Jef & Mindy on the Liberating Power of Comedy, Creativity, and The Ridiculous

What if the biggest obstacle to living a more creative, fulfilled life isn't talent or opportunity—but the fear of looking ridiculous?

Mookie sits down with Jef & Mindy, the married co-creators of The Ridiculous, to explore a science-fiction comedy universe that grew out of an unexpected place: the competitive fitness industry. After spending decades helping people transform their bodies, they came to an uncomfortable realization. Looking better didn't necessarily make people happier. Confidence built on appearance alone often collapsed under pressure, leaving the deeper questions of identity, purpose, and fulfillment unanswered.

That realization sent them in an entirely different direction. Instead of writing another self-help book, they built The Ridiculous: a fast-moving science-fiction comedy inspired by the spirit of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but with a fundamentally different destination. Rather than using absurdity to argue that nothing matters, The Ridiculous uses absurdity to remind readers that they're free to try, fail, laugh, create, and grow.

What emerges during the conversation is something far more ambitious than a trilogy of novels. Jef & Mindy are telling a story and building an ecosystem around it. The books are only the starting point. Readers can participate in community experiments, contribute artwork, audition for audiobook roles, compose original music, submit stories, collaborate with other creators, and help shape future installments of the franchise. Instead of drawing a hard line between creator and audience, they're intentionally dissolving it.

Underlying the entire project is a patented behavioral framework they call the Value Reinforcement System. Rather than rewarding people for perfection, it encourages participation, experimentation, and personal growth. Members are invited to complete real-world challenges, share their experiences online, inspire others to do the same, and receive recognition through a growing community built around positive reinforcement. The goal goes beyond simply entertaining people for a few hours, and also creates an environment that nudges them toward becoming more curious, creative, connected, and confident.

Mookie and his guests also discuss how The Ridiculous extends beyond books into what could become an animated series, graphic novels, games, streaming content, live events, and an expanding creative platform. Instead of following the traditional publishing model—write a book, sell a book, repeat—Jef & Mindy are embracing a participatory model where readers become collaborators, collaborators become contributors, and contributors help shape the evolution of the universe itself.

Jef & Mindy share an optimistic philosophy wrapped inside science fiction, comedy, behavioral psychology, and collaborative storytelling. At its heart, The Ridiculous argues that growth rarely looks graceful while it's happening—and that perhaps the most ridiculous thing of all is allowing the fear of embarrassment to keep us from becoming who we're capable of being.

Jef & Mindy

Jef & Mindy are known for building transformation-driven communities, gamified experiences, international events, media platforms, and brand collaborations that turned participation into identity, and identity into belonging.

For more than three decades, they built fitness, wellness, media, and live-event brands that brought people together around confidence, transformation, personal growth, recognition, and community. Through FAME World Tour, WNSO, Body Proud, international events, expos, speaking, publishing, television, magazines, and brand activations, they helped create movements where people did more than attend, they participated, transformed, and became part of something larger.

Their work has evolved from physical transformation into emotional, mental, social, and creative transformation. The Ridiculous carries that same foundation into a books-first absurdist sci-fi comedy franchise built around laughter, perspective, participation, and possibility, where people laugh first, think deeper, and do something remarkable with it.

The Ridiculous

Website: www.DoRidiculous.com 

About us: https://doridiculous.com/about-us/ 

Amazon Book Link:  https://www.amazon.com/Ridiculous-comedy-curiosity-perspective-enjoying-ebook/dp/B0FK37DJ2G/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0

Dean Grey, the behavioural scientist, who formed the baseline to the value reinforcement system: https://www.deangrey.org/

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Hello and welcome to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Factory. I'm your host, Mookie Spitz, and I'm thrilled to have Jeff and Mindy, the co-creators of The Ridiculous. Welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for having us. And you guys are a couple. You guys are married. You guys are co-writers, co-franchisees. How does that work? You guys fist bump and do stuff together? How does it how does it shake out?

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Well, and funny, the the first time I met Mindy, like our first official, like kind of date-ish, I told her about this book series. You know, she stepped into that.

SPEAKER_00 0:57

But yeah, we and he told me about that the first time I met him. The first time we talked. He told me about this character because I looked like her.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

But you asked, you know, how does that work? How do we do this together? We've been working together for over 25 years, with you know, in the book series and uh in the other things that we did, which was really launching a whole movement around fitness and wellness and empowerment. Uh, that was our our big end of it. And so how did the book part like Mindy Connect in? Well, we ran that whole movement, and it was really based around uh it was the the the natural bodybuilding movement and fitness model search, and these things didn't exist. Uh, this is pre-internet type days. Um, and we grew that into a really big movement all around the world with TV shows and expos and magazines and everything. But what we found, what we thought at the beginning is that people were going to step in uh and become uh happier and healthier and more confident and all that kind of stuff. And what we realized was something different.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

There's not that. So, yeah, so going back to your question, like how did we make it all work? It's like it naturally just kind of has to happen that no matter what it is that we're focusing on on the books, the movement with fitness, whatever it is, that we just naturally gravitate to where there's an opening where something has to be completed, one of us completes it. And sometimes we both have to help on certain things, but otherwise it's just a natural thing.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Yeah, and where that completion process went was we said there's something wrong, like the fitness industry is broken to a certain degree. People are doing things.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

That's the conclusion we came in the fitness world.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

