Season 4. Episode 12 How Deece Casillas went from high paid consultant to successful comedian

Deece always loved comedy, in fact he would fake being asleep in the floor while his parents fell asleep on the couch so that he could stay up and watch comedy on TV.  Growing up in a California neighborhood better known for its gangs than anything else made life harder for him and he got swept up in the gang life for a while. Eventually, he turned himself into a successful business consultant and even had two homes -- one in Mexico and one in California. But the comedy dream had never left him and he decided to ditch his comfy life and pursue a career in comedy.

It wasn't easy -- but as Deece speaks about -- change rarely is easy but it's worth it! Fifteen years later, he is a successful comedian and writer, and he just finished his first comendy special.

Dreams do come true, but as Deece reminds us, there is a lot of work involved!

To learn more about Deece and his latest projects, (including his podcast and his new special) go to:  www.DeeceComedy.com
Here is a link directly to his special on Youtube: https://youtu.be/fr740QLKF_I

You can also follow him and learn about the latest news on his Intragram: https://www.instagram.com/deece.comedy/

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Original music "Saturday Sway" by Brendan Talian

Transcript

Unknown: 0:03

Hello, and welcome to the Storied Human. I'm Lynne Thompson. And today my guest is Deece Cassius. He's got a cool story. It's a story of transition, a story of a big career change. And he's going to tell us all about it. He's a comedian. He's a host of the social hour, he recently released his comedy special, which I'm dying to hear about. He's got a lot of interesting twists and turns to tell us about his his story is really cool. And I think we can learn a lot about I'm guessing perseverance from him at least trying new things. So welcome, DESE it's great to have you on the story. Human. I'm very happy to have you here. Yeah, thanks for having me. Really good to talk to you. You know, I have a soft spot for comedians. My ex sister in law is a comedian, I had a great interview with her. I just have always loved comedians, that's one of the things I do to relax is I go on Netflix, and I look up Stand up comedy. So I'm just a real fan. Well, maybe you could have a chat with my mother and tell her we're not so bad. I don't know. I don't know if my mother would have loved that. Or, you know, if I had become one. Yeah. That's a really good point. It's not exactly the the thing our parents wished for us. But it turned out okay for you. You've been one for 15 years, right? Yes, yes. It did turn out okay. For me. And it's, you know, there's a bigger contrast because my My older brother is a fundamental Baptist minister. So there is there's a big contrast between my mother's two sons, and what we do for a living and how we live our lives. Our lives like unbelievable. Yes. And Yang, right. Yeah. Yeah, very much. So. So you know, not a lot. Yeah. Not a lot of Christmas cards traded. But you know, you had to balance each other out, right. Sure. Sure. We'll go with that. That sounds like that sounds like a diplomatic answer. But I love it. So I want to hear the beginning. I want to hear what you how you started out. You know, some of the troubles you had in your youth how you found your way to being a consultant and how you changed? Because that's an amazing story in and of itself. Yeah, yeah. So how far back do we go like as a zygote? Go back to all. Yeah. What feels like a natural starting point for you? Well, here's a couple of good, let's, let's see, I'll try to I'll try to give the Reader's Digest version on some of it, but not not skip the good stuff. It's the I grew up in Long Beach, California. I always say not not. Not the good side, the Snoop Dogg side is what I always tell people is like Long Beach, he has beach in the game too. It's nice. Like, yeah, there's a part of it, that's okay. There's also a part of it, where, during the 80s, you had a better chance of dying than making it home. So, you know, with 80s, South Central LA height of gang violence, you know, police, all that stuff. You know, grew up in a big Latino family. I had a, you know, kind of had that type of inner city childhood, I always loved comedy in some aspects. You know, despite jokes, I make up my I do, you know, my mother and I do still talk, although there was a time we did not the, but you know, even she, she was over that my house the other day, and she told me she was even when you're little you were so young, you just had a sense of humor, like, I couldn't believe just in advance the jokes you'd come up with as little kid. So I always loved comedy, I always, but you know, you just never know how to get there. Right? Like, I never had any model of how that well, you know, I, you know, like my, I remember my, I pretend to fall asleep on the floor of my living room. While my parents would sit on the sofa and you know, they drink or they'd pass out just go to sleep on the sofa. And then I would I pretend to fall asleep. So then once they'd fall asleep, I could stay up and I would watch you know, the tonight show or I would watch Saturday Night Live or they used to have this stand up spotlight on VH one back in the day, which was, believe it or not hosted by Rosie O'Donnell before she was in angry person. She still had joy in her life. You know, choose a comedian. It's like, you know, I that's what I would do. I would try to stay up late so I could watch these shows, you know? And I just You Really I, you know, it's not like I what I really want to do is be a writer, I always love writing. And, you know, I'm able to do that and have been able to do that in my career also, which is nice. But yeah, so that's kind of where how I grew up and wanted always just, I just never knew how you know, like, so there's no road. We're not showing that that's not one of the pads that were shown were shown, like the more traditional pads. I'm wondering how old were you when used to pretend to be asleep and watch those shows? Oh, I mean, I remember doing that as long as far back as I can remember. So probably, you know, as early as like, probably six or seven. amazing to me. Yeah. It's always been in your DNA. