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The show was ahead of its time to represent a Black family in ways the television hadn't shown before.
Exactly.
It's Telma Hopkins, also known as Aunt Rachel.
And I'm Kelly Williams, or Laura Winslow.
On our podcast Welcome to the Family with Telma and Kelly, we're re-watching every episode of Family Matters.
We'll share behind-the-scenes stories about making the show.
Yeah, we'll even bring in some special guests to spill some tea.
Listen to Welcome to the Family with Thelma and Kelly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, I'm Radhi Devlukia, and I am the host of A Really Good Cry podcast.
This week I am joined by Anna Runkle, also known as the Crappy Childhood Fairy, a creator, teacher and guide helping people heal from the lasting emotional wounds of unsafe or chaotic childhoods.
That talking about trauma isn't always great for people.
It's not always the best thing.
About a third of people who were traumatized as kids feel worse when they talk about it.
Get very dysregulated.
Listen to A Really Good Cry on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hey everyone, welcome back to my podcast channel.
Thank you so much for being here.
If you haven't subscribed already, make sure you do so that you never miss an episode.
Now I want to ask you, what moment changed you the most this year?
Where in your life did you grow the most this year, even if it didn't look like growth at the time?
What if the toughest moment of your year was actually the moment preparing you for what's next?
The end of the year is always a time for reflection, a time to look back at our journeys, our lessons and the growth we've experienced.
Some moments challenged us, some inspire us and some remind us of the power of presence, courage and connection.
In this special compilation, we revisit some of the year's most powerful conversations on On Purpose deeply personal stories from guests whose honesty, insight and lived experiences offer invaluable guidance as we move into 2026.
The perspectives shared here are more than stories their practical roadmaps for how to grow, reset and move intentionally into the year ahead.
Let's get into it.
The number one health and wellness podcast.
Jay Shetty.
Jay Shetty.
The one, the only, Jay Shetty.
Selena and Benny take us into the heart of their love story, sharing how vulnerability, patience and humor have shaped their relationship.
What started as a friendship between two young artists blossomed into love, reminding us that connection grows through presence, laughter and small acts of care.
I was saying that, watching both your love story and I know you were saying Selena two seconds ago you were like this is such a safe and cozy space to come to.
I'm hoping that today we get to know your love story on a deeper level.
And we get to access really what's in your hearts and minds.
Because I think...
There's so many interviews and so many things that kind of will touch on the surface level of stuff.
But I hope we can go deeper.
So what I want to start with is I want to actually rewind, and I want to rewind to a place where we don't retell the story, but we get to relive your story with you.
And I think there's a difference because when we tell a story, it's like, this is what happened.
But when we relive it, it's almost like going back to who we were when that happened.
So I want to go back to the first time you ever met.
And I want to hear about it.
Well, the funny thing is, is we actually, it was so long ago that we don't remember.
We know that her mother put us in a meeting together when, how old were you?
16.
So she was 16.
Wow.
I didn't realize it was that long ago.
And I'm like four or five years older than you.
So I was probably 20, 21.
And her mom was trying to gather into music and her mom is a.
The way she goes from room to room gets things to happen.
We've had her on the show.
Yeah, she's a powerhouse.
Gets things to happen and you know, and somehow she got us a meeting together and we don't remember that.
And, you know, after we had done the song together, there was one time where...
It was probably 2016 or 17 or something.
I remember when you were in a studio, like Interscope Studios.
And I remember I came.
She doesn't remember it, but I remember I came in and I had this talk with you.
And I remember being like whoa wow, like Sydney's really like a complex person, like in a good way.
And I was like, wow, she's, she's, she's so deep.
And we had this conversation where I really, I was just really left by being like, oh, she's deep.
And then we went and thought nothing more of it.
And then When we did our song together, I remember leaving.
Not feeling romantic at all, I just remember leaving and I was talking, you know, because when you're a pop star, like she is, and you're a huge entity and you've done so many things in your life before, like people set up all these walls before.
So it's like you get like like.
Before I came in, they were like well, you know, this thing's like this and this is like this.
And like, she might not want to do that.
And like stuff.
And they, they speak for people so much.
And then I remember we were so me and the director were so nervous.
And then, The first second, you disarmed everybody.
And I remember walking back and Jake was like the guy who was directing with me he's like this is going to be so easy.
They made it seem like this was going to be this crazy thing.
And the warmth I felt from her in that moment.
I remember leaving being like, wow, Selena's such a cool girl.
And Selena, you don't remember this at all.
No, no, she remembers this.
I remember the video part.
But it was interesting because, yes, I don't have...
I have very good memory.
But I just remember the video shoot.
I didn't see anything romantic nor really felt that.
But I had a really good time.
And that was probably the first time after years of doing music together and not together.
That was the first time I really got to hang out with them.
And it was fun.
I had a good time.
And that was that.
And then how it kind of continued was...
I was always cautious because I always wanted to make sure that I did protect myself.
So to be honest, I didn't talk to him very often.
I thought she hated you.
Really?
I really did.
I knew that was coming.
I really did.
I thought she didn't like I would see her and I would be like Like we weren't thinking about anything.
I was like, wow, she really, like, didn't talk to me a lot.
And I was like, I thought I was being nice.
And, like, my friends would be like, no, no.
And then, like there was another time, I remember, and my friends were like, oh yeah, she was kind of weird to you.
I'm so sorry.
And there was like a few times and I didn't know and I was just like you know, I was like that's okay.
I thought I was being, like, polite by not... She didn't really engage.
Basically, we...
I was working on some music and we went through some of the demos that we had and Single Soon came up, which is ironic because it was actually nowhere near where I was in my personal life.
But Benny happened to do the song.
No, no, I didn't even do the song.
It was like one of my guys.
Oh, and you came to fix it.
Yeah, and I like came to help out because I was like oh, I want their song to.
I was like I don't like the way this, let me just at least help them.
I said, I was like, well, I'm not sure if it'll be okay.
Cause I don't know if Selena likes me or something.
And then John Janik the, you know, the president of Interscope.
He was like well, why don't you just go into the session?
She usually doesn't have people in, but just go in and like if there is something that you feel is weird, like try to just smooth it over and talk to her and get in.
And I said, okay, I'm going to go smooth it over.
So I went in.
It was so funny.
Right before I came her engineer told me like later that she was like ah, Benny's coming.
And she was like.
And here's my reasoning.
I'm going to defend myself.
I get very nervous around the producers watching me sing.
Of course.
It's just a very intimate thing for me.
I feel like I need to sound a certain way or do whatever to make them feel.
And when I get to record with just me and my engineer and maybe someone I trust, I get more out of the experience.
So I just was thinking okay well, maybe he'll stay for 10 minutes and we'll just talk for a second.
And 10 minutes turned into like 30.
Then he went to the other room and I finished recording and he stayed there.
And then, yeah.
Yeah.
This is too long.
No, no, no.
Okay.
So here, so from my perspective, here's what happened.
I get in there and I'm like, I got to smooth this.
I love this back and forth.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I was like, I don't have this with anyone.
Like I was like, I want us to be chill.
And obviously 99 of it was in my head and And I come in.
We just start talking about life and her AR is there.
One of my friends is there.
And we're just, we're talking about life and we start talking about dating.
And I was like, yeah, you know, I went out on this date, blah, blah, blah.
And then I was talking to her and I said, oh my God, I have so many good single guy friends.
I was like, we have dinners at the house all the time.
You should come over sometime.
And I wasn't even thinking about anything.
And we're like talking about like our ideal date and like this and that.
And I wanted to make sure she did the line right.
So I was like, oh, I'll stay there to like make sure it's good after.
And then, so I did, we left.
And then I didn't have her cell phone number. because she changed her number a bunch.
So I asked someone, I said, hey, give me your cell phone number.
I want to say like, you know, thing.
And I wrote, I was like, oh my God, you were.
And during that, when I was with her, I was like, oh my God.
I was like, not only, she's like, really cool.
I was like I want.
I was like I want to be like.
I was like I want her to be like in our friend group.
And I couldn't even be thinking.
I was like, I want her to be in our friend group and I want to make sure this thing's smoothed out.
So the song figures out, goes well and everything.
So I said, let me just text her.
Thank you or whatever.
And I was like, You know, you were so sweet or something, something like that.
And then she writes back, I guess we just were texting throughout the day.
And she, she told me, she looked back at our message.
She said, somehow you started sending like selfies where you looked really bad on purpose.
Like the worst ones in your phone.
You started to do this.
Yes.
Which, by the way, no girl should really, Or anyone in their right mind to someone they would have a crush on, do that.
