Hi everyone, and Sophia, Welcome back to Work in Progress. Today. I wanted to introduce our guest musician, songwriter, mixed media artist and writer Morgan Harper Nichols in a slightly different way. I am going to read to you some of her own beautiful words. She writes, I know you haven't done everything perfectly up until this point, and there are still so many unknowns that lie before you. But you must remember how far you have come, Remember all of the things you have already let go of, even if others don't seem to notice, even if you don't feel like your accomplishments reflect just how much time and energy you're putting in. The important thing is to make room in your heart for gratitude, even when there are a thousand things on your mind and you don't need anyone else's permission before you begin to do at You don't have to wait until someone says, Wow, you're doing so well, or you've come so far to know in the well of your soul that you are healing and you're stronger than you used to be. You do not have to wait on anyone else to notice just how much progress you are making. How lovely right it's moving, it's encouraging, and that quote happens to feel incredibly important for work in progress. If you love that piece, you can find it on Morgan's secondary Instagram page at the storyteller Co, also the name of an app she started. Her main Instagram page is her name at Morgan Harper Nichols, where she has one point seven million followers who all tune into view her art and writing, her poems and musings, and what she's created in music. Morgan's work is centered around the question how can we create connection with this in mind? She is a true renaissance artist and a hustler. She's creating art and sharing it across her Agram feed, her company, her blog Garden twenty four, her social media, her YouTube, and she has a podcast plus. Her latest book, How Far You've Come, just came out this April and it's full of art, poems and thoughts on living a life. Please join me for the soul strengthening and deeply enriching conversation with Morgan Harper Nichols. I know you said that your sister came and helped you with your setup. Was that just the mic and the lighting or was it the whole view of what I see. Right. Oh yeah, so it was all the audio and then I do the same thing for her. I help with all the visuals. So we have a great little partnership. She does like all the audio things and I do the visual things. So yeah, I love that. I love that. That makes sense because your art is just the best. So I imagine that you being a visual storyteller and and the painting that you do and things makes you able to really set up spaces beautifully too. Oh well, thank you. Yeah. It kind of took me a minute to put that part together though, because I am a very visual thinker and I think and I can see things in my mind. But it kind of took honestly, other people saying, oh, your art, I think this could go on a wall. I was like, oh, I think you're right, Okay, let's give it a try. So yeah, I think I'm I think I'm kind of just now starting to come into that. And then the whole like this past year of just sitting in front of the computer all this time, I'm like, yeah, let's try to just make this space beautiful, Like, let's just see what happens. Maybe maybe I can figure it out. That is so cool. Oh. I have so many questions about how that realization about your art and your capabilities came to be. But before we get into what you do as a grown up, I want to know about you as a kid, because you, like me, are a born and raised Angelina at least early in your life. Everyone looks at me like I have four heads when I tell them I'm actually from l A. So please tell me about being born here and where you were born and everything you remember about it. Yes, I was born in well, the Long Beach area, but specifically bill Flower, and my family goes back two generations in the l A area, and we actually moved. I mean, it's kind of a sad story, but true. We actually moved not too long after the riots happened. The Rottney King Ryot's happened in the early nineties, and um, I'm a preacher's kid, and my parents moved to Georgia, where my mom grew up and they started to church. So the Georgia connection was that your mother grew up there. Yes, yes, so my dad is from Los Angeles South Central and my mom from Atlanta. So yeah, we packed up, and I mean I didn't pack I was a toddler, but they packed up some and moved us south, and we would go back to visit quite a lot. So we would take road trips from the East coast to west, which is just so wild to think about the patience my parents must have had traveling with young kids across the country. And yeah, we we would come back and visit, and I was always just I mean, I still into this day. I loved California. Yeah, I mean, the diversity of nature here is so crazy to me. Yeah, I mean, I love nature. I make art inspired by nature, but I've gone even even deeper with that now. Like I bought like a birdwatchers Bible, and I'm like, I'm gonna be a birdwatcher. I was like, how cool would that be if I could just identify birds? Um u u day, I'm actually really terrible at it. It's very hard. Um I'm like, man, I thought they were gonna be distinct enough for me to kind of get a little repertoire here, but they're not. They're beautiful though, um so. But yeah, it's just just the depth of how many species there are of plants, of animals, and it's just you could literally go on a walk in the same neighborhood every day for a month and see something new every time. But it takes a lot of like practice to be able to look in that way. And I think I'm still learning how to do that, if that makes sense. So yeah, it's it's been really interesting making a hobby out of just slowing down and and try to observe and and look closer, just kind of just because m Yeah, to make a hobby out of observing feels it feels like a profound shift. Was the shift going from California to Georgia? And I know that happened when you said, you know, you were a toddler, But the road trips, which, by the way, the patients are your parents, You're right, I got. But the back and forth, what was that experience like as a kid, you know, coming here, going back home to Georgia, that move? Did it did it feel like a natural kind of change or did it feel like you were thrust into a whole new world. That is such a good question. It's interesting because since I was young, and like, my very first memory is actually in California, and um, maybe I was so young, but I remember, um, and it was weird because I had this memory. I was like, is this like a recurring dream or something? But I asked my parents and they verified. They were like, no, you described it perfectly. And they were like, you're too young to remember that. How do you remember that? But I remembered this. Um. It was actually during the Rottney King riots and we were sleeping on the floor and I told my parents I was like, I have this memory of looking up to the sky and I could see the street light and I could just see like just beyond, and I was like, there was so much sky and I could just see for miles and miles just lying there as a kid. I mean, I wasn't literally seeing for miles and miles, but I felt like, wow, this sky is just so big. Like here I am looking up in this window and then it just opens up to this massive sky and I was like there was an orange street light like right there to the right. And my parents like, yeah, that's exactly what you would have been able to see from where you were. And I don't know if that was just kind of like intuitive or inside of me, but I always felt like what the West Coast and particularly California as a kid, I always just felt like a sense of openness UM. And then those young trips, those trips I would take when I was young, kind of driving leaving West Texas into New Mexico into Arizona, it was just like it felt like the world was just opening up, Like it was just like there's there's room here, there's like kind of like permission to breathe. And I mean, of course I wouldn't have used that language when I was six, but it just felt like, I don't not explain it, it it just felt like open which was interesting because my experience being in California, it wasn't like just hanging out chilling by the beach, like you know, we were in like urban area, like hanging out with family and stuff. But for me, I just felt that sense of openness. And in contrast, growing up in Georgia, I didn't feel that way. It's something about UM, like a lot of the spaces were relived in. There were so many trees, and I was like, I feel like I can't see enough of the sky because like these massive oak trees are just reaching up. And I always love to hear how people different people interpret these experiences, because I've been with people who visit the South for the first time and they're like, oh my gosh, I love the trees, and I'm just like I just want to give beyond the trees, like I need openness, Like I feel like the trees are holding me back. So yeah, even just some like a natural like just nature itself, like I really did from a young age, I kind of created this shift of like okay, here on the East and the South, like I feel kind of restricted, kind of restraint, and I was always just like wanting that what I interpreted as like this West Coast freedom. So yeah, in many ways, I feel like I'm steel like that. But I do feel like I have more of an understanding of kind of like