[MUSIC] Hey, you're listening to Creative Pet Talk, a weekly podcast companion for your creative journey. I'm your host, Danny J. Pizza. I'm a New York Times bestselling author and illustrator. And this show is everything I'm learning about building and maintaining a thriving creative practice. [MUSIC] Today on the show, we have an almost unedited chat with fellow podcaster, Ronald Young. Ronald currently has two podcasts, a series called "Wait For It" as in "Body Wait" and a movie review podcast called "Leaving the Theater." If you enjoyed "Right Side Out" the series we made here on Creative Pet Talk just a couple months ago, I highly urge you to go check out "Wait For It" because it's in the same vein from a different perspective. It's a radiotopia podcast and a multi-award winning series that explores self-image, storytelling and personal journey. If you like things like This American Life or Snap Judgment, you will love this show. I was massively buzzing with so many creative takeaways and sparks from this chat. But for me, it's all the insights into how to get your best creativity, taste and your past influences that made you who you are all smashed into your work for Max Potency. One of my favorite parts of this conversation happens at the end when we get to the idea of finding what kind of hook you want to hang your practice on. Like, what makes your work you, what's the juicy part, the crucial element that you're looking for in every single piece that you make to make it shine and make it quintessentially you. So stick around for that. Jason, we have a lot going on. We really do. Maybe too much, but it doesn't feel that way thanks to Miro. Yeah, Miro is the visual collaboration platform that helps your team work together from anywhere. Yeah, and Miro has tools for project management, creating a digital whiteboard with your team where you can brainstorm, making retrospectives and a whole lot more. We have a lot of content here at M&N and we've been trying to figure out how to get our videos up on different platforms and Miro's Flowchart tool really helped us get organized and figure out what we need to do to make that happen. And I really love Miro's mind mapping tool. It's a space where you can organize your thoughts in a way that translates to the rest of your team so that they can help you take action. Super helpful because I can't always reach your mind. You know, it would be scary if you could. Whether you work in product design, engineering, UX, agile, or marketing, bring your team together on Miro. Your first three Miro boards are free when you sign up today at Miro.com. That's three free boards at miro.com. If you want inspiration to make deeper, richer, creative work, check out this podcast from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It's called Imaterial 5,000 years of art, one material at a time. Each episode examines a material of art like clay, stone, and even trash and what they can reveal about history and humanity. One episode I suggest starting with is space part one giving form a feeling. If you know me, you know this notion of giving form a feeling is very much my jam. And the story of the artist that cast these forms of negative spaces like in a wardrobe or underneath the table was particularly moving to me. And I could feel it kind of opening up that essential emotional novelty side of my creative brain. Check out Imaterial by searching immaterial 5,000 years of art, one material at a time in your podcast app. That's immaterial 5,000 years of art, one material at a time. For context, I'm just going to start by saying we met at OnAir. I was going to be the MC of the podcast, Pit House. So I was kind of checking out shows. And I started listening to your show, and I was like, dude, this is phenomenal storytelling. And also, for me, it felt like a thing about self-acceptance from a different angle. And I was in the middle of starting this series about ADHD on kind of similar topic. And so I was just, yeah, I was instantly glued, and I loved the way that you approached it. So I thought maybe you could just start by telling people about, wait for it, like, what is this show? So wait for it is a show about body image, which I also, I used to tell people those about the ways in which we talk about weight. That's the way I used to introduce the show. But I started saying body image because the word weight is in the title. However, whenever you talk about weight with people, you can see their face change a little bit when you talk about it because it's like, can they see, can you see what I'm thinking? Are my thoughts about weight clear? So I've started to say it's about body image and the way we look at ourselves. And when I say that, I feel like I get a more neutral response for people, which is what I kind of expect because there's just a lot of people that generally don't like talking about their weight, thinking about their weight, and the ways in which we think about each other's weight is also problematic. So I wanted to make a show that stared that directly in the face and told stories from that perspective so that people would stop being in their heads about it and start realizing that a lot of us are thinking the same things. And maybe there's a better way for us to handle this moving forward. And that way of talking about it, thinking about it, did that evolve as you made it and or released it? Like, did you change the way you talked about it or even thought about the project as you move through it or as you're doing it? Because it's still ongoing, right? You have another season coming. Yeah, it's like I actively am realizing that I'm a person who now that I have this show out, I've kind of like, you know, staked a flag in the ground about body image and about weight, which means it oftentimes I have to look at my own show and look at myself and say, well, what is my position on weight and what is my position on body positivity, body neutrality, body acceptance, all of it? What's my position on any of that now? So it's something that I'm constantly interrogating. But the truth is I already was now I'm doing it a lot more publicly than I was before, which for me only means that the show has a shelf life because I can only do this publicly for so long before I'm like, okay, I mean, I still think about it, but I don't really want to discuss it with y'all all the time. And I think there's a way of which, like, we're having thoughtful discussions about it versus like, you know, reporters