TW: Eating disorders, body image
Brynn Plummer
Enneagram: 7
Donut of choice: Krispy Kreme Strawberry Iced with Sprinkles
In our first interview of the season, Ashley Brooke James and Elizabeth Moore, co-founders of TRILUNA, sit down (virtually) with Brynn Plummer, Vice President of Inclusion and Community Relations for the Nashville Entrepreneur Center and founder of Dissocialite Design Co. Dissocialite works to destigmatize mental illness through playfully designed apparel and goods.
Today we’re talking about curiosity, mental health, and thirst traps.
Tune in next week for a conversation around setting boundaries, stepping into personal power, and intentionality.
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[00:00:00] We would like to open this episode with a trigger warning, as it contains discussion of eating disorders, body image issues, and or weight loss or management. If this does not feel safe for you at this time, please skip the episode and come back to it if, and when you're ready.
[00:00:18] It was when I was like logged into my friend's feed, then I was like, Oh, this is like, I'm seeing skinny white women. Like I hope I almost never see thin white. Someone's about to get popped. Somebody doesn't like skinny, white woman. There's maybe some bias in the tone. That lovely voice that you just heard was Brynn Plummer, Vice President of Inclusion and Community Relations for the national entrepreneur center since 2018. She's also the founder of Dissocialite Design Co. Dissocialite works to de-stigmatize mental illness through playfully designed apparel and goods.
[00:00:54] Brynn was born and raised in Greensboro, North Carolina. After graduating from Columbia, she moved to Nashville in [00:01:00] 2011 to join teach for America. She taught middle school, English and social studies before working on the teach for America staff for five years, mostly doing diversity and inclusion work.
[00:01:09] Today we're talking about curiosity, mental health and thirst traps. Hi everyone. I'm Ashley , James. And I'm Elizabeth Moore co founders of TRILUNA and this is the wellness community magic podcast, a podcast where we settle in, get cozy and talk hard truths about the wellness world. We're here to take on diet culture by making self-care realistic, sustainable, and inclusive.
[00:01:37] We have a pro donut anti-racist Glenda, the good witch agenda. So join us on our journey to build community and redefine wellness. Let's get started.
[00:01:52] So let's talk about donuts. You said strawberry iced with sprinkles. I think that is a [00:02:00] delicious donut. I think five daughters has one of the best strawberry donuts. Ever. Yeah, why did you pick that donut? Well I'm a Krispy Kreme gal. I should say I am from ... I'm from the town next to where Krispy Kreme was founded and that Hotmail sign that drove our life, Bro.
[00:02:19] Let me tell you driving down battleground Avenue. Like if I was driving down, I would just, we'd text the family, like, Hey guys, just so you know, the Hotnow sign is on, like, it was very much a thing that was like the Hotnow sign to this day. I just want a shirt that just has Hotnow on it. I just got a text, I literally just got a text Monday night and said from my best friend group was like, the hotnow sign is on and I'm going, and I was like "Dang it!" Brynn, maybe that needs to be your next shirt.
[00:02:47] I think it is. I wonder if there's copyright on it because that's it's the most. Yeah. And so anywho, Krispy Kreme strawberry iced with sprinkle donut is like, I like all Krispy Kreme donuts. I'm particularly a fan of lemon filled, but that one [00:03:00] is, I think, whimsical, colorful and you get the original glazed underneath it.
[00:03:05] Like what's not to love, you know, what's not to love. The original glaze is something about that original glaze. So we have a couple of questions. I'm sure we'll get off topic. We'll just talk because that's what we do here at the wellness community magic podcast. We just talk. So you work with entrepreneurs on a daily basis.
[00:03:27] What advice would you give to the entrepreneurs for cultivating a strong community? That's a good question. Okay. One, people are searching for identity and purpose and to see themselves a lot right now. I think you can see it reflected in just the rise of something like a Nexium or, uh, even some of the, you know, multi-level marketing schemes that are out here. Even the way people are adherence to things like, um, astrology [00:04:00] or Enneagram or Myers-Brigg like people are trying to find meaning about themselves and also higher purpose. So I think giving your audience and your customers a higher purpose and also giving them an invitation to be part of something that you're building is meaningful.