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it was just I knew, because if I, if I fell asleep, pretend like I was asleep. And then they would pass out. And then I could stay up until they woke up and decided to actually go to bed, like get to bed. That's when they would take me and put me in bed also. So I could I could, I could squeeze a couple hours. Out of watching TV still, you know, in this is like when the Tonight Show is still the Tonight Show? Like that's when I mean, I'm talking like Carson, I'm, I'm 41. So, you know, for Carson, I loved him. Yeah. So I mean that, you know, or like if I was lucky enough to be able to stay up to watch, you know, Letterman after Carson, who really was more for, you know, as far as stand up comedy that's more of a comedian show. The arson even was. But yeah, so you know, I always Saturday live was my favorite if I could stay up and watch that. And so yeah, it was definitely always in my DNA to have to do. You know, my teachers always said that I I marched to the beat of my own drummer is what my diplomatic way my teachers would say I was an asshole in noncomplying. I don't think they meant that. But they always know that the student who's not, you know, in the middle of the bell curve? Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I was in the LA Unified School District where you're talking, I mean, these, there was barely school, it was just warehousing to try to keep you alive during the day while your parents were working. So that, you know, education system was pretty, pretty terrible. And, again, I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to write in, in some form or fashion. So when it would come to like math and stuff like that, I'm like, I'm not interested. I'm like, I have zero interest in that, you know, the I'm like, I got a calculator. Let me write some more. Let me create some more, you know, I don't need I don't need that, you know? Not everybody does. Yeah, we do need it to a point. But, you know, it's like, yeah, I'll get the fundamentals down. And then beyond that, I'm like, just, I'm good. Yeah. Oh, hopefully, they're not teaching it in exactly the same way as they taught it. Because it was a little much. Yeah. I don't know, I keep hearing about this common core math and all these new ways. They're doing it for easy ways. Yeah. I don't know. They just lower all the standards to push people through those. So they're not I don't know what their job anymore. And, you know, your, your situation highlights the fact that it's not equal education for all because it really does depend on how much money your district has the neighborhood you live in. It really does alter the education that we get. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And, you know, well, you know, it's one of those things that you as a kid, you just know what you only know what you know. So there wasn't like a contrast, there wasn't an option where I'm like, I felt like I wasn't getting something because I didn't know what the other option would you right. School, right. Yeah. Sucks for a lot of kids, you know? Yeah. The idea, but I mean, you know, looking back, it's like, I wouldn't, I wouldn't change it. I feel like it all made me more resilient, self resilient, and got me motivated to in the long run, you know, I certainly had some bumps along the way that probably could have been avoided if I lived in a different area or went through a different school, but that's, you know, you made it work for you. Yeah, yeah. So tell me how you became a consultant because that doesn't sound like where you were headed. Yeah, yeah. Well, I certainly like I said bumps in the road. I mean, I if to be perfectly candid, I mean, you know, I was involved with gangs and you know, I was just a felon at 13. So it like you know, Z you just it just kind of, in when you when you live in there, that it's almost, I always hate to say, I don't like the phrase, you don't have a choice because you have a choice, you always have a choice. But it's sometimes it's very, very difficult choice and hard to avoid those things. So you're surrounded by it. It's what everyone's doing. I mean, I can imagine. It's really, especially at a young age really hard to resist those forces all around you. Well, yeah. And so, you know, especially when you don't have a lot of home life and, you know, you're kind of a free range kid, you can kinda kinda, you know, there's no one there. It's your only support system at times. So your influence on you is strong, right? You just, we just don't have perspective when we're 13. We don't you can't measure something or judge something. Yeah. And you know, so then, in my mid teens, we my whole family, we actually moved to Western Montana. That's a big change. Very big change. And it was a change. I did not want Okay, God, I hated it. I hated it. I hate the cold I didn't fit in. It wasn't you know, I remember one of my first days in the school I went to my my principal of the school he just he came up to me in the hallway. And he said, and I didn't even like all I just was a couple days there. And it's not like I started trouble. Nothing. Anything. I just was new kid. And he's like, and he just comes up to me. He's like, you're just a worthless gangbanger from California and I'm gonna do everything I can to get you kicked out of my school. That's a no, this was like, I mean, I wasn't even this was primary third day, their fourth day. Yes. I'm like that. apprehensible Yeah. So much for treating all the kids equally. Yeah. Well, I mean, it was. Here's the thing. This is a small this was a small school in a small town, like this school had first grade through seniors in high school, the same school. So I mean, this was a town without even a stoplight in it at the time. It has one stoplight in