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If you feel like you’ve lost your holiday joy, you may be overlooking the very simple secret to finding it. I explain how to reclaim it in this short episode (spoiler: it applies to more than just the holidays!).

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Transcript: The Secret to Holiday Joy

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Hey, everybody. This is Nancy Norbeck with this week’s Creative Pep Talk. Since we are here in December, as I am recording this, which means that we are deep into the holiday season, I wanted to just give you a thought about holiday joy and how to achieve it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:39]:
And the answer, the short answer, is that less is more. But let me just expand on that for a minute because less is less is more is one of those answers that like so many, can, can be a little bit deceptive and hard to wrap your head around. And here’s what I mean by that. So I’m teaching make bad Art right now. And one of the things that we’ve talked about is how do you want to feel in the process? The thing is, that’s not just a question about creativity. That’s a question about everything. It’s a question about your whole life. And it’s as much a question about the holidays then as everything else.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:18]:
How do you want to feel in the process? I don’t know about you, but that’s not a question that most people tend to think about at the holidays. I can’t remember anyone ever really asking me how do I want to feel during the holidays. Nobody thinks about that because what are we thinking about at least here in the US where this is the most consumer crazy time of year, and since the US is, if nothing else, good at exporting its consumer crazy to the rest of the world, I feel fairly confident that those of you who are listening around the world, God bless you, are probably caught up in at least some of this too. What we are thinking about is: “How many things do we have to buy? Who do we have to buy them for? Where are we going to get them? How are we going to get them? When are we going to get them? Are we going to get them in time? And also what, what are we going to cook? How are we going to cook it? Who’s going to make it? Who’s responsible for which pieces of making it? Who’s going to bring it? Who’s going to, you know, be responsible for putting it all together? How many people are we feeding as we’re getting ready to do all of this, all of these different little logistical pieces? It becomes this enormous production. Some of it is a crazy consumer production, some of it is a crazy feast production. All of it is a massive production. And a lot of it is really really obsessively crazy making. You’ll notice that nowhere in that description was anything about how do you want to feel in this process? Now, when you stop and think about it, the obvious answer to this question is that we all want to feel good, right? It’s a holiday.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:01]:
We want to have a good time. We want to enjoy our family and our friends, but nobody thinks about all of that. We think about all the things we have to do. We have to buy the food, we have to cook the food, we have to prepare it right. We have to get all the gifts. We have to get them. We have to deal with the crowds at the store. We have to order them online.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:18]:
We have to hope that they arrive in time. We have to wrap them. We have to. All of these things that we have to do. I’m going to suggest something really, really, really radical right now, and some of you are probably not going to like it very much, but I’m going to suggest it anyway. And here’s the suggestion. You have to do less of this than you think you do. Now, that may sound really privileged, but let me explain, because maybe it is and maybe it isn’t.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:54]:
The core of achieving joy in this holiday season is to be in the moment. Most of these things that we think we have to do, and some of us may really, truly have to do more of them than others, but the core of it is to let go of as much of the chaos as possible and just be in the moment. Because, folks, I’m here to tell you that that is where the joy is. The joy is not getting caught up in the chaos and, dare I say it, the perfectionism that tends to come with the holidays brought to you by Food TV and HGTV and folks like Martha Stewart who want to tell you how to achieve the perfect napkin fold for your holiday table. Is the perfectly folded napkin really what’s going to make your holiday joyful? I don’t think it is. I think what’s going to make your holiday joyful is hanging out with your friends and having a good time and letting go and relaxing and enjoying each other’s company. Forcing things to be perfect tends to be when relaxing and enjoying each other’s company is less likely to happen. In fact, it’s the least likely to happen because when we get all up in our heads, we can’t let go and have fun.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:33]:
So I’m going to suggest to you again, and I know this may seem controversial and it may seem crazy, but I really invite you to sit with the idea if it strikes you that way and see how it feels in your body, is to just relax and be as much as you can in this holiday season. Really look at the things you think you have to do and see which ones you truly have to do and which ones you can choose to do, which ones you can let go and choose accordingly. And choose in the spirit of how you and your friends and your family want to feel this season. Because I think you will agree that this holiday is about the people, not about the perfection. It’s not about the hustle; it is not about the bustle. It’s about what you think those things will achieve—and that is how you want to feel. So you might want to take a step back and see how you can reprioritize all the things on your list and put how you want to feel at the top and then see what’s really necessary to achieve that underneath. I think you’ll have more fun and you’ll have a more fulfilling season and you’ll appreciate being less stressed out about it because right there you will add more joy to your holiday.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:08]:
So take some time and sit with that and really think about it, if this comes across as impossible or as crazy to you, because I think it might not really be as crazy as you think. Either way, it’s a choice. It’s yours to make. And regardless of the choice that you make, I hope you have a fantastic holiday and that I will see you in the new year. And with that, I’ll see you next time. If this episode resonated with you, or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at The Spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:57]:
See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

My guests today are Lisa McMullin and Alfie Shaw, both of whom write for Big Finish Productions, creators of audio dramas ranging from established series like Doctor Who, Sherlock Holmes, and Dark Shadows to original dramas featuring the Air Transport Auxiliary from World War II and Marcus Tullius Cicero in Ancient Rome. Lisa started her career as a drama teacher before moving into dramatic writing—she’s written for TV series like Death in Paradise and the Sister Boniface Mysteries as well—and Alfie, who is also a producer for Big Finish, dabbled in stand-up comedy.

We talk about Big Finish’s apparently magical ability to redeem characters—including villains—who were less than beloved, the challenges and opportunities of recasting familiar characters, the way Big Finish finds new writers (including the best ways to do that), what the writing process looks like for an audio series, and a lot more. While there’s a lot of Doctor Who in this conversation, there’s also a lot of insight into the creative process, too. We apologize for being a bit vague about particular stories so as not to spoil them for those who haven’t heard them.

Episode breakdown:

00:00 Introduction

01:39 Lisa’s creative childhood

09:22 Alfie’s early passion for stand-up.

11:03 Alfie worked at BBC after making dentist websites.

21:10 Lisa met writers, felt impostor syndrome, networked successfully.

23:19 Mixed interests: Paul McGann, river, Big Finish’s “Survivors.”

27:46 Amused student challenges English class symbolism interpretations.

34:57 AI affects creativity more than expected.

42:27 Exploring creativity within set formats is valuable.

44:13 Big Finish enhances characters like Sixth Doctor, Daleks.

50:54 Varied reactions to piece on religion, conversion.

57:04 Balancing new ideas and classic elements creatively.

59:44 Anonymous entries processed for judging panel selection.

01:05:56 Balancing established and new talent in writing.

01:14:58 Audio parallels theater through character-driven dialogue.

01:21:24 Recast Doctors’ strength: unique, non-traditional portrayals.

01:23:24 Continuously innovate and explore new creative possibilities.

01:28:25 Eleventh Doctor and Jacob Dudman.

Show Links: Lisa McMullin and Alfie Shaw

Lisa’s Twitter

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Transcript: Lisa McMullin and Alfie Shaw

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. My guests today are Lisa McMullin and Alfie Shaw, both of whom write for Big Finish Productions, creators of audio dramas ranging from established series like Doctor Who, Sherlock Holmes and Dark Shadows to original dramas featuring the Air Transport Auxiliary from World War II and Marcus Tullius Cicero in ancient Rome. Lisa started her career as a drama teacher before moving into dramatic writing. She’s written for TV series like Death in Paradise and the Sister Boniface Mysteries as well.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:49]:
And Alfie, who is also a producer for Big Finish, dabbled in standup comedy. We talk about Big Finish’s apparently magical ability to redeem characters, including villains who were less than beloved, the challenges and opportunities of recasting familiar characters, the way Big Finish finds new writers, including the best ways to get their attention, what the writing process looks like for an audio series, and a lot more. While there’s a lot of Doctor Who in this conversation, there’s also a lot of insight into the creative process, too. We apologize for being a bit vague about particular stories so as not to spoil them for those who haven’t heard them. Here is my conversation with Lisa McMullin and Alfie Shaw. Lisa and Alfie, welcome to Follow Your Curiosity.

Lisa McMullin [00:01:37]:
Thank you for having us.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:39]:
So I start everyone with the same question, and I think what we’ll do is, since I see Lisa on my left and Alfie on my right, we’ll start with Lisa and then we’ll switch over to Alfie. Were you a creative kid or did you discover your creative side later on?

Lisa McMullin [00:01:56]:
Oh, no, I was definitely a creative kid. Yeah, I’m. But I think most kids are, aren’t they? Or I hope they are, that as soon as you read the line the Witch and the Wardrobe, you’re immediately in your own wardrobe, your own closet, trying to find your way into Narnia, that. That sort of thing. And I was writing. I’d write plays for my friends to perform at primary school. I would. I don’t know.

Lisa McMullin [00:02:25]:
I can’t remember what you. What you call primary school. Elementary school.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:30]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [00:02:30]:
I would. I’d always be writing plays and making the teachers put them on in assembly.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:38]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [00:02:38]:
So I was probably annoyingly creative. Always writing and always putting on little, little shows for anybody who’d be willing to suffer it, really.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:54]:
Someday I want to see a survey of how many kids did that, because I know I did that when I was a kid. I have A few. You know, most kids do that.

Lisa McMullin [00:03:03]:
They do. My nieces still do it. There’s something innate and I think it’s something that maybe people lose when they get older. Except for people like us who just never grow up. I think all creatives are Peter Pans. We’re just clinging on desperately to childhood because, well, the adult world is scary, right?

Alfie Shaw [00:03:29]:
Yeah, Quite similar really. I mean, I have very distinct memories from a very young age writing a series of short stories about two bears called Pimto and Mimto. Don’t know why they were called that. One time they were on a beach and they dug under the river and found themselves the other side of the river, even though it was a beach. I have a lot of notes on my previous work and I used to draw a lot of comics with stickman figures and would name them after my friends. And there was one that was sort of against. I think it was meant to be called the Jelly Monster, which was a sort of big thing of jelly with a.

Lisa McMullin [00:04:08]:
A beak coming soon from big finish.

Alfie Shaw [00:04:12]:
I still couldn’t spell back then, which I appreciate is a very weird way of phrasing that. So it was called the Jelly Monter. And so I. Yeah, I used to do that and I used to draw comics on. I had yellow walls as a kid and I used to draw comics on the walls. Yeah, well mine, mine did. And then just couldn’t really stop me, so just let it happen. It was all wallpaper, so it was fine.

Alfie Shaw [00:04:41]:
It could also come down quite easily. But yes, I think I’d say I’ve also been creative but instead of hiding in the wardrobe, I was drawing on the wardrobe.

Nancy Norbeck [00:04:56]:
Oh man, you’re reminding me of the time that I took white crayon to the coffee table of my parents house.

Lisa McMullin [00:05:03]:
The coffee. Oh, that’s furniture’s worth.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:06]:
Yeah, yeah, it didn’t. It didn’t go over well. So then what was the journey like between creative kidhood and what you do now?

Lisa McMullin [00:05:24]:
I. So when I was at elementary school I wanted to be an author. I thought I wanted to write books. It didn’t. In my. It didn’t occur to me that I could write drama as a. As a job. And then when I was in high school I really loved acting and I got into local theater groups and I really wanted to be an actor.

Lisa McMullin [00:05:47]:
So I went to university to do drama. I was the first person in my family to go to university. My poor parents, they must have been beside themselves. Grief that I chose to do drama rather than medicine or law. But to their credit, they just. They let me do what I wanted to do, even though they must have been thinking, the first person with a chance at a good career. But I was a terrible actor. So bad.

Lisa McMullin [00:06:17]:
So bad. So I did a couple of years of really awful community theater and school touring shows. And we have something called pantomime over here, which is larger than life fairy tales on stage. It’s a Christmas show. And it dawned on me very quickly that I was never going to be able to sustain myself as an actor. And I thought I didn’t know what to do as an alternative with a drama degree. So I became a drama teacher because I was the only thing I could think of to do. And I’d completely forgotten at that point how much I loved writing, even though I was still writing, but for myself, just for fun.

Lisa McMullin [00:07:10]:
Never didn’t twig until I’ve been teaching for quite a few years that, oh, I’m teaching other people’s plays. That means people do this for a living. That means I could write drama for a living. And then it was a friend of mine who was somebody I went to. I’d studied drama with at uni, was still trying to be an actor, but hadn’t had any work, and so asked me to write a play so that he could be in something. And so together we. I wrote a play and we produced it at a tiny fringe theater in London. And I.

Lisa McMullin [00:07:44]:
I just loved the whole process and I directed it as well. And so it was just joyous to create something that was entirely mine for other people to come and watch. And the idea that that could be a job. But then suddenly I thought, oh, this is what I should be doing for a living. But it took me a long time to get there. And then I quit teaching. I quit my good job with a decent salary and good benefits and just threw caution to the wind and thought, all right, I’ll try and be a writer.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:25]:
Yeah, that. That noise is required when you do.

Lisa McMullin [00:08:29]:
I mean, it’s all right now. But I had some hairy, scary a couple of years where I didn’t know if I’d be able to. To keep up the payments on my mortgage. And just my bank phoning me up saying, why don’t you go back to teaching?

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:46]:
Wow.

Lisa McMullin [00:08:47]:
And me telling the bank manager, but I’m following my dream. And them saying, yes, but you can’t pay the bills. But, yeah, I clung on in the. And big finish rescued me. They gave me my first job and made me think, okay, I can do this. Wow, that was neat.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:07]:
Came first.

Lisa McMullin [00:09:09]:
Yeah, that’s the first proper writing job I got.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:15]:
Well, it certainly turned out well but we’ll talk more about that.

Alfie Shaw [00:09:22]:
Yeah, I mean I had a fairly similar ish journey. I always remember secondary school, there would be kind of creative writing modules in English and then we would go back to, you know, analyzing other people’s texts and I was going very bored going, this is, this is not my work. Why are we, why are we focusing on somebody else? Pure egomania even from a young age. But I started to want to be a stand up comic from quite young and I started performing at about 16 and went through doing that until I was about 21 but I never had the memory for it. So I never really quite got it. Doing one because of the never being able to quite remember the lines, which is quite important. And not quite having the admin minds to kind of book enough gigs. You really have to kind of do it almost every night if you can to sort of get that going.

Alfie Shaw [00:10:15]:
And I just never quite managed that. So that kind of, that was the goal for about five years or so. And off the back of that I made and produced my own sitcom that I put out as a podcast, like a full half an hour six parter thing which did moderately okay. And I on itunes for a day got to the top 10 and then just disappeared again. And I then recently re listened to it and went oh, I’m just going to take that down, that’s not good. But so then I saw, I did, I did English at university mainly at my parents behest just to sort of, they went, you know, you needed, you need a degree. Which I think is sadly kind of true. Ish.

Alfie Shaw [00:11:03]:
And from there I went to work for a company that made websites for dentists. That was an interesting experience, I’ll put that politely, so no one can sue me. But after surviving there for about a year and a half, I got on the BBC production trainee scheme which is sort of, I think the BBC runs where they train you on how to be. I think it’s meant to be like a researcher, entry level gigs and various things. And one of the things there was working on Radio 4 presentation who do various things, but one of which is they run a radio station that was called Radio 7 is now Radio 4 Extra. And during that I met Nick Briggs, said I’m a massive Doctor Who fan. Which was, I didn’t need to say because my producer has said hello, this is the person going to producing you. I think he’s your biggest fan because I got into big finish when I was about seven, I think.

Alfie Shaw [00:12:07]:
No, not. That’s a lie. That’s when I first got into Doctor Who, but very young and I’d always wanted to do it. And so off the back of that, a few months later, both from the short trips gig, and that was also my first professional writing. And here we are.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:27]:
Well, I’m curious, you know, since you mentioned doing stand up, that has to have influenced how you write.

Alfie Shaw [00:12:36]:
I suppose I never really considered really. I’ve always quite like a joke. I do love a joke. You know, I loved Hitchhikers growing up and all the. And all the old school Rey for comedies. Clithero Kid, the Navy Lock, all that sort of thing. So I used to listen to a lot of Radio 7 back when I was there and they did a thing where they had a writer in residence, I can’t remember who for a week. And they had kids ring in and give them ideas.

Alfie Shaw [00:13:04]:
And I was one of the people who got an idea on for that. And it was something really meta like the way they solved the problem was that they actually had a backup script and the whole thing was. It was something like that. Everyone else has been suggesting quite sort of standard story beats. What if this was just nuts? And kind of from that. I mean, the. The sort of, you know, Doctor Who stuff I’ve really chimed with has been the Steven Moffat stuff that’s quite dark, but with jokes and anything. Even my tasting games that I enjoy.

Alfie Shaw [00:13:37]:
The Fallout series is incredibly dark with jokes. So I suppose it has. I kind of have always. I always like putting humor in stuff. My sister says I can’t write anything without putting a joke in it. In the same way she said I could never write a kitchen sink drama because the kitchen sink would eat someone. Which I think is quite fair. But yeah, I.

Alfie Shaw [00:14:01]:
I always think kind of jokes are important and should be used in drama. I think you can overuse them and sometimes some films mentioning no Marvel franchises will put jokes at the wrong moment. But people do make jokes in dark situations, dark situations. So I think it’s actually quite realistic to have someone say jokes.

Lisa McMullin [00:14:27]:
Yeah, sometimes the. The funniest moments can happen in. In the darkest scenarios, darkest situations. I don’t think anyone’s ever been to a funeral without there being some moment. Sometimes I think if an atmosphere is so oppressive it almost needs it in order to give people some light relief. I’m very like you and I can’t write anything without putting some humor in it. I have to be. Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [00:14:58]:
I have to be told Quite often to dial down the jokes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:02]:
Well, and there are jokes and then there’s just clever wit that’s also funny.

Lisa McMullin [00:15:08]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:09]:
And I know there’s, there’s plenty of that in Big Finish. I can’t tell you the number of times that. Because I listen a lot when I’m driving and I’ll be driving along somewhere and I’ll go, that was a fabulous line. And I want to remember that I’m driving my car and what am I going to do? Yeah, so. So yeah, I think, I think that, I think that that is a more, more of a characteristic of British writing in general too, than American writing. I don’t think we do the clever, witty thing quite, quite as well or quite in the same way that.

Lisa McMullin [00:15:43]:
I don’t think that’s true. But I think my favorite American drama has that, has that wit that, that’s that, that banter that, that, that, that sharp. We’ve been re. Watching the West Wing just gonna say, yeah, yeah. And the way Aaron Sorkin writes dialogue is just, it’s, it’s fast paced and everybody’s witty. Everybody is the best version of themselves. And it’s not realistic because people don’t talk like that in real life. But it’s entertaining drama and I love that.

Lisa McMullin [00:16:14]:
I, I’m not really keen on drama that’s totally realistic, totally naturalistic because we have real life and sometimes you need something that’s a bit more aspirational, something that takes you. Something that makes you think, okay, maybe humans could be this. Yeah, let’s have something to aspire to rather than just mirroring ourselves. I think art should be more than a mirror.

Alfie Shaw [00:16:44]:
I think a lot of big American shows, and I say that by probably, by which I should probably mean like big streaming shows. I think they’ve kind of. We know there’s been so much of a sort of hodgepodge of culture that all the American writers have watched a fair bit of British tv. All British writers have watched a fair bit of American tv. So it kind of is starting to.

Lisa McMullin [00:17:06]:
Look at succession, which I think of as an American show, but it’s British writers, but it, but an American Australian, actually. It’s a real international cast, isn’t it? But that’s also got that fast paced, witty dialogue where everybody is much cleverer than real people are. Although not the. I wouldn’t say those characters are aspirational.

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:31]:
Yeah, no, I. Since, since Alfie mentioned Hitchhiker’s Guide. I mean, I was 12 or 13, I think, when I first read that. Which reminds Me, my nephew is about to be that age. I need to get him a copy.

Lisa McMullin [00:17:43]:
Yes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:45]:
Yeah. But, you know, like, his kind of wordplay, when I first encountered that, I was just like, whoa, I don’t know what this is, but it’s amazing, you know? And then a couple years later, when I kind of stumbled onto PG Wodehouse after seeing some of Wodehouse Playhouse on the tv, and I went to the library and I picked up the book and I started reading, and I was like, if Douglas Adams never read any of this, I will eat my own shoes.

Alfie Shaw [00:18:16]:
He definitely bust himself. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:18]:
It has to be, you know, but. And that’s that kind of style that maybe we’re picking up on it.

Lisa McMullin [00:18:25]:
Yeah, Right. About people like Aristotle, essentially British, I think, isn’t it that human?

Alfie Shaw [00:18:29]:
Yeah. Terry Pratchett is a more kind of race.

Lisa McMullin [00:18:32]:
Does Terry Pratchett try. Do you. Is he as big over there as he is over here?

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:39]:
I don’t know enough about how big he is in either place to compare, really, in a meaningful way. But he’s pretty popular here.

Lisa McMullin [00:18:47]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:48]:
Yeah. In fact, I remember somebody telling me, you know, when I had run out of Douglas Adams, you should try Terry Pratchett because you’d probably like him. So, you know, that that will be the next thing that will slip into the nephew’s reading list.

Lisa McMullin [00:19:06]:
Good. We like your style.

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:10]:
Well, you know, if you’re gonna. If you’re gonna try to. And I shouldn’t use this word because now it’s been used in all sorts of horrible political ways, but if you’re going to try to indoctrinate the child, you’ve got to give them.

Alfie Shaw [00:19:22]:
That was exactly the word I was thinking of. Yes. Yes. That is it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:25]:
You have to give them the good stuff.

Lisa McMullin [00:19:27]:
Exactly.

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:28]:
You just have to. Yeah, yeah. So big finish saved you, basically, or led you down a path.

Lisa McMullin [00:19:37]:
Yes. Certainly gave me the start for. It made me think I could actually do it for a living, that this could be an actual career, because up until that point, it had been. Just felt like throwing stuff into the wind and hearing nothing back. It’s very difficult to break. It’s a very hard industry to break into. I don’t know what it’s like in the us, but in the UK it feels very much like a closed shop. We don’t have writers rooms like you do.

Lisa McMullin [00:20:10]:
So most TV shows tend to be all written by one writer who. Who’s the. The creator of the show and that.

Alfie Shaw [00:20:20]:
That shop. To try and carry on this metaphor is losing departments. So there are fewer and fewer opportunities to get in as well.

Lisa McMullin [00:20:27]:
Yeah. So. And a Big Finish was a. I sort of stumbled into it by. Not quite by mistake, but I didn’t target them to apply for jobs initially. I met somebody at a. An interview for another TV show in uk TV show that I’d flagged my way in into the short list for by pretending I’d already had TV credits and just lying, basically, because I thought, well, what else do you do until you’ve got some experience, nobody will look at you. But how do you get experience into.

Lisa McMullin [00:21:10]:
So I lied. I found myself in a room with other writers who’d all done loads of other stuff, and I was feeling really imposter syndromey and worried about that I was going to be found out. And I got chatting to a guy called Richard Dinick who was talking about he’d been writing for Big Finish, he’d written lots of Doctor Who books and comics. And I said, oh, I’d love to do that. That’s amaz. And then he introduced me to Matt Fitton, script editor at Big Finish, at a birthday party, just in a social way, just. This is my friend Matt. This is my friend Lisa.

Lisa McMullin [00:21:48]:
And then I worked out who Matt was and the poor man, I stuck to him like a leech the whole party, just chewing his ear about Big Finish and desperately pleading to be allowed to write. And then after several. I’ve told this story so many times, so several points, parties and glasses of wine, he finally said, oh, send me a script. So I sent him a spec script and then he went, oh, okay, you’re not just a nutcase, can actually write.

Alfie Shaw [00:22:25]:
All right, then you’re a nutcase as well, but you can also write, so it’s fine.

Lisa McMullin [00:22:29]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:22:30]:
How much Fukunish did you actually heard?

Lisa McMullin [00:22:33]:
I’d read some, but I was. This is terrible.

Alfie Shaw [00:22:36]:
You’ve read some?

Lisa McMullin [00:22:36]:
No, I’d read. Did I say red? Yes.

Alfie Shaw [00:22:39]:
All right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:22:41]:
Okay, okay.

Lisa McMullin [00:22:41]:
No, I’d listened to some, but I’d only. I bought it illicitly and illegally off ebay because it’s quite expensive to buy. I was. I was getting it secondhand, which I think I advised somebody to do at a Big Finish panel once and.

Alfie Shaw [00:22:58]:
Yes, you did. Yes.

Lisa McMullin [00:23:00]:
That’s not a good idea. I’m terrible. Yeah. So don’t do that. Fired from the website. So I’d listen to a fair bit, but not huge amounts of it. I listen to lots of Paul McGann stuff and river stuff. Okay.

Lisa McMullin [00:23:19]:
Because I wanted more Paul and I love river, so I was sort of oscillating between those two mostly. But then my first job at Big Finish wasn’t Doctor Who, it was Survivors, which is a spin off from a 70s TV show about a virus that wipes out most of the human race, which I think they rebooted again during 2020, which was excellent timing. So, yeah, that’s why I was tested. I think they were a bit worried I was too manically obsessed with Doctor Who, which, now that I know the other writers, seems ridiculous.

Alfie Shaw [00:24:02]:
All right. Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [00:24:03]:
Because we’re all manically obsessed with Doctor Who. Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:24:08]:
More so than others.

Lisa McMullin [00:24:09]:
Yes.

Alfie Shaw [00:24:10]:
I’m very. We’ve got a WhatsApp group, and I will just keep going and going these things. Have we used these things before? What, What. What do they do? And people just know about. Thank you very much.

Lisa McMullin [00:24:22]:
You think you’re a Doctor Who fan until you work for Big Finish, and then you realize you know nothing compared to the encyclopedic knowledge that some of them have.

Alfie Shaw [00:24:31]:
A few people are sort of there discussing which who’s their favorite sound recordist from the 1970s stories, and go, well, I just about remember the titles, right. I know what the monsters are, but no, I don’t know who. Who was operating the boom that day. I’m sorry.

Nancy Norbeck [00:24:47]:
Doctor Who is an interesting fandom that way. You know, because you really do. You think you know your stuff and then you meet somebody and drop a name and they’re like, oh, they directed this thing. You’re like, how do you know that? Yeah, yeah. And, oh, man, to be surrounded with so many other people like that. I don’t know if that would be, like, heaven or if it would be slightly nightmarish. And you don’t have to answer that question if it’ll get you in trouble. It’s totally okay.

Alfie Shaw [00:25:18]:
Well, sometimes you’ll find yourself in a conversation and someone will start making a 20 minute passionate defense of the Kraals, and you’re sort of nodding along going, which ones are the Kraals again? Okay. Yeah, yeah. Yep.

Lisa McMullin [00:25:31]:
Great. It’s amazing and it can be terrifying. I’m always terrified at things like Galley, where you’re on a panel and I think the audience know more than I do. Why am I sitting up here while they’re sitting down there when they’re going to ask a question? And I go, I don’t know the answer. Well.

Nancy Norbeck [00:25:52]:
And I interviewed Sarah Sutton two years ago, I think, at Long island. Who. And when I talked to her beforehand, she said, just don’t ask me anything about Doctor Who, because I don’t remember anything. And I’m like, okay, it’s got to be interesting. And you know, what she really meant was the questions that are like, so in the second scene in the third episode of Arc of Infinity, when you do this, you know, what were you thinking? And she was.

Alfie Shaw [00:26:23]:
I feel particularly bad for the actors as well when people got them and discussed the audios because they literally come in, we’ve done like a night’s prep, maybe record it in one to two days if it’s a two parter. And they will forget it completely.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:38]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:26:38]:
And then, you know, the writers at least have kind of sat with it and the producers sat with it a bit, and obviously the. The fans are hearing it completed, and then when they ask questions about it, these poor people go, it was a day I didn’t have to learn it. I’m so sorry. Yeah, it just kind of comes in and out. It’s a really rapid process that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:58]:
That came up with her too, because I wanted to ask her about the one she did with David Tennant, and she was like, wait, was that, was that. Wait, I’m not sure which one was that? Kind of could remember it, but yeah.

Lisa McMullin [00:27:10]:
And some of them do so many as well. I mean, I forget sometimes I forget what I’ve written, even in between, even while writing it. So because we. We write usually got several stories, several scripts on the go, and there’ll be varying lengths of time to. Between writing them and recording them. And I had a question the other day about something I wrote six months ago. What did you mean by this line? And I don’t know, I’ve got no idea. Then I made something up.

Lisa McMullin [00:27:42]:
And whether it was what I originally intended, who can say?

Nancy Norbeck [00:27:46]:
Who can say? Right, Right. Which is what has always amused me when I was my poor 10th grade English teacher, who may or may not still listen to this podcast, suffered greatly having me in class for a year and then having me come back and visit regularly for the two years and after that before I graduated and, you know, it was all. All those questions that you get in high school English classes about, you know, what does this symbol mean? And what does. What is all of this? And I was just kind of like, really? Really? And then I read Isaac Asimov’s story the Immortal Bard, which is like two pages, but it basically just blows that whole thing out of the water. If you’re listening and you have not read the Immortal Bard, you should go find it. You can find it online. It will take you 3 minutes to read it. It’s great.

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:39]:
And I think I took it in and showed it to him. You need to read this.

Lisa McMullin [00:28:44]:
Oh. As a teacher, I can tell you, I bet she was very lovely and smiled politely and went home and put herself around really large glass of wine.

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:55]:
Well, I’ll tell you, he. He made. I call it the mistake. I don’t know how he thought of it. He obviously managed to put up with me for three years and then beyond when I would come back to visit. But he made the mistake early on in the year that I was actually in his class of, when he overheard me mentioning that I had been writing something, asking if he could read it. Oh, and. And this was.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:22]:
This was. So it would have been like 1987, 88, something like that. So it was dot matrix printed. And I think I had five or six pages of my story. That was me and my friend Marjorie, who had introduced me to Doctor Who the year before in the TARDIS with the fifth Doctor and Tegan and Turlow.

Lisa McMullin [00:29:49]:
Amazing.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:50]:
And I brought it in and I gave it to him. Him. And then I went home that night and I wrote like three more pages and printed them out and brought them in and gave them to him. And it just kept growing. So there was a running joke about the folder on his bookshelf that had my thing, and I would just come in and put new pages in it, and I have no idea how many of them he actually read. He may have read all of it. I don’t know.

Lisa McMullin [00:30:15]:
I bet he did. Probably did, yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:30:19]:
I did. Like my English teacher, when someone made the very. You know, when we’re analyzing a play, is one of the students very fluently went, do you think the author intended this at the English teacher?

Nancy Norbeck [00:30:28]:
God.

Alfie Shaw [00:30:28]:
Police force. But obviously, of course, it’s all intended things. Having written a lot of stuff. No, probably a lot of it was quite accident. Why did this theme emerge accidentally?

Nancy Norbeck [00:30:38]:
Well, and that. I remember a conversation like that when I was doing my mfa, when I was working with Rachel Pollock and we had small advising groups and she. She talked about that in one of our meetings and she said, look, you know, you think you know what your book is about, but somebody else is going to read your book and they’re going to say, oh, but there’s this theme of this. And you’re going to go, what? And yet when you stop and look at what they’re talking about, you can say, oh, yeah, I can see where you see that. But I didn’t do that intentionally. So, you know, when you teach? Because I did teach for a while too. And, you know, the. The ninth grade teachers would have their short story unit with their kids, and then they would tell them to write a short story.

Nancy Norbeck [00:31:18]:
And all these kids knew about writing a short story was there’s a setting and there’s a theme and there are symbols and there are characters and. Which doesn’t really equip you to write a short story. And so, you know, they’re sitting there trying to make a theme happen, and they’re, you know, 13 or 14. And so if you get lucky, you get a couple of good ones. But, you know, it’s kind of. It’s kind of a doomed exercise from the start, because I don’t. I think the best themes emerge on their own.

Lisa McMullin [00:31:46]:
They do, but you need to know what story you want to tell. And the. Yeah, the theme becomes apparent, and it’s usually the reason why you want to tell that story, but you don’t necessarily. You’re not necessarily conscious of it when you sit down to write it.

Alfie Shaw [00:32:01]:
That’s why it’s quite useful when we do stuff like outlines, because we have to outline everything because it’s tying word. So you. As you start going through the outline, you go, oh, actually, this has emerged. And then you can redo the outline to pretend that it was always about.

Lisa McMullin [00:32:13]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:32:13]:
Whatever it may be. But I always try and make sure that when we get outlines that the theme is kind of there and the emotional arc is kind of there. Because sometimes outlines can be very much. I mean, mine are as well, especially sort of blueprints. This happens, this happens. That happens. That goes through there.

Lisa McMullin [00:32:32]:
Why not? Mine are. Mine are like the. The recipe that you jot down after tasting a slice of cake and you think. I think there’s that in there that might be in it. There’s some of this, a little bit of this, and there’s some ingredient that I can’t quite work out. But I’ll. I’ll figure it out as I go along and I. Yeah, yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:32:52]:
But even then, you’re trying to make sure that the. Because you don’t want to just put out something that’s not about anything. You kind of. As you go.

Lisa McMullin [00:33:02]:
Yeah. About the time it’s written, I know what it’s about.

Alfie Shaw [00:33:05]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [00:33:05]:
But I don’t always know when I start.

Alfie Shaw [00:33:08]:
No, that’s true. I just try, always try and avoid hitting draft, the end of draft three or four, and going, oh, this is what it’s about. Right. Page one. So you kind of can discover it along the way rather than right before the end. That’s always.

Lisa McMullin [00:33:22]:
That does happen though, sometimes. Yeah. I wrote the Audacity. That drove me nuts.

Alfie Shaw [00:33:28]:
Yeah, I did what that was about.

Lisa McMullin [00:33:30]:
I wrote so many drafts of that and then it was recording it before. A week later I still hadn’t quite worked out what it was about and something just clicked. I went, oh, that’s what it’s about. And went right back to the beginning. Threw out what I’d done before.

Alfie Shaw [00:33:48]:
And I had the reverse problem with the inheritance. I knew exactly what it was about, but not the best way doing it. So I did about 60,000 words, which is about basically six versions of the script before I got to the end of draft one.

Nancy Norbeck [00:34:03]:
Wow.

Alfie Shaw [00:34:04]:
Came the proper one, which then didn’t need that many more drafts. Thankfully. That one really went around the houses. But that was a thing that we kind of knew what it was going to be but wasn’t quite nailing the execution. So sometimes you can do. If you, if you come up with something that’s kind of idea or concept led, you kind of know what the theme is. I find generally anyway, because it sort of explains itself.

Lisa McMullin [00:34:30]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:34:32]:
But then you kind of tricky kind of the execution. Whereas if you’re kind of exploring, you’re sort of discovering the explanation as you go kind of clearing the gap and you’re finding the way and what’s there.

Nancy Norbeck [00:34:44]:
Well, and I’m wondering because I have listened to a lot of the behind the scenes stuff for Big Finish, you know. So you know when you guys.

Alfie Shaw [00:34:54]:
Oh no, what did we say? We can’t remember those either, Alfie.

Nancy Norbeck [00:34:57]:
Well, you’re not the person, and I’m not exactly sure who said it on the episode of the Robots that I was listening to last week that they were sure that the last thing that would be affected by AI would be all of the creative fields. And I was like, you were really wrong about that one. Unfortunately, you were really wrong about that. But. And I don’t know who it was and it’s okay because nobody knew. But you know, when, when people are talking about, you know, I was given this idea or we worked out this idea, it kind of sounds when you listen to it like, oh, I had this conversation with, you know, the producer or whoever it is that’s coming up with ideas with you. And then I went home and wrote it because this was a great idea. And I know enough from my own experience as a writer that it doesn’t really work that way.

Nancy Norbeck [00:35:50]:
But it makes me wonder like how much room is there to Say, okay, I’ve worked with this idea and it turns out it’s actually about this other thing. Do you have that kind of flexibility? I mean, I don’t even know what the timing is usually like, so I don’t know how much time you usually have to play with things.

Lisa McMullin [00:36:08]:
I mean, it depends. With some Rangers more than others, with some stories more than others, sometimes there’s a very tight arc across a series that you really can’t deviate from, or there’s not room to deviate from. Sometimes stories are more standalone and you get a chance to something I’ve just. That is that I’ve just written and will be recording it will.

Alfie Shaw [00:36:43]:
We promise.

Lisa McMullin [00:36:44]:
It’s so it’s a. Is very, very far from the actual pitch that I originally pitched. When I sat down to write it, It. It went off on its own little journey over the hills and far away. And it’s better than the original outline that I submitted. But, yeah, it really depends.

Alfie Shaw [00:37:06]:
It does depend. I mean, I was quite fascistical on Dylan Dr. Series, especially for the last set, because due to various reasons, the options of the stories we could tell were basically eroded away until there was the one. The one thing. What it turned out to be that we so poor John and Flick on that were going, oh, we could explore these other interesting. No, no, no, no, no, we could, but we. We need. We need you to go from there to there, so then that person can go from there to there and there to there.

Alfie Shaw [00:37:39]:
And it’s all these little intricate things and, you know, it’s a house of cards. It all has to absolutely fit perfectly for this one. Whereas anything that’s more either standalone or if you’re earlier in an arc. Yeah, generally at the kind of either throwing ideas up in the air stage or next week’s episode doesn’t totally rely on, you know, a certain ending. So, yeah, that kind of, as you say, is a bit more. More freedom to it. Yeah, but.

Lisa McMullin [00:38:11]:
But by and large, you. You come up with a paragraph of an idea and your script editor and the producer will say, okay, expand it more. So then you’ll come up with a 1, 2 page pitch. So you have a couple of pages, but it goes back and forth a couple of times between script editor and writer, and then to Nick Briggs, who the exec who has an eye over all of them, making sure we’re not bringing the company into this review.

Alfie Shaw [00:38:42]:
And then the B, despite my best.

Lisa McMullin [00:38:44]:
Efforts, then the BBC have to look at it as well to check that, you know, we’re not Destroying the good.

Alfie Shaw [00:38:51]:
Name of Doctor Who, despite my best effort.

Lisa McMullin [00:38:57]:
So you have. Yeah. How long is a piece of string? So, yeah, you. Sometimes you have a lot of freedom. Sometimes it’s quite constricted and so many different goalposts in play that are movable.

Alfie Shaw [00:39:10]:
But also some. Some series are. We will sit down and have a meeting and we’ll basically thrash out the entire series arc. Was that Stranded? You had a fairly.

Lisa McMullin [00:39:20]:
Yeah, Stranded. We sort of knew where it was going for we had a big meeting because it was quite different to what they’d done before. So we sat down in 2019 and said, right, let’s set this 2020.

Alfie Shaw [00:39:37]:
What could go wrong?

Lisa McMullin [00:39:38]:
The Doctor Strange. Okay. Little did we know. So we had a rough idea of the shape of the story over the four box sets.

Alfie Shaw [00:39:49]:
Did you have the ideas for the actual story, like the paragraph versions for each book?

Lisa McMullin [00:39:55]:
No, no. So the individual stories, the stories within the story, they were made up as we went along. But the. What I’d call the serial, the sort of ongoing story of the regular characters that was loosely mapped out from the beginning.

Alfie Shaw [00:40:20]:
Yeah. Because that’s sort of what we did with. Well, actually with 11, we planned it all out entirely and then had to drop most of it due to behind the scenes shenanigans. But we kept. We knew the sort of emotional arc for the companion and not even specifically actually we sort of always knew they were gonna. It was gonna end in a wedding because it was going to be at the beginning. They lose their family, they travel with the Doctor, they gain a family and that would be their emotional arc. But we didn’t have anything sort of planned beat wise.

Alfie Shaw [00:40:59]:
In fact, the other. The big arc for the Doctor was. Was entirely pulled out and which is why if anyone’s heard that series, the Doctor sort of gets a character arc halfway through when it suddenly really, really becomes about the Time War. Otherwise we’ve just. It’s sor. About the companion and setting things up, which is fine because that’s sort of how series of new who can generally be. You know, you focus on the companion and bits of the Doctor, but you can shove it one way or the other. But that in that kind of circumstance, when you’re coming down, coming down, coming together and having a big meeting to plan it, you will generally hammer out almost log line versions for some future stories.

Alfie Shaw [00:41:40]:
So there’s one we. I’m working on at the moment where we have one line descriptions for almost every story in the set. Sorry, every story in the. In the run. Specific things for Certain sets at the moment, but that has generally been. We’ve gone to people and said, what do you want to do? And they’ve gone, oh, I’d like to do a. Gone.

Lisa McMullin [00:42:08]:
To the writers.

Alfie Shaw [00:42:09]:
You mean go to the writers. What would you like to do? Here’s our character, here’s their arc. What would you like to do? And they’ve got, ah, well, I’m going to do a episode in the style of blank, or I’m going to do an episode set in blank and we’re going to do the entire thing in the style of blank. Was that vague enough?

Lisa McMullin [00:42:25]:
Good.

Alfie Shaw [00:42:27]:
But all of those are true. And trying to do kind of slightly different things with the format, but we said to people, what’s the kind of thing that you really want to write? Don’t worry about, you know, bringing people back or whatever. And that’s always quite useful just to go, if you could do anything, really, what would you do? And we can see if we can try to make it work. But sometimes. And do stop if I’m rambling because I’m wearing. I’m going on sometimes with Doctor Who, when they go, hello, we need you to do this villain, whatever it may be, that can be quite useful because you then go, what’s special about this villain? How do they work? So having a starting point sometimes is actually quite useful.