And we said, you know, there's uh people need to have a better guidance system to healthier products and uh, you know, healthy lifestyle and who to follow and and what to do. And we said, okay, well, let's continue with this book, let's do it differently, let's exit out of the fitness in that specific way, but let's approach this through comedy because comedy and laughter opens up a doorway. And when people are in that state, they're more open to, well, some maybe some aha's or a different way of thinking of things. So we layer the book, and this is where we came in it together. We we made sure that we've layered the book with enough meaningful messages distributed through the laugh out loud content so that the end result is to help people feel good, and and uh and then that is expanded further. But it's always been us together. Uh something needs to be done, we need to do a website. Well, one of us is gonna learn HTML and design that, and one of us obviously needs to get sponsors, so we gotta fill the expo, and you know, so we we've always figured it out that way.

SPEAKER_02 3:55

Sounds like a dream team, and it was really founded on helping people. So it sounds like you were you were spearheading the fitness movement, and you saw some issues in that. Can you drill down just a little bit? Was it overemphasis on body type, on confidence building in the wrong ways? What what problems did you guys see and how did those roll into creating a comedy series in science fiction?

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Well, basically, the main thing we saw was that loving or changing the way that you look does not change how you feel. It doesn't change how your body functions, it doesn't change what you like to do. In some cases, it makes you more body conscious and more um have more like depression and more mental issues. So we recognize that. That was one of the things that we recognized, and we realized, uh-oh, things need to change because clearly everyone's capable of doing a transformation. They just didn't have the tools to transform everything so that the end result is they feel fulfilled. They're more happy, they're more confident, and they're doing the things that they're able to do, discovering actually their talents, like pursuing passions, dreaming big, doing all those things. So we recognize that it was narrowly focused and focused pretty much solely on appearance. Yeah. That was one thing.

SPEAKER_01 5:36

And and people, you know, specifically in the fitness end, where you're being judged on your physique. So that's a big, that's a big deal, right? That's like uh, and people spend a lot of time preparing for that moment. So we sat as you know, judges probably for 20,000 plus people that we saw walk across the stages. You're preparing for that moment. So that might be nine months, 12 months, 18 months of prep. And there's so many things that you need to get right because under that, you're under like the lights, you put on tanny products to highlight, you know, different things, but your whole dieting and comes down to like those last few minutes as you prep. Uh and if people get that wrong or they're so so focused on it, then the whole experience of everything that they've done goes out the door. Uh, and we just really wanted to make sure that people captured that journey because it's more than just that moment on that stage. It was who did they become in that process? Who did they empower? How do they feel? And that's where we we just felt like it was going so much, just to what do I look like? And how do I make sure I look like that? And how do I eat uh, you know, in such a way that will keep me like that, but that everyone around me won't want to eat with me because you can't eat anything. Uh and um, but that leads to all kinds of other things that uh sort of our uh uh eating disorders, uh it leads to uh the mental health side of thinking that you always need to look this certain way. Even the point, you know, we've had these talks many times of people who are working out. So when you're going to work out in the gym and you're, you know, you're gonna do a bench press and you're gonna press that through. What are you thinking of? Are you thinking about like water exploding up and you're you're pressing this or mountains?

SPEAKER_00 7:38

That can be a good thing.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

That's a good thing. But a lot of people are thinking about horrible things that are gonna push them through that. That's what you're building your muscles and your body and the muscle memory and all that kind of stuff with. So we just found that there's got to be a better way to do it, and that there's gotta be a better way to connect brands that are showcasing stuff that are gonna help people to do it in a way that is authentic, that's accountable, that's transparent. And we know, well, let's let's dive through comedy because everyone gets comedy. Most people don't like to be told what to do. But if it's in a form of a joke that makes you stop and think, well, maybe you'll think long enough. Maybe not the first time, maybe you need multiple, you know, repetitions of it. But that's where the doorway opened up on that end of it.

SPEAKER_02 8:32

So if self-improvement was the goal all along, you saw it as one-sided. We're improving ourselves at least aesthetically and externally. But what about the inside? And you felt that that was lacking, and the transition to comedy, making people laugh, and doing it in the way that the ridiculous does. Having read it and checked it out, I can see where these themes come together, which is it's introspective, it's zany, and it looks at oneself through this humorous lens and looks at the world as a crazy wild place. But at the heart of it, there's values and there's things that we could learn, and there's a growth which goes beyond just pumping up and looking good and acting sharp. Is is that is that the intent? Because I think you you guys got to where you wanted to go.

SPEAKER_01 9:30

Yeah, they the the first step that we had on that journey was uh we we said, well, we we've got to make people more aware of that it's more than just the body. So we had a whole initiative called Body Proud. And the premise really about body proud is yeah, body, mind, heart, spirit. But it was to focus on the journey of what you're who you're becoming, and you know, that transformation.