running up to you with a mic and just saying, hey, Jonah Hill, how much weight have you lost? How do you feel about your weight loss? And it's like, you don't really want to be having those conversations all the time, which is why he said I don't want to be having these conversations all the time. Sometimes I just want to tell you all about this movie that I made or tell you that I like, I like going to the movies or hey, when I come to the movies, like, you also have a movie podcast, so that makes sense. Yeah, that's exactly. That was a great pivot, right? It's like, why don't you just listen to my movie podcast and talk to me about that. And to be clear, Andy, I'm not talking about this discussion here, but I mean, like, generally, I know that in the future, like, while I have the show in production, I am going to be having a lot of conversations about weight and why I made the show, which is perfectly fine. But I don't want I'm a talented audio, I'm a talented award-winning audio producer, and I want that to be a part of the story, as well as this one particular track that I've discussed. So it evolves and I constantly interrogate my own thoughts on it all the time as a result of the evolution. Well, you know, really, I know you're not saying this, but we're not really going to talk about weight more than maybe this question. We're going to talk about the craft and the journey of this kind of vulnerable piece that you have been working on. But I do want to just say, as someone who has a complicated relationship with my body, with which I'm guessing lots, almost everyone has that and a complicated relationship with food, you know, I call myself Andy J Pizza. Surprise, surprise, that's not my name. It almost feels. Yeah, you know, and I was I was curious about that. I'm like, what is this? Listen to the show. I've heard the story too many times, but basically I made my website, Andy J dot pizza, and then people just thought that was my name. And the funny thing is, I did that and I just rolled with it because I'm not I wasn't attached to my real last name, which is Miller and very kind of basic and unmemorable. And it's funny because that happened at the same time that I really changed my relationship to pizza. It's kind of like if you were an alcoholic and you named yourself Andy J beer, like that's kind of me. I still love pizza, but it's complicated. And so anyway, I just wanted to before we get into the kind of craft stuff, I just want to say thanks for making it because it was moving and it was just, you know, like you said, people like to talk about weight, but it's so rarely talked about through empathy, humanity, nuance. It's almost always an objectifying conversation. And you were so really what I want to talk about is the externalization of self through creative stuff. And you just did that so well. So I did want to say thank you for that. Well, thank you. And I mean, you're those words. Thank you for saying that. And those words really mean that we, you know, that the show's on target. That's what we're trying to do. You know, every bit of feedback we've heard about the show hasn't been positive. You know, some people always push back a little bit on some things that we say or whatever. But I think by and large, the feedback has been that the show was resonating with people, which is all I wanted. I just wanted to be heard. And I wanted people to feel like I was saying something that they could actually connect with. And so I appreciate you saying that. So before we go into the process of that project, I don't really know a ton about how you got into audio storytelling. Is that, is this through like a lot of people making shows today of that nature? I feel like it starts with some kind of audio journalism or something that hooked you in and then you got you interned and what that kind of typical journey. But I also know you're kind of an indie podcaster. So what was the, well, how did you get to this place where you're making this award-winning work? I like to think that I was, that my work was always award-winning and that's going to sound cockier than I intended. But I mean, I think the, well, I'll respond and I'll kind of ask you this, like, think about like when you like first started, you know, illustrating, right? Like when you first started like, and you did stuff and you said, Hey, this is pretty good. But maybe you didn't have an audience, but like there was some stuff you were just like, there's something here. Like there's something about my style. There's something about what I'm doing that I think works. But I just, I don't have anybody listening or I don't have anybody, I don't have anybody looking at it. No eyeballs. So for me, there was, when I started making work from the beginning, I connected with other people who were doing really good audio story, really good publicly visible audio storytelling. This American life, a snap judgment, radio lap, I was listening to a lot of those shows in the very beginning. Those are all NPR, like public media shows. And I listened to those the way they told stories and said, I could tell stories like this, I have that inside of me for my upbringing in the church, praise and testimony service. Like you stand in front of crowds all the time. I feel like, especially in the Black Pentecostal church, we are amazing storytellers. We learn it like in diapers from one another, how to tell a story, how to draw people in, all of that. And so it felt like there was a lot of stuff that I had been trained my whole life to do well at, to excel at in audio storytelling, and especially in podcasting. So for me, in the beginning, when I first started my first podcast, Time Well Spent, if you listen to those episodes, and then you listen to a most recent episode or wait for it, you're going to hear the DNA of Time Well Spent in there. You're going to be like, oh, he's okay. So he just wanted to do a whole series about one thing, which was kind of like in Time Well Spent, it's kind of like this anthology storytelling thing where each episode is different. And I'm telling stories about anything and everything, and just kind of enjoying making a podcast, whereas wait for it is more like fully focused on one thing is kind of the culmination of all the skills that I've had along the way. So I did, I guess I didn't give specifics about that journey. But that is to say, okay, that is to say that most of it is self-taught. But I did work in radio briefly, fresh out of college. And that's