The Intersection of Art and Activism w/ Award-winning Filmmakers, John & Roddy

Show notes as a general guide below. Somewhat in order and not written in perfect grammar because we want you to actually listen to the show!

Show Time Stamps:

• • Reminiscing about High School [00:00:11]
  • Last “Oh Shit” Moment [00:01:25]
  • Finishing a Half Marathon [00:02:48]
  • The Best Beer Ever [00:04:23]
  • Starting Standup Comedy [00:05:01]
  • The Power of Storytelling [00:05:56]
  • Change for Balance [00:09:16]
  • Breakup and Reunion [00:10:40]
  • Battle-Tested Friendship [00:13:36]
  • Jealous Wives [00:14:27]
  • Partnership and Mission [00:16:00]
  • Love and Bananas Film [00:17:27]
  • Making a Documentary [00:18:54]
  • Inspiring Action [00:19:46]
  • Impact of Love and Bananas [00:22:22]
  • The Elephant Encounter [00:23:42 – 00:25:38]
  • Purpose and Profit Balance [00:25:38 – 00:27:29]
  • Storytelling in the Fighting Space [00:28:05 – 00:29:30]
  • The metaphor of fighting [00:28:54]
  • Manifestation and hard work [00:29:35]
  • Similarities in ancient and modern teachings [00:32:44]
  • Programming and Repetition [00:33:34]
  • Char Least Their Own Africa Outreach Project [00:35:56]
  • Challenges of Mission-Driven Filmmaking [00:38:30]
  • Innovation is Key [00:40:49]
  • Importance of Call to Action [00:42:58]
  • Entertainment as Education [00:43:29]
  • Pushing for Donations [00:44:39]
  • Sponsorship and Plugs [00:45:49]
  • Short Form Storytelling [00:47:34]
  • The issue of cobalt mining [00:49:18]
  • Challenges with electric vehicles and the electric grid [00:51:25]
  • Raising awareness and finding solutions [00:53:27]
  • Conscious Consumerism [00:54:28]
  • Uniting to Create Change [00:56:24]
  • Perfection is Not the Enemy of Progress [00:59:43]
  • Scaling Good [00:59:56]
  • Glyphosate Awareness [01:01:06]
  • Food Deserts and Financial Practices [01:03:03]
  • Food Deserts and Community Gardens [01:05:40]
  • Detoxification and Real Food [01:06:13]
  • Traits of a Conscious Leader [01:08:23]
  • The Importance of Conversation [01:11:00]
  • Call to Action [01:11:22]
  • Healing Relationships [01:11:45]

Connect with John and Roddy on Instagram

Connect with Sebastian on Instagram

SebastianNaum.com

Below is a transcript of the video podcast created by Seb’s Robot buddy, Zekton. He tends to make mistakes so please forgive him if you find errors or some funky sounding sentences. For the real deal, watch the video or click on your favorite audio Podcast platform above! Enjoy!

Sebastian (00:00:00) – Boys, welcome to the show.

Roddy (00:00:01) – Thanks for having us. Hell

Sebastian (00:00:03) – Yeah. I love being here like in your studio. This is epic.

John (00:00:06) – It’s great to have you.

Roddy (00:00:07) – It’s great to have you.

Sebastian (00:00:08) – Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I love it. We’re for anyone fans

John (00:00:10) – Of what you’re doing, man. So we’re honored to be on

Sebastian (00:00:11) – Thank you boys. And I’m a big fan of what you guys are doing and uh, for anyone that doesn’t know. So we all went to high school together. Yep. We went to high school together and one of the first things I asked my guests is I asked one of my guests, when was your last, oh shit moment. But first of all, I wanna actually, I wanna reminisce, and I think I’ve told you this before, Roddy, but one of my clear memories of high school, I had this memory that for whatever reason, like your stomach was always fucked up and we were at your house and I just have this clear cut image of you chugging Pepto-Bismol out of the bottle to the very end. And so

Roddy (00:00:48) – I think I might have blocked that out, but

John (00:00:51) – Dude, it’s so funny. We try to, I mean, we don’t really try to explain this to people, but like a lot of people that we meet through work see us as kind of these like, I don’t know, empathetic, really sensitive, like filmmaker guys. But I’m like, dude, in high school we were kind of menaces . Like Roddy was gnarly, especially in high school. And we were like, we, we were football players, man. We were jocks. Yeah. Yeah. It was pretty funny. I

Roddy (00:01:12) – Had a little Napoleon thing going on in school. .

Sebastian (00:01:16) – You know, one thing I love is you can be all the things, you can be all the things we’re just multifaceted humans. Yeah,

John (00:01:20) – A hundred percent.

Sebastian (00:01:21) – Yeah. Absolutely. So when was your last, oh shit moment, rod was the first thing that comes to mind.

Roddy (00:01:25) – Oh shit. Moment. I mean, every day. You know, I mean there’s, there’s things you gotta navigate. Things go wrong all the time and you just gotta do your best to come out on top. But as far as, oh shit, I mean, looking back, nothing’s an oh shit moment. Everything is like a blessing, right? Even the worst backs, stabbings or whatever you can think of serve you in one way or another. I mean, I truly live my life that way. Even the worst things that have happened to me, when I look in hindsight, it’s like, wow, that was protecting me from something that was guiding me towards another thing. Yeah. That was introducing me to another person. Opening space for something new. So it’s hard to say a os shit moment. I’d have to think about that could be good too. I an OSHA moment. I got a good one last night. , .

John (00:02:05) – See

Sebastian (00:02:05) – I do got something .

Roddy (00:02:09) – I was on, I do standup comedy last night. I was on stage and absolutely bombed. Really? That was an OSHA moment and that’s an OSHA moment that you’re stuck in for about five to eight minutes. , you can’t get outta, you know you’re gonna bomb, you’re gonna try to get the crowd back. But it

Sebastian (00:02:24) – Kind, it happens right off the bat, right? Like it just starts that way. You can tell.

Roddy (00:02:27) – And a really seasoned comic will know how to turn that room. But you know, I had a tough set last night, so that was an ocean moment. We talk a little bit, but again, , looking back on it, it serves you gotta improve. That’s a lesson. Gotta write, gotta work harder. Absolutely.

Sebastian (00:02:41) – Yeah. Yeah. John, what was your last hell ya moment? Oh

John (00:02:45) – Hell yeah, moment. Switch

Sebastian (00:02:46) – It up on you. You already had the Oh shit. Ready?

John (00:02:48) – Yeah. Um, I was thinking, cause I was trying to define like, what is, oh shit, like, oh shit. But I’ve had some like, oh shit. Hell yeah. Moments. Oh yeah, recently. I mean, let’s go. I’d have to say the most recent one is probably just when I finished the half marathon, that’s like the first thing that comes to mind. Congrat, because I was in brutal pain the entire time I entered it with an injury. I didn’t train. And I got, and I was at like mile eight. I was like, I think I’m gonna Uber. And then I just kind of beasted it out and got it done through David Goggins and was just like, I can’t be

Sebastian (00:03:17) – A bitch today

Roddy (00:03:18) – . So

John (00:03:18) – Got it down and I was,

Sebastian (00:03:19) – That’s amazing, man. Congrats. That’s one thing that I haven’t been like, I would, I don’t even know if I’ll want to, but like, you know, I mean, I train a lot and I’m in shape as you guys are both great shape, but I can’t imagine like, like a marathon. Like, like, or even a half marathon. It’s just, I feel like it’s so mental too. It’s so like, I don’t even, I don’t know, I don’t think I could do it.

John (00:03:37) – I disrespected the distance. I was like 13th, really? One minor. Like I just, I could go on a jog and bust out like 10 or something like that. So I was like, who cares? What’s three more miles? But it was, it kicked my butt, man. That’s when I got done. I was like, hell yeah,

Roddy (00:03:49) – Let’s rewind a couple months to another Hell yeah. Moment that as your partner, I want to brag about. Yeah, sure. I admire it. The, the paddle. Mm-hmm.

John (00:03:59) – . That was a big hell yeah. Moment. I paddled from Catalina to Newport on a prone paddle board. So just kind of head down like this. Another one actually where I had a really weird injury and then, um, but it was all for the Ben Carlson Foundation, which is raising money for lifeguards and like underprivileged lifeguard stations in Nicaragua, Mexico. Um, so it was great. It was a huge accomplishment. I’m proud of it.

Sebastian (00:04:22) – That’s amazing, man. Yeah. That’s awesome.

John (00:04:23) – And after that, that was a huge, so when you pull into Newport and it’s a huge like, community gathering event. So like, you’re paddling, you’re paddling, and there’s all these people on the pier, and as soon as you get close they just chuck beers at you. Oh, really? As I open this pacifico, like this warm canned pacifico, as soon as I pulled up and I’m like, so dehydrated and salty was honestly the best beer I’ve ever had. Best. Yeah.

Sebastian (00:04:43) – I love that

John (00:04:44) – Man. And that was a hell

Sebastian (00:04:45) – Moment. Those traps must have been so sore. The, it looks looks

John (00:04:48) – Jacked. . That’s why. Yeah. I’m like, some of my favorite photos are after that event. I’m just like,

Roddy (00:04:53) – . That’s epic. You were in good shape for

John (00:04:56) – That. Yeah, I was in good shape. So

Sebastian (00:04:57) – Rod, you started doing standup, which is epic. It takes a lot of balls to do that, man. I

Roddy (00:05:01) – Started with John actually.

Sebastian (00:05:03) – What’s that? We

Roddy (00:05:03) – Started together.

