Episodes

Show notes #26 Prosperare Nugget of wisdom from Santa Monica – receiving a treat through your window, just exactly when you need it. Prosperity – PRO= towards Spera=hope spera. sperare Verb = hope for, hope.  Looking at prosperity. Pro pro means towards. Sparity Comes from Spera it's  Latin, Spera means hope. Prosperity, if we break it down means towards hope.   My question is how can we look towards hope? What is prosperity? Fawn: “Prosperity is a universe inside of you. Do not look outside at other people. When you find yourself looking at your friends and feeling like you're left out, that right there is the opposite of prosperity. That is scarcity.” ???:  How can we go from hopeless to hopeful? How can we go from feeling left out, shut out and uncared for to realizing a muffin flying through your window? Fawn: “You can use scarcity as a tool. You can use it as anger for fuel, enough to get you to a point where you're realizing you're not where you want to be. That's okay. When you…

Show notes #25 “Peculiar” Nugget of Wisdom: Jesus and the Bread Guy – Fawn recalls “… two things, two, if you pick two things in the neighborhood, within the community that are a constant, you never thought about together at the same time; in the neighborhood, you never thought had a connection. If you take two things or two people that are consistent in the neighborhood that you never connected; like they are not going to cross, or it didn't even cross your mind, but when you see it, it makes total sense. Have you ever had an epiphany like that?” This story is about two main fixtures in the Santa Monica/ Venice neighborhood that one early morning Fawn became aware had a divine, spiritual connection to one another that brought her a deeper understanding of our connections within our community. PECULIAR - pe·cu·liar  /pəˈkyo͞olyər/  adjective strange or odd; unusual. Similar words: Strange, unusual, odd, funny, curious, bizarre, weird, uncanny, queer, unexpected, unfamiliar, abnorma…

Episode #24 – US/THEM/SYNTHESIS  - Is it possible to have synthesis? How can we have Synthesis in society when there is so much of “us” versus “them”? Pearl of wisdom from Santa Monica: the light within can really touch someone out there that you may not know. What you do in your own home can seriously affect someone on the outside. SYNTHESIS:   1) the combination of ideas to form a theory or a system. 2) The production of chemical compounds, by reaction from simpler materials. Fawn: I have an issue with “simpler materials” for so many reasons. If you're going to take it outside the science scope (I'm going to talk about synthesis), like communication with people and culture, using the word “simple” is a mistake. If you look at something through a microscope, you can get more powerful microscopes and keep going and going and going and going as you look at any given thing. Does anything ever stop being or existing? Like numbers, is everything infinite? You look at something through a…

Nugget of wisdom from Fawn’s neighbor in Santa Monica, upstairs Joey – the lesson of the hot stove. Today’s episode revolves around the fable, “The Frog and the Scorpion” “The Scorpion and the Frog” Our super friend, psychotherapist KJ Nasrul joins us to discuss: the changing of minds; our belief systems, specially in times of argument. Can a person fundamentally change? How do you know when to reenter a friendship? How do you know when to end a friendship?

Episode 22  - Emotion Motion – the Good, the Bad, the Ugly Nugget of wisdom from Santa Monica: Moses and the Ten Commandments – Why hearing a crowd chant your name is important. It is a healing. It is validation. We need that. My friend hearing his name chanted - that's a good thing. It gives you that strength and that validation, that power that says "I exist. I am powerful. I am loved". What is it about words? I always say words have vibration, words have power. There's so much energy associated with sound. The internal emotion logic works between two people. Two people are arguing and one person takes the emotional argument. The other person takes logical argument. We're working in a whole different system. We're working against imposter syndrome. We're working against everybody tells me whatever it is I want to hear, except for there's one person who says that hurtful comment. That's the only person (maybe I feel because I'm an imposter walking through the world because we all fee…