SPEAKER_00 9:56

It's like taking an action where you can actually feel body proud in that moment, and then multiple of those actions lead into the feeling of body proud.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

So so what we did is uh we had uh the North American championships. So we had hundreds of athletes, and we said, Well, let's do something different. On the Friday night before the event began, we said we're gonna invite anyone who wants to to come on on stage and be part of a body proud showcase. We had no idea what it was gonna be. We said it would be interesting. We had some idea. We said, you know, hopefully we're gonna have cool stories that come out of this. So we invited media, we invited all our brand partners and and uh people connected to it, and we asked people to come up and they had two to three minutes to share their story. It was the most uh incredible experience. Powerful. Because you had these, uh, so you have a guy who's stepping on stage that's you know, big, big bodybuilder, and he's in that moment because they were just told before what it really meant, they stepped on stage and shared what Body Proud meant to them. And their story. Their story of like maybe being bullied and like in tears on stage, one after the other. And it was such a moving event. And we realized, okay, well, that's really what gets the people really going. It's not being told, oh, you got to get in shape or you gotta do this. It's what is motivating you? What was your story? What was the end goal behind that? Being recognized, being recognized, giving them that moment for that spotlight. And that's what we said. If we could do that in a book series, that's well beyond just the fitness market. This is something that could help people who are dealing with isolation and depression and uh all the loneliness that people experience online. And let's connect them through that, but then let's create it in such a way where there's participation. Let's get people really, really, really engaged. And we've been talking about this for years, but we needed the system to do it. Uh and uh uh someone who's working with us as part of the team is a behavioral scientist, and he developed a system called the value reinforcement system that's a patented technology. And the whole idea is to be able to uh give people pathways of things that they can do, create, do, experience, and then have a recognition process through that, and then help guide them to become, you know, that better person that they want to be. And that's what we said we're going to employ on a bigger basis into the ecosystem.

SPEAKER_00 12:38

I want to add one thing that when we were talking about the fitness world, the one thing that brings it all back is that a lot of people in the fitness world, although uh the focus was primarily on appearance, uh, many people went on to went inward to discover more about the body, how it functions, how you can make it feel better. People went on to develop great products, make great discoveries. And now what happens in the book, we're alluding to these experiments that people could take to discover what actually helps them feel better, what actually improves how they function. And the people who we're directing them to, a lot of them, are going to be the experts who came out of the fitness world because they're the ones who went inward to self-discover.

SPEAKER_02 13:27

It sounds like you took what ostensibly was a bodybuilding championship or some kind of performance, and you gave them a mic and you gave them two, three minutes just to open up. So bodybuilding combined, let's say, with the moth. You know, when people come up and then they they do true confessions, they tell stories, and the light bulb went off, which is that's the missing link. We're so focused on building ourselves up physically, physical fitness, maximizing our physical health potential. But what's missing is the inner story, the inner healing, the inner release. And then it sounds like you've combined all of this into the ridiculous franchise. So you've got storytelling, you've got comedy and humor to open people up, you have this reinforcement system that you've described, and you even have an opportunity for people to co-create with you on the website. So, can you give people an overview and maybe start with the books because they're more familiar and tangible? You have a trilogy that's out, three books. They're available on Amazon too. They're uh a zany comedy, sci-fi adventure, written in nice little chunks of fast-moving prose and witty dialogue, very entertaining and uh and a fun read. And interwoven with all that, you have created this reinforcement kind of ecosystem. So it's a very unique approach to healing, to betterment through comedy and science fiction and and this kind of system. Can you can you take us through it?

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Yeah. Well, number one, the reason you know science fiction was chosen as a genre for this, or it was inspired by hitchhikers, so there's an obvious. But science fiction also allows you to uh imagine and uh be accepting of that imagination, and it allows you to be more childlike and explore. The co-creation part, so I'll talk about that part first, and I think you'll probably talk about the experiment part thing, but whatever. The co-creation part was really important to us because we said, you know what, what if we do this in such a way where we don't fully, fully describe what the characters look like. We hint at certain things, but let's put this out as a challenge and let people draw those characters. Let's do redo the audiobook and do it as a full production where we have musicians that are providing the songs.

SPEAKER_00 16:14

And we provided the lyrics.

SPEAKER_01 16:16

Yeah, let them provide the the tunes and have the fan community uh audition for roles on the audiobook. And then let's take that even further to the illustration side, because we're now in talks with different studios. I'm taking this to an animated series and building that. So we created this co-creation that we're giving people that ability. You know, a lot of people think, I would love to write a book or I'd love to do, but I don't know where to begin, I don't know where to start. Well, what if you just start with a story? Just submit a story of something that you found from the book, something ridiculous, something that you want to add to it, that you took from it. Maybe you're an artist, but you haven't had that vehicle out. Well, here there's an opportunity. And then for all those participating, there's the visibility, you know, because these will be used on trailers and for producers and studios and social media, and it gives people another opportunity and then an opportunity to interview them and put those interviews on the on the audio book and you know, give people that way to express themselves either from the help or the creativity end of it. Uh the whole notion of the experiments are to get people to uh maybe stop what they're doing that may not be making them feel as great as they are, and get outside and go do something. Go in the real world, get offline, do something that you might think is ridiculous on the first time that you think about it. But if you do it, you'll probably feel great. And then go and share that with other people. Kind of like that whole ice bucket challenge, but in in a in a in a positive way and get people going with it.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

Uh our message really is if if you were ridiculed for it, then that means somebody didn't understand. So go do it anyway. This is our experiment, go do it anyways, and let us know if it worked. And if you need to test out your product or your service or what you discovered, put up your own experiment and let people test it out because now the community will figure out what works, what doesn't, what works for who, and then together we're going to come up with this living life guide, this resource of wholesome products, proven methods, authentic role models, smile makers, and all these things. It'll be in all these amazing categories that is discovered by real people doing real activities to get real results.

