#99 I Guess You Needed It w/ Lisa Lampanelli

Published Sep 9, 2021, 1:00 AM

Between you and Nikki, you have seven times more in you than you might think and it is a good thing to be uncomfortable. Andrew is lowering his mirror time as a means of being less critical of himself. Lisa Lampanelli legend/host of the podcast Losers With A Dream joins and the conversation gets even more elevated. They discuss positive framing like, "I got to", noticing your moods and feelings and ensuring that you spend your time doing things that are fun. Lisa shares her wisdom and gets Nikki to have an epiphany and Andrew to get a little testy.

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The nick Here's Nikki here I am. Hey guys, welcome to Nicki Glazer Podcast Wednesday edition. We got a special guest on the show today, Lisa Lamponelli is going to be here with us. Um My policy on the show regarding guests is like only the best, right, Like, um, you know, I I love Lisa so much. She is someone who, ironically enough after my It's just perfectly timed because after I shared on the show, I think it was yesterday that I was thinking about getting into more like self help talks, public speaking, like away from just the cynicism and the escapism and the kind of, uh, what's it the insincerity of stand up comedy that is so much of what attracted me to it initially because you can cut everything that's painful with a joke and then you don't have to like go to the pain. And now that I've like been more into going to those places, like it makes sense that comedy from stand up comedy for me was the perfect outlet to tell the truth that was in my heart but also not really go to the painful places, because what what is comedy? I mean it helps us cope with pain by like not actually addressing it if you're being honest with yourself, like yes, it's very therapeutic. Clowns and hospitals, like kids need to laugh, Like laughing is good for your stress and your um just everything your health. But I think that a lot of times it's a defense mechanism. And I found that that's one of my biggest pet peeves of hanging out with comics is that you can't get a real conversation off the ground because there's always someone that's gonna throw a joke in Everyone laughs, and then everything resets, and so you can go back into that uncomfortable nous that was just there, you know, like life is so uncomfortable that you know we I and I hate to reference Louis here, but I mean Louis c K actually did give me so many things in life that um I refer back to. Um. He also taught me to that I was very lucky to not have penises pulled out in front of me. But because of all the guys I hung with out with after shows and went up to their hotel rooms to like smoke pot or just hang out and write jokes, like, I just got lucky that no one did that to me, um, but there's like pieces of wisdom. I remember reading something about like he was just talking about phone screens. Maybe it's in his bit about like his kids on phones and something him being uh, just an amazing dad um, which is always the you've ever noticed with certain comedians, like the world arounds them is crazy, but they're a good person and when they do reveal at things they do, there never they're always it's well. Actually for him, he Louis did actually admit to some things that I'm like, wow, that's it's great to hear you say that you're a bad person. But the extent of it, I don't think was we ever really reached that aside? Did he owe it that to us? I don't know. Um. My point is he once I was reading an article about how he would run five miles every day and not to me, I'm not into that, but what he said was like there would be a point in it that he would want to quit, Like there's when you're running five miles no matter how like, especially someone with his build like he's always he knows that that is the amount of miles where there's always going to be a point where he's like, fuck this everything. My body is telling me to quit, the uncomfortable bullness where it's like you can you know you have it in you to get through it because you've done it before. But you've got to persevere your past that and that that doing that every day would teach him that he you know, when there was a time on set where he would want to throw in the towel after a long shoot day, or there's like you know sometimes I'm I. I referenced that all the time. It just taught him he can persevere, like I know that seals. I remember there was something about like the Seal team or something. They always say that when you want to quit, like when you're working out and you're in like a spin class, let's say one of those insane classes that I refused to take, that it's just makes you want to pass out and like vomit because you're so exhausted. You have seven times that amount in you before you really your body will really quit. They say it's just so much, it's mental fatigue. And I always referenced this, but I love this. There was a radio lab about an endurance runner, this woman who would run you know these hundred and twenty two hundred mile races, and she was a runner before that, but never competed at that level. She was in a carson or something happened to her brain where a part of her brain was injured. That had to do with short term memory, so she was regenerating, you forget where she was constantly. She had long term memory, but her short term memory was constantly restarting, and so she all of a sudden was able to do endurance runs out of nowhere. Like she went from being like maybe a half marathon runner to like these two and she could just go. And the thing that they discovered was that so much of our exhaustion when we're working out is because we know how long we've been doing it. So when you think it's the beginning, constantly you have this energy of it's the beginning. And when you don't know where you are in something, you know a road trip, saying you're in the last hour and you're just like or you have two hours left. The two hours always the worst because it's not an hour hour. You get like a surge because you're like still in the end. But let's say it's like halfway through and it's maybe a ten hour road trip if you. Sometimes when I'm on a run or a road trip like that, or a long trip or an exhausting day, I think about what's the energy I can bring to this that I had when I first started. That's more for runs I did. The other day, I was at the last mile of my run and I was really trying to clock in at a speed I wanted to do. I wanted to beat the speed, and I don't look at my time. I'm just kind of like, wait until it's over, and I go, did I do it? And this last mile, I was like so tired. I was like, just give up and just know that it's going to be slower. And I was like, wait a second, let me just pretend like I just started running. And I swear to god, I looked at my map later on where it shows how fast you were that moment, because I remember where it was, the tree I was looking at when I go, just pretend it's the first one. Remember that Radio Lab episode where that girl at a short, short memory and she could do infinite amount of miles. And I was able to like conjure some speed that I didn't know I had. And that brings me back to the Louis thing of like the uncomfortable, Like we just don't want to be uncomfortable ever, And that's what's so helpful about our screens. It offers us an immediate distraction from whatever feelings bubbling up inside when I reach for that, like a handful of food that I'm just gonna mindlessly eat when I'm watching like the things we do, we were checking out because we don't want to feel, because feelings are scary and like they're the worst and we don't know what's going to happen on the other side of them. Sometimes I'm like, if I start crying, I'll never stop crying and then I'll drown in my tears um, which doesn't happen. You don't die from feelings. No one's ever died from feelings, although maybe maybe there's some research behind that. But I just feel like I'm really excited to talk to Lisa today because she's someone who was I'm like, you, guys, I'm not kidding you when I say her and Louis E. K are the two people I went to go see live when I was in Kansas City going to school in Lawrence, Kansas. A comic at the Stanford and suns Camp Comedy Club as you know, uh An m C. There I would get to go to shows for free. And Lisa Lambinelli was one of the first comics I am seed for. But before that, she came through the club, you know, and I went to go see her with Kirsten, my friend who you know, and I remember just how rapid fire this woman was in a way that you know, it wasn't me being naive and like wow, like I could tell the difference between good and bad comedy back then, I really could. And she was just someone that was head of line for everything. And you know, she probably had the most of the room convinced that she was coming up with the stuff on the fly, including me. But even looking back, thinking how did she have a line for that guy and that guy and that guy's shirt and that guy's hair and that girl's top and like just NonStop jokes And it was because, I mean she had written written those jokes and used them and crafted over time. But there was no one I could say that killed harder than her that I've witnessed. There's been very few. It is Louis and her that I witnessed there that like blew the roof off the place, and my my, I was gasping for air. There's few comedians that make me gasp, and she's been one of them. And she also would say the most offensive things. I mean, very much cancelable for the stuff that she used to say, the slurs she used to like, she used to really go there. And and then you know the roast. She's a redecessor of mine. That is was someone I watched when I would prepare for the roast and say if I could only get to that level. And then someone else who take a took a lot of ship on the roast. It's one thing to be a woman on these roasts. It's one thing to be an older woman who um is like the one that's going to be the brunt of all fat jokes because she's a size bigger than the other girl on stage. So like one girl has to be fat, you gotta have a fat woman on the days because well that's just such a gold mine. So she took a lot of abuse. Um, she gave it back. She obviously was in a lot of pain. She um. And then I did the roast of Ronnie the Limo Driver with her on stern and This was the first time I had really come in contact with her since I worked with her in Kansas City, and I avoided her when I worked with her because I was not one of these comedians that was like, well you watch my act? Can I even bunce. I was just like, I suck. I'm gonna stay out of the way and just learn what I can. And um, I met her at Stern. I was so nervous. I was doing the roast of Ronnie the limo Driver. It was my I think, first appearance on the show itself, and um, it was Jim Brewer, me and Lisa backstage, and Lisa was so nice. She had like a short haircut. She dyed her hair green or blue or something, and she was like, this is my last roast, this is my last time. I'm quitting stand up and I'm announcing it on the show. I was like, you're what are you talking about? Your quitting stand up? She's like, you'll hear all about it. And then she goes up there. She slays on the roast um and then announces on Howard Stern while I'm sitting there, but she's quitting stand up and getting into self help. She has a new podcast coming out UM called what is it called something? Losers? It's out. It's called Losers with a Dream, Losers with a Dream. I'm so excited um about this podcast. But she's doing it with two know what, correct me if I'm wrong. She's doing it with two up and coming stand up comedians and Losers with the Dream. First of all, her use of the word loser, she's a loser, Like she used to say