why I learned some of like the more technical skills of actually cutting tape and software and all that stuff. But everything else, man, has just been, man, I think I can do this and kind of just going after it. Okay, I didn't really even prepare for this at all. But this is something I've been trying to find a place to have this conversation. And you so perfectly articulated it. I'm like buzzing. So I'm trying to figure out how to how to which way in here. But for me, I think I'd like to just kind of explore the idea. Like, when you read about innovation, people that like study that, they talk a lot about cross pollination as as a big factor in how innovation happens. And I think that most of the creative work I do, I'm trying to do something that's sustenance, like base, like it's like about like, you know, even if it's light or even if it's dumb, still like food for the soul, like humanity, stuff, not trying. I don't see myself as an innovator, honestly, in almost any sense. But the one thing that I've stuck with as like, I think this is something different is and I'm not alone in this, but it's the I grew up my relationship to religion, church as dramatically changed. But I grew up in the church. I wasn't a super church kid. I had cousins that were super church kids. But I we were kind of on the periphery. And so I do think maybe that even gave me a little outside perspective. So we had seasons, we were more active and whatever. Anyway, in my kind of late teens, early twenties, I started to just get obsessed with the storytelling. And I think along the way, I just made this connection of this is what this is what people like Mike Briggly are doing. This is the same thing. And I and so and then finally enough, years later, I heard Ira Glass on a show say that because I because Mike was like, hey, you're like doing something that's never been done. And Ira Glass was like, well, except for, you know, like Jesus, he would tell the story and then say, this is what it means. That's this American. Yes. And so I love that you brought up that angle because just an interesting thing for listeners to think about like cross pollinating things that they've taken from grant for granted growing up or what there's just there's a lot of interesting stuff here. One of the things about organized religion is that it's caused a lot of harm in the world. Just generally, every bit of organized religion has created divides in ways that it never should have based on its origin. And when you think about Christianity and the message of Jesus, it is a lot more pure. It is a lot more compassion. It's a lot more joy. It's a lot more gentle. And all of those concepts that are taught, all of those intentions that are taught are inherently good. You know what I mean? They're not really meant to like hurt people, make them. It's really to stop people from hurting one another. It's meant for us to love ourselves. You know what I mean? It's like there's so many bits and parts in there that says, "Hey, I love you and you should love each other." Which I'm like, "Hey, who can't get behind that message? What are we talking about?" I love what you're saying. It's literally like Jesus is like, "Hey, love your enemy. If you live by the storm, you're going to die by the sword." And then they hear, "Okay, slide them up. Okay, go." They're like, "Get as many swords as you can." Very strange interpretations on these things. Yeah. It's our translations that mess it up. But if you think about the ways that churches, synagogues, mosques, all those things are set up, they're set up in ways that are meant to build community. And so for those of us church kids that grew up having that community and for whatever reason to side, I'll take the community, I don't want any of the homophobia or anything else that comes with it. You say, "You know what? I'm going to do other things." But then when you leave, you end up longing for that community. And all of the skills that you learned in those communities are still, they have the ability to shine amongst other people. So just to get back to your point, when you get to the point of saying like storytelling, "Oh my God, this brand new thing that, you know, Mike Berbiglia taught us." And even Mike Berbiglia would tell you like, "I'm not doing something brand new here." Like this is the idea of telling a story is like all of your favorite comedians are excellent storytellers. They're drawing you in at, you know, with a beginning, middle, and in. All of our favorite movies, all of our favorite songs are evoking feelings of storytelling inside of us. It's really everywhere. It's only when it became like really polished and, you know, Hanagatsby and people started like really doing boat burn. I'm starting doing like really more long forms of it that people turned their attention as to something that was like new and hip and in. But it's been here a lot longer than that, you know? Yeah, 100%. And I think my other, as you're saying that, I think the part that rises to the surface and what to do with it, it makes me feel like taking a second look at maybe what you would consider your guilty pleasure. Like what are the things that hit you hard? And you're like, "But I wish I don't want this on my Spotify wrapped." Like what are those things that do that? And then there's a potential for innovation if you can match that with the acquired tastes, you know? The things that you've learned along the way. So yeah, I love that you brought that up. Did you think about that while you were making shows but making this show? Did you ever think about that like literally? Did you notice any parallels? Did that come up or was it more maybe subconscious? Just in church storytelling versus what you were doing there? Did that ever? Did you ever be like, "Oh, this is kind of," or did you ever think like, "Oh, this is what makes it different." Because I do see stark differences too. Like for instance, I'll give you an example of what I'm thinking is like in growing up in Sunday school, all the stories they told you were felt like most of people delivering them were like, "And this means this. This is the answer." Whereas I think the most powerful stories open up a question for you. And I think your podcast did that really well. Got me thinking about, "Well, what do I think about my relationship to? What is positive? What does have healthier outcomes or whatever? Does that make sense?" So, yes, this is not a religion podcast but I got to use it as a religious