38. Whose Dream Is This, Actually?

Dino's been sober for seven days, just made a hard business decision, and is somehow still at the studio on a Sunday morning with a 7-Eleven coffee. That's the vibe.

This week we're talking about ambition — specifically whose dream you've actually been chasing. Dino gets into the SaltDrop origin story, what it really costs to build something from scratch versus directing someone else's vision, and why losing Dude a few months ago has a way of making you ask what any of it is actually for.

Then we get into the inbox. And babe — you all delivered.

A consultant who's been standing outside a bookshop every Saturday morning for years and finally said it out loud. A wellness entrepreneur with a sage green color palette and 47 views on her best day who is now a therapist. A Filipino mom who let go of her version of her daughter in four seconds. A florist who got the promotion, sat in her car, felt nothing, and left eight months later. A first-gen kid performing success for an audience that already went home. And a dancer who stopped at 24 and just got back on the barre on Tuesday nights — not to be good at it, just to be in the room.

One more email is coming to Patreon. You'll want to hear it.

Next week's prompt: the little things that irk you. Send your stories to IHearYouBabePod@gmail.com.

I hear you. I got you.

Thanks to the brands keeping us going:

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello, everyone, and welcome to I Hear You Babe. My name is Dino Malvone. I'm your host. We've got a fantastic episode for you today. We got a big, big inbox. You guys had a lot of feelings about ambition. Turns out that most of us have been working to live out somebody else's dream, including me at some points, and we'll get into it. But so, and I as always, we always have a little bit of um chit-chat about what's going on here in New York City. And I have to say, it's been a full seven days since I've had any alcohol. So I'm trying to take some time really focusing in on what's going on at work because I recently had to let somebody go because just we're I I'm trying to downsize just a little bit, trying to maintain, you know, get a hold on what some of the expenses are. And which is, you know, one of those, one of the costs of owning your own business, right? Is that having to make decisions that sometimes hurt people's feelings. But I I know because I've been in both positions before. And I will say this I I know what it feels like to be in a sticky situation in a big city where you're like, where's the next paycheck coming from? I tend to I've had I've had jobs like that kind of my whole life here in New York City. When I first got here, I worked at Jeffree in the meat packing, which is closed now, but it was like super high-end clothing boutique, and I sold women's ready to wear. I had clients like J Lo and the founder of Spanx, Sarah Blakely was one of my clients. Yeah, I shopped with a bunch of really insanely talented, famous women. But and then after that, I went to real estate, which to some degree I had a good time doing, but whatever. I feel like my talents were squandered there because it was such a boys' club. And I, you know, I dressed well, I presented well, I was smart, I had an education, unlike a lot of brokers. No sade, but but that just wasn't for me. And eventually I started teaching fitness and then found that that was like my real passion. But you know, salt drop, honest to God, was something I built from scratch. I remember being disillusioned in my former job to some degree because I was, you know, without giving all of it away, I was treated really well. And at one point just decided that I was either going to sign my life over to somebody else's dream, or I was gonna start to build my own. And and I know what it costs to do that. I also know the difference between building something that's yours versus chasing a version of success that looks right from the outside. And I'm I stumble and continue to stumble and make mistakes and hopefully learn from them. But finding this clarity over this last week has been really, really good for me. But you know, it's weird because making it from the outside is one thing, right? Because everyone thinks I'm celebrating six years of salt drop, well, four years in the studio later this week, because today's the 15th. I think I signed my lease, which was on March 1st, but I think we started teaching, you know, some free classes during the week of the 16th or something like that. I think the 19th was the actual date or something, but of March. So it looks like from the outside we're nailing it, right? And I can tell you firsthand from inside, we're for sure nailing it in some way because we have mastered, I think, the art of music and movement. And of course, not mastered. We're always, we're always in in beta over here. But the idea of trying to figure out how to teach people