that all the time in her act of like she was brutal man. No one scared me more with how she could talk. Now this this podcast is about her kind of discovering her coming out stand up comedy and and and kind of talking to them through the lens of like I've been through it, and and maybe tempering some of their enthusiasm or giving them lessons for what comes is coming, and probably having a little bit of like, oh god, I kind of miss it. What's it like out there? And maybe I want to ask her about that too, Because as much as I worry about stepping away from stand up comedy ever in my future because I've known nothing else, there's part of me that goes I can always go back LISTA can always go back These farewell. We can all have shares first, farewell to her. You know what I'm saying, Um, so, uh, Losers with a Dream is that it Losers with a Dream. Guys subscribed to this right away, Like right now, stop everything you're doing, subscribe to Losers with the Dream. We're gonna ask Lisa how this came about what the show is, because I think it's right if you're listening to my podcast, Lisa's doing what I'm kind of like headed towards and whatever you think about Lisa Lampanelli. Put it aside for a little bit, and maybe you already know her through my up podcasts threw you up on serious, but put it aside and um, and maybe go familiarize yourself with her a little bit and watch some of her roasts and see how much this woman has changed. And I just I don't know. I'm this is all I hate. I don't believe in I do believe in signs, and I believe in God and a higher power. And that to me means like no free will more than more than like a guy in the sky. But I take my life like I things have been happening to me that are ships that are sending me in the direction that I'm meant to go in. And guess it all came from it all came from a bunch of hate I got on the worst night of my life. And it's all everything that has precipitated that worst night of my life was a week and less than two weeks ago, has been all of these signs that, um, I'm gonna be doing. I'm I'm going towards what is good and if you don't want to come with me, that's fine, And I'm excited to get advice from Lisa about this. Don't worry, besties, I'm not going anywhere. Um, this is the most gratifying thing that I do. And uh, that is not taking away from my life performances, which you should all get a ticket to, because who knows If this is my farewell to our who the hell knows. But I'll tell you one thing. I'm free as hell on stage. I'm excited. And Andrew knows none of that. Well, he knows a little bit of this. We talked about it last night. Andrew and I had a great night last night with our besties. Was bringing Andrew Andrew, Hey, Andrew, Oh my god, the color scheme over there is popping off. Dude. I like colored green hat, the purple shirt. You got a lava lamp in the foreground of look like you kind of do the boy so funny the girls in Cosmo magazine. You read about what kind of shape you are, and it's like apple pear lava lamp. But it should be. I do feel like my body depending on like the the amount of soy sauce I have or the amount of water I drink. And I know a lot of it could be in my mind looking in the mirror, but I feel so much softer within minutes of treating my body like ship like it's like instant for my body. It's weird. Why do we do it then? Because it tastes so good? I know, you know my body also goes through like softer phases, but it's always associated with Yeah, because I've been eating more, or it's because I've been eating Um. I can't know what I crave. Sometimes you just crave soy sauce or like something salty, and you know what if it makes your body puff up as long as you doing it, and it's painful as you're doing it. I think that a lot of or the pain on the other side becomes It is like if if you can handle being a little puffy, then eat your you know, like if it's causing you so much immense pain on the other side that then you might need to take away that pleasure that you get from the soy sauce. Right. But like I got a question when you used to drink, if I had, I swear to god, if I had two beers and one shot, you know, like something not crazy. I would wake up in the morning and look like I got ran over by a marching band that was on top of a train. It was there we go. There's a classic. I saw you and you got nail this. You gotta stick this, baby. I could feel it. You did you said when you said marching band. I was like, he's already got it, He's going to do it. It was almost like watching a gymnast, like like you know how sometimes the commentators when gymnastics know they're going to stick it before I knew you gonna stick it because I have eyes like I was the coach. I was Katie Lettikey's parents. You know where they go in the stands. Have you ever seen that footage? I think it's her parents. They would be like, but dude, there's some there's some people that can drink like they're like they look like a million bucks. I'm I'm puff daddy today. My face like, it's just I was on a I was on a FaceTime earlier with a friend and I was like, it was hard to look at my face. It was causing me to have all of these kind of like you know, everyone watching at home or listening at home. You know when when your face isn't what you want your face to look like. It's that that hungover kind of face, too much salt, like didn't get enough sleep, maybe got too much sleep face. And I'll tell you, man, like I just I just laugh at it now, like the the the acceptance over it leads to so much less because you know what, this is my fucking face. There's literally nothing I can do about it right now today. Yes, I can drink more water today, but nothing in the immediate moment is going to change my face. And I just gotta laugh because instead of going like, oh, I look disgusting, because I'll tell you that was my first instinct this morning. You know, I wasn't in the best mood. I had to get on this call. I didn't want to be on. Then I see my fucking pale face, that's puffy, and I look like all the things that I I see myself turning into that I'm scared of. It was on that camera, and I just didn't let myself go down there because I go I got a podcast to do, I got an interview to do. I'm gonna maybe try to go rollerbading with a friend. This whole day will be fucking ruined if I let myself go to a place where I go, you are disgusting, and I let that in instead. Listen, I did disgusting, but to be you got to be a good mood. A lot of consternation, the idea of like, I got a puffy face, I can't rollerblade like but you know, that's so funny. I used to in high school my friends. I remember the first time my friends this was. I mean, now, I think this is probably a regular occurrence for girls, but I remember my friends did not have body image issues like I did. I was the first one to get them. And I remember there was a pair of jeans that just for the first time, they weren't fitting, and I was putting them on to go to the mall or go do something with my friends, and I threw myself on my bed and I was sobbing because these jeans were so tight. They just felt uncomfortable, and I just yeah, and that might have been the problem, honestly, as I was trying to get those wheels past the knee. This was and this was in the age of like, you know, wide leg um no that they were just I remember. I remember they were expressed brand jeans, and they were they had a stretch in them already, and they were so tight. And it was just a month before that, yeah, I mean maybe a day before. It was just you know, I was probably ovulating, my body was puffing up whatever it was. And I remember hurling myself on the bed, sobbing, and my friends I could hear I get this a lot. I hear the silence from people who are trying to comfort me of like this is out of our realm, of we need to call him a specialist, because this is I mean, I've heard it from you before. You've heard the sobbing, the like wild hate and it always stems from my looks like you've witnessed it, and that was the first time I remember going, I can't go to the mall because my jeans are too tight. And it wasn't because they didn't fit or that there weren't other genes that could put on. It was those genes and it wasn't like I needed to wear those genes. It was just I knew I was fat and I was uncomfortable with my body, and I said, I can't go to the mall. And I remember the how dumb that is because my body, it moves, I have clothes to wear. That doesn't make sense to not be able to go rollerblade because I feel ugly today. But I would say most most everyone understands that feeling of like I'm so fat and ugly, whatever that means for you. It could be too skinny, like there are days when I feel like I'm too skinny or I'm too old looking to go out, like my mom, I know, feels that way sometimes of like I can't go to this party because I look too old, and it's like, well, you're sixty five, so you're you're old. But it is a college part, it's a fresh house's but you know she's a fun lady and blur your eyes she as the you know, the stature of and the kind of freshman of a freshman. Yeah, you can take advantage of because listen, um, anything I was conceived. Yeah, you know what I've done recently is I stopped with the mirror, Like I'm not. I feel like like Instagram, like if you could lower we should look at our usage of mirror time, because I think if you can lower your percentages a mirror time of like looking at yourself and dissecting yourself or whatever that is, it's not healthy. There were mirrors back in the day. They would have to look out of like a shadow and like the in the your reflection in the pond. That's Narcissius. You know that he saw his reflection in the water and it was like that was the only mirror, and he became obsessed in wouldn't eat and like just and he got really cut and like super hot, and then he couldn't stop looking at how sucking his jawline popped out even the finish and so many disciples, so many fucking disciples, And uh, I was trying to think of something likes in that trained Ham drip. And but it's so interesting because I just was saying before you got in here, how I am really tired of how comedy just takes the sincerity out of everything. I love comedy because it's helped me deal with so much pain, just like my because I'm good at it. But like I'm good at I was also good at binging because that got rid of the pain. Like I was good at that too, and it and it served me. Like I'm grateful that I was able to have anorexia and my binge eating disorder, because I don't look at that as like or the fact that I would abuse hot in alcohol. Thank God for those things, because the other side, if I wouldn't have had those things, I had no way of coping with it, or like I would have reached for something more dangerous. Those were always the lesser things because I was trying not to die. But I think those were I reached for those instead of a gun or instead of a bridge, saying, when you're really in pain, yeah, comedy was the first thing people are in pain, and I'm tired of I don't want I want to sit in that uncomfortable nous. I want to get through the pain. I don't want to need to cut it with a punchline. I want to be able to present things to an audience and have them sit in it. And and that's the thing. I can sit in it. But I want to protect other people from being in pain. So that's why I always have to go j K. But I'm tired of doing that and I kind of want to force people to be more uncomfortable. However, I'm not ready to do that yet. But what I was just saying was interesting because you said get rid of mirrors. To me, that's locking up the food and preventing yourself from doing the thing you want to do where's opposed to or that that is looking right in the mirror right out yourself and being like this is who I am and