the town now. I'm wondering who made this decision and how they came to this decision? Yeah. Well, I think my parents were just you. They saw how bad the area was in getting worse. And the economy was really bad at the time in California. My mom had family in Montana. So the decision was, so there was a connection. Yeah, that's crazy. What a change. It's like moving to another country. Oh, it was for me. It was Yeah. And, you know, my parents were just gone even more working. And I found more ways to get in trouble and was kind of back and forth between California stayed with relatives. And yeah, it's like, I was like, 15, I was I wasn't 16. Yet, even when I would, I just bounced, I moved out of my parents house. And out on my own, stayed with some friends who were older, they were about 2021. And just kind of figured out, made it and was bounced around all over between the Northwest and LA. Eventually back to Long Beach permanently, and kind of was getting, I was doing music at the time. It was doing a hip hop music at the time. But it was there's there's a thing with hip hop, where obviously, like it's it's inexorably connected to gangs in the streets. Right, right. So there, I just found myself back in these situations where you're kind of tied tied back to that. And you know, those people around you they're gang related things happen, your parties, your events, and then a buddy of mine got shot and killed at a event we're doing. And I was not the first time friend of mine yet shot and killed, but it was it was I just remember thinking of like, I have a couple of options here. If I keep going down this road, I'm like, I'm just gonna go back into what I was doing before. I don't want to do that. I have to if I want to change I have to make the choice. So I did I quit music. I removed myself from friends that I had and put myself in a different area, moved to a different area. And I started I just started I just started working and I found the A friend of mine. Their sister had a clothing company knew that they wanted a sales rep for. So I started doing that forum getting they did screen printing and embroidery. Right. So I've been doing I started doing that for work. And but they so they and then they gave me an office in their office building downtown Long Beach. But this office building also had very high end, lot of lawyers, doctors, high end clients in this and I started meeting these people. And they're like, Hey, you, you know, can you do this for me? You know, can you and they started wanting to go approaching me with different things they wanted in a lot of like, I've been in sales before. So I've done some sales. So I started doing like sales training in March. And then I started doing marketing for people then consulting on it got to a point where I had my own company. So cool. It just kind of happened in I was working with very high end clients, I was making, you know, six figures a year. And it was great. I had a place in Mexico, I had a place in California, I was back and forth. Mexico, I'd stay there work from there. It was great. And then I just realized one day that I didn't like it. You know, I didn't care about it. It wasn't even the money wasn't enough for me to be like to I just realized I was wasting time and selling my soul. And I won. It wasn't fulfilling. You know, I wanted to I wanted to write, I wanted to do comedy. A couple of things happen. One thing I started writing, I started writing a book that I had this idea for. And then also, I started doing this open mic in Long Beach. This I used to go to watch because I just wanted to watch comedy. So in the guy who ran it, I'd hang out afterwards and drink and talk to him when he's like, Hey, we bullshit and he's like, you're funny. He goes, we should try this. Ah. And I'm like, Well, I've always thought about it. He goes, Yeah, come next week, he goes, you're gonna do a spot. I'm like, okay, so I came back and I did it. And I kept doing it. And then I was doing that for a while I was writing my book. And then I just like, You know what I started, I got a job. writing comedy for a website of comedy articles I submitted, I got a job doing that. And I'm like, and then as soon as I was making any money, like getting gigs doing comedy, and finished my book, I quit my job. And I just went just like, I'm just gonna do creative, and I just dove in. And, yeah, 15 years later, I've toured and crossed five countries and released two albums, one special, have a production company working with over 40 venues in 20 states. You know, I've I doing comedy. Two years ago, I did 189 dates in one year. That was my, Whoa, that's a lot. This year, I've scaled it back because I need some time off. I decided, but so how do you I think I'm just struck with how you decided you were going to get out of the gang life and then you decided you're going to get out of the consulting life? How do you do that? Because people have a hard time making those changes. And they want to know if there's any kind of secret or tip that you might be able to share. How does that happen? Well, here's, here's what people hate to hear this. Because it's like a cliche saying that has gone around and is attached has some stigma attached to a certain political party, which I don't identify with. I'll leave a libertarian, for the vote for everyone out there, just so you know. But the term pulling yourself up by your bootstraps can do a lot for you. There's more to it than that. It's not that secure. You know, I do hear you you have to take responsibility for your actions in your life. Yeah, you have to take control and you have to understand that it's frankly, really hard for an unknown amount of time. And there's gonna be a lot of obstacles and it might not be as comfortable actually is definitely not going to be as countable. It's going very uncomfortable. There's going to be sacrifices of time, money, friendships or relationships. But you have to decide what it is you want to do. I wrote this the book I wrote about 10 years ago and published now. It's called