how to talk about salt drop because we don't really fit a category, is what I'm working on next. And I have a really smart team of women around me who are going to help kind of pull the blinds back from what it is that we're actually doing. So people can talk to talk to their friends about it. I think right now it's difficult because you're like, well, what is salt drop? And it's a sweaty, beat-driven workout, but like that doesn't necessarily give it give it away. We're we're we're like cardio sculpt, but we're also like music and movement. And like the music is so important. I think we do that the best. And anyway, so the other piece of it was when I was at my former job, which by the way, you guys all know it was bar three. When I was at my other, when I was at the other job, I was, you know, I I loved it. I had a lot of freedom, a lot of creative freedom. I was doing well financially. I had recognition, which was super nice because I I never really had that so much in a job. And I had respect. There was mutual respect, actually, but I was like directing someone else's vision, you know? And which is great that I was given the freedom to exercise some creativity, but at the end of the day, it it still wasn't mine. And I learned so much about everything that I'm doing right now through that experience. So, but I will say that building your own is a lot harder than you think it is. It's a lot harder than you think it is. Look, and if I'm being honest, I feel like you know, I have this cute little home life, right? I've got Darius and Rocco and Vito, and what do they have to do with my ambition? Well, everything, because I feel pretty I feel pretty taken care of. And you know, losing dude a couple months ago who was 13 or 14, about to be 14, you know, grief has a way of making you ask yourself, like, what am I actually doing this for? You know like what is the what is the why? So anyway, I that's kind of what's going on in New York City. Also, I will say this. I I don't know if we last time we spoke, I think I was about to do it, but I did my workshop on negotiation this past week, and it was the the architecture of this workshop was about the art of asking, and that it was designed around a group of women primarily, and it was about some basic negotiation tactics that can be used in let's say salary negotiations. One of the stories, sorry, I had to have some of my 7-Eleven coffee today. Is regular coffee with French vanilla? Usually I get French vanilla with French vanilla, and obviously two Splenda. Don't come for me unless I send for you. So but what was I talking about? See, I this is me losing the my my train of thought. Anyway, I what was I talking about? Who even knows, guys? How do we even get here? So let's okay, again, bringing it all back to ambition, because I forget where I was going with that story. I don't even know what I was talking about. Listen, forgive me. It's like 10 a.m. on a Sunday. I felt like getting up and getting at it today. But let's let's get into these emails. What do you think? Boop, beep, boop, beep, pop, scoop, boop, boop, beep, doop, boop, boop, boop. Okay. So okay, the theme this week is ambition, right? And giving yourself a chance to sit back and think to yourself, like, whose dream am I actually chasing right now? Because you know, I have a lot of thought lots of thoughts about it. And then let's get into these emails, see what you guys think about. Okay, whose dream is this actually? This says. Okay. Hey, babe. Well, hello. I've been thinking about this one all week and I need to get into it with you. Okay. The first one says the novella. Okay, Dino, I've been sitting on this email for three weeks because every time I start writing it, I end up going somewhere I didn't plan to go. And then I close the laptop and go watch something on Netflix and pretend I didn't just feel something. Okay. I think that's what Netflix is for. I've been binging Netflix. Oof. Oof. Okay, but here we go. I grew up in a really small town in Ohio. I'm from Pittsburgh. Like the kind of town where the big debate is whether to get a Chili's or a Texas Roadhouse. And the Texas Roadhouse won, and people genuinely celebrated. Girl, we just talk about tint and the level of tint on your windows, the tires on your car, and um, and what sound system you had. Why? I don't know. That's what people do there. I was the wait, okay. I was a kid who was good at school, good at being quiet, good at not making waves. This was not me. My parents are wonderful people. I want to say that clearly because this isn't a story about bad parents. They really loved me. They worked hard. My dad drove a truck for 22 years, and my mom did bookkeeping for a dental practice. And they both wanted more than anything for me to have options. That was the word they used, options. Like options were this big, beautiful thing that they had not had enough of and were gonna make sure that I did.