Lisa McMullin [00:43:19]:
I love a steer. That’s my worst question is, what would you like to do? If you can do anything at all? My mind just goes blank.

Nancy Norbeck [00:43:27]:
Yeah, I know that feeling. Yeah. Too much possibility is sometimes.

Lisa McMullin [00:43:32]:
Yeah. Where do you start? I need somebody to narrow it down for me.

Nancy Norbeck [00:43:38]:
Yeah, well. And, you know, I’ve been thinking, like, Big Finish has this reputation for redeeming so many characters or situations that didn’t seem to go so well on tv. I mean, most notably the sixth Doctor, suddenly everyone loves because he’s so fabulous on Big Finish, you know, where he generally comes in at the very bottom of everybody’s. Which is your favorite Doctor poll, which I never take because I can never rank them, but no, me either.

Lisa McMullin [00:44:09]:
It’s the same character. How can you pick one?

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:13]:
But, you know, at the same time, like, I don’t know how. I don’t know how you do it, because when I sit down and I listen to a sixth Doctor audio, I’m thinking, well, what’s actually different about him on audio? You know, like, the character is still essentially the same, and yet somehow I like him better, you know, so, like, how maybe it’s just some weird big Finnish magic that you can’t really put your finger on. But I think that the same thing kind of can happen, you know, with villains who, you know, I’ve seen people talking online recently about, you know, can we not have any Daleks for a while? We’ve had too many Daleks. They, you know, the Daleks are great, but they kind of become one note after a while if you’re not careful, you know.

Lisa McMullin [00:45:00]:
But then you get the other side of going, can we have more Daleks? Where are the Daleks?

Alfie Shaw [00:45:06]:
It’s really, it’s really interesting, that debate, because we. We did Daleks for 11 and I was dreading it because I. Exactly for that reaction, oh, God, everyone’s going to go to Daleks again. We were given the Daleks by the BBC. The BBC went, use this, they’ll solve everything. I was like, okay, cool. But because we were using the Rainbow Daleks and they’d never been done before, people went mad for it. And I was not expecting that at all, because I was expecting, as you say, oh, God, no Daleks.

Alfie Shaw [00:45:35]:
And there were some people going, well, I don’t like Daleks, but it is those Daleks, so I’m okay with this.

Nancy Norbeck [00:45:41]:
Which is funny because when they first, you know, debuted on tv, everybody was like, what is this? This is stupid and crazy.

Lisa McMullin [00:45:49]:
Yeah, you definitely redeemed those Daleks.

Alfie Shaw [00:45:51]:
But I, I just. I thought they were a bit like the Andrew Garfield Spider man films. Everyone sort of now retroactively loves them, but everyone at the time went, these really.

Lisa McMullin [00:46:01]:
This is what we’re doing.

Nancy Norbeck [00:46:02]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:46:03]:
But they seem to be a slight kind of nostalgia factor. And also because we were on audio and they did have a great voices.

Lisa McMullin [00:46:10]:
Yeah. Poor Nick Briggs.

Alfie Shaw [00:46:11]:
Oh, yes, he did.

Lisa McMullin [00:46:12]:
He lost his voice.

Alfie Shaw [00:46:14]:
Seven to eight unique Daleks on there. And I did just say, blame Stephen. I didn’t come up with them. I worked given because he was the Prime Minister as well. It was all of them, it was just. Yeah, Daleks are tricky. Daleks are surprisingly tricky to write and you do really have to focus on how to write them and what to do with them. That’s new.

Alfie Shaw [00:46:40]:
Otherwise they can be quite screamy. Just scream. But sometimes you need just screamy tanks. They’re quite a useful shorthand if you’ve got a full story, full of other stuff. And they endure for a reason. Yeah, I think, you know, that’s thing.

Lisa McMullin [00:46:55]:
Is, that’s such a unique villain, aren’t they? There’s nothing. I can’t think of anything else like it. They’re just so peculiar, their form is so unthreatening, but their voice is so chilling and the. It’s just a lack of any empathy at all. Just. They are the perfect villain. I love a Dalek, but I’d prefer a Cyberman, I think.

Alfie Shaw [00:47:23]:
Oh, I love a Cyber. They were my favorite. They’re my first Doctor Who. Never done a Cyber VHS double Tin.

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:29]:
Wow.

Alfie Shaw [00:47:30]:
It was a Simon VHS double Tin, which I took into school because it turned out my history teacher, Mr. Ready, was sort of exactly like Colin Baker, which was very weird. No, but I’m glad you’re enjoying it. But, yeah, you do constantly have to. Every time you kind of have to try and earn using that classic villain. And there’s a few of them that I’ve slightly given up on because I just can’t think of anything.

Lisa McMullin [00:48:01]:
And what do you do?

Alfie Shaw [00:48:03]:
Yeah. Which isn’t to say there aren’t new things to do with them. I just can’t think of them.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:08]:
Well, you did.

Lisa McMullin [00:48:10]:
Yeah, I was gonna say.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:10]:
Yeah, with the Eleventh Doctor series, you definitely did, because.

Alfie Shaw [00:48:15]:
Oh, yes. Sorry, I. I’m just. I was thinking more stuff like the Weeping Angels. I’m like, I don’t know what I would do the so and so again. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Well, yes, this is that probably my sole Cyberman story because it went down really well and I went, well, they’re my favorites.

Alfie Shaw [00:48:29]:
Never touching them again. I did them good once. Doctor Who fans are happy. Let’s not mess with that. There we go. Run.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:37]:
Yes. The story in question, I think, is called Sins of the Flesh, as opposed to Sins of the Father, which is where my brain wants to go. That’s not what it’s called. And it was just such a fabulous way of using them to do something completely different. And, you know, the. The thematic elements of that story could not have been a great big mystery to you either.

Alfie Shaw [00:49:02]:
No, it wasn’t. It wasn’t subtle, nor was it really meant to be. No, I don’t do subtle with slime. And sometimes you don’t need to be subtle. I always find it very interesting online just to do a real tangent, that, you know, all these very sort of angry, right wing, really, really far right, hateful people go, oh, well, you know, you must not put open themes in your work. You must be subtle with these things. But we’re going to be very open and aggressive with all of our stuff. Well, I’m not sure if I can swear on this to you we’ll be as subtle as you are.

Alfie Shaw [00:49:37]:
Thanks very much, Sunny Jim. But, you know, that one I Can’t remember how it came about because I remember having vaguely having the idea and then watching. There’s a documentary on Netflix, Netflix, I think, called Pray Away. And in the opening of that, which I think I do talk about in the extras of the CD version, there is someone who is leading a religious ceremony in their own home. And they all started stomping in unison while praying. And I just went, oh, God, it’s the actual cyber, Cybermen. So that opening scene with them praying is just ripped straight from that documentary. And that’s when I went, I’ve got to do this.

Alfie Shaw [00:50:24]:
And this is how we’re going to do it. And that’s all. And then that one actually come together quite quickly.

Lisa McMullin [00:50:30]:
I remember you sent me your script while you were writing that, and I just looked at it and went, oh, it was one of those moments where you think, why didn’t I have this idea? Why didn’t I write this? It’s just. It was just seemed, what a perfect story for the Cybermen. It just. Yeah, what a way to tell that story as well. I just thought it was.

Alfie Shaw [00:50:54]:
And we went, we sent it past a lot of people to make sure it was read and, you know, done properly. And it was also interesting, the reaction to that. There were some people who didn’t like it because it was about religion. And some people, some religious people thought it was unfair because their, you know, their church wasn’t like that. And some people went on the other end of it, went, well, it’s about religion, but it’s not really attacking religion enough. And I said, well, it’s not really about religion at all. It’s about those people, specifically conversion therapy, people who are using religion, you know, to sort of perpetuate, and they’re this horrific thing. So sometimes you do, when you see.

Lisa McMullin [00:51:39]:
Reactions, you were saying about people, you write something and what you intend and what people take from it.

Alfie Shaw [00:51:44]:
Yeah, always same thing. And then you have to take heart as the creative going, well, fine, I understand your point, your various points of view, but it was very specifically about. In this one thing about this. And it’s that sort of weird thing of there is death of the author, but there is also almost solace of the author going, it was about this, but, you know, so that. Understand that. But I don’t have. I don’t have to have my ego or opinion of my own work or those bits of criticism. I can accept them without having to take them to heart, if that makes sense.

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:24]:
Yeah, yeah. Because you can’t control what people are.

Alfie Shaw [00:52:26]:
Going to say about it as much as we’ve tried. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:30]:
Now that we’re talking about it. God, yeah, that’s. That’s kind of a terrifying thing to throw out into the world, a story like that, that is about something that really shouldn’t be controversial but still is, and then kind of go, well, you know, I hope that most people like it and I hope that nobody comes after me in some horrible way because they thought it was terrible.

Alfie Shaw [00:52:53]:
Yeah, no, yes. Didn’t have any particular direct nastiness. Someone anonymously gave it a four, which everyone else was giving it. Super high score. So I just. But I wonder what’s behind that out of ten? It’s five out of five or nothing, darlings. We. And then we got another review on someone else, which was really just.

Alfie Shaw [00:53:22]:
I mean, so offensively awful that it was. It sort of swung round to being funny, you know, like, break out the popcorn. Because this person was like, well, this has lesbians in it. Okay, bear, you seek help. But yes, no, it hasn’t had anything. But what was quite nice is then there were a couple people came up to me at various conventions and thanked us for doing that story. And that was really. That was.

Alfie Shaw [00:53:58]:
That was a sort of really big thumbs up of this was absolutely worth doing. And we should definitely try and do things that are engaging with actual problems and sort of slightly darker material, which my stuff tends to skew towards anyway. But again, had some great jokes in it, wonderful one about regeneration that I will not stop banging on about.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:22]:
Yeah, well, that one just hits on so many different levels because it’s clever all on its own as an idea for something different to do with a Cybermen, and then it has such a massive emotional punch, you know, like, as soon as you realize what’s actually going on in that story. And I want to apologize to people who are listening because we’re being vague so that we don’t spoil anybody. But. But yeah, once. Once you figure it out, you’re just kind of going, yeah, whoa, whoa. This is like, this is not your typical Doctor Who story. This is. This is operating on like five or six different levels all at the same time.

Nancy Norbeck [00:55:00]:
And. Holy cow. So. So, yeah, there’s. There’s a reason why it sticks in your head.

Alfie Shaw [00:55:07]:
Thank you. As I said, that’s true.

Nancy Norbeck [00:55:14]:
So, yeah, but that’s part of why I find the Cybermen scarier than the Daleks, because they want to turn you into one of them. But at the same time, even with that, after a while, they tend to be all kind of doing the same thing. So when a story like that comes along, it’s like, oh, we can still do something different with these guys. Oh, yeah.

Alfie Shaw [00:55:40]:
That’s the trick that you’ve got to try and find with all of the new stuff. So I generally have a rule on my. The stuff I produce, which is no prequels, no sequels and no classic monsters. And it’s there mainly because we will have discussed what we want to do with classic monsters beforehand. And it will be like when we have the big meetings for series, we will go down and go, okay, we’re going to use. We’re going to do this interesting thing with this classic learning, because we can do this, this and this, but then we don’t really want anyone else because otherwise if you just say open submission, you get a lot of stuff that is. Can we do a sequel to Terminus? Why? I like Terminus.

Lisa McMullin [00:56:24]:
Oh, you shouldn’t.

Alfie Shaw [00:56:26]:
No, no, just in terms of writers and stuff, because everyone has the kind of, you know, pet love monster that they. They just want to sort of use rather than kind of push. And so we always sort of say we’re generally looking for new and if we’re doing old, we’d have had a big chat about it to do, to do something new with. But yeah, it’s also that kind of old thing with. When you’re doing a series of Doctor Who, there is a sort of push and pull between. I mean, people, you know, people say, oh, well, there too many Dalek stories. People will generally can say that with this. Too much classic monsters in general.

Alfie Shaw [00:57:04]:
And it is that slight push and pull of going, we want to do lots of new stuff. But you are in the Doctor Who toy box as a creative. So part of the joy is getting to play with the existing toys. People kind of like it when you bring back classics up, especially if you can find something new with it. That’s really the sweet spot. But you kind of have to balance not using them all the time with too much of them and not kind of the kind of dynamic of the thing in the same way that the TV show. I always think it’s interesting that they generally will use a classic monster or so for most series just to kind of go, hey, this is the. This is the same thing that you remember.

Alfie Shaw [00:57:48]:
This is still Doctor Who. So it is a kind of not only just considering what you can do with new stuff, but who’s the best fit for this storyline. And then the thought escaped me and left and went on holiday for three weeks and had a glorious time and never Came back because he married someone out there. Yes. Next question, please. That really went away. I’m sorry.

Nancy Norbeck [00:58:14]:
That’s okay.

Alfie Shaw [00:58:15]:
Welcome to my brain. Just throwing things out.

Nancy Norbeck [00:58:18]:
It happens to all of us. Right? Yeah. Well, since. Since you mentioned Paul Spragg, I’m. I’m curious to know, like, I mean, I don’t know how much you guys have to do with that competition, but there was. There was someone on a forum I was looking at maybe, I don’t know, like a week or so before submissions ended for this year’s contest. So whenever that. That was not too long ago, and the conversation had kind of steered into, are Americans allowed to write for BBC Doctor Who tv? And a lot of people were saying, I’m not sure.

Nancy Norbeck [00:58:58]:
You know, like, there are. At the very least, there are all of these rumors that they’re not. And somebody replied and said, man, you know, I’ve always wanted to write for them. And a bunch of us were like, well, so write for big Finish. And they were like, I can do that. And I said, well, I’m pretty sure at the very least, you can enter the competition and you got a week to write something and send it in.

Lisa McMullin [00:59:18]:
And see what happens.

Nancy Norbeck [00:59:19]:
So, I mean, what’s the experience like with people submitting to that contest? Do you guys have enough to do with it to have any idea?

Lisa McMullin [00:59:27]:
I have nothing to do with it at all.

Alfie Shaw [00:59:29]:
I have all to do with it. I am the person that does the initial sifting, so I am the person who makes the shortlist. So unfortunately, if you’re listening to this and you’ve been rejected by Paul Spragg, you’ve probably been rejected by me, for which I can only apologize.

Lisa McMullin [00:59:42]:
It’s all anonymous.

Alfie Shaw [00:59:44]:
It’s all anonymous. So the process is people will email in the one for Karen in the office, then puts them on an internal storage system, but without names and contact email, all of that filed off. I then read all of them. I start I did it one year in three days, which did nearly kill me. I generally now will, as they come in once a week, sift through this year. I think about 40% of the entries came in on the last day. That last day is a real rush. And from there, once I sorted them, they will go on to the shortlist, will go onto the judging panel who will then pick their top tens and then their respective winner.

Alfie Shaw [01:00:40]:
But yes, you can absolutely enter from anywhere, all over the world. There is no. I’m pretty sure Selim is American or Canadian. I’m for. Sorry, Salim. I’m forgetting the man who wrote Battle Scars, who also won for laps. I think it’s called lamb bound. The third doctor 1.

Alfie Shaw [01:01:08]:
Apologies, my brain forgets things. But yes, it is. It can be. It can be quite intense and there’s a. There’s a lot of them. There’s a lot of. It’s interesting. Certain themes kind of emerge sort of naturally.

Alfie Shaw [01:01:32]:
Not so this year specifically, it was themed about the Time War, so you’d have certain types of Time War stories emerging, which I thought was interesting. Just the kind of. That repetition of ideas by people who clearly had not spoken to each other because otherwise you wouldn’t enter this.

Lisa McMullin [01:01:46]:
I have a question.

Alfie Shaw [01:01:47]:
Okay.

Lisa McMullin [01:01:48]:
Do they. Do you find that the themes that people are writing about and the stories they’re wanting to tell have. Do they resonate with what’s going on in the world?

Alfie Shaw [01:02:00]:
Some of them do. I mean, this year, not so much, because people were really leaning into the Time Warrior of it all and getting to use the Daleks. A lot of people put Daleks in. But yes, there’s a lot of covered ones. There was a lot of Doctor Who Solves Covid. That was the main one really for that year. There was a lot of that and a lot of people being in isolation and that sort of thing. But not, not so much other than that, really.

Alfie Shaw [01:02:30]:
There are certain. Every year someone will enter a story from the point of view of the tardis, without fail, trying to know what else I can say. Yes, ask me questions and I’ll see if I can answer. But yes, I’m. I’m. I’m very insult, very involved because it’s part of my production coordinator office job. So I, I’m the one who sorts all of those.

Lisa McMullin [01:03:00]:
So send your complaints to us if you’re not already.

Alfie Shaw [01:03:06]:
But I can’t do feedback.

Nancy Norbeck [01:03:07]:
Email in the show notes. No, we won’t. So do many of the people who, who win that competition end up writing more for you guys?

Alfie Shaw [01:03:18]:
I certainly made an effort to when they. When I was doing short trips and could pull things through. There is. There is. Writing prose and writing drama are two different skill sets, which was why during my tenure on short trips, I introduced the mini dramas because we could sort of use them as testing grounds for people a bit more effectively than pros. But some of them do. Some of them I just sort of take a leap with and just. They get a bit more kind of hands on support.

Alfie Shaw [01:03:54]:
But yeah, I try to, just because it’s sort of meant to be a way to. To break into the company. And we had A few really, really brilliant people come through that, but.

Lisa McMullin [01:04:08]:
And not always the winners.

Alfie Shaw [01:04:09]:
Not always the winners, no. Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [01:04:11]:
The runners up.

Alfie Shaw [01:04:12]:
So Felicia barker, who wrote one of my 11 Dalek stories and the 11 Valerie short trip, plus my master short Trip, a subscriber Short Trip, and I think that’s her complete things under my commissioning, basically made the shortlist every year. She basically came second about two or three years in the running. And we just went, oh, well, you’re. You know, there’s clearly something here that we can use. So I think Matt Fitton got into the company by not winning consistently. I think so, yeah. And there are people who go on to be used in short trips. I think if they didn’t win as well, sometimes we.

Alfie Shaw [01:05:02]:
People will be in touch and kind of develop from there. But, yeah, I. Yeah, we’ve. We’ve had a few people come through that way, and some really brilliant people as well. But it’s that also, that sort of thing that you’re. I mean, I have as a producer, I think is less of a problem for you because you don’t have to commission anyone, is that you are aware that there are a certain number of writers who are established within the company, really know what they’re doing, are, if you put them in a set, are very popular, really easy to use, great balancing. That is the desire to bring in new people and new ideas, and even really brilliant new people need a lot more work than an established person who really just knows the ropes. So you do have that to kind of balance getting new people in versus established people.

Alfie Shaw [01:05:56]:
But you do want to constantly have that sort of new stream of people coming in balanced on top of that is also a problem some people have, which I have, and James Goss has a similar thing where they are writer producers and are effectively showrunners for whatever series they’re doing. So it’s then, how much do you get established people in? How much do you get new people in? Because you always want to get new people in? How much do you write yourself because it’s the series arc or because you’ve got a thing that you really want to do, which was Me and the Sideman one. At one point, I wasn’t even going to write the finale until Emily Cook went, that is insane. What are you doing? Write it. You will hate yourself forever if you don’t do the finale. But it is that kind of juggling act and getting people in through the short trips. You know that we do have that kind of transition between prose and drama, which can be A stumbling block for some people, but it is a good way of discovering people who at least have a proven understanding of the show and have a proven understanding of character and how to do some guest characters and have their emotional arc. So there is.

Alfie Shaw [01:07:15]:
At least when I was. I was there, I imagine whoever has taken it over. I’m not sure if it’s been publicly announced. Not. I think it probably has, but I’ll play it safe, just not. They’ll probably do a similar thing as well. You know, I’ve taken people over from pros to drama and will probably try and do so when if I have the option. Lots of able to me, I think the thing I’m producing at the moment might be my last one for a while, but we shall see.

Alfie Shaw [01:07:44]:
I can ramble, can’t I? I’m so sorry.

Nancy Norbeck [01:07:47]:
It’s okay.

Alfie Shaw [01:07:48]:
The one bloke on the. On the podcast, he dominates the conversation. I mean, nothing changes.

Nancy Norbeck [01:07:54]:
Well, here I am sitting here thinking, you know, Lisa could have just submitted to the contest and gotten in that way instead of, you know, latching onto Matt.

Lisa McMullin [01:08:02]:
You know what I’m not sure I would have done. I think I’m much better if I just approached someone with a glass of wine than if I actually have to. Could be.

Alfie Shaw [01:08:11]:
I will say it’s much harder. People should take heart in this. It’s much harder to get a commission through Paul Spragg than it is any other way through the company. Because every other time when you pitch, the producer can go, I like that bit of the idea. That bit needs working. That bit doesn’t work. You can do this. Paul Spragg, it’s literally.

Alfie Shaw [01:08:29]:
You have got to be a bullseye first time. So it is a. It’s a harder way of getting in. So if people have not made it through so far, I would say keep going. Because you are essentially trying to enter through the hardest path.

Nancy Norbeck [01:08:45]:
Interesting. That’s probably not what most people would guess.

Lisa McMullin [01:08:49]:
No, but then it’s. Yeah, but then people would say, well, then what are the easier ways in.

Alfie Shaw [01:08:57]:
Oh, make your own work. That’s always a big one. If you can prove that you can write. Specifically if you write your own audio drama. We can’t look at anything that stops who because we might be doing something similar. That’s a substantial rule across IP work. But if you can write your own scripts, write your own prose, if you’re looking to try and do the short trip stuff, that’s always much, much better and is. Because then people can look at your work and assess It.

Alfie Shaw [01:09:23]:
I would say that it’s a weird thing. A lot of people go, I want to write, talk to who. And the advice we always give is, okay, go and write literally anything else.

Lisa McMullin [01:09:31]:
Yeah, write something else. Yeah. I mean, that’s the same. That’s a difference, I think, in the US and the uk. Is that a UK show? If you want to write on a show over here, you absolutely do not send them a spec script for their. They don’t want to see it. They want to see something original that you’ve written. And yeah, that works for Big Finish as well.

Lisa McMullin [01:09:51]:
You never, ever would send the Doctor Who script to Big Finish because it won’t get looked at, just be deleted immediately.

Nancy Norbeck [01:10:01]:
Well, that’s good for people to know too.

Lisa McMullin [01:10:03]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [01:10:04]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [01:10:04]:
Because I’m sure lots of them send stuff and have no idea why it. Why it never went anywhere.

Alfie Shaw [01:10:12]:
Probably if it did, it went to someone else. No one ever really sends us.

Nancy Norbeck [01:10:16]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [01:10:17]:
I would hope they’d get an email saying, thank you. We can’t look at this.

Alfie Shaw [01:10:20]:
Yes, yes, there would be a reply.

Nancy Norbeck [01:10:22]:
Yeah. Yeah. But still, it’s. It’s a lot of effort to go to. To have that kind of reply.

Lisa McMullin [01:10:28]:
Yeah, yeah, we just can’t look at.

Alfie Shaw [01:10:31]:
Yeah. I mean, speaking of, my favorite Paul Spragg entry ever. And this. If this was you, well played. Someone once just submitted the entire shooting script of Heaven Sent, which I loved reading because I haven’t before. This is good. Unfortunately, Stephen, if it was you, you did it already and you did it pretty well, so we can’t do it again. But I did enjoy that and it might have been sort of.

Alfie Shaw [01:10:57]:
It was presumably sent in as a joke and there might have been the sort of setup in the email because it was stripped of that. It was just by mistake uploaded to the internal system. This is that. Oh, cool.

Nancy Norbeck [01:11:09]:
Wow.

Alfie Shaw [01:11:10]:
A copy of this now. Okay, great.

Lisa McMullin [01:11:14]:
Maybe it was Moffat who sent it.

Alfie Shaw [01:11:16]:
Yeah, this was really good. Make it again. People liked it. People need to know how good I am.

Nancy Norbeck [01:11:21]:
Yeah. Wow. Would that even. Would that episode even work on audio mail me? I guess it would because these an awful lot of it.

Lisa McMullin [01:11:30]:
Very visual. I mean, it’s.

Nancy Norbeck [01:11:31]:
Yeah, there’s a lot of.

Lisa McMullin [01:11:34]:
It’s voiceover, isn’t it? A lot of it. And yeah, I don’t know.

Alfie Shaw [01:11:40]:
You could probably do a version of it. That’s another thing we get a lot of you get when you working with newer people. You get people who send very visual ideas to go, this would be wonderful on the telly. Really not so Suitable for audio.

Lisa McMullin [01:11:53]:
I mean, sometimes I’ll write something and think, this is really not meant for audio. What am I doing?

Nancy Norbeck [01:12:00]:
I was going to ask you, you know, like, since you’ve written for TV as well as for audio, like, what. What’s the, you know, how much of a difference is there?

Lisa McMullin [01:12:09]:
So different. Yeah, it’s very, very different because with TV and film, so much of the storytelling is visual and less is more in terms of dialogue. But then with audio it’s the reverse. And you. You’ve got to use the dialogue in a way that helps to set the scene and to clarify what the sound effects are. The sound effects are so good, though. Like the big, I think, big finish. The sound designers are just fantastic.

Lisa McMullin [01:12:44]:
What they do, what they do with the ridiculous directions that we give them.

Alfie Shaw [01:12:50]:
What’s. What’s your most ridiculous. I think my most ridiculous stage direction for fx. Fx. Their universe implodes. What’s your most ridiculous.

Lisa McMullin [01:13:00]:
I once asked for the sound of a fun fur exploding or like things like the sound of utter dread and fear going down a plug hole. Like ridiculousness like that. And then you go. And they do it. They go, ah. Do you mean this? Yes, that’s exactly what I meant. But it’s brilliant. I once had.

Lisa McMullin [01:13:32]:
I wrote a Paul McGann one with. There was an army of giant skeletons.

Nancy Norbeck [01:13:39]:
I listened to that not long ago.

Lisa McMullin [01:13:42]:
Then she’d made the. The skeleton army using wooden coat hangers.

Nancy Norbeck [01:13:48]:
Oh, wow.

Lisa McMullin [01:13:50]:
But you listen to it and you’re like, oh, wow, that sounds amazing. And then you know that what he’s doing, he’s just in his studio going, I think they have a lot of fun with that. Sort of.

Nancy Norbeck [01:14:02]:
I bet they do.

Lisa McMullin [01:14:03]:
Yeah. But, yeah, so different to writing TV because. And I. And it’s hard to switch your brain from one to the other and to get. So you get used to writing for audio and then you write a TV script and suddenly it’s so dialogue heavy and you like. Then you’ve got to be stripped down, strip it down. You’ve got to direct the. Tell the actors where they’re moving, tell the director what we’re meant to be focusing on.

Lisa McMullin [01:14:31]:
Where’s the camera meant to be looking? What are we seeing? And then you go back to writing audio and you’re, ah. You start writing something visual and thinking they can’t see it. How am I going to present that in a. In an audio way? But it’s fun. I like the difference between the two. It’s challenging. I write or I’ve not. I haven’t done much, but I’ve done some theater as well.

Lisa McMullin [01:14:58]:
And I always think that audio is so much closer to theater than it is to television because it’s characters talking and the story is told through, through dialogue more than anything. Even though some theater today can be really visually spectacular, I think it’s still, for me, my favorite theater is when it’s, it’s intimate and you feel like you’re almost part of the, the drama yourself as a, as a spectator rather than. I thought. I think too much visual stuff and crazy special effects for me distances me from, from theater. I like to be sucked into it through the, just the, the actors on stage. I like to lean in and feel like you’re actually, you’re in the, you’re in the same space with them, which you don’t get with TV or audio or, or any other medium really. You’re, you’re there and it’s live and whatever happens, it will only ever happen exactly like that, that one time. Every performance will be different, even if it’s in an.

Lisa McMullin [01:16:14]:
In tiny, tiny, tiny, infinitismal way. But yeah, but I love, I love that about theater. You don’t get it anywhere else. That feeling of you’re part of something you’re all experiencing something that will never, ever be repeated exactly the same way.

Nancy Norbeck [01:16:30]:
Yeah, yeah, it’s true. It’s very true.

Alfie Shaw [01:16:39]:
Jump in. I thought I’d spoken too much. I thought I just hide away.

Nancy Norbeck [01:16:44]:
No, no, you’re fine. You’re fine.

Alfie Shaw [01:16:47]:
You do get a lot of theater writers in, that is how. Yeah, especially the Tim Foley, Stuart Pringle, Lauren Mooney faction. Bring in a lot of theater people then. Yeah, I think they are. They find the leap a bit easier than the pros people.

Nancy Norbeck [01:17:05]:
That makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. Is there anything we should talk about that’s not big Finnish? Because my brain is sort of locked into big Finnish territory.

Lisa McMullin [01:17:18]:
We find it, you know, wherever we are. As soon as, if you get one person, if you get more than one Doctor Who related person in a room, or if you get more than one big Finnish related person in a room or in a conversation, even if you’ve met, to discuss world politics or as.

Alfie Shaw [01:17:37]:
We often do, or horticulture, as we.

Lisa McMullin [01:17:40]:
Often do, the conversation will always, always. I think even. Actually you don’t even need two people. You need one person connected to Big finish or Doctor Who in any situation. And somehow the conversation.

Alfie Shaw [01:17:57]:
Suddenly you’re listening to a 20 minute defense of the crowds, wondering who they are.

Nancy Norbeck [01:18:04]:
Is it terrible to Admit that I do know who they are. When you mention Android Invasion. Android Invasion.

Alfie Shaw [01:18:13]:
I did listen for the first two minutes.

Lisa McMullin [01:18:17]:
Do you?

Alfie Shaw [01:18:18]:
Well, I’m. I do a lot of nothing else. All my other, all my other work is very speculative and in early stages. So you, you’re the one with.

Lisa McMullin [01:18:29]:
And I do random things. British television that probably your audience hasn’t. Haven’t encountered unless they have Britbox or they come across it in some strain. Although I will occasionally talk to somebody in America about something and I think it’s so British. I write on a show called Sister Boniface, which is a murder mystery solving nun. It’s like Agatha Christie, Miss Marple in a wimple. And then somebody will say, oh, I’ve been watching it on britfox America. Okay, who knew? That’s a quintessentially British show.

Lisa McMullin [01:19:09]:
I’d like to. I’d love to write on an American show and I’d love to get my own stuff. I’m in a constant process of development with different production companies trying to get things green lit and. Ah, it’s. Yeah, it’s so funny when you first. You think about what you wanted to do when you start out and you continually move the goalposts. So If I’d known 10 years ago that I’d be doing what I do for a living, I’d have thought all my wildest dreams have come true. This is the pinnacle of what I want to achieve creatively.

Lisa McMullin [01:19:49]:
But now that I’m here and I. Oh, but then there’s other things up there that I, I want to do now. So you’re continually. I don’t think you ever get. I don’t think you’re ever satisfied as a creative person. I think there’s always something else that you want to do. I think that. And I think that’s right.

Lisa McMullin [01:20:10]:
I think if you, once you become satisfied, you might become, I don’t know, bored of what you do. There’s got to always be something to.

Nancy Norbeck [01:20:22]:
Aspire to, I think, I think that’s right. Because you can’t keep doing the same thing over and over again.

Lisa McMullin [01:20:29]:
No. Well, you can.

Alfie Shaw [01:20:31]:
I mean we’re definitely. I mean we’re working for the right company to do.

Lisa McMullin [01:20:37]:
But it’s the same thing. And not the same.

Alfie Shaw [01:20:39]:
It’s the same thing. But also. Yes, I joke before Jason sends out.

Lisa McMullin [01:20:44]:
The headband, continually find new ways to do the same thing. So it’s. It’s the same but different. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [01:20:53]:
Yeah. Well, it’s just like we were talking about with that Cyberman story, You know, it’s a totally different thing to do with them. And, you know, how many other people could have watched that same thing on Netflix and seen that scene and maybe even had a similar idea, but weren’t in a position to do anything with it?

Lisa McMullin [01:21:10]:
Yeah, yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [01:21:13]:
And somebody probably was like, oh, you just think about Doctor Who too much. That may or may not be true, but you had a chance to actually do something with it.

Alfie Shaw [01:21:24]:
Yeah, it is. It’s interesting. Since we’re back on Big Finish, we’ll crack on. It’s really interesting working on Recast Doctors because I think they have a. I’m aware that they are a thing that divides the audience, but they do have a strength that they are not really people. Like, there isn’t really a desire, for instance, if we had, I don’t know, Jake doing 11 to do Jake as 11 with Amy or Clara or Rory or. I’m sure there were some people out there who wanted that, but, you know, then most people would go, if we are going to do 11 and the ponds, you would like the TV versions, because that’s part of the charm of having those characters back. So what the real strength of doing Recast Doctors is it.

Alfie Shaw [01:22:15]:
It really forces you to do new stuff, which is what really interests me, because there’s a freedom to it. Like, you don’t have to go, I’m working with these characters and. But we know due to a story in 1987, this is where they end up. There is a real freak. Like, we can do whatever we want with our companion. No one knows what’s going to happen to them. We can make loads of guest characters and nobody knows what’s going to happen to them. And there’s just a real chance to kind of explore gaps.

Alfie Shaw [01:22:50]:
And also, because we’re doing recast, we’ve kind of got to them first, so we have that fresh pick of where we want to put these. These new series gaps. And it is like the early days of Big Finish, where, you know, so much of the. The universe had not been mapped out and explored. There are still sort of unexplored pockets. And because we are, you know, using recast, there is a. Almost a kind of obligation to go, well, if you’re going to do this, you know, in my view, with those. Is always recast as little as possible to make the story possible, which is really the Doctor.

Alfie Shaw [01:23:24]:
Once you’ve got that, do something new, give the audience something new, Give it a. You know, bring new people on board, try and do weird, weird things with it. Really stretch. Because one of the, one of the joys of Big Finish Doctor Who is going, oh, I loved Sylvester McCoy. And so if you ordered a Seven of Ace, I really want to do a Seven and a Story and, and doing those and getting to write those characters. But on the flip side, those characters are now very thoroughly explored and you’re constantly, you know, comes back to trying to find something new to do with them. Whereas if you’re doing the recast stuff, it is a lot easier really and a lot more kind of liberating as a producer because you just go, oh, great, that big gap there, we’ll just put it all in there and we can kind of do almost whatever we want, really. So there is a real kind of freedom, I don’t think really gets considered a lot online.

Alfie Shaw [01:24:26]:
People just because people are, you know, wanting. We want Matt or we want Peter or whoever to come back and do the role. There isn’t really that kind of consideration because a lot of the feedback we got from 11 is, oh, I really want more new series stuff to be like this. I want it to be like a new TV series. The TV show. We have the freedom to do that. Because I went to Jake and went, this is the plan. And he went, great, by the way, I will leave at the end of the plan, but let’s do the plan.

Alfie Shaw [01:24:54]:
Whereas if it was Matt, Matt just might want to do 12 box sets of 11 and river, which would be great in its own way, but it wouldn’t be that kind of long form storytelling that part of the audience wants, which we can actually do with more ease with a recast.

Nancy Norbeck [01:25:14]:
Yeah, yeah, well, and I think that the 11 recast is kind of the pinnacle of recasting. There was a conversation on Blue Sky a couple weeks ago where that came up in the One who Feed. And you know, the person who hadn’t listened was like, oh, but it’s not really Matt Smith. And isn’t that kind of jarring? And a whole bunch of us were like, no, you have no idea. It’s not Matt Smith.

Lisa McMullin [01:25:45]:
You just can’t tell the difference, can you?

Nancy Norbeck [01:25:47]:
It’s so freakishly uncanny that, you know, if you listened to it and you didn’t know, you’d swear it with him.

Lisa McMullin [01:25:53]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [01:25:54]:
I mean, there is also a real pressure on them because it’s, you know, not even. These things have to absolutely be essential listens or they are dead in the water. We have no, you know, oh, it’s got that person from the tv. Obviously no one is trying to make Something that’s bad. I do love it when you see people online go, oh, they moved to box set so they could commission one in the middle. That’s bad. Like the commissioning process goes, we need an all time classic from you, an experimental one from you. And you just whatever you can, the worst thing you can, please.

Alfie Shaw [01:26:27]:
Obviously everyone’s trying to do their best, but sometimes you try things and they just don’t quite end up how you like them. That’s the nature of the creative part. But with the recast, it really does have to be well, especially for 11 and 12 because, you know, with the other, recasts it’s generally because sadly, the original actor’s no longer with us. It really. There is a real pressure and I do put myself under quite a lot of pressure. Poor Lisa is like, yes, I have to live with it. But they really do have to be absolutely top tier. I said it was like the line has always got to be, yes, it’s not insert original actor here, but the stories are so good that you have to get them anyway.

Alfie Shaw [01:27:16]:
And it does, it does drive me a bit insane, which I think is probably why I can only do one series of it as a time before I step off. But it’s that kind of weird pressure of these absolutely have to fundamentally be essential. And you, again, you’re trying your best, but there’s no way you can guarantee that, like, that’s, that’s insane.

Lisa McMullin [01:27:39]:
But the two acts, I mean, Jake.

Alfie Shaw [01:27:40]:
And Jake and stuff, we, I mean, we’re very fortunate there. Just go, yeah, but going forward, you’ve got to try and do that again. And yeah, it’s a real, it’s a real, any, the slightest thing and people will go, well, never mind, I’ll just go and buy something with Tom Baker instead. It is a really kind of high, high risk, high reward thing, as I was saying, with the opportunities. But it is also, these had better be absolutely the gold standard or we’re gone. So, yeah, they are quite a unique opportunity, but they are also quite creatively stressful.

Nancy Norbeck [01:28:25]:
Well, having finished finally the 11th doctor, which I will admit that I was putting off, and then when we had you on the schedule the first time, I was like, oh, now I have to finish them, dog. I was like, I don’t want them to end. They’re so good, you know, because it was one of those things where I tried it and I was like, well, we’ll see, you know. And like I listened to the trail and I mean, everybody had seen his, you know, Jacob Dudman’s YouTube video and everything where we all went, holy crap, how does he do that? You know, so it wasn’t really a huge surprise, but it was still. It’s one thing to do somebody’s voice, it’s another thing to somehow get all of those mannerisms and everything else, especially just in your voice. Holy.

Lisa McMullin [01:29:10]:
He’s a great actor. It’s not just an impression.

Nancy Norbeck [01:29:12]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [01:29:16]:
He’s acting.

Nancy Norbeck [01:29:17]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [01:29:18]:
Every, every word. Not just pretending to be Matt Smith.

Nancy Norbeck [01:29:23]:
He’s right.

Lisa McMullin [01:29:24]:
Just. And if you watch him in, if you watch him in the recording booth, he, he moves and gestures. It. It’s bizarre.

Alfie Shaw [01:29:33]:
He.

Lisa McMullin [01:29:34]:
It’s like this being embodied by the spirit of Matt Smith.

Alfie Shaw [01:29:38]:
We’re still alive, currently working at hbo. Maximiz.

Lisa McMullin [01:29:42]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [01:29:43]:
I do find it interesting though that I think, like, weirdly, Doc, the Doctor Who fandom is more. I mean, this might be because I’ve got an outside suspect from other fandoms. They seem more suspicious of recasting, but other sci fi things. And I do wonder if it’s because the idea of regeneration is anyone could play and do their version of it.

Nancy Norbeck [01:30:03]:
Well, I, I will admit when I found out that, you know, you guys were bringing back the Brigadier, I was like, oh. You know, and then when I found out who was doing it, I was like, oh, okay, that might work. That might work.

Alfie Shaw [01:30:19]:
Yeah.

Lisa McMullin [01:30:19]:
It’s always difficult, especially if an actor’s died as well, because you don’t want to do anything that might sully the. Their memory or the way that they performed a part or created a part. I think, I think with Harry Sullivan as well, that big finish have done really well in the casting because he plays it just beautifully. Christopher Naylor is just got that, that quality. And again, it’s not, it’s not impersonating anybody. He’s performing it. I always think the people. I don’t understand why people.

Lisa McMullin [01:30:55]:
I kind. I do understand why people would prefer the original actors, but obviously that’s not always possible. Right. Especially if somebody’s deceased. But it’s a character. And I think with other, other plays, other stories, you recast characters over and over again.

Alfie Shaw [01:31:13]:
Well, this is why I was wondering about the regeneration thing because, you know, Star Trek has now three spocks. One of them is hotspot. Star wars has the animated series where loads of other people voice the same characters and all. That’s all canon and everyone seems generally quite happy with all of them. It seems to be quite an interesting, Quite specific. Yeah, Doctor Who or somebody else is playing this person. And maybe it is because it could be. Well, Actually, you know, shoot.

Alfie Shaw [01:31:47]:
He could regenerate into Jacob or, you know, or Jonathan Kali or maybe, but.

Lisa McMullin [01:31:52]:
But with characters. So not the Doctor characters like the Brigadier and Harry and.

Nancy Norbeck [01:31:59]:
Yeah, with the Brigadier, I think with. For me, at least, and I can’t speak for anybody else, just Nicholas Courtney had such a distinctive voice. Yeah. To have someone else come in and try to do that, I was like, how is that going to. Gonna work until. Well, okay. If anybody could do it, Jon Culshaw could do it.

Alfie Shaw [01:32:16]:
Yeah. Oh, Jon.

Lisa McMullin [01:32:17]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [01:32:20]:
It’s an interesting one.