[00:04:19] I think a lot of us right now are going culturally going through this shift where, you know, in our parents' generation, it might've been, your job was your identity. And now I think for people who are my age, they sort of elder millennials, we are, uh, realizing our jobs don't, we don't want our jobs to define ourselves, but there is a real absence of meaning beyond that, unless you, um, have a religion or a part of a community group or a part of a, something else, some other kind of higher identification order that gives you meaning.
[00:04:51] And so giving people a meaning and a purpose through your product, whatever it is, is important. Um, that also, and then that will also bind them to the community and make them part of a [00:05:00] community. And then, two, using your, uh, user or your consumer using their words, using their images, using their, um, participation in your brand as the stories that you're telling. So you're not just like, Hey, you got this, you bought this product. I'm so glad you bought it. You're not just thinking them individually. But you're also saying to the rest of the buyers and users, this is who's part of our community. This is who's part of us. And so that people buy people, buy and people become part of the brand because they're like, Oh, that person is like me. People like me are part of this brand in this community. So it's reflecting back who are the members of the community so that more and more people can find identity within that community and can see themselves reflected in it. So I guess summing up purpose and then, uh, reflecting back who the members of the body are.
[00:05:46] And, uh, showing that it's a really wide net too. I think that's something that matters a lot right now for brands, especially if you were attracting millennial or gen Z customers. So Brynn, you have done this in [00:06:00] such a phenomenal way with Dissocialite Design co. I was like early, like as soon as those were out I was like I want that, have that.
[00:06:08] So tell us about Dissocialite Design Co and then I'll say which one I got and we'll go from there. Good. Okay. So, uh, Dissocialite Design Co is, we are a company that is aiming to de-stigmatize mental illness and raise awareness about mental health more broadly through playfully designed wearables and goods.
[00:06:27] So we primarily started in apparel, sweatshirts, t-shirts. And now we've branched into a few other products, um, hats, tote bags, dog clothing, drink tumblers, um, notebooks. And the idea is, um, it came about through quarantine and talking with a few friends of mine. And we were kind of just marveling at this reality that we were in, where we were continuing to do work, put out work, maybe even putting out work at a higher pace or higher volume through the quarantine. And we were all like, but we are [00:07:00] really depressed. We're really depressed and we're not okay. And we're scared and feel terrified every day. And the, it sort of came from there. Like if there was a way to signal to the world, Hey, I'm not doing great today and, or I'm here. And also I'm anxious. Like I'm here and I'm present and I'm also anxious and take the whole bundle baby. If there was a way to do that and then also to give people the tools to talk about those things on masks, then that could possibly be a tool to raise the consciousness of our entire community.
[00:07:32] So if it becomes not, you know, if there's only one person in the workplace, you're saying I'm really anxious today, and I'm having a hard time today. If there's only one person shows up and the attention goes on to that person, but if there are, you know, five or six people within a workplace who were saying, yeah, I'm anxious and I think part of what, maybe what's going on to make me anxious is part of this and, or even if it's not part of this workplace or this environment, a lot of us are bringing that to work. Maybe we can start to make some [00:08:00] interventions that are more structural or systemic as opposed to at the individual level.
[00:08:04] So that's really what Dissocialite is about. It's about a way to talk about and show your own personal mental wellness, where you are in your mental wellness or, or mental illness, if that is where you're at or what you're exhibiting. But it's also a way to connect with other people who are members of that particular community.
[00:08:21] So for me, I identify as like a high functioning depressive and someone who has generalized anxiety disorder and intermittent sleep issues go through periods of being really up there at periods of being really low. Big, seasonal, affective disorder, seasonal depression person. And, uh, there's a lot of people like me out there so it's been really, for me, instructive to connect with other people and find and find out how they're managing and dealing. I've also been really interested in the buyers of Dissocialite because they tend to be like some of the most ardent early adherence people like Elizabeth are probably some of the most bad-ass, high achieving.
[00:09:00] [00:08:59] They're not the mold for what people think about when we think about mental illness, you know what I mean? And I think in some ways that speaks to how ubiquitous it is. And also the resilience of people to find ways to either use their mental illness or wherever they are in their mental wellness journey as an accelerant, or to work around it or a workaround or what have you but there's a real resilience in the community too. And I think that's part of it too. Like it's, doesn't have to be this heavy, heavy, heavy thing. It's more of just, how would you talk about, you know, having allergies? How would you talk about, um, having celiac disease. How would you talk about these things in a way that makes them commonplace for us to talk about them and not so heavy?
