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Sierra, let's get moving. You're

1:01

listening to Inside of You with Michael Rosenbaum. Ryan's

1:03

having a seat as we talk. Yep. Having

1:05

a little chat. Good to see you, Ryan. Hello,

1:07

good to see you. I didn't sleep well

1:09

last night, so if I look like Merle Haggard.

1:11

Merle Haggard? He was a country singer. Just

1:14

Haggard, operative word being me. Not not not

1:16

just tired today. Just brand we had to

1:18

do a bunch of talkville stuff and you

1:20

know all that stuff Hey, thanks for listening

1:22

to the show appreciate you. I'm glad you're

1:25

here Thanks for taking the time and choosing

1:27

this podcast because there's so many freaking podcasts

1:29

But we've been doing this a long time.

1:31

Mm -hmm. Look if you want to support the

1:33

podcast if you're here for Will Wheaton Thank

1:35

you if you like the interview all I

1:37

ask is subscribe if you like it

1:39

say hey, I like the interview man Good

1:41

job and subscribe and follow us

1:43

and I appreciate it. You

1:46

also have a chance of being

1:48

on the podcast if you

1:50

join Patreon, patreon.com slash inside of

1:52

you and there's a new

1:54

tier and it's called how deep is your

1:56

love tier and so a few people will

1:59

come on and talk about mental health or

2:01

whatever at the end of an episode and have

2:03

them on for a few minutes and Say

2:05

thank you for being a patron. There's

2:07

also many other perks, I guess, and

2:09

boxes and sign stuff. And so just

2:12

go to Patreon, P -A -T -R -E -O -N

2:14

dot com slash inside of you. Check

2:16

it out and see if you want to, you want to

2:18

become a patron today and support the podcast. I

2:20

always say it's like a streamer. It's like, if you

2:22

are watching the show constantly and you're like, you

2:25

know, why not get back? Go to my

2:27

Instagram at the Michael Rosenbaum and

2:29

my link tree, link tree. It

2:32

tells you everything I'm doing. Cameos and all

2:34

the conventions I'm going to doing smallville

2:36

nights with Tom. We have a cruise, the

2:39

smallville cruise. Go to cruiseville.com. You have

2:41

to get tickets. It's going

2:43

to be a blast. A lot

2:45

of the cast are coming on

2:47

this cruise. So get tickets now.

2:49

It's June 15th to the 22nd.

2:51

And we're going all over rolling

2:53

around Bahamas, Honduras, Coco

2:55

Pay, Coco Tay. I

2:57

don't know. Don't ask me, but it's it's going to

3:00

be amazing. We're doing a lot of stuff

3:02

on on the ship, you know,

3:04

a lot of excursions. You can take

3:06

excursions and swim with pigs with

3:08

me. You could do karaoke with me,

3:10

smallville nights and a bunch of

3:12

other stuff. Also, the inside of you

3:14

online store folks, if you want

3:17

autograph pilot episodes of smallville or lexmas

3:19

scripts or ship keys or tumblers

3:21

or there's the Funkos, which you can

3:23

hardly get. And some people are. They

3:26

sign, you know, they have my autograph and

3:28

I'm not sure I signed all these, but they're

3:30

for sale for like, they're selling them for

3:32

a lot, but you can get them and know that

3:34

they're signed by me for well, a lot less. Um,

3:37

and, uh, Lunchboxes signed

3:39

by me and Tom, Smallville Lunchboxes. And

3:42

yeah, a lot of other stuff. And

3:44

last but not least, I have to

3:46

just give you this. This is the

3:48

Rosie's Puppy Fresh Breath here, trying to,

3:50

you know, get this product going. Ryan,

3:52

Rosie's Puppy Fresh Breath, just a capful in your

3:54

dog's water, odorless, tasteless, and your dog's breath will

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be great. I'm on the back here, picture me.

4:00

No brushing, just add to your dog's water.

4:02

And a lot of people are loving

4:04

it. So thank you for supporting Rosie's Puppy

4:06

Fresh Prep. And we got a

4:08

great episode. Will Wheaton is here again. And

4:11

he's got this new idea,

4:14

this new show

4:16

where he narrates

4:19

people's literary works. And

4:22

the way he does it

4:24

is pretty freaking cool. I'll

4:27

let him explain it, but we talk about

4:30

so much. We talk about dysfunction and mental

4:32

health, and we get deep as always. I

4:34

didn't know where else this would go since

4:36

the last episode, but it gets even better.

4:39

And I appreciate him for being so

4:41

open and honest. Always. He's

4:43

such a great guy. I

4:45

loved having him over, and we're going to

4:47

get a drink or something. I don't drink,

4:49

but we could have maybe a shake. Maybe

4:52

we could have a shake Ryan

4:55

go to the mall shop. Yeah, go

4:57

to the mall shop have a

4:59

shake a shake for Gad seeks We

5:01

could do that Thanks for being

5:03

here again. Thank you. Appreciate it. Let's

5:05

get into this. Let's let's get

5:08

inside of Will Wheaton It's my point

5:10

of view you're listening to inside

5:12

of you with Michael Rosenbaum Inside

5:20

of you with Michael Rosenbaum was not recorded

5:22

in front of a live studio audience. You're

5:25

starting the podcast today. Will is trying

5:27

to convince me to watch. You're not

5:29

trying to convince me. Absolutely not. I

5:31

think it's a lot severance. Did

5:34

you ever did you watch the wire? I

5:36

tried for the first two episodes. People say you

5:38

need to get through the first three and then you're

5:40

OK. Is that true? I don't remember what I

5:42

remember. I hear it's brilliant. What I remember about the

5:44

wire is that I was on location in Vancouver.

5:46

It was pouring rain as it does. And

5:49

I was at the Sutton and I had

5:51

nothing to do. I had nothing to watch

5:53

on a day off. So I walked down

5:55

about two blocks to the HMV and went

5:57

to that section of TV DVD sets. This

5:59

is this is like before you could do

6:01

this online. Yeah. And I walked in and

6:03

you know, just so many people had just

6:06

been all up in my shit about go

6:08

watch the wire, watch the wire. And I

6:10

thought, OK, I'll watch. I'll give it a

6:12

try. And I went back to the to

6:14

the Sutton and I put it in the

6:16

DVD player. And like literally nine hours later,

6:18

I got up. I couldn't stop watching it.

6:20

I was just captivated by it. The reason

6:23

I ask you if you watched it is

6:25

it is one of those shows like Friday

6:27

Night Lights, which I understand. I love Friday

6:29

Night Lights. OK. I never watched it because

6:31

I got so exhausted by every dude I

6:33

know going, you haven't watched it. You've got

6:35

to watch it. What do you mean? We

6:38

all know. We all know that guy who

6:40

like will not shut up about how great

6:42

the wire is. And after a while, I

6:44

don't. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't care. I

6:47

don't care that just leave me alone about it.

6:49

That's what happens. It's like, oh, you have to

6:51

watch it. You have to watch it. I don't

6:53

have to watch shit. Yeah, well, then I'll make

6:55

that decision. And then it becomes like, are you

6:57

going to test me? Am I

6:59

going to come back to you? Yeah. What

7:01

do think that means?

7:03

Did I like it the right way?

7:05

I don't know. So I believe that

7:07

you would like severance. But

7:10

I tell everybody, if you're not like really on

7:12

board, if you're not, wow, I want to know what

7:14

happens at the end of the first episode. Who

7:18

has time? Why do you want

7:20

to invest three episodes in a show?

7:22

which is ridiculous. You're like, why

7:24

do you want to spend three hours

7:26

on a thing when it might

7:28

not ever pay off? Because

7:31

your hope, you know, usually because

7:33

you're too young to have experienced lost

7:35

in real time. I just watched

7:37

a series of paradise. OK. And

7:39

every was telling me to watch it. So

7:41

I watched the first episode is great. And

7:45

then a lot of the episodes. It's

7:47

not that they're bad, but it's it

7:49

becomes sort of networked television feel and

7:51

then doesn't that break your heart? It

7:53

does and like, oh, she's here. I

7:56

don't know. It's a procedural. Here we

7:58

go. I mean, look the acting's for

8:00

the most part great, but Episode 7

8:02

was one of the best episodes you'll

8:04

ever see. It's fantastic. Yeah. And then

8:06

the finale is back to kind of

8:08

bullshit. Yeah. And then they're like, oh,

8:10

and it looks like there's going to

8:12

be another season. I'm like, did you

8:14

watch it? It just feels like

8:16

How are they going to get another who would

8:18

want to watch another season of this? Yeah, like it

8:20

was good. And I'm you know, I'm glad I

8:22

watched it. But I don't want to do another season.

8:24

They try to stretch it out. One show I

8:26

will say, then we'll get into this. Yeah. Have

8:29

you seen dark? No, I

8:31

keep seeing it keeps coming across my dashboard

8:33

on on on Netflix. I promise you

8:35

you can you can tell the world I'm

8:38

an asshole. And I'll agree

8:40

with you. Yeah. Dark

8:42

is probably. The

8:44

first season is probably one of the best

8:46

seasons of television in history. Yeah, all the way

8:48

from the from the get go. You

8:51

will love it. Your mind, you're

8:53

very cerebral. You're very, you know, you

8:55

love sci -fi. You love clever stories.

8:57

You like going down wormholes. You

8:59

like all this stuff. With your mind,

9:01

I think you will just eat

9:03

it up. OK. And it's not

9:06

something that. Everyone has seen it's sort

9:08

of like most it's still like a little

9:10

it's I wouldn't say that it's under

9:12

the radar It's just like sort of like

9:14

it blips on the radar But there's

9:16

something else next to it that grabs the

9:18

attention of the average person instead So

9:20

they go after whatever that happens and you

9:23

have to watch it in German and

9:25

subtitled. Yeah, I can't do that. I can't

9:27

like watch something in a different like,

9:29

you know, speaking English when they're speaking German.

9:31

It just takes me out of it.

9:33

Have you ever met someone from a non

9:35

-English speaking country who watched your work in

9:38

their native language? A lot. So I

9:40

was in Germany and I met some people

9:42

who had watched Star Trek The Next

9:44

Generation in the German dub. And

9:46

when I was a kid, I

9:48

never understood why German fans in

9:50

particular were very Thumbs

9:53

down on Wesley Crusher. Like they

9:55

really hated him. And I was like,

9:58

I do not understand this. It

10:00

makes no sense at all until I

10:02

went to Germany for a con

10:04

15 years ago. Oh, boy. And

10:07

I heard the voice

10:09

voice. There was

10:11

a direction choice made at

10:13

some point to make

10:15

him a whiny. um

10:17

really annoying pay attention

10:19

to me why is it

10:21

anybody like basically like

10:23

they just they made the

10:25

the choice that was

10:27

made was to make he

10:30

was so unlikeable like

10:32

i hated that character and

10:34

it was weird because

10:36

that's not that character is.