Sebastian (00:05:04) – Oh, nice. Yeah. Why don’t, why don’t you just start us off with a kickoff a bit. Give us a bit, what do you, what do you do like those? Like, like I, I can’t wait to see you. I haven’t seen you yet, but like, what do you do? Like, like Jerry Seinfeld stuff. Like what’s the deal

Roddy (00:05:15) – With corn nuts? Like, oh, what kind of shit do you do? You know, like, this might come to a surprise, but I don’t give my material away for free. You’re gonna have to come to a show or

John (00:05:24) – Subscribe to his sound fans. ,

Roddy (00:05:26) – There we go. Uh,

Sebastian (00:05:30) – So guys, is video the best way to bring awareness and inspire change? And whoever wants to take these questions, we can just, you know, popcorn.

Roddy (00:05:38) – Absolutely. Johnny, I like that question. I like Johnny’s answer is my favorite. I like to watch, take notes and then go home, recite it in the mirror and try to do it as good as he does. So let’s play .

John (00:05:50) – Um, is video the best way to create change

Sebastian (00:05:54) – To create awareness and inspire change?

John (00:05:56) – Yeah, I think 1000%. Well I think story is right. Okay. Um, and we’re talking about talking about this a little bit like in the like pre-show kind of deal, but, um, whether it’s, I think video is like the, the delivery mechanism of our time that works best. But what you’re ultimately delivering is a story. And story is something that is baked into our DNA to respond to, right? Like before we had written language, we told stories about where to hunt, about what to eat, what will kill you, what won’t. And cave paintings were like the first kind of stories, right? When someone tells you, Hey dude, I got a story. You lean in. Yeah. You listen and there’s this thing that happens that’s called narrative transportation that sucks you into the story. That’s the gold standard. When you’re feeling the emotions, the highs and the lows.

John (00:06:48) – Um, there’s this thing that we talk about, I can’t remember who said it, but our buddy Prier says it all the time, the longest journey you’ll ever take in your life is the journey from here to here. Mm-hmm. Right From your head to your heart. Yeah. And a story is actually the shortest way to get you from there to there. Mm-hmm. So as filmmakers, as storytellers, our job is to take viewers from their head into their heart because we want to inspire change, right? Mm-hmm. , that’s why we started our company, is to make the world a better place. Yeah. Uh, to bring balance to it. Yeah. We can only do that when people are operating in their heart. Yeah.

Roddy (00:07:25) – Yep. We always say that awareness is the bridge to action. You know, like if you don’t know about something, you can’t do anything. Yeah. And like, you know, they always say people hear facts, but they feel stories. Yeah. Mm-hmm. , you remember a story. Yeah. You want x number of people in this area are suffering from this that comes in one year out the other. Yeah. But if I tell you a story about a young girl in South Africa and what she’s dealing with on a day to day, you’re gonna remember that. Yeah. So those stories are the way that we connect with our viewers and inspire change.

Sebastian (00:07:55) – Yeah. I mean there’s science behind this. People who make decisions with their emotions and not with the rational side of the brain.

John (00:08:01) – A hundred percent. Absolutely. Yeah. No, we’re way more rationalizing than we are rational. Like you make the decision and then you kind of rationalize it. Yeah. So, you know, you can play on that. That’s cool. And I mean, there’s all sorts of stats, right? Like that we use when we’re kind of marketing or trying to sell like Right. Viewer, uh, a user of a website will spend 88% more time on a website that has a video on its own page. Mm-hmm. , like, there’s so many stats to back up why video is sort of like the, the method of our time, um, or of this generation especially. Um, but it’s clear that really at the end of the day, it’s, it’s the story that’s being told that will, you know, whether it’s us as filmmakers wanting to inspire change or whether it’s a brand or a company that comes to us wanting to tell their story, to connect them with viewers to engage sales or drive up donations. Yeah. Telling a a story is the way to do that. Absolutely.

Sebastian (00:08:51) – You’re right Rod. That was a really good answer. Like that may be have, that may just be something that we cut up for real later. Cause that was perfect. And you may have to go practice that shit in the mirror to be honest. , that was

Roddy (00:09:01) – Good. I’ve heard him do it better when he is trying to sell . Yeah.

John (00:09:04) – It

Roddy (00:09:04) – Depends.

John (00:09:05) – It depends. Yeah.

Roddy (00:09:06) – , yeah. I love it.

Sebastian (00:09:08) – How are people using video irresponsibly? How are people doing it? The opposite of what change for Balance is doing in terms of raising awareness and inspired change.

Roddy (00:09:16) – I think that goes back to our origin story really. Yeah. And what inspired us to start change for balance. Okay. So it’s 2008, 2009, it’s the, you know, the shock and a campaign, the war in Iraq, um, you know, the war on, you know, weapons of mass destruction mm-hmm. soon after Afghanistan. And all these different ways that media was being used to spread different types of propaganda. Whether you wanna believe in it or not, that’s not what we’re debating, but it’s just like the way that the media uses this type of storytelling and playing on fear and emotions. Mm-hmm. , that’s a way that it was used and we were seeing it in real time, unlike any other time in history. I mean, at least in our short history on this planet. Uh, and that we said, wait a second, if they’re using these tools to persuade people to live in a state of fear mm-hmm. and panic. Right. Can we also use these tools to inspire hope, inspire change, inspire transformation Yeah. Of global consciousness, you know, so that’s really where Change for Balance came from. We said, I think we can use these tools to create change. And John and I grew up together. We were in, you know, went to kindergarten together in middle school, high school, um, college roommates. And we separated for a little bit, went on different paths and then met back up. And was

Sebastian (00:10:36) – That like a little bit of a breakup? Was that awkward? Or?

Roddy (00:10:38) – It was actually a nice break. It was a nice

John (00:10:40) – Break, but we needed it.

Sebastian (00:10:41) – You needed it. You made stronger

John (00:10:43) – And then you come back together.

Sebastian (00:10:44) – Yeah, yeah.

John (00:10:45) – No, it’s true. I mean, like, it’s crazy because we we’re the same age, so obviously we grew, went to school together, so we have all the same kind of shared experiences, or at least context for moments in our lives. Yeah. It was wild when we graduated. I mean, unless you had sort of like a clear cut, I’m an engineer or like you had a masters or PhD if it, there was nobody knocking on your doors for jobs. You know, my first job was in finance and 2008 was the banking crisis. And then, you know, you got

Sebastian (00:11:12) – In real estate in 2008, the worst time in the history of real estate. Yeah.

John (00:11:16) – . And I mean our, we remember in college watching Operations Shock and all like, it was like a fricking Michael Bay movie. Like it’s, it was nuts. And you saw like the rise of these like just so polarized vo polarized voices, especially on social media speaking to their own echo chambers. And Yeah. I mean when we saw the power of media to separate and divide where like this, the power has to exist for it to also unite. I love that. Cuz at the end of the day, we’re all in this leaky canoe together. Yeah. So we have to work together. That’s why

Sebastian (00:11:46) – I love that saying.

John (00:11:47) – I had to make sure we squeeze leaky canoe in there. .

Sebastian (00:11:50) – What is that like to be business partners and best friends? You guys have known each other forever, like you said, your best homies. That’s gotta be tough sometimes, right? Like what is the best and worst of it?

Roddy (00:12:01) – That’s a good

John (00:12:02) – Question. I mean, the best is the unshakeable trust. Mm-hmm.

Sebastian (00:12:07) – ,

John (00:12:07) – Like I know this guy to his core. Yeah. I know what he’s made of. Um, and then the worst of it is, you know, each other to their core. You know, so you can’t bullshit. There’s no sliding by, you know, like, I can’t make it up. Be like, ah, I was just gonna like, it’s like, no, I know you’re better than that. Do better than that.

Sebastian (00:12:24) – That’s good. That’s good. And you guys feel, you guys are good about calling each other out on that in, in that sense of knowing that somebody could do better and pushing them to grow?

John (00:12:32) – Yeah, I think so. And it’s not even always verbal. It’s energetic, you know, and we’ve gone through a lot together. We’ve done spiritual healing together. We’ve been through some of the highest of the highs and the lowest of the lows. Yeah. Uh, and, and I mean like, we’ve been in scenarios where like, fuck man, we could die here. Like,

Roddy (00:12:49) – We were being followed once in the red square in Russia and like we had like a, you know, 30, $40,000 camera and I was carrying a tri tripod. John was carrying the camera and this guy was following us and I was like, John, if this guy comes towards us, I’m gonna have to crack this guy with the tripod and we then we’re gonna have to run. So like, you know, and then we were in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a hundred degrees, like close to a hundred percent humidity in a two-man tent surrounded by villagers in a very remote village who had been drinking moonshine all night. And we were like, dang dude. Like hopefully everything goes cool. Like we were there working on a deforestation project. Um, there’s been scenarios where like we’ve been through so much together. Yeah. We’re, we’re battle tested, you know? Love that.

Sebastian (00:13:36) – And,

Roddy (00:13:36) – Um, that’s amazing. I mean, we’re talking 30 years of friendship and 15 years of business partnership. Yeah. So like, you know, there’s times in the early days where, you know, times were hard, you know, we didn’t know if the lights were gonna stay on or not. We didn’t know if we were gonna have to get a job, but, you know, we just kept plugging away. Plugging away. And when you go through war with somebody Yeah. And you can count on them day in, day out. You show up at the office every day and they’re there, you know, you go through the highs, like he said, the lows. It just, it just creates a really special partnership that is, there’s a lot of non-verbal communication. If we’re on set and something needs to happen, it’s eye contact and the thing gets done as opposed to like, you know, walkie-talkies. You know what I mean? So it’s like, it’s cool.

Sebastian (00:14:19) – It’s That’s amazing. It’s pretty. That’s awesome. That’s a beautiful thing you guys. Yeah. And I bet there’s a lot of things that you take from your own relationships with your romantic partners, with your marriages.