[00:09:40] Yeah. So when we talk about community, we're a very community based wellness company, because we believe fundamentally that you are as well as your community and that your community and your part in community has a part in your wellness. And one of the stories that I tell all the time, and we've already told on this podcast once was that I [00:10:00] discovered that unwanted intrusive thoughts were a thing when I finally admitted to someone that I was having them and they were like, Oh, that's called this it's common people do this. It's okay. And all of a sudden, a whole world of therapy, solutions, thoughts, processes, healing, were available to me because I had been vulnerable enough one time to tell someone something and they responded in a way that was like, here, let me bring you into my community. Let me tell you what I've learned and here's how you can move this forward. So as soon as I saw, so I have this incredible bright orange shirt with it, is it a rabbit? It's a rabbit, right. And it says unwanted intrusive thoughts.
[00:10:41] So it's like, not only am I like reclaiming that for myself and saying, look, here's the thing I have. Here's the thing I'm learning from and dealing with and what I'm doing about it. And also, I don't have any shame about it, at all. This is part of me. This is part of the way my brain works. And I'm here to say that I have it.
[00:10:58] And also to say, if you [00:11:00] have it, if this is something that you're curious about, if even the name of this makes sense to you, you can come and talk to me about it. I have it on a bright orange shirt right on my chest. Like, come talk to me about it. And that is, to me, what is so powerful about vulnerability and community together.
[00:11:17] I love that. I love that so much. I think that's also, I mean, language is helpful. I mean, language is so many things. It can be oppressive and this, but language, particularly as it pertains to wellness or medical journeys, all that stuff, all the solutions to your point, derived from that language, like having a term to describe this thing, you feel connected to other people can actually read everything you're saying is exactly, like you could write the Dissocialite copy right now. I would be happy to. And you know, honestly, like part of it is I always like side eyenpeople who like say things like social media will be the end of us or whatever cause it's usually like a white man on a [00:12:00] podcast who's always had access to seeing himself. And uh, it's anywho, but shout out to Tumblr because I feel like I've found so much of my identity and so many ways to talk about myself as a kid on Tumblr, on my space. And now Instagram, I think has become this amazing democratized way to find out about mental health, to find out about different things we might experience to find out about sexuality, to find out about, uh, different phenomena that are in our lives.
[00:12:33] I mean, some of the things that we talk about with the Dissocialite are some of the things that are like printed on the t-shirt of Dissocialite are words that are exclusively found like in the DSM-5 or things that you might not get access to unless you could spend thousands of dollars or hundreds of hours in therapy and Instagram has made it possible through the way that a lot of psychologists and counselors and mental health practitioners like Nedra Tawab and folks like that are using it to kind of give [00:13:00] access to this broader world of understanding yourself like access to working on one's mental health has been incredibly inaccessible like the ability to work on yourself from a mental space down. And the psychological space has been incredibly inaccessible for almost all of human history or undervalued, devalued, whatever. It's a very new science, right. But because of Instagram and platforms like that, people are now finding language and tools to talk about things so that you don't have to be someone who has hundreds of free hours and thousands of extra dollars who can go get this, this, this learning. And so I really credit Instagram, uh, in a lot of ways for teaching me things about like on one interest of thoughts, trauma responses, recovered past life stuff. I feel like if I didn't have this platform, it's just, which started as a picture sharing app.
[00:13:51] If we didn't have this platform, I think there's so much knowledge that would have just been, I would have had to wait years and years to get to. And I feel [00:14:00] really inspired when I look at folks like gen Z'ers who are using tik tok to share these ideas and are exploring phenomena that I have baby boomers who really like the content.
[00:14:09] Like my mom is learning things about her mental health through Dissocialite. And I think that's really powerful thinking about this next generation of kids that are starting out at the gate, knowing these different words and things and phenomenon and ways to describe the everyday experiences that they have. I think they're going to be so much more, they're just going to be able to go farther, faster. I think in a lot of ways, of course, they'll have a climate climate crisis and recession and everything else to deal with, but they'll know how to describe and label the things that are coming up for them as they go through those things.