10:38

And it supported my

10:40

conviction that when something

10:42

is created in another

10:44

language, always watch it

10:46

with subtitles. Yes. Because

10:49

there's so much that's important.

10:51

Oh, my gosh, I can't imagine.

10:53

A lot of people in Brazil

10:55

will say, wow. And I saw

10:58

it once. I saw me with

11:00

a Portuguese accent or something, or

11:02

seeing it on Mexican. and

11:04

TV and it's just like,

11:06

you know, I

11:09

don't I

11:13

don't know. I mean, I don't know

11:15

how good the acting is, you know,

11:17

in terms of what they are singing,

11:19

what they perceive as good. Yeah. So

11:21

you're only that's the thing. You can

11:23

only cover your own ass. Right. Once

11:25

it gets to the other countries, it's

11:27

sort of like, well, I hope they

11:29

chose the right direction. Yeah. So that's

11:31

how you found out. You're like, yeah.

11:33

Well, then it made all kinds of

11:35

sense to me. And for that entire

11:37

con, so many people were

11:39

coming to introduce themselves to me and

11:41

like, you know, getting pictures signed and

11:43

things like that. And I don't know,

11:45

probably slightly more than half. Like I

11:47

always thought I hated Wesley. And it

11:49

turns out that I don't. Like

11:52

that's so weird. Oh, my gosh. That's

11:54

so strange. It's like you to talk to

11:56

that casting director and go, hey, I just

11:58

want to the direction. Yeah. Man.

12:00

All right. So look, since we talked last

12:02

time, a lot's happened. It's been a couple

12:04

of years. Yeah. But first of all, how

12:06

are you doing? I'm pretty good. I

12:09

mean, you know, the world, I

12:11

don't know if you've looked at the world lately.

12:13

I tend to look at the world. I

12:15

try to distract and never talk

12:17

about the world when I'm in here.

12:19

Yeah. It's sort of my breakaway.

12:22

But like, yes, I see things happening

12:24

that are just shoved in your

12:26

face that you can't. can't look away.

12:28

Yeah. And it's disheartening. And you

12:30

know, you just try to I mean,

12:32

how do you deal with it? I

12:35

have I've been the way

12:37

that I can honestly answer that

12:39

question is existentially and in

12:41

a large gigantic global sense, terrible.

12:43

Everything's terrible. But in the

12:45

immediate this side of my event

12:48

horizon, things are really good.

12:50

My family is doing really well.

12:52

You have two kids. I

12:54

have two kids. How old are

12:56

they? 33 and 35. 33.

12:58

You look 33 and 35. know.

13:00

Dude, I turn 53 in July. Oh.

13:04

So you're exactly your birthday July

13:06

29th. Yeah. So you're a year

13:08

and 18 days older than me.

13:10

No shit. No. You're

13:12

less than a year. I'm

13:14

July 11th, so you're less than a year.

13:16

You're 18 days less in a year than I

13:18

am. So how do you feel about that?

13:20

How does that make you feel when you turn

13:22

53? Is it kind of shocking or you

13:24

just don't care anymore? I have

13:27

been so consistently surprised by

13:29

the moments where I don't

13:31

feel that I'm a middle

13:33

-aged weirdo and the moments

13:35

where I feel like, gosh,

13:37

I'm really like I'm really

13:39

getting older. I feel that when

13:41

like my body just asserts I've been around for

13:43

a really long time and you have not

13:45

exercised me as much as I told you you

13:47

needed to. So

13:49

that that's a whole thing that kind

13:52

of sucks. Yeah. And anytime I'm

13:54

around a someone in their 20s and

13:56

I'm just so curious, I just

13:58

want to know like what do you

14:00

care about? But what is what

14:02

what drives your world? Like, I know

14:04

it was important to me in

14:07

the 90s. What's important to you now?

14:09

And most of the time, I

14:11

feel like I am speaking

14:14

to someone from another planet because

14:16

I have no idea. I

14:18

don't understand the culture. I don't

14:20

the the and the values

14:22

are confusing. It just feels like

14:24

every day there's something new. that you're

14:27

like, oh, that's the thing now? Yeah. Or

14:29

that's what we're doing? Or that's? My

14:31

understanding is that like youth culture moves faster

14:33

than it ever did. And I was

14:35

reading something about for kids that are like

14:37

in school right now, the thing that's

14:39

hilarious during the first period of school is

14:41

just old news and dumb by the

14:44

time lunch rolls around. And they're like, get

14:46

off of it. Now we're onto the

14:48

fifth meme iteration of that dance. God, I

14:50

cannot keep up with that. But

14:53

generally, I'm doing

14:55

well. Since I was last

14:57

here, when I wrote Still

14:59

Just a Geek, I was

15:01

looking for some catharsis, you know?

15:03

Oh, I love that,

15:05

that's awesome. wanted to see this bookshelf

15:07

for that bookshelf, yeah. Oh, well, I'm

15:09

really honored that it's still being, I

15:11

love that, you. Yes, of course. I

15:14

was hopeful for a catharsis, right? I

15:16

was hopeful for some understanding and I, boy

15:18

did I not find that. All

15:21

I did was really retraumatize myself

15:23

and reveal to myself all kinds

15:25

of stuff I had not dealt

15:27

with, all kinds of stuff I

15:30

needed to reprocess and work through

15:32

and so much trauma that I

15:34

need to heal. Really, after all

15:36

the trauma, after all the work

15:38

on yourself, after, it was

15:40

something that after you wrote that, you felt

15:42

sort of like, wait a minute, I'm going backwards.

15:45

Yeah, I had, well, I was forced

15:47

to be honest. I had

15:49

to be honest with the reader

15:52

and that forced me to

15:54

be honest with myself. And in

15:56

pursuit of that veracity, I

15:58

had to confront things that I

16:00

had always overlooked or gone

16:02

around or pushed to the side

16:04

to be dealt with later. And

16:07

it's been a couple of

16:09

years since it came out.

16:11

And when I was finishing

16:13

up Press, there

16:16

was a day where I just

16:18

realized My body is

16:20

dysregulated. I'm in this real major

16:22

fight or flight all the time. And

16:25

I need to prioritize my mental

16:27

health. I need to prioritize getting better.

16:29

I wish more people would do

16:31

that. I wish I would do that

16:33

more, you know, most of the

16:35

time. I think that we always put

16:37

our mental health. to the side

16:40

a little bit. And we're like, oh,

16:42

that's OK. I could deal with

16:44

this. And I'm just going to keep

16:46

going, keep going, keep going. And

16:48

you could feel it. You can actually

16:50

feel it physiologically. Yeah. Your body,

16:52

the the the anxiousness. You're ahead of

16:54

yourself there. What is causing that?

16:56

Well, that's that's a fight reflex, right?

16:58

So like we're fighting against allowing

17:00

those emotions to land on us and

17:02

to experience them. And what I

17:04

ended up doing was. looking

17:07

at what the year in

17:09

front of me looked like, and

17:11

what does my future look like,

17:13

what do my commitments look like,

17:16

what's my time look like, and

17:18

I had the privilege to center

17:20

and prioritize just taking care of

17:22

myself and my mental health. I

17:24

kind of made it my job.

17:30

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19:37

Isn't that amazing? I

19:39

did EMDR, it blew me away. It

19:41

has been so healing and so remarkable

19:44

that there have been moments where it's indistinguishable

19:46

from magic and I have said to

19:48

my therapist, so this is

19:50

weird. I cannot believe

19:52

that I'm able to talk about

19:54

this thing without freaking out,

19:56

but I am and I can

19:59

work through this stuff and

20:01

now it doesn't. sit on me

20:03

anymore. They say EMDR, it's

20:06

like if one of your

20:08

problems, something, you know, there's a

20:10

lot of trees the forest,

20:12

right? Yes. This is the analogy. She

20:14

said it's almost like getting through part

20:16

of that trauma, you're knocking down that

20:18

tree and in the process, some of

20:20

those other trees kind of fall down

20:22

with that tree when they go down.

20:24

And it doesn't eliminate everything, but those

20:26

things that are really traumatic and really

20:28

have caused you pain, those things don't

20:30

affect you as much after you complete

20:32

EMDR or through it. And it's true.

20:34

I had a situation where this memory

20:36

that I didn't think was that. pertinent.

20:38

I was sitting there and she's like,

20:40

Oh, yeah, we're not going to do

20:42

it today. I don't think you're ready.

20:44

I don't, you know, whatever. I start

20:46

talking. I just, I just said this

20:48

one thing. I go, Oh, yeah. And

20:50

I remember when this happened, blah, blah,

20:52

blah. I was like, don't do that.

20:54

Yeah. And she's like, okay. Uh, let's,

20:56

I think we're ready. Let's stay on

20:58

that. I go, well, I was just

21:01

joking. Yeah. She goes, I'd like to

21:03

get into that. Yeah. Something that I

21:05

just kind of threw away and thought,

21:07

Oh, this is funny, right? It's funny.

21:09

It's me guarding myself and pretending it's

21:11

okay. Yeah. And. I

21:13

went from. I

21:16

went to such a dark

21:18

place and so emotional that I

21:20

was almost embarrassed. Yeah,

21:22

I got that. I've never cried

21:25

that hard in my life

21:27

and I it came up and

21:29

I and it just I

21:31

was lost in it. And but

21:33

after that day, I noticed

21:36

even to now when I think

21:38

about that moment, I know

21:40

it happened. It's there.

21:42

but it doesn't affect me anymore the

21:45

way it did. Is that how you

21:47

felt? Yeah, so a lot of

21:49

my work has been trauma recovery. I'm

21:52

sure we talked about it

21:54

when I was here before. I

21:56

am a survivor of child

21:58

abuse and child exploitation and I

22:00

lived my entire childhood absolutely

22:02

terrified. terrified and alone, isolated in

22:04

my house, not allowed into

22:06

my family, treated like absolute shit

22:08

by my father. It

22:10

was horrible, all of it.