Lisa McMullin [01:32:21]:
And there’s no ego with Jon either, as well. I think that’s always important is that actors come in and they’re not saying, oh, this is how you actually play the part. I’m gonna stamp my thing on it. He comes in with such humility and he wants to pay homage to the.

Alfie Shaw [01:32:37]:
And so. But also so keen in a sort of quiet way. He’s such a massive Doctor Who fan. He’s the only actor who, when I said to him, oh, hi, Jn, I’m a producer. I’m considering, you know, this story what ended up being awol. The short trip, if you’ve heard it, between where he plays the Brigadier and the third Doctor myself. And, you know, Angus has got this idea and he sort of went. He went away and then came back about 20 minutes race went, yes, this sounds like a good idea.

Alfie Shaw [01:33:04]:
Then arranged a meeting off his own back with the writer and myself to discuss it, which I think is the first time any actor has gone. I would like to organize a meeting to discuss the story we’re going to do. I was very confused by it and, you know, put forward some ideas that were used. He’s. He’s a wonder to work with.

Nancy Norbeck [01:33:26]:
Well, I think, you know, the fact that you guys are so respectful of those characters and those actors, I think makes it easier for people to say, okay, you know, it’s not. It’s not ideal. We’d all much rather, you know, have Nicholas Courtney around to do this, but we’re gonna. We’re gonna give it a shot because it’s done from such a place of respect and admiration. So I think that comes through too. And, you know, when you are talking about Jon Culshaw, I’m just thinking, he’s the guy who once called Tom Baker as Tom Baker. I mean, that. That, that is so, so nervily hilarious.

Lisa McMullin [01:34:11]:
Yeah.

Alfie Shaw [01:34:13]:
The danger with all these people who can do impressions, this is. This is. This might get me to a small amount of trouble, but never mind, is when we do the Wild Tracks, at the end of the day, you know, people make making crowd noises and things. Jacob and John both try to get like Trump in the background of alien planets. Boris Johnson and some of them made them. If you listen out quite carefully and these, there’s an alien congress that I think the twelfth Doctor takes Oscar. And if you listen out, there’s definitely Trump and Boris in on that planet.

Nancy Norbeck [01:34:46]:
We’ll have to listen for that now. Even if you’ve heard it already, you’ll have to listen for that. Wow. Well, I feel like I have taken up a good chunk of your time, but this has been so much fun. So thank you so much.

Lisa McMullin [01:35:05]:
Thank you very much.

Nancy Norbeck [01:35:08]:
That’s this week’s episode. Thanks so much to Lisa McMullin and Alfie Shaw, and to you for listening. Please leave a review for this episode. You’ll find a link in your podcast app so it’s really easy and it’ll only take a minute. If you enjoyed our conversation, I hope you’ll share it with a friend. Thank you so much. If this episode resonated with you, or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at The Spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners.

Nancy Norbeck [01:35:45]:
The link is in your podcast app, so so sign up today. See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

Freelance writer Amy Weinland Daughters mostly wrote about college football until she decided to try her hand at, in her words, “a hilarious time travel novel.” That novel, You Cannot Mess This Up: A True Story That Never Happened, turned out to be a catharsis, giving her a whole new look at her childhood and her family. It’s gone on to win the Silver Winner for Humor in the 2019 Foreword INDIES and the Overall Winner for Humor/Comedy in the 2020 Next Generation Indie Award.

Amy and I talk about the experience of writing about sports as a woman, what happens when a creative project becomes “real,” the importance of supporting each other’s creative dreams, even if they seem a little crazy, and just how she re-constituted Thanksgiving weekend 1978, and her whole family from an adult point of view, in her book.

Episode breakdown:

00:00 Introduction

01:22 Always creative, imaginative childhood eventually inspired writing.

09:27 Support networks vital for achieving difficult careers.

10:42 Creative doubt and imposter syndrome affect identity.

18:23 Creating requires empathy; art preferences are subjective.

21:14 Believe in yourself; push to create magic.

27:52 Unexpectedly transformative journey, beyond initial intentions.

36:41 Book evoked nostalgia, laughter, and personal reflection.

38:59 Embraced younger self, now proud and united.

45:44 Memories change with age and perspective.

52:18 Nostalgic, relatable, thought-provoking, humorously realistic moments.

53:12 Misunderstood as sci-fi; divided reader opinions.

59:29 People share personal childhood stories with Amy.

Amy Weinland Daughters Show Links

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Transcript: Amy Weinland Daughters

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Freelance writer Amy Weinland Daughters mostly wrote about college football until she decided to try her hand at, in her words, a hilarious time travel novel. That novel, You Cannot Mess This Up: A True Story that Never Happened, turned out to be a catharsis, giving her a whole new look at her childhood and her family.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:39]:
It’s gone on to win the Silver Winner for Humor in the 2019 Foreward INDIES and the Overall Winner for Humor and Comedy at the 2020 Next Generation Indie Award. Amy and I talk about the experience of writing about sports as a woman, what happens when a creative project becomes real, the importance of supporting each other’s creative dreams, even if they seem a little crazy, and just how she reconstituted Thanksgiving weekend 1978, and her whole family from an adult point of view, in her book. Here’s my conversation with Amy Weinland Daughters. Amy, welcome to Follow youw Curiosity.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:01:19]:
Thank you so much, Nancy. I’m very excited about being here.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:22]:
So I start everybody off with the same question. Were you a creative kid or did you discover your creative side later on?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:01:30]:
No, I was a creative kid in a lot of different ways. A lot of pretend, a lot of makeup stuff. You know, even when I was by myself, I would run through the woods and make up like alternate worlds. Not fantasy as in dragons and swords, but more like I live on a farm and I know I’m going to go pick these onions as if this was a crop, you know, so always creative. And, you know, I didn’t really pick up the creative writing, you know, I think I did a little bit of that poems and I always kind of thought it was funny. But then as I went through high school, I started to write more, write short stories. And so I think it’s always. That’s always been in me some somehow, but it didn’t really manifest itself to later in my life as a real component, you know, of a career or, you know, where I took it seriously.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:23]:
Were you encouraged as a kid to keep doing creative things even if you didn’t recognize that it was a real thing for you?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:02:30]:
Yeah, I think that’s a tricky thing because I was kind of very exuberant child. And so I think, you know, my dad, who was not around me most of the day, encouraged me more than my mother. But I think I was a handful and I think she liked that about me. But also this was like the 70s and so. So that had to been managed in some way. But I was encouraged, and I’ve always been encouraged. And the thing that they encouraged me to do the most was I would come up like crazy ideas. They’d be like, yeah, that’s a great idea.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:03:01]:
And I think that ties into creativity. So I definitely feel like it was never completely squelched. Not the creative part of my personality, kind of out of control part. I know that’s a lot of personal information, but all that’s wrapped together though, you know, it’s part of my personality. It’s part of your personality. So.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:18]:
So, yeah, absolutely. So when did you start really looking at writing as a real thing?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:03:25]:
Well, you know, I wrote short stories and I had an English teacher in high school. I think it was my junior year of high school. And I showed her the stories and she’s like, you know, Amy, these are pretty good. And I wasn’t, you know, a great student in that. I’m not a super book smart person, you know, I’m more of an outside the box person. But when she told me that, I was like, wait a second, you know, I was. She was somebody I really respected. And so then I got more serious about writing the stories.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:03:53]:
And so when I got accepted to. This was back when you got accepted to college and you didn’t declare your major right away. Like, you didn’t get into college to go to business school. You would have had to get into business school once you got to college, if that makes sense. So I went to Texas Tech and this was like 12 hours from my house. I grew up in Houston and I was standing in this, you know, the student union building with my father. And if I went this way, I was going to go be in the business school. And if I went the other way, I was going to be in the journalism school.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:04:23]:
Because I think I knew then that I wanted to write and that a little bit of encouragement from my teacher, you know, made me think maybe that was a thing. And my dad, God bless him, didn’t tell me what to do. And I really think he wanted me to go the business way because he felt like that was my. The best way to support myself, which would have been the whole point of him paying for all this. But he didn’t say anything. He was like, it’s your decision. And I went to business school on my own. It was my own decision.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:04:50]:
I never regret it. I got a degree in business management and I went and worked in purchasing for probably a dozen years in Houston. After I graduated, moved up the ranks there, loved it, thought it was great. But I was always the girl who reread her emails to herself like eight times. And like I write the memo for the picnic and like it would be like funny. You’d laugh, you’d cry. It was an experience, you know, so I was still doing it, you know, at that point I didn’t know I was doing it though. I just like, that’s part of me, that’s part of who I am.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:05:22]:
And then we had a major turning point in our family. My husband’s job, we both were moving up, you know, in our respective careers and his job said, hey, why don’t you all move to the UK for three years? And we were like, that’s cool, we’re in our 30s, you know. And so we did it and so we move over there and I don’t have a work visa, I’m going to suspend my career. Which looking back it’s almost seems, you know, like what were we thinking? But it was so, it was such a grand adventure. And so at first I was like, well I have one kid and he went to school. And I was like so what am I going to do? Like I’ve never done this before. And so I went to the university near where I lived and took history classes, which was fascinating. But then I was like, okay, I’ve got to do something else.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:06:04]:
It was almost out of desperation, I was like wait, all right, you know, and so I like out of left field. And I think it just kind of hit me when I was writing emails home. It was before social media and I would like kind of update on everybody what was going on in English England, you know, like funny haha. But like real information, like this is the struggle with dial up Internet in England because it was like 2000 so and like pictures of castles of me wearing a kilt, you know, all that kind of stuff. So I did that and then I started looking around so the Internet was, you know, starting to blossom. I was like wait a second, I think I could do something with this. So I started submitting things and I had so much time to do this so I could really got invested in it. And then people started buying my stuff and I was like wait a second, there’s something to this.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:06:49]:
And by the time I got to the end of England I was, I was making, would have been the equivalent of a part time job. And then voila, we get back to Houston, I’m pregnant with my second kid. And so I’m like, I don’t Want to get, I don’t want to dip my toes back in full time because I need to have this kid first. And so then when I got back over, somehow magically, I’ve always loved sports. I started writing for this guy, like freelance writing, college football. And he’s like, well, here’s a contract. Why don’t we just do this for real? Then I started working for the Bleacher Report. So I never went back to purchasing or any outside of the house career.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:07:24]:
I just, I just rolled with this writing thing and it turned into a full time job. And never in a million years, Nancy, would I have thought that this would have been my career path, you know, And I found myself in this process and I found really what I really think what I was supposed to be doing all along.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:45]:
It’s so interesting that it didn’t turn out to be, oh, I made the wrong choice when I went for the business degree that it worked out that you liked it, but you still ended up essentially kind of having made both choices at the same time.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:08:01]:
Right, right. And I guess life just pulled me that way. And the other thing I have is I have a super supportive, like in my house, support network and I have people who take me seriously, including a spouse who’s like, that’s a great idea. But I also think he felt like he sacrificed, like I sacrificed so we could go do those things. But it doesn’t always work that way in a relationship. And I realized that someone who is a creative person who wants to, you know, pursue, especially in the realm of books where there’s no promise while you’re sitting here, you know, flogging yourself for hours, doing this thing going. And everyone around you has got to be going, oh my gosh. But I’ve been lucky because he has really supported me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:08:40]:
Not in just, you know, go in the other room and roll his eyes, which I’m sure he’s done that because this is marriage, you know, but he’s been like, no, we’re going to take this seriously. Your mom’s in there, you know, and she’s got to go somewhere for the weekend and do this because you people are allowed. I mean, I’ve been taken seriously that my children have taken me seriously. So I’ve been super. And I don’t think, I think any successes I’ve had has a lot to do with my support network. It’s almost like being a quarterback and going to an NFL team. And like Patrick Mahomes went to Kansas City and he had that entire support network, you know, and then somebody else went to the Cleveland Browns and didn’t win the super bowl, and they were both great quarterbacks. I’m just saying, I think that’s really, that that’s been a big component of the trajectory of my writing career.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:27]:
That makes sense to me because I’ve talked to so many people now, and one of the biggest themes that I’ve heard over and over again is how much of a difference it makes when you have that support network. You know, especially as a kid, if your family is not sitting there and saying you can’t write or be a musician or whatever because you’ll starve and you’re never going to make any money and so you have to go into the family business or go get the business degree or whatever. There’s a huge difference. You know, the people who succeed in those fields that we typically tend to think of as difficult to succeed in. Like, you know, if you want to be a professional musician, what are the odds that you’ll actually manage it? Have all had that kind of support. And so, you know, it’s. I think it’s so much easier to doubt yourself and to give up on yourself if you don’t have that sort of cheering section. So I’m not, I’m not at all surprised that you think that that made a difference.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:10:27]:
Right. And I think, you know, to doubt, I mean, back to doubt anybody does something creative, there’s already the built in doubt without having the people doubt you around you. Because I know that. And I think as a woman, I think that the doubts even compounded, you know, and.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:41]:
Absolutely.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:10:42]:
And when you do something creative, like writing, like you said, making music, making art, whatever you want to call it, I mean, the doubt. And I think that really my, you know, path through the business school and the business world or whatever you want to call that, that made me even feel less like a writer. Because I still to this day don’t want to say, like, I want, you know, like, I’m a ribbon dancer. I want to say something else because I don’t, like, there’s still a part of me that’s like, I don’t really fit in. Like, I was looking at the guests that you’ve had on your podcast. I was like, oh my gosh, like, look at these esteemed people. And then here’s the girl who wrote herself back in time, you know, funny ha ha girl, but that, but that. And they call it imposter syndrome.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:11:23]:
I don’t know if that’s what. But I think we all have A component of that, you know, because, you know, I’m not a professionally trained writer, and so what am I doing? Writing. But that’s, I think that’s what it’s important about podcasts like yours and what I’ve listened is because you’re empowering people to feel like, by hearing their stories, to feel like, hey, look, if he can do it, if she can do it, you know, this is a path for me. And maybe it’s not writing, maybe it’s whatever their, their thing is. And that’s very powerful stories.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:49]:
I hope so, because that’s a big part of why I do this. So, yeah, I think there are ways to do the things that we love. Even if it’s not a full time job and even if it hasn’t been so easy to figure out what that is or how to do it. I think you can find your way. Which is why I talk to people that, you know, friends of mine from high school that nobody else has heard of, who do, you know, really cool things on the side. Because, yeah, go do your thing on the side. Go do it for 15 minutes after work. You know, if that’s all you have, do it better than not doing it at the end of the week.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:33]:
You’ll have done a couple hours worth and look, you’ll have something to show for it, and who knows where it’ll go.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:12:39]:
Well, then that’s what. And then also those are the things that feed, you know, people’s souls. You know that. Those are the things that really make us who we are. And I think it changes every other component of our lives. You know, we become better people. We became better moms, better sisters, better brothers, you know, whatever, co workers, whatever it is. You know, my story at work is great because I was a better employee when I was over there rereading my emails because I was so, you know, enthusiastic about that part of it, that it made me, you know, a happier, better coworker, better employee, all the rest of it more effective.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:16]:
And that’s how, you know you’re really a writer, right? Because you’re sitting there rereading your email 16 times before you can finally hit send, right? That’s just how we’re wired.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:13:26]:
That’s right. That’s right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:28]:
Yeah. So you mentioned, like, the extra pressure of being a woman. And that’s one of the things that I wondered about since you’ve done sports writing. How, how was that?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:13:37]:
You, you know, when I started, you know, doing it, seriously, it was like 2006 maybe. And really, I’m happy to report that the, it has changed a lot in those years between now and then. I’m, I’m. This is last season. College football season was the first season I didn’t actively write about football because I had stuff happen with my, with both my books and I just, it was, it was too much. I couldn’t do it and I really missed it. But at the beginning it was, I mean, you know, and we’re in the online so you can picture it. It’s.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:14:11]:
First of all, we’re online where everybody can say whatever they want to, you know, second of all, I’m a woman writing about college football and it’s so opinion based because that’s what they want. They want your opinion and the people want to kick it around. But if you look at your objective, you know, male sports writers take a lot of grief as well, not just women. But if you attach that you’re a woman, then you’re really going to get it. So I really got it at the beginning and I really had to learn how to manage that because I’m kind of a sensitive soul at the end of the day. And you know, kind of what I finally, you know, I had a couple things I did. One, I didn’t read all the comments. I couldn’t because it would just, I would just mess with me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:14:50]:
If somebody sent me an email, even if it was a horrible email, I’d respond and just say, I’m not going to, I’m not going to listen to you. And the other thing I started doing because I’m real numbers based person, so a lot of things I wrote about were about statistics. And so at the bottom of every one of my articles I started linking the statistics sites that I use. Just saying statistics courtesy of. Because that shut a lot of people down. Shut a lot of people down. Because what I learned is I could back up everything, my opinions with actual data. Not because I’m a woman, because that’s how my brain works, but I put that at the bottom.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:15:23]:
It’s like, okay, I mean you can argue with me, but the numbers are the numbers. And that, that really helped me. And then I really got the support. What ends up happening is you get a, you know, a support group of readers. I did a lot of radio of listeners and then of editors and other sports writers. And all those people I’m talking about are usually males but they start to see the merit of your work and then you just focus on that feedback. And I think the other thing that it did for a while, it Held me back from getting better at what I was doing because I was so, you know, I was so engrossed with the fact that I was just getting like. And I mean, a literal get back in the kitchen type comments.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:03]:
Oh, I’m sure.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:16:04]:
Yeah. So. And much worse. You know, but that has changed. It absolutely has changed. And I’m sure it’s changed for me because I got better at it and because I had some kind of traction and, you know, people have maybe heard of me or not heard of me, but then it goes back to. Also I took myself more seriously and gained confidence.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:27]:
Yeah. But I think you must have really figured out how to. I don’t like this expression. But grow a thicker skin or armor yourself for. Yeah, because that’s. That’s just such a rough thing. And I, you know, everybody always says don’t ever read the comments, and I agree with that. But I also know it is the hardest thing in the world not to read the comments.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:16:50]:
Oh. Oh. And if you’re in a. I mean, like, that’s like in a vulnerable position. Like, you get in bed and you have your phone. Not a good idea. Because you’re gonna. You’re gonna.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:16:59]:
That’s when you’re gonna look. You’re. When you’re off guard, you’re gonna look. And you, you know, authors, same way. Don’t. The comments are. That’s a different thing. But it’s.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:17:08]:
But it’s very difficult. And I think you have to know yourself and you have to respect your own boundaries because that’s what the sports writing where I finally had to do. That’s not gonna be. Do me any good. And I’d have friends be like, oh, my God, you gotta get on there right now. They’re hammering you. I’m like, you guys go do all that. That’s not gonna do me any good.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:17:23]:
And make a boundary and say, I’m not going there. I can’t do it, because I just can’t. I can’t go on if I do it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:30]:
Yeah. And I. Now that you mentioned that, I had an experience a couple years ago with somebody who was a friend of mine who was like, you know, people are talking about something you said on your podcast, and they’re saying that it’s not actually true. And I’m like, well, did they listen to the podcast? Because the guest said it, not me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:17:46]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:47]:
You know, but. And they thought they were doing me a favor, but all it did was just like, my adrenaline was sky high. I was trying really hard not to freak out. And, you know, talking to somebody else about it later, they were like, why was that even any of your business? It’s not something that I would have encountered if they hadn’t mentioned it to me. You know, I would have gone right on with my day, no big deal. And instead it was just like, ah, you know, for a couple hours until everything just settled back down again. And I think, I think people think they’re being helpful, but they’re really not.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:18:23]:
Right. Right. And I think that, yeah, unless you’re on the side of the creating, it’s hard to know what that is like, you know, it’s hard to know because you get a lot of comments even about the books, and you just think you, you’re, you’re discounting because you look at other authors, you’re discounting even if you didn’t like it, you know, all the work that went into it and books and articles and music and art. It’s like wine, you know, just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s any not good. And I would never come up to you and say, I cannot believe Nancy, you drink chardonnay. I mean, you lightweight, you know, but people will come up to other people and say, I can’t read. I can’t believe you read Danielle Steele. Like, what were you thinking? And that’s ridiculous because if you like Danielle Steele and I’m still reading Nancy Drew, who cares? I mean, that’s the thing.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:19:14]:
If we could take that, you know, but wine people can be that way too, frankly. But I’m just saying, if we, but that’s like all of life, like your one small voice inside of you pushing you to do these crazy things, you know, if, if, if we could all just support each other on our different tracks rather than, you know, try to tell each other, you know, no, no, this is the way to do it. This is the blueprint, you know, rather than saying, oh my God, that’s nuts. Go do it. Let’s go. That’s crazy, you know?

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:38]:
Yeah, I like that. That’s nuts. Go do it. Totally, totally. Hang that like on my bathroom mirror. But yeah, yeah, if we all encouraged each other the things we would accomplish.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:19:54]:
Oh, yeah. And if you felt like you had that real support from other human beings, you know, if you’re like, you know, you’ve got this one friend who’s like, yeah. And then I’ve had, with the first book, which I never thought I was going to write, I had a set of probably three, three different friends who would every Once I’d be like, where’s the book? Like, are we gonna do it or we’re not gonna do it? Like, what are you doing? And that. Then I. That was there in the back of the. There are the acknowledgments of that book. Because it was like, y’all made a difference. You guys checking on me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:20:21]:
Because it made me feel like it was real. And you were holding me accountable to what I said I was gonna do. And the whole time, I thought, that’s nuts. I’m not actually gonna do that. And then, voila. I’m talking to Nancy.

Nancy Norbeck [00:20:34]:
Well, and, you know, that whole thing about feeling like something’s real is something we don’t talk about. I don’t think anybody’s ever really brought it up before on this show, except maybe me and a pep talk, maybe. But there is something that happens when a project starts to feel real to you and not like some loopy flight of fancy that, you know, oh, you know, I was just really tired, and I don’t know where this came from, and that was a dumb idea. But there’s something that happens when it starts to feel real that is almost magical. It’s like it takes on a life of its own to an extent, at that point.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:21:14]:
No, you’re 100% right. And when you get there, it is a magical moment, if you can just push yourself just. And believe enough of your own crap for long enough to get there. Because, you know, with my novel, the time travel novel, I remember, I. You know, I wrote the whole thing, and my husband was like, what are you going to do with it? And I’m like, I need an editor. This is before I thought it was going to get published. And he’s like, well, let’s hire somebody. And he said, that way we at least leave our kids with something they can read, you know? And that’s what I’m talking about.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:21:47]:
Him taking it seriously. I was like, okay. So I get in my first meeting with this lady, and she’s, like, trying to tell me, like, we’re talking about the narrative and the storyline and the characters and, like, stuff I need to cut. And I stop her. And I’m like, wait a second. I’m like, so you think, like, this is a real book? And she’s like, I don’t understand what you’re saying. I was like, no, like, it’s a real book. Like, you really feel like it’s a real book? She’s like, what are we doing here if this isn’t a real book? Like, yes, this is a real book.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:22:13]:
Like, she was like, I don’t understand your question. And I was like, no, like, really, this is like a real book? And she’s like, yes, let’s move on now. We’re going to have to, you know. But it was that. That’s how much I didn’t believe it, you know, That’s. That’s how much I didn’t believe it. But then once you let yourself go where you have that moment, you’re like, oh, my gosh, this is real. You know, it is like the.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:22:36]:
It’s like this magical point in your life that you could have never imagined.

Nancy Norbeck [00:22:42]:
Yeah. Yeah. And I’m thinking now, when I wrote my book, it was my MFA thesis, and I don’t know how, when. When that moment might have hit, because, you know, when it’s an academic thing, it’s sort of real and sort of not all at the same time. And yet it’s a real book.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:23:02]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:23:03]:
Caught a couple boxes in my guest room.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:23:06]:
So do I. In my guest room.

Nancy Norbeck [00:23:08]:
Yeah.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:23:08]:
That’s where the books go.

Nancy Norbeck [00:23:09]:
I guess it’s a real. A real thing. Maybe it was when I graduated, you know, and I had to get up and do a reading and print out all 300 and some pages and stick them in one of those ugly black thesis binders that goes in the library and all of that. Maybe it was then. I know right after that, my cousin took my file to work and had it printed up and spiral bound and, you know, not an actual paperback copy of something, but it still looked a whole lot more real than it had before. And that was a moment.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:23:43]:
Right, Right. And I think that if people could just hang on long enough and believe just long enough that it could be something that you can get yourself to that moment, you know, because I had that moment when I asked her, and I didn’t even know it was going to be a book at that point. I just wanted someone in the book world to think it was a real book. Like, think it had the potential to be a book. But like you said, that moment when it clicks in your own brain, whenever that is in your heart, you’re like, wow, you know?

Nancy Norbeck [00:24:13]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The day that the paperback proof arrived was definitely another one. Oh, yeah, it’s definitely a real book. Like, holy cow.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:24:22]:
Yeah. That’s otherworldly for sure.

Nancy Norbeck [00:24:24]:
Yeah. Yeah. I remember taking pictures of it and sending it to people, being like, it’s a real book.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:24:32]:
Yeah. Yeah. No, that’s. But that’s exactly how it feels, though, because it’s, you know, you don’t quite believe it yourself.

Nancy Norbeck [00:24:39]:
Right, right. And even then, you know, you’re kind of sitting there looking at it, going, so there are words inside there. Right. They’re the ones that I wrote. It’s not. It’s not just a little illusion that’s sitting on the coffee table staring at me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:24:51]:
Right. And then you’re like, oh, my gosh, now I can’t change any of that. Whoops. You know, now it’s so for real that I can’t take it back. And then years pass and you’re like, you progress as a person. And, you know, you might have said things differently, but I do think that there’s something so profound about the book being three years old or four years older because it captures a snapshot of who you were at that time. And it’s so terribly brave because you don’t know that. I think you know that with the second book.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:25:22]:
But it’s so terribly brave to allow a snapshot of your life or yourself out in the world and you’re willing to stand by that. I think there’s something very freeing about that. And I think that what comes with that is you almost the freedom to do something else crazy. Because, you know, it’s out there. It’s very brave. And I think that’s not recognized in the publishing process either.

Nancy Norbeck [00:25:43]:
Oh, yeah. No, not at all. Not at all. But you’re right, it is. It’s like this little moment captured in Amber, and it is what it is. It sits there and it’s like, I might not be that person anymore, but I was that person once.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:25:57]:
Right. And this may not be perfect, but you know what? It was pretty good at the time and I did my best.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:03]:
Yeah. And hopefully I had fun doing it.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:26:06]:
Yeah, 100%.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:08]:
So let’s talk about the time travel novel memoir. Because I’m so fascinated that you started out thinking that you were going to write this hilarious time travel novel.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:26:24]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:25]:
And then you ended up with something so different, which ending up with something different than you start with is not that uncommon. But in your case, it was a big. I want to say a big shift, but maybe it wasn’t really a shift. And it was always that, and you just didn’t know it at the beginning. I don’t. I don’t know.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:26:42]:
I don’t know. It was so non intentional that, you know, like you said, I had the idea to write a hilarious time travel book where I wrote myself back to my own childhood. And I had this idea for, like, Eight years. I was probably still, it was probably pre moving to the uk and I had thought about it and thought about, because I love everything vintage from the past. You know, I have a metal detector, I like the Sears catalog. I, you know, this before YouTube, I would get my hands on anything again. Old newspapers, magazines, whatever, the History Channel. I like all of it.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:27:14]:
And then I think I’m funny. And so those two things, I was like, this could be really funny. You know, she goes back in time, gets dropped off at her parents house. They’re the same age as her, they don’t know who she is. And then she’s got to deal with her 10 year old self. And I didn’t realize it before I started writing it. Once I started writing it and I think it was the moment in the book like, you know, I did the whole, you know, I used an airplane as my time travel mechanism. I think when she gets to the house that she grew up in and the pilot is dropping her off and tells her, you have to go in there for 36 hours, they think you’re their cousin and she knows where she is.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:27:52]:
And I think when, when my dad opens the door in that book, that’s when I started to realize, wait a second, this is going to be way more than some little troll up through time. You know, it’s going to, you know, it’s going to be. And then when the grandparents show up who passed away, there’s just layers and layers and layers. And I’ve had so many people ask me, so did you work with your psychologist before you set off on this journey and you were like trying to get to this land of catharsis? I was like, no, no, no, I wasn’t trying to do that at all. You know, I was not. And I realized that this was going to be something that was going to change me, you know, and that was not my intention at all, which I actually think is good that I didn’t go in with that intention because I think it was a lot, the way it happened organically, it’s probably a lot realer. And then that editor I mentioned that I worked with, there was points where I didn’t go far enough in the first version of the book. And she’s like, wait a second.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:28:50]:
You know, she was like a great reader’s advocate, which a story editor should be. She was like, you’re going to have to go further. We can’t leave everyone hang on, you’re going to have to go deeper. And that was hard to do. I mean, parts of that book were really hard to write. And because. Because basically what it is is it’s a memoir, you know, and it’s wrapped in this tortilla of fiction because it’s time travel. So basically I had the privilege of writing about my life as if it was fictional, but most of it’s nonfiction.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:21]:
Yeah. As I was reading it, there were moments where I was like, how is she doing this? She’s got both of these things going on at the same time. And how in the heck do you even make this work? But it. But it does. Did you, like, have any conversations with your family before you started it? I mean, I know I read the acknowledgments, and it sounded like you mostly talked to them about it afterwards. But I mean, I’m kind of like, where did you know? Because you’re. You were 10. So.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:54]:
So, so much that you weren’t necessarily aware of, like the party after the kids went to bed on Thanksgiving, you know, and things like that. Where. Where did you find that or how much of it did you end up just making up?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:30:08]:
Well, I talked to my mom quite a bit, both my parents, and. And then my own experience as a parent, realizing that these people that I gave birth to don’t know what’s going on here, you know, and so I would say about 75% of it is stuff I remember as a kid now. Like the scene of. I used. I. You know, my parents had a swimming party a couple times, and I use those memories to write the part about the party, you know, But. But. But most of it, you know, is real memories.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:30:38]:
And I did talk to my parents about the relationship between their two sets of parents, because as I got older and watched them as an adult, I could see some of that myself. So I used some of my adult experience with these people to write what I. What I would imagined it would have looked like, you know, and kind of turning my memories on their head. And some of them were real childhood memories, which is hilarious, because my brother and sister were like, that never happened. I was like, this is my book. You have no idea what happened. They’re like, she made that up. I’m like, that’s real.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:31:10]:
You know, we argued over the finer points, but I didn’t. I didn’t have deep conversations with either of them about it, because we’re from the 70s. We don’t talk about our feelings. You know, I mean, why would we talk about that? And I think that, yeah, so I didn’t spend a lot of time talking to them. I Did have a couple real long conversations with both my parents and my dad. They were all so good about. And it amazes me about my mom because I write a lot about my mom and our relationship, like a lot of people’s was difficult with their mother or their father or with a parental figure. But my dad was like, you know, don’t ask us permission, just do what you got to do.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:31:47]:
And I wonder if he ever.

Nancy Norbeck [00:31:50]:
Amazing.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:31:51]:
Yeah, so I was given the. I was given that even my mom, who I was really afraid to have her read it. You know, she was at the front of every book signing, sitting in the front row. She’s been. And she. I think she really loved the. You know, because one of the themes that runs through the book is me watching my mom, you know, me being B and 48 something, her being 48 in the book, me watching my mom, maybe in a 90s, 2000s mom watching my 70s mom going, oh my gosh, she’s doing all that same stuff, only she don’t have the Internet or she doesn’t have the support that women have in 2010. She has zero.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:32:27]:
She’s not the 50s, but she’s, you know, she’s not 20, 20, you know, for either. And I think she loved me thinking that my dad’s a great guy, but is that the right guy for her? She loved all that because I think she felt so much more seen in a lot of the parts of the book. And I think that’s a very relatable theme to a lot of, you know, mothers and daughters, women, large, even men, though, you know.

Nancy Norbeck [00:32:53]:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s amazing because I did, you know, what’s the right way to say this? Like, you, your look at your mother, as far as I can tell without having been there is. So it’s objective, but it’s simultaneously kind of really sympathetic, but also, oh, good God, what’s going on here?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:33:22]:
Right?

Nancy Norbeck [00:33:22]:
And that’s. That is such an interesting combination. And I think that is, you know, if you had the opportunity to go back, that’s probably exactly what you would be thinking is, wow, you know, I never noticed this, but what is happening here? And holy cow. You know, so, yeah, when I was reading it, there were a couple of times when I was like, I wonder what her mom thought about this. Yeah, but you’re right, you know, I can see where she would feel really seen.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:33:51]:
Right. Validated. And.

Nancy Norbeck [00:33:53]:
Yeah.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:33:53]:
You know, and at the same time, you know, she had a difficult relationship with her mother. And that’s, I mean, that’s in the book, too. And so, yeah, I read it, you know, and it’s hard to read your own book as, you know, objectively.

Nancy Norbeck [00:34:07]:
Yeah.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:34:07]:
But, you know, I think that what I did, though, to create that, I. Because my kids were little at the time. And so I actually went away to this hotel, like the 70s hotel south of Dayton, Ohio, where we lived at the time. And I did, like, you know, three nights, like, go down to the 70s salad bar and eat, you know, have a glass of wine. But then I had like, a vcr. I took a VCR with me. I brought all the tapes, I had all the photos laid out in this room, and I just tried to put myself back emotionally. Like, what would this really look like if I actually did it? And the other second key thing that happened is when I was writing the book, our house, the physical house, went up for sale.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:34:50]:
And so I flew back to Houston and got a showing of the house. And I invited. Here’s who end up going to this showing. My mother and my father and my brother and sister and I. So we go back into this house, and it had been redone. Parts of it have been redone, but we physically inhabited the space together, the five of us. And it was such a valuable spatial. And these people are kicking around memories because we’re walking around this house and this poor real estate agent thinks we’re actually interested in buying it, you know, But, I mean, it was a great move for the book, you know, but those two, those weekends, plus that combined, I think, is where I got the emotional, like, my tact, like, how would this actually look for me? And then once I got rolling on that, then it, you know, it.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:35:37]:
It seemed to. I just. I guess I actually, you know, had a time travel experience in my own head, I guess is the best way to put it that I wrote about.

Nancy Norbeck [00:35:47]:
Yeah, yeah, it’s. It’s funny when you’re talking about going back to the house. A year or two ago, I went to see my parents, and we spent the first night that I was there, all of us on our own separate devices, looking up old houses on Zillow.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:36:03]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:03]:
And looking at all the pictures. So I haven’t been back to the house that I grew up in, but I’ve seen it, and it looked so small.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:36:10]:
That’s it. That’s it. And that’s why when I. When I write the scene, when I come through, dad opens the door, I come through. I wrote that entire scene based on my entire reaction when I walked in that house again, you know, in 2000, whatever that was. 2016, 18, I don’t remember. But that entire thing was like, oh, my gosh, this is the. And I think it’s so relatable because any one of us who walked back, you know, because everyone I talked to about this book, you can see it.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:36:36]:
It’s like, click, click, click, click, click. They put themselves in Big Amy’s.

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:39]:
Absolutely.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:36:41]:
And then they say, what about little Nancy? Like, what would that look like? What would that feel like? And it’s immediately that’s. I’m really proud of the story because what I could have never guessed in a million years, and I’m not tooting my own horn here, I’m just saying this is what ended up happening. I wrote a catharsis, and people feel like they had their own reading the book. And if you would have told me that, I just want everybody to laugh out loud in the bus station, you know, that would have. I would have been fine with that, you know, but. But what a great honor, though, to, you know, basically reintroduce people to their own younger version of themselves, because that’s what this book ended up doing and, you know, evoking all these great memories, you know, and making people laugh, which is the thing that I like the best about it. So.

Nancy Norbeck [00:37:25]:
Yeah. And I think. And obviously you can correct me if my read is wrong, but as I was reading it, I’m not going to lie, there’s a part of me that’s like, I want to write my own book like this now. Except I think if I did, I think you’re right. You had the advantage of not knowing that’s where you were going. And I think that probably made it better. But, yeah, I was like, boy, I could use an experience like this to go back and, you know, even in my own head, hang out with my younger self and kind of get to encourage her and talk to her and have her back when it seemed like maybe nobody else did. And, you know, all.

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:01]:
All of that. I mean, that’s. That’s a powerful thing that you kind of accidentally wandered into.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:38:08]:
Yeah, no, it’s. It’s profound. And, you know, the. The person most changed by the entire experience is obviously me, you know, because. Because I went into writing that book when I first sat down with those. There’s one clip on this family video. You know, they had it put on the VCR tape because that was like all world technology because it was on the 8 millimeter reels when he took it. And so there’s this one video, and I’ outfit For a Christmas play and these tights.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:38:34]:
And I’ve got this Blur shirt on, this little hat, and I’m running around like I’m all up in people’s faces and I’m like, oh, my God, what, for the love of God, is happening with this kid? And I was. And I wrote that. I mean, it’s really. And people have said, you’re really hard on yourself. It was all from watching this VHS tape. I was like, she’s got to stop. Like, you know, And I was trying to. If I had to witness that lie, you know, that’s how I felt.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:38:59]:
But I went from, like, literally wanting to run from her at the beginning of that book to wanting to be her at the end. And I still say stuff to her like, I mean, this sounds like totally, like, psycho stuff, but I’m like, little Amy, man, we’re killing it. Are you kidding me? You know, because I. And I feel like I lived until I wrote the book. I lived away so many great things about her, about my younger self, you know, and now I want to be part. Especially as I, you know, I’m 50, I’m mid-50s now. Now that I don’t care anymore what anybody thinks, like, we’re rejoining together here, you know, and somewhere in the future, 80 year old Avery’s like, yeah, let’s go.

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:39]:
Who cares?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:39:41]:
Y’all, don’t screw it up no more. Get here. You know, but. But it is. And that’s so relatable, you know, my life was so normal and so like, you know, and. But it’s so relatable because that. And I think that would be so true of so many people. They’d be like, cringe, but they’d be like, oh, my God, I love her.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:40:01]:
Oh, my God, I love him.

Nancy Norbeck [00:40:02]:
Yeah. Yeah. We had all of our old home movies put on video, and then my dad put them on DVD a couple years ago. And, you know, when we actually sat down and watched them, it was sort of. Sort of the same thing. I just was like, boy, what a little ham I was. And something happened because I haven’t been like that in a long time, you know, But I was. I was just coming right up to the camera and smiling and dancing and waving and the whole thing.

Nancy Norbeck [00:40:29]:
And I was like, wow, where’d she go?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:40:31]:
Yeah, I read that in your bio. You know, the choir and the. And the. And the. And the singing and the, you know, singing for other people individually. Very interesting, because you would have seen that. I’m sure you would have made that connection with your life story. And it would have.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:40:46]:
And the other thing, it would explain some stuff to you. You know, you would have seen some stuff that you couldn’t put into context. It makes me really want to go back in time.

Nancy Norbeck [00:40:55]:
Like, you know. Yeah, especially because, you know, we’re about the same age. And so I was sitting there going, okay, 1978, I was like seven.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:41:06]:
Oh, yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:41:06]:
So we are there, you know, so. So a lot of the things that you mentioned, I remembered or was surprised by. And like the level of detail that you had in there, like the name and the model number of the little micro cassette recorder. I had to go look it up because I was like, were those really around in the 70s? Because I really thought those were an 80s thing, you know, But I pulled it right up on ebay. And I was like, well, look, there it is. That’s exactly what I was picturing. So clearly they must have been. But yeah, I mean, how much time did you spend just looking for that kind of stuff?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:41:42]:
Oh, a lot. And it was delicious because again, that’s who I am. I mean, I enjoyed every bit of it. And we had to cut so much of it because there was so much. It was just too much of it. And trying to pick the parts that were most, you know, that, you know, people would most connect to. But I, you know, newspapers, and I spent a weekend at the downtown Houston library, and I read all the newspapers, magazines, and YouTube and, you know, it was. It was so fun.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:42:10]:
I mean, I have three boxes of research from the book and I enjoyed every minute of it. Like, the outfits are all from the Sears catalog from 1977, because I didn’t want anybody from Spring, Texas to be too in style because that wouldn’t have happened in 1977. We weren’t living in, you know, like, New York, but it. So all of that. And again, that was one of the reasons I did it, because I wanted to write all that. Write all those things and weave all those things in there. And those are some of my favorite parts of the book. You know, the funny stuff and the back in time stuff.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:42:39]:
So.

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:40]:
Yeah, and it wouldn’t work if you didn’t have details like that in there. You know, it would. It would just kind of be okay. It’s supposed to be 1978, but it could be 1983, you know, whatever. But you’ve really hit all of those details that just, you know, I mean, they’re complaining about the fabric and all of that stuff. I was like, oh, yeah, we didn’t wear A single real thing in the 1970s. Probably a good chunk of the 80s, too. Like, what’s cotton? It’s all polyester and not even good polyester.

