So much of what we experience culturally and what is happening in the larger scope of the world today can feel indigestible. Especially if we seek to handle it mentally. Being able to metabolize the suffering, dysfunction, and pain of the world is better attempted through our whole body and beingness.
Today, I’m incredibly excited to host Toni Nagy, a comedian, and dancer who harnesses the playful power of interpretive dance to navigate deep and often heavy topics with both sincerity and humor.
In this fun and casual conversation, Toni Nagy takes us through:
- Her innovative artistic expression through the comedy of interpretive dance.
- How she discovered the power of movement in a countercultural environment, contrasting with her sports-oriented upbringing.
-How starting dance later in life and being “bad” offered its own benefits
- How she marries interpretive dance with political and social commentary in her comedy routines to create a unique and engaging form of artistic expression.
- How she views the realm of somatics from her unique perspective.
- Her “inner masculinity” and how she channels that into her comedy and as a helpful tool in her personal life...
-parenting tips, astrology snacks, and so much more!
Toni Nagy is a stand-up comedian and content creator most known for her viral videos where she interpretive dances her philosophies while pontificating, gyrating, and questioning culture.
She has 600,000 followers across her social media platforms, not that she's counting or anything. Her comedy is quasi–radical, pseudo-philosophical, somewhat existential, and mostly funny.
Observing Toni’s work is like micro-dosing shrooms, but then an hour later, wondering, "wait... was that actually a macro-dose!?" She's directed and acted in numerous films and written multiple award-winning screenplays, and is the founder of Cavelight Productions. Nagy has performed stand-up at the Comedy Store in LA, Flappers LA, Elysian Theater LA, Greenwich Village Comedy Club NY, the Improv Boston, Laugh Boston, Next Stage Theater Vermont, the Palm Springs Comedy Festival, and the infamous "Sweet" show at the Chelsea Music Hall in NYC.
The Broadway Comedy NYC club twice voted her “Best New Comedian.” She is currently on a national tour performing a two-person multi-disciplinary comedy show with her 13-year-old daughter entitled “Go To Your Womb!” It’s like a PG-13 acid trip you’ll later want to process with your therapist.
She is also on tour with her one-person show “Men, Come Inside of Me,” a comedy show during which she embodies all the men that have come inside of her, both metaphorically and literally. Toni relates to the men that have come inside of her and connects to them on a heart, soul, and genital level. Her effort to uncover these men is entwined with her desire to understand them, as well as herself. Social Media
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A: Every day, there is a forgetting, and every moment there is the possibility of remembering. Remembering who you truly are, awakening to your body, to the inner world and experience of being alive. Here is where you find the beauty, the joy. Here is where you free your Soma.
A: Hello everybody, welcome to Free Your Soma, stories of somatic awakening and how to live from the inside out. I am super duper excited today because I have Toni Nagy with me today and I've been following her on Instagram for about a year now, and she is so hilarious and awesome, and the first I have to say before I introduce her completely, the first video that I saw of hers was where she's in this little skit with a therapist and the therapist is sitting on the couch with his legs crossed and his little pad of paper and she's doing the most like big, like expressive full body movements as she's talking about like moving emotions and energy through her body.
And there's this like kind of straight man there trying to like, you know, psychotherapize her, and she ends up like turning the tables on him, and by the end of it they're both moving around and doing these really expressive movements, and I just thought like, this is brilliant for one, like I don't see people like using their full body in their comedy very often, like of course we have people we can think about who do that like throughout history, it's a big part of comedy being physical in your body but I feel like more and more these days people are kind of closed in and not doing that kind of comedy. And so I found this incredibly like inspiring and refreshing, and then just watching Tony kind of develop over the last year and develop more and more of a following, get her name more and more out there. I've just been so excited to watch her journey, and I'm excited for this interview.
So Tony is a comedian, a dancer, and she's a human on planet Earth, and her comedy in my opinion, it really is pushing, pushing the bars of what we expect from a female comedian but also just like what we expect to hear from someone you know over the course of like a five-minute video, like you really get out there and get deep and get strange and get interesting with things. So I'm really excited for this conversation and I would love to have you introduce yourself to our audience.
T: Well, thank you for that. It's funny to hear about yourself in someone else's mouth. I mean, you know that thought, I think it's a kind of common philosophical quandary of how many different versions of you exist in the people who experience you and as somebody who projects myself out into the cosmos, I sometimes forget that I exist in all these people's heads that I do not know and have never met and may never even connect with, you know you have all these people that watch your content without necessarily you know connecting with you even in the astral plane or the quantum plane of the internet.
So I was just something like, wow, I do exist in the heads of others, and I'm like, that's kind of a funny thought to me, like there's a lot of bi-pelvis out there in the world, and I stand by it.
A: Absolutely, yeah, no, I mean it's that's the other thing is like watching you move is inspiring, and you have like, I mean, I guess most people would describe it as interpretive dance that goes along with these philosophical like, you know spiritual like socio-political ideas that you're presenting and you're so natural and fluid with it that's part of why I wanted to invite you onto the podcast to talk about kind of the realm of semantics from your particular lens.
T: Yeah. I mean, interpretive dance, to me, I'm not exactly even sure I know what that means beyond just like it being kind of like a campy comedic gesture like I don't think anyone would take interpretive dance seriously as an art form. It's kind of meant as almost like a clowning thing that one would do.
It's like derivative of modern dance or contemporary dance or something, but I've never really thought I'm like, well, is anyone doing interpretive dance seriously or because I just thought it was funny I was just like, oh yeah, it would be interpretive dance is like funny and silly, and I think that was why I married these two kinds of concepts of interpretive dance and political social commentary because I was like oh the seduction of the absurd with the as serious I think yeah my intention was from the beginning.