unknown 10:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

I feel like that's a lot of parents, right? Especially that era, they were, you know, they were stuck on doing better for you than was done for them. So I got good grades, I took the right classes, I got into a good school, not an Ivy, but a good school. The kind where you could tell people the name and they'd nod in a way that meant something. Listen, even people that go to like Ivy sometimes, like, listen, trust me, nepotism is alive and well. People ride the coattails of their moms and dads all the time. I know some. So I studied because it seemed practical and because my dad said you can do anything with a business degree, which is technically true, in the same way that you can technically wear a ball gown to the grocery store. Possible, not always the right call, though. Touche. I graduated, I got a job at a consulting firm. That's so funny, though. Technically, in the same way, you can wear a ball gown to the grocery store, business degree doing it. I had to sit on that one for a second. I graduated, I got a job at a consulting firm, I got promoted and then promoted again. I moved, she's like, we'd love to see a boss girl winning. I moved to New York, which felt like arriving somewhere important. I bought furniture from West. Oh, chic. I had a standing desk. I used the word deliverable in sentences without irony, the eye rolls. I called my parents every Sunday and they asked how work was going. And I said really good. And I meant it, kind of. I meant that things were happening. I meant that it was moving forward. I did not, but I did not mean that I was happy because I had stopped checking in with myself about that somewhere around year two and just kept going because I felt like the point. It's so hard because you get stuck in the idea of like needing to have that constant paycheck, needing to have the things, you know, needing to have the things. And then you get stuck like do I what what is the sacrifice? What is the trade-off for those things, you know? I and then my company did this thing where they brought in a consultant, which I'm aware is deeply funny. A consulting firm hiring a consultant, I mean, that is very meta, to talk about purpose-driven leadership. Oh God, and that's in quotes. And this woman asked us to write down on an index card the answer to this question. What would you be doing if you knew you couldn't fail and money didn't matter? What I wonder what it would be. So I sat there for the entire 20 minutes with a blank index card. That's hard. Not because I didn't have an answer, but because the answer was so embarrassing to me and small sounding compared to what I was supposed to be that I couldn't even write it down in a room full of people with expensive shoes on. I wanted to open a bookstore. That's it. A small one, the kind with a cat and a good fiction section and a staff picks wall. I wanted to make people tea and recommend novels and close at six and mean it. I have never told anyone that until right now. Well, I'm so glad that you were able to air that. That sounds like a total dream come true. To you and like 400 strangers. I am still at the firm. I got promoted again last year. My parents are so proud. And sometimes on Saturday mornings, I walk past little bookshops in my neighborhood and I just sort of stand outside them for a minute before I keep going. I don't know what to do with any of this. I just needed to say it somewhere. Oh my goodness. Okay, wait a minute. First of all, like, first of all, you standing outside bookshops on Saturday mornings and like just standing there and then walking away, that kind of that light little detail maybe like destroyed me a little bit. Because someone who doesn't know what they want versus someone who knows exactly what they want and has been saying goodbye to it like once a week from outside, looking in from the windows, you know, and you and you call that your walk on Saturday mornings. I've I hear you on the index card because that's a I've had that moment too, like the moment where you know the answer is so embarrassing compared to what you've been perf what you've been performing. That you almost can't even write it down in front of anybody else because you feel like they're gonna laugh at me. And I'll tell you what's so funny. Just a second ago, I was flipping through Instagram and Shanti, one of the posts he said, when I stopped giving a shit what other people thought about me is when I started feeling the happiest in my life. So, you know the life that you're supposed to want versus that one, you know, that's anxiety when you live too far into the future like that. You know what I mean? There's nothing really intuitive about that. That seems like that sounds like anxiety to me. And the because the bookshop isn't small. The bookshop is like the whole thing, you know? It's the cat and the tea and the like six o'clock clothes, and the person who's like coming in with the idea of what they want and like leaves with the exact right book, say less. That's not nothing. That's actually everything, not just to you, to other to other people