SPEAKER_02 18:47

Like a co-creation platform of ridiculousness. So you mentioned several touch points here. So there are the books, which tell the ridiculous story. There's the audiobook that's there that people can actually participate in creating with you, and then there's these experiments where they can apply some of this holistic healing and growth and inspiration in their everyday lives. Yeah. Those are sounds like the key, the key touch points. How does it all come together? What's the user experience like? So if you hit that button in the upper right hand corner of your website and you join, what what's what's going on? How is my life gonna change for the better by getting some more ridiculous in there?

SPEAKER_01 19:43

So there's a few ways. You can engage with the content so you can read the book or listen to the audiobook. So that that's a natural.

SPEAKER_00 19:49

But you can that gives you a laugh, that gives you enjoyment, that gives you something new to do something exciting with your day.

SPEAKER_01 19:57

And then you could click join an experiment or create an experiment. And then very simply, choose something that you want to do, go out and do it, share it on social media, uh, use the right hashtag, uh, tag someone else that you you want to inspire with it. We're now making use of where technology lives today, and AI could do very different things that we couldn't do many years ago, which means anyone could go to their own social media platforms, share, use the hashtag, and we'll use the systems behind it to collect those hashtags to be able to bring that up into leaderboard and street boards, because it's not just someone doing something once, it's taking people on a journey because if you do something and you feel good about it, typically you want to find more things to do about it. So, how do we help that person who may say, I want to do this, but now we can guide them on how they could become something else through that journey? That street boards, leaderboards, all that kind of stuff that tracks it. And then we have the brand partners. The brand partners that either want to get their product known or recognized for the value of what it is, they want people experiencing it, and they're gonna provide or they're providing prizes and opportunities so it connects them all together. So that user experience is really challenging people to go out and do something that they normally wouldn't have done, and then go and share that. Uh, and we'll the the big part that people need is recognition. And if we can give them recognition and rewards, and through that, people could have breakthroughs. Well, then that's amazing because then there's a positive association with the entire experience.

SPEAKER_02 21:45

Are you headed toward a unified kind of experience? So an app or uh a program. Because it sounds like you're creating a community and You're giving people the tools to do it. So you can hashtag and you can jump on X or wherever, and you can post your stuff. Sounds like you aggregate all of the threads and comments, and then you mention a leaderboard and opportunities to reshare what's been shared. How do these elements come together? How is the ridiculous program a part of my life in ways where I can go back to it and express myself in a continuous kind of way?

SPEAKER_01 22:34

Well, the community I absolutely where this is going with the audiobooks and the books is yes, we've gone to book three, uh, and book four and four point two are really books that uh are from the community, right? It's the stories, it's the the results of these experiments. Uh it's the brands that are integrated, but not just because they paid money. That was a sponsorship model, right? And uh when we ran the events, that's how that model had to work. You had the key sponsors, they they provided the funding that allowed the events to happen in certain ways, and we're grateful for all that. What we wanted to do is say we're not the ones who are the gatekeepers on which of the brands or influencers or products or services are the right ones. Let's let the community do it by engaging in activities and experiences that may also connect them to brands and different products. And as those elevate and rise to the top with all these leaderboards and everything else, well, now we're going to build that into the books and the audiobooks, and when this goes to the screen, all these different opportunities so that it's built into the narrative, into like a real storyline integration.

SPEAKER_02 23:57

That's that's a kick-ass idea, and putting it into play is very, very creative and it's very timely. So, old school, you would write a book, and then you'd get an agent, and then you'd pitch it, and then it would be published, and you'd go to the bookstore, and there you'd be your book, and it's a physical object. And obviously, we've entered digital, so you have two-way communication, democratization of information, media fragmentation, okay. But book writing hasn't really changed all that much. You just have other touch points to be able to maybe sell it better and connect with the community. But what you guys are actually doing is co-creation of the storytelling and the book using all these channels and technologies and platforms to get active participation from your readers, from your community. And to your point, that's like the first three you guys co-wrote together and you guys laid the foundation. But it sounds like 4.2, 4.8, 5, 6, 7. These are a combination of the brands getting involved, but also your fans getting involved, and they can see themselves in the evolution of the dynamic story as it as it comes to happen.

SPEAKER_03 25:18

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 25:19

That that's really neat. I had an author just yesterday, his name's Mallory, and he's successful in lit RPG, which is literary role-playing games, and he his success came from Royal Road, which is a website where authors put up their stuff, and then fans and detractors leap on it. Okay? So he's a writer, he's getting all this feedback, and he had like a million beta readers, but he's still the content creator. So it's using a platform with a bunch of fans and a community, but he's creating the content and it's his books. You guys have turned the model upside down in the sense where instead of uploading something and having people comment and you just being the writer, tweaking it, and then making it available to them, you guys are letting them in. You guys come on in, like write a song for the audiobook, and then you'll actually see it in the product. Like maybe put in a vignette or a piece of dialogue or something funny that's the next episode in the ridiculous, so that you're blending, you're dissolving that boundary between creator and consumer in a way I think that's very creative and fun and and probably trend setting. Because people want to participate, they they want to take part in all this daniness. And everyone's a content creator now, right? If you're even if you leave a mean comment on YouTube, you're a content creator.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

Yep. Uh even the author character in our book needed to become a content creator and and break through that that third wall, so that fourth wall. Uh yeah, so yeah, it we just want to have a different approach because that's what leads to change. If you get people involved and they're that they're participating and they're enjoying the process and they're sharing that process, then they feel inspired. And when they get recognized, that inspiration goes even further. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:32

And the cool thing is we're on the co-creation side, we're inviting people to collaborate with each other. So singers get together with a band, band get together with dancers and like perform your stuff. So now we're creating this engagement across community and uh really in the process at the same time, all of the brands that are involved strengthening their identity and visibility because they're actually helping the people achieve their results, have their breakthroughs, have their aha's, have their proud me moments, and all of these elements.

