantage of this. And let's use the raining and the mood that this is... The nature has given us to create an amazing footage. Let's change the mood.

Let's use the mud. Let's use the dirty and let's create a different approach to this content and we did that, it was amazing obviously at the beginning for everyone was really frustrating but at the end was so fun because everyone was full of mud, like cake of mud everyone and the shooting was amazing and it was like that it's like yeah there is some topics that even like cake among everyone. And the shooting was amazing. And it was like that. It's like, yeah, there is some topics

that even with the technology, even with the advance of the humanity, we cannot control. And that's okay, weather is weather. Well, it sounds like a wonderful maze. I can't wait to share, please share with us what the end result was. There's something beautiful about playing in the mud, right? We always do it as kids. So,

I mean, sometimes you have to go back to that moment. But that's amazing, Jim. Thank you. And yeah, it's funny how life has brought both of those moments to us to share in this week. And I wonder what everyone else is feeling out there, you know, when you're listening, what are you thinking about what your jam was for the week? What are you open to change? Are you open to experiencing life in the moment for what it is and appreciating it? And also, what is your word? What is your word in which you're seeing the world through? I love that way of thinking that Maro shared with us today. So we want to hear all your feels. Please do send us your feels to the socials. We love receiving your messages.

And before we do finish, Maro, I have one more question for you. And that is something we call the stack. So it's our reading list. So if there's a book or it could be anything that you feel that you've read that you'd like to recommend, or maybe you haven't read it yet and it's still on your pile. I want to ask you today, what is in your stack that you can share with us? Oh, I'm that kind of person that in the stack have more more days in life. It's like I'm that kind of person that really loves reading and every book that I watch is

I want to read that and I have a list that is infinite. Never will. I know that I will never be able to read all those books. One of my favorite books ever that I'm always reading and rereading again is... I don't know the exact name in English. I think it's something like The Return of the Witches. There is a book created for two French philosophers. I think there's something like the Return of the Witches. And there is a book created for two French philosophers. And it's a book that they wrote after the Second World War.

And it's a really interesting book to read because they are talking about the final of the Second World War and about the atomic bombs and how... imagine, I think this book is 1950, so in that moment all the world was really shocked about the situation and they talk about the war is in the top of the technology. Human being has been capable to manage atoms and really small things that the war is doing, you know, it's like human is changing the essential of things and they're using to create chaos and death so from that perspective they talk about science never has been like like this in this moment because the greatest of science like Newton or Marie Curie, all of them, they have first of all an intuition, a really deep feeling that what happened here, maybe there is some

strange invisible force that is attracting the things to the earth but they don't have any tool to know it so they will be forced by themselves to discover the way how is that working? but they follow that feeling, they follow that intuition, that great idea even Einstein is one of them. And in this book they name these people and these amazing, brilliant people as witches. Because in some way they are talking about invisible things.

So there is something happening that I can explain, you can explain, no one knows, but it's there and it's happening. And in this book they say that in order to stop this, to stop the chaos, the death and the bomb and the atomic bomb, we need that witches return. We don't need science guiding the destiny of the world because there is no doubt that science is guiding us to the dead because they are not fascinated about that invisible things, that mysterious, that witches, yeah, are passionate about it. So this book is really interesting and it's a really big book and it have a lot of moments, really funny moments

but when you're reading you understand this main idea, it's like let's follow our intuition because it's about that, trying to explain what they crazy people and brilliant people it's feeling that is happening there and let's do that not in the opposite way, because we're doing it the opposite way. We're following the case, and we are creating them. So I really love that book. It's like always, it's a really hard book to read

in some moments, because there is a lot of documents and books that they are using to explain this idea so sometimes you have to read three pages of a really antique book but it's good, it's good, at the end you finish and say okay this is true, they are not just suggesting and using the imagination or they are giving us some really good sources to go and read if you want. But yeah, I love that book. I'm always reading that book forever.

I think I will read that book forever. Continuous stack, a continuous reading list. Some books aren't just like that, right? They kind of stay with you forever. Khalil Gibran's The Prophet is that for me. I will keep rereading that book forever and ever. But I really wanna add this to my stack and we'll be adding it to the Friday Field stack.

Thank you so much for recommending that. And it's interesting if you go back in the history how many people that were kind of doped witches were really just healers that are, you know, energy healers that are so accepted today and how things have changed and it's really just people that are in touch with that imaginary thing, that beautiful part of ourselves, like you say, that's imagination and intuition and everything that's around what makes us divine souls, I think, you know. So I definitely would love to read that and I hope it is available in English.

Otherwise I'll have to just upskill in Spanish, I'm sure. No, no. I'm sure that there is in English but because I never... It's an old book so I never saw it in English probably. I don't know. Thank you so much for sharing that. And yeah, Amaro, just thank you for sharing today and coming on to tell a bit about your story and how you see the world. And it's always just such an amazing moment with you. You've got a beautiful, kind, grounded energy. So thank you for sharing that with the world through creation and film. And yeah, we can't wait to see the film that you make. Thank you for sharing that with the world through creation and film.

We can't wait to see the film that you make. You're welcome. Let me say thank you to you because you're doing a really amazing job here. And I know that the reasons that you are doing all of this are really novel. I really like that. As I told you the first time we need more people like that in the world people that is trusting in the art people that is trusting in something that it's designed to create feelings

emotions and it's the only thing that humans are only waiting for. We want to feel kindness, we want to feel happiness, we want to feel even horror because we are going to see horror movies. So yes, we are emotion chasers, you know, it's like we're always trying to get it and you're working for that. So Thank you for that No, it's my pleasure my pleasure and you're right and let life be a ride of sensations If you haven't just yet follow friday feels on instagram facebook tick tock and linkedin You can share with us all your feels this week by tagging us at

fridayfeels.co and you can also find the website at that handle. And now as you ease into this weekend take a moment celebrate who you've become, what you've overcome and what is yet to come as you do the crazy and cool things that you do as the authentic you. You know the truth about life and work is that it's hard but the beauty is this global working experience that you're in while we are in it together. So keep connecting, empowering and inspiring this week. And of course, keep it raw and real. Until next time.