what was happening internally as a kid and why I may have felt constricted growing up in Georgia. I don't think it was just literally the trees. I think the trees just kind of end up becoming symbolic of those feelings of feeling stuck as a kid. When you talk about what the trees might have been symbolic of, and it's funny because having lived in the South, I'm thinking about what it feels like to walk under those giant oak trees, and I love them because they feel so old and so wise. But when I think about them through the lens of the memory you're sharing, I also realized that because they're so big and they reach so wide and they come down so low, you can kind of feel like you're under an umbrella, which if you're if you're seeking the vastness of the sky is quite literally the opposite of that which you're seeking. So what what do you think they became symbolic of? Was there was there a shift for you in terms of a bit of culture shock and what might have been happening in a West Coast versus a southern community, or or was you know you mentioned being a preacher's daughter. Was there a sort of pressure to be that kind of you know, perfect progeny of of a leader, which can I know it can be so hard for a kid. You know what, what do you think gave you that that feeling of um wanting to expand? Oh wow, what you just said that actually just made me even think about this in a layer deeper that I had really thought about it before. Yeah, when when you were talking about the trees being you know, these old, wise like massive presence it's like, yes, it's that, but also, especially if you're a kid or like you said, the child of a leader or something like, you can feel lost in the shadows of that. It's like two things are happening at once, Like you recognize the greatness of it, but at the same time, it's like, well, what the heck am I doing here? Like this is great without me being here. And I think that when I was a kid um and it became even more apparent kind of moving into my preteen and teen years, I became even more conscious of it. I was very aware that specifically in the Atlanta area. I mean Atlanta has so much rich history, specifically for black people. I mean you have like prestigious historical black college universities there. I mean this is a place where I mean Martin Luther King like, I grew up specifically in Stone Mountain, which has like a lot of history that has to do with the Civil rights movement. And I my mom was an educator and I was homeschooled, and I mean we were always like either in the history books or everywhere we went, She's like this happened there, We did that, you know this this happened in nine like all of these things like we were very much so like being educated on the history. So I think for me, I kind of felt in some ways of like, wow, here I am surrounded by all of these like I was. I grew up being surrounded by like black entrepreneurs, like people like doing things like in the community, and I'm like, everyone's so great, So what am I doing here? Like what am I supposed to do? And it was hard because I was more introverted. I had a hard time communicating with people and really kind of putting myself out there. So I felt this sort of like almost in a way, I kind of felt shame. Like it's like, wow, I have I'm in this place where people literally moved to the city to like do great things and dream big and and create, you know, things for the community, and here I am like I can barely like form a sentence without getting sweaty palms, and it's just like who am I supposed to be? And it was just so it was so challenging because I my parents are They're still this way, like they were just so supportive, but I just I kind of felt like I'm gonna let him down. I'm like they're like Oh, you're so talented. You could do this, you could do that, And I'm like, oh boy, I don't think I can. I don't think I could rise to the challenge. Guys. So yeah, I think kind of going back to those trees, it's just like you're you're there among something that's so much greater than you, and while you can admire it, you can also kind of feel lost in the shadows of it and question what your significance is. And I say, you mean, but but I think you know. It's interesting because I think that the specific is actually universal. You're talking about your specific experience. But I do really believe that that feeling of what do I contribute here is so universal, and I think all of us can, probably in this moment, feel something in our chest that makes us not along with that truth. And I think it is compounded now especially I mean, God, I think about you as a sensitive kid trying to figure it out. I think about me as a sensitive kid trying to figure it out. And now I think about all these kids who grow up with the Internet, where everyone's comparing their insides everybody else's outside, and I can't imagine how small it must make so many people feel, and I mean, really, it's one of the reasons I wanted to do this show in the first place was to really dig in because every single person I've ever met has a story of trying to find themselves, trying to understand what worth is where it comes from, figuring out what they really don't understand and what they're still trying to learn and and from the outside. So many of the people who I get to interview on this show are people who their communities look at as you know, quote unquote having it all figured out, and it's like, nobody has anything. What are you talking about? We have no idea what we're doing, no idea, no idea, And I wonder, and this this might go really deep, but I can't help but see, I'm seeing your story like a movie, which really strikes me about what an amazing story to other you are because you're painting a picture for me in my head at least of a visual language that I understand. And I think about this little girl being in l A in that moment of incredible tumult and pain and such deep pain for the black community and such a such a historical kind of tent pole for police brutality and lack of accountability and all of these things that are enormous social constructs, and you were just a little girl, and your family, from what it sounds like anyway, is saying we're not staying here for this and choosing to move and setting up life, you know, in your mom's hometown, setting up their church, the Kingdom City Church install in Mountain as you mentioned, and and the the at best potential for sort of leadership and inspiration of a faith community, the historic goal leadership and inspiration that comes from that community for you know, the entire civil rights movement and social progression and also as you said so specifically rich for the black community. And then what the Atlanta Black community is as this incredible community. And I have this feeling of kind of wanting to take a deep breath for that little girl, because there was fear, and then there's legacy, and then there's family and love and faith and all of these things baked into it. And I imagine that that's a lot to try to figure out how to process as a small child, the kind of best and worst of it all. And where do you fit in? Yeah, I'm just oh sorry, I just have to remind myself I was on a podcast, Mark and you can't just sit here and not your head, because yeah, I was just taking that in. That is so true and it's such just you just reflecting my own story back to me. It was just such a reminder of how how till this day I still need to continue to nurture that young Morgan and tell her that you just said that. All I've been thinking is like I just want to hug the girl and be like, Hi, like my little kid inside that I have to hug a lot wants to hug your little kid. Let's oh my goodness. Oh yeah, And I love that you said play because I that's honestly been such a huge word for me right now. It's just how can I remember to play? And it is amazing to me that as a kid, while I was like this sensitive kid taking all these things in, that I was still able to be imaginative and play and even if I was just playing by myself, like I was having the time in while life. So yeah, that's something that you know in today's time that I have to for the sake of my own mental health, like I have to find ways to continue to play and I've been like keeping crayons around or like the past few months and just like originally bought them for my little one, um, but he barely touches them. I'm I'm the main one using them. And even just that practice, UM for me, it's just it just kind of takes me back to like, yeah, that that six year old me, that that kid me. It's it's like still inside of me, and I have to continue to nurture that version of myself. How do you feel like you do that? How do you find play? How do you hug little Morgan in your life? Now? When I make something that I'm really proud of or have be about, and I feel no pressure to share it whatsoever mm hmm, and I just look at it and say that was good. I had a lot of fun with that, and nobody else has to be a part of it. And when I get to that place, like I know that that is that's the heart of nurturing that part of myself. And I just think about the work it takes to be able to be kind to yourself that way, and I I wonder when did that ability to express yourself begin? Because I'm you know, I'm so I'm so curious about now, But I'm so curious about your childhood too. I just want to know all the things. And I think about what we know so far about the move and