But we were talking about ugly photos.
Because I always say I take the worst photos sometimes.
And...
He's like, oh, you said something.
And I sent him the worst pictures of me, like in bed sick.
And then, you know, me at weird photo shoots.
And now looking back on it, I'm just thinking, these are so weird.
I don't know why I sent them.
Did you like me in that moment yet or not yet?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Oh, you did.
Okay.
So I had no idea.
So I had no idea.
And somehow we decide.
So wait, why did you do that?
If you liked Benny, why were you sending?
Well, because I didn't know that it was going to be like.
Maybe I thought it was just going to be flirting and not really anything else.
But I really started to, to just.
I don't know, fall for it.
So I didn't know any of this.
And then we decide, we're like, I forget how it happens, but we're like, yeah, let's hang out.
And I was like, oh, my friend's having a birthday party tomorrow.
I was like, just come along.
And I was like, just thinking friend stuff.
And then so she comes to mine and I guess she thought the party was going to be at my house.
But I was like oh, in my head, I was like oh, she'll just come over.
And we can just like grab a drink first and then go there.
Like, like not thinking anything of it.
I was like, we'll just like grab a drink at my friend's wine bar.
It's on the way.
And then we'll go there.
You were there and we were sitting together and she said something like well, you know, because it's a date, I wore blah, blah.
And I was like, and I was like No, I said, if this was a date, I definitely would have dressed like a nicer.
And he just kind of looked at me and I thought we were on a date.
And I was like, we're on a date.
And then, and then we went and then we didn't really talk about it.
You thought, who thought it was a date?
She thought it was.
She thought it was a date.
I'm sorry.
A nice man takes me out for a drink.
I'm assuming it's a date.
I didn't know.
But no one had asked each other out yet.
No, it was like, let's just hang out.
Like.
And then we go to my friends, we go to this Thai restaurant, we go to Jit Lada and we're like hanging out.
And there's a bunch of people there.
And then she all of a sudden like leaves.
And she was like, I got to go to, I have a video shoot really early in the morning.
And I was like, okay.
And I was like, But I wasn't like, cause it wasn't a date to me or anything.
So I was like, okay, cool.
And I stayed with my friends and stuff.
And then she texted me after.
And I remember you being like.
That was like one of the most fun times I've had in a really long time.
Selena, so you technically asked Benny out on the first official day.
She did.
She did like every... Walk us through that confidence, that energy.
There wasn't any confidence.
That's the scary part.
I think that's when I recognized that I had some sort of feelings for him.
The key takeaway here is that love thrives in authenticity.
Showing up even imperfectly allows deep connections to form.
It's not about creating the perfect story.
It's about cherishing the moments that truly matter.
Emma shares how the smallest, most ordinary moments can become profound teachers.
How paying attention to what's unfolding right in front of us can reveal who we're becoming, what we need and what's ready to change.
It's a reminder that growth doesn't just happen in big milestones.
It happens in the quiet shifts and honest check-ins we allow ourselves.
Well, I was going to ask you actually because I want everyone to get up to date with where you are now.
Like, what is your day-to-day life look like?
You just said like, I wake up and I shower and I go on a walk.
Like, what is your day-to-day life look like right now?
And what's it made of?
And what are the things that you love and look forward to?
I recently started riding a bicycle.
And yes, I started riding a bicycle before my driving ban, but now it's particularly fortuitous that I also ride a bicycle for that reason.
I thought that was mainstream news.
Yeah.
Oh my God.
I was getting phone calls like, it's on the BBC.
It's on international worldwide news.
I was like, my shame is everywhere.
This is I mean, I don't know.
I think in a funny way what the sweetest result of it was getting so many messages from people.
Being like happened to me too.
I feel you.
This is awful.
It sucks.
Which was kind of nice in a way.
Do you want a lift?
Yeah, totally.
Do you need a lift?
I was like, actually, yes.
But I think, again, it's funny.
Like I went from when you work on movies I don't know if people know this, but like They literally will not ensure you to drive yourself to work.
I've asked so many times.
You have to be driven.
You have to be driven.
It's like not a choice.
And especially because they need you there.
You know, down to the minute basically depending on what they have going on.
And so I went from basically only driving myself on weekends or during holiday to then, when I became a student, driving myself all the time.
And yeah, I did not have the experience or skills, clearly. which I now will and do.
But I think again, this was one of these awkward transitions I made from kind of living this very, very structured life to living a life where I was like okay, I guess I'm going to get myself to this place and I'm going to do this thing that I've basically not done since I was 10 years old.
So it's been a discovery and a journey that's been yeah, I guess humbling, because it's On a movie set.
I'm able to do all of these extremely complex things.
Stunt, sing, dance, do this thing, do that, whatever.
And I'm like, yep, don't worry about it, guys.
No worries, I've got you.
And then I get home and I'm like, okay, Emma, you seem unable to remember keys.
You seem unable to keep yourself at 30 miles an hour in a 30-mile speed limit.
You don't seem able to do some pretty like basic life things, and it was definitely kind of yeah, I had days where I just wanted to turn around to people and be like I used to be good at things.
Okay, I used to be really good at things, and I know it doesn't look like that right now but um I, I used to.
I, I can do things normally, um so yeah, it's been uh, it's been humbling.
I feel like all of us can relate to that, though.
Really?
Because doesn't everyone forget their keys, their wallet, doesn't know where things are?
And by the way, I think I was three points away from losing my license before I moved to the States.
Thank you for that confession.
I appreciate that so much.
Because I was in the States.
I've been in the States now for nine years.
And I think it happened just, but then all the points get wiped off.
And I think I'm now back to six points.
I spent two months in London a year.
Okay, this makes me feel... Every time I go back, I seem to... Go much better.
Yeah.
Wow.
So I'm confessing too.
Okay, thank you.
But I haven't lost it.
A lot of people, Actually a lot of people, have like taken it upon themselves to come and confess to me, which I found like very, like very enduring and like really really appreciate it.
But no, I think, you know...
I think something I've been realizing is most of us live in a state of like I'm just trying to kind of figure it out and keep it together.
And the only thing that is different between us is people's willingness to be honest about things, that the degree to which they can admit to.
Actually, i'm just like scrabbling around trying to keep the pieces together versus um, oh yeah, i know everything's amazing and everything's incredible and i'm having the best day ever, and aren't you?
And you know so.
I do love the people who who are just willing to be like yeah it's uh, It's not going so well today.
I'm like, great, amazing.
What a good starting point.
Like, I don't know.
Failure as a starting point feels like.
I feel like attempting things is so compelling and, of course, success is wonderful, but I love to see people who are like I'm really bad at this, but I'm going to try.
I love you.
That's everything to me.
That seems to be becoming harder and harder now.
Like that desire to attempt something that you might not be good at because it's exposed, or because everyone will see it, or because everyone will hear about it.
Yeah.
Talking about attempting things, I mean, you're currently studying, right?
You're learning.
Yes, yes.
Well, two things I want to say.
There is, I think, in a way I was sort of I mean, I'm someone who's always cared about vulnerability and authenticity, but I think I was also forced into it to a degree that maybe even I wasn't ready for, and that I just started so young that I had to learn in public.
I had to make mistakes in public and say, oh, okay, now I've learned this.
And I had to be willing to go back and be like, hmm, there were some gaps here.
And here's what I know now.
And I agree with you.
I think it's becoming increasingly difficult to learn in public and continuing to learn.
I think that's one of the reasons why I have gone back to school and why I continue to do it is because I want to make sure that I have things to say that are worth saying.
I think you can only do that if you take a minute, sometimes listen to some people who aren't you, you know, and like not just the sound of my own, my own wonderful voice um, so yeah, it's been, it's been great and I think also I needed to.
I wanted to be inspired.
I think being around my favorite piece has been being around young people who still believe that the world is malleable and things are changeable and that like, anything can be done is um such important energy.
There's so much dystopian fiction at the moment and dystopian movies.
It's all dark.
It's so dark.
And I'm just like, what happened to thinking about the utopia?
What happened to planning for the best case scenario?
Where did we lose... yeah, vision, excitement, imagination, possibilities.
So I think it's been.
Um yeah, it's been wonderful to be around young people and just to sit there and listen.
Do you ever, I mean, you clearly read so much.
Do you have to take yourself away to do it in order to be able to do it?
Do you have to cordon off time?
Like how are you still managing to study and learn?
Cause that seems like it's important to you.
Yeah, you reminded me, as you were talking, of one of my spiritual teachers, my monk teacher, who always said to me if you want to move three steps forward, you have to go three steps deep first.
Whoa.