allegory. Like we're going to lose half your listener base with this episode. Hey man, everybody, I think it's important. When I go, my dad tells me this, like if I go to like a fancy art school and I'm about to go do a talk there and I'm like, "Oh man, what are like? They're going to chew me up and spit me out." He always tells me like, "Remember, they're people and they have the same basic hardware, desires, things." And so it doesn't matter if you're religious or not. It's completely relevant in terms of listenership. Everybody has these things. What I wanted to say was that, so inherently I'm a preacher at heart. I'm a minister at my church, which kind of like more like a street minister, if you will. I used to be a lot more formalized with it, but the pandemic and some quibbles with organized religion kind of means that I have the title and not nearly as many of the responsibilities as I once did. But when I think about my relationship with them and I used to say this with people studying the Bible, is that people used to study the Bible, go have a question, read the Bible, and then come back with an answer and be like, "Here's the answer. Here's a scripture in the Bible." What I find is that when I study the Bible, oftentimes I read it and I get one question answered, but I get, I actually end up with three more or three new questions. And I feel like that's true study. I just started learning how to play the keyboard. In January 2020, before the pandemic started, the important thing to note about this is I had this epiphany while I was playing, was that you don't play to be good enough to be in a recital or you don't play to be good enough to like even play in some concerto someday. You literally just practice the rest of your life. You just practice things. That's the whole thing. Like, you understand this as an artist, you spend a lot of time just practicing drawing and sure, you'll make a picture that will be complete and they'll be like, "Andy did this great picture." But when you're in your studio, you're trying things, you're experimenting, you're doing stuff because that's part of your practice. That's what you're supposed to be doing in order to continue improving and getting better. So, my podcast, that was a very long introduction to say that my podcast is meant to evoke that in people. If you're listening and you left and it planted the seed and you thought moving forward, then I have been successful. And that is something that I think about in every episode that I do is that I just want to stir your brain a little bit and give you food for thought. Like, I think a lot of people look, there was a couple of times even when I was making it and I would work with collaborators, they'd be like, "Well, what's the conclusion here?" I'm like, you don't need a conclusion. You need to end the episode, but you don't need to like tell them what to think at the end of it. By the time they, they should close this and they should end, it should not end on a resolving note. It should end on a note that makes them like dissatisfied in a way, satisfied that it's over, but it should leave them unsettled enough that when they walk away from the episode, they're like, "Oh man, I'm still thinking about this. It's reframing how I'm thinking about other things." And all of the best podcast episodes I've listened to, all of the best art I've consumed, even pictures I've seen on a wall, have just made me do that. They've left me being like, "Huh, and I think that that's something that I do think about when I produce." massive thanks to Squarespace. Squarespace is an all-in-one website platform that makes making a website easy peasy. For a moment, creative websites were kind of looking all the same and I really wanted to break out of the templity look. Then I heard that Squarespace has this new fluid engine and boy am I glad I checked it out because this thing is what I always dreamed making a website could be like for me. Drag and drop stuff and then drag it all over the place, text, images, videos, you can put it wherever you want, layer it up, tear it up, everything I cooked up in my mind. I could figure out how to do without any knowledge of coding. Got a lot of comments like, "Hey, who helped you build this?" And I was like, "Squarespace is fluid engine, baby?" You can see it at antijps.com and head to squarespace.com for a free trial and build your own site. And when you're ready to launch, you can get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with promo code PECTALK, all one word, all caps. You know, I am all about getting to the bottom of what fuels the world's greatest artists. So for me, American Masters Creative Spark, the award winning podcast from PBS is just a treasure trove of creative inspiration. American Masters Creative Spark catalogs creative journeys of artists and icons across disciplines from music to comedy to poetry to film. This show features some of the absolute best to do it and the new season is next level with the likes of singer-songwriter Jewel. Grammy award winning singer-songwriter Connor Oberst for you fellow bright-eyes fans and Pulitzer winning playwright Annie Baker. I'd say a great place to start is with Tony award winning actor and one of the most legendary guests we've ever had on the show, none other than JGL himself, Joseph Gordon Levitt, where he talks about the wide spectrum of mental approaches he needs to be able to tap into from realism to comedic farce and everything in between. That's the juicy stuff I love, so go check it out, follow American Masters Creative Spark on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. I'm a huge fan of this, I guess he's kind of like a scholar of story. His background is in neuroscience and then he moved into Shakespeare and he's got a PhD in that and his name is Angus Fletcher. Have you ever heard of this guy? Okay. No, the name sounds actually familiar but I don't think I have. I feel like he's kind of a hidden gem but he's brilliant. He has a whole book about story called Wonderworks and each chapter kind of dives into a particular thing that literature can do to you and the kind of person who invented that thing in writing and one of the ones he talks about is how literature learns to produce wonder in people on demand and that's what I hear you saying. I think when I think about propaganda, I think this is a thing that's meant to make the world smaller. It's meant to make you feel safer for that reason. We want to narrow your vision. In