the church they began in your life in Atlanta, and that that sense of trying to find identity d And I think about you being an artist creator, and I wonder, what's that pathway you know? Were you were you painting and drawing as a little girl, you know, at at eight or nine or ten, were you finding that voice? Did that come later? Kind of what how did that all start? I was always drawing and writing stories for as long as I can remember. I started keeping a diary at age eight, and I have kept that going until today. I it is, I mean it is, like it's hard to even say. Like writing is like an extension of me. I mean it, it feels like a part of me. I used to treat my my sound weird. But I used to treat my journals like they were actual beings. Like I would introduce myself, like in the beginning of the first page is I'm like, hello, I'm working, um here's my life. And I would tell my life story every time. I'm like, you might also want to know this about me. It's kind of greepy. Going back and reading some things, I was really invested. I found one of them not too long ago when I literally cut off a piece of my hair and it's like and taped it inside of the journals, like, here's what my hair looks like. I'm talking to the journal I was like, Wow, we're good. Okay, so yeah, Needle's say. I got really creative with the page and and bringing that page to life, like I was just really interested in that. Just any color pencil, any marker. I mean, I was like, oh, I haven't tried these dollar store watercolors. Let me just try this and see what happens. But it was interesting because for a very long time, it didn't feel like something that I could share with other people. If if my parents saw it and my sister saw it, I was fine with that, but it was never like, Okay, you know, show it to your aunt, you know, show it to the neighbor. It was never like, oh, let's put what you made out there for others. Even if if my parents tried to encourage me to do that, I was very hesitant, And I mean I wouldn't have used these words then, but I think it was a sacred space for me. I think it was just this whatever this is, like I feel calm, I feel at peace when I'm doing this, when I'm sketching, when I'm doodling, when i'm writing, and I'm not sure I'm ready to let that go yet. So the first time I started to really kind of let that go willingly and and and say, Okay, I guess I can share some of this maybe with others. It started with my grandfather, and my grandfather is I. I I feel like I take a lot from him. He's just he's very curious, like he's just he's the kind to sit at the kitchen table with a dictionary and just read the dictionary, like he's just like, let's learn some new words today. And until this day, he's still like this in his eighties. And when I was fourteen, I actually went over the house and he had started collecting instruments from yard sales and teaching himself the instrument. So he bought like drums, said, bass guitar, electric guitar. So we're at their house and he was like, Hey, come check out this new guitar I got. And I was just like I said, yes, because it was just like my grandfather, I wasn't really like, you know, that invested in the idea of a guitar. Bus like at sure, okay, I'll go look at his guitar. So I picked up the guitar and till this day, I've never had anything like this happened in my life. I heard what I can only describe as the voice of God just literally say in my ear, you're going to use this, and it was like the most audible like I've never had until this day, I've never had any moment like that, and it just shook me. I was like, I don't know what that was. I don't know what that was about, but okay, there's something with this guitar. And when he showed me, like how to play a chord, I was just like, yeah, there's something to this. I don't know what it is. So he let me take the guitar home and I taught myself to play and that was the very first time that And it's funny because that was the first art form that literally makes the sound. So it's like you can't hold music in and I'm like, if you're gonna play music, eventually, someone's going to hear it, and in a way, I feel like the guitar kind of became this Like so, this sounds like a negative word, but for me it wasn't. Um It was kind of like a barrier, like between me and the world. It was like, as long as I have this, I can share some of myself. I have something to And again, they sounds like such negative words, but it wasn't negative for me at the time. It was like I wasn't so much hiding behind it, but it was like, this is assistance that I need to be able to be out there in the world, and maybe I can share some of the stuff that's inside of me. I don't think of that as negative at all. I I think it's actually quite profound to know yourself enough, even as a young kid, you know, as a as a child, as a teenager, to say I am and I'm path, I am an open channel. It is hard for me to be bare chested out in the world. It's it's beautiful, but it's painful. I I think about the way a guitar rests over you. It's like it's a shield for your most vital organs, and never thought of it that way. I just got chills when you said that. I mean, what a beautiful version of armor, right, Like to be able to hold something that makes you feel safer but that also allows you to give beauty to other people. That's a pretty incredible thing. Wow. Well, thank you for saying that that way. I never thought, yes, I do too. Yeah, that that really stubs it up perfectly, because it felt it felt like it chills, like it didn't feel like, oh, I'm you know, trying to I was like, no, this is this is helping me be out here. This is making it possible for me to be out here in this scary world where I'm encountering people that I don't know, that don't know me, and you don't know how they're going to react to your art or your words or your story. And yeah, that was that was a huge turning point for me. And and and I still, I mean, I don't I don't play guitar every day now, but I mean I still feel a sense of that every time I pick it up. I really do. I love that. Do you remember when you first performed in front of an audience. I don't remember the exact first time, but it was a whole string of really bad performances with patient people, very patient loving people in my life. I'm sure my mom was so like she still this way, and she's like, we're gonna get your music out there. We're gonna get it out there. And she was just like, oh, I know, you're gonna sing at coffee shops. So she would just like going random coffee shops like can my daughter come in here and sing? So it was stuff like that. It was so um and I'm I'm glad she did it. But back then I was just like, what am I getting myself into? But one thing that was nice I remember as I as I started to learn how to tune my guitar and pace myself through the songs, when people started to like leave me tips. So I would like play coffee shops and stuff, and you know, being a teenager, I mean it's like, you know, any little dollar, it's just like, oh my gosh, just like I can get paid for this. Um. That was that was really nice. So yeah, it was UM. I used to there's a town in the Atlanta area in Lanta call five Points, and I used to do um when I was like eighteen. I used to like bust out there a little known fact about me. I don't talk about that much, but I used to set up my guitar, open my case and just play on the street. And it's so wold that I was like with my personality and how kind of subdued I naturally am. I'm like, yeah, I don't know what came over me, um, but some kind of way. Yeah, I was out there. Do you think finding that kind of more what would you call that, like a public facing identity as a musician at eighteen, had anything to do with you starting school outside the home at sixteen? Because I think about you know, you're talking about your mom always having a history lesson and a thing to point out and leading you know, you in home school. Then to go into a traditional school environment, was that like a wild change for you or or was there something about the the amount of time that you got to be home and the way that you learned to kind of protect your energy that made you feel ready at sixteen? That's such a good question. Yeah. So I graduated from high school at sixteen, and then I went to college, moved on campus. I was I was only like forty minutes away from my house. The school was very close to home. Yeah, I was like. My mom was like, I was like, you know, you could live at home if you want to save money. I'm like, no, I'm I'm a grown up. I'm gonna move on campus. So I just I just always think that was so funny because I thought I was really doing something. I mean I was, I mean, I was sixteen in college, but I was just like, I've moved three five minutes away, so um yeah. I think what happened was that I knew because I was two years younger than everyone, which by the way, I wasn't planning on telling people. They're just so happy to be a girl from my hometown who recognized me. Like at orientation, I was like, aren't you sixteen? Why are you here? And I was like, well, I don't blow everyone knows um, So everybody found out pretty quickly, so I think honestly, from that moment, I was like, well, I've got to prove that I'm worthy of being here. So I really I kind of went into a little bit of like a survival mode. I think if just like, don't mess us up more again, Like you need to perform well in class, you