Be Weird. Be You. That’s Where the Magic Is.

00:00:00:01 - 00:00:23:14
All right, so it's been a while since I recorded a video for the channel. A couple of weeks. But given the fact that I've been trying to do this every week, a little disappointed with myself. However, I've been really busy pushing the business. The one of those video is to share a story, that I don't think is unique to me, but I think it's something that I definitely, roll with because I'm just weird that way.

00:00:23:16 - 00:00:53:12
That's just the idea of being weird. I think as a little boys, we all and little kids, we all have this, weirdness to us. Everything is new, right? We want to do everything. We want to get into everything. And then we get older, and, all of a sudden some things aren't cool and some other things are, so, and in many instances, kids just go towards the cool stuff because that's where the people are at.

00:00:53:13 - 00:01:20:22
And then there's weirdos like me. Always been that weird kid in my family. The weird kid in the neighborhood. Weird kid in school, but not in a terrible way. Just weird because I liked certain things. A lot of the things that now are pretty popular, they're part of pop culture now. I was big fan of hip hop and art, hip hop, rap, the rap culture in the 80s and 90s, late 80s, when I was introduced to it through, Run-D.M.C..

00:01:21:00 - 00:01:43:08
Who was it all? Oh, cool J and two Life Crew. I bought bootlegs of them. And, at a bazaar, here in old Cliff, Dallas. But then in the 90s, I was a big hip hop head, loved it. Bought everything I could. We just love the storytelling and kind of gave me some some sense of direction and some anger and resentment at the world.

00:01:43:10 - 00:02:22:21
Comic books were big for me as well. I was big into art. I wanted to be a comic book artist. In fact, I didn't go to college because I was determined to be a comic book artist. But study graphic design. But that's a whole nother thing that ended up leading me to the marketing space. The point is that I did these things, because I just wanted to, I was never I did please, please know that I did follow some trends, as all kids do is they're trying to discover themselves, but ultimately just became this weird, kid that decided not to follow them too much.

00:02:23:15 - 00:02:41:05
So much so that I became really strange. I had a friend that I hung out with for years ago, and he told me because I asked him what was I like? I was he was literally one of the original crew that I grew up with. And I said, what was I like? He said, man, you're crazy.

00:02:41:07 - 00:03:01:08
You're just crazy. It well, we're all out playing. You would be at home drawing, drawing, drawing. I'd have to drag you out of the house. Literally drag you out to come play with us. And it's not like I didn't like playing. So it's also this, I think even now, this fight that I have of, having these big ideas that I need to work on and also needing to socialize.

00:03:01:08 - 00:03:21:08
And when I socialize, I'm, I'm pretty good. But I can't relate to the things that they're doing too much because I'm in my head. I'm doing these things that are different. And I guess the point of this video is to say that, if you have something you like and it's not hurting anyone, you should really you should pursue it.

00:03:21:10 - 00:03:52:12
If you have this curiosity, you really should pursue it. I did, and all those little weird quirks, things that I did that people didn't understand are just now, not just now. It's actually been paying off for a little bit, and it's really coming together. Coalescing. Is that the right word? I hope I am just coalescing, coming together in a nice little skill stack in this nice little person that is me.

00:03:52:14 - 00:04:12:18
And these are these things that that help create me. All these, weird things that I was into are now a part of me. And it's something that I'm pretty prolific and proficient at. I still didn't know how or how bad it was in terms of even as an adult, I didn't know how how it was being perceived.

00:04:13:06 - 00:04:35:03
Never mind my family, because I'm sure they're like, oh, that's just Teevee being Teeve. But people that knew me and known me for a while knew that I had, I want to say, eccentric, but I was always curious and willing to try things. Luckily, one of those things I tried was the internet. The internet, and exploring this idea of creating business and creating a business that pretty much runs online, or that I do the work online.

00:04:35:06 - 00:04:59:00
That was 2009. So I've always been open to these ideas that allowed me to explore, to find new ways of making money. So I started doing that 2009, 2000, actually 2008, when I really started with my, my friend Brad, and we started our first online information company, Information Education. I forgot at least called information. We should have a new term, another term for it back in the day.

00:04:59:00 - 00:05:19:14
Unknown
Now it's called just course creation and training. At any rate, that mindset has always been there. And I had a conversation with my friend recently, one of my oldest friends, big Mike, and he said he told me that when remember when you were taking improv? T I didn't understand it. He's like, why? Why is he doing improv?

00:05:19:14 - 00:05:53:21
Unknown
What's that got to do with anything? And that I did that. I started doing that as well. And in 2009, 2010, but I was just curious. I was curious about this idea of improv and what how it can, how it can be used. How is it performed? I had no idea. I literally went into class. Everybody else in the class was pretty much everyone else was, trying to get into comedy or do storytelling, writing in cinema or plays, skits, sketch comedy.

00:05:53:21 - 00:06:09:12
Unknown
They were all trying to do something. And there's me. I was just like, I'm just here to have fun and learn this thing. So follow. My curiosity felt awkward the whole time, and if you don't feel awkward and a little out of place at times, and you're probably not doing enough things to push yourself. But I did it.

00:06:09:14 - 00:06:28:21
Unknown
And I went off and on for years because of course, it's a long, pretty long process to go through the various levels, but not till 2016 that I finally go all the way through. And I got my certificate in. Funny, as I like to say, and and I think I'm pretty funny, I think I'm pretty funny. I hear you, I hear something you.

00:06:28:21 - 00:06:55:10
Unknown
I think you're a funny looking haha. But, there's some that in your head. And I did that many other things. But back to my conversation with my buddy. Today's episode of Becoming Better Ancestors is brought to you by me. That's right Teevee the marketer founder of Rockstar Marketing, where we help small businesses stop being invisible and start becoming unforgettable.