And what I found often in my life is I'm trying to go four steps forward and I haven't yet gone four steps deep.
And so it's almost like.
I mean, this is probably a terrible analogy, but maybe thinking of the movie The Substance I don't know if you watched it.
Okay, fine, okay, terrible, let's move on.
No, no, no.
No, no, no, let's forget about it.
But it's that idea of like every extra step you take when you haven't learned and you haven't experimented and you haven't attempted is taking away from your ability to move forward.
And sometimes I think, when we feel stuck or when we think things are not moving or they're not progressing, there may be a sign to say well, pause and go deeper for a second, or pause and go inward for a second.
And so to me, hearing that from you, I find that, and I definitely fail at this all the time.
There are so many times I'm trying to push more forward than I've gone deep.
And so whenever I noticed that myself and I noticed that I'm just kind of trying everything and nothing is working, it's actually just the universe.
And self saying to me, go read, go study.
And so I found that I've had to really carve out time to make time to do what I love, which is to read and study.
But I found that I'm someone who doesn't love 30 minutes a day.
I'm not that kind of a reader.
I'm someone who needs to read for three or four hours, if not more.
And so I found that carving out deep, immersive time is more important to me than this kind of mechanical 30 40 minutes a day, which is great for you if that works for you as a habit.
It doesn't for me, because I'm a bit of an extremist and I just need to spend a whole weekend reading.
Yeah.
As opposed to, you know, I don't need to read every day.
So I'll try, and I try once a month on a weekend, to just absorb into a subject that I love and I'll take a course, I'll go to a class, I'll watch a TED talk online, I'll read as many books as I can and I try and immerse myself that way.
What's your learning style?
I'm the same as you.
And actually someone who I really respect and ask for advice for often and I ask for feedback on myself.
He said to me Emma, I think if you did 90 of what you wanted to do at 50 of the speed, you would get so much more like life, would be so much better.
And I was like, wow, 50% of the speed and only 90% of what I want to do.
And he was like, I think that's the minimum, to be honest.
And I was like, wow.
But I think, yeah, what you said resonates.
I think I often have to remind myself that it's not about speedily getting somewhere.
It's just not the point.
Things are supposed to happen with a certain timing.
The key takeaway here is that life's transitions, even the awkward or challenging ones, are opportunities to grow.
Struggle doesn't diminish our past achievements, it humanizes us.
Being honest about where we are and embracing failure as a starting point creates space for real learning, authenticity and resilience.
Want to make a real difference this giving season?
This December On Purpose is part of Pods Fight Poverty podcasts, teaming up to lift three villages in Rwanda out of extreme poverty.
We're doing it through GiveDirectly, which sends cash straight to families so they can choose what they need most.
Donate at givedirectly.org forward slash on purpose.
First time gifts are matched, doubling your impact.
Our goal is $1 million by year's end enough to lift 700 families out of poverty.
Join us at givedirectly.org forward slash on purpose.
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Hi, I'm Radhi Devlukia and I am the host of A Really Good Cry podcast.
This week I am joined by Anna Runkle, also known as the Crappy Childhood Fairy, a creator, teacher and guide helping people heal from the lasting emotional wounds of unsafe or chaotic childhoods.
We talk about how the things we went through when we were younger can still show up in our adult lives, in our relationships, our reactions, even in the way we feel in our own bodies.
And Anna opens up about her own story what helped her notice the patterns she was stuck in and how she slowly started teaching her body that it is safe now.
So when I got attacked, it was very random.
Four guys jumped out of a car and just started beating me and my friend.
And they broke my jaw and my teeth.
I was unconscious.
Then I woke up and I screamed.
And I screamed because, even though I didn't know who I was or where I was, something in me was just like hold on, wait.
They could kill me, and I'm not going to let that happen.
I'm not going to let that happen.
I'm going to get through this.
And I did.
Listen to A Really Good Cry on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm Jonathan Goldstein and on the new season of Heavyweight, I help a centenarian mend a broken heart.
How can a 101-year-old woman fall in love again?
And I help.
A man atone for an armed robbery he committed at 14 years old, pointed the gun at him and said this isn't a joke.
And he got down.
And I remember feeling kind of a surge of like, okay, this is power.
Plus, my old friend Gregor and his brother tried to solve my problems through hypnotism.
We could give you a whole brand new thing where you're like super charming all the time.
Being more able to look people in the eye.
Not always hide behind a microphone.
Listen to Heavyweight on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Cardi B opens up about the difficult chapters she has walked through in her life.
Career pressures, relationship struggles and the loneliness that followed.
If you've ever been in a season that felt heavy or impossible to move through.
Her story shows how accountability, reflection and time can help you rebuild and grow.
Talk to me about that depression for you, as confident as you are, as bold as you are to be so vulnerable.
And I'm so sorry you went through that, but to be so honest and open about the fact that a year ago you were in this dark depression and it seems like the worst it had ever been.
Yeah.
What got you there?
Why were you feeling so low?
It was just a lot of pressure from my career.
And I also felt like my marriage Like I felt the love dying.
From my end, from his end, I was very lonely because I chose to be lonely.
I was saying like, you know what?
I can't go through this anymore.
I have to put a stop to it.
But when I said I was going to put a stop to it, because you could say you're going to put a stop to it and you could
You could go a month without being around somebody.
It's not when you say so.
It's when your heart says so.
Mm-hmm.
I kept telling myself, I will not contact this person for a month.
I will not give in.
I will not forgive this easy.
I will not go back.
I will not go to the pattern.
I will not go through it.
But I was crying every day.
I was hurt every day.
I was out here in LA in a mansion by myself.
I was thinking about it every single day.
And when your heart is not done, your heart is not done.
Then.
I told myself, I'm pregnant.
I'm going to accept my flaws, the flaws that I bring in this marriage.
I'm going to apologize for it, and I'm going to work on it.
And when I take accountability and you take advantage of me taking accountability and you take that as a see I know she be back.
Instead of me taking accountability and you taking advantage of that, it really just killed everything.
And while it was dying, I had a human growing in me and I just kept thinking.
It's like what's life going to be without this person?
What's life going to be without raising my last child without this person?
What's life going to be with that person not being my friend anymore without nothing?
When you have those type of thoughts, it will make you sad.
It will get you depressed.
It will have you lost.
But I overcame that and I am the strongest person than like I have ever been.
Like I almost feel like, when was I ever my strongest?
I felt my strongest when I was 22, 23, 24.
That's when I felt like my strongest and I was like living in a power.
And that's how I feel right now.
Like I feel like I live in a power.
And it took months for the heart to say, you're done. instead of my mouth and my brain.
My heart had to be like, you're done.
Cause you could say it and you could take actions.
But even if you take actions, if you're not done, you're not done.
Like I kept asking.
Like around that time I was working with Shakira and I was like how the did you overcame this?
Like, how did you overcame this?
And it's like, it's going to happen.
And it's like, it will never happen.
And it happened.
It took some crying.
It Took some thoughts, scary thoughts.
But I'm here, honey.
Yeah.
I'm here and I'm the strongest I've been and I'm just... I love hearing that.
But it was hard.
I can tell.
I can tell.
I can see it as I'm speaking to you.
It's not easy and...
I think those moments in all of our lives are the most difficult moments.
What did you do for your mental health at that time?
What did you do?
What actions did you take?
What did you have to do to keep yourself together and come back the strongest you are right now?
I think there are so many people who are listening, who have probably been through similar things, who feel broken, feel hurt, feel lost and confused.
What worked for you that helped you come back the strongest you've ever been?
I don't know if it was just time because I kind of did a little bit of everything.
Like I did do therapy.
I did saw a therapist.
She's really good, by the way.
It was like on Zoom.
And it was like I was telling myself, like it's, like I can't believe I'm telling a whole stranger my feelings, my thoughts, my personal business for three hours straight.
I was just like, what the fuck am I doing?
That just feels so weird.
I did therapy for, I did a couple of sessions.
They ain't gave me no nothing.
I was all spring, all summer recording.
It just wasn't like enough.
I just felt like I just had to let it die on its own.
Let things die on its own.
And the bad thing about it is that it's like not only am I dealing with that, that's my personal life.
I was also dealing with fans putting pressure on me because they want, you know, they want an album.
They want products from me.
I had people that don't like me talking down on me.
And then I had peers trying to start problems with me.
And all of that, while I was going through a mental breakdown at home.
So it was just a lot.
It was like, I'm trying to work it.
I'm trying to sleep it.
After I gave birth to my daughter, my baby girl, I was just like, okay, take a break from work.
And I was just going out every weekend with my friends.
It was scary talking to somebody else and giving them a little piece of me.