too. That's the experience, that's the high-touch experience, right? And you told us that you said it out, you said it out loud to me and the hundreds of people who are listening, who are total strangers, and that matters too. That's not that's not nothing. I think Saturdays for you are gonna hit different after you hear this podcast. I don't know. I'm excited to hear what you think. Okay, this next one says the Sage Green Era. Dino, my version of the story starts in 2019 when I decided fully and without irony, with a Pinterest board and everything, that I was going to become a wellness entrepreneur. Love this so far. Okay, said says, I want to paint a picture for you. I had a brand name, I had a color palette, it was Sage Green, obviously. It was 2019. Uh I had a podcast name that I will not share here because I'm still embarrassed by it. I bought a ring light. I took a course on building your own personal brand that cost$400. And the main thing I learned was that I needed to niche down, which I did. Except my niche was apparently vague, anxious, millennial women who drink too much coffee and has opinions about oat milk, which is a niche, as a niche is, it turns out extremely crowded. I know that's right. A lot of people out there with that same with that a lot of people have big, big thoughts about oat milk. I personally have big, big thoughts about almond milk. I it just could never be me. It's like basically water. I don't know. Okay, so it says I posted for eight months. My most viral moment was when I accidentally filmed myself dropping an entire smoothie on my white couch, and I said a word I won't repeat here, and my friend screenshotted it and sent it to a group chat. 47 views, my finest hour. Here's the thing, though, and this is the part I didn't expect. Underneath all the cringe, and there was so much cringe, do you know you don't even know. I was actually trying to build something I cared about. I genuinely wanted to help people feel less alone. The dream wasn't wrong, the execution was delusional. The ring light was also a mistake, but the feeling underneath it was real. I have a ring light that's like shoved into the corner over there. I I don't know. Is the ring light still a thing? I'm a therapist now. I went back to school age 31 and graduated at age 34, and I have a small practice that I still sit with. It says, I sit with people all day long while they try to figure out exactly the kinds of things you talk about on the show. And I think about 2019 me a lot. Not with embarrassment anymore, just with this kind of tenderness. Like she was trying to find her way to this. She just had to go through the sage green phase first. Girl, nobody wants anybody to look back on the things that they first did, right? Like, I don't want anybody to go and listen to the first few episodes of I Hear You, Babe. I don't even want anybody to go back and listen to the first few episodes of I Fear You, Babe, because I, you know, I think just now am I starting to find, you know, we're like somewhat 30-something weeks into the podcast and maybe like 20 weeks into the other podcasts. And I'm still trying, I'm I still feel like we're figuring out the easiest way to not feel like a total dork when you're sitting by yourself recording a podcast, like talking to the yourself to the computer screen. Cause listen, I I love to yep. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Just like those what were what were those Jim Henson things on Sesame Street or whatever? Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. They would like with their shoulders up and down, like feel like that's me. I can talk and talk and talk. In fact, wait, let me just go back to this email. See what happens? Where do we even go? So I'm a therapist now. She says I went back to school at 31, graduated at 34, and have a small private practice that with people outdate. Da-da-da. Green sage green. Okay. Anyway, the ring light is in my closet. It works great for telehealth sessions, full circle. Ah okay, the green sage. The sage green. It it was always sage green. It was always sage green. Why was it always sage green? That was the color palette. Was that was that the Pantone of the year? I don't know. Maybe not. But anyway, I love you so much for saying this because that part got me when you said the dream wasn't wrong. Because and but the execution was delusional because I that that's because that's yeah, that's the most generous and honest thing that you can say about a chaos era, right? Because the feeling underneath it was you was you, it was real. You just had to go through the ring light phase to get to the other side. Not the ring light phase. And look, now you're a therapist, you get to sit with people all day long and help them figure out exactly the kind of things that we talk about on the show, I guess. You know, it's like the universe has a sense of humor, but also. I think it has a plan, babe. The ups and the downs, can you hear New York City out there? There's always an ambulance. But you know, sometimes the plan just has like a sage green c cover to it. Or maybe there's just like a sage green chapter in it.

