Once suffering from anxiety, Jill Whalen, an extraordinarily successful marketer, tackled her demons and overcome, and then lived to share the tale and teach others how they, too, could overcome. In this podcast, Jill and Tamar talk about anxiety, getting healthy, how different each and every single one of us are, and then deviate into our reality and past lives. TAMAR: Hey, everybody, I am delighted, excited, ecstatic to bring my old friend from, I don’t even know, like over a decade, we’ve known each other for a really long time. Jill Whalen. And she is she’s like this expert in her craft, but kind of walked away from it. So I guess I’m going to talk about that and has been making, been migrating lately, so, yeah, I mean, I guess I’ll give too much information out, but thank you so much for coming. Jill Whalen: Thanks for having me Tamar, yeah, I think it’s been more, much more than a decade, probably 20 years since we first knew each other. TAMAR: Oh, wow. Yeah, that’s that ages me. Yeah. No, it hasn’t, it hasn’t been. I got into it in about 2006, 2007, so it’s gotta be, it is over a decade. But it’s not that long. I kind of wish it was, you know, what benefits you would have had, I would have had if I started earlier. Jill Whalen: Oh, yeah, true. TAMAR: Yeah. So Jill and I know each other from the search engine marketing world, and Jill was this rock star of a SEO High Rankings, if you will, official. And it’s, no pun intended because she ran her, she ran a site called HighRankings.com and then walked away from it because life came and got in the way and no regrets. So that’s always the dream. So talk about your history a little bit on that. Jill Whalen: Sure, yeah, so I was doing a SEO thing for I think it had been about I was about 17 years at that point and this was 2013 and, you know, I loved it. It was my life and it was my passion. I lived and breathed SEO, basically was a pioneer in the industry, pretty well known, and went to all the conferences, spoke at conferences, and then I at some point in 2013 I was, I mean long before this I was gaining weight and drinking too much, never having really eaten very healthy most of my life and getting older. I was about 50 at this point. I was just getting very unhealthy and I knew I needed to do something about it or, you know, something bad or something really bad would happen. And so I finally, after years of thinking about it, I always wished that if you just thought about things that would happen, which actually kind of does now I know, but after years of thinking about it, I was like, OK, I got to lose some weight and I wanted to lose about twenty five pounds. I’d always been fairly thin most of my life, so I had never done diets and I always thought, you know, diets were weird or whatever. But I wanted to make it be like a lifestyle change. I felt like that would be sustainable, but I did have to lose the initial weight, so I just you know, Fitbits were fairly newer back then. I got a Fitbit and the MyFitnessPal app. And so as a techie, you know, it was kind of, it actually was kind of fun doing like, I just was counting the calories, using the apps and but always at the time still making leaving space, leaving calorie space for my two, at least two drinks a night cuz my husband and I were always going to bars at this point. My kids were grown up and the thought of like giving up those drinks was like, no, I don’t want it. I don’t want to do that. So with my limited like 1200 calories I think it was, I made sure I could have enough for my drinks and fit it in and I started I had been doing yoga already for a couple years, a little bit, a couple of times a week. And I think actually that kind of there’s something about yoga that’s magical that kind of changes your mindset a little. And I do think that spurred me on for the weight loss, so my goal was kind of in six months to lose the twenty five pounds. And basically I did it, but I, and I as through that six months, you know, I started I went from someone who used to think I was aller—I didn’t think I did, but I kidded that I was allergic to vegetables and exercise and, you know, to suddenly really liking, love those things. I was making all kinds of veggie creations for my lunch, and I was walking in the woods, you know, three, three, four miles a day and getting those 10,000 steps in on the Fitbit. And just like it was, I just I lost the weight and then it just started. I started really thinking about sort of identity, like how could this be? Everyone was saying, “you know, what did you do with Jill? ” Because I was such a different person. That’s my blog, actually, whatdidyoudowithjill.com, because that’s what everyone was asking me, my family and things like that, because I just became such a different person. And I found that really fascinating. But so, so what happened was I, you know, really kind of just suddenly, I had to write my SEO newsletter, which I had been doing for practically all of that 17 years, every other week. And I just didn’t want to do it. And just like, you know, I just don’t want to do it. I just rather go out in the woods and take a walk or do some yoga or eat some vegetables. And I just didn’t want to. And then I saw. I remember. I emailed my proofreader, who was always on board on Wednesdays to get that newsletter out, and I said, you know what, I just can’t do the newsletter. And this was like for me, like “what?” You know, that was the one thing I did every other week that was on my schedule that that was a non-negotiable. And she’s like, “um OK,” I said, “I don’t know, maybe I’ll do it next week or the week after, but I just can’t do it. I have nothing left to write about.” Right, soon after that, like a couple of days later, I just was like, you know, I just don’t want to do SEO anymore. And it was so weird because like I said, it wasn’t something I thought about. I had been loving it up to that point. But it just hit me. And when I kind of made that decision, I felt like it was just my inner guide or something, just like, you know, but you’re, you’re done. You’ve done it all. And at the time in the industry, you know, things were I had always been advocating for doing SEO, what I call the right way, you know, with just making a great website and that’s what search engines will want. You have good content on it and they’ll they’ll show your site eventually because it’s good. And at the time it seemed that that was actually finally starting to work. More like the search engines kind of came around finally to my what I had been saying all along and so it seemed like a really good time to to leave. I felt like my it was like my work here is done. And so that’s what happened with that. And that was in the very near the end. That was October 2013, I believe. And right away I’m there instead of writing my, I just like switched over from my SEO newsletter to just writing about my journey with losing weight and getting healthy and writing, putting in recipes of healthy things and and I just I just switched over to the blog like within a week and just any insights I would get, I’d start writing about. And so it was kind of cool because I just, I just sort of just transitioned right into doing that. TAMAR: That’s awesome. Good for you. Good for you. You know, it’s really helpful because if you think about it and I’m actually thinking of a startup concept based on this, is that if you think about it, you become more accountable when you have to basically put it out there. And I think people struggle with that, like I struggle with that. I used to say, if I’m going to put myself out there, what if I fail? Everybody is going to see me as a failure. But I also think that if you’re so committed, then that never becomes an issue. So, like, my whole startup idea is like creating this whole accountability type of like social network where people are going to be putting themselves out there in a way that, you know, they have community members egging them on and making sure that they continue to pursue their whatever goals that they have, whether it’s fitness, weight loss, a combination of the two or who knows, I mean, hopefully it can extend to things like smoking cessation and whatever else you might have that you want to basically get out of it. Jill Whalen: Yeah. I agree, I remember hearing I remember reading some book back and about losing weight and it suggested “mae sure you tell somebody.” At least tell someone because I normally like to just do stuff on my own. But there is something about that, when someone else knows that you’re at least held somewhat accountable and it makes, it does make a little difference. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. The biggest challenge, though, is that where do you tell somebody? So I think that if you’re posting to, for example, Facebook or Twitter, you have followers that are following you specifically for other reasons. So they’re not necessarily, you know, your advocates when it comes to this type of thing. So that’s actually why I’m trying to create a network that’s exclusive to that type of behavior change, because I think people would be the only type of people who would be interested are the people who like, you know, it’s like, you know, we got we don’t Facebook groups because we’re only interested in certain type of things, and we don’t necessarily care about, like the diverse personalities of friends. And unfortunately, you know, some people are polarizing in their politics. You don’t necessarily want to follow that kind of thing. So it’s like having the exclusive focus on these behaviors. So I’ve been toying around with this idea for a while and maybe see if we can materialize it because people will do it. But I think it’s so important. Jill Whalen: Yeah, definitely, I think from me to the being a lifestyle change aspect of it, it’s so good because, you know, so many people, they lose weight and then gain it all back and then they lose weight and then, you know, and then they always gain back another 5 or 10. And, you know, I’ve been lucky enough, having made it a lifestyle change. It’s, you know, it’s stuck, that was 2013. And I’m, you know, I’m going to be 60 in a month and, you know, I’m in the best shape of my life and and and look way younger than I am. You know, my daughter had said when I first lost the weight that I looked younger and seemed younger than when she was in high school and she had already been out of high school for ten years. TAMAR: That’s great. Good for you. Awesome. So I know you wrote about anxiety to some degree, and you were talking about that. [Jill Whalen: Mm hmm.] I would love to learn a little bit, I guess, I guess we’ll go into like, I don’t know if this is your adversity story, but assuming it is and if it’s not, then I guess you’ll let me know. You’re very open about that. And I think that issues like that are still very stigmatized. So being able to put that out in the open is something that I think a lot of people are grateful for. But, would love to hear a little bit about like where, a little more about that story. Jill Whalen: Sure. Yeah. So I ended up writing a book. It’s called Victim Of Thought: Seeing Through the Illusion of Anxiety. And it’s available on Amazon basically in all different formats. But that came about because, as I said, I sort of thought it was really fascinating how my identity changed so much in six months, you know, which was a very small portion of my life. And so I sort of started getting interested in that. Like, how how how does identity change? It feels so fixed in our minds. We are who we are and where this person who paints vegetables, where this person who this, I mean, we always every day we say things like that, well, I don’t like this or I like this or well, I’m the kind of person who does whatever. And I sort of started exploring that a little bit without, in hindsight, this is how I describe it, but. And I came across some interesting things online about about our thoughts, creating our experience and our thoughts on reality, and I was like, you know, just it sounded to me I didn’t understand really what it meant. I had listened to this guy named Michael Neil, which anyone can look up. He’s a really interesting, very well spoken. He’s got a lot of books out there, too. And he can’t say and I didn’t understand what he meant, but I it just it resonated with me. So I asked my husband to listen to this talk like this, this guy, he’s he’s super, he seemed like a genius. And I thought he was maybe talking about something sciencey and my husband, like science, like maybe you can understand what he’s saying and you can explain it to me. So he listened to it, too. And then, you know, at some point I was like, he told me he listened to and I’m like, OK, so what did he say? And he goes, “Well, I think he’s saying that thoughts create our reality.” I’m like, “I know, but what does that mean?” And then one day I was having we were I was making dinner and we had been, as I said, going to bars a lot. But because I had gotten healthy, I sort of was trying to avoid that food sometimes. So I was trying to cook more. But my husband still like to go out. So I was cooking and he and I said, OK, dinner’s ready. And he said, “OK,” but he said it in a, in a way that I thought was like, “OK,” or, you know, like I came in, so this one word, you know, OK, he said and then he, he came in and he ate. But we, it was like this silence like between us there was this tension in the air and in my whole head was going in, was he mad at me? Or you know, he doesn’t want to eat at home? He wants to go out? And had this whole thing going on in my head. So the next day when I had heard, when I heard, again, listening to something that said, “your thoughts create your experience or your reality.” I was like, “oh my God, that’s what happened last night.” Like all my husband said was one word. And yet and I, and I was just like the whole night in this tizzy of, you know, blahblahblahblahblah all the stuff going on in my head of what might be happening. And I felt horrible. He did, he ended up going out to a bar and stuff, and I stayed home. But the whole rest of the night, I was just in my head when, you know, with all this anxiety going, “what’s going on?” And then I got it. Like, I understood what that meant. So that’s what that means. You know, if I’m feeling crappy, it’s because it’s just thoughts happening in my head. And it’s one, how can one, one word from somebody else isn’t actually what’s creating me to be anxious. It’s my thoughts about that one word and the story that I created around it. And so once I started to really understand that concept and how much it’s thoughts creating, just like everything, anything that we feel, it’s, you know, for feeling a certain way, it’s a gauge of what’s going on in our head, what what thoughts are ther. And because of that, I started observing my thoughts more like I had been listening to a lot of Eckhart Tolle too, which you heard him, The Power of Now. [TAMAR: Yeah, Presence.] And he, yeah, he’s really good. And he always said, you know, “observe your thoughts during the day. Just just observe them. And you don’t have, you can meditate and stuff if you want. But but just every now and then during the day, observe your thoughts and just notice what’s going on there. And I always thought, “oh, that sounds like a good idea,” but of course never did it. But at this point, I finally started doing that. And just every now and then remembering, “observe my thoughts” and realizing just how much was going on there. And there was something in the observation of thoughts that quieted down my thoughts. I felt like, it’s like I liken it to like cockroaches when you shine a light on them, they scatter, and thoughts are kind of like that as well. You, you shine awareness on them and they scatter. So my mind overall just started getting a lot clearer. Like there was one point where I was laying down in yoga in the Shavasana at the end, and usually my mind would be above the blah blah blah. But all of a sudden one day that the thoughts parted, was like clouds parting and it got like super silent. And then I got scared and they all kind of came back and I was like, “whoa, what was that?” And that’s how I realized when I started living more from that place with a much clearer head, I realized how much anxiety I had had in my whole life that I didn’t even know because it was my normal. Like just when, you know, I had this clump of thoughts going on in the back of my head my whole life, ever since I was little and thinking that anything could come around the corner and make me anxious, always looking for the next thing that’s going to disturb my peace of mind and, and somehow when I got this “thoughts create my feelings, not the outside world, it’s an, it’s an inside job,” it’s just like, the anxiety just fell away like that the big clump in my head just kind of dissolved at that point. And that’s not to say that I don’t get anxious. I still do. But it’s like it’s a different thing because deep down I know that it’s not coming from the outside world, it’s coming from within. And and it’s not who I am. It’s just crazy. You know, we all have a crazy person that lives in our head and and it’s, it’s that crazy person. And I don’t have to listen to what the crazy person says. It’s no different than if I don’t have to listen to the homeless guy on the street yelling crazy things at me as I walk by. It’s, you know, it’s it’s kind of the same thing, all those, that noise in our head is is 99% not valuable and you start to see that more. So my book kinda outlined this whole experience and, and the whole journey. And I do get a lot of people that email me and stuff and say, hey, and that’s the same thing when I was little, I went through this and it’s fascinating, we’re all, we’re all going through this. We all have anxiety. You know, any time I meet someone on the street or in a store and I happen, if we get talking and I mention I wrote a book on anxiety, they’re all like, “oh, I need that.” Like every single person, it’s, and yet everyone feels like they’re alone with it or that they’re the only one, or that theirs is worse than everybody else’s. But it’s, it’s really, it’s just it’s the human condition, I would say. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. It’s hard, it’s so hard because there’s nothing positive in terms of the stigma. It’s still there. Just people don’t want to expose themselves. They don’t wanna put themselves out in the open. And we’ve been doing that for myself. I’m getting the same thing privately. But it’s interesting. A lot of people are also like, “are you OK? Are you OK?” I’m OK. But, you know, I still struggle. And I actually had you know, I’ve had pretty bad anxiety and I had depression. This past weekend, I had, there was an unknown that could have potentially upended my entire entire world. So without knowing what was going to happen, I had extreme anxiety. Thankfully, things aren’t as bad as I hoped, but that’s the way you are, and I kept going back. It’s like it’s like when you start to rationalize and whatever, but that’s obviously the extreme. And I would say for me, that’s that was my extreme. I think for other people, there’s no reason to to have that level of anxiety, it’s really how you interpret other people’s feelings and thoughts and that’s a very difficult one of the books that I’m a big advocate of besides Eckhart Tolle, which, by the way, I’ve never been able to really kind of focus on my thoughts in the way that he talked about. He’s very, I just can’t do it. I’ve tried. I’ve tried. Or rather, I just don’t have the patience to try. I’m not sure what it is. But one of the other books that I really like and I’m a big, big proponent of it is, is Stephen Covey’s “”The Seven Habits of Essential, Highly Effective People.” He, one of the chapters I really like. It’s one of the things that I stick with, keep with me all the time, it’s that optical illusion or you see the old woman and then you see the young woman. [Jill Whalen: Yeah.] The point is that everybody sees the world differently and it’s how you like it’s ultimately you have to be respec—appreciative of the fact that, the diversity in the world. But I think it’s also it really kind of lends itself to what you’re talking about in the sense that our perceptions are not usually the reality. Everybody has their own lens and they see things differently. Jill Whalen: It’s key. That is so key. I mean, that’s why we all have separate realities. I say it’s people who don’t quite understand what you’re saying, it sounds kind of crazy when we have separate realities, but we literally do because our conditioning, you know, like everything that’s ever happened to us and our genetics to a certain extent as well, everything that anyone’s ever said to us or anything that’s happened to us, it it it just it’s a program in us, you know, and we’re just computers like and or robots and we get programmed by all these things and so that creates our experience, our thoughts, what thoughts come, our triggers, all those things based on all that stuff. And so everybody is different. We have overlaps, of course, but it’s, it’s so often so hard to see from other people’s points of view. Like, like you can kind of think of it like when you like a certain flavor of ice cream you don’t like. I like chocolate and, you know, and I think I used to, and my husband would like like something which I thought was gross, you know, maple walnut. And I’m like, “what? How can that be?” Like in in our minds, it doesn’t even compute that anyone could like maple walnut, right? And we do, and we, but we do that about everything. And, and, but in our minds, we are so right. And but we’re not. It’s just our, that’s just our program. TAMAR: Yeah. So the other, the other book, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck by Mark Manson, and yet no apologies for the cursing, don’t worry, you can even do it too. But he talks about in his book that you know, five hundred years ago, I guess the research that we knew to date was at that point was like sophisticated research and now we look back at it like “seriously?” Like I was reading another book, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to throw books out here, but Bill Bryson’s body, “Our Body: A Guide for Occupants,” which is a great book. And they were talking about like in the 1700s, this one guy was insistent that we needed to, that doctors needed to wash their hands before any type of medical procedure. And the doctor at the time was was ousted. He was ostracized. They thought he was crazy. And it wasn’t until after he died that he was quote unquote redeemed. But by then he was like nothing. I think his name was like Semmelweis or something Jill Whalen: Yeah, I heard that that even took like two, 200 years to actually become like a actual real human thing that doctors did. I don’t know if that’s true. TAMAR: Crazy. So, like, just everybody, like our reality is insane. And like in five hundred years now from now, we’re going to be looking like I mean, we have a pretty like happy and healthy, sophisticated reality. I mean, ignoring covid and everything. But, you know, like, we we’re very lucky to be the best time to be alive right now. Five years from now, hopefully the world will still be in a good intact and everything will be will be good. But that, that just, it just blows my mind that this is this is the way of life. I don’t really know. Yeah. Jill Whalen: It is it’s it’s fascinating. And the more you can understand that separate reality thing, like it makes relationships just so much better because you can. And first you can really see it in yourself. I think like that how we’re creating our own reality and how it’s our thoughts that are doing it and it’s not other people. And then you can start to see what’s happening in other people and have a little more compassion for them that they’re not purposely, most of the time, not purposely trying to bug the crap out of you or, you know, they’re just living their own reality. And also that their words don’t always mean what you think they mean to, you know, like the whole Mars and Venus book. But it’s, it helps relationships so much. It was, my next book was if I ever get around to it, it’s me being on relationships because it just takes so much out of relationships of all kinds. TAMAR: It’s it’s it definitely fosters this sense of empathy. And it’s really I’m glad I’m having this conversation with you because I’ve been trying for very many months and even years at this point to articulate this this mentality that people they see things in their way and their tone, like, for example, that, OK, you know, you interpreted it one way and it was meant potentially, you know, another way. And we need to get, we need to be at the point where we understand that everybody’s a victim of their own circumstances. The word “victim” doesn’t even sound right, but. Jill Whalen: Of their own thoughts. That’s my book. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. And then, there’s a, there’s a meme or something out there I’ve seen on LinkedIn or perhaps elsewhere. But like, they show you this big, long line and they say, and then they color out like a color like a little tiny sliver of that line. And they say this is the only stuff you know about this other individual. They’re dealing with other things, have some empathy or whatever it is, and try to understand that you don’t understand what a whole person is dealing with. Yeah, it’s so it’s so important. And I try to do that. I try to kill with kindness now. It’s sometimes really hard, you know, people. [Jill Whalen: It is really hard.] Yeah. And people in general, like they’re out to disagree with you and. Yeah. Like, you know, like I said, no one’s really right. That’s that’s the Mark Manson mentality. Like nobody’s right. Jill Whalen: Yeah, I, I have a million blog posts about all these things. I’m just looking at my site now like some of the topics where why is it so difficult to agree to disagree? You know, like it’s so hard. You don’t want to be the one to, to just because because you know so much, you’re right. TAMAR: It’s you know, it’s really interesting because like, I embrace the diversity in such a way that I appreciate the fact that people will disagree with me. And I’m having respectful conversations, respectful disagreements on Facebook. Not that I can change anybody’s mind, but I definitely have, recently, I had an argument about a political not really so much of a political matter and more of an international affairs matter. And, you know, I had a conversation and was very respectful and I said, here’s here’s what’s actually going on in that area and instead of like having that conversation in a way that was a positive thing, it was like, “let me unfriend her” and she unfriended me. And I was like, “you know what? I would totally have beaten a dead horse with you respectably.” But like, you don’t, you know. It didn’t hurt as much as it would have potentially done, because I recognize that I doubt I would be a victim of my own thoughts, so. Jill Whalen: It’s so yeah, so interesting because very few people I’m like that, too, like you say, I want to hear all sides of the story and I try to keep an open mind. I still have my biases, of course. But I do want to hear if we live in our own little bubble and won’t listen to anybody else’s things or we unfriend everyone who disagrees with us, you’re never going to grow and learn. And so I do, I’m like that. But I think it’s fairly rare, especially in this very, very polarized world we live in now. You know, it’s sadly. TAMAR: Yeah. So I’m going to tell you something about that, you know, this whole growing and whatever. And this is going to this is going to be the weird part of the podcast. So I was interviewed for a different podcast. This woman I met at one of these online digital events, connection digital, connector whatever, online zooms, and she like she she loved the fact that I’m talking about leveraging all five senses and whatever else, and she said, you know what, I, she a very big advocate of Brian Weiss, I don’t know if you’ve heard of him. Jill Whalen: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. TAMAR: So you’re familiar. Jill Whalen: So I like the weird stuff. Don’t worry. I can get really weird if you want. TAMAR: Have you done that? Have you done a past life regressions ever in your life?. Jill Whalen: I did the in-between one, in between lives one that doctor, doctor Newton, doctor something, Robert New, I forgot his name. I forget his name but. TAMAR: Moody? No, I don’t know. Jill Whalen: Go on, though, finish. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. So I’ll get a little bit of a background for anybody who’s into this, she’s very into this. And she’s like, I met Brian Weiss and like he changed my life. And she was like, she’s like, she tried to sell the whole concept. I will say I am, and I was and still am, but like maybe less so a skeptic. I had the book. He writes this book, Many Lives, Many Masters so I read that, and I actually tried one. And the hypnosis definitely worked because physically I could feel all that stuff, but I was never able to. And I think that’s because I have lots of lines of defenses. So. Yeah, so, so sorry, Brian Weiss. Let me, backing up, Brian Weiss is this therapist who a traditionally trained Columbia, I think he also Columbia University-trained psychiatrist, and he had a patient who wasn’t getting better after many, many months of therapy so he decided to hypnotize her and he asked her about her early life, early life, and she started talking about some abuse that she endured. And then he asked or anything before that, and she started talking about previous lives like ancient Egypt and like random places that were not in the current twenty first century. And I, and she was like, and he was like, he, he was he was a skeptic also. He was in such disbelief. But he kept doing this and each time he he regressed her, he learned more about her. So she had eighty six lives. And the interesting thing about her is that you can either go into your life or you can go, right, as we’re talking about the in-between. So the in the actual like lives, she learns their lessons that she takes away. But in the in-between it’s like voices that aren’t from her and it’s like the soul is kind of talking. And so they talk about growing, growing, growing, and that’s the whole idea is like the soul comes back again and again and again, it becomes eventually perfect and then quote unquote, immortal again. There’s a lot of skepticism that I have because this is like still outside of my element. So I tried. I did. I did one. And I think there was too many defenses. I think I was making things up as I went along. I didn’t really see anything. Jill Whalen: That’s funny. Yeah, that that was the same for me. And like, I’m skeptical too about it. But I feel like there’s so many people that have these experiences that it seems true. But as you’re doing it yourself, that is very much the same as what you said. Like, I was definitely hypnotized because at the time went by super fast and but I did feel like I was making it up too. I mean, the guy’s like, well, just ignore that fact. TAMAR: Yeah, he told me, “just go along with it.” So this actually happened to me literally a week ago today. [Jill Whalen: Oh cool.] So it’s so new. But at the same time I feel like I still can’t get around the concept that I actually have more than one life. Like, I just, I really, I couldn’t see much. But yeah, in terms of the hypnosis, he did a test. He’s like, put your left arm up, put your right arm up. Let your left arm, feel like it’s being lifted and let your right arm feel like it’s being hit by like, like being like a light like lead, land. And like the way my hands responded. Absolutely, the hypnosis was there, and my Fitbit, sorry, not my Fitbit because I don’t have a Fitbit, my WHOOP. I have a WHOOP, heart tracker and I have a, or I’m a nerd when it comes to this, I have an Oura sleep tracker ring and have a Garmin watch and all three of them thought I was taking a nap because my heart rate was so low so it definitely had that. But like, it was just, I couldn’t I still think there’s just so many defenses that are preventing that access. So it’s really, it’s it’s interesting. Jill Whalen: Yeah, it it is interesting, I mean, I love it. Have you ever read the Seth books by Jane Roberts from the 1970s? She supposedly channeled this entity named Seth and I actually was [TAMAR: I’m scared.] I do, I do a book club, I mean, just we’re she, tomorrow, finishing the last session of it on the book called “The Nature of Personal Reality.” It’s, to me it’s not the best book I’ve ever read, and which is why I wanted to do the book club on it. And anyone who’s interested in this kind of stuff about creating your reality like that, I highly recommend that book. TAMAR: OK, I will check, I don’t know. It’s a little bit scary… Jill Whalen: Well, I know maybe it’s scary. It does take, I find that you have to kind of gradually come to this stuff like, like, and then it becomes more and more what your beliefs are. Because I mean, it’s in the Seth books, she basically says everything is based on beliefs, whatever we see in the world is completely based on our beliefs. TAMAR: That’s so true. I mean, like there are certain things like you and I, all of us have been wrong by people. And like I had to come to terms with some stuff that I’ve dealt with. And I remember my psychiatrist saying, you know, you and I see it as completely illogical. But, you know, this happened and this is this made sense to this person. I still can’t wrap my head around some of those things, but that’s their reality. Jill Whalen: Yeah, well, in a lot of times, if it’s bad things, you know, they were bad, bad things done to them. And so you don’t know what what’s going on to them as well. And then there’s also the fact that if you do believe in the past life things or even that we could if you believe, I believe that this is sort of a dream that we’re in or a virtual reality that that we’re we’re experiencing here and that, you know, well, we’re actually somewhere else with our goggles on and and we’re going to wake up and be like, oh, wow, that was wild, let’s do it again. TAMAR: There’s an episode of I Chicago Med, I think, with that. Keep going. Jill Whalen: Yeah. Yeah, it’s, it’s but the interesting thing with that is you also, because if if it is a dream or game. Right. Then we could choose to come in as some as, as a invalid or something, you know, just to experience that. Like if you were playing an actual game, you might want to try a different character, you know, and and people supposedly make plans together to be, you know, I’ll be the mother, you be the the daughter who has the problem or, you know, and and when you when you hear about some of the people who had near-death experiences, stuff like that, there’s so much of that kind of thing. Another favorite book of mine is Natalie Stedman’s book. She had a near-death experience thing and it helped me see, it changed my perspective, like with my adult daughter that lives with us, still has a lot of issues. And I had the perspective of it seems to me like, why would you just come into this world and kind of waste your life, like just by doing nothing and just have this wasted life? But then after reading that book, I and thinking about what if she chose, it’s actually pretty brave to choose to come in with it with a, you know, a kind of mental condition that nobody would really choose to have in on this level in this world but if, if, at a different level, if you if you know it’s a game, you just want to experience that, you know, and then you have to go through it together too? It like, there’s so much, it changes your perspective on life. And I know some people don’t like that. They don’t, they think, well, no, “well I would never choose to have these bad things happen.” And that’s true at this level. But it’s another level. It’s a different perspective you’re looking at it from. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. That’s really interesting. You know, another thing, I think it would be interesting for you to know, at least in the context of this, you know, again, being a skeptic, whatever it is, what it is. So Stephan Spencer, I don’t know if he’s into this whole mysticism type of life these days. Oh, I think this just started about five months ago. I, I was sitting there one day and he randomly reached out to me. He’s like I had I had a vision to speak to you. And I’m like, and he told me all about this whole thing. And I’m like. “Holy crap,” like it was just such a random message from him. He’s a mutual friend of ours for everybody who is listening. It’s so, so random to just hear from him, but like he had this, like, vision and he’s basically aligned with this whole thing. And he’s like, “I was told, like, I got this voice” and I’m like, “all right, I don’t know.” But it’s like maybe solidifying this stuff. He’s like, “once you let these voices..” Like he’s very into this angel, like angels communicating, once you let there, let them speak to you like you’re you’re going to feel better. He was living in Israel with his wife and his child, and they were told right before all of the violence in Israel to move to get out. And he made it out just in time. [Jill Whalen: Wow.] So, I mean, he says it’s all about this whole system of belief. So it’s really interesting. Jill Whalen: Mm hmm. And I think it’s good to be skeptical, like you say, I’m skeptical, too, and skeptical. Does it mean that you still have an open mind about it? You know, as long as you leave a little crack open that, well, maybe this is true or what if it is true? Then you can explore it and still, you know, but you don’t have to just go along and drink the Kool-Aid. TAMAR: Yeah, it’s funny. My son, my 12 year old son is just like “I don’t believe it.”” And my nine year old daughter is like, “I think it’s so cool.” [Jill Whalen: Yeah.] I didn’t want them to watch, so the hypnosis session that I had was over Zoom, and I did not want my kids, I said, I couldn’t, I couldn’t possibly go and watch this, have them watch it. I don’t think I could go back to that, I mean, there was nothing exciting there. It was just like really kind of just creepy. Jill Whalen: Did you get away or did you get a recording? TAMAR: Yeah, I did. So I was I started watching and I saw myself laying in bed and I was like, “not going to watch it anymore.” Jill Whalen: You didn’t want it, you didn’t want to hear what you said? Someday, listen to it. TAMAR: I mean, I remember. And he took notes as well. So there’s that. But like I said, I still feel like I just made it up just to go along with the whole idea and feel like I had to do something at that time. And it didn’t go so fast for me. It went actually pretty slowly. It felt like real time. It’s really interesting. Yeah. So OK. Yeah, I guess we’re going to maybe get close to wrapping up, but I wanted to know like, so self self-care, yoga, like, is this your self-care regimen, what, how are you surviving these days, is it different from what was mentioned? Jill Whalen: Yeah, I just yeah, still just kind of, my, my things have changed what I’d like to do, like my, when the coronavirus hit my yoga studio, a place which also did barre classes, went virtual, and so that was good. I just kept doing those classes and then they added some they added this infernal hot pilates class that was awesome that I was doing. So I was actually getting an even more shape during that time. Now we moved out of state, but I could still I was still doing those classes for a while. Now I’m exploring what I might do here in the new area, either sign up for new gym or just keep doing some online stuff. But I just, yeah, I walk and I just try and, I just yeah, I mean, I’m I’m basically retired, so I have the luxury of pretty much just doing what I want. I listen to a lot of podcasts and audiobooks and just kind of living the good life right now. TAMAR: And I guess you’re still exploring the new hood. Jill Whalen: Yeah, that’s awesome. We’re in old town, Alexandria, Virginia, it’s a great place. TAMAR: Awesome, awesome. Yeah, you have a good view. Jill Whalen: But I also happy to speak to anybody. I don’t really do this for work. I don’t charge people, but if people just want to, if they look at my book and have questions or read my blog, or, and just or just have an issue they want to talk about, I’m happy to do Zooms calls and stuff with people. So. TAMAR: Yes, well, let’s talk about that. The next step is how do people find you? Jill Whalen: They can go to whatdidyoudowithjill.com and or just look me up on Facebook or Twitter. Even now I’m back. I had been off Twitter for years because it was all SEO for me years ago. And I just recently got back on and and there. But yeah. Or just Joe Whalen at Gmail dot com. TAMAR: Yeah. Cool, cool. And I guess I have the final question for you is: if you can give an earlier version of Jill some advice, what would you tell her? Jill Whalen: Oh, wow, huh? TAMAR: The loaded question. Jill Whalen: It’s interesting because I feel like in some ways I had to go through all the things I went through to get where I was, to get where I am. So I’m not sure that I would want to know stuff. I don’t know. I guess I would, I guess I would say: you create your own reality, even though I wouldn’t have gotten it. So but I think that’s like the most important thing for people to know in life. TAMAR: Yeah. Awesome. Cool. Well, thank you. This has been fun. I really, I really enjoyed this. I hope you did as well. Jill Whalen: I did. I did. Thanks. It was nice to catch up again. TAMAR: Yeah, definitely, definitely. Cool. All right. So. Jill Whalen: Thank you.