insomnia. It's out there somewhere. But the, that was kind of the crux of it was that like, you have to decide to go through the door, you know, and it's going to be really shitty for a while again, nobody knows how long, but when your make it through to the other side, the rest of your life is now. infinitely better for the until you die. You've you've successfully made everything better. And you know, you got to face some things, you got to again, sacrifice, you know, I've lost a lot of friends, I lost a lot of relationships. I definitely lost money for years not doing my consulting thing. But now I live the life I want to live. You know? You got it. You got there. Yeah. And you know, I've been talking to people recently. It's funny how things keep coming up. It's certainly in the zeitgeist, people keep talking about how you're going to fail, and you're gonna fail more than once. And you have to accept that as part of the path to success. And a lot of us weren't raised that way. My overly protective family always said, you know, once you failed something, it was like, it wasn't meant for you. You know, they backed up, and they made me all afraid. And the opposite is true. And I hear it in you and I hear it and other people I talked to, that you have to be ready for that, that there's you're going to fall and you're going to get you're you're going to pivot you're going to learn from it, you're going to keep going and you win once you realize that you start to view the failures, little failures, as you're you're getting closer. So I think, but I still think there's something about certain people's personalities, you seem to have that personality that perseverance, that belief in yourself, there's a strength there that I'm trying to unravel, because it really interests me, some people can do this. And some people don't. They can't Yeah, I mean, I'm sure I attribute part of it to again, my, the way I grew up and having to be self resilient. So early on, under, you know, kind of not feeling like I had a safety net. And also like, things don't scare me, is like, things that you would traditionally be be viewed as scary. Yeah, happened to me a lot at a very early age. You know, like, you know, you're a little tougher than your average person. Like, I mean, I I I've been shot at I've had guns pointed out, we I've been beat up I've been like those. So those those things happened. I saw it a lot and a lot of violence. So it's like, those things don't scare me. I always tell people like I used to box, too. I was a boxer and a fighter for a long time. And like, I was good at it because I always say like, I I get very relaxed, high pressure situations. So things that there's that cliche of like, oh, like, time slows down. I'm like, yeah, it actually does. It feels lower. Like I see things and I get it. Yeah, it really happens that way you can you can kind of capture that. The my buddies always tell me he goes he's like these. You're the only person I've ever met that would the the crazier things get the cooler you get? Yeah. That's a response that some people have. I'm I'm like that I get highly. When there's a catastrophe around me. I'm the one that's focusing. Yeah, I feel like I have to write. And I'm able to, and I'm the one that saying no, no, don't go out that door. Let's go this way. But not everybody's like that. My dad was like that he was a pilot. Yeah, yeah, he could. He could just stay so calm. I think that it's just a reaction. It's like a, I've seen it on tests where they asked like, do you get more upset? Or, you know, do you get calmer? And it's, it's a little bizarre, but some of us are, are made that way. I live helped you. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I literally have like, my resting my doctor actually thought something was wrong with me for a long time, because my resting pulse is sometimes as low as like, 46. Like, it's gosh, like, my pulse is very low. And for the longest time, he's like, I think something's wrong with you. I'm like, I just don't get excited, you know, the IQ but in that manner, and, but I mean, it's not just I don't think it's just the way I grew up. It also, it also is like, I made a conscious decision to mine. A good buddy of mine. He says, I'm stubborn as part of it, which I don't think he's wrong. But like, I, I like I smoked cigarettes for 10 years, you know, pack a day. And then literally one day, I was in the middle of a cigarette and had a pack of cigarettes in my pocket. And I was like, I don't want to do this anymore. I threw a cigarette crumpled up the pack of cigarettes threw away and I've never smoked again. And that was almost 20 years ago. You know, I thought the usual way that people quit. Yeah. You know, like, I drank every day, almost from the time I was like, I don't know, probably 1314 until five years ago, and one day I said, I'm gonna quit, and I quit. And I haven't touched it since. And it just, you, it. It's not a special thing. I don't think I think it's just here's what I always say. Okay. So like, when it comes to like, quitting cigarettes, you know, they're always like, well, you what's the first thing you think? Well, that's hard. People say quitting cigarettes is harder than quitting heroin. And quitting heroin seems like it's impossible. So you you've already lost, you've already defeated it before. So why, you know, you have he's like, No, it's not that hard. You You have to choose and you have to stick to it. You have to make some lifestyle changes. You know, like, when I changed my entire life, I changed everything I started, I'd wake up and I would run five miles a day, when I get home, I would literally ride my bike until I couldn't ride anymore. And then I'd have to walk at home. I stopped, you know, that's when I stopped smoking. I stopped hanging out with people, I started doing yoga, I started reading books about Taoism. I changed the music, I changed the music I listened to for a while because I'm like, I need to shift. Because I was doing all these other things. And I began where I wanted