22:12

And I have worked really hard

22:14

for a couple of years

22:16

to... all of that. And

22:18

I've been using a really

22:20

interesting therapy technique called the

22:23

internal family systems model. And

22:25

the idea is that our bodies

22:27

and our minds create like pieces of

22:29

the personality to do different things

22:31

for us when we are responding to

22:33

trauma. And you get

22:35

kind of like different parts of your

22:37

personality. And the way that I've

22:39

been doing this therapy is to interact

22:42

with these different parts and talk to them

22:44

and understand like, okay, This

22:46

part of me is that little

22:48

kid who's so scared, who

22:50

just doesn't know what's coming and

22:52

is so terrified. And

22:54

I remember being that kid. And

22:56

a lot of the work that

22:58

I can do with EMDR and

23:00

using this particular model, and I'm

23:02

oversimplifying it, is to get into

23:04

conversation with that kid and help

23:06

that kid understand that. Do you

23:08

talk to yourself? And help

23:10

that kid understand that he's safe and

23:12

he's me. And we grew up and there's,

23:15

you know, there's just things that happen.

23:17

And it's weird. And I know that this

23:19

sounds crazy, but no, but there are

23:21

times where I'll be talking to my younger

23:23

self, you know, and, and, and I'll

23:25

be out doing something and the younger self

23:27

will pipe up and be like, I

23:29

remember a thing. And I'm like, okay, go

23:31

ahead. Let me, let me hear what

23:33

it is. And I listen to it and

23:35

I, and it's so weird. My therapist

23:37

last at our last session, it feels silly,

23:39

but it makes a lot of sense

23:41

to me that I'm in conversation with myself

23:43

and I say to my younger self, sweetheart,

23:46

I'm so sorry you're going through

23:48

that. I went through that too. I

23:51

remember when I went through that and I

23:53

know how much it hurts and how scary it

23:55

is. And if you can

23:57

hear me and if you can trust

23:59

me, I promise you that it gets

24:01

better and I promise you you are

24:03

safe. And here's how I know these

24:05

things. And I'm massively oversimplifying it. No.

24:08

And it does. But you know, I get

24:10

it. I'm getting what you're saying because I can

24:12

almost imagine You know,

24:14

myself just, and I guess I've talked

24:16

to myself. I definitely talked to

24:18

myself. But it's what I'm thinking is,

24:20

do you also say things like,

24:22

I know what you're thinking right now.

24:24

And that's not true. That's not

24:26

true. How could you be this way

24:28

and feel this way? Here's

24:30

the reasons why you're wrong. Yeah.

24:33

And I write myself

24:35

notes. like, dear

24:37

Will, you

24:39

have forgotten that you're

24:41

loved. and you're safe

24:44

and that you matter. I

24:46

am reminding you because you forget

24:48

all the time. I love you. That's

24:50

awesome. Signed you from the past. Then

24:53

I put it out there for me. And every now

24:55

and then I come across that and I'm like, wow,

24:57

I really needed that. I'm glad that I did that

24:59

for myself. Like little notes. Little notes and things. think

25:02

that's awesome. You know, I

25:04

don't, it's really easy for people, I

25:06

think, to fall into this sort of

25:08

like toxic positivity of just like, well,

25:10

I just do this little trick. There's

25:12

nothing tricky about it. And there's a

25:14

line there, you know, where like, I

25:16

feel like it becomes avoidance. And then

25:18

there's a, there's, but there's a different

25:20

track where it really becomes like really

25:22

engaging in just a way that, that

25:24

is understandable and accessible to each, you

25:26

know, each person's journey is different. Each

25:28

person's experience is different. Yeah. Do

25:30

you, do you medicate? Yeah,

25:33

so I yep. So I you

25:35

I take an antidepressant every day

25:37

and I'm really grateful for it.

25:39

I'm a big believer in medication

25:41

for for some people in general,

25:44

but I'm also a huge believer

25:46

in medication for for mental health.

25:48

Like as I have said for

25:50

years and years and years, if

25:52

you have a chronic illness, you

25:54

would go to the doctor and

25:57

get some medication to like take

25:59

care of that, right? Genetically.

26:02

I have high cholesterol. There's nothing

26:04

I can do about it. I've tried so

26:06

hard for years. I even went

26:08

so far as to literally dump everything

26:10

I like out of my diet

26:13

and lifestyle. It didn't work. So

26:15

I take a statin three times a week.

26:17

Right. No one listening to this

26:19

is like, oh, that's weird. No one, not

26:21

a single person would go, huh? What? Right?

26:23

If anything at all, they would say, oh,

26:25

well, you're kind of young for that. Or

26:27

that you look healthy. I don't know why

26:29

you would do that. I don't understand why

26:31

there would be a different response to mental

26:33

health, to like, I take whatever. I

26:36

deliberately don't talk about which medication I take, because

26:38

I don't want to influence other people to think,

26:41

oh, that's the one I want, because they're very

26:43

different from different people. I've said it, but I've

26:45

also said I went through a lot of them

26:47

that didn't work for that one work. But this

26:49

one may not work for you, and you might

26:51

need to get through five or six to get

26:53

to that one. It was a painful process. And

26:56

for me, You know,

26:58

I understand that exercise certainly helps with

27:00

mental health and communication and therapy and all

27:02

these things that you can do. And

27:04

some people say, well, you don't need there.

27:06

You don't need medication. Everyone

27:08

is different. Everyone is wired differently. And

27:10

for me, this is the first

27:13

thing that has made me feel

27:15

at least what I think normal is.

27:17

Yeah. And that's so interesting, right?

27:19

Like, I don't know what normal is.

27:21

I don't know. mean, I know

27:23

what I kind of know what it

27:25

looks like. And I've read about

27:28

it. Do you ever like look

27:30

at any friends while they're talking and

27:32

in the past or whatever and just

27:34

look at them and they don't know

27:36

you're thinking this, but you're going, I

27:38

wish I was as normal as you.

27:40

I wish I didn't freak out about

27:42

things like you. I wish that I

27:44

had this upbringing like you. I wish

27:46

that almost envious of people. Oh, dude,

27:48

one of my friends has the most

27:50

amazing parents. And he

27:52

loves them so much and they

27:54

love him back so hard and it's

27:56

so incredible. And every time I

27:58

just think, God, I wonder what that's

28:00

like. I wonder what

28:02

it's like to feel safe

28:04

and feel seen and feel worthy

28:06

and feel like you're enough.

28:08

Like I've had to look for

28:11

that myself and to dovetail

28:13

that on the talk of medication.

28:17

I have complex trauma. And

28:19

as a consequence of my

28:21

complex trauma, my brain has

28:23

changed and it does not

28:25

process neurochemicals the way

28:27

a non -traumatized brain would. So

28:29

I take medication to

28:31

help regulate that, just to

28:34

help the chemicals in my

28:36

brain that everybody has, just

28:38

be a bit more

28:40

even and work out a

28:42

little more like efficiently. And

28:45

I heard someone once say,

28:47

if your brain isn't making the

28:49

chemicals it needs, store bought

28:51

chemicals are entirely acceptable as an

28:53

alternative. I want to

28:55

hear what you use, not now, but

28:57

maybe after you tell me, I'm

28:59

just curious. But yeah, I've done that

29:01

too. I've had a lot of

29:03

friends where I'm like, you know, I've

29:05

had friends that, you know, are

29:08

really poor and didn't have a lot

29:10

growing up. And but a lot

29:12

of times I would feel like I

29:14

would switch with them in a

29:16

second because I would see that how

29:18

much love there was. in their

29:20

family and how much attention they got

29:22

or respect or listening to their

29:24

kids or things. And I would think

29:26

those things. I used to spend

29:29

the night at different friends' houses and

29:31

I didn't want to leave. I

29:33

would be at my friend David Eidemann's

29:35

for a week and his mother

29:37

would say, does your mother care that

29:39

you're here still? Yeah. And

29:41

she goes, no, she's fine. She won't, she

29:43

won't, she's fine with it. My

29:45

friend Danny Cutter, I didn't want to leave his house. My friend

29:47

Nate Shepard, I didn't want to leave his house. My friend Emil

29:49

Camacho, I didn't want to leave his house. And

29:52

growing up, you don't

29:54

think, a lot

29:56

of times you start blaming yourself for all these things

29:58

and why you're thinking this and it's not, and

30:02

then it's, that's why I

30:04

feel like therapy is so

30:06

important and why communication is,

30:08

and watching documentaries and understanding

30:10

the brain and understanding childhood

30:13

trauma and this and that.

30:15

Um, because then you could

30:17

say, then you could start getting into that

30:19

inner child thing and saying, Hey, it's okay and

30:21

all that. Somebody listening

30:23

to this needs to

30:25

hear this. You

30:27

are worthy. You

30:30

deserve to be happy.

30:32

You deserve to

30:34

live a full and

30:36

satisfying life. Million

30:38

percent. It

30:40

is absolutely

30:42

okay. to go ask

30:44

somebody for help. There's nothing wrong

30:46

with you. You're not broken. You're

30:49

not never going to get well. It's

30:52

a thing that I promise you, you are not

30:54

the first and you are not the last person

30:56

to go through this. And you

30:58

absolutely can pick up that phone call,

31:01

make, you know, pick up the phone, make the

31:03

call to talk to somebody. 100 percent. I think

31:05

people are, I think that was a big stigma.

31:07

And I think that's going the way in a

31:09

lot of ways. Yeah. It's all right. That's me

31:11

knocking. It's your phone. I don't give a shit.

31:13

Who cares about my phone? That's not the worst.

31:15

It's happened to it today on the way here

31:17

today. It fit. I was going up the on

31:20

ramp on the freeway and I jammed it into

31:22

the cup holder and the phone was like, I'm

31:24

going to fly out of the cup holder and

31:26

I'm going to go underneath the passenger seat into

31:28

that place where you can't reach. It always does

31:30

that. It knows how to piss you off. The

31:32

other thing, but when something falls, you go, how

31:34

the fuck did it get there? If you're going

31:37

to smuggle things around, honestly, just let them fall

31:39

under the seat. No one can ever grab them.

31:41

They just run away from you while you try

31:43

to pick up. I think they have a mind

31:45

of their own. Yeah, I was taking my nightly

31:47

pills before I go to bed and I dropped

31:49

one down and I put my hand down there

31:51

and I go, how is it not within a

31:53

foot or two feet of my hand? Isn't it

31:56

crazy how far away those things can bounce? somehow

31:58

rolled to the fucking wall. Yeah. And now it's

32:00

got lint and shit on it, dog hair. Yeah.