Brandon Snower left a cushy job on Wall Street and decided to reinvent men’s fashion. In this podcast, we discuss his early journey, and watch as Brandon just gets started. TAMAR: Hey, everybody, I am super excited. I have Brandon Snow here. He is a jet setter. Came, flew in just for this podcast. Right? Thanks so much for joining. Brandon Snower: Only for you. Only for you. TAMAR: Yeah. So you’re in New York City, right? Brandon Snower: I am. TAMAR: OK, so we’re we’re local, but we’re not really local. But he did take a red eye to kind of get here on time and was on time in a different time zone. So. Yeah, yeah. So so tell me a little bit; first of all, where in the city are you? Brandon Snower: I live in Chelsea. I have been out here for two years. TAMAR: Nice. Nice. Brandon Snower: What about you? TAMAR: I’m actually in Westchester County. I was in Morningside Heights and the Upper West Side for a while and then I made my way slowly up as I moved. I guess it’s it actually coincides with the different milestones in life, the marriage and then the having kids. And it was Riverdale first and then it was Westchester. So. Brandon Snower: Awesome. TAMAR: Yeah. Cool. So Brandon’s here and he has an entrepreneurial journey that I definitely wanted to share because he did I guess the unlikely and he did something especially like that is extremely gutsy and pretty fab. So I, I don’t even know how to introduce it. I’m going to let you do that all. Go ahead. Tell me a little bit about your story. Brandon Snower: Yeah, well, thanks for having me on. It’s always great to speak with other entrepreneurs and just discuss kind of the facets, the obstacles and kind of the journey, you know, just to help others. And so essentially, starting out, I’m twenty four right now. I graduated from Northwestern University a few years ago in twenty nineteen. And like every person in college, you know, you don’t really know what you want to do. Brandon Snower: You know, very rarely, like people are like set as, like if you’re an engineer, you’re a doctor. You know, you’re those are kind of like set courses that you take, then you know where you want to be. But like most I didn’t know, I studied learning and learning and organizational change, which, you know, it’s very like a broad not very niche kind of path in terms of you can go to X if you study organizational change. Right. It’s like understanding human behavior. And I didn’t want to be a psychologist, but I liked understanding people and leading and seeing what what works and what doesn’t in terms of like the human psyche within organizations and just interactions with people. And but with that I’ve always had this like business mind and kind of business acumen. My dad always had small businesses here and there. He’d start one, quit, and then started back up again and and then just move all over the place. But from there, I, I knew I wanted to either build something at some point or I knew I had a business savviness from just watching him work hard and get up at 5:00 and do all these things that you don’t really get to see growing up that much. And from there that kind of just took me to the spot where, OK, what’s the what is it going to lead me to a path that will give me a lot of opportunity down the road. And I thought, well, you know, finance, banking, they make a lot of money. It is a challenging environment. They’re smart people and they work super hard. But that’s the trajectory I want to go to. So I went for it. And I didn’t have any finance background. I didn’t know what an income statement was. Yeah, I was really underqualified. But that kind of shaped me to, like, really grind and really learn about, OK, I have to learn all of this, all this information in order to get a career that I want. And so ultimately, I ended up with a job. Someone took a shot at shot on me on working on Wall Street, a pretty large bank. And from there, I started working as an investment banking analyst. You know, I was the happiest person in the world. And I had my career that I wanted. But there is a massive learning curve, right, like I started learning organizational change and and everyone else was studying finance, math, accounting, but that just meant that I had to wake up at 5:00 a.m., go to the office, study, you know, learn as much as possible, be a sponge and literally be the last one and turn the lights off. And I did that every single day because I knew I wanted to progress. I wanted to learn and take on this challenge. And so, you know, six months and seven months and I’m still happy. I’m still absorbing and learning. And then it kind of just hits me kind of randomly that I know that this isn’t the path for me. You know, I wanted something that embraced everything about business, not just one aspect of it. You know, I like the creativity. I like the design. I like thinking in different creative ways that might not necessarily be the case and an investment banking or corporate world. So. I left and that was March of 2020, and that’s when covid was creeping up in the US, but it wasn’t as significant around the world. There was Italy and and China and Asia. And obviously it was— TAMAR: You weren’t in Westchester. You had no idea. Brandon Snower: I had no idea. Yeah, no one really did, you know, like we would hear on the news and I’d remember like making reports to our clients, about the impact of covid to the markets. And, you know, like everyone was saying, oh, it’s not going to be that bad. And then this was early, early March, maybe late February. TAMAR: And we just you know, I’m connected to the patient, our index case here. I was part of an outbreak where I started having symptoms the beginning of March also. Wow. Yeah. So we were in the quarantine as of March 3rd. Brandon Snower: Oh, yeah, I mean, my dad had covid, I think, without knowing that he had it, you know, [TAMAR: it’s crazy] in February but yeah and I didn’t really think anything of it. I just knew that I didn’t like where I was. Where I was and what I was doing and what that was going to lead me towards, so I quit, didn’t give two weeks notice, quit that day. People were not happy, but they were supportive. They were very supportive, actually. TAMAR: They should have seen the writing on the wall. It wasn’t even about you. It was just the nature of the the world. And, you know, if that is the biggest disruption they had, if they got lucky, I don’t know. Brandon Snower: Yeah. And I never I’m not the person to show that I don’t like something like I’m going to work as hard as I did the first day to my last day. And people were shocked that I quit. It took me two hours to quit. Yeah, everyone wanted to talk to me. Yeah. Yeah. There was something wrong. TAMAR: You had a plan in place or you just decided you were going to quit and you were going to figure it out later? Brandon Snower: I had a plan, I wanted to move into marketing, and I was interviewing at different places and technically I thought I was going to start at a new marketing agency in April, but it was like more of my optimism that I was going to get it rather than it was going to happen. And and so. You know, when I quit, I was under the assumption I had it and hen everyone was taken back about covid, all the offers were rescinded, everything was going away, and especially digital marketing was severely impacted, and so they took away the potential offer that I had. So I didn’t have a job and I was 23, had a pretty good degree at Northwestern. You know, if you told me I wasn’t going to have a job a year out of college, I would have laughed because that’s just I just never expected it. Brandon Snower: And but at that point, I kind of, I don’t really know what hit me, but I always wanted to start and be an entrepreneur, and at that moment I just felt like it was the best opportunity to do it. Like, I didn’t have a job and I just kind of went for it and I had no idea what to do, like what to build and what to start. And I just kind of thought about it. I’m the type of person I know a ton of people are they just write ideas in their, you know, iPad or your iPhone, like in your notes. And I just had a list. And I just went through the list and then just one day, you know, I saw, like I remembered having this contrives collar shirt from, like high school. It was like a very casual, very elegant, like untopped Oxford buttoned down. And it was blue with a white collar. And I was like, OK, like, I, I lost this shirt. Let me let me try to find it online and it didn’t exist. I spent a week looking for it and. And just genuinely didn’t exist, and this was my favorite shirt, favorite style of all time. And so as I was looking at all these online menswear brands, Instagrams like trying to find a shirt for a week. It was like a light bulb hit me where indirectly I was seeing how all these menswear brands were targeting 40 year olds and up, like they were very traditional, very outdated in their marketing, their branding and as a 23 year old, I looked at every single one. I was like, “they’re not talking to me, you know, like they’re not resonating with me at all.” I’m a 23 year old. I like to, you know, look at things and enjoy and connect with the brand that is more than just selling a product. [TAMAR: right.] And and then I looked at like the competitors and the most popular DTC apparel brands and they were so cool, like they were so fun, they spoke to this millennial, young, fun, creative, personal audience in their own respective niches and I was like, why can’t this happen in classic menswear? Why can’t there be a really young, fun, cool, sophisticated style and brand that connects with all of these guys from 20 to like 35 and not even that, but it will resonate with people that are older than that because they want to be a part of like the young fun hip culture. And so I started. And from there I was kind of just building every single day, let’s make the coolest, most unconventional. Young fun brand possible while still having this high quality elegance and sophistication that all these luxury menswear brands have. And that’s what I’ve been doing ever since for about a year. TAMAR: That’s great, that’s so cool, so I guess I’m going to have to ask you that journey, because, I mean, you you found an opportunity, but the next part was the supply chain and the logistics and I mean, growing the team. I’m not even sure if it’s just you still. And assume it’s probably more. So what’s the process to build a company from? Brandon Snower: It’s tough. It was really hard. TAMAR: This is adversity, and we’re going to hear this. Brandon Snower: No, this is adversity. It’s resilience, and it’s failing a million times. And you don’t understand, like, you know, people like aspiring entrepreneurs, like I was an aspiring entrepreneur and I would always see these articles and and read these I read these articles and hear these stories of, you know, these entrepreneurs just failing and failing and going through so much adversity. I was like, oh, yeah, it’s not going to be that hard. It is. It’s very difficult. But you have to have a certain mindset and it builds your character every single day and you just have to push through it. So to answer your question, I mean, it is still just me, but to start, the first thing I did was Google like, how do you start a clothing brand like Google? What’s what’s that like? TAMAR: That’s very millennial. I’m not even sure the reaction is for that one. It’s awesome. Brandon Snower: Yeah, yeah. No, but it was I was so unprepared and had a lack of knowledge for anything in the space. I liked fashion in terms of I’m conscious of what I wear, I see what other people wear and I have a good eye. I think, you know, that was it. I never read magazines. I never kept up with the trends. I didn’t know what was popular. Like, I didn’t know really any of these menswear brands, except except for like the basic big ones, like Ralph Lauren and Brooks Brothers or Tommy Hilfiger And it started out with, yeah, what how do you start a clothing company or what is a supplier? What’s a manufacturer? I had no clue. Wow. Absolutely no. And then it just built on OK, what a supplier actually does, who are the people involved and supplier. And then it just builds from that. Right. Like you learn more and then you read, you read and research, you learn a bit more about a different aspect of starting a company. Right. Like incorporate, like it got to like so many things where it was just going all over the place because I wanted to learn everything right. And a lot was most of it was common sense in terms of like what to research. Right. Like, I know I want to be selling online. So like, how do I build a website? What platform do I use? What’s like this sales funnel from like like the customer seeing my content for like keeping them engaged and having them through this funnel of like email marketing and social media presence. Like all of this was just things that I kind of knew had to happen in a company just based off of just my common sense. But I had to actually know how to do it. And research. And there are obviously things I had no clue. Right. Like I had no idea that, like what Klayvio is. I had no idea what, you know, like a 3PL was . TAMAR: You need to explain it to the people who are listening. Brandon Snower: Yeah exactly. So like a 3PL, like third party logistics, was basically, the transportation from you know like where your manufacturer is to a warehouse that distributes your shipping when a customer buys it, or Klayvio is an online software service that makes you build your email templates and creates a sales funnel for your email marketing campaigns. So like when you purchase a product or when you get an email, like we build it in Klayvio and send it to you, there’s so many things. There’s millions of things that you have to think about and research and learn. And luckily this was my full time job, but I, I needed income. So I was doing, you know, things here and there, you know, selling, flipping TVs, flipping furniture, trying to keep you know, I also I had a lot saved up just through banking because, you know, a benefit about working in finance is you don’t spend the money because you’re just too busy working. [TAMAR: Right.] So I had some saved up, but it wasn’t much. I only had a year of experience of work. [TAMAR: Right.] But yeah, I mean, it just progressed and progressed, but in terms of the failures and adversity, right. Like finding that manufacturer, there were so many times where I had no clue what I like, how to build the shirt. Like, how do you make this idea that you have in your head a physical product without any experience? TAMAR: That’s a lot. Brandon Snower: Yeah. And it’s and I’m not saying that’s not I mean, it’s very much possible. I think every person or most people who start a product or, you know, a brand, like they don’t have experience in it. Like much like yourself. Right. With like your perfume. You went from idea to concept and had the vision of I’m going to build this and I need X steps to get there. TAMAR: Right. Yeah. I knew I wanted to do it. I spoke to a guy who created it for me because I wasn’t going to sit down in a lab and lose ten years of my life to just figuring out if. You know, this peppermint goes with like vanilla like that was in I think. I did outsource that, just like you have to kind of get at the supplier and to to to focus on the creation of the product and then from then, I mean, the hardest part right now, and I’m still trying to figure it out, is to make this more global because at least you get shipped your stuff. I can’t because flammable. Flammable. I can’t speak. Flammable fluids is dangerous goods. And that challenge is everything. It really does. Brandon Snower: No, I’m sure I haven’t even thought about going international yet. I want to just one step at a time. TAMAR: Yeah, well, I mean, it’s not even that. It’s like I had a crowdfunding campaign for that part and I have a personal buyer in Ireland and I keep trying to do it. It’s been returned to sender a few times and. Yeah, Canada was hard enough, it was an argument is, in fact, I lost a couple couple of bucks a couple of times, in fact, shipping it out, even though they promised me that they weren’t going to incur any charges if it doesn’t lead to state but they reneged because it’s covid and you can. Brandon Snower: Right now, right now, it’s things that you just have to have to fail to actually learn. Yeah, that’s a lot of that’s how I learn and that’s honestly how I built my company is I’ve failed. Over one hundred times and I learned from it, and that’s the thing is you can’t make the same mistake twice or else you’re not going to progress. Yeah. Like, if you keep making, you know, like, for example, like one of I spent, you know, maybe I lost like a few thousand dollars because I jumped the gun on what I needed. Right. Like, I thought I was going to have this manufacturer forever. And it turns out that the communication and just the partnership wasn’t there in terms of scaling this business. So I bought thousands of boxes from him. I bought rolls of fabric that I’m not using today like it’s and those are thousands of dollars of just me making mistakes and and looking back and saying, OK, let me slow down, actually assess what I need. I know how to speak to manufacturers. This is how I mess up. And how do I change what I did in order to, you know, like progress and actually execute and a better and more effective way. TAMAR: It’s iterative. Now, I remember like having my first conversations with people who are going to supply the bottles. And I mean, it was very embarrassing. I think I know how to have that conversation, but I’m not doing it on an ongoing basis like you really are now. Right. TAMAR: Talk about your SKUs. How many how many items do you have right now? What is what is what is the inventory look like? Brandon Snower: Yeah. So I had 6 SKUs when I launched and then it turns out two of them didn’t sell well. So now I have four. But like so they’re their contract colors. They’re, you know, the best Portuguese Oxford fabric that you can find. And they’re in four styles, all with a white collar, like very casual, very sophisticated. And, you know, I learned right. Like in the beginning, I wanted 12 SKUs. I had, like, this vision on so many shirts and everyone’s going to love every shirt and then, after talking with people, they’re like, no, 12 is way too much. And I’m like, oh yeah, small, medium, large. XL, XXL times twelve is crazy. I don’t have enough money for that. So I mean the less SKUs you have, the more you know, the better chance that you can have limited inventory and really you sell more units because there’s less options. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. That is complicated. And I hear that, you know that I am also one of those people who prefers a lot of options. But you hear that when you watch a Shark Tank and you also don’t believe it. But it’s true. Brandon Snower: It’s true. It’s true. And I watch Shark Tank every day, almost every day. I’m going to be on that one. TAMAR: But you should. You should. I have like twenty five still on my TiVO that I have to get through. Brandon Snower: Yeah. No I applied. TAMAR: Oh really? Brandon Snower: But I’m still waiting. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. It’s, I told a funny story when I one of the last weeks I was working in banking, they was Shark Tank on the desk floor and I was just telling all my associates and I was like, I’m going to be on Shark Tank one day and I just was like motivating know, yeah. TAMAR: People have told me that I should be on Shark Tank. They say my story is very apropos for Shark Tank, but I don’t know if I can subject myself to that. And I’ve I’ve heard, you know, that My First Million podcast, they did Everywell, they did an interview with the from the girl from the chick who was the CEO of that founder and CEO of that. And I think she was talking about how she was on Shark Tank. And like you said, she got out or she didn’t. But the prep is crazy. It’s not just like, you know, you show up. You’re obviously besides the presentation, the their team psych’s you up for, like, four months to prepare you. It’s like it’s a very rigorous program. [Brandon Snower: Oh, sure.] Yeah, it’s just I just mentally cannot I don’t think I could put myself under the microscope in that way, although it’s such great PR and right for me, I might actually sell out and that’s hard. TAMAR: We were talking before we started and you were saying that sometimes you do feel the struggle of like motivation. I want to talk about that also because I think you and I as entrepreneurs and first time entrepreneurs and we basically you launched this last year, I also pretty much launched last year, made the official announcement last year that my product was finally available. So, you know, I was like pretty much in the same boat. And, you know, it’s it’s very, very difficult. You found a need. I found the product that I think has this need, but it’s not quite… People understand it once they get there, but they don’t like they don’t realize it. And I think it’s partially my challenge, is partially because there’s no real science validation and there’s a lot of education specific to this particular type of product, like people do not see perfume, cologne, this is unisex for mental health. And everyone’s like, oh, yeah, “the perfume audience is very cutthroat and it’s very competitive.” But I don’t see myself as a perfume product. And it’s so hard because right now I’m still like I go it’s like going back to the same conversation that I have earlier. Who’s my target audience? Is it right, mindfulness people or people who like I need to bring into this mental health fray of like who burn candles and incense and sniff essential oils all day. Or is the people who like perfume and would buy it anyway? And I honestly, I’m going at the former audience, and that requires a lot more a lot more effort, a lot more education. So I struggle a lot with that. Like you saw something and you saw that people already are buying. So I want to hear from you, first of all, you talked about like building out your supply chain and building out the 3PL doing all of that, but, what for you, your next step was obviously making people, making your audience aware of who you are and that you exist. So a little bit about like how you educated the world that you are around. Brandon Snower: Word of mouth, me going out with my sandwich board on the weekends when people are drinking at bars and having fun and have a sandwich board with a funny quote or a funny sign that they can follow me on Instagram and I’m launching on. But going to these bars with this sign and and showing them the shirt, showing them the product, telling them a story of, hey, I’m just a regular guy like you. I worked in banking, I worked in the corporate world, you know, like, let’s do something amazing. Let’s do something in fashion for us. And I still do it. I have pictures. I’m still just starting. Right. It’s not like everyone knows about me and it’s still like the hustle of, you know, me getting my name out there beyond my friends and family. But, you know, in that regard, like, I am not embarrassed at all to text as many people as possible, people that I haven’t spoke to in 15 years or ten years since grade school or high school, just showing my vulnerability on LinkedIn, showing my vulnerability on Instagram of, hey, I can’t go out, I’m working and I’m doing all these things, I think. A lot of people would just feel uncomfortable doing just exposing yourself or just feeling judged that you’re doing things that are a little out there. TAMAR: Yeah. You’re doing something that’s one hundred percent outside your comfort zone; really, really it comes down to that. And going back to this whole thing about like that, I don’t know if the word is negative self talk, but for me, it is it’s something that I struggle with on my with the perfume still kind of figuring out the right audience. And I always go back to reading the books by Robin Sharma. He is a fantastic author. He wrote a book about the Monk who sold his Ferrari. It was basically like a guy giving up fame and fortune and the prestige of his working at a really prestigious company. I don’t even remember, maybe a lawyer or whatever it was. And then I’m reading the leader who has no title of The Leader Without a Title right now or a variation of that title. TAMAR: But it’s all about like even even though it’s about like how you can work as a housekeeper at a hotel and still be the best, best in your own class, like every single person and every organization can be the best at what they do, but like they reinforce things. And he says so many good quotes that I dropped them down as I’m reading them in Google Keep. And then I tend to like like to to either write a social media post because I wrote my my whole philosophy of the brand is like that. You can overcome all odds and you can be positive and embrace your who you are kind of thing. So it really aligns with my mission and the values. But truthfully, it’s not just about the mission, it is about me as the entrepreneur in my personal life. So like for that purpose, I would say you should follow my brand. But that’s not what I’m trying to do here. I’m trying to say for you personally, like, you know, that is it’s about it’s about the hustle. It’s about really pushing yourself and getting yourself, making yourself aware that you can just be awesome and just chugging, chugging along. I’m not really sure, spinning the wheels, moving forward, I’m not really sure where I’m going with that, but. Brandon Snower: Yeah, I mean, you’re right there. I mean, there are so many times you’re going to self doubt yourself like every day. I mean, especially. Especially when things don’t go right, right, there’s, that’s obviously, you know, maybe common sense, but when when you’re actually going through it, you realize how impactful that self-doubt is to your competence, your decision making. And just the quality of the work that you put out there, right there. There are times when like I just you know, I posted something that I think so many people are going to resonate with and so many people are going to like and it gets like three or four likes. Right? And then I’m like, what did I just do? I thought I spent an hour, two hours maybe on this email or on this, like designing this poster, drawing this shirt from scratch. And, you know, people see it for a second and they don’t care about it. TAMAR: No one wants to know the detail that you put like four hours into it. Brandon Snower: They don’t, they don’t. They have no clue. But like they shouldn’t. Right. Like I, I learned that it’s not expected of them. Right. Like, they’re just we’re just another brand that’s trying to make an impact. And if we can get through you, that’s great. And that’s what we want. But there’s thousands of other things that people are scrolling through every second, like, we can’t really blame them for scrolling, right, but it’s tough, it’s mentally exhausting to just see how maybe insignificant, your work may be to some people, and that’s really hard because you’re dedicating your life, your time, you’re literal blood, sweat, and tears to this and you see this vision and then someone just shrug it off is like, you know, it hurts a lot. TAMAR: Yeah. So last Friday, my social post was that you don’t have to necessarily vote with your wallet. You should support your fellow entrepreneurs with a like or with some sort of sharing it or telling your friends like it’s so minimally friction. That’s minimally frictionable, for the friction there in terms of that kind of engagement versus, you know, you can’t afford the product, you don’t want to buy the products, at least do that. And, you know, I might have gotten one like and I went out of my way to, like, thank her for doing that. TAMAR: I mean, she knows the struggle because she’s also an entrepreneur. And I think entrepreneurs identify with the entrepreneurial journey, but others do not. And unfortunately, we’re the minority here now. Brandon Snower: And that’s true. And like you learn that very quickly, that people who aren’t entrepreneurs don’t or maybe haven’t seen or been a part of a startup like a very early stage startup. They don’t know the work, the effort, the things like the straps that goes into it. And it’s it’s every day, it’s not it’s not just like, oh, it’s three times a week. It’s I’m working Saturdays, Sundays, I can’t see my friends like it’s something they exhumed it. Brandon Snower: So that’s the right word. But it consumes, consumes your life. TAMAR: It could it probably would exhume if you do it, yeah, it’s not healthy, but yeah, you know what I think the struggle is, is just trying to get that massive break where everything is just a snowball effect from there, because right now you and I are climbing a mountain. And I it’s this is something that was I drafted a social post on this last night, and it’s like climbing that mountain and you’ll hit sometimes you’ll hit like a slippery part of the side of the mountain and sometimes a little bit of the rock under your foot will fall off and you’re going to be stumbling and you’re going to be falling and then you’re going to fall back on and really tired. TAMAR: And you’re not going to want to you’re going to want to sit on the other side of that mountain for a little while. And people don’t realize that because they get a job, they get stability, they deal with the toxic workforce, and then they deal with their colleagues that throw them off the bus and, you know, steal promotions instead of them. And they’re not realizing that, you know, that company that they’re working on, maybe 15, 10, 15 years ago, 30 years ago, there was somebody on the other end like you and I who are really trying to push this and to make that company big and some of them do. But other ones, you know, and you just don’t want to be is really what it comes down to. And for me, like, I was just I had just stumbled a little bit and for a while I kind of had to take a breather. And that’s that’s negative self talk, like, you know, saying it’s very identifiable because it’s like I still like I just I’m like paralyzed by what fork in the road do I traverse? TAMAR: Do I traverse this mindfulness perfume thing where people will find my perfume and think about mental health? Or do I just want to be another perfume bottle on the on the wall where I know that you all get buyers, but it’s just a lot more competition? And every single day I wake up with this and now I it’s like it’s now I’m at the point where, like, I have to set a daily goal that I actually work on the brands and try to tackle this problem. TAMAR: But it’s literally like this has been like maybe nine months of no sleep kind of things where I’m still still in the same position. Everyone’s like I took a class on defining my target audience probably about a year ago during a time really covid times. And I’m no further today than I was like a year ago because everyone’s like it’s so competitive, but it’s not because of the way I want it, but nobody wants to buy it. The hell do you do, you know? TAMAR: Yeah. These are the struggles that we all have. Just visibility is the biggest thing. And the best way to do that is, is honestly you got to get an infusion of some sort of venture capital and put like all that money in marketing. That’s why Shark Tank is very appealing for me, because I could potentially sell that story right then and there. But I don’t know if I want to do that. And I think I think for you to be perfect still for you, but like, everybody wants to take a different path and that journey has to be very different and very personal. Brandon Snower: So now, yeah, I yeah, that’s one hundred percent. And like I had a conversation with someone that I was networking on LinkedIn and he’s like a brand strategist. And I started his own beauty brands and he said, your target audience is different than the people who are going to who might buy your product. And with that being said, like in terms of your your perfume, maybe it’s the people that care about mental health that want to support that, buy it, rather than the people who actually are going through it. Brandon Snower: Right. Or they’re buying it for the people, a loved one or someone that they know that has gone through something. It doesn’t necessarily have to be the most extreme case. But maybe something has happened in their life, like a death or or something that is uncomfortable. [TAMAR: Right.] And maybe they give that to them. Right. And there’s so many ways to think about it, but like who you’re trying to sell to might not actually be the people that buy it, right? TAMAR: Yeah, but I’m in the same boat with you as like friends and family. It’s like, you know, so yesterday, like I said, I had been really kind of facing that self-doubt really head on. And I had this todo item to post about my launch on Reddit. There’s an indie group, but not for not for this. I would say that I wonder if you can post on the entrepreneurs subreddit, but I announced that I’m an indie brand in the indie perfume makeup IMAM r/indiemakeupandandmore yesterday. And I pushed myself to do it like it was something that was on my to do list for literally like eight months. I kept pushing, postponing it, postponing it because I was terrified, because I don’t know, like I want to be more mainstream. I don’t want to be an indies and still figuring that part of that audience that was like a struggle. And then literally like maybe like three minutes after I hit the post button, I get this email from somebody who said, I wanted to let you know I bought your perfume back in the day. TAMAR: I hope you remember me. Well, she even said, I hope you remember me. She didn’t think I remember her. And she said I put it on and I put on right before I take a shower and I love it. And I was like, wow. Like, this is like it’s sort of like meant to happen. But like, I honestly, I’ve had like weeks of, like, dry spells where, like, things aren’t like moving because of the struggle of these target audience challenge and getting beyond that. TAMAR: But that was like that was to me, it was like a little bit of a cue to like keep going and keep pushing this because it’s still about figuring that out. But the perseverance is what happens. And now to push away. And I’m going with I’m going to put the microphone back in front of your face in a second. But one of the struggles just in figuring that out, I, I, I just bought a haven’t gotten yet. It’s being prepared, but I bought a wall decal for my office that now is going to like remind me again, like I had a story and I was really kind of reeling through, like the trauma of like losing something and it was really precipitated the launch of this brand. But like this is that’s sort of becoming more numb and it’s obviously more pronounced. And like you lose sight of like where it’s coming from, or at least I was for a while, so I had to remember where I was going. TAMAR: And so I bought this decal that says “how badly do you want it?” And I’m going to put it on my wall and hopefully it will remind me [Brandon Snower: that’s awesome.] TAMAR: So, like, when you have negative self talk you gotta figure out how to negate that. And there we go. Brandon Snower: A hundred percent, I have the exact same kind of thing that I do. I always have like inspirational either image or quote that I make on my phone and I wake up every day or even like reading it, if I’m on my phone right now and I try to open my phone or unlock it like I read this quote or it’s there, right? Like I know it’s there. Maybe I don’t read it, but it says, make a million. Brandon Snower: Am I allowed to curse? TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Go for it, it’s funny, like everybody apologizes. It’s like I don’t care anymore. Brandon Snower: I mean, I’ll curse all day. I don’t know if it was – it says “make a million fucking mistakes, but don’t waste your time making the same mistake twice. Successful people know how to get back up after shit happens. How are you going to respond? Move forward. It’s done.” [TAMAR: Yeah.] And like I have this with, like my logo underneath and like my colors and everything. But like I’ve made this quote because, like, I started from nothing in terms of like knowing anything about what I was doing and I made so many mistakes and mistake after mistake after mistake, it literally was just deterring me from continuing. TAMAR: That’s right. It’s really, really, really hard to pull that out. I love how you tackle, like, so many different things of that in that quote, you’re just like, you know, like make mistakes, not don’t look back. Just look to the future. Brandon Snower: Yeah, it’s done. Like who gives a shit? You made a mistake. Like, move forward. Like it already happened. You can’t do anything about it. TAMAR: Yeah. And I think I think most of us spend our lives looking back at our behind our shoulders versus moving to the present and everything. I find that suggestive quotes are really, really helpful. And they say, like, I used to think that was cheesy stuff, like I would read Noah St. John or Napoléon Hill, not so much Napoleon Hill, but Rhonda Byrne of The Secret. Napoleon Hill, I mean, he’s the guy kind of like pioneered this movement of like mindset is everything. [Brandon Snower: It is.] It one hundred percent is, but they also like this whole Noah St. John thing is all about like writing affirmations. And I always I always was reading I had read his books in the past in this moment where I I wasn’t believing myself. So I wasn’t going to believe in the affirmations. And nowadays I just have like up in my bathroom, I have another one that says “be awesome today.” And even if I if I walk in my bathroom, I don’t even pay attention to it. It doesn’t make the impact. But I do believe that if I actually just take a quick glance and recognize that it’s there, it really does have that suggestive nature and it turns things on for me. So I thought [Brandon Snower: a hundred percent.] I think that I think that these things are so important. And you just it’s not even about, the Noah St. John thing, I guess that’s why no one knows who the heck he is. He’s just one of those other guys who just like in that book and that’s in that space. TAMAR: But it really is about not necessarily like, just just having it there to suggest without doing anything else, and, yeah, it pushes it pushes its way into your psyche and you figure it out and you make yourself look, as most of these guys say, you make yourself get to that point because your mind wants to convince yourself that you should. Brandon Snower: Right, people, I believe that everyone’s smart enough to do something to to start a company, to do like to build what they want to create. Obviously, you have to do the research, you have to work super hard, you got to, like, learn everything, but if you don’t have the mental toughness to do it, then you’re not like that’s what differentiates like a successful entrepreneur to from a non successful entrepreneur, like in hindsight and like in the natural, like if you have the same idea. Brandon Snower: Yeah. Because it is all mental when it comes down to like after the fact of like actually executing it. And like that’s also another thing that I mean, it’s also lonely. It’s super lonely. Right. Like I’ve done this all on my own and you know, I’m sure I had I’m sure you’ve done a lot on your own. If not, you’re still doing it. You know, it’s. There’s a lot of, like, self doubt and it’s hard to, like, lean on people that aren’t necessarily like trying to do this with you. TAMAR: Yeah, I mean, there’s so many quotes that I can read out loud to you that I’m just saying you should read Robin Sharma’s books. I think you would relate so much to this stuff. And they’re easy reads. They really are. Brandon Snower: Yeah, no, well, I mean, I’m also the type of person that, like these mental things, like, yes, it’s embarrassing maybe, but like who gives a shit because it’s like helping you, right? Like, I had it was I was at a point I was it this was at a point in investment banking, like I had a really tough time in investment banking because I had to learn everything the same way. I had to learn fashion and supply chain and building a website and all this stuff, like I had a ringtone or like a alarm that was like an inspirational quote from just like a random YouTube link. Brandon Snower: But like, I had it for like a moment because, like, I needed it. To get me through, I’m just like, wait to back up, you know, like I can do this, but like, it doesn’t like, you know, it doesn’t matter if you have these things right. Like, if it helps you, if it benefits you, do it. Like people are scared or embarrassed or had this thought in their head, like, oh, this is super cheesy like who gives a shit? TAMAR: Yeah. So I’m going I’m going to actually read to two quotes from him. So I have: “no one’s unimportant. There are no extra people alive today. Every person and every job matters.”” So that kind of like talks to just the roles that we have. But some people make our roles, gets better, but everybody needs to feel that they’re significant. And the other thing tied to the excellence of leadership is: “no excellent leader ever got to the lofty platform they reached by feebly clinging to a fear filled excuses.” So that to me is like a way of making sure we just have to persevere and carry on. Brandon Snower: Right, that’s true, and and so to the first quote, you know, I’m maybe not like thinking I’ve never heard of that quote, but like, you know, it’s a great quote. And I think of it in terms of I’m not trying to hire, you know, people right now and like, I’m just envisioning and want to create an environment that is worthwhile for everyone who’s who’s in it, right? Like, yes, I’m the founder, but it doesn’t matter if you’re the founder or you’re not the founder. Brandon Snower: You’re part of the team. You have just as much creativity, say. You know, autonomy as me, in a sense, right, because like I want you to perform and be so comfortable and have the greatest time while obviously executing and progressing, but like there are so many times where people and they’re all over the world are just felt like they’re insignificant or their opinions or thoughts don’t matter because they’re an analyst or an associate or a lower level than someone else. Brandon Snower: And I’m constantly thinking, OK, I want to create an environment because I understand that people want a voice. People should have a voice. And people don’t realize that when they’re starting companies because there’s so many things to do. And you have all this experience as a founder, but you’re like the person below you doesn’t. But your job is to have them up to speed and contribute as much as they can. And that’s not going to happen unless you commit your time and create this working environment that builds this community. TAMAR: Yeah. So another book and it’s early for you to read, but at the same time, it’s interesting, I connect, I sync up every Thursday morning with a group of entrepreneurs that we met in the same group. By the way, we kind of forge this group back in the day and we and one of them really kind of, he mentioned that he tries to dictate his organization based on this EOS, which stands for the Entrepreneurs Operating System. And it comes from a book called Traction written by Gino Wickman. Now, I’ve heard about Wickman’s book because I’ve read the other Traction first by what’s his name, Gabriel Weinberg, the DuckDuckGo guy. And I was like, oh, yeah. well, that sounds like the more corporatized version because Gabriel is a startup guy as far as I’m concerned. And I read it and I will say that it’s really a really a fantastic read about, like setting aside really having like this like cheat sheet for, like, everything about your organization. TAMAR: Now, you and I like I said, it’s kind of early for us to kind of think about. But at the same time, it’s sort of it’s really relevant because it talks about how when your company has enough people, you’re going to want to have people who align with your specific company values but also are in the right seat, so like, for example, some people might align with your company values, but like there aren’t in the right so like maybe you have somebody who’s like an operations person and the CFO role or you have somebody who doesn’t align with your company values but who is great at the CFO role that they’re sitting in, but they don’t really care about the company. So you really want to find someone who really kind of checks out both of those boxes and you might have to shift your company. So the idea is like, you know, you have like 17 people at your company already. Are they all in the right place, are the perfect for your company? And if you have this alignment of of all these goals, all of a sudden, you know, the people have seen year over year growth in the percentages like massive, massive growth. TAMAR: And it’s pretty, pretty cool the way the way you do it, especially if you’re in the moment of growth and you’re looking to bring on people. You want to kind of think about this philosophy and embody that right then and there. I think it might simplify things later. You know, he talks about how he’s hit the clients that he’s had. It’s like companies the size of like three all the way to like seventeen hundred. And I’m like, I’m I still consider myself a company of one, even though I have like a couple people helping me here and there, but yet it’s given me a foundation upon which I could potentially build this thing and especially think that at least you don’t necessarily need to implement it today, but you can especially understand it and get to that point. So my thought was that for you is just to say, go ahead, take a read. I know I’m not I never used to be much of a reader until this entrepreneur thing bug hit me. Yeah, there there’s so much value that comes from these these pieces of paper. Brandon Snower: No I will, no thank you. No, I think building the right team is one of the most important things. It’s not the most important factor like actually conveying your brand and making that good product, because that’s what’s going to get you from where you are now to where you want to go. You can’t do it on your own, right. It’s impossible. And you need to surround yourself with people that are better than you. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah, that’s right. You don’t want to be the smartest person in the room. Brandon Snower: No. And I don’t I don’t. I want to be the dumbest person at my company. Right. That’s my goal. Because there are so many people that know marketing and supply chain and like design, product development that like, yes, I, I started this, I have the vision, but if I can facilitate and be the conductor which I think that’s one of my greatest abilities to actually understand and create this environment team and people around this like an idea but that’s like my goal, right? And that’s how I’m going to get from now, like a one person selling out and 50 units to like thousands of units down the road. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. So I’m still figuring that out, too, because I’ve had people come and go and kind of get there, don’t completely align with the values and the hustle culture, because especially now you think about that. It’s it’s also the millennials versus the older, if you will. Brandon Snower: Yeah, I know it’s hard too because what I’m seeing and it’s very apparent, I think just above the broader audience by. I mean, it’s hard to find people that are going to work like no one’s going to work harder than you, right? You’re the founder, but you can’t expect them to do that. Right? Right. Like, you have to, like, take a back, put your feet in their shoes. And say, OK, I’m like, imagine me expecting to work all these hours have like all these commitments and I’m not like really starting this company. Brandon Snower: Yeah, right. Like I mean, that’s one reason why I couldn’t do investment banking or frankly, I can’t really, it’s hard to do another job because I don’t know if I can. You know, like work for someone or do something that wasn’t mine. And it’s difficult and it’s a hard challenge to face. TAMAR: And the passion isn’t there for a lot of people like you hope that they align with the values. That’s why it’s like I try to really the first thing I do when I talk to people is get in touch with my values like, you know, but not everybody likes that. I’ve had people who really like buy it, but then they don’t work for like three weeks because I don’t necessarily need them. And all of a sudden, the night before this project is due I have outstanding questions about something that, you know, they had worked on and all of a sudden they freak out. That’s not a lot of cultural alignment. But then again, I have to respect the people who do have like have to go out in due time. But like when you have nothing to do for a while, you know, like there’s a question because that’s the thing that’s that’s their culture, their culture. You really have to understand, as someone who works for a startup, that not everything is your standard nine to five. Brandon Snower: Oh, it’s not. TAMAR: And I think that especially the elders, if you will, don’t really get that. They don’t really embrace that. And they don’t understand, you know, the things that they’re going to be ebbs and flows based on what’s required at certain times. So they’re very they prefer that they want stability of those normal times, but yet they want to live in the startup culture and that they’re not ready to mentally. I guess conceptualize what that really looks like. Brandon Snower: No, no, not at all. I mean, I worked for a startup just as I need money, and I thought it was a great opportunity to show I worked at a startup from January to and then I quit about a month ago and it was like an Amazon ecommerce FBA the start up. And like, I knew I should be working a lot, you know, and there were people at the company that thought it was going to be a nine to five. Brandon Snower: And it’s it’s not the case at all, it’s it could be eight to nine, it could be eight to eight, it could be nine seven, but it’s definitely not nine to five. It could be nine sometimes work until midnight. TAMAR: Yeah, it’s hard, you know. Brandon Snower: And you’re not getting paid that much either. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. It’s the nature of the beast. And hopefully people understand that’s what that’s required to get the company off the ground. You know, you’ve got to do things in a very, very different systematic way. And that’s a systematic way, if you will. But it makes it makes everything it makes everything better, I guess. Yeah. So I realized we were over an hour now, I think. And I want to kind of I would have asked you other questions, but I guess really the big question is at this point, you know, I want to make sure people support you and you get that visibility. TAMAR: So first, before I do that, or I’m going to ask you one question. And especially now, because I think you have the experience, but if you can ask an earlier version, if you can tell, give advice to an earlier version of Brandon, what would you tell him? Brandon Snower: I would say start start something and actually do it. Like find something in your life and it doesn’t matter if it’s it’s not making money. Right. Like start a hobby if you like. Watching sports then start a blog, right, or like start making like a funny, cool Twitter account and just like tweet what you like doing because so many people are just in this position of: I don’t like my job or like I don’t like what I’m doing and they’re trying to find things that they like and building off of that, but like start a side hustle or like start something that you genuinely enjoy that takes your mind off of it. Brandon Snower: And it will build. It will grow like people will start saying. And don’t be afraid to tell people about it. Like that’s a thing people are so scared of telling someone that they’re starting something because they don’t want to be judged that, you know, if they won’t like it or it’s cheesy or dumb or stupid, like, who cares, right? It’s like your life. You’re going to regret it if you don’t do it right. Why are you going to let other people dictate that like it’s your life? Brandon Snower: And I am like, very passionate about this. Yeah. Because I see so many people like this. TAMAR: Yeah, there’s the there’s another quote about how people who mind don’t matter and people who matter don’t mind. I don’t know who actually said that, but it’s not Dr. Seuss, that’s what I know. Yeah, so that’s that’s really important. And it’s funny because right now I’m in this moment of like this perfume thing. I really want to make big, but I have all these little, like, ideas that I think will eventually come back to the perfume and support the perfume. TAMAR: And I feel like very serial entrepreneurial right now. Serially. I don’t have to say it, but I’ll try to use it as a descriptor here where, like, I feel like I could do this. And like I’ve been talking to people with advice I like for advice and they keep going back to me. What about the perfume? I’m like, well, honestly, this would supplement the perfume. This is an aggressive, this will promote the perfume but like because the perfume is like I’m going to say, it’s like there’s so much more I can put life into but all of this together. I don’t think there’s anything like deviating from it. I think it’s just pushing propelling things in a different direction. So who knows? But yeah, don’t hesitate and don’t worry about how people judge you, because if the only person who matters is basically yourself. Brandon Snower: So, yeah, and it extends beyond like what you’re doing. Right. It’s like what you wear, what you say, you know, obviously be conscious of what you say saying like your situations. But, you know, just people are so conscious of what other people think about them. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, cool, so how do people find you? Brandon Snower: Yeah, so my company is LeCollier, it’s French for the collar, hence all the shirts are contrast collar. And so I have a website lecollierclothing.com, and then Instagram, the same @lecollierclothing. I’m working on building a TikTok. I’m not TikTok savvy, so that’s what I’m looking for, someone for it. But but yeah. I mean those are really it. And then I’m on LinkedIn if you want to follow the journey I guess and just understand like what it’s like to be an entrepreneur, I’m starting to post some some things that I’ve been through just on my personal LinkedIn. Yeah. That’s that’s really it, keep it simple. TAMAR: Yeah. I love it. I love it. I’m looking at your socials right now. I like I like your little fancy you really. You make it like very, very sophisticated looking into the backgrounds. Brandon Snower: Yeah. TAMAR: I don’t know, I don’t know the descriptor if they are looking for but uh traditional, contemporary, whatever. Brandon Snower: It’s not, it’s not a traditional brand. I said it’s like a very cool version of a menswear brand that you’ve never really seen before. And that’s how we like to do things like because I’m a banker. Right. I’m not a fashion guy. But like we’re creating a really sophisticated fashion brand in New York. So, you know, we want to play to our strengths. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, and you will, and you will, and you’ll get there and I have faith in you and I know I mean, listen, as entrepreneurs and a similar journey, we should definitely keep in touch and keep each other apprised and support each other in whatever way we can, because I think that’s that’s the most important thing for this journey that everybody like we build upon each other. TAMAR: So, oh, I’m here for you. Whenever. Brandon Snower: As well as me. TAMAR: Yeah, thank you so much. Awesome. Cool. Brandon Snower: Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for having me. It was great speaking with you and always happy to chat and get back on your way when we’re both successful. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. We’ll get there. We’ll get there. We got slow and steady wins the race. I realized in the beginning it’s going to be a lot more of a marathon, not a sprint, but it’s like the slowest marathon you’re ever going on, because if you’re doing it literally from your life savings, you don’t have the foundation to kind of do things in the way that you maybe otherwise expect. And and I’m ready. I’m ready to move. I’m prepared for that, you know. Brandon Snower: Yeah. Keep reading those quotes and we’ll get there. Yeah. Well now we have now we have each other so we’ll talk.  