Your responsibility to party – How to be a good guest Nugget- The blind date – How to be gracious “To Be a Good Guest” When I was little, my immediate family quite honestly, was pretty stressed all the time and angry and kind of hateful. I was always surprised by how the relatives put up with. I actually had to cut them off. It's not something I did lightly. It took many, many therapists to get me out of that situation. As a whole though, my family and its dynamics was very much the movie, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”. It was exactly like that but Persian. The relatives would get together every week; parties all the time, get-togethers all the time; always in each other's business and very loud and the dinners are not just like quiet dinners with seven people. As a child, every time I had to go to one of these parties, (I mean, other people would call them parties for us, it was just a Friday night), the amount of stuff that would happen in our home that I grew up in was just not happ…

Fawn and Matt break out all their dictionaries and read all the definitions of friendship and have a good laugh. Then THEY break it down for real. Fawn feels a kinship, like a family type feeling about certain people, to which Matt says they are not friends because they don’t even know you! Fawn says we're all connected, at the risk of sounding way too woo woo. So yeah, this person doesn't know I exist perhaps, but they've touched my life profoundly. And because they touched my life, I shared how they touched my life with my close friends and so they also get touched and changed because of this person. Do they (the person that hasn’t met us) know how they changed lives? When I tell other people about this person and it changes their life, it's a ripple effect. My idea of friendship is getting a little bit more fluid, especially in the time of 2020, and the fact that we can't be together. Before 2020, our criteria was that to have a substantial friendship, you had to be together within…

Today's Pearl has to do with fine lines and the path that we walk on. We discuss having the intention, awareness, and the wherewithal of knowing how we walk in the world.  One of those paths we referred to as “A.W.O.L.” which in Santa Monica, California, stood for “Always West of Lincoln”. Then there’s the Camino de Santiago (the Way of St. James) which is a large network of ancient pilgrim routes stretching across Europe and coming together at the tomb of St. James (Santiago in Spanish) in Santiago de Compostela in north-west Spain. We talk about this path and Fawn talks about listening to Caroline Myss and her experience as she walked part of this path and the insight she (Caroline Myss) shared. There's a fine line to everything. We can walk on a path and if we veer even one step to the left or the right, we’ll have a completely different experience. As a photographer, Fawn is especially true in her field of art and how looking at the same thing, we will all have a completely differ…

Jennifer Lopez, (aka Jenny from the block, JLO) visits and shoots a movie in the neighborhood and comments about our little village by asking: “Does anyone work?” when filming the movie “Monster In-Law”. She was noticing our way of being in our community. The truth is we all worked but we didn’t all have traditional “9-5” jobs. We also knew how to luxuriate and enjoy every single day and to someone looking in from the outside, it appeared that we just hung and played all day. The Pearl of wisdom is to enjoy your life for God's sake. Just enjoy. Notice the trifles. There is really no need to rush. Put on your roller blades, roller skates, flip-flops, sit, sit at a coffee shop holding on to a cup of your favorite coffee, play, eat, watch the light change, drink a great delicious drink, ride a bicycle, feel the sand between your toes, feel the sun on your body, take a stroll, do a little dance down the sidewalk…you get the idea, right? The focus of this week’s podcast is on the alpha, …

Nugget and pearl of wisdom from Santa Monica Days: Iraq and Iran – the adventures of turtle/babysitting. Fawn’s Santa Monica friends (Anders and Liz), named their turtles Iran and Iraq to bring peace to the Middle East. The reasoning for the choice of their names was that every time they called their turtles lovingly by their names, they not only sent their turtles love but they held loving kindness for the Middle East at the same time. Words have power. Fawn and Matt begin relating words, numbers, zeros, ones and computer coding. Matt corrects Fawn and says as a programmer, he thinks “all things are code, code is not necessarily math. It’s Boolean logic and saying it’s a bunch of zeros and ones fails to convey the true majesty that is.” This week’s topic is about the first time you felt the power of friendship and what it did for you and your life. The alliance that we talk about this week is all about the sense that together, you’re able to do ANYTHING. You can overcome racial injus…