Roddy (00:14:27) – Oh, our wives get jealous of our relationship. Yeah.

John (00:14:29) – They wish we had this bond. Or they, like my wife wishes we had a bond like Roddy and I have

Roddy (00:14:34) – No, my wife’s like, can we go to Europe? She’s, he’s like, she’s like, can you check with your other wife to make sure? Yeah, yeah,

John (00:14:40) – Yeah. I mean, it’s forged through fire though, dude. It’s like, it’s, it’s hard. Like he said, it’s battle tested. It’s from the, from old deli. From the craziest bazaars and, and most extreme poverty. Yeah. Too, like the biggest, most glamorous perfume parties in Monaco that we’ve been good to. You know, like it’s just crazy. This crazy journey that we’ve been on. That’s epic. All because we picked up cameras one day. That’s amazing. It’s pretty wild to

Sebastian (00:15:03) – Think about. That’s amazing. You guys have like a recent argument that you guys just got into and like how you guys solved it and or challenge that you, you got through together?

Roddy (00:15:10) – I think the last argument, I don’t even know when it was, but we got into a little fight and John walked out, he left the office and then he called me like three minutes later. He is like, Hey look dude, that’s bullshit . And he’s like, I’m coming back . And he like came back, we like squashed it and then it was over.

John (00:15:25) – So let’s go grab a bite and squashed this thing, stack . Because you know, you just learn. You’re like, what’s the point dude? Yeah. Like, it’s not even in, in the grand scheme of things, it’s meaningless. It’s a small little frustration. We’re in this for life dude. That’s why we do yoga. Cause we’re gonna do this until we’re 180 years old. That’s right. . And, uh, so let’s, let’s go break some bread and just get to the bottom of it. Love

Sebastian (00:15:45) – That. Love that. It’s not,

John (00:15:46) – It’s not not grain free bread. It’s always about something else, right? Like, it’s like you see the ripple, but the rock that makes the ripples like four or five steps back. So it’s like, what are we actually upset about here? Yeah.

Sebastian (00:15:57) – Fucking

John (00:15:57) – Gets

Sebastian (00:15:58) – Of it. Is John just full of analogies?

Roddy (00:16:00) – I think also what it comes down to is that we’re on, we’re on a mission here. We’re on a mission, right? Yeah. We’re on a mission to transform this planet and make it as you know, much better for future generations.

Sebastian (00:16:12) – Absolutely. Let’s get back to mission.

Roddy (00:16:13) – Yeah. So it’s like when you have, when you’re mission focused, it’s a lot easier to cut the noise and just keep moving forward. And I’ll tell you the best thing about a good partnership, partnerships aren’t easy, especially with people that you don’t know super well. Sometimes there’s like a financial partner that’ll come in and you don’t know that person, but it’s a good deal. So you move forward. Partnerships are hard, but the best thing about a true partnership is that it’s rare that both people are down at the same time. So if one person’s down, the other person’s carrying that person mm-hmm. and vice versa. And when you’re both on, you’re unstoppable.

Sebastian (00:16:47) – Yeah. And what you said there about the shared mission is, is that’s so key. You got the same true north, you got the same mission. Ultimately, if you can find a way to always go back to mission, that’s what’s always going to, you know, get you back up. So, and if you both have that same mission, it’s like you can’t, you know, one person’s gonna be down, like you said, the other person’s gonna help you back up. So that’s amazing. So going back to Mission, you got the post strip here of, uh, love and Bananas, which was, I saw it in, in theater at a special screening with you guys. I can’t remember what year that was, but, um,

John (00:17:16) – 2018.

Sebastian (00:17:17) – Yeah. So it was epic film. Love the film. It’s a beautiful story. Uh, share a little bit about that journey cuz it’s, it’s won a lot of awards. I mean, just tell us a little bit about this

John (00:17:27) – Film. Totally. So the film is basically us taking viewers on an elephant rescue in, uh, Thailand and Cambodia. And back to Roddy’s point of like, we hear statistics, but we feel stories. Yeah. Like, I could shake you and say, Hey, Asian elephants are going extinct. They’re predicted to be extinct by 2020. We have to do something. You’re not gonna feel it. I mean, you might, but what do you, you’re not gonna know what to do, but what if we transported you to the back of a moving truck, flying down the superhighway in Thailand with an Asian elephant that’s on the verge of a heat stroke about to collapse and kill us all. You know? And then you see this woman who’s tiny and she’s dedicated her entire life Yeah. To rescuing elephants. So this is a story that maybe you’ll go home and you’ll tell your partner about or you’ll tell your friend about.

John (00:18:15) – And that’s, that’s the power of story. And, and that’s why this film is really like a proof of concept for us. Like we started this pro, uh, this company to do original films, original productions that could like elevate the consciousness of the planet. Mm-hmm. along the way. You have to keep the lights on. So we start our commercial company. Yeah. And then you start the, you know, it starts rolling and it’s going really well. And then you kind of like veer off course and then you’re like, wait, let’s reset. Mm-hmm. . And we’re, we’re fortunate that a lot of our clients, we have the share same shared intentions and, and same values. Uh, but this one we were like, okay, pivot back. We gotta make a movie. So what do we do? We just, we, we had heard about this issue and we were, you know, like, what Asian elements are going extinct?

John (00:18:54) – Like, fuck that dude. We gotta do something about that. Load cameras in the backpack and go, you know, and we partnered with LS Schiller, who’s she’s mother earth personified. She’s epic. And she just opened the doors for us. She let us stay on her elephant nature park and she took us on a rescue down to the border of Myanmar, uh, where we met Noy na, which is the elephant that we ultimately rescued. Yeah. And along the way we just kind of educate viewers on what’s going on with Asian elephants and, and introduced them to one. And through this one they can understand what the broader context looks like. Yeah. And so we’d like to use it as a proof of concept because, um, it drove impact. Yeah. Right. Like, we’ve all seen a lot of documentaries that kind of leave you like, oh fuck, what do I do now? Like, holy shit, that’s gnarly. And then they’re like the end buy roll credits. This one we wanted to kind of put, put a way for people to, to get involved.

Sebastian (00:19:46) – Yeah. And so that’s what I wanted to ask you next. Right. You watched, so for that documentary for me, like, that was really special. It really hit me. Right? Like, it was, it was very powerful. It’s epic film. So you watch people, most people watch documentaries, you watch film that really makes you feel connected to the cods. Right. It really hits the heartstring. But I feel like maybe like 97% of people don’t take any action. Right. At all. Like, how, how do we change that? How do you actually inspire the action? How do you take it from the film, from the emotions and all that good stuff to actually doing something about it?

John (00:20:18) – Yeah. I think, I think the answer to the question is you just have to make it easy for them. Hmm. You know, because most people just don’t know where to start. You’re so bummed. Straighted,

Sebastian (00:20:26) – Do

John (00:20:26) – This. Yeah. You’re so overloaded with fuck, there’s so much stuff out there. The second you open your Instagram or your social media, it’s like, if you’re not ice bathing for two minutes, you’re gonna fucking die. Or if you’re not doing this, like, there’s so constant content overload to think about. Yeah. You know, but if you can hook them and you get them engaged and they’re watching past the first five seconds, which most people don’t mm-hmm. , um, because we’ve become very sophisticated as an audience. Right. And our attention is lower. Yeah. But I think we know that there’s a lot of bs. So if I’m not in, I’m just gonna keep moving. Um, you just make it easy for them to get involved. And that’s what we did with, with this movie. If you sat through the movie, we, you were in, we got you mm-hmm. , you took the huge journey from your head to your heart mm-hmm. and now you’re feeling something. If you watch that movie and then you go decide to ride an elephant, you’re just a dick. Yeah. There’s not much I can do straight up

Sebastian (00:21:15) – For that.

John (00:21:15) – Yeah. But I only heard of one, one story where that happened and we did hear of it. Yeah. Um,

Roddy (00:21:20) – And the guy was a dick and the

John (00:21:22) – Guy was a dick.

Roddy (00:21:24) – Um, oh

John (00:21:25) – Man. But no, we say here are some seriously, or like super easy tangible steps that you can do. We created an entire impact campaign. Um, we do believe that awareness is the first step. We don’t know all the solutions. Yeah. Talking, sharing will open this up to somebody who does know all the solutions. And that’s really cool. And that’s one of our new like kind of methods now with our c c for B originals. Um, but in general with, with love and Bananas, we created an impact campaign that led to us rescuing eight elephants and breaking ground on a sanctuary in Laos in the name of the film. And we still continue to raise funds, um, for Leck. She shows the film once a week at Elephant, uh, nature Park in Ang Mai Thailand. Really? And it’s just been the, the impact it’s created in the lives that it’s touched. Like we still get emails to this day and it’s, it’s really cool. I mean, we had educational screenings at schools across the country. We partnered with like the San Francisco Film Society and did a school tour there. Yeah. Uh, but that happened all over the country nationwide.

Roddy (00:22:22) – That’s amazing.

John (00:22:22) – Nationwide, we’ve sold it to Nat Geo and Asia and Nat Geo Latin America sold it to places in Germany and Israel, like it went worldwide. That’s so

Roddy (00:22:30) – At Cafe Pacific, which is also really cool because people are flying to that part of the world and riding elephants is a big deal there. So if you can show them that movie on a plane flying out,

Sebastian (00:22:40) – Huge. Yeah. Huge. That’s gonna change behavior right away. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I I I got to go and be at the park. I, if you remember, but I, I hit you guys up when I was in Chiang Ma and you guys got me connected to go in there to go, um, that’s awesome sanctuary. And it was just a, it’s, I totally about that. Did

Roddy (00:22:56) – You meet?