[00:14:42] Yeah. That's uh, the, the talk about generational mental health is really interesting. I, I, our parents that was just like, not part of their lexicon. It was not part of their life. My dad's in his sixties and just this year, he said, I have anxiety. And I was very [00:15:00] aware of it because I have anxiety. Like I know these things, you know, and I, I, I look back to just certain situations growing up and how he would respond to certain things. And like you said, we just didn't talk about those things. Our parents didn't talk about those things and we have created, and I think that's why our brands aligned where you have created a space for people to speak openly about things like intrusive thoughts. We have created a space where people to be able to talk about those things, as well as their physical wellness, that things that the world has told us that are going to work for us and making us feel like, again, we're not well enough.
[00:15:42] Instagram has been both a blessing and a curse. I think at the height of my eating disorder was like when we were just starting to get into the like MySpace, Facebook world was really more my space when I was in high school and Facebook you could only get with a college address, [00:16:00] which I did not have, but that was like when I first started really being able to massively compare myself to other people on a broad scale and not just people who were celebrities, but my peers, right. And so it became a tool that amplified my body dysmorphia. But it also, once I realized that that wasn't what I wanted and I started curating my feed more carefully and I got into body positive, which turned into body neutrality and the kind of the journey there, it also became a tool for me to unlearn. And so I think the idea of getting really careful about how you curate your feed and how you pick things that show up for you is really important and will be even more important for younger generations as well. That is, Elizabeth, just come over here and just write, write the thesis. Okay! It is one of [00:17:00] those things I do think it's, I don't, I hate to use the word.
[00:17:02] I often think about like, uh, you know, what is your media diet? And I don't even like to use the word diet per se, but I can't really think of a better word, but like, what is your media intake? And, you know, I had this. Interesting moment when I realized that my Instagram feed was wholly different from my friends who were thinner, white or what have you, because my feed is extremely queer, gender non-conforming, black, specifically medium and darker skin, black, fat bodied, very fem centric and very anti-capitalist and just very, uh, different. And it was when I was like logged into my friend's feed, then I was like, Oh, this is like, I'm seeing skinny white women. Like I don't, I almost never see thin white women.
[00:17:54] Somebody's about to get popped. Somebody didn't like skinny white [00:18:00] women. There's maybe some bias in the tone. I think that, I think so. I think we're seeing what's going on over at that house, which is funny cause I like have so many friends who are thin white women, but I also like, anywhere you look outside of my feet is thin white women, you know? And so my feed is almost, uh, an antidote to a lot of what the mainstream is. And I think, um, learning is a great way to talk about it because once we know what we're looking for, we have, now, the tool to work in opposition to the thing that we're consistently being fed. Like it's nice to me that my feed is advancing ideas that are really radical to me and are very rooted in liberation and radical imagination about what our society could be, because I can get the mainstream idea of society or the very nationalistic idea of society. I can turn that on, that fire hose on, when I turn on the TV, I can turn that fire hose on it any time, but this is sort of a way to rebalance what I'm seeing and what I'm feeling and what [00:19:00] I intake as truth, right. I do think there is, there is some curation, curation is such a great word to use. I love that word that you shared Elizabeth, because that there is some, some dials you have to turn up and turn down. But I also think that there is something particular about comparison that I, I think, I think different groups experience comparison differently.
[00:19:19] I think for CIS straight. I mean, there's been studies on body image done across racial groups for young women and usually young, white CIS straight girls tend to have a higher rating on like their friend's opinion of their body mattering a lot more to them than a girls and other racial groups. So there is more of an identification with the more we identify with the mainstream tends to be, or the more we see the, the mainstream has giving us access to, uh, the life we want to live. Like the more I opt into the mainstream, the more I can live the life that I aspire to live that tends to correlate with pressure, to live into that mainstream that tends to correlate with a preoccupation, [00:20:00] with a certain ideal.
[00:20:02] And I think because there's never been to me like an idea put up with like, what is the ideal fat black woman? Like there's never been an idealized body or person that, that is a fat black woman. Like if you think of the ideal woman that society would paint, it's not anything close to me. I think if you would think about like the idealized and now in our society, the idealized fat black woman, you might think about like a Lizzo and I might have more access to that.