need to perform well socially, like make friends get involved with every activity. So I just packed my schedule with every possible thing, like try to be likable to everyone. I think I just felt like I had something to prove, you know. It was just like if you're gonna be a sixteen year old in college. Also, I was at a predominantly white school as well, so you know, being a black female sixteen year old, I was conscious of that. I was just like, yeah, if I'm gonna be here, I felt like I had to the pressure of, like I really do have to kind of go above and beyond. And I think that version of me being eighteen busking in Atlanta, like that was a part of that too. It was just like, Okay, if you're gonna be a musician, you gotta make yourself stand out. So let's go. Let's go singing radio Head in Atlanta because that's what people do. So yeah, yeah, I think a lot of that season of my life. I can look back on that and say, oh, Morgan, you were putting so much pressure on yourself. Like it's like, yes, yes, put yourself you know, take your up out of your comfort zone, challenge yourself. But I've learned now it's like you also have to be gentle with yourself, and you also have to to know what your limits are. And I was really pushing myself. I was I really felt like I had something to prove. Yeah, I mean to enter college so young and to constantly be trying to prove to everyone that you know, I'm growing up enough to be here. I know enough to be here. Whatever it is that's inside of your mind at the time, I would imagine that felt like a lot of pressure. How do you feel like you began to take that pressure off of yourself, because I know that after college you you pursued an m f A. UM for everyone at home, You've got a Master's of Fine Arts and Creative Writing. I dropped out, you did. Yes, I'm I'm an m f A drop out. The Internet lies sometimes, according to Google, you have one, so right. Yeah, it was so funny. I actually, um actually google my net work the other day. I was like, Wow, Google thinks I really got stuff together. I've done that, And I was like, I'm going to cut that out and put it on my vision because if the Internet says maybe someday it could be true. Yeah exactly. I was just so I was like, let me just see I was honestly shocked. Something came up and it was just like here's what we're gonna earn from being in the music industry. I'm like, that is absolutely hilarious. But thank you Internet. You know. Well, the funny thing is I had someone like sass me when I was talking about universal healthcare on Twitter and like their comment was like, yeah, it easy to say when you're worth blah blah blah, And I was like what And I don't know why. It's like it's stuck with me because I was like, it's so specifically, I'm not have this little internetural get this specific number. And then I was like, huh, I wonder what. So I googled it and I was like, oh, that's where they googled this and they think it's true. And that's larious. It's it's really something. I also giggle because like I also get screamed out. I don't know, actually know what your thoughts are on this, but we can talk about it. I get screamed out a lot on the Internet for like, if you think, you know healthcare should be free for everyone, you're a socialist. And I'm like, well, I just actually think that. Lots of other nations that are capitalists in nature habit and why can't we we have so much money here? Where does it all go? And and I started laughing, and I was like, I guess maybe the reason that I'm okay with a redistribution is because I'm an artist. And like the thing that nobody knows is that when you're an artist, like you pay, everyone on your team eats together. So it's like ten percent goes to your agent, and ten percent goes to your manager, in five percent goes to your lawyer, and three percent goes to financial human and then there's another three percent that goes to the p are humans that work on your strategy. And then like and I started like listing out all the percentages and then I was like, oh yeah, because I like, you know, of it goes away before I get it. Yeah, And I'm like I can live on this, Like I'm cool with my just under like, and everybody else deserves their percentages too, And I was like, maybe I kind of am a democratic socialist. I don't know, but I was like, it seems to be working great for you know, the majority of us who make art, So why can't everybody else figure it out? Like the government. I honestly can say that healthcare is I am super passionate about that because I, like you just said, it's just it's like, yeah, if if we can't agree on like philosophical differences, like can we at least just agree to like take care of each other's like physical health like that to me just seems like the bear minimum. And not only should it be the bare minimum from a moral perspective, but even if we take our empathy out of it, from a fiscal perspective, it is cheaper as a nation to keep people well then it is to only take care of them once they've gotten sick. Yeah. It actually it would pay for itself so many times over if everyone could just go to the doctor, and if people didn't have to rash in their insulin, and if people didn't you know, wind up meeting triple root canals because they couldn't afford to go to the dentist when they had a little pain in one of their teeth. It's like, it's so I think, this idea that you know, you've got to make people work for it is so insidious when you see the numbers. Like my favorite person on the internet and in government is Katie Porter when she whips out that whiteboard and breaks down the math. I am just in, I'm like on the computer, like, go Katie. I just love her because she really she makes it makes sense and it is funny to me. And it's a it's a strange, roundabout way to get back to your story. But we have theoretically all in whatever faith tradition we've grown up in, we've grown up with the universal truths of faith, which essentially say love thy neighbor, which say we're supposed to serve each other, which say that the greatest leaders who inspired you know, books about God, the universe, whatever you want to call it, all leaned into the communities that were the most marginalized and showed up to serve those people. And I'm like, shouldn't we do that with like medicine, anybody. I think about this all the time. Um, I mean even more so over the past year. I mean, it's just become so apparent evidence. My mom has a chronic pain condition and it's just what I've seen her go through. My my my dad's her primary caregiver, and when I've seen them go through, Yeah, it's just I'm like, yeah, we shouldn't be here. Um, it shouldn't be this difficult. So yeah, it's something that I I spent a lot of time about and when we were forming my company, like I was like, I don't care what it takes, Like everyone's gonna have health care. Um, I'm like, and and the best we can find, because I mean, it's like I said, I know, like it's a bare minimum. I'm like for people to be able to breathe. So I mean, I I write a lot about breathing, and I'm like, this is not just a medical metaphorical thing, Like I'm talking about physically breathing, physically being able to go into the doctor's office and know that you're safe and know that you're gonna get the care that you need. I just feel like we have we have a long way to go. But I also just want to say thank you to you because you're someone who who I see that has a level of specifically Internet bravery that I do not have. And I'm just like, I am cheering you hot. I'm like, teach me your ways because it's it's it's so sad that it is controversial, Um, that it's political. Um. Kind of going back to my story. I was actually thinking about this this morning, actually, And I've kind of struggled a little bit in recent years with faith conversations because I grew up in a version of a Christian tradition that was African American, that came from descendent of slaves. So for me growing up, it wasn't it wasn't like a political controversial thing to like talk about justice and oppression in the same conversations that you're talking about Jesus. It's like those weren't. It's not like, oh, you got political. It's like, no, this is real life. Um and and it's only political because it's always political if people are involved. But it became very hard for me over the past few years of just like, wow, some people are just now recognizing for the first time that if you're going to be a person that belongs to any faith or you know, religion and love is a part of it, then the conversation about oppression and social justice and many other things just too a many have to be a part of it too. And and I recognize that that's a hard conversation to have, and and I definitely do try to have grace, but I'm also a human being who who gets really frustrated about like, shouldn't be this complicated. I'm with you. The people listening at home can't see me. Now I'm the one that's just nodding. I'm like, I'm with you, And I must imagine because I think about this feeling is emotionally connected to humans, as I do the only way I know how to output that love and the kind of sacred rage that comes from seeing injustice happen, because people should be met with justice and love and the opposite is painful. So it's like, I gotta get it out somewhere. So I got to write about it, and I got to talk about it on the internet. And I think about lessons I've learned from my parents, and