SPEAKER_02 28:07

I think it's again wonderful. And I just asked the immediate and obvious question, which is IP, intellectual property. So, all right, so I'm Mookie and I'm a big ridiculous fan, and I send you a song or I send you a little piece of ridiculous, and it makes it uh 4.2 or 4.8 or book five. How does it work in terms of recognition, in terms of even money? How does that shake out?

SPEAKER_01 28:38

Yeah, uh, some of those are still being worked through. The recognition is there. So I'll use the easiest example, like with the audiobook. Every one of the musicians will, in the audiobook, they'll have an interview. You know, there'll be uh the relevance of you know, the interview will be about them, but you know, what inspired them into that song, what it did. So any way that we can to help build up that that musician, that that band to it. And then that will extend in everywhere it goes. Uh uh as far as that, that then leads to live events, it leads to invites to all kinds of different opportunities. Those musicians or those key songs, the one who comes up with a theme song or so, well, that's gonna be used in the trailers, and that's gonna be shown to any of the studios when they're saying, Okay, now let's go that next layer with it. Same thing's gonna be in the book. So uh we will have a uh the book set for the the first three. That book set will have additional content, and that there'll also be content from all the people who are participating. So it's it's really an exposure and recognition.

SPEAKER_02 29:51

Where do you see it going? So you mentioned like it's every writer and creator's dream to have Netflix knock on their door and you know, here's a contract for a for a mini-series, thank you very much. But but how do you see it tactically working out? Because you you have the book, the book series, and you've got the recognition program, you've got your experiments, you've got your website is pretty much the digital hub. Where where do you see it going? Because it has platform potential, it's it's kind of its own social network. It's a combination of like social network, Slack in terms of content and commenting. I mean, obviously the sky's the limit, but when you're thinking this thing through, what does the ridiculous look like? Phase one, phase two, phase three?

SPEAKER_01 30:47

So our first thought or our first process was let's uh let's prove the concept with with the book and let's get the book established. And we uh very, very uh specifically said, okay, let's just work on Amazon so we can monitor and engage with those algorithms and stats and see how that goes. And we said, well, we're not going to do much marketing. We'll do some tester marketing on keywords, but we're not going to do marketing until we're able to when we're in the position to scale it. So through those campaigns, uh we sold thousands of books. Uh, we got number one rankings in the whole bunch of categories like comedy, science fiction, happiness.

SPEAKER_00 31:33

Metaphysical humor.

SPEAKER_01 31:34

Metaphysical humor, all these really cool things. And we said, okay, so the books are working, it's doing it. People are moving from book one and going on to the others. And we said, well, what's gonna happen first? Are we gonna start with the experiments because we have the value reinforcement system? Are we gonna start with a game uh and uh choose your own adventure? Or we explored for a while working with tech companies on uh 3D uh uh worlds to bring people in where they can create the characters and really engage in that. Uh or is it gonna be a television show or a movie or a streaming? And we just put everything out. And right now, so the book is doing well, and now we've we've taken on, so now bookstores could order it through Ingram Spark, so it's open up to a bigger market. Uh and uh we have representation on the Hollywood side, so uh there are studios and producers actively looking at it right now, like ones that were like, oh my god, really? They're looking at that. Uh uh, we're in discussion on uh broadcast uh side, more uh that is uh on the experiment side of things, you know, because essentially we're crowdsourcing people creating videos and bringing that together. And we've produced TV shows before, so it's more being able to bring that content. Uh so we don't know, is it going to be the movie that starts first? Like we're actually in discussions of well, how would we want that movie to look? Or what would we want the series? Is it animation? Is it real life? Is it a blend? Uh next week we're actually meeting with one of the producers who's very much interested, along with their screenwriters, so we could talk about it in more detail. One of the people on our team uh is very, very big in the gaming world. So is that the direction that we'll take uh first? So there's a lot of different openings, and the music end uh is really becoming big because all of a sudden all these networks that we're connected to have opened up and said, wow, musicians would love to be able to do that, you know, to create some songs or giving them something to do that is that gives them a reason to go and get together with their their buddies and jam and put something together. And we have and a big access point that we have is all the different jam band, you know, type of markets, the Grateful Dead style and fish and goose and and that kind of thing. So those are communities that love to co-create and collaborate. So it's still we're we're we're see which is gonna be the big doorway that opens first, but we're putting them all out at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