to be. So if I believe things, things, it'll be different. You know, I'm, I'm creating my environment. That's so cool. That's also what they teach us about how to be successful. It's like change your mindset, but also your input, the people that are around you, you know, there's when I tried to quit smoking, that's an i, it took me six times. Okay, I always you always tried to, I tell people, I don't think that's a failure at all. Each time, I got better at it. I got better at quitting. I got better and better and better. And then the sixth time, I was like, I got this, you know. And I think we have to teach that to people who are in recovery, because a relapse doesn't mean, it's just again, it's just a step along the way. We're all different. We're all wired differently. But that's so cool that you knew that. Because when I was trying to quit smoking, it said, don't take your regular way home, because you always are triggered by what you see to smoke or don't don't go on the phone in the regular back. Well, we had phones, right? Yeah, don't go on the phone, in your house. Because that's when you when you light up or don't you know, don't pull them out when you're out to dinner. Don't don't have an ashtray visible. You knew that intuitively, though. You were like, I got to change the whole thing. So that I change my inside, change my outside, change my inside. So you just knew things kind of intuitively, I think, yeah, you just all I just knew that what I was doing wasn't what I wanted. And I wasn't, you know, I always wanted to write, I always wanted to, you know, I love to all these things. And it's like, I'm not doing that. So how do I get to that? And how do I like you got to align, however metaphysical you want to get in this. So you have to align your mind with your spirit, and make sure they're, you know, working in conjunction with each other. Whether you believe in a true spirit or not, you know, there is a metaphorical spirit that you have to get in line also, and reels like This couldn't hurt. This couldn't hurt. What exactly, yeah, that's a great attitude. It can't hurt. Yeah, it might not help but it can't hurt. I mean, it will help in other ways, right? You got your health was better, and you were putting cooler things in your head, you were reading really cool things you were exercising was much better for your body. And so I don't know, I think you just send a message to your unconscious like we're changing this up. Yeah, you know, it's one of the you know, it's why people are afraid of change. And it's again, it's hard and what it's not that hard, but people perceive it as hard in the second year, they defeat themselves again, before they even get started. Whereas like if you just start going down, you know, it's like I have friends who in the last couple years, like a friend, good friend of mine a couple of years ago, she's like, I think I'm going to go back to college finishing and but it's going to be three years and this and that and blah, blah, blah. And I go, Hey, do you remember when we went and did that show? You know, in Idaho and this and that. And I tell her she's like, Yeah, that was great. I go, that was three years ago. I go you'll go in three years will go by like that. And then you'll have the rest of your life where you finish college and get a better job and you get to do do all the things you want to do. Or you can just meander through the This unhappiness you're in right now. But I think it's just easier for people to externalize in, not internalize and say because even even when I was a kid, and even when I was doing dumb shit, and I was getting arrested, or I was getting coffee, I never, I never blamed anyone. I always was completely culpable for everything. It's part of why I had a lot of and I, for anyone, currently in recovery or trying to quit alcohol, this isn't me saying don't go to AAA. But it's part of why I personally didn't like going to AAA, because everybody does. Yeah, I've heard this. When I quit drinking, I went to a couple meetings and I'm like, this isn't for me. Because the i Every, every time, they'd be like, do you want to say something? Or this and that? And I'm like, no, no. And then finally, like, they like, they finally got me to tell my story. And I did like what you know, and I would tell them a little bit out, like, Well, why do you know? So they kept wanting to like, a reason me to blame something for why I did these things. And I'm like, No, I'm not I go, I just chose bad I chose completely, you know, it's at the end of the day I chose. I and I can choose not to. and powerful. Yeah, yeah, they there. It seems like they're always looking for you to blame something else. I'm like, no, no, that I don't want to pass the buck. I want to internalize figure out why and change those patterns instead of just being like, it's always floating above me. And it could ruin me at any second like, no, no, I can. I can overcome it. And I hear that. So that's a lot of changes. So tell me about what's coming up because it sounds pretty exciting. First, like, I want to know about the show. Sure. So our the social hour. Yeah. So that's a podcast I've been doing for actually coming up on 10 years now. No. Yeah. Podcasting back then. Yeah, I know, it was June of 2014. I did my first episode. The show's evolved over the years, but I was in the last year. So I've been it's was weakly for forever, the last year. So I kind of got off that schedule because of traveling and moving. But I've been able to get back on with my weekly schedule, which is nice. I just love talking to people. Again, the show's evolved a lot over the years, we used to used to have like a studio, a producer, a news anchor, and it was more like a we'd have segments and games and it was kind of more like, you know, like radio talk show, Morning Show type format. Now it's more one on one just because of where I live and how things are. But I I'd like to get back to the old format at some point. But it's the social our new episodes every Wednesday, at DS, comedy.com, Spotify or wherever you find your podcasts. So we'll be celebrating our 10 year anniversary in a couple months. So cool. Yeah, we I think we've got about 460 episodes or something like that we've done now a lot. Yeah, I know how tough it is to start. I mean, that's pretty cool. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's, it was interesting. It was just my buddy and I bullshitting years ago and then we started getting guests and you know, now I've literally you know, I've I've interviewed presidential candidates now, you know, yeah, the Libertarian Presidential Candidate chase all over this election and last election was Jo Jorgensen so I interviewed her spent the day with her actually got to go out on the campaign day with her have lunch with her did a benefit little comedy benefit for her campaign and stuff? So yeah. So I mean, that you know, things have evolved in a very lucky in, you know, also not and also, I am lucky but also I've done I've worked extremely hard. Funny how that works. Yeah. So yeah, the podcast I'm I just released my special not your cup of tea. That came out. I guess it's been a couple of months now. But that is available at my website, also DS comedy.com. It's all donation so you can people can pay whatever you want as little as $1. And you'll get the whole hour forever. Recorded at my favorite club in the country. One of my favorite clubs in the country in Bozeman, Montana, actually, it's this club. Wow. Yeah, there is a great comedy club in Bozeman, Montana called last best comedy. And I decided to do it there. They're just been really great to me over the years. And I thought it'd be a cool thing to do there. So yeah, check out the special. I'm also, I'm also about to release my debut comic book that I wrote. So oh, what's that about? It is, I've, I'm a little, I've been a little bum about it until we figure out where it's home is going to land. Because I have it. We're submitting to some publishers to see if we can get a deal on it or if I'm going to independently publish it. So until I know for sure, it's a it's say, urban knew our story. will say you've heard the you've heard the phrase suicide by cop, right? Yes. So this is basically suicide by vigilante ism. There's a guy nothing else to live for. He decides to go out on the street and tackle the streets. Here's he'll be taken out and a couple days, tops, and craziness ensues. So it's a light piece. Yeah, it's yeah, it's a fluffy little piece. So that that I should have more news on where that's gonna land. By the end of April. Okay, so we can check your website, right? These comedy.com It'll be on there. And yeah, yep. Or in the show notes. Yeah. Ideally, to listen, I'm sorry, go ahead. Oh, I just said, Oh, more my instagram at De staat comedy. That's where I update a lot, too. So great. Okay, well put that in there, too. I can't wait to listen to your comedy or your Comedy Hour. Oh, yeah. I'll send you a link after the after the show. Okay. We'll add that all to the show notes. Now, is there any other thing that we didn't mention? Is there any piece of advice that you might want to share that I didn't get to? Oh, boy. Any nugget. Man, the let's see. Yeah, drink more water, however, was always a good tip. Odd enough? I don't know. I would say I it's, there's so much but there's so there's a movie. I say this sometimes this is so you ever seen the movie? The Curious Case of Benjamin buttons? Yeah. Brad Pitt, the David Lynch movie. Great movie. It's one of my, I wouldn't say one of my favorites. I like it a lot, though. There's this final one of the end scenes, as Brad Pitt is you know, getting younger and even more unbelievably handsome. And the girl is getting older. So you know, they separate, right? And he's living his life. And there's this monitor, there's this montage of him, you know, he's on a motorcycle in Tibet, or he's scuba diving in the you know, Alaska or he's taking taking a space shuttle to Mars or whatever the hell he's doing. And there's this monologue that he says over this montage where he's like, just remember this, like, it's never too late. You can always pivot, there's always opportunity for change, and to do something new and I'm paraphrasing it. Sorry, Brad, I know you're a big fan and listening, I'm sure. The, you know, in I always that that, like, idea stuck with me, you know, like, you can change you know, you can be you can be 60 or for me, like literally I've done comedy last 15 years and have a successful comedy career and I have production company of comedy happening everywhere. I could just keep doing that. You know, and I will but also I always wanted to write comic books. I love comic books. So I and I've been wanting to my whole life. So this last year, I'm like, we're gonna do it. And I just started I you know, fully scripted this 12 issue series and got an artist and a colorist and a letter and we're it's first issues almost done. And like that's, we're just gonna do it. The and I mean, just, I always tell you like bet on yourself. If you've bet on yourself, you're gonna bet on yourself and put yourself in a corner Don't bet on yourself, put yourself in a situation where you have to succeed. And I guarantee you, you'll succeed way more often than you realize. Because people are resilient. And we find a way to overcome. And if you're in a position where you have, you know, it's part of why, like, when I quit my job and start doing comedy, I'm like, Well, I guess I gotta find gigs to pay my bills. No, I did. You know, so it just happened. Because you had to find a way. I love that you said it's never it's never too late. Because if people say that, but they don't really mean it. You know, they get like, stuck in their life, and they get afraid. And if you're it really isn't your it's never too late. I went to a poetry reading an open mic poetry reading. A couple weeks ago, at a local art museum, I used to write poetry. I always wrote it my whole life. But I used to write it a lot. And I won an award in college. So I really, you know, I'm a poet, who doesn't