I really have such just emotional vulnerability when I have conversations with my friends who are now you know, young parents, and you know you as a mom. How is that experience for you? Because I I'm at a stage in my life where I have that experience now by proxy with you know, the first friends and my group of friends who've had kids, and I'm so overwhelmed with them, and then I'm like, what is it going to be like when Mama am I just gonna be crying all the time? Like, does it? Does it feel bigger? Has has having a kid changed you know, your view on the world, on on love, on faith, on on how we interact with each other? M hmm. That's such a good question. I I feel like having a child has taught me so much that I I don't quite have the language for it yet. Even though I've been apparent for almost two years now, it's still I still very much so feel like a newbie, kind of like we're talking about like no one knows what they're doing. I'm like, how did I become responsible for human being? So trying to figure that out. All my friends and kids say that though, they're like, you just give me a baby, And it's so I mean, it regularly gets really primal. I'm just like are you fed? Are you warm? Are you are you clothed? It is very much so like okay, yeah, all those things. Okay, we're doing good. Because I'm a very curious person, like I love to learn new things, like I love new experiences. I'm like, give me all the things. However, I do kind of have like blind spots maybe you could call them of like where it's really hard for me to kind of lean in. And I would say a big thing for me that has been a big the biggest challenge is what does community look like now? Like I've never really had like a lot of parent friends around um, and then with this past year, you know, I haven't been hanging hanging out with people, so I'm there is some anxiety there of like whoa, what does it look like to not only like try to even that word raise a kid. That's such a weird word. It's just like raise a child. I'm like, I just I don't know. I can't wrap my head around it. How do I like, how to look after guide this person you or whatever into being an adult while doing that with other adults who are doing the same thing, and you know, maybe we don't do it the same way and what does that look like? And I don't know because I'm just starting. But I do think that one thing I have seen that has given me some hope in that area and some permission to breathe is that I ended up with a child who is incredibly outgoing and easy going. And it's so interesting watching him, um, even just from a distance, interact with other humans like where we live, there's, uh, there's a street nearby, and like there's like a gate and everything. But sometimes like I'll just like hold him up until you can see over the fence and he will just wave at all the cars and he's just like, hey, oh my gosh, people, people, And he's so just energized by other people's presence, and I'm like, wow, he's not thinking about how am I going to connect with these people? Am I going to see them again? You know? I like, are we going to be best to control? Like he's just like present to who is in front of him, and I'm like, well, I've got to find that in myself, um, because I put so much pressure on myself of like on how do I fit in the world, how do I fit in this community, how do I fit in that community? How do I what does what does this mean? You know? What does it mean? Now? Post COVID all of these different things, And it's just like he's just open and curious and just willing to be present with people, and so much of it is just that so many of the other things are boundaries that we've created. I Mean, it sounds so cliche to say, but it's like kids on a playground are not thinking about, you know, the social hierarchies and things like we as adults do. And I'm just trying my hardest to just like learn that from him, or relearn that from him, if you will, because I still know it. But yeah, yeah, I love that. I really love that. And you're right, you know, I think, weirdly for me, working in film and television kind of was my lesson learned the hard way on that stuff a little bit, because I am such a person who loves community and craves a sense of home, especially because usually when I'm working, it means I have to leave my home. And it wasn't until I kind of flipped the script and said, when I am in this space, when I am on this stage, when I'm working with these people, I want to love them like they're my family. And when I go off to the next stage with the next group of people, I want to love those people like they're my family. And the sad reality is you don't have room for so many families, but you can love the ship out of people when they're in front of you, and then just see and maybe you'll talk to them all the time and maybe you'll talk to them every once a year and maybe it'll be a holiday check and who knows. But I realized I had to get over the paranoia of well, what's it going to mean? And how long are we going to be friends? And you know, do they care as much as I care about this thing? And it's like, it doesn't matter. My My job is to love the people in front of me. And this show has been such a great kind of exercise there. Look at every single person who I sit with on the on this zoom, I'm like, you're so cool. I hope we can be friends forever. And that's the feeling I want to have, whether we get to be or not. I want to be in this cocoon of thought and idea, sharing and vulnerability and and to offer it out there and to just let it be enough, whatever this is, to let it be enough. And And it didn't strike me until you told me that story about your son that it really were acquires, a freedom from expectation, to be so emotionally open and present and to not get obsessed in the moment was what comes after? Wow, what you just said that was so freeing like for me, and I hope anyone else who hears this, because that is huge. And I feel like, in some ways what what you just said is, at least for me, it feels countercultural because I feel like a lot of times value is kind of evaluate if that's the right way of saying, by like who you know and how many connections you have, and who's all in your group, and and oh look how many people they had come to that event, you know, how many people can you get together or whatever? And it's like or we've hung out once or a couple of times, and that was just as beautiful and valid and there was no expectation that, Like that's just so free. So thank you for sharing that, because I want more of that in my life. And I think it gives it gives me their permission to kind of like lean in more to those moments without that fear or anxiety or or paranoia about what it has to be later. I think that's really good. M hmm. Yeah. And it's not easy, Like I definitely I'm much more of a hoarder than a minimalist, and that goes for humans and experience it. Like I just I don't know, I have such a my mom and I always laughed at. This probably comes from, you know, my grandmother who literally like came to the US as an immigrant on a boat and was like the kind of person who was always like take this help from the hotel, like, and she had drawers of little things that she had collected from everywhere. And I think I have a little bit of that tendency that the nervousness of like, well what if what if we don't have this tomorrow and what And for me, I really as that that can be so poisonous and to to attempt to release that a little bit it requires some introspection. But I think for me figuring out that if I set the goal of b as present here with no expectation, it kind of it gives such a deeper potential and a more real emotional runway. And it's not easy because I also have, you know, crippling social anxiety, and I'm really struggle being around strangers and I'm just like, oh man, you know, but I gotta deal with my ship because I'm a grown up. Oh god, I yeah, I I love that. I love what you just said, and I love that you just you know, affirmed how how hard it is, Like it's something you have to kind of think about and and even just having self awareness of like, oh, this actually is probably beyond me in the sense that it's could be in my ancestry a little bit, like there could be something here. Yeah, that's why I'm and I'm just so interested in just hearing your story as well, because I considered like, to me, acting is like the pinnacle of like, I don't know what y'all tap into, because you have to be present in a different way because it's it's you. It's it's you, but it's not you, and it's just a great mystery to me. I know nothing inside of the field other than just watching and admiration, and I feel like you just end up learning so much about connection and human relationships that's just really unique. And this is kind of a tangent, but I think one of the reasons why I do love watching film and television is because I I was diagnosed with autism this year, which has been kind of like a yeah, it's it's been kind of a huge change in my life, a lot of affirmation for a lot of the struggles that I've that I've dealt with in my life, especially socially and communication wise. And it has been a lot of movies and TV, a lot of fictional stories that ended up helping me learn about human connection, and I all, I often can think about how I kind of like having that fictional separation because it's like that was so created by human being, Like the people