32:02

What? You did like a Mario World

32:04

double jump. What the hell? My

32:06

pill. Yeah. No, I'm

32:08

glad you said that. I'm glad you said that because

32:10

a lot of people need to hear it. And

32:12

a lot of people are like, what if I don't

32:14

want my therapist? You change your. You change your

32:16

therapist. It's very easy. You don't have to, especially with

32:19

the online stuff, because better helps the sponsor. And

32:21

it's like they make it easier for you, the people,

32:23

especially that have like, I don't know, am I

32:25

going to like this? Just just try it. Yeah. Just

32:27

try talking. I just think that. You know, if

32:29

I didn't let things out, like, you know, this morning

32:31

I was talking to my girlfriend and I just

32:33

started talking about my grandpa. Yeah. And she's

32:35

a great listener. And

32:37

I just was thinking about

32:39

him and it brought up things

32:41

about me and my life.

32:43

And it was almost like I

32:46

needed to talk about it. But

32:48

now I marked my calendar when I talked

32:50

to my therapist next because I really want

32:52

to get, you know, inside more,

32:54

I want it inside. But

32:57

no, I appreciate you've always been an

32:59

advocate for for mental health and all

33:01

that. And I, you know, I

33:03

think it's amazing. Do you

33:05

ever feel like and we're going to get

33:07

into its story time with Will Wheaton because

33:09

I'm very excited about this. I'm excited to.

33:11

Yeah, March 26. It's launching. I

33:14

know. I can't believe it. But did

33:16

you ever go through a phase where,

33:18

you know, as you're going through this

33:20

process of not

33:23

having any relationship with your family and

33:25

really just drawing a line and that's

33:27

the path that's done. I'm not having

33:29

anything to do with that. Did you

33:32

ever feel and I think we talked

33:34

about this a little bit. Did

33:36

you ever feel like because I

33:38

get I feel like when for me

33:40

it's I've always been guilted. Yeah,

33:42

it's your it's your blood. It's your

33:45

mother. It's your father. It's your

33:47

this. It's your that. And I'm just

33:49

this sap. And I guess and

33:51

I and I just like, oh, well,

33:53

you've been best friends with this

33:55

person. Well, you know, and it's almost

33:57

like it's making me feel bad

33:59

about myself like maybe in that spring

34:01

back childhood stuff. Did you ever

34:04

feel like you have those feelings? Absolutely.

34:06

In my family, I have one

34:08

relative. who loved me unconditionally,

34:10

who always supported me, who was

34:12

always there, who made me feel

34:14

like I mattered and made me

34:16

feel safe. And that was my

34:18

Aunt Val. And my

34:20

mother is

34:22

just a deeply

34:25

manipulative person. And

34:28

one of the times my

34:30

dad was super cruel and abusive

34:32

to me. And I stood

34:34

up for myself. He went off

34:36

on a big pout about

34:38

it. He had a big temper

34:40

tantrum about it. And my

34:42

mom sort of cornered me later

34:44

that day or maybe the

34:46

next day and said and accused

34:48

me of like hurting the

34:50

family. Right. And then said, you

34:52

know, Aunt Val always said

34:54

nothing's more important than family. And

34:57

at that moment, I

34:59

realized. My

35:01

mom is using the love that

35:03

I have for my great aunt

35:05

who has been gone for too

35:07

long to try and control me

35:09

and try to she's weaponizing the

35:11

love I have for my for

35:13

my great aunt the one person

35:15

the one the only person and

35:17

I was like how dare you

35:19

and I was I was I

35:21

was offended by that in a

35:23

way that all the other shit

35:25

they did didn't offend me and

35:30

I just remembered that when I was,

35:32

you know, I tried to, I

35:34

didn't want to walk away from my

35:37

family. I wanted to heal my

35:39

family. And I tried so hard. I

35:41

tried so hard. I wrote a

35:43

letter. I wrote lots of letters. And

35:45

I got on phone calls and

35:47

I said everything. It just wasn't ever

35:49

going to happen because they are

35:51

people for whom that will never, ever

35:53

happen. They're not wired that way.

35:55

They're not wired that way. And I

35:57

have said that it's God,

35:59

it sucks to not have parents.

36:01

It really hurts to not be part

36:04

of a family, but it hurts

36:06

more to Subject myself to the whims

36:08

of the people who are choosing

36:10

not to be loving parents But who

36:12

chose to be an abuser in

36:14

the case of my dad and someone

36:16

who just used me to have

36:18

things in the case of my mom

36:20

in spite of all of that

36:22

There were moments where I

36:24

wanted to call them to tell

36:27

them about things when my book

36:29

came out, which tells my whole

36:31

story that like, you know, tells

36:33

all about how awful they were. Still,

36:35

I was like, I got to

36:38

call my mom and dad when

36:40

I was getting ready to do

36:42

this podcast. And when we, you

36:44

know, we put out our announcement

36:46

and the response was so like

36:48

so overwhelming and so positive and

36:50

so much. the volume

36:52

of people was so much greater than

36:54

I anticipated, the instinct is call

36:56

the parents and tell them. And

36:58

it's still there. And I'm like, but

37:00

no. So when. That's

37:03

really interesting, by the way. Yeah.

37:05

And it's just, you know, I

37:07

mean, I think like it doesn't

37:09

mean that. You have forgotten or

37:11

you have forgiven or you hate

37:13

them or or or yeah, whatever

37:15

it is, right? It doesn't matter

37:17

what it doesn't matter what that

37:19

is. That is a supernatural impulse.

37:21

Everyone has parents. Every child has

37:23

a mom and a dad. And

37:26

like you want to share that

37:28

with them. And I like I've

37:30

just accepted that that, you know,

37:32

when I have that impulse. Call

37:34

your wife. I text my Star

37:36

Trek family. Inside

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inside. I

42:28

text my Star Trek family. Gates.

42:31

I text Gates and Frakes and Marina

42:33

and Brent and Patrick and Michael and

42:35

LeVar. Yesterday morning. That's

42:38

nice. So yesterday morning before

42:40

we announced, I texted

42:42

LeVar because this doesn't exist

42:44

without him. I texted him

42:46

and I said, I just

42:48

want you to know that

42:50

we're announcing today and I'm

42:53

excited and kind of nervous.

42:58

But this wouldn't exist without you.

43:01

This wouldn't exist if you hadn't believed in me,

43:03

if you hadn't said, I want you to

43:05

do this. This wouldn't exist if you hadn't said,

43:07

how can I help? And I said, I

43:09

just want you to know that if this goes

43:11

the way I really hope it does, it

43:13

could be the next thing in my life, right?

43:15

This could be my gig for a while.

43:17

This is something that I could do. And it

43:19

feels like it could matter to people. And

43:21

I just want to thank you for

43:23

being there for me. That's awesome. When

43:26

you didn't know that you were. I

43:30

could see a happy feeling when

43:33

we're talking about this. LeVar called me

43:35

last night. totally

43:39

unexpectedly and told me how proud

43:41

of me he was. What?

43:43

Yeah. And he was just like,

43:45

he said, he said, you're I couldn't

43:47

just text you. I had to

43:49

hear your voice. And

43:52

I could see you get emotional now.

43:54

Well, you know, the thing is like

43:56

twice in my life, I have felt

43:58

what I imagine it is like when

44:00

your parents love you and are proof

44:02

of you once was when Frakes was

44:04

on Ready Room. And

44:06

he told me how proud of me he was

44:09

at how much he loved the show. And just,

44:11

I don't know, he was curious about me and

44:13

about what I did and how I did

44:15

it. Isn't that weird to have that feeling? And

44:18

then last night, it felt that way from

44:20

LaVar. Did you get emotional last night? Yeah. Yeah,

44:23

but it just, when I got off the

44:25

phone, I said, I

44:27

was sitting out in my

44:29

game room playing Fallout

44:31

76, which has consumed

44:33

my life. And

44:36

I set the phone down and I just

44:38

put my arms around myself and I just

44:40

sat there and I was like, remember what

44:42

this feels like. Wow. Sit

44:44

in this, enjoy this, feel

44:46

this in your body. You

44:48

know, you have these feelings in

44:50

your heart and in your,

44:52

you know, arms feel weird and

44:54

like just there's a feeling

44:57

of joy and acceptance. And

44:59

I was like, this is

45:01

the closest you're ever going to

45:03

get, buddy. So,

45:05

like, love that feeling? See, that

45:07

just tells you how important it

45:10

is. It's so

45:12

easy just to love your kids, to

45:14

unconditionally love your kids. The

45:16

moment that you've been waiting for

45:18

your whole life, one or two

45:20

moments, happened from someone who wasn't

45:23

your mother or father. I

45:25

remember my grandfather sent me a

45:27

letter, and it was

45:29

just like, and he had this great

45:31

handwriting, or just such a...

45:33

And he just said, I just want

45:35

you to know how much how proud

45:37

we are of you, how much we

45:40

love you. And it really

45:42

doesn't matter what you do, Mike,

45:44

we just want to see you happy.

45:46

That's incredible. And this and I kept

45:48

it. And that's moments like that that

45:50

you go, it just

45:52

feels so good. There's

45:54

nothing that can replace

45:57

that feeling of unconditional

45:59

love. That is visceral. And.

46:02

I'm glad you got that. Bravo,

46:05

LeVar, too, for reaching out. Because

46:07

a lot of times, you

46:09

know, you'll text, hey, congrats, it's

46:11

awesome. And that's fine.

46:13

It's nice in our FaceTime

46:15

or Facebook or a

46:17

tweet. But

46:20

actually, someone's taking the time to say, I'm going

46:22

to call. I'm going to actually pick up

46:24

the phone. And I want you to hear this.

46:26

This is important. And

46:29

by the way, you know, you do have

46:31

a family. You have that family and you

46:33

have your own family. Yeah. So, you know,

46:35

you have plenty of people to call now.

46:37

Yeah. So that shouldn't be a problem. But

46:39

it's, yeah, I understand that feeling of like,

46:41

you know, you only get one of these,

46:43

you only get one of this. It's hard

46:45

because sometimes in your family, whether it's your

46:47

brothers or sisters or aunts or there's people

46:49

that you just don't really like. There's

46:52

it's it's it's okay. And

46:55

I keep telling myself it's okay. Talk to me

46:57

now about its story time with Wil Wheaton. How

46:59

did this, how did you come up with this?