Sebastian (00:22:57) – What’s that? Did you meet l Yeah. No, I did not meet her.

Roddy (00:23:00) – She’s probably on a rescue or something.

Sebastian (00:23:02) – A after this actually when we’re, when we’re having lunch, you gotta remind me to tell you a story about the day prior. About the day prior. Yeah.

Roddy (00:23:09) – Yeah, yeah. I love to

John (00:23:10) – Hear it. Thailand’s epic. Yeah.

Sebastian (00:23:12) – Uh, it was great. So I’d love to go back any, um, what is the, what is the funniest shit that happened, like behind the scenes in that in Thailand? Yeah, because I feel like that that, that had, that had a, an environment that could give her a lot of variables. Like she could just go wrong or, you know. Yeah. Anything that comes to mind. Intense

John (00:23:31) – Dude. It was pretty intense. Um, I mean, we’re always having fun. We’re always cracking jokes. We’re in, like, we could be in the heaviest situations and we’re finding ways to make that fun. How important

Sebastian (00:23:38) – Is that man? Like how important, how important

Roddy (00:23:40) – Laughter is our number one.

John (00:23:42) – It’s absolutely critical, especially in a heavy documentary finding. If there’s any moment of comic relief, you have to put it in. Yeah. Like, there’s a scene where the elephant farts. Yeah. Gotta throw it in. Gotta throw the party in. It’s not like, how could you not throw a fart in? Yeah.

Roddy (00:23:55) – There’s a scene where I get chased into a veterinary closet. I remember that a raging angry elephant that was mad that there was an, the one that we rescued was, was there. So it’s like a territorial thing. And she was just going wild. And so I had to split. And actually, it’s a funny story. We used to say it at the q and a’s after the screenings all the time. Basically what happened is this elephant’s charging me and I have this big camera and I gotta protect myself in the camera. I see a veterinary closet. So I jet towards veterinary closet and there’s this like tourist park visitor that’s frozen, like a deer in the headlights. Now I try to dodge her , but she’s not moving. And this elephant’s charging us. So I accidentally shoulder check this girl, she goes flying into the into the closet as well, thank goodness. And we both like go in and to the back. Now this elephant’s trunk comes into the closet. Oh my God. Starts knocking over stuff and is just like Jurassic Park, like trying to grab us and pull us out. No way. And it was scary, dude. It like, dude, it’s funny

John (00:25:04) – Now, but it was scary. Yeah, I bet.

Roddy (00:25:07) – Like, everybody’s like, why weren’t you recording that? I’m like, dude, are you kidding me? I was like, literally like fear and panicked to the top. Oh my. It was like survival, dude.

John (00:25:15) – It was crazy,

Sebastian (00:25:15) – Man. Fucking big man.

John (00:25:17) – Dude. They’re huge. I got kicked by an elephant, like just a little baby elephant. Yeah. Little baby elephant was running just fine, pink, like the tiniest little thing. And I was like, oh, I thought my leg was gonna shatter. Damn. It was insane.

Roddy (00:25:28) – No, an elephants, they’re they’re mo they’re beasts. They’re big

John (00:25:32) – Dude. They’re dinosaurs.

Roddy (00:25:33) – They’re not in, you’re not supposed to be near an elephant.

Sebastian (00:25:35) – What an experience, man. What an experience. Yeah,

John (00:25:37) – It was wild mean.

Sebastian (00:25:38) – I was thinking about something you, you said a little earlier, John, that I wanted to touch back on. It’s, you, you started, you know, change for balance for a reason with a mission, and then you have to keep the lights on too. So you start taking on different types of projects that are essentially just for-profit only or maybe they’re not as mission-driven as you like. Right. And it is, I think it’s important to understand too, the importance of keeping the lights on in order to keep that mission going. Mm-hmm. . Right. So for example, even at our, at our marketing agency at Go Global, we have over 70% of our revenue comes from mission-driven, purpose-driven businesses. Right. And there’s some that, that, that don’t. Right. But to a certain extent, in order to continue the mission, in order to keep doing good, you have to have profits coming in in order to fund those missions. Right. Um, sometimes it’s, it’s tough to just make it all about the mission. So I think that balance, yeah. The purpose and profit balance is important as long as that profit only stuff isn’t, you know, something that’s causing harm. Right. Um, but I think it’s an important balance. So I can see how you guys probably have to go back and forth sometimes between those projects, right?

John (00:26:44) – Yeah, totally. I mean, the balance is so key. We, we’ve had projects that we’ve passed on that were big budgets that would’ve been pretty transformative for us at the time. Um, but they didn’t fit in line with our greater values. And so we pass and we can stand in our integrity with that. Yeah. And we’re lucky at the point now, like people kind of know what we stand for. Yeah. They know why you come to change for balance. And I mean, I think a hundred percent of our clients are in our, in the purpose and mission driven, and we can get behind them. Love that. And so with when, since we’ve expanded to be marketing and pr, we’re not just video anymore. Video is a really important tool, but we do their full strategy, their full communication, marketing, public relations, so that we can help them grow and then we’re with them as they grow. And that’s really awesome.

Sebastian (00:27:29) – That’s great. That’s awesome. So when I think of, you know, mission driven video content and this and that, and then I, I, you know, I see a lot of the, the ufc, the fight stuff. You guys did a lot of shit for Ruka, which is epic and looks like a lot of fun. And honestly, this is something I’ve actually never asked you guys, so, but I know you guys love that stuff, right? So I’m having a lot, I’m having a tough time tying mission driven and positive change with, you know, with fighting mm-hmm. . Yeah. So where does that come in? Because I’m sure there’s something there going on. Totally. Especially the two with the stories behind the people. Yeah. Right. Yeah,

John (00:28:05) – A hundred percent.

Roddy (00:28:05) – So our pri primary work right now in the fighting space is with, uh, incredible athlete and human name, Marlon Cheeto Vera. Okay. It’s a good friend of ours. And although it is a story about a fighter, it’s also a much bigger story. You’re talking about a guy who came from a farm town in Ecuador with not a lot to his name and his family’s name. And, you know, throughout these different years and hardships of his life, he had a daughter that was born with a rare condition called Mobius syndrome, which is some sort of facial paralysis where she wasn’t able to smile. He knew that in his current situation in Ecuador, he was never gonna be able to pay the 80 K required to get her surgery. Okay. And he knew that the only way that he was gonna pull this off was to get into the U F C and win fights so that he could do that.

Roddy (00:28:54) – So this is a story about somebody who was born with, you know, not every, every advantage and opportunity, but just said, you know what, I’m gonna fight for what I believe in. I’m gonna fight for my family, and I’m gonna fight my way to a world championship and get my hand raised to raise that other kid and that other farm town who was born in the same circumstance. Mm. Right. So this is really a story beyond fighting. Right. But fighting is like a metaphor for life really. Yeah. You know, like a good friend of ours, Jason Perillo, who’s actually his head coach, always says that, you know, in fighting, you gotta want it. And a coach can’t want it for you. A mentor can’t want it for you. A business coach can’t want it for you. Your wife can’t want it for you. Your partner can’t want it for you.

Roddy (00:29:35) – If you don’t want it, you’re never gonna get it. Mm-hmm. and what does want it mean? It doesn’t just mean sitting on the couch and manifesting. It means knowing what you want, being really clear on that, pulsing that out to the universe, but then taking every step you need to get what you want and putting in the work, putting in the blood, putting in the sweat and tears and overcoming all the obstacles to get what you want. Because that’s all that exists in your reality. If you wanna be a champion in the ufc, you have to be obsessed. Mm-hmm. There’s no room for, you know, one foot in, one foot out, one foot out gets you knocked out. You know what I mean?

Sebastian (00:30:11) – Yeah. That’s a different world. That’s a good saying. That’s a different world. You really have to be obsessed. Yeah. You have

Roddy (00:30:15) – To.

John (00:30:15) – It’s the only way. Yeah. And for us, I mean, we we’re multifaceted, we love Yeah. Elevating the consciousness, but we also love working out and we love training and we love stories. And when it comes to fighting, there’s no game with higher stakes. And the high stakes are the key of a good story. And you, everybody fights for a reason. You don’t just wake up and say, I want to go get punched in the face today. Yeah. So you meet some of the most interesting characters leading really interesting lives. And Cheeto, like he said, is, is the heart of our, like, of what we’re doing in the MMA world right now. And he’s fighting for his daughter. He’s fighting for his family. And that’s a story I think we can all get behind. Yeah.

Sebastian (00:30:50) – That’s inspirational. That’s epic. I love what you said right about, you know, there’s so much talk about manifestation nowadays, right? Because it’s becoming more and more mainstream to talk about these things in terms of manifesting what you’re putting out and what you get back in and, and kind of getting to the, the quantum field, into the universe and how that works and how you receive things. And there’s a lot, I think a lot of people do think, oh, I can just sit on the couch and fucking manifest, you know? Yeah. But, and there’s a certain aspect of doing that, part of it, you know, of manifesting and putting it out to receive, but then you gotta go out and get it once something is a full fuck. Yes. Once you feel something Yeah. Then you do have to go out there and get it and get after it, you know? Totally work tirelessly.

Roddy (00:31:30) – We, um, you know who Neville Goddard is? I don’t. Okay. So you would love this guy. He’s one of the original American mystics in the early, like mid 19 hundreds. And one of the things he says is assume the feeling of the wish fulfilled and continue therein mm-hmm. and the universe has no choice but to harden that assumption into fact. So like,

John (00:31:49) – Deny all senses,

Roddy (00:31:51) – Deny anything in the physical world that says otherwise, and your assumption must be hardened into fact. I love that. And so like, that’s a part of it, right? Yeah. Like, you have to feel, you have to live from the end. What is your biggest dream goal and desire Yeah. And can you live from that space? That’s a part of it. The other part is getting up and doing the work. Yeah. Right.