00:06:55:12 - 00:07:14:17
Unknown
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00:07:14:17 - 00:07:42:01
Unknown
I head on over to WWE Rockstar Don marketing. It's a real thing and let's make some marketing magic happen. And he said to me, I didn't understand what that had to do with anything while you're wasting your time is what I heard in my head. He didn't say those words. But I see you now. See? I see how it's important and is it's helped create you and and, give you skills to become, who you are, to be much more conversational and so forth and so on.

00:07:42:01 - 00:08:11:06
Unknown
And I'm like, yeah, that's it. I know I'll be honest. At the time I didn't have any idea, but I knew that I was curious. I love learning stuff and is especially as it relates to community dating, to having a conversation, making a joke, lighting up the mood. I will say this. And I had another conversation with another friend of mine last week, who was the individual that hired me and brought me into the training department, at a corporate level.

00:08:11:08 - 00:08:33:18
Unknown
Quick clip of context setting. Back in the day, I was in the grocery business for 16 years, 18 years, 16 of which were, in the grocery stores, running, managing. I was always in management, but he helped pull me out of the stores and put me into the training department, and I was a trainer. So over the course of that, I started taking NLP classes.

00:08:33:18 - 00:08:58:11
Unknown
That's where I met my friend Brad, and then I started taking, improv classes. And I did this on my own because I did want to improve. So I will say that there was one outcome from improv for me, which was to make me more flexible when I was teaching classes. Inevitably, you have some smart asses, and those smart asses love to to to hit show where it hurts or try to derail the class in a way that is not really useful, beneficial.

00:08:58:14 - 00:09:22:12
Unknown
But they they, you know who they are. You might have been one yourself. You know, you are, or you may have been next to the guy next to the guy. But what improv taught me is that there's always this flexibility. And I'll say this specifically, this is the biggest lesson that I got from it, is that at any given moment, you may think that you don't have a choice, but to say the thing that comes to mind, people will say, well, if like I am who I am, you are.

00:09:22:12 - 00:09:44:23
Unknown
And but the first thing that comes to mind is not necessarily the best thing. It's probably the most impulsive, but not the best thing. In fact, Dell, close, the founder, one of the gods of the improv, community and, forefathers I remember this stuck with me as well in regards to this idea, in this lesson, which was your first thought is trash.

00:09:45:01 - 00:10:07:11
Unknown
The first thought is trash. Your second thought, not so much trash, but better. And your third thought, that's where the gold is. That's where you have something or some significant second lead the scene along and push it into different, different places. Because in improv you're trained, you're essentially creating a story in real time with fictional characters, successional spaces.

00:10:07:11 - 00:10:33:07
Unknown
You know, you might be on the moon, you don't even know it, but your first thought is trash. The second one is, and your third one is golden. And what that ended up telling me is that in any given moment, you can say you have a million things you can say to create a scene, to create a conversation, a more or flexible conversation, one that can lead to much deeper, understandings or just funny.

00:10:33:07 - 00:10:56:11
Unknown
I mean, if you're doing improv, maybe it's just funny, but improv also teaches you not to go for funding to play a natural, that the humor happens over time. So I needed those skills in my training classes. I needed to be able to feel more flexible because my buddy gave me this compliment. He said I was one of the most, natural trainers and teachers that he had ever met.

00:10:56:13 - 00:11:14:11
Unknown
And I've never trained, I just always in the stores, always at the retail level. And I had to manage people, but I never trained. But there was something that I guess I brought to it, but I wanted to get better. So when I heard about improv, I followed that curiosity and knowing that at least if you take that back to class, I wasn't going to be any sketches.

00:11:14:11 - 00:11:38:14
Unknown
I wasn't going to be on TV, although I am Teevee, I was going to learn something that could benefit me. But to this day, improv is a massively vital part of my identity, just in the way that I think and process and try to pause, pause before uttering my first thought. Not always successful. My girlfriend can attest to that, but it mattered.

00:11:38:14 - 00:11:56:16
Unknown
And it is important in my buddy saying that to me meant a lot. He probably is. Could write my my biography when I die. He I had to fight my money, my fiance, my wife, my future wife. In the writing of a book, he knows he knows a lot about me, and he knew all the weird things I did.

00:11:56:16 - 00:12:19:00
Unknown
And that was just one of them. And for him to say that to me meant a lot, because it meant that he is seeing my master plan, which was just two things, and figure it out later. Follow your curiosities. Be weird. Okay, being weird because what is normal? Like it's it's a bunch of crap. And ultimately you end up being this unique individual and not someone else.

00:12:19:02 - 00:12:39:01
Unknown
Everything about me is is is it is an effort to just express myself as truthfully as I can. And I think it's served me my entire life. It served me and the relationships that I've built. It served me and the relationships that I will build into the future. And I know myself and I'm cool being that weird dude.

00:12:40:01 - 00:13:01:15
Unknown
I mean, I'm not. I don't treat people terribly by being weird. I just I'm just the strange one that does things differently. And once you get to a certain age anyways, you're definitely going to have some some insights that now, combined with your weirdness, are going to make you incredibly valuable. And if nothing else, you're going to have some great conversations because people are going to be so interested in figuring out who they are.

00:13:01:17 - 00:13:22:02
Unknown
And those are fun. So be weird. Follow your curiosity, man, because even if there's no money behind it right away, it doesn't matter is going to help create a new, newer, more, richer version of you. And I can't imagine a world where that's not of benefit and of value to the world to to the people around you.

00:13:22:04 - 00:13:38:12
Unknown
So until next time, we're actually we renamed the podcast, and I'm sorry, becoming better ancestors. Thank you for tuning in to the Becoming Better Ancestors show on Teevee. And until next time, have a great day and we will talk soon. Bye. Go be weird.