47:02

A couple of years ago now, it was

47:04

a long time ago. One of my

47:06

oldest friends, who I've known since I was

47:08

a freshman in high school, texted

47:10

me that a story he

47:13

had written had been bought

47:15

by a magazine. He's

47:17

been writing since we were kids. And

47:19

it's not his primary profession, but

47:21

it is his passion. And

47:24

he's a great

47:26

storyteller and a talented

47:28

writer and just

47:30

never really found the

47:32

place that would

47:34

say yes. And this

47:36

place said yes. And I was so

47:38

excited for him. I grabbed the story

47:40

immediately. I read it and it's a

47:42

great story. And I loved it. And

47:45

I loved the way he wrote it.

47:47

And I loved how it was told.

47:53

This is weird. This is weird for

47:55

me. I know it is a thing

47:57

I have friends good friends that I

47:59

that I love that that just see

48:01

me as a person I'm not like

48:03

I'm sure you've experienced this there are

48:06

people who treat you like you and

48:08

then there are people who treat you

48:10

like the thing they see on TV

48:12

and it's very very very different and

48:14

He's one of my friends who has

48:16

never treated me like that thing from

48:18

TV and He really

48:20

likes it when I narrate audiobooks. Oh,

48:23

well, obviously, many people do. You've

48:25

only done hundreds. It has

48:27

told me how much he liked

48:29

it. And I just thought I'm just

48:31

going to quick and dirty. I'm just going to record

48:33

this and send it to him just as a

48:35

like, here you go. This is just for you, buddy,

48:37

just because you're my friend and I'm so proud

48:39

of you. Congratulations. I started

48:42

to do that. And then

48:44

just this voice kind of like leapt

48:46

like a little shadow version of me jumped

48:48

out and went, dude, Check

48:50

this out. You are

48:52

the narrator of the bestselling audiobook

48:54

of all time. a New York

48:57

Times bestselling audiobook narrator. People tell

48:59

you that they buy audiobooks because

49:01

you narrate them. What if you

49:03

used all of that privilege to

49:05

elevate the voices of writers that

49:07

haven't yet found their way into

49:10

the mainstream? What if

49:12

I used that skill that

49:14

I have that I've worked really

49:16

hard to develop to do

49:18

really great work But the

49:20

original material that forms the

49:22

basis of that work is coming

49:24

from people who may be

49:27

waiting for their break. Everybody

49:29

needs a break. Everybody just

49:31

needs that moment to get in,

49:33

right? So just like when

49:35

Felicia and I did tabletop, the

49:37

idea for tabletop sprung out

49:39

of me fully formed in like

49:41

four sentences. And I

49:43

was, by the time I was done saying what

49:45

it was going to be, I

49:48

realized that I had just I just designed

49:50

the entire show in my head in just a

49:52

matter of seconds because it just everything felt

49:54

right. I kind of intrinsically knew this is the

49:56

way to do this. And I had a

49:58

similar feeling about this when it was getting going.

50:00

So I I didn't record the thing. I

50:02

wrote up an email to my team and I

50:04

said, this is what I'm thinking. What do

50:06

you guys think? And like within and usually it's

50:08

a while before I hear back from people

50:11

because they're busy and I'm not their only client.

50:13

Right. I mean, it was like I

50:15

felt like I had I had not even hit send when

50:17

the responses started coming in. We're doing this. Let's get

50:19

going. Let's set up a meeting. This is amazing. I want

50:21

you to talk to. I want you to talk to.

50:23

I want you to talk. And it all just came together

50:25

right away. So I

50:27

thought, all right, I'm just going

50:29

to do this. I'm going to go

50:31

find some writers. And I spent

50:33

like eight months, nine months just going

50:36

through every like kind of emerging

50:38

writer market and and every indie publication

50:40

I could find and the stuff

50:42

that was great had already been published

50:44

and it was like already out

50:46

there and and I realized I'm not

50:48

good at this. I need an

50:50

editor. I need somebody to do this

50:52

and a good friend of mine

50:54

introduced me to Lynn and Michael Thomas

50:56

who are the editors of a

50:58

great speculative fiction magazine called Uncanny. And

51:00

I had a meeting with them

51:02

and I pitched them the show and

51:05

they were really excited. And I

51:07

said, okay, so to start, I

51:09

need to show the audience and I

51:11

need to show the people I'm hoping

51:13

are going to come pitch me that

51:15

this is real. So please

51:17

find me great speculative fiction. I don't

51:19

care who did it. I don't

51:21

care how popular it is. Just help

51:24

me find really great stuff. I

51:26

would prefer if it hadn't really landed

51:28

in the mainstream yet, just because

51:30

I kind of want to put it

51:32

there. And they were

51:34

like, great, got it. They came

51:36

back with stuff, and every piece

51:39

was amazing. And everything

51:41

was wonderful. And all

51:43

but two authors said, yeah, we'd love

51:45

for you to do this for us.

51:47

And the authors were excited and supportive. It

51:49

was important to me to pay them

51:52

for their work. It was important to me

51:54

to pay a little bit higher than

51:56

what the CIFWA per word rate is for

51:58

things like this. I didn't want

52:00

any rights. I didn't want anything at

52:02

all like that. I just wanted permission

52:04

to narrate their stories. And

52:06

as I started doing

52:09

that and going through that

52:11

process, I had been

52:13

listening to LaVar's podcast and I love

52:16

Lavar's podcast. And I

52:18

say in the introduction to the first

52:20

episode, like before we were family on

52:22

the enterprise together, I was a reading

52:24

rainbow kid. It's a huge reading rainbow.

52:26

Reading rainbow came to our set. I was

52:28

like, oh, my God, I can't believe this. And

52:31

and I and

52:33

I I just

52:35

thought, gosh, Lavar's

52:37

podcast is finished.

52:39

And there's space.

52:42

And I think I'm gonna try to

52:44

step into that space if he

52:46

says it's okay. We

52:48

had that conversation. And

52:50

all those things lined up, went

52:53

in and recorded everything.

52:55

How much? Recorded

52:57

10 stories. How long did

52:59

it take you? Two weeks. Two

53:02

weeks, 10 stories. And

53:04

went to edit it.

53:06

All the audio was bad. You

53:09

had to do it again? I had to do it all

53:11

over. Were you upset? No, I was thrilled. It's like I

53:13

got a dress rehearsal. I

53:15

was disappointed, right? I was like, bro, you had

53:17

one job. You know, that was a bummer. But,

53:20

you know, it wasn't a big deal. Right.

53:22

Just did it again. And it was like

53:24

I'd had a dress rehearsal that I didn't

53:26

know I So much better. So much better.

53:29

I asked a woman, her name is

53:31

Gabrielle DeCure. And she's one of

53:33

the founders of a company called Skyboat

53:35

that has done. Virtually every

53:37

book that I've done, all the

53:39

books I do for Scalzi and a

53:41

lot of the things that I've

53:44

done, all the books I've done for

53:46

Bill Gates, she directs. And we've

53:48

worked together for almost 20 years and

53:50

we have a great rapport and

53:52

a great creative relationship. And I asked

53:54

her if she would direct me

53:56

on these because she helps me. elevate

53:59

my performances. She catches things that

54:01

I miss. I catch things. That's

54:03

good to have that. Absolutely.

54:05

a really good creative partnership. So,

54:08

she reads it first and gets like the

54:10

idea in the direction so she knows. Yeah.

54:12

Right now, you should have a little more

54:14

energy because this is what's happening. Yeah. And

54:16

we talk about ahead of time, you know,

54:18

what are the motivations and who is this

54:20

person and who are you talking to and

54:22

things like that. Anyway, I brought her in

54:24

and we worked, we did

54:26

really good work together. And she knows

54:28

me and she knows my voice

54:30

and she knows my like she's been

54:32

there literally in the front row

54:34

for all of the work that I've

54:36

done. And we were getting ready

54:38

to finish episode one of the podcast

54:40

and master it and put it

54:42

up for like, you know, to be

54:44

uploaded next week. And how long

54:46

is it? It's about 46 minutes, I

54:48

think. So I wanted it to be

54:50

less than an hour. I wanted to give... I love that.

54:52

I wanted it to be something that you can listen to

54:54

on your lunch break. You can listen to it on your

54:57

commute. You can listen to it on your morning. That's

54:59

why I do hour episodes. You

55:02

know, that's what I like. There's podcasts that

55:04

I love. I'm a huge fan of behind

55:06

the bastards, but it's difficult to set aside

55:08

90 minutes for something or three hours. Oh,

55:10

man, you're talking to someone who is an

55:13

old school Dan Carlin's hardcore history fan and

55:15

I'd be like seven hours. What are you

55:17

doing? This isn't the podcast. This is a

55:19

university course. Yeah. So Gabrielle said

55:21

to me as it was getting ready to

55:23

go out, she's like, I just I need

55:25

you to know that we've done a lot

55:27

of work together and I think this is

55:29

the best work you've ever done. And

55:31

I feel like I've done really good work in the

55:33

past. And to hear that

55:36

from someone who knows me, right? And

55:38

like after it's finished, right? It's not like

55:40

I'm saying this to motivate you, right?

55:42

It's just like, I just want you to

55:44

know this. It's

55:46

hard for me to take that and internalize it

55:48

and hold on to it because there's a big

55:50

part of me that really believes that's not true.

55:52

They're all going to laugh at you. You know,

55:54

they're nobody's telling you the truth. They're all lying

55:56

to you because they just want to like make

55:58

money off of you or whatever. But

56:01

we've been worked together long enough that I trust her. So

56:03

she's never said that. Never. And I'm not so I'm

56:05

not willing to like get out over my skis and

56:07

be like, look at how great I am. But I

56:09

am willing to accept the possibility that I that it

56:11

doesn't suck. That's awesome. That

56:14

it's that it's that it's good stuff. And

56:16

this comes. I love that I wish there

56:18

was. I mean, there's

56:20

so many great writers out there and

56:22

they'll never be heard. Yeah. And

56:24

just like I think a lot of

56:26

actors and, you know, I think

56:28

that's such a beautiful thing for the

56:30

arts and for artists out there

56:32

and people who want to express themselves

56:34

and people who have passions but

56:36

work nine to five jobs that they

56:39

don't necessarily love. But this is

56:41

their passion. And. It will remain their

56:43

passion, but having somewhere for a

56:45

platform to be heard is is so

56:47

rare. You don't you don't see

56:49

that. So I hope people really support

56:51

that. I hope so, too. The

56:54

the material that I am

56:56

pulling from is short speculative fiction,

56:58

and the short speculative fiction

57:00

market at this moment is really

57:02

struggling. the just it's hard

57:04

for the magazines to stay afloat.