SPEAKER_01 22:23

You don't know.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

We're burning sage here, you're making sage green, you know. It it all it all the same. It's all the same, sis. Also, are you okay? And you said yes, thank you for asking. I I'm obsessed with you. Please come back and write again. Okay. Because we love, we go, we love whenever you guys write back in. Okay. This next one says the Filipino mom and four seconds. Okay. Hi, Dino. I've never written in before, but I've listened since episode seven, and something about this prompt brought something open in me. So here we are. Well, thank you so much for coming by, and thank you so much for writing an email. My mom came to this country from the Philippines when she was 23 with two suitcases and a nursing degree. Oh, that's beautiful. That wasn't recognized here. Oh, I didn't finish reading the sentence, which meant she had to redo parts of her certification while working as a home health aide for three years to support herself. She never complained about this. I don't even know the full story until I didn't even know the full story until I was in college and asked her directly. And even then, she told it like it was just logistics, just steps that she took. She's not a dramatic person. She shaped her, she saved her feelings for important things. Could never be me. I know that's right. There's no way we we we're here for the story, we're we're here for the drama. Who is the main character? We're still sussing it out. She became a nurse, a really good one. She worked nights from most of my childhood. So the day shift, so the so that the day shift differential didn't eat into our income, which meant she was sleeping when I got home from school. And I learned very early to be quiet. Also, it could never be me. You should see old videos of me whenever my mom would bring me and my brother out, and about my and I have this one video that we put on a DVD. It's somewhere at my mom's house, but it's just like my brother on one side, my dad, and then my mom, and then me. And all I'm doing, I'm holding my mom's hand, just jumping up and down and yelling. For no, there was nothing, nothing was going on. And my mom was like, you know, not even really. I mean, she was paying attention, obviously, but like not really. It wasn't even bothering her. It could never be me. God. So okay, she became a nurse, knew how to be quiet. We were close in the way that people were close when they're each other's whole household. She knew everything about me. I told her everything, except eventually one thing. I am gay. I knew this probably from the time I was 11, and I managed it the way a lot of gay kids manage things, which is to say I became very good at performing a version of myself that didn't include that information. Yeah, I can relate. I was good at school, really good. Cannot relate. I was gonna be a doctor. My mom talked about this like it was already decided. You know, when you're a doctor, she would say. Not if she had done everything so I could have options, and medicine was the option that made sense. And I loved her too much to complicate that. I think so many people were gonna relate to this story on so many different levels. So already in love. So it says I got into a pre-med program. I lasted two years. I was miserable in a very quiet way. The kind of miserable that doesn't look like miserable from the outside. That just looks like tired. I switched my major junior year to communications. I told my mom in a phone call, and there was a silence that lasted maybe four seconds and felt like four years. And then she said, Okay, tell me about the program. Four seconds. That's all she took. I've thought about those four seconds for so many times. I came out to her the following Thanksgiving. She cried. She told me she had known since I was 11. And I said, I actually said this out loud, like, why didn't you say anything? And she looked at me and said, because it was yours to say. Those four seconds my mom took on the phone, she was letting go of her version of me, and she did it in four seconds. And from that, I'm trying to learn. I kind of need a moment after that one. And I don't want to rush through this. I feel like that email deserves more than just me moving on. Because, you know, the four seconds that she took on the phone and then said, Okay, tell me about the program. That's like do you get what your mom did in those four seconds? Because you know, she let go a version of you that she've been holding on to for years. She's like, put it down four seconds, and she mom just put it down. I've been carrying things for years that she's that she's been able to put down in four seconds. And listen, and then Thanksgiving, because it was yours to say, I'm sorry, but it seems like your mom is pretty extraordinary. The way she loved you quietly, you know, without making it about her feelings. It was like that's a big one for it for some of us, you know, when our when our parents make it about them. So, you know, waiting for you to arrive at yourself on your own timeline is that's the kind of love that you know it doesn't need an announcement, it just kind of like holds the door open for you until you're ready to walk through, which is great. And if you said something about figuring out what wanting things feels like, what do you say when it's not in reaction to something? I think that's one of the most honest sentences anyone's ever sent in. And like, and your partner sounds wonderful. Tell your mom that she has another fan. Okay. We love, we love, we love, we love it. Next the next one says, Isn't that so cute though? That's very cute. Not everybody has that experience, so it's always fun to celebrate those who had, you know, like a not some of us had okay coming out, and some of us had like you know really shitty ones, but like it's good to it's good to hear