In this week’s Common Scents podcast, TAMAR connects with Dan Prasad, who is based in Australia and works in the home fragrance industry. In this candid conversation, we tackle the crazy time difference (14 hours), our scented histories, covid and scent, and more. TAMAR: Hey everybody, I’m so excited. I met Dan Prasad on LinkedIn of all places. I think we did, right? Dan Prasad: Yeah, that’s right. On LinkedIn. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. And he’s actually, we are doing this at weird hours for me, and normal hours for him, but I would consider it a weird hour for me too at 6:20 in the morning Australian time. [Dan Prasad: Yes.] So kudos to you for showing up and doing this. You’re in your car on the side of the road, podcasting. So that’s, that’s really some serious, serious discipline, I will say. Dan Prasad: Dedicated to the cause. When there’s something cool to talk about sometimes you gotta stop and have a chat about it. TAMAR: Yeah. So let’s talk about that. So I will say that Dan and I met, like I said, on LinkedIn, under the fact that we both are fragrance aficionados. It is not my standard podcast’s type of “rise above adversity.” But, you know, this is the Common Scents podcast. And since being scent, the actual smell scent, s-c-e-n-t, everybody’s like, “what does that mean?” And I have to explain that. Every so often there happens to be times that I have conversations with fragrance people, so then is here and Dan is going to share that. I guess I’ll have you introduce yourself. First of all, I know I mentioned that you’re in Australia. Talk a little bit about where you are physically, what it looks like, what it looks like outside for you, maybe even. Dan Prasad: Okay. I’m in the state of Queensland, which is on the northeastern side of Australia on the coastline, and Brisbane is not exactly on the beach. It’s like an hour from the beach, but yeah, southeast Queensland. Queensland is like a massive state. You can fly out for two and a half, three hours and still be the same same state. That’s how big Queensland is. It’s a beautiful crisp morning. Again, for us, “crisp” is like, you know, 10 degrees Celsius as you walk around in t-shirts in New York probably when it’s 10 degrees Celsius. TAMAR: Now I have to Google that. What is that, 10 degrees Celsius is how many degrees Fahrenheit? Dan Prasad: I’m not sure. I’m not good at those conversions. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. I’m going to do it right now. There’s some cool way that I read on Reddit a few weeks ago, but it didn’t sit with me, so I don’t remember it. So I, I’m going to C to F. It is fifty degrees Fahrenheit. So that’s actually about what it is right now, fifty three. [Dan Prasad: Oh, okay.] It’s about fifty three right now. It’s pouring rain. It’s been a fun day. Dan Prasad: Yeah. There you go. It’s been raining a little bit here as well so it’s interesting. So this time of year is a similar kind of thing as everyone else. So that’s good. TAMAR: Yeah, interesting. What season is it there? I don’t even know. Dan Prasad: We’re, last season of autumn, which you guys call fall. [TAMAR: Right.] Yeah, winter starts next month. TAMAR: That’s crazy. So how cold does it get for you in winter? Dan Prasad: Oh, nothing. In the nights, the coldest it’ll get is maybe three or four degrees in this part of Australia. Other parts of Australia gets really, really much colder in the evenings, 3 or 4 degrees Celsius in the daytime. The coldest it is going to be like maybe 16, 17 degrees Celsius, that’s as cold as it is gets. TAMAR: Oh wow. We’ve gotten zero degrees. Global warming affects things. I don’t think we’ve had that for a while. [Dan Prasad: Okay.] I grew up in Florida. Now, I have to do more conversions. It’s hot. 10 degrees Celsius is probably the coldest it gets and you’re wearing sweat pants and all this crazy stuff and just that’s just the nature of the beast. Dan Prasad: Yeah. Yeah. It’s interesting. Because when they’re in the environment, and then go onto another environment. Initially, it’s super hard to adjust. But then the body regulates itself and there you go. TAMAR: Yeah. It’s funny because now I go back to Florida and I get sick because it’s not my natural habitat anymore. I was born in New York, so going from New York to Florida, living in Florida for 17 years and then going back to New York and then traveling to Florida. It’s like a jolt to my my physical, whatever, my nervous system. I don’t know what it is. It’s a jolt to something because I always get sick. Dan Prasad: Hmm, interesting. [TAMAR: Yeah, yeah.] So, fragrance, eh? Because we’re gonna be on a weather podcast. TAMAR: We could. I’m getting there. We talked about how we knew each other and how we met in the context of fragrance. Explain I guess your background on that. Dan Prasad: I’ve been in the home fragrance industry for like, I started in the late 1990s, in the wholesale, retail, because I had my own retail store and also worked for importers in home fragrance. When I say home fragrance, I talk about incense mainly, then there are candles, oil burn, fragrant oils, melts, all that sort of things. Basically people’s love for. It’s such a huge industry that it sort of a little bit overlooked sometimes, but it’s a multibillion dollar industry, the home fragrance industry and people just want their environments to smell nice. Obviously in the last few years with what’s happening in the world, so many people at home are locked down, all sorts of things, this industry has actually been thriving TAMAR: Yeah, it’s really amazing. And it’s funny because you say that and I’m looking at the five candles that I have, which I never light at the same time because they’re all different. But I’m just staring at my five candles, which I basically unboxed within the last six weeks. [Dan Prasad: Oh yeah.] I have four children and I’ve been a little nervous to light candles around them. And in a way, I’ve been also sort of traumatized by the college fires that have happened, that have been spurred since people, burning incense. So I’ve been particularly cognizant of that. And I’ve kind of avoided it, even though I love that. And I prefer that the candles and the incense to the aromatherapy, everybody says, aromatherapy, for example, is the big thing. And when we first talked and you were telling me about home fragrance, I’m like, I like to believe that you have it on your person versus having it in your bedroom, because I think about it in the aromatherapy context and it’s my misspeaking. There are candles and there are essential oils that are kind of there and you don’t even know that they’re there and you might smell something, it’s not powerful anyway. And then there’s like incense and the candle and they’re like, holy crap. That actually smells amazing. Dan Prasad: So, yeah, so so many varying degrees of A. quality and B. presentation, all sorts of things that all come along with it. And it’s interesting what you say you feel about it’s stronger when wearing it on your person like a fine fragrance or perfume, and but especially with the whole incense history and culture. When people burn incense, either in traditional form of granules or resins or the snare or stick form, or the incense current form or whatever, that fragrant smoke is something that becomes on your person because a lot of people, in some cultures, women, when they’re doing their hair, they let the fragrance smoke go all through their hair and almost invariably have fragrance themselves so when they’re out and about, you can smell that on them. TAMAR: But do they remember that it’s there? So my philosophy is very different than the way people see it. And it’s really it’s also very hard to sell this philosophy because people don’t think about it. The idea is: you put on perfume in the morning, cologne in the morning, whatever it is, you put it on and then you forget that it’s there. People might smell you throughout the day like the incense being in your hair. But what do you get out of it after the fact? It’s like you’re doing it for other people. But my philosophy is that you put it on in the morning, you actually have an intention, you revisit that intention throughout the day by sniffing your wrists. If you don’t sniff your wrists every two seconds, you’re going to get anosmic, you’re not going to be able to smell. Anosmic for those who are listening is meaning losing that sense of smell. You’ll become numb to it for a while, but then you can come back to it in a few, ten, fifteen minutes and it’s back there again. So if you do that enough times, not too much, but enough times that, you know, with that aligned intention because of scent and memory being so well, well, intertwines like that would potentially change your life. You could do that. And the thing is you don’t have to limit yourself to, to perfume. I like the idea of carrying it with you throughout the day. But like, let’s say in the morning, you can’t leave your candle unattended. So I don’t know if it’s the candle’s the right thing, but when you put on some sort of, I don’t know, wax melt or something and you put on in the morning, you do the same thing, and then you come home from work and you feel the same way. It’s just a matter of revisiting the scent with the right vibes, really at the end of the day. Dan Prasad: Yes, yes, yeah. Most definitely. TAMAR: Yeah. It’s hard, though. It’s really hard because people don’t see the perfume. I’ve been mentioning this to people. “I’ve never thought of putting perfume and mental health together.” Well, I mean, there’s the aromatherapy industry. It’s huge. Dan Prasad: It totally makes sense. It is exactly like what you say. From the retail side of things like I was telling you, direct customers in my shop, I could see just how much people love certain fragrances or whatever it might have been, whatever the product was. They had to have it every few days or every week. It’s like “I gotta have this. I don’t feel right without this, burning this, or whatever. In that form of fragrances, it had the same importance for their own feeling good in their own well-being. They had to have that product every time. They ran out, they had to run back and get it. TAMAR: Yeah. I was just going to ask you, what brought you this whole world? How did you get into it? Dan Prasad: Uh, just naturally really. With my background in, I sort of stumbled, well, really, when I came to home fragrance, I kind of stumbled into it because my background is, I’m part, my father was Indian from Fiji, rest in peace, Dad, he’s gone about ten years now. And my mom is Dutch. So we have a very mixed culture in terms of growing up and cultural backgrounds and all that sort of thing. The Indian side of things is, there’s a lot of incense involved in spirituality in the prayers and stuff. So that was always sort of around from the 90s onward that I actually started paying more attention to that sort of thing. And then I started, because I have a natural love for certain fragrances and then I just got in the industry in terms of first selling it at markets, a shop, and then going to the wholesale side, waiting for someone, it just kind of went from there. And then you just get educated about all the products within the home fragrance market. It sort of naturally progressed, really. TAMAR: Yeah, well, it’s nice that you have that culture. I’ve been having conversations with people and they’re like, “elsewhere in the world, fragrance is a very big part of people’s identities, like you were saying, the Indian culture. When I first announced my site launch, I had somebody, a brand new perfumer guy, I don’t know if he was a perfumer or just a perfume entrepreneur. And he’s like “I’m opening a store in Oman can you give me some advice?” I’m like, I don’t know. “I’m just as new as you you have forty fragrances and I have two,” He really had, he started at 40, 40 different scents. I said “you should sell online, you should do this. Maybe you can ship to me and I’ll help you get it in the US market.” But it’s so hard, it’s so extraordinarily difficult to start this, especially in the U.S. market. Dan Prasad: This is a billion different options. And like I say, it’s usually 99 percent of it is all marketed the same way. And when you try to do something outside the box like you’re doing, people are going to just like “hang on, what’s this about?” and then really try to just kind of get them to open their minds up from a different point of view, which is an awesome thing to do. Because for you it was such a critical thing. That’s why I started chatting to you in the first place, reading your story, about how, literally, the importance of fragrance pulled you out of what you were going through. That’s powerful stuff. That shows you how powerful this can be. TAMAR: Yeah. And people have said it to me. Two people have actually said come up to me because I’ve shared my story openly and they’ve said the same thing. “Cologne brought me out of depression, perfume brought me out of depression.” I want to potentially interview these types of people to really get their stories. There’s my anecdotal story and there are other people having the same story. I am also potentially seeking funding, ideally, if I can study the scents, the effects of scent on depression, and if aligned with a mindset, could that change everything? Of course, there are external factors. I need to do like a very big study. We would be talking about thousands of participants in order to do it right. I’ve reached globally, on a global scale, to professors and researchers to potentially help me validate this hypothesis. And everybody is like, well, “covid is not letting us do anything.” And I’m getting a lot of pushback, so I’m applying, I’m thinking of applying for to a grant at the National Institute of Health, which is one of the United States governmental entities. I’m not really sure about those folks. I know there’s just quite a few departments and some departments underneath there. I don’t know. But there is there is there are grants there. I want to speak to somebody and kind of get some advice on it, because it’s more integrative. It’s more alternative medicine. I think there is an alternative medicine play here. I really think that there is. And I don’t know if it’s attributed, though, to any specific scent, like walking in a room and smelling some lavender and frankincense or whatever else you would be smelling, mint, or whatever it is. I think it’s more about, it could be completely new. Nothing you’ve ever tried before. And could it still help if you align it with the specific perspective? That’s where I come from. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Dan Prasad: The particular fragrance that helped you initially. Did you have a history with that fragrance or was it just— TAMAR: So that’s a great question. So I’ve had this conversation a couple of times. But what’s interesting is, so I went through my postpartum depression and started in 2009. I actually won that perfume in 2012 in a mommy blog contest. And I was probably still postpartum depressed because I was entering all these giveaways as my way to kill time. But I didn’t really have the awareness of it. I put it on and I liked it and I put it in the corner in a cabinet, and I revisited it maybe once or twice in the interim. And then put it on again when I was at my dark day in the summer of 2018 and this is like six years later. And whatever it was, it wasn’t about that. I didn’t have like that history. And it’s interesting because a few months later when I was talking to these two people about my story and she was like, you know, maybe the idea is that it was tied to the whole amygdala and the fact that scent and that it might have triggered something based on an earlier memory, and I’m thinking, well, first of all, it doesn’t smell like anything. Second of all, the only times I’ve tried it out during the worst, depressed times in my life, maybe it was about mindset. And then I realized it’s probably true because after that, after I really got excited about scents in general, I went to the perfume stores here and I started trying on a bunch of perfumes, literally from my wrist to my shoulder. I would put on like four or five as much as could fit. I didn’t want to use the spray, the fragrance strips because I wanted them. I wanted to smell myself, it was about me. And every single one I tried I liked and I got more excited about it. So it actually made me more excited to experience scents in a different way. And it had to be variety of scents. But I think that this was an impetus, so with that being said, and I have my two scents, I’d love to get like, you know, 20, 30, 40. I think you could do this alignment, put the perfume on and whatever else. You could probably do this alignment with different perfumes, or yeah, you could establish this as your signature scent and just visit it, and hopefully there is still something there. I still think that can validate this hypothesis. I’d really like to think that I can—as long as you like it in the beginning, you can’t just hate in the beginning if you hate the scent and can’t do it. Dan Prasad: No, obviously not. It’s not gonna make that positive change within, so. TAMAR: But, that’s actually an interesting thing. It’s one of my LinkedIn posts. I scheduled this one. There’s a shampoo that they were selling at Costco. I think there are Costcos in Australia. [Dan Prasad: Yeah, there is.] OK. This specific shampoo was actually not a good shampoo, I don’t know how it got there, and I saw complaints online about it. That’s how bad it was. I don’t know what Costco buyer would have bought this because it smelled so bad. And I bought it and it wasn’t going to return it because I’m not that kind of person. And so I ended up trying it, trying it, trying it. And I would hold my nose basically to put it on, you know it’s covid. I’m not going out. People are not smelling my hair. It’s fine. I don’t care. So anyway, maybe about a week ago, it hit me that I could tolerate it. It used to be intolerable and now I’m just like “I can tolerate it”. So I think over time you could adjust to smells even if you hate them. But like that was probably like five or six months, no it was probably less, maybe three or four. But the bottom line is that’s not something I would recommend to the average human being that you have to get used to something you don’t like. So just wait for that one. Dan Prasad: I think it’s interesting what you said that it wasn’t really a fragrance that you had an issue with, it still was something you liked, but it still had that powerful result for you, so thats interesting. Obviously, maybe chemistry-wise, something clicked someway. TAMAR: Yeah, I don’t know what it was. I honestly don’t know. One of the things I say when you’re depressed. You don’t care what you look like. You definitely don’t care what you smell like. And maybe I was just at such an emotionally low level that anything, you could have given me a chocolate chip cookie and I would have been an advocate for chocolate. I mean, I don’t know about that. No, I don’t think so. But I do think that in terms of that, it was something that did awaken me. And it wasn’t an overnight thing either. It was a slower process of just feeling reinvigorated to experience the five senses as a whole. Dan Prasad: Yeah, okay. Mmm. So how did that perpetuate onto the other senses? Was it more— TAMAR: It just made me appreciate things more. Dan Prasad: Ah okay. TAMAR: It’s not like I have any type of like synesthesia where you can see colors and stuff like that and all of a sudden listen to music [and see their colors]. I would just say that I think as humans we have five senses, and if we don’t think about [them and] we take [them for granted.] If you ask any person and I think you’ve probably read it, I’m sure you’re familiar with the research, that if you ask and I think the Pew Internet did a survey that people would rather give up their sense of smell than anything else. But there was also another survey that said that teenagers are more willing to give up their sense of smell than to give up the Internet. And you don’t realize that. I was reading a Bill Bryson book. He’s a fantastic author if you don’t know who he is, and the book, it’s called Body: A Guide for Occupants. I’m sorry. It’s called Body a Guide for Occupants. And it’s a great book. He talks about how like taste is literally 80 to 90 percent smell. You don’t realize [Dan Prasad: Exactly.] how much, how well integrated that is. Dan Prasad: Yep. Yeah. You lose your smell and yeah, all of the sudden, food ain’t gonna be the same. TAMAR: So I did lose my smell during covid and I did have that experience for a while. Dan Prasad: How was that for you? TAMAR: It wasn’t the most ideal. I kept eating to think that maybe the next bite will taste… good. I was facilitating a lot of restaurant deliveries to my neighborhood. I actually paid a lot of money for this brisket joint to deliver to my neighborhood because we were all in quarantine at that time. And I was just, I was like, “this food sucks!” I didn’t realize it was me. It was me. I’ve been there before and I’ve enjoyed it, but I’m like, “what is this? Did it not travel well?” And then I’m like, “wait a minute. I think I have covid.” That was March 13, 2020. So March 15th, 2020. I went and I confirmed that I had a positive diagnosis. Wow. Yeah. Those were some crazy times. Dan Prasad: How long before you felt all right again? How far did it go in terms of symptoms? TAMAR: So I it’s interesting because I used to document every perfume that I’d wear every single day and I stopped. It was probably at least a month that I stopped. As I put it back, just speaking to the smell for a moment. I don’t even know if I have it 100 percent back or I never really have the strongest nose to begin with because I feel like I’m going through my the perfumes that I wore, I have a bunch of samples, I literally have hundreds of samples, and I’m going through them again. And there’s some that I’m discarding now and I’m not sure if it’s because I just don’t experience the scents the same way I used to or if the fact is that I just realized the second time around I don’t like them. I will say that my children are pretty perceptive and my husband’s pretty perceptive. They didn’t get covid and they smell things that I don’t so I don’t know what it is. It could be me. It could it could very well be me. It probably is. So I’m not sure in terms of in terms of smell, I would say I feel like I’m more like maybe 80 percent of the way there. But you don’t really put that out there, because regardless, I’m still appreciating the fact that I have it. [Dan Prasad: Yeah, of course.] Yeah. In terms of the other, I tested negative on April 1st of last year, so I started donating plasma right away, but the smell thing came and went. There were times when I smelled things and the smell would be very profound. And there were other times where it just felt very subtle. I don’t really have that on and off that much anymore. I did have like a few more symptoms for a while. Thankfully I’m not a long hauler that some other people are still struggling to breathe and walk in and overcome. Dan Prasad: Yeah. Dan Prasad: But it’s hard. It’s so crazy how it reacts differently to really different people [TAMAR: Yeah] and especially now with so many different strains, like who knows now. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Did you have any experience in your in your neighborhood or anything like that? Dan Prasad: Oh we’ve been super blessed in this country. It is like hardly happening, really. There’s a few peakings here and there, in certain areas, but we are walk in the park compared to most other places in the world, so we’re pretty fortunate. TAMAR: Yeah. Did you vaccinate? Did you have to? What’s the vaccination schedule?. Dan Prasad: They’ve only just started rolling it out. TAMAR: Wow. It wasn’t a priority. Dan Prasad: The majority of the population haven’t had it yet. TAMAR: OK, yeah. So New York is a little bit accelerated on that front. I actually did get my vaccine this year, April 1st. They rolled it out to thirty and up two or three days prior. So we rushed to get it done and I felt like I had covid. The first time for real. That was it. It was a very it was, it wasn’t a good recovery. Yeah. Dan Prasad: Yeah. I’ve got a few friends that are health care workers and when they had it, they felt the same. They felt like total crap for a few days and then they’re okay. TAMAR: Yeah. It’s very variable. Because I had covid, the Johnson and Johnson shot was not easy for me, but my husband, again, he didn’t have covid. He doesn’t have antibodies. He might have antibodies now, but he didn’t have any then. He was totally fine. And I’m sitting there with, I don’t know what a fever is, 38.9, I think. I think? Dan Prasad: Wow. TAMAR: It was one hundred and two fever. And I actually converted that one. That’s how I know it by heart. I converted that one in advance because I was talking to my other friends in Europe and it was I couldn’t, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t get up and it was hard. But thankfully, and not going back to the scent thing, I didn’t lose it that time around. It was just feeling like I actually got the virus for the first time for real. Dan Prasad: Yeah, yeah, wow. Really interesting how it works. How’s New York at the moment? Is it locked down, or not really? No, no, we’re opening up, which is crazy. Restaurants are at 75 percent right now. Curfews are being lifted because forty six percent, I would say, of new York is has it has been vaccinated at least one dose, twenty three of whom have both doses. I only was a one and done because of the Johnson and Johnson. We’ve been getting emails from the governor here for the last year and it used to be like you’d see these numbers surging of those people who test, were at eight percent of people who tested positive and now we’re down to less than two percent so I think it’s giving him the confidence to open things up. But that being said, it doesn’t mean that people have to go out and about and doing things. I still realize I have to be super careful. Dan Prasad: Yeah. It was interesting what you were saying about the sense of smell thing and how a lot of people disregard that one the most but there’s another person I’m connected with on LinkedIn and she’s got a perfume boutique in, I think she’s in Manhattan or somewhere, and she’s actually helping people regain their sense of smell— TAMAR: Oh, yeah. Yeah, I read that. I think she was in a newspaper recently. She’s very expensive. Dan Prasad: Yeah. TAMAR: Good for her. Dan Prasad: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I saw some of the posts she did, a few people have really sort of, she’s helped a few people get their sense of smell back so that’s kind of interesting as well. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. That was really fascinating. They talk about how she sends them home with their own concoction and I’m just like [sigh] because I’m still new. Dan Prasad: Yeah she’s over the moon in terms of those things happening. TAMAR: I have to ask you, how did you, I know because I’ve shared my story but it’s not like I’m going overboard with hashtags. LinkedIn is a very hard place to share this stuff in general and I guess you’re surrounding yourself with the fragrance people on LinkedIn, but how did you come across my story and all that stuff? Because I know we did meet there and we’d been conversing there. Dan Prasad: It just popped up. It just popped up on the feed. TAMAR: Oh, wow. So the algorithm seems to be very, very… I guess I have to post more about, I don’t know, because I post more about mental health more than fragrance in general. But I guess posting about, it’s interesting. It’s interesting how they consider it. Dan Prasad: Yeah. Most of my connections on LinkedIn are uh, I don’t even know if it’s the majority but a lot of them are fragrance related people so I don’t know. It just popped up one day and it’s super interesting so I started reading and reacting to your, you know how it is, you reacting to someone’s stuff and then every time there’s something new that comes that’s on your feed again, so. TAMAR: Yeah, and I’m grateful for that, I will say, because it’s so hard to share this stuff and just a thumbs up makes a world of difference. Dan Prasad: No doubt because sometimes I say to you of what you’ve put on, no one’s says— TAMAR: No one says anything. It’s because it’s so raw. Dan Prasad: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s right. TAMAR: I feel for folks and people are saying, some people message me like, “are you OK? Why are you sharing this on LinkedIn?” I’m like, “because humans use LinkedIn.” I don’t know how to answer that, honestly, because they think about it as such a professional network that you shouldn’t ever integrate your private life there. But nowadays I feel like covid has kind of forced that, thrust us into that. We really need to— Dan Prasad: Think about it. LinkedIn has changed its whole platform to being much more of a social thing more than just a business thing now, it’s all integrated, intertwined now. TAMAR: Yeah, it certainly is. But that doesn’t mean the expectation is really. The alignment in terms of what people want to use LinkedIn for. I just did a podcast with my friend Tris a few weeks ago. And he’s like, why are you sharing this stuff on LinkedIn? That was the point of our conversation. He wanted me to explain that we’re marrying the fact that t’s not just about the professional self and the little the little sliver of yourself that you’re going to communicate, but it’s about really showing that we are people, and especially now when we’re at home and we’re on a Zoom call and your kid is in the background like mine right now, I can hear him. He’s upstairs and he’s I don’t know if you hear this, but he’s like stomping on the floor. It’s right above my head. This is the reality we’re dealing with. We should embrace it. Dan Prasad: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it. There’s so much interesting stories when it comes to fragrance, not just mental health, but just how things have produced one thing and the nature of the whole, as a matter of fact, sorry, from the growers all the way to the farm of product and the journey these, all the stuff takes. This is why I’m connected to so many people within the industry from A to Z so I just find the whole thing fascinating. TAMAR: Yeah. I’m trying to figure out where like where to go. I guess I would want to take a step into your home. What is your home fragrance right now? Dan Prasad: I like the kind of woody, spicy fragrances. They’re my favorite. All those combinations, the leathers and the sandalwood and the agarwood and all that sort of thing. Both of them are my favorite combinations. It’s more than the florals and stuff that’s sort of musk and sandalwood is sort of based off of it. That’s my favorite combinations. [TAMAR: OK.] So you’ve always smelled that kind of thing coming out of my house. TAMAR: Yeah. Do you put on perfume or cologne or do you just limit to—. Dan Prasad: Yeah, I do, I do. I’m not someone who goes out actively looking for that kind of stuff much. Usually, a friend will recommend and say “try this” and give me half a bottle. Some of my friends, have got like, you walk into their place and they’ve got like 200 bottles of perfume lying around or cologne [laughs]. TAMAR: Yeah, that’s me. That has unfortunately become me. If you ever said this to me three years ago that I’d be doing this, I would be like, you’re out of your mind. TAMAR: I think you you were the one who recommended that I share some videos of my life and I have, I have a few. The thing that I’m embarrassed about is that they say don’t put your perfumes in a bathroom because the humidity might not be good for your perfumes. Mine have seemed to last. And I have I have them in drawers and I have them in my bathroom. So I’ve been embarrassed to actually post these stories, the LinkedIn videos of my experience, because God forbid, somebody in the fragrance industry is actually going to post about her bathroom collection. Dan Prasad: Oh, I don’t think it matters, to be honest. However your media, you choose to get your story across, I think that video’s a powerful tool. That’s why most people use it. [TAMAR: Yeah.] It catches the attention pretty quick. TAMAR: It’s true. There’s just this purists out there that want fragrance to be this exclusive beauty product, but then again, that’s not who I want to be. I’m trying to be a product about: you wear it for yourself. You don’t wear it for anybody else. You don’t need to attract external approval. You need to feel good for yourself. Dan Prasad: Yeah, and ultimately that’s why you put, well, you would think that’s why someone would wear something in the first place is because they love it themselves first. Maybe they have a motive to get the attention from others with it, that might be there as well, but but ultimately, you gotta love it yourself, otherwise what the hell’s the point? TAMAR: Right. It’s annoying when you love something so much and then your significant other hates it. It’s funny because I will say that the fragrances I don’t like I give to my husband. Dan Prasad: Oh, OK. TAMAR: Because there is the body chemistry change. He’s really getting all my rejects and he seems to be OK with them. Yeah. Dan Prasad: Yeah, the body chemistry thing is interesting, how they’re even on yourself, how it can just change over time. Definitely. Smell the fragrance when you first put it on, and then, after a little bit of time, it can change, how it smells. TAMAR: Well, I think that always happens. I think top notes, middle notes and base notes are never, that’s, hopefully, unless you’re like a Juliette has a Gun one note fragrance show. What’s interesting is Juliette, she’s actually the brand that I’m having difficulty sniffing right now with the covid reaction. I’m not sure if that’s what it is, but, when you put it on, it could smell amazing on you, it can smell like crap on the person right next to you or just the opposite. But I don’t know if that’s a limit or whatever it is on how it’s being concocted. There’s layers to it. There’s whatever evaporates in the first 15 minutes and then within the first 15 minutes to two hours or so, or two to eight hours. It depends. And then the last two hours or so at the end. Dan Prasad: Yeah. What’s the general for people who’ve bought one of your two fragrances, what’s the general feedback you’ve been getting? Is there one that’s a lot more popular than the other, or is it pretty even? TAMAR: Right now it’s pretty even, but I get some interesting feedback. It depends because, the smoke in the vanilla is not an expected, it’s not what they’re expecting there. It’s different. And the pear and patchouli, people don’t even know what patchouli is. It’s supposed to be something you could never have had. It might have a memory to something, but it’s not something you can potentially base on a past memory. I was actually surprised. My mother hates one of them. I won’t say which one. She’s like “this one is not for me.” And then I’ve had other people who are like, “I love this more than anything, like a snowflake. And I’m just like, “Mom,” my mom is very plain Jane. So I think that’s part of the thing. I grew up never eating anything like really delicious, because my mother gave me the same plain, a little little bit of flavor, but everything was pretty bland, so my life was very bland. So it’s sort why I also I’m appreciating things more in life, food and everything else, since then, so yeah. Dan Prasad: Also the combinations of, the two combinations that you made, they’re pretty, they sound really cool together, regardless, even if you don’t have any idea of what the smell or the fragrance would be, but just the pear and patchouli and the smoke and vanilla, they actually sound really good together, so. TAMAR: Yeah. And I’m sure you would like them knowing that you have a nose for these things, I think you would love them. I wish I could ship them to Australia. I can’t ship them anywhere outside of the continental United States and Canada. And it’s super hard. I don’t know what struggles, if you have any struggles with that. But FedEx, you have to like take a training course and it’s super expensive and I already am doing everything right, so why do I need to take the course? Dan Prasad: Yeah. Fragrance can be, unless you’re one of those big players that ships stuff internationally and whatnot, these big corporations, companies, certain products, It’s the same with home fragrance. There’s some products in there that got a lot of restrictions on international shipping as well and I don’t understand why but there are. TAMAR: No, they think that it might blow up the plane or something because it has alcohol. Dan Prasad: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That kind of thing. That’s right. TAMAR: And I think to myself, it’s totally not that much alcohol. I think the requirement is like five liters or something like that, I’m shipping out like how many milliliters? Dan Prasad: Yeah. Yeah. TAMAR: It’s crazy. Dan Prasad: Yeah, interesting how it works. TAMAR: It’s been a fun conversation. I really enjoyed it. And I hope we conquered or tackled a lot of the fragrance convers—topics. If there’s anything that you want to add or how people can find you or learn about you and home fragrance, please share here while we have that chance. Dan Prasad: Oh, no worries, no worries. Nothing, not really. Just always interested to have interesting conversations with people. That’s the main thing I’m connecting with you and others about. Just chatting, get each other’s stories and how we see things. It’s always interesting to get other people’s perspectives and stories and relay it in relation to fragrance and what it means to them in their lives and how it’s affected them in their lives. I’m always intrigued by that sort of thing because it’s such a personal thing, the whole fragrance journey. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Dan Prasad: That’s the beauty of it. TAMAR: Yeah, absolutely. Dan Prasad: Like anything really, it’s an art form in its own. TAMAR: It really is. Dan Prasad: It’s so personal, like any type of art form is, some people are not going to actually get it or connect with it at all and not understand why someone else is so into something. But that doesn’t matter because it’s a very personal thing. But someone out there might connect with it and on a certain level, talk about it and express about it, so that’s why we share it with someone, that’s why we share it ourselves. TAMAR: Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah, I’m hoping that I can sell this concept more in the United States. If you have any thoughts on that, please, by all means, because yeah, like I said, culturally, it’s just not something that the United States embraces on a regular level to make that more of a mental health level, even with mental health being such a rampant issue, it should be easy to do. But I am doing it on a shoestring budget. That’s partially the string is even more frayed than it was before. [Dan Prasad: Yeah.] I had to be creative. Dan Prasad: Most definitely. I think there’s ways but we’ll talk more about it. It’d be cool to have another conversation in a few months and see how things are going. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely Dan. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much for taking the time and in your early morning hours. Dan Prasad: Not a problem at all.