57:06

And because the magazines are

57:08

struggling to stay afloat, nobody's really

57:10

like the, I don't want

57:12

to say nobody, but the the

57:14

opportunity for writers to get

57:16

paid for their work is just

57:18

it's already difficult is even

57:20

more difficult because there are not

57:22

as many places for them

57:24

to get published. And it

57:26

is my hope that by

57:28

pulling from the short speculative fiction

57:30

markets specifically. that it

57:32

helps bring a little bit of awareness

57:34

and a little bit of visibility

57:36

that uncanny and light speed and on

57:39

spec and Clark's world and these

57:41

just these wonderful online publications that I'm

57:43

crazy about that they see a

57:45

growth in their subscriber base and that

57:47

that people may go there because

57:49

they liked one of the stories that

57:51

I read and then they find

57:53

all this other stuff that's just as

57:55

great. See I think this is

57:57

important because a lot of times what

57:59

you see what you hear what

58:01

you read It's sort of along the

58:03

same lines. Yeah, it's sort of

58:05

like you're almost. There

58:07

are certain things that

58:09

can differentiate themselves. People

58:12

can differentiate themselves from other

58:14

people, but like now you're

58:16

opening up another. whole

58:19

world of this, in a

58:21

way. In business, I think that

58:23

there is an understandable and

58:25

defendable desire to stick with what's

58:28

familiar. That's what I was

58:30

trying to articulate, but I couldn't.

58:32

Because, well, it's just, oh,

58:34

I already sold ads for this. I know how to sell

58:36

it, right? I had meetings with

58:39

people about this and they didn't see it.

58:41

They just didn't get it. And it was

58:43

so interesting to talk to people who

58:45

didn't get it and to see how limited

58:47

they were in their thinking and how

58:49

unwilling they were to take a risk. So

58:52

I financed this completely on my

58:54

own and I believe in it

58:56

so strongly and I believe in

58:58

doing it the way I want

59:00

to do it with the people

59:02

I want to do it with,

59:04

with the material that I wanted

59:07

to use that there is an

59:09

audience that will love it. And

59:11

I just hope that we find

59:13

it. And when we find that

59:15

audience, then I can take it

59:17

to people who six months ago

59:19

would have said, well, I need

59:21

it to be more like this.

59:24

I need it to be not an audiobook podcast. I

59:26

need it to be a you talking about current

59:28

events podcast. I'm like, wait, that's not what I want

59:30

to do. that I can go back to

59:32

them and say, so like, this is what we did and this is

59:34

what it looks like. And would you like to be part of this

59:36

moving forward? Would you, you know, do you

59:38

want to, you want to get a piece of this?

59:40

And hopefully they're like, yes, please. Because

59:43

it just means that we get, that we

59:45

just get to do more. This

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1:01:11

myself, We work hard and to

1:01:13

get somewhere, that's the goal. But sometimes

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we get into a rut and we don't

1:01:17

know what to do. We

1:01:19

could talk to our friends, but

1:01:22

they don't know anything. They're

1:01:24

not experienced. They're not trained specialists

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1:01:28

They're not career coaches and career

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1:01:32

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1:01:34

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I started doing was I got a

1:01:39

whiteboard and scheduling my events for the

1:01:41

week. I write a list of all

1:01:43

the things I need to do. And

1:01:45

my career coach says, just circle

1:01:47

three of them and get those

1:01:49

done for the week and then

1:01:51

off to the next three and

1:01:53

things I want to do with

1:01:55

my health. There's so many little

1:01:57

things that I've learned by. career

1:01:59

coaching that have helped me throughout

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1:02:38

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1:02:40

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1:02:42

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1:02:44

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1:02:46

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your career success shouldn't

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wait. So

1:03:13

you want to do more so you

1:03:15

this is like the first season essentially the

1:03:17

first season and it's very much it's

1:03:19

it was I Think of it as a

1:03:21

pilot season, you know when you do

1:03:23

a pilot for a show you figure things

1:03:25

out you you build yes, you build

1:03:27

yourself and and and Nothing, yeah is exactly

1:03:29

like the pilot right like just you

1:03:31

have to do so much you have to

1:03:33

lay so much It's it's it's its

1:03:35

own thing, which is why when I see

1:03:37

a pilot that's like Also

1:03:40

legitimately great on its own. It blows

1:03:42

my mind. It's like, how did they do

1:03:44

that? Yeah. How did you do a

1:03:46

pilot like that? That's crazy. Yeah. So

1:03:49

this whole season is just to see. I'm

1:03:51

just saying, hey, audience, I made a thing. Are you there?

1:03:54

And hopefully the audience says we sure are.

1:03:56

And then it's just going get better and

1:03:58

better. And then I can then I can

1:04:00

take that as a thing that's kind of

1:04:02

packaged and finished. and pitch that rather than

1:04:04

having to have a negotiation about what it's

1:04:06

going to look like. I really wanted to. I

1:04:10

wanted to have something that was mine. I

1:04:13

love, love, love, love doing other

1:04:15

people's work and I'm so grateful for

1:04:17

it. I hosting the ready room

1:04:19

was the greatest job I have ever

1:04:21

had. I loved it. It was

1:04:23

very much at the pleasure of Paramount

1:04:25

Plus or CBS or whoever they

1:04:27

get sold to. which

1:04:30

means until strange new worlds drops, whenever

1:04:32

they decide to drop it, I don't know

1:04:34

if I'm going to get to go

1:04:36

back in and do that again. I don't

1:04:38

know if this thing that I love

1:04:40

so much is going to just be, is

1:04:43

just going to be unavailable to me

1:04:45

for the rest of my life. I

1:04:48

love that. This is

1:04:50

my choice. This is my

1:04:52

doesn't feel good. It doesn't feel good.

1:04:54

It does. It's story time is mine. And

1:04:57

and and it is it's it's

1:04:59

mine even more than tabletop was

1:05:01

because tabletop by Felicia and I

1:05:03

shared tabletop and I no regrets.

1:05:05

I'm thrilled. I'm fiercely proud of

1:05:07

our creative partnership and so intensely

1:05:09

grateful. And every time I talk

1:05:11

about tabletop, I need to point

1:05:13

out, especially for the men in

1:05:15

the audience, I am the only

1:05:17

dude involved in the product involved

1:05:19

in the development of tabletop. It

1:05:21

was all women and all the

1:05:23

incredibly good ideas. came out of

1:05:25

Jen Arnold and Sherry Bryant and

1:05:27

Felicia Day and Kim Evie. A

1:05:29

few ideas came out of me.

1:05:31

So you just like the dumb

1:05:33

guy? Dude, I

1:05:35

just learned that, look,

1:05:37

on balance, I would

1:05:39

rather work with women.

1:05:42

Yeah. Just for a

1:05:44

woman to... have the same

1:05:46

opportunity and access that an

1:05:49

untalented or mediocre man has,

1:05:51

she has to work so

1:05:53

hard. So when we

1:05:55

have the privilege of being joined

1:05:57

by incredibly talented women to

1:05:59

work with us, like just grab

1:06:01

it. So anyway, we

1:06:03

were coming out of Tabletop, it was

1:06:05

heartbreaking to lose control of that to legendary

1:06:07

and we tried to buy it back.

1:06:09

Ledger is like, we're never going to do

1:06:12

anything with this. We're not going to

1:06:14

re -release it. We're not going to do

1:06:16

anything. It's a dead property as far as

1:06:18

we're concerned. No, we will not sell

1:06:20

it to you. I've been

1:06:22

trying to get something back

1:06:24

forever. It's bizarre. We

1:06:27

sold it to Sony. We

1:06:29

sold it to Happy Madison. And

1:06:31

then ultimately it didn't get

1:06:33

made. Yeah. And

1:06:35

it's like I have fought for years. I

1:06:38

finally got to a point where they said, you

1:06:40

can go out with it. Yeah, we get

1:06:42

a piece of it. OK. So it's like, OK,

1:06:44

but it took. And so, yeah, but

1:06:46

I never understood that it should be in the

1:06:49

clause. I think you should say, hey, if

1:06:51

we go out with this. Yeah. And

1:06:53

we don't sell it. And if

1:06:55

you paid me, if I pay you

1:06:57

back plus interest, that money, I

1:06:59

can have the project back. Period.

1:07:01

Yeah. The thing is, if

1:07:03

you talk to a creative person, the creative

1:07:05

person would be like, yeah, I want you to

1:07:07

have your thing. The creative person is going

1:07:09

to support you getting out there and being creative,

1:07:11

right? We just don't

1:07:13

deal with creative people anymore. We're talking

1:07:15

that we're talking to MBAs and gross

1:07:17

venture capital bros. It's story time with

1:07:20

Wil Wheaton. Check this out. This is

1:07:22

such a cool, not only a cool

1:07:24

project, but an important one. And I

1:07:26

love that you had the balls. to

1:07:28

to go out and do something

1:07:30

like this and just giving it's giving

1:07:32

back to me It's giving back

1:07:34

and it's allowing people to hear from

1:07:36

the unheard sometimes. I really hope

1:07:38

so. It is my dream that

1:07:41

we highlight and we elevate and

1:07:43

we celebrate writers and short fiction and

1:07:45

a year from now or two

1:07:47

years from now. One of the writers

1:07:49

who we played for for the

1:07:51

very first time on the show that

1:07:53

I narrated their thing. Maybe they're

1:07:55

signing a deal for an IP or

1:07:57

something like that. And then they're

1:07:59

going to forget that. Wouldn't that be

1:08:01

cool? I would I would I

1:08:03

would love that. It's funny because I have an idea.

1:08:05

I'll tell you after because I haven't like I haven't pitched

1:08:07

it yet. But. I have this

1:08:09

idea, too. That it's something like that.

1:08:11

You'll get it. But all right, this

1:08:13

is called Shit Talking with Will Wheaton,

1:08:16

patreon.com. Thank you for all of you

1:08:18

that listen and support the podcast. And

1:08:20

here are some people with questions. Rapid

1:08:22

fire. Let's do it. Yeah, go. If you

1:08:24

could send a question to Alien Civilization and they

1:08:27

could reply with one word, what would you

1:08:29

ask? Will you come save us? I

1:08:31

was going to say that. I was going to

1:08:33

say, will you help us? Isn't

1:08:35

that funny? Will you help us? Because

1:08:37

if it's one word, it's like yes or no.