this kind and actually Angus Fletcher even talks about this is usually what good, I don't think he is religious in any way based on what I can tell in my conversations I've had with him but he says like this is one of the best types of storytelling that you can find in religion are the ones that give you those moments of awe and your world expands and usually that does mean less answers. I think your show just, I think you're great at that because I think a lot of these things were felt kind of neat and tidy in my mind, these different types of ways of thinking about body image and then you definitely destroyed them. Well, it should be, most of our thoughts in all of that should be messy and complicated and I think the problem with a lot of the legislation in the world and a lot of the ways in which we think about the cultural wars that are going on in society and all that is that there are people who are trying to simplify everything and there are people who are encouraging things to remain complicated and somewhere we are trying to regulate one way or another and the truth is everything is way more complicated than we ever imagined and because that's the truth we should love one another. What podcast have we started now? Yeah, what just happened? What just happened? I'm sorry, that's just where it hit the bell. It is but the truth is like if we really went with that approach and just saying that things are supposed to be more complicated and messy than we ever anticipated and trying to oversimplify them. The most of the simple answers come from just treating each other with kindness and respect. That is simple but when we try to regulate it into a place where we want everything to be the same, everyone to be either this or that, everything to be binary in this very specific way, I think that's where we mess up and I'm an overthinker and I think you are too. So like for us it's like we've already, there's been times where I've been sitting down and I've just out of nowhere had the intrusive thought of what if this wild thing happens and in my mind I imagine it all the way to the very end. Like what if I just got up and just slapped the taste of something crazy like that? I'm just at a restaurant, what if I just flipped this table and just pushed the waiter, went back and started cooking my own steak, like what would happen? And in my mind I go all the way to the end of that and I think because I think like that, I also know that we are all having complicated thoughts and messy stuff all the time and I just want, I want our conversations and our podcasts and our art to reflect that as well. Like reflect the messiness and not like the, not the tidy little bow at the end. Yeah and I just kind of point out the, I had one of these the other day, I was at a soccer game and there's a guy sat below me and he opened his beer and it sounded really good and I thought what if I just grabbed it and I was like thanks man and just took a drink and I think that same, that same impulse I like I think it's Neil Gaiman talks about how that or maybe it's Stephen King I don't know but it's it's about how anxiety and creativity are so linked like that what if made me laugh in that moment but there's a lot of times where that same kind of impulse can turn into a total nightmare yeah 100 percent like well because there's millions of people in prison for letting those impulses run their lives and then like not understanding that there's consequences that come with them but I think but the bigger problem is knowing that is acknowledging that all of us are struggling or having these thoughts like yes I have thought like I'm sure if you stood up in that stadium and say hey did anyone else when he opened that beer want to take a swig of it like oh my god yes absolutely okay yeah we all thought it wasn't just me so I think that's but that's the whole point of like the podcast is to say like I know you're thinking this thing let's talk about it finally and not because the thing is if we start saying the minute we start saying stuff out loud that's when we're able to address it and say oh we actually need to address this thing because so and so just said it out loud and we've been thinking that this wasn't going to be a problem and apparently it is so now it's something we need to think about and the thing is when you legislate and regulate those thoughts out of existence it makes it so that those people and those things are invisible to you now I'm not going to go into I definitely don't want to make this type of political podcast that this could be with my say but you know what I'm talking about Andy you know it's interesting man like I feel like that conversation is so it's just like you say it's kind I'll tell you the way that things kind of evolved politically I never saw it happen more in real time than when when COVID hit and for that we had about a week I think where we were like together on this right we're gonna do this we're gonna we're gonna have mask and then instantly something happens where one side says I don't like this and now instantaneously those opinions are codified as you're either this or that that and and so I think even as you touch upon the idea of having letting those thoughts out letting actually I just saw a guy I can't raise a writer he was talking about M&M's music and I don't I don't I haven't over thunk M&M's music enough to have an opinion about this but he was just talking about how he's a he's an intelligent chap I think he's like a TV writer and he was saying that like art's point isn't necessarily to model good behavior it's supposed to put you in the head of somebody even into things that you you'll never do you would never do even things that you thought you thought this is the worst thought and I hate myself for thinking that um yes and I and so I that's so much of what my project right side out is about right side out it started as a thing of like um working through masking your ADHD and by the end of it we worked through a bunch of creative prompts and I realized like oh it's really about externalizing yourself and projecting onto canvases instead of people it's so that like you just said so that we can work with it right so we can think about it so we can um conceptualize it how did that that's one of the main things I wanted to ask you about was how did the work work on you how did that how did making that and getting that onto tape and letting other people hear it and I have to imagine it had an effect on you