SS/OUND WAVES®

In an age where people are so connected through the internet, social media and devices, I also believe this is a time when people have never felt so isolated, alone and physically disconnected. I say this because I can personally see it in my own experiences and the connections/friendships I try to establish with the people I come in contact with. So how does someone take mindful actions to turn a stranger into a friend through communication, attention and presence? In this episode, Tiffany and I did just that.

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Life has the power to push us to ground, but we have the power to pick ourselves back up. Life has the power to break our hearts, but we have the power to love stronger than we did before. Life has the power to ruin our day, but we have the power to transmute that energy into healing properties by giving the pieces of us that's dysregulated the attention it's requesting. -- Just like you, the pieces within you require your attention, your love, your understanding and your compassion.

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As someone who built a whole career using the internet and social media, I didn't even realize when my phone began to turn into an extension of my hand. It seems like one day, it was just always there. No matter where I was, or who I was with my, face was constantly tilted down and locked-in on the blue screen. One of my non-negotiable rules that I started implementing into my life a couple of years ago is 'put the phone down when company is around'. If there's someone in the room with me, they become my focal point. My full attention is on them as I 'listen to listen', not 'listen to respond'. I communicate mindfully as I make sure the person feels seen and heard. The beauty of this practice is that it's so rare today that it becomes an impactful experience that tends to inspire others to be more present as well. They put their phones away as we co-create a beautiful human connection.

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So many of us only show pieces of ourselves to the world. Rather than showing up fully exposed as our authentic Self. We tend to hide behind the masks that we fabricated for protection from rejection, or from our insecurities being fully seen. It's time to remove these facades and lean into our truth. It's time we stop using this buffer that prevents us from making deep, meaningful connections with others. -- It's time that we start to fully see and fall in love with ourselves.

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I attended my first ACA (Adult Children of Alcoholics) support group and was surprised by how safe I felt and how much I had in common with the strangers surrounding me. Track with me in this episode as I unpack my experience in real-time and share my personal take-aways.

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Jenna is back in the Zen Den for another candid conversation where we talk about everything from non-negotiable's in modeling, pathways to forgiveness, visualizing future-self and she even teaches me about Chat-GPT, her AI pen-pal whom I nicknamed, Chadwick.

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I've never heard anyone openly speak about how packaging and selling positivity is a harder product to push. Especially in the beginning stages of the initiatives. As someone who has rapidly scaled a past business, one that was modeled around negativity, sexually explicit imagery and self-destructive antics, I can firmly say this positive space has been a much more challenging one to grow in. -- In this episode I share my experiences from both sides of the spectrum and why the challenges are so worth it.

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One of the easiest things to do in life is to become like everyone else. To dilute our truth, our identity and stifle our voice in pursuit of feeling accepted, of feeling like we belong to something. -- But here's the truth, we were made to be the ORIGINAL and it's time that we stop living as the carbon copy.

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It took me years to acknowledge the fact that I'm my own product, and in order for others to believe in what I'm selling, I must first believe in it myself. And here's the gift, when your product helps people and is in service of others, there's no market cap or glass ceiling -- there's only upside potential.

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Today is a reminder that you have the power to brighten up someones day. It can come in the form of a simple "hello" or saying good morning to a co-worker. It can come in the shape of asking the cashier how their doing or complimenting a stranger. There are so many ways that we can use our internal brightness to illuminate the world outside of us. And here's the most beautiful part -- the more sunshine we give, the more we get.

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When I find something that I love doing, creatively or professionally, I'm prone to overworking and taking on a million things at once. Part of it is a control issue and part of it is feeling pressured to run as fast as I can -- like I'm racing against some imaginary clock. I become so obsessed with the creating and the doing, that I smother it. I hug it so tight that it can't breathe, and that's usually when nature steps in and pushes us apart. It shows up as a physical response in my body in the form of anxiety and stress, which is also the doorway to burnout. This time though, nature showed up and took away one of the things that I value most about myself, my ability to speak. I got a month long reminder of what can physically happen within me when I do too much, too fast, too soon and don't slow down to simply enjoy the ride.