Sebastian (00:32:15) – Yeah. That’s powerful. Uh, you know, what I find fascinating about this is that a lot of this stuff has been said since like biblical times. Yeah. You know, it’s just in different ways. Yeah. In different ways. And now, you know, Joe Dispenza is huge right now Yeah. In that field. But I was just telling you guys before the recording about this book that I just finished from Jose Silva on Mind Control and like, a lot of these things are the same thing, uh, about feeling that and, and, you know, working backwards at it mm-hmm. ,

Roddy (00:32:44) – You know. Yeah, totally.

Sebastian (00:32:45) – And, uh, I think it’s like, for me, I can achieve that feeling pretty easily in meditation after I’m like 15 to 20 minutes into my meditation that like 20th through 35th or 40th minute, I’m, I’m in that zone and I’m feeling it, and I’m, I feel my body vibrating and it’s powerful and it’s amazing. And then the challenge is, and the medic’s over, and then you’re outliving the rest of your day. Like getting back into that feeling, getting back into this sort of feeling of, of the gratitude of feeling what you’re trying to manifest and what you’re looking to achieve. Um, when, you know, when you’re driving your car and somebody cuts you off or something like that, , and then you just get thrown off and you’ve completely forgotten about it. So how can you live in that moment of constant, you know, gratitude of the feeling of this sort of high buzzing, you know, energy that you’re attracting, you know?

Roddy (00:33:34) – Well, that’s interesting. Like, we’re all programmed, right? Like we, we are like a computer, right. Our parents program us our teachers program, us society programs, us. And so like, we are a computer at the end of the day. Now, if we were raised and our parents taught us, look, parents are parents for the first time. It’s not like they have 10, 10, you know, past examples of experience that they’re, that they’re working off of their parents for the first time. They’re doing their best. A lot of ’em, our parents were immigrants. Mm-hmm. , they’re navigating a new country, a new language. So like if our parents raised us to say, live from the end, what do you want to create? And that was your awareness from day one, it would be a lot easier. But we’re reprogramming ourselves to believe that at 30, 35, 40 45 mm-hmm. .

Roddy (00:34:20) – So it takes repetition. Yeah. And then we gotta pull the weeds of the old things that aren’t serving us. Right. So if we have poverty programs, if we have lack of love or worthiness programs, if we have, um, any of these programs that are holding us back, then yeah. We can sit there and manifest and visualize all day long. But if our subconscious is operating from that place, we’re not gonna get anywhere. Correct. And then if we’re surrounded by people who are holding us back and not propelling us forward in the vi direction of our dreams, we’re not gonna get there. Absolutely. So there’s so many different things that we gotta curate our lives to be able to, to support that vision.

Sebastian (00:35:00) – Well, one of the reasons I actually find that it is actually quite challenging is because personally I’ve been raised with a ton of love. I’m very lucky and I’m very grateful and fortunate that the parents that I have, and I think about these things and I’m like, man, even me with the upbringing that I had is life is still hard , right? Yeah. And it’s still hard to sort of change these subconscious, you know, lack mentality things and like not enoughness type stuff. And I’m like, damn, I was raised with all the fucking love in the world. Yeah. And I still have those things ingrained in me, like how the, you know? Totally. It’s like wild. And it’s like I can only imagine people that are raised in totally different environments Yeah. Where they’re not even given that love. It’s like a damn, like, I get it. It’s, it’s hard. It’s hard. Yeah. Absolutely. Guys. Um, so change of balance has been working with Charise Theon, um, in Africa for the prevention of HIV for a long time now. You guys been working on this stuff. Um, share a little bit about this project. Yeah.

John (00:35:54) – You want take it away or? Sure.

Roddy (00:35:56) – So we’ve been working in South Africa with C T A O P for about 10 years now,

Sebastian (00:36:01) – And that stands for

Roddy (00:36:02) – Char least their own Africa outreach project. And they’re not reinventing the wheel, they’re not coming to be the saviors down there. What they’re doing is finding local organizations who are really helping their communities in different ways. HIV prevention, testing, education. You know, for example, one of their programs used to use co-ed sports to bring guys and girls on the same team mm-hmm. to teach them how to work together. Right. To teach each, treat each other as equals. Right. Um, so that they could have respect so that boys could have respect for young girls. Right. But through this process, there’s HIV awareness, education, um, testing, treatment. Right. So in a world where there’s a lot of stigma, like if you have a small corner store in your neighborhood and you can’t go by condoms because the guy who works there is your dad’s friend and he’s gonna tell your dad that you bought condoms and now all of a sudden everybody’s gonna be talking about it in your small community. So they have these different programs, these youth groups that’ll educate, give, uh, condoms, do different things to, to help, um, educate these kids to prevent hiv. I mean, it’s young girls. There are at, at risk more, way more so than boys. Do you, can you, I know we said stories are more important, but do you have some stats on hand?

John (00:37:21) – Yeah. I mean, you’re dealing with the country that’s just, it’s 1% of the global population, but it has nearly a quarter of all hiv. Wow. So it’s pretty wild how they got, you know, just ravaged and Charli grew up in South Africa, so she saw the epidemic firsthand. Mm-hmm. today, young girls are almost five times more likely to get HIV than the young boys. So there’s a huge gender inequality, which is why the program that Roddy was talking about, the soccer can be so beneficial. But whether it’s soccer, whether it’s drama, or whether it’s arts and crafts, they do a lot of things and they just recognize that young people are, have always been, and always will be the drivers of social change. So they empower young people to be the leaders, to be the best leaders. And like his point, they’re not trying to be the savior. Like, we know how to get it done. They’re like, you know how to get it done. Yeah. We’re just gonna help facilitate, we’re gonna help fundraise, we’re gonna help empower you, give you the tools that you need to succeed. And so we’ve gone down there, I think four times with Charli and the team. Um, and it’s just been incredible to see what they do firsthand. South Africa is an incredible country. The culture is so beautiful. We still haven’t surfed, which is something we need to do.

Sebastian (00:38:30) – Guys, the, the challenge of making mission driven film and documentaries, I think one of the biggest challenges there is that the money isn’t as readily available as it is for other types of content, although maybe things are changing. But is there something for creators, um, that are looking to get in this field that, that you would say to them

John (00:38:52) – As far as, are things changing in terms of, is there more money and mission driven content? I’d probably say no. I think we’re getting closer.

Sebastian (00:38:59) – We’re getting closer. Yeah. I mean, general

John (00:39:01) – We started Yeah. Consciousness was not even a term you could say without being looked at as though you were some insane hippie that

Roddy (00:39:08) – Sustainability Yeah.

John (00:39:09) – Even, even organic, like Yeah, it was crazy. That’s wild. Yeah. And now it’s, and by

Sebastian (00:39:13) – The way, and it’s still like that in a lot of the world and in a lot of the country, we’re just like, in this bubble. Yeah. Yeah.

John (00:39:20) – . Yeah, it’s true. I mean, like, I think this film is a proof of concept that, um, you can have a meaningful film that that can do well. Um, there are a lot of documentaries that are like doing, doing great. I think we still have ways, a little ways to go. What I would say to somebody that’s trying to like, get in and wants to do mission driven work, start working with some organizations or some small nonprofits because they have embedded in them incredible stories. They’re often walking the tightrope of like, budget and big dreams and goals because they need to finance or they need to fundraise, but they typically don’t have the money for big productions. But if you’re a young filmmaker, get in there and make some incredible human-centered emotional stories and then just watch the impact that that can do if you have like a little bit of a marketing strategy to get that in front of people.

Sebastian (00:40:08) – Yeah. Is this tough? Is it tough though to stay motivated if that kind of keeps going for a long time of like, I can barely make it because I’m in this field and I’m trying to do good for the world so that it creates this association that doing good is suffering and sacrifice. You know what I mean? So like, there’s this aspect of, even with my content, even with this podcast or just the concept of conscious capitalism in general, it’s, it’s trying to show people that you can do good and still make money and still make a great living and live a good life. Because we have this ingrained concept that doing good means sacrifice and suffering. Yeah. You know, and I think it’s, we need to change that

Roddy (00:40:49) – With the state of the world. The innovation in this space is really gonna be what helps us live a prosperous life for many years to come. So the key I think is innovation. If you’re gonna do something, you need to innovate. Right? Like, if you can innovate in this space, if you can add value to the world, then you’re gonna get paid for it. Right. You know, if you can capture attention, add value, people are gonna come pay you for that. So it’s like, yeah. If your stuff is mediocre and you think that you’re just gonna start, you’re gonna create a documentary for like, some organization and like, don’t be naive. You know, you’re gonna have to hustle. Yeah. You’re gonna have to work hard. It’s

Sebastian (00:41:26) – Still business. Yeah.

Roddy (00:41:26) – It’s a business. And at the end of the day, it’s like, are you willing to put in the time and hustle? Like Yeah. For a long time. A lot of our projects were not mission driven. We’ve been doing this for 15 years, you know, five to seven days a week. So it’s like, you know, after years and years and years, we finally were able to focus on what we want to do. But for many of those years, we were taken any job we could get as long as it wasn’t in conflict with our values. Yeah,

Sebastian (00:41:55) – Correct.

Roddy (00:41:56) – So that we can saying earlier, keep the lights on. Yeah. You

John (00:41:59) – Know, and today consumers want to make smart choices. They want to do the right thing thing. Yeah. Yeah. It goes back to making it easy for them.