Not just my heart, just a little piece of me.
But I overcame that.
And that's why I feel like I just became a little bit more better, like just resetting.
Yeah, it's a good reminder that time is the ultimate reset and time does have a healing power that we you know.
The cliche of time heals all wounds.
But it's the truth.
But it's true.
Yeah, it's a cliche because there's truth in it.
Yeah.
There's some reality in it that time and distance and being patient enough.
I was working with a client recently and who was going through a breakup.
And when we would speak in the first month, she would tell me every single day that she couldn't stop thinking about the guy she was breaking up with.
That broke up with her.
And then the second month, she'd tell me every other day.
And then the third month, she'd tell me once a week.
And then the fourth month, she was just telling me once a month.
And I was like you don't see it, but I see that it's affecting you less and less and less as time goes on.
But when it's you, you feel like you're just still stuck there.
And so it's such a great reminder that time is the ultimate reset and time does heal.
And just because time heal, like in the meantime, don't think that you shouldn't try to get help.
Because it's like therapy didn't really help me like that.
It didn't work for you?
Not as much.
Well, maybe because I didn't get to the part of where you get the help.
I mean, I did do like six sessions.
I don't know how long.
Yeah.
Like sometimes when I give advice to girls, I be like bitch boss up, boss up, go to work, get pretty.
But even when I was doing that, I had like a pain in my heart.
And sometimes, when I was going out with my friends and I was having a good time, it will always be like around 430 am, when it's time to go home and I'm drunk and I'm thinking to myself.
I am alone.
I don't have nobody to talk to.
And it feels really weird and it feels very lonely, especially when you're used to that.
However, don't avoid that.
Don't avoid that, but it will be time that will heal it.
It will be time.
Time just heals everything.
When you said again last week, you were saying when you put new music out It was kind of the lowest you'd felt in another year.
What's the hardest part for you to take that criticism?
Because like you said, you're quick with it.
You've got responses.
You've lived in a place where you had people coming at you.
Why is it so hard to put out something you love?
It seems like you really put your heart into your work.
And so when you put that out, is that why the criticism hurts the most?
Because you put so much heart and soul into your work?
Yes, because I put like a lot.
I always...
I don't like what, like I'm not a lazy person and I do understand my flaws.
Well, it's not really my flaws because a lot of people will say something about my accent, right?
But it's funny because my accent to some people might be my flaw, but it's also my superpower and what makes me unique.
Some people will say that I have a Spanish accent, but I really don't really have a Spanish accent.
I have a very unique accent.
I talk very unique.
When you try your best to perfect your accent, perfect your flows, perfect everything.
I always try to perfect everything that I'm doing at the time.
I always try to perfect it.
Even when I was a stripper, it's like okay, I'm a stripper, but I'm going to be the best pole dancer in here.
And I'm going to bust my ass, bust my knees. practice every day and to be the best at it.
That's the same with music.
I'm going to perfect it.
That's the same with my marketing.
I'm going to perfect it.
That's the same with my business.
I'm going to perfect it.
I like to perfect things.
And if it's not the best things, if I'm not the best at it, I could say that I tried to be and I worked my ass off to be and I didn't make it easy.
So when people just throw it in your face and then make other narratives on top of it with that, it's like that is so mean.
And it's also like different narratives of you.
Like it's like, wow, you don't even know me.
You don't even know me and you're making all these stories, scenarios, all this this. over one song.
The key takeaway here is that time is one of the greatest healers.
Growth often comes through discomfort and, while therapy and external support absolutely help, the ultimate reset is patience, self-awareness and persistence.
Difficult chapters can lead to profound transformation if we let them.
Next up, Madonna discusses the role of spirituality in navigating life's ups and downs.
Her spiritual practice has been a guiding force throughout her life, helping her stay driven, aware and intentional.
She emphasizes the importance of reflection and taking space for yourself, especially in a world increasingly dominated by work and digital distractions.
What's your intention for being here today?
Why now?
Why today?
Well, in the past I've usually done interviews to promote my work, whether that's music or a tour or a film.
But today I would like to talk about my spiritual life and the spiritual path that I've been on for over 28 years.
This wisdom has helped me navigate the The ups and downs of life, for lack of a better expression.
People ask me a lot through the years, like, what is the reason you're still sane?
What is the reason you keep going?
Why have you not fallen by the wayside like other people?
Definitely a lot of my peers who are no longer with us like what would you say is the key, And I would say that is my spiritual life.
I absolutely would not be where I am or who I am if I did not have that.
It's helped me enormously, as I said, navigate the ups and downs of life.
So I feel like...
I would like to share that with people.
So that's really the point of I'm not here to promote a product, or I don't want anyone to buy anything.
I just, I want to share something with people that has pretty much saved my life.
That sounds dramatic, but it's true.
Yeah, it seems like it's something that's extremely meaningful to you and a deep part of your life that often I feel you don't get to share in other spaces.
So, even though it's been a part of your life for nearly three decades, maybe you haven't shared parts of it before.
What would your life look like if you didn't find it?
I would believe that the physical world is all there is.
I would believe all the illusions.
And that would be my downfall.
And that is most people's downfall.
What does spirituality mean to you?
Because I think that word itself means so many things to so many people.
Well, yes.
I mean, a spiritual life or a spiritual path could mean a lot of things.
I know that you have a spiritual path.
And for me, it's not really about like whose is the best or, you know, it's whatever works for you.
I've been studying Kabbalah for 29 years.
So since 1996.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a long time.
It's a long time.
And I'm not a frivolous person.
I don't suffer fools gladly.
If I think there's something false about it, or corrupt or not authentic, I wouldn't have stuck around for so long.
I've had the same teacher for all this time.
I feel...
Almost like it's my responsibility to share with people.
Because I feel like people need guidance.
People need enlightenment.
And for me, a spiritual life is having an internal life.
Because you know this, I'm sure.
If we get caught up in the belief system that...
Our value in the world is based on people loving us or other people's approval, or how much money you have, or how many fabulous outfits you have, or how many followers you have on Instagram.
Those things don't make us happy.
Those things don't bring us peace.
So having an internal life and being able to look internally and having some kind of practice, whatever that might look like your prayer, your meditations, the time you take out of every day to stop and take stock, like contemplate.
We live in a very busy, chaotic world lots of noise, lots of distraction.
I mean, how many times have you heard people say oh, you know social media and like all the you know people can't walk down the street without listening to music.
Everybody has to be visually stimulated all the time.
Like there is no peace.
There is no quiet.
We're not comfortable being quiet with ourselves.
And looking inward and asking ourselves, why am I here?
Or what am I doing?
Or what is my intention in this specific choice I'm making right now?
Whether it's about my work or the way I'm raising my children, decisions that I make about Everything.
Really, I have to ask myself.
And if you don't have a spiritual life, you're never going to stop and ask any questions.
You're just going to plow through life.
And you're going to see everything that happens to you as just a random event.
And I don't believe that anything is random.
I think everything that happens to us is meant to happen to us. to teach us some kind of a lesson.
But the question is, are you aware enough?
Are you awake enough?
Are you interested enough to find out what that reason is?
Why did this happen to me?
What is my lesson?
I don't want to go through life seeing everything that happens to me as random, but I also don't want to go through life as a victim.
And I've had a pretty challenging life and it's easy to fall into the trap of feeling sorry for yourself or like being a victim, or you know Why isn't this happening to other people?
Why is it happening to me?
Why don't I have what that person has?
I'm sure you know the expression comparison is the killer of joy.
So, you know, it's like you got to get out of that game.
You have to have a spiritual life.
You just have to.
You're reminding me of something beautiful that I came across called the third space theory.
Have you heard of it?
It's this idea that As humans, around 50 years ago, we had three spaces.
So we had work, we had home, and then you had a temple, a synagogue, a church, a community center or a third space.
And the point of that third space it's kind of what you're saying was a place that you could look back at work and home and you could reflect on your life.
You could take stock, you could introspect.
But as time's gone on, what's happened is we lost that third space.
We stopped going to temple, church, community, whatever it may be.
A place of self-reflection.
A place of self-reflection.
And we ended up with working at home.
And then after the pandemic, we lost work.
And so now we're in one space and we don't have a different vantage point to where we are anymore, which is what I think you're saying.
Go back even one more step that to me is like a prison.
If you remove the spiritual life, spiritual practice, you remove the workplace.
Then you're in the home.
And then removed once more from home is you're looking at your phone.
Mm-hmm. which even takes you out of home.
It's a great point, yeah.
So where are you?
You're nowhere.
We're living in the virtual world.