stories about you know, even if it was uneventful, those are always good ones too. Okay, this next email says the florist. It says, I'll keep this one short because honestly, the whole story is just one sentence. I got the promotion I'd been killing myself over for three years, and I sat in my car afterward and called my mom and cried. And she thought something bad had happened. And I said, No, I got it. I got the thing, and she said, Well, congratulations. And I said, thanks. And we hung up and I sat there for another 20 minutes, not knowing what I was feeling, and eventually I just drove home. Oof. That that girl, that one, that's a real, that's that's real. I've been like that. I've felt like that sometimes too before. There was a time whenever listen to this. There was a time when I got into grad school, I got into Tufts, and I had I I kind of fought my way in there. I I knew my SAT scores were over five years since I had taken them, so I didn't submit them. And had I submitted them, I would have just got I would have gotten in. But so I anyway, I got a rejection letter and I went to the the dean of admissions and I was like, hey, listen, can we reconsider? And I resubmitted my application with my my SAT scores and I got I got in. But once once I got in, girl, two weeks into it, I was like, what the hell? This program was designed for people who want to work in like local government or want to work like you know, policy, or I'm like, there's no way I smell polyester a mile away. I can't do it. No, they're doing the Lord's work, it just can be me. It was so boring. But but what I did do because I wanted to leave with a degree that made me feel like I left with a purpose, you know, or like a skill set. So I spent my time whenever I was at Tufts understanding the fundamentals of negotiation. I know you guys all fell asleep 11 times while I was telling you that story. Anyway, back to this email. And okay, so eventually that was four years ago. I left that job eight months later, she says. So I'm a florist now. I make less money and I smell like flowers all day. And last week a woman cried at my counter because I got the arrangement exactly right for her mom's funeral. And I went home that night and felt more like myself than I had in a decade. Aw, that's really sweet. Okay, don't make me cry. The promotion was the kindest possible. Man, that kind of made my nose tickle a little bit. The promotion was the kindest possible way in the universe could have shown me I was in the wrong place. I'm grateful for the car cry, I really am. Okay. Well, maybe I am like a little bit, I don't know, too well slept or something because that made me that made me a little weepy. You said you'd keep it quick, um, and you absolutely did, but not keep it quiet because here wiping a tear away. The call your mom when she thought something bad had happened, in in a way not totally like be dramatic, but like kind of something did, you know? Because the way you'd been chasing that thing for three years showed you its face, and the face was just like nothing, and then that's it. It's like that's its own kind of loss. You know, it doesn't look like it from the outside, but it it is. And the woman who cried the counter because you got the flowers right for her mom's funeral. No, nope, can't go back to that, and then you went home and it felt more like yourself in a decade. That's the whole story right there. Because, you know, you're not arranging flowers, you know, you're holding space for people in the hardest moment of their life, which is man, I'm glad you're doing what you're doing. Sounds like you're doing, sounds like you're doing what you're meant to be doing. So that's great. Woof. Okay, let's move on. This next one says the first gen identity. Dear Dino, okay, so here is the thing about being the first person in your family to do a certain to go to a certain kind of school and get a certain kind of job. Nobody tells you that you'll spend the next 10 years performing a version of success for an audience that isn't even watching anymore. You know, it took me a long time to figure out that no one's watching anymore. Yeah. My family stopped asking about my job details around year three. They were so proud. I know they were so proud, but the specifics didn't land for them in the way I thought they would. You know, my dad asked once what I actually did all day. I started explaining and I watched his eyes do that thing where they stay polite but go somewhere else. You guys, my my dad makes pizza when I try to tell him what I do. He also asked me, like, what do you do all day? So how many classes a week do you teach? And I tell him, he's like, So that's how many hours you work? And I'm like, okay. Because the business it just runs itself. It's crazy. The person I've been working this hard to impress didn't need these particular achievements to be proud of me. He was already proud. He'd been proud since I graduated. But I kept going anyway because by then it wasn't about him anymore. It had become about me, about the me that I built, about the identity that required a certain level of title and salary to hold its shape. I'd become someone who needed to be impressive to feel okay. And I didn't even notice when that happened. I got laid off two years ago, restructuring, nothing personal, deeply impersonal, actually, very corporate. And in the weeks after, before the next job, during the gap, I had this weird window of being nobody professionally, no title, no company. Yeah, like what happens to your identity then? It's like ding, nothing to put on the bio section. And it was uncomfortable in a way I can only describe as detox. Like I was sweating something out. I'm somewhere new now. It's a smaller company, it's a little less prestigious in name. I make slightly less and I am more myself than I've ever been since I was 22 and hadn't learned yet to be