like you weren't the same at the start as at the end you know making it itself like putting it out there uh probably had less impact of than people's listening to people's feedback with the exception of one episode and that was episode two with uh where I talk and throughout this episode I talk with uh a woman named Kaitlyn who I dated in college and uh at the time Kaitlyn was fat and I was I was straight-sized and I talk about the way I treated her uh and that episode culminates with you know now I am fat and and talking to Kaitlyn asking Kaitlyn if uh how she feels about me now saying that I've gained all this weight and all that so I asked her that question and her answer certainly you know it gut punched me and like I was pretty devastated hearing it from her but also uh it changed me specifically because it it confirmed something that about like fat phobia about uh anti-fat bias all of that which is that it still resides in each and every one of us no matter what size we are and we have to actively fight to to get it out of our heads and knowing that means that like even when I'm making these even as a fat person when I'm making these I have to actively stop myself from uh telling a narrative or telling stories or pushing myself to to say that thin is the goal or losing weight is the goal like I really have to push myself to not try to like prove to prove acceptance or seek acceptance from people that's really what's changed the most um to make sure that I stay on the same path of saying like being matter of fact saying here it is this is what I think and just saying now you go do some thinking about what I just said and well that that's it for now you know what I mean so it's like it all of it works on me every episode I do I'm like you're listening to something that I've like been thinking about a lot like even with the stuff that I'm thinking about for season two we're going to talk about air travel I'm really excited to talk about air travel and much of the story of air travel is is how is anxiety is saying that a lot of people are anxious about traveling and uh one thing that I always like to say is that everyone hates to fly everything not a fact to be honest every single person that gets on a plane whether tall short fat skinny anybody you don't like it they they load the planes wrong the seats are way too small they everything about it is just is garbage and they could fix it easily they can fix it tomorrow if they wanted to but they don't want to you know and trying to find out why has been kind of the issue um but yeah even telling that story I have to make sure I'm telling that story with the lens on saying like we are not the problem fat people tall people are not the problem the problem is the airline so every episode I make I try to keep in mind like hey uh Ronald do you have any bias here and how is that affecting how you're going to make this episode and when I listen back and when I get feedback from people that's what I really see like how good the job was done or not done and the feedback like I said for a lot of these has just been people being like no I absolutely understand what you're saying and I get it or people saying I didn't think that before but now I'm curious which is which is also good that's probably been the biggest change in me I kind of rambled a bit that answer your question yeah you definitely did it and also oh I thought you said no absolutely did I mean la right take two um no no it was great and it gave me a lot to think about that for context you can even leave some tasty stuff not said to get people to go listen to it that episode's a great episode but could you give a little context a little more context about what that interaction was oh with me and Caitlin yeah yeah so you know we we met in college we were hooking up for a while we never actually dated but I was in like I was embarrassed to take her around my friends because they made fun of me because she was fat and so she knew that and now 20 years later we sat out and had a conversation about it we had kept in touch like throughout the years but never like super regularly and so we decided to have like a conversation about what what that meant to both of us what those interactions with us in college meant and what our lives look like now as a result and she answers she answers those questions she gives a lot of context and she answers those questions it's a powerful episode and it's I can imagine it's there's a level of intensity there too and as you're saying it I thought it kind of reminds me of as I was telling my story about growing up and my relationship to my mom someone prompted me like you should you definitely need to go have a conversation with her and and I did and I and we had because it and I think I'm just highlighting like the power of research whether you make audio work where you do interview people and it ends up as part of the piece or not these conversations and this type of firsthand research has can inform what you're doing in a way that I would have never guessed like that conversation it sounds like it informed the rest of the episode you made yeah and it sounds like it was pretty difficult too yeah you know one making the episode was tricky because when she said yes I'll talk to you about this it was first of all I had to have two conversations with her in the first conversation I thought I got enough and then we started editing and I was like I need to talk to her one more time so I go back down there and I talked to her and that's where I got the big question that I didn't ask which is like how do you feel about all this like because we didn't get a lot of of how Caitlin felt through each each stage of our interactions between us so it was difficult but once we got that piece once we knew what the hook was that's the thing about podcasting too and I'm sure it's the same in movie making television all that which is like once you find out what the hook is you really have to say what is the journey to the hook it's like playing chess where you're just like the goal of this game is to get the queen you know what I mean I want to play and I want to get the king I want to get the king I'm gonna I don't know anything but it sounded so right I was just there I appreciate that that's good that's good yeah man gift whichever one yes you got to get her no you got the goal of the chess is to get the king but there's so many ways that you can do it but once you know that that's the goal it really informs