Nigel Asinugo was once 435 lbs, ready to end his life because he felt like he needed to end it. But his support system came through, brought him out of his dark place, and now he’s in the Navy and crushing it.“Yesterday doesn’t exist. Tomorrow doesn’t exist. All that fucking matters is what you do right now.” ~Nigel Asinugo … “No one really knows what they CAN do until they’re in a position where they HAVE to.”Read More »

You may never know looking at all that David Henzel, a serial entrepreneur focused on conscious capitalism, has accomplished, but he was once an extraordinarily fearful introvert. Today, he’s let his shy past fall by the wayside, and keeps himself sane through living a life filled with good habits. [00:00:16.470] – TAMAR: Hey everybody, so excited. I have one of my old online, but I don’t know how to describe it, industry entrepreneurial type friend dudes here. David Henzel. I don’t know the best descriptor, but I’m really excited that you’re here. And thank you so much for joining us. [00:00:38.190] – David Henzel: Thank you for having me, Tamar. It’s good to catch up. [00:00:39.300] – TAMAR: Yeah. So, yeah, it really is. We have been doing that a lot lately, so I’m excited. I hope we can keep that cadence going. [00:00:46.680] – David Henzel: I hope that we will meet at conferences again on a regular basis as we did 10 plus years ago. [00:00:51.630] – TAMAR: Yeah. Well 10 plus years ago, because it’s funny, because once I had started having kids, I stopped traveling and then covid kind of kept you from traveling. So now we’re really looking forward to having that face to face. So I’m looking forward to that, too. In some way, we’ll have to figure out way that’ll happen. Hopefully there will be a South by Southwest next year. That’s something that that’s always exciting. Yeah. So where are you in the world? So let’s talk about our distance because we do have some. [00:01:15.390] – David Henzel: Yeah, I’m from Germany. I lived in Los Angeles for 8 years and now I live in Bodrum, Turkey. [00:01:21.900] – TAMAR: What, Turkey? I don’t even know, I didn’t even know you were in Turkey now. [00:01:25.690] – David Henzel: Yeah, after we sold MaxCDN, my wife wanted to go back to Germany so we’re closer to family and our daughter grows up with family. But I couldn’t go back to German weather conditions after eight years of L.A. and so we decided to move to somewhere that’s close to Germany but warm. My initial thought was Spain. But my wife has Turkish parents, so she preferred Turkey. Even though my my Spanish is much better than my Turkish, we decided, “happy wife, happy life,” [so] we decided to go here and we’re very happy here. [00:01:59.580] – TAMAR: Very nice. So what’s the city in Turkey? I never heard of it. [00:02:03.390] – David Henzel: Bodrum B-O-D-R-U-M. Um, it’s it’s a vacation destination where the wealthy Turks have their vacation homes. It’s as far south as far west as you can be in Turkey, close to the Greek Islands. We’re like twenty minutes from Kos. [00:02:17.700] – TAMAR: So how many languages do you know? Because you talked about Spanish and Turkish and English, German, I assume. [00:02:23.910] – David Henzel: I mean, English and German, then some Spanish and some Turkish. [00:02:30.570] – TAMAR: Wow. That’s pretty impressive. And you picked up Turkish? [00:02:36.010] – David Henzel: Yeah, I mean, my Turkish is very basic. I like go to restaurants and stores and say, “hey, how are you doing? blah blah blah,” like small talk stuff. No deep conversations. Initially, I was very ambitious when we moved to got like a a private tutor one hour a day to learn Turkish, but since all business is happening in English and abroad, I just lost interest. [00:02:58.330] – TAMAR: Oh, well, yeah, I’m starting to learn Spanish with the help of Duolingo and I feel it’s actually cool because I feel like maybe my level of Spanish is your level of Turkish, because I could like I could read things on signs. It says like viernes [Friday]. They talk about specific days of the week and when things are open and closed. The one time I had to understand and I didn’t understand, it [said] you have to wear a face mask, and that’s like it’s a weird word, but I’m getting there. Yeah. That’s not something that they teach you in like level one of Duolingo, the face mask part. But yeah, that’s cool. That’s cool. I guess if you if you ever wanted to get a little more fluent, you can either obviously, you can talk to the natives, but I don’t know if you have any reason to at this point, but Duolingo seems to supplement that pretty well, except you do have to execute. You have to actually talk. [00:03:49.650] – David Henzel: Yes, I like the app, I used it for a while as well. That’s cool. [00:03:53.530] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Well, I know we met, but I couldn’t give you the right introduction. I’m sorry. I know that some podcasts they have this lengthy introduction. I like to wing this. I want to make it casual. [00:04:07.770] – David Henzel: That’s totally fine. [00:04:07.770] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah, but but I can’t really give you the right introduction because you’re like this dude who does all the things. So talk about that because you have, when I talk about career trajectories on the podcast, some people are like, oh, a lawyer now a baker, and then I have, you. I don’t know what to do there because you’re everywhere, you do all awesome things. Tell me, how do you want to describe that? [00:04:33.150] – David Henzel: So I describe it by: let me tell you how we got here. Initially, I co-founded MaxCDN, the content delivery network, this is also how we met. I think back then you were at Mashable and we were the CDN providers for Mashable. I think this is how we got together, or via the WordPress community. We sold MaxCDN and I moved to to Bodrum, Turkey. And then I read this book called Conscious Capitalism, which talks about that the old way of doing business is that a business has to increase shareholder value, it has to make the owners of the business rich, and the new way, the conscious way of doing business is you take care of all stakeholders, meaning suppliers, employees, customers, community, the planet’s environment, all these things. And if you do this, then the business is the best vehicle to have a positive impact in the world. I thought that’s pretty awesome. I decided to go back into business and start an outsourcing company called LTD plus, we provide live chat agents and support agents for ecomm and SaaS companies. [00:05:38.500] – David Henzel: Then I bought TaskDrive, which my business partner Samir, who is also business partner at MaxCDN started because it’s also a people business. It’s lead research if you do outbound sales. Then I invested into shortlist.io to become a co-founder there, which is a agency for SEO and backlinks, and somehow ended up with a few more businesses that I invested and that I started. So I have this portfolio of businesses. Then I started to coach the leadership teams of my businesses to make sure they’re on their A game, and I couldn’t find the software that was doing what I wanted to do, and so I took the CTO of one of our businesses and to build me something which ended up being this coaching platform called Upcoach.com. And I showed it to a buddy of mine who is a very well-known coach. His name is Todd Herman. He wrote the book The Alter Ego Effect and I showed it to him, I’m not a coach by trade, but a business coaching software. What do you think about this? And he’s like, “that’s amazing. I want to invest and make this big” and I do want to end up with another business. And I’m really passionate about Upcoach, I think I’m most passionate about this one, because this allows me to have a positive impact in lots of people’s lives, because I can empower coaches to help more people better. And that’s why I’m super stoked about about this one. [00:07:10.160] – TAMAR: That’s awesome. Yeah, I didn’t realize that it was the impetus of that was reading this book about this conscious capitalism thing. But I think it’s so important and I mean, especially when we see the distribution of wealth right now and some of these variety of companies and how especially in the context of covid, the rich getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. I never like to make it too political, but I think it’s true. It’s true. I like the way that you’re philosophically aligned in a way that builds, that’s focused on the whole company versus the people at the helm. So I love that. I love it. I had no idea. [00:07:47.720] – David Henzel: Yeah, I do like being a net positive in the world, you know, even if you would take good care of your employees, etc.. If you sell cigarettes, then I think it’s it’s also not a good thing. You also I should do something that actually doesn’t harm the people or the environment and provide, I want to provide lots of jobs to lots of people. That’s why I picked an outsourcing business. My goal is to get to ten thousand employees. We’re only at three hundred right now, but steadily growing. So at some point in our 10 year goal is to to get to at least ten thousand and to provide a cool job, remote job with a good culture and put food on lots of people tables. This is like something that just gets me excited. [00:08:32.870] – TAMAR: Well, if there are hiring links, you want to bring yourself from three hundred to ten thousand, let me know. I’ll put in the show notes. [00:08:40.610] – David Henzel: Thank you. I appreciate it. Actually, we’re bringing everything together. I don’t know when this airs. Right now, I have all these different businesses and I’m bringing it all together under one umbrella, which is howwesolve.com, which is currently just a podcast. But I’ll have different resources, like my portfolio companies that help people scale their businesses, then content, blog, podcasts, webinars, etc., and then also masterminds around several topics to help people scale. [00:09:11.390] – TAMAR: I love it. [00:09:12.350] – David Henzel: It will be on howwesolve.com. [00:09:14.480] – TAMAR: You need to talk to the Gravity Forms guy. He also did this thing very overtly. I’m sure you’re familiar with who he is. Dan? I don’t know. [00:09:23.090] – David Henzel: I’m familiar with Gravity Forms. [00:09:25.100] – TAMAR: Yeah. So the background is for anyone who knows: he basically shirked his salary so that everybody can get seventy thousand dollars in his company. And I love that. It’s the same concept. It’s just one guy has the potential to make a million dollars and his staff has the potential. They’re making 20, 30. But if you could change that, if you can skew the scale and make it so that everybody’s on an equal level playing field, it changes everything and it makes people happier to go to work. Because you believe in, obviously the boss believes in you to do that and you believe in the company to show up. It does a lot of things. [00:10:06.200] – David Henzel: You can do things that the CEO can only make certain multiple of what the lowest paid employee does to kind of like keep the scale. But with some companies, it’s like I don’t know, the CEO of the company makes like a few thousand times more than an employee. [00:10:29.480] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, so, yeah, I think it’s great and I love that you’re doing it and I’m definitely going to be following along, you know what you need to do. I think it’d be kind of fun. You should you should journey this, you should document this journey from 300 to 10,000, like something like that. That would be fun. It’s a good goal. But then again, if that’s a hard thing and it’s funny, I was thinking of creating a site that will also make me accountable to some of the things that I want to do in my life to do. I’ve done it, but I haven’t done it as overtly, and I think the overtness is going to be the accountability. You’re talking about, the Managing Happiness stuff that’s like an accountability component. I think everything in my life right now requires accountability. [00:11:15.260] – David Henzel: It just become so much easier if you have accountability in your life, for example, working out. I’m pretty driven to work on a regular basis. I work on three times a week like clockwork. But only since I got the personal trainer, I really became much fitter because he pushed me to do even more. When he’s not there, then it’s like, “yeah, I’ll just go running today.” I will not push me so hard. But if he’s there, he just murders me for an hour and a half and he always shows up at six a.m. in the morning. He’s in front of my door. [00:11:47.060] – TAMAR: Oh, wow. [00:11:47.540] – David Henzel: And then even though if I didn’t sleep well, I went to bed late or whatever, there’s like no excuses. He’s there and I just do it. [TAMAR: Because you got to make it happen.] It makes it so much it easier. [00:11:56.090] – TAMAR: Yeah. So I’ve been toying around with this idea. I know I talk about this in the context of Tamar the perfume brand, but my perfume brand is a mental health perfume brand. But I think mental health also comes from a component of physical health. So I’ve been thinking of like sort of an offshoot with this concept to kind of create a social network that kind of has the fitness and health accountability. So weight loss, if weight loss is your goal, or just fitness. I know Strava exists. I know MyFitnessPal exists. I want a hybrid of both with a lot more visuals. [00:12:30.260] – David Henzel: OK, you’ll like Managing Happiness, which hopefully you’ll join on the next cohort, which actually, I didn’t mention in the things that I’m doing. It’s a group coaching to help people to figure out their personal mission, vision, and core values, to figure out their goals, what they want to do the next 10 years, one year, 90 days, 60 days and this week to kind of really break it down and then the habits that they need to actually achieve this. Their goals, because I’m a big believer that habits determine everything in your life if you’re rich or poor, happy or unhappy, obese or in shape, it all boils down to which habits you cultivate. My big vision for Managing Happiness is to become something like Toastmasters for itself, organized groups where people hold each other accountable, that actually doing the stuff that they’re setting out to do, help each other to figure out what are these things, who do I want to be and to become, have a definite purpose in life, aka their mission and their vision, and having like a peer group that holds some accountability, move towards this. I think that’s super important that you don’t drift in life, that you kind of figure out what you want and that you go for it. [00:13:40.430] – TAMAR: All right. Yeah, no, I love it, I love it and, you know, so the thought process that I have is really like sort of like an integrated tool that you ask yourself questions, but it’s sort of like the stuff that you’re going to be coaching about. But like it’s in like the social network format where everybody is like it’s very feed driven. So I’m going to I’m going to I want to talk to you about this separately offline because it’s so early. I was reading, I have it on my desk right now Nir Eyal’s book Hooked. I don’t know why, it’s literally how to build habit-forming products. I’m not trying to build like when I was thinking about it, I was the only thing I had in my mind was the Tamar perfume. Tamar is a potentially habit forming product, but it’s not going to be a habit forming product, really. When I started reading this, it was about Pinterest and Twitter and Facebook and Google and the sites that people are using on a regular basis. All of a sudden, I hit chapter three and I’m like, wait a minute, I wanted to be accountable to myself in the fitness realm. And I am. I’ve been diligent since December 24, 2018. Every single day I show up and I walk and I run. But can I do more? Even those of us who are so committed to our health might actually have like a month or two where we really deviate from our path. Is there a way, and then and then all of a sudden either you spiral out of control or you get control, you redirect yourself and you actually start finding yourself. I want to potentially avoid those issues because if you spiral out of control, you might be totally screwed and I mean, if you’re redirected, you’re in a better place. I needed my own redirection. And this is a means—[David: I have some hacks for this.] Yeah. Yeah, I would love to hear it. We definitely should talk about this. This is not the context of the podcast, but maybe we should discuss it. I don’t want to talk about it now. I mean, totally. But I want to we probably should sync up as well. I want to run this this concept by you because it’s early. But I think habits and it’s mental health and mental fortitude and physical, all this stuff comes in tandem. Really, you and I, I know, we totally align with the stuff. So feel free to elaborate now if you want. If not, we can— [00:15:44.760] – David Henzel: Yeah, really really quick. I have a restart routine once I fall off the wagon, I’m not sticking with my habits. I have this self-care restart routine, like get the massage, get a haircut, whatever, get a manicure, pedicure. I would do something that’s good, makes you feel good: self-care. And then from next day I’m jumping back onto your game. OK, now we have reset and then I jump back on the good behavior. And I have an early warning sign for my habits, which is my inbox zero. If I’m not at inbox zero for like three or four days or a week, then I know that I’ll have too much on my plate and have to kind of reconfigure stuff, take something off my plate. Otherwise I will fall off the wagon with my good habits. [TAMAR: Yeah] Like the canary in the coal mine that tells me that I’m pushing it too much. [00:16:36.140] – TAMAR: Interesting. Interesting. So I’m an inbox zero person and I get it. I have to do the same thing. I have to snooze my inbox so I get it out of sight, out of mind and it gives me like a refresher. So that’s my little hack for that. Self-care is always a big part of my life, but, I can’t figure out if, for example, if I feel like I have to have some chocolate, sometimes that chocolate will be a few days longer than I expect, so I don’t know how to reset myself mentally for that. But if you were to, the thought process of where I’m going in, this is if you were to articulate to yourself why you’re having this food and then you ask yourself how you feel after that and you start reinforcing the good and the bad, and hopefully it becomes more habitual. There’s some science to it. There’s some stuff that I’ve been kind of reading and studying up on in the last 12 months that lends itself to that. I’ll share also this concept with you a little more. [00:17:26.120] – David Henzel: Yeah, please, looking forward to it. [00:17:27.590] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would love to, if I assume I end up doing something like this, I would probably need some beta testing, so I’ll send it out to you. I’ll keep you posted. We’ll see. I mean, this is this is the first time I’m talking about on the podcast. It’s literally like something that just hit me and I’m like I should have been an end user for this. I’ve been thinking about journaling, this kind of stuff anyway. If there’s a means of having a journal that’s more community driven and aggregated and everybody supports each other, that ties into the Hooked philosophy of social reinforcement. Why not? So that that was anyhow, that’s where I was going. Yeah. All right. [00:18:03.260] – David Henzel: Cool. [00:18:04.670] – TAMAR: Let me deviate and shift on the podcast side. I know we talked about your rise above adversity, which is something I think is very relatable for a lot of people. But I think at the same time, we like it’s very unique because we struggle. A lot of us struggle. I do, even. So talk about your story. [00:18:27.140] – David Henzel: So I used to be very introverted or shy, which was holding me back a lot in business especially. I noticed this when I moved to America. And, you know, people here more are more extroverted than people in Germany. I felt it was really holding me back, I was even uncomfortable in a conference call. It was ridiculous. Actually our mutual friend Syed kind of like really showed me how he went to a lot of conferences and [from] where he was as well, and seeing how he was networking and how he was just acting. It was like, “holy cow, this is so effective.” [00:19:02.770] – David Henzel: And it’s actually fun. So I want to really change this introvertedness to to be more extroverted. And I did it by two things, which, one was kind of exposure therapy, doing, going to networking events, two a week in L.A. and just like talk to everybody and their mom until I was kind of over it. And then Toastmasters, which is like a club where you learn how to public speak. toastmasters.org. It’s pretty cool. It costs next to nothing and they’re pretty much everywhere. I did this also twice a week and it’s kind of helped me to overcome. But the real change happened when my yoga teacher said “everything in life you have to do out of love or fear, and if you do it out of love [it’s] the right path and fear, the wrong path,” and this was something I always knew deep down inside, but I couldn’t articulate it. And she gave me the tools to articulate this. [00:19:51.510] – David Henzel: And, you know, ever since, you know, I used this, for example, being on the podcast or speaking on stage in front of a lot of people, I would have never done this before, but now if I do this, I can give a good presentation when I think about the audience and how I can provide value to them and make it about them. Like what they can see. What I say here can help them in their life and their business or whatever. I provide value to them, then I’m acting out of love, versus if I’m acting out of fear, and only think about me. I think, do people think I have a weird German accent? Do people think I look weird? Do people think what I’m saying is stupid? Then I freeze and I can’t give a good presentation. So that’s the thing in my mind that just makes everything easier. In sales, I used to hate sales with a passion, because I always felt like a used car salesman, but if I sell out of love because I know this product, what I have here can really help you to help you in your life and your business, then I can even be pushy and say, “hey, Tamar, freakin buy this. Freaking do Managing Happiness, I think you’re going to get a lot out of it” versus if I sell out of fear because I sell because I have to hit my numbers, I have to pay my mortgage, whatever, if is the motivating factor, then it’s going to be super hard for me to do it. And the other person will also feel where I’m coming from. I could go on with examples about this, the love and fear thing, but that became my mantra and has been really powerful for me to get easier through life. [00:21:23.620] – TAMAR: I’m actually a big fan of Toastmasters, it is close to nothing. It’s like thirty dollars a year. And you have weekly meet ups with a specific agenda and you public speak, you talk in front of people. They’re very mindful of how you talk, so you have to avoid those filler words like umm, you know, and like. You get scored on these things based on, the audience listens. So now you’re making me think I have to start talking like a Toastmaster instead of casually. That might change my podcast philosophy here. You’re supposed to avoid saying things like saying things like saying things like say—you want to avoid those types of things as well, repeated words. That was intentional, just in case you were wondering. And it’s very, it’s great. It happens to be very difficult to do. But you do have to make more of a conscious investment in your articulation, which to me is not very natural so you can’t really do it normally. But at the same time, it’s the fact is you are standing up in front of a group of people and there’s some sort of agenda whether or not it’s prepared or more improvisational, that’s the difference. So I think that’s great. Are you still involved in that? [00:22:39.530] – David Henzel: I haven’t done Toastmasters in a long time, I looked at the one here. They have only one in Istanbul, an English speaking one in Istanbul. Where I am, there is none. I would have had to start one and didn’t feel like doing this. But yeah I love Toastmasters, I think it’s totally cool. [00:22:57.240] – TAMAR: I was actually thinking of doing one as well in an area that was a little more convenient to me. Not that the one that is is not. It’s literally like a mile and a half down the road. It’s just the timing and stuff wasn’t so great. So I stopped doing it. I also just, I gave birth to my child. So it just like I couldn’t. I had to choose one over the other. And I guess the easy decision was that. But globally there are much more difficult to access and you have to put an investment in that. I was curious to know, given that you’re not involved in any more, you don’t really know. I was curious to know how how they transitioned in the context of covid. [00:23:35.730] – David Henzel: Oh, I’m still in Facebook groups of the previous groups. They just do them on Zoom. [00:23:42.630] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. So it seems like it’s more practical for it to be more global reaching. It was always one of the things you had to do it in person. And I always thought, “oh, we need to do it face to face.” I didn’t want to do the face to face thing and I always wanted to do the remote thing. So I wonder if what they’re seeing and in terms of attendance, based on the fact that people it might be more accessible to other people, especially locals near you, who might be interested in such a program like that where they don’t have a local chapter which is close and is able to serve them. I wonder. [00:24:19.680] – David Henzel: Yay remote work. The positive side of covid. [00:24:23.940] – TAMAR: Yeah. So how did you, just curious, going back to the networking thing. How, I mean, finding those, just to get two a week. I mean for me, right now I can’t even fathom one a week. How did you, we’re in April 2021, so it’s seems just so far off to have these networking events. But how are you finding those? Just were they random? Were they aligned with your business? [00:24:52.680] – David Henzel: Yeah, yeah. It was always like some marketing thing, SEO thing, tech thing. In Los Angeles, it was like a meet up. There used to be meetups like there’s no tomorrow or conferences, etc. So there was a lot of stuff to go to. [00:25:07.710] – TAMAR: Yeah. Well, I guess L.A. lends itself to a lot of that as well by nature of where it is. I never pursued that in New York just because right now I don’t live in the city, but I always knew that there were always things I just was never so keen on. It would be commuting wise, would just be already like two or three hours. [David Henzel: Can’t do that.] I don’t live that far away. It’s just that, you know, just the nature of the beast. Even though I love those events, I consider myself pretty introverted, too. I don’t know if I could get from where you go from introvert to extrovert. I think I’d be in the middle. But there are sometimes where there are events. I’ll have a conversation with one person. I’ll be like, that’s a win. [00:25:58.010] – David Henzel: No no no, I talk to everybody. [00:26:00.250] – TAMAR: Yeah, that’s awesome. Good for you to be able to do that. Do you have any advice on anybody trying to get there? Besides the steps that you’ve taken? Because that thing your yoga teacher taught you about doing things out of love, out of fear, how to break out of that mindset, that was it for you. But what do you think for other people? [00:26:23.340] – David Henzel: For me, when I talk to another, before I was taught, again, love and fear. I talk to somebody who they think that they probably don’t wanna talk or they probably think whatever I’m weird or whatever. The fear aspect. But if I see this person, I see, “oh, there’s another human that I can provide value to,” and ask a few questions to see if there is like a hook that I can bring in my area of expertise or like if I can help this person. It’s always about like, how can I provide value to this person. If this is what you think about, then the fear of introvertedness goes away at least for me. [00:26:58.210] – TAMAR: I like that. I think everybody wants to help. So I think it’s true. [00:27:02.971] – David Henzel: When you can provide value. [00:27:04.220] – TAMAR: Yeah, and I will say I’ve gotten a lot of help from you and I’m very grateful. So thank you. And you’re like you’re extraordinarily altruistic in many, many ways. There’s a lot to emulate, because you’re just very inspirational. So very cool. Thank you. [00:27:22.600] – David Henzel: Thank you so much. Make me blush. I’m German. I can’t take compliments. [00:27:27.050] – TAMAR: We can’t see each other anyway, because right now I do see your, we’re on Skype for the record, and I see you’re holding a tiger head or something. [00:27:36.740] – David Henzel: Oh, that’s you remember the MaxCDN mascot. [TAMAR: Oh, it’s a MaxCDN.] The MaxCDN cheetah. It’s a real live thingy. It’s actually really funny story. We had an intern back then. I think it was even South by Southwest. I think where we saw each other last. We had the the cheetah costume and we were preparing the GDC Game Developers Conference and we were preparing the trip, and the booking, the tickets for people, etc., all the stuff that we need for the booth. My intern at the time reads through the list of people who are attending and he speaks out loud, “I wonder who’s going to wear the cheetah costume.” And he goes like, “fuck” because he realized it was him. Sorry for cursing on you, on the show. Yeah. [00:28:23.920] – TAMAR: Oh, yeah. I didn’t realized that because it’s sort of cut off. But yeah, that’s reminiscent and it’s funny. I guess, have you gotten a haircut yet since the last time we saw each other because you have very short hair [in the icon]. [00:28:38.680] – David Henzel: I have covered hair. I had my first haircut today in like a year and some. I have really long hair though. [00:28:45.940] – TAMAR: Is it still long? So you’ve got your covid haircut. That’s still long. You just got to trim. [00:28:51.190] – David Henzel: I just got it trimmed. It’s still really long. [00:28:54.550] – TAMAR: Okay, well, good for you. Yeah. [inaudible] So I don’t even remember you, this is such a long time ago. This is what happens with this technology that’s that still works for podcasting. And yet it’s really old technology. Like you said, you haven’t used Skype in years. I only use Skype for, well, that’s actually interesting, I work with some Asian companies, Pakistan, and they’re still using it, but there’s the software that I use happens to do good stereo recording if I use it only on here. I can’t do it on Zoom. The Zoom quality doesn’t meet my criteria and I can’t do it on Google Meet. So this is it. And I’m happy with it. [00:29:34.230] – David Henzel: But it works. It works. [00:29:36.040] – TAMAR: Exactly. All right, cool. Yeah. So let me let me ask you the final question, because I know you talked about how your make yourself accountable. Self-care, I guess, fitness for you is part of self-care. Working out. Talk about a little bit more about your self-care regimen, what you do when you work out, for example, and what that looks like. [00:29:55.450] – David Henzel: Yeah, self-care is more than just the workout. It’s a very key thing to work out on a regular basis. Just if you have little endorphins being produced and other things in your body that make you feel bad being destroyed. But for self-care for me, as I mentioned, I’m a habit nerd. Planning the next day, super crucial for me, so I know what I’m doing the next day. Inbox zero, super important. Eating the frog, meaning doing the task that I least likely want to do the first thing in the morning, are really important for me. Then yoga, meditation on a regular basis, also everyday. Not eating after 9pm, really important, because if I eat after 9:00 p.m. it’s not about gaining weight, it’s about getting an energy boost and then not going to bed until like 2am, and then, my trainer’s in front of my door at 6am, it doesn’t really work that well. Then I have a gratitude rock that I use every day in the morning. I pick it up and then go through the things I’m grateful for. And then at the end of the day, I go through the things that went great this day. And the Maui habit, which is from the book Tiny Habits, which is in the morning, you just get up and tell yourself “today it’s going to be an awesome day.” So this, you know, just kind of walks you through my habits of the day. This is the thing that makes me be on my A-game and feel good. [00:31:23.280] – TAMAR: I love it, I love it. I’m very aligned with you in so many different things. I use the, it’s an open source app right now called Loop Habit Tracker. Very, very obsessed with it right now. The gratitude thing. I have another app I’m looking at, Presently. I journal every single day what I’m grateful for and I try to make it different. I try to, every single day I want to realize that my life isn’t about like the same constant stuff to be grateful for my family, my friends, like, for example, I’m just going to open my app right now: What was I grateful for yesterday? A walk with a friend. Getting started on the thing that has been driving me insane. You talked about how you do the thing that you least want to do first thing in the morning. Well, I’ve been procrastinating on the one thing like I don’t usually do. I never procrastinate. But this is one thing that, like, is totally, totally giving me so much anxiety. I started doing that yesterday. So, like, those are like things that, you know, I articulate that. Inbox zero, very, very similar. All the things, though. I like that. I like that we’re very, very aligned in our goal settings and what we try to get done in it. It totally makes you feel better. One hundred percent. So really, really cool. And you have a lot of things, food for thought and you’re very succinct in how you articulate what you’re saying and what you’re doing. So it’s great. [00:32:39.720] – David Henzel: We have in Managing Happiness or in Upcoach, we also have a group habit tracker because we talked about accountability before, having this positive peer pressure where people see if you’re doing your habits or not. It’s like another reason to push you to be good. [00:32:57.890] – TAMAR: It is. It is. Accountability so important, I think people don’t realize that. I don’t know when you have to realize that, you have to hit a certain age, like in your 20s, you don’t care at all. But when you’ve hit your 30s and 40s, you’re like, “wait a minute. I can live my best life. I just have to do things the right way,” Live your best responsible life for your family. [00:33:16.730] – David Henzel: When you’re young, it’s more like negative peer pressure. And now, accountability equals positive peer pressure. [00:33:22.280] – TAMAR: Yeah, I like that. I like the way you put that 100%. And it’s so great, especially when you have a group, a regular cadence with individuals that that changes everything. It totally, totally changes everything. So my recommendation is for anybody out there who wants to do something, you have to have, first of all, it shouldn’t be one on one. I don’t recommend one on one. I think there should be a group of people. And you have to regularly reinforce that by showing up. So everybody needs to show up. You and I talked about this separately, but like, I have two accountability groups, one with four women every single Wednesday. It’s the accountability to myself as a founder, and then I have another one actually on Thursday has just ended and it’s seven guys and me. So I’m the only woman. But the fact is, once you start the rapport, in the beginning it’s just meh, you don’t really feel it. And then like maybe by the third and the fourth you’re like, “oh, I’m starting to derive value.” And then you’re like, that’s the one thing you might look forward to the entire week. It can’t be forced. It can’t be like a team meeting with your colleagues. You need to do this for yourself and not do it for everything else. And I think it changes everything in terms of mindset. [00:34:35.120] – David Henzel: Yes, it’s very powerful. I can confirm, it’s highly recommended. It’s going to push you to be on your personal best. [00:34:43.070] – TAMAR: Yeah. So take take take a look Upcoach if you want to build something like that, because David has has the solution for you. [00:34:50.300] – David Henzel: ManagingHappiness.com, in case if you want the mission, vision, values, and habits and also accountability coaching. [00:34:56.402] – TAMAR: ManagingHappiness.com. Yup, you got it. Cool. So I got I got one final question for you. And the question is, if you can give an earlier version of David some advice, what would you tell him? [00:35:11.030] – David Henzel: It would be figuring out the love and fear thing earlier and a very personal thing, but my mom passed away like seven years ago or so, eight years ago, and I wish I would have spent more time with her, not being so focused on work. And also, you know, we moved to Los Angeles and she was still in Germany. Well, one of the regrets that I have. I think, kind of being really mindful about what matters. [00:35:36.970] – David Henzel: Also maybe another advice: finding early in life what you really want out of life and what you want to do, because most people are like a leaf in the wind, and also figuring out what actually YOU really want, not what the dream of the world or society or whatever [wants], kind of keeping up with the Joneses or just gotta figure out what’s what’s your thing, and then everything becomes much clearer and easier. This is what what I would tell 15 year old David. [00:36:09.470] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. It’s powerful stuff. And I’m sorry to hear about your mom and yeah, that’s tough. [00:36:16.880] – David Henzel: I have a condition called aphantasia. I think we talked about this. [00:36:21.530] – TAMAR: Yeah, we talked about this in a previous call. [00:36:24.470] – David Henzel: Yeah. I cannot in my mind, it can’t create images. So when I close my eyes and think of what happened, I can’t see anything. Everything in my mind is text based. And this also has a side effect for me because I have an extreme case of aphantasia. I can also not relive feelings. Which also makes it, I don’t have trauma. When my father died, when I was 12, it was sounds like a dick, but was not not really hard for me, I just accepted it. But my brother is still suffering from it, so it’s like a positive side effect of this condition. [00:37:03.590] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, wow, it’s crazy how everybody’s minds are like how they process things is so variable. And, you have some people who are like, oh, you know, they can never drink this habit stuff, this habit following Kool-Aid, which is great, Kool-Aid. It tastes the best. It’s the healthiest. But then there’s other people who are just like completely, you have to be in the right headspace, but I think there are some things that are changeable and some things evidently aren’t and it’s just insane. It’s fascinating all the same. Yeah, cool. So where can people, you mentioned a bunch of these websites, but if somebody wanted to follow or find you, contact you, what’s the best recommendation you got there? You can check out howwesolve.com, there you’ll find all my portfolio companies, they can also check out DavidHenzel.com. Actually, now you can check out Henzel.com which I just bought, I’m very happy about. I paid, I got a good deal, I paid thirty seven hundred. I would prefer my first name even though my first name is pretty common, don’t think this would fly. [00:38:08.870] – TAMAR: I know who owns it! I know who owns david.com. [00:38:12.530] – David Henzel: Really? [00:38:12.950] – TAMAR: Yeah, he’s in the industry. I met him at a few Mashable meet ups. [00:38:22.460] – David Henzel: Oh, David. It’s the founder of the phone system Grasshopper? [00:38:30.650] – David Henzel: Hold on a second. Why do I have? I haven’t spoken to him in so long. Gotta find this dude. David Blumenstein. Why do I say that? Yeah. So he’s not, he just, I don’t know what he did. But yeah, it’s funny, there’s so many people who have mentioned this that I’ve always said, “oh, I know the guy!” But I know the guy who owns it. I have a David. My son is David. My grandfather’s David. I’ve lots of Davids. There’s definitely a lot of people who want that domain. I can tell you that. Yeah, but Henzel is the next best thing. So yes. [00:39:09.370] – TAMAR: And you said howwesolve.com? I want to make sure because you said it quickly and I want to make sure it’s transcribed. [00:39:16.930] – David Henzel: Howwesolve.com. [00:39:17.410] – TAMAR: Yes. OK, perfect. Awesome. All right. Well that sounds good. Anything else you might want to add and share? [00:39:25.190] – David Henzel: No, just make decisions of love, not fear. Do yourself a favor and leave a comment and like the podcast. It helps to promote it. Do Tamar the favor. [00:39:34.580] – TAMAR: Yeah, absolutely. Share the podcast. I don’t really have buttons on my social posts. I guess you can go right on Spotify and iTunes. [David Henzel: on Spotify and iTunes] [00:39:43.190] – David Henzel: Go in there, leave a review. [00:39:44.540] – TAMAR: That’s a good point. Yes, good idea. Thank you for the recommendation. I don’t even I don’t promote it. I think about it on my platform versus on the platforms that I distribute to. So good thought. Cool. Awesome. Well, thank you so, so much, David. This is fun. I enjoyed it. [00:40:00.660] – David Henzel: Likewise, Tamar, thank you very much. Yeah, forward to having you on the Managing Happiness group, and let’s chat soon [00:40:04.890] – TAMAR: Cool, thank you, all right, take care.

Where does one start with Chris Owens? Once 302 pounds, he put a renewed focus on his health, traveled across the country to take care of his ailing grandparents, got engaged, and now is working to get in the Army. TAMAR: I am so excited. I’m bringing you Chris Owens, another one of my David Goggins groupies. He and I met, but he is like the sweetest, coolest guy here. We’ll share his story, like his background, it’s really fascinating. I definitely it’s funny because Chris and I were supposed to podcast like six times, maybe more like two. But he’s had a lot of stuff going on in his life. So he’s going to share all of that. I hope I’m putting you on the spot here, but thank you so much for joining us. Chris Owens: I like it. I like I like getting thrown right into the lion’s den. It’s the only way to do it. TAMAR: That’s right. That’s right. Yeah. Yeah. So where are you physically in the world. Chris Owens: Physically in the world? So, depending upon where you want to start at, basically I’m just recovering from about 16 months ago now and November 4th, 2019, I had an almost fatal vehicular accident. Apparently what I was told was I had a seizure, but I don’t actually remember being told that, unfortunately. Nevertheless, I hit a semi truck on the highway fully loaded, and I’ve got pictures on Facebook and things like that, just a reminder and so forth. Chris Owens: But I at one point in time, like Goggins, I was 302 about six years ago, three hundred and two pounds. I had a micro lumbar discectomy. I was out of shape and just I started listening to David, a lot of the different motivational things like Admiral Craven, some different stuff, and just started trying to change my life and the impact of that semi, I’ll never forget it. TAMAR: Wow. Wow. So, so OK. So going back, where are you? You’re in the U.S., but where you’re like somewhere. I don’t know what time zone. What state? Chris Owens: Yes, ma’am, no, absolutely. I’m in Oregon. I’m in the Portland area more specifically, so Pacific. TAMAR: Cool. Cool. Awesome. Awesome. OK, so I don’t even, yeah, like I said, I have no idea where to start. Chris Owens: For sure. I can certainly go with it and take over with with whatever we need to do. So as far as my life goes, yeah. I had a real rough childhood growing up. I won’t go too much into it. But I was I was molested by my father. I was physically, emotionally abused by my stepfather, which is it’s made me a better man overall. Chris Owens: This made me a better father. If they were around, I would I would say thank you for doing a service and making me a better man. So that’s kind of part of my past. Where I’m at now though, is I’m in a much, much better place. I’ve I’ve forgiven the past and let go of so many issues that I held onto for so long and that stuff tears you down. You can’t do that. It’s poisonous. TAMAR: It is 100 percent. So you’re like a caretaker for your grandparents. Talk about that for a minute, because I think it is fascinating. That’s awesome. Chris Owens: Oh, thank you, ma’am. Yes, ma’am. If you go back to with me a little bit on about 30 May 2020, I left North Carolina, about the Fort Bragg area, and came out to see them, and long story short, found out how bad it was with them both having cancer and wanting to help out they needed it. So I just went ahead and said, OK, you know, you guys are OK with me coming and staying here, then more permanently, let’s do this. Thankfully, we went through a lot of chemotherapy, radiation therapy with my grandmother. She had a seven inch mass near her liver and her spine. She ended up becoming completely cancer free. So we had a lot of success in that area. TAMAR: So awesome. Awesome. And then you got engaged. Chris Owens: So I did. I did. Thanks so much for bringing that up. So kind. My girlfriend at the time proposed to me. She’s an amazing, amazing woman, the best woman I’ve ever met in my life and could ever imagine to meet. And then of course after that, after going, I’m “man, I can’t let this stand.” So I got her a ring and then I proposed to her so and she thankfully and happily said yes. TAMAR: So awesome. Awesome, so did you meet her in Portland or where did—did she follow you? Yeah. Chris Owens: It’s kind of another story too, actually. We went to high school in Oregon City, Oregon. She was a year behind me. And oddly enough, we don’t recall each other really at all. But we had the same and similar friends. I actually reached out to her on Facebook. I saw something about her and saw that she was from Oregon City High School and something just kind of sparked there when we started talking and one thing led to another. It was just a really, really amazing connection. Just, she’s absolutely my best friend. So it’s very cool. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. So were you in touch with her from when you were in North Carolina or was that more recently? Chris Owens: No, ma’am. That was actually while I was just being caretaking from my grandparents in my downtime. It’s very cathartic for me to write and to express myself in different ways. And one of my outlets happens to be, like I said in writing, and long story short, we just started kind of talking and one thing led to another and went from there and today, just feeling like the absolute luckiest guy on earth. TAMAR: Yeah. Wow. Congratulations. That’s awesome. That’s very cool. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So you said you were in Fort Bragg. [Chris Owens: Near there, yes ma’am.] I guess my question for you there… you weren’t in the military per se. Chris Owens: I have a military background but no ma’am, I was I never technically, I can neither confirm nor deny any involvement. What happened, though, the gist of it was I was set up to, I went through a junior ROTC, was set up to go through all ROTC army and actually had a daughter and have a beautiful twenty one year old daughter that just, just turned twenty one is going to college and I’m very proud of that. TAMAR: I thought you were 21. I’m very confused. Chris Owens: No, no ma’am. I am about to be 39 here in May. TAMAR: I would never know that. You carry yourself as, as this very mature twenty one year old. Chris Owens: Thank you so much. Hopefully that’s a very good thing. TAMAR: No that’s a compliment. Trust me, it’s a compliment. Chris Owens: Terrific. I like to have the energy of a twenty one year old for sure. But yes. So I apologize, getting back to it. Yeah I had, I went through a long, tough battle custody battle. My daughter’s mother was not fit to parent at all at the time. She attempted suicide in multiple ways, one of which was a particular manner with my daughter in the car. Chris Owens: And so I stopped all things. I was very successful in managing some stores and retail stores and doing different things like that. And I had to kind of really put everything on hold because I felt the need to as a single father, there aren’t enough out there and then not following the same path that my fatherly roles did for me. So it was very, very important to me to make sure that I got 100% custody of her, so unfortunately, that halted a lot of those plans. However, I made a lot of incredible people. I’ve served with a lot of phenomenal, phenomenal people, and I’m very proud of that. TAMAR: Awesome, awesome, wow, good for you and I guess you have a good relationship with her. Where is she physically? Chris Owens: My daughter physically actually is in Vancouver, Washington. She currently lives with her half sister and is doing super well. I’m so proud of her. She’s just working her tail. She’s grinding all the time and I’ll text her up and say, “hey, you know, I love you, I miss you.” And she’ll be like, “Dad, I’m busy” and I’m just like, “well you just keep grinding, keep doing your thing. I’m proud of you. So I just try and stay in touch with her as much as I can. She’s twenty one. She’s got to do her thing. She’s she’ll live her life too. I have to respect that. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. I mean yes. She’s technically an adult now. Yeah. Chris Owens: Yeah. That makes me feel a little more grey. TAMAR: Oh wow, my oldest is eleven and I’m a year older than you so I’m just thinking in my mind. Just that gap, it’s like you could be like the same age. [Chris Owens: Absolutely.] As you come on 40 and in your late 30s, you start to realize that there’s like very little gap between the 30 somethings and the 50s and a 60 somethings because mentally you’re all in the same place. And when it comes to the younger, when it comes to your children, and especially when I start to think twenties, it’s like the gap is narrowing mentally. It’s weird to explain. Absolutely, it narrows and it expands at the same time. And it’s it’s a very complex and odd thing to witness, especially in different people. And if you really watch it, some people mature and everybody matures vastly different. It’s so crazy to see how people will blossom when they all blossom, because kind of like in the movie Moneyball is quoted something along the lines of I’m not going to get the right, but it’s one day we’re all told that we’re going to play this game, we’re going to end the children’s game, play the game as adult, whether or not that’s eighteen or that’s forty. But one day we’re all told that it’s kind of a cool quote. And to think along the lines of that, my daughter, I have ADHD and PTSD so I get a little off track, but with my daughter, it is pretty cool to know when and scary at the same time. As an adult and you reach that point of maturity or at least you think mental maturity, that your parents and you understand your parents are humans too, and that they that they fuck up. Pardon my language. TAMAR: Now, don’t pardon your language. This is a real, real podcast. Chris Owens: Yeah. Your parents, your parents fuck up. And and in all honesty, all parents are fuck ups lately, all none of us are perfect. So when they realize that, they go “shit! If this dude is human just as much as I am, then what the fuck does he have power over me?” So it’s kind of an empowering [thing], but it’s kind of scary, it’s it’s a real tricky double edged sword there. But that’s on how your perception [is]. So I just tend to think about a lot of the stuff like that. So but that’s a concern. And maybe some other things, too. TAMAR: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, I think I think it eventually all hits us. I think Facebook has also narrowed that gap as well, because when you start to realize that you’re posting in a forum, you don’t know the ages of people who are posting. But then you start realizing that some of the things older people say are so stupid. And then you click on their. You see that stupid post, and then you click on their face and they look like they’re eighty five. It’s not about that. We’re all eventually, we grow up and then we plateau, we all kind of do it. Everybody’s on the same plateau, some people with a higher intelligence than others. It’s really kind of fascinating. Chris Owens: It is fascinating to see, you’re one hundred percent accurate on point one hundred percent. think I posted something about actually Admiral William McCraven and a great video that he did a commencement speech, if I remember correctly, on an Oregon City high school alumni page. And I had a bunch of people liking it. I never posted on there before. But I figured hey if you’re an alumni, that’s where I went to high school. And let’s share some of this light. Let’s let’s illuminate the darkness where I can. And that’s one thing I like to do. I tend to feel unfortunately like it’s a mission of mine and it’s a soul crushing mission sometimes because you can really get hurt if you’re not careful. So you got a really toughen yourself. But nevertheless, I posted some and I had a bunch of haters hellbent on going, what is this of shit? It was funny because I had everybody back me up, I said something along the lines of, and don’t quote me on this, but it was like, “all I trying to do is like some light and make some positivity, at these dark days. And if you don’t like it, don’t read it.” TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, people don’t know that, people don’t think about that. Chris Owens: Their comments were going crazy. So it’s cool. It’s legit. So I never try. I don’t like when I hear stuff on podcasts and they were like “get off YouTube, get off that stuff.” Everybody’s got their thing. I get it. Don’t be addicted to it. Don’t get focused on that. I still grind all day long. I’m still working out and I’m still crushing it, I’m living life. But there’s certain stuff I go on. I want to chat, I want to talk with people, I want to help people out. So yeah. Like you’re doing like this is what you’re doing is awesome. I think it’s amazing. TAMAR: Yeah. And it’s hard and there are times it’s very uncomfortable. And there was a podcast that I did pretty recently that was just like. I don’t know if there’s a tie that I have is this I have to say, with one of my favorite self-care, because we really are having back and forth ribbing most people, it’s very difficult because a lot of people just want to start talking and talking and talking, and it’s no ability for me to interject and have a conversation, so I’m really I got to say, I’m extraordinarily thankful that we’re actually having that. So yeah. Chris Owens: Yeah, absolutely. I feel very comfortable. It’s rare that I don’t anymore, and I should correct myself on that. That’s my ego talking. There are a lot of times where I feel uncomfortable. But, you know what? It’s those times where you’re uncomfortable that you learn to grow. So you just do it. So not I think this is cool as hell and I’d be happy to ever if I was I was every reinvited back on I’d be honored. So it’s awesome. And I love to share with you so you can ask away anything you want to ask. I’m an open book. TAMAR: I’m going to keep tabs on you. Yeah, you were talking about how like people come and attack you on social. I haven’t spoken about this much, but I talk about like how I’ve been depressed and I was afraid of having, using my voice online. But part of that, I’ve been blogging and I’ve been in the social media world since before my friends really started owning computers. TAMAR: So I was able to build a thick skin in a very, very early age. When this whole covid crazy pandemic stuff happened, I decided to create a bunch of WhatsApp groups with my local community, people that I know face to face. And I I started coordinating, orchestrating food deliveries. [Chris Owens: Oh cool, good for you.] Yeah. Yeah. I’ve done more than one hundred and fifty so far. I can’t even keep track of it. It’s insane. It’s a very busy and I put on thirty pounds. I’ve lost most, most of it. But I think this week has been difficult for me mentally. But that being said, I coordinated all this food stuff and the thing is that no good deed goes unpunished and that really happens because you can never make everybody happy. And I’m starting to learn that. Steven Covey, he writes a book, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, and he talks about, he has that one picture, that optical illusion, where you don’t know if you see a young woman or an old woman. [Chris Owens: Yeah, yeah.] I’m starting to understand the perspectives. People have different perspectives than me, and I’ve started to really embrace that and appreciate that. But in the beginning, I had to be extraordinarily diplomatic in ways that I think rubbed people the wrong way, but in other ways that really had people patting my back and saying thank you so much. I was honored at a recent community [event] for the county. So like, you know, people obviously are recognizing the efforts. But I had somebody come and she picked up some some orders from me earlier this week and she said, I can’t believe what kind of attacks, like how you’ve been subjected to so much abuse in this community. And I said, I can handle it, I can stomach it, I can deal with it. It doesn’t affect me at all. I judge a few people, but otherwise I’m just like it’s just business as usual. It’s casual for me. Chris Owens: Who doesn’t judge? Honestly, you know what? I honestly, truly believe and I don’t mean to interject or interrupting you. [TAMAR: Oh, no, not at all.] But I truly believe that. And this is, I’ll say this about me. This has nothing to do about just like Goggins says, nothing to do about the fact that I do cuss and I do talk differently. I do. I have a different communication ability and level skill set than a lot of other possess. I will speak formally. I will talk openly, it doesn’t matter. And it’s all it’s all about just your own. Obviously you handle it very, very well. And I want to give you some mass kudos for that. It takes a lot of balls. And whether or not that’s a label or, you know, I mean. [TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. All labels.] You’ve got the courage and you’ve gotta own that shit. You’ve obviously done that. I’ve been through a lot of depression. I’ve been through a lot of anxiety with PTSD, regular anxiety. Seeing my doctors PT doctors lately. They’re like, “bro, you got some mileage on you, dog.” And I’m like, “that’s right.” And I got plenty more to go. There’s a lot more fuel in this tank and this engine ain’t quitting. And so mad respect for you. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I’ve had a number of people specifically say to me, I’m so angry for you. I’m like, don’t worry, I got this. Like, but I’m glad that, you know, they’re observing that because at the end of the day, while I can handle it, it’s still human behavior. It’s not necessarily a reflection of me. It’s a reflection of whatever insecurities they have. [Chris Owens: Yeah] Whatever they want to look like that publicly by all means. Like I said, there are judgments that I have to make privately, because these people know that their inaction is action enough. But nonetheless. Chris Owens: 100%. When you see somebody like with and I hate to be OK, so I’ll be real. I hate on the fact that I listen to Joe Rogan’s podcast. Right. I mean, I actually live with my ADHD, my PTSD, and I do smoke some pot. Unfortunately, that’s that’s one thing that helps the dichotomy in my life don’t sound. TAMAR: Don’t say unfortunately. It helps. It helps. I get it. Chris Owens: I’m in Oregon, it’s legal, and everything like that, unfortunately, is really frowned upon. And it’s got a negative connotation, which I really dislike. It pisses me off, actually. One thing that said in this said podcast, again, not quoting, but it’s basically like these dudes hate on, these guys, the haters that wake up and shake and bake and all this and then hate on him, on Joe Rogan for being in shape. But it’s like, you know what? I get the gist of that but I don’t like to be labeled like the uncommon thing. Don’t ever compare me to anybody. I am me. And so when we say judging, I think we all do that. We really do. We’re all going to have that prejudice. I don’t think it’s a bad thing. It’s a fight or flight instinct as well as some other things too psychologically and subconsciously maybe. I think that we are all looking at the next person that is coming by and we’re scanning, especially as that have got that warrior mentality and had been through different things that we had to stand up for those who can’t fight for the others or for themselves rather, and we’re all constantly got our head on a pivot. It’s always on a swivel. And so I don’t think that necessarily being prejudiced is a bad thing. I think that it can be. And making, kind of jokingly laugh, besides and say, “what is this girl wearing, pink tie dyed hair like do you have a job, fool?” You know, I think at the same time, you’re on to something, though, that’s a positive, that can be a life that can be illuminated into something that maybe if you’re looking at negatively, you’re saying “I’m being judgmental and I should not do that.” Maybe look at it as “OK. Maybe I’m just judging upon my safety and the safety of others.” [TAMAR: Yeah.] And if you look at the problem that you perceive and you can’t seem to figure it out, think of it instead of like a 2D image like maybe a 3D image. If you change the way you look at the problem, the problem will perceive differently, and so ultimately, the outcome will potentially, I would hope, ultimately come out differently. And you should be able to figure out your problem by looking at it from a different aspect. TAMAR: Yeah, the only judgment I’m really making, I really don’t judge. I’m going to be perfectly honest, I’m judging the assholes. I had I had some people who were kind of advocates for me in the beginning, the specific I’m actually thinking of a very specific group of people, two married people, and very advocate [of me] pushed the buttons in the right way, but kind of did it in a way that was supportive of me. And when I finally asked for the true support versus, you know, like give a long story short, when I helped the community, he’s like, you should collect tips for yourself because you’ve given so much of yourself, so I’m like “I don’t want to collect tips. I want you to support my perfume venture when I launch it,” because the Common Scents podcast comes from my perfume venture. Perfume took me out of depression. It was a whole mindset shift. And I said, “OK, when when I finally launch my perfume, I want these people to show up.” So I reached out to him, and I said hey, I launched my perfume brand, would love your support.” “Oh, I don’t do that.” Chris Owens: Oh hell no. TAMAR: Yup, yup, yup. Chris Owens: You have this this amazing gold. It’s not only cathartic, but it’s helpful. It’s profitable. Like is win win, win, win win and yeah, and dude’s like “I support you” and but then in the end once you say, “Yeah yeah, he dropped out?” TAMAR: It was all talk and inaction. He’s a local guy. In due time, I don’t know, I’m not really sure where I’m going with it, but he has been consistently invisible since and I think part of it is because I think he knows. I think his challenge is is “I don’t do that. But I don’t also support a campaign, like a pre launch of a product.” But now the physical product is out so there’s nothing to [hold back]. It was a crowdfunding campaign in the beginning. Now the product is here. So he can’t say “I’m not supporting something that’s like real.” I’m looking at it right now. Chris Owens: But it is maybe not something tangible and physical, right there, but OK, so this is a person has had your back, you said? TAMAR: He had my back in the beginning, but it was I think it was just all he was very busy with him [Chris Owens: For sure] with him trying to push my buttons in a way that, it was polarizing in the beginning because I took his advice. It was a long story. Whatever. Chris Owens: If I got you. What I was going to say, if I may, is a lot of times people are and it may not be the case in this case, but a lot of times to try and look at it positively, because I always try and do that, I always try. And no matter what, whether it’s raining and right now it’s crap outside in Oregon. It’s not all that warm, but I’ve been through worse and the sun is out there and it’s shining. So maybe this person like you was in there and gave you an idea to bounce off the spark, an idea. And that was all you needed. Unfortunately, yeah, the haters and the assholes, the flakes, they’re all going to be out there, but they’re going to be out there seeing people like you that are shiny and they’re going to try and take some of that light. And when they know they can’t take that light anymore or you won’t give them that light because they haven’t earned it, then they’re going to walk away potentially. [TAMAR: Yeah.] That might be just temporarily but that might be something that you need to have and then walk away kind of thing. TAMAR: So, you know, that’s an interesting parallel because the launch of my brand is the launch of my perfume. The discovery that perfume would save my life actually came from: I’ve had four children, but then I had postpartum depression, and during my postpartum depression, I was exploited by an individual who really needed me and I got a high. I got a massive emotional high by helping this individual navigate things like sex, drugs, jobs, every type, suicide, you name it all the big life problems like this person was a glut for drama so I dealt with all of these things and I helped them navigate them in a way that I think was very professional. But in a way, I was I was suffering. And in another way, I loved this. I totally clung to it. When you when your life sucks, the drama kind of makes it exciting, but then it just makes you just like, “why is this person always attracted to drama?” So I didn’t need to be. I could have just been somebody who was regularly like a fly on the wall. But this was a way that made me feel good. But then, when you’re—it’s hard to explain—when you’re so emotionally, I guess, spread so thin and like when you’re exploited in such a way eventually, especially when you’re already vulnerable and you’re already weakening in your suffering from a depression, in a way, eventually you’re not going to be able to, you’re not going to be—I would I was not emotionally strong at the at the end of this relationship than I was in the beginning of the relationship because I had been exploited. So… Chris Owens: So you get weakened. TAMAR: Yeah. And and eventually, I was completely, I was dropped like very violently. I was basically thrown into the freakin center of this well that I was already trying to climb out of, fell into my rock bottom. It destroyed me. I’m still thinking, I think about it every single day. I think about it. And this is three years ago. Yeah. So it’s totally the same thing but it’s not the same thing because it’s just one guy. This one guy. Chris Owens: What you want, in my humble opinion, would be some of the hardest things in life to do or change. None of us think change. Change is a challenge. We all want to sit in our comfy, La-Z-Boys and be and live in our comfort bubble. And unfortunately, success lies outside of the comfort zone. And that’s the only way that you’re also going to grow or die and all that good stuff. But I think in having personally been cheated on in almost every single one of my relationships, unfortunately, or they just they just ended in an informal fashion from somewhere, Anyway, I won’t go into that. But again, when I talk to my grandfather about something, it almost takes heed to this. I think he was really angry at a lot of things, he had a lot of pent up anger. And I didn’t know what it was from. And I know that a lot was from growing up, etc.. Chris Owens: Anyway, you got to learn, first of all, you’ve got to forgive yourself. You obviously didn’t do anything wrong. You took this on headstrong to try and help this person out and for so long. A relationship is transactional. Unfortunately, to put it truly, there are ways to give and take. But the transaction isn’t always to give and take. It can be a give and give and give or take, take, take. And unfortunately, with your exploit there, you’re going to have to try to find that way to go ahead and forgive yourself if you haven’t already. And if you haven’t do it, do it now. Just be like, “you know what? I’m over this.” You got a life to live. You gotta, right now there’s eight four eighty six thousand four hundred seconds in a day. Just choose one second and change that. TAMAR: I love that. I love that. You start to realize that especially when you’re working out and they’re like, you can do anything for sixty seconds. I’m not sure about that, especially when I’m pushing myself to my hardest. But it’s nice to know that you could break it into even smaller chunks of seconds versus 60 seconds instead of it. So I like that a lot. Chris Owens: Yeah. When you’re in the gym to the build muscle, you’ve got to break it. It’s got to rebuild, sort of just like your heart, your soul, sometimes, not sometimes, in life, you’ve got to rebuild. And it’s not a question of when, it’s a question of how many times and all of that stuff. So, you got this. You can do this. I’ll support you 100%, you want to join me on Facebook. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I got you. TAMAR: Yeah, I like you. I like you. You’re good. You’re definitely a very enjoyable guest. And I just think you’re just like I mean, you’re incredible person. I mean, coming out, taking care of your grandparents. Let me ask you a question. Are these is this your maternal grandparents or your paternal grandparents? Chris Owens: They’re my maternal grandparents. And actually technically it is my maternal grandfather and then he is remarried. So if they were technically terms, it would be my step grandmother, but I would never call anyone this close family at all like that, let alone if I’m lucky enough to be able to continue down my path and have my fiancée’s children become my children, they’ll never be called my stepchildren ever. However, she is my step grandmother, but yes. TAMAR: Wow, that’s so beautiful. Like I said, when I said the sweetest guy, I reserve that especially admitting that publicly on the podcast. We’ve been talking on and off for the last few weeks with the struggles that you’re kind of dealing with, the fact that you’ve relocated in a way, the fact that you’re talking to me with potentially a broken rib, which we haven’t talked about yet and that you wanted to show up. So talk about that for a minute. Chris Owens: I’m not entirely sure. About three days ago now, right over my left pectoral muscle, I have a scar from a collapsed lung during a car accident near there. I don’t know if a pectoral muscle or tendon has torn, if I got a fractured rib or a broken rib. It is not comfortable at all. It’s getting worse. But long story short, my fiancée does work for a hospital. I’ll go further into that because of all those things, but, we’re looking into, if it continues to get any worse and I go, all right, it’s time. I don’t like to tap out. I’ll go. I’d go until the bell rings and I’ll keep going. I listen to her and she knows what’s up. So I’m just watching it and making sure she’s updated. In fact, she texted me while we’re talking and I said, “oh, I’m good.” TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. Wow. All right. I think this is this is a good foray into your—we’re talking we’re over, usually I have like this structure, part one, part two, part three, but we’re like this going all over the place. I think this really kind of talks to the David Goggins philosophy where you’ve listened to him and you listen to the Joe Rogan podcast, which, by the way, I have #lifegoals, is to get on his podcast to figure it out. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. Chris Owens: If you get on there. And, you don’t invite me, I will… TAMAR: We should go on together. Chris Owens: I totally got your back to get on Joe Rogan. [?] TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The fact that he’s able to, like Goggins, I read his book. I didn’t actually I don’t like I’m not very good with the function of listening. It’s always been my weakest point, which sucks because if there’s one thing I want to develop in my life outside of the physical, it’s the mental and the ability to listen in a way that I can do an empathically and also just because I suck—. Chris Owens: I’ll be real with you. Honestly, I love truly helping people out that. I know that you’re much more professional than I am in that area. However, if I ever came down to wherever you wanted to find out, I’m also thoroughly, I proudly own determined that term “nerd” or “geek.” [TAMAR: Me too!] I have been my entire life. And if you need help with anything like that, feel free to hit me up. TAMAR: I got to figure it out. Yeah. Yeah. With what you were saying with your 3s, 33k. I got that. I got it. I know what 31337 means. I majored in computer science and I was in that hacker audience back in the day when probably, you were pretty much the same age, back when you were when you were in diapers and I was, I was just toddling around, but yeah, so yeah. So actually you probably, you might have. I potty trained late in life. You probably wouldn’t have been in diapers. I probably would’ve been toddling [in diapers]. You probably would have been in diapers. Chris Owens: You’re saying I wet my bed all the time? What are you saying? TAMAR: I was, I was going to say: the podcast, going to David Goggins. I read the book and he talks about in a chapter of his book that he ran a marathon on broken legs. So like I said, you’re toiling on, I think there’s a good foray into, like, what you do to keep yourself on on your feet. I see your picture right now on Skype where we’re using Skype and like you got this this tank top and you got these chiseled shoulder. I can’t see too much, but you evidently invest in that so talk about like what you do and how you, talk about your self-care and then talk about like the David Goggins routine for you, Chris Owens: For sure. Oh, so am by no means would I ever claim to ever be on the same even metaphorical playing field as him. But the mindset I certainly love it and I empower myself, and I challenge myself every day to live that. Doctors asked me recently during PT because I also had an MRI done this last week because I very possibly have some bicep injury as well as a rotator cuff slight tear on my right shoulder, yes, so I’m a little beat up. It’s all outlook. You’ve gotta keep that sunny sided. Chris Owens: So with trying to do that, and trying to say you gotta block out the pain or and had a micro lumbar discectomy like me like me. So the surgery on my L4-L5 which I didn’t want but I needed apparently. And they wanted me to do surgery on my neck. I’m like, no, I’m not going to do that. You got tennis elbow or tendonitis. You need surgery on this. No. This MRI, they’re probably going to want to do surgery. No. I can handle this. I can do this. TAMAR: Oh, I like surgery. I would take the surgery. Chris Owens: No. Once I had a meniscus tear, had to repair them. And the anesthesia wore off too early and I woke up just in excruciating pain. TAMAR: Oh, wow. All right. They gotta give you more. Chris Owens: So I was a little aggressive with the nurses, I won’t lie. But I’m sure they were understanding. Actually I’m looking at, truth be told, I am looking at enlisting in the Air Force just mainly because of my age background of what I wanted to do with military and where I was going to go on my path and looking and doing some special warfare stuff, but I don’t know my surgeries will allow me to do special warfare, so I’m going to go off to see what the man allows me to do for less. And the Air Force is the lesser of the jobs but top of my mind, the mindset, I’m going to be 39 in May and as long as you’re in and as long as you pas before you’re 40 years old. Then you’re good to go. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. I just hit that. So I’m not. It’s a little devastating reality there. Chris Owens: It does, it is kind of a suck, it really is, but I’m going to shoot for it, because, you know what? I always wanted to do it. I’m going to shoot for special warfare anyway. Whether or not they deny me, they can deny me all they want, but I’ll keep going. TAMAR: I think we need to keep our eye on you because like and you need to be like, I don’t know how or where, but you need to figure out how you can talk to Goggins. You’re evidently in the group, but you got to like be with him, podcast with him, talk to him, because I think you’re just you’re doing you’re following that trajectory. He had to push and do things, being in the SEALs. He wasn’t initially part of whatever, Badwater, he wanted to get in things that he couldn’t get accepted to. You’re doing the same thing. Chris Owens: 100%. The world’s not going to tell me what I can’t do. TAMAR: Right. I love that. I love that attitude. Yeah. So when you talked about you’re not in the same metaphysical plane as him and then you talked about earlier in the podcast that, and you kind of were apologetic, “that people are against pot, but I’ve tried, I need it for my ADHD.” I start to recognize that nobody is freaking, no one’s on the same plane ever anywhere. I think we need to be a little more sympathetic and realistic about our realities. I love the mindset. I love the David Goggins approach of just pushing through. But I said it in past podcasts, that there are so many people that are dealing with the same, everybody is dealing with the same— Chris Owens: Everybody’s dealing with shit. Everybody. TAMAR: Yeah the same shit but not everybody can be David Goggins. I would like to think that, I think he’s insane. It’s incredible. He’s inspirational. He’s insane. Chris Owens: Yes, he is. You’re absolutely 100% right. My catharsis is writing and I’m happy to be a friend on Facebook so you can see the posts. More than that, I say honorably and courageously, I don’t care, I don’t give a fuck who thinks of anything. I write poetry and I do a lot of writing. And it’s really cathartic. I’m not unintellectual. I’m happy to share some of that so. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, and you’ve got to figure out how to make it public for the listeners because there’s going to be that necessity evidently. Chris Owens: That would be awesome. I’m super looking forward to that. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, the thing is, he’s insane. And the thing is that I don’t think everybody can do what he can do. I’m sorry. The way he writes his book in the way he like he’s talked about it. Obviously, it’s not for everybody. But he talks about how I was able to run a marathon on broken legs. Not everybody can do that. I’m sorry. So then when we go back to the whole pot thing and the fact that there is bad reception and pot has a bad rap, that’s not necessarily a reflection of everybody entire experience with pot. For me personally, I don’t think it does very much, but for other people, it helps them substantially. Everybody is fucking different. Deal with it. I’m trying to I’m trying to make this full circle because I think it’s very important. There was another thing. There’s a book that came out recently, How to Change Your Life by Michael Pollan, maybe three or four years ago. I read it. It’s about micro dosing in the LSD, shrooms, and everything world. I haven’t admitted this publicly, but right after that book, I tried to pursue that. And I did it. The book makes it seem like it’s for like people who are dealing with devastating cancer diagnoses or dealt with the reality that their life is falling apart in a way. They have this trip on shrooms, usually it’s moderated, if you will. It’s managed by a provider who makes sure you don’t like all of a sudden jump out from the top of a building. I think it could be a shaman, it could also be like a therapist. They’re talking about how they wanted to be FDA approved. And I ended up doing a trip right before covid, before covid, not right before. I tried to experience it also under the moderation of somebody just to see what it could do. Because at that point I was trying to find myself. I did pot, similar[ly], medical marijuana, rather, for the same [reason]. My psychiatrist prescribed it pretty much for the same reasons. I didn’t think that helped me. I had to take so much and eventually I just found, you’re stoned. That’s why they say “you’re stoned.” I couldn’t have my kids come in, with me putting my hands up like a cloud. Chris Owens: There’s some point in time when you start giggling at something and you’re like oh man. TAMAR: I wasn’t giggling. I started writing and blogging, like I would write at that time and just to see how I did. But I just didn’t care about anything. I wanted to correct my mistakes and I was like “I don’t wanna go back.” It was a weird dynamic. But anyway, going back to this whole shrooms thing, it was sort of the same thing. She started me and I didn’t really feel like much effects. Maybe things come to me late, like with pot, I had to go really go big or go home and I went big and I didn’t like it. And when I did nothing, it didn’t do anything. So shrooms, the first two milligrams, nothing happened. And I’m like, I’m not feeling anything. Instead of, like, giving me, like a little more, she upped me to five and and I was sitting there and she’s like doing her thing. And eventually, you’re dying if you will, like you’re regurgitating your stomach, whatever’s in there, and it was not, I didn’t feel like that trip was very valuable for me, which is totally contrary to the book’s presentation of how this can change your life. It didn’t give me any extra clarity because I think I’ve been in a soul searching mission for the last year prior to that or even more than that at that point. The interesting thing for me is that it was so deep, that trip was so extensive that typically they say it’ll wear off after seven hours. She was there for 12 and it hadn’t worn off yet, and was like “I have to go home!” Chris Owens: The least you can do is look as it as, “if I did, I won or I learned. I didn’t lose. If I did. If I failed, I’ll fail better next time,” that type of thing. You had a learning experience. You went through something. You went through life experience. So that is the story to tell. It’s a memory to have made whole. Yeah. You won’t do it again. So that’s a negative trigger warning in your head going, no, don’t touch that, because I don’t like that effact. TAMAR: Right. It’s hard to say. It’s hard to say because it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It was literally the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It’s hard to explain that, like, you just took drugs and you were like sitting there and that’s really the truth. But like, mentally, it’s the slowest. For me, it was twenty six hours. Twenty six hours. Eventually, I had to wait till some of it passed and then I could sort of sleep through the night, but I had to take the day off the next day. But the seven, the twelve hours of that experience, I couldn’t, it’s hard to explain because ten minutes is literally feels like three hours. It’s weird. It’s weird. I don’t know. But yeah. Chris Owens: You know what? It’s A: good on you and matters of respect, for A, admitting openly and publicly, that it takes a lot of fucking courage, so seriously, good job on that. And B, like you said, you tried it out and you learned to find something and then it would be you naturally type of thing, some that would work for you and it didn’t work. It’s like Edison and lightbulbs. It takes a thousand trials and a thousand fails, but it just takes the one time to get it right. And that’s where [Mayan?] came in with, they’re lying to of course be in Oregon, to be a little stricter, things like that, so many pain seeking people who are going to ruin it for people who are in pain. So potentially it’s going to screw up with my ADHD medications because they’re not possibly prescribing. So I’m kind of, it’s always a constant juggle, there’s always chaos, there’s always fog and noise, and you’ve just got to try and do your best to filter out the noise and say it’s all just bullshit. [TAMAR: Yeah.] And I got to focus on: what do I need to focus on? First, it’s me, I can’t do anything and help anybody else, which is my life’s mission, is to help other people, and to be successful and many other things. But the joy that I bring to it, that it brings to me is helping other people and reaching out. To do that, I’ve gotta be 100%. I can’t do that and try to give 80% advice to someone advice who needs 100% advice. That’s not fair. That should be criminal. TAMAR: Yeah, 100%, yeah. For me, the reality is that we just need to be mindful of the fact that everybody experiences the realities differently. And, you know, you’ve got you got this David Goggins superhuman. You have the pot. Like, let’s just accept the fact that we’re all different. Try to become, we could try to be David Goggins. I’ve been working out since every single day since December 24, 2018. I see people who started like three months ago who all of a sudden (and maybe it’s because my biological whatever my age at this point and my genetics), but people who started three months ago are doing better than me and I started freakin two years ago and change. It’s just like we’re all, just embraces the differences. Just push yourself and do the best you can. Chris Owens: But look at it two ways for sure: the way you look at understanding the biological, or the physical aspects and DNA that we do have different body structures and different DN—we’re all different, but that doesn’t mean, that’s kind of mindset of the Goggins kind of a theory, right? It is just being uncommon. Whether you’re not, I’m not 100% at all the peak where I want to be. I want to be 6’2″ and I’m at I think 245.2 as of this morning. I’d love to be something like 202. I want to get back my 8 pack abs and working on stuff nonstop. My age and different things like that, I’ll get it done, but I can get you to think of it. Jim Rohn your best is all you can do. You can’t give more than your best. If you give your best 100% of the time, do it like nobody’s watching. Every single time and thinking that, honestly, I’m going to do the right thing. I do it the right way always, because nobody’s watching, and know that there’s always someone watching. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Chris Owens: You’re obviously doing well, and I think, you definitely need to not believe any negative stuff [TAMAR: I’m not hard on myself.], keep on the positive track that you’re on, because you sound like you’re doing phenomenal. TAMAR: I mean, listen, I’m showing up, and the bottom line is I’m not going to be able to do what I’m doing at 40 that I used to do at 21. I don’t know if it’s even again, I don’t know if it’s an issue of age. The regret is potentially that I didn’t start earlier, but at the same time I needed to start now. As long as I’m doing it, I’m feeling good about doing it. It may be the the results aren’t as visible. And sometimes I do fall off the path a little bit. This week has been, like I said, I usually eat better, this week has been a little more difficult. Sometimes mentally I’m totally in the game and sometimes mentally I’m just the opposite. And that’s OK. You know, I have to be OK. I have to be consistently. Chris Owens: It’s OK to be OK, 100%. [TAMAR: Yeah.] I won’t lie, I’ve got two days like my fiancée, there’s the smart cheddar popcorn called Smart Food and she calls the dumb food because I eat it because I love it. And when I’ll have some of it, she’s like, “you’re eating your dumb food again, it’s not your cheat day.” And I’m like, I put the bag, know a couple of bites. We’ve all got our vices. We’ve all got our we’re all we are all uncommon in that way. if a unicorn is uncommon, like be the unicorn of unicorns kind of thing. Rise above. Be that 1% always, at least in your mind because your mind is there, then you’re going to be happy. You’re going to be healthy. You’re going to be successful. Whether or not that’s now or that’s just building it. Progress is motion. Motion creates a motion. Keep moving forward like it’s it’s all good. So you sound like you’re doing phenomenal. You just seem to stay on track and not get you can’t let the haters and all the bullshit noise fucking cause confusion. Don’t let that happen. TAMAR: Oh 100%. I’m mentally I’m in a perfectly, like I said, thick-skinned. I just keep doing it. The only person who sees what I’m doing is basically me. I kind of think to myself, because there was a point in my life where I didn’t want to really live. Not like I had ideations or anything, but I definitely didn’t like, I didn’t like myself. And now knowing that I wake up the way I live, the way I go to bed, I would say if other people were watching, which they’re not and that’s OK with it, they would be jealous of me. I don’t need to say anything else. I’m proving it to myself and that’s it. It’s all internal. But at the same time, I’m like, you know, obviously she’s doing exactly what she needs to be doing. She’s doing the right thing. I wish I could be doing things like that. Chris Owens: Rose silently and then shine brightly. TAMAR: Exactly. I like that. Yeah. Cool. All right. So we talked about a lot of things and I totally said I enjoy this. We kind of touched upon things in a way that we totally were meant to do. But at the same time. [Chris Owens: No, for sure.] Let me let me ask you a question. I mean, you talked about sort of like self-care. What do you what what kind of like fitness, regimen? What’s that look like for you? Chris Owens: Oh, yeah. So, yes, I apologize. You did ask that. Yeah, mainly my fitness regiment: as I’m on the ranch, like my grandparents own ten acres out in Oregon City. We’ve got horses and different animals, just a few getting stuff cleaned up for potential, when end of life does come and there’s a lot of stuff to move around. So I’m physically just putting in the grind, moving, just hardened steel and farm products and stuff that’s old from welding and it’s just got a lot of weight to it. So that’s my atypical day, just moving stuff around, like just on a mule. But my kind of workout routine typically is every single day I go to bed, typically between around 11:00 pm and 12:00. So I try. It’s hard with ADHD and falling asleep, usually up between 4:30 and 4:45 automatically every morning. That became habit over time. Just set the alarm clock a little earlier and earlier and get in the habit of not hitting snooze. My workout though atypically is I push out pushups until I can’t stop. I kind of go by the Arnold idea like I don’t really count, I just go until like I hurt and I do it every single day. I don’t take days off. And that might be what something that that hurts me and I’ll learn from that mistake. If that’s the case, I’ll make the correction and I’ll recalibrate and I’ll re-execute. But going into doing similar sit ups, wall stands. Most of my workout traditionally is things that I can do in the home because of covid. And so I will walk, jog because of my knees and my back and getting back into running. But that is that’s a progress where I make, or I should say that’s an area I’m making progress on. That’s where I’m going to start shredding that the last few weight that I want to get, I think. But other than that, a lot of the military style PT stuff that I’ve gone through, I would, PT regiments, if that kind of describes at least a little bit, I know we’re kind of short on time, so I don’t want to go into every single thing, but atypically it’s that. My diet is very clean compared to what used to be when I was 302 pounds, I would drink two liters of soda a day. I was eating, I was eating cereal, I was eating Cinnamon Toast Crunch a day. I could down a box in a day. It was a joke. That was after my recovering from my surgery, my back surgery and being on pain meds. So I don’t take that stuff when, when I don’t absolutely need to. And I really tried to really never need to. And if I do, I try not to. But the healthy regiment is taking out sugars. I don’t drink soda or pop or wherever you want to call it, wherever you’re at in the world. I cut that out completely. That was very, very difficult. And having had a past of migraines and I still do that created a lot of those. But I said, you know what, I need to do this. It’s like quitting smoking, I guess for smokers. It’s shitty, but I need to go through the suck. Just fuck it, eat it. Let’s do this. And I just do it. I tend to be a glutton for punishment myself. I swallow my pain and then I use my pain no matter what it is from my past or it’s something that’s going on currently that drives me. So to fuel the change, like the change agents in the diet, it was more like, I don’t want to eat turkey bacon. I love my pork bacon. I don’t want to cut down. I want to go to light mayonnaise. I like mayonnaise, but no, fuck that. This is what needs to be done, okay, so done. TAMAR: Yeah, ricotta cheese, I can’t I can’t sacrifice that one. That’s what you can never go light. You have to go with the full. Yeah. So first of all, I want to say that I do also try to show up every single day. I’ve never missed a workout, if you will, and especially for the last three hundred and sixty five days. Well, starting January 1st, 2020, I’m in a group that is an accountability group and basically it’s two hundred fifty workouts in the in the year 2020 and this year. I basically didn’t miss a day but sometimes, a minimum workout is like a 20 minute walk and that’s fine with me. I told myself in 2021 I was going to break a sweat. It’s really important to break a sweat but I think just really doing it every single day. I think eventually it does catch up with you. I think it was Sunday, I couldn’t move and I like but I had walked. It wasn’t even like a big walk. I walk like three miles on Saturday and Sunday morning, I walk two, two and a half miles, and for some reason I just couldn’t move or do anything. I was packaging. I was sort of a mule, but not really, packaging some stuff for members of the community, again, to coordinate some food delivery. And it was just like five feet of walking that’s putting a little chocolate bar, like a chocolate 3.5oz chocolate bar in a box. I couldn’t do something. I think eventually it does catch up with you, but it catches up with you, like you could consistently do it. It’s bad advice. Nobody should take my advice. I want like an audio, I need visual… Chris Owens: We don’t condone said previous advice, by the way, just for the licenses and affiliation privileges of this podcast. kids: don’t try this at home, but, you know. Yeah. So it was just that was there’s one exception. And then, like, I usually go to bed like 2:00, 3:00 in the morning, I had said I go to bed at ten, a quarter eleven. And then I woke up like at eight, which was give them enough time. But like, all of a sudden I felt better and I was like, wow, well, like the difference. I don’t know what happened because I’m so not like that mentally. I’m never like that. And yet the experience was insane, so I would say keep doing what you’re doing, but be mindful and let your body respond. Your body will tell you. You just wait to the cues of your body at the end of day. So cool, all right. I got one last question for you before I ask how to follow you, how people should follow you, but the last question that I would ask is if you can give an earlier version of Chris some advice, what would you tell him? Chris Owens: To make sure the answer the answer correctly, if I was an earlier version of me? TAMAR: It could be yesterday. It could be when you were twelve. I don’t care. Chris Owens: Like telling an earlier version, “hey go do this?” TAMAR: Don’t overthink it at all. Chris Owens: If it were me telling a 10, 21 year old version of me, the best version of me would be never ever quit. TAMAR: Yeah. Okay. Chris Owens: No matter what it is, never quit. TAMAR: I love it. Yeah. Yeah. That’s what I was looking for. Perfect. You gave me a perfect answer. It’s always helpful to get the ones that are identifiable by most people. So that was good too, and you don’t even take too long to think about it. Some people think about it and they give me, like, 25 seconds later, “oh, this is a hard question.” So I mean it. I love it. I love the reaction. My editor gets out the gaps, he always edit and it’s the gaps. For my editors reference, and by the way, he doesn’t have to edit out this time around. You don’t have to edit it out in the future. Chris Owens: I do have one comment toward your challenge of your workout. I, too, am in one of my groups called Modern Era Warriors and am looking into getting into one of them here, Krav Maga, looking into getting one in Portland. [TAMAR: Of course I know that. It has Israeli roots, I’ve wanted to get my kids to do it actually.] It’s phenomenal. You should get your kids into it. So I floated the idea to my daughter, but she didn’t bring with her friend, so she was with dad at the time, she didn’t like it, but regardless. Modern Era Warriors if I can speak, few of us are doing a couple of us or more, but few of us that do it every single day and always post their own day, I believe 80 to 100 or so. TAMAR: Sweet, yeah. Cool. All right, all right, yeah. Tell me where where people can find you and you might have a website or something. I don’t know, because we met on Facebook and usually this is an unconventional thing, where can people find you, contact you. I’ll link to it for sure in the show notes. But curious. Chris Owens: Yeah, 100% you know, I want to say if you bear with me one moment, I wasn’t quite 100% prepared for that question. But give me one second here. You should be able to just honestly, facebook.com/public/chris-owens under Chris C Owens and the middle initial is Charles. My call center is Wildcard. Update: It is at this link. TAMAR: So, OK, I think I see it there. Yeah, it’s it’s a different, you actually do not even have from what I see, you don’t have a, you don’t have a an actual username, so if you go Facebook dot com slash like you could set it to WildCard which you won’t be able to because that’s the thing I created. Chris Owens: It’s definitely more to change and play around in some point in time. So, appreciate that. TAMAR: Yeah. Awesome, sweet, cool. I will definitely link to it at well because I don’t know the URL and I can’t figure it out. Chris Owens: Well, thank you so much for taking the time to talk and everything and thank you for your patience with dealing with my chaos and everything like that. I am very grateful and I’m very honored to be part of this. And I appreciate it. TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you so much for participating. This is a really fun conversation. And again, there’s so many things that I would elaborate on more. But eventually now at this point, I get to pick up my kids from school. You know, it’s a quiet day until they come home. Chris Owens: Yeah, we’ll see if we can link up later on for sure and we’ll see if we can do something else. TAMAR: All right. Cool. We’ll be in touch. Thank you so much, Chris. Thank you so much. All right. You too. All right. [Chris Owens: Go own it up, go kill it.] You too. Chris Owens: Thank you, bye.