acting on screen, the people writing it. These are all still human beings with lived experiences who are all kind of like working together to create this experience for us that feels very humid. Did you happen to watch Amy Schumer's documentary I Have No Pregnancy? Oh my goodness. Okay. It's a three part doc and it's basically all shot on her iPhone and her husband's iPhone and her husband Aisle. They it's before they had their son, which is what the whole doc is about. Um, but her husband was diagnosed with autism and the way they discuss it and the way, you know, she as his partner, learns how to understand his communication skills, UM and patterns, and that he understands things he might need to tell her that wouldn't necessarily strike him to express, but that she needs to know the whole It is so beautiful. They are such a cool pair and it is the rawest realist. Like there's shots in this thing where I was like, oh my god, Amy, Like, I'm just like, girl, you just let us all see that. Okay. Like the the amount of respect that I just like put on that story. It's very special. And it's one of the things that I watched in lockdown. I was like, this is incredible. I will I will definitely check that out. Yeah, I had no idea. Yeah, there's not a ton one of stories out there about autistic adults. It's it's very hard to find our stories, um. And that's even why I've started to share mine, just because it's it's a really mysterious journey in the sense of it's, yeah, I don't have a lot to look at, so I am always looking out for other people's stories as well. Okay, one other one I will share with you. Then I'm kind of a documentary junkie. These are both docts, UM. But there's another documentary UM that a family made about their son who is also autistic, and he is much further on the scale of being nonverbal and not being able to communicate, and the thing that he always loved from the time that he was little, that he really responded to were animated Disney films, and what they discovered is that over years of repetition of watching these movies is even for someone who who began as being nonverbal, the films gave him a pathway to understanding emotional communication. And essentially there's a doctor who the interview in the movie who talks about how because in cartoons reactions are heightened, it created a blueprint for him of human emotion and it is I mean what I tell you, it's called life animated. If I didn't say that already, I want I tell you that when I watched this movie, I sobbed. I was just like like I could not I couldn't even thinking about it. I'm like tearing up. It's so beautiful. And then you know, the work that a family did to figure out how to create lines of communication with their son is is really really special. Um. And to your point, I think when there's not a lot of not a lot of a catalog of stories to look too, I think it almost becomes even more important that even if a story doesn't line up with your own, that it's still made available so you know, for if that might be fun for you or anyone listening to watch, I highly recommend it. I'm definitely going to check that out because even as you were sharing that, it made me realize one of my favorite films that I have that I watched so much is the Pixar film Inside Out, which is all about your emotion favorite and it is exactly what you describe the scenes. I mean and if I were I mean, I'm definitely fear. Absolutely like fear embodies so much what happens inside of you. Um. So yeah, that was that was um yeah. Even just when you were sharing that, I was like, oh, there's probably there's probably some deeper reasons that's so. I connect with that movie so much. It really I really appreciate the way it lays it out. Not to be like a complete creep who knows your entire background, but I do, aside from Google lying to me that we've got an m f A but also like good for you also take your degree in your googlet and just right into the sense. But it really strikes me. Um, And I feel like for the audience listening at home, I should give the precursor. You released your first album in which I want to talk to you about. But the thing that this conversation about communication, he's really making me even more in awe of is the project you started in you set a goal to write a million poems to strangers over the course of your life, and in Seen you started writing personalized letters for strangers as part of that project. And the idea, now knowing what I do, that you set out to communicate in the most vulnerable way with one million strangers, despite the fact that because of who you are and how you are, that level of vulnerability can often feel painfully expository. Girl, How did you decide to do this? It's it. I thought it was brave before I knew everything, and now I think it's like brave and impossible and amazing, Like how did you make that decision? And how does this new information about your makeup affect how you do that? Yeah, and it's interesting because the album actually connects to how how I ended up at that. So when I released my first album music album, I was super excited. I was like, well, I get to do this. However, I was in an interesting place, so I think other artists may feel this too. When you work on something that you were really passionate about working on and then it's all, and then it's just like now you have to spend X amount of time depending on what the project is, promoting it and marketing it. And then it's just kind of like if your project that you're working on doesn't like shoot off into the Sunset is not the most successful thing, then you don't always get to just like work on another project right away. So that's where I was. I I'm super proud of the music I made, super proud of the album, but it didn't top any charts. It didn't lead me to get on a bunch of tours like that didn't happen, so um, And I mean this is not unique to music artists. Lots of people deal with this, but yeah, you end up kind of waiting around trying to figure out like, Okay, how am I going to keep this going, you know, and you end up taking a lot of different jobs or just random background work and which I was doing. But I was like, I love to I love to create. Though I was like, I was, I could do this, but I'm like I missed that that process of like being in the studio and writing songs and thinking about stories and thinking about who might be on the receiving end of um. This song. I was always very very visual about it, Like when I was sit down in songwriting sections, I'm like, Okay, who are we writing for? As sometimes the writer would be like, oh, let's write for you know this demographic, I'm like, No, what's their name? What time of day are they going to be listening to this song? Like I want to create like a whole character for every single song that I wrote, because it just I don't know, like on the listening end of music, it feels very intimate, like like I know this person didn't they didn't write the song for me, but it feels like they did. Like it feels like they wrote it for me. And I just felt like, if I'm going to make our I want to do my best to try to create that experience for someone else. So yeah, I just found myself kind of hitting some walls because I wasn't a music producer, so I couldn't just like go in the lab and just like make my own thing. Um, believe me, I tried, but I tried again. I have my sister Jamie, she is she is one of those music artists who can get in and produce it. And I'm like I, I just couldn't couldn't figure it out. I'm just not wired that way. So I was kind of stuck because I was like, Okay, I can't afford to like self produce a record. I can't preford to do that. I financially can't afford to do it. But I love to make art for individual people. I'm like, that is where I come the most alive. And I think it came from not again. I didn't know I was autistic at the time, but it came from struggling with communication and struggling socially. Art felt like a place where finally I can connect with people in a meaningful way. Finally I can get to hear and connect and exchange stories. So it's like, I gotta find a way to keep that going, you know, hitting these walls with music. How can I keep that going? So that's actually what led me into poetry was the realization that Okay, I may not be able to produce a song, but I can write a poem. I don't need a producer for that. Um, all I need is a is a good spell check and it can go out in the world. I was like, this, this I can do. I can do this, and it did feel like like a reduced version of what I was doing before, Like I did feel that way at first. I was like, wow, I was a few months ago, I was sitting in a studio. I mean few years ago. I was sitting in a studio writing songs and producing, and musicians were coming in with their fancy instruments and creating these special sounds. And now I'm just sitting here with a notebook and trying to say something. So it did feel like a lesser version um at first, but I was like, it's all I have and I have to do something, like I have to create. So that was kind of how it started. And then I recognized as I was slowly starting to share these poems, new poems, what comes to me? When I was reading Instagram, d M s, I was responding to emails like just individual people who were responding to my poems. Like that's when I would think of something new, when I was literally talking to someone and I was like, oh, I don't have to like