1:08:39

Yes or no. Yeah. And

1:08:41

we don't have to ask them if they exist because

1:08:43

they're answering us. Because they're answering us. Yeah. How

1:08:46

do you deal with writer's block,

1:08:48

if any? I take walks. When

1:08:51

I get writer's block and it happens all

1:08:53

the time. So there's a moment in my writing

1:08:55

process where this is terrible. Why was I

1:08:57

even doing this? What is wrong with me? Why

1:08:59

do I? I'm the worst. I should never

1:09:01

try to do this again. I should throw this

1:09:03

away. I should print it out and burn

1:09:05

it. When that happens, I know that it is

1:09:07

the creative part of me saying you're so

1:09:10

close to being done. That's good.

1:09:12

You're almost there. You're almost through the draft. And when

1:09:14

that happens, I go for a walk. I get

1:09:16

out. I talk it out. I

1:09:18

move around and sometimes

1:09:20

that breaks it and

1:09:22

sometimes it doesn't. My

1:09:24

my ability to be

1:09:26

creative. is predicated on me

1:09:28

being able to swim in an ocean

1:09:30

of ideas and inspiration and that ocean

1:09:32

has a tide and I stand at

1:09:34

the shore and when the tide is

1:09:36

in I can get in that water

1:09:38

so easily and I can just take

1:09:40

a little dive in and get all

1:09:42

the stuff I need but when that

1:09:45

tide goes out I can't force

1:09:47

that tide to come back in. I can try to

1:09:49

walk down to it. I can try to get close

1:09:51

to it, but then I'm only in a few inches

1:09:53

of water and kind of like whatever comes out of

1:09:55

that is muddy and gross and not what I want.

1:09:57

I've learned that it's best to wait for that tide

1:09:59

to come back in and it's gonna come in on

1:10:01

its own. I cannot force it.

1:10:03

Good, that's experience. That's what that

1:10:05

is. You learn from experience. For me,

1:10:08

when I write something, I'm like,

1:10:10

oh, this is fucking great. This

1:10:12

is really good. I go, you

1:10:14

know what? I'm going to send it

1:10:16

to my friend, Nick, because he'll probably

1:10:18

shit on it. Yeah. And then I'll

1:10:20

know if it's good or not. You

1:10:22

know, when it comes to writer's block,

1:10:24

yeah, I sort of, it depends

1:10:26

if I keep coming back and back and

1:10:28

I can't, then I'm like, well, maybe this story

1:10:30

isn't meant to be told. Maybe it's not

1:10:32

as good as I thought. But I give it

1:10:35

time, but it's also very hard. Let's see.

1:10:37

Would you ever consider writing or directing future Star

1:10:39

Trek projects? Yeah. I'm not directing. I don't

1:10:41

have any experience there. That's not my skill set.

1:10:43

There's people who are really good at it.

1:10:45

But writing, I know how to do. I've

1:10:48

written lots of Star Trek fan fiction

1:10:50

in my life. And if I had

1:10:52

the privilege, honestly, just to sit in

1:10:54

their room and observe and watch how

1:10:56

they do it. Oh, my God,

1:10:58

what a gift that would be. Yeah.

1:11:00

The closest I've come so far is that

1:11:02

I got to write for the Star

1:11:04

Trek comic book. And I got to write

1:11:06

a Wesley Crusher story for the Star

1:11:08

Trek comic book that was set during Picard

1:11:10

season three. And it was really wonderful

1:11:12

and really exciting. And it gave me just

1:11:14

a little taste of what it is

1:11:16

like to go through the Star Trek approval

1:11:18

process. It's complicated, man. I can't even

1:11:20

imagine. There's so many talented actors in Star

1:11:22

Trek who gave you the best advice.

1:11:24

Who were you the most close with? Who

1:11:26

intimidated you? I was intimidated

1:11:28

by everyone until I wasn't. I

1:11:31

got great advice from everyone. at

1:11:34

various points during all of

1:11:36

those years. One

1:11:38

of the things that I'm super

1:11:40

aware of is that Patrick Stewart

1:11:42

made me a better actor just

1:11:45

by being in scenes with me. It

1:11:47

was probably 1988 or 1989,

1:11:50

first or second season, or

1:11:53

actually, no, second or third season. I

1:11:56

heard an interview with someone who had

1:11:58

played hockey with Wayne Gretzky. And

1:12:01

by the way, Gretzky's mega heel turn

1:12:03

breaks my heart. And

1:12:05

he, and it's awful

1:12:07

that Vladimir Putin's super good buddy, Ovechkin,

1:12:09

is going to be the guy

1:12:11

to break Gretzky's record. Like, can we

1:12:14

just reestablish Gordy Howe, please? Because

1:12:16

at least he's, if he was problematic,

1:12:18

we don't know about it. Anyway,

1:12:20

somebody said, somebody said, when I play

1:12:22

with Gretzky, I'm a better hockey

1:12:24

player because. You do not want

1:12:26

to be that one guy on the ice who's

1:12:28

not ready. You don't want to be the

1:12:30

one guy who he knows you're open before you

1:12:32

do. He knows that you have a shot before

1:12:34

you have even crossed the blue line. Be

1:12:37

ready. So you're ready. You're prepared

1:12:39

and you're focused and you're dialed

1:12:41

in. I would work

1:12:43

hard to get to that

1:12:45

point. And I learned

1:12:47

it. from being in scenes with Patrick and

1:12:49

they never, no one in next -gen ever

1:12:51

made me feel like I didn't deserve to

1:12:53

be there or like I was a dumb

1:12:55

kid or that I was an obnoxious kid

1:12:58

or anything like that. They were all wonderful

1:13:00

to me. But just by existing the

1:13:02

way that he did and carrying himself the way that

1:13:04

he did, I just like, I don't want to let this

1:13:06

guy down. I don't want to

1:13:08

be the weak link in this scene. No,

1:13:10

I have been there. I have been

1:13:12

there where I just want to, I want

1:13:14

to fit in. That's it. I just

1:13:16

want him to look at me go, okay.

1:13:18

Yeah, you're good. Yeah, I've had that

1:13:20

with a few actors. Many

1:13:23

people look up to you for your honesty

1:13:25

about mental health, which obviously you've done today. Does

1:13:27

that ever feel like a burden or does

1:13:29

it empower you? It feels like

1:13:31

a really important responsibility. I

1:13:33

feel like I'm a little bit of

1:13:35

a caretaker and. In

1:13:40

December. Just

1:13:43

the reality of what we're looking

1:13:45

at for hopefully only four years.

1:13:48

really crashed down on me really, really hard. And

1:13:51

I thought, I can't do this podcast. It's

1:13:53

frivolous. Like, I need to be doing really

1:13:55

important good work. And

1:13:57

as I was saying that, I was like,

1:13:59

sitting like this. And I looked down and

1:14:01

I have this tattoo. It's

1:14:04

from Mr. Rogers and it says, look for the

1:14:06

helpers. And I got it

1:14:08

during the first term presidency to remind myself that

1:14:10

when things are bad, you look for the helpers. When

1:14:13

things are, you know, when things are scary, you always

1:14:15

look for the helpers and you are reminded. There

1:14:17

are people who want to help. Yeah. People who want to

1:14:19

make things better. One of

1:14:21

the ways I can be a helper

1:14:23

is to provide an escape and a break

1:14:25

and a reprieve from all of that.

1:14:27

Right. And I can do that by telling

1:14:30

stories. And I can do that by

1:14:32

and I hear this from people all the time.

1:14:34

Your voice is soothing. Your voice makes me feel

1:14:36

comfortable like the way you tell stories. I like

1:14:38

that. It feels like it

1:14:40

is a gift. It is a

1:14:42

privilege. It is also a responsibility. Sure,

1:14:45

I am trying so hard to be

1:14:47

the person that I always needed in

1:14:49

the world and the person I needed

1:14:51

in the world was a person who

1:14:53

said mental mental illness is not a

1:14:55

big deal You didn't choose it. You

1:14:57

didn't do anything. You're not wrong. You're

1:14:59

not weak. You're not dumb This is

1:15:01

a thing that just happened to you

1:15:03

and like you can get better. I

1:15:05

got better The shit I have been

1:15:08

through the shit that I that I

1:15:10

survived if I can survive this stuff

1:15:12

I promise you that you

1:15:14

can survive whatever your thing is. And

1:15:16

I'm grateful for that. I'm really, really grateful

1:15:18

for that. I don't take it for granted.

1:15:20

I don't want it to be the beginning

1:15:22

and end of me, but I know it's

1:15:24

a big part of my life. And

1:15:27

had I heard someone who

1:15:29

I trusted and respected, who had

1:15:31

credibility with me, talking about

1:15:34

how mental health is just a

1:15:36

thing, it's just not a

1:15:38

weird thing to be ashamed of

1:15:40

or to be to be

1:15:42

weird about. Had

1:15:44

I had that voice in my head

1:15:46

instead of my mom telling me how

1:15:49

embarrassed I should be and how shameful

1:15:51

it was and what a betrayal of

1:15:53

the family it would be if anyone

1:15:55

knew and how I should just try

1:15:57

harder to be cheerful. Like

1:15:59

if I had had support instead of that,

1:16:01

I wouldn't have suffered for a really

1:16:03

long time. I am trying so hard to

1:16:05

be the person that I have always

1:16:07

needed in the world. And if

1:16:09

I can be that person for

1:16:11

myself, I occasionally am that for someone

1:16:14

else. So whoever asked that, just

1:16:16

thank you for the opportunity. to

1:16:18

be a helper. Did I not say? Oh,

1:16:20

that was April Roller Morris. Thanks,

1:16:22

April. And I meet people at

1:16:24

cons all the time who are

1:16:27

also trauma survivors. And

1:16:29

it's like we know Matty Sype was

1:16:31

the writer's block one. Oh, thanks,

1:16:33

man. And directing Jason Jeter. Thank you.

1:16:35

Thanks, Jason. Yes. There

1:16:37

we go. Sorry. I didn't say their

1:16:39

names. So I, you know, people tell me

1:16:41

just like I'm a survivor too. That's

1:16:43

all you have to say. Right. And like,

1:16:45

sometimes you don't even have to, like

1:16:47

we just know. And I tell people, and

1:16:49

I mean this, I'm sorry that you know

1:16:51

the secret handshake. I wish that

1:16:53

neither one of us knew the secret handshake. But

1:16:56

there is a club that we get to walk

1:16:58

into because we know that secret handshake and we're

1:17:01

all in that club together. that makes us cool.

1:17:03

And it makes us it makes me feel less

1:17:05

lonely and it makes me feel less weird and

1:17:07

afraid. I think that's beautiful. I'll

1:17:10

leave you with this. I just remember

1:17:12

you were talking about helpers.

1:17:15

Yeah. I just felt like,

1:17:18

you know, when you die, whatever you believe

1:17:20

when you die, but if you die and

1:17:22

you go to the pearly gates and St.