I’ve known Anna Bourland for over 1/4 of her life, and yet, it wasn’t until this episode that I learned that she had endured extreme abuse as a young child. With an incredible sense of resilience and an amazing attitude, Anna has truly embodied what it means to overcome extreme adversity. [0:00:16.590] – TAMAR: Hey, everybody, I am super excited. I don’t know what number we’re at, 59, 60 of the podcast. I have a friend this time around. It’s not somebody I randomly met on a Facebook group or a Reddit chat these days. It’s my friend Anna and I’ve known Anna for over a decade now. I guess you can talk about how we met, but she was sharing a story on Facebook. I’m sorry not sorry that Facebook seems to give me rise for a lot of podcast ideas and guests, I guess with covid, and the fact that my, my my local community is is relatively boring. To be fair, I get to get to reach out beyond my geography. And Anna is on the other side of the country, so she’ll tell her she’ll talk about herself. But yeah, I thought she had something to share and I felt that this was the right avenue on the podcast to talk about her story. So, Anna Bourland, thank you so much for joining us. [0:01:17.700] – Anna Bourland: Oh, yeah. Thank you for having me, Tamar. [0:01:19.710] – TAMAR: Yeah. So where are you in the world? I know I mentioned a little bit, but you can give me a little more. [0:01:26.040] – Anna Bourland: Yeah, I am. I’m born and raised in Southern California and I’ve been in this area pretty much most of my life. And I live in Corona, California, in Riverside County. So it’s been interesting, even simply just having the name Corona. Everything I post on social media has a warning because they think I’m talking about covid. (just because I’m checking in because I’m at a restaurant). So it’s been kind of hilarious being from here these days. [0:01:55.170] – TAMAR: Yeah, their algorithm hasn’t figured that out, but it’s funny. It’s funny. I’m glad you mentioned that because I was going to say you’re from Corona, right? And that’s I never knew that [it warns you]. You should post that. You should post a screenshot of what you deal with every single day. [0:02:06.510] – Anna Bourland: Yeah, well, it’s funny because I moved to Corona about six, six or seven years ago and I’m actually from Anaheim. So I went from being Anna from Anaheim to being from Corona. Yeah. [0:02:18.480] – TAMAR: Anna from Anaheim, I like that, I like that. That’s awesome. Cool. So yeah. What do you—I know I met you through I guess I would say more of the industry than anything else so you could talk about that. Feel free to share where, how we met and what you do and where you come from. Like trajectory career wise if you have a little bit of a story in that regard. Absolutely great. [0:02:44.940] – Anna Bourland: Yeah. Tamar, we met in such a funny way, I guess, because we were both early adopters when it came to social media. So I know that we’ve been members of, I don’t know, failed social media platforms is really the right word. Just, you know, the candle didn’t keep burning, so we ran across each other and it turned out we were in the similar industries, women and tech specifically. You know, we’re SEO and marketing and all kinds and social media and all kinds of different things that were emerging. [0:03:20.100] – Anna Bourland: And we kept talking. And then I remember when you were getting ready to be a mom for the first time, I sent things, clothes and play things and all that stuff for for your first little one. And we bonded over that. And then next thing you know, we were up at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning. Gosh. And that was my time. So you’re a night owl and working on bouncing ideas off each other for your book. [0:03:49.860] – Anna Bourland: So that was it was really neat to get to know you in that way. And then, of course, as each of our stories has evolved, we’ve made sure we’re there for those significant milestones cheering each other on. Of course, as far as my career goes, I honestly I ran into a guy I went to high school with outside an Outback Steakhouse. We were waiting for a table and he said, what do you do? And I said, well, I’m kind of dabbling with building websites. [0:04:21.450] – Anna Bourland: And that was back with Yahoo! Geocities and everything. And he goes, that’s funny. I work at a website company. I’m the accountant and I know they need people. And I think within a week I was working there. [0:04:33.360] – TAMAR: That’s awesome. [0:04:33.740] – Anna Bourland: And I started as a customer service representative, which also meant we were hand coding the HTML from the websites that we were building at a real estate Web site company. And because that was back in the old days, that was the everything was the Wild,Wild West. [0:04:49.710] – Anna Bourland: This was before Google was on the scene. You were getting into the Yahoo directory was free and then it was $2.99. And then all that stuff was evolving through all of that at a start up, and so I got to kind of where every hack at the company, which and I was there for 11 years, all the way from four to eight thousand square foot office space, all the way up to getting bought out by a giant company on the East Coast and working with them for a while with some pretty big name brands and doing marketing for them and search engine optimization and being the voice and the face of the company with all when forums were really big and doing all of that, and it just led to more conversations with you Tamar and with people like you. And yeah, it led me to this place. Then I dealt with some pretty significant health issues that they couldn’t figure out because eventually, spoiler alert, it turned out to be an autoimmune condition and those are really hard to diagnose. So I went through years of struggle and at that point I decided I was the director of two departments for search engine optimization and content. [0:06:09.300] – Anna Bourland: I was working for a company that was making mandatory overtime. And all I could offer my employees was like free pizza when they came in on a Saturday or Sunday. It was just, I thought there has to be a better way than the churn and burn agency life. So at the time I was married and I went home and I talked to my then husband and I said “there has to be a better way, I can’t do this anymore. My health is ridiculous. And I keep feeling like I’m going to pass out at work. And I don’t even believe in what I’m doing. I feel like we’re not serving the customers well.” And he said, “well, then just start your own business.” And I was like, yeah. And the next day I gave notice that my job and I sent an email to about 20 different people and I said that I was going to start working on my own, and this is what I want to do for people’s businessesm, and I said, “who’s in?” Within about 30 minutes, I had a full roster of clients and people who just emailed me back. I mean, when do we start? And that’s kind of how I got to where I am and the job I have now, I love it so much. And it was born from that business. They just started contracting all my hours about five years ago. [0:07:30.570] – Anna Bourland: And so now it’s like they have all my hours, all my heart and I have health benefits. So I absolutely love what I do. So that’s kind of my career journey and how we met and weaved in and out with each other throughout the whole thing. [0:07:45.620] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. It’s been interesting. I didn’t realize that your story started with the Geocities trajectory, but it doesn’t surprise me. And I mean, I’ve seen you sort of since you worked for a firm. You had your own firm. Yeah, I love that. Back in the day, I wasn’t on Geocities because AOL had its own website and not their, it wasn’t a website builder, but AOL allowed members.aol.com and I had a site there, and that was that was a fun experience, I will tell you that. But you know that you understand because everyone’s on Geocities. And I was like, oh, I have many website and I still do, you know, on the Internet Wayback Machine, you can still pull it off, which is kind of fun because it was like our teenage years. It’s how we grew into the internet. [0:08:29.940] – Anna Bourland: And it’s like our teenage years, all the trends are coming back. I remember when I was Geocities, it was like, look, when you opened my page, it’s playing a midi of Every Little Thing She Does is Magic. And there’s blue butterfly GIFs [hard g] flying everywhere. Right? It’s like, look, I coded that. And then it was like GIFs [hard g] there, ugh, that’s so old. That’s like Geocities, that’s old. And then all of a sudden we speak to each other in GIFs now. [0:08:58.920] – TAMAR: GIFs!!! [soft g] You’re killing me. GIFs, GIFs, GIFs. [0:09:03.270] – Anna Bourland: I can’t have the debate. It’s not. It’s not. [0:09:08.610] – TAMAR: It’s GIFs [soft g] it’s totally GIFs [soft g]. Sorry. Sorry. You can’t do that. [0:09:13.110] – Anna Bourland: Well I will challenge you a GIF to a girrafic designer. It’s a graphic designer. [0:09:23.970] – TAMAR: I will challenge you for a giraffe. I don’t know where I’m going with this. [0:09:32.040] – Anna Bourland: You are so funny. Yeah, but if you say you’re a graphic designer and a gif is a graphics, well, I just think it’s a GIF [hard g]. And I know the guy who created it says GIF [soft g] so props to him. I think Wil Wheaton and Chris Hardwick have this debate and they’re best friends, so it’s OK. [0:09:51.530] – TAMAR: No, I don’t know. I’m not OK with this. It’s not, for my mind, it doesn’t work so well. I can’t mentally process this. [0:09:58.640] – Anna Bourland: Yeah, but we agree that the blue butterfly, the shiny butterflies flying up from our Geocities and our MySpace pages, those are long gone. [0:10:06.710] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. No, I never did animated stuff. I thought that the MySpace era, I only joined MySpace because everybody else was on it. But it wasn’t really my thing because, yeah, the fancy schmancy, that’s why Facebook never really wanted to move into that trajectory because [Anna: right] that was ugly, A.F.. [0:10:27.400] – Anna Bourland: Exactly. Exactly. And I felt like I didn’t know any better. And then once I did, I was like, oh my gosh, this is like going in the file of the most embarrassing moments. [0:10:38.750] – TAMAR: I’m going to have pull up your Geocities after this just to see what your little butterflies look like. [0:10:44.360] – Anna Bourland: I don’t even think it’s because I think they took them all down. I don’t really know if it’s there. [0:10:50.900] – TAMAR: I think what happened is that the Wayback Machine decided that it’s too ugly to even go to the Wayback Machine. What do you think? [0:10:59.780] – Anna Bourland: We’ll have to ask archive.org about that. That is so funny. Well, that is actually how I learned code, though. It’s so funny. Like now there’s all these free programs and Girls Who Code and all this stuff. But then it was almost like you could feel like for white hat people like me, I was like, “oh, I feel kind of like a hacker because I made this do something it said I couldn’t do.” And that’s how I learned. If I’m being honest, that’s the the toe I dipped into the pool that got me into my entire career. Yeah. [0:11:36.950] – TAMAR: Yeah. Wow. That’s it’s true. It works. For me, I was online, I loved communicating with people online. I liked HTML ish. I hated it when it started. It was really nice to build everything on one HTML [file], but I think eventually as things migrated to the CSS world and try to get the updated W3 standards. All of a sudden, like this strong tag started being deprecated. And I was like, “ugh, this sucks,” so I stopped caring. Nowadays I’m using like WYSIWYG builders like Elementor, which is my new, I don’t want to say my obsession because it pisses me off in many ways, but even so, like I can’t troubleshoot my own sites anymore. I mean, I understand a little bit, but as the web grew, it became more sophisticated and a lot more challenging. And anybody listening: just don’t overthink this. Hire a web designer— [0:12:32.120] – Anna Bourland: Just go get a WordPress website and stop overthinking it. [0:12:35.420] – TAMAR: Yeah, and Elementor is built on WordPress. [Anna: it’s all going to be okay]. Yeah, you will be OK. But, you know, for me, I’m like right now I’m trying to make tamar.com a little—I’m moving from WP Bakery, which is another WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) builder to Elementor. I’m a perfectionist. I want things to be as perfect as they used to be, so I will say that it really does anger me to no end when I can’t get the same functionality. So there’s that. [0:13:06.440] – Anna Bourland: But yeah, if somebody uses it the way it’s not meant to be used, I’m cleaning up a website right now that used WP Bakery and I had never used it before. I just haven’t. It’s going to take me like probably eighty more hours than I originally quoted or expected because everything got built in the theme in the plugin, so like if I just change themes, it’s going to erase everything. [0:13:36.950] – TAMAR: Yeah. That’s the challenge that I have because I’m trying to migrate that over. WP Bakery as not so glorified as a script and a builder that it is because it does make the website slow. I think it’s easier to use, even though it’s not as pretty, it’s easier to use than Elementor which is annoying because everyone’s like “you gotta move to Elementor! You gotta move to Elementor!” And I’m drinking the Kool-Aid right now. [0:14:01.250] – Anna Bourland: Oh my gosh, that’s so funny. I had a client that was using Elementor, but I got to tell you, I think the key is you have to be the one who installs it on a fresh site, because what’s happened is there’s all kinds of inherited legacy issues and somebody copied code from here and there. And there’s all these weird IDs in the middle of like just a picture, like a before and after picture, and it’s it’s just ridiculous. So, yeah, that is one of the mountains I am trying to climb right now. [0:14:35.150] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. I wish you the best on that. I know it isn’t so it’s not as easy as it seems and I’m still trying to figure out like I’m like “oh I feel so good about Elementor” one day and then five seconds later I’m like, “wait a minute, that’s one issue. Then I have to solve 30 more.” I hit burnout two weeks ago and I couldn’t work for about two weeks because some of the stuff was just so frustrating that I needed to take a break. I started back yesterday and then and all of a sudden things started not working, and I was like this sucks again. [0:15:12.860] – Anna Bourland: I’ve totally been there. And people think when they say, oh, I got this drag and drop editor, there’s like a part of my soul that just sinks because I’m like, you know, I really could have fixed this if the code was just in a notepad document and I could just hand code the HTML that’s going to go in the page. Yeah, but it’s like now it’s so much more complicated because you dragged and dropped and you did it pasted from all these weird places. You did all these different things. And it’s just like all these weird nested tables and things like that. So it’s it’s really sort of like a needle in a haystack work. It’s hard to explain that to a client because they just slapped it all together. And you’re like, well, now I’m having the reverse engineer this so that that content can be in your new design. [0:16:05.650] – TAMAR: Right. Right. Yeah. [0:16:07.280] – Anna Bourland: It’s it’s a journey. It’s definitely a journey, and I really appreciate that more people are talking about that drag and drop is not as drag and drop [TAMAR: it’s harder to do] because it’s not as scalable for change. [0:16:19.580] – TAMAR: Yeah, it’s funny because the Internet was a lot easier in the 90s than it is now. And that’s what I think. [0:16:26.960] – Anna Bourland: I agree. But go back to listening to our grunge with our flannels and flying by the seat of our pants because this new thing just got released. I remember when Yahoo! was in alphabetical order, so we’ve come a long way, I guess. [0:16:44.770] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We could reminisce for a really long time, though. [0:16:49.280] – Anna Bourland: I know. [0:16:50.570] – TAMAR: But hopefully we have listeners who like web design and understand our challenges, but we can talk about other challenges, I guess. Let’s talk about. Yeah. So I mean, you touched upon a few things. I think you probably won’t elaborate on those things. Your story, the Anna the Anna adversity story, I guess I would start with. Tell me a little bit about that. I know it gets started. There were things that I’ve learned about you recently that I didn’t know, so there’s that. And then I guess there’s something else. I don’t know. I’ll let you do it, I’m not volunteering anything for you. [0:17:27.590] – Anna Bourland: Oh, for sure. OK, so I know we touched on all this tech and web design and stuff like that. And, you know, Web dev, understand that that is the cool part of, I won’t call it the end of my story, I’m in the middle of my story, of course, in my life, but that is the very cool victory and functioning healthy citizens sort of result of all the stuff that I went through since I was a little kid. [0:18:00.560] – Anna Bourland: And so when people find out that I’m not kind of going nuts or on the street or anything like that, they’re kind of amazed and I don’t even think of it that way. I only realized that from the outside looking in, because that’s what people have said to me. [0:18:21.080] – Anna Bourland: But I was raised by my mom. I never knew my dad, and there is a funny story about how I met him once on accident when I was working at Sears. But that’s we can get to that later. But I didn’t know my dad and my mom was the emerging bipolar, meaning she was in the time when they called it manic depressive. They were just coming out with lithium and she was the tester group. She was actually in a clinical trial for it. And it really affected my childhood. There was a small part of my childhood that there’s like bits and pieces that I feel like shine through. [0:19:09.530] – Anna Bourland: But I remember being homeless at six, sleeping in somebody’s garage on a mattress with cockroaches all around me; my mom having me live with my aunt and uncle and said they were going to adopt me. And then all of a sudden she was convinced that they were there was a conspiracy and they were trying to steal me so she’d come in the middle of the night just to take me to be homeless somewhere. So there was there was all of that going on. And in the middle of it, there were stepdads and boyfriends and all these sorts of things. [0:19:44.960] – Anna Bourland: And I, of course, as the only child, the the little girl I was, of course, I guess tossed around a victim of that, sort of, circumstance. I was the statistic, really. I was always physically abused by my mother. I would get hit with all kinds of things, and I’m not talking about the like, I know everybody kind of,, not everybody, but I know it wasn’t abuse, like, if somebody got a spanking or somebody like I don’t really come from that school of thought. But this was true abuse and it was just forever. And so there was the physical abuse, there was the verbal abuse. And then I she married a man who took it upon himself to give me eight years old, some sort of sex talk. And that turned into me being abused, sexually abused by him. And then when I told my mom, because “the more you know,” commercials and everything that tell you, “tell someone! Tell the teacher, tell your parents, tell whoever.” I did all that. [0:21:06.170] – Anna Bourland: And it all got swept under the rug. So here I was, an eight year old and my mom entrenched in what she felt was some sort of biblical direction said that her husband, the Bible, says her husband comes first. So she was telling me that he was allowed to abuse me. So that continued. And then there was more they were taking pictures of me while I was in the shower and selling them for rent money. And things like that, and there were a couple of times that I was actually sold to friends of his for the weekend and things like that when I was very young. [0:21:50.430] – Anna Bourland: I remember one of the times when I was,, I want to call it a basement, but I know it was in Southern California, and I’m really pretty sure it was just like a weird, odd room because I don’t think there was truly a basement in Fullerton, California. But but I was there for three days and I was just I was handcuffed. [TAMAR: Wow.] for three days and I remember that. And I had a friend who actually lived in the neighborhood. I have bits where I can really—because I had a very good memory. I wouldn’t quite call it eidetic memory, but close. And so there’s bits and pieces of where it’s like, “oh, I’ve been over here before. This is where this thing happened,” because, of course, I’m in the same area that I grew up around. So it’s really interesting. And when I say it out loud, I go, “whoa, how am I not super messed up?” [0:22:44.010] – Anna Bourland: And so here’s kind of the answer to that, because that’s what a lot of people ask. The truth is, I was privileged to have some really cool people around me who said, well, let me just take you to church, and we had gone, my mom and everything, there was always church involved, that sort of thing, just go to youth group. But as I was getting older, you know, junior high, high school, I could go to youth group. And that was fun. You know, you played air hockey and you had tacos beforehand or whatever. It was hanging out. It didn’t have to be about religion. Right? And then you’d have your Bible study and talk, but here was the thing: there were young adults who were around me who started hearing what was going on, and they started signaling me, hey, that’s not normal. And for a super long time, I didn’t realize how abnormal everything that was going on was until I started kind of talking about it. And apparently I had been in some sort of survival mode. And so through this, I met a woman named Nancy. And Nancy pulled me aside, and I believe I was about 15 years old and she said, I want you to listen to me carefully. [0:24:05.720] – Anna Bourland: And she had been through terrible abuse through her family as a child. So she pulled me aside and she said this. It seems like because we filed police reports, we did all the stuff, everything fell through the cracks. I’m going to be perfectly honest with you, CPS stopped calling. Everybody trying to get me foster care, adopted all these things, and it just all fell through the cracks, so she pulled me aside, and she goes, “It doesn’t look like we’re going to be able to legally get you out of anything right now. So here’s what you need to do: You need to prepare for when you turn 18 and you can get out. So she said you need to learn to type really fast, OK? And then she said you need to as soon as you turn 18, just sign up with a temp agency so you can get a job job so you can get out. And then that’s the other thing: you need to get out and have your own apartment. You need to do that.” And then the last thing she told me is “as soon as you are 18, you need to sign up to get counseling” because back then you needed parental consent to do everything. So I think now if one of my kids needed to go talk to somebody, they could just do it. And they didn’t. They don’t need my consent, which is fantastic. [0:25:19.960] – Anna Bourland: Back then, they can have this control on me. I didn’t even have access to a phone. When I was home, there was no phone on the hook. It was in their locked bedroom. So I wasn’t allowed to call 911 or anything. So she told me these things and I don’t know what it is, but it just stuck to me. It was like, this is my directive, this is my manifesto. [0:25:48.270] – Anna Bourland: This is what I need to do. And I was kicked out at 17. My mom came to me on a Tuesday and said, I don’t want to be a mom anymore. You need to be out by Saturday. [0:26:00.210] – TAMAR: Wow. [0:26:00.630] – Anna Bourland: So it threw some of the things into chaos for me because I had to scramble instead of having all my plans in a row. But I had learned to type really fast. I knew that I could sign up with this very specific temp agency that was going to help me get a job. And I had already been working at retail saving up some money. So I was kind of on my way. Then at that point, I knew I could sign up for counseling. So this is what I think really made a difference. So many people go through hell and back and again and again and help is misleading. I, because of Nancy and her sticking that in my brain and me being ready for it, I, I started counseling right away when I turned 18 and I dealt with so much. I went for years. I think I went from 18 to about 23 to this one specific counselor who helped me with feelings of guilt about my mother and all, because I wasn’t talking to my mom because it was unhealthy. [0:27:14.460] – Anna Bourland: But then other members of the family were like, everybody’s been abused. We just get over it and move on. That’s your mom. These sorts of things, these old tropes that we have to sweep under the rug and love somebody because they share DNA with us. And that’s just a total lie. And so I remember her really helping me visually. There was a whiteboard in her counseling room and she would say, OK, I need you to repeat this: it is OK to not feel guilty about not talking to my mom. So, like, I had this mantra that I repeated so that I wouldn’t have this baggage, OK? And then and it kind of felt like I was playing like a role playing game. And these were like little side quests to make me stronger. And then she said, well, and of course, at the time, you know, my faith, and my faith is still very important to me, it’s just taken on a bit of a different outlook. But at the time, my faith was very important to me in the Bible was very important. And I want to say it’s still is like I said, it’s just taken on a different kind of face for me. But she asked me what what tool, what what tool do I have in my you know, in my tool box? That seems like it would help me. And I said, well, there’s this first in the Bible that says to take every thought into captivity and that the context of that is so that you have control of your mind and your mind is in a good place and in a healthy place. [0:28:50.490] – Anna Bourland: I thought, gosh, what a great mental health foundation regardless of from atheist, agnostic, what a good practice to take every thought into captivity and decide if that is something that’s worthy of your energy and your time. And so she said, I like that. So what we did is we diagrammed on her whiteboard where my thoughts were going sideways because at that point I had been diagnosed with PTSD and OCD from trauma, so less straightening carpet fringe in the middle of the night and more like intrusive thoughts and things of that nature, my brain being like one big, worse case scenario, Choose Your Own Adventure book. We diagrammed those thoughts out, and she goes, OK, “here’s where” and we would circle. “Here’s where the thought went from kind of like a normal trajectory to being in that OCD territory.” And so I have this visual representation of how to just stop and change that. [0:30:01.270] – Anna Bourland: And I’m going to tell you right now, that’s how I’m here today. And I’ve been I’ve been to other counseling, you know, like it’s kind of like going to the doctor in some ways. Like sometimes it’s good to have it for a long time. Sometimes you go when you need it. I’ve obviously gone through some other hard things as an adult. I’ve been divorced, had all kinds of stuff go on through that hurt me, that created new trauma. But the cool thing is, is that all the new trauma is not attached to the old trauma. That’s huge. It’s so huge that it’s not, okay, I’m forty one years old and I’m also dealing with unpacking my childhood and unpacking abuse and unpacking divorce and any feelings of betrayal in there and things like that. I’m not unpacking it all together. Consequently, it’s actually what makes me not be in this place where I’m dragging through the mud of feelings about having my divorce. Right. [0:31:02.560] – Anna Bourland: And so actually, on Sundays, it’s Family Day and my ex-husband and the kids and I, we go to dinner, we go to lunch, we watch a movie together at my house or what we can. We communicate. We’re friends. And I really credit that ability going all the way back to doing the work so early. So many people don’t get that opportunity or they don’t realize they need it because we’re taught to shut up. And I’m going to tell you right now my story, like I watched the the Gabriel Fernandez story on Netflix. I don’t know. And while he’s a kid who is kind of a famous case and they did a documentary about it, and yes, I am one of those people who likes to watch all the true crime and stuff documentaries on all the streaming services, but Netflix has really been the star of those lately. It’s so crazy how much of this story is like mine being handcuffed to things being set in ice baths for hours as a punishment, one of the punishments I got was having to eat these really insanely hot peppers and I had to chew them until they were mush and then swallow them. And shocker, shocker. I have acid reflux problems from that. Wow. I have I have what’s called GERD, a gastro esophageal disorder. It’s like a reflux disorder that’s like pretty bad. And that is from when I was abused as a kid, I was punished any time I blinked wrong or I said something wrong. According to somebody, I got the all these crazy over-the-top punishments. I mean, one time I was I had to sit outside in the rain overnight because I wasn’t allowed in the house, you know, different things like that. I came home one time to the locks being changed and had to find somewhere to stay. [0:33:02.530] – Anna Bourland: I started paying for all my own supplies, toilet paper, shampoo, everything by the age of eight or nine. So these were things that I had to have kind of that that drive and that that hustle, if you will, to get through all of that. And so. You know what? There are things that that echo from that time, right? [0:33:30.230] – Anna Bourland: But it’s not an ongoing trauma. And so I was able to really work on that and make something of myself and promise. And this is the one of the biggest things. And even though I’m divorced, my ex-husband and I have this very clear understanding because obviously I met him at 17. He’s the one who helped me move out of my mom’s house when I got kicked out. [0:33:58.540] – TAMAR: Right. [0:33:59.120] – Anna Bourland: So we got married very young at twenty one and we were married for 17 years, and we still have this agreement. It’s just like we our kids do not have to go through what I went through. I don’t want that to touch them. They’re aware of it. They’re aware of that history because I’m very real with my kids and they’re amazing little humans. My daughter turns 13 tomorrow. Yeah, yeah. And my son will be 16 in June. They’re just I will use the word literally here, literally incredible. [0:34:33.440] – Anna Bourland: So I think my kids are literally incredible. They’re just, when I say they’re little grown ups, I don’t mean because they grew up too fast. I just mean, I don’t know, there’s just an old soul element in some way to each of them. And so they really comprehend what I went through and thus they comprehend how hard I work so that they do not have to go through anything similar. Yeah, there’s definitely it’s like I never want my children to experience homelessness, I never want them to experience any kind of abuse. I’ve been through, we talked about as from a parent perspective, but I also had other things happen to me. And so, you know, there are things that we impart to, like I’ve been part of to my daughter that it’s very important that she understands that just because she’s confident and she knows what she wants, it doesn’t mean somebody is not going to try and force their will on her. So she has to speak up if something is uncomfortable, and that it’s OK. [0:35:42.400] – Anna Bourland: And that’s what we were taught, is we were still in that sweep it under the rug. I mean, and we’re still just emerging as a society, barely. I mean, it’s still so fearful to take something and not sweep it under the rug these days. [0:35:55.960] – TAMAR: Yeah. [0:35:56.380] – Anna Bourland: So I, I don’t want, as much as it is up to me. I really want to avoid my children having a childhood they have to recover from. [0:36:06.390] – TAMAR: Right. Yeah. Well, I mean, you seem pretty resilient. You’re able, I know you for so many, for so long, and I didn’t know this until you started hearing it recently. And that’s why I had you come here. So, I mean, kudos to you. And I have to say, there’s one thing when you talked about how you like your church, someone in your church helped you kind of pull through this as somebody who like and this is a weird observation, but I think I might have even raised this in a past podcast. There is I think something about the structure of a religious community that lends itself to really helping people overcome a lot and or rather helps them. I see this from Facebook and I do genealogy and I notice that a lot of my distant cousins who don’t have any sort of religious identity anymore, they are definitely they definitely struggle a lot more than those who do. It’s a weird dynamic. And I think that there’s something about having that community and having a community. A religious community, I’m able to observe it in a different way, but if I think you can observe if you have a community as well to some degree. But I think there there is definitely a lot more. You have a group of friends. That’s one thing. Everybody has friends. But there’s something about that that is different than what anybody else has dealt with, has had. And I think that really helps. And I’m not like, I don’t want to say I’m like a religious advocate here, and I’m not trying to convince people to become religious in any way. [0:37:43.570] – Anna Bourland: But you’re a “community” advocate. [0:37:45.490] – TAMAR: Yeah, I’m an advocate of community. [0:37:47.650] – Anna Bourland: Yeah. The advocacy of community is so important. For awhile I was I was at a church that was like, you know, you don’t have to, you can be involved without you can be an atheist. Come be involved. We’re trimming trees on Saturday and we’re going to hang out and we’re going to have lunch. [0:38:05.830] – TAMAR: Right. [0:38:06.160] – Anna Bourland: Like, don’t be alone right now. [0:38:09.280] – TAMAR: But you have to be part of that. [Anna: There’s an element of that.] [0:38:12.220] – TAMAR: There’s an element of that. There’s also the element of the fact that I think the reason why community, like I’m an advocate, if you will, and I do say, you know, religious community is because at least for me, when it comes to Judaism for myself, but I think it would also translate to Christianity or elsewhere, is the fact that there is that component to the fact that usually you stay in that community. [0:38:36.460] – TAMAR: You’re not, it’s not a community that you leave and come and go as you please. Whereas I advocate for other communities like the running community, the fitness community. But that’s not a community that I feel like, right now, those are those are limited only to Facebook groups anyway, so they wouldn’t notice if I’m gone. I’m not a big part of that. [Anna: Right.] But in the community where you’re seen face to face your absence is recognized, it’s noticed, there’s something about that that’s more important, it’s more solidified. [0:39:05.320] – Anna Bourland: There is an element of faith community that that lends itself to that when it’s done well. I think what we’ve seen so much of is it being not done well and being broadcast like across the masses, like look at all this done poorly, community, religious community, activity, I guess you could say, or like the bad actors, etc. So it can be really difficult, people. But overall, as far as community and feeling like there’s something bigger than you, whether it’s religious or whether it’s something that it’s just like this is my hugest passion, etc., but that that bonds you in such a way that, like you said, you you can’t get away with disappearing and I mean that in the in the unhealthy way of disappearing, if you’re spiraling down into depression or if you’re feeling like everything’s falling apart or you have a kid who you feel like, oh, my gosh, I don’t know what I’m going to do, I feel like they’re losing them or whatever feelings people might be going through. That kind of community is ,when it’s functioning right, that’s the community that is not going to let everything fall apart. [0:40:32.730] – TAMAR: Right. Right. [0:40:33.650] – Anna Bourland: And sometimes I have found that that community is like two people for me. And sometimes it’s been like two hundred, right? I think that that’s like the natural cycle of of life and how we function. I’ve seen that happen with my kids too, how they had all these friends and then it sort of transitioned into this other thing. And now, like my son is talking about how he has so much depth with his group of friends now, and they stay up on discord until 4:00 in the morning on the weekend, watching movies and talking about all the craziness of the school stuff that’s going on and everything. And it’s like, thank goodness they have that. You know, I don’t care if you’re on the phone till 4:00 in the morning if it means that you’re going to make it. Just do that, and the fact that I have kids that are supporting the mental health of themselves and others and that they understand what self-care is and that they don’t, when they look in the mirror, they think they’re fabulous instead of flawed. I mean, this is a miracle. [0:41:47.050] – Anna Bourland: We grew—I don’t know about you, but I grew up with the self-esteem was something I had to fight for. [0:41:53.629] – TAMAR: I understand, I know. My mother gave me a self-esteem book. I remember that very, very, very acutely. [0:42:00.160] – Anna Bourland: Yeah. And it was this thing. And it’s just like now I’m sitting here with a 13 year old daughter who loves herself. I sat back a couple of months ago and I thought, OK, that’s not just a big deal because she has a momma who had to fight for that. It came from hardship. But that’s a big deal. And it’s not just a big deal because, OK, I must have something to do with it because I raised her right. But, within herself, she found who she is, loves herself and doesn’t have all these hangups about herself, and it’s just like, oh my God, that is a miracle, you know? And then to see my son have confidence as well and confidence that is married to empathy. So without the toxic masculinity of it all, that is just like how did this happen? And that’s why I say, like, they’re amazing. And so that kind of goes into the self-care bit of it is that when I became a mom, I said, OK, my identity, I’ve seen what happens to moms who their whole identity is kids, and I don’t think it helps the kids either. And so I made sure, because I do art, I paint, I sing, I actually dance, I learn to tap dance and jazz dance and actually did performances and stuff like that in the last few years. And it’s you know, I had my art displayed in a gallery. [0:43:32.000] – Anna Bourland: I did all these things and some of that was all year I was getting divorced. I just went for it, and my kids have even told me that that’s helped them because I wanted to show them that they can do all kinds of things regardless of their gender or if they’re a parent or whatever, that they can still genuinely be themselves, and that taught them how to be themselves. They actually know who they are at a younger age than I knew who I was. They see that example and then they model that for other people. I tell them like we’re each a ripple in a pond, you know? I’m just trying to help your ripple continue from this and that. We’re passing on good things. So yes, we’re going to take the 15 minutes in the evening to do a face mask or we’re going to say, yes, we have all this work to do, but we’re going to stop and we’re going to watch a comedy movie because we all need a little levity. Then we’re going to go back to all the crazy stuff that we have on our plate. [0:44:44.950] – Anna Bourland: I really appreciate that they have absorbed that because that’s my I want to say that’s kind of my biggest goal other than obviously I want to enjoy my life and be healthy and happy and things like that. But passing that on to them instead of all the other junk that I could be passing on to them is is incredible. Yeah, it it is my pure joy that the chains got broken in my generation through me, and that that is not something I’m passing on to them and somehow it has been passed on to them that my daughter just said, “oh, my gosh, I look fabulous today.” This is great. It’s like. Yes, and it’s not with an arrogance, it’s just confidence and I run into that and I’ll tell you where her generation is going to be much better. But I’m still here as a 41 year old who’s single and has been trying to well, I’m not really trying to date anymore. I’m open to it, but I’m not actively working on anything dating-wise. But as I have, I have met guys who said they don’t want to see me again because they expected me to be less confident. I’m overweight, I’m a bigger girl, and they just expect me to be less confident. And you know what? That is the ultimate compliment right there. [0:46:19.730] – Anna Bourland: Honestly, it’s like, OK, you can’t handle my confidence or that I’ve been successful at something, etc., and then then I am super happy to be single and stay that way, I don’t need to worry about it. That was someone else, and that’s yet another thing I can model for those kiddos. You don’t have to chase after what everybody you know what that societal norm, that social norm, you don’t have to chase after it. You can be amazingly content and happy and I am. And that makes me so openhearted to whatever may come instead of bringing if I were to have this amazing romance or whatever. I’m not bringing all this baggage with me. I’m bringing a smile and an open mind through it. [0:47:12.020] – TAMAR: So talk about that. Let’s because I know you have to go soon, tell me a little bit about what you’re what you’re doing for that happiness self-care side of things. [0:47:23.060] – Anna Bourland: Great. [0:47:24.140] – TAMAR: But keep it keep it brief because I got some more questions for you before it’s too late. [0:47:29.360] – Anna Bourland: I’ll keep it brief. Well, I mentioned that I do art and singing and dancing and the singing is very important to me. I’ve been doing that since I was probably three or four years old. And I, I do karaoke before everything was shut down from covid. I have, there’s an eighties club near my house and we would meet every Wednesday night and do karaoke there, and they had a great experience. I hope they will come back soon. But that group we created Zoom karaoke group. So I created a Zoom karaoke group that’s been meeting now, tomorrow is our one year anniversary of meeting every week on Zoome to do karaoke to sing. So I do that. [0:48:09.980] – Anna Bourland: And then also I have like some skin issues, like I get dry skin, I get eczema and so it like really hard for self-care because it’s like everything smells pretty and I can’t use any of that because it makes me break out. And I found this amazing company that makes stuff that smells super pretty and doesn’t destroy my skin. And so I loved it so much after using it for a couple of years now I sell it to and because why not? Because I get a discount on my own stuff. And through that I make sure, you know, I have a routine. I make sure to take care of myself. I make sure that I spend lots of time with my kids laughing and joking around and stuff like that, so like all of that is involved with with self-care. [0:49:01.700] – Anna Bourland: I love my dogs, I have two dogs and they make us all happy and they’re great companions, too. So all of those sorts of things come into making sure I’m OK. I mean, and that’s gosh, I’ve worked from home for eight years. So when the shutdown all came, it was like extra super isolation, like on steroids for like now I’m super isolated. [0:49:27.980] – Anna Bourland: I already was pretty isolated. So that’s why I would make sure I go to karaoke and do stuff. But now, you know, it’s been super important. You have to be. I have to be very mindful of it. [0:49:38.690] – TAMAR: Yeah. You know, yeah, so for me, I talked about [how] singing has really given me a voice. It made me feel like I can start talking again. And that was something that I didn’t do for around—we’ve known each other for a very long time. I’m sure you noticed, but you probably didn’t notice notice because we’ve kind of been talking. I just never felt comfortable talking out loud for a while. Social media. I was very quiet. I stopped blogging. I really stopped posting on social media. I have to stop posting to Twitter. Yes. We met on Plurk of all sites. I know. And I like. Why not? [0:50:08.240] – Anna Bourland: Hey, I was really there too. You know, because, remember, social media was like, “oh, we got mentioned by so-and-so” or “ooh, these people!” I have celebrities having me edit their wiki pages or whatever. And now I’m like “eh,” I know how to do social media like the business for a client, but for myself, I don’t need to be recognized anymore. [0:50:24.310] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. I feel like I have to a little more so and I do it more. But I’m like there’s different outlets that I have to do it. I don’t use Facebook too much unless I’m like really like a big announcement. Right. I will announce probably that I’ll vaccinate and that’s like the only thing I planned on my, docket as well. But I post about my brand all the time now and I wouldn’t have felt comfortable. And Twitter, I stopped using Twitter for so long and people were, people are trying to get my Twitter account. People try to get my Instagram account, but now I’m just like, yeah, that’s that’s just the nature of the beast and I’m OK with it. Yeah. And I think it really came from the ability and the desire to sing. It’s a weird dynamic. But it felt [right] and it’s funny because and I’ve shared this in the past, but when toward the end when I was starting to get better from and I was seeing my therapist, my psychiatrist, I showed him, I said to him, I sent him to one of my recordings and we played it out loud and one of the sessions and we were singing Confrontation by Les Miserables, the Les Mis show, and we have different parts and we’re sitting at the same time. And he listens to this guy and he was a proper voice [singsong]. I’m just like me singing my ahhhh. I sing like a kid, whatever, I was a soloist in high school, in elementary school, but he listens to the opera guy and he’s like, that guy has a good voice. I’m like, what about me? His response was like, he has a good voice. You, not so much. And I was so offended by that. But then I’m like, you know what? It’s not going to stop me from being able to be who I am because I’m finally starting to do it. But I will say that it still left the mark. I don’t think I’ll ever get over that. But it’s fine because at least it hasn’t stopped me and my daughter is starting to do it. I’m just feeling more confident to be able to keep doing it. It’s very therapeutic to do it. I don’t do it for any reason. But the fact that it feels good to sing a harmony with somebody else, that’s it. [0:52:17.530] – Anna Bourland: Yes. And that’s what’s important. I think as a society, we have all this access to all these crazy things, like everybody’s on YouTube and they’re covering this big star. And the star saw it and they you know, and then now they have a recording contract here where America’s Got Talent and The Voice and American Idol, all these things. I mean, back in the day, we had Star Search and it was on like once a month. [0:52:44.710] – TAMAR: I know, right? [0:52:45.010] – Anna Bourland: It was chill, you know? And that’s how we got Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears and all. But now it’s just like everybody is so much more talented. I had somebody reach out to me from America’s Got Talent, “you should audition this” or whatever. And I mean, I kind of started the process at one point and then covid happened, and it was it was kind of crazy. But it’s just I remember having this feeling as confident as I am. It’s just like I don’t feel like I’m not good. I just feel like, well, they’re like this whole other level. And I think as a society, we we might be discouraging our people who just do this for fun or whatever, because we’re all trying to be the next such and such, or the viral video and everything. I thought I was a little immune to that. But then at that moment I was like, I guess I’m not. I guess. [TAMAR: That’s the problem. That’s the problem.] It kind of made me feel like, why should I do this? I’m not that level. And it’s like, no, forget it, we need to do that. You know, if you want to paint and you suck at it, who cares? Nobody. There’s no canvas police. Go buy more canvases and make those suck, too, because you’re enjoying yourself, you know? [0:54:00.310] – TAMAR: Exactly. But it’s funny because I enjoyed myself and I was like, I’m good because when I was little, I was always reinforced by my teacher, Mrs. Tuchinsky. I loved her and I still love her. And I haven’t spoken to her in 30 something years, but her daughter just friended me on Facebook within the last six months or so. So I should reach out to her just to speak to her, her mother. But like, she helped me so much in getting that confidence, and then I felt like I wasn’t afraid. But then when shrink was like, “well,” you know, you’re not supposed to do that! You’re supposed to make me feel better! He shrunk my brain a little more. But it’s fine. Yeah, yeah, I don’t know if we should go into that. I’m going to lead with a last final question, if it’s fair, how do people find you? How do people learn and get in touch with you. [0:54:47.350] – Anna Bourland: Oh, great. Well, Instagram is probably the quickest way because then, if there’s Facebook and there’s private messaging on Instagram and all the other stuff so the easiest way is to get me on Instagram. And I’m @annainthestudio. [0:55:01.750] – TAMAR: OK, perfect. I’m going to ask another question. And you have literally, you’re going to give me a ten second answer, OK? If you can give an earlier version of Anna some piece of advice, what would you tell her? It’ll take 10 seconds to think about, and I’m fine. [0:55:20.330] – Anna Bourland: Tell somebody besides your family what is going on. [0:55:25.160] – TAMAR: Yeah. OK. [0:55:28.970] – Anna Bourland: If social media existed back then— [0:55:30.950] – TAMAR: You would have been tweeting [0:55:32.290] – Anna Bourland: I might have been rescued. I was almost a statistic, basically I lived. [0:55:38.130] – TAMAR: Yeah, wow. That’s powerful. All right, cool. Thank you so very much for this, and it’s been a lot of fun and I hope you enjoyed it. [0:55:49.280] – Anna Bourland: I enjoyed it so much. Thank you. Thank you so very much. Tamar. [0:55:53.060] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah. Cool, cool. All right.