Nancy Norbeck [00:43:10]:
And everybody thought it was great.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:43:13]:
Yeah. And that was the thing, you know, I had a set of eyes from 2015, and I was looking at all that as one of us. And so the things that stuck out, you know, to me were the things that were going to stick out to everybody else. Like, what, are you kidding me? You know, there were so many things out and, you know, there’s the whole scene where we’re watching TV and that commercial comes on for that ABC movie of the week about. About the. About the lesbian couple who, you know, have kids and they’re trying to get custody of their children. And I could not believe, like you said, about the Olympus Pearl quarter or what. Whatever the little.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:43:49]:
Because that player was called. I could not believe that that was actually a thing because I saw it in a TV listing. I had a TV Guide for Houston, like, you know, the one that came in the newspaper. And I was looking and I went and looked up everything on the TV Guide to kind of see, you know, of that week or the month, I don’t know what I did. And I was like, that can’t be real. I wouldn’t actually watch the movie. It was terrible. I mean, it wasn’t terrible.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:44:10]:
It was just terribly done, you know? But I could not believe that that subject matter was being covered in 1978, because if you would have told me that, I would have. And I’m somebody who has read a lot, I would have said, you’re wrong. Absolutely didn’t happen. And it did. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:26]:
And yet, you know, that’s when Soap was on tv.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:44:30]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:30]:
And I was never allowed to watch that because, oh, my God, there was a gay character.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:44:35]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:35]:
You know, I had no idea why until I caught it running on Comedy Central in the 90s and started watching. It was like, okay, I get it now, why I wasn’t allowed to watch this, but good God, it’s hilarious, right?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:44:47]:
Right? Yeah. And that’s why my dad Ninja rolls across the thing to change it when the kids come back downstairs, because that’s exactly the reaction you would have gotten in 1978 on behalf of the. Behalf of the parents. But there was a lot of things that I found in the research that surprised me. Target being open on. On Thanksgiving. That was. That was a.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:45:07]:
That was a real thing, too.

Nancy Norbeck [00:45:10]:
Yeah. No, but I like you in the book. I was like, wait, what?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:45:15]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:45:16]:
Isn’t that like a late 90s, early 2000s ish kind of thing, but clearly not right. Yeah, but there, there were, there’s like all of those little, the little things that I was like, oh, I’d forgotten all about that. You know, the kids wearing their tuff skins from Sears and you know, my mother loved those things because they were indestructible. It didn’t matter what my brother did, he wasn’t going to destroy them.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:45:44]:
No, it was the only one you’d have to put knee patches on and now you would just throw them away. You wouldn’t put a knee patch on there. But I think that whole thought line there really lends to another theme in the book is like, you know, our memory, you know, how we remember things and how we would remember them differently. Like we might have, like, let’s say you And I were 40 in the, in the 70s rather than 10 and 7, you know, we would have remembered those things. You know, Target being open. We might have remembered them differently because we would have been adults. And then that’s another thing that Big Amy realizes that all the stuff she remembered as a kid, she remembered it as a 10 year old. You know, as a 10 year old that was bound to not understand the dynamics of what was really happening.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:46:32]:
You know, and I think that’s another, for me, that was another kind of profound thing that happened from writing the book is that, you know, our memories are, you know, they’re not static, they’re very malleable based on who’s doing the memory with the memory and how old they are, what kind of life experience they have, you know, and I think that’s, you know, makes, you know, that’s something repeated throughout human history.

Nancy Norbeck [00:46:56]:
Yeah, yeah. And I think, you know, when you’re talking about how your brother and your sister are like, ah, she made that up. That didn’t really happen. You know, my, my brother and I had a conversation like that back at, I think, Thanksgiving, you know, where he was like, you don’t remember this? You know, it’s like, no. And, and I realized later that it was because I so hated everything that was associated with it that, you know, it. We were talking about when we had soda in the house, because we never had soda in the house.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:47:25]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:26]:
But my dad liked to renovate houses and those days there would, they would order out for pizza, they would get 2 liter bottles of soda and whatever. And I think I didn’t remember it because I just hated that whole thing so much.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:47:40]:
Right, right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:41]:
And so it was not Enough to sweeten the deal for me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:47:44]:
Right, right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:44]:
So it didn’t register the same way. And meanwhile he’s looking at me like, you’re, you’re going crazy, you’re losing your mind, you forgot this thing. I’m like, no, I think it just wasn’t important to me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:47:54]:
See, that’s really interesting because sometimes it’s self preservation, like you don’t want to remember it. And so then you just, or like you said, you just didn’t like it. So it doesn’t show up in your highlights, you know, like your top 10 plays of 1978. It doesn’t show up there. But why it happens, no one knows. Except for we all carry different. We remember different things differently or remember the same things differently. And if we got to remember it again as who we are now, we’d remember it totally differently.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:23]:
Well, and that’s like they say, you know, you can grow up in the same house but have completely different experiences because, you know, your, your relationship with one parent may not be the same as my relationship with the same parent and vice versa.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:48:36]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:37]:
So yeah, it’s all, it’s all different. You could get, it’s kind of like a weird family game of Whisper down the Lane. You know, it was the same experience. Experience, but totally differently rendered for each person.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:48:49]:
No, I like that a lot. You know, and at the end of the day, it’s, in most cases it’s just done to survive the whole thing. And that makes it sound like it was bad. But the truth is real life, we just try to get up every morning and do the best we can. And I saw that in my parents in writing the book, you know, because at the end I’m like, the one thing I know for sure is, please tell me my kids aren’t going to go back in time and write a book about it. You know, oh my God, I’m going to be, you know, they’re going to be like, mom, you were completely off the chain. But that’s the thing. They were doing the best they could.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:49:24]:
10 year old Amy, she was doing the best she could back in time Amy, she was doing that. But that’s what we’re all trying to do. And that Whisper down the Lane, people who love each other are just trying to love each other and survive for the next day. And you can’t really control anything that’s happening and it’s just life is happening all around you and it’s, you know, that’s the way it works. That’s what we’re Doing today.

Nancy Norbeck [00:49:46]:
Yeah. And I think that’s where we kind of forget to give ourselves grace and compassion. You know, we all think, especially now that we have the age of Instagram and all that kind of stuff where it’s like, oh, but you know, my next door neighbor is like, off in Boca Raton or wherever, wherever you go. And I’m stuck in my house and they’re obviously doing so much better than, Than me. Well, no, they’re just taking better pictures than you.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:50:11]:
Yeah, yeah. And they’re, they’re sharing, you know, certain things and not sharing all the rest of it. You know, it’s. It’s like memories. Who knows what the, the real truth is anyway, you know, But I think you’re. That, that giving yourself the grace is, is hugely important, especially when you’re looking back in your past and, you know, like what I said about little Amy, I should have given her and myself a lot more grace. And I think the other thing that I learned from writing the book in that same vein is that, you know, our stories matter to us. Like, it matters to me what happened with little Amy.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:50:45]:
You know, it matters to me what happened with Lil Kim and Lil Rick. I mean, that, that matters profoundly. And it doesn’t have to. It doesn’t mean it has to matter to Good Morning America or it doesn’t have to matter to People magazine. I mean, it matters to the people who care about me and love about me, but, you know, love me. But you know what? It matters most of all to me. And that’s okay. It’s okay for it to matter to me.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:51:06]:
It’s okay for it to matter to you. Not just okay, that’s what it should be, enough to investigate and discuss and figure out how we feel about it and then to move forward, you know, and that’s. And that’s. I think that’s one of the takeaways from the book that I’m the most proud of, is that, you know, I found out that my stuff matters and I put it out there for the whole world to see, you know, and I hope other people will be inspired to do that too, because that, that is one of the lessons of the story. It’s just a normal story, you know, told in a humorous way.

Nancy Norbeck [00:51:35]:
Yeah. And I think, you know, my impression certainly from the book is that you did walk away with a lot more compassion for your younger self and probably for your present day self at the same time.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:51:46]:
Oh, absolutely. I’m a different person who started writing that book, you know, to the one who wrote It. And now the one who went through the process of losing her mind and sharing it with the whole world, that’s, you know, that’s kind of what it feels like when the book comes out. You’re. Why didn’t someone tell me that people were going to read this? You know, I mean, well, that seems pretty logical, guys, you know, so.

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:12]:
But yeah, what’s the reaction been from people that you’re not related to who aren’t in the book?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:52:18]:
Oh, I, you know, the reaction was much stronger than I thought it would be. Just people feel like they went back in time on their own back in time journey. You know, they loved the nostalgia, they love that. And, and people have told me that the thing they like the best is, you know, it’s so relatable. But they like how, like there’s some serious point, you know, like some thought provoking moment where she makes some self realization and then it’s just like, wham. There’s something ridiculous and silly right in the middle of that, you know, And I, I’m proud of that reaction, I really am. Because I think that’s what real life is. That’s what humor does too, is that in this moment of like profound realization, you know, where you take yourself so seriously, then something ridiculous happens right in the middle of it, you know, and you’re like, oh, okay, you know, this is, that’s real life.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:53:12]:
And so, yeah, so the reaction has been, you know, people have, you know, I think, I think there was people at the beginning who thought it was gonna be a science fiction book. You’re like, how did she go back in time? Like, how did that. Because I got a bad review. It was like, the sci Fi guy was like, I could not wait for it to be over because she never said how she actually got back in time. But that’s back to the whole, I drink white zinfandel and you drink cabernet. I mean, we’re fine. Like, let’s both just drink and get on Zoom. Who cares? We’re fine.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:53:44]:
But it’s a fair reaction. He just shouldn’t have gotten the book, you know, it didn’t.

Nancy Norbeck [00:53:50]:
Yeah, wasn’t the audience for the book and.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:53:53]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:53:53]:
And having started and never finished a time travel novel myself, you can twist yourself into knots over how the time travel works. And the thing is, nobody knows because as far as we know, it doesn’t work.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:54:06]:
So you can make it up.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:08]:
If you spend all your time trying to explain how it works works, I think you’re probably losing. So, you know, you fell asleep on a plane and you woke up wearing bad polyester and going, where in the heck am I?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:54:21]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:21]:
I think that’s as legit as anything else.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:54:24]:
Yeah, well, yeah, no, for sure. Especially for someone who’s not a scientist. You know, the space time continuum or commendium or whatever that is. That’s probably how it happened. And I can’t even say the word. So therefore. Therefore I’m not your expert.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:39]:
Right, right. And I think. Yeah. If you. If you spent that much time trying to explain it, you’d never get to the actual story. So the story is the important part.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:54:49]:
You’d never get to Bonanza. Sirloin pit.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:51]:
That’s right.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:54:54]:
That chopped steak in that salad bar, that would have been a real shame. That Thousand island dressing would have to go on another book. And for that it would have cost all of us friends.

Nancy Norbeck [00:55:03]:
Yeah, yeah. No, I was laughing at that because I was like, I remember that. It may not have been exactly the same thing, but it was close enough. I was like, yeah, I remember that. I do not remember it being $1.99. And I can imagine my father complaining that that was too expensive.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:55:19]:
Right, right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:55:19]:
You know, when. Now.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:55:22]:
Yeah, that. Well, that’s the thing. I had this group of people who I’ve befriended because of this book, and they grew up in Minnesota, and they feel like their experience was so similar to Houston, Texas, like, almost blueprint, you know, and that’s made me really happy, too, because, you know, I wondered if it was too regional, because I do. You know, I’m proud to represent Houston. I mean, that’s where I’m from. But we had. So many of us had such a similar experience growing up, only we didn’t have the Internet to connect us. But we were connected all along anyway.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:55:50]:
From our memories. Yeah. Of shared things, you know.

Nancy Norbeck [00:55:55]:
Yeah. I grew up in central Pennsylvania, and it was pretty relatable for me. I’ve. I’ve been to the Houston airport, but that’s as close as I’ve been to. To Texas, so. Yeah, but it’s still there. You know, going to the mall. I don’t remember having to dress appropriately for the mall, but I remember the fountains and the, you know, all of that, all the glory days of the mall.

Nancy Norbeck [00:56:16]:
And now you’re lucky if half the stores are even there.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:56:20]:
So I got. Somebody tagged me on Facebook today, that mall in the book, Greenspoint Mall. They are closing it down permanently this month. So, I mean, it’s sad.

Nancy Norbeck [00:56:29]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where do the kids hang out if they’re not hanging. I guess they hang out on their phones. I don’t. I don’t know. I’m not. Not sure that’s a good thing either, but that’s a whole other subject.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:56:40]:
Yeah, it is.

Nancy Norbeck [00:56:42]:
Yeah. But I have to tell you, I. I went for the first time in a long time. I went to a thrift store a couple days ago, and I was walking through and looking at all of the kitchen stuff, and there was my mother’s crock pot from when I was a kid. I mean, a lot of that stuff is, like, when you mentioned the Mr. Coffee, I’m like, I bet there was one of those at the thrift store. There probably was. And so it was really.

Nancy Norbeck [00:57:10]:
It kind of added a little bit to the surrealness of the experience of reading about 1978 and then going and looking at stuff at the thrift store and going, yeah, a lot of this. This is stuff from back then. It was a little. Little wild. It just kind of. It added to the experience.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:57:27]:
And doesn’t that like seeing that crockpot. Did that evoke something inside of you? But it’s hilarious because it’s a crockpot, Nancy. But, but. But there’s something. There’s some kind of emotion evoked when. When you physically are. You know, when you’re sharing physical space that can put your hands on something from what. Something that seemed like your own past.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:57:50]:
You know, that is your own past. And I think that’s what this. And I’m not. Just don’t want to just talk about my book on and on. But that’s what. That’s kind of what the book does, though. It evokes this, you know, that kind of. And whether it’s nostalgia or longing or.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:58:04]:
I don’t know. I don’t know what that. What that is, but there is a emotion associated with that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:58:10]:
Yeah, well, I like to look at that. I mean, it was an ugly avocado green, right. Little crock pot. Like, they couldn’t sell a crock pot. You know, now they can sell, like, the little ones for dip and stuff. It wasn’t that small, but it was, you know, it was the crock pot, but nowhere near as big as they are now. But, you know, take one look at that, and I can smell the sauerkraut cooking in it.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:58:32]:
Oh, yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:58:33]:
You know, it’s. It’s a whole. It’s a whole thing all on its own. Even though it’s just a crock pot on a shelf that’s. They’re probably selling for five bucks.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:58:42]:
But you’re right. Like, it evokes all your senses. You can smell, you can kind of feel the room, the kitchen. You can hear, you know, the presence of your mother. I mean, it’s a very. It’s a very powerful emotion. And I think as we age, it becomes more powerful. And that’s where that.

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:58:57]:
I don’t know if it’s a longing. It depends on. I don’t know. There’s something about our past, though, you know, that’s very. There’s an emotion, a set of emotions with that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:59:08]:
So, yeah. Do people ask you, like, for. I don’t know if advice is the right word, but I’m going to run with it on going back and exploring their childhood that way. Are there people who are like, how do I write a book like this? Or how did you. You know, how do I. How do I reimagine my family?

Amy Weinland Daughters [00:59:29]:
And I’ve been asked that the things people have most done is shared their story, like their story with little Julie or little, you know, and then you, you know, they’ve told me that they’ve gone that, you know, and like, sat down and really thought about it and tried to put themselves in that position. I, you know, and. And I have had people ask me, like, what was the process, like, how did you get yourself to that point where you could write about it? And I told you the story about getting in that hotel, and so I’ve told them that. And I haven’t had any other writing. People, like, ask me about, like, how to write about time travel or writing back to their own childhoods. I think they immediately. People just immediately associate themselves with it, and then that’s one of the questions. But more than anything, people have felt the need to really share deeply about.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:00:20]:
And I think sharing with me, they feel like I get it because they feel like I. Because they feel like I did it. And that’s. Then that’s an honor though, too, you know. But there is an emotional birth there, too, because you got people telling you, you know, these very. Because I’ve got these very long emails which I’m honored to read, you know, about what happened to them as a kid and how this book made them feel, whether there was healing or remembering or it was hard or it was easy. And that’s the biggest thing that. In that vein that people have reached out to me about.

Nancy Norbeck [01:00:50]:
Yeah, and I think that’s true. I mean, obviously my experience is only my experience, but I can’t imagine it being very easy to read that book without putting yourself in that situation.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:01:02]:
Right. And then I think what comes with that, and I. This is something I didn’t expect is that people with childhood trauma, you know, I inadvertently opened up a can of worms, good or bad. And that. And that clearly was not. I had no mal. Intent in writing this book. Again, I was funny.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:01:19]:
Haha, girl, from the emails at work, you know, I was not trying to, you know, and I, you know, I’ve had quite a few of those emails and. But no one’s been accusatory. No one said, you know, I read your book and it, you know, it made me so. But it did scare me. Like, are those people out there that I. That this was like a step back for anybody? Not my intention at all. But I mean, you know, real life means there’s stuff to all of us that was unsavory, that happened to us. And some of us unfortunately, you know, you know, much higher level of, like I said, trauma or, you know, you know, things that happened that were, you know, criminally not good.

Nancy Norbeck [01:01:58]:
Right, right.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:02:00]:
And I am, I am. It’s funny though. I wish I would have been. I, you know, again, you can’t walk into something and know everything, you know, on the back end of it. You just can’t.

Nancy Norbeck [01:02:09]:
Yeah, yeah. And you can’t account for every single person who’s going to read the book either.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:02:14]:
Right, right.

Nancy Norbeck [01:02:15]:
You know, you need to tell the story that you need to read and hope that it reaches the right people and that they can approach it in a helpful way and, you know, if it hits them in an unhelpful way to be able to do something about it, you know.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:02:29]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [01:02:31]:
Yeah. Especially if, you know, if it brings up something that you’d forgotten about or whatever. It could, in a way be kind of a gift because it opens you up to doing something about it.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:02:40]:
Right. And that’s where the catharsis, you know, is for the reader, hopefully. But again, if you would have told me that at the beginning of that whole journey, like, this is going to be a real catharsis and it’s going to be on feelings.com, i would have been like, you’re kidding, right?

Nancy Norbeck [01:02:56]:
Or you’d have been like, I’m not doing this.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:02:58]:
Yeah, no, exactly. I’m glad nobody told me because I was like, no, I want to talk about JCPenney. I mean, let’s go. Yeah. You know.

Nancy Norbeck [01:03:04]:
Right, right. All of. All of those old stories that don’t exist anymore. Let’s talk about those. This is just a fun trip back to 1978 for 36 hours, right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think that it’s. It’s certainly unlike any other memoir or time travel novel I have ever read.

Nancy Norbeck [01:03:24]:
And I, I’m amazed and impressed that you managed to pull it off because like I said, I kept reading it going, how is she managing to do this? She’s, like, fitting so many things in here, so it’s very cool.

Amy Weinland Daughters [01:03:36]:
Well, I appreciate that’s a high compliment. I’m quite, you know, humbled that you read it, that you have those words and that you have me on your program, which is excellent. So thank you.

Nancy Norbeck [01:03:46]:
Oh, thank you. I’ve enjoyed talking to you. That’s our show. Thanks so much to Amy Weinland Daughters and to you for listening. Please leave a review for this episode. You’ll find a link in your podcast app, so it’s really easy and it’ll only take a minute. If you enjoyed our conversation, I hope you’ll share it with a friend. Thanks so much.

Nancy Norbeck [01:04:08]:
If this episode resonated with you, or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the Spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today. See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

Story lover Lucinda Sage-Midgorden and I met here on Follow Your Curiosity last year. We got together this past week for a short conversation for her Patreon about why you should think about making bad art and embracing anti-perfectionism. What does that mean (and not mean), and how might it change your life? For that matter, how are we defining perfectionism—it’s often not what we expect it to be (as I learned myself when I was training as a Kaizen-Muse coach, to my great shock and, yes, horror!).

Lucinda was kind enough to share the recording of our conversation with me, and I want to share it with you. If you’ve been wondering if my Make Bad Art course is for you, you might find the answer here—for instance: whether you need to be an artist to make bad art, and if there’s a right way to make bad art (spoiler: no, and no). This conversation is short, but you’ll get a lot out of it. Make Bad Art starts on November 4th (the day after this episode is being released), but it’s not too late to sign up, and we’d love to have you. 

Episode breakdown:

00:00 Introduction

01:23 Kaizen-Muse coach helping creatives break perfectionism.

05:43 Realizing hidden perfectionism hinders creative projects.

09:05 Creating bad art frees creativity for good art.

10:54 Next class starts November 4; contact details provided.

14:03 Anti-perfectionism practice: Easier and fun in groups.

18:56 Need to relax and overcome perfectionism daily.

21:51 Join “Make Bad Art” starting November 4th.

Please leave a review and in it, tell us about a time when a story was important to you.

Want more? Here are some handy playlists with all my previous interviews with guests in theatre and writing and publishing.

Show links

Make Bad Art

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You can subscribe to Follow Your Curiosity via the handy links at the top of the page for Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, TuneIn, and YouTube. If you enjoyed the episode, don’t forget to tell your friends!

Transcript: Why Make Bad Art with Lucinda Sage-Midgorden

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, Extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Story lover Lucinda Sage-Midgorden and I met here on Follow Your Curiosity last year. We got together this past week for a short conversation for her Patreon about why you should think about making bad art and embracing anti-perfectionism. What does that mean (and not mean) and how might it change your life? For that matter, how are we defining perfectionism? It’s often not what we expect it to be, as I learned myself when I was training as a Kaizen-Muse coach, to my great shock (and yes, horror). Lucinda was kind enough to share the recording of our conversation with me and I want to share it with you.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:55]:
If you’ve been wondering if my Make Bad Art course is for you, you might find the answer here. For instance, do you need to be an artist to make bad art? Is there a right way to make bad art? Spoiler: no and no. The conversation is short, but you’ll get a lot out of it. Make Bad Art starts on November 4, which is the day after this episode is being released. But it’s not too late to sign up and we would love to have you. Happy listening.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:01:23]:
Today I’m talking to Nancy Norbeck and Nancy and I connected on her podcast, Follow Your Curiosity. And so I wanted to share with my social media friends and my pod, my Patreon community about her new course. So Nancy, I’m going to let you tell about your course and then maybe I’ll ask some questions.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:51]:
Okay. So I am a master certified Kaizen-Muse Creativity coach and—that’s that’s really a big fancy word for somebody who helps creative people who get stuck to get unstuck again. And I just decided this summer I offered two free workshops. The first one was called Permission to Play and the second one was called Make Bad Art. And they really in many ways dealt with similar issues from different angles. But after I did Make Bad rt, we had so much fun in those two hours and it was just, it’s such a liberating experience for people to be in a situation where they are specifically given permission to have fun and let go of all of the things that our culture tells us we have to be like: to be perfect, to always do the very best thing that we can possibly do, to have super high standards and expectations, to always do it the right way. I’m not convinced that there even usually is a right way. I think somebody just made up the Right way.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:09]:
And then everybody else, that’s how they had to do it. And the biggest thing that making bad art does, when you sit down and you deliberately, intentionally say, I am going to make a piece of bad art, it shuts down your inner critic.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:03:30]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:32]:
About it. Your inner critic has no job to do because you’re not trying to make a masterpiece. You are not trying to outdo Michelangelo. You are trying to make a crappy piece of art. So your inner critic can’t sit there and say, I don’t think that part’s good enough because there is no good enough.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:03:54]:
That’s right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:55]:
And it is a fabulously liberating, amazing experience for most people. And we had so much fun with it. And people really didn’t know what to expect. I kind of had an inkling of what to expect because I’ve done some of these things before, but people in the workshop really didn’t know what to expect. And when it was over, pretty much as soon as it was over, I found myself thinking, this needs to be a whole course. This needs to be more than, “I spent two hours on a Sunday afternoon with a bunch of strangers writing a crappy poem.” So I sat down and I said, okay, I think this is what I need to do. So now I need to figure out what this is going to look like and how to put it together and talk to a bunch of people.

Nancy Norbeck [00:04:40]:
And finally, here it is. So it’s a six week course and it’s all. It’s two hours each week. Every week. We will be making bad art, but we’re also going to be talking about what goes into digging out the sneaky, pernicious roots of perfectionism that are in all of us. And, you know, perfectionism is a weird word because unless you have kind of turned perfectionism into your Holy Grail, most people don’t want to be called perfectionists because we tend to think that perfectionism is not a great thing. And also, I’ll tell you a little bit of my own perfectionism story. People tend to think that perfectionism means that you’re the person who has to have everything lined up on your desk the right way, or fold your towels all the same way and line them up the way on the shelf or something like that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:43]:
That’s what I thought perfectionism was when I took Kaizen-Muse training. And so when we got to that section, I was like, I don’t have to worry about this part because I’m not a perfectionist. Because, you know, a lot of creative people are kind of messy. So I figured I’m not a perfectionist. I’m good here, you know, not that I didn’t need to learn it to deal with other people, but at least I personally was okay. And then the coach mentor that had been assigned to me was talking to me about it, and I said this to her and she said, are you sure? I said, of course I’m sure. I mean, seriously, you know, that’s never been me. And she said, okay, are there projects that you don’t do because you figure that they’ll never be good enough and so why bother doing them? And I just sat there as this pit opened up in the bottom of my stomach and I went, yeah, hi.

Nancy Norbeck [00:06:48]:
Okay. I think I am a perfectionist, so never would have guessed that that was perfectionism. But yeah, there’s a whole lot of stuff that I just decide I’m not going to bother with because I’m not going to do it well enough, so.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:07:06]:
Right. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:07]:
So. Okay, guilty as charged. You got me. So, you know, it. It comes up in all of these ways that we don’t expect and sometimes we don’t even label that way, but it is with us. It comes out as self judgment and this belief that we’re not good enough. And so giving ourselves permission to just play around and do something badly is a great way to undermine its effect on us, which is not the only way we’re going to tackle it in this course.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:07:37]:
Right. Yeah. So I have a couple of things to say when you were talking about how fun it was to just make bad art, because I think it was Edison who said, you know, he. How many times? Or maybe it was Alexander Graham Bell when he was creating the telephone. You know, I figured out a thousand ways or. Or 1500 ways or however many ways not to create something. It only took one to create. To create the thing.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:08:11]:
That was one thing. And then I had a friend who used to say, you’re, you know about writing your first draft is going to be crap and just let it be crap because then you get to go back and fix it, you know, so. Right. So any kind of artwork. Yeah, any kind of endeavor, actually. I mean, don’t scientists do that? They do the experiments and. Oh, that didn’t work. And then they do more experiments.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:08:36]:
I just finished reading Lessons in Chemistry and then they do more experiments and that doesn’t work. And you know, so it’s just all. It’s all just being. It’s all just being creative. It’s, you know. Yeah, I love it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:52]:
Right. And with every one of those experiments, they discover something new that they didn’t know before.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:08:57]:
Right, Exactly.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:59]:
Every failed experiment is a new piece of information. Now we know X doesn’t work, Y doesn’t work.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:09:04]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:05]:
These other things don’t work. So you’re one step closer to the thing that does. Right. But also when you’re making bad art, the thing is, you’re freeing yourself up, you’re shutting up your inner critic. You’re making a lot more room for the good art to come out alongside the bad art to surprise you. Some of your bad art could turn out to be really good. When I told my friend Dawn Kotzer, who is also a Kaizen-Muse coach who used to work with florists about this, she used to tell her florists to go and make bad floral arrangements. She would say, stay within, you know, design principles, but deliberately make bad floral arrangements and then put them in the front window.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:53]:
And she said every single time the bad floral arrangements sold first.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:10:02]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:02]:
What you think is bad might not actually be as bad as you think it is.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:10:07]:
Exactly. Yeah. Because I was thinking that that, man, you could be making bad art and someone’s going to look at that and go, oh, that’s really cool. You’ve started a whole new art, you know, like, like Impressionism or whatever, Pointillism or, you know, you’ve created a whole new school of art, you know, a new, whole new technique.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:32]:
Yeah, yeah. But when you’re trying deliberately to make good art, you’re so busy judging it harder for that to come out. And you may create really good art and not recognize it because you’re judging it so much. So there’s, there’s multiple angles to this whole thing. Yeah.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:10:47]:
Really?

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:47]:
The idea is to help you get out of your own way so that you can create more and create better.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:10:54]:
Yeah. So now when does your next. That we’re recording on? August 30th. I mean, excuse me, August. Oh my gosh. October 30th. And when is your next class start? And how do people get a hold of you? I mean, I can put it in the, you know, the notes on my social medias and stuff, but tell how they can get a hold of you because, you know, there are so many stressed out people right now with the election coming up. Maybe they’re going to need your class.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:32]:
It certainly could be a helpful antidote to post election stress for sure.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:11:36]:
Yes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:37]:
We’re starting on Monday, November 4th, so very soon.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:11:41]:
Oh, okay.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:42]:
And there, there is a link that I’ll give you.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:11:45]:
Okay.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:46]:
Yeah. Also find me fycuriosity.com, short for Follow Your Curiosity. And yeah, I mean, we’re gonna go for six weeks where there will be a break for Thanksgiving because that I know everybody tends to be crazy and families come to town and whatever. And I will have some special tips for how to kind of have an anti perfectionist Thanksgiving, especially if your family comes and tends to want to make it a very perfectionistic event.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:12:16]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:18]:
Because it’s kind of. It could be a great test of how well you’re incorporating all of this stuff. And I want to say this is. It’s been kind of interesting to watch people’s reactions. There have been questions about, you know, oh, I have to check my calendar to make sure I can be at every call. Which is kind of a perfectionistic approach to taking the course. Like, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but you do not have to make every call. They will all be recorded.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:44]:
It’s great if you can be there, but if not, don’t freak out.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:12:47]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:48]:
People have also asked me, what if I don’t make bad art “right.” There’s no wrong way to make bad art. And if you’re not an artist, it’s okay. It’s bad art. You’ll be fine. And you don’t have to do the course perfectly. It’s an anti perfectionistic course. It’s okay.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:04]:
As long as you can make a good faith effort, you will get something out of this course. So now that I’m done interrupting myself, we’ll finish right before Christmas. So it could be a great Christmas gift to yourself.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:13:18]:
Yes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:19]:
I can’t promise that you will be a fully reformed anti perfectionist. I’m not sure in our culture that that’s possible because it’s being thrown at us. Right. But you’ll be much closer. And then you have a great new attitude for starting the new year. So.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:13:36]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:37]:
That timing.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:13:39]:
And you can take it more than once.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:42]:
Correct. And I will be doing it again. Yeah.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:13:44]:
Yes. Because, you know, it’s. It’s like a little spiral. You take care of a little bit and then you get spiral around, take care of some more. So you might have to, you know, might want to take it more than once just for fun and to be creative. Yeah. Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:14:03]:
In many ways, I think anti perfectionism is a practice. I don’t think you’re ever really fully recovered and you can always. Can always use a little refresher session, get yourself back into it, especially if you work in a really perfectionistic kind of field. I’ve worked as an editor and proofreader for a long time. It’s very, very perfectionistic and so you need an antidote to that. This kind of stuff can be hard to do on your own and it’s really, it’s a lot easier to do it in a group because you know, you’re not alone. It’s also a lot more fun.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:14:40]:
Yes, yeah. The camaraderie and the connections that people make. Yeah. So now you’re doing this via zoom, right?

Nancy Norbeck [00:14:48]:
Yes.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:14:49]:
And yeah. So you’re getting people from all over the country maybe, or all over the world maybe. Yeah, I love that. And I’m assuming that it’s in the evening, your time or there is an.

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:08]:
Evening session, 7 to 9 Eastern Time. And I’m also putting together a session that’s more friendly on European time. Yeah, yeah. Because that’s a terrible time if you’re in Europe.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:15:22]:
Oh, it’s in the middle of the night.

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:24]:
In the middle of the night. But I wanted to make sure that it’s accessible to people who are working during the day.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:15:29]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:29]:
So. So there will be another daytime session that I’m just working out the details for as. As people are showing up. So.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:15:36]:
Yeah. Now can you tell I know a little bit about the form of art that you were talking about or teaching Kaiser. What is it called?

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:47]:
Kaizen-Muse is a creativity coaching method. Yeah.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:15:52]:
Say it again?

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:53]:
Kaizen-Muse Creativity Coaching. It’s. Kaizen is the Japanese word for continuous improvement through small steps.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:16:01]:
Yes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:01]:
Which is a big part of Kaizen-Muse. And then the muse part. Jill Badonsky, who put together Kaizen-Muse, took the idea of the nine classical muses and reimagined them as nine creativity principles. Right. So that’s, that’s the muse part. It’s not an art method, it’s a creativity approach.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:16:23]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:24]:
And that.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:16:24]:
So you don’t apply to anything.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:26]:
You can apply it to anything at all. And it can go beyond creative stuff too.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:16:32]:
Yeah. Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:33]:
If I wanted to, I could use it for business coaching for somebody. But that’s not my. So that’s not what I do.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:16:39]:
Yes, right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:40]:
But yeah, it’s. It’s a great non linear coaching method that really takes into account, you know, that people don’t naturally move from A to B to C. Life comes up, stuff comes up, all sorts of things. So.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:16:57]:
Yeah, yeah. And that’s the way someone, I can’t remember who was describing this. It might have been a book I was reading about grief. But grief doesn’t go that way. You don’t go from. You don’t go through all the steps linearly. It’s. Yeah, you go backward and forward.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:17:15]:
I mean, that’s how all growth is. You take some steps forward and then something happens and you’re back at the beginning and then, you know. Yeah. So I love that. I love that idea. I. Where did. I wonder where perfectionism came from? Can we blame the Puritans?

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:37]:
You know, I blame them for everything, so I don’t see why not. I mean, they. They were busy trying to be better than everybody else, so it’s as reasonable a guess as anything.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:17:52]:
I mean, I hope there aren’t any Puritans living right now because we’re criticizing. Because we’re criticizing them. But I think they died out.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:00]:
I think they did.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:18:02]:
Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Yes. Because, I mean, I’m. My theater’s. And background. My background is in theater.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:18:10]:
I’m talking backwards. Perfectionism. And when I lost my teaching job in high school teaching drama, and I had to go teach English, but one of the things we read was The Crucible, and that is such a good example of perfectionism right there. You have to follow all the little rules, and if you don’t follow the rules, you have to pay, you know, you have to pay. If you don’t show up to, you know, meeting, you have to pay a fee because you didn’t show up. I mean, it’s, it’s.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:48]:
And if you. If you don’t have as much stuff as everybody else, God doesn’t like you as much.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:18:53]:
That’s right. Yeah. Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:55]:
Yeah.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:18:56]:
Yeah, exactly. So, yeah. Oh, man, we definitely need that. We need something to break up our perfectionism because I think we probably almost all of us suffer from that. I mean, if I wake up, I’m. My husband and I are now retired, you know, so I had to get used to the fact that, oh, I don’t have to get up and make his breakfast before he goes off to work, which means I’m not waking up as early as I used to, or if I do, he’s still in bed and, you know, my morning routine is disrupted and oh, my gosh, when am I going to get in to work on my novel or edit my podcast or whatever it is. And then yesterday I was reading something and I went, you know what? I just need to relax. If I do a little bit of something every day.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:19:50]:
That’s good.

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:52]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And a little bit every day is. Is a big part of this course. You don’t need to spend your whole day on it. If you have Five or ten minutes a day. You’ll be fine.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:20:04]:
Yeah, right. Someone else that I interviewed. I think I interviewed them for my podcast, Story Power. Who? They do the same form Kaizen-Muse as you. They do that too. So, yeah, that would be really great if we had a lot more people teaching that. So, okay, so I encourage my. Anybody on my social medias who just needs to relax and have fun, or anybody on my Patreon community, go talk to Nancy.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:20:43]:
Go sign up for her course. I’m putting the link in on all of my outlets so that you can connect with her and just have fun and get over your puritanical perfectionism. We’ll blame the Puritans.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:02]:
Absolutely. Why not?

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:21:06]:
Right? Really? Yeah. Okay. Oh, wow. Do you have anything else you want to say?

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:12]:
I think that’s. That’s really it. I mean, I just think it’s one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:21:17]:
Yes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:18]:
And it kind of is a gift to others because the less you’re judging yourself, the less you’re likely to judge others, too. It trickles into all sorts of other areas of your life. It’s a great thing.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:21:29]:
Yes. Yeah. Really. Because we are so hard on ourselves all the time. We are. I don’t. I wonder if other people in other countries are as hard on themselves as Americans are, because in the United States, we are just so hard on ourselves. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:47]:
Yeah.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden [00:21:48]:
Oh, Nancy, this has been so fun. Thanks.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:51]:
Yeah, thanks for having me. That’s it for this short episode. Make Bad art starts on November 4th, and we would love to have you. If you know someone who might be interested, please pass this episode on to them. Thanks so much, especially to Lucinda Sage-Midgorden for sharing this recording, and I hope to see you in class. If this episode resonated with you, or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now. Join me at The Spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today.

Nancy Norbeck [00:22:33]:
See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

What happens when you make bad art? Sometimes you get really good art by accident! Here’s a real-life story of a time when that happened to Doctor Who writer Steven Moffat, and why you should consider Making Bad Art yourself.

Source for this story.

Want to come Make Bad Art of your own, and lose perfectionism and harsh self-judgment in the process? Join us starting November 4, 2024! 

Want more tips? Check out this playlist with all my previous Creative Pep Talks!

Could you leave a review? It’s really easy, and it helps SO much. Thanks!

Join my free creative community, The Spark! We celebrate each other’s creative courage, and I’ll be sharing programs for subscribers and listeners there in the coming months.

Get in Touch

I’d love to hear your feedback, questions, and experience with these ideas! Send me a note at fycuriosity.com, or contact me on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.

Subscribe!

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Transcript: The Magic of Making Bad Art

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Furiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Hey, everybody. This is Nancy Norbeck with this week’s Creative Pep Talk. Now if you’ve been listening for a while, you know that I’m a big Doctor Who fan, and I wanna tell you a story this week about the origin story of one of my favorite episodes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:32]:
So in the third season of the revived series, there is an episode called “Blink.” And, apparently, when writer Steven Moffat set out to write this story, he was originally told that this was gonna be a huge blockbuster episode, lots of special effects, huge budget. He could basically do whatever he wanted. And then at the last minute, he found out that, oh, no. No. No. No. Sorry.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:55]:
Budget’s been slashed. No special effects. Oh, and, also, your two leads are barely gonna be in it. Sorry. Have fun. You can imagine this was not what he wanted to hear. And so apparently, he was left at the very last minute writing this episode in 45 minutes in the back of a cab. And basically, he said to himself, well, everybody’s gonna hate this because the Doctor’s not even gonna be in it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:20]:
And so I don’t know. I’m just making stuff up. And that’s what he did. He made stuff up and expected that everyone was gonna hate it, and it was gonna be terrible. And since then, it has actually turned out to be a classic Doctor Who episode. It is one of the most highly regarded of the new series and probably ever, and everyone loves it. And he has decided that this is a sign that less is more, and he’s adopted a more bare bones approach since then, supposedly. I don’t know.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:54]:
You could argue that that’s not that’s a different conversation for a different day. And there’s merit to that. Absolutely. But that’s not why I’m telling you this story. I’m telling you this story because I suspect that the reason that this episode is so good is because Steven Moffat lowered his expectations because he didn’t have a choice, and it pretty much deliberately sat down and made bad art because he had to. He had nothing to go on. Everything that he had been told was taken from him. His stars were taken from him.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:31]:
The two most important characters in any Doctor Who episode were basically taken from him. And, literally, his thought was everyone’s going to hate this because the Doctor’s not even gonna be in it. So what was he gonna do? So he just wrote anything, and that’s basically what happens when you make bad art. You sit down and you just write any darn thing at all. It’s no surprise to me that what came out of that process of saying, well, whatever, actually turned out to be good art. Because when we lower our expectations and have no intention of writing something good, our inner critic gets out of our way. We stop judging ourselves. Our our sense of play comes out because there’s no there’s nowhere to go except what the heck, might as well have fun with this because it’s all ridiculous anyway.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:27]:
And that’s where the good stuff tends to come from. We don’t think that way because we’ve been trained to believe that we have to aim high and, you know, quality is the best policy and all of these things. Anything worth doing is worth doing well. Well, it’s also true that anything worth doing is worth doing badly. Because when we let ourselves do it badly, great things can happen. It’s just counterintuitive because we’ve been told that it’s counterintuitive. This is why my course Make Bad Art exists. It exists to help you get out of your own head because the more time we spend in our own heads, the harder it is to make good art.

Nancy Norbeck [00:04:08]:
And the good art cannot come if we’re not willing to let the bad art out with it. The more we judge what we’re creating, the harder it is for the good art to come out. And the harder it is for us to do anything because when we’re judging ourselves, seriously, when have you ever accomplished much of anything with any kind of ease or frankly, good quality when you’ve been busy judging yourself all the time? And I’ll bet you even if you have created good quality under those circumstances, you haven’t recognized it because you’ve been so busy judging yourself for it. It’s so much easier to create good art when you get out of your own way and you stop judging yourself and you have compassion for yourself and you play. And it’s so much easier to just be in this world under those circumstances too. And that’s what I wanna bring to you through make bad art. That’s the whole point of it. It’s kind of a multifaceted thing.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:04]:
I was asked recently, you know, what comes first in Make Bad Art? Is it the shift in your mindset and how you view these things or is it the bad art? Well, yes, it’s both. They happen at the same time. It’s all part of the process, and the process is the key. So I hope that you’ll think about this story. Steven Moffat did not deliberately make bad art. But either way, look what happened. He’s got a critically acclaimed, amazing episode, which, by the way, stands well on its own. So if you’re not a Doctor Who fan, it’s great for the Halloween time of year or whenever you happen to be listening to this episode.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:42]:
So go out and find it. He’s got an amazing episode because he sat down and he made bad art. What might happen for you? Hope you’ll think about it. We start on November 4, 2024. And if you’re listening to this later, I have every intention of continuing to offer this program, so I hope you’ll check it out. So with that, either way, go make some bad art. Have fun with it, and I’ll see you next time. If this episode resonated with you, or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage.