[00:20:27] Um, and in some ways I don't as well. Like she is incredibly much more physically active than I, if I had to do a Lizzo show I would die in the first three songs. Like I couldn't, I don't have the stamina baby. Um, I'm out after the first one, I've seen her perform multiple times and every time I'm like how, where from what, from what well does one draw.
[00:20:48] So I think there is something about our ability to see the mainstream as something toxic or as something aspirational that does do a lot to change how we [00:21:00] view these tools, right. I even think about something like, um, You know, I have a lot of dear friends who were really into Pinterest for awhile because it gave them a way to curate meals but Pinterest definitely fueled a lot of stuff around clean eating, "clean eating". I'm putting that in quotation marks for the audio people, a lot of stuff around food and morality, a lot of stuff around disordered eating. Um, And Pinterest, I think in particular is used by a certain, it makes sense. Like if you think about the kind of person who is using Pinterest, she fits all the things that also are correlate with being more likely to be involved in disordered eating like perfectionistic tendencies, definitely someone who like pushes herself, maybe type a, all of these things that also correlate with being like a really, really amazing successful person, too. So it's very, very, very tangled and, and seeing them as tools and not necessarily as truths; [00:22:00] they're not necessarily Gospel. They're just ways to turn up and turn down the dial on what we're receiving. I think is really helpful. Um, and I do feel like the faculties that younger generations have, gen Z's and I think some, some of us millennials to the faculties, we have to see everything as just a, a source will hopefully, hopefully help people use them and engage with them more as tools as they grow. And who knows what the platform will be in five or 10 years, who knows how that will impact our, our sense of wellness and community.
[00:22:32] I don't know if it will be things like tik tok where, you know, you have people participating globally in trends, and that kind of binds you to a community or you have people elevating things like very, very, very niche. Like Tik TOK is so good at getting a niche culture. I found myself on wood shop teacher, Tik TOK, well, not too long ago. And I was like, how did I get here? It's very, very niche carriated. [00:23:00] I think you've opened up a lot of Tik TOK doors in my life just following you. I'm like, who who what. I mean, especially the fine man and I'm like. So here's the thing, I think we would be remiss to talk about Instagram and Tik Tok without mentioning your COVID Cuties, which was, if I may call it an equal opportunity, thirst trap, where everyone is represented and everyone is made lovely. And it was a true source of joy for me at the beginning of COVID. Will you talk about what that was, what that project felt like for you? Yes. Well, for one thing, I am, I identify as a maximalist. I can't get enough of anything. I want everything. I want to do everything. I feel very much the pressing down of the number of years on this earth all day, every day.
[00:23:48] So I feel like if I have an idea, if I have something that I'm interested in, I just have to run with it. And, um, so I have about five or six different Instagram accounts that are just for like my weird little niece things. And in quarantine [00:24:00] I've like learned French, learned French... I've done duolingo, started to play ukulele, like started painting, gardening, all this stuff, like just random stuff. Like, I, I love stuff. I like to get real deep in a thing. And the thing I got really deep on at the beginning of quarantine, I think existentially my terror drive was in full swing. So I was supe randy. And so I got really into, like, everything was like that that's hot, that's hot. What's going on. Like, I would be scrolling through ASOS to look at some clothes.
[00:24:32] Like I bought my husband some clothes for his birthday in April. Like I would be on ASOS looking at clothes and I'd be like, who is this? And then I would find out like, who represents this model? Where does he live? I'd follow his Instagram. I'd be like deep in the computer finding because I was just so thirsty.
[00:24:51] I was very thirsty. I think my drive to procreate was high. So I started COVID cuties, which was a campaign to just showcase hotties [00:25:00] that I found on the internet. And sometimes just be like a Tik TOK, or it would be someone on Instagram who has like, look at this fricking Bae. Sometimes it would be my friends who I would see in quarantine. Like I, the first person that I saw a lot during quarantine was my coworker, Jeremy. Um, just go ahead and say, I'm gonna just go ahead and say, I'm a, just go ahead and say it because he's going to listen to this.
[00:25:25] Jeremy I've loved you from the first time that I saw you.