make up characters. I can just write to actual people and it's still excites me and I still do it. Do you keep a record of how many you've done so far I keep losing count. Is there like a poetry accountant out there somewhere, Please please hit me up if that exists, if you inventory poems, because I keep losing cow. It is in the thousands. I mean, I've counted at different points, like four thousand, six thousand, like just based on the trouble is that I started responding directly to Instagram d m s and there is no way of like, I would take screenshots, but there's no way to like, you can't like I have a number for the scent emails that I said, because I can look at the scent inbox. But I've done so many Instagram d ms and they don't allow you to, like, they don't have like a scent feature. So I must feel like you would need like a if you screen grab them like every day at the end of the day, you'd need to dump those screen grabs into a Google or something and then you can count, like yeah. And the reason why I said a million, which is such a wild number, it honestly was I did the math and I realized that I was like, this would take me decade to do, and I was like, coming from the music industry, which is oftentimes for me at least, it felt like a very rushed, you know experience, like you know, if you're not like famous by especially if you're a woman, like it's just like it's it gets really difficult, it gets really hard to get support. Um. So I was like, I need something that I can't if I want to stick with it, I can age into it. I can I can grow into a project and not worry about like, oh, if this doesn't reach bestseller's lists by this time, then it doesn't matter. I'm like, no, I want something in my life that's not like that, and that allows me to like spend time with it over years and years and years. So you know, I'm four years and four well five years in four years in so we'll see, we'll see how many, how many years I think to have something that isn't tied to outcome is so important, you know. Again, that's part of the reason I did this. There, it's not about a rating or whatever. It's it's mine and it's creative and it's fun and it's expansive and and I love my job doesn't mean I don't love my job. It just means I needed something other than my job that was incredibly fulfilling. I wonder too, you know, how did in the wake of the album coming out and you beginning all of this, how did it become an art and poetry project online? Because I just opened my phone to double check and I'm like, yeah, we're up to one point seven million followers on Instagram and your account is truly one of my favorite things to look at, Like if I scroll through it, the colors and the way that the paintings are done and the poems on it just makes me feel so happy every time I look at it. It makes me feel seen, It makes me feel emotionally open, and you grew something this giant community so authentically. So how did that overlap with this million Poems to Strangers project? How did this poetry and then painting and art? How did that all kind of come together into this perfect storm which has led us to your latest book, which we're going to talk about. Yes, So it started with the first poem that I ended up writing was a poem I wrote about kind of my frustrations that I was experiencing at that time with my music career, that I was really struggling and kind of the breaking point for me. Was it was the finances. Honestly, I was just at a point where I was so tired. I knew that I was. I knew that I was physically giving my all. I mean I was, I was saying yes to everything. I was just like, Okay, you gotta pay your dudes, you know, work your way up. I was exhausted and broke, and I was just like, I can't maintain both of these at the same time. Like I could do one, but tired and broke They're just not a good combination. And I was just like, I have no time to do anything else. I'm tired. I feel like I'm not getting anywhere, like I'm I. I have people who are supporting me, and I'm super grateful of it, but like I still can't really like get to that point where I'm like, Okay, I'm good, Um, I can afford healthcare kind of like what we're talking about, like I didn't have healthcare. Just just all of those things just just falling on my shoulder, feeling like a failure, feeling like I let my family down. So I wrote a poem about that, and that was in the end of and the following January. I ended up finding out that it had been repinned on Pinterest over a hundred thousand times, and until this day, I don't know how that happened. I didn't have any tags on it at that time, like by me putting it on Pinterest. I was just sort of like just barely putting this out there, like even the original poem, like that poem that I wrote, the way I wrote my name on it is super weird, like I wrote it like off to the side. I was barely owning this poem, like I was barely putting my name on it, barely putting it out there. Until this day, I have no idea who pinned it and repinned it and repinned it, but some kind of way that happened. And I started to see people that I knew started to see the poem on Instagram and they were messaging me saying, Hey, there's like a poem, but like it's like your name on it. Did you write this? I was like I did. I don't know how people are finding it, So that's what I went back and looked at Interest and I was like, oh, okay, somebody found it somewhere, and um, the poem is it's essentially it just says, when you start to feel like things should have been better this year, remember the mountains and valleys that brought you here, And the premise of the poem is is really just something that I really desperately needed to believe. At that time, I felt like a failure. I felt like I let everyone down, and as it turns out a lot of other people we're feeling that way. So it was then that I started to receive d M s also from people that I did not know, who are saying, hey, I don't know if you like write poetry, but I you know, write more poetry, but I like this one poem you wrote. It really spoke to me. And it was when people started sharing their stories with me that I was like, that's when those poems, like new poems started to come. And it was it especially happened when it was young women, like eighteen year old girls, nineteen year old girls, girls in high school, just the stuff that they were like, here's what I'm going through. I'm just like, WHOA, Like, you shouldn't have to be going through this, And I'm like, I wrote this poem about like career challenges, and people are sharing these like like they we don't even know each other, and they're sharing these really vulnerable stories with me being so vulnerable, and I'm just like, I can't fix this. I don't know what the answers are. The only sort of like response I could give was just like poetic words of just trying to I'm like, at least maybe I can just help her feel seen. I was like, this is the kind of work I want to do. I'm like, this is this is exciting to me. So that I spent kind of asking those questions of like what is this. I'm like, I'm really excited about it. I don't know why, but like maybe I kind of want add some color to these poems. Um. I'm not I'm not a trained artist visual artist, but I do like to draw, I like to paint. So I just started experimenting. And then it was in October that it just finally clicked and I was like, oh, I can just I can invite people to share if they want to. I mean, you obviously don't have to if you don't want to, but if they want to share, I'll just write something directly to them. I was like, let's just see what happens with that. And the first thing I did it. I got quite a few messages from people who didn't even follow me. They're just like, hey, I heard you're writing for people like I don't even know if you'll see this, but I just want to share. And I thought that maybe I would have like the stamina to do it for a few weeks. But here I am, all these years later, and I'm still a part of my practice. I'm not doing this sagram d ms as much anymore because they're really hard to keep track with, but email, especially, I I'm still there. That in box is still open. I'm still responding. And if someone wanted to send you an email, where would they do that. It's Morgan at Morgan Harper Nichols dot com. So that's the email. And honestly, I think what kind of contributed to the growth was that I I was. I think I was just so excited that like something I made was just being seen. Like I'm like, man, I spent like two years working on the album that was just like crickets. Um, I shouldn't say crickets. Thank you to everyone who listen to my songs, but you know, I'm like, I spent all these all these years and money working on the album and I'm like poems and art on my iPad and people are connecting with it. So I was super I like, encourage you. I was like, if you liked it, you can share it. I was like, feel free, like share it, reposted, do whatever you want with it. So I think that could have been a huge part of it. And then the final thing I'll say is that I end up finding out again with Pinterest, people were taking screenshots of the art that I was making and they were posting it on Pinterest, and people would write phone wallpaper, and I was like, oh, I'm making phone wallpapers. So I didn't even think about the fact of like putting art on the Instagram story that format. People were taking screenshots at it and using not only using