Nancy Norbeck [00:06:22]:
It’s free, and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today. See you there, and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

Four years ago, artist and art therapist Darcy Wade joined me to talk about her own journey with art and creativity, including how her  discovery of expressive arts brought her back from a period of disconnection with her creative side and helped her recovery from addiction. Darcy has since moved from North Carolina to Colorado, where she’s now undertaking fundraising efforts to help folks back home in the wake of the destruction from Hurricane Helene. She talks to me about the history and artistic culture of Western North Carolina—particularly Asheville, but also the surrounding area; the creativity, ingenuity, and community that arises from crisis; her journey from North Carolina to Colorado; how awe and wonder elevate our lives, and more. You’ll find links to our previous conversation and Darcy’s fundraiser below, and I hope you’ll check them out.

The Roger Ebert piece on elevation is here.

Episode breakdown:

00:00 Introduction

01:18 Resigned dream job, faced challenges.

07:24 Art and creativity integral in daily life.

13:37 Art project raised $7,000 for North Carolina.

17:09 Stuck in Denver due to licensure requirements.

25:32 Artists help Asheville mountain communities with essentials.

31:25 Nature-based expressive arts; paused for now.

34:13 Pass exam for new job in youth.

39:12 Expressive arts therapy empowers diverse artistic expression.

44:54 Children’s fresh perspectives inspire and move me.

48:37 Redefining “bad” art: Challenging traditional definitions.

56:00 Embrace sensitivity; curiosity fuels personal growth.

Darcy Wade Show Links

Darcy’s website

Facebook

Instagram (art)

Instagram (personal blog)

Subscribe!

You can subscribe to Follow Your Curiosity via the handy links at the top of the page for Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, TuneIn, and YouTube. If you enjoyed the episode, don’t forget to tell your friends!

Transcript: Darcy Wade

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Four years ago, artist and art therapist, Darcy Wade, joined me to talk about her own journey with art and creativity, including how her discovery of expressive arts brought her back from a period of disconnection with her creative side and helped her recovery from addiction. Darcy has since moved from North Carolina to Colorado, where she’s now undertaking fundraising efforts to help folks back home in the wake of the destruction from hurricane Helene. She talks to me about the history and artistic culture of Western North Carolina, particularly Asheville, but also the surrounding area; the creativity, ingenuity, and community that arises from crisis,; her journey from North Carolina to Colorado;

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:00]:
how awe and wonder elevate our lives, and more. You’ll find links to our previous conversation and Darcy’s fundraiser in the show notes, and I hope you’ll check them out. Here’s my conversation with Darcy Wade. Darcy Wade, welcome back to Follow Your Curiosity.

Darcy Wade [00:01:18]:
I’m so happy to be here. Thank you so much.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:21]:
So it’s been four years, which is kind of mind boggling.

Darcy Wade [00:01:28]:
It’s blowing my mind truthfully. I know. Four is my favorite number though, so that, that I don’t believe in coincidences, but yeah, 4 years. So a lot has happened

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:41]:
in the last four years. And for people who missed your first conversation with me, I’ll have a link in the show notes so that they can go catch up on that. But but tell me what’s going on with you now.

Darcy Wade [00:01:54]:
Yeah. So I remember when we had the first conversation, I mean, we were in COVID times. It was 2020, and I was still in Asheville, North Carolina. I am now in Denver, Colorado, and it’s been a journey getting back there. Follow your creativity or your curiosity and creativity. I mean, that has been definitely the theme, trusting the process. I mean, just to kinda bullet point. Yeah.

Darcy Wade [00:02:20]:
Moved out to Denver, Colorado, started, you know, my professional career as a therapist with the focus of expressive arts and art therapy and nature based expressive arts, which we had talked about. I almost I almost feel like that first episode helped manifest a lot of that. I thought about that after the fact. And Yeah. And then, you know, I was on a sober journey, not drinking and taking Adderall, which Wade my 2, you know, crutches and a lot of stimulants. And I did relapse after about two and a half years. It I thought it was like an intentional relapse. I thought I was doing it really carefully, but I’ve since learned that it was very much a real relapse.

Darcy Wade [00:03:03]:
And that brought me back to Charlotte, and that was 2 years there, Charlotte, North Carolina, which is where I’m from. And that was a hard journey being there. I was basically, like, couch surfing, living with my parents, living with friends, but I really like tapped back into being an artist there, which I can talk more about later. And then, I finally got the call, literally, like the call from above, that I needed to put myself into treatment, because my addiction had gotten really, really bad. And so I did that back in March of this year, 2024, and was there for about a month. And then that is actually what brought me back to Denver. I I did sober living and I did like a outpatient treatment out here in Denver. They were like, oh, because my the the original residential place I went to was in South Carolina.

Darcy Wade [00:03:56]:
It was beautiful. It was amazing. It was just what I needed. And then it was they were like, so for aftercare, do you wanna go to Denver, Colorado? I was like, yeah. That’s that’s been the plan the whole time. Let’s do it. And so that’s how I got back out here. And I am now, like, officially, like, the art therapist, expressive arts therapist.

Darcy Wade [00:04:19]:
We might we probably will talk more about this. I just experienced a really hard situation where I was working kind of my dream job as an art therapist for really at risk youth out here and, found out my mother I’m actually the one that caught this. My mother has been diagnosed with chronic leukemia, and that plus a lot of other things have caused me I had to resign, which has been really, really hard. But kinda going along with follow your curiosity and trusting the process, I resigned, like, the day before the hurricane hit down in North Carolina, hurricane Helene. I think I’m saying that right. I always wanna say Helen. And had that not happened, and I Wade, like because I’m doing a fundraiser that we I just did the numbers we’ve raised already, just in presales, about $7,000 that has directly gone back to the Western North Carolina population who are a lot of my friends down there. Had I had not lost my job, or been out here in Colorado, none of this would have happened.

Darcy Wade [00:05:24]:
So, yeah, there’s my elevator pitch on the past 4 years. Wow. I know I’m gonna try really hard not to cry through this, but also I, I accept any emotions because they’re also real.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:39]:
That is a lot.

Darcy Wade [00:05:41]:
It’s so much. Yeah. It’s a lot. And a really big piece I just wanna highlight while it’s like coming to me is like the power of creativity and the power of community. Like, creativity is what fuels our problem solving skills. Like, my friends, like, your friend, like, our people down in Western North Carolina are literally surviving. Those who did survive the storm, many who did not, many lands who did not, many animals who did not, but the ones who are there being creative, they are working together in a community. They are fighting to save everybody they can.

Darcy Wade [00:06:17]:
It’s incredible, and it’s heartbreaking at the same time. Isn’t it interesting

Nancy Norbeck [00:06:25]:
how Wade, in Western culture, tend to discount creativity and community until it’s a life and death situation and we can’t survive without either? Yeah. Because that’s really what I’m hearing as as you’re saying this is, you know, we know as human beings, we’re wired for both of these things, but we like to pretend that we’re not and that we can get along with, you know, not doing the creative thing because we’ve been told that that’s not important, and that we can just do everything ourselves, you know, the whole rugged individualism thing until your house washes away. Yep. And then you can’t, because, actually, that’s not how humans are designed to work, and also just kind of not how nature works.

Darcy Wade [00:07:18]:
And

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:19]:
then we find out that we need them both literally to survive.

Darcy Wade [00:07:24]:
100%. One thing that has always stuck with me that I learned when I was, you know, studying expressive arts therapy, which which was my main focus that in somatics, for my clinical master’s degree. I remember learning about how, like, you know, indigenous and ancient cultures, like, art and creativity was not separate. It was a part of everyday functioning. It was like while you cleaned, while you cooked, while you did anything, you were singing, you were dancing, you know, you Wade, like, making things, you were crafting craftsmanship. And so it’s rooted in our lineages. And that’s a huge part of, like, this is like, you know, as we are recording this right now, and you are an amazing person for being able to bump this up for the urgency, but, like, it’s it’s just like a reminder of the importance of community and creativity. There was another point I was about to make, which it will come back to me.

Darcy Wade [00:08:23]:
I just lost it, but yeah, I mean, all of what you said 100%. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:28]:
Yeah. I think I think it’s a shame Wade only remember it when it gets down to the brass tacks. Yeah.

Darcy Wade [00:08:35]:
Oh, that’s what I was gonna say is, like, right now as we’re filming this is a lot of us who are directly connected to WNC, we really know what’s going on. There’s so much that has not been released that people outside don’t know. But as a nation and and globally, the Western North Carolina Appalachian culture is like where so much of our creativity and our arts and our lineage it’s it’s the culture of America. America’s a very young, you know, nation and our creatives have built a lot of this culture that we have as Hurricane. And that is very rooted in the Appalachian, you know, Blue Ridge Mountain, Western North Carolina. And that’s what has been literally and metaphorically kind of washed away. But the people on the ground right now and who are connected are fighting to keep that alive, along with a lot of humans. And so it’s powerful, and it’s a national wake up call.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:34]:
Yeah. It’s a wake up call in a lot of ways. I mean, Asheville is so far inland that no one ever expected anything like this to happen there because of a hurricane. So it’s a climate thing.

Darcy Wade [00:09:47]:
100%. 1 in a 1000% chance of this happening, and this is where it’s so important that this is getting out. Like, there’s been a lot of people mind you, I’m in Colorado. A lot of people out here don’t even realize what’s happening or at least not to the extent, and people are like, well, why didn’t people evacuate? I know like, there are friends of mine and people I know that once they got the message to evacuate, the the roads were gone. They couldn’t. Their cars were gone. It was so unpredicted to this level. And, of course, we know that there’s, you know, destruction, Hurricane Milton down in Florida and other areas, and, like, there’s so much that’s been affected.

Darcy Wade [00:10:26]:
But, like, the reason Western North Carolina, WNC, is so important to be aware of is, like, it was a 1 in a 1000 chance of this happening, And it’s home Wade. Like, it’s getting closer to home and the reality, climate change, all the things. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:42]:
Yeah.

Darcy Wade [00:10:44]:
Yeah. Big breath. Yeah. Water. Using my I said before we started filming, I literally have like my squash mallow behind me, my my squishy, like, regulation ball in my hand. I have water with electrolytes, like taking care of ourselves first, taking care of our families, taking care of our community, and then we take care of the world.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:08]:
Yeah. So you’re so far away, but you have so many contacts at home. Yeah. So how are you I mean, it must feel it must feel frustrating to be as far away as you are, and yet at the same time, you know, it gives you resources that you wouldn’t have if you were there to be helping out.

Darcy Wade [00:11:32]:
100%. I mean, like, as I have said, I’m kinda now forgetting what I said prerecording to now, but it’s okay. It all it all comes it all is important. You know, I lost my job as an art well, I I had to resign. I wouldn’t be really respectful in how I word that. I I had to resign, due to, yeah, finding out, you know, I I was the one that caught that my mother had chronic leukemia when she came out to visit me in Colorado, and the elevation brought the jaundice to the surface in her skin, and I knew what that Wade. I immediately took her to the ER. We found out she has leukemia.

Darcy Wade [00:12:09]:
I think she’s had it for a while. And then just other things. I’m in recovery again. All these things led to where I was the job as an art therapist, it was my dream job, still is, but it ended up being more dangerous in a lot of ways because of the population. It’s really, really heartbreaking, like, youth that have just, like, ended up in really bad situations. And, yeah, I had to resign, but then I was able I resigned literally, like it was like the day before the hurricane hit. And had I not had all this time off, you know, it’s been, what, like, 2, 3 weeks since all this has happened. Feels like 2 weeks, 2 years, and 2 days all in one breath.

Darcy Wade [00:12:51]:
But, yeah, being out here in Colorado and mind you, I I was planning actually to move back to Asheville before I got myself into rehab. So I could have very easily been one of the artists down there impacted, but, you know, God took me out here to Colorado to get clean and sober. And then being out here without a job, when everything hits, it allowed me to have, like, you know, Internet access and just, you know, I channeled my anxiety. Like, those 2 days, when we couldn’t hear from everyone like, my my partner is from Marion. His family’s in Marion, North Carolina. So, like, we were watching this from when it hit. And we there was, like, at least 2 days, maybe even more, where we we hadn’t heard from everyone. We didn’t know who was alive.

Darcy Wade [00:13:37]:
And I was channeling so much of my anxiety into, you know, this drawling, of 2 hands holding North Carolina with a heart over where Western North Carolina is. And I immediately just was like, we need to make money, we need to do things with this. And I I just reached out. Mind you, every time I’ve done things like this in the past, it’s all been Asheville based artists and screen printers. So I’m having to, like, build community out here in Denver, trying to network, trying to figure things out and get this fundraiser going. And as of today, we have raised 7,000 that we have donated back to the WNC community, and that’s just in presales. So, yeah, being out here and the luxury of not being impacted directly, but still being affected by it definitely helped this fundraiser get going. And that’s been a huge, huge thing, especially just highlighting the power of art and creativity and just following your curiosity.

Nancy Norbeck [00:14:33]:
Yeah. Wow. Yeah.

Darcy Wade [00:14:37]:
And I somehow haven’t drank this whole time.

Nancy Norbeck [00:14:43]:
I mean, that’s a major accomplishment. And and I, you know, I can’t imagine You mentioned an intentional relapse before, which is something I’d never heard of, but I I can’t imagine, you know, thinking it was one thing and realizing it was something else and what that must do to you psychologically and then, you know, going and and dealing with it the way you did, and then all of this stuff on top of that, and how that influences you and your art and your drive to do something in this moment too.

Darcy Wade [00:15:22]:
Yeah. I mean, I remember talking about that in the our first episode together of how through all the ups and downs, the good moments, the bad moments, the years where I just felt so lost. And, you know, those those still happen. We’re human. It’s a it’s a wave. We are all learning to ride. And, I art and creativity has always been the baseline, the grounding force to help me navigate the turbulence when the waves just get too overwhelming. And I I just can’t and I think that’s where, like, my heart is just shattered for you know, at this point, yes, I’m from Charlotte, North Carolina, but I lived in Western North Carolina for 2 Wade.

Darcy Wade [00:16:04]:
And that’s where I got, like, most of my drive and my ambition as an artist. And just knowing that so many not only, like, just people impacted, like, losing so much, but losing, like, the original, like, art, being swept Wade. Like, I’m I’m just picturing that on top of just everything else. But yeah, I mean, what a powerful time I will say to be creative because we are needed and it’s necessary.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:33]:
Yeah. And I I’ve never been to Asheville, but, you know, my, my friend who’s there lived there for a while, and then she briefly moved up to, I think it was Massachusetts. And I’m not even sure that she stayed there for a whole year because she missed Asheville so much that Yeah. She moved back maybe 6 or 7 months ago. And now, you know, she’s dealing with the aftermath of all of this. But I I have a feeling. You know, I haven’t really talked to her because of the whole situation, but I have a feeling that if I ask her if she regrets moving back, she’d still say no.

Darcy Wade [00:17:09]:
A 100%. Well, that’s the other thing too is, like, yeah, I’m out in Denver, and that’s kinda because I have to be like my, my professional mental health, clinical mental health licensure is out here in Colorado. And I looked into trying to transfer it. And just because of, like, reciprocity between state to state, I have to be out here for a couple more years to be able to move back. But the plan is, like, I’ve always wanted to move back to Western North Carolina. Once again, heartbreaking, the reality, like, my dream home is, like, in the mountains, kind of more secluded, right next to a river. These are the places I got swept Wade. And I’m just, like, you know, very grateful to, you know, God, my sobriety, just, like, myself for following, you know, the curiosity that led me out here to be able to be safe right now.

Darcy Wade [00:18:00]:
But, like, yeah, I mean, in the big bigger picture, this is a huge, huge, like, loss and, many, many, many steps backwards for our art community, for Western North Carolina, you know, just for so so many people. And, yeah, fighting the good fight because that is home.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:21]:
So for those of us who haven’t been to Asheville, what what is it about Asheville that makes it so special and different from other places?

Darcy Wade [00:18:30]:
In the artist, it’s such a hub for artists, creatives, musicians. A lot of those are specifically what my fundraiser, and I’ll provide you links that you can link that the show notes. But, you know, there’s such a creative atmosphere there. It’s like the phrase of Asheville. I remember when I first moved there, it’s like, keep Asheville weird. And it was just, you know, of course, it’s, like, grown into a lot of breweries, which a lot of those people are friends too. And, you know, the mountains. Oh, my gosh.

Darcy Wade [00:19:05]:
Like, the Blue Ridge Mountains like that. You know, because I lived in Boone. I worked in Old Fort. That’s where I did wilderness therapy, and that’s one of the areas that got, like, completely washed away. Swannanoa, like, my mother, like, this brings tears to my eyes every time, but the Swannanoa music gathering and Swannanoa is an incredible collection of musicians who meet every year, and it’s right there in Swannanoa on the Warren Wilson campus. And I haven’t even been able to look, but Swannanoa is like gone. And that break my heart because my mother wasn’t able to go this year, even though she had tickets because of her leukemia. And we kept saying next year, next year.

Darcy Wade [00:19:48]:
And, you know, that’s the that’s the heart wrenching thing people need to realize is, like, it’s gonna take so long for this all to recover if it can recover. Like, the lands are hurting. But, yeah, I mean, Asheville, it’s I know they’re trying to still open. I know there’s a lot of places in the surrounding Western North Carolina who, because of their resiliency, they are open. And like, there’s artists there, there’s musicians there. Like, they want people to come and support. They need that. And we’re just, like, you know, Helene, crossing our fingers for places like Asheville and Black Mountain and Lake Lour, who I mean, like Lour, that’s where Dirty Dancing was filmed.

Darcy Wade [00:20:22]:
Like, those places got demolished, and that’s a lot of, like I said, our our art culture in this nation.

Nancy Norbeck [00:20:30]:
Wow. That’s amazing. Because Dirty Dancing was set in the Catskills in New York, and yet

Darcy Wade [00:20:38]:
They found a lot of the scenes, like around that Wade, it was in Lake Lourdes. And I’m like 99.9% sure I’m right on all this. I mean, out full transparency, like, I know I’m dysregulated, and I know I’m exhausted. I have a huge exam I’m studying for tomorrow for my licensure that I have to pass. It’s like $400 if I don’t and all these other things, but, like, you know, it’s hard to keep track of it all. I think the most important thing for anyone listening, thank you, it’s like do the research, listen to the locals. It’s hard for a lot of us who have just been and I’m I’m speaking to someone who’s not even down there, but, like, there’s so much information going on. So, like, you know, fact check, but I’m doing the best I can with this little brain.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:22]:
Just for clarity, I’m not saying that you’re wrong about the Darcy dancing thing. That kind of stuff happens all the time that you know, set in one place but filmed in another. But, you know, never would have occurred to me that

Darcy Wade [00:21:32]:
it that

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:33]:
it would have been filmed in North Carolina, though I’m sure they found a place and said, well, this looks enough like, you know, upstate New York somewhere. So, you know, because that’s what they do.

Darcy Wade [00:21:42]:
I like to remember my dad telling me when we went there one time for a family trip. But, yeah. I mean, just that whole area. It’s just it’s magic. It’s beautiful. And, yeah, here I am in Denver, which is equally as beautiful. You know, the Front Range, the Rocky Mountains, but, like, such a connect and so much influence. I I’m pretty sure this definitely like, I hope I’m saying this right.

Darcy Wade [00:22:04]:
I’ll backtrack myself after the fact. But, like, I’m pretty sure, like, the Appalachian like, the French Broad River is one of the oldest rivers in the world. And that’s when the rivers that it got up to 25 to 30 feet in a lot of areas, like Marshall, North Carolina, where that’s a huge hub for herbalists, artists, musicians, you know, armors, so so so so much. But yeah, I mean, like, yeah, it’s so much. We don’t have to talk the whole thing about the the venue, but it’s important, and it definitely is a a big focus. But, like, yeah, I mean, as an artist, this is impacting all of us.

Nancy Norbeck [00:22:47]:
Yeah. Well and and that’s the thing that that really when I have heard people talk about Asheville, that’s always what I’ve heard about. It’s kind of it’s kinda like when you hear about Austin, Texas, which I also haven’t been to. And and they also say, you know, keep Austin weird. It’s the the Wade kind of kind of vibe. It’s, you know, you hear about Asheville, and it’s always in an artsy kind of context. So it does it does seem like, you know, it’s kinda like Asheville, Nashville, you know, very artsy kind of communities that that have built themselves up around that. And so it’s not the only reason to support them in the wake of a hurricane, but it’s an extra reason to say, hey, you know, this is a real cultural enclave.

Nancy Norbeck [00:23:35]:
And so, yeah, we wanna help people get back in their houses, but we also wanna help support the artists that have been affected by, you know, potentially losing their work and and losing their studio space, losing their their musical space, their instruments, their, you know, whatever it is that they’re using for their particular art and helping them to get it back, especially if it’s their livelihood.

Darcy Wade [00:24:00]:
Yeah. 100%. Like, I’m thinking right now, and I’m really bad with, like, name pronunciation to just, like, preface saying that I might butcher names, but I’m pretty sure. But, like, my friend Jerry, I know I know how to say the word Jerry, but his last name, Cahill, I’m pretty sure I’m saying that right. He, is one of the founders of Wade Printworks. Rad stands for River Arts District. They are who printed my shirts for during, like, COVID, the Black Lives Matter, all the protests. I did a fundraiser, my first fundraiser for the racial justice coalition, like and Jerry’s one of the ones and his partner at Wade, Matt, they printed my shirts and they lost everything.

Darcy Wade [00:24:46]:
Like, we’re for art District in Asheville is, like, no more. I it’s it’s amazing the things that did survive. Like, my friends who are potters, I’m seeing them posting pictures of, like, little pots that made it and all these things. There’s such a metaphor in that. But Jerry has been working directly with Beloved Asheville, and Beloved Asheville is an amazing organization that’s been around for as long as I have known of Asheville, probably even longer, that really focuses on the homeless population, the addicted population. I mean, that in it itself, like, I immediately knew, not to be too morbid, but the death toll was gonna be really bad in this area because of all those who Yeah. In the Appalachian Mountains, there’s a lot of addiction, a lot of homelessness. You know, those people, unfortunately Yeah.

Darcy Wade [00:25:32]:
I mean, we I don’t even need to say more about that. But, you know, Jerry and Beloved and the Wade Print Works River Arts District Group, they have been literally the ones, like, even though they lost everything, they’ve been nonstop on the grounds in Asheville doing things that you would never expect, like like like going into these territories, into the smaller areas of the mountains that, people are stuck and stranded. And it’s been, like, you know, 2, 3 weeks elders who have not been able to flush their toilet because there’s no running Wade. There’s nothing. And they’ve been going in and, like, bringing them water to they call it gray water to help them flush things into clean. Like, it’s just and so it’s like, these are artists, like, at this point, they are, like, the professionals. Like, I have friends working with FEMA. I have friends, you know, working with all the different organizations, but, like, these are artists at the area who they could have left.

Darcy Wade [00:26:29]:
And a lot of people did because they had to, and I just wanna be really careful in saying that anyone who had to, like, retreat and go elsewhere just to, like, take care of themselves, that’s really important. Every single piece of this puzzle is important. But a lot of those who stayed, the artists, the musicians, the locals, the business owners, the nonprofit owners, they are fighting to save their own, and they don’t really know what they’re doing, but that’s the power of following your curiosity and the creative process and problem solving, and they are saving lives and they have been nonstop. It’s it’s remarkable.

Nancy Norbeck [00:27:01]:
Yeah. It’s amazing what what, you know, necessity being the mother of invention. Mhmm. You know, what you can come up with when you have to. And I’m I’m really glad that they’re finding ways to support folks like that.

Darcy Wade [00:27:16]:
Yeah. Yeah. This I saw someone post this, and it’s so true. It’s like this area, I think doesn’t get a lot of credit too, but it’s a lot of survivalists. It’s a lot of, like you know, this is where I worked, Wilderness Therapy in Old Fort, North Carolina. And a lot of people who live there, like they, they do choose, they choose to live in a little bit more of like secluded mountain area, but they know how to survive. And it’s the power of community of like, yeah, people have prepared they they have, like kept supplies, but everyone’s sharing with with everyone. And that’s beautiful, too.

Darcy Wade [00:27:56]:
Yeah, so there’s a lot of good. The quote that sticks with me right now is, like, I might butcher this, but essentially it’s life is both beautiful and tragic, and we have to pay attention to both.

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:12]:
Yeah. I think there’s wisdom in that for sure. And not just when tragedy strikes.

Darcy Wade [00:28:18]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:19]:
No. Yeah. It’s it’s in every moment.

Darcy Wade [00:28:22]:
Yeah. Gratitude. I mean, that’s and I can kind of, like, do a natural segue just into kinda, like, what’s been happening in my life behind the scenes, in the past 4 years. But, like, you know, just trying to, like, go back to the roots, like, you know, the whole nature based expressive arts, which I I’m pretty sure I talked about that Oh, yeah. In this episode. Yeah. Yep. You know, just it’s not even just about learning how to survive, you know, not only in this world, but in our natural world and like, you know, our we are humans, we are animals too, and appreciating nature.

Darcy Wade [00:29:02]:
This has stuck with me a lot too. And this, I think just gives a paints a picture pun paints a picture of maybe how my mentality is through all this. It’s like, yes, we honor and we grieve all those who have who lost their lives in this catastrophe and all the other catastrophes that are happening in the world. But at the same time, you know, mother nature spared a lot. Like, I can speak for myself. I know a lot of people in Western North Carolina, and every person I know personally survived. And that’s the power of like, yeah, like their resiliency, but I also just really trust nature. And, even if it doesn’t make sense in the moment, it’s it’s bigger than us.

Darcy Wade [00:29:45]:
It’s a bigger thing to comprehend, but mother nature is wise and also is hurting because of what humans have been doing. But I know that’s been a really big guiding for, like, my recovery journey, especially round 2 and just being an artist. Like, a lot of my art still revolves around just like nature, listening to nature, trusting the process, and it’s helping me regulate as I grip my little stress ball

Nancy Norbeck [00:30:21]:
like crazy. Yeah. I I really I remember being really fascinated with your your nature and wilderness therapy work before. So I’m I’m curious to know, like, I mean, how how did you I’m assuming that you still work in that way in Colorado? Like, how how is it is it different out there? Have you had different opportunities to expand it, to explore it differently?

Darcy Wade [00:30:53]:
Yeah. I mean, since we last talked, I did end up starting a private practice, which technically is still operating. I mean, well, it’s it’s still active. I’ll say that. I’m not working through it right now just for, like, ethical boundaries. I’m still in recovery. I’m trying to be very ethical about what I do. But my private practice that I started, I think it was in 2021, based in Boulder, Colorado, and it’s called heart of earth healing.

Darcy Wade [00:31:25]:
It’s not gonna be helpful to look that up because I’ve made everything private, but it was like the concept of like the word art is in both heart and earth, and I don’t believe in coincidences. And then the focus for me, and I I had a lot of success with this, it was really hard to end this, but I knew I had to go back home to North Carolina, and pause. But I was seeing clients out, like, we would go on, like, walks around some of the, like, beautiful lakes out here in Colorado. We would meet at the foot of, like, Chautauqua, which is like the front range, beautiful, mountainscape in Boulder. I definitely hosted a lot of groups. I like nature based expressive arts groups, and it it’s so fun, and I’m planning to do more. It’s just beginning. We just took a pause.

Darcy Wade [00:32:17]:
Yeah. That that is like soul food for me, like, for my heart. 100%.

Nancy Norbeck [00:32:23]:
Are you still working with a lot of kids?

Darcy Wade [00:32:26]:
Mhmm. I’m gonna try to get through this without crying. Oh, it’s so hard. Yeah. I mean, I worked, at a really amazing place called Denver Children’s Home, and we are in very good relations. You know, they were really taking care of me. It was hard to see in the moment, but it was like I needed to resign to take care of myself. And they saw that, but for the 4 months I was able to work there, until honestly, my health just kinda got in the way and everything else.

Darcy Wade [00:32:59]:
Yeah. Our main population is kids right here from Colorado who really grew up with not a lot of family, if if any, and a lot of them ended up in gangs. And, you know, it’s just fighting to find that sense of community. And because of that, a lot of the kiddos and I have to be very careful about what I shared just for and I’m obviously not gonna share any names or anything. Absolutely not. That would be big no no. Right. Like, it’s like kids that just got into really bad situations because they were young, and they now have charges against them.

Darcy Wade [00:33:31]:
And it’s kinda like going to different children’s home is their their attempt to try to, like, do get not in the system, not go immediately to jail. And it’s so hard. But, yeah, those were the kids that I was working with and doing art therapy specifically with. I was hired as an art therapist. I those kids are amazing, and I I was starting to, like, connect a lot of things to be able to, like, do things in the garden. We had a new amazing community garden there, and so really trying to get the nature element to them. And there’s still there’s still hope. Like, I I have full faith that this will all be connected later when I have the capacity.

Darcy Wade [00:34:13]:
But, yeah, I mean, I love working with the kids. And I do have another job lined up, and that’s why this exam I’m taking tomorrow is so important because I have to pass that to get to the next stage of my licensure to be able to get this job. But this new job, like, they’re giving me free range. Like, it’s basically doing a private practice, but through, like, a company. And yeah, I mean, I I can’t I wanna continue working with the youth. Anyone honestly, who is curious about how creativity in nature can just really help because that is truly what has allowed me to be, like, alive today, honestly. And I just wanna share what wisdom I have gained and continue to gain, and I really love working with the kids.

Nancy Norbeck [00:35:01]:
Yeah. Do kids take really easily to art therapy? Because I have to imagine that they that they do probably more than adults do.

Darcy Wade [00:35:10]:
They do. They do. And it I remember specifically this one kid, I wanna say he was like 15 and he had just gotten there. And I think the art therapy group I was leading was one of his first, like, entrances into, you know, our program. And I remember like trying to like hand him, like, paint stuff. And he’s like, I’ve never painted before. And I was like, woah. And, like, by, like, group 3, he loved it and Wade, like, already saying how his favorite type of painting art was abstract art.

Darcy Wade [00:35:40]:
And it just it was like watching these kids who didn’t really a lot of them didn’t really have a childhood because they were, like, in survival mode from the get go. Watching them just, like, reconnect with their their childlike wander, which is a huge part of, like, the creative process and the curiosity behind that. Like, it’s powerful. It’s medicine. I like bringing the focus back to, like, Western North Carolina. I’m so, like, amazed and just, like, my heart lights up when I see all these videos being posted by my friends of groups sitting together by candlelight singing to each other and dancing and just, like, painting. And it’s like, that’s that’s the artist way.

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:22]:
Yeah. And, you know, you mentioned wonder and I wonder and awe really fascinate me because I think that they’re they’re kind of what’s the word? They’re kind of hard to pin down. You know? They’re hard to describe it. If you have a really awe inspiring experience or moment, it’s hard to explain it to somebody else. So so it’s kind of difficult to connect with somebody who wasn’t actually there. Like, if somebody else was there with you, then you don’t have to explain it to them, and it’s great because then you you just kinda you know. You know, you Yeah. You were there, and and you you have that connection, and you don’t need words, and yay.

Nancy Norbeck [00:37:05]:
But if somebody else wasn’t there, you Yeah. You just you trip all over yourself, kinda like I’m doing right now, and and it’s really hard to communicate it. Whether that’s, you know, going to see Bruce Springsteen on the beach in Asbury Park like he

Darcy Wade [00:37:22]:
did a couple of weeks ago the kids, by the way. You know? Anyway Or

Nancy Norbeck [00:37:28]:
or, like, seeing a fabulous sunset over, you know, the mountains in New Zealand or or something like that. You you know, it doesn’t it doesn’t really matter what it was. It’s it’s equally difficult to explain to somebody else. A photo or a recording is not the same as having been there. It’s but it’s something your awe inspiring experience probably still felt the same way to you as my awe inspiring experience, even if it was a completely different thing. I don’t know. It just it just fascinates me because I think that it’s this feeling that is important somehow, but that the English language really lets us down. We don’t have good words for it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:13]:
We we know what it is, but we can’t talk about it easily. But it I don’t know. It it’s important. I don’t know what you what you think. Help me

Darcy Wade [00:38:26]:
out here. Fire. I know that those listening because this is just audio. Like, I’m sitting here just nodding because, like, you’re I have been where you are so many times trying to just explain what expressive arts therapy is to people. Like, I don’t know. Just come do it. Yeah. Right?

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:44]:
Like, it’s hard.

Darcy Wade [00:38:45]:
Away Wade happy. It’s so hard and that’s that’s the power too of, like, the creative process, especially when it comes to healing. I mean, essentially, it’s synonymous. Like, creative creativity is healing. For the most part, when people are tapping into their creative power, it is in turn healing them in some way. And then trying to explain that though to people who haven’t tapped in. Oh my gosh. Like, shout out to the movie Soul.

Darcy Wade [00:39:08]:
Have you seen that?

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:09]:
Oh, yeah.

Darcy Wade [00:39:10]:
Oh my god. Like What

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:11]:
a great Darcy.

Darcy Wade [00:39:12]:
It’s so good and so such a great way to explain exactly the concept we’re talking about, which is essentially expressive arts therapy. It’s just expression tapping into that ancestral, that, like, deep rooted, you know, a blessing being human is we were given thumbs, which means that we are allowed to create with these thumbs. Obviously, you know, my heart goes out to a lot of, like, those who are, like, disabled, and that was a huge population I actually worked with in Asheville. Shout out Open Hearts Art Center. That’s a huge place that, like, I’ve been directly donating to because I worked there for basically the whole time I was in Asheville. And we we worked with artists in the Western North Carolina community who had, like, a bunch of different, you know, yes, disabilities, but the correct term is differences. And, you know, I remember working with a woman who didn’t have access to her hand. She had cerebral palsy, but we I helped her translate writing and write a book and amazing things like that.

Darcy Wade [00:40:12]:
And it’s it’s hard to explain. And that’s where like, when we are able to capture it into words like this podcast, that’s where I’ve always loved this whole premise of what you’re doing, and I’ve wanted to stay connected because it’s important. And it’s yeah. I mean, sometimes you just can’t find the words, and that’s where you let the the the art talk for you.

Nancy Norbeck [00:40:35]:
Yeah. As as we’ve been talking, I’m I’m remembering that, the late great Roger Ebert, the film critic, wrote a piece one time about elevation. It’s what he called it. Is that that moment when you’re watching the movie and you get the goosebumps because something amazing is happening. And and he he may have had a way of putting it into words. I’m gonna find it, and I’ll put a link to it in the show notes because I remember reading that piece maybe, I don’t know, 10 years ago, and thinking, oh, yeah. That’s that moment when, like, you feel the hair on the back of your neck stand up when you’re in the movie, and and you just have this moment and you might start to cry. And, you know, and and not every experience of our wonder makes you cry or or makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up or whatever.

Nancy Norbeck [00:41:19]:
But I think I think there’s some crossover there, but it’s Yeah. Maybe it’s just feeling like there’s something bigger than you happening. I

Darcy Wade [00:41:27]:
don’t I

Nancy Norbeck [00:41:27]:
don’t know.

Darcy Wade [00:41:27]:
There it is. That’s it. Yeah. No. I mean, that it’s weird. I would it’s not weird because I really just trust that we’re on the same wavelength right now. I think a lot of us creatives are because, surprise, if you haven’t noticed, it’s like the world’s on fire everywhere right now. Mhmm.

Darcy Wade [00:41:43]:
And it’s really hard. I mean, it’s really hard. Everyone’s dealing with something and, you know, mad respect for just pushing through one day at a time. But like, yeah, I mean, creativity in itself, and I think this is where I’ve always, like, used it as my my lifeline, like, my anchor in this world is because it does in turn, connect you with just the bigger picture, the greater community to God’s spirit, to mother earth, to, like, whatever human language feels right for you. It connects you to that bigger energy, which gives us hope. It gives us faith. And without that, what is the point of this whole human experience?

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:24]:
Yeah. Yeah. Not to get everybody going, oh, it’s all pointless. That’s not what we’re saying. But but, yeah, there’s there’s something that, you know, connects us to stuff that’s bigger than us. I actually there there was a book there’s a guy named Dacher Keltner who’s a some kind of psychologist out at, Berkeley, I think. And he released a whole book called Awe last year. So he’s obviously got lots and lots of words for awe.

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:56]:
And it was Wade? AWE. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was an interesting read, but he he divides it into different different categories, like, you know, group movement and, you know, all all sorts of stuff. But I’ve you know, now I wish I had read it more recently. But, but he’s too.

Nancy Norbeck [00:43:17]:
Yeah. There’s all sorts of stuff that can elevate the the immediate moment. And he’s he talked a lot about, like, everyday awe, which I don’t think we think about all the time. We think about, you know, the sunset over the mountains or the Bruce Springsteen concert on the beach or, you know, the big things that that we think about and and that, you know, we separate into these elevated moments. But, you know, there are there are these ordinary ordinary moments. You know, I was just thinking the other day about a student that I had once when I was teaching. I taught ESL kids, and a lot of people told me that they couldn’t do creative writing. And I was like, why? Why? Just because English is their second language, you think they can’t write a poem? I mean, what what you expect them to write an essay for their English class, but you think they can’t write a poem?

Darcy Wade [00:44:09]:
And it always always comes down to someone down the line told them they couldn’t because of what their experience is, and that’s where we come in and say, yes. You can.

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:19]:
Yes. You can. And my kids regularly wrote all sorts of stuff, and we, you know, would put it in the literary magazine. And one of my kids wrote a poem that ended up in the literary magazine, and the school chaplain at the end of the year asked him to read it at the final chapel service. Oh. And he got up and and read it. You know, I’m like, yeah. Really? So you wanna tell me again how ESL kids can’t write poetry? Yep.

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:45]:
Can’t do creative writing? Because that one just did, and he’s not the only one. You know? That’s a moment of everyday awe. You know?

Darcy Wade [00:44:54]:
It literally brings tears in my eyes every time, because, like, this is, you know, for all the, like, mothers out there, fathers out there, you know, just, like, even adopted parents, like, our youth is our our future as we know. I mean, I’m I’m I don’t have kids my own, but obviously, like, I I love being around children and working with children. There’s so much wisdom to gain from basically everyone in that younger like a little bit more naive, you know, they’re still kind of in that Wade that wall. That was me trying to combine Wade wander and all they’re in that. They’re just in that, yeah, childlike, just seeing the world with a really fresh perspective. And I I try to tap into that a lot, especially when I’m out hiking, when I’m doing art. Just every process I’m trying to, like, see it from like, okay, What am I actually experiencing without all of the other noise and chatter that’s happening and all of the different, like, you know, things that have happened throughout my life that told me, no. I can’t or not good enough or all the things.

Darcy Wade [00:46:07]:
And it’s like, this is when we rewrite we rewrite. That is a tongue twister. Those, neuro pathways. Like, you know, speaking as a clinical therapist, I worked in neuro. I’ve done a lot of my own work. You know, I I put myself in treatment, did a lot of brain spotting, did a lot of, EMDR, all the things. Like, we have the ability to rewire our our our brain and rewire these connections that are telling us we can’t and to not go there, to not fall out of curiosity, to not try to do this, to not try to do that. I think what is really being highlighted with what’s happening in Western North Carolina right now after the hurricane is the power of the creatives, especially in crisis, the power of the, quote, unquote, hippies.

Darcy Wade [00:46:52]:
I remember we laughed about this when I was trying to explain expressive arts in episode 1 when we did this. It’s like, you know, we’re kind of seeing now that, like, this culture and this way of life is really, really sustainable and it’s grounding. I mean, they literally overcame majority of them overcame and survived a major catastrophic, I in quotes, this is how it’s been said, biblical level catastrophic once in a lifetime events. And they are just showing us the power of that deep rooted resiliency that comes from being a creative. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:36]:
And and to what you were saying a minute ago about, you know, listening to all the messages that say, no, you can’t. You can’t do that. You shouldn’t be this way. You should, you know, do this other thing. That’s that’s literally why I’m launching a course called make bad art. Yes. To

Darcy Wade [00:47:55]:
get people

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:56]:
out of, you know, making bad art goes literally against the grain because everybody believes that if you’re gonna make your if you’re gonna make art, you have to make good art. Well, how do you think you get to make good art?

Darcy Wade [00:48:08]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:09]:
Nobody starts out making good art. Yeah. Guarantee you the first time you try to make any kind of art, whether it’s taking a photo or, you know, drawing or writing something, it’s gonna be bad. And if you judge yourself on your first effort, you will never make a second effort. But if you sit down and you deliberately make bad art, then you say, oh, look, I made some bad art. Maybe I’ll make some more because that was fun.

Darcy Wade [00:48:37]:
I love that I love that so much. And I would even like, you know, taking it, like, a step further, I mean, this is where my creative brain and my expressive arts brain is, like, seeing the beauty in this process of, like, once you realize the power of what has been deemed, quote, unquote, bad art, you see it’s not necessarily bad. It’s more of just, like, not maybe accept it. And okay. So who who got to have the rights to tell us what is and isn’t accepted in the art world? And I know and this is a huge thing we talked about in my first episode Wade, like, how blocked and, like, defeated I felt when I was kind of being told that my art was not good and things like that when I was in college and that whole story. You know, I actually weirdly relistened to that episode. I got called to relisten to it, like, not long before you had tagged me. So this is all, like, posting the music, and I love it.