Our nugget  AKA pearls of wisdom for this episode involves Dr. Bradley Nelson, Dr. Joe Dispenza, Gregg Braden, the Heart Math Institute, Electromagnetic field, Heart math, heart brain, heart wall, intellectual humility, social intelligence, IQ, emotional intelligence, shared reality, Magneto cardiogram and it measures the magnetic field of the heart. These machines record this field to be about 12 feet in diameter, but they're all saying that the machines are actually limited. That in fact they believe the, the field to be infinite, which makes sense. How do we “Agree to Disagree”, especially now with so much charged emotion within our divided nation in the United States? How can we maneuver the misconstrued tones, the arguments that grow, the unexpressed resentments, the unheard voices, the differences of psyche, culture, sex, race, social/economic, generational points of view, the mess under the rug? How should we step away when both sides are deeply emotional? Can we find a shared …

This week’s nugget is a 16th century Norwegian term, meaning to comfort or to console -  related to the English word “hug”. You need HYGGE in your life, especially these days, guys, this is how we can feel better! Here are some words words associated with HYGGE – comfort, cozy, relaxation, indulgence, and gratitude. This is about taking pleasure in the presence of a gentle thing, soothing things like a freshly brewed cup of coffee, cozy socks, food, drink, pastries, whatever your favorite things are, you partake in them and have them all around you. There’s even a HYGGE manifesto containing 10 things that will get you to a HYGGE state! We share them with you! There's a book that's called the book of” HYGGE  -  the Danish art of contentment, comfort and connection”. There's a quote from it:  “a practical way of creating sanctuary in the middle of a very real life and a cure for S a D” a cure for sad, which stands for seasonal affective disorder. In this episode, we learn about the unfo…

First, Santa Monica’s pearl of wisdom: This week’s pearl of Wisdom from Santa Monica comes via Fawn’s Santa Monica Bathroom conversation delivery and what was shared with her that was a game changer. There are three words that have to this day been chanted by Fawn and those close to her. We talk about a couple of things here regarding the pearl of wisdom. Number one is what you focus on grows. So focusing on money coming, it's going to make that grow and happen. When Fawn was first learning to drive, her point of focus would have her not able to drive straight because she focused on a short, short distance (because she was fixated on the hood of the car) instead on the road ahead. You need to look way down the road where you want to go. Don't focus on that spot so close to you. Look to where you want to go. Look really far out, look way ahead of you. Your vision always has to be shifting. It’s about knowing what the next step is, and knowing where you’re going. If I have both of those…

Critic: A person who expresses and unfavorable opinion of something a person who judges the merits of literary artistic or musical works, especially one who does so professionally Criticism:  The practice of judging the merits and faults of something. Fawn thinks they're the downfall of our culture, of our society. She can't stand them. ARE THEY VITAL TO OUR SOCIETY????What kind of critics are there? Art, business, coding, neighborhood people, friends, family, randoms, yoga women…Is there a semblance of a constructive opinion, constructive criticism????? We talk about the HATERS (thank you Katt Williams and Busy Philipps).Then there is the silent critic: complicitness This episode almost didn't get aired. Fawn ended up in tears towards the end and Matt stepped away from the mic. The issue was resolved. If only we could have more conversations like this one (that got uncomfortable for a minute), we would all end up feeling good.

What happened to the village? We always heard that “it takes a village”, but Fawn points out that most of the time; we’re left on our own. This leads us to mentors. Where are the mentors? Does anyone truly have the knowledge to guide us? From Fawn’s point of view, the world is changing so rapidly and radically that we’re all trying to figure things out and the role of the mentor, apprentice, journeyman...etc, is no longer really there…EXCEPT, Fawn believes that friendships, the friend, babies, and THE COW (tune in to hear Fawn’s story and inspiration from the cows in New Delhi, India) are the new mentors as we guide each other through life. Matt has a totally different take on things (of course).