impressive. I think that's actually the goal to get back to 22-year-old you, but with better judgment and a more functional bedtime working on it. Actually, I don't know if I would ever go back to 22. I think I look better now at 45. I digress. The eyes going somewhere else when you started explaining your job. I know that look. I know that look exactly 1 million percent. That's because that's what my dad does whenever I try to talk to him about what I do. And they're impressed with like the title and the and the and the name and the fact that you have a job, like they don't need the details. You know, like the details to them are like what, you know, and that kind of lands for me too. They don't need the details, but he doesn't care what I do all day, you know. And then we I think we build these like big elaborate performances, you know, for audiences who already gave us the standing ovation, you know? They're like, they couldn't be happier. They are they already brag about you, you know? And then like the audience goes home and like now we're performing to an empty house. Cause like there's only a certain type of person who's like gonna can get get continual recognition like that. You have to be kind of like forward-facing. I can't even think of like aside from like you know, someone who's in the public eye, who's gonna be under that level of scrutiny where they're gonna be either, you know, whatever, but but then you like forget how to stop performing too. You know what I mean? And I feel like maybe detox is the right is the right word for that gap in between, because it happens like I think that gap in between is pretty important. So like yeah, I think you find out a little bit more about who you are whenever nobody's watching, and it's a little bit scary. And and you find out you're someone who is more you with less, and I feel like that's a win. Because this whole thing's a fucking game anyway. 22-year-old you, yeah. I'm putting that on something. I love that. I if I had a better functional you know, uh let's see, we got one, two, we got three more. Let's do it, let's do it. This next one says the food content disaster. Oh gosh. Okay, I need a sip of my water. Hold on. We rent the studio out on the weekends to a company called Perlottes. They happened to leave like a few Poland Spring bottles here. And I needed to wet my whistle my whistle. Okay, this says, Dino, I need to tell you about the two years I spent trying to become a food content creator despite having the following disadvantages. I can't wait. They're enumerated. One, I cannot cook. Oh. Two, I have the camera presence of a cardboard box. Three, I live in a studio apartment with lighting that makes everything look like it was filmed inside a sad beige cloud. Okay. I made 41 videos, and my most viewed one was when I made a pasta dish confidently described as quick and easy, and it took me four hours because I did not know that you had to salt the water. The comments were not kind. You know, fuck that. It's really hard to put yourself out there, you guys. So whenever you're doing content that goes out there, I don't care if it's like you're putting out a podcast, I cringe every single time I hit publish on this podcast. Like I die a little bit, and then I have to promote it. What? So anyway, fuck that. Anyway, one person said, and I quote, are you okay? And I replied, yes, thank you for asking, which I think confused everyone. What I was actually chasing, if I'm being honest, was belonging. Well, that's a I think that's a human, what do they call that? Basic human needs. Everyone wants to belong. My best friend had built this incredible online community, and I watched her and I thought I could do that too. And what I didn't understand was that hers came from a genuine place and I was doing it because I wanted what she had. Oh, that's that comparison trap. Better watch out, which is not the same thing, and apparently the camera can tell. I work in marketing now and I'm really good at it because it turns out watching yourself fail at content for two years teaches you a lot about what actually works. Every cloud, I still cannot cook, and my boyfriend handles that. We're thriving. 41 videos. I mean, 41. I gotta put some respect on your name before you let it go. Because I have respect for that level of commitment, babe. I'm not kidding. Like, you got that's a lot of that that you know, that's a commitment to do that that many times. Trust me, I haven't even done that many episodes of this podcast yet. So good for you. We love a boss girl winning, even when she's losing. The are you okay? And like you said, yes, thank you for asking. I would have paid money to be in those comments. Like, I'm devastated I was not there. I like to hang out in the comments a lot. The comments are usually like sometimes if I see something immediately I'm just like boom, right to the comments. Because that's where the real, that's where the real reel goes down. But if there's one thing, I think you nailed it at the end, and I don't think you've gave yourself like full credit because you said you were chasing belonging, and you saw your best friend with this community that she built in and you wanted that. And what you didn't clock was that hers came from a genuine place, and yours was what coming from like the desire to have what she had. And that's like a really honest thing to say to yourself because I don't think most people ever even get there. That's a that's a I think that's a level of self-awareness about what you're putting out there that I don't think everybody, I think you're probably doing what 99% of people who are going into a self-assessment don't do. So, you know, and you found the door, it was just a different door than you expected, and and now your boyfriend cooks for you. And honestly, I think you figured it out. Like, I think you're winning. Thriving is correct.