everything you do from the opening step to the final step which is cat which is a checkmate you know so I feel like once we had that hook we were able to kind of understand like the goal of the episode how it should sound the introduction all of that and it made it made cracking it a lot more easy I really I really enjoyed that making that episode when we got to the end because it just felt very satisfying to get it out yeah there there's a quote and I'm not remembering who said this but it's about how there's always an art behind the art and I'll try to look it up and find it in the show notes but the hook idea is something that changed the way I when I really figured out like what is an illustration supposed to do or what at least like what kind of illustration do I want to make and what does it need to do and the same for storytelling um it it totally changed everything I made after that and so I yeah I I wanted to see if you could talk about and it might not be a specific thing and it might also be hard to articulate but I would appreciate you even trying because I just like you know turning turning the gym so to speak um with it but with a hook for a story what are you looking for how do you know when you found it because I totally agree and you kind of for me at least I feel like oh either I know when I've had it sometimes I try to convince myself that I have it but when I have it I know it I'm like oh boom that's it and everything needs to build to this and I think the easiest way for me to think about it is like a punch line in this in a in a joke it works in a similar thing but how do you think about looking for it and what do you what kind of story hawk like does it for you does that is that a clear enough question okay it is I think for me it's like you you know it when you know it like when you when the hook comes you know it when you know it and I knew for me I was talking to my sound designer John Delure and one thing he said like when we talk about we always talk about good tape what is good tape and good tape is just like a piece of recording that you have where it's just like it nails it either emotionally or just states the answer clearly and good tape we also use it to mean that it's like the fidelity of the audio is actually very good but for me when I'm talking about good tape I want it emotionally to be good I want it to be emotionally resonant and hit the beats and be you know sometimes just factually correct that's to me what good tape is and I think that oftentimes if I have a bit of good tape I will fashion the rest of whatever episode to make sure it supports that piece of good tape and I think that's what this was it was making sure that we had seeded the episode enough to get to the point that we were trying to get to with with this episode while also making sure that we stayed true to the rest of of the the themes that we're trying to like send forward to the listener so it was um when you know what the hook is when you know whatever that good tape is for you then it's easier for you to make the rest of to draw the rest of the picture you know what I mean if you're like I know if I'm put the emphasis if the whole emphasis is a single tier coming out of this person's eye then I know what I need to do with the hair I know what I need to do with the nose the chin the mouth the neck the shirt all of it I know what I need to do with all of that um and I feel like and I know where I need to put the focus of this picture I know how I need to like simulate the lighting or whatever once you know the point the composition falls into place yeah yeah that's exactly it and thing is and if you think you know and you start fashioning it towards one play one way the other thing I always say about my episodes or about podcasting generally is you need to let the episode be what it wants to be not what you want it to be yeah because a lot of times we're like forcing our will on on tape in front of us meaning that we're just trying like for in our case like taking that piece of tape and forcing everything to fit that piece of tape whereas like you allow it to fit that piece of tape you know what I mean it should at some point your projects and think things should start making themselves if you have determined a solid focal point like most of the work that you have to do like for instance if you think of that movie the usual suspects once you know who Kaiser Soze is then that's you can make the rest of the it's the rest of it's going to be entertaining or like in one night Shyamalan I think at one point was doing a very good job of of you know crafting his movies around the twist but to me lately it's been like that's been the force it's been like I'm going to force the rest of this movie to make sense when we hit the twist you know what I mean as opposed to saying like where does it naturally want to go what should naturally be happening as a result of whatever this focal point is that and I love what you're talking about with the let it be what it wants to be I personally I always like I don't feel the need to be either or on it you know some creators like to talk about making stuff through the lens of a more mystical or spiritual lens and then some people like that don't you know have a problem with that kind of language I actually like both to think about it both ways because it helps me feel it and kind of understand it a little bit and so the for me what I'm hearing is letting the piece be what it wants to be it reminds me of it there's this mid-century research on creative people like the top architects of the time the thing that they said that these people did was that they were comfortable playing with the problem and it's kind of I think what what it feels like it's happening is for me when I'm trying to force the hook it's coming from a self low self-esteem or fear I'm not going to find it I'm not going to make this good so I've got a latch on to something and may and convince myself this is good rather than yeah play with the problem be open let it kind of mold and change and yes and yeah I think that that's essential I think I mean people are so intent on fixing it like whatever the air quote problem is they're just intent on fixing it and sometimes you're just meant to engage with it and sometimes the engagement is the solution actually I would say most times the engagement is the solution as opposed to just trying to get the problem out of the way engaging with the problem kind of can put you in a position