laughing. I laughed like that. I just want to give this tool to someone because I thought it would never work for me. And maybe and you definitely use this a lot, because you use humor with your body, like used to pull up your shirt and show your your tummy when it wouldn't be like an attractive stance. You'd have your gut out. You try and it was like you were leaning into the joke of your body, which you know you don't want to go too hard into that because then you are you're just always a joke. But you know on days when you just have a puffy face or a puffy body, and you know that those days are going to come, and they're also they can go away. It's not like you're just I don't want you to accept it or for myself to accept it, like this is the way you are forever. That's not it. But I just go, dude, you look like a man today. Like I'll look in the mirror and go, like, you're looking like a dude today, And it's funny, Like it can be funny that, like my face looks puffy. It doesn't need to be a tragedy that like I'm a burn victim that has to come to grips with the fact that this is my new face. And even if I were a burn victim, I think at first I would have a little bit of humor about it. But I just think that the next time I'm just talking to bust is now the next time you look in the mirror and you want to say uh or and and and like pull out your skin, do all of that, pull up your shirt, like see the problem areas that fat like you don't need to do that, but like, let's take it back as pull it over your your screwed them over your penis, guys, But I just try this for me today. And I know it feels stupid, but if if you're my friends, I just wanted you to do this because when I started doing it, it just I never thought it would work. And I just want to say I'm skeptical about any of the self help like easy tricks. This one's a good one. The next time you look in the mirror and you like are going like or like I hate this part, just go well, that's just well that looks hilarious, and just like make fun of yourself, go like, well, today is not my best day, but we're living, like laugh about it, Like just just give yourself a little ease with it. But that's the thing. We would write jokes about it, I know, And that's why I'm saying it's so funny that I just said I want to get away from that. But I'm telling people with myself, but I swear there is lefter. I'm so so grateful for jokes and that ability. Why have I not employed it when I'm alone with myself in the mirror before. I always use it for other people before they can make fun of me, I make fun of myself. Why don't I use it before I can badger and beat up myself and hate myself? Why don't I use it to to lessen the blow? And there is a big difference between making a joke about yourself and really like owning it and like making it making yourself feel better as opposed to just making a joke and still being sad about it. There, Oh, I think it's I don't think it's different. No, no, no, no no, I'm not saying that. I'm saying that those two things are different. Like comedians are like, oh, they're so open and vulnerable. They could joke about themselves. They must be fine with themselves, right, But there's a difference between making a joke about yourself and not really feeling the the you know, the release from it, as opposed to really feeling to release from, really like finding them, not even saying you can find you. You have to feel the release. I want to be very clear about that because that's something that helped me up of like look in the mirror and love yourself and tell yourself you're great and just like, you know, I would have heard this podcast and got Nikki. It's it's I'm I'm gonna laugh at myself and I'm still gonna hate my arms and think they're fat. You're allowed to. You're allowed to still walk away from the mirror and just sucking at your arms. All I'm asking is that you try to make one. You just you just tease yourself very lovingly for just one and it doesn't even need to work. But I swear over over time it will work. And You're right. There is a difference because sometimes I go on stage and I talk about what a slut I am uh that I have, Like I I insult myself and then someone will say it to me off stage and I'm like no, no, no, no, no, Like you don't get to talk. It's almost about like when you bad mouth your family and then your friends do it. You're like, wait what and they're like, I was just repeating what you said and you're like, I can do that. You can't. So everyone today, if you hate something about your body, look down, just go well. I picked a ward on my leg and now I have a really bad scar and I bought some maderma earlier at Walgreen's, and let's talk to Lisa Lampanelli about it. Lisa, Oh my god, Hi babe, We're gonna get right into it. Lisa Lampanelli, thank you so much for being here. I'm so excited to talk to you. You can't even imagine the podcast you're coming into. In the subject matter we're talking about. Andrew Colin is here, who you've met before and had a great like back and forth with you kind of like roasted him last time we were on Wasn't you up? Yeah? It was you up? I I fell down, but it was great after well, you know, you know, as a retired comedian and retired roaster, just to get little shots in on a podcast is my only fixed for pleasure right now in life. So I'll try I to resist, We'll let it fly, because I've been backing off recently because it's just it's become too much for me to do it every day with him, and it sometimes because we live together, it has a lot more. It's not so funny as real and like has resentment underneath it, and that's just that's not good for anyone. And so I'm gonna rely on you to just like you know, uh, just come in and say what I can't. I'll text you what I do. There's issues recently. It's really really interesting because if I had to live with someone, I would kill them then myself. I don't understand how anyone leaves with anyone. I think it's it's just disgusting. And I feel lived with someone before. Oh yeah yeah. And I would say to them, I'd go, why the funk are you always here? And they'd be like, because I live here, And I'm like, but I pay all the bills, so get the funk out, like I can write. Okay, Lisa, I just I'm just gonna right now. I want to just quickly go over some some things that people need to know. Sure well, I already set this up in the top of the show, and I want you to just know that, um, you were one of your one of the funniest people that's ever lived, one of the best comedians, the sharpest, the the fastest, the quickest, the just the wittiest, just elite level, Olympic level, like Simone Biles. And and you know what, like Simone Biles, you go, this isn't working for my mental health. I'm out, And um, I and I talked about how I got to know you closely. I was kind of overly intimidated by you. You come off you know, a lot of people have a lot of preconceived notions about you being mean and like, you know, just someone that you don't want to cross paths with because you might be in the line of fire. And I kind of felt that way about you, even though I had seen you and know as a comedian that you're not the same on stage whatever. And I had worked with you at Sanford Sons years before, and you were nothing but nice to me, even though I boided you because I just knew as an m C. You don't want to be like we want me said least like I was not that kind of comic, and if you're a comic listening, don't be that comics never um but Lisa, I said, I met you at Stern. You were so nice to me, and then you told me backstage as we were about to go on, I'm announcing my retirement, and I was like, it was news to me. So you announced on the show you're retiring from stand up. I know you've covered this a lot before. What led to that decision? Oh my god, Nikki, I can't even tell you. I've been talking about this and I love it because it really helps me figure out why. And I retired before cancel culture was a thing, so thank god I kind of got out before I was so gone girl. God. Yeah, it's literally I canceled myself before they get me. The reason, the reason I really was nicky. I think this is really important. And because I went pretty deep with this, I just started to notice my life, like we get on autopilot from age whatever whatever age somebody gets achievedment oriented or hey like me, like me, hey, mommy noticed me, And we get on that find something that works, feeds that hole inside, and we just stick with it. And at about age fifty ish, I think, which is like ten years ago, I said, Oh, I noticed I kind of get bummed out every Thursday when I have to pack and go away. Oh I notice I don't love doing this kind of humor anymore. Oh I notice I want to talk deeper with people. I want to connect and I'm only using comedy to connect and not connecting in my real life. So I was like, oh, I call my business manager. I was like, oh, I don't like this anymore. When can I get out, when will I have enough money? And because I'm smart, I don't want to be poorer. So I just said, you know, we made a plan, and luckily I was very blessed with parents who were depression ERA taught us how to save, and I was like, dude, fifty seven, I'm out. And I was stoked because everyone, thank God for Stern, took it very seriously and I've been allowed to just kind of do what i want. So you put this plant into place at fifty and then seven. You knew that in seven years you could have the amount of money that you needed to say goodbye and and and pursue something else that might bring you also a lot of money. But who knows you're going to try something new. Well, I really thought that I would want to do like coaching and um storytelling events and things like that. And the hardest part of retiring. I just wade a book on this because it's so hard to find support about retiring if you already have. It's not about planning financially, it's about what's the emotional impact of retiring. It's like, oh, you do it wrong three times before you get it right. So it's been three years of experimenting what do I want to do or do I want to do anything? Dude? Yesterday I literally ran six hours of errands and it was the best day of my life. So I'm like, my God, but it's a balance. It's a huge balance, because I said ran six six hours, and I was like, I think that's what you should be doing. Don't worry. I physically hate to move, so I just I just said, well, but if I did that for a week straight, I feel purposeless. And I think what I figured out in retirement is, and it's taken me a lot of tries, three whole years of trying and failing, is do everything with a small, purposeful feeling, and you don't have to have purpose with a capital P. So basically, if I live without a goal with a capital G and purpose without a capital P, then I get to just enjoy everything in my life with purpose. So if I'm doing a podcast, or if I'm coaching some comics with writing, or I'm playing with my dogs or gardening or whatever, it all has purpose. But it doesn't it doesn't look like a huge life purpose, which is exactly how we should all live. It doesn't look like um, you're going to egot with that. There's no Emmy's Grammys, there's no Mark Twain Prize or red carpets with coaching comics and and I know what you're saying that, you know, we we hear a lot of these things and self help speak of like the capital P, and it's like, well, what does that really mean? Like and what you're saying is these things that these tangible medals and honors and likes and followers and all the things that obviously we got into comedy to get in the first place. Was I mean, I don't know about you. I wanted to be popular in high school. I want people to like me. I And it's so ironic, though, to be someone that all I want is for people to like me. And so much of my act and my persona