Sebastian (00:42:06) – Absolutely. Absolutely. Boys. Uh, you created the most viral video on climate change with Prince ea, which is amazing. Uh, this was called Dear, dear Future Generation, sorry. And, um, he gives a specific call to action at the end with certain, with an organization that you can get involved in. Um, and then more recent one, there’s one called, uh, dear Parents, do You Love Your Kids? Uh, you guys also did that with Prince A, which, which I thought it was, was epic. And it, he ends with this line, which is so powerful. Uh, you did not inherit this, uh, earth from your, excuse me, you did not inherit this earth from your ancestors. You’re borrowing it from your children. It’s just such an epic line. So he basically leaves you with this line, you feel all this emotion and sense of responsibility. Um, and then again, he cuts at the end.

Sebastian (00:42:58) – It’s like the video ends, and then there’s like an extra minute or minute and a half with this call to action of what you can do. And it’s a little bit of what we were talking about earlier is, okay, you’ve kind of created this sort of connection from your brand to your heart. You’re there and now you’re ready to take action. How important do you guys think that this type of content, this sort of like four to five minutes, so it’s not super short form where it’s like a minute, but it’s four to five minute content within the specific call to action at the end. How, how important do you think that call to action is at the end for people to take action?

Roddy (00:43:29) – I think it’s important. I think if there isn’t a way for people to get involved afterwards, they’re just left inspired and possibly even afraid. You know, because you bring all these things to light, you talk, oh, I’m inheriting it from my children. Oh my God. Like, yeah, what world are they gonna live in? What can I do? So having that call to action at the end I think is super important. It’s also important that it comes from like Prince’s fans. Like that campaign was targeted towards the people who love Prince because they’re into the environment, they’re into creating positive change. So if you hear it from like a trusted voice and somebody you actually love listening to, yeah. It’s easier to integrate into your life as opposed to like, not creating an inspiring piece and just saying, Hey, we should be doing this, this, this, this, and this. Like, so e anytime you tell somebody to do something, they’re gonna push back a little bit, even if they’re into it, even if they’re excited about it. But it’s like you try to use these different strategies, create something artistic and fun and, and entertaining. You know, like we always talk about like education through entertainment, you know, like don’t just try to educate people, entertain them first, and then slide in the education.

Sebastian (00:44:39) – So like, why do you think that there’s a, there’s a push back? Is it just the immediate pushback of like, I don’t, nobody likes to be told what to do. Is that or

Roddy (00:44:48) – Line or like, you know, you’re selling me on something. Yeah. Like at the end of the day, for that one in particular, we were like working on donations and this, we’re asking people to open their wallets in the middle of like, towards the end of a pandemic where they’ve been dealing with financial hardships and stuff like that. You know, they haven’t been able to work, maybe their business closed down, all these different things. Yeah. So it’s like nobody, nobody wants, at the end of the day, people who aren’t like set up financially, anytime you ask them to do something with their money, it’s like they’re gonna pull back. So like, yeah, the art is getting people to contribute to things that they care about and, and doing it in a way that’s gonna add value to their lives and the planet. Right. If so, if, if what they’re doing is real, if what, if what you’re participating in is real and is actually, you know, has a track record and integrity and a reputation, all of those things make it easier. I mean, for us to believe, we have to believe in it. And those things have to be present for us to believe

Sebastian (00:45:41) – In. And the viewer has to feel like they’re making that decision on their own. Yeah. It’s like they got a little bit of a push, but it’s really their decision that they decided on. Yeah.

John (00:45:49) – Yeah, that’s true. Yeah. Yeah. And it’s a little nod to our sponsors as well, like the Nature Conservancy, which is an organization who was awesome to partner with on dear parents, they financed the production mm-hmm. . So at the end, we kind of give a little plug to them, tell people how to get involved and go to the nature conservancy.org to learn more. Yeah, yeah. Or nature.org. I love

Sebastian (00:46:10) – That. Which would be so different if I’m just saying an ad or like, like those old school nonprofit ads that you see on TV or something like that. Or just go straight into like, donate for this reason. Yeah. It’s such a different way to tell the story. Yeah.

John (00:46:24) – You know? Totally. And

Roddy (00:46:26) – It was like, dear Par, uh, dear Future Generations, we were raising money for like deforestation efforts. Mm-hmm. in AF in Africa. Africa, and all over the world. And, um, like that did pretty well. Yeah. You know? That’s great. Raised quite a bit of money and

Sebastian (00:46:39) – That’s awesome. Yeah. So guys, you now have a new format that you’re coming out with that I’ve been seeing on Instagram. So you’ve got sort of these max 92nd type things, mostly real, uh, real types, um, or tos. Right? So this is a, a new way of raising awareness to it caused by very, very short form storytelling. Uh, recently you guys have been doing some stuff on lithium batteries. So you see Rod rolling around on Tesla, which is actually your Tesla, but I believe Rod, you also have an electric, uh, car and electric Audi. Yeah. Yeah. And I have more devices than I can think of, right? Like, it is what is how realistic is the whole thing with lithium batteries. Like, we’re so dependent on this on, on this, you know, thing, and how can we actually, you know, change? How can this change at all? Because we’re going into more and more lithium battery usage.

John (00:47:34) – Totally. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, change for balance, we’re calling them change for balance originals. And really what happened after Love and Bananas is we got the opportunity to create more long form content, to pitch more ideas, pitch more movies, like, oh, what else are you guys making? And we kind of fell into the rhythm of like, okay, let’s pitch a documentary series or a feature length documentary. The reality is those take a long time. Yeah. And you can even be developing them for years before the, you just get the final No, that puts the death nail in the project. Mm. Getting noses is part of the process. That’s fine. You know, like dealing with that, rolling on refining your pitch and learning to do more is great. But we got to a certain point where like, we’re kind of done waiting, you know, like we don’t wanna just, and not everything has to be a feature length documentary. We had these Google docs and vision boards for documentaries that we wanted to make that are just overflowing with ideas. Yeah. So how can we just put ’em out in a short format way? We’re already doing them for some of our clients and friends that are like, you know, influencers or big in the, on the social space. Why don’t we just start doing some for ourselves with

Sebastian (00:48:38) – Social causes?

John (00:48:39) – Totally. Yeah. So, you know, we believe in a couple things. You’re either reacting to the world you don’t want, or actively creating the world you do want mm-hmm. , we could sit here and be like, oh, we just gotta develop more. Why don’t they just buy it? Or we could just actively create a world where we’re putting out the content that we want. Yes. Putting forth the stories that we want and see if we can actively create change through this short form content, which is kind of, again, the like a really big popular thing of our times. We see those videos all the time. Yeah. So we’re like, why not? We make ’em. Uh, when it comes to cobalt and lithium, like our first two, were definitely on, on like the sort of green revolution and sort of the dark side of that. Yeah. Because that’s something that really interests us.

John (00:49:18) – You know, when, when popular conventional thinking is all leading towards one thing, we’re like, well, what’s behind the hood of that? Or what’s like behind? Yeah. You know, the scenes, um, when we learned about Cobalt, it was pretty eye-opening, you know? And I don’t really know what we can do about that. I mean, clean cobalt is one way being aware of it. This is one of those situations where we don’t have all the answers, but maybe we can put forth the question and together we can crowdsource a solution. Yeah. I mean, that might be really cool because you can’t let perfection get in the way of progress. We’re not perfect. None of us are perfect. I still drive my electric car, I still use my iPhone. I’m reliant on my com, on our cameras and on our computers Yeah. To feed my kid. So how can we be smarter?

John (00:50:01) – Is there a way that we can raise the standards for what’s going on in the cobalt cobalt mines in Africa? Yeah. To at least give them a living wage or something. Let’s talk about it. Let’s find the solution. But what’s happening is not good. And you can’t call it a green revolution when it’s built on the backs of child labor. It’s just not gonna happen. And so it’s one of those things that’s like elephants for us. Like, elephants are dying. Well, let’s go do something about it. Yeah. This, this was another one of those things. Let’s go do something about it. And they’re not all gonna be heavy, you know, and not all these Yeah. All these shorts are gonna be heavy. Um,

Roddy (00:50:33) – Like documentaries in long form film still have a lane, but we’re seeing a lot of available attention on Instagram and TikTok and Twitter and these different short form platforms. Right. So it’s like, or YouTube shorts. So it’s like, that’s an avenue. Mm-hmm. , that’s an avenue to create change. There’s people waiting to see and learn and educate themselves on those platforms. And if we can plant seeds of awareness there, that’s exciting for us because we can turn, turn ’em around quick. You know, like John said, we’ve been working on some documentaries for over three years. Yeah. And then we get a, the nail in the coffin. It’s a no. So again, John talked a little bit about cobalt, but when it comes to lithium, like, you know, in California we talked about having all electric vehicles being sold by 2030. Right? Okay. Last summer we had a heat wave, and Gavin Newsom asked, asked us to stop charging our electric cars.

Roddy (00:51:25) – Okay. We have a really old grid, and there’s no way that you can put superchargers on every corner because it’ll fry the grid. Okay. So there’s hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars of change that needs to happen with our electric grid before we can even sustain electric vehicles for a hundred percent adoption. We have a 2% adoption rate on electric vehicles across the country. And Gavin Newsom’s Newsom is asking us to stop charging our cars in the middle of a heat wave. Mm-hmm. . Okay. How is the world gonna work? Right? So, and let’s get real, where does lithium come from? How many fossil fuels are used to mine? Lithium. Okay. We’re not having the exhaust come out of our tailpipe, but it’s coming out of the coal mine. Where is the charge of your battery coming from? And people need to think about all these things, right?