A: Awesome. I love that because often the serious gets really really serious and really really heavy if we don't have some levity, right if we don't have something to kind of balance it out it can be easy for people to want to turn away, but if you can also like make people laugh a little bit or like have some enjoyment you know they'll actually lend their ear a little deeper I think.
T: Yeah, it's such an interesting balance because, on the one hand you don't want to minimize the intensity of global suffering that is happening, which is undigestible right? It's too much. It's just like I think we're experiencing a collective IBS a social diarrhea where nobody can digest the level of pain that is projected out.
However, you know, when things are kind of like, you know, we see it when things are too comedic, then it's just like oh whatever it's almost like do you remember there was these concerts the free Tibet concerts and then they were like oh we're raising money for Tibet and it's almost like in that effort to quote-unquote free Tibet with these concerts it's like when the concerts are over the public is like oh Tibet must be free because there's no more concerts so it's interesting like marrying causes with artistic expression I oscillate between like is this is this the language or isn't it however it's the language that I play with because at least it's it's like diving into a consciousness where people are becoming more aware.
But in order to be a true quote unquote activist or citizen of the world it is going to take personal action, and how do you spread personal action? I don't know, it's that does happen. I think within the family a little bit like I'm thinking about this only because I was having this conversation with my friend about, you know, she is a kid who's younger than my kid my kid's 13, and we were talking about you know some issue and she was like asking for advice about her child and I was like well you could tell your kid to say whatever the fuck you want doesn't mean they're gonna say it the kid is going to embody the culture of your family.
So if you want to give your child values, you have to embody those values that has to be the consistent culture within your family in order for that to fully integrate within their being, and I you know, when I think about education, when I think about any of these things I can say whatever I want but is anyone else gonna embody it if I'm not embodying it no so it's like I have to embody what the hell I'm talking about and in order for me to do that I have to be on that consistent path of integrity which is not easy I'm not saying I'm accomplishing it I'm saying I attempt to
A: Right, it's an ongoing practice because life is overwhelming and, as you said, sometimes completely undigestible and there are things that happen to us throughout our lives or even throughout our day that throw us off, and we're like out there seeking comfort from the catastrophes or the pain that's showing up and so it's easy to get out of integrity you know in a split second in our lives and so it's always about reorienting back to what's important and we get better and better at reorienting ourselves and coming back to that right
T: Yeah, I love the reorientation because it has a dance metaphor
A: yeah so tell us a bit about like your I mean you've been dancing a long time and tell us a little bit about like your dance journey because I know dancers they have a specific way they relate to their body and to somatic sometimes did you know about somatics from a dance point of view
T: So I started dancing late in life I was 19, so that's a very different experience than someone who starts as a young child I mean, it's two different worlds right, and the advantage of starting when you're young is, like, from a physical standpoint you probably are gonna be better you know you're gonna have more flexibility you're gonna have more training just because you have more years doing it the advantage of starting when you're older is there's a certain like intellectual sophistication that happens with our relationship to the body.
However, a lot of adults or older teens do not start dance because they find it humiliating it's really hard to be bad it's really hard to compare yourself to others who have more training who have more experience you know, and there's like a self-consciousness that exists when we get older that you know a three-year-old isn't self-conscious in the same way I mean they begin to be but it kind of takes time for that to fully take over so there's a lot of I think physically it's probably easier to start younger and from a psychological perspective you're a little more open however there's a different potential when you start when you're older because you have this wisdom that you're bringing to the table.
So when I started dancing, it was kind of random I was just a very physical person I was diagnosed as a young kid with ADHD, and I did not resonate with that like I understood I was annoying and that like adults wanted me to stop like I got that you know but like a diagnosis even as a nine-year-old I was like would I rejected that and I I'm not like speaking for anyone else's path or anyone else's desire to understand their own brain you know I'm just speaking for my own experience because I know it's a sensitive topic however from my experience I felt very boxed in when someone was like you're this thing and you have this problem and here is this medication to make you stop being like that and as a child, I was like well then who would I be if I took this medication like what would this medication do to my personality.
I was very concerned with like this impact on my personality, which is incredibly ironic because PS I've done like a bajillion drugs since then. You know, it's not like I haven't experimented with drugs 100%; I haven't do but I just something about the taking of this thing every day in order to impact my personality which was how I was understanding it as a kid I was like no thank y'all so my teacher was like well you're very annoying and you have to stop being so annoying and so her suggestion I think it was her suggestion was you need to get all your beans out so you got to move your body more.
I think it was her who told me that I don't know who told me that so anyway my grandmother, a grandmother, just some random grandmother no my personal grandmother gave me roller skates around the same time so I would come home from school and I would put on roller skates and then I would roller skate for seven hours like I would roller skate from seven until like or three until like nine at night.
I would just roller skate around, and so then I would be more tired, and I would be subsequently less annoying and more focused, and so I think that taught me at an early age like, oh I have to like move my body a certain amount every day in order to like be accepted or regulate like happy in a certain sense I think I was probably happier I don't know I don't know I was like a kind of a dark kid I don't know if I was ever really happy I didn't resin it also didn't resonate with being a child but um which is again ironic because I'm like people would probably think I'm sort of like playful and immature now but um long story very long is that um what was I even talking about why did I start this
A: We're talking about the dancing, like you know
T: coming into the dance yeah I started dancing because I went to a school that did not have sports and I had played sports my whole life and my mother actually was like you should go to Sarah Lawrence college I knew nothing about this college. I didn't particularly want to go to college yes retrospectively I 100 understand college is a deep privilege and I was incredibly lucky I this was not lost on me but when I was applying out my parents are professors they wanted me to go to college and I was like fuck education book you mom dad I'm not going to college and then my mom was like yes you are.