We're living in the virtual world, not even in the material world.
Yes, and a virtual world is not a bad world, but if you don't have consciousness, there's really no point to living.
Yeah, so it's interesting to think about that, because I feel like everyone can relate to the idea that if we all had consciousness, We need physical spaces to sometimes make us do internal things.
Yes.
I mean, some kind of ritualistic behavior has to happen.
What have been your rituals?
I'm intrigued.
I'm curious.
What are your spiritual practices and rituals that have been so supportive and emblematic of your journey, that have kept you going at the times, as you said, there were so many times you could give up or things could go wrong, or you kept pushing and they kept you locked.
What were they?
What are they?
Well, one really important thing is studying, making time every week to sit down and study.
I mean you can study, It's the Bible.
You can study the poetry of Kahlil Gibran, or you can study the Vedas, you know.
And you did that, right?
You actually studied different traditions on your own.
I mean, to be honest, before I discovered Kabbalah, I was looking for answers.
Why do you think that was?
Why were you looking for answers?
Because I had everything that people would assume would give you happiness.
I had a successful career.
I had fame, fortune, monetary things, physical things.
But I wasn't happy.
And I naturally sought out, well, when I was a dancer, I had a roommate.
She was a Buddhist.
And she would get up and chant every day.
And so I was very intrigued by that.
Like nothing bothered her.
You know what I mean?
Everything bothers me.
Everything bothers me.
I'm a Leo.
I'm Italian.
I'm very dramatic.
I wouldn't say she was peaceful all the time, but I was just struck by her confidence and her knowingness that everything was happening for a reason.
She never got upset about things.
And this is in the beginning of my career, when I was living in New York and I was broke and a lot of crazy things happened to me, really scary, traumatic things, and I would always ask her her name is Marianne.
I would always say what, like?
Why are you like, never upset.
So I attributed that to her spiritual life, but it didn't speak to me.
And then later on I started practicing yoga ashtanga yoga and my teacher, Eddie Stern he still has a Love Eddie, he's great.
You know Eddie?
Yeah, I do, yeah.
Yeah, he's amazing.
I got quite caught up and competitive about first series, second series, third series.
But one thing I noticed is that a lot of people would come into his practice, his studio where he taught, and they wouldn't even do the poses.
They would just go and sit in front of... the statue of Ganesh or light candles or prayer.
And I realized and Eddie pointed it out to me because sometimes I would have injuries or I would be traveling and I couldn't practice yoga.
And he'd say, look, are you breathing?
And I'd say, yes.
And he said, you're practicing yoga.
So I realized that I was still too caught up in the physical poses.
And he's like, no, you don't understand.
You're missing the whole point.
The poses are just something that you do to breathe through, to calm your nervous system down and to bring you back to your center.
And that really spoke to me.
There was a big No.
It was a painting on the wall of the yoga studio that says Desire and Detachment.
And I said, what does that mean?
And he said, well...
Of course, we want all the beautiful things in life.
We want all the pleasures.
We want all the happiness.
We want it all.
There's nothing wrong with that, but you can't be attached to it, because then, if you're attached to it and you don't have it, what's going to happen to you?
The key takeaway here is that cultivating an internal life through spirituality, reflection or mindful practice anchors us amidst life's chaos.
Understanding our experiences as lessons rather than random events, allows growth purpose and resilience.
Dr Orna masterfully explores the dynamics of narcissism and relationships, showing how our interactions often reflect deeper patterns within ourselves.
She reminds us to look beyond surface labels and understand the real drivers of our behavior and choices in relationships.
Everyone feels like they've dated a narcissist.
How accurate are they?
100 accurate because we all have parts of ourselves that are narcissistically oriented, meaning they are to protect our sense of self.
Some people move more to the extreme and they're really like, deeply wounded and have to spend a lot of energy protecting themselves and working around their ego.
But most of us, in certain situations, were provoked to behave in more narcissistic ways, and when we're offered other conditions, we can be more open and interested in the world.
So it's usually the way it's used in pop language.
It's usually just like a word that covers up a whole other world of things.
I think when people talk about I've dated a narcissist, they're like that person didn't give me enough attention.
Hmm.
And what's that about?
There could be so much there.
Like what went on between the two of you?
Why?
What happened?
Where were you in that?
It doesn't tell you much.
Yeah, I'm so happy to hear that because I do think that the word is a relief and it's not that it's wrong.
It's just that don't stop unpacking it there.
So those words are really helpful for you to categorize, summarize your experience, but don't feel that that's the end of the investigation.
Like there's so much more.
Exactly.
And you're actually doing yourself a disservice.
Yeah.
And the moment you're thinking about, I found a word that finds all the problem outside of me.
You're deluding yourself.
When you find couples come in with financial issues.
Mm-hmm.
Is it really about money?
Money's a big issue for people.
Money's a big issue for people.
You know the question of money.
One of the questions that couples deal with when they're fighting or debating about money is the deep question of mine versus ours.
What's mine and what are we sharing?
And the most concrete version of it is money, but it's everything.
It's time, it's attention, it's airtime, it's sex, it's so much is like mine versus ours.
But money is like, especially in our culture.
Money is like the most concrete way to talk about it and to fight about it.
Like if you're making more money than your spouse or than your partner, who pays for dinner?
Right?
Like, what's the vibe between the two of you?
Is it shared money or is it, no, we're still going Dutch, right?
Fights about money are about the concreteness of money, but they're also about where do I begin and end and what's us together.
And then there's a whole other thing with money, which is money is also something to do with our relationship with reality.
I mean, back to the idea of someone hiding a suitcase with bills, unpaid bills under the bed.
How realistic is your relationship with reality, with what you have, with what you're making?
When people talk about money, they're talking about reality in certain ways.
I usually ask people, how do you think money should play out between the two of you?
If you're making more money than your partner...
What is your ideology on this?
What do you really think should happen?
Does that give you more power?
Does that mean you should be making more of the decisions?
Does that mean your partner should be paying for less?
How do you think about it?
Each of you, just what's your basic ideology? which is hard for people to acknowledge, right?
They want to feel like, no, money doesn't matter, but it matters to everyone in some way or another.
They have an ideology.
So are they willing to put it on the table to be honest with how they think about it?
And then once you compare these ideologies, then we can have a discussion.
It's back to the idea of like the couple creating their political backdrop.
Like what is the politics of this relationship?
Are you like socialist or are you capitalist?
Are you, what's your economic system?
What if we disagree?
What if we vote differently?
You probably will disagree.
On some level, you will.
Somewhere, you will disagree.
And then it's going to get interesting.
It's going to be like a Congress, right?
Debating what's the right way to do it.
But it's better to have that debate on the table rather than act it out in those like What was that film?
There was that, oh my God, it's a film in which there's a shipwreck.
There's this couple that are sitting at the dinner table and they're looking at each other like who's gonna pull out the credit card?
Oh, I don't know.
Brilliant scene.
Everything about their relationship was in that scene.
I don't know.
With her kind of pretending she lost her card.
Oh, okay.
And him reluctantly pulling out his credit card.
And then there was, it was just like perfect.
I was thinking of a movie called Fair Play.
I didn't see that.
Did you see that?
I heard about it.
I didn't see it.
I don't know if you'd enjoy it.
I don't know your taste in movies, but I think it's pretty interesting.
It's a movie made about a couple who are competing for the same job because they work at the same company.
But it's really dark.
And it really goes into that, the psychology of competition, gender roles, the pay gap.
Yeah.
Everything comes to play.
Yeah.
And it shows how it affects them from the bedroom to the boardroom to everywhere else.
Awesome.
It's really well done.
Yeah, it's really well done.
It just shows you what's going on inside of our heads that doesn't often come out, and just how we all feel.
And it's so interesting how society and all of this has such a play on how we feel about our role and who we are today.
We have so many more people to look at and view and see how their lives are going.
I had a friend who his girlfriend made more money than him and he did really well for himself, but she made more money than him.
So she, but she expected him to pay for everything.
And she wanted him not only to pay for dinners and rent, and she wanted him to buy her a car.
Because she believed that- Because he's a man.
Because he's the man.
Wow.
That's how she should be treated.
Interesting.
And that was for her.
Imagine them having a conversation.
They ended up breaking up.
But what would their conversation sound like? literally this.
I deserve this.
I'm a queen.
I'm a princess.
I'm like, this is how I should be treated.
Do you think she said something like that?
She said stuff like this.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
And you see a lot of this language on TikTok and things like that about what a high value man is, what a high value woman is.
And A lot of the language and vocabulary out there today.
What is meant by a high value man?