Roddy (00:52:12) – So the answer isn’t stop driving electric cars, go get yourself a diesel, go get a V 10 and just start polluting the earth. But the answer is educate yourself and don’t be naive and start flying this flag that I have an electric car, so I’m a part of the change. You’re not, we both have electric cars, you know, like we both got ConEd , but we did it because we want to create change. We wanna be part of the change, right? So we’re like, okay, I want to be a part of the change. They’re telling me to get an electric car, I’m gonna get one. Yeah. We lift the hood and it’s not perfect, and we don’t want to say, Hey, let’s pull the plug on this, but we need innovation. Yeah. You know, we need clean energy. It’s

John (00:52:51) – Young industry. So we’re just thinking, all right, let’s bring awareness to it and let’s make it better. Let’s, there’s

Sebastian (00:52:56) – Still the lesser of the evils. At a certain point you have to make a decision, right?

Roddy (00:52:59) – Yeah, there is. But if all of our powers coming from coal, then it’s not clean. The EV’s not clean because it’s coming from Yeah. A fossil fuel. Lithium is a finite resource. It comes from the earth, right? Cobalt comes from the earth, and there’s a lot of other minerals and batteries that come from the earth. So we’re still using plant and, and, you know, earth resources to get around town. So it’s not like we’re just like, we’re just jumping from one source of fuel to another.

Sebastian (00:53:27) – You know, this is the, this is the kind of thing that can also be frustrating too, right? In terms of like, fuck, you just educated me on this, this subject on via short form content. And it’s like, there’s no solution to this, right? It’s not like, you know, I watched this documentary on elephants and there’s this beautiful call to action that I can take action on and help this cause with this, like you said, this is just, right now it’s maybe it’s just raising awareness and being like, you know, starting to get people to question the industry, right. So that we can figure out ways that we can improve this. And look,

John (00:53:58) – That’s really important. I think being transparent, that, and some of ’em, some we do have a solution, you know, that we’ll come out with, but some we don’t. And that’s okay because maybe somebody out there will Yeah. And awareness is the tool, right? Awareness is the first doubt.

Roddy (00:54:10) – And somebody commented, like on one of the posts, Hey, this is a new industry. Like, you gotta give them like the benefit of the doubt they’re working. A billion dollar industry does not get the benefit of the doubt.

John (00:54:19) – And just because it’s new doesn’t necessarily give it the right to pollute the earth.

Sebastian (00:54:23) – How much Yeah. It’s like, how much of the budget is going into the solution of what, you know, the,

Roddy (00:54:28) – It’s a corporation. Their job is to make money. Their job isn’t to create sustainable solutions. And if the consumers say, Hey, you know what, like for h and m, there’s a reason why h and m is going more sustainable. It’s because their consumers demanded Yeah. Right. All these these fashion brands. Yeah. Right? So like, if a billion people are saying, Hey, I want my lithium and I want my cobalt, and I want my minerals for my batteries to be humanely sourced. I want these people in Africa to have decent living wages, and I don’t want kids in the mines. Yeah. Then those producers of those el of those, uh, you know, resources are gonna change their practices because they know that, that if Chevy starts doing that and people start buying Chevy, they want to get part of that market share back. Right. So it’s like we create the demand, so we have to demand the right things in order for them to act accordingly.

Sebastian (00:55:18) – Yeah. And that’s why conscious capitalism stems from conscious consumerism. Exactly. You know? And so hundred percent, the more we can educate and inspire people to be conscious consumers, that’s just gonna force businesses to go into conscious practices. Right? Yeah. So, totally.

John (00:55:31) – That’s really, that’s, that’s

Sebastian (00:55:32) – It, man. Yeah. I love that. Like,

Roddy (00:55:34) – One thing that I think is really worth mentioning with John, and, and my philosophy as far as like creating changes is we, like Desmond Tutu said, if you want to create change, you don’t talk to your friends, you talk to your enemies, right? And we’re living in a world of echo chambers where people’s hearts are in the right place, but their actions are not. They’re talking to people who agree with them because that’s comfortable. And anybody who’s achieved anything in life knows that excellence and, and championship mind, the championship mindset is lives in discomfort. Right? So like, be, you know, why do we go into ice bath is because it’s, it’s uncomfortable, but there’s a lot of benefits. You know, why do we work hard? Why do we train our bodies to like failure? Because there’s a lot of benefits. Why do we eat clean?

Roddy (00:56:24) – It sucks. There’s a lot of benefits, right? So like, if we want to create change on this planet, we have to rest in discomfort. We have to challenge the people in a loving, kind way that we disagree with on everything. So, like, Republicans hate the Democrats, right? There’s all these race, uh, situations going on where people don’t like this race and don’t like that race, and there’s like abortion and this and that. The yelling at each other and agreeing with our friends is not gonna create change. And if we’re gonna create a sustainable future and environment for us to all thrive forward, we have to learn to unite and come together and bring both sides together to say we agree on these things and we disagree on these things. Yeah. But we’re in this leaky canoe together. We’re either gonna sink or swim, we’re gonna survive, or we’re gonna burn this place down and wipe out a majority of the animals on our way out.

Roddy (00:57:16) – Mm-hmm. . Right? And, and the planet’s gonna survive, but human beings might not. Mm. Right. So it’s like, it’s not about save the earth, it’s about save humans. Mm-hmm. , you know, and, and the only way to do that is to extend your hand. Democrats extend your hand to Republicans. Republicans extend your hand to Democrats, look at them in the eye and say, I love you, and we’re gonna make it. We’re gonna work together to make this planet heaven on earth. You know what I mean? And that’s, that’s how we live our life. And that’s how the, the lens that we take with every project that we work on.

Sebastian (00:57:47) – Yeah. And the beautiful thing about that is that if you get into that discomfort enough, if you get uncomfortable enough, you end up getting comfortable with the discomfort. Totally. Totally. You know, that’s, and the only way to do it.

John (00:57:59) – Yeah. I think this is, I’m gonna butcher this quote, but in the 16 hundreds, I don’t even know we’re gonna cut this, but I think Cicero said, most of mankind’s problems come from their inability to sit in stillness. Hmm. But sitting in stillness with each other, then as somebody that you disagree with, is just the next level of that. And that’s gonna be a, an insane video we’re gonna put out during election season. You heard it

Sebastian (00:58:23) – Here. Oh, nice. Yeah. Just wait for that. Nice. I love that.

John (00:58:25) – We’ll keep you on your toes. The other thing I would mention for what Roddy was saying is that all these things can feel extremely daunting. Like, I’m not doing enough of this. Or Wait, I, like, there’s, you’re getting bombarded with things like, oh, is there seed oil in my lunch? Am I doing the ice bath? Am I doing all these things? You know, like, it can feel so daunting. There’s kids in Africa, there’s a, it’s like, it’s, it’s hard so much. There’s so much, there’s so much. And I’m reminded, I think if we coax Roddy, maybe he’ll tell this story, but it’s, it’s the starfish story. Do you wanna tell the story? ?

Roddy (00:58:56) – I can tell the story.

Sebastian (00:58:58) – .

Roddy (00:58:59) – So, David Castleman, who is an executive producer of love and bananas, would tell the story at every, every post screening q and a. And the story goes like this. There’s a boy on the coast, and there’s it’s low tide and there’s a bunch of starfish that have wiped up, washed up on the shore, and the boy is going, thousands of starfish are on the shore, and they’re dying. And he’s grabbing the starfish and throwing them back in the ocean. And this old man walks by and says, Hey son, what are you doing? And he says, I’m saving starfish. And the guy says, look it up and down the beach, there’s thousands of starfish. You’re not gonna save ’em all. And he picks one up and throws it in the ocean. And he says, I saved that one. You know? So

John (00:59:43) – The idea is that perfection is not the enemy of progress. You can’t let that be, you know, so you might not be able to save them all, but you can save that one. Mm-hmm. . And so when things feel daunting and there’s so many issues and there’s so much that you feel like you need to do.

Sebastian (00:59:56) – Yeah.

John (00:59:56) – One little step. That’s it. Yeah. You know, that’s it.

Sebastian (01:00:01) – And to take that a step further, because I think that this is something for me, when I started getting into this world, into this movement, when I joined Conscious Capitalism, the board of it, one of the things was this sort of individual action that you can take can be very minor. Right. But that can inspire, uh, a scaled form of it so that can, that can inspire scaled form of, of good, right? So perhaps a businessman could come in and see the boy that’s tossing the single starfish and come up with a, a business plan that can help save all of the starfish and scale that good. Right? And so that, that’s a little bit of a, of what I’m after is how can we scale good? Because, because business and because capitalism essentially is, is, is made of that, is how do we scale? How do we more, okay, well, but why don’t we just scale good Right. Through that process. Right? Yeah.

John (01:00:54) – It’s so true. I mean, what is a logging company? What are they based on? They’re based on the price of a fallen tree. Well, how can we create the price of a standing tree? Hmm. It’s that, how can we scale that?

Sebastian (01:01:06) – Yeah. Yeah. Well, before we cut out here, guys, there’s one other thing that I wanted to ask you about. Cause glyphosate is something that I, that I find fascinating. And it’s just like, in America, we somehow, we literally created laws that made it okay to spl to spray glyphosate and poison our own people. Like, what the fuck? Like, how did that happen? And it’s been happening for so long. And finally there’s some awareness, and finally we’re starting to see some change and some laws and this, this and that. Is there, is there light at the end of the tunnel with this? Is this something you guys are gonna be creating some content about? Cause I feel like it is

John (01:01:40) – Yeah. Yeah. As, as far as light at the end of the tunnel, I think. I think so. I think awareness is, is the key. I mean, Germany has, has banned, it’s no longer gonna be used at the end of 2024. Austria banned it. Italy banned it years ago. There’s cities and states that have banned glyphosate. Yeah. It’s an issue we’re insanely passionate about as far as solving the issue at large. It’s, it’s one of many other issues that I think we need to bring Chris Rock’s idea into life where politicians have to wear on their jackets, like NASCAR jackets, who their sponsors are. Mm. And I bet you’ll see a lot of Monsanto and Bayer patches

Roddy (01:02:19) – On those politicians.