I have an old friend and he's a fish head. So I was living in New York, he goes, Hey Mookie, do you love fish? And I was like, Well, I don't know, they're I guess they're all right. So he came to New York for the fish shows at Madison Square Garden, and he just out of the blue texts me. He goes, Hey Mookie, I got an open ticket tonight. Wanna go? And I'm like, Okay. And fast forward two hours later, I'm like, whoa, it was so cool. So he turned me into a fish head. And I know exactly what you're saying about communities and uh and co-creation. And your your overall strategy is very indie, very contemporary. The two hottest movies right now, Obsession and Back Rooms, basically originated from from teenagers on YouTube playing around. And the industry is changing where you just DIY it, you do it yourself. If you have an idea, write the book. If you have a concept, go on Blender and create a world. And once you do it yourself, you build a following around it through the social channels, and that momentum will give you legitimacy and authority to get into the legacy systems, which are frankly where the money is and where the major distribution happens. So when you blend these two worlds together, it's very indie, it's very contemporary, it's very digital, but it's super fresh and fun, which is if you feel like doing it, just do it. Don't sit around and wait for it. And then if you have a great idea, put it on put it on paper, make it make it real, and then pick up the phone, send emails, make connections with people all over the place. You never know what can happen, and give it a whirl. And and I and I like how you're building it as you're flying it too, which is like we don't know, huh? We don't know. Let's uh let's let's give it a try, right?

SPEAKER_01 36:33

Yeah, but what we did though is we surround ourselves with a team of people who know who are experts in their area, right? So uh we we could be more creative and and and get the right advice on what to do for the next steps.

SPEAKER_02 36:52

Yeah, very, very exciting. So you gave us a great overview of the ridiculous franchise platform. How how do you guys refer to your universe, the ridiculous universe? Is there a term you're using?

SPEAKER_01 37:05

We say ridiculous universe. Uh we haven't fully read it, but we say uh we say do ridiculous or ridiculous universe, you know.

SPEAKER_02 37:14

So we got a pretty good flavor for all the different touch points. Let's let's talk for a second about the core content itself, which is the three books, how how it got going. On First Blush, as I mentioned, it's written really staccato. So you've got quick sentences, sentences don't go long. It's like boom, boom, boom, boom. It's like axios.com. I personally find this very relatable. I wrote my science fiction book in three-line paragraphs. So when I was checking out your book, I was like, yes, this is this is fresh, it's fun, it's contemporary. People don't read like they used to read Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. It's it's gotta be gotta be quick, right? In in bits and pieces, you're doing this, you're doing that. We're used to doom scrolling, and your narrative is fast like that. It's fun and fast, and your dialogue is like that too. How'd you guys arrive on on that staccato prose style? And it does fit the themes and motif of the book, too, which is zany, and to your point, ridiculous, which is things are things are happening. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 38:25

Great question. So uh once we brought a team together, they said, okay, the first thing is really, really identify who our audience is for the book, which that took like a that was like a four-month process of really getting that down. And once we made that determination, we said, okay, let's go back to how we've written the book and let's make sure that it's matching for the audience. Because, like you're saying, that a big part of the audience uh wants very fast content, they want little bits that they can easily share a post, you know.

SPEAKER_02 39:04

Right, that's the other one. Shareability. They could tweet that. I'm actually reverse tweeting my whole novel on X.

SPEAKER_03 39:11

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_02 39:13

Yeah, and I'm like, it's like a lighthouse every day. I'm like blasting, but it's that same spirit of shareability.

SPEAKER_01 39:20

Yeah. And what we saw there's there were two really big audiences. One audience is those who uh, you know, love the sci-fi comedy type element, or hitchhikers, or red dwarf, or discworld, or any of those uh relatable things. Uh and we ensured what we kept, you know, the style of that. And then there's the other big odd, and that's that's the readers. That's the one who read the full book. And then there's a bigger audience is people who read in short little bits. And it may take them a while to read the whole book, but they love the little content and they'll share that. They're looking for shareable snippets. Okay, so we said, well, let's write the book in that way. It makes it fun, it makes it fast, it keeps it on style. It was a really, really big process. So you asked at the beginning, you know, how we do things. I typically write it, and then Mindy comes in and developmental edits and goes through and then uh ensures that we're the the jokes are all landing right, we're getting the right messages, then I reread it, and then we go back and forth a few times together. We read it to each other.

SPEAKER_00 40:31

Uh, and then when in the voices, in the voices, we have fun with it.

SPEAKER_01 40:36

Uh and then when we're you're never really ever ready, right? Like it's how many revisions have you done? 1000? Like, but going back and changing it to be that shorter sentence style is different because it you have to think about the words differently. Like when you're saying people aren't reading in those long proses, well, no one wants to read three sentences about how the wall is white. They want to know that it's white and it it's not black. You know, so it's how do we get to that quicker while still keeping the humor and still keeping the word play? So it it's it's a whole other way of working it.

SPEAKER_00 41:15

Uh it's a lot more fun. It's like a challenge. And so, like, as a writer, it's it's uh the it adds a whole element to the entire writing process that wasn't there before. And uh it's so much more enjoyable.

SPEAKER_01 41:30

Yeah, and and it it really does provide that content for anyone who they just they love that quote, they're gonna share it. They take uh a small screenshot, it's easy.

SPEAKER_00 41:40

Uh it's impactful, like you get it all done right there. And you have to choose the words very carefully to ensure that you get the impact you want.

SPEAKER_01 41:49

Yeah, so you have to look at the audiences are the the actual readers uh and the and the fans, but the ones who are gonna amplify the message, and that's gonna help mission accomplished, because again, it's passed.