is that people that don't really know me, not listeners of this podcast, but people think I like to offend people, and that I'm you know, and YouTube as a roaster. That was never the goal is to alienate or offend. It was to It was me what was the exact opposite, Because it was the exact opposite, It was going, how can I connect? Oh my god, look, I just insulted them, and they liked me more because we have a gift to do that. Not all comics can do that. So if you have that innate likability, they go with it. But here's the problem. You do not ever get enough achievement, accomplishment, Grammy nominations, whatever it is that I got. Nothing filled the whole. And the fact is when you take it all away, you have a huge loss. Because even with a positive change like retiring, comes loss. So any change is loss and you work through the loss. So I had a huge thing in the last three years not knowing who I was, lack of identity. Wow, I'm walking around going what do I do? Do I have enough purpose? And it's like, oh wait, I don't need any I get to actually live and not prove myself. So these next thirty years, if I have that, I'm like, oh my god. Can you imagine if I walked around every day and I didn't have anything to prove to anyone except like, I'm like a nice person. Those are the best you ever noticed. Those are the best people to be around. And when people start talking about achievement, you just want to like cut them off and go. Doesn't feel at all like, I have a lot of young friends. Yeah, And I'm always like I'm bringing with a lot of millennials because I really think they get it and they understand how to change the world way better. My generation blows. So I was just like, Okay, you don't want any friends with the millennials on the world's old, this millennial. So I hear them talking about because they're all theater days and they're like, oh my god, we want a Grammy and a Tony and like, inside, I'm going, yeah, you'll still hate yourself. So I think it's like, can I just stop real quickly? Can we go get the charger for the computer because we're I forgot to charge the computer. It's about to die. And I just I want to hold this thought, but you hold the thought that you were just about to ask, Okay, um, well, I just want to say, Lisa, that's interesting to me that I thought you only entered retirement with the plan of like knowing exactly like I'm ready to fulfill this purpose. So you you you quit before you even knew what was going to fill that hole, because you would you you're you're you're you let your you quit because you realize you weren't happy anymore, Like that's what that was the first thing, you're packing, you realize, I don't want to do this. This isn't bringing me the happiness it's supposed to. Yes, um, sorry wan topreat that? So you you you're packing, you realize this isn't bringing me the happiness it's supposed to. Then you come up with a plan, you call your business editor. Seven years later, you get the money, you get secure enough to be able to quit. Then it's another three years or so before you even find the thing that you feel actually fills the hole that you weren't even really filling anyway with stand up or any of these achievements. And that is But I'm wondering someone like you, you prepared with a safety net financially you enter. Did you not did you not foresee the emptiness you might feel of Did you think the only problem was that it wasn't making you happy anymore? And if you just stopped then you would be happy? Was that? I thought? Yeah, I I when I was on stern. I think you might remember, Um, I had thought the things I I thought I wanted to coach people life coach, and I thought I was on good workshops, food and body image workshops, and I did some of that, and then I was like, oh wait, I'm just trying to get achievement from that. I'm just trying to be like working at all these high end yoga places and be like little miss food and you know, you know, food and Body Image consultant. Then all this crap. And then I'm like, oh, I'm just doing the same thing insert different career, and I go, you gotta stop all of that. And thank God for the pandemic in a way for me, because it was like, oh, all that stops, and you got to see what comes in, because what comes in is the connecting to the right things and noticing what does give you a little bit of joy. And again, your life isn't happy all the time, but it's like oh today, for instance, okay, this is my day today, Okay, I got to. I mean, it's it's so like ingrained in me say to say I got to and said I had to. It just gets ingrained when working yourself. I was trying to come common knowledge. Yeah. The thing that's is hard to change, those those things that people go don't say you have to say you got to, You go Okay, yeah, I'll never actually just say that on my own, but if oh my god, I don't have to anymore, Like it's really yeah, it well, it works because you do it and you finally clear out enough of the trauma that you know was holding you back and kept you a victim and you felt put upon. So like today, for instance, my day is, oh, I get to I'm like painting this door in my house very badly. There's no way I don't have to call a professional painter after this ship that I did today. But it was fun and I go that was cute. But also, Nikki, I was shocked. Grief came up because I was like, oh, I bought my parents house and I live in my childhood home and I love it, and I'm like, oh, could dad have painted that better? Like I felt like I was letting my father down. So the grief comes up. Oh my god, I got to feel my feelings. That was cool. Then I got to talk to you despite Andrew being there. What do you I got you with that grief? Let's go back to you literally, yes, okay, what did you did just sit there and paint and cry? Or did you take a breather and sit down did you call someone? Did you journal? And like, I want to know when that pain comes up, what do you do with it? Like how do you release it? Okay, I literally I'll tell you a step by step. It just happened like two hours ago. Okay. So I paint the door because I read all about how to paint a Bill Coo door, which is a metal door. So I got this cool lime green paint. I'm like, yes, girl. So I got my painting clothes and my freaking mask and big lesbian lock and I was like, okay, here, I'm doing it. And I looked at it. I was like, I gotta call a painter. So I called my friend Cindy had called me about something. She's really spiritual and cool, and I go to, dude, I think I have to retire the idea of me being an outdoor painter. And she started cracking up and she's like why, and I just started crying. It just came up because I'm very ever since the last three years. I mean, I've just been working with trauma therapists and getting so much access. The feeling is just ump. So I just go, dude, I I I'm terrible at it. The doors ruined. I she was what's coming up? I said, I that the thought that my dad would be able to do it better. I'm sad he's not here. He'd probably be not disappointed to me, but like my father would always be like, oh, why even bothering doing that? You have money, pay somebody to do it. So the fact is it just came up. I cried a little. I was like, Wow, that was very cool and just the understanding of it doesn't mean it will never happen again, but it helps you just pass through it because you, as we know, you can't go around it. You got to go through it. So then I was able to call you. I was like, this is fantastic. So your day kind of does always look good if you just feel the feelings. I do cry a lot. I credit every episode of ted Lasso, even the happy one. I mean, I was watching it last night and you're That's what I was gonna just get to about ted Lasso. Thanks for bringing that up. Is that why why you know you found yourself going into the self help You want to get all in the best yoga self help studios and you're looking to achieve these um the Grammys of the self help world, let's say, and the oscars. So why can't it be both? Why can't you help people through those classes and coach people through that while also making the big bucks operating at this like elite level of that? Um, why can't I understand that it's kind of like a gross thing too and and superficial to to be motivated by those things more than the helping. But clearly you were still helping people in those seminars that you were giving. So what was it that made you abandon that entirely and go I want to shift into something that's maybe not as lucrative or as esteemed. Well, I think it took me twenty I was in comedy thirty one years, so it took me about twenty one to figure out that it wasn't fulfilling anymore. It I found it unfulfilling to do the other show. I was good at it, but I was like, oh, I noticed a lot quicker. So now I noticed quicker. What doesn't work? So I was like, oh, that was fun. All those women gave me great feedback on that it helped them that weekend, that that we can retreat I gave or whatever. But then I was like oh, you know what, it's not right for me right now. And it's cool because you get to example, like, look, I discovered within an hour that I can't paint and I don't like it. I so you just get this isn't you didn't take them on the whole house and decided to paint it and and and start taping everything and go. Now you're realizing you get one side of the door done, you go, this ain't for me, and you can you can find but if you painted for twenty years, you'd become a hell of a painter's exactly. And I also was a hell of a comic. But what what you want to know? What's interesting? If you asked me what I accomplished in my life that meant something to me? And again I think I didn't tell you this. I don't think. But a girl was doing her master's thesis one year when I was very famous. She did a paper on me and my style of comedy, and she asked me my ten biggest achievements and I'm just naming them, and she goes, do you realize all ten things you said? We're about family and friends that had nothing to do with career. So that's part of noticing going, oh my god, I'm not even naming the big stuff. So it's not that it was meaningless. I still get letters from especially like gay guys and into racial couples and all saying it really helped them to laugh at themselves and thanks for calling me out and this and that. But so I get it. I was really good. I was a badass. When it came to roasting. I cracked up because I had a game night for Labor Day and I print on the back of old roasts and things like that because I don't want to waste paper. I'm so woke now. So I um had people keeping score and they go, what is that on the back and they're reading like thank God for the Jews, and I'm like, oh, that's like stuff. But so I recognize how freaking badass I was, Like I'm and I really had embraced whether anyone knows it or not. I literally think I'm a retired legend. Like I literally I think so too. And what you don't retire just because they're good at something and could still do it doesn't mean you have to keep doing it, like you've already proven yourself. What I was thinking that with Simone Bibles, like she already has how many? At what point do we go enough? Golds like or oscars. I remember when I had a conversation with Jennifer Lawrence once and after she won an oscar, she was like, I was really having this moment of like, what next job do I accept? Do I chase the oscar? The one that's gonna win me an oscar? I already have one? Is it going to Am I going to double the feeling that I got that night? And by the way, the feeling that night isn't that great. It's not like, let me tell you the best part. Let me tell you the best part of being nominated for Grammys. I Okay, the first time, I fucking hated it because I made a big thing out of it and I had to get the big dress and to bring the