Sebastian (01:02:20) – Oh man.

Roddy (01:02:22) – And if you want to really go deep, you know, the food and drug and chemical spraying of pesticides and the medicines sold in the hospitals are very tied together. Okay. So like, if you want to go deep on it, it’s like people are getting sick because of the practices that are passed, and then they’re being sold the same medicines, and billions and trillions of dollars of profits are being made. So this is a money game. At the end of the day, it’s all about money. And so the reality is, if people stand up and say, I don’t want to eat that shit, and I’m not gonna buy it, and if you don’t buy it, nobody’s gonna make it. Yep.

Roddy (01:03:03) – Okay. And we hold the control in our hands now. Yeah. Now, we can’t be naive. There’s a lot of people in this world who don’t have those kind of options. Yeah. Because there’s food deserts everywhere. Yep. Okay. There’s people who are, have not in the best financial position, who have three kids who are working two jobs, and single mother who is just trying to put food on the table. They don’t have the option to go eat organic. Yep. And those are the exact targets of these practices. Yeah. It sucks. But, you know, hopefully together we can create awareness for this and put solutions in place to take care of that mama because she can’t do it alone. And I mean, like, I’ve had these arguments and I’ve had people call me out on it and say, Hey, you don’t know about food deserts. I, I do know about food deserts, but at the end of the day, we need to command change through our financial practices. We vote with our dollars as best we can,

Sebastian (01:03:55) – You know? Yeah, absolutely. And, uh, it is, it can be easier said than done for people like us who have those options. You know, one thing I was, uh, I was in Turkey and, uh, I was, uh, I was having a drink with a, with a Turkish girl. And, um, it was funny. So she’s, she’s just like, just puffing her dirt, you know, smoking her cigarette hard, you know, and she’s kind of like making like, fun of how Californians and people from LA like, were so clean. And, you know, it was just, it was just funny. And, and she brings up, uh, air one, and I was like, that’s so weird. Like, you know what Air One is? And like, there’s only like seven of ’em, I think, and they’re all in California, I think. And, um, so basically she was like, yeah, like there’s all these like tos and all kinds of stuff and content around making fun of basically, you know, LA Southern California type people and about how much we care about organic and this and that.

Sebastian (01:04:47) – So the point that I’m trying to make with that is that as humans who are in this, in this sort of bubble in this world, it’s easier to make those decisions. Right. And it’s, it’s almost like, it’s almost like not cool if you don’t make those decisions. Right? But I think it’s also our responsibility to then to introduce these things and give awareness to our family and cousins or friends that are in different states and different countries, and inspire that and, and inspire the change through the education and sharing that type of content. So sharing this sort of purpose-driven, mission-driven content around these causes that we care with people that are outside of our circles, like you said, you have to reach and shake the hand of the people that are on the opposite end in order to truly inspire the change, but the people that are, that it makes you uncomfortable with in order to inspire that change, you know? Mm-hmm.

Roddy (01:05:33) – absolutely. Brilliantly

John (01:05:35) – Put. Yeah. I mean, if you know, then you kind of have an a duty to act.

Sebastian (01:05:39) – Absolutely. Absolutely.

John (01:05:40) – You have to, and, and when it comes to those food deserts, we’ve, we did a project that we were in talks with, like, I think it was the Inglewood Social Justice League or something. And they drove us around Inglewood and they were showing us basically what it looked like and the food deserts, but they also showed us the community gardens that they were building, that they were planting. It’s not a perfect solution by any means, because there’s a lot of people you have to feed. There’s a lot of poverty. Yeah. But, and we don’t have all the answers. This is another one of those situations, but together we know that we can come up with it. So let’s have the conversations, let’s get dirty, let’s put out content that talks about it and let’s see what can happen. Absolutely.

Roddy (01:06:13) – And this is actually a really important thing. So we work really closely with Dr. Alejandro Younger, and he’s an incredible, you know, you can look him up at Dr. Alejandro Younger, incredible information about the gut, you know, detoxification. Mm-hmm. , he’s the godfather of detox. We are surrounded by toxins. Okay. The stuff that we use to wash our hands, wash our clothes, wash our countertops, the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat is jam packed with toxins. We talk about all the different systems of the body. We never talk about detoxification, right? So he says, if you go to a grocery store, you should only shop on the outside of the grocery store, cuz that’s where all the real food is. You got the meat and fish, you got the veggies, you got the fruit, and you got the, you know, various other things that they have along. Mm-hmm. , the beer and wine, no , but

John (01:07:05) – Beer and wines on the inside. We’re moving into the outside just for this.

Roddy (01:07:07) – Like he says, if you want to be healthy, eat real food and do not eat food like products in the center of the grocery stores and in these food deserts, it’s all food like products, jam packed with preservatives, jam packed with different types of, of pesticides on the different wheat and corn and soy that’s grown, right? So like, if you have the means, eat real food. And that’s a great step in not getting sick and not having to go get medicine and not continually supporting companies like Bayer, who not only make the pesticides, but also make the medicine to fix you. Mm-hmm. . Yeah. So it’s like we hold the power, you can make the decision to be healthy and to live a life on your terms, or you can continue to eat bullshit and get sick and perpetuate that cycle. Yeah.

Sebastian (01:07:51) – Well, I love what you guys are doing. I’m so proud of you guys. You’re, you know, you’re conscious creators. That’s what you’re doing and bringing to the world. So I wanna leave you on, uh, I wanna ask you a question. What are two traits that you believe a conscious leader? Because to be a conscious creator, you have to be a conscious leader. Whether you’re leading lots of other people, or you’re leading your own life and you’re leading your company. So what are two traits that you find that a conscious leader must embody in today’s world? I’ll ask each of you the same.

John (01:08:20) – Should we each say what Please,

Roddy (01:08:21) – You go ahead. You go first.

John (01:08:23) – Courage is the first thing that comes to mind. And the root of that core is, it means heart.

John (01:08:29) – I, I think courage. Um, and there’s a lot of things that fall under that. But that, just that willingness to take the first step to, I mean, again, when we were saying sustainable and consciousness, people were laughing at us. Uh, it took a little bit of courage to just stand up and be like, no, this is what we stand for. Yeah. This is what we’re gonna do. And, but under that is, is the love that we have for our planet, for our friends, and for our family. And I think that’s what sometimes could get lost. If you tell people like, go green, don’t eat that. They think you’re judging them, but really, no, I love you. I don’t want you to put that inside of you. Uh, and it just, it’s, it’s everything. We love animals. That’s why we stand up for animals. We love this world. We love living. And that’s why we do what we do. I

Sebastian (01:09:13) – Love that. And you know what’s awesome though too, John, is that like the world is changing so much that these things that would get you made fun of back then, they’re cool as shit now. . Totally. You know what I mean? And like this multifaceted aspect that, um, you know, that doesn’t mean that you and I can’t share a beer and bullshit and laugh about stupid shit after this and all that. Yeah. And still not at the same time, like also care about the environment and these social causes and all these things. We’re multifaceted humans. A hundred percent. It’s okay to be all the things, dude.

John (01:09:46) – Absolutely. That’s, that’s the

Sebastian (01:09:48) – Key. Yeah. Yeah. Cause that, that’s like true authenticity. I it, you know, and that’s really what it is. Yeah. Broad.

Roddy (01:09:54) – I totally agree with John e. Courage, very important. I think a conscious leader has to have compassion. Mm-hmm. . And it has to be able to see himself in that other person and that person inside themself. Mm-hmm. . Because if you can’t feel compassion for the people who oppose your beliefs and who are sitting on the other side of the aisle when it comes to the things that you’re disagreeing on, you’re never gonna create change. And for me, that’s what it’s all about. It’s like we have to love each other. Like John said, we have to be there for each other and we have to support each other even if we hate that person’s ideologies. Yeah. Because that’s the only way that we’re gonna create heaven on earth. That’s the only way that we’re gonna create a world that’s better than the one that we’re living in now. Yeah. Because if we continue down this path, it’s gonna be more division. It’s gonna be more anger, more frustration, and more of the things that we don’t want to see.

Sebastian (01:10:46) – Yeah.

John (01:10:47) – And we’re more in common than we think. Yeah. Even the, even the person that you think you have the most is, is on the farthest end of the political spectrum. I guarantee you, you have more in common with them than you do any politician.

Sebastian (01:10:59) – Hmm.

John (01:11:00) – And it’s just becoming aware of that, getting people together, having conversations.

Sebastian (01:11:04) – Yeah. And there’s an interesting call to action out of that outside of obviously checking out change for balanced productions and all the epic stuff you guys are doing is think about someone that you feel that you’re on the opposite end of stuff right now. And reach out to them. Like, go grab a coffee, go grab a beer with them and see what that’s like instead of avoiding the shit out of ’em, which is totally

Roddy (01:11:22) – What we typically

Sebastian (01:11:22) – Do. You

Roddy (01:11:23) – Know, especially we saw that during Covid, we saw families being ripped apart. Yeah. You know, so if somebody, if you, if if, if you have a, a rip in your family, heal it. Yeah. If you have an old friend that said something about vaccines that pissed you off mm-hmm. , squash that shit. Yeah. You know, go extend your hand to that person and go grab a beer, you know? Yeah.

Sebastian (01:11:45) – Hundred percent. I love that. I love that. Well guys, keep doing what you do. Absolutely love what you do. So keep being you and, and changing the world. One video, one form of content at a time. Love you guys. Love you brother. Love you too. Love. You’re killing it, Seth. Thank you.