Darcy Wade [00:49:30]:
But I was, like, remembering just how hard that was for me as someone who is an artist who had always been told throughout my life, I I was so good at art. Mind you, I was not really good at a lot of other things. I’ve grown. I’ve learned. But art was always my thing. And as someone who even had that foundation, the 1, 2, 3 handful of times that I was told my art wasn’t good stuck with me in such a Wade. And that’s where we are I love your course. I just already love the sound of it, and I will happily help promote it because, like, getting people to realize that, quote, unquote, the bad art is where the magic happens because that’s where you’re the most vulnerable and real, and you’re doing it for you and not anyone else.

Darcy Wade [00:50:09]:
I love it. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:50:10]:
And it gets you out of what other people tell you about it.

Darcy Wade [00:50:13]:
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:50:15]:
Beautiful. So it lets you be yourself. I mean, that’s that’s the whole that’s the whole thing. That’s why I’m so excited about it. Because so many people, even if they’re, you know, we all get all of these messages about who we’re supposed to be. Well, what about who you wanna be?

Darcy Wade [00:50:29]:
Yeah. And you know what? I even have it right here. You know who I’ve learned? Yes. I’m an artist and I’m a human, but you know what I wanna be? I wanna be a good person. Like, that’s literally, like, Logan. She’s got a

Nancy Norbeck [00:50:42]:
hat that says “be a good person” on it.

Darcy Wade [00:50:44]:
Yeah. I’m showing her it. It’s my, like it’s literally, like, my, like, emotional support hat. But I this is actually a company here in Denver. It’s really tragic. I think I actually and I might have to backtrack this too, but I think it started during COVID time. I know that it was kind of founded. I it might have already been around, actually, but where it really got highlighted, when I when I learned about it, it was, a really innocent individual was shot and killed from a I think it was a gang thing.

Darcy Wade [00:51:16]:
And then, you know, they they’re utilizing their platform, be a good person to just raise awareness about all of that stuff. And just remind people that at the end of the day, when you’re still trying to figure out who you are, you know you can be a good person. And that comes in all shapes and sizes, but that’s also how we all come. And it’s all about, like, what you’re feeling in your heart and the altruism and, like, the just authenticity. And I I’ll speak from just what I’m seeing with my fundraiser. Like, I’m literally not keeping a penny. And that’s hard because I don’t have a job right now. It’s really hard.

Darcy Wade [00:51:49]:
We are constantly being sort of, like, tempted with all these, you know, things that maybe aren’t the best choice. But every time you choose the right choice, you choose to be a good person choice, more magic happens, and it ends up, like, expanding tenfold. And it’s always worth it in the end. Always.

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:09]:
Yeah. Well, and you know, my my instinctive reaction to be a good person is that probably the person you really wanna be is the person you are deep down inside.

Darcy Wade [00:52:21]:
Yep.

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:21]:
That that doesn’t always come out because you’re influenced by all of these other things that are telling you buy this thing, or be this person, or this other person’s more perfect than you. You know, but all of you know, the the famous exercises like, who are the people that you idolize and why do you idolize them? And those qualities are the qualities that you probably already have that you don’t acknowledge in yourself. I mean, that’s I think that’s true. I think that that, you know, the person that you wanna be is is what’s really deep down or you wouldn’t wanna be that. And the things that get in the way are things that aren’t really you. There are external factors that make it harder to live up to that.

Darcy Wade [00:53:04]:
100%. I can speak from from my own experience, like to anyone who’s listening that is or has gone through addiction of any kind. Like, I still I will always refer to myself as an addict because at the end of the day, like, that is how my system is is is, like, formed. And I know this, and that’s a beautiful awareness that I now have, and I’m able to, like, accept and move forward with that and not see it as, like, a a a something that’s holding me back. It’s more of, like, if someone had an allergy. Like, I’m I’m allergic to something. Okay? Like, I’m allergic to alcohol. Like, literally, like, if I drink it, it does not do good things to my psyche or to my body, and that doesn’t mean it’s everyone.

Darcy Wade [00:53:49]:
But, yeah, like, even though I have struggled with addiction my whole life and it’s a forever long process, I’m someone who struggled with still struggle with anxiety. I’m definitely like a neurodivergent individual. I’m an adult person who is just now kind of coming to terms with all the hidden disabilities. Shout out to, like, the sunflower. I use that a lot. It’s like my symbol right now because I learned when I was, you know, experiencing having to help fly my mother after we learned her diagnosis back from Colorado. We had to I had to help fly her to North Carolina. It took like a week to get her to that point because the elevation was messing with her hemoglobin levels.

Darcy Wade [00:54:30]:
And sunflower is a symbol, at least in airports and a lot of other systems of like, hey, there are hidden disabilities that you may not notice on the outside. Oh. Yeah. I know. I I get chills every time about that because I I literally dressed as a sunflower when I was taking my mother to the airport the first time, the first attempt when the doctor said that she was stable, quote, unquote. And I thought I lost her in my arms just in the checkout line to try to get our tickets. It was terrifying. It was overwhelming.

Darcy Wade [00:55:00]:
It was scary. I was dressed in a yellow sweater. I had this little, like, hide glitter all over my face. I don’t know why. I just felt called to do that. It’s a god thing. I had this little, like, green, like like, flower looking thing poking out. And I also had just gotten trained at TCI, which is therapeutic crisis intervention.

Darcy Wade [00:55:21]:
I had just gotten trained that, like, the week before, and I was able and mind you, this Wade when there was, like, some kind of technology crisis at the in the airports where there was understaffing as there always is. And when my mother went down in my arms, and I think she was in and out. It was really scary. I’m not even gonna go into that. But, like, I with all my hidden disabilities, I channeled and just knew, and I was like, this is what needs to happen to get my mother into a hospital and be Wade, and I channeled that. And I guess my long way of saying is, like, even if you’re someone who’s doubting who you are because you’ve been told your whole life that you’re not good enough, that you don’t you’re you’re too addicted to things. You’re not strong enough. You’re weak.

Darcy Wade [00:56:00]:
You’re too sensitive. All the things I’ve been told so many times, it it is what builds your character if you just learn to accept and love it and work with it and not work against it and just be curious. That’s a huge, huge follow your curiosity, be a good person, listen to your body, and just trust yourself and don’t give up because, like, that’s what helped me. I I don’t wanna sound too, like, presumptuous or you get to school to say this, but I I do think I helped save my mother’s life a few times. And I think it was all of the above that I just stated that helped me be the person I am today to be able to do this. And that’s definitely, like, what is fueling me right now to be able to just, like, put my all into this fundraiser to help my friends back in WNC. So, yeah, every flaw does help in the end.

Nancy Norbeck [00:56:53]:
Yeah. Well and we are all flawed. And I love what you said about acceptance because, you know, if you fight the flaws, you’re you’re just you’re just deluding yourself more. Whereas if you accept the flaws, they just they just become part of you and they they help you become more comfortable in your own skin rather than less.

Darcy Wade [00:57:12]:
Being human is so interesting.

Nancy Norbeck [00:57:14]:
Isn’t it? But there’s no one no two ways about it. No matter what you do, you’re still gonna be human.

Darcy Wade [00:57:21]:
One day at a time. That’s my favorite forever my favorite, like, recovery, you know, AA slogan, one day at a time, trust the process. Yeah. Be grateful, have faith, stay, you know, don’t do it alone, ask for help, all the things. Hashtag all the things.

Nancy Norbeck [00:57:40]:
Well, before we go, I wanna make sure that you get a a solid chance to tell us in detail exactly what this fundraiser is and how we can find it and what we can do to help out.

Darcy Wade [00:57:51]:
Yes. So the fundraiser is, directly supporting Western North Carolina after hurricane hel Helene. Thank you. I always say it wrong.

Nancy Norbeck [00:58:01]:
It’s my grandmother’s name, so it’s easy.

Darcy Wade [00:58:02]:
Oh, that that makes yeah. It it doesn’t, like, make sense in my brain when I read it. But yeah. So after the hurricane, there was outrageous devastation. I mean, this whole area of our nation has just been, like, almost completely demolished, but there are people down there, my friends, our friends who are fighting the good fight and helping, and they have lost a lot. So this fundraiser is directly supporting them. I’m literally, like, basically just being a channel as when I get donations in, I’m filtering them back out, and we’ve raised 7,000 as I’ve said, and it is helping. I’m I have really put in a lot of work on my social media platforms.

Darcy Wade [00:58:38]:
So Darcy Wade art is kind of, like, my overarching platform for everything. That’s my website, www.Darcy Wade art.com. My handle on Instagram is Darcy Wade Art, all the things. But then even my personal Instagram, I made public, and it’s more of like a blog. It’s more complicated because it has a lot of, like, dots and underline things because it’s D Wade. It’s harder to find. But, I’m trying really hard to post their daily updates about where Darcy donations are going to, updates about what’s really happening down there. Just amplify the voices of my people down in Western North Carolina, our people who are not being heard, and, at the same time, trying to raise money to send to them.

Darcy Wade [00:59:20]:
It’s shirts, stickers, prints. I’m gonna be releasing, I hope hoodies and mugs and maybe even, like, stress balls, like, just really, like, like things that people need when they’re in crisis, also in the mountains when it’s cold when they have nothing. So every single scent is going to help this project help others.

Nancy Norbeck [00:59:41]:
You mentioned prints. Is that prints of your own work?

Darcy Wade [00:59:43]:
Mhmm. Yeah. So right now, yeah. I mean, I am so I actually just started a raffle as well that’s gonna be going until Halloween, and, it’s $5 to enter, and you can enter as many times as you want. Every $5 gets your name into this pot. And, essentially, the winner is going to win a free custom anything you want drawing by me. That’s kind of my specialty, and you can find that under, commission work on my website. But then anything I raise from that, I’m gonna be donating.

Darcy Wade [01:00:15]:
And then also on the side, like, I definitely am still taking commission orders. I’m donating 20% of any commission orders directly back to WNC, but also these are great holiday gifts. And I am gonna be releasing soon, kinda almost like a catalog to my newsletter. So if you’re interested, like, subscribe. It’s right on my website. There’ll be a catalog of all the different items, both for the fundraiser and just my own personal art that you can buy, and it’s great for holiday gifts.

Nancy Norbeck [01:00:43]:
Well, and I I asked because if if you haven’t seen Darcy’s artwork, it is absolutely stunning. So this is a great opportunity to get some and do some good with the money at the same time, and we’ll definitely have links to all of the social outlets and Darcy’s website, and who may even throw some some, artwork photos into the the show notes, the the fuller show notes on my website so that you can check it out there, and you can check it out at her website. But seriously, it’s it’s it’s beautiful stuff. So if you’re looking for something pretty to hang on your wall, this is a great opportunity to do some good at the same time. So

Darcy Wade [01:01:23]:
Yeah. Yeah. I love it. Thank you so much for having me on here. This this was Wade really important and very special, and I I’m just so grateful.

Nancy Norbeck [01:01:32]:
That’s our show for this week. I’m so grateful to Darcy Wade for joining me and for her determination to help the Asheville area recover from hurricane Helene. I hope you’ll check out what she’s doing and help out. If you enjoyed this episode or know someone else who’d like to participate, please do share the episode. Thank you so much. If this episode resonated with you or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today.

Nancy Norbeck [01:02:12]:
See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

I recently had a chance to get a very different perspective on something I dearly love doing—by not doing it. I thought it would be torture. I was wrong. I tell you what I discovered in this short episode.

My Make Bad Art course starts on November 4! Are you tired of contorting yourself to meet others’ expectations? Do you want to remember your own wild, imperfect self? And reclaim your curious, adventurous, creative genius inner kid?

Make Bad Art is the anti-MBA, a safe place to come unlearn all those things you’re taught you have to have as an “adult” (stress, perfection, conformity) so you can reclaim the inner wild, curious, creative kid who’s always been inside you–the one who knows how to play, invent, have fun, and live with abandon and joy. It’s a playground for the liberation of your inner artist AND your authentic self, and the effects will go beyond the class container.

Check out all the details at https://fyc.quest/MBA

I hope you’ll join us!

Want more tips? Check out this playlist with all my previous Creative Pep Talks!

Could you leave a review? It’s really easy, and it helps SO much. Thanks!

Join my free creative community, The Spark! We celebrate each other’s creative courage, and I’ll be sharing programs for subscribers and listeners there in the coming months.

Get in Touch

I’d love to hear your feedback, questions, and experience with these ideas! Send me a note at fycuriosity.com, or contact me on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.

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Transcript: Change Your Perspective

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Hey, everybody. This is Nancy Norbeck with this week’s creative pep talk, and I wanna tell you, I just recently went back to my alma mater for a choir reunion. And I know for most people, things like a choir are an extracurricular activity, and, technically, they were an extracurricular activity for me too, though we did get credit for it, academic credit.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:38]:
But but for me, my relationship with my college choir is a little different because it started, actually, it kind of started before I was born. My dad went to the same school I did and sang in the choir. And when I was in middle school and high school, we would go up for the annual lessons and carols service at Christmas. And I just absolutely fell in love with this amazing choir. So when it came time to apply for colleges, there was really only one place I wanted to go because I really wanted to sing in that amazing choir. Now I hadn’t really thought this through because I applied to exactly one school. When I was teaching, and my kids who were applying for colleges asked me how many schools I applied to, I told them that they should not do what I did and certainly not tell the college admissions people what I had done, because I was not not not a good example, but I applied to one school. I I applied early decision.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:37]:
Thank god I got in. And then when I actually got there, realized that I still had to pass the audition. If I didn’t, I was gonna be kind of in big trouble. Fortunately, I did pass the audition. I got into the choir, and everything else was kind of, you know, secondary, like majoring. I majored in English. I also suffered from the delusion my freshman year that I was gonna be an engineer. That didn’t last long.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:06]:
But, anyway, the the choir was always a really, really big thing for me. It was a really important thing. And we’ve had a couple of reunions since then, but this one was a little bit different. Because when the announcement came that there was gonna be a reunion, I I wasn’t sure if I should go or not. And that’s because I realized that I was not gonna be able to sing. And for me to go and listen, just not the same and really kind of painful. There’s a story about my great grandmother sitting in the audience for a performance, and my grandmother, her daughter, saying to her afterwards, now wasn’t it nice just to sit here and listen? And my great grandmother replying, no. I would much rather have been up there.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:58]:
Well, there’s clearly a lot of her in me. And so when my mother suggested to me that I could go and listen, my first words were just kill me now. And so I really weighed whether I should go or not because it was gonna be painful to just sit and listen. And I finally decided that I would probably really regret it if I didn’t go. So I went. And I’ll tell you what, I’m really glad I did. Not only because I got to see people I haven’t seen for a long time, be in a space that I love and hear a choir that I love, but because it was a lot less painful than I thought it would be. Part of that is because I realized when I was there, when it would be physically painful to do the thing that you love, it’s not as emotionally painful not to be doing it, and you realize that while you’re sitting.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:49]:
But what really, really blew my mind was I have never actually sat and listened to this choir. Now, obviously, it’s a college choir, so it’s never really the same choir twice. Every year is a little bit different. A reunion choir is different still, and yet it is in a way that I’m not sure that I can explain if you haven’t been there. It’s just it’s this it’s different, but it’s the same. It’s the same sound. It’s the same spirit. It’s the same people conducting.

Nancy Norbeck [00:04:21]:
It’s the same some of the same people in it. Somehow, I don’t know how choral math works, but somehow it all comes out the same way. And I sat there listening to that choir, and it was amazing. I mean, it was amazing in a way that I could not have predicted. And there were moments there there were individual chords that I thought would just destroy me with how incredibly gorgeous they were and whole pieces that were phenomenal. There was a conversation with some of us in the afternoon on the the the Saturday. And one of my friends from when I was in the choir mentioned that there was one piece where she just kind of felt like she had no idea what was what was going on and what it sounded like in it. So it felt sort of disastrous to her.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:12]:
And I understand that feeling because when you don’t feel like you know what you’re doing, everything feels like chaos. And I said, oh, oh, but I need to tell you how incredibly, incredibly beautiful that piece is. Like, it is unbelievably beautiful, and it was. And through the weekend, as more rehearsal was held and and by the performance on Sunday morning, it was just just soul shatteringly gorgeous. And it really made me think about how how much we can get caught up in that moment of the chaos where we don’t know what’s going on exactly. We feel like we haven’t quite got our footing, and and everything just feels unsettled and, like, nothing is working. And what’s going on? And we don’t often get the opportunity or even stop to think to just pull back and experience it from that other point of view. And I will admit it can be really hard to find that other point of view when you are in the middle of that creative chaos.

Nancy Norbeck [00:06:24]:
I get it. It can be tough. I was in a position where I didn’t have a choice, so it was a little easier for me. I understand. But if you can get outside of it long enough to get a look from some other point of view, from the point of view of someone who’s just walking by, someone who is experiencing it from without the creative process, someone who’s just looking at it for what it is, not trying to solve the puzzle of what it is, but just for what it is in that moment. You might see it very differently. It might give you the perspective that you need. And even if it doesn’t, it might just give you a moment of, hey.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:13]:
You know what? This isn’t bad. In fact, it’s actually really kinda good. It kinda works. I think maybe I know what I wanna do with it. Still have to figure some things out, but I think this works better than I realized it did. So I offer that up because I think sometimes it’s really, really easy to be caught up in the details, the tiny little levels on the ground floor where all of the pieces are in front of us, and we get caught up in trying to make them all make sense. And what we really need to do is kinda get a bird’s eye view and see what it looks like from there and get the bigger perspective or just kinda sit back and listen and take it all in, which is what I got to do, and it was amazing. It’s really, really amazing.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:05]:
I mean, I’m planning to be up there singing next time, but for this time, it was really pretty cool to be sitting where I was sitting. So I hope that you find a way to give yourself that little treat in the middle of the creative chaos. I think it’ll change the way you look at what’s going on. Even if it doesn’t make it make more sense, might at least kind of give you a different a different little perspective and maybe a little piece about it. So as always, let me know how that goes for you, and I’ll see you next time. If this episode resonated with you or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free, and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:03]:
See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

My guest this week is Dr. David Weill, the former director of the Center for Advanced Lung Disease and Lung and Heart-Lung Transplant Program at Stanford University Medical Center. He’s currently the principal of the Weill Consulting Group, which focuses on improving the delivery of pulmonary, ICU, and transplant care. He’s also the author of the new novel, All That Really Matters, which follows his memoir, Exhale: Hope, Healing, and a Life in Transplant. David talks with me about how he made the shift from surgery into writing, how healthcare workers have historically been encouraged to deny the emotional reality of their work as a defense mechanism, and how that is finally shifting; the harsh and sometimes cruel realities of the transplant world; how fiction allows greater latitude in telling the truth about those realities; why transplant patients often like to go sky diving after their surgeries; and more.

Episode breakdown:

00:00 Introduction

01:31 Transplant professional documented experiences, produced two books.

05:19 Hid emotions in career, later embraced vulnerability.

06:53 Health care work strains minds, career change needed.

12:14 Interesting emotional arc, unwise career decision impacts surgeon.

16:51 Medicine’s learning curve: years of motivating terror.

18:01 Mentor’s patient admiration influenced his demeanor.

22:32 Some should leave jobs earlier, unlike most.

26:47 Healthcare struggles balancing patient care and profitability.

29:34 Moral injury from value misalignment in healthcare.

31:57 Left clinical role; now consulting for solutions.

36:49 Saving young lives is my most memorable work.

40:27 Enjoyed writing fiction; eager to continue exploring.

42:31 Organ allocation ethics and financial incentives examined.

45:40 Talented, flawed protagonist falls and redeems self.

50:55 Next book explores questions of identity.

Dr. David Weill Show Links

David’s website

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Instagram

YouTube

LinkedIn

Subscribe!

You can subscribe to Follow Your Curiosity via the handy links at the top of the page for Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, TuneIn, and YouTube. If you enjoyed the episode, don’t forget to tell your friends!

Transcript

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. My guest this week is Dr. David Weill, the former director of the Center For Advanced Lung Disease and Lung and Heart Lung Transplant Program at Stanford University Medical Center. He’s currently the principal of the Weil Consulting Group, which focuses on improving the delivery of pulmonary ICU and transplant care. He’s also the author of the new novel, All That Really Matters, which follows his memoir, Exhale, Hope, Healing, and a Life in Transplant.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:47]:
David talks with me about how he made the shift from surgery into writing, how health care workers have historically been encouraged to deny the emotional reality of their work as a defense mechanism and how that’s finally shifting, the harsh and sometimes cruel realities of the transplant world, how fiction allows greater latitude in telling the truth about those realities, why transplant patients often like to go skydiving after their surgeries, and more. Here’s my conversation with doctor David Weill. David, welcome to Follow Your Curiosity.

David Weill [00:01:21]:
Thank you, Nancy. Thanks for having me.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:23]:
So I start everybody off with the same question. Were you a creative kid or did you discover your creative side later on?

David Weill [00:01:31]:
I think later on. I don’t

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:32]:
I I wasn’t particularly creative as a child. I, I was into sports and I did a lot of those kind of activities.

David Weill [00:01:40]:
Found academics pretty late in life, actually. So I don’t think, the creative side came out in me until much later.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:48]:
Alright. So would you say that that it came out when you started writing or did it start before then?

David Weill [00:01:55]:
I think it actually came out as I was seeing things in my professional and personal lives that sparked the curiosity in me and sparked that creative part. I think I was drawn to writing, as many people are because they saw a lot of things experienced a lot of things and had a lot on my mind that I wanted to put down on paper. And so I think it was a matter then of how best to express it either through nonfiction or fiction. And, for me, it’s both nonfiction and fiction. And I think that that’s where the creativity probably came from.

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:33]:
So let’s get into that a little bit because obviously you’ve spent a lot of time in medicine. So how how give us a little overview of of how that came about for you and then how you got into the writing side.

David Weill [00:02:47]:
Yeah. I was I I was in the transplant field my entire professional life. And I think in that field, there’s so much there. There’s morality, there’s ethics, there’s life and death situation, there’s courage, there’s humility, There’s high highs and low lows. And I think that in seeing all of that every day, I was walking around the hospital essentially looking over my shoulder to see if anybody else was catching all this. And I decided about 10 years into my career that I was gonna start journaling. And so I kept fairly extensive notes about what I was seeing. And and many of those notes made its way into my first book and then some more into my second book.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:29]:
Do you have a a note on your website about a mother a mother of 2 kids and having to go and and tell her husband and the kids that she wasn’t gonna make it and, you know, wandering off afterwards and crying. And even just the little little blurb is heartbreaking. And I think, you know, most people see shows like ER and don’t, you know, and just kinda think that that’s reality, but we don’t really think about what it must be like to be the actual person in a situation like that.

David Weill [00:04:10]:
Yeah. I wrote I wrote that story in my first book, exhale. And I remember that really distinctly, not only because it was just profoundly sad, you know, a young mother losing her life and leaving behind 2 young children that I got down on one knee and talk to and tried to explain to them what was happening as best I could. But I think it was even more profound than that for me because it was the first time I’d ever cried inside of a hospital. And I, had been in a hospital setting since I was in high school. I started working in hospitals when I was 15 years old. And although I saw a lot of sad things happen in hospitals, I think all of us do. I never really got emotional the way I did in that in that particular scene and actually wanted to sorta hide that from the rest of my team.

David Weill [00:05:03]:
And so I went into a storage closet, in the hospital supply closet and, cried my eyes out. Incredibly sad scene.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:14]:
Did you ever talk to anybody else who admitted they’d done the same thing?

David Weill [00:05:19]:
Later, I did. You know, at that time of my career, and I would say my own emotional development, I I I was more trying to hide the emotion that I was experiencing in the hospital. And as we do, a lot of health care workers do this. We don’t really share that with one another because it seems weak, overly vulnerable. And, you know, a lot of our mantra, a lot of what we’re taught in medical school is just go on to the next patient and, you know, don’t wear your own emotions on your sleeve. So you walk around with this armor around you that I had most of my career and then started to shed much later in my career. And, you know, it it it it really hit me that that was what was happening to me, you know, because I I wasn’t really someone that looked at myself as very emotional in terms of my own patients, but I I became that way certainly.

Nancy Norbeck [00:06:18]:
That’s really fascinating to me because it seems to me that in a medical setting, you are by definition in a place where you really can’t avoid emotional situations. So to try to live that way is is massive denial of what’s going on around you. And I I can see where on the one hand, it’s survival to try to just say move on to the next patient. But on the other hand, it’s gotta take a toll on you.

David Weill [00:06:53]:
I I I think it does, and it did with me. And I think it it you know, in working with a lot of health care teams now in the role that I have now, I see that it’s taken a toll on a lot of us and that this was well before COVID, but certainly exacerbated during COVID. And it’s a defense mechanism, and it’s something we really are taught early on to use to kinda shield ourselves from the emotional ups and downs of doing this kind of work. But I but there’s to your to your point, I don’t think there’s any denying what’s happening and, you know, the body does know and the mind does know what’s happening. And as I’ve sort of reached the end of my run-in the clinical arena, in the hospital arena, I I realized that it was time for me to to change gears and do something else.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:46]:
Yeah. Do you think that that that needs to change, or do you think that that defense mechanism is necessary?

David Weill [00:07:53]:
I think it needs to change, and I think it actually is changing. I think COVID brought to light the emotional duress that our healthcare workforce is undergoing. And I think there’s a lot of healthcare institutions that have taken measures to address that. And I think there’s also much more openness now for people that are working in health care to share their stories and their emotions with one another, which I think is a positive trend. And I think that that’s gonna be very good, especially for the younger generations coming up. I think that’s gonna be very important. And I, and I see it changing. Is it, is it changing fast enough? Probably not.

David Weill [00:08:32]:
But I do, I do see it changing.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:35]:
Yeah. It was coming to mind as I I talked to a woman named Carrie Maluesta a couple months ago who actually started a writing program for health care workers during the pandemic and got a lot of response very quickly. So I think there’s a lot of self identified need there at the very least. So

David Weill [00:08:55]:
I think you’re right. And I see a lot of healthcare workers doing just Weill you talked about. You know, they’re starting to write There’s a whole area of medicine now called narrative medicine, which is storytelling around the hospital experience either from the patient side or the health care worker side. I get invited to talk at, medical institutions and they have these humanities lectures. They didn’t have any of that when I was, working on the front lines. And I I see that only as a positive trend.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:25]:
Yeah. Could be very interesting to see if there’s a whole new genre of medical writing coming up.

David Weill [00:09:32]:
I think so.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:34]:
So how did writing end up becoming more important to you as you moved through your career and and transitioned into what you’re doing now?

David Weill [00:09:44]:
I think both inform the other. In other words, I, I see things that I’m passionate about and wanna write about them a lot. I write a lot of op eds and essays for various publications in addition to the long form, which are the books that are, you know, different animals. But I also think that in thinking about these issues and expressing them, I can actually help the health care teams that I work with more because I’ve really thought deeply about what they’re experiencing, and I can try to give them the best advice I can about number 1, how to do their jobs better, but also how to stay healthy from an emotional and physical standpoint. Things that I didn’t necessarily have when I was working on the front lines. It it was, you know, I had to keep my own counsel as they say and

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:39]:
Yeah. So the first book that you wrote is a memoir. Right. And this one is a novel.

David Weill [00:10:47]:
Yep.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:48]:
I haven’t read the memoir, but reading the novel, I get the sense that there is a lot of you in it. So I’m curious to know what it was like writing both of them actually. Like, how are they similar and how are they different? Yeah. I think when I wrote

David Weill [00:11:02]:
the memoir, it was obviously me, as memoirs are. They’re all about the author.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:07]:
Right.

David Weill [00:11:07]:
Self indulgent in that way. And, I I think that with the novel, there are parallels between me and the main character. The main character was in transplant. I was in transplant. He liked to ride his bike. I like to ride mine. He spent some time in New Orleans. I grew up there.

David Weill [00:11:27]:
I think the similarities pretty much stopped there though. You know, the this the characters in the book and the setting was all informed about from what I saw. I mean, I didn’t make all of this up out of thin air. I I I ran up against a lot of interesting people while I was doing this kind of work, and so it made coming up with characters pretty simple. But I wouldn’t say that Joe Bosco, the character, and David Weill are are the same kinds of people. I like to think I’m a better guy than he is. That’s in the eye of the beholder, I suppose.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:08]:
Well, he does go on quite a journey.

David Weill [00:12:11]:
Yeah. He does. He does.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:14]:
Yeah. I I thought it was very interesting to watch him, and I’ve I don’t wanna give away too much here, obviously, but he has he has an interesting an an interesting emotional arc because you do he kind of he makes one career decision that you kind of see you kind of watch him make this decision, and you’re kinda going, I don’t think you’re gonna be happy there, man. I don’t think you’re gonna be happy there. And and he kind of is on the one level, but it it ultimately just doesn’t work. It doesn’t work well for him. And you sort of you see it coming, but not in the way that it all falls apart for him. But but you kind of see that image that surgeons can have of kind of becoming god in their own mind, which is exacerbated by that decision that he makes. And one of the things that I found really fascinating that that you brought out intentionally or unintentionally as a as a writer.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:29]:
I know sometimes your themes are not as intentional as you realize when you’re writing it, but the idea that he’s kind of addicted to his patient’s gratitude. You know? Like like, he he feeds off of it almost, and I I just found that so fascinating because I had never really never really thought about it before. I think when I’ve encountered that notion of that god complex, that it had always seemed to me more like a power thing and not something that came from that, oh, my patients are so grateful because I saved their lives kind of aspect. And I’m just curious about how that how that, you know, came about for you or where where that sort of fits into your own experience.

David Weill [00:14:32]:
Yeah. I mean, it’s a very perceptive point. I I think that my observations of other people working in my field, especially transplant is is different and unique. I I think that you saw all sorts of motivations for doing the work. I mean, yeah, we got paid well and so money could be, a motivating factor. Power can definitely be a motivating factor. I worked in academic medicine, my whole Weill, big institutions like Stanford. And, yeah, power was a big deal there, as it is most places.

David Weill [00:15:08]:
But I think there’s also a subset of people, and I might include myself in in this area where the most important interactions of the day were not when the check arrived in the mail or when I got a new title. It was when I was talking with a patient, and they said, wow. You saved my life. I owe you everything. And that happened pretty regularly. And I think that there’s very few people that would be not changed by that, not influenced by that if you hear that day after day, you’re up. Mhmm. So when you look in the mirror, just like my character David, and I have scenes of him looking in the mirror.

David Weill [00:15:56]:
The question is, what do you see? And I’ve thought a lot about identity, you know, while I was writing this book. My character looked in the mirror, and he saw somebody that in the course of an operation could change somebody’s life. They knew it. He knew it, and the people he worked with knew it. And I even write in the book that if you don’t think that that influences how you look at yourself in the mirror, then you’ve got another thing coming.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:27]:
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And yet at the same time, the scene where he’s, like, first told, okay, you know, go go for it. It’s your turn to do do this operation. I was reading that thinking, oh my god. I’d be terrified.

David Weill [00:16:47]:
Well,

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:48]:
Absolutely terrified. Yeah.

David Weill [00:16:51]:
I’ve said this before that when you’re when you’re especially in the first, like, say, I don’t know, 10 or 15 years while you’re on the learning curve in medicine, it takes a long time to learn how to do this. There are moments of extreme terror, and I and don’t let anybody tell you differently. You know, you’re you’re you’re terrified. I mean, you’re you’re truly terrified. Now sometimes that terror can be motivating, get you to focus and work harder and study and do all sorts of things, but it’s terror nonetheless. That goes away. At least it did it did for me, where you feel comfortable that you know what you’re doing, but it takes 10 or 15 years to get to that. But I I remember very well those early patients when it was just me and the patient, and I tell you my heart rate was was clicking away.

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:46]:
I bet. Yeah. I kind of have this image in my head now of a graph where, like, the the terror line is slowly going down and the the gratitude effect line is slowly going up.

David Weill [00:18:01]:
Yeah. Yeah. No. I remember I mean, I remember when I was in training, an early mentor of mine, who I remain friends, you know, with to this day, I I was a trainee, and he would walk through the waiting room on the way to see patients when we were together. And the patients would all stand up and start clapping for him. And I was like, That’s why he is like he is. You know, if you get that if you get that attention every day, you know, it’s gonna go to your head.

Nancy Norbeck [00:18:34]:
Did you know anybody that had that kind of attention, but wasn’t affected that way by it? I think I did. Yeah. I think I did. I I I think,

David Weill [00:18:43]:
they at least weren’t outwardly affected by it. I think, you know, there’s certainly maladaptive behaviors in medical settings. You know, some people drink too much. Some people, have extramarital affairs. Some people become gratitude junkies and some people are wholly well adjusted and they do their job and they don’t have seemingly any kind of character flaws. So, yeah, I think it happens. I don’t think it happens as commonly as most of us wanna think it does, but, yeah, it happened.

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:13]:
Yeah. I was just kinda wondering, like, what grounds the people who are who are able to do that?

David Weill [00:19:19]:
Yeah. I I I thought I’ve thought a lot about that because, you know, in my own journey, I wanted to make sure that at least the best I as as I could, that I stayed grounded. And I think it comes down to family, friends, your faith, if that’s something that, you know, is important to you. And I think that the folks that adjusted the best to that had those 3 apps in place, pretty firmly.

Nancy Norbeck [00:19:43]:
Yeah. So did you have a moment where you kind of, you know, looked at that person and said, oh, that’s why they’re that way, and I don’t wanna be like that?

David Weill [00:19:51]:
Oh, definitely. Yeah. Definitely. I mean, I I think especially early on, there were people that I encountered in the hospital setting that were leading a life and doing their job in a way that I did not. You know, I I did see all of it. I I saw the extramarital affairs in the hospital. I saw the too much drinking. I I saw the, you know, profound ego displays and all sorts of anger issues and, you know, you name it.

David Weill [00:20:21]:
And, you know, I tried to steer and I think I did steer away from all all of the really, really bad behaviors. But, you know, there was a times when I I probably wasn’t a day at the beach either. You know? I I think that, you know, you have to own that and just say, well, I’m gonna try harder, you know, and that’s that’s what I tried to do, you know?

Nancy Norbeck [00:20:44]:
Yeah. We are all human after all. Though I’m also wondering now if what we were talking about earlier with the whole, you know, denial go on to the next patient kind of feeds into that too. If you don’t have an outlet for everything that you’re seeing and experiencing, that probably tends to lead towards some of the behavior that you really don’t wanna exhibit, but it’s gotta go somewhere.

David Weill [00:21:11]:
Yeah. Definitely. And I and I think that, you know, the the dizzying part about transplant is you could have a great outcome and save somebody’s life in the morning. And then the afternoon, a patient you care about deeply dies, and then somebody else needs a transplant that comes and sees you the next hour and then knew the process and you have to start again. Or you’re in the ICU room and somebody passes away and they will another patient in the same ICU room and you have to, you know, so you’re constantly kind of having to reset yourself, which is exhausting times.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:44]:
Right. And if in the morning, you’re a savior and in the evening, you’re suddenly a complete failure. That’s a lot to deal with in a single consciousness in a single day.

David Weill [00:21:58]:
Yeah. Weill, it was for me. I mean, you know, that’s why even when I started out on this, you know, field when I was 32 years, 31, 32 years old, when I was fully trained by that time, I kinda thought I had about a 20 year rip in the hospital, and then I was gonna do something else. And in fact, it worked out to be almost exactly 20 years. And, and, you know, I had gone to chapter 2 of my professional life.

Nancy Norbeck [00:22:27]:
Is that about average or does it vary widely?

David Weill [00:22:32]:
Mine was probably a little a little faster. I I think that there’s and I’ll be frank about this. I think there’s some people where they probably should leave, or earlier than they do. A lot of people don’t have either an option or the creativity or the wherewithal to think of another career path. They have real life concerns, and I and I get that. And I think that especially in transplant, I don’t think you see a ton of old transplant doctors walking around the hospital. I I walked out at least from the front lines, you know, from Stanford when I was 52 years old, and, it was time for me. Are there people that go a bit longer than that? Sure.

David Weill [00:23:22]:
But probably not a lot longer than that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:23:25]:
Wow. I mean, there’s a part of me thinking that’s kind of a shame because you need people with experience to train up the next set of people, but at the same time, I’d imagine that burnout comes pretty quickly just because you are on that emotional roller coaster.

David Weill [00:23:44]:
Yeah. I think it’s accelerated in our field. And not to say that other fields in medicine aren’t intense. They are. But I I think in our field, especially, it’s a 247, three 65 kind of endeavor. We we didn’t really have time off or say just because of the nature of transplant happens when it happens. You don’t have a whole lot of choice about when you when you do the operations. So I think it probably happens sooner in the transplant field.

Nancy Norbeck [00:24:12]:
Yeah. Yeah. So you get into a lot of detail in the book about the process behind the scenes, the meetings, and, you know, how it’s determined, who goes on a list, and and then you also get into the ethical considerations of of who goes on a list, which was certainly eye opening. And it I I think a lot of people would be surprised by, you know, just just how bureaucratic some of that is. Yeah. And I get the this sense that that was part of why you wrote the book and part of what you’re working on now. Has it changed much since you started working on the book?

David Weill [00:25:01]:
No. It hasn’t changed much at all. And, you know, yes. Part of why I wanted to move to fiction is is that I can have more latitude about telling things a little more closely to how they they were. You know, it’s difficult when you write a memoir. You know, you don’t sit down to write it to settle scores or to hurt people. That’s certainly not my intention. I think with fiction, it does give you latitude to tell a more complete story.

David Weill [00:25:31]:
And that’s what I tried to do in the book. I think I was all clearly making commentary about our health care system, you know, and the difficulty of the ecosystem right now, you know, to work in. I I don’t think it’s a real secret that, you know, health care has lost its humanity and it’s lost a lot of its soul because we do put profit over the purpose of it all. And I definitely wanted to make that point loud and clear in the novel.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:04]:
Yeah. I mean, the the hospital that’s kind of at the center of the story is pretty clearly a for profit hospital, which is still an idea that kind of makes my head hurt, that such things exist even though am I surprised? No.

David Weill [00:26:23]:
I, you know, I I I think that, you know, hospitals are interesting places right now. You know, they have they have the public face that they show to patients. You know, we we’re here to help you. We believe in you. We’re all about you. We just want you to get better. Nothing else matters to us. That that’s just that is not true.

David Weill [00:26:47]:
It’s it’s simply not true. I I don’t think I know I haven’t met a hospital administrator that didn’t want patients to get better. I’ve never met anybody like that. I don’t think they would be in health care, but they are running a huge business, that not only has to be responsive to Wall Street and shareholders and all sorts of people, but they’re they’re they’re trying to make money. And it’s pretty obvious when you work in health care that that’s an important goal of of the environment. And in the novel, I wanted to be sure that I showed that that not only impacts patient care, it impacts people that work there because they’re trying to, on the one hand, just save the patient in front of them and give them a good outcome. And on one hand, you’ve got all these people behind you that are counting the beans as it were, and that’s a tough environment. That’s what’s going on out there right now.

Nancy Norbeck [00:27:51]:
Is there this almost seems self evident, but is there a moment where new med school grads are suddenly hit with this reality? And and if so, I mean, I can’t imagine it goes well.

David Weill [00:28:07]:
No. It it doesn’t go well. And unfortunately, it’s gotten something a lot of medicine, especially young people who are more idealistic, and especially this younger generation who I think is interested in greater goods. And I think it happens gradually. At first, you see it while you’re in training and you think, well, yeah. I mean, we understand there’s money involved in this. And then you say, you see it more and more. And you’re saying, at some point, not only is money involved in this, it actually may be the most important thing in this.

David Weill [00:28:40]:
And you see then to especially if you get into a leadership role, you interact with people that are running the business more and more, and you hear from them and you see that they are trying to make money. And if they hope the patients do Weill, and I wouldn’t say otherwise, but they are clearly trying to make money. And sometimes care gets compromised because of that. I don’t think that’s any secret.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:09]:
I imagine that there’s there’s a moment where there’s a clash with those people, but probably also an internal clash. There’s

David Weill [00:29:22]:
a doctor, doctor Wendy Dean, who I’ll give a shout out to who I think is mainly created this term. If not, she certainly has popularized it called moral injury.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:33]:
Mhmm.

David Weill [00:29:34]:
Moral injury happens in the health care workforce because of a misalignment in values between those of us who provide the care and those that are running the business. I don’t think that they necessarily have to be in conflict with one another, but they often are. I I I think when things went the best when I was working in the hospital is when I partnered with the people that were running the hospital to give them what they wanted and to get what I wanted and to to work together. Now that doesn’t happen all the time. It may only happen some of the time, but that’s that’s the goal. So I do think it’s a moral injury of sorts.

Nancy Norbeck [00:30:16]:
Yeah. I mean, there are examples in in the novel that, I mean, it’s really one example, but obviously of, of a situation that that happens fairly regularly. That seems downright cruel of keeping someone alive to meet a 1 year anniversary because that means something larger for the institution when it’s just cruel.

David Weill [00:30:45]:
Yeah. And I’m afraid all of the things that I wrote about in the book, whether it’s that issue, keeping a patient alive for a year so that the survival statistics for the program look better. I didn’t make any of those. I mean, they were fictionalized about Right. But I didn’t create that out of thin air. It’s not science fiction.

Nancy Norbeck [00:31:07]:
Yeah. I didn’t think so.

David Weill [00:31:09]:
So I I think would patients be disappointed to to know that? Sure. I would be. But does it really happen? Absolutely.

Nancy Norbeck [00:31:23]:
Yeah. It it just seems like is it is it really medicine at that point, or is it just number crunching statistics?

David Weill [00:31:34]:
It’s the latter.