whole family. The second time I got nominated for Grammy, I said, I'm not even gonna go. It's so stupid. It's never fun. And then I go, wait a minute. My dad had just passed about six months before. I said, I'm gonna bring my little niece and nephew. We're gonna get some my dad's suits tailored to look like for the Red carpet, and we all wore like my dad's clothes, all like judged up from a tailor, and we all lied and said we were nominated for Best Swedish Folk Band because they're so blond and at the time, so a night and so we're a great night. So in other words, people listening, all you have to remember is I don't like platitudes, but you have to sometimes just saying we are enough, we are born perfect, We don't have to prove one more thing. If I never was a comic, I earned a life. And yes I was, I never will shoot on comedy has given me a great career, and thank God, financially at least I'm stable. But Jesus Christ enough nothing like connection do you feel like though without chasing those goals of a Grammy or being a legend, you know you you got fulfilled in so many other ways because of chasing these even if they don't fulfill you at the end, Like if you're telling a young comic like, hey, don't chase this, then maybe they won't be as motivated to be a great comic. And and and you know, no, no, I I get that totally. And what I say to the guys I coach because I I'll plug shamelessly plug my podcast. I do have party done it. But yeah, like I talked about the top, but I want to get into your I can't wait. This is what podcast, this is what's important, exactly what Andrew said. I'm so thankful Andrews proving himself useful once. Um that door really affected me and it came out on my head. No, I love you man, You know you know I love you best know the way the way I bring it up the pot. I brought the podcast up because the way it developed was I coached these two guys and they are I would say, two three years into it, so they're funny and I know they're funny, or else I couldn't coach them in comedy. Well, the way I look at it is I never tell them chase a high. Thankfully one of them and one of them is in recovery, so he already gets the chasing the highest bullshit. So I go chase connecting with that audience. Chase the fun, the fun, the fun. I said, if we don't have three listeners to that podcast, I don't give a ship. Because Nikki, I have loved two things in my life as far as loved every minute of dot dot dot. When people say that I loved every minute of plan in my wedding because I didn't have a budget and I was fucking rich and I didn't care, and it was so much one to war that wedding. And I love every minute of recording this podcast because it's deep, because it's funny, and it's a lot of depth with two friends. And here's what I think. Instead of telling them to chase listeners and likes and downloads, I go, don't even look at how many listeners. It doesn't matter if we make one penny. I'm already rich. I'm having a good time with you guys. So I discourage having big goals. I encourage the small goal of connecting with that audience and having somebody go, oh my god, I learned a little about myself. Oh you help lighten my day. It feels really good. So that's why what happened was so to to segue in, I had met these two comics. My niece had asked me to go see them. Now, I do anything for my nieces and nephews, so I said, okay, even though you know when a niece or nephew says, come see my friend is a comic. You know you're gonna want to kill yourself because they're gonna suck. But I go to see these guys and they're actually pretty good. I start coaching them, but then I overhear their conversations and they're two straight millennial guys, and I'm thinking, I've never heard deep conversations like this from straight men. It is ridiculous. That's a podcast, and I walk away. That's all I said, And then I start thinking, I go, that's a fucking podcast. And I want to go on and read them the Riot Act and coach them after they talk about deep ship. But if they won't talk about deep ship, I don't want to freaking participate. So they committed to talking about a huge issue every week, like acceptance, um, vulnerability, fear of success, like all the stuff we really need to unearth within ourselves, and I go, if you can't go deep, then we're not doing it. And dude, every second I have such a blast. And again, of course, like with Andrew, you know, the roasting comes out a little one night. You gotta temperate with jokes. But it really is the reason I like it. And by the way, it is once again called Losers with a Dream available everywhere. And that's, by the way, a roast line. If you remember, I used to it gonna say you you you use the word loser so um so artistically that like I when I read that title, I heard you going lose. Like it almost hurt my soul to hear because it's such the way you would brand us. That word was well, you know, it was from an actual we're sitting down and trying to figure out what to call the podcast. I'm like, well, you know, because you're both a couple of losers in every way. I said, I'm a loser too, because I don't know what I want to do with my life. If anything, maybe I just want to sit on my ass and paint the fucking door. I said, you know what, in the comedy roast, Nick, you'll remember you make fun of the whole day is first everybody on the stage, then get the roast. Uh subject, So I would go, but enough about these losers with a Dream? How about William Shatner? Yes, yes, so I said, you just can take my title because I just think that's such a funny phrase. So that's it's great. It's a great Martin Luther King saying the same things with a dream like it's a different speech, it's a different it's I'm still motivated. It's everything about your podcast is what we do here on this show. And that's what this was all built around, was I. I just wanted to create a podcast that had no agenda of like having to be comedy. It could be it days, there's days that is not that funny. That's why I have Andrew here, because he is uh, He's less comfortable in the uh moments going really deep, so he'll cut it with humor in a way that relieves everyone listening. And sometimes I forget that person listening needs just something to to make to levitate the moment from this depth of like sadness, because sometimes I get on here and I like will cry and and get really sad and and and it doesn't like. That's my problem with like therapy and self help is that it just has to be all or nothing, and it can't be both. And when you do inject too much comedy, it comedy for me. I look, I was just saying, Lisa, I because I look at my eating disorder, which I've been in recovery from for a year and a half. Now I thank you. I Um, I look at that. I never look back and go, God, that sucks that you lost all those years with it. Like I now look at my addictions is like thank god I had them. And I look at comedy like that too, like I'm if when I i'm I'm veering towards retiring from stand up as well. And I'm just starting to like wrap my head around that because when you first told me about that, I thought there's no way I'll ever do that. I would never want to do that. I'm too competitive. I can't let these young people who are right in my like right behind me do better than me. But you know what, they've people have always been funnier than me. People have always been achieving more than me. It's going to keep happening. And honestly, I don't. The pandemic made me not care anymore. Like I mute the people that trigger me and I forget they exist and the ones and then when I do remember they exist, I go, oh my god, I'm not really jealous of that person anymore. I like wish her a lot of success actually, and that's myself doing the work. Well, it is the internal work. It's all an inside job, and we're you've seen early on by the way, you referring to someone as a young comedian makes me laugh because you're the young comedian now you know you're I know that, but right now I'm going to replace you with a rum. But yeah, I mean, I think what's great is you are. I said to you last year on the podcast you and me did one during the heat of code, and I was in a lot of I was going through deep trauma therapy at the time, so that's kind of helped me a lot, because when you have to go really deep about like what your real issues are, and I think me and you really talked deeply about I said to you, I said, Nikki, please do a better job than I did at setting up your life for a better outcome when you're done with this, because I hadn't been as close to people as I want should have been. Um, I didn't. The only rewards I think I reached from comedy. For sure, we're a good living But I had to miss these birthday parties of the kids. I had to miss this, I had to miss that, And I'm like man from age fifty on is when I actually started, you know, being president lives of other people and showing up and working on the big, big issues that are buried down there. So I think it's great that you're thinking of the next step. I can see. I'm grateful for you to pave the way. It's so funny to always have reference to you as someone paid the way for me and stand up and for you to pave the way as like a Simone Biles, Like I was really moved by Simone Biles being like this is too much. I already have, like I don't need to do this event, or like I'm gonna just drop out. And it's like the Limpics. You can't drop Nikki. You couldn't drop out of stand up pay when you are getting you know, given specials and TV shows, it's like I, yes, I can, yes, I can. Well, well, no, of course not. And the great thing is you will have again. It's going to be it's not going to be an easy transition. But what I know about you is you can't hide anything. And I like this and I'll tell you why I'm bringing this up. When we were in that documentary Hysteria Goal um a great documentary. Jesus Christ, you were great and that thank you well. I had many friends call me and say, Nikki was so fucking cool when right after you said your retirement they cut to something of you saying, oh my god, she escaped, she got out something like that, and being like like, I was a prisoner, so meaning that you feel that way too, And I'm like, all I wish for her because I send you such love all the time, just in my mind, and I'm like, oh my god, I hope she knows she doesn't have to do anything she doesn't want to do. And the fact is money is great, but does it ever do anything for you other than pay for seven days a week therapy if you need not really like you know, it's just it makes it so if my parents get cancer, they won't get worse cancer worrying about bills. That to me is what money gets me. Is like my mom when she eventually gets something that's going to take her down, because everyone does that. I know. Stress when you're physically sick makes your sickness worse. And so whenever we get a diagnosis in the family for someone, the fact that I can maybe bail them out financially will make them live longer. And that's why I accept gigs like that. Is it like? And well, well, I think I just go seven year plans with my businessman. When you let me say really quickly, I'm sorry, I apologize. Um. I just want to say about that whole money thing. First of all, I had the same goal of you as you did. I remember when my dad got sick, he had like, oh my god, seven months that they didn't have the money to pay for twenty four hour nurses. So I paid for that, and of course my father insists to pay me back out of the will or whatever. Who gives a ship. So I you and I are motivated from the same uh in a same similar way. We wanted to take care of and hand love. And I see that I'm just kidding. I know, I know you're not like that at all. But what's funny is, I guess true people don't understand how how I how the people don't