write much, or read much public. But anyway, and I'm a tech writer full time, that's how I make my money. I saw this ad for, for this poetry open mic. And I'm like, You know what I've been writing again, I have a couple poems, I shared them with a select bunch of friends, they love them. It was real, they really love them. I'm gonna go read, it didn't make any sense. Like I should have been terrified, right. But it just felt like the right thing to do. So I went and I did it. And it was so such a fun night. And the weirdest part was that everyone seemed to have similar imagery in their poetry. It's almost like we got together, like in a dream and said, Let's all meet here, because we could really appreciate each other's poems, I was kind of freaked out. Like when that kind of thing happens. It's a little freaky. But my point, my real point is that I met this wonderful woman that night. She read her poems. And it turns out, she recently published a book of poems, and she, we ended up having dinner with my friend and my husband, we loved her, she was so interesting. She lives right in our town, I never would have known her if I hadn't gone to this poetry reading. She's 81 years old, I would have never guessed it. She's vibrant. She's a fiber artist. She's having a showing in April. Unbelievable shows up. But the poetry reading reads Republic has a book that she just published. And it just really, it just sort of lit my brain up, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you seem to be that person. You know, you don't have to be the person who doubts themselves and stays home too much. And watches TV, whatever people do. Yeah, you don't have to have that life. You can have this other life, but she's just very fulfilled. And she's really interesting. And she has a lot to say. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I, this is this a hard thing for people to swallow. But like, if you're not, if you don't have the life that you wish you had, it's probably your fault. Like, if you and not to say like, Hey, if you just wished you're a millionaire, you can make it happen. No. But you can also make your life happier, make your life better. You can. And again, it may take time, and it may not be comfortable at first. But you know, your prime making choices and doing things that are keeping you in that rut, in that it's just, I was thinking that as you're talking, it's the choices, you're making those? And you know, it doesn't have to be huge changes at first. No, because there's there's a, there's a great book, a self help book called atomic habits. And this this guy study, I guess, he's a psychologist who studied how we change our habits. And you just make tiny tweaks. It's really that you just make tiny tweaks, and you make another tiny tweak, and then before you know it, you've changed a big thing. You know, you've changed these little things. It's almost like you're turning the dials you know, you're setting the dials a little differently. But I don't know if this is if Tony Robbins was the originator of this kind of idea. But he I heard him say it and again, I don't know if it's a it's an old original from him. But he's like, if you have two boats in the ocean, two ships in the ocean that are sailing parallel to each other, right. And one of them just changes their direction one degrees off, you know, they have first it still looks like they're going the same direction. But over time, they're going to be in wildly different destinations. Yeah. So I love that usual Yeah, I love that. You know what you just reminded me of two is I remember hearing how a missile finds its how it how it keeps on its path. taxpayer money. Unfortunate Titleist. But when the missiles going towards its target, it keeps on the path by by noticing when it goes off the path. So it goes off the path detects that it went off and re corrects to me. I mean, I hate missiles. But I love that analogy of you know, if you've got that end in sight, you really do have your goal in sight. And you're dedicated to getting there. You're going to catch when you're not going there, you're going to catch when you're a little off. And you can you can pivot you can Rican, reconfigure your, your direction. Yeah. So there's, there's a consistency there. There's a there's a dedication there. And so if you can't find that, it's hard to get where you want to be. And I love what you said before. I always say I always say like, how's that working for you? When somebody says, you know, I've been doing this, but I don't want to do this. It's just basically like, well, art is what you're doing getting you where you want to go. Yeah. Then yeah, change it. If it's not, you know? Well, yeah. And I mean, it's like, you got the sacrifice thing. And like the just willing to open up doors and do things like so here's an example. So a couple years, this was two years ago now. I, when I was starting to ruminate about really feeling the bite about doing this comic book. I was on tour, and I was in I was going to be in LA for this weekend doing shows. And it happened to be the same weekend is the LA Comic Con. Well, there's a guy, his name is Fabian neesee. And he's actually I don't know, Jerry familiar with comic book character, Deadpool? Oh, yes, I am. Hopefully, this is the writer who wrote co created Deadpool. So Him and I are kind of friends. And he he's like, Hey, my Brother owns a small press comic book company. And he is looking for volunteers to work at the LA Comic Con, like, just help him work his booth during the day. And I'm like, he's like, you'll get a free pass to the convention. And I'm like, Hey, I'm gonna be in LA. I'm like, I don't have anything till eight o'clock at night. I got nothing to do all day. I like comic books. I'm gonna go to this convention. And like, I'll help like, I'm like, Yeah, I'll volunteer. So I work this convention and didn't really talk to his brother much. His name is Mario. But then afterwards, a couple of like, a week later, Mario called me out of nowhere. And he's like, Hey, he goes, I