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I was asked a question yesterday that made me think about my inspirations and what do my G.O.A.T's (Greatest Of All Time) represent? When I sat and thought about who they are and the impact they've had on my life, it was so clear to me as to why I respect these individuals so much and aspire to head in the same trajectory. But then I thought about my past, especially in a creative capacity. Who was the pinnacle of achievement and the measurement of greatness in my eyes? Who was standing there behind the mask (or camera) of creativity and did their internal virtues align with their external success? The answer was, no -- and to be completely honest, I never even had the insight to question these things or be curious enough to go beyond the surface of their aesthetics, cultural influences or financial accolades. Attention and focus is currency, do the research and make smart investments.

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In this candid conversation with my friend, Kendal, we talk about how she found her passion for acting and what it was like working on a hit show such as Grey’s Anatomy. We dive inward and discuss happiness and friendships and even have a little fun talking about how she’s currently expanding into social media and exploring TikTok, which I find fascinating because it's a space I haven't played in much. She was even kind enough to give a few tips on how a guy like me who doesn't know anything about the platform, and who can’t dance, can still create a compelling narrative in a fun and creative way through this millennial lens.

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I actually forgot I had a blog until yesterday and this wasn't just any blog, this was a high-ranking, highly trafficked creative space that people would visit often. I was listening to a podcast and the words “successful blog” was thrown out and I consciously caught them like most of us caught Covid in 2021. I mean, it’s been nearly two years since I deactivated it and there’s so many reasons and variables as to why but to quickly sum it up -- I needed to heal some things and learn how to love all of me, even the old creative parts that I was trying to stifle and suppress because they reminded me too much of my old life. After a lot of internal work, I’m now in this really beautiful space within where I no longer wish to silence any piece of me and felt it was time to reactivate this creative outlet and invite my fingers to start dancing on the keyboard again. Because who I was isn't who I am, and we all have the ability to repurpose our mess. To turn our shame into something that serves us (and others) in a positive capacity.

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I was recently acknowledged for my sobriety by someone important in my life, which impacted me deeply. It got me thinking about why this recognition by this particular person had so much weight, and why I received it differently then I do when other people in my life recognize me for the same continuous battle. After a few days of sitting with this experience I realized what was different about it, it was because it was the first time in my life that a strong, positive, male figure, that I look up to and admire, witnessed and celebrated me for the strength that it took to turn my deficit into a superpower. He didn't just observe my battle, he also verbally expressed my win. Which got me thinking even further, am I intentionally celebrating and verbally acknowledging others for the same? Am I asking what's hard for them or am I only championing them for the battles I can see?

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I used to view my parents as my heroes, especially my dad, and I knew they loved me but they didn't know how to love me in my way, which caused me great pain and left me feeling inadequate. I recently came to a place within myself where I removed the hero labeling that I placed on them and began to humanize them, which gave me the ability to look beyond my own childhood deficits in search of theirs. This shift in perspective provided me with tremendous healing and it gave me the compassion to finally understand that my parents did the best they could with the tools they had. -- Just because we forgive, doesn't mean we forget and it certainly doesn't mean that we have to engage in a relationship with the people that hurt us. But ultimately, forgiveness for others is a selfish act because it frees us from being tethered to that person. Love sets us free, hate keeps us imprisoned. 

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Sometimes we meet people in our present that trigger things in us from our past. It's normal human mechanics that happens to all of us, and it happens all of the time, everywhere. I got front row seats to this show over the weekend and let me tell you, it was a wild ride that left me dysregulated and ramped up. Please bear with me as purge my real-time, raw, inner thoughts out into the open in hopes of finally stumbling upon some clarity.

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We're living in a world that is so fast paced and the majority of us are usually really overwhelmed or constantly on the go, which doesn’t allow us a moment to stop and ask ourselves, “how am I feeling right now?”. This ritual of checking in with myself was a game changer when I started implementing it and it's been such a vital tool in helping me show up as the best version of myself. Here's how I started using it -- and how you can too.

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Have you ever spent time with someone but later on realized that you actually don’t know anything about the person? That almost perfectly describes my experience with Jenna. I’ve photographed her three or four times in the span of a year, yet we’ve never initiated the type of  human experience that allows for us to break through the surface and go somewhere deeper. — That all changes in this episode. We welcome you into the room as we sit down for the first time and talk about everything from interests, modeling, photography, nudity, body image, childhood experiences and finding joy in life. 