I mean there's lots of different definitions, but generally it's someone who has a good career, makes a lot of money, does well for themselves and the obvious definition of it.
Well, it's not obvious.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, but the- To me, it's not obvious.
Yeah, to you it's not obvious, yeah.
But it's just interesting to hear how these societal ideas kind of, because then we're like oh, but you're not with a high value man.
And it's really interesting because in my world a high value man would be someone who has good values.
Right.
The good values being like ethics.
Yeah, ethics.
Yeah, exactly.
Like character, moral character.
Yes, moral character.
Strength and courage and bravery and honesty.
Right.
That's what I would consider a high value person.
Me too.
Forget a high value man.
Yeah.
And it's interesting how all this language at play kind of cascades ideas quickly, like you said.
Yeah.
Because it's easier.
Rather than saying I'm with a good man, it's easier to say I'm with a high-value man.
But, you know, what does that mean?
Right.
Yeah, I was going to ask you, do more people want more intimacy or more sex?
I think it depends.
First of all, it's a complicated thing to draw the line between intimacy and sex.
Oh, interesting.
Okay.
And I think it depends very much on the stage of the relationship.
Early on one of the things I mean.
We all know that one of the things that binds people, one of the strongest glues, is sex, like passion and excitement about each other and wanting to get into bed together.
And then at some point people start coming to terms with like differences differences in scripts, differences in appetite.
I know that the...
Like.
The stereotype is that men are more focused on sex and want more sex, and women want less or it's less important to them.
I don't think that's actually true.
I think again, it's very hard to make generalizations and it changes between like straight and queer couples.
So it's really not necessarily about the biology.
But I think typically... there are different focuses for men and women.
And then later in the relationship things change, because I think later in the relationship the line between sex and intimacy gets very blurry.
And I think generally everyone wants both intimacy and sex.
Everyone wants it and everyone wishes it for themselves and wants it in large quantities.
Everyone needs it, but they focus on different things.
And no one has energy for it.
And no one has energy for it.
And anyway, a lot of it is about wanting to feel desire of some sort.
That's what it is.
That's really what it is.
And not necessarily wanting, you know...
Oh, I need to have it three times a week or I need this or I need that.
It's a lot about the experience of desire and being desired.
That is really kind of the thing we all want.
To be living in desire rather than living in a certain kind of deadness.
The key takeaway here is that self-awareness is essential.
Relationships challenge us to explore our patterns, and understanding those dynamics allows us to set boundaries, make healthier choices and build relationships that honor our values.
This new year, swap someday with today.
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For 25 years, I've explored what it means to heal, not just for myself, but alongside others.
I'm Mike Della Rocha.
This is Sacred Lessons, a space for reflection, growth, and collective healing.
What do you tell men that are hurting right now?
Everything's going to be okay on the other side, you know, just push through it.
And, you know, ironically...
The root of the word spirit is breath.
Wow.
Which is why one of the most revolutionary acts that we can do as people is just breathe.
Next to the wound is their gifts.
You can't even find your gifts unless you go through the wound.
That's the hard thing.
You think, well, I'm going to get my gifts.
I don't want to go through all that.
You got to go through the wounds of your life.
Listening to other people's near-death experiences, and it's all they say.
In conclusion, love is the answer.
Listen to Sacred Lessons as part of the My Cultura podcast network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, I'm Dani Shapiro, host of the hit podcast Family Secret.
We were in the car like a rolling stone came on and he said there's a line in there about your mother.
And I said, what?
What I would do if I didn't feel like I was being accepted is choose an identity that other people can't have.
I knew something had happened to me in the middle of the night, but I couldn't hold on to what had happened.
These are just a few of the moving and important stories I'll be holding space for on my upcoming 13th season of Family Secrets.
Whether you've been on this journey with me from season one or just joining the Family Secrets family, we're so happy to have you with us.
I'll dive deep into the incredible power of secrets, the ones that shape our identities, test our relationships and ultimately, reveal who we truly are.
Listen to Family Secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Cody Sanchez dives into financial literacy, debunking myths about credit, debt and the resources needed to start a business.
For anyone who's ever felt overwhelmed by money, even small actions like opening a credit card.
This will help you feel more confident in your financial decisions.
Walk me through the myths about credit cards and debit cards that people can solve right now.
Is there a special credit card they should be getting?
Is there one that's better?
What should they be looking out for?
What does APR mean?
Walk me through the hidden things behind credit cards that we all feel stupid about.
When you see an ad and you're like I have no idea what that means.
Yeah, it's so true.
You know, I had an employee, actually, Christian, who's from the UK too.
And we were ridiculing him mercifully, actually, because he only had a debit card to pay for things.
And I didn't even know that the UK was completely different.
No, there are credit cards, but it's not... He said it's not normal.
Yeah.
I was like, you're a 28-year-old man and you don't have a credit card?
And he was like, you need to travel more, Cody.
And I was like, sorry.
But then we got him a credit card so he could start establishing credit here.
But moral of the story is, here's I think the couple first steps to financial freedom.
If you want to set up your kid for success, you actually want them to get a credit card really early.
Does it so much matter what type of credit card?
I'm not like the points guy, where I like to – operationalize and optimize every aspect of a credit card.
I think that is almost more work than trying to make more money.
But I think if you go from any of the major banks, there are a lot of rules around credit cards.
So they're really not allowed to mess with you so much on interest rates.
There's a lot of protections for consumers.
So don't stress too much about which one.
Which one seems like it has some nice perks for you and you can get the most amount of money that you need.
Cool.
So that's step one.
And if you can do that for your kids when they're in high school, they will actually have more access to the first pillar I think of wealth, which is resources.
We all know what's the saying, takes money to make money, right?
And so if you come from nothing well, you can start actually building up your resource pile just from your credit, which you can start at a young age.
You And then after resources, you pile on knowledge, right?
The rich pass on how to invest.
We need to start doing that to our next generation.
Then you pass on wealth accumulation.
That's where you start to pile on your own money.
And then finally, you pass on the ability to invest, to continue to move cyclically your money around and make it work for you.
But that's where I would start.
It's like you start with a credit card.
You have a debit card really just because you want to get cash out, sometimes if you're going to the club and buying drinks or whatever people do these days that are cooler than me.
And that's where I would start.
And then I would move to this next level of okay if I have some credit.
Now we need to focus on earning.
So how do I make more money?
But I think most people skip that first step because credit is scary.
And like listen Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett's partner, obviously very famous dude, but he has a line I love, which is Men only go broke by three things, and it's whiskey, women and leverage.
And leverage means debt, right?
Warren Buffett gave him a little adage to it at the end and he goes.
I think actually what my friend meant to say was it's really just the last one.
It's really just leverage.
And Warren Buffett, one of the richest guys in the world, said he doesn't like debt.
But here's the problem, Jay.
He's highly levered.
He has a massive amount of debt, right?
Why?
Because he has debt on assets and other people's things as opposed to personal guarantees on his own.
He's not mortgaging his house to buy these companies.
He is raising debt on a company in order for it to make more money.
And so if you don't understand all that right now, that's where I want you to dive in a little bit more.
Maybe you can start with a debit and a credit card.
Yeah, no, I think it's so important to understand debt.
And you see that when you see a celebrity buy a new home and you realize they borrowed to buy that home.
They didn't buy it in cash, even though they have the cash and it's available to them.
And I think that idea is so foreign.
If someone's thinking about starting a business right now, or wants to grow a business, and the number one thing you hear is well, I don't have any money.
I don't know how to fund it.
How much do you actually need to start a business?
I think you never suffer from a lack of money.
You suffer from a lack of knowledge on how to get money.
The richest people in the world, they never use their own money entirely to buy things.
And if you can like sit on that for a second and let that sit in, then I think you can really open up your eyes to the fact that all around you there are deals right now.
And there is money that is waiting for the actually rarest of things, which is a human who wants to work really hard and has a good idea where to put the money.
And so you actually don't need money to start a business.
I don't think you need it at all.
What you need is some access to it.
And so you know, next week I'm going to the SBA, the Small Business Administration, and they just ran out all of these new programs for new business owners, where they will one do grants, where they give you money.
And grant means you take this money, you don't have to give it back.
The government is going to give it to you, maybe because you're a minority or a woman or have a core needs business.
They also do a ton of loans.
You know, they'll loan you 90% of the purchase price of a business if you need one.
And all around us are also people who want to invest.
And so like there's a website called Percent.
And on Percent.
If you have a small business and you need some debt for a small business, you can actually get debt from your small business through a website.
But I think the most important part is not just tactically.
It's like can I change my belief to believe that money is all around me and I do not need to have only my own money in order to get rich?