[00:25:28] This is Ashley. I just have to say my husband knows like the people around me, they know Jeremy, this is me coming to you. A hundred percent and Jeremy has no Instagram. So I would be like, Jeremy, we'd be at the EC and I'd be like, Jeremy, can you please just pose just a little bit, just for me, and I would just like take six pictures and be like can I put this on COVID cuties?
[00:25:50] And he's like, sure. And it would be like Jeremy and his mask or whatever and like posing in front of his fricking motorcycle he got. Um, so we were, I was just like, [00:26:00] you know what, baby? You're the prime COVID cutie. No, of course. There's nothing disruptive about Jeremy being a COVID cutie. He's like six feet tall.
[00:26:07] He's basically a dang hanger. Um, and he's, you know, tan, tan, white boy with Brown hair and Hazel eyes. Like there's nothing disruptive about Jeremy's hotness, but I do think there is something about....
[00:26:20] I mean, I will stop you when you're wrong. Keep on going and keep, let's keep this conversation about Jeremy going. Again, Jeremy, this is Ashley. I am crying.
[00:26:33] But there was, I do think there also was, not only wasn't it a place for people because people might, my DMS were flooded. People were like "holy shit, what are we gonna do? This fireman so hot? What are we going to do about this? Like, it looks like a, it was approaching a public, a public crisis. And at the same time, I think existential thirst trapping is real.
[00:26:55] There is something when you think, when you realize that your body is a mortal thing [00:27:00] and you don't have it forever, I think it makes you. Thirst trap. I think the, I think a natural reaction is to be like, let me, let me preserve because one day I'm going to be, I'm not going to have this body. Let me take a picture of it today.
[00:27:13] Let me take a video of it today. Let me share it with the world today. Uh, it is my conduit to connect with people. People were missing touch, all these things. So I felt like it was a great time to be thirst trapped in a great time to thirst trap cause we were all at home, not getting touched enough, not getting loved enough, not dating for my single friends.
[00:27:32] And it was just one of those things that I think it was sort of like lightening in a bottle. Like everyone was super bound wherever they were and really engaged in it. And then also people were putting out phenominal content, like I got really into boudoir photography of just myself over quarantine. I have a frickin photo backdrop now. I have a frickin, you know, I'm not a vlogger, but I have one of those vlogger ring lights. This, this room is my guest is our guest bedroom. This is where, this is my set. This is [00:28:00] where I do my things. And it's just pictures of myself that I share with no one, but my husband and my girlfriends. So I'm like, guys, look at this, look at this as it is.
[00:28:07] Yeah. It's just one of those things where like, what we don't have is touch. What we do have is horniness and what we have access to is just basically our phones and our own environment so let's give everybody access to this stuff. I love the idea of existential thirst trapping as like an empowerment tool.
[00:28:25] I love it. It is incredible. And I love the fact that we've spent the last 20 minutes talking about thirst trapping plus Jeremy. So, I mean, I have the best job in the world. I do find too that like, like dissociation is a big part of my own mental illness and the way that I respond to the world. Something about seeing your own body reflected back is a powerful antidote to feeling dissociated where you feel like, " is my body real? am I here?" Whatever, like, Taking your own photos, seeing your body in space, all that stuff is like a really powerful antidote to [00:29:00] that feeling of dissociation. Like what is real? It's like my body is actually here and like, this is what my body actually looks like right now in real time. It is one of those things that I find incredibly reality making, like we're actually here, we're actually in our bodies.
[00:29:12] Like I'm actually on this plane of existence and someone can see my body and look at my body. Isn't that interesting? I'm not just a consciousness floating around in the world. Um, I've been thinking about this a lot. Like when I get messages from people that are excited, it usually is it's, it's usually about the content, but it's just as much about, I really just like to see you living life.
[00:29:36] I don't think we have a lot of examples of people who feel unbound and it's, I mean, I do, I mean, I reigned it in because some of the things I'd be wanting to post I'm like girl you have a job and like, I remember when I posted the Dissocialite announcement and I had taken a boudoir photo where I was wearing like a high cut brief and my, my husband and I didn't when my husband saw the [00:30:00] next day, I didn't tell him anything about launching Dissocialite.