understand how I sold all the purses and shoes and furniture, like all the stuff that was that bought out of lack, you know. And I listened to the minimalists a lot, this podcast that I love and this is so true. They go, you don't have a better life by adding things. You have a better life by subtracting things. And I'm like, wait a minute. If I think back to the things I've subtracted a husband, three houses out of four, a career, bad friends, impulsive, social media bullshit, I'm like, wow, oh my god, my life is better by taking things out, so and taking out the purses and the shoes, and then you can do something with that money that helps your dad or your mom, and you just go, man, how the hell is my life this happy? So it's through struggle of working on yourself. That stuff doesn't come easy. Those lessons are hard one. But you're already on the track at your young age. I always picked you. I imagine you're about thirty. Are you about thirty? I'm thirty seven, okay, So you are so ahead of the game. I am so happy for you to even be having this in your consciousness at all right now, because thirty seven I wasn't even I hadn't even made it yet. So I'm really I I feel I lost some years, but damn it, I'm making up for it now just by sitting around and trying to paint the fucking door. That's what my mean. It just proves that I don't think there's nothing. You know, before you retired, there was a little bit of me being like, well, we'll see if she likes this and if she's really I mean, she's making a move here, but is it? Is it because she is not as famous as she was anymore now she wants to get out because it's like, you know, I didn't even think those things, but people could have said those things about your choice at that moment to get out, like you know, your star was huge, and like everyone in the business. That's another fear of mine, is this this being built up and there's always is gonna be the roller coaster has to go back down, you know, like they're the pendulum always swings the other way. So when I get things and people go second season of f we Island, oh my god, Nikki, you were killing it, You're on tour, selling out theaters, I'm just like, it's gonna go away. And I'm not saying that to be a pessimist. I'm just saying I can't get too excited because when it goes away. If I'm if my word is based on that or my looks, which are also going to go away. What do I have? So I just like to keep it like just like, yeah, I'm happy about f we Island season two, but that show will be canceled someday because it's called f boyfucking Island. You know that can't that's not gonna be Survivor or you know Seinfeld where we walk away graciously that I'll be taken from us from our cold dead hands. So Andrew, before we go to break, I want you to get in your question and then we won't answer it and go to break. Yeah, yeah, so you know, just stop me before and we can go to break before I'm done even asking. Um so I was gonna do that. You just ruined my joke. But ask your question. Let's go to break. We'll be right back, Andrew. Welcome back, Andrew. Let's let's hear your question for Lisa that you've been trying to get out for the past hour. No, so you know you guys talk about like all or nothing. You don't like the fact that it's all or nothing. We live. We have a profession, right, Like if you wanted to do stand up, let's say once every three months or once every two months and just get that feel of selling out a show, fucking crushing. Granted, you might not be as good because you're not writing as much, you're not performing as much, so you won't feel as great about your own you know, your own jokes. Maybe, but maybe you write some new bits and you just get that feeling of like that high again, right, Like why do we have to say I'm retired. It's over done when we're in a profession that like, because like my dad was a doctor, right, my dad's an oncologist. He retired, he ended up getting cancer. Actually he's fine now. Uh, he had breast concer, he had big tits and had the cut one off, but whatever, So he has it in his fanny pack, don't or she carries it around now Andrew so so. But my point is is like he couldn't then go hey, I'm gonna go into the hospital in every three months and just get that feel of like connecting with his patients. Again, we have a job. So you like a long question, which I respect? What was more of us A little quick? I do? I like it? I like it. Your monologue was terrific. You don't get the part if you cut me do I not bleed. Okay, here's my feeling. Why why is somebody allowed to do anything because they want to or don't want to? So I could tomorrow? My manager says to me, She goes, you know, you're hilarious because I told her only accept gigs where I can talk about myself constantly. So I do a lot of podcasts. I don't want to go on stage anymore. Are yes, maybe I can't even imagine wanting to do it again. But if I did, I could be like, let's do it. But you don't do it for the high. I think that's where you and I are making a disconnect here. I don't want to do anything for a high. I want the highest I want wait, wait, wait, let me finish. I want peace contentment. Does that come from chasing anything? No. I read a quote that was so beautiful I cut it out. I was like, oh my god, how beautiful it is to not be chasing anything or working, working for acceptance at anything. And yeah, I do a killer job on that podcast. Believe me. We prepare, We fucking have meetings every week. I'm like, you guys are gonna get deep. So I have a great time with it. But I'm like, the high is just being like, oh man, that was really fun. So I've never been a risky person. I've never done anything physically risky. All my risks are on stage. All those risks are kind of bullshitty because it's like trying to prove what's the difference though, because I think this is what Andrews getting at. What's the difference between having fun on a podcast and feeling that that joy that you get from having a deep conversation with your friends. One second, Okay, go ahead, what's the difference between having fun on a podcast and Andrew? You know Andrew someone who goes on stage and he really I don't. I'm numb to the audience loving me, or the applause or the massive crowd. It's not then I don't want people coming to see me thinking like she doesn't even appreciate us. I appreciate it so much that I feel like I don't deserve it, you know, Like that's kind of how I num myself because I just feel like an impostor. Right. It's not because I resent the audience or think that whatever. Um, I just don't want the audience to hear that be Like, why would I take it to her show. If she doesn't feel it, I just can't let it in because it's too much and I feel like I don't deserve it. Andrew will get off stage and he'll hill for ten minutes and get off stage and being a really good mood only because he had fun and because they liked you. I mean, like, whether you're fun is based on if they like you. Let's be honest, it's not. You can't rarely do people bomb and have fun still, And I'm not a truth teller. I'm not like, oh, I got out what I needed to. What's what's the difference between what he's doing and the feeling the joy he feels after that, and something that's an unhealthy pursuit of Is that a healthy pursuit is that he's getting a high and a and a joy from I think. I think the only unhealthy thing Andrew's done here today is to think said he to think that I am saying everyone should retire. So he's taking it personally, which is one of the four agreements. You're not supposed to take anything from No No, you are no no. In other words, I'm saying I am happier this way I'm not prescribing this for you, but you are very angry that I'm saying, Oh, but I don't have enough money yet, Lisa. He has been conditioned. He's pavlof dogs by me because I have a lot of the same kind of things, a lot of the things you're saying. My listeners have heard me say in the less articulate ways, more clunkly ways. But I don't have what you just describe. So much of is which this is what works for me. I often come from a you should perspective, and he hears that all day, so I think that's what that is why he's interpreting it that way. I've conditioned him to be that way, and I gotta take responsibility for my part in that. But you're right, but I also took that that way too. When I heard that Lisa retired, I was like, boy, that looks nice. And I even remember doing the interview for Hysterical and saying she got out, knowing that I would never get out, because it's not. I was not in a place ever that I really as anything in life could bring me as much joy as working myself to the bone and being the best and and and honestly, never feeling like the best. No no special, no review, no no um comedian who I was super like, like, no Gary Goldman telling me that I was a great comic, no other great comics who I put on a pestle complimenting me. None of it ever landed. I'm not kidding you, none of it. Never did. I actually think, like, you know, because people would say it was funny, and I could always go, well, they're not a comedian, they don't really know. They're like, yeah, I've tricked the masses. But when a comedian like Gary Goldman or like you know you or anyone would say it was funny, I would still think that I tricked you. You you haven't seen me enough. He was just like, because I was nice to you in a green room, and so you're gonna say I'm funny, Like I never let it in even the Netflix specials. The people at Netflix I tricked them. They saw one good set where I followed someone who kind of set me up to kill like it was always an excuse. And whether or not that's true, which, by the way, it can be true. Those things could have been true, they're probably not because that would be insane coincidences that everyone that's like me has been tricked, but it could be true. Let's just say that even given that, I think that I've realized and and this is so interesting and the part the point you made about like me being pretty young to discover these things. My friend of Milwaukim, he's twenty three years old. He is just such a great comedic mind, diligent kind, just one of my best one of our closest friends, young comic that I just was like, Oh, this guy's gonna if he sticks at it, he's going to be famous no matter what. He recently got a commercial and uh jf L and all these things. And he said to me, I saw him recently, and he goes, can you just talk to me about like what it's like to get things for you and like how it it made you feel to like start getting things when you started getting things. And I was like, honestly, it just I know this is such a platitude, so trite, but it doesn't it doesn't make you happy. And I truly know that now, And that's why I'm I started to talk to him about like I want to get away from it. It's not doing it for me, and he goes, I gotta be honest, I feel that way like and I don't want to burst. I don't want to say something that he wasn't I'll check with him to make sure it's okay to say this. But he said to me, I was just like blown away that a twenty three year old had this kind of perspective. He goes, When I got JFL, when I got this commercial, I felt like an impostor. I felt the stress of having to live up to the expectations. My life is so much more worse, not like my stress levels and my discomfort and my sleeplessness and my anxiety are so much worse because of these things that I thought I always wanted. And he goes, this is not a harbinger of good of good news for my future, of my goals, and and yes, you see it. You're you've acknowledged it, right, But that's only part of the work, because step you don't need to quit something. He doesn't need to now, you just need to acknowledge it. You need to get it and go to figure out why you have