So she wanted me to go to the school called Sarah Lawrence that was very artsy very like creative very like counterculture the complete opposite of my upbringing up until then I had gone to a school that was like kind of sports-oriented, and everyone wore a gap and shit like that. So when I landed at that school I was like what the hell where am I it was a culture shock I was like this is like the Lilith Fair what's going on like these aren't my people and the only like physical outlet was dance, and so I was like oh I'll just try this because I used to go out dancing at clubs and it raves.
I don't know they don't have raves anymore but back in my day there would be these raves where you would just like take ecstasy and crystal meth and dance for seven hours in acid, and I was like oh yeah I do that that's something I do so I had been dancing since out, and I would always dance in my room alone because I think that's what people did in the 90s we just you danced alone in your room and like thought about things because you didn't have a phone.
A: Right. Now people just record it right now people do that, but they record it and put it on the internet.
T: You like literally just made that connection for me that's exactly what happens, and that's like exactly what my life is like my wait a minute like you're just like putting the pieces together the last like 25 years. And like wait a goddamn second yeah my whole high school years I was oh I was also super depressed because I think of the birth control fells so I would dance in my room to like feel an apple you know just like expressing my total sorrow constantly and then I would go out to raves and do drugs, and then I would go to clubs and do drugs.
I don't know how I was getting in these clubs oh, I do I got a tattoo at 15, and I'd be like, this is my ID, you know, and then people would let us in because I was dressed like a harlot so I had been I dancing was a part of my life and a part of my medicine. But, I had never been trained, and then it was in college that I started this training, and I was very bad I was the worst person in every class for all four years always the worst, and that was its own important humbling because someone had to be the worst and it might as well have been me and I learned a lot by being really bad.
A: Yeah. Well, it takes a lot of courage to be really bad and keep showing up so if anything you built some character like some strength of character in just being okay that you were going to you know still be like probably bad today you know or maybe not bad just on that like spectrum of like who was in the room like you just were down here in the lower ranks maybe because of what you said before about not dancing as a kid or things like that or maybe even just the way that your movement was so personal.
It sounds like you know you you danced as a teenager to like outlet feelings and emotions and I mean, you still do that that's different than someone who's dancing to be perfect that's different than someone who's dancing to perform for others. It sounds like dancing has always been a personal process for you, and that could be you know in a dance class that could register as like not as good. That's a that's a D right, versus somebody who's there trying to please everybody.
T: Hell yeah. I'm like why do you understand me so well I'm like yeah, I really vibe with what you said yeah, I mean I think that actually makes tons of sense it's like the personal practice versus the aesthetic practice. And like I do want to say the concept of training right because training is a very valuable thing to do however training can also pull you from your personal practice or pull you from your personal exploration, and they're kind of I mean in a perfect world there's a dance between the two because if you only have training it's very hard to break free from it and figure out where your voice is because the training is such a loud voice in your head that extrapolating from it or experimenting from it or even deviating from it is more difficult because the training is so loud.
However, if you have zero training, you're not referencing anything either, and it's kind of easy to get into a pattern because you're just kind of doing an expression, and you don't have the training to deviate from right, so it is interesting, I think to give yourself the medicine of both of like times of training and times times of like vast personal reflection and exploration, but I will say that like now that I've had more training over the many many years I have more creativity because I have more ideas of where to pull from
A: Yeah. Absolutely. That reference point or having varying reference points, as you just said, is a big part of being able to make it your own right to be able to play with these different ideas that have been like shared with you and then start digesting them and making them part of you and then being able to experience them authentically right because that's ultimately what we're after in like a teacher or a personality I guess.
Like we want to experience an authentic person not just someone who's regurgitating things that they learned at some point in a dogmatic way like that's not interesting. You know we could just go read a textbook if we want to be around another human. We want them to have like absorbed and integrated this knowledge and then made it their own so that we can make it our own so that we can transmit that like kind of back to what you were saying about embodying this shit instead of just saying it right. And just showing up and saying the right things versus showing up and being a person who's integrated the things that they've learned. Right?
T: Oh yeah, yeah. I'm like I really like you on your phone you're saying I'm like yeah yeah.
A: Well I love your videos because you do this really wonderful thing where you're just going off I guess we could say you know and I've had friends or I've known people I would say that have that like archetype of like super smart articulate creative and they just start talking and you're like listening to them and they're just like blowing your mind making you laugh suddenly you want to cry.
And you're just going through this whole gamut of feelings while this person is sharing like basically their inner monologue with you right and I've had those moments when I'm like watching your videos, and there's a few that I just like had to watch like three times because I was like I missed something she said this, and then she said this so quickly and it like changed the direction you know so I kind of felt like you know oh like she's my people like I can vibe with this like there's a connection here so that's also why I wanted to bring
T: You into like my little world. You remind me of me and I like
A: Me and I want more of,
T: Me that's how I was myself, and I'm very into it.
A: Well, yeah, well, going back to what you said earlier about like not wanting your personality to be changed by a drug unless you're choosing that, you know, like this idea of like a doctor coming in and saying, oh like this is wrong with you this will fix you and that you rejected that early on actually shows a substantial amount of self-love that you have carried you kind of and I think of that as like a certain level of integrity that people carry when they have that sort of like self-preserving love.
T: Oh yeah, I also almost think it's like self-curiosity because self-love to me, well, okay, I find love to be a complex idea because I think a lot of maybe this is a western, you know programming, but I think a lot of the collective understanding of love is like I love you because I like the way I feel about me when I'm around you so my quote-unquote love for you is a projection of my own experience of myself within your presence.
I'm not saying that's what like big L love is. I'm kind of saying that that is a paradigm within the language of love that I think is kind of hard to apply to the self, but if I think of like the concept of and like also you know maybe I were I like I don't know I have like a body reaction to self-love even though I probably like mention it is like love almost has this encompassing assumption that it's like completely pure or something. But then, my experience of human love I would not say is pure I would say it's complicated like to experience genuine unconditional love from human to human is a life process that, you know, I would say is pretty is it's it's a process.