How do you handle criticism when it is beyond the simple critique? How to hear the good voices telling you, that you’re great, and why do we get stuck on the attacks and become unable to hear the good? Fawn shares her personal experience with her career, being a woman of color in an unkind, white dominated art world, how she was treated, resulting in her fighting back and making a radicle turn in her work , how she does business, as well as how she relates to people. Listen to the funny and revealing stories of the art photography world and her experience out in the bush on the border of Kenya and Ethiopia, how Matt’s code blends in to this issue and how to move forward while staying true to yourself. “Emotion builds Taj Mahals. Logic says F you and walks away. There is a certain element of compartmentalization. There's a certain element of looking holistically at your life and saying, does my life suck or does my life rule? If your life in general rules, one tiny little piece of one …

PLAY – We begin to find out why Fawn’s nick name is “The Wookie” and why she struggles with playing all the great games: Pictionary, Scrabble, cards, music… We know all the great things friendship does for us spiritually, physically, emotionally, and the same, same is true about play.  Play is a source of relaxation. It feels our imagination, our creativity, helps with problem solving skills, and helps our emotional wellbeing. It takes our mind off of stuff. It helps with brain function, changes our perspective and even helps generate optimism.  And most importantly, it builds relationships and connections. Play is a basic need. In this episode Fawn and Matt talk about the science and emotional component to this very important and basic need and relate it to our lives, friendships as well as the power plays in corporations.

We begin with Rumi as food for thought and get right into it. Fawn challenges Darwin’s theory and uses the unlikely friendships as an example of how wrong Darwin’s theory is. Nature relies on cooperation and mutual aid, not competition. It's not about competing for survival. We're here to help each other. As the conversation gets even deeper, we talk about how compassion has a life force, that it's the glue and the foundation for love. Love doesn't last without compassion, which leads us to explore the role our jobs have in shaping our lives and how we can turn that around. We also have the 90 second rule to allow your to fully experience and feel, after which brings you freedom from negative emotions. Stay tuned for the last half of the episode as Matt really goes for it and lays down some fabulous wisdom.

We begin this week with 3 nuggets of gold information and carry on to the unresolved emotion that is at the root of it all. We talk about the Heart Math Institute research, Gregg Braden, the brilliant work of neuroscientist, Dr. Candace Pert, “Molecules of Emotion”, Mr. José Mujica, the former president of Uruguay, the 90 second feeling, the question of why we  have a 40 plus hour work week and how that runs our lives and friendships. Pay close attention to the end of the show to hear how it all ties together.

Logic can’t get you out of something that emotion has gotten you into.  Fawn and Matt discuss the difference between logic and emotion, the importance of speaking, being heard, the state of the world, how to hear what is really going on and how respect plays the role in all of it. From mixed martial arts to Aikido to Nascar, to Nicomachean Ethics, Matt’s  super-secret  formula for pick’em survivor league (NFL),  to becoming like bamboo, the art of friendship  is further unpacked and  by the end of the episode things really go deep with one of the big reasons for how our society has become touched by the loneliness epidemic. Make sure you lean in towards the end of the episode for the revelations of imposter syndrome.

Why don't we follow through (regarding friendship, our dreams in life, our goals, our health, all the things that need some action, some movement)? What is the thing that stops us from doing and creating? This week's episode, Fawn and Matt bring up Sumo Wrestling, Herman Hesse, Dr. Mario Martinez, Dr. Joe Dispenza, Carolyn Myss, Aikido, dinner parties, being honest, misunderstandings, and how effort is involved and the one key to make it all effortless.

Fawn and Matt discuss the philosophy of Aikido (the Japanese martial art founded by Morihei Ueshiba that operates using the art of peace). They describe the one purpose, which is to better the lives of people, especially those who attack you physically and emotionally and being able to bring harmony to each situation (as your job is to protect your attacker: "If your opponent strikes with fire, counter with water, becoming completely fluid and free-flowing. Water by its nature, never collides with or breaks against anything. On the contrary, it swallows up any attack harmlessly." - Morihei Ueshiba (translated by John Stevens) This episode further explores our interactions with one another at the office and in our personal lives and is about applying the Art of Peace to the Art of Friendship.

Could the loneliness epidemic have been rooted initially from the family unit, where we learned how to treat each other? As the family dynamic has changed over the last few generations, so now have friendships. Fawn and Matt also discuss the role of the corporate/job world and how that has influenced our relationships and where we go from here.

Fawn and Matt talk about treating the outer world (and your inner world) as your home and everyone in it as your special guest.Treating strangers, people you know, to people you work with and even advisaries as if they are your guests and assuming the role of a party host and creating a space to have people feel at home (no matter where we are).