And I want more people to think that way.
It's hard.
I get it.
Do you think everyone needs a side hustle right now?
I have two thoughts.
One, I do not believe that you have to go all in on the thing that you want to do in life.
I think that is told to you by people who had survivorship bias.
Like it worked for me, so it's going to work for you.
And what do we know to be true?
90% of startups fail over any five-year period.
And so I actually think that the way to never have risk in building a business, if you want to do a startup and have no risk, I think the You keep your job.
You do really well at that job while you're doing it.
You use your salary to fund your side hustle or your next venture.
You keep moving forward on it until your side hustle matches the cost of living, that you have your cash flow and then you leave your business or your job to go start your business once you have enough money from inflow of the business.
And I think we've told too many people and idealized this idea of entrepreneurship when in fact I had three or four businesses fail.
If I had just left my job that paid me good money, I would have been sleeping on somebody's couch.
And so you can have a side hustle, but please keep it on the side for a minute until you make sure it's not just a passion project.
It is a profit project.
Yes.
Yeah.
And I think that's the smartest, wisest advice.
I'm in the same boat.
When I started doing what I do today, I had a full-time job.
It didn't pay great, but it paid enough to get by.
It paid my bills.
It means I wasn't creating from a place of stress.
And when you're creating something new from just stress, it can be quite debilitating.
Now, sometimes stress can be the greatest motivator.
It can propel you.
It can be your launchpad.
But you've got to kind of get it right.
Too much stress and you fall apart.
Too little stress and you stay in the golden handcuffs.
That's right.
And I think that's where I see a lot of people stuck today is I meet a lot of people who I feel have tied on the golden handcuffs but not using that as the investment.
So it's like, I want to have a lifestyle with the money I make.
I don't want to use it to build a new life.
The key takeaway here is that access and education, not just effort, create opportunity.
Taking the time to understand resources and systems allows us to leverage them effectively and take control of our financial futures.
Novak Djokovic reflects on the delicate balance of stress, motivation, and purpose.
Even after reaching the pinnacle of tennis.
He emphasizes that growth comes from passion, self-awareness and the desire to inspire others.
And if you've ever felt weighed down by pressure, his perspective shows how it can become a launch pad rather than a trap.
Do you feel like in your career you've achieved everything you set out to as a tennis player?
Yes, and more than that.
And at the same time, I still want to do more.
And I know that that comes in a big part from a good place, meaning from a place of purpose inspiration motivation, love for the sport, passion for the sport, passion to make people happy when they watch me.
If I'm doing that and I have a feeling that I am by still actively being on the tennis tour and having my tennis career, active tennis career I'm still spreading that light by playing tennis and inspiring younger generations.
That's something that... that comes from a good place.
But what comes from maybe, let's say, not necessarily a bad place, but less of a good place I have identified that as well is my feeling of not being enough.
And that goes back to my very, very beginning of my life and my relationship, particularly with my father, and not doing enough, not being good enough, et cetera, et cetera.
So now that I'm talking about it I kind of get emotional about it because it's still deep inside of me.
And it's kind of the battle that I also go through often.
Because a lot of people, even closest people in my life, ask me, what more do you want?
You have achieved everything.
What do you want?
Why do you keep going?
And I tell them the good part that I told you, that I still really strongly feel it's inside of me.
And I feel like, as long as I have the capacity or ability to to compete for the biggest titles in my sport, I want to keep going.
And also partly the part that I didn't mention that inspires me to keep going is to test my limits, mentally and physically.
Because when I was starting to break through into professional tennis, I remember when you reach your 30, you start counting your days to your retirement.
Like after 30, you know, that's it pretty much.
Even though there were some exceptions, like Jimmy Connors, the legend of our game.
He played, I think, semifinals or finals of US Open, when he was 40, you know, still dominating the tour.
So there were very few exceptions.
Nowadays it's different.
Why?
Because I think the care for the body has improved so much.
I mean now not only top 10 or 15 guys or girls on the tour have like multiple people in their squad to take care of them.
You have top 50 people that are taking care of them.
It's due to the improvement, of course, of the conditions for the players, and we earn more across the board.
So it gives you, it allows you to hire more people that would take care of your body.
And I think that...
It's also a kind of a curiosity from my side.
How far can I go?
You know, I'm 38 this year.
You know, how long can I push my own limits?
And I don't feel like I do have limits.
And I feel like the limits are normally constructs in our mind.
I've seen the episode you did with Brian Johnson the other day.
And then he talked about, you know, he's... by a lot of people's opinion, very extreme, but he dedicated his entire life to getting the data and understanding what are the best conditions for the longest living life that he can have for himself, which I think it's something that is admirable and I give him huge credit for that.
And I understand because as a professional athlete You know the care for your body and your mind and the devotion to the daily habits is so tough, because when you want to change a certain habit, science says it takes at least 21 days right.
For the brain to start growing new neurons that are reprogramming.
But if you don't have the right environment, that's going to be very, very challenging.
So that was also one of the things that I wanted to reflect on in your question is the environment is the one that can be very stimulative to you.
It can be really supportive or it can be pulling you down.
It's super important, even though we always encourage ourselves to be independent in terms of what we do, what we eat, how we sleep, how we lead our lives and what we do and how we can live the best version of our lives possible.
But at the same time, we are social beings.
We are very tribal beings.
And even if it's a smallest community, we still want to belong to that community.
We still want this community to support us, even if it's one person or two.
But it's super important in the end of the day because making tough choices, these are tough choices because society, when you go out there, you know super majority of the places where you go to eat or people that you see.
It's a kind of a vicious cycle and they lead their life in a certain way that maybe doesn't coincide or correspond to your choices, that you want to make the new choices or maybe the new changes.
So it's really hard, you know.
I mean living in the big city and deciding you want to go through transformational journey.
On a daily basis, we're being exposed to something that is contrary to what you're trying to achieve.
I feel like it's reinventing yourself constantly.
For me.
I've had this kind of upbringing, had the great foundation, and I've achieved incredible things.
I was dreaming of becoming number one in the world and becoming a Wimbledon champion, and that was my dream.
I achieved that dream within two days.
I won Wimbledon and, at the same day, became number one in the world in 2011, in front of my family, in front of president of Serbia, who was there.
I mean, it was with the welcoming of hundreds of thousands of people on the way back.
It's just, you know, once in a lifetime type of experience.
And when you do something for the first time, obviously that big it's just like you're flying to the moon.
I mean, you're not, it's a kind of an out of body experience.
But then I felt like I had to set new goals.
And because I was, you know, at the time, 2011, I was 23 years old, 24.
So, okay, what do I do next?
You know, I feel like I'm at, you know, peak of my powers and I want it.
So then I want to win multiple slams.
Then I want to win all slams at once.
Then I want to win gold medal for my country.
Then I want to make history and so forth, so forth.
I think goal-oriented mind particularly in sports, but also in business or anything really I think is super important because the clarity from my experience is something that is essential to have also peace of mind and to have a calm heart that you know what you're doing.
And that you set your goals, your short-term goals, your long-term goals, and you know exactly the strategy that you need to implement to achieve them.
And you surround yourself with the people who are supporting you, but also people who are telling you what you don't want to hear.
You know, giving you constructive criticism or maybe giving you non-constructive criticism and then putting you very down.
But that's also part of the journey.
It's also learning how to get up like a phoenix and rise and try to develop a thick skin, so to say.
So it's a constant process.
Really I don't see myself fully satisfied if that's maybe a shorter answer because I have that part of me which is like I think I can still do more.
But the other side of me is like, of course, I'm happy and I'm proud.
And in a way, I can't wait one day for me to reflect on everything.
But while I'm steering my active career, I don't have time.
Tennis has the longest season of all sports.
January, starts January, ends almost end of November.
And of course, I earn my right in a way to be selective with tournaments where I play.
So that's what I'm doing.
I'm not playing as much.
I'm focusing on the big ones.
And I'm trying to incorporate all these other things inside of my career and basically expand the platform and use my voice for other things than just the tennis court.
And I'm super blessed to be in a position that I am.
But as I said, it's a constant journey and process.
The key takeaway here is that purpose driven effort transforms challenges into growth.
Whether in sport or life, aligning motivation with passion and community allows us to turn pressure into performance and inspiration.
Mel Robbins teaches us about the power of our attention, energy, and boundaries.
By letting go of the need to control others' perceptions, we reclaim our own agency and how these small, intentional choices in work relationships and self-expression create meaningful change.
It's so interesting how we think love is over caring, but actually over caring is over enabling that person and overwhelming that person.
Yes.
And it's control.
It's control.