I don't think like everyone's like, oh I'm just unconditionally loving everyone and myself constantly so I guess that's why I think of like this concept of curiosity because if I'm curious about a person, if I'm curious about myself, if I'm curious about humanity if I'm curious about the world then like love folds in and out of that because to you can't love something you're not curious about but like I do you know what I'm saying you understand my oh yeah yeah it's something about self-love I'm like well that's what you mean I'm fucking always and I also hate myself sometimes
A: I know, and I think that the you know baby like we're limited in our language, like they say that I don't know in French or Italian or whatever there's like 13 different words for love and it's like different words there's like 36 right, and it's like loving another person versus loving spaghetti but like in English we just like have the same word for like you know loving like our child as we do for loving spaghetti which is sort of bizarre right so we're limited in like our language for one but like also what you're saying is that like there's complexity meaning there's usually multiple things we're feeling at once even when we're feeling love for someone it's like oh I love you and I also want to slap you right now you know.
And you can feel that way about yourself. You can feel that way, like looking in the mirror at yourself like I appreciate you and I love you, and I also want to like just knock you over right now, and so I think maybe like when I think of love, it's like a container that holds everything you know like a bigger container that's holding it all, but we have these like limited little like micro explanations for it because of our limited language in English.
T: Yeah. I like that I like that, and I also think like what was it about me at that time that was like so kind of rejecting I also think I had a distrust for adults I had a I had a distrust for systems. Even then you know I was like I don't know if I want to fit into your dumb little school and your stupid little bike you know like desks are dumb like you know all of these things that it's funny as a quote-unquote free spirit I'm also very uptight and like super intense about rules also.
However, I have to see the rules as meaningful to mean a deeper way there has to be like a spiritual connection to these rules so, for example, I went to a silent meditation retreat it was a Chinese Buddhist retreat, so there was a lot of cultural things that I was being exposed to for the first time however I really trusted the intention of the rules in this retreat which was you know to better understand the nature in my mind therefore I was compulsive about following the rules they told me to say the mantra 24 hours a day.
I was going to say that mantra 24 hours a day, so it's interesting I have like this like deep rejection and rebellion against rules but also like a stalling commitment to rules as well like so it's a contradiction so but I think I did not connect to the rules of this like school that was trying to squash the spirits of
A: children, yeah well I feel I feel you like I was homeschooled for a portion of my growing up and I had alternative education I went to a charter school and I was like, basically what was it third grade I said to you I got pulled into like the counselor's office with my mom and like the school counselor and they're like Aimee why are you so angry I was like well you just can't go out there and be a pirate anymore like I was just like I was just like I have this like intense energy of like wanting to go out there and do things and experience the world.
And like you guys aren't letting me do that and that's why I'm angry is that this isn't what I meant to do I'm meant to just sit here and follow the routines it's funny though because I also have like these ways that I get really strict about rules especially if they're ones that I'm like choosing versus ones that are being imposed and I think that's like the difference for me is like if you're telling me that I have to do things and I'm not consenting to this then like f off but like if I'm going into like you said a meditation or a yoga or an environment and I'm saying I want to be part of this I'm saying yes to this and there's all these rules I'm going to be like so compliant right what sign are you I'm a cancer Leo
T: Oh, interesting. I'm a Capricorn.
A: oh nice, yeah what's your oh let's do the whole astrology thing. What's your moon?
T: My moon is torus, my rising is Pisces, my mercury is Sagittarius, and my venus is Aquarius
A: oh sweet okay that so fits with what I have observed yeah I
T: would earth energy mixed with like what yeah
A: well, especially that rising sign like they say that with Pisces rising like your eyes like people will comment on your eyes or your eyes kind of like drop people into like this other world or something, and I've definitely had moments like that with like your videos and your eyes like your eyes will like get real big when you're talking about something and I'll be like whoa we're entering the quantum field right now
T: oh yeah, that's so interesting yeah yeah that is very true yeah because I do have like intense eyes for sure I didn't know that you know my other Pisces rising friend also has these really wacky eyes yeah huh I'm gonna like that more that's cool
A: well it's because they say Neptune's ruling your first house so that's like this energy they say the eyes might also even if they're not blue they have like a lightness to them I have like a translucent my son has a Pisces rising and he's got blue eyes but they're kind of asiatic shape like mine so people are always commenting on them because it's not you know you don't usually see like blue eyes that like have an almond shape or something yeah interesting yeah.
I think of it as like a language you know people are like oh you believe in astrology I'm like I don't know like it's a language that I speak because my mom raised me with it personally like that's part of my lore is like my mom was always talking about astrology when I was growing up so there were times I rejected it like you know you might reject Catholicism but then there's like a part of my brain that's like but what if it is true like what if Mercury is in retrograde and that's why or something
T: oh there is no doubt in my mind that we are intimately impacted by the stars and our connection to the solar system and that the archetypal analysis that people have been doing for thousands of years has some meaning and wisdom behind it 100%
A: yeah yeah well like kind of coming back to some of the things we were talking about before like these themes about marrying and I feel like in your astrology we can almost kind of see that like with you know bringing your earth signs the the capricorn and the torus like those are very much embodied signs but they're kind of almost on opposite ends because the torus is very like pleasure like beauty oriented and the capricorn is like kind of more intense and like hard working right and so in your videos you're sort of like bringing these heavy like material reality ideas into like your physical expression in your body right where there is a certain amount of like laughter and joy and like clowning around that like occurs but it's also like getting into some heavier territory you know what I mean yeah
T: Yeah. I definitely do know what you mean I mean I think that I've been wondering a lot about what embodiment actually means versus like this buzzword that people say and I like you know you brought in the concept of integration earlier you know but I also think it's exploration it's like integration and exploration and you know I move my body a lot and I also explore the emotional depth of my body like I cannot have an injury and not then be curious about like the psychological underpinnings of my inner injury like I was just out of you know Easter party for my kid the other day and this woman is like I dislocated my shoulder she's like a right she's just like a hiker you know and I'm like you're shouldering too much in your life you're shouldering too much in your marriage you're shouldering too much as a mother you need to be cared for in the same way that you care for others you know.