Nancy Norbeck [00:31:36]:
Yeah. Yeah. How do you how do you I mean, you mentioned partnering with those folks to as much as possible, make sure everybody gets what they want, but how how do you how do you reconcile that for yourself when it’s not possible to make sure that everybody gets what they want?

David Weill [00:31:57]:
It it it becomes difficult. And and and it’s one of the reasons, frankly, that I left the clinical front lines is, you know, I I just didn’t feel like it was happening enough to my satisfaction. Now there’s other people that may have a different opinion. But to my satisfaction, it wasn’t happening enough. But now I work with those people in my consulting role in a similar fashion, and I know what they want, and I know what the clinicians want. And I try to figure out a way to come up with solutions that everyone can get what they want. And, you know, and I like to think that I have an impact on that. But does it happen every time? It it doesn’t.

David Weill [00:32:35]:
You know, it doesn’t. But I think it’s something to strive towards, certainly.

Nancy Norbeck [00:32:39]:
Yeah. Absolutely. And and how long have you been doing that?

David Weill [00:32:44]:
I left Stanford in 2016, and then opened a consulting practice, and we go around and help transplant programs. And also ICU situations, we just help them improve. We help them improve from a clinical standpoint, team dynamics, financial, administrative, you name it. We just help them perform better. And, you know, I like to think as opposed to being the quarterback, I’m more of a coach at this point, and, it’s it’s a role that I accept. I think it’s I think it’s great. I’ve really enjoyed it. You know, it there’s nothing that replaces the 1 on one contact with the patient, but this is about as close as you can get.

Nancy Norbeck [00:33:31]:
So does that how does that leave time then to write? Because obviously, it does.

David Weill [00:33:37]:
Yeah. It does. I I split for David and hour. I I’m a morning writer, so I write up to lunchtime when I usually can’t take it anymore. It’s hard work. And I and I, get a bite to eat, and then I switch gears and do my consulting work usually in the afternoons.

Nancy Norbeck [00:33:56]:
Oh, that’s cool. That’s very cool. So the the title of your book, tell us about how how the title came about.

David Weill [00:34:07]:
Yeah. I struggle with titles. I’m terrible at it. My publisher titled my first book, the second book. I got tons of advice about how to title it. And finally, I just sat down with a big glass of wine and, you know, tried to figure out what is this guy really looking for? What is the main protagonist in the book? What does he want? Well, he’s trying to figure out all that really matters. And I said, why Weill not that? So, all that really matters is a reflection of what this guy is trying to figure out in life. And I think, frankly, I think all of us are trying to figure that out.

David Weill [00:34:49]:
And in one way or the other, we have we have time on our hands and how we spend it is largely up to us. And so I think we’re Weill striving every day to figure out all that really matters.

Nancy Norbeck [00:35:03]:
Yeah. Did you when when you were working with transplant patients, did you see people shift what they thought mattered as a result of that experience?

David Weill [00:35:15]:
Yeah. Definitely. Definitely. You know, it it’s an education. I mean, it’s the education of a lifetime. You know, to see patients will tell you what matters to them as they’re facing death. And I think that that is profound. But also, you know, in medicine, we pick our field when we’re pretty young.

David Weill [00:35:34]:
I mean, I was in my late 20s, when I decided to go into transplant, and, you know, we change as people during the course of that career. We don’t stay the same. I had my wife and I had a couple kids. That changes everybody, I think. My father passed away during all of this, you know, to whom I was very close. That changed me. And, you know, during the course of my career, I saw some patients live and some patients not live. That changed me.

David Weill [00:36:06]:
So I think it’s difficult to pick a career or pick a field of medicine when you’re so young and expect that to sustain you and be perfectly static for the rest of your life. That’s just not particularly realistic. I don’t think.

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:22]:
Yeah. I think that’s probably true for everybody, but but maybe even more for doctors.

David Weill [00:36:27]:
Oh, I

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:27]:
think it is. I mean, I’m I’m

David Weill [00:36:28]:
re I’ve read and I’m sure you’ve read that people have more than one career, sometimes several careers days. Whereas I think in our parents’ generation, it was probably, you know, you pick a job and you do it. You

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:40]:
know? Right. Right. Yeah. Do you have a favorite transplant story?

David Weill [00:36:49]:
I have a lot of them. I tell I tell my first and second books. And I I think I think the most important stories to me generally were the ones where we took young people and especially young people, and we took them from a certain death situation and save them at the last minute. I mean, I’m I’m prone to the drama just like everybody. And, you know, when you’re running out in the middle of the night and doing this kind of work, that’s what you live for, you know, when you’re able to do that, when you turn somebody around like that. And I think that that’s those are the things that I remember as I look back on this career. You know, the people that not only do you save them and that feels good, but then you get cards and letters and pictures from them as they live their life and they get married and they have kids and they climb Mount Rainier and they do this and they, you know, on and on. You know, that’s what that’s all that really matters.

David Weill [00:37:48]:
I mean, that’s what it’s really all about. So I I’ve been fortunate enough to stay in touch with some of the patients that I that I helped, and that’s quite important to me.

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:02]:
Yeah, do a lot of them really get into skydiving? Because you mentioned

David Weill [00:38:07]:
that. Yeah, for reasons that are absolutely unclear to me, there was a couple of things that patients would do, especially young patients. Skydiving seem to be one of them. I don’t know what it is about getting a transplant that makes you want to jump out of a plane. But we had that, we had a lot of patients get tattoos of various sorts, all kinds of different things that I wasn’t necessarily in favor of. I had no particularly against skydiving Weill the tattoos, but it’s not for me. And so, I think it was just a reflection on patients wanting to squeeze every bit out of life, and they just said, look, I got this second chance. I’m gonna do whatever I want.

David Weill [00:38:56]:
And I’m gonna, you know, climb a mountain, jump out of an airplane, and I was, you know, I was mostly for it. Sometimes I would say I wish you wouldn’t, but patients would generally do it anyway. So

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:16]:
I can kinda see where if you felt like you’d suddenly got a second chance, jumping out of a plane might feel like the most alive thing you could do.

David Weill [00:39:26]:
I think that’s right. I think that that’s right. My daughter actually went skydiving last year. She was she she’s 21. And I asked her why, and she said it just makes you feel so free and alive. And I said, okay. Alright. I’ll buy that.

David Weill [00:39:41]:
That sounds good.

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:42]:
Yeah. Yeah. I can see that. I’m pretty scared of heights, so I don’t think I’d ever do it. But but you never know.

David Weill [00:39:48]:
Why not for me?

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:52]:
Yeah. I can see where from your point of view, you might be kind of thinking, I just put a new set of lungs in you, and you’re gonna risk them jumping out of a plane.

David Weill [00:40:03]:
That thought did go through my mind.

Nancy Norbeck [00:40:05]:
Yeah. Yeah. I can totally see that. Totally see that. So how was it for you to take your experiences and put them into this fictional character based somewhat on yourself and somewhat on other people and somewhat, I’m sure, totally on stuff you completely made up?

David Weill [00:40:27]:
To be honest with you, I I know this isn’t a popular thing for authors to say because I think authors tend to say, well, god, it’s hard work, and and it is. I had a blast, Diane. I’d like to do it again one day. My 3rd book, I already signed a contract to write. It’s gonna be nonfiction, but I may return to fiction because I really had Weill a good time doing it, just imagining things. I don’t know that I’m gonna write about that a medical setting anymore, but I I I have I have a good time imagining, you know, what could happen. You know, if my if my life, for instance, had gone right instead of left, what would have happened? And I think that’s the fun part of it all. So I enjoyed it.

David Weill [00:41:12]:
It’s hard work. I mean, you know, it’s it’s what everybody says it is. It’s it’s difficult to get it right. I don’t know if I did or not. That’s for the reader to decide, but it’s it’s hard work.

Nancy Norbeck [00:41:24]:
Did you talk to a lot of colleagues to get their perspectives?

David Weill [00:41:28]:
Not really. I talked to a lot of writers to get their perspective. I, I didn’t really talk to a lot of my transplant colleagues. I felt like I knew the Weill, that world. And I felt like I could describe it well, and I didn’t really have them look at it. Some have been early readers of the finished product, and their reaction to it has been positive, which I think is good. I asked them if I got any of it wrong and they said, maybe they Yeah. That they I think you’ve been surprised at how much I’ve revealed about the world.

David Weill [00:42:08]:
But I don’t think you sit down in a book and sit down to write a book and say, well, I’m not gonna tell the whole story because I don’t want people, you know, to know that. I think you have to, you know, be fairly transparent about it and honest and I tried to be.

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:22]:
Yeah. Has has anybody done any kind of reporting on the more ethical issues like you kind of

David Weill [00:42:31]:
Yeah. There’s just there’s just the beginning of that now. You you see, let’s call it in the last couple years, a a certain focus on the transplant industry, if you will. And it’s more about not as much about what I wrote about, but how organs get allocated, throughout the country. It’s a long complicated process that we could spend the next podcast on. But there there there is some examination of the ethics, the financial incentive, all sorts of different things about how organs get allocated. Believe it or not, it may it may be no surprise. There’s a lot of money in that too.

David Weill [00:43:15]:
That’s a huge industry. And so, there has been some reporting by Washington Post say and others, and they’re talking about that now, just now, after, you know, how many decades of doing transplants. So it’s a relatively new topic of discussion.

Nancy Norbeck [00:43:37]:
Yeah. That was something that, again, you know, I, like, I suspect many other people who aren’t involved in all of that had never really thought about. You know, it seems so straightforwardly altruistic, you know, somebody donates organs, somebody who needs one gets one, everybody’s happy. And so that was really an eye opening thing to read about. And and it made me wonder, you know, just how much blowback there would be for someone who kind of blew the whistle on it.

David Weill [00:44:12]:
Yeah. Well, I’ll Weill find out. I did some of this in my first book, and and there really was not a lot of blowback just because they look, as long as it’s the truth, very hard, you know, to blow back too hard on it. I, you know, I I think that, you know, we have to reveal these things. I love transplant as a field. That doesn’t mean I can’t criticize it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:44:40]:
Right.

David Weill [00:44:40]:
I love my children. I sometimes criticize them. I I think that I I love the field so passionately. I think about it all the time that I wanted to improve. And if I can help in that way by exposing some of these things, then that’s my role. I’m not trying to tear the field apart. I’m not trying to knock the people to do it for a living. I just want it to be better, and I think it can be better.

David Weill [00:45:09]:
But I think we have to reorient ourselves toward what what really matters. Another shameless plug for the title. Weill we really have to we have to be clear eyed that it really is about the person in the bed, in the hospital bed. And whenever we lose that focus, we start to stray. And maybe with my writing, I I don’t wanna overstate my importance in the universe, but maybe I can shed some of some light on that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:45:40]:
Yeah. Yeah. I think if people are aware of the factors that go into it beyond the naively simplistic description that I just gave, that that would help a whole lot. And I also think, you know, as I’m kind of reviewing parts of the book in my head, you know, that I I think one of the things that is really helpful about the novel is just that it’s such a 3 d image of someone who is a really, really talented guy at what he does, but is also a fundamentally flawed human being who, you know, gets caught up in that that world with all of his ethical dilemmas and has a pretty significant fall from it, but still remains a good guy underneath it all. Yeah. And has to kind of crawl out, you know, and find himself again, but doesn’t lose himself in it.

David Weill [00:46:47]:
Yeah. I think that’s real world kind of stuff. I mean, nobody Yeah. That and my guy isn’t either. I do think he’s passionate about his work and sometimes the passion shows up in maladaptive ways. But but I but I think that’s true to life. I mean, you see that in society, with some of the most brilliant people, you know, also have trouble interacting with the rest of the world at times. And, you know, I I wanted to show that, you know, my protagonist could care about his patients deeply, but also could be a pain in the behind to work with.

David Weill [00:47:22]:
You know? And I think that that dichotomy is something that’s true to life, and it’s certainly things that I saw.

Nancy Norbeck [00:47:31]:
Yeah. Yeah. And and it’s you you also make it pretty clear where some of that comes from in his life that it started long before he ever went to med school.

David Weill [00:47:42]:
Long before. And I think it doesn’t people. I mean, you know, most people that do this kind of work, things have gone right for them a lot. And, you know, they’ve had people like my guy did that have had huge expectations put on him. And he has been successful at meeting those expectations, generally speaking, and it’s a it’s a burden to carry around. And I think that he, didn’t wear it well at times, and I I just want experience.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:14]:
Yeah. The expectations came with a big cost

David Weill [00:48:17]:
Yep.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:17]:
As they do with a lot of people.

David Weill [00:48:19]:
I think that’s right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:21]:
Yeah. Yeah. So I I also have to say that that I was I I giggled with, with being both impressed and amused that you got Terence Blanchard to blurb your book.

David Weill [00:48:40]:
Well, I I’m glad that you know who he is. Everybody needs to know who he is. He’s a genius. He happens to be a friend of mine, and he’s a creative genius, in every way. And he is also somebody that inspires a lot of us to do creative things. And there’s not a moment that I’m writing where his music isn’t on. And I truly think that it inspires me to do better and dig deeper because I think his music is very deep in the soul. And, you know, Terrence is somebody that I look up to.

David Weill [00:49:20]:
You can look up to your friends, and he’s one friend that I really look up to.

Nancy Norbeck [00:49:24]:
That’s fantastic. Yeah. I noticed that he that he turned up in the in the book and it’s even better than he’s a friend. That’s great.

David Weill [00:49:31]:
That’s right. That’s right. Yep. Yep. I that that art form, you know, jazz to me is is life. You know? It it has everything in it, and Terrence is an embodiment of that, I think.

Nancy Norbeck [00:49:44]:
I mean, you live in New Orleans. You’re not allowed to live there if you don’t like jazz. Right?

David Weill [00:49:48]:
I grew up with a guy on the corner that had a saxophone that blew it every morning. So, yeah, we have music here for sure.

Nancy Norbeck [00:49:58]:
Yeah. That’s great. So you’re working on a 3rd book. What’s the 3rd book about?

David Weill [00:50:05]:
I am. It’s about identity, and it’s specifically about religious identity, but it’s gonna be identity more broadly. And it it kind of is a building block. My I I think my books are kinda build on one another a little bit, and my 3rd book is gonna be, I think they wanted to be out in late 2025. So, still working on it. Still have a lot of thought thinking to do around it, but that’s the general topic.

Nancy Norbeck [00:50:35]:
Cool. I’ll be curious to see how how that comes about. Has so the since the first book was a memoir and the second book built on your own experience, Obviously, there’s a connection there. Does the third one build on the first two, do you think?

David Weill [00:50:55]:
I think it does. Because I think that, I’ve always been interested and had a complicated religious background. And I think that it speaks to a larger issue is how do we identify? Like, when when we do look in the mirror in the morning, who or what do we see? And for me, a lot of times, that was I’m a transplant doctor. That’s what I saw. And that was my main source of identity, but it also is a husband, a father, a friend to, to folks. And I got really interested in people that see themselves as a Catholic or a Jew or a Muslim. And I got interested in in religion as a way to identify ourselves about who we are, what tribe we belong to, what team are we on. And that’s what I’m writing about in this 3rd book.

Nancy Norbeck [00:51:50]:
Well, I’ll be interested to see how that goes.

David Weill [00:51:53]:
Me too.

Nancy Norbeck [00:51:54]:
Especially since it can be such a fraught thing as we see in the world right now.

David Weill [00:51:59]:
Yeah. I’m tackling these easy subjects. Right?

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:02]:
Yeah. Yeah. Let me know when you tackle the hard stuff.

David Weill [00:52:06]:
Yeah. I’ll talk to that later at some point.

Nancy Norbeck [00:52:09]:
Yeah. Boy, you have a lot to draw on at the moment for sure, if you decide to. So before we go, is there anything that you’ve learned in the process of of writing either book, but especially of delving into fiction writing, that you would pass on to anybody who is considering taking a leap from something not related to to fiction writing or to anything that they’re, you know, that they’re currently doing, you know, a creative endeavor that seems unrelated to what they’re they’ve been doing with their lives.

David Weill [00:52:45]:
I I think follow your dreams and follow your heart. I think writing, it can be for for just for you. It can be for the public. It can be to figure things out. For me, it’s an incredibly important part of my life at this point. And I think it’s such a great outlet for me. I can’t, I can’t do what Terrence does, but I but I can try to do this. And I think it’s just like anything else.

David Weill [00:53:11]:
Just it’s a lot of work and the work pays off because, you know, these aren’t the best books that I’ve ever written. The next one’s gonna be a better one and the next one is gonna be better. And I wanna I wanna grow as a writer just the same way I grew as a transplant doctor. When I first started out, I wasn’t as good at it, I don’t think, as I was when I finished. And I I look at writing the same way.

Nancy Norbeck [00:53:41]:
Yep. That’s that’s the way it works. The more you do it, the better you get.

David Weill [00:53:45]:
That’s right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:53:46]:
Alright. Well, I’ll be curious to see where you go from here. Especially curious to see where this next book goes. So

David Weill [00:53:54]:
Thank you. I’m actually a little bit curious about that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:53:57]:
If you weren’t, I’d be worried. So, yeah, definitely keep us posted.

David Weill [00:54:03]:
Alright. Thanks for the conversation, Nancy. Enjoy.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:07]:
That’s our show. Thanks so much to David Weil for joining me and to you for listening. Please leave a review for this episode. There’s a link in your podcast app, so it’s really easy, and it will only take a minute. If you enjoyed our conversation, I hope you’ll share it with a friend. Thank you so much. If this episode resonated with you or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at The Spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:43]:
The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today. See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

In Western culture, we don’t often think of creativity as something controlled, but the truth is, there’s a place for chaos and control in our creative process. In this slightly-longer-than-usual pep talk, I give a couple examples of the push-pull of chaos and control, and how they can both be helpful–and detrimental–to our creative work, and why it’s worth experimenting with a little more of one if you’re used to working primarily with the other.

Want more tips? Check out this playlist with all my previous Creative Pep Talks!

Could you leave a review? It’s really easy, and it helps SO much. Thanks!

Join my free creative community, The Spark! We celebrate each other’s creative courage, and I’ll be sharing programs for subscribers and listeners there in the coming months.

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Transcript: Chaos and Control

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Hey, everybody. Just a quick announcement before we get started. I am currently in the home stretch of putting together my upcoming Make Bad Art group program, which will be starting in about a month.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:30]:
Make Bad Art is the anti-MBA. It’s a safe place to come unlearn all those things you’re taught you have to have as an adult. Things like stress, perfection, and conformity. So you can reclaim the inner wild, curious, creative kid who’s always been inside you. The one who knows how to play, invent, have fun, and live with abandon and joy. It’s a playground for the liberation of your inner artist and your authentic self, and the effects will go beyond the class container if you let them. I’ll be posting more very very soon on the Spark, my newsletter. So subscribe to get the details as soon as they’re available.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:10]:
We’d love to have you, and there’s a link right in your show notes. Hope to see you there. Hey, everybody. This is Nancy Norbeck here with this week’s Creative Pep Talk. And, you know, I’ve been doing these for three and a half years, I think. And in that time, it’s kind of amazing to me, the things that I’ve talked about and the things that I haven’t. And this morning, I had a conversation with someone, and we were we were talking about creativity in general. And he mentioned how in Asia, the arts are taught very differently than they are here.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:49]:
And he gave the example of Asian art classes teaching by having students reproduce the same painting over and over and over again to an exacting standard, which is the opposite of how we in the West tend to think that art should be taught. We tend to think that it should be very free and creative and, well, creative. What’s the definition of creative? You know, but but that it should be very free and free form and flowing and whatever. Now if you listened to my first interview with Domenic Sciortino about his experience in art school, you might think that perhaps the 2 are not so different. Perhaps if you went to art school, your experience may reflect his and a little bit more of the Asian art experience. But the point was the point that he made is that the this person that I was talking to this morning was that the philosophy is that you must protect perfect the technique first in order to have the skill built up, to be able to know how and when to break the rules. And, you know, if you have been listening to this podcast for a while and are familiar with your friendly neighborhood creativity coach here, you might come to the conclusion that she would be against this, this philosophy. And in in initial knee jerk reaction, you might not really be wrong about that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:03:30]:
But the thing is, multiple things can be true at the same time. There is definitely room for that point of view. And if you think about it, many things in life, we learn first by imitation. You learn handwriting by imitation. Your goal, or at least a zillion years ago when I was in elementary school, is to imitate those letters as closely as possible while you’re learning them. So that, you know, when you learn your own handwriting style, everybody can still read it. Right? Everybody’s signature is unique to them, but we can still usually, hopefully, at least in the early stages, read each one. Certain doctors, not so much.

Nancy Norbeck [00:04:23]:
But in theory, we can read everybody’s signature even though they’re different. So so there is some merit to that idea. And this had me thinking today about one of my high school English teachers, because my 1st year in high school, freshman year, I had an English teacher who is, is all right. He had us do some creative writing. I was pretty happy in his class. My second year in high school, 10th grade was my favorite year in high school because I really, really liked my English teacher. He was sort of like a second dad to me in some respects and certainly a writing mentor and lots of lots of creative writing, lots of interesting conversations about writing and reading and all sorts of good stuff. And we’ve stayed in touch for a very long time.

Nancy Norbeck [00:05:13]:
And then then we hit junior year and it was a very, very different year. That year started off with 2 solid weeks of writing about the only summer reading I had to do in high school, which so first of all, that was to strike against this teacher before we even started the year. And the summer reading that we did led to a couple of essays, which then became the basis of the most rigorous grammar boot camp of my entire life. To say that my class was thrilled about this would be one of the biggest overstatements in the history of the universe. And after the last couple of years, that’s saying something. So so we suffered through this, though I have to say to his credit that for the first time in my life, I really truly knew which grammatical terms went with which grammatical constructions. So fair play to him for that. Now how useful is that in the real world? I don’t really know.

Nancy Norbeck [00:06:24]:
I’m the kind of of kid–was the kind of kid, maybe still am–and the kind of writer who just kind of instinctively understood how these things worked. So knowing the difference between a gerund and a predicate nominative didn’t really make much of a difference to me. Knowing what it was called. Didn’t help me use it any more or less effectively. Now, if you had told me back then that one day being able to use all of those things was going to mean that not only did I become a really good writing teacher and eventually end up being hired to and being a very good copy editor and proofreader. I don’t know if that would have impressed me when I was 16 years old, but it’s true. But that year we did no creative writing and boy did it wrinkle. I mean, to say that I hated that year’s class would be a gross understatement.

Nancy Norbeck [00:07:35]:
I mean, I hated that class. You know? When I think back to that class, I just imagine myself shooting invisible daggers out of my eyes the entire time I was in that class, which is why I will not name this teacher to protect the guilty. But, but, yeah, you know, it it it was it was a jarring experience, I think, for most of us in my class because that’s not what we were used to. And what I remember hearing from an older student who had had his class previously, because previous classes loved this guy, was that he didn’t want us doing creative writing. Why? Because we would use it as an excuse to break the rules. So was he actually going for the idea that we had to learn the technique first before we would know how to break the rules? I don’t know. It’s been a long time, 30 odd years. So I couldn’t say.

Nancy Norbeck [00:08:48]:
Given the experience that we had, where we had ample evidence that he actually really didn’t like our class, I’m not particularly inclined to give him too much of the benefit of the doubt, but maybe I’m wrong. I don’t know. But the fact remains that there’s a level of chaos that is inherent to creativity that you need to bring to k to creativity. If you try to control creativity too much, you’re gonna kill it. You just are. You’ll take all the joy out of it and and you take all of the experimentation out of it. And at that point, it’s no longer creative. But if you let the chaos run too rampant, then you’ve got other issues.

Nancy Norbeck [00:09:40]:
So it’s kind of like you’re trying to drive, you know, a cart or a stagecoach or some, you know, pre internal combustion engine vehicle with 2 horses. And you gotta have the 2 horses in sync. You have to balance the horse that is the chaos with the horse that is the control. 2 things can apply at the same time, even if they seem to be polar opposites. And you have to have just enough of each of them. And it may not be an equal amount in any given situation. Think about it. When you’re gonna turn, you have to have a little bit more of one than the other in order to successfully turn your vehicle.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:24]:
But you have to have the right balance in order to make it go, in order to make it work. And in order to make it happen without either grinding your vehicle to a halt or turning it over in the middle of a street or over a canyon. Right? So so they’re both part of the equation. There is a merit to the idea of being meticulous about learning your technique before you let in the chaos. And there is merit to the idea of being completely chaotic and learning how to reign in the chaos, the chaos with a little control. It really depends on what suits your personal style best. If you’re a more chaotic person, you may need to let it run wild and then figure out how to tame it. And if you’re more of a controlled person, you may need to learn the basics and the technique and all that stuff first, and then slowly learn to let in the chaos.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:26]:
I suspect in the writing world, we call the more chaotic people the the pantsers, and we call the more controlled people the plotters. It may not actually map out that that neatly. I don’t know. I’ve never studied it, but it’s possible. But my point is you need both. Don’t be afraid of either one. So if you’ve been afraid to be a little more controlled, maybe give it a try. If you’ve always been super controlled and you’re afraid to be a little bit more chaotic, let a little chaos in and see what happens.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:02]:
It’s probably not going to be the end of the world either way. And it’s always good to try something new and see what it brings to your process and what you can learn from it. And it may be that you’ve done a little too much and that’s okay too. You can always scale it back. You can always try just a little bit more. It’s why we talk about small steps and we talk about learning from failure. So give it a whirl. 2 things can be true and even necessary at the same time, even from opposite ends of the spectrum, And they will enhance your process as long as you don’t let them get too out of hand.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:42]:
So let me know how it goes. And with that, I’ll see you next time. If this episode resonated with you or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today. See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:23]:
And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.

Paul Pape is an artist, designer, and entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience in the creative industry. He’s created thousands of personalized products for clients worldwide as well as companies such as Disney, Universal, and Nickelodeon. In recent years, he’s shifted to empowering creatives, companies and corporations, sharing his expertise and insights to help them embrace innovation, reverse the creativity crisis and make life and work FUN again. Paul talks with me about failure as something necessary to innovation—not something you did wrong; what we’ve learned from the pandemic, and what we’ve refused to learn; and the technological pandemic of boredom and doomscrolling, and what we can do to find inspiration outside of screens and devices (spoiler: it involves PLAY).

Read this week’s post, “Letting Go and Finding Flow,” here. 

Episode breakdown:

00:00 Introduction

01:18 Intro to Paul’s creative and educational journey.

06:21 Disillusioned artist seeks better opportunities after MFA.

11:25 Thrive on process and problem-solving, not outcomes.

18:44 Creativity crisis: Innovation decline due to pressure.

23:16 Ownership fosters pride and individuality in work.

26:53 Uninterrupted work and flexible schedule were beneficial.

35:38 Short-term thinking limits long-term business growth.

38:48 Engage audience; leave wanting them to play.

44:03 Focus on interests, continually learn, and yield.

48:00 Prioritizing profits over addressing boredom and technology.

55:31 Encourage creative play with devices over mindlessness.

58:38 Hope: Augmented reality enhances life’s immediate engagement.

Paul Pape Show Links

Paul’s websites: www.paulpape.it

www.paulpapedesigns.com

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Transcript

Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. Paul Pape is an artist, designer, and entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience in the creative industry. He’s created thousands of personalized products for clients worldwide, as well as companies such as Disney, Universal, and Nickelodeon. In recent years, he’s shifted to empowering creatives, companies, and corporations, sharing his expertise and insights to help them embrace innovation, reverse the creativity crisis, and make life and work fun again.

Nancy Norbeck [00:00:48]:
Paul talks with me about failure as something necessary to innovation, not something you did wrong, what we’ve learned from the pandemic and what we’ve refused to learn, and the technological pandemic of boredom and doomscrolling, and what we can do to find inspiration outside of screens and devices. Spoiler, it involves PLAY. Here’s my conversation with Paul Pape. Paul, welcome to Follow Your Curiosity.

Paul Pape [00:01:15]:
Well, thank you for having me, Nancy. I appreciate it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:18]:
So I start everybody off with the same question, which is, were you a creative kid, or did you discover your creative side later on?

Paul Pape [00:01:26]:
Well, how deep do you think it’s gonna be here? I, I’m a give you my origin story, kinda like my Batman origin story here.

Nancy Norbeck [00:01:34]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:01:34]:
I came from an abusive home. And so as a child, I threw myself into education. When I found school, that was, like, the game changer for me. It became my church, my sanctuary, and so I really threw myself into education. But at the same time, I’m a very creative person, and I always have been. My imagination and, the ability to play for myself is really what was an escape from all of that when I was home. I spent many, many, many days sinking Luke Skywalker through the Dagobah, quicksand on the little Dagobah PlayStation when I was a kid. I mean, it was just one of those things.

Paul Pape [00:02:10]:
And so, oddly enough, I’m both. I’m a a creative and an, educated person, and so they usually don’t go together, but I’ve figured out how to make it work. So

Nancy Norbeck [00:02:20]:
So I’m gonna guess that your any any encouragement must have come from school, but I’m probably not from home?

Paul Pape [00:02:26]:
Well, it depends. Like, my family is very creative. My, my grandmother owned the 2nd largest doll museum in the United States, and she ran it out of her house. And my grandfather is the one who built the whole thing. And so he would do giant dioramas using things called apple head dolls where he’d carve head like, faces and apples Paul let them shrivel up, and then they would become the heads of the, things. And he’d create these things. And he was a painter and he could draw, and he’s a woodworker mechanic and all that. And then my mom is a super crafty person, and so we always had arts and crafts and such around our home growing up.

Paul Pape [00:03:00]:
But it was more we weren’t really well off, and so it was a lot of found material stuff. So I remember a lot of the projects when I was young being just out of whatever I could get within arm’s reach. Now I will say that my mom, she loves this thing. I have idle hand issues. I don’t like to sit still, and she used to do this thing where whenever I’d come to visit, she would put 3 random items on the table where she knew I was gonna sit just to see what I would do with them. And she always laughed to herself. I don’t and she eventually told me that’s what she would do, but it’s it’s just a you know? So found object art is is really kinda where I got it. But, yeah, family, it did inspire me a lot.

Paul Pape [00:03:32]:
I just think I got the reassurance or the, the okay to be who I was in school and that but I think it was more when I leaned into education because I could do no wrong if you were doing the schooling correctly. And and, ironically, I’m a lefty, and so the hardest problem that I had in school, especially elementary school, was the fact that I was left handed, but doing things from a right handed perspective because that’s how you’re taught as a as left Right. You know, everything is right handed. And so I failed handwriting because I wouldn’t turn my page far enough over or, those kind of things. And so it was usually the creative pursuits that I failed at at school as opposed to the educational things. But at home, you know, there was an environment that nurtured being creative, however that falls.

Nancy Norbeck [00:04:20]:
That’s pretty cool. That’s very cool. So how did you eventually end up moving toward a creative career?

Paul Pape [00:04:32]:
So I went through school until I got to high school and I found theater. And so in in high school, I became an actor, and, I was casting Paul the leads because I didn’t get stage fright. I’ve got a really good presentational voice, and all that, but I’m a horrible actor because I can’t memorize lines. And so but because they didn’t have anybody else who was willing to step up to it, they kept casting me. And so then I went to undergrad, and I was like, I’m gonna be a theater major, and I just walked right into it. I’m day 1 theater major. And then within, like, 2 months, I was told by the the head of acting that they wouldn’t cast me in anything. And so, I was like, well, I’m still a major.

Paul Pape [00:05:10]:
I don’t know what I’m gonna do with it. And I met a man, who was the dean at the time, and he asked me if I wanted to learn everything about theater. And he meant it, and I said absolutely sure. And I learned everything from the maintenance to, like, rigging the electrical wiring to, stage management, directing, acting, and design. And, eventually, I fell into the design aspect of it. And I fell in love with scenic design, so I’d create the worlds of the plays. And I was really good at it. I won some really nice award, ended up going to graduate school for it.

Paul Pape [00:05:41]:
And then, when I finished graduate school, I was talking to a designer I was assisting who had all these shows on Broadway, and I asked him how it was to be at the apex of your career. And he told me it was horrible and that he he traveled too many months too many weeks out of the year. He was on the road. He paid for an apartment he was never in. He had a bunch of assistance just to keep up with the paperwork because in the states, it doesn’t pay that well. And so, he says if you ever wanna, like, lay down roots, this is not the job for you. And, ironically, I just talked to him, like, 4 days ago, and I was telling him this, and he’s like, I don’t remember everything He didn’t know this information. But it, like, really it, like, opened my eyes.

Paul Pape [00:06:21]:
And I and I I knew as I was assisting him, I assisted him on a lot of different shows, and I think he just saw that I had, like, a wanderlust that I, you know, that I wanted more than just this one thing. And so he gave me that advice, and it really kinda shook my world because I had just graduated with an MFA. And I’m like, now what? And, my wife is a costume designer. We met doing shows, and, she is still a costume designer 20 something years later, but I was kinda disillusioned by this whole thing. Because when you’re in school, it’s always unlimited funds, unlimited time, unlimited everything, but then the reality is you’ll make $300 doing 6 weeks worth of work. That’s not enough to pay your bills. And so I I thought, well, let’s see what else I can do. And I happen to be working on another show where I had to hand cut a bunch of tiny little chairs, and I got to thinking after making the 100th one that there’s gotta be a better way.

Paul Pape [00:07:14]:
So I went this is in early 2000. So I actually called Hallmark, the card creating company, and said, I noticed you have these laser cut greeting cards. Can that machine be used to make other things? And they’re like, yeah. Sure. Come on down. And so they had this warehouse sized machine that could laser cut paper. And so I designed tiny paper furniture that you could fold, called pop out furniture, and that was my first real, like, venture into entrepreneurship in a creative industry. And then from there, I went to I was a college professor for 3 years.

Paul Pape [00:07:48]:
I taught design in the same place I went to undergrad. I thought since I loved it here so much and I love education so much, why don’t I jump in and be a a professor? And then the curtain was pulled back, and I saw how it worked. Nope. And it was it was that was really eye opening because everything that I loved about school was there and in my hands. I that’s what I could dish out, but it was everything that I didn’t like about all other aspects of other jobs that was the back end of it. And I was working 14 to 16 hour days, 6 days a week for 3 years, and every annual review I got, said, if you only, you could apply yourself and be and do more. And I was like, wow. I don’t I don’t know how like, I was getting to school at 5 in the morning, and I would leave about 7, 8, 9 o’clock at night.

Paul Pape [00:08:35]:
And this is 6 days a week. And when you do theater, sometimes you’re there till midnight. And so, yeah, that was that was too much. And so I my last year there, I had a student who asked me if I could create a little figurine of him and his girlfriend for Valentine’s Day. The Nintendo Wii had just come out, and so he wanted little Miis of him and his girlfriend. And so I made them for him as, you know, as I do, and he put it online. And this is before there was an online, before everybody had their own Instagrams or Facebooks or all that, and it got picked up by a bunch of nerd based blogs. And it took off.

Paul Pape [00:09:06]:
It went viral. And I started getting requests to make more of these. I’ve made over a1000. And so, I was making more on the side doing that than I was being a professor, and I was a lot happier. And so I asked my wife if she would let me quit being a professor and then try and do this for real. And she said, I’ll give you 1 year, and then I had my second viral thing happened about 4 months later. We made $50,000 in 2 weeks. And she’s like, okay.

Paul Pape [00:09:32]:
I think you can do this. That was 20 years ago. And I have a philosophy in life, which is bend, don’t break, which basically means that whenever a job opportunity if you’re familiar with improv at all, they have the yes and Mhmm. Very similar. And so when people would ask me, you know, hey. Can you make this? It’s a yes, and I’d figure it out later. And so that’s why when you look at the wall behind me, it’s so varied, and it’s because anytime anybody had something crazy that they didn’t know how to have made, I would step up and say, let me give it a shot. And that’s what led to working with Disney and Universal and Nickelodeon and all of these different places because when they get stuck, I live literally outside the box.

Paul Pape [00:10:10]:
And so they would call me up and say, is there a way to do this? And the answer is always yes, and we’ll figure it out.

Nancy Norbeck [00:10:16]:
We’ll figure it out. Yeah. And for those of you who are are listening, there’s there’s there’s a a huge a huge wall that I can’t even see all of just just in this shot on Zoom, but Paul has shown me everything that’s behind him, and it is it is basically nerd paradise. There’s all sorts of stuff on on this wall that, you know, you could sit and stare at it for hours and probably not see all of it. So so, yeah, that’s, that’s where we’re that’s where he’s coming from, very literally.

Paul Pape [00:10:49]:
Literally, the nerd wall is behind me. Yes. It it is a Yeah. A billboard of inspiration in in in jobs that I’ve done. I mean, 20 years you don’t really think that 20 years is a very long time, to be doing the same thing. But when I look back at all the stuff that’s behind me, I’m like, yeah. That’s that’s a lot that’s a lot of mileage off of that.

Nancy Norbeck [00:11:08]:
That’s a lot. And I think, you know, and you can tell me if I’m wrong, but I have the feeling that the fact that you’re always saying yes and, and you’re you’re not sure what’s gonna come next, and so everything is different, probably makes that 20 years feel like it went by in no time at all. Absolutely.

Paul Pape [00:11:25]:
And I I know a lot of people, my wife included, are get very nervous when you don’t know what’s next. And she says I have a superpower that whenever we need money, it appears. And it’s just a a random thing that happens, but I I thrive on not knowing. One question I get asked a lot is what is your favorite thing you’ve ever made in 20 years? And I don’t really have a thing that I’ve made because for me, it’s the process. I’m a professional problem solver. I love to figure out how to do the thing. And so it’s the process into it because that feeds into the education and the imagination side of things. And so I’ve I’ve had my, you know, trials and tribulations with any of these projects, but for me, the the what I learned from it and how my skill set grows is really what inspires me to keep going.

Nancy Norbeck [00:12:10]:
Yeah. I mean, it’s it’s always a new challenge. Right?

Paul Pape [00:12:14]:
Absolutely. There’s been some doozies. I worked for the The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, and, when they call you, they literally need everything tomorrow. And I really wish I was exaggerating. The first time I ever worked with them, my wife was in labor when they called. She was we were in the hospital. She is going through labor. And they called me, and they they needed something the next day to give to Dwayne The Rock Johnson.

Paul Pape [00:12:36]:
And they wanted to know if I could make it happen. And my wife is literally, you know, going through contractions, and I just looked at her, and I’m like, so it’s The Tonight Show on the phone, and I was wondering, can I take this job? And, it was our 3rd kid. So she’s like, it’s our 3rd kid. We know the routine. Go do this. It’s an opportunity. And so now when and I’ve done things like I’ve designed the LEGO set for the tonight show where they turn the entire tonight show, say, into LEGO. I had to design that for them.

Paul Pape [00:13:05]:
I’ve done many awards for them, and, like, sometimes, they’ll Paul you up in the last for weird things. Like, we need 2 praying mantises playing double Dutch with bumblebees, and they need to be realistic in in actual size. And we need it by tomorrow or the day after. And I’m like I said, I’m in Nebraska, and they are not. And so everything I do, I have to ship to them. And so it’s it’s, always a challenge to meet the 6 o’clock FedEx deadline to be able to get it to them the very next day, and it’s it’s always a challenge. But I love it. It’s, you know, I thrive on on that kind of, well, I guess, pressure would be Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:13:42]:
Would be what you’d call it. But it’s fun.

Nancy Norbeck [00:13:46]:
Yeah. Well and and I’m just imagining how many boxes of Lego you had to meet that FedEx deadline with.

Paul Pape [00:13:54]:
Oh, so many. So many. My kids will never want for Lego. That’s we’ll just Paul it that way. They just, because what we did was we I designed it. So if you’ve ever, like, been to the store and you’ve seen, like, the the Friends set or the Seinfeld set that they have that you can build, they basically wanted me to do the same thing, figure out how to build. And then what they did is I had to then draw it out so I knew how big one LEGO brick is in real life, and then they blew it up. So I sent them all the plans, and then they built a full scale version out of what looked like LEGO bricks, but they weren’t LEGO brick.

Paul Pape [00:14:28]:
And it was it was it was crazy just to try and because that’s not a one to one with Lego. It’s, like, 1.45, and it’s really weird to have to try and figure out the math on all this to make it look like the brick, but at the same time, has to be human sized so that they could play around it.

Nancy Norbeck [00:14:45]:
Yeah. I I think you may have just broken my brain on the math part.

Paul Pape [00:14:51]:
That’s the challenge, though, and I love it. I thrive on that. That’s fun.

Nancy Norbeck [00:14:54]:
I mean, that would take me I was gonna say that would take me the till tomorrow part, but, no, it would take me way longer than that.

Paul Pape [00:15:03]:
That one, I I will say they gave me 4 days. They didn’t give me they gave me 4 days to figure that one out. So it wasn’t, like, instantaneous, but I’ve had some really some some doozies from them as as well as other companies. And it’s they think it’s impossible. And I love I love to be able to surprise people with being able to do something that is that seems impossible but can be made possible. And I’ve I’ve blown the socks off of some executives in some different boardrooms across the world, and they’re like, how do you and because I can come up with answers really first because I’ve been doing this for so long. You know? And Mhmm. So they don’t they don’t see the creative process.