John Ryan has done the superhuman, deciding to say goodbye to his vehicle so that he could commute by bike or on foot to his job 10 miles away. [00:00:16.895] – TAMAR: Hey, everybody, I am so excited. I have John Ryan here. He is another guy that I met through the David Goggins Facebook group on which if you know and you’ve listened to the podcast before, David Goggins has, he’s not human and we’re all trying to be not human, just like him. I guess John will share his story. So, John, thank you so much for coming. [00:00:41.535] – John Ryan: It’s not a problem. [00:00:42.765] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, where are you physically in the world? Tell me about what you do. [00:00:50.285] – John Ryan: I’m Johnson County, Kansas, the United States. [00:00:54.305] – TAMAR: Nice. [00:00:56.085] – John Ryan: Yeah, and I’m currently off work, but four days a week, I work as a restaurant shift manager and lately I’ve been biking the 20 mile round trip down, four days a week to get to work. [00:01:16.235] – TAMAR: Yeah, was that inspired by David Goggins? [00:01:18.595] – John Ryan: Yeah, it’s it’s been a big part of my current routine, [which] has been inspired by David Goggins. I’ve pushed myself further than I would have otherwise. [00:01:33.575] – TAMAR: Yeah, that’s amazing. So for those who don’t know, he talks about in his book also and everybody has to read this book, it’s a crazy book, Can’t Hurt Me. And he talks about how he commuted, I forget. He commuted—he ran to work a couple, like a hundred miles or something like that, or he biked to work. He did all those things and it’s insanity. So kudos to you. I can’t say I have that option because my work is downstairs. I don’t have too much of a commute. Yeah. So that’s pretty cool. So did you did you take off the day because of the podcast? [00:02:12.125] – John Ryan: No. [00:02:12.755] – TAMAR: Oh, you’re just planning. It just worked out. Well, this is meant to be. So just out of curiosity, because these conversations are intended to flow naturally. I know we’ve talked about with the podcast is about. But how have you been faring in covid times? How’s how’s everything been going over there? [00:02:32.895] – John Ryan: Oh, we haven’t been affected a whole lot here in the Midwest. So it’s basically business as usual. [00:02:41.405] – TAMAR: So you haven’t had any specific issues with, the restaurants didn’t close or anything like that? [00:02:47.465] – John Ryan: No, my restaurant did not close, fortunately. [00:02:51.165] – TAMAR: Oh wow, good for you. Yeah. I’m right outside New York City and just going to the restaurants. It’s a sad view of everything. I mean there’s more staff than patrons. And when I say there’s more staff, there’s like two people in the restaurant. It’s really it’s devastating actually. I say that like, it’s it’s really, really depressing. And there’s lots of parking in the city, too. So it’s a good time to move to New York City if you’ve ever thought about it. That’s what I would say. But it is sad. Yeah. Well, good for you. You’re lucky. Very lucky. [00:03:28.355] – John Ryan: Yeah, I realize that. Yeah. [00:03:30.415] – TAMAR: Yeah. So I recruited people to be on the podcast really based on their story and how they’ve been able to overcome a lot. And you kind of touched upon that in your podcast journey just now in the beginning. And you wanted to join the podcast. So tell me a little bit about where you came from and where you are now. And I guess because of, the Goggins story and how that all ties in. Feel free to touch upon the book as well and touch upon him, his life based on what you know, it doesn’t have to only be me. [00:04:10.215] – John Ryan: OK, well, so I grew up playing sports, but never—I didn’t play in high school for a team, but I still always enjoyed playing sports. But as I got older, I got more into the work routine and everything, so it took me away from being athletic. But then once I got older, I ended up being in a position where my car was failing me so for several years I was paying for a car that had been new a few years before. But this whole time for a five year period, I had been paying thousands for this car, and it was failing, so it led me to want to be independent, not to rely upon that, to actually get me to and from work or anywhere. So that’s when I got a bike and I haven’t driven since I got that bike. I let my car be picked up, like the bank got it back and I was happy for it because I didn’t owe anything and I was just going with it. So it was a financial thing that led me to my current lifestyle. But then discovering David Goggins on Joe Rogan’s podcast, I watched both podcasts that he was on. I watched those so many times that I have them memorized, especially the first podcast, with Joe Rogan. It made a really big impact on me, to say the least. That was the most impactful experience so far in my life to hear his story and understand what his perspective is and it totally changed the way that I look at life in general and it’s weakness is the biggest threat to my life, I know that, and I figure it’s the same for everyone. It’s just a matter of being willing to accept the fact that we’re all capable of more than we may have been led to believe. So that’s that’s good for now to summarize your question, my basic answer to that question you gave me. [00:06:56.555] – TAMAR: Yeah, did you do you actually read the book or you just heard about it on the podcast? Because I’m sure he’s presenting his content in many different ways in the spoken word and written word. I’m just curious if you’ve actually read the book. [00:07:06.575] – John Ryan: Unfortunately, I have not read the book. That’s not something I chose, to ignore the book. It’s just, you know, I dug hard for very long, actually. Separate story right there. But yeah. So anyway. [00:07:25.955] – TAMAR: Yeah, You could share that. You can. Go ahead. [00:07:30.305] – John Ryan: Oh, well no, I was just saying. Yeah I don’t have, it’s not a good story. I just didn’t know how to get a debit card until a couple weeks ago and it’s just another facet of my financial woes as a lot of us have had, especially if you’re still young, a young adult. We’re all making our way in this world. So anyway, I haven’t gotten around yet getting the book, unfortunately, and that’s something I’m really looking forward to. [00:07:55.055] – TAMAR: Yeah, I will tell you, I don’t own the book. I got from the library. I’ve been taking advantage of the library. You forget that that’s there. [00:08:02.615] – John Ryan: I know. Yeah. Yeah, that’s right. [00:08:05.015] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. So I will say that there’s a, I think in like chapter two and I don’t want to say it, I’ve talked about it before, but there’s this part where it’s really early in the book, maybe chapter three, and he talks about his his upbringing and his father abusing him, but he talks about this child on the school bus. I’m not going to go any further, but at like age six or something, he witnessed a trauma that you and I will never come close to witnessing, and it’s just like I read that and I’m like, holy crap. And it has nothing to do with his future, what he’s doing as an adult, where he really defies all odds and he does all these things that, like I say, are not human. You talk about the weakness. I’m trying really hard. It’s really difficult to do what he does. But I think what what happened to him as a child really shaped him into, of course, because that’s the early parts of the book and it’s terrifying. It’s really terrifying. But I mean, this guy is, he runs ultramarathons on broken legs. I don’t think any of us—I don’t know if that’s a weakness. I don’t know. I mean, he was died many, many times. It’s crazy. Yeah. But it’s it’s great that he provides that inspiration. [00:09:23.125] – John Ryan: Yeah, for him, it’s different because if you’re on that level of being a Navy SEAL and all the different stuff that he accomplished before he ever got on the 24 hour one mile track, the first time he ever did a significant race or trial, before that he was already a different kind of person. It was just it took the cardio to get him to a new level to where he was actually able to inspire other people, because other people, most people can’t relate to his time before that. [00:10:10.495] – TAMAR: Yeah, you can’t relate to most of his life. You can’t relate to what he’s doing. I mean, I’m sitting here and I’m like, now I have kids now, and my life is a little different than what it was when I might have been a little more [athletic]. I was definitely sports minded, but then I became sedentary when the computer kind of became a big thing and I shirked my responsibilities to my health and now I’m trying to get back into it, and I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been sitting on my ass for like 20 years (it makes me feel very, very old. I’m not that old), but, you know, I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been sitting on my ass for so long that I am at this point where I can’t do the things that other people are doing. But like I was saying in a previous podcast that I don’t know if I’ll ever get a sub 10-minute mile at this point. When I was younger, I was getting seven to eight minutes. But that was when I was a kid. And I don’t know, even if I push myself like the Goggins way, I love that he shows that humans can get to that point. But can all humans get to that point? And that’s the hard part. I hope the takeaway for most people is that they shouldn’t push themselves to do what he does because, again, he’s superhuman, but like to persevere and not to give up because we do have limitations and it is a lot of psychological barriers on ourselves, I think you can identify. [00:11:31.385] – John Ryan: Definitely. I want to go as far as saying this superhuman. We all have our own ways to describe them and you read his book so maybe you’re more aware of everything that I am. But for me, what he’s inspired me to do, is just to not be so ready to accept defeat, you know, so that’s what it is. It’s your own personal battle. What are you going to do today? Not you. But what is the listener going to do today. There’s several options that you have and those are going to make you feel better tomorrow, next week, next month, or they’re going to be something that tomorrow, next week, next month, that you’re like, why did I do that? Right. So for me, it’s hard for me to digest certain stuff, so it’s like why did I eat that? Why did I even try? It’s just a waste of time and money. And so it’s a matter of self knowledge, and that’s the big thing these days. People are so involved in other people’s lives. People want to take inspiration from Goggins and they want Goggins audience to be their shepherd or whatever. So that’s not really, like I take inspiration from and it’s his voice is in my mind when I’m struggling through a workout, you know when I’m trying to get home, and I’ve been gone for 14, 15 hours and I’m walking on the snow. This happened just a month ago. I was through a foot of snow and ice and my fears and horrible pain, and it’s just one of those things where I’m not going to give up. It’s just bettering myself, just feeling better about what I can accomplish and improving upon yesterday’s gains. [00:13:28.915] – TAMAR: Yeah. Yeah, and it’s funny because it’s like there’s so many things and the philosophy of this incremental growth that that it’s important. Like the Atomic Habits movement by James Clear. As long as you’re just seeing, you’re pushing on that. I mean, kudos. You’re actually literally, you were in the ice, you’ve been walking in ice to work, too? Or that was just— [00:13:52.035] – John Ryan: Yeah. I usually bike, but for that time I had to walk because it was it was to the point where my bike was actually going to be able to go through it because it was so thick, yeah. [00:14:09.375] – TAMAR: Wow. Wow. And how long does that take? Ten, ten miles. It’s not it’s not a walk in the park. [00:14:14.985] – John Ryan: Yeah, yeah, it’s a 20-mile round trip though. I leave to work at 6:30 in the morning. I get home at 11:30 at night and while I’m at work, I’m not complaining and not trying to avoid doing stuff. It’s funny because I have somebody who rolled out and shows up for work a half hour late, tired, doesn’t do anything for the first three hours they’re there. And then they leave a couple hours after that. And meanwhile, I’ve been there for like 12 hours and I walk six hours on top of that and I don’t say a word about it. It’s different, completely different ways of life there. Me and my coworkers sometimes. [00:14:51.505] – TAMAR: That’s amazing. I am really, really, I’m inspired by YOU. Forget David Goggins. You got this like, that’s that’s awesome. Yeah. What do you listen to usually when you’re when you’re walking to work or biking to work, what is usually in your ears? Is it the Joe Rogan podcast or is it another podcast or is it something else? Because I have something, I have a recommendation for you. [00:15:13.365] – John Ryan: Oh, okay. Well, really, I don’t have data I can use my phone and the weather. My phone’s usually not what I use. I usually just use a radio or nothing. [00:15:25.935] – TAMAR: Oh, wow. Wow. [00:15:28.725] – John Ryan: Yeah, but radio sometimes. [00:15:31.395] – TAMAR: You should look into this. I don’t know if you can maybe download like offline or whatever, but I’ve been finding, the voice in my head that’s also helped me. And it kind of like when you were saying and I identified with this. There’s this podcast, not podcast, there’s an artist. I have them on Spotify. I guess you can get them anywhere called Fearless Motivation. And it’s really just the same voice in your head that “you can keep doing it, you can [start] pushing.” It’s all about the boundaries that we mentally put on ourselves. It’s totally the same. It’s very aligned, it’s not aligned with the story, the David Goggins story is very him. But it’s aligned specifically with this mindset. It’s all about mindset shift. And there’s a lot of really, really like, it’s not I don’t even know what genre of music I can call it. It’s like hip hop, but it’s not hip hop, because I’m not really a hip hop person, but it’s it’s weird, but it’s I like it, I really, really like it. I haven’t listened to it in a while. I usually do when I’m running and when running gets tough for me, that’s usually what I’m listening. And I’ve been on the treadmill watching The Expanse these days. That’s why my walking these days. So I will say, yeah, more and more inspired by you because I haven’t been able to get that but you should check that out and see if there’s a way to listen. [00:16:51.245] – John Ryan: Okay. Yeah. [00:16:51.845] – TAMAR: Yeah. And another thing, I’m finishing a book right now by a woman named Gretchen Rubin. She wrote The Happiness Project. A second book, well, she’s written quite a few books and she talks about, it’s basically the same thing you were saying. I just finished this chapter. It’s basically the second to last chapter in the book about how like how other people’s stories, more than psychology, more than scientific research, other people’s stories are usually can be an impetus for people to improve their lives, like sort of like my perfume story has kind of helped people in improving their lives and using perfume for mental health, which is my story. But your—it’s sort of the same thing. Like you say, you’re validating the whole David Goggins story, [which] was was more powerful than anything else, you’ve heard it. I don’t know if there are scientific studies to this because it honestly pushes well beyond human limits. So there’s that. But you’re validating a lot of these things that I’ve been coming across lately, so it’s nice to hear, and it’s like I said, it’s inspiring because it’s like there’s this domino effect. It’s not just you. At the end of the day, you’re inspired by David, I’m inspired by you and by David, and I’m hoping people who listen to this are inspired as well by you, David, maybe me, but I’m going to put me like, like lowercase, you know? Yeah, it’s cool. Awesome. [00:18:18.895] – John Ryan: Definitely. [00:18:20.205] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, so I know you’re like working like these crazy hours and your self care might just be about that. I’m kind of curious to get from you, like how you focus on yourself. You’re very kind of like I’m assuming you’re like, I don’t know, I have to get I have to get your headshot when we actually put this online and all that or even like of running out of biking or something, I’m sure you got that covered. But just just curious, like what is self care? How do you how do you unwind? How are you taking care of yourself? [00:18:52.015] – John Ryan: Well, so I really I don’t work crazy hours. I only work four days a week. The company that I work for is really actually to a fault, considerate of their employees. So like I said, if somebody wants to show up late and not do anything and then leave early, that’s perfectly fine and we let them do that on a daily basis. There are people that work for my company that do very little and it’s just fine and dandy. So having said that, I don’t work very many hours, but I do put in a lot of time, almost as much time working as I do on the bike or whatever, not quite, like half the time, easy. So anyways, to your point, for self care: my routine. when I’m at work, I’m allowed to take my time and do things the way that I want them to be done and to create a healthy working environment for myself because I wouldn’t work there if that wasn’t the case. So in any way, to and from work, I can feel, I can unwind on my way home. It’s important for me to be relaxed, to gather my thoughts, to be by myself. I’m introverted in that way. I get a lot of my mental ability when I’m at work. I feel drained when I leave work. So I want to be able to have time to myself way that made feel very good about my self care on my way home. And on my way to work it just makes me feel good and ready to go so I’m so tired and not wanting to be there. I’m actually really excited to be there and just really happy that I’m not on the freakin road anymore, now I’m actually actually my destination. So then I do have three days per week. So I do stretching, and I was talking about that digestion. And that’s that’s been a big thing for me, along with my exercise routine was really hammering down exactly what benefits me and what doesn’t. It’s about money wisely, you know, blah, blah, blah. And in addition to what you’re saying about perfume, I’ve discovered aromatherapy. So I’ve been using peppermint spray, lots of it. I don’t use any other kind of like cologne or whatever. But anyway, aromatherapy is another self care type of thing that I could point out. [00:21:44.915] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. So I want to talk about aromatherapy for me. I’ve had this conversation when I launched my perfume. So the story of my life is that I had children and then I got depressed and then my depression ended up hitting a rock bottom. And I discovered one day, I think because my mindset was in such a different place, I put on perfume that one day and it changed my life. All of a sudden I woke up. I think my fifth sense finally woke up. And most people take scent/smell for granted. I’ve known about aromatherapy. I’ve actually own aromatherapy 50 ml Intense.Rated 4.78 out of 5 $188.00 Add to cart 50 ml Quirky.Rated 5 out of 5 $188.00 Add to cart . But I didn’t I didn’t get the same impact. I think the difference was maybe the scent itself, I don’t really know, or maybe was the fact that my mindset where my head was in such a bad place. So I was more it was more suggestive to me at that point. So I said I wanted to do something in perfume. I spent the next couple weeks and months kind of focusing on building out a whole idea. And people have come to me, they’re like, yeah, aromatherapy is totally the thing. But it’s been around and it’s doing really, really well. But my my challenge to aromatherapy is you go in a room, you smell it coming out of this diffuser and then you forget that it’s there. The idea of perfume to be on your body and to have this mindset when you put it on in the morning and then you keep it on throughout the day, it changes everything. It’s interesting because I would love to like I don’t know about the David movement, the David Goggins followers, if this mindset changes. I actually have like I’m really trying to disrupt perfume in general and cologne and that whole world. I like to say that if you put on perfume and then you go for a run and it gets really hard, like, I don’t know, you’re running uphill and all of a sudden things get challenging. I like to think that you can put your wrist to your face, smell, take a whiff, it’ll ground you and hopefully like reseat and change and anchor you back in the present and it’ll make it a little easier. And it’s a very different mindset. You can’t do that with aromatherapy. You definitely can’t do that with aromatherapy. But if you have it and you’re not sweating too much on your wrist, and even if you are, it’s still smell probably if it lasts. It changes everything. And that’s like I said, this is extraordinarily disruptive, very, very different than anything I’ve ever thought to do before. But I think that it’s like people are like—I did a photo shoot a few months ago, and people were like, why would you want a runner for [it]. Like I wanted runners, why would you want to runner for perfume? And I said, this is why and this is this is like starting like another book, Simon Sinek, Start With Why. What is my why? It changes you, brings you back and it makes you remember who you are as a person. So. Yeah, yeah. It’s a different thought. So I’d be interested in hearing if you ever put on how cologne, put out a perfume, something that lasts all day. And if, when you’re biking, you’re feeling like “I can’t do this anymore.” I don’t know how many people do. If you’re biking to work, you’re probably going to be able to finish. But for me, I run locally and eventually I’m just like, “do I want to keep running?” And if I’m close enough to home, I might not, I might just give up. And but if I do this, I’m just like, “no, I’m not going to give up” or rather running versus walking. And you just decide, “I don’t want to walk. I don’t want to run anymore,” this could potentially help you and make you keep going. So if you are willing to try this, I would love to hear your thoughts on it in a few weeks’ time. [00:25:19.345] – John Ryan: There’s a couple different things that I do. But as far as like, I have some sort of underlying asthma and I used to smoke, and so anyway, I’m like very sensitive to smells whatsoever. So that’s why aromatherapy is about as far as I can go with what I feel comfortable with. But to your point, though, to reset, there’s lots of things that I use to get my mind back. A big thing that I use, I remember, I play [unintelligible], I sit down and watch something funny on YouTube, and I know that’s not really what you mean, but that’s what helps me here to reset. Any stressful time I kind of I find humor in. [00:26:23.745] – TAMAR: OK, yeah, yeah, and I mean, it’s there’s so much stuff out there, there’s so much content out there. I would love to, I guess, were you just randomly discovering stuff? Or… [00:26:37.795] – John Ryan: Well, the one thing that I rediscovered on YouTube that I grew up watching was Mystery Science Theater 3000, and they have it on YouTube. And it was a goofy show, but I think it’s funny, and I always liked it growing up. It’s one of the things that they was endless, seemingly endless content of that one show. And then there’s lots of stuff on YouTube to your point. Yeah, but that’s usually where I go. [00:27:10.965] – TAMAR: I was just gonna say awesome. Yeah, yeah. I’ve I’ve, I’ve heard about the MST3K. I didn’t quite follow it, but no, that’s cool. I didn’t realize all episodes were on YouTube. That’s pretty neat. [00:27:25.125] – John Ryan: Yeah. Most of them. [00:27:27.305] – TAMAR: Cool. All right. Awesome. I’m going to ask a question that I ask everybody and I usually don’t give them any prep. So if they listen to the podcast they know it, but otherwise they don’t. And that’s fine because I don’t expect you to know it. But if you can give an earlier version of yourself a piece of advice, what would you tell them? [00:27:52.185] – John Ryan: Oh. I, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t change anything. [00:27:59.965] – TAMAR: I like it. Yeah, everything we do right now, like I don’t think there’s any reason to regret, so I like that a lot. [00:28:08.875] – John Ryan: Yeah. [00:28:09.805] – TAMAR: Sweet, sweet, well, yeah, I mean, like I said, you got, where you are and doing things in the way you are, I mean, you are going to be inspiring a lot of people, so thank you for for being here and sharing that and all. [00:28:26.185] – John Ryan: Yeah, no problem. Glad to be a guest. [00:28:28.415] – TAMAR: Cool. Yeah, yeah, so one last thing, I don’t know if it’s possible, but I ask people this and sometimes they have a big online presence. But if people are potentially to follow you on social or to contact you, is there any means that they should do that? Is there a website or anything, anything you got right now? [00:28:54.625] – John Ryan: I have two YouTube channels. [00:28:58.025] – TAMAR: OK. What are the URLs? I’ll also put them in the notes. [00:29:03.425] – John Ryan: OK, well, the one the one that has most content is Johnny Suave Health, [and] there are 30 or so videos, just me doing different things that I discovered and I made a video of what it is all about, health products and whatnot. [00:29:43.215] – TAMAR: Cool. What’s the second one? [00:29:44.025] – John Ryan: Oh, it’s just my name, John Ryan. [00:29:46.365] – TAMAR: OK, awesome. Oh, so you’ve got your name. OK. Yeah. So you’ll send me those links and I’ll make sure I get them in the notes as well. And cool, cool, sweet. Well thank you so much again. If you have anything you want to add before we sign off, I’ll take that. But otherwise, you know, we’re good. [00:30:05.555] – John Ryan: No, nothing to add. Thank you for the interview. [00:30:08.465] – TAMAR: Yeah, yeah. All right, we’ll talk soon.  

Erin Panzarella’s attitude on life has been incredible, especially given her early years where she was still trying to figure out who she was and what her place is in the world. TAMAR: Hey, everybody, I am so excited to bring you Erin Panzarella. I met her in you know, I talked about meeting people in these online groups. And this is no exception, but it’s different than all the others. So far, I’ve met people in running groups and women founders’ groups, and even a perfume guy. And a guy like David Goggins, who’s overcome Aaron Anna. And those are all Facebook groups. I met Erin because she posted on Reddit, which I’ve talked about a lot in the podcast. But I haven’t actually had a guest on the podcast from Reddit. I posted a self- improvement post. I guess I’ll talk about that. I thought it was really enlightening and powerful. And it really aligns with a lot of what I talked about in the podcast. So, I figured I would bring her on, and have her talk about her story and where she came from, and how she got there. And what she shared on Reddit, because I totally forget at this point. It was all really, really good. Actually, I say that because I want to kind of make a foray until what’s about to be so.  Erin, thank you so much for joining. ERIN PANZARELLA: I’m so excited to be here. I was like so unbelievably happy when you messaged me. This is actually the first time I’ve ever been on a podcast. I host my own podcast, but I’ve never been a guest on one. So, this is really exciting. TAMAR: Yeah, and this is totally a promotional vehicle for your podcast, as well. So, I’m excited to talk about that. And to promote that at the end when we talk about where to find you, and all those things. So, this is gonna be really exciting. Yeah, I do remember vaping too much content in my head, I basically would say. So, where are you physically in the world? And what do you do with yourself all day long these days? ERIN PANZARELLA: So, I am physically in New York City. I’m in Queens, and my days are so different. But I also do work a 9 to 5 job. I’m an accountant for a nonprofit organization in New York City. I like to say that I am a soul having a human journey. And that’s what I do. And it really feels so true because I have a lot of different hats. But I found that when I tried to define myself by a job or something, I would get lost and get really consumed by that. So, my day to day life, like throughout the week, is me working the 9 to 5 and then also I have an energy healing business. I’m a podcaster that’s focused on shifting from a victim mindset into co-creator with the universe and sharing the tools that helped me do that. I am a writer. And yeah, it’s ever evolving, for sure. TAMAR: Sweet, sweet. So, like I said, Erin and I met on Reddit. I have no background on her except seeing her name and the post. I actually live in Westchester. So where in Queens are you? ERIN PANZARELLA: Two Gardens. TAMAR: Aha, cool. I lived in Forest Hills for 2 years of my life. But my mother’s from Kew Gardens Hills. ERIN PANZARELLA: Oh, wow. TAMAR: Yeah.  ERIN PANZARELLA:  I walked there all the time. TAMAR: Yeah, So, it’s a small world indeed. ERIN PANZARELLA:  Yes, it is. That’s so awesome. TAMAR: Yeah, I’ve lived in 4 of the 5 Boroughs. So now, I’ve moved myself out of the city into Westchester before COVID, which is helpful when you have 4 children in your backyard. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, completely. I’m actually looking to move a little bit north in Westchester, downstate, upstate area. TAMAR: Well, let me know if you’re looking into Westchester. I could either show you around, whatever I know here, or I could get you in touch with other people in other areas. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, thank you so much. TAMAR: Lots of helpful community. In fact, Reddit has a committee in Westchester as well, where it’s kind of dead. But there’s conversation. Yeah. Cool. Awesome. ERIN PANZARELLA:  Yeah. TAMAR: So, you talked about how your podcasts is about a shift from the victim mindset to someone who’s really kind of taking charge in life. I guess that might be precipitated by something in your life. Give me a little bit of background of where that comes from, that mindset, that thought process. ERIN PANZARELLA: Oh my God. So yeah, it has been seriously a lifelong journey. It goes back to many different things. I have incorporated a lot of different healing modalities. So, like Inner Child Work and Shadow Work because growing up, I’m adopted. So, it really starts from there. I was adopted before I was born, but I have been learning through my healing journey that there’s a really big abandonment issue that comes from that adoption. And as I unpack and I heal, I am noticing how prevalent those issues have come up with in my life without me even knowing it. All the work that I do is really focused on the subconscious thought and the unconscious thought and how they impact your everyday life. And I didn’t realize that it was completely running the show. So, I’m really working on shedding light on all the things that have impacted me. But aside from being adopted 11 days before my fifth birthday, my first dad passed away. And even though adopted, like, my dad is my adopted dad, he’s my dad, and my mom is my mom. And when he passed away, like I said, it was 11 days before my fifth birthday. I completely flipped a switch. Essentially, I don’t remember being a happy child. I don’t remember any of that as I go into my healing journey more, but everyone told me that I was the happiest kid ever. And I couldn’t access any of that for most of my life. So, I always felt like I was like a sad person, or I was never happy. And I’m realizing how untrue that is, how big that grief impacted me for so long. So, I really navigated in this victim mode for most of my life because I was just stuck in grief. And I was having all these repressed memories, like, regressed and repressed. I couldn’t remember anything. And I just navigated like, everything bad was going to happen to me because I felt like my life was just always bad. And I couldn’t see the beauty in my life. And I couldn’t see how privileged I was. Like I grew up really not wanting anything because my mom provided for me all the time. Shortly after my first dad passed away, my second Dad, I know, it’s weird to call them that, that’s just how I have to reference them to be honest. But like, he’s my dad as well. He entered my life. And he passed away 6 days before my 28th birthday in 2019. And just seeing how I dealt with that grief in a completely different way because I’ve been on this healing journey for quite some years. It’s just really showing me how much I’ve grown. So, navigating in that victim mindset and we can talk about how much it manifested in so many different ways. But I’ve really been able to transform the way that I view life and really excited for life again, and realized that I don’t control everything, but I can control what I do. And really stepping into that power has been the most beautiful journey. TAMAR: Wow, that is very powerful. Just curious, are you familiar with adoption? Subread it? ERIN PANZARELLA:  No. TAMAR: Okay, so I’m not adopted, but I wrote a book on it. I guess you probably know your birth parents? ERIN PANZARELLA:  No. TAMAR: Okay, because you mentioned that it was organized beforehand. I mentioned that because I wrote, I published a book in 2019, 2018. I don’t even know anymore. (Both Tamar and Erin laughing). TAMAR: Keep track of anything, the adoptee’s guide to DNA testing. And it’s because I was in that ecosystem completely randomly. I was invited to an ancestry test party at South by Southwest. And at that party, they distributed tests, free DNA tests. I took one and distant cousins of mine, adoptees, started reaching out to me. I didn’t know what to make sense, like I couldn’t make sense of it. Like they said “I’m trying to find my birth parents.”  I’m like, “I don’t really know how to solve that problem.” But eventually, I became like a sleuth. And I helped all these individuals solve a lot of these challenges. It’s not always necessarily the adoptees themselves. It’s sometimes their children or their grandchildren trying to say, “Oh, I want to learn more about my birth, great grandparents, or whatever it is, or my birth grandfather.” I know a lot of people like, “I thought my father was who he was. And he wasn’t.” And it was not in DNA terms. It’s called NP, which is Not Parent expected or non-paternal event. And all of a sudden, I was solving all these problems. So, our challenge is helping people figure out lifelong mysteries. And all of a sudden, I found myself in this ecosystem. I totally understand that challenge of feeling that abandonment that you have, that’s really manifested for a very long time. And I think that you, personally, could be such a source of comfort. And with just the 5 minutes that you’ve shared that, I mean, there’s so much there that I think you should just, perhaps participate in that community. I do to some degree, it’s like weird because they didn’t know I wrote this book. I don’t really like to make my way in, but they’re always navigating these challenges, emotionally, particularly. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, wow, that is so synchronistic. I can’t even believe that, to be honest. I actually just did my 23andMe and then the ancestry DNA. I’m waiting for the results. I’m getting more curious because initially I wasn’t. I don’t know if I was nervous about my mom. And how she would think even though she’s always been very open, and I have a letter from my birth mom. And I think I have more information than a lot of people do. So, I just think that’s so amazing because I do know how it’s not really talked about. I guess I always felt alone, I didn’t really know many adopted kids growing up. And I definitely believe that my path is definitely connected to helping either people who are adopted or people who dealt with childhood grief, or who are dealing with grief as an early adult. So, I definitely am connected to it so much. And I know the issues that come up especially regarding fear of abandonment, fear of loss, and how that manifested in my relationships without me even knowing why I was self-sabotaging, or why I was doing what I was doing. And now finally, once I’ve done all this healing, and really brought everything to the surface, I’m like, “Oh, that’s why I did that. That’s why I tried to push people away because I was afraid,” and really honing in on that and realizing that that’s not the way it has to navigate anymore. TAMAR: Yeah, wow. Well, I’m happy to help you with your particular journey if you need to decipher some of this data. Sometimes if you don’t like, it sounds like your birth mother wanted to be in touch with you and to some degree. So hopefully, there’s somebody there, and you’re going to be able to find things. You say that you’re waiting on your ancestry results, but you’ve got your, how your 23andMe results come through? ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, so I had the 23andMe last year done. And then I actually found a first cousin through it. TAMAR: Okay. Did you find how are you related? Paternal or maternal? ERIN PANZARELLA: No, I didn’t. I didn’t really contact anyone because it’s still like more of a curiosity and not really wanting to take action at this point. But I definitely see how the curiosity is growing. And I’m thinking about maybe reaching out, who knows. So, I’m still kind of letting intuition guide me all the time. You know, when it’s the right time, and the results are pending with the Ancestry as well. TAMAR: Okay. Yeah. You know, what’s interesting to me is that that first hasn’t reached out to you either. One usually initiates. So, the question is, has that person checked in since they tested? Or is it they did, and they don’t know or they don’t like. Well, I’m curious. For that side, I tried to reach out to my cousins all the time. I have the second cousin that won’t respond to me. And if I had another one like that, about 3 or 4 years ago, maybe closer to 5 now at this point, and I pursued him, and I kept messaging him and messaging him and messaging you. And finally, thank you for your persistence. And he got so into it, after we ended up talking on the phone for 3 hours. Turns out, his father looks exactly like my grandfather. His grandfather was my great grandfather’s brother. So, we were able to make that connection. But it took a lot of pushing and plotting, and prodding and urging in all these things. And now I have one like that again, and it just drives me nuts. So, you know, the reason why I mentioned that is because either the person hasn’t checked, the person doesn’t want to check, doesn’t know how to use it, or they’re probably going to be one of those passive people. So, your curiosity is going to mount and they’re not going to be receptive when you finally initiate. And that’s what I’m potentially worried about. Not sure if I’m helping you raise your curiosity right now. But I will say that most of these answers, especially on 23andMe, Ancestry is a little better because it’s such a wide, big database. You really kind of get people across the board. But 23andMe is more of like a passive test taking audience database of users. So, I am curious and I’m happy when you’re ready, if you ever want me help you navigate. I know that it’s extraordinarily sensitive. I’ve had to navigate those very sensitive topics. But I’m here and I’m here to support you emotionally as well. Because I know especially   this type of thing is difficult and it’s challenging. It changes. I don’t want to say changes everything for you because you have the awareness. But when somebody tests and you’re like, I’ve had to tell people that their siblings aren’t full siblings and they’re half-siblings and obviously it changes the identity that you’ve known about yourself and that woman’s case like 64 years or something. So, it’s a lot to take in and if you do need anybody, I’m here for you. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, wow. Thank you and I don’t believe in coincidences. So, the fact that this just came up right now, it definitely helps. I really have been leaning into following what is presented in front of me instead of trying to force anything. I don’t believe in coincidences, like I just said, and I think that it’s just a beautiful way that the universal bring us certain people or situations to help us figure out what next steps to take. So, thank you. TAMAR: Yeah, it’s funny, because I’m starting to realize that when these opportunities arise, even if it’s like completely on a whim, I’m just going for it. And you know, you don’t have regrets when you kind of go ahead, or I haven’t. Like my last podcast, someone’s like, have I started reflecting back on some of the decisions that I’ve made. I’m like, I have no regrets on anything anymore. I just know I just have to go for it because you do have regrets of the things you don’t do versus the things you do. That’s my philosophy. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, I completely resonate with that. And I am learning going for it instead of being fearful of what will happen if it works out or if it doesn’t work out. So totally agree with that, for sure. TAMAR: Yeah. Cool. So, let me ask you going to that kind of leads into the Reddit posts that you had shared. If you want to give a little bit of background on where you posted it and what the content was? That would be awesome. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, sure. Hold on one second. TAMAR: I’ve had to do that. I pull up posts, I start reading them out loud. The big one for me is the nonzero day post. You may or may not know it, but the self-improvement subreddits are amazing. And when you want to, get back to things and even the meme is in the little images. And the little quotes are cheesy to some degree, But you know, if you follow them, you buy them. It is life changing. So, I would love to have everybody — the listeners, me, you again, reinforce that and share that. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, completely. So, I mean, I post on the self-improvement and deciding to be better all the time, because I realized that I have so much information that has helped me that even if just one person reads it and benefits from it, I feel like I’ve paid it forward in some way. And just knowing my own journey and knowing how anxious and depressed and how really like helpless I felt in my life, I just know that there are other people who feel that way. I’m not alone in that feeling. And I kind of want people to have hope that they can get out of whatever mindset is really detrimental to them and making them feel like they’re a victim in their life. There was the post that it was either we attract what we believe we are worthy of instead of what we actually deserve, or not having to find a purpose. TAMAR: Well, you could share both of those because both of those are in alignment with the podcast. ERIN PANZARELLA: okay, yeah. I mean, do you want me to read it? TAMAR: How do you want to go? You could read somewhere else. I know, one of them was longish. Whatever you want. I’m gonna leave it up to you. ERIN PANZARELLA: Okay, yeah. So, the one that I’ve got a lot of traction was “We attract what we believe we are worthy of instead of what we actually deserve.” And truthfully, this one, is such a huge shift for me. And that’s why I wanted to share it. I really discussed it, how I used to be a perfectionist, and I was so tough on myself. I was tough if I did something and made a mistake I felt like I was the worst person in the world. And I would really ruminate on every single mistake that I made. I regret everything I said, everything I did. And part of it is due to growing up. Just feeling like whenever I made a mistake, or whenever I did something, I would be punished for it. And that really kind of stuck with me thinking like I have this huge fear of authority figures growing up, it translated into my adult life. Like I was afraid of bosses being upset with me. I was afraid of even my mom when I was out of her house. Like I was really just afraid that if I made a mistake, then I was not worthy of someone’s praise, love and attention. And that stuck with me for so long. And it really ties into that fear of loss and fear of abandonment, thinking that if I’m not good enough, this person is going to leave me and that has really manifested itself in like so many ways for me, like my first dad who passed away. He had a whole family. That was considered my family. Like I had siblings, like half siblings, even though it was like I’m adopted but they were from his first marriage and they were a part of my life because it was my dad and his family. And then as soon as he died, they all completely cut off contact with me. And I was 5. So,  I internalized that thinking that I did something wrong, that I couldn’t have done something to make them stay, like, “Happy birthday to me.” It was turning like the worst. Like, I didn’t only lose my dad by death, but I lost my entire family, essentially. And as I’ve healed, and all of these memories are coming back to the surface, I realized why I thought that I had to be perfect in order to be worthy of anything. And really coming to terms with the fact that no one is perfect and we all make mistakes. And if you make a mistake, it’s actually a beautiful thing, because it shows that you’re doing something new. I don’t know if you can relate to this. But even with the podcast, at first, I was always going back editing. It was taking me a really long time to edit everything because I was so nervous that I was going to sound weird or do something that people didn’t like, and then eventually I was just like, “Whatever it is what it is.” And really leaning into the fact that I am worthy just for being here, has completely shifted everything for me, because I don’t need to prove anything. I don’t need to go out and people-please, I don’t need to go and navigate in this way that’s trying to prove that I deserve to be here or prove that I need to be loved. And I actually show up way better in all my relationships because I’m not trying to prove anything. I don’t have an agenda. And it’s really just leaning into the fact that all of us have made mistakes. All of us have a past that we internalize certain events, and it made us act in certain ways. And instead of making that be this detrimental thing and thinking that you are your past, you can actually just learn from what you went through and learn from the way that you responded to things and realize that maybe there’s a better way to navigate. And once I learned that I can forgive myself and have compassion for myself, and then I’m worthy. I literally have attracted so many beautiful things into my life. TAMAR: Awesome. Yeah, you definitely have to let go of those chains that we self-imposed upon ourselves. You know, you’re lucky you saw that now. I had to basically see that in my later 30s. If you will, I don’t want to say anything else. But yeah, I definitely became very vulnerable and was exploited. But it was a lack of understanding. I was also a perfectionist, which if I look back at myself, and I see myself as a perfectionist, I was a freaking mess in every way. And now I’m less of a perfectionist, but now at least I like myself. I wouldn’t have said that about myself a few years ago. I couldn’t say that. I like that. It’s the way what you attract, it is how you become and it’s eye opening. And unfortunately, it takes us such a long time to really get that understanding. And we spend our 20s and some of us our 30s trying to navigate so much emotional strife, and it’s hard. And obviously, it’s all built on what we’ve dealt with in our teens and in our youth. And it’s hard, it’s hard. One of the things that you said earlier when you were like 5 years old you looked like the happiest kid but you look back and you don’t think about that. It’s hard, I start realizing as a parent, dealing with children. Like I also don’t know if had a super happy childhood. It’s an uneventful childhood as far as I’m concerned. But you know, it’s scary when you bring a child into the world. And thinking that they’re happy now, what can precipitate a change when they look back. I’m not a happy kid. And I don’t know, it goes beyond your challenge. Obviously, your issues are extraordinarily relatable. But in general, we were so imperfect, and yet we embrace perfection and that perfection become I think a vicious cycle in all of us. So, I don’t really know how to reconcile all this. I’m just kind of thinking out loud right now. It’s definitely a challenge. But it’s so good that you’ve been able to overcome and let loose from these. Like I said, the chains of perfectionism and trying to be something that you don’t necessarily need to be because you are who you are. And you’re meant to be here in the way that you are. And I guess whatever happened was meant to happen. Maybe it’s because here you are, and you’re sharing that and you’re providing strength and comfort to so many people. And yes, one person is benefiting a lot more than one person is benefiting. I mean, here we are sharing this. ERIN PANZARELLA: So completely. And today, I actually wrote something and it was your journey. You wouldn’t know what you know now without it. And I just know how true that is in my own life. And every time I’ve looked back and being like, “Oh, I should have done this, I should have done that,” but hindsight is 20/20. You know now that you should have navigated in a different way. But you didn’t know because you didn’t know realizing you don’t know. What you don’t know has been such a helpful thing. For me, it’s an NLP term. And I just really lean into that and just forgiving myself. I was so hard on myself; my internal critic was so loud and so harsh. And I realized that I need to start speaking to myself, like my best friend, because I’m the only person that’s with me for the rest of my life. Like I say the things that I say to myself to my best friend. I would be like, “It’s okay, you tried something new, and it’s okay, if you made a mistake,” like I would be very kind to someone else. And I was like, “Why can’t I show that kindness to myself?” So now I am really dedicated to a practice that is showing myself kindness, showing myself compassion and forgiveness. And it’s not letting myself off the hook for certain things. But I’m actually stepping into responsibility more, and being a better person, because I’m realizing that that’s the way I want to show up. TAMAR: Right. Yeah, it’s very identifiable. I like that sort of my revelation as well in the last 2 years. That I’m showing up, and I’m doing it this way. And I’m providing context in the podcast and the perfume that I launched and the content that I’m promoting online. And people approached me because I do it. And I talk about coming from a place of darkness. People are like, “You sound so depressed,” but it’s like they don’t read the rest of the books. It’s like it starts from a dark place that goes to a better place. And I’m here to share that everybody can come out of a place of darkness and come to a place of strength. It’s such an interesting spectrum. And obviously, it’s a lot more appropriate place to post versus LinkedIn where I’ve been sharing things. Because I’m in LinkedIn, people still want that perfect self. I’m the perfect professional, I don’t want to talk about the fact that I work from home and now my kid is screaming in the background. I embrace that I want people to be human again. And that’s sort of why I’ve sort of migrated to LinkedIn and started to post there because we need to appreciate our imperfections in order to become more acceptable. Friendly, more approachable humans. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, completely. I used to solely post on Reddit, because I felt like Reddit understood me. TAMAR: Yeah, they do. It’s such a good spectrum of people on Reddit. It’s such, everybody. I see some of the challenges that people are navigating, like I’m homeless. And when you’re in a different type of platform like LinkedIn, especially, the household income is a lot higher. So, it’s the right place. ERIN PANZARELLA : Yeah. And I’ve really struggled with other sort of social media platforms because I felt like I was still stepping into that fake “What am I going to do to get more likes” kind of thing and Reddit just accepted me for who I wasn’t, but I do get the occasional like, you should go kill yourself kind of message. Like, alright, I don’t get another (laughing). But Reddit is also just showing me how much I can help people by sharing because of how supportive everyone is, or just everyone commenting like “Oh, wow. This one really helped me.” I feel like I don’t see that on other platforms. So, I really have a special place in my heart for Reddit. TAMAR: Yeah, it is such a great platform. And it’s such a nice platform. You know, it’s funny when I started on the Digg and Reddit ecosystem. I don’t know if you know about Digg, but in 2006, 2007, digg.com and reddit.com were the two highest. Reddit was always the front page of the internet. But Digg was always the site that got more of the visibility. And it was all games. The algorithm was completely games. All you needed to do was get a bunch of people to kind of pat your back and up vote your content, and you were on the front page of Digg. And I was actually one of the top users. I was at the at the top, at my Zenith, at my peak. I was at 42 on the top 100, which was like huge because I got tons of opportunity. Lots of people helped me promote my content, which is again a completely game thing. And then Reddit never let you do that. I think the Reddit top user, his name started with Q, was just huge, but he was never given all it was. It was him doing his own thing. And that was us. We were like, “I scratch my back, you scratch yours; I scratch your back, you scratch mine” kind of thing. Yeah. Reddit was able to withstand the test of time. And I was looking at a Facebook ad yesterday for charter.com And he was talking about how Facebook has kind of peaked in December of 2012. And it’s gone down. But Reddit has been increasingly doing better and better and better. And it’s attracting such an audience of so many types of people. So, this is where we’re to be and yeah, the subreddits you talked about. I think you said deciding to be better and get motivated or self-improvement. Yeah. So, deciding to be better. You know, that’s another one I checked. And yeah, there’s also the get motivated one. And the other one is non-zero day which I talked about before. The post that provoked that launch of that subreddit was incredible. And it’s something that I like to read, you need to like, absorb. You can’t just read it. You need to really absorb it. But it’s so powerful. And it’s just amazing that there’s this like-minded community of people who are looking at we are not looking, the thing I love about Reddit. And I was sort of getting into this before. But we’re not looking at images, we’re looking at just names and we’re not judging, and people call me bro. People don’t know people. They see your name. I guess they know you’re Tamar if we go their way, I guess. But anyway, not Aaron. Aaron can be you know, ERIN PANZARELLA: Everyone thinks like a guy. TAMAR: Yeah, certainly everyone thinks I’m you know, I’m sure you get that too. Everybody does because that’s what they think.  Let’s just default to the masculine here. Yeah. It’s kind of helpful. It’s helpful. But it’s powerful. Because we’re not using any type of images to convey some sort of motive or anything like that. And it’s like a level playing field that really makes it a level playing field for everybody. And I talked about this all the time. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, it really is just such a great platform for me. And I’m trying to dive into other platforms as I build my business, and I do other things. But I’m always going back to run it. Every time I do a social media cleanse, I delete everything except for Reddit. TAMAR: Yeah. If you find the right groups on Reddit, it’s not necessary to have on social media clubs ERIN PANZARELLA: Right. And that’s another subreddit, no surf subreddit. And I follow that why do I follow that? I don’t really know. I’m not gonna know surf. But the thing is, if you find the right groups and the right communities online, it really ends up cleansing you in a better way than a social media cleanse would. ERIN PANZARELLA:  Yeah, completely. TAMAR:Yeah. Cool. So, let me ask you a question. You know, you talked about your emotional well-being. Let’s talk about self-care in general for you. What is it? What are you doing for that beyond posting and sharing your journey? What does your self-care regimen comprise of? ERIN PANZARELLA: So, I really have integrated a lot of practices lately that have completely transformed the way I show up in the world. Meditation daily in the morning, like first thing when I wake up has been a huge help for me. It just helps clear my head, it helps me to be more productive, and then I’ll occasionally do a night meditation as well. I also do a daily celery juice. It’s really helped with my hormones. And I always used to struggle with like a bunch of acne. So that has been like a daily self-care ritual that I integrated into my life around like 3 years ago, and it’s really helped just my health, which I think is all connected like the body mind, soul. Like everything integrates. So, I definitely noticed that when I eat healthier or when I have these different little practices around what I’m putting into my body, I feel a million times better. I also do a morning drink called mud water. So, it’s basically like a coffee replacement. Just because I was noticing that when I was having a lot of caffeine, I was very jittery. And I skip it intentionally. And I just set my intentions for the day and what I want to feel throughout the day, and I journal a lot. Journaling sometimes looks like me completely complaining about something that’s really bothering me or something really insightful that I’ll either like, keep to myself or post later. So, meditating, my celery juice, my morning hot drink, intentional and journaling are like my non negotiables. And then I’ll integrate a bunch of different other things that are like here and there. Kind of like, maybe I’ll do it once a month or twice a month, like reading a bunch. I have so many different books that I read. Like, I’ll go back to the Four Agreements. I don’t know if you know it. It’s a really helpful book that gives like 4 guidelines for life that I go back to a lot. The Alchemist is my favorite book ever. TAMAR:Yeah, it’s like a fixture read that I haven’t read that yet. I need to ERIN PANZARELLA: Oh, my God, it’s one of the books that is formatted the way that I want to write a book. So, I think that’s why I love it so much. Because it’s just like a quick fictional story that’s just integrated with so many helpful messages and the way that they do it is very artistic, I think. So, I just love the way that it’s formatted. And it’s such a quick read that it’s just something to come back to all the time. Again, then I just incorporate like other small things like my best friend’s posts, a Moon Circle, which is like kind of cool to just set intentions. And she does journal prompts and things. So that’s something that I incorporate, once a month, or she does it twice a month sometimes. And yeah, so my practice looks different every day, but I have those 4 non- negotiables. And then the rest is very fluid. TAMAR: Yeah, yeah, the intention thing is so important. And I talked that also about my fragrance. You don’t know about my story too much besides what I introduced to you before we started the podcast. But my whole idea is that perfume saved my life, brought me out of a depression. And nowadays, the whole idea of having my perfume is that you put on perfume with attention. You apply the perfume at that moment, and you revisit that set throughout the day. Thankfully, it’s on your person, so you’re actually able to get that experience and it lasts. And if you revisit that consistently, because of the longevity of the perfume, it could hopefully manifest in your life, and it could change your life. So, it’s very different than what anybody is preaching in the perfume world right now. And it’s very disruptive. It’s scary, scary to have me do this. Because it’s different than anybody like in Sephora and I don’t even want to pitch to ever be featured there because this is just wellness for them. And I don’t necessarily see myself as beauty/wellness. It’s more like mental health/wellness. ERIN PANZARELLA:  Completely. But it’s . .  I’m sorry. Yeah. TAMAR: No, go ahead. ERIN PANZARELLA: I truly love that. And also, the olfactory sense is very powerful. I know, in terms of memories, it’s very good with triggering memories. So, I think that connecting an intention with the smell is like such an important thing. I feel that’s amazing that you’ve thought of that. I think it’s so mind blowing, to be honest, TAMAR: Year, it is. And the crazy thing is, if there’s anybody listening to this that can get me in touch with a researcher, I’ve been trying for over a year now, actually for almost 2 years to find a researcher to study this because I am so convinced that it will work. I just need other people launching this brand. And saying this anecdotally is all really nice. It’s all well and good. But if I can show some science behind it and have the scientific method actually do a little more than validate, to truly validate my hypothesis. I mean, this could be a game changer for so many people. And so, I’ve had my last phone call on Friday. She’s like, talk to all these people, which is more helpful than anything, but I have no idea where to go from here. And it’s kind all the people are in right now, especially because of COVID. A lot of people lost their sense of smell. So, it’s even more important, but it almost feels like it’s insensitive to do this research in that context. So, I’m trying to tread carefully and be very sensitive to the challenges that a lot of people are dealing with right now. And I think that maybe it’s beneficial because it put the struggle of mental health and scent in the spotlight. It’s just a matter of navigating it in the right way. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah, completely. And I think that it’s just like all things. It’s a balancing act. And really your intention is so good with it. I think that even if people were taking it the wrong way, or it is insensitive, you being aware that this is the current climate of the world right now, I think it’s such a beautiful thing. And I just truly believe when your intention is pure behind something it’s okay. TAMAR: Yeah. hopefully, we’ll get there. It’s got to be a slog, because it’s been harder than I thought. It’s hard especially because scent is such an eclectic sense, but COVID kind of product and we’ll just see what happens. Hopefully, I’ll find somebody in due time who’s willing to take this on and work with me. I’ll get a grant and get some studies and research out of it. That truly validates it all. ERIN PANZARELLA: So, yeah, I definitely think about it in terms of like, I’ve used essential oils for a very long time, and how aroma therapy is becoming very prevalent in hospitals now. TAMAR: Yeah. ERIN PANZARELLA: So, I’m just thinking about it in terms of that. TAMAR: A lot of people say it’s me, and they’re like, how is this different from therapy or Roma therapy and my response is, “You forget that it’s there. As soon as you walk into the room, and you carry this on your purse, and you put it on in the morning and night.” It actually lasts, you’ll be able to still smell and be able to revisit that intention. So, it’s very different. And, it’s such minimally invasive, it’s just a spritz and that set in. ERIN PANZARELLA: Right. TAMAR: Yeah. Anyway, yeah. Let me ask, I have one question that I would want to ask you. And that question is, if you can give an earlier version of Erin a piece of advice, what would you tell her, ERIN PANZARELLA: It’s okay to feel whatever is coming up. And it’s also okay to let those feelings go. Like, I just am really practicing that. I guess that’s another self-care practice is letting the feelings come up, but also not attaching to them. And I think that even with my grief journey, I wouldn’t let myself feel anything at all. I was like, “Oh, I have to be the strong one. Everyone comes to me for advice. So how can I be the one who breaks down blah, blah, blah.” And I also think that there was a fear, like, if I started crying about something I would never stop. But the truth is the emotions do stop if you feel them and let them come up. And then they also subside. Like, it’s an ebb and flow. And you’re meant to feel the emotions. I don’t think we would be here on this earthly plane if we weren’t supposed to feel everything. So, I just would send to my younger self, like it’s okay to feel everything. And it’s also okay to let go of it. TAMAR: Yeah, and it shows such a level of strength to be able to let go of it. Cool. Yeah, so where can people find your podcasts to follow you. ERIN PANZARELLA: So  I have a bunch of different legs. But I have a website https://erinpanzarella.com. You can find me on Instagram, or in panzarella. You can find me for my podcast. It’s called Everyday Perspectives. And again, it’s about shifting from that victim mindset into co-creator, and then different tools that I’ve used along the way. It’s definitely evolving, because I feel like I’m changing every moment. So, it’s a lot of self-help, but also blending the spiritual part of my life as well. So, it’s definitely evolved since the beginning. I actually released an episode today. I think it was Episode 36. So, we’re growing and it’s coming along, and I absolutely love it. It’s such a beautiful thing to do, for sure.  I’m on Reddit, or in panzarella. And yeah, if you can provide the links to people, I’ll share everything that you need for people to get in touch with me. I love connecting with people who are interested in proving themselves and really just showing up as they are. So, I would love for anyone to reach out. TAMAR: Awesome. Yeah, sure. And I’ll definitely include all these links in the post notes, which will probably be transcribed and I’m excited to get people to know, to follow you. I mean, you definitely are an embodiment of resilience and strength, and so much more. So, I am so grateful that you were able to share yourself here to open yourself here. And I genuinely hope people keep up on following you because there’s so much you’ve given, so much value and light that you can shine on other people’s lives. So, thank you so much for being here. ERIN PANZARELLA: Thank you so much for saying that. It was a pleasure speaking with you, and thank you for everything that you’re doing. I think this is such a beautiful thing. And I’m so happy to be connected. TAMAR: Yeah, please be in touch for sure. I would love to help you navigate that crazy territory, unfamiliar territory. I’m here to support you in every way. Thank you. Yeah. Awesome. Okay, so I’m gonna assume it’s over. And I know you have a meeting soon. But I hope that wasn’t too bad. ERIN PANZARELLA: No, it was great. Thank you so much. You made me feel very comfortable. TAMAR: Yeah, I guess it’s so very chill. So, if ever you want a guest on the other side, I’m happy to guest on yours. But I’m not going to question myself. Sometimes I did that. Not now. ERIN PANZARELLA: I will send you so I have like a schedule that I will send you over a link. So, you can just sign up whenever, whatever time works for you. I know that you said that your children are home later. TAMAR: But if it’s easier for you, I’m going to work on your schedule. I appreciate you working on mine. Because I’d probably have to go back to work 5 minutes. Again, yeah, you might just have to hear them. So, I’m gonna warn you in advance. ERIN PANZARELLA: Okay, yeah, no worries. But I’ll send you all the information on how to get and how you can schedule that. And I would love to reconnect again on the podcast and also in other ways. TAMAR: Yeah. Are you on Facebook with a message there? You could send me the image there because Skype isn’t the best for that. I can’t imagine you actually use it more than just for this. ERIN PANZARELLA: Oh, no, I can definitely send you on Facebook. Send me a message or send me a friend request. TAMAR: But you can message me there @facebook.com/tamarweinberg. If you think you might not be able to message me, I can get your photo that you feel comfortable sending. ERIN PANZARELLA: Okay, yeah, I’ll send it to you. TAMAR:  Alright, I think I found you in the first one. I got you. ERIN PANZARELLA: Okay, great. TAMAR: All right. I sent you a message. It might be in your other inbox or your spam folders. So just make sure. Okay, cool.. ERIN PANZARELLA: All right. TAMAR: Cool. We’ll talk soon. Um, yeah, please, send me a photo when you can. I don’t know when this is going to go live. I have to get it edited first. It’s not too much editing. But there was a little bit of noise in my background that I might have to edit out. So, maybe next Tuesday, but I don’t want to say for sure. ERIN PANZARELLA Oh, yeah, no worries, just let me know. And I’ll send over the picture. TAMAR: Awesome. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. ERIN PANZARELLA Thank you. All right. TAMAR: We’ll talk soon. ERIN PANZARELLA: Yeah.

In this episode of The Common Scents podcast, Tamar talks with Ryan Handis, creator of Broken Anatomy Perfumes, about their journeys into fragrance, their overcoming of adversity, and the parallels between the two brands. [00:00:16.577] – TAMAR: Hey, everybody, super excited bringing in Episode 57 of the Common Scents podcast. And this one is going to be a different one. The reason why is Common Scents podcast really talks about stories of transformation, stories of career shifts, stories about self-care. And while we’re not going to drop that at all in this particular podcast, this particular podcast, I connected with Ryan. He is actually in the fragrance world. We connected in a completely different environment. I was super excited. He started his own thing. I started my own thing. We aligned; the stars aligned for us in that front. And I think that there’s a really good opportunity for us to talk about our journeys, learn about Ryan’s journey. I certainly don’t know yet. I’ve seen his stuff. It’s been amazing. He’s going to share that. So thank you so much for coming. [00:01:04.667] – Ryan Handis: Hi. Yes. Thanks for having me on here. [00:01:07.097] – TAMAR: Yeah. Where are you physically? Tell me a little bit more about that and what you do and who you are. [00:01:13.097] – Ryan Handis: My one year old back here, she’s doing good, just eating. So we’re from Cottonwood, Arizona. So we are about 15 miles east of Sedona, which a lot of people know more about than Cottonwood. So we’re in the desert, which is nice because we get lots of cool desert rains and it’s just it’s a good time. Yeah, cool. [00:01:36.537] – TAMAR: And tell me, what do you do? Because you work in the fragrance world. So tell me a little more about that. [00:01:40.877] – Ryan Handis: OK, so in the fragrance world, I am the founder and perfumer of Broken Anatomy Perfumes and I say perfumer. I haven’t gone to perfume school and I’m self trained so I’m more of a perfume artist. I guess I wouldn’t say “official perfumer by trade,” but needless to say, I do enjoy creating things that are kind of off the wall and different as well. I started reviewing fragrances in 2017 and I really just wanted to, I guess, expand on that. I kind of got bored of it and ran into some personal issues in my own life and I thought, I need a change and I think I have the tools to do this. One thing I learned in the perfume school that I was watching online was that if you want to do it, you can. And that’s the only requirement, is that you want to do it. You have the passion for it. So that’s really it. Yeah. [00:02:38.967] – TAMAR: Yes. That’s a good story. [00:02:39.437] – Ryan Handis: And we’ve been around for about a year and well, sorry, we launched last November, but I’ve been around working on this for about the past year. So it’s been it’s been a while in the making. We’ve really officially only been in business since November of last year. So we’re pretty new. [00:02:59.177] – TAMAR: 2019 or November 2020? [00:03:01.817] – Ryan Handis: 20. Sorry. [00:03:02.237] – TAMAR: Yeah. Wow. That’s amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Because I had seen your stuff and I was, I’ve been pretty impressed. I mean you have to check his packaging out. It’s just, it’s so cool. It’s like hieroglyphicky. It’s like it’s really cool stuff. Yeah. [00:03:17.357] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, thanks. [00:03:17.837] – TAMAR: My story is very—you don’t know my story so I’ll share it here. I don’t know. I wasn’t into fragrance and fragrance reviews at all. It just sort of fell into my lap. You know, as a father I guess you’ll relate maybe. I don’t know if you will. You might, you might not, but having children, I have four and I fell into a postpartum depression after the birth of my first one, but I didn’t really have the awareness of it until finally, like, I hit a rock bottom, basically due to other things and kind of external influences, that kind of like really seized my depression and made it a lot worse. And the one thing that saved my life was perfume. Perfume changed me, perfume. [00:03:56.817] – Ryan Handis: Wow. [00:03:57.797] – TAMAR: And I said to myself, I want to do something in perfume. I want to launch a perfume brand specifically because I wanted to help people. [To] kind of figure out scents to make it—it’s not about wearing it for other people, but wearing it for yourself, which I’m sure you completely identify with. I’m sure you understand that 100%. A lot of people do. I would say the majority of people do it because they want it for other people. You can see that in the fragrance world, everyone’s like, oh, “what should I wear if I want to go on a date with this person?” You know? And it’s this, right? I don’t think it’s about that. I don’t think it should be about that. It should be about doing it because you want to wake up in the morning and you want to make a concentrated effort to accomplish something throughout the day, and if things get difficult, especially when, like for me, I’m working out and I actually take the opportunity to sniff my wrists because it grounds me in that way. When I’m like sitting here and I have like one hundred and seventy beats per minute of my heart rate, that’s the philosophy that people don’t really take. And I think it’s important to kind of reset yourself and even when the going gets tough. So that’s my story and that’s kind of why I did it. But in the way you did, you’re like, no. Most people I don’t think there’s very few people that really can get the training to become a perfumer unless they’re working as an apprentice at one of these perfume shops. You do have to be self-trained. You did have to figure it out. And for me, I don’t have the patience for that. So I outsourced that part. [00:05:20.587] – Ryan Handis: Right on. [00:05:20.587] – TAMAR: Yeah, cool. Well, yeah, I would love to learn a little bit about—you know, you came from that, that space. What were your what was your life like before that? What were you doing before you went into this whole perfume thing in the fragrance world? Like what did you train in officially like school wise and all these things? [00:05:40.807] – Ryan Handis: So in 2011 I started as a part time firefighter. And that’s kind of where my life took off from leaving home, not being a kid anymore, going to college. And I got married in 2011 as well to my wife, Liberty, and she’s pretty much seen me through my whole entire career. And I’d say that’s that’s where a lot of the brokenness sort of came from in my own life, was was just seeing it. And other people you see neglect and abuse and car accidents with, children and young adults that lose their lives right in front of you. And you see the brokenness around you that’s really hidden from a lot of people. And I really think that I wanted to kind of exemplify that and say, look, it’s OK, it’s OK that we’re all broken, but we’re never lost. And and that’s what’s on my coin, you know, “always broken, never lost,” because we’re not. We’re not lost. We all have a divine purpose. And that’s what I want my perfume to kind of remind people of and say, hey, you know, we do have a greater purpose. And that’s that’s where the stories come from in my perfume: Burnt Remedy, Chasing Memories, Brain Dance, they all sort of have their own different stories and feelings that come to the table. That’s kind of our philosophy is just being one with everybody and being honest and open and saying, we’re right here with you, we’re going through this life together and let’s do it. [00:07:04.507] – TAMAR: Yeah. You know, there’s a big alignment with Tamar also. The perfume that I ended up calling Intense, which was appropriately named in the end of the day, it was going to be called Flawed. I still probably am going to have a flawed perfume. OK, but the it’s smoky; it’s a smokiness as a firefighter, I guess you have that, but it is pretty intense. So my mother, for example, she won’t, she’s like, “that’s way too intense for me.” But a lot of people think it works. It works out very well. The whole idea is that it’s supposed to— the names of my perfumes right now [are] Quirky and Intense and hopefully we’ll go out and get more. But it’s about embodying the fact that we’re not perfect and to appreciate who we are and to appreciate that through the experience of like for me, it’s scent. It’s totally like it’s great that you have that. That important. [00:07:58.387] – TAMAR: I don’t think—a lot of these perfumes don’t have these stories. They don’t really talk about [this]. It’s all the external stuff, the seduction, the sexualization. I’ve seen your products. I follow you on Instagram. That marketing is that you and I take, it’s very different. I think it’s about time that the industry gets disrupted in this way. They start to feel that, just remember, remember who you are. [00:08:25.027] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, absolutely. And that’s that’s exactly what it comes down to: remembering who you are. And, for us, we’re a Christian brand. You know, I don’t really advertise that on my Instagram, but for us, it’s remembering who God is and who we are and or who he is in our lives. And with that brokenness, we are whole in Him as well, which is that’s really cool. We don’t of course we don’t push it on others, of course. But that’s just our own personal feelings aside from the brand. [00:08:58.147] – TAMAR: Yeah. No, I’m Jewish. I totally get it. The philosophy of [the fact that] we’re made, we’re created in God’s image is never lost upon me. We’re here. I could never have agreed, aligned with that whole philosophy, until—the best parts of you lie ahead. And then I finally hit that stride. And I’m in my thirties and all of a sudden, things go, oh my God, it’s starting to come together. But you got to believe that there’s potential there. And I think that there’s opportunity in due time that you do hit that that moment where you’re like, “yeah, that this is me. And I am as perfect as I can be. And I appreciate exactly who, how I was made. And I’m going to make the best of what’s in front of me.” [00:09:45.817] – Ryan Handis: Sure. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. [00:09:48.367] – TAMAR: So I don’t know. Can you talk about you like your whole story and how you’ve kind of gone into this? And I know I talk, a big part of the podcast in general talks about like transformation. My transformation came from the experience of scent. Just curious if you have anything that kind of aligns with this whole story and stuff like that, I know we kind of met in a completely different environment and this podcast is expected to be different. But I’m curious to know if you have that defining moment where it all comes together and that’s sort of where you’re coming from with your philosophical approach toward the fragrance that you’ve had and where all that comes from because I assume that there is like there is an adversity story that kind of defines you, your “start with why” as Simon Sinek, the author, says in his book like your Why. So, just curious to hear from you about that. [00:10:33.777] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, absolutely. And so starting out, reviewing perfumes and stuff, you know, I was I was gradually writing poetry, taking photos, meeting new people all over the world and just kind of getting more prideful about myself and who I was and who I thought I was. It led me to make some bad decisions professionally and personally. Basically, I was giving up my wife, my kids, my house, really everything. And it came really close to that. Fortunately, I worked it out with my wife and we kind of got to the root of all of it and what was going on for me mentally. And I started going to counseling and getting help for some of that. Some of it was drinking. Some of it was just relationship sort of stuff with my wife. All along she was always steadfast. And God was too, of course. But Liberty, she was always, always steadfast and patient, even when she thought I was messing up. At the very bottom, she had a choice to make where she could have given up on me. This is before the brand, of course, but she could have given up on me personally. And didn’t. She could have left our marriage but didn’t. And she forgave the man that I was and gave me a chance to be the man that I’m supposed to be. And that’s not under my own power because I can’t do that under my own power. If it’s under my own power, I’ll turn back into the same person I was. So that sort of pretty much almost losing everything and then not only getting her back and my family back, but getting this new brand with her. We’re doing this together as a team now and getting this brand back, but getting more back than I than I had before was just such a such a huge turning point in my life. Because, now I’m not just reviewing scents and writing poetry for people who mostly don’t even appreciate it, but now I’m actually doing something and I’m doing something that’s not only benefiting my my craving to create art, but it’s benefiting a private company who pretty much rescues human trafficking victims. [00:12:50.597] – TAMAR: That’s amazing. Talk more about that. [00:12:50.637] – Ryan Handis: Yeah. So all together with all that, we have this brand. We don’t really make a lot of money off of it, but with all that happening, my point of this brand now and people ask me all this all the time, “what’s what’s your legacy?” Not “what’s your legacy,” but “what’s the purpose of your brand?” And I say, “well, my purpose is to leave a legacy for my kids and for everyone that gets to experience our family and the stories we’re telling.” And if anything, that’s the purpose of the brand. If there is a monetary purpose, I’d say we get to go travel the world someday, at least a couple of times with this brand and and use it to actually see the world that we’re put in. But yeah. And so that’s that’s kind of how it all ties together to that story. I don’t want to go too specific and do it, but yeah. [00:13:38.907] – Ryan Handis: To answer your question, the OUR Rescue, which is Operation Underground Railroad, they’re a company that works with law enforcement worldwide. Operation Underground Railroad, they are an or an organization nonprofit, I believe. They run strictly off donations and they work with FBI and private law enforcement agencies to rescue human trafficked children or human trafficking victims and children alike and put them in better homes. Of course, they pursue charges against the perpetrators. I found that through a clothing launch I was kind of participating in a couple of years ago. I bought a few shirts for them and all the money was donated to this company. And I was like, man, that’s so cool that they do this. And then, of course, when I was in church, our pastors talking about multiplying what we’re given, not just adding or subtracting from it, and I thought, man, that’s that’s so cool. And that’s that applies to the brand right there. Like, I need to be doing something that’s multiplying our brand. It’s not adding to it like, “oh, let’s go take a million trips,” or subtracting from it, “let’s go buy all the stuff because we’re making money.” It’s actually multiplying our purpose, meaning it’s multiple purposes in one and so it’s adding much more depth and meaning to our legacy and also helping out with that cause so it’s really cool to be a part of it and to be able to do this. [00:15:15.157] – TAMAR: That’s beautiful. That’s awesome. I’m so—that’s very cool. Yeah. Cool. Cool. [00:15:19.537] – Ryan Handis: Thank you. [00:15:20.287] – TAMAR: Yeah. You know, it’s funny talking about the struggles that you kind of went through in your marriage. I also, like I said, you know, there’s so many align there’s so much alignment with your story and my story. Like when I hit my bottom, I was definitely, I was dependent upon an individual who is not in my immediate family emotionally. I was drawn into helping an individual, an external individual outside the family, and I became addicted to the high of feeling like I could do that. And it certainly had a negative impact on me where I was neglecting my family. My husband would go on trips, my children would go on trips with my husband and I would stay behind because of this desire not to, like I was feeling more satisfied on the other side. And why? I don’t know why. I guess for me personally, I latch on and become vulnerable to solving emotional challenges. [00:16:11.047] – Ryan Handis: Sure. [00:16:13.057] – TAMAR: It’s a dangerous, it’s a slippery slope for me personally. But I would say my husband could have easily walked away. My whole family knew it. It wasn’t just his family. My parents told me, you need to focus on your husband. You focus on your kids. And they’re 100 percent right. But I wasn’t really of the headspace to do that because depression was really robbing me and the visibility, I had visibility into it, but I didn’t have the… There was no desire. It’s very hard. But then that that moment when perfume kind of changed that, it was like, hey, I’ve become a better version of myself. And ever since then, the rest is history. There’s nothing to do with [the past]. But that also ended, that relationship ended in a very, very, very bad way, which brought me into a lower headspace for a while but then eventually the perfume saved me from that. So I fell into this whole, I was already in a hole. I was sort of climbing out. It’s like being stepped on when you’re like halfway up the hole. It’s hard. It was definitely difficult, but I would say thanks to the experience of knowing all my five senses and actually appreciating how my five senses, which I don’t think we all do, I think everybody has the opportunity, the ability to unravel and to unleash that, that if they could only give it give a little bit of thought into it. It’s so easy, we take it for granted all the time but I think it can change everybody. And that’s what that’s that’s how I feel anyhow. [00:17:33.037] – Ryan Handis: Absolutely. Yeah. Wow. And I can relate to that for sure. Yeah. Right right along the same lines. And that’s how a lot of that stuff starts, is that feeling of being needed and having purpose and even maybe a feeling of your own spouse not understanding you and feeling understood by this other person more. So it’s crazy. I can definitely relate to that and that’s how a lot of my problems started too was that exact same way. But of course, it was in the perfume industry, so it wasn’t really it wasn’t really something where I came into perfume and I got relief from it. It was kind of the problem. And there had to be a huge step back and reorganizing of my priorities and my thought process. I totally understand how you go from being on this high to being so depressed and feeling so useless and trapped like you’re the only person in the world and you can’t really tell anybody your secrets. Thankfully, like I said, my wife, she was strong enough to pull that out of me and to handle it responsibly and gently because she can see it on my face. I would come home and I’d break down and I’d have to make up a lie. I couldn’t tell her why I was. But yeah, she knew. She knew once I told her the truth about everything, she wasn’t really surprised. [00:19:05.947] – TAMAR: Explain that a little more, because you say it comes from the fragrance industry, so. [00:19:09.217] – Ryan Handis: Well, I don’t want to explain it too much in detail because it involves other people still in the industry. I don’t want to slander them at all. But I learned a very important lesson too. And through that other person, which is interesting because in that yearlong relationship with that person, I kind of trained myself and I was already a little bit like this, but I trained myself to really pity myself a lot more than I ever had, and after ending all that and trying to heal, I noticed I was still doing it to Liberty and it was like, man, what’s wrong with me? This wasn’t something that was to my attention until we kind of gotten the word and Liberty would say, “having pity on yourself this heavily is just as bad as being prideful, it’s it’s another form of pride. It’s just the opposite.” She’s absolutely right. So instead of spending days on end feeling sorry for myself or if she’s telling me how I’m feeling instead of feeling sorry for myself, for how she’s feeling, acknowledging her feelings and saying, “hey, I understand I’m here for you even though I did this.” And that ultimately has been the biggest challenge since then. [00:20:29.497] – TAMAR: But I like that quote. I really like that quote, what she said. I think that, you’re right. Pity is totally not the way you want to perceive your life. And it builds ruminations. I like to always think I’ve had people come up to me ever since I’ve talked about how I overcame depression. Not that I’m at all qualified to get people to get over depression, but I’m like, where does the question really start? When I start to look back on my life, because I’ve been depressed more than once in my life, and it starts with rumination. It starts with the way you see things. It’s all about mindset. The word mindset; these days, people are like maybe that’s like a cliche, but it’s not. It’s all about mindset. Yesterday, I will say right now, it’s March 4th. Yesterday, March 3rd was the one year anniversary that my community fell into a quarantine. We were the first city in the United States that had a community-wide quarantine. Two weeks later, the rest of our state did, and the rest of the country started to follow. [00:21:27.077] – Ryan Handis: Wow. [00:21:28.867] – TAMAR: I was featured [in] an NBC News segment last night. And the woman [newscaster], I spoke to them for forty five minutes, they ended up taking only ten seconds of my quotes. Of course, that’s how it happens. Sometimes they talk to you for five minutes, but this time they talked to me for like forty five minutes and they took two minutes out or so, but whatever it is, the whole thing was like it’s mindset. Covid could have totally been a complete [disaster]. I’m very vulnerable to having. Having had covid, like if I was in a bad, a worse mental—if I had a bad mental mindset, this totally could have devastated me because I know that I’m vulnerable that way. But it was about preparing myself mentally. I read a lot of books. Robin Sharma is probably one of my favorite authors for this, and I was in that different headspace. It again, it comes down to mindset. It really does. And they’re very difficult to do though. It is very difficult, especially in the moment. It has to define and it has to permeate you and you have to believe it. And getting yourself to believe. You might need an external physical factor. It’s not about the mental. So that’s why I say “use fragrance as a means of getting into that.” [00:22:36.817] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. One thing I discovered was with the self-care stuff going around. And I totally understand that. For me personally, it was actually easier for me to get over my depression and stuff when I took my focus off myself and put it on God and my wife. And this is just relating to that, not saying it’s wrong to take care of yourself or to do those things. That’s not absolutely what I’m saying. [00:23:09.037] – TAMAR: Yeah, self care is the most important thing. But in order to do that, you have to you have like you did have to put [forth others]. Sometimes it works. I couldn’t be a better parent without focusing on myself. So it started from within which I think you recognize. But you focused on prayer. That’s that’s important. [00:23:27.127] – Ryan Handis: Well, exactly. I mean, you have to stop your own bleeding before you can stop someone else’s. I mean, and that’s just the thing. You can’t really be worth anything to your kids if you’re not worth anything to yourself. It’s just how it is. And there’s no way around that. And that’s OK. I was always so inwardly focused in my life and so to to kind of step back and say, wait, it’s not about me, you know, it’s not my responsibility. If I focus on my family and taking care of them and of course, learning as much as I can from my father, God, then, I don’t have to I don’t have to have the burden of making myself happy because I just naturally will be. And that has been the biggest gift that I’ve been given through through the despair of, you know, that whole year was realizing that. And it’s took a lot. I would go on drives and just cry and not know why, and then think about ways to end my life. I never did anything, never made plans. But, you know, it was it was just such a low point into some sort of think back then. And the thing now, you know what’s around me. I just I’m just so thankful to be surrounded by my family and friends like you and this brand, that can keep reminding me that I’m always broken, but I’ve never lost. [00:24:53.227] – TAMAR: You do have a community. And that’s the thing. I really, especially now in the last 365 days community has been such an important and integral part of my survival, I think they need a community. I’m not talking about—I’m talking about specifically like the fragrance community online. I’m talking about, I feel I emphasize, I sympathize with the people who aren’t online because I think that’s the way I know the sanity that we really get, especially in these hard times. So having that friend circle, as superficial as they are or whatever, like I was reading an article a few weeks ago, I don’t remember where it came from. Maybe, I don’t know. But this woman was was actually mulling over, like these social acquaintances that we kind of have, like, for example, when you’re on line at Starbucks and you’re always have this one person in front of you. You’ll never, you might exchange pleasantries, but it means nothing. But it does mean something because now you don’t have that. You’re like, “oh, I wish I had those pleasantries with this stranger.” And online, like the way you the way you say, these people that I have online communications with, I think even though it’s not the same, the context is completely digital. It’s the written word. I think we’ve already figured out how to replace that. Or not replace that, but supplement that for the time being temporarily. Yeah, I don’t know. [00:26:23.867] – Ryan Handis: And it’s interesting, you go so long without seeing people and you almost wonder if you don’t see other people alive, are you alive? It’s sort of a weird psychological thing. What we don’t see. If you don’t interact with people, you sort of doubt your own existence. It’s crazy. You know, we were created to be around other people. Yeah. [00:26:46.597] – TAMAR: Yeah. It’s an interesting dynamic for sure. So I want to ask you, because you talked about self-care to some degree. I want to ask you about your self-care regimen. [00:26:59.267] – Ryan Handis: Well, I don’t really have a regimen of self-care. Mostly, I just, when I can remember or have the motivation in the morning, I’ll read my Bible and, you know, I’ll try. I’m a musician, too, so I love, I just put my drums away because my kids are taking up more room. But I love playing guitar. And that’s one way that I sort of get my frustration and my feelings out. Yeah, I don’t really have a regimen specifically for self-care, but just taking care of others and focusing on the things that I love to do, that sort of makes me feel good and confident about myself and it makes me feel healthy, I suppose, especially emotionally and mentally healthy. [00:27:53.307] – TAMAR: The experience of scent really can help so much. And I think people just don’t benefit from that. Also, like a lot of people are like, “oh, essential oils. That’s just good enough.” But when you go in a room, you forget that it’s there. But if you take your wrist and you put it to your nose. Obviously eventually it won’t be as potent unless you try it again in a few hours or something like that. That’s what people don’t realize. You can hold it on your body the whole entire day. It changes everything. [00:28:19.017] – Ryan Handis: Oh, it does. Absolutely. Yeah. So yeah. [00:28:23.257] – TAMAR: I’m really trying, it’s so trying so hard to disrupt this environment. It’s so difficult, that you understand. It’s also, I’m small, we’re both small, very niche, very indie. We’re getting out there trying to break a mold, trying to change the way people look at things. In due time, we should band together take our, you know, get in a big truck and we’ll drive down that closed fence of all the big brands. But yeah. Yeah, eventually. I have to figure it out. I’m still working on, I’m actually refining some of my messaging because it’s not reflecting what we’re talking about. And I think that that’s important because everyone’s like, “oh, you’re in a saturated space.” But no, I’m not in a saturated space because it’s a completely different way of looking at the saturated space. And that’s the difference. And I think you and I are very, very aligned with that. [00:29:10.707] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah. [00:29:13.467] – TAMAR: All right. So let me just end with one final question, and I hope it’s going to be fun for you. What I would say is: if you could tell an earlier version of Ryan one thing, what would you tell him? [00:29:26.777] – Ryan Handis: I would tell him to stay humble. I guess given the advice that pride is the one thing that can bring a man down. And so please don’t let yourself get too prideful no matter what happens in life. Be humble, be giving, and understand that God is always there. And if you mess up, you are forgiven. But at the same time, you know, pride can ruin a man. So don’t let that ruin you because it almost ruined me a couple of years ago. [00:29:56.347] – TAMAR: So I hear you. I look back on some of those mistakes when I had too much pride or too much ego. And then I crashed afterwards. And then I look back and I’m like, now I don’t even want to like self promote. It’s definitely different. [00:30:11.497] – Ryan Handis: And what would be yours? [00:30:12.647] – TAMAR: I don’t know. It’s funny. No one’s ever asked me that. Um, don’t overthink anything. Just do it. When I came to my perfume, I had a lot of hesitations, a lot of hesitations and just progressing in life and doing things. And nowadays I am all about, I’ve been reading a lot of books that say, “you will regret the decisions you’ve never made.” So I make a lot of decisions, and if I regret, I don’t want to look back and say I wish I did that. I’d rather say. I’ll never say “I wish I didn’t do it. I wish I didn’t spend that much money on something.” Maybe? No, not really, because at least I’ll have the experience to speak to. [00:30:57.467] – Ryan Handis: Sure. [00:30:57.977] – TAMAR: Maybe if somebody is asking me in the next 57 episodes, I will have a different answer because I have to get a little varied here, but I think I think at the end of the day it’s all about like looking back and regretting. I don’t want to have regret. Even the mistakes that I’ve made. Almost in a way, I regret having to let myself be vulnerable and exploited like this, but if I wasn’t like that, I would just be like somebody who’s a woman who wakes up, goes to work, go to bed, does her thing and now, I mean, we all do that. But now I feel more fulfilled and now I feel I’m potentially fulfilling. I’m very mission driven, like maybe I could change the world and so I’m glad that those mistakes were made and I don’t know if I have regrets. [00:31:41.867] – TAMAR: I want people to know where to find you. So tell me about that. [00:31:44.747] – Ryan Handis: So I do a lot of my daily, my day in, day out posting on Instagram, so if you want to follow how my day is going, that sort of stuff, I’m on Instagram, @brokenanatomyperfumes, and then our website is BrokenAnatomyPerfumes.com. We do most of our shipping through there, our sales through there. And then we are also in D’or Perfumes in Glendale, California, for in-store pickup. So if you are in California, you can sample us, at D’or Perfumes in Glendale, California, but we do sell sample sets online and feel free to order one of those. They come with a cool challenge coin to remind you of everything I just talked about. We have our first three scents. We just launched Burnt Remedy yesterday, so we’re really excited to finally—[baby squeals] [00:32:32.087] – TAMAR: She’s excited about it, too. [00:32:33.377] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, she’s very excited. [00:32:34.937] – TAMAR: It’s awesome. I didn’t realize your store is like, it’s far away, so if I ever want to visit it, I won’t find you. You won’t be there. [00:32:41.627] – Ryan Handis: Yeah, it’s far away from me too. It’s OK. It’s about a six and a half, seven hour drive. It’s right by Los Angeles. So. [00:32:49.517] – TAMAR: Yeah, cool. [00:32:52.517] – Ryan Handis: But thank you for that. And I hope I get to meet you some day. [00:32:55.787] – TAMAR: Yeah. One day. But we just have to keep in touch and figure it all out together. [00:33:00.197] – Ryan Handis: Yeah absolutely. [00:33:01.937] – TAMAR: Story of entrepreneurs. Strength in numbers, baby. [00:33:03.647] – Ryan Handis: That’s right. [00:33:04.547] – TAMAR: Well I’m happy to support you in any way and I hope we can we can continue to do it together. We can pave that— [00:33:10.037] – Ryan Handis: Thank you. [00:33:10.367] – TAMAR: Pave the way forward together. [00:33:11.327] – Ryan Handis: Thank you. Appreciate that. [00:33:13.217] – TAMAR: All right. We’ll talk soon. [00:33:14.777] – Ryan Handis: OK? Sounds good. [00:33:16.067] – TAMAR: All right. Thanks again.