imposter syndrome and why you, Nikki have imposter syndrome. Still, after all that stuff because none of that. I mean, we all have imposter syndrome. Definitely. If you don't, then you're just some self sociopath. So the fact is we're all enough as we are, and that to me, Lisa, enough as we are. I gotta stop you because I hear that all the time in my recovery, and I hear that in every book I read. Got you know, whether or not you believe in God, A lot of it is the way you were born is the way you're supposed to be, your perfect way you are. Now let me I have I've I've arrived there. I don't know how it's been through a lot of step work, a lot of you know, meet different things. I've It's just it's gotten in, you know. Um. But for someone, for the for someone who doesn't do that work, or maybe doesn't have an addiction where they find themselves in a room that they can get that kind of work done. How do you get to a place where you even can grasp the concept that how you came out is the way you're supposed to be. What if you came out of pedophile? Well, you know what I did, and I worked on it, and I no longer molesque children. So honestly, though, what if you come out and you didn't have to fully retire though? What did you come out a bad person? I love that Andrew is going to give me career and no, no, I'm saying the kid, tell your manager you're open to auditioning. But honestly, what does that mean for someone who Let's not say let's say pedophile, Let's say, um, someone who I used to feel ugly. Let's say someone is ugly and like they just are because some people are ugly. What if you feel ugly and you go? I used to say to my mom, how could you have sex with dad knowing that somewhere your your lineage could mix and make a child as ugly as me? Why would you inflict that on a human? And my mom used to be like, that is the weirdest thing. And I go, I'm so ugly? Why did you make me? How could you have done this? When and and you you you aced it with Lauren, your DNA met mixed together. My sister got it. I was I felt so ugly. And there are times though, and I talked about this earlier with my body image, that I you feel like and I think a lot of people who are you know, trans, or who just have like a body that they don't feel comfortable in. Which that's why I've always related to the trans community, is because I truly feel like I wasn't supposed to be born in this body. I was supposed to be a supermodel. And I know that sounds nothing like trans gonna be like, yeah right, that's I just want to be who I am. I truly felt like I deserved to be Gizelle, like have her body. And I felt so angry at God, my parents, whatever it was that I had to be put into this earth not that where how can I or how can someone who's born without legs say I'm perfect as I am when truly I'm not. You know, I don't think it's perfect. I think that's what people get mixed up. No, I think I had a shrink in my twenties, and again, I just turned sixties. We all had to shrink in our twenties. I we all thought that fresh. I've had a shrink for like forty years, like different ones. And the first one had said to me, and it finally got in there somehow when I was about fifty. Um, she said you're never gonna be the best, You're never gonna be worst. You're never gonna be the prettiest, you're never going to be the ugliest. But you're enough. And finally, after thirty more years of trying to do it with achievement everything, I literally always kind of just think I'm enough, and I'm always sometimes i'm too much, Like I know I'm too loud, and I'll notice myself at a party going, oh, why do I need attention? Like gosh, let the other people talk? Or why am I introverting myself and not speaking at all? So it's adjusting every day and just noticing how you act and it's okay, it's I need to tell you this. You're never gonna be the prettiest, you're never gonna be thet My therapist Donna, you're not a borting. You're never going to be a model, your average looking and that's fine. And I used to go, don't think, how could you say that to me? But I think I don't think she was right because I don't think there are it's subjective, this is not math. But you just said there's the best and the worst. Let's be honest, Like you just said You're not gonna be the best or the worst because it's an artist someone. No, there's an artificial construct. It's not no one. You could you could name who to you is the best looking, and I could disagree, and he could degree and it would be totally someone different and the ugliest. I know couples who trump. We all agree. I mean, like I think that what actually were We're all right on that. Yeah, I just think we're in other words, all she was trying to say was to try to think of yourself as because we go from I'm the worst human being, the ugliest, most disgusting piece of ship too, I'm the best on the fine Sometimes I'm the funniest and no one can touch me, and I'm the best You can do is when you notice yourself thinking. Notice if anybody does nothing from this podcast other than notice and go high, I notice. I'm having that thought that I'm like, I'm the fucking best. You noticing you know what? Yeah, you're really good. And that's what I said earlier, Lisa, I've been doing this thing for my body image where when I see my leg and it's bigger than I want, or paler or something, or my face is puffier. I told the I told her our listeners. I said, this new thing I've been doing, I've been doing it a while, and now it's become like you said, the changing the I have got to do, I have to and now you just say I got I get to and it's now it's just you, you work. You don't have to try it anymore. I used for a while, I was forcing myself every time I would have a thought, a negative thought in the mirror, to just go, well, you kind of look like a man today, and that is hilarious, and you know what, it's not really gonna just to like have a sense to just go, oh, buddies, look at you look at like a man, to not deny it and go, no, you're beautiful, you have yourself. I'm so tired of that ship of like love your body. You gotta like be like Lizzo, like be like I can't overnight just love my Boddy. And I'm not gonna lie to women and create because I feel threatened when I see a woman who is like, you know, someone that I would assume has body image issues and they're like, I love every part of myself, and I go, do you because you're in a juice cleanse two weeks ago, and that you're lying to me be honest, that somebody's you don't love your body, but like be light about it. Is that like, well, I think I think you noticing, And then if humor helps you, that's a great tool because you know, I always joke on myself about what a big lesbo I look like. I don't care. I'm never gonna win a beauty contest. But sometimes I look in the mirror because I dress, you know, cool, I'm like freaking nailing it, so you just go, yeah, but I'm not nailing it like for everybody else out there, I'm nailing it for me. So if I'm walking around at sixty years old thinking I'm okay, because really it's just like I'm okay, I'm fine, And the humor does help. But I think the stuff about affirmations I love myself. You can't go from my hate my body to I love my body lying to yourself. But also it's another thing not to live up to you in another false expectation. So it's looking in the mirror going I'm okay today, I'm fine as I am today, and again eventually maybe when I'm made. He I'll look in the mirror and go, oh, I love every part of me, not today, and that's all right. So I think it's taking all that pressure of the platitudes off you, the positive vibes only all that ship that doesn't work, and going oh, I'm not great, I'm not terrible, but I'm fine, and about that about aging, about uh looking, abandoning the pursuit of being sexy sexually desirable, because Lisa, you have been fuckable before, like like, yes you have, you have, well, I already I always had both at least were like you would you would embrace that find side of you. Yes, I always had boyfriends and husbands. So I always said there's nothing better than the dead husband because it's proof you had you were hot enough to get somebody, and then you don't have to live with the fucking asshole. So I'm at the dead husband place right now because I'm like, I freaking have proof that I falked before, but I don't have to like, wait, they're not dead though, your ex husband, you're dead in your mind? No, no, no, no, they're okay. I know one that speaks so highly of you and just has so much love in his heart for you. And so that's so let me let me ask you about that. What about? What about that? Real quick? The aging part is so funny because I always said, you know, I'll never have surgery above the neck or botox or anything, because I'm like, I can accept the face like I think women have. I'm an easier time accepting their face because there's it's a very weird process to have to go through a lot of stuff up here. So we're stuck with the same face the rest of our lives. So I just had the weight loss surgery from the neck down. I said, that's the only surgery I'll ever have. So I I think, because I have a sorry, he's gonna just never. So what was the weight lass surgery? Remember I had weight laws surgery eleven years ago. I lost a hundred and seven Was it the lap band or was it like, no, it's called the sleeve where they sleep. Did you have like surgery for the skin or anything like that. Okay, so that's not like cosmetic surgery, but I guess it was trying to achieve a cosmetic thing and health too. I mean I didn't but mostly health. Yeah, So what happened was I accept aging so easily because I think I just was like, what's gonna happen? Like, I'm not going to try to be something I'm not, so I think I don't shoot on people who get surgery. It just to me seems like a sad pursuit that's never gonna end. Well. It'd be like if I pursued being a violinist right now, that's a sad pursuit that's not gonna end well. No, my neighbors would hate me. I wouldn't be good at it, and why the funk am I doing it? That's to the I just started pursuing guitar at a right bulled age, and I love it so much. If it's honestly what I want to do. I want to transition to be a singer songwriter. But I hear what you're saying in terms of like you're you, You're never what what you're looking to get from violin or from fixing your face, which is love and acceptance of If you're just fixing your face because you want to look like a shiny cat, like that's your goal, then yes, like do that. But if you're doing it to be more fuckable, that's gonna have diminishing returns. And and this is the thing I talk about on stage a little bit, and it's actually giving me hope about stand up right now because the things we've talked about, I'm like, Okay, you know what, I can talk about these things that I want to talk about it and still be funny about them and ease into more serious stuff. But one of the points I'd make too, because I remember being in my twenties and just thinking looking at older women or women in their thirties, forties and and so on, not really beyond that, because that's just like, so I'll kill myself before that, because I was always just so depressed, but um, seeing women and just going I'm just I'm not gonna I'm just not gonna do that, like almost like you have a choice of like I'm not going to age. And I know that people in their twenties think they can opt out somehow, and with Bezos and his new like experiments he's doing, that potentially might be the case that there's no more aging. But it will it isn't it. It's inevitable and unless you die, I want to go into our final thought, this will take us out the thing that I really struggle with with aging is that there's always something you can do that isn't the surgery, but it's something like it's a laser