Paul Pape [00:15:37]:
I teach it, though. And so when I get into it and I and I talk to students or now I talk to companies, corporations, and and, like, clients, like, actual creatives on how to harness this creative process, it’s it seems like magic, but it’s only because you don’t really understand the inner workings until I explain it. And then you’re like, oh, that’s how you got

Nancy Norbeck [00:15:56]:
Right. Right. Well and and I before before we get too far away from it, since you mentioned your kids, I am imagining you know, first of all, are are they the recipient of of many, many new and and exclusive things that no one else has seen?

Paul Pape [00:16:19]:
It here’s the funny thing about kids. Do you have I don’t know if you have kids, but, if you if you do, whatever you do in your life is so mundane to your children that it’s just the thing that you do.

Nancy Norbeck [00:16:32]:
That’s true.

Paul Pape [00:16:33]:
And so my kids come down, and they see the nerd Paul, and they just they’ll just grab things off of it and play with it. And sometimes it comes back without a head or a hand, and then they put it back. My wife is a costume designer. Everyone’s like, Halloween must be the best. My kids are like, nah. We don’t care. I have a house, like a tree house I built in the backyard, and we call it the tree house, but it’s actually tree management. It’s got air conditioning and heating.

Paul Pape [00:16:54]:
It’s got a Wi Fi. It’s got fingerprint scanners, hardwood floors. It’s beautiful. It’s made of trees that support it that are actually made out of concrete, but they look like real trees. It’s beautiful, and the kids have never used it. That is because in when you are creative all the time, when you’re born into this, they it’s just they’re normal. Now I will say my kids are all very creative in their own right. They all have none of them wanna do it, my wife or I do.

Paul Pape [00:17:22]:
They wanna do their own thing, and we encourage it. You know, please, obviously

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:25]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:17:25]:
Whatever you want. Be creative. And we it was for us, it’s more about, like, I I said, I love the process. For us, it’s about giving them the fundamentals to let them understand that no matter what it is that you’re interested in doing, whatever the creative outlet is, and it doesn’t have to be art. Anything can be creative. Just throw yourself into it. Become the best at it that you can. And then, and then if you decide that you don’t wanna do it anymore, go do something else, and that that opportunity is always there.

Nancy Norbeck [00:17:52]:
I think that is awesome. And, you know, totally, they should go do their own thing. I mean, that’s that’s the that’s the important thing. You know? Going and exploring and figuring it out for themselves.

Paul Pape [00:18:06]:
I teach them also that because one thing that I’ve, and this is one of the things I speak about is failure. Failure has gotten such bad rap lately because when we look at failure, we look at it as doing something wrong. And, actually, failure is the only thing that leads to innovation. It’s the only thing that leads to new ideas. And so I encourage my kids to try things without fear of failure or or we say failing creatively so that we kinda change the paradigm so that we don’t feel like it’s a negative because, you know, they’re in school. They’re like, oh, no. I failed this test. And so bad me, and then it’s like self flagellation.

Paul Pape [00:18:44]:
And even when you go into the business world, you know, go out into the real world, you know, if you’re not hitting your deadlines, if you’re not, you know, getting the bottom line low enough, all of these things, it’s failure, failure, failure. And then it’s fear of losing your job. We’ve gotten so far away from, like, innovating because we’re so concentrating on right answers and the bottom line that the kids are suffering from it, and we don’t have the innovation anymore that we used to have 50 years ago. There’s There’s something called the creativity crisis that I’ve been really looking into. And since the nineties, we’ve seen a 60% decrease in creativity in children. Trackable. This is, like, 60%, and the hardest hit are kindergarten to 3rd grade. Like, that’s the time when we should be the most creative, when we’re just playing all the time.

Paul Pape [00:19:28]:
And so we teach our kids, try it. And if you don’t like it, that’s okay. But you’ve tried it, fail at it. What did you learn from the failure? Because even if you learned that you just didn’t like it or that you didn’t fit with you, that’s that’s something you’ve learned. But I Mhmm. I find that whenever you’re trying something new, every time that you fail, there is a a nugget in there that progresses you forward. And it may not contribute to the thing that you’re making right now or the thing that you’re doing right now. It may be something that pays off 10, 15 years down the line.

Paul Pape [00:19:58]:
But you have that, and you’ve got the security in self that you know that it isn’t a mistake and that you can tuck that away and and pull it out later.

Nancy Norbeck [00:20:07]:
That is such a massive gift to anyone of any age, but especially to a kid.

Paul Pape [00:20:12]:
Yep. I think so. And you should see my kid. My kids take advantage of it all the time. And our kid, like, their teachers are like, you guys are fearless. And it’s like, it’s not fear. It’s it’s not that they’re fearless. I mean, trust me.

Paul Pape [00:20:23]:
They’re scared of a lot of stuff. My they talk they have, like, crisis subconscious about growing up. They’re like, my my middle schooler, he’s getting he just graduated 6th grade today. He’s going into middle school. And the other day, he was sad. I’m like, what’s up, bud? And he’s like, oh, I was thinking about having to pay taxes. I’m like, you’re in 6th grade, dude. You’ve got time.

Paul Pape [00:20:41]:
It’s all good. Don’t worry about it yet. Like, you don’t need to have but but they aren’t they’re fearless when it comes to trying new things because they understand that there’s really, the only repercussion is the ones that we we throw on ourselves. Even if somebody says, oh my god. You failed at that. He’s like, yeah. I sure did. Okay.

Paul Pape [00:20:58]:
You know, it doesn’t hurt. It it once you get that mindset going, it doesn’t hurt anymore.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:03]:
Yeah. And and so many of us and I’m I’m, you know, thinking of places that I’ve worked as you’re talking. I’m like, you know, we want the same thing we had last year. Do it the same way we did it last year. And, you know, I’ve worked with graphic designers who are like, can I change the color slightly? It’s like, oh, no. It’s not black like it was last year. It’s like, oh, lord. You know? I mean and yet they’ll come in and they’ll say, well, we wanna do something different.

Nancy Norbeck [00:21:34]:
But by different, what we really mean is we want it to be exactly the same as it was last year. Mhmm. Mhmm. And so, you know, the the whole opportunity to fail and to try new things just just isn’t there. So it’s really no wonder that we have a whole pile of adults who are like, ah, I can’t move half an inch in one direction because I’ll mess up and and I’ll lose my job and, you know, whatever. And I just I think that’s crazy, but you see it all the time. Yeah.

Paul Pape [00:22:04]:
Yeah. And so I try to instill I mean, the there’s 3 things that you can give a creative, whatever your creativity is, that will make them feel honored. You can give them more money. No business is doing that right now anyway. Mhmm. You can give them ownership, which I think is something that a lot more willing to try that basically gives people a little bit of wiggle room to try to make the job their own. I’m I’m a kid of the like, I grew up in the seventies, but I was high school in the nineties, so nineties is huge. There was a a a guy, Montel Jordan, who sang a song, this is how we do it.

Paul Pape [00:22:40]:
And it’s become like like, that’s how we do training videos anymore. It’s like we sit somebody down and say, this is how we do it, and this is how you’re going to do it. The problem is is whoever came up with that idea, when whoever they filmed to be the person who did it correctly, was given leeway to figure it out, to figure it out how best it works for them. And then what they they did is they then encapsulated that information, and and their boss came down and said, wow. You are super efficient at all of this. And they they said, you know, you’re really efficient at this. You’re really good at this. We wanna film you to be the person who teaches everyone else.

Paul Pape [00:23:16]:
And that person obviously is like, oh, that’s high praise. Of course, I will sit and video this. And then they do that, but then the next person has to be fit into a mold, and then that person has to be fit into the mold of the person before it. And by the time, you know, 4 or 5 generations of employees come through, whatever that job was, whatever made that person good at that job is gone because everyone’s trying to square peg round holes, and it doesn’t work anymore. And so ownership gives somebody the ability to say, this is the solution that we’re after, and this is where we’re at Paul all the parts that go to it. How do you get there, and can you get there efficiently? And once you do that, they then they have there’s a sense of pride in that. When you figure it out for yourself, you’ve got pride in in ownership of your position, and then you’re happier about it. You’ll come to work happier about it because this is how you do it, not how everyone else does.

Paul Pape [00:24:07]:
And then the the third thing is time. Give everyone their time back. And I really wish the pandemic everyone’s like, oh, the pandemic was horrible, and I think the pandemic was probably the best thing to happen to modern civilization because it proved something to us. We were stuck in this rut of the 9 to 5 that didn’t really start until after World War 2, where we go to work every single day, and it’s like babysitting for adults. We’ve got middle managers whose sole job is to make sure that you play in your playpen.

Nancy Norbeck [00:24:38]:
Right.

Paul Pape [00:24:39]:
Then at 5 o’clock, you you’re given your snack break at noon. You’re giving you know, it’s like it’s just like day care for adults. And I have a good friend right now who he’s at a job, and he says, I have become a master of being at an 8 hour day and spending 1 hour getting my job done, kinda put a 100% done, and 7 hours of being on YouTube and not getting caught. And I’m like, that is a phenomenal waste of your time. He’s like, yes. But the management makes me be here. I have to. And so all of these people are going to these businesses to sit in these cubicles and to do their job when their job is done.

Paul Pape [00:25:15]:
And we found out that the job was done because the pandemic came. We had to sit at home, and then people are noticing, like, I can get my entire week’s worth of work done in 4 hours.

Nancy Norbeck [00:25:25]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:25:26]:
Now I’m not gonna tell my boss that because then he’s only gonna pay me for 4 hours and or they’re gonna expect me to do another 36 hours worth of someone else’s job. So what we’re gonna do is Right. But when they’re not in your home monitoring you, then you had all this free time. And then humans decided, wait a minute. We don’t need to work 40 hours a week as long as I’m being paid for it. So that’s the third thing. It’s giving people their time back. So if as an employee or an employer, if you’ve got creatives, you can either give them ownership.

Paul Pape [00:25:54]:
You can give them more pay so that they can do the thing that you want them exactly the way you want them to, or give them their time back. Let them do the job and let them leave. And because the job is still being done.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:05]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:26:05]:
And and any of those 3 or combination of the of the of the the 3 of them works really well to give people the energy, the the want, and the desire to be there to do the job every day.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:19]:
Right. Yeah. I I think you’re absolutely right about that. I mean, definitely, there there was a an adjustment period to the whole being at home all the time thing, and I definitely remember the moment when I thought I was gonna go completely stir crazy. But, but, you know, what what has amazed me since then, because people people seem at least in in a large group, people seem to look back on that like it was terrible. And I’m sitting there thinking, no. I loved that. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:26:53]:
I loved it. I could do my own thing. I didn’t have people interrupting me and bothering me all the time, especially with, you know, useless things that were just distractions, which I think is part of why, oh, look, turns out we don’t need all this time to get the work done because nobody’s in my face constantly. But, you know, you you could go for a walk at lunch, you know, in your own neighborhood. You you could schedule things a little bit differently, and nobody was gonna have a problem with it. But, also, what blows my mind is the the places that, you know, when you went back in what, like, I think was the fall of 2021. At first, it was, so how many days a week are we still gonna get to be at home? But but nobody I mean, it it came back with all of the even if you got to stay at home for 2 or 3 days a week, it came back with all of the same talking points from before the pandemic as if none of it had happened about how, oh, our work is very collaborative, so we all have to be in the same place. And you’re like, I’m sorry.

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:06]:
3 weeks ago, I was at home every single day, and and that was how it was for a year and a half.

Paul Pape [00:28:12]:
Yeah. And we

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:13]:
got all of our stuff done, and you never stopped telling us how it was better than it had ever been before. But now you say that we can’t do what we do if we’re not here. Yeah. Walking through playing the part, going through the motions of being in your space, it it just I don’t know. It blows my mind because it’s like, thought we learned something, but apparently, we didn’t learn something. Or more to the point, you don’t want to have learned something because you missed being able to micromanage the crap out of everybody.

Paul Pape [00:28:48]:
Daycare. Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:28:50]:
Yeah. And and so you just despite the fact that you saw the results, you still never really believed that people could get these things done without you standing over them.

Paul Pape [00:29:01]:
Yep.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:02]:
Yeah. It’s crazy.

Paul Pape [00:29:04]:
And it’s also all the buildings that they own. They’re like, We’re paying rent on these things that we don’t need.

Nancy Norbeck [00:29:09]:
Like, No,

Paul Pape [00:29:10]:
you don’t. And you don’t want to sell it because it’s such an asset to the business. I’m like, Well, but you’ve just discovered that you could Paul down to, like, 4 people in the building at any one time Paul all of your other employees. Like, PayPal is based in Omaha, Nebraska where I’m at. And they built this multi, multi, multimillion dollar facility that could house 1,000 of people. And during the pandemic, they gave everybody a laptop, and they closed that building. And the building’s not been opened. They’re like, we found out everyone can work with a $1,000 laptop that we give them from their house, and everyone’s happier, everyone’s getting the same Pape, the same benefits, why why not? We don’t need to be here.

Paul Pape [00:29:50]:
And what’s Right. Good is that you you air down middle management. I mean, I not to not to downplay middle managers out there, but it’s an an it’s an unnecessary ask when I mean, because we’re adults. We can self regulate. I mean, as much as we don’t wanna think that and there are people that during the pandemic, and and I know some of them personally, that had a hard time Yeah. The isolation. They are because we, as human species, we are social by nature. Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:30:20]:
And I think that that’s still necessary, but it’s the time is our most valuable asset because we can be given more money. We can be have money taken away. We have a finite amount of time. It’s an unknown quantity, and when it’s gone, it’s gone. And so when the pandemic came and we we figured out we could do our job quicker, we had more time to be us. We we had more of our life back.

Nancy Norbeck [00:30:43]:
Yeah.

Paul Pape [00:30:44]:
And so it’s that is the biggest stumbling block, I think, with bringing everyone back is that now you’re we we tasted the golden apple Yes. Of freedom, and then you’re like, alright. Now playtime’s over. Get back in here. And we’re all like, no. I know I can do exactly what I’m doing with more freedom. Can I do it? And a lot of people are quitting. A lot of people are quitting because they’ve been they’ve been told you are required to be back in the office.

Paul Pape [00:31:14]:
Not, nah. I know companies will hire me to not be in the office. Mhmm. Because that time thing, that time is so valuable to people. And it I mean, and if you think back to the pandemic, I don’t know how much you watch, like, social media and all that during the pandemic, but there were people who were coming up with super creative ways Oh, yeah. To make it look like they were working. Like, somebody figured out if you put a stopwatch underneath their mouse that the ticking secondhand made it look like the mouse was moving. And so their bosses who were you know, their middle management would check-in to make sure that the mouse was still moving for 8 hours a day.

Paul Pape [00:31:47]:
They were just like, yeah. Just set it on my watch, and then I went and watched Netflix because I’m already done with my job. Right. You know? And as humans, we are creative. I mean, that’s just we are the only species that we know of who are truly creative. The actual definition of creativity is to be able to use your imagination or to create new ideas, and that’s what we do. I mean, that is literally in our foundational being. And so when we’re confronted with something that we don’t wanna do, we will find creative solutions.

Paul Pape [00:32:18]:
And even when we find things that we want to do, we’ll find creative solutions to make it take longer. It’s because that’s just who we are as a species, and it’s just it’s been really interesting to see how post pandemic, how the majority of society is not willing to go back to the way it was. This is not how we

Nancy Norbeck [00:32:37]:
Yeah. I mean, people are doing it, but they’re not enjoying it. They’re not happy about it. And I think that the people who are forcing folks to be back in the office are really underestimating the effect that’s having on folks. And, you know, the the the metaphor that pops into my head is is Plato’s allegory of the cave. You know, we all got out of the cave. Right. And now you wanna tie me back up in the cave in front of the fire, and I don’t wanna be there because I know that there’s this other stuff outside the cave.

Paul Pape [00:33:04]:
Yep. Yep. I can live my life and do my job. That’s the that’s the you you can do both. You don’t need to work so much during the week that you only get 2 days off. Like, even if you went to a 3 day, 4 day work week, you still have 3 days off. You know? We like, we’ve we’ve conditioned ourselves just through repetition and because we use the think this is how I did it. This is how you should have to do it as well.

Paul Pape [00:33:29]:
You know? If I suffered when I did, you should suffer too. And that’s not like, as a teacher, your goal is to teach as much of the students so that they can bypass you. You want them to elevate past you. Whenever you do a job, it’s it’s the same thing. Whenever you have children, you hope that your children will succeed further than you did. And yet when it comes to work, like, nope. Like, we’re gonna all suffer the exact same way. We’re gonna stay nice and level.

Paul Pape [00:34:00]:
We don’t rock the boat. And it’s so weird that in every other aspect of our life, we’re all about elevation except when it comes to that, and then it’s stagnation.

Nancy Norbeck [00:34:08]:
Yeah. Weird. Yeah. I I mean, it’s it’s like the ultimate fear of change. You know? Like, no. No. No. We want it to be exactly this way because this is what we know.

Paul Pape [00:34:18]:
Right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:34:18]:
And we say that we want you to come up with new things, but we only want you to come up with new things within this very narrow band of acceptable new thingness. And if it goes outside of that, no, no. We get it all has to stay the same.

Paul Pape [00:34:35]:
I mean, some of the best inventions that humankind has ever come up with happened by accident. Mhmm. Like, penicillin, the dude left cantaloupes out over the week a long weekend. I mean, that’s that’s the biggest mistake ever. You know? Post it notes. The guy was coming up with a permanent glue and came up with Post it notes, the least permanent glue you can come up with. Edward, or, Thomas Edison with a light bulb, 10,000 failures before he figured out how to get it correct. I we are just every vulcanized rubber is one of my favorites to talk about because they were trying to find a better shoe leather that wouldn’t wear out as much, and they found vulcanized rubber.

Paul Pape [00:35:09]:
It changed the industry. Until then, tires on your car were white, and it wasn’t actually in the vulcanization process where we added carbon into it that actually made it stronger. And now we have, you know, everything we’re like, that’s just what we’re used to completely by accident. Like, the great things and it’s because they were trying something, they failed astronomically, but they didn’t fail, feel bad, and throw it away. They failed, and we’re still conscious enough of it that they’re like, well, what is this? And they were curious. Yeah. And they they look at it. And but you’re right.

Paul Pape [00:35:38]:
That narrow band, mm-mm. They don’t want you to to look outside because what if something is better that’s out there? Well, it might take away or it might cost me something, cost the business something. But they they’re so shortsighted that it’s like, yeah. It might cost us something now, but if we elevate our profits down the road, is it worth taking the hit now? And, unfortunately, because of our limited timeline here on Earth, we don’t think 3, 4 generations down the line. We don’t think 1 generation down the line. We think of us right now until the day we die. Frank Lloyd Wright, one of my favorite architects that’s out there, he’s got standing or falling water. He’s got a it’s a beautiful area.

Paul Pape [00:36:17]:
If you’ve ever had a chance to go there and go look at it, go check it out. Beautiful. But he when he bought the place, he planted a bunch of trees. And they somebody had asked him. He says, oh, you’re planting all these trees. What happens when they get too big? He goes, I’ll be dead by then. That’s the next person’s problem. And now you go to see falling water, and it’s there’s no view anymore because there’s all these giant trees, and he was right.

Paul Pape [00:36:39]:
It’s not his problem. He did. You know? And Right. I think that if we would forward think just a little bit, that’s how we that’s how we get, you know, like, how we progress as a as a species, as as humankind.

Nancy Norbeck [00:36:54]:
Yeah. Yeah. We don’t we don’t tend to be as good at that. The closest we get is, I think, when we look at our kids and say, how should it be for them?

Paul Pape [00:37:03]:
You would think.

Nancy Norbeck [00:37:03]:
You would hope. You would think. But but it doesn’t it doesn’t happen on on a large enough scale.

Paul Pape [00:37:09]:
It doesn’t. There’s a Group mentality is a big issue, unfortunately. You were talking earlier. You mentioned that, like, during the pandemic, we, as a group, all decided that that wasn’t working and and that we all need to, as a group, go back to doing this thing. And and that’s the truth. And mob mentality is a is an actual thing, and we wanna fit in because we are a social creature. And so as an individual, we’re like, I love being at home by myself during the pandemic because I got so much done. I got time to be by myself, whatever.

Paul Pape [00:37:37]:
But then when you see one person say, we need to come back, and then somebody else is like, I guess, and then everybody’s like, I guess too because they don’t wanna be left out. It’s that fear of missing out and and fear of not following the herd for fear of being left behind. But some of the most innovative creative people in the world throughout our entire history have been people who have walked outside that group.

Nancy Norbeck [00:37:56]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:37:57]:
They’re aware of them. They can go in, do a little mixing around, and then come back out, and they don’t mind not being part of the herd. They can socialize with it. They’re not completely outside of it, but that ability to to phase in and out allowed them to be innovative in a way that most people aren’t.

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:16]:
Right. So when you go and you speak to corporate folks there are so many directions I could go in here right now. I’m I’m do you have much hope that they’ll actually listen?

Paul Pape [00:38:36]:
Oh my goodness. I’ve had people ask me, what’s the turnover rate of, like, them actually taking what you give them?

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:42]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:38:43]:
And I’m like, yeah, 5050. Like, I can tell more than

Nancy Norbeck [00:38:46]:
I would have thought.

Paul Pape [00:38:48]:
Because a lot of people who bring me in, they know what I’m coming in for, and so I think that benefits me. When you can tell within, like, the first 3 minutes of any speech as to whether or not they’re gonna take any of it to heart. A lot of it and public speaking is a is a weird profession because you’ve gotta excite them enough to want to be there because they’re usually 9 AM. They’re being forced to go to this convention or whatever. And so you’ve gotta excite them to be there. So you get out on stage, and you you wanna play a game, and you wanna make them laugh, and you wanna give something poignant and all this. But at the end of the day, I could scrap every bit of that as long as you would just do the one thing I want you to do. You know? And, like, the one thing that I leave is I want you all to play.

Paul Pape [00:39:33]:
I mean, like, if you think about it, when was the last time you actually just played for nothing? No stakes. No nothing. Just play. We don’t do that anymore, yet our children do it all the time, and we encourage them. Go outside and play. What does that mean? I don’t know. I don’t do it. It’s like, no.

Paul Pape [00:39:47]:
I I do

Nancy Norbeck [00:39:48]:
it at all. Out of my hair for a couple hours is what it means.

Paul Pape [00:39:51]:
Go entertain yourself. Yeah. We we don’t teach them how, and we don’t do it anymore ourselves. So what does that what does that mean? Well, now it’s this. You’ll pick this thing up and stare at it and let this be my entertainment. And it’s unfortunate. And so when I go out there, that’s the one thing I want anybody to take away. I want you to play.

Paul Pape [00:40:09]:
I want you to fail, and I want you to play. But, you know, just do those two things. The problem is that we think play is childish.

Nancy Norbeck [00:40:17]:
Yeah.

Paul Pape [00:40:18]:
And it’s not it’s not because it’s that it’s in play that we innovate. I love to use the word innovate, and I say it a lot, but it’s it’s truly where it comes from. It’s when we let loose any of our inhibitions. One example that I like to give when I’m doing speeches is that as a baby, when we’re born, we nothing means anything. Like, language is all made up. You know, everything is make believe. And as soon as, like, our parents start to teach us, you know, from the very first thing, dada. You know? We are given a brick, and we lay that brick down.

Paul Pape [00:40:48]:
And as there that brick has constraints. This is dada, mama. And then as we go through our life, we’re constantly adding these bricks of education around ourselves. These are the structures of our life, and we build it up and up and up and up. And, eventually, we find ourselves in a box. And what we forgot to do was put a door or windows in it, And we are constrained within these limitations of rules that people have given us throughout our entire life, through education, job, all these different things. And we’re stuck inside this box. And what I try to teach people is you need to get out and play.

Paul Pape [00:41:22]:
You need to put a window in your in your bricked in house here so that you can step outside and actually see things in a lawless, rule less way. And there are very, very, very prolific people out there who have figured out that most of the brick wall or room that we build around ourselves are group mentality ideas. We don’t have to abide by them. And they figured out that they’re not going to, So they step outside of it, and they live their entire life with the box next to them. And so they have the rules. They understand the rules, but they’re not gonna live by it. But they’re not gonna buck the system so much that they’re ostracized. They just understand that those constraints that we put on everybody, like a 40 hour work week, is not necessary.

Paul Pape [00:42:09]:
A 4 hour work week can be a great thing, and it’s possible. You know? You don’t need to follow all of these strict rules, just enough to be able to fit in with society, but then you can live your literally your best life by not staying inside that box.

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:26]:
Yeah. That’s a great metaphor. It was a great image because because yeah. I mean, and it’s it it is that. It’s the social pressure. It’s the you know, we are social creatures. We wanna fit into the group, and so you’re socialized to fit into that group. But that doesn’t mean that that’s the place for everybody, and it might be the place for fewer of us than we think.

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:48]:
But but yeah.

Paul Pape [00:42:51]:
But we’re there. We’re we’re there.

Nancy Norbeck [00:42:52]:
Yeah.

Paul Pape [00:42:53]:
It’s hard to unlearn. And that’s why I I say play. Play for me is actually it’s a it’s oh, now the word is just gonna escape my brain here. So it stands for something. P l a y stands for the it’s ponder, learn, apply, and yield. And ponder, I want you guys like, what I tell everybody is start a daily practice of play and ponder. I want you to use your imagination. Imagine new things.

Paul Pape [00:43:20]:
Imagine fixing something in your life that you use on a daily basis to make it better for you. Ponder these things. Imagine it. Just use your imagination and and go wild. You know? It doesn’t this is this is how we we innovate in our own lives. You know? Like, I’ve got my coffee cup, and I’m always drinking. I’m like, how can I make this better? You know? And I think of, like, 10 different ways that I can make it better. Some of them are impractical.

Paul Pape [00:43:40]:
Some of them would only be useful to myself. That’s okay. Then learning is something that it’s a lifelong thing. The day you stop learning is the day you start dying. It’s just you have to continue learning. And when I say learn, a lot of people instantly go, school. And learning is not school. I mean, this thing right here is the best device for learning, and you can dive into any rabbit hole that you want.

Paul Pape [00:44:03]:
And you can learn as much as the things that interest you, and you don’t need to be a generalist and and and super knowledgeable in everything to be really good at be at at anything. And so but constantly learn because our brains are really interesting machines in that it consumes everything that happens to us all day long. Whether we’re consciously aware of it or not, it is taking it in, and it’s compromising it. And so when we have genius ideas, which comes into apply here, is when you take the learning stuff that you’ve done and the imagination stuff that you’ve done and you apply the 2 together to create something that actually could work, we we like to think that we have design divine inspiration where, like, God comes down and jiggles the gray matter in your brain, and that’s not what’s happening. What’s happening is that your imagination and the things that you’ve learned are being put together inside your brain. Yep. And this is what leads up to yield. And yield is one of the hardest things for people to do these days, especially because we’re conditioned not to, and, especially in the technological age that we’re in, is that you’ve gotta stop and give your brain time to decompress.

Paul Pape [00:45:14]:
You’ve gotta yield to not pick this up in doom scroll all day long to you know, when you go out in nature, yeah, it’s great to listen to music, but when was the last time you walked without music playing and just heard bird and bug sounds, you know, or the sound of your feet hitting pavement? It’s what I like to say is whenever you’re coming up with a brilliant idea or you’ve come up with an idea that you’re like, oh, that’s genius, it never happens when you’re in work, when you’re at the job, when you’re at the desk and you’re pouring over paperwork. It happens when you’re driving. It happens when you’re trying to fall asleep, when you’re in the shower. Shower thoughts

Nancy Norbeck [00:45:47]:
are a huge

Paul Pape [00:45:47]:
thing. And that’s because your brain is your primitive brain is preoccupied with a task that is mundane and easy, and we can do it in our sleep. And then what that allows is it allows for the creative side of your brain to actually form these ideas and to be able to, you know, put these things together. But if your brain is constantly active, it’s like a computer that’s running on overdrive all the time. And if you’ve ever been one of those people who’s fallen asleep scrolling through your phone, and then you wake up the next day and you’re exhausted, and it’s because your brain does not have the time to sort and process all that data that you’re throwing at it. And so while you might physically be asleep, your brain is not. And so you need to yield. Give yourself moments in which you just just live your life.

Paul Pape [00:46:33]:
Be inside here for a minute, you know, not in a device, not learning, not playing, not imagine, not any of those things. Just be. And then what you’ll find is that think ideas come quicker. You’re just like, oh, yeah. Because your brain’s got you know, the it’s now created these neural pathways that allow you to think through things a lot easier, and you can grab from this. So when I do that magic trick where some company calls me up and says, how do you do this magical thing? You know, how can I have one call me up? I I worked on this movie, called the creator. They were doing a promo event for it. And in it, there are these androids that and you knew that they were androids because they had a hole through their head.

Paul Pape [00:47:08]:
They had normal human face, but a big robot spine and a hole through their head. And, like, we wanna do a promotional item where we give everybody headphones, but we want it to look like the headphones make a hole through their head. And we can’t figure out how to do it. And instantly, I had the answer to it because I used to you know, like, a big fan. I’m a nerd, so I love magic as a kid. I worked with David Copperfield. I was like, what if we did an infinity mirror inside each of the headphones so when you look at it, you see a ring of light that goes on forever as if you’re looking through their head. And that, like, came to me instantly, and I pitch it to a room full of Disney execs, and they’re like, how did how did you come up with that? And that’s because of following the play practice.

Paul Pape [00:47:43]:
It’s literally that every day. And it’s just pulling from all of these random things. You wouldn’t think magic tricks would come into headphone design, but it works seamlessly. It it was so easy to to implement into that, and but it blows their minds. It becomes magic to them.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:00]:
Yeah. Because they’re not they’re not doing any of that. They’re they’re saying, we want we want x, and it’s gonna make us this much money, and that’s the important thing. But but, you know, you’re you’re also reminding me, like, I I don’t think we know how to be bored anymore. No. You know? I mean, you you keep, you know, referencing the phone, and the phone, I think, is is the huge thing. And sometimes I say to myself, okay. But, you know, I would take books with me back when, you know, books were still a thing, and and you could, you know, I could stick 1 in a bag.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:34]:
And if I had to sit on a train or wait in a waiting room or whatever, I’d read the book. And is it really that different? But it is. Mhmm. You know? I mean, even if I am reading a book on my phone, the phone still is the the source of every possible distraction. You know, you know there’s other stuff you can do on it. With the book, it’s a book.

Paul Pape [00:48:58]:
That’s right.

Nancy Norbeck [00:48:59]:
You can read it or you can not read it, and that’s pretty much all you can do with it. But, you know, I I will sometimes, when I have to, like, you know, go to a doctor’s appointment, sit in the room, and wait for them, leave my phone on the other side of the room just to see what happens. And it’s usually maybe a minute before that part of me just wants to reach over and grab it and go get it, and I’m like, nope. It’s over there for a reason. So what are we gonna do instead? And it’s hard because we’ve forgotten how to do it.

Paul Pape [00:49:28]:
Yeah. We don’t like to be alone with our thoughts. No. Which is funny because, like, we’re alone with our thoughts 247. It’s the only it’s the only guest we can’t make leave. You know? And yet we wanna we wanna silence it. And it’s really interesting. If you take a if you take the time to listen to what that little voice is telling you, it’s it’s just trying to lead you to a better place.

Paul Pape [00:49:50]:
I mean, there obviously, there’s mental illness and such, and I don’t wanna I hate to generalize in that regard.

Nancy Norbeck [00:49:54]:
But Right.

Paul Pape [00:49:55]:
For the majority of people, the that voice is saying, why don’t you try the why don’t, you know, you are very happy when you’re doing this. Why aren’t you doing it? And you’re like, no. I’d rather see I’d rather doom scroll through Reddit or Instagram or whatever because I wanna find joy in what everyone else is doing rather than making my own. Because it’s too much work, you might Paul. You know, those kind of things. That that precondition Right. All there. We’re in our little brick house.

Paul Pape [00:50:20]:
And, it’s it it is amazing how like, my son I have I have a 9 year old, and he has every device known to man because that’s part of my job, you know, so I can have every gaming system, and he’s got his own computer, and he’s got LEGO forever. He’s got all his tools, and he’ll come out and he goes, I’m bored.

Nancy Norbeck [00:50:39]:
Right.

Paul Pape [00:50:40]:
And I’m like, you have everything at your disposal and the wide world outside, and yet you’re you say you’re bored. And it’s not that he’s bored. He’s lost the ability to self to self propel play. Like, he needs someone to say, this is the game that you’re gonna play, and these are the rules. This is the drawing like, he loves to draw, but he’s like, I don’t know what to draw. So tell me what to draw. And we’re all we’re all stuck now with this need for prompting rather than self prompting.

Nancy Norbeck [00:51:11]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:51:11]:
It’s it’s a hard one to break because in school, it’s the same thing. What what is my assignment? Right. I gotta do this. Okay. And that’s what I’m working on, and you’ve got 15 minutes to do it, and then you’re done. Okay. Then what now now what? And that’s what we do, and we just conditioned ourselves to not be able to self, self direct. And

Nancy Norbeck [00:51:30]:
I I think we’ve been trained to believe that that we need to be given the prompt rather than the can coming up with our own. Like, that ours isn’t good enough.

Paul Pape [00:51:39]:
Mhmm.

Nancy Norbeck [00:51:39]:
And so we need the one from the teacher or the manager or whoever. You know, I think I think that confidence gets trained out of us in that process.

Paul Pape [00:51:47]:
An authority figure. And yet you go talk to that authority figure, they have no idea what’s going on anymore than you. No clue. So it’s it’s it is interesting. And, I mean, if you can it’s we don’t like to retrain ourselves because it’s it’s work. And the one thing that we wanna avoid, and we’ll avoid it, is self you know, working on ourselves. We’ll avoid that forever, which is funny because then we’ll go to work and we’ll avoid doing our work at work as well. And it’s like if you just spent the time to actually, like, better yourself, we could all be in a better place.

Paul Pape [00:52:22]:
Like, I am a creative by career. This is my job. I love my job. And they say if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life. That’s not true. I work every day of my life. I just I’m not burdened by it to to the point that I it’s it’s a chore. It is work, but it is something that I I enjoy doing.

Paul Pape [00:52:41]:
And I think with, especially with, like, my kids, when when he asks for that prompt, I give I we’ll turn it around on him. Well, what do you think you should do? Well Mhmm. Oh, I’m bored. I don’t know what to do. Well, name 5 things in the house that you have that you could do. So we turn it around on him so that he’s forced to be the mediator to his own issues. And I think that it helps them to redefine the answer to that. Eventually, we just don’t hear from him at all because he’s like, I am bored.

Paul Pape [00:53:11]:
Oh, but I know I can go do this. And he swaps out what he’s doing all the time now, to just do random, random, random, random things. You know? And and I think that’s good because he’s not bored. He’s just short attention seeking. It is a different different issue altogether.

Nancy Norbeck [00:53:29]:
Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, it’s funny because the the other thing that I have noticed with the phone and all of the social apps and everything, because I’m as likely to fall into that as anybody else, is that lately, I I’d sit there and I think, this is boring. Mhmm. You know? Like, I’m really, really aware that this is boring, and that there’s just this that it’s it’s I’ve trained myself to go and look and see what’s there even though, you know, even though with something that seems to start out as interesting within 20 seconds, I’m like, yeah. It’s it’s not. You know? And yet you still do it for a while before the this is boring takes over. And I think it’s because it’s just so easy.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:18]:
Convenient. It is the easiest thing to do. There is no friction. You just pick up the phone, and as long as you have an Internet connection, you think you have entertainment. You know? And and it’s kinda like there there was an ad, boy, a long time ago, probably at least 20 years ago, and it was probably for somebody like AOL where, you know, this guy in his pajamas at at his desk looking at his computer, and and it comes up, and it says, you have reached the end of the Internet. It’s like and the guy is sitting there going, what do I do now? Because the Internet became the source of entertainment.

Paul Pape [00:54:53]:
Yeah.

Nancy Norbeck [00:54:53]:
You know? We it’s it’s like I babysit my nephews, and it’s like, hi. There are board games. There is a soccer ball outside. There’s all of this other stuff, and you guys just wanna sit and stare at Minecraft on your iPad.

Paul Pape [00:55:08]:
Yep. Yep. And the the thing is is I’m not down on that though because my my my youngest, he loves his Paul of my kids have gone through that Pape. But I asked him what he’s doing on Minecraft, and I think that’s the that’s the key. My youngest, he creates stories. He’s a storyteller. And so he doesn’t have the tools to be able to make a motion picture, but he’s got Minecraft. And so he can Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:55:31]:
Little worlds and little scenes, and then we’ll be like, hey. What are you working on? He’s like, well, come here, and I’ll show you. And he’s like, this is this guy’s character. And he goes over to here, and this happens, and this happens. And I’m like, that’s an interesting way to use Minecraft as opposed to just mindlessly going through the world and and and doing whatever. I think that that is it if if we encourage that part of it instead of the you know, because devices, I don’t think, are inherently bad. It’s just that we we do find them to occupy every moment, every free moment because we’re afraid of being alone or bored, that I think that it is important that we encourage a specific type of play with those devices rather than just being the the time suck, the doom scroll that they all are. And don’t get me wrong.

Paul Pape [00:56:16]:
I’m I’m just as, you know, susceptible to the doom scroll as everyone else. I

Nancy Norbeck [00:56:22]:
Mhmm.

Paul Pape [00:56:23]:
My favorite thing is, is when I fly, I don’t like to pay for Internet on the flight because it’s 1, it rarely works. And then, 2, I just sit there, and I’m just, like, doing this. You know? The entire you’re doomscrolling. And sometimes I’ll just sit and stare and just Pape watch because it’s infinitely more interesting to me to to do that than it is to sit and and scroll through Instagram or or these other things. And it’s one saves me money, but I’m able to put that device away and just kind of

Nancy Norbeck [00:56:52]:
Yeah.

Paul Pape [00:56:52]:
Be around. And I’ve had some great ideas come to me while flying, staring out the window, watching clouds go by because my brain’s able to sort that information out and and come up with some Yeah. New things.

Nancy Norbeck [00:57:03]:
It’s it’s like, you know, the whole driving the car being in the shower thing. Your brain is in that state where all of that stuff can come together.

Paul Pape [00:57:11]:
Yep.

Nancy Norbeck [00:57:12]:
That’s kind of like, you know, sitting at the airport watching all of the people around you is similar thing. Or you just, you know, tell people, go go to the mall and just listen to how people talk. And, of course, that’s not as much of a thing anymore. But No. But, yeah, I mean, there’s there are are ways to to go and and give your brain something to chew on without boring it to tears and ruining your eyes while you’re staring at a screen.

Paul Pape [00:57:43]:
Absolutely. But and we’ll get there. And I think, like, companies are moving to what’s called AR, which is augmented reality, where they don’t want you to hold the device. They wanna just kinda put it in your peripheral. And I think for a lot of the unfortunately, it’s all led by companies, and it’s all company bottom line. So they wanna just inundate your life with ads, which I think is sad. Mhmm. But if we could live our lives in in which we don’t have to be beholden to the square, we could actually have something that it you know, if something important happens where or we could turn it off, but we could it would then just be part of the peripheral.

Paul Pape [00:58:20]:
We’re still living our lives. Our heads aren’t down. We’re not staring at a device this way. We’re actually still entertaining the world that’s happening around us. But, eventually, you know, like, some things because we do want that distraction. We want to be connected. We want to see what the rest of the world is doing. And that’s because we are a communal species.

Paul Pape [00:58:38]:
We want you know, we’re a herd mentality type Mhmm. Thing, and so we want to be part of that. But at the same time, I think we we lose sight of the what’s going on right around us. And I’m hoping you know, I’m rainbows and unicorns guy. So I think with future tech, I would love for that part of it, that augmented reality, to give us the ability to live our lives an or not distracted by a a thing, an object that we have to carry with us. But instead, if we need a distraction, the distraction is, like, peripherally available so that we’re still in the moment. We’re still we when we walk across the street, we actually see if there’s traffic as opposed to staring at our screen, trying to get directions or whatnot. You know? We are still living our life, and that’s that’s for me, that’s the hope with augmented reality in in futurism, but we’ll see where we’ll see where it goes.

Nancy Norbeck [00:59:28]:
We will indeed. Well, that’s probably a pretty good place to stop.

Paul Pape [00:59:34]:
There you go.

Nancy Norbeck [00:59:34]:
I have really enjoyed this conversation. It’s been a lot of fun.

Paul Pape [00:59:38]:
Excellent. I have as well. So it’s been it’s always nice to talk about possibilities is a big thing for me. And I think that, especially with a creative lifestyle, with anybody who wants to be creative, it’s about possibilities and not telling ourselves that it’s not possible. That possibility is there, and it’s within grasp for anyone. You just have to be willing to try it and fail and accept that failure’s a possibility, but then try and try again. Don’t get hung up on it. And the possibilities are endless.

Paul Pape [01:00:12]:
So grasp it. Run for it. Have fun. You know? You get one shot.

Nancy Norbeck [01:00:15]:
Perfect. It’s perfect. Thank you so much.

Paul Pape [01:00:20]:
You’re welcome.

Nancy Norbeck [01:00:21]:
That’s this week’s episode. Thanks so much to Paul Pape for joining me and to you for listening. Please leave a review for this episode. There’s a link right in your podcast Pape, so it’s super easy and will only take a minute. If you enjoyed our conversation, I hope you’ll share it with a friend. Thank you so much. If this episode resonated with you or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the spark on substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage. It’s free and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners.

Nancy Norbeck [01:00:59]:
The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today. See you there and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.