SPEAKER_01 44:04

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 44:06

This one says The Dancer, which is one of my favorite books by Hollinghurst. I need to preface this by saying I'm not someone who writes into podcasts on a pretty private person. I can respect that. I am a 44 year old woman. I own a small business, and I listen to you on my morning walk. Oh, thank you so much. And usually you make me laugh or feel something and then they go to work. But the but this prompt, I know, babe. Some of you I got a lot of emails this week. I was a dancer, not professionally. I wasn't quite at that level, but close. I trained seriously from age seven through college. I did regional theater. I was good. My whole identity was built around it. And when people asked what I was like as a kid, my parents said she was the dancer, not a dancer, but the dancer. I stopped, I don't know what that means. I stopped at 24 because of an injury that healed incorrectly and because I fell in love with someone who was building a business. And I wanted to be part of that because I told myself it was time to be practical and I believed it. Those things were all true. None of them were the whole truth, though. The business did well. I became indispensable to it. I became good at operations and numbers and managing people and scaling things, which are skills you would not have predicted for the girl who spent 20 years in point shoes. I built a life that made complete sense and had almost nothing to do with who I was before 24. Yeah. I think people get pulled into stuff like this a lot, you know, when especially when there's like businesses in the family or like your partner has something, and you do, you lose a bit of your identity. It's an interesting tug and pull. She says, I'm not with that person anymore. The business is mine now, which is a toll other story for another email. Wow, that's crazy. And a few years ago, I started taking on adult ballet classes on Tuesday evenings at a studio near my apartment. Not to be good at it. I will never be what I was, but just to be in a room with music and movement and my own body again. Love it. Love it. The first class I cried a little in the bathroom after, not from being sad exactly, just from recognition. Like meeting someone that you used to know so well. I don't think I chose the wrong life. I think I chose a life and then forgot to keep that part of myself that danced, trying not to forget anymore. Aw, that's all. Thank you for the show. It gives me somewhere to put things. I'm really grateful. Thank you for writing. That's so generous. I always appreciate the time it takes for you guys to write these emails because I know that it's not just like you just sit down and boop. I know, I know they're they always feel very thoughtful. And I want to be careful with this one because I feel like it kind of it deserves that, you know. The part about like meeting someone that you know so good so well already, and that's like when you said you were walked back into that studio, and I've been sitting with that because that's grief, isn't it? Like you meet a part of yourself you put down somewhere, and then you like come back and find that it's like still there, but like a little bit dusty and just needs like a little bit of an oil change and you know a tune-up, but that's still there. It and like you said you you don't think you chose the wrong life. Um and I I believe you because I also hear everything underneath that sentence. Like it's like it's complex, it's family, it's a bunch of years, it's all the things that were true and led you to where you are, you know. I don't know if that I think life is right choices or wrong choices all the time. I think they're just like choices, and then you do with what with what you do, like within those choices, you know? So but I'm glad you went back to that Tuesday night ballet class. That's that's you going back to the music and to that room that feels so familiar, and maybe your body that feels like not so familiar, but like you know, you got that little cry out in the bathroom, and that's like a not even like a sad cry. I think that's like a oh, like nice to see you again. But I I hope that you keep going. I think it's important that you keep going because I think it feeds a part of you that you know was missing or something. So anyway, and the thank you to this show that gives me somewhere to put things. Honestly, girl, thank you for giving me the chance to read your email because that's I mean, I really love doing this, and I and I couldn't do it if it wasn't for you guys sending in these notes. So there's one more, but this one is I am like doing a quick little scan over it, and I think this will be a really great Patreon episode because it's a very it's a long one. So why don't we end this episode here? For those of you who are interested, you can always come and catch us at Patreon. The Patreon is I hear you, babe. What else can I tell you? I'm gonna put up the I'm gonna put up the ba ba, whatchamacallit, for next week, the prompt for next week. I think we're gonna do things that irk you. Like things that like little things that annoy you. Cause I feel like we're getting like so sweet and cute or whatever. And I just feel like maybe it'd be fun to have a week of just like laughs and giggles. So I believe next week's prompt is gonna be something about the things that irk, little things that irk you. But anyway, I am so glad that you guys joined me today. I am so grateful for your emails. Again, these emails you guys all send to IHearYubabepod at gmail.com. If you've got stories of little things that irk you, please send them my way. And so grateful to have you guys here. Can't wait to talk to you guys again next week. Bye.