1:17:24

Peter's there or you talking to God or

1:17:26

whatever, I always feel like

1:17:28

they're gonna say, Hey, did you help

1:17:30

your fellow man? Did

1:17:32

you look out for him? Did

1:17:34

you try to help someone? And

1:17:37

those are the, I think the important

1:17:39

things like that I think of is like,

1:17:41

how can I help someone? How

1:17:43

could I make someone feel better

1:17:45

about themselves? How could I? The

1:17:48

little things because we get so

1:17:51

caught up in everything It's those

1:17:53

little things that really Make you

1:17:55

feel whole Every one of us

1:17:57

has the opportunity to be a

1:17:59

helper multiple times a day. Yeah,

1:18:02

it's just a choice that we make I

1:18:04

100 percent. All right, look, this I could talk

1:18:06

to you forever. This is awesome. I love

1:18:08

what you're doing. Thank you so much. I love

1:18:10

talking to you. It's always a treat. You're

1:18:12

such a I mean, your energy is just right

1:18:14

when you come to the house playing with

1:18:16

the dogs. Your dogs are great. Yeah, I love

1:18:18

my boy. Do I love your dogs? My

1:18:20

dogs going to be super bummed when I go

1:18:22

home. Oh, by the way. Yep. How many

1:18:24

dogs do you have? I just have one Marlowe.

1:18:26

Oh, yeah. Marlowe. Yeah. What do

1:18:28

we have for Marlowe? So this is. This

1:18:32

is from Marlowe. This is my new product,

1:18:34

Rosie's Puppy Fresh Breath. Oh my goodness. you

1:18:36

just put a cap in your dog's water

1:18:38

the morning and it's odorless, tasteless, and your

1:18:40

dog's breath will get better. I that. And

1:18:42

it's like my dog's on there. Oh my

1:18:44

god, that's great. Yeah. Bravo. Made in the

1:18:46

USA. Way to go, dude. Hey, man. That

1:18:48

doesn't happen anymore. No, it doesn't happen much.

1:18:51

That's great. I love your dogs. That's wonderful.

1:18:53

Will, you're amazing. Thanks for being here. Hey,

1:18:55

thank you so much for having me. It's

1:18:57

been wonderful to come back. Awesome. Will you

1:18:59

come back again? Absolutely. This

1:19:04

episode is brought to you by

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learn more. What

1:19:31

a guy. A

1:19:33

consummate podcast guest. Yes. Can

1:19:36

you fix this? Understand the assignment. Yeah. What's

1:19:38

it? There you go. Perfect.

1:19:40

A little crooked. My OCD kicked in. But yeah,

1:19:42

he's a great guest because you always know you're

1:19:45

going to get the genuine side of him. And

1:19:47

there's only one side of him. It's genuine. You're

1:19:49

going to get the juice. You got

1:19:51

to get the juice. So Will, you're the

1:19:53

best. Thanks for being here. And

1:19:56

thank you guys for being here. If you'd like

1:19:58

to interview again, subscribe, follow at.

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Inside of you podcast on Instagram

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patron dot com slash inside you

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and right now we're going to read

1:20:12

the top tiers. That

1:20:15

have been supporting this podcast that this is

1:20:17

the how deep is your love to you this

1:20:19

is the top tier this is the. There's,

1:20:21

you know, it's just a bunch

1:20:23

of good people supporting a show that

1:20:25

I care about and I care

1:20:28

about you guys. So here we go.

1:20:30

Nancy D. Little Lisa, you Kiko

1:20:32

Brian H. My eighties concert

1:20:34

buddy, Nico P. Zack. You're

1:20:36

killing it. Running like the

1:20:38

wind brother. Nancy, do you

1:20:40

haven't seen you in a while? You've

1:20:42

been traveling a lot with those

1:20:44

supernatural conventions. Little Lisa, you're the best.

1:20:46

Got your package. You're you're simply

1:20:48

the best. Yukiko,

1:20:51

I miss you. Rob. I.

1:20:55

Isn't it rabbi? We keep having

1:20:57

this conversation. Is that an I? No

1:21:00

one is correct. Someone. I

1:21:02

think that's Rob. I. It's Rob.

1:21:04

I. It has always said Rob.

1:21:06

I. We always say Rob. I.

1:21:08

You're my Rob. I. I love

1:21:10

you, Rob. Jason Dreamweaver. Always love

1:21:12

hearing from you. Sweet Sophia. Um.

1:21:15

Always the best. I always wish her

1:21:17

the best. She's, uh, she's working on herself

1:21:19

like the rest of us, just working

1:21:21

on ourselves, trying to get better Raj. Just

1:21:23

sent me a note. Um, did you

1:21:25

get the, uh, the top tier,

1:21:27

the, uh, did you get the, uh,

1:21:29

five year? He's been around for five years

1:21:31

on the patron and I sent the

1:21:34

five years something special. So if you're a

1:21:36

five year, you're getting something

1:21:38

special. And if you're, um, Another

1:21:41

chair, you're still going to get special shit,

1:21:43

too. So Raj gave me tasty cakes in

1:21:45

New Jersey. Such a gem. And I

1:21:47

froze them and there was a couple of months where

1:21:49

I forgot about them. And you ate them later? I

1:21:51

mean, I just finished them in the last

1:21:53

couple of weeks. Is it good? Frozen. Incredible.

1:21:55

Thank you, Raj. Wow. Yeah. Stacey

1:21:57

L and Jennifer and Jennifer and

1:21:59

Stacey L. She's been here for

1:22:02

they've been here for a while.

1:22:04

Jamal F. Love Jamal

1:22:06

F. Janelle B. Of

1:22:08

course, Mike, Mike. How the hell

1:22:10

are you? Eldon Sopremo has been here

1:22:12

forever. 99 more.

1:22:14

Santiago M. Love, Santi. Maddie

1:22:17

S. Maddie Sype.

1:22:19

She's amazing. And

1:22:21

Kendrick F. Of course,

1:22:24

been here. Kendrick F's been here forever.

1:22:26

I just sent Kendrick F. And

1:22:28

Belinda N. Belinda now,

1:22:30

Dave Hull. Dave. Dave Hull.

1:22:32

We love you, Dave. Brad

1:22:34

D. You can't forget Brad D. Ray

1:22:36

Harada. A

1:22:38

child she's raising and living in

1:22:40

Japan and we miss her.

1:22:43

Tabitha tea is just a wonderful

1:22:45

soul. Why don't you say a few

1:22:47

names? I will. I don't know any of

1:22:49

you personally, but I'll just read your names. Give

1:22:51

them a little action. Tom

1:22:54

and. Oh, yes. Talia M.

1:22:56

Talia Betsy D. I love my

1:22:58

Betsy D. Rhian

1:23:00

and C. Rhian and

1:23:02

C, like the

1:23:04

wind. Michelle A. Michelle.

1:23:06

Jeremy C. Jeremy

1:23:08

C, OK. Eugene

1:23:11

and Leah. Oh, man, Eugene and Leah.

1:23:13

You know I love some me.

1:23:15

Me, some Eugene and Leah. Oh, yeah,

1:23:17

of course. Mel S

1:23:19

or Mel's. Mel's. We love

1:23:21

our Mel. Eric

1:23:24

H. Eric H. Gosh,

1:23:26

thank you, Eric. Amanda

1:23:28

R. Amanda. Kevin

1:23:32

E. Oh, yeah, Kevin E. And

1:23:34

don't forget Jor -El. Jor -El's been here

1:23:36

forever in Jam and J. Sweet

1:23:38

Jam and J. Sweet Leanne J.

1:23:40

Luna R. Jules M. Jessica

1:23:43

B. Jules have been here forever. So

1:23:45

is Luna and Jessica. Kaley

1:23:47

J. Love the name

1:23:49

Kaley. Mm -hmm. Charlene sweet

1:23:51

Charlene or was that

1:23:54

sweet Caroline sweet? Yeah, yeah,

1:23:56

Mary and Louise L.

1:23:59

You're the best, you

1:24:01

know that Romeo the

1:24:03

band of course Jen

1:24:05

T Love your music

1:24:08

Jen April R April

1:24:10

Randy s Randy Randall

1:24:12

Randall Pink Floyd Claudia

1:24:15

beautiful Claudia you and

1:24:17

your mother. I love you

1:24:19

guys Rachel D is

1:24:22

the best Nick W Nick

1:24:24

Stephanie and Evan Stefan.

1:24:26

Yeah, we love Stephanie and

1:24:28

Evan and Don Giovanni

1:24:31

lovely Don Giovanni Jenny B

1:24:33

7 6 been here

1:24:35

forever. We love you Tina

1:24:37

E Tina Tina talking

1:24:40

Tina and G Tracy Keith

1:24:42

B It's all that

1:24:44

needs to be said about

1:24:46

Keith. Just Keith, behave yourself. Heather

1:24:49

and Greg, Grether. See you soon. Love

1:24:51

them. L .E .K. Ben

1:24:54

B. Ben. Ben B.

1:24:56

Jamin. Pierre C. Sultan. Sultan

1:24:59

of swing. Ingrid

1:25:01

C. Dave T. David

1:25:04

L. Kind of

1:25:06

newbies, but not really. Now just part

1:25:08

of the family. Dave T. and David

1:25:10

L. Jeff G. Kareem

1:25:16

H. You guys just sent

1:25:18

Kareem something too. And Brian B. Don't

1:25:20

forget Brian B. We love you from the

1:25:22

Hollywood Hills in Hollywood, California. I'm Michael Rosenbaum. I'm

1:25:24

Ryan Taze. Yes, little wave of the camera.

1:25:26

We love you. Thank you so much for being

1:25:28

here and supporting us and we will see

1:25:30

you next week. Be good to yourself. Bravo

1:25:35

TV star Lala Kent holds nothing back.

1:25:37

There's been so many times where I'm like,

1:25:39

I apologize that I said that, but

1:25:41

that wasn't meant for you to hear. Fill

1:25:43

you there. How fun would it be

1:25:45

to bring in some Bravo liberties and make

1:25:47

our own bracket? I con it. All

1:25:49

right, I'll take Dorenda, you take Sonia. Sonia's

1:25:51

who I wish I could be. You

1:25:53

and me both. I cannot be someone in

1:25:55

the program. What's PTO? Pay time off,

1:25:57

see? Oh. You never had a real job.

1:25:59

Give them Lala. It is nothing but

1:26:01

honesty You guys know. Follow and listen on

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