just wanted to say, thanks for helping you talk to you much. But like he goes, so you do you do comedy? And I go, Yeah, he goes, have you ever thought about he's you write all your material? And I go, Yeah, he goes, have you ever thought about writing anything else? Like a comic book or anything? And I go, Well, now that you mentioned, now that you mentioned Mario, yeah, my literally my entire life. I've thought about it and wanted to. And I, again, I had this comic book that I've been writing. And I didn't, I didn't mention it to him. And my that wasn't my intent. When I went in and being like, work this guy, and I'm gonna pitch them on my me and this thing. I just went and I helped him. And then I walked, I'm like, I know you, and maybe down the road, I'll see you again, whatever. And he called me. And just to check, and then this came up, and then I go, and he goes, he goes, Why don't you send it to me? Because you sent me your script. He goes, I'll take a look at it. And I'll give you I'll give you some feedback, because he's an editor and writer. And I'm like, that'd be great. That's awesome. And I sent it to him. And then he emailed me back about a week later, he goes, Hey, I'm gonna send this to our head, the publisher at our, my company, I want him to take a look at it, too. There you go. Okay, great. Then a couple of weeks later, I get an email. He goes, Hey, we want to hop on a call with you. We love this. We want to do this book. And I actually had an opportunity to publish it with our company and I ended up walking away from it just because it there were some logistics, it wasn't going to come out exactly like I wanted and offer still on the table. If I want to go to them. We're still friends. We still talk. It's fine. But yeah, it was just like, you know, maybe the timing isn't right. And I got I'm moving and and it just didn't work out the way we wanted to. And I'm like, Let's pump the brakes. And now I'm moving forward with it independently. But I it really was like, a catalyst moment. And it really pushed me to keep moving towards this project, and who it was. And, you know, maybe that's all it was, but it just took me being like, yeah, a volunteer for this guy. And I didn't push it. I didn't talk Talk about it. But again, the kind of your, your magnetic field around you, you know what you're putting out, it does pull things in, and you say, you know, you're however, I totally get it. But going to the poetry reading, it was sort of, I needed to surround myself with, I'd forgotten how much I liked those kinds of people. I love creative people. And I hadn't been in a creative circle in a while, and I just wanted to be there with them. But I know that I'll go to the next one, you know, in spring and, and I'll know some people there. And it's funny because my husband said, Oh, I just really liked these people. And my friend said, Oh, I just love hearing that. We've just like, missed it. We just missed that world. You just have to step out sometimes and try something. And I love that. You just said, Yeah, I'll volunteer What the heck, right. And so that's so crucial that you didn't ask for anything. Because that's, that's what they talk about. Like, I took a podcasting class with Kathy Heller to learn how to podcast. She's super famous, like multi millionaire. And we had time with her like live. We had a free five day class before the actual class. Oh, wow. She talked a lot about you know, that mindset stuff. And I needed all that because I was sort of stuck in that, you know, taking care of the kids and working and I really had, you know, a different life. And she she talked so much about people don't buy from you describing what you want to do people buy from you your energy people buy you thereby you So put yourself out there, it was such a different, interesting take. Because I always hated the idea of sales. A lot of people do. And they hate, they hate the other kind of sales. There's nothing wrong with getting out there and get excited about what you do. And somebody is attracted to your energy literally attracted to you. And they Hey, have you ever done that? They know you're reliable, they know you're interested because you volunteered. Right? They like that feeling. It's just so cool, though, because I don't think we are often taught that when we're young. I think that you know, there was an old style sales like even guys like when I was little they used to go door to door. Oh, yeah. Another would buy like brushes from the fuller brush, man and guy comes around, you know, and my father but Encyclopedia Britannica. Those days are gone. Yeah, they're still a little different now. But I really was educated by her and your story reminds me of that. Like, just put your another another way to say it is just love on people. Just be positive and love on people, you know, like, give of yourself and have that good energy and people will want to work with you don't. They'll come to you. And that you're like a great example of that. Yeah. Oh, go ahead. I can't thank you enough, because I just think this has gone all over the place to good places. Oh, yeah. Interview. Yeah. You have a lot to talk about and a lot to share. More than your story. You have a lot of life lessons. And I hope that's my favorite kind of interview. Well, I try at least to you know, been lived a lot of life and had a lot of experiences. So it's you have, and I'm with you about being stubborn. I'm just so stubborn. Sometimes. That's all that got me through. Yeah, it's not it's not always a bad thing, right? It's not. Yeah, well, it was great talking to you. Thank you for sharing so much. Yeah. We'll definitely get all that stuff into the show notes and people can get in touch with you is is Instagram the good way? Yeah, yeah, that's the Instagram or Facebook, Instagram. D stalk me on Instagram. So yeah, hit me up, follow me. I post clips of my comedy. You can find all my links from there to have everything going on. I know people are gonna love it. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you.