And she like looked at me and she was like about to cry you know so like there is nobody that can speak to me about some physical thing that's happening and like I will obviously and consistently comment on like my idea like what the psychological emotional underpinnings of whatever their physical ailment is so like I'm very into all of that stuff I've been into all that stuff for very long time it is how I approach my body and my illnesses my pains my psychology and yeah I find I'm like always hurting you know.
I'm like even though I do this like oh I'm doing the work I'm like oh my buck and like oh my knee like it is kind of funny like how much like effort I put into like this embodiment practice and yet my body is still just like ow and I'm like Jesus Christ he's like what do you fucking want from me bitch like like I can't and then like there's people who like smoke cigarettes all the time and then like I feel fine and I'm like cool like rad for you I feel everything is that better maybe I don't know it sounds like I heard a lot
A: you've been a body whisper it sounds like you know and you're sort of like listening when other people are telling you about their physical challenges there's a part of you that just like connects really quickly with like the somatic element which is that whatever physical whatever experience we had came with a physical contraction like literally everything and even though we don't feel it all at once right it's a full body experience every time because everything's connected so like if you think about like how your face looks when you're stressed like you're like a scrunchy stress face that's not just your face that's contracting there are muscles in your inner thighs and your groin and your stomach and your lower back they're simultaneously feeling and contracting in maybe a microwave like it's not perceptible by most people.
But when you have like a more sensitive nervous system structure which it sounds like you do you get that feedback more you get more of that feedback from your body and you are feeling more of that discomfort that everybody else has just like made normal and habituated right so it is kind of this double-edged sword because you're hearing what your body is saying to you versus someone who's just like totally got their like noise canceling headphones on and they're just like oh until it hurts like you know really bad like I'm not even there right but then at the same time it sounds like you're looking for different ways that you can respond and listen to your body to actually get the relief like to actually close that loop of communication right
T: yeah it's almost like I've opened the door of self-reflection it's like so wide that like my body just does not let me get away with anything and then that like quote-on-quote hypersensitivity like do thing I experience you know does that make me a better person I don't I like to think so I'd like to think so although um I am playing in the waters of a lot of like okay okay more learning more growing more evolving more trying more getting to know myself more healing more healing like yeah that's just why sometimes it's like good to just like unplug and like not feel like you have to heal for a second oh yeah there's so much going on but it's funny like I can litter I mean I I know this word is often overused literally but I can literally look at someone's posture and I'd be like oh would you like a 40 minute powerpoint presentation about what's going on with you emotionally purely by looking at the way someone's hands
A: but yeah I mean it sounds like that you do have a gift for reading into or feeling into like what somebody's body is saying and that's probably because you have that in you like kind of going back to that idea of like actually carrying the things that you've learned in your own body yet you are someone who receives all this feedback from your body constantly when you see it and someone else it's like oh that makes sense to me.
And you know it's all one of my mentors called it a somatic sixth sense like he says because there's different ways of doing things right he says I've never looked at an anatomy book to try to like help someone with their muscles he's like because your muscles don't know what a trapezius is like they don't they just they feel and they sense and they hold certain positions right and so when he like looks at someone he feels what that might be like in his body and then he goes about helping them to release that based on that like soma to soma like sixth sense versus like let me look in this book and let me like you know try to section out and like pretend that your body is in pieces and let's put it back together right it's just different ways of going about things but it sounds like you're much more in that like perception sensing type
T: yeah that's really interesting because I had this you know woman working on me once and she was a body worker and you know Regina's in my right hip I can't remember and she was like oh I think you have bursitis in your right hip and I was like go fuck yourself like I was like I don't what the fuck like bursitis like like, suck a dick. Like I was so disinterested in that like word even. Like I was like, I was like, honestly I would have more enjoyed if she was like, oh, you happen to have a demon in your right hip. And I would have been like, oh, interesting, you know? Like I just, I guess I'm really just like a diagnosis. This is like, like who the fuck you think you are? And I really do like this idea of like soma to soma. It's like that skin to skin, you have a baby.
And what do they always tell you? Like put the naked baby to your skin. You will need that skin to skin data to be transferred to one another. And like, I'm so much more interested in being like, oh, like rather than being like, oh, I had this condition called bursitis and now I must do this or take this blah, blah, blah. I'm so much more interested in just like exploring my right hip and like all the ways in which that manifests in a physical spiritual way. And like how I can support it, how I can, you know, heal it, how I can develop the strength I need to, you know, release it, whatever is going on. I'm open to so much language and I'm open to work and I'm open to suggestion. I just like, I'm very disinterested in some like diagnosis.
A: It's like a label. It's like a label kind of getting like dumped on you and you're like, now what do I do with this? There's no solution in this. There's just telling me there's something wrong with me that like may not actually, there may not be anything wrong. Maybe your right hip was, you know, maybe it was related to something you were experiencing. That's a good question. Like when you're going about your life, have you noticed that certain areas of your body respond to like different situations in a certain way?
T: I think every time I have to just like stand for a long time, my body does not like it. I get so stiff to stand it. I hate standing. Yeah, I'll dance. I'll move. I'll walk or I'll sit, but I don't want to fucking stand anywhere. Hate standing is garbage.
A: Yeah. So do you find that like you do that thing where you like kind of shift your weight from side to side? Like you have to stand in line at the bank. Are you like kind of like shifting a little bit, like doing a little something, something?
T: Oh, I'm like, oh, like a meet a party or I meet any event. I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, like standing is not for me.