SPEAKER_02 42:02

You also do those little breaks. Someone sings a song or there's a quote, there's space, there's a wall of content, and it's also got its own symmetry to it because your paragraphs, two lines, three lines, max, pretty much, right? So it looks almost like poetry when you're when you're flipping through it. And that that's refreshing too, like a refreshing change. That's nice. Yeah, and also your tone. Uh, one thing that struck me, I mean, the immediate comparison is you made is Douglas Adams and the Hitchhiker's Guy, which remains the definitive when you talk about humor and science fiction, boom, that's it. Ezra Klein, the the New York Times pundit, was on a podcast recently and they were talking about their favorite books of all time. And he put that one in his like top five. So everyone knows it, everyone loves it. But here's the difference, though, and I'm curious what you think. Douglas Adams is very, very, very, very English. Okay? So Arthur Dent is really just interested in one thing throughout the series, and that's getting a decent cup of tea out there in the universe because he's a snob and he never wanted to leave home, which is so English. Right? And all this craziness is going around, and he's the perfect character for that book. Is it like, can't you just leave me alone? It's my idea. And with that, there's a deep sense of cynicism. So the humor in Douglas Adams, we're going back to the points you were making early on about feeling good about yourself and about sharing inspirational mood and ideas, right? Hitchhiker's Guide is not that. Hitchhiker's Guide is existentially brutal. The humor in Hitchhiker's Guide is not only is the universe ridiculous, but it's Pretty much out to get us. And regardless of what we do as human beings, no matter how hard we try, it's never gonna really work out. And even if we're successful beyond our wildest expectations, it's doomed to fail anyway. That's kind of the Douglas Adams thing, right? But you guys aren't like that at all. You guys are all about positivity, learning from your mistakes, seeing the absurdity in the world, and then, you know, I I can I can figure this out, I can do better, I can I can improve myself here. That that's not Douglas Adams. So I'm curious what you think of that, which is when you guys are compared with that classic writer, it really only goes so far.

SPEAKER_01 44:53

Yeah, it goes as far as a recognition. And what what I find is if you say to someone when they say, What are you doing? You say, Oh, I write sci-fi comedy, they already have a smile. You say it's kind of like the style of hitchhikers. If it's humor and science fiction, you're Douglas Adams. And you're there. And as soon as you say the Douglas Adams or Hitchhikers, people have a fond memory of it because it was something that made them laugh. And uh it was something that they connected with, and there's a nostalgia aspect to it. We just said, okay, well, well, we updated that with more positivity to it and uh more you know modernism to it. Uh we kept the style of humor, the style of wit, and you know, that kind of feel to it. Uh but that and and that was that was great the way that you you looked at it. And a lot of people say the same thing. It's like it's a hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, but there's like other things, you know.

SPEAKER_02 45:59

Well, there's there for there's hope in it for starters. Yeah. There's very little hope in hitchhikers, except you know, we laugh at how ridiculous everything is, which is just very English. But there's really no attempt at learning anything. The only thing that you learn in hitchhikers is how funny it is to be meaningless. Yeah. So so, in that sense, you guys bring nice contrast to it, and you you springboard off of it. Yeah. And there are other humorists in um science fiction. There's there's a few others. So even Stanislav Lem was funny in his own way, and there's there's a bunch of classic science fiction rhymes. Heinlein, every once in a while, is kind of funny.

SPEAKER_03 46:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:47

Even Arthur C. Clarke. But for the most part, they're more they're more serious sci-fi storytellers. And uh, it's great that you bring all all these elements, all these elements together.

SPEAKER_03 47:00

Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 47:01

If I wanted to get a piece of the ridiculous, readers, viewers, listening and watching, where is a where's a great place to start? Because you have all of these things to do now. So where where should they start? Should they pick up book one and get into the story? Should they try a personal experiment? Should they register for recognition? Should they try to create a song? There's a lot going on here. Help help them along.

SPEAKER_01 47:34

The answer is yes. But you know, dorediculous.com is the website where everything's there. Uh, info about the books and the characters and the different book series and the audiobooks and the different experiments and and all the things that people can do. The book is in Amazon uh is on Amazon, uh, on Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, and Audible. And uh you could pretty much walk into any bookstore and say, Hey, do you have the ridiculous? And if they say no, they could simply order it in uh, you know, from uh from uh the book suppliers because it's now in that network. So we see that that expanding there. But we want people to participate, uh, you know, whichever entry point is is best for them. You know, uh some it will be the book, some may do an experiment and never even know that there is a book, and then they'll, oh, there's a book, and then it'll come in that way.