[00:30:01] He just saw it on Instagram and found out like the rest of the world. And when he saw it, he was like, Oh, your butt is, your butt is, it's in this photo. And I was like, Yeah, I guess I should've thought about that more. He was like, I just didn't, I wasn't expecting it. And it was just one of those things where I, it's not even about what is shared or whatever, but it's really more about the spirit of it. It's just like play, whimsy. I don't feel very, the things that mattered to me and the things that are important to me are very like baseline, non-negotiables like, we're not going to be homophobic, transphobic, queer phobic. You know, anti-black like, those things are very clear to me and I'm very serious about those things because they don't feel like they feel like such obvious and clear truths to me. Like when something is, goes against them. I can look at it like, can you believe this foolishness? And I think that spirit of like, I feel so clear on those things and like that I'm here to do something [00:31:00] I'm in service of something that's probably not going to come to fruition until six, seven, eight generations from now that it gives you a certain freedom when you're like the things that I do in my life don't matter that much. The things that I do in my life don't matter.
[00:31:11] It's like Fannie Lou Hamer said like, if I die, I'll die five feet and four inches closer to the, the freedom line. You know what I mean? Like I'll die, like I'll fall, whatever distance I fall forward, that's how much closer we'll be to the wherever freedom is. And so I think that does give you a sense of, this doesn't matter, but not in a nihilistic way, but in a existential way.
[00:31:34] And it's like, we are in service of something. The best thing I can do if I think about all the labor that went into me existing...The best thing I can do is live free. If I think about my mom working third shift at the post office, or my parents driving to three different schools to get us to different schools or like hustling and scraping by to send my siblings and I to a private school for different parts of our life.
[00:31:54] But I think about those things or like every recital or play or whatever they went to. What [00:32:00] choice do I have except to be free and grateful to be here? Like the best thing I can do to pay them back is to be the little weirdo that they wanted to exist. Um, I don't think any of us have had access to feeling free in many, many, many generations, maybe ever.
[00:32:18] And I'm certainly not free in a sense that like, I still got to pay this mortgage and stuff, but I am free in the sense that what I do here in this time matters less than our, all the people around you, are they on a pathway to getting free? Are they, do they feel like they can wear whatever they want to wear because you wear what you wear? Do they feel like they can say, "Actually I question whether we should be working 70 or 80 hours a week?" because you say I ain't doing it, blank. And do they feel those things, um, do they feel like they can talk about their mental wellness and mental energy or whatever? Do they feel like they can do those things because you do those things?
[00:32:57] And so I think that is, I don't know, it kind of lifts the [00:33:00] veil for you in a lot of ways. For me, it has lifted the veil in a lot of ways. I do feel very myself, more myself than I think I've ever felt. I said that to Liz earlier this year. This is the most myself I've ever felt in my whole entire life. And it's a good feeling.
[00:33:15] I think I'm actually, I can see the woman that I'm wanting to become because I'm becoming higher and it's just the best feeling in the world. You know, I know all the other things that I dream and fantasize about will come, but for me as a person, I feel like I'm right where I want to be. I'm the person I want to be.
[00:33:36] So, all right Brynn. We love you. I love you guys. I just laughed so hard my cheeks are red. I appreciate you. This was, I was trying to be serious. I was trying to...sorry Grace. I was trying to like, and then I laughed so hard that my cheeks are red. We can't not play together. Yeah. I know. We act a fool when we come together and I'm [00:34:00] all about it. So we appreciate you.
[00:34:03] We appreciate the COVID cuties. We will have you back. Cool. And we just thank you so much for your energy. The information. And then for you just always thinking of us during networking and connecting us to really great people. So we thank you for that. Um, I want a link to every single one of your Instagram accounts in the feed.
[00:34:26] So make sure we have those. I will. I think I'm going to revive Covid Cuties. Please do! A little bird in the back said as long as Jeremy's in it again. And I actually want to close the podcast out by saying shout out to Jeremy. We talked about you a lot, so I hope you listened to this one, my friend. All right, Liz, I think that's it. That's all. All right, we'll talk to you guys later.
[00:34:52] Thank you for listening to the wellness community magic podcast. We're excited to share our thoughts with you and bring compassion to the wellness space. [00:35:00] Take what you've learned today to a friend or colleague and tune in next time for more tough but necessary conversations about the future of self care.
[00:35:09] If you are interested in learning more about TRILUNA , or are pre-ordering one of our wellness gift boxes for a loved one, check out our website at trilunawellness.com.