A: Yeah. When I first started on like my kind of like body awareness journey, I noticed that like I would squeeze my legs together when I was in public all the time. And I mean, obviously like you can totally, you know, I feel like you zeroing in on like, oh, what that might mean, especially if I was like on a bus or something, or if there were a lot of men around, I would notice that unconsciously I would just like make myself smaller.
I would like squeeze my legs together. And it was completely involuntary. And I had no realized at a certain point like, oh my God, I've probably been doing this like my whole life, like since I was a kid. And then I realized I would realize that I was doing it and I would like consciously like soften that.
I would like consciously like stop that thing that I didn't even know I was doing for most of my life. And so it's interesting just like making those links, you know, and maybe there was something for you in standing. Like maybe there was something that happened early on for you where you had to stand for a long time and like there's something there. I don't know.
T: Just standing just feels like so adult. Like who just fucking stands? I've never done it before. And. You know, they're always like, you know, doing something. I'm going to the only time you stand is like, get in line, get in line and stand in line like a sucker, you know.
A: Right. Right. Or I'm thinking like a soldier, you know, like that whole like archetype of like add attention, you know.
T: Yeah. Oh God. What'll I mean? I guess you could do like to Dostin for a moment in yoga, but still I'm like, well, let's get going.
A: Absolutely. So in terms of the because you do the videos and you have your, you know, online social media presence, but then you've also been doing like live experiences. Right. Is that like stand up comedy or I knew you did like a one woman show or like you did a show with your daughter. How do you kind of take like this model into like another format? How does that, how does that been going for you?
T: I don't. I mean, like I have my online thing and then I have things that I do on stage and I'm not trying to like congeal the two. Oh, OK. Yeah. That's not really like what I'm doing because I think like the thing about, you know, and even in the online stuff, I'm not doing the same thing every time.
Oh yeah. I think that would get stale. I mean, the algorithm would like that. I think if I just like did dancing videos and that was all I did and then the algorithm would reward me for that because they would know how to categorize me.
But like as a person who like, you know, wants to explore different parts of myself, that was never something I wanted to do. It's just one thing and same with the live performances. Like live performance is very different than like being digested on the internet.
I think the thing about the internet is like two things are happening. You're not always editing, but you can edit your work. And like part of editing is creating like a rhythm, a visual rhythm of what people see with these cuts and a lot of almost all the dancing videos, 99.9 percent of them I edit and I edit them with a rhythm in mind. Like I know what I'm doing.
I know how I'm saying something. And that rhythm is part of how people retain the information because otherwise it's like, you mean, if you were to do anything, if you were to watch a dance and it's all one note, if it's all fluid or if it's all sharp, sharp, sharp, then the brain starts to kind of tune out because there is like it's too predictable, right? The interesting is dynamics. It's like, oh, this is sharp and now it's smooth and now it's up and now it's down. And so for me, the editing rhythm is part of the dynamic of those dance monologues.
I don't know if it would translate live in the same way because it might just like, I don't know. I don't know. This is not what I'm interested in doing. I like to do stand up. I'm a stand up comic and I like to do regular stand up. And then if I'm going to do a show, there are elements of dance, but there are more traditional elements of dance in a certain sense. Like I do a contemporary dance in my, I did a show with my daughter called Go To Your Womb. And like we do a contemporary dance together and we do all these skits and we do monologues and we, you know, it's like a variety.
I mean, I guess I want to say variety show in a certain sense. Those kind of things interest me, variety interests me. So my live shows are have a variety to them. And then I have a one person show called Men Come Inside Of Me where I like embody men and I embody myself and I become men and I invite audience members up. So it's like, I think I'm do, I like to explore what it is to be live and like why being live is different than being on a computer and like do that when I'm in front of humans.
A: That makes so much sense and kind of since you brought it up, like the times when you're like being some dude, you know, it's like scary because it's like, I've met that dude. Like you. Like I have met that dude. Like I have so met him multiple times, you know, and you are like too accurate or something. And I'm just curious, like, are you drawing from like sort of, I mean, it's probably a lot. It's like cultural references in a way that you're drawing from, but also personal experiences or both or is it one or the other?
T: It's me. It's my inner dude.
A: It's your unique inner.
T: My inner man. It's not, it's not a like. Impression of another man. It's the man and me. That's why the men come inside of me is the show because it's I am talking about men I've come into contact with, but my embodiment of those men are how they are inside of me. The men that I relate to masculinity because I am masculine, quote unquote. You know, I understand gender, spectrum and blah, blah, blah. What is masculine when it's feminine? These are socialized traits.
These are conditioned. This is part of our programming. Yes, yes, yes. I've read Simone Dupevoir.
I got it. And this is kind of what I'm exploring is like my own masculinity and my own connection to masculinity because I am a very dudely woman. Like I have a lot like the role I am a if you were to do whatever the attachment theory, you know, anxious, avoidant, healthy attachment.
I think those are the three types. So like culturally, most of the times women have anxious attachment, you know. And so anytime you hear people talking about what it is to be a woman in relationship, they seem to be describing anxious attachment completely to me. That's what I'm right. And that the way men are more loofed, that's detached, right?
That's distant. That is me. That is how I show up in relationships because that was how I was conditioned to be as a child. So most girls are like, oh, you cry little girl. You know, that's how you express your emotions. And then the crying creates a certain way of relating to people versus men. It's like, oh, you shouldn't cry, but like you can be as angry as you want, you know, show your anger.
Fine. That's warrior spirit. And so like men or boys are often conditioned to like express their complex emotions through rage, right? So women on average express their complex emotions through tears and men through rage. So like, I just didn't have a lot of outlets for any complex emotions, either tears nor rage, right? And so the outcome of that on my like attachment style is to be more reserved.