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"How do you want to be loved?" — Have you ever taken a moment to ask the people you care about this question? And furthermore, have you ever even answered it for yourself? A very interesting thing happened to me last night while I was doing an internal check-in and reflecting on my relationship with myself, my family and my friends. I abruptly came to this fascinating realization that I don’t know the answer to this question. I mean, logically speaking, of course they know I love them because I show them and tell them all of the time. But how am I expressing this love? Is it in my way — or theirs? Let's unpack this together.

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I've been playing with podcasting for about two years but only within the last three months has it been something that I've started taking very seriously. Now in full ownership and full commitment to this thing, I thought it would be interesting to share what I've learned from it so far. In this episode I touch on the few, yet extremely impactful gifts that this project has given me. While recording this, in real-time, I could clearly see how the skillset of communication and my new level of confidence transcends way beyond creating a verbal-digital-tranmission. For me, podcasting has not only been a creative and therapeutic tool, but also a tool for my life.

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I found this unreleased interview with Kate Compton from 2015 on an old hard-drive and it was like opening up a time capsule that sent me right back to that exact moment. We recorded it in my little West Hollywood apartment on Norton Ave using two iPhones and headphones with built-in mics tucked under Kate and Emily's shirts because I didn't have any interest in voice recordings at the time; how things have changed. Emily, who wrote and conducted the questions can't be heard in the interview because I didn't even know how to edit two separate sound files together. -- The thing that stands out the most to me was just how openly and vulnerably Kate shared her story and how I wasn't able to see and acknowledge and celebrate her for her courage and self-awareness at the time. I wanted to share this because even though this thing is eight years old, I feel it's still relevant in todays landscape. In this episode you will hear Kate touch on topics such as social media, modeling, posing nude, and some of her childhood experiences that ultimately forged her mindsets and perspectives as an adult.

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Have you ever stopped to ask yourself if you really know your friends? Do you know them on a deep level or are they simply familiar faces in your life? I recently had an experience where I had to ask myself these questions and analyze how I used to approach my friendships in the past compared to how I build them now. There's a very accurate saying -- "you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with", and if that is so, what kind of people are you co-creating these relationships with?

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For so long I had to live through an inflated facade to protect myself from being seen for the shy, timid and insecure person that I was. Eventually the mask got heavy and the persona that I manufactured got exhausted. It was time for a change. Finding an authentic confidence in myself was one of the most challenging endurances that I've ever gone through -- but it so worth it. Here's how I began to turn fear into fun and how I unearthed this new ability to live and love and move in this world confidently.  

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Photography is the vein that connects all of my creative aspirations with a feeling of joy and happiness, so you can imagine how hard it was to let go of when it slowly transitioned into a toxic pursuit of followers, likes and money. Here's the first of many upcoming episodes where I let you into the creative underbelly of my world. 

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Laura is back in the studio for a guest appearance as we catch up and candidly touch on what happened between us, navigating in this new space of our friendship, finding safety in vulnerability and discussing strong male emotional intelligence. I'm going to be honest, this took a turn at the end and I didn't think I was going to openly share so many personal and private feelings but I'm glad I did. This was a genuine real-time conversation that added a lot of value to both of us.

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The desire for perfection has always been the anchor that keeps me stuck. This inability to move forward because I'm too focused on what I lack, what I don't have, or what I need to get next in order to start. My professional pursuits have undergone a drastic shift recently when I stopped seeking perfection and started focusing on what I can use right now. When I stopped reaching for the shelves and started reaching for what's right in front of me.

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I've been feeling like I am on a whole new level of happiness lately and was trying to figure out how I got myself here, and what ingredients I used to make this experience. While recording this episode I found some stand-out actions that got me to this new state, a place that I've never been to before, and if I can get myself here -- then you definitely can as well.

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Learning how to celebrate myself has been a long, tedious process. I find it so easy to openly champion those around me. It's a natural reflex for me to root and cheer for the people I love, because I genuinely believe in them. When it comes to me, I find it to be a bit more complex to climb up the mountain and shout as loud as I can that I'm proud of myself. It's hard for me to celebrate my wins -- both the internal and external victories. I also find it really challenging to open myself up and allow those who love me to celebrate me in return. In this episode I speak about how I'm re-wiring this inability and turning it into an empowering muscle, one that I need to flex way more often because I (and you) deserve it. 