to prevent it from being a problem again you know like if you truly are engaging with it and saying what is this why did it happen why is it in front of me and I think that's what that's the same thing we should be doing with our focal points with our stories and all of that is engaging with them and saying how am I supporting this what are all the scenarios that led to this how can I lend my talent to make whatever this point is yeah and also you kind of hit on this earlier where the whole idea of why most people go into doing creative things isn't to solve the problem it's because you like the process of playing with the problem like that's that's the whole thing is that as soon as I get that mindset of like I got to make a good illustration I forget that I'm I get to make an illustration you know I mean yes yeah exactly you just get that result you're like wait like you're like little Andy would love god what I do for a living well I could do what I could talk to you for so long but I feel like there's just already so many good things in here and uh if people haven't checked out your work where do you want to send them you can find me on instagram at oh it's big ron that's at o-h-i-t-s-b-i-g-r-o-n the podcast is called wait for it w-e-i-g-h-t you can find out anywhere that you listen to podcasts and also check out my movie review podcast leaving the theater where I review movies as I'm walking out of the theater uh I do it with guests it's a lot of fun it's not as polished that's my other work but I have a good time doing it and if you like movies and television then that is another show that you would also like and Andy thanks for having me this has been great and I haven't listened to the movie one yet but what's your latest recommendation oh uh well I just saw uh what did I just see I saw a quiet place day one I saw that on Tuesday uh on Wednesday not my favorite so that's not my favorite I think in terms of well don't think about recommendation Andy but don't leave nuance do that that's the thing like with recommendations is like I feel like there's like a cost to recommendations meeting that I have to nail it or they're just like this guy doesn't know what he's talking about yeah you know what I mean so I think for me normally I just say here's what I liked and and I you might like it too but you know what I really did like is uh the Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare which I think should probably be getting to streaming either now or the next few weeks it is uh with Henry Cavill Alan Richmond um it's about these uh these British uh uh this British splinter unit that their whole uh goal was to kill Nazis it's it's basically a more light-hearted Inglorious Bastards uh but I really enjoyed it from the opening shot to to the end you just really it's like Guy Ritchie wanted to remind everyone that Nazis we can all unequivocally agree that Nazis are the bad guys like there's no gray area or the ones here like no matter what we disagree on we all should be able to say Nazis are bad and maybe some people need to remember too exactly yeah so I would recommend that um but uh but hey it's not a recommendation but you like it so yeah sounds good I liked it and actually I would recommend it I think it's if you're looking for a fun Sunday afternoon uh a lazy Sunday uh like just just a good uh like stave away the Sunday Scaries type of movie this is it thanks Ron for joining us this week I really enjoyed not only discussing work with another podcast storyteller but just chatting with you man it was just a really good time check out the show notes for links to his series and instagram if you didn't quite catch those this conversation was exactly what I needed and some of the sentiments that he expressed were extremely timely for me sometimes on this podcast it feels like I do try to tie things up with a tidy bow every time try to have all the answers try to fix things and with my own personal series right side out it became apparent that when it came to me I was still a messy work in progress and even after all my growth and all the efforts that I've put in I still have a lot of work to do and a lot of questions and I thank Ron for reiterating the value of the messy middle engaging the problem and walking through things together for this reason it feels like a good time to fully switch gears for the remainder of the summer we're going to do no CTA's this week or the rest of the summer no homework it's schools out for summer and starting next week we will have a new casual series of both monologues and interviews so what's the angle slash theme you might be asking rest nourishment pace joy we're going to question and explore we're going to remember where and why we started this creative journey and get in touch with that we're going to maybe even turn our anxiety about the future into dreaming of what could come next so more on that next week but for now kick up your feet or just dive into creative work for the heck of it and you don't even need to stay peped up just stay tuned in and we'll get back to that next week creative pep talk is part of the pod glomerate network you can learn more about pod glomerate at www.podglomerate.com this has been another episode of creative pep talk a weekly podcast companion for your creative journey hey it's dangerous to go along take this podcast with you weekend and week out by subscribing to the show to keep you company and keep the best creative practices top of mind so that little by little weekend and week out you can make progress in your own creative practice i'm your host jj pizza i'm a New York times best-selling author and illustrator and i make this show not because i have it all figured out but because as a squishy creative artist type that's prone to big emotions it takes a whole lot of creativity to just get out of bed sometimes so every week i put out the ideas that are helping me stay disciplined and stay excited and have helped me stay on this creative path for the past 15 years plus in hopes that it might help someone else or at the very least help them feel less alone in their own creative journey massive thanks to yoni wolf and the band y for our theme music thanks to connor jones of pending beautiful for editing and sound design thanks to sofie miller for podcast assistance of all sorts and most importantly thanks to you for listening and until we speak again stay pep top (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (bell chimes) (gentle music)