Like it's very hard to know what it is I'm feeling and thinking I'm not like abusive. And therefore that is a more masculine way of being quote unquote. And therefore I attract men who are more feminine. I attract anxious men because whether or not they're quote alpha dudes, a lot of these dudes are like very angry, very angry alpha men.
I've attracted many of those, but ultimately their emotional spectrum is anxious. And there and that is considered. Again, I'm putting all in quotes to reinforce my understanding that this is all a construct. They approach relationships from an anxious, slash more feminine standpoint. So when I talk about my experience with relationships, my embodied experience of relationships, or when I'm talking to my friends about their embodied experience with relationships, I am always relating to the man. Like when my friends talk about their dudes, I'm like, oh, I'm on his side. Always.
Always. You know, of course I'm their friend and I can, oh, yes, I understand you and you are my friend and I can do all that. But I'm like, let's talk about what's going on in his head because I actually understand him a lot better. So I'm like, great at giving women heterosexual women advice about how to deal with men because I'm just like tapping into my own attachment style. And I'm also an amazing person at texting men who have my own attachment style because I very much know how to manipulate the circumstance. You know, so if my friend's having a problem, I just give me a phone. I will, I will turn it around. You know, like I know exactly what to do, you know, because I am him.
He is me. So I mean, I don't know. It's just interesting when we think about like our relationship to this is why I explore men because I am a man, even though I'm a woman.
A: You know, that must be why it feels so authentic is because it's coming from an authentic place in you. And so then when I come across this like very authentic expression of like, you know, and I have to say, I love the way that you kind of brought these two spaces together of like the attachment theory and like duality, you know, or these like masculine feminine. It's like I hadn't really heard someone like marry these things before, but it totally makes sense. Like 100%. And so I love that.
And it, it's just so interesting that you like speak this language. The other thing that I'm thinking here is like Venus and Aquarius, right? Yeah. So that can be like, we can use that lens to kind of say, hey, there's like going to be more detachment here. There's going to be like more distance between you and like maybe your emotional body, maybe you and other people because of that. And there's strengths that come with that kind of like experience.
And there are challenges, right? And it sounds like you've really honed in on some of the strengths, which is that you can relate to men in this very unique way that not all women can, right? And that you also are able to like understand the way that I guess in speaking this language in your own words, you said manipulate, but you could kind of like guide things back to like a positive place. It sounds like when things have gotten all like messy, because we're having these two attachment styles, like banging up against each other or the men are from Mars, women are from Venus. There's like this neutralizing energy that you can bring in by like actually translating or something. Yes.
T: I am a translator. I'm a man translator. The relationship will be like about to implode. I'll be like, give me your goddamn phone. I'm like, now you're back in it. Is that a good thing to do?
I don't know. But like I've done it for many a friend because it's like, it's almost like this concept of rational versus emotional, right? And there is this, again, cultural insistence that men are rational women are emotional.
Like first of all, I've never been with a man who has not punched multiple holes in my wall. Okay. That is very irrational and that is very emotional. So the fact that men have their reputation of being rational versus emotional is comedy to me.
Okay. Like that's hilarious. Men are so emotional. Men have more emotions than like, you know, the average teen girl. However, it's just the way that these emotions are expressed are through like almost like two lenses, which is like fucking rage and shutting down.
They don't have like the kaleidoscope of expression that women have to express their emotions because it's just like it wasn't conditioned in them. It wasn't allowed, whatever, whatever. So a woman might have more access to be like, I'm embarrassed. I am confused.
I am insecure. Like she may be more connected to the nuance of what she's feeling. And therefore there is more possibility for her to express her emotions.
Like, you know, with more variety. And I think that's why men have this reputation of being quote unquote more rational just because they're just like distant. They're just like, they're stepped back there. Like there, there's an emotional landscape here and then they're like back here.
Kind of observing it or turning their back to it, you know. So yeah, I think I'm very capable of compartmentalizing emotion in a certain way. Like I can sense, I sense PMS, right? I'm like, oh, I am experiencing PMS inside my body. However, I do not externalize it most of the time. I'm like, well, it's no one's fault that I'm feeling this.
I'm not going to like put that on anyone else. So there is oftentimes when like I'm experiencing inside my body, like a certain tornado. However, what I am expressing to the outside world isn't what I'm feeling, which like, is that a masking thing? Is that a neurodivergent thing? Is that a people pleasing thing? Is that a trauma response to my childhood?
We could pathologize that, you know, to the moon and back. However, I am a slower processor when it comes to my emotional landscape because I want to have an understanding of it before I share it. So a lot of times someone will do something that'll be very offensive to me. And I will, I will get a body reaction that like, oh, this is not OK. And I'll almost like clock it. I'll be like, OK, and I'll still act kind and I'll still like, you know, be in a vibe with someone and not necessarily like be reactive. But then later I process it with others, with myself, with my friends.
And like I then go through the like the slower unveiling of like, well, what was going on? Because it's very important to me to ask the question, why did that person do that? And if I'm just in a reactive space, I don't have time to have compassion, empathy or curiosity about why they did that.
I'm just reacting. And so that is also, I think, part of my motivation of just like taking time before I react, you have to really come out your face at me to make me be reactive. And then unfortunately for that person, if they do do that, the well of rage that is inside of me is volcanic and terrifying, you know? So it's like, oh, if you get me, if I'm tired or I'm hungry or like, you know, hormonal or overwhelmed and someone pokes me and like, I don't have that bandwidth that I usually have or that they're accustomed to of me like being a slower, more like, quote unquote, mature processor. I don't know, maturity is any part of it.
Just a slower, more like conscientious processor. The level that I will like go to unleash all these feelings inside of me, the endurance I have is unparalleled, you know? Like people, they will get so tired fighting with me. They will wish they never did it. I will 100% make you cry. There is no world in which you're not crying, you know?