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Welcome to Season 2 of the SS/OUND WAVES® Podcast. In this episode I shine a light on some of my current battles such as breaking through my comfort zone and doing things that I've never done. I speak about seeing the sunrise in Malibu for the first time, losing a grip on my personal rituals that tether me to my highest self, navigating through the complexities of feeling like an adult orphan and learning how to lean in to my authenticity. Grab a drink, grab some snacks and strap in because this is going to be an emotional ride.

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Perhaps it was the season change or a lot of stuff that I've been deflecting, but I recently went through an internal storm that had me in a very dark place, a place that I haven't been to in awhile. Rather than avoiding it or running from it like I would have in my past, I decided to strap in and experience everything that it had to throw at me. Here's some of the insights that I found now that I'm on the other side. 

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Full transparency, I had no clue on what I was going to talk about in this episode aside from the pearls that I've been finding in my day-to-day experiences. Then something magical happened, I started speaking from my heart in free-flow-state, and when this happens, I tend to get very emotional. In this particular moment I felt like I was speaking to the scared little boy inside of me. The unprotected child that never felt like he had a place in this world. When I speak to that part of me as the man that I am now, I can't help but to get a little lost. 

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I'm a firm believer that god (the universe, whatever you wish to call it) puts low hanging fruit in front of us when we're on our path to inner-fulfillment and growth. This fruit is a decision. We can reach beyond it and grab a source of nutrients that fuel us or we can pluck what's right in front of us and take the empty calories that leaves us starving. It's everywhere and in every aspect of our life -- whether it be our jobs, our relationships, our intentions or what we deem as important. So, what do you do when this fruit is being dangled in front of you? Do you grab it because its easy or do you stretch yourself and go after what's better for you?

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So many times our minds go to the past or the future and we create so much chaos that doesn't exist in the now. How do you find your way back when you get lost? 

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We can only do so much on our own, which is why after a couple of months of me outsourcing help, I am a true advocate of the value one can receive when they take initiate and start taking responsibility for themselves and their internal wiring. Here's my experience of what I learned over the last week and what bubbled to the surface in my therapy session.

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I'm going to be honest, entering the dating world is daunting and I felt like I needed to share my experience of what it's like out there; especially dating as a sober individual. Also, I felt the need to be completely vulnerable and open up about how I feel creatively and professionally stuck at this moment in my life. So much of my identity is directly tied to what I do and what I create. I put a such high value on what I can produce so when the engine stops, what's my worth? 

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I thought it was important to share with you the four new rituals that I've been implementing into my days to help guide me to a positive and healthy place during this current life experience. Perhaps you can pluck one or two or all of them and throw them in your toolbox to help pilot you out of what ever friction, pain or discomfort you're currently grappling with. But more so, to help you expand and build a better you.

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In this episode I have a conversation with my good friend and artist, Steffano or better known as Step. We talk about our friendship that has spanned over a decade and the wild times we had along the way. We dive deep into the world of creativity and drugs and how they intertwine as well as what it's like to unravel yourself from the romanticized logic and learn how to create as a sober artist. As I was editing this episode I discovered that there's a lot of Easter eggs in this conversation that I wish I would have come to realize a lot sooner, not only in my career but also in my personal life. Enjoy!

Laura is back in the studio and we dive deep into conversation about what has been going and how much has changed in my life. We laugh, we cry and of course we make fun of each other throughout the episode.

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How do I say goodbye to the person that has never given up on me? I don't even know where to begin on the process of letting my mom go.

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I surprised (@Lauraawawryk) with a gift as we talked about our love languages, zodiac signs, crazy ex's and the infamous "slap".

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Laura (@Lauraawawryk) and I did our first Instagram Q+A. We answered your questions about dating, sex, photography and our turn-off's.

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In this episode we talk about how one of our listeners sent Laura (@Lauraawawryk) a D pic. We talk about the types of individuals that we date and how to navigate through life being vulnerable. 

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In this episode Laura (@Lauraawawryk) and I talk about life, situationships, OnlyFans, partying and more. Enjoy the first of many conversations that is surely to take place between us.

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Do you ever feel like the rope tied to all of your daily rituals and daily habits is slipping out of your hands? Good, because I do too. Here are three things that I've been doing to get back into my rhythm and to keep me in a strong and positive headspace. 

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Welcome back to the SS/OUND WAVES® podcast. In this episode I explain where've been, why I wiped my social media and what my new plans are for this show are. I'm beyond excited to finally start navigating through my truth and sharing my journey through this outlet. I welcome you to come along for the ride.

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