facial that's let's not say you're going on it's a knife, but there's makeup. Makeup is great because to me wise makeup okay. For me, it is because it's not invasive. I'm not hurting myself. God I don't. I would feel I'd be hurting myself physically because I'm I. I told you I'm adverse to physical risk. I think it would hurt too much. Like I have to get a call on oscarpy next week and I don't even want to go. I will, but I know it's for health, so yeah, I can't wait. Um, But I feel like, here's the thing. It's everybody's own choice. I have to say that because I'm woke, but I will say. All people have to do is question why if you're doing it only for you, and being brutally honest and really say I'm doing it for me. If a guy on a desert island wants plastic surgery because and just for him, because he and he doesn't see anyone, you go, oh, he's telling the truth. If I get it, I would be maybe thinking what other people thinking of me. So I have to look at my calendar every day. I have to the why is more important than the how. So if I'm looking at my calendar every day and I'm going, why am I doing Nikki's podcast, I'll be a hundred percent off to you. I'll give you in order why. Let's go. I love Nikki. I feel like we're kind of aunt and niece in a way because older sister younger sister's cute. I just for me, I just see I wanted to be that because I want to be at your left. I want to like, okay, no, well, I just feel like i'm some old count to like not to me, So I feel like, okay, first it was Nikki. The second reason I do the podcast is it's fun. The third thing is I'm trying to help these two comics with the podcast. We're doing Jameless plug Losers with a Dream available everywhere, so that those are fucking three great reasons to do this. Because I also I love talking about myself and my journey because I think it might help someone. Plus I'm incredibly self centered. Where am I on this leg, your fifth, your fifth, it's gonna you keep going. I really wanted you to keep going to see if I ever even today, No, I was happy. I I get to stare at your sassy legs as men sometimes have terrible eggs in yours. You know, he has great legs. They're enviable at least. I love love that everything has intentions. None of that was outer focused in a negative way. So yes, you might say, well, you're trying to help those guys on the podcast. Isn't that focused on them? I guess, But it makes me feel good to help, so I guess there's a zero game. It's going to help people. Like that's I listened to some Sam Harris podcasts long ago about what your purposes with your work and if you can't look and see how it's helping others and making the world a better place, Like what do you do what you do? And I really and we can always argue that like comedy people go, oh my god, you got me through the pandemic your roast clips, and I'm just like listen to my like when people That's the thing. I want to just be clear. When people compliment me about my stand up, it doesn't get in because I just feel like it is a magic act um and I have a harder time acceecting those compliments. When I get compliments about this podcast, it is it fills my soul in a way that I've never had it filled. And that is why I this podcast has changed everything for me because it was conceived of the same reasons that you just listed. I want it to be fun. I want to do it with my friends. That's why I do it every day. They didn't even ask me to do it every day. I could have gotten paid the same to do it once a week for an hour, and I do an hour and twenty plus minutes four times a week because it fills my soul and and and I didn't even know that it was going to turn into something where we had a fan It was always my like dream to have a fan base of people that And that's why I'm so glad to have you on the show, because your podcast is exactly what my listeners are into. So I implore you, all right now, just give it a subscribe. Like Lisa and I when we quit Stand Up, we could always go back to it. You could subscribe to this and you can always unsubscribe. If you don't like it, just give it. You don't. If you don't, I blame you because not you NICKI your listeners, because you should like to go deep and laugh at the same time. And I think that's what the future of comedy really is. So yeah, it's what I'm going to give it a subscribe, and if you have time in your podcast life gives a subscribe, listen to it and see if you like it, because honestly, I'm so glad to have you on because this is you were. I realized when you mentioned that hysterical documentary, which, by the way, if you have not seen that, it's an f X documentary. It's on Hulu. It is so good. I'm so proud to be in it. And there's a lot of documentaries and men, you know, we get have to do a lot of these things, so this one is truly done so well, and um is so beautiful. And I even I watched my own scenes in that and I cried because I was like this poor girl, like I got to see myself in third person. But what I want to say is like you, I'm realizing it now. You were the first one that planted the seed in my head that I could do something else and and not have it come from a place of like, I'm just not this isn't giving me what I want career wise anymore. It's about it's not giving me what my soul needs, and what my soul needs is not love and like acceptance from others. It's that I know from recovery that giving back and being of service to others and trying to make people feel good about themselves and feel as good as I feel is the only way I feel good, Like I can't feel good unless I give it back. And it took me so long to figure that out, but this podcast has allowed me to do that. And that's why I'm so freaking grateful for the listeners and that they get that. And we have some that don't and I'll lose them, but you know, I'm gonna lose fans. You probably have fans that are like, what the funk are you doing? What did you abandoned us? How do you deal with that? Oh? I crack up because I'm like, well, I'm a secretary is allowed to retire, a businessman is allowed to retire, Like why wasn't I? And I go there are plenty of comics out there who are really funny. I hope you enjoy some of them, because it's like, I can't control what people think. Uh. And the old days with my comedy, I always like that it was loved me or hate me. I wasn't ever I like her. It was like I love her, I hate her. So I always like that. So it's polarizing. Now it's just like, oh, I don't have to be polarizing. I could just be like, oh, that's fine if you don't like me. It's really and it comes really hard. I think. I think it comes with age because you know, I'll see a comment. I rarely look at social media other than Instagram because it's fun, and if i'll see a bad comment, I'm like, okay, that's okay. They don't like me, and I just deleted or whatever. So I think it's very interesting. It's it's working on yourself so much that you inarguably can like yourself a majority of the day. It's never gonna be and the mood, by the way, liking every mood that comes in. I could be happy one minute crime you know, over painting the door, then sad the next time because I feel I let my dad down. So you embrace all the feelings. You have all the feelings and they and they all pass eventually. So I think that's the stuff I like to talk about now a while, like having a little platform for it. And I'm glad you do that on here and don't just have some surfacing funny podcast, because you know I've done it before. It was I want it served me and I'm so grateful I had comedy to like cut thir and not feel the pain, because the pain would have killed me if I felt it back in the day. I can handle it, you know what. You know what they say, people can't be at their best when they're in survival mode. And you were in survival mode, so you weren't at your best, meaning you've defined be where you was soul filling. It's not always funny, funny funny. I was in survival mode up on that stage and on the TV appearances. I mean I did the Tonight Joe thirteen fourteen times panels just on the couch, just bang bang bang, like you know, Rickles, Rickles, Rickles, and I was like that survival mode, So of course I wasn't at my best. And then I wasn't at my best off stage, but now I feel like, oh, probably at least sixty percent of the time I could be at my best in my life, and I'm like, wow, that feels pretty good. Hopefully when I'm eighty it'll be eight percent. And you know you're right. It's like, I think that so much of self help people get discouraged because they're like, I I had a bad mood, I I yelled at my spouse, I I hated my body that day, I ate too much, and it's like you're gonna have slips, and it's about just being like, ah, well that happened, and being gentle, being nice. You wouldn't you know. I always go back to if you overeat like, which is my you know, uh coping mechanism, doujure now instead of going you mother, you dumb fat piece of ship. You lay you knew like now you feel sick. Instead of that, I just go, oh, babe, that was you had some feelings just now and this helped you, and that is that's what you needed. And maybe don't do that next time, but if you do, it's okay. Why don't you just go right? Why don't you sing a song? Or listen to one song, and if you want to go back to the food, you can, but just listen to one song three minutes. And it's just it's being gentle, because it's it's just people were people, it's practice. No one, No one ever made permanent change by yelling at themselves or being yelled at. You make permanent change by being gentle. But parents, the right parents understand that. So when we're looking, I over eat at least one at least once a day. I I eat the small meals because of my stomach size, I have to eat like six seven times a day, very very tiny amount. At least one of those times out of six, it'll be two three bites too much, and I'll be like Jesus Christ. And then I go, M I guess you needed it. Okay, I want you want and one meal at a time. And you know what, I missed my smoothie yesterday. Oh no, am I gonna die. No, I'll have one today. So it's you needed to miss it. I get like that that I guess you needed it is the perfect thing. Like I guess you needed to just yell at yourself in the mirror, like be gentle with even the abuse of things we do. I guess you needed that to smoke that weed. I guess you needed to slam that door or honk that horn or yell fuck you to that guy, like I guess I needed it forgive yourself and then it will lead to less behavior like that. We've learned so much. Thank you, Lisa lamp and Elly. Please please go subscribe to her podcast, Losers with a Dream. I can't wait to give it a listen myself. Lisa, thank you so much for being here today. You just echo everything that I believe in and and and there's gonna make me go paint all the doors in my apartment and cry while I do it. And Nicky, I knew. I knew when I met you at Stern. I actually I met you in Stanford and Son's. I didn't know because you were shy. But when I met you at Stern, I said, she's somebody I'm gonna have deep connection with. And I always am so grateful because there's so few comics that you can really talk about this stuff with, and I'm not friends with a lot of comics. So when I saw you on Bill Maher, I reached out to you. I was like Oh my god. That was so great, and I'm just thrilled for every step you're taking. I'm so fucking proud of your emotional growth and your stick tuitiveness with that, and also just man, if you could just be easy on yourself, it's fine. Andrew. I even love you because Nikki loved you. Thank you for listening. See you tomorrow on this show. Don't be cut

The Nikki Glaser Podcast

Every Monday through Thursday, comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced 
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