You're not like, if you think about what love really is, and for me, love is two things.
It's consideration, right?
It's having someone in mind.
If you pour in oat milk instead of the cow milk, because that's what they like, that's an act of love.
It's also admiration.
And admiration is the ability to see something in somebody that you deeply admire.
I want to go back to something that you said, though, because it was genius.
And it had me think about the idea of the power of your time and energy.
And you were talking about imagine if...
Like your time and your energy had dollars associated with it.
Because I don't think we value it.
And I started to think about one of the biggest obstacles, because what's ultimately happening when you start to use let them and let me, is you're going to see that you've turned other people into a major problem?
And you have turned them into a problem in four ways.
First of all, you allow them to stress you out, but you're not going to do that anymore, because you're going to let them be.
But the second way that you've made them a major problem in your life is that you give so much weight to other people's opinions.
And in the example you were just talking about, what was happening is by asking you what do you think Roddy was doing?
What we all do.
But most of us do it subconsciously and we don't even realize it, which is before we even ask ourselves what feels right for us.
We stop and consider what we think somebody's going to think.
And you have that like really brilliant thing that I've heard you say a bazillion times that I love.
It's not what you think, you think a thing.
And I'm like, wait, what?
But so I want to play this out because this is so important, was a huge thing for me.
If you open up your favorite social media platform.
We've all had the experience where you go and you pick a photo and you then put it up and you're like okay, should I put a filter on this?
And you start to then question, is this the right photo?
And then you go back to your photo roll and then you start working on the caption.
Should I put emoji?
Is this too much?
Should I do this?
And then you are worried, why?
Because you're actually thinking about what other people are going to think or do in response to what you're posting.
Yes.
Which means if you take the value of it, right?
You just overvalued something that you will never be able to control.
Ever.
Ever, ever, ever.
And yet you're doing it subconsciously.
And what typically happens is if you notice, everybody's got hundreds of draft posts.
You know what that is?
That is a graveyard of energy you wasted on something that you didn't you'll never be able to control, because the average person has 70000 random thoughts a day.
You can't even control half the crap that goes in your own mind.
So what makes you think any post is going to guarantee that any human being thinks anything?
And the let them theory revealed to me Jay, how often I was subconsciously valuing someone else and that like, are they going to think negative?
Are they going to think this?
Are they going to think too much?
And there's such a simple way to change this.
You just let them think negative thoughts.
That's it.
The next time you catch yourself stopping to consider what you're going to post or what your colleagues might react to and that's what's keeping you silent say to yourself let them think negative thoughts.
Because that's what you're actually afraid of.
Yeah.
And so when you say, let them think negative thoughts, something wild happens.
You accept the reality that, no matter what you do, it doesn't guarantee that anybody thinks anything.
Yeah.
And then you say, let me, and here's where this gets really cool.
Let me remind myself I can think what I want and I can do what I want.
And your social media in particular, as you and I both know, it's your self-expression.
That's what it's there for.
And if you can't allow yourself to express yourself there, then it's going to be everywhere where you edit yourself, because you're not just letting people think negative thoughts.
But if you operate in a way now and you now take the value, you take the money back.
We're not gonna pay Jay the money for his opinion.
I'm gonna take the money back and where I'm gonna put the value is operating in a way that makes me feel proud of myself.
Because when I operate in a way, whether I'm posting something or I'm speaking in a meeting or I'm showing up and not responding to my dramatic whatever I'm proud of myself.
And when you're proud of yourself, you don't even consider what other people are thinking, because you've just anchored all of your worth inside of yourself.
Yeah.
And that's why this is another reason why this is so unbelievably powerful.
Yeah.
And the truth is no one's thinking about you for as long as you think.
It's true.
No one's thinking about you for as much as you think.
No one's thinking about you as much as they even say they're thinking about you.
And we just, like you said, we keep draining that energy, consumed by it.
You reminded me of... the beautiful Charles Horton Cooley quote, and he wrote this in 1890.
And he said, the challenge today is I'm not what I think I am.
I'm not what you think I am.
I am what I think you think I am.
Which means we live in a perception of a perception of ourselves.
So if I think Mel thinks I'm not smart, then I don't think I'm smart.
So it's not even reality.
It's not even factually proven or checked or tested.
By the way, everything in the Let Them Theory this book is literally every thought, those 70000 thoughts.
That's what you're addressing in this book.
Yes, and let them, two words, gets rid of this fear.
It literally does.
Because I've talked to at least three friends this week and all of them are concerned by either.
Hey Jay, I'm thinking about posting a video on social media.
I'm scared of what people will think.
So that's for their professional or their passion.
I've got another friend who's worried that a lot of our other friends are talking about him negatively because he's recently fallen out with them.
And so he's worried, like, what are they saying?
They're all talking to each other.
What rumors are they spreading about me?
Like, maybe it's not true.
And the thing that they're holding onto is they just can't let.
They can't let them No, but they can.
See, I don't think they have the tool.
See, here's the thing.
If you're worried that people are gossiping about you, let them.
Let them gossip about you.
Here's why.
You can't control it.
It's going to happen anyway.
Yes.
And so if you can't control it, why on earth would you allow any time or energy to be wasted?
It's an act of self-torture.
So if you are worried that people are gossiping about you, first of all, let them gossip about you.
Yeah.
Because they're going to do what they're going to do because you cannot change what other people do.
You can't control what they think.
You can't control what they do.
If they're going to gossip, they're going to gossip.
So let them gossip.
And when you say that it's a relief because you actually acknowledge the thing that you've been afraid of and it's like you're allowing it without allowing it.
But then don't forget, you have power.
Yeah.
Let me... remind myself that I get to choose what I think about myself.
I get to decide what I do and what I don't do, whether or not I respond or not.
And I get to decide who I spend time with.
And so the bigger question becomes if you're busy worrying about which means you're expending time and energy people who are gossiping about you, Why would you want to be friends with them?
And so now you take responsibility for your own part in chasing people that aren't treating you in a way that you deserve.
And you recognize that the power here is in just letting people be.
And when you let people be, your relationships get better, because people reveal who they are and where you stand, and then you get to choose how much time you spend or not.
And not everybody in your life deserves an explanation.
They don't deserve a response necessarily.
And so you also get to choose who you tell your story to, or who you apologize to, or how you respond to it.
And that's where your power is.
And I'm not saying this makes it easy.
Because you're probably in a situation like that, gonna have to say, let them, let them, let them.
And then you're gonna see them on social media and you're gonna be like, should I block them?
Should I not block them?
Are they gonna see if I do that?
Should I not gonna?
Let them, let them know their lives.
And if I want to unfollow them, let me do that, because I get to choose what comes into my space or not.
The key takeaway here is that your time, energy, and focus are valuable.
Protect them, use them intentionally, and don't let external validation dictate your actions.
Once you make that shift, then you make space for freedom, growth and fulfillment to grow from within.
As we close this episode and this year, remember this.
Life is not about perfection.
It's about presence.
Growth is not linear, but every moment, struggle, draw your reflection is a step forward.
The lessons are clear.
Embrace failure as a starting point.
Show up authentically in your relationships and life.
Give yourself time to heal and grow.
Protect your energy, attention and focus.
Pursue your purpose with passion and courage.
The past year has shaped us, challenged us and reminded us of what matters.
As we move forward, carry these lessons into your next chapter.
You're capable, you're growing and your life is a canvas to become your best self.
Thank you so much for listening to this conversation.
If you enjoyed it, you'll love my chat with Adam Grant on why discomfort is the key to growth and the strategies for unlocking your hidden potential.
If you know you want to be more and achieve more this year, go check it out right now.
You set a goal today, you achieve it in six months, and then, by the time it happens, it's almost a relief.
There's no sense of meaning and purpose.
You sort of expected it and you would have been disappointed if it didn't happen.
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What up, y'all?
It's your boy Kev on stage.
I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Moment, where I talk to artists athletes entertainers creators friends, people I admire who had massive success, about their massive failures.
What did they mess up on?
What is their heartbreak and what did they learn from it?
I got judged horribly.
The judges were like, you're trash.
I don't know how you got on the show.
Check out Not My Best Moment with me Kev on stage on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, I'm Dani Shapiro.
We were in the car like a rolling stone came on and he said there's a line in there about your mother.
And I said, what?
What I would do if I didn't feel like I was being accepted is choose an identity that other people can't have.
I knew something had happened to me in the middle of the night, but I couldn't hold on to what had happened.
These are just a few of the moving and important stories on my 13th season of Family Secrets.
Listen to Family Secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
This is an iHeart Podcast.
Guaranteed human.