SPEAKER_02 48:27

Yeah, that that's another cool aspect, which is this multimedia, multimodal focus on stuff, because your mission is to make people feel better. That's how it all started, right? And you were trainers and judges in bodybuilding and workout, and then you expanded your horizons, but the mission hasn't really changed, so you could do it all these different ways, and where it all kind of comes together is what you hope is that franchise idea that could have all these extensions and in different in different areas. Speaking of which, a Netflix miniseries, of course, is every creator's dream, at least at this point. But when I'm reading it, I'm thinking even graphic novel and serialization into visual media. So I'm I'm assuming you've thought of that and maybe even Parker, because that I can see a ridiculous comment.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

That we're all these things are graphic novel, right? You know, our our motto that we we have is dream big, do ridiculous, achieve remarkable. And the first part is the dream big. A lot of people don't do that. Uh they they limit their dreams or they don't even do the dreams because they don't think that they could ever achieve it. We we're we're big, big, big on the dreamers. But when you do that and you go out and sort of do ridiculous, go out and do it and put it into motion, then things start to connect. So, for example, uh when you said, you know, which is the first opening? Well, the reason that we started with the experiments is we reconnected with our friend Dean Gray, and he happened to get a patent on this behavioral system that he designed after traveling all around the world and meeting with people one-to-one and communities and understanding behavior. We said, Well, he can bring that whole system in, and now we've got this value reinforcement system that's part of it. Well, that adds a credibility angle, but it gives us a reason that we could start that. So that's doing that. So the dream big, do ridiculous, then you'll achieve remarkable. We've put it out, we've talked to people on the comic book side and graphic novel side, and you know, streaming creations, all this kind of stuff. So it's which of those doorways going to happen, but you have to put it up. Uh, and that's that's what we that's what we want. And and you know, the fact that we have all these people on our team is amazing because it it allows the decision-making process to be more calculated.

SPEAKER_02 51:05

Awesome, Sauce. It's like live by example. And and hearing you talk about the the do ridiculous and the ridiculous theme, I think it's starting to gel in my bald head too, in this way, which is which is whenever anyone tries to do something new, it's gonna be disruptive, it's gonna feel awkward, and it's out of their comfort zone. But in order for us to get better at anything, and in order for us to expand our horizons, we need to take that leap. And in your sense, with your language and your themes, it's do ridiculous because you feel ridiculous, you feel like an imposter, you feel like you can't do it, you feel like you suck at it, and all these negative feelings come to be almost overwhelming, which frankly stifle and mute a lot of possibility in our lives. And if you embrace this theme that you guys are sharing of do ridiculous, then you accept that and embrace that from the very beginning. I am gonna wake up this morning and I'm gonna do ridiculous. And what that means is I'm gonna feel ridiculous and I'm gonna do ridiculous stuff, and that automatically absolves me of guilt, a feeling of responsibility, even a feeling of accountability in terms of like getting it right the first time, because it's ridiculous. And that is unbelievably liberating. And I'm guessing that that's that's part of your angle here, which is you're encouraging people to be all they can be. And the best way to do that isn't your typical, you know, wake up and do a hundred push-ups and you know, go through your list and just butt button it up, okay? Be your own drill sergeant. That that's a traditional way of improving yourself. And you guys are saying, just do ridiculous, try some crazy shit. You know, you've had these dreams your whole life. Do ridiculous, just go for it. And if you have that spirit of ridiculousness instead of this, I gotta get this right, I gotta be really good at this, I gotta look perfect, then all of a sudden you're liberated and amazing things could happen.

SPEAKER_00 53:29

Very well said. And yes, exactly. It's to do ridiculous isn't to ridicule, it's to relieve. And can you imagine all of the great creations that people are gonna have if they actually go for it? They say yes and they actually do it. The breakthroughs people will have, the ajas, the transformations, the triumphs, all because they decided to go for it or because they were inspired to take an experiment that somebody put up because they noticed themselves that they had great results.

SPEAKER_01 54:00

Yeah, the the freedom in what you were saying lies in you're not being you're being rewarded and recognized for doing that. You want to do it. So go and fail. Oh, it doesn't matter. Not purposefully, you know, not you know, uh the person that has perfected something, it's because I did it so many times, but they failed every other time until it I did it, right?

SPEAKER_00 54:25

So it's like you have to accept sometimes you're not gonna succeed. So share those times because after that you will.

SPEAKER_01 54:33

Yeah, grow from it.

SPEAKER_02 54:34

I love that attitude, and I think it's inclusive, it's liberating, and it takes the shackles off of expectation. And to your point, you know you're gonna mess up. Who's who's you know, I I I play guitar. It took me like months to learn how to just tune it, and I felt like such a moron the whole time, like you know, just the D chord. And then you gain proficiency, but why put yourself through the torture of expectation and all these hurdles you need to jump? Which is like, this is ridiculous. Start making sounds, beat the guitar up, right? Like pick a hammer and start getting like be creative with it from the beginning, and that'll really let out your energy in a way where it's fun from the start, every step of the way. Why why couldn't it be? Why shouldn't it be? And it should be if you're ridiculous about it. You guys are great. Thank you for uh for doing what you do. It's a it's a great idea, it's it's combining all of these elements. I wish you the best. And let's follow up in six months or a year and see where you guys are at. And hopefully I could you know turn the smart TV on, and then there's a ridiculous mini-series going on. And if it does go on, then it'll have interactive features like uh Bandersnatch from uh from Black Mirror. People will be able to like influence the content while they're watching it. That seems to be a natural extension of your idea, right?

SPEAKER_03 56:12

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:14

Very cool. Jeff and Mindy do ridiculous. They've got three books already on Amazon. We're gonna put the link to the website in the description below, and they're constantly taking in your feedback as a viewer and a listener. This isn't just about an author writing a science fiction and fantasy book. They're putting together this dynamic ecosystem of content. They're welcoming your own contributions, and they're eager to recognize you and celebrate you for being ridiculous. Thanks so much, folks, for your time and your ideas and your great content and experience. Thank you. That was so much fun.

SPEAKER_00 56:56

Yeah, thank you.