it as phone wallpapers, but then posting it on Pinterest, saying here's the wallpaper you could use. So there's a lot of my art on Pinterest that I didn't even upload because I was just like, yeah, you can share it, you can do whatever you want with it. And then, um, yeah, when I asked people today, a lot of people how they found what I did, they say, oh, yeah, if I saw your wallpapers on Pinterest, So thank you to all the all the people who helped make this happen. I mean, I really think the the credit goes to that for sure. And then how did you wind up at the book? Yeah? So I always wanted to write books. I was like, that seems fun, but I have no idea how to do that, you know, in terms of getting the connections and things. But my publisher found me through Instagram actually, and it was literally like a dream come true. They're like, we want to do hardcover book, full color, full of poetry and art. And I was like, that sounds amazing. Sign me up. So I said yes, and yeah, the latest one is How Far You Have Come? And I started writing it at the beginning of the first Lockdown, and I was in a place like literally everyone else of I have no idea what's ahead. I don't know how to plan for what's ahead. I certainly don't know how to write a book for what's ahead. And what I found was I was like, well, at least I can look back. I can look back at the miles I've already traveled, so kind of going back to like what we were originally talking about. The book actually starts with a road trip and It starts with a road trip that starts in Atlanta, Georgia, when I was six years old and we were going to California, and I stopped in eight different states. And I tell stories and I've written poetry and created art around these different themes of just honoring the journey and just seeing really owning our stories and just seeing them for seeing the beauty and them. Um. I think it's for me. I know it takes time and looking back to find beauty in a lot of chapters of my life. So yeah, I just hope that it helps others do that too, if just like I don't know, maybe they're somewhere on the map, somewhere I've lived, somewhere I've been, that I can kind of look back and reclaim that moment as as something beautiful. I think that that's such great advice for people to remember that what might today feel hard or feel like part of the struggle is something you will look back on and see differently. What do you hope comes next? I mean your art, your community, your poetry, UM, your paintings, your books, your your site. I mean there's so much that you're working on. What do you what do you hope is on the horizon. You know. I'm trying to figure that out because i feel like I've just been in like survival mode over the past. Here I'm like, just get through it more again. Like it's like just get through, you know, get through writing this book, get through releasing the book, all these things. But one theme that has been coming up so much for me is I love I love kids books, I love kids movies. So I want to write something like four kids. So I'm trying to figure out what that is because I think now I am riding it four kids, but I also think that there is like a demographic of adults and I'm a part of it, like where we just love kids though we love kids movies, like we just like it's like an escape, Like it just makes you feel like a kid again. So I'm really interested in that. I don't I don't know what it is. I feel like it has something to do with nature and animals, and it's probably because I'm getting into a lot of that with my son, and yeah, he really motivates me. I'm like, yeah, I kinda I kind of remember my animals, Like I I was like showing him a picture of like an eel, the other day, I was like, Oh, I don't think that's the eel. I think there's something else. Let's circle back to that. So it's like I'm doing a lot of like trying to remember a lot of things and and there's yeah, there's just some like curiosity and fun in that. So I've been like drawing animals lately, Like there's like a humming on my Instagram. I'm really proud of it. Yeah, and then I've been doing a little bit of that on my podcast, like doing a little bit more storytelling, talking about what I've learned from animals and different things in nature. So yeah, I'm really excited to see see what comes of that that. It's funny when you talk about your art, you know, being on Pinterest. I've I didn't even realize, um that my writing was writing, you know, the way that I'll just write a short essay on Instagram or talk about something happening in the world. And it was actually the inspiration even for the name of the podcast, just offhanded one day. You know, when you're really in flow and you say something and you look back and you go, wow, yeah that resonant. Yeah, I'm really in it today. That's what happened to me, and I was I was asked a question and I think again, something I really needed to hear, And what came through me was you are allowed to be both a masterpiece and a work in progress simultaneously. And that quote of mine, And when I think about it, I'm like, I've been working on TV since I was twenty years old. I've said a lot of dumb ship that's recorded forever, and this one thing of all the things that I've ever said, it took off and likewise took off on Pinterest, and I didn't know anything about even how to use that platform, and honestly still don't, aside from the copious amounts of boards I keep for like Upstate New York barn. I don't live in New York, but I fantasized that something. Oh I wish Pinterest didn't come up with those like like the groups inside of the bars because I have like different homes from I'm a lunatic. Now it's like fifteen foot farm table. I'm like, what am I doing? I don't live on a farm, but I you know, I had this moment where all these people started tagging me. I was like, what's going on. Liz Gilbert, who was like an icon to me, shared a piece of art that someone made of my quote on her Instagram, and I was like, what is happening? And just like, I don't know, five or six weeks ago, the pandemic has really ruined my ability to understand time. I'm like, when was that? Um? Janet Jackson shared it on her Instagram and all these people were like, you got a credit at Sophia Bush, this is her quote, and I was like, I don't even know what to I don't even do I care Like Janet Jackson read something I wrote, what's happening? Like I need to talk to her about my entire childhood listening to her music on a walkman, Like this is insane. And I guess I get so excited because that felt like such a weird experience for me, and You're the first person I've ever spoken to has had that also. But it it brings me back around, not only to this incredible feeling I now have that not only would our adult salves be friends, but clearly so would our inner children. But I wonder on the subject of our quotes on Pinterest, what for you? And this really is my favorite question to ask everyone who comes from the podcast what it feels like the work in progress of your life right now. For me, the biggest thing right now is just really learning how to own what makes me different and own what makes me who I am, and and my autism diagnosis has helped with us a lot in the therapy that I've been in since then. It's just it's I carried. I've carried so much shame in my life around feeling different and for a lot of different reasons and a lot of different pockets, a lot of different kinds of social groups, and it's I feel like it's now I'm becoming more self aware of like, but you don't have to stay there. There's a whole part of really owning who you are that I owning who I am that I feel like I'm just now coming to and like this myself so silly to other people. But I mentioned the humming bird on my Instagram um that I made not too long ago. I'm really proud of um. And for me, it's not even just sort of aesthetically what happened with this hummingbird, but it's the fact that I can remember points in my life where I wouldn't have even allowed myself to just be at all of a hummingbird because I felt like that wasn't the cool thing to do, or that wasn't what was trendy, or this is what you know. If you're gonna be in the industry, you gotta be into these things. And I was like, yeah, it doesn't matter like if this is a popular motif or not. This is meaningful to me on this day, in this hour, and I'm going to spend like these twenty minutes watching this hummingbird YouTube video so I can get my sketch just right, just because. So yeah, that just that small thing was very symbolic of there are millions of other moments out there like that waiting for you. And if I want that for others, I have to walk in that myself and I have to fully embrace all of these little quirks and interest and thoughts and ideas, no matter how random or you know, whatever they seem. So yeah, I feel like I'm very much so a work in progress and that area of learning to really fully own who I am. M hmm. It's beautiful and it really touches me to hear you talk about in order to do that, you have to give yourself the same grace that you want for other people. Yeah, yeah, I'm like, I want, I want that. That's why I want for everyone else, Like not even just people my life that I know, but for strangers. I'm like, yeah, I want. I want the best for you, Like I that's what I want. So I have to have that same level of grace for myself. I have to thank you so much. This has been really wonderful.