So is that good? I'm not, I don't think so, but it sure is what happens. It sure is what happens, you know? So it's just kind of like, it's hard to be emotionally mature because there is always a part of us that is very reactive and like, I don't want that side out very often. Maybe it's better to just be a little more reactive every once in a while.
Who fucking knows? There is no better. There is no worse. There's just like external internal processors. But that is how I process. I'm an internal processor unless you get me on a bad day.
A: It reminds me, my friend has this T-shirt that I swear, like I read it and I was just like, this shirt is deeply therapeutic to me on so many levels. It says, I'm a lady, but if you make me mad, I'm a sadistic psycho bitch from hell who will make you wish you were never born and when I'm happy, I bake muffins and shit. Yeah, hell yeah. I was like, yep, that's how it goes sometimes. And I think what you're saying about like having those moments where, and I'm sure other people are also like this because I have clients, I've experienced clients who have this, there's like a lag time, like you described it as longer processing. So like something happens and your kind of natural responses to just kind of be like, oh, I'm not sure how I feel yet.
So I'm just going to default, like continue to be normal. And then later you go and you're like sorting through and realizing, oh, this was like really not okay. This crossed a boundary.
This was disrespectful. But there's like a sorting process that has to go on. And I think that sometimes people don't do that. And it sounds like you make a practice or you at least naturally want to do that, that like sorting through. But sometimes people don't and then they're just, that's where resentment.
Right? That's where like resenting people in your life starts to build. Is that you're not actually sorting through and coming to terms with what you didn't like about the interaction, you know, what kind of boundaries, you know, were crossed in someone's behavior with you. And you just keep tolerating that same like crappy shitty behavior from other people. And then just kind of like, like you said, compartmentalizing it or just like putting it back there.
Right. And there are theories about that kind of like that, you know, when we have a practice and unconscious practice of doing that over and over, we store it in different places in our body. You know, like I'm sure you're familiar with these ideas like breast cancer, for example, being like a form of resentment for like giving overgiving to people or something like that, like overgiving nourishment and stuff. And that we, you know, we have this way of like, oh, I have this response or this reaction. And if I don't take the time to actually sort that out, it's just going to get stored somewhere in my physical body and build up. Right. Yeah.
T: 100%. I mean, like breast cancer as a phenomenon makes perfect sense with like how women show up in relationships, how women show up as mothers, the resentment that you have a partner that's using their weaponized incompetence to have you do everything and then you do not humanize yourself to your children.
And so your children kind of view you as a function of their need versus like a person that gave birth to them. You know, so there is a plague or like a, what was that thing we just went through? That, that corona, what was it?
A: Oh, what was a pandemic?
T: Pandemic. I was like, what's that thing that just happened? There is a pandemic of this as like women and mothers, especially if you're a wife to a man within the patriarchal system. And like, I see this constantly there. I've never like, what?
Breast cancer. I'm like, yeah, that adds up. I can like see it in the way you operate in the world. Not to blame. I mean, I think that the hard thing that happens is then people feel victim blamed for their, uh, unhealth or like, oh, how would you, why would a child ever suffer?
Why would a child ever get leukemia? You know, like I understand how this thought experiment has holes in it. I'm not victim blaming. And I'm not saying any child deserves a disease or any person deserves a disease at all. You know, it's like, these are just ways of thinking about our health and our bodies that actually puts some power in your hands. And that word power is like slightly complex because I'm not insisting you have power over anything.
But when I think of like, Oh, I'm dealing with this health problem with my stomach for instance, and like, there are things I can do emotionally that are part of the healing of my gut that feels like I am taking responsibility for myself. And to me, that is an exciting thought versus like, I'm blaming myself. I'm a victim, et cetera, et cetera. I don't resonate with victim consciousness because I think that when I get into that place, I've been sick. I've been that I've under, I understand that I've gone through that.
And I think like one of the things about being sick or like not being well is I personally had this unconscious expectation that like, Oh, everyone's going to be nice to me now because I'm sick. That was not the case. Absolutely wasn't the case. And it was a very like lonely way of discovering like, Oh, I can be sick.
And people can still be very shitty to me. Like this isn't my salvation sickness is not my salvation. It's not going to be how I'm going to develop boundaries or how people are going to finally care for me in the way that I so deeply crave, but don't know how to ask for, don't know how to access or don't know how to receive, or they just are just too happen to be too narcissistic to even notice or give. Like if I want that type of caring, it's not going to be through me being sick. It's going to be through me embodying caring for myself and embodying caring for others and then pulling in the vibration of others who have that capacity.
You know, the capacity to fully care for another and nurture another person, like that is a skill that is demonstrated, that is learned, that is practiced, that like we all need more of. And so I always kind of like, whistle a little bit too, when self care is just presented as if like, oh, this is this thing you do for yourself. It's like, no, it's self care is for community.
Yeah. Care is for like how you exist and you operate in the world. And that is very motivating to me, not as a martyr. If I murder myself, I'm not self caring. If I murder myself, I'm not being a better mother. I'm not being a better friend.
I'm actually just allowing someone to be a shithead. You know, is this kind of dance we have to do about care, like caring for people truly authentically, but also insisting on your own humanity, insisting on your own need for care, insisting on a structure and a platform where you are receiving and not just giving and to receive is to give and to give is to receive.
A: Absolutely. I think it's a public service to do the things to take care of yourself and not carry around like all of the bullshit that's ever happened to you. Like when I think about the somatic work that I've done, you know, in my own personal body over the last like 10 years, it's like this was a public service because not only am I actually able to help other people through that stuff now, which is obviously like a very clearly we can define that as service. But the way I show up in the world is differently. The way that I interact with humans at the grocery store or the way that I like, you know, deal with things in my interpersonal relationships. It's going back to that idea of having integrity, you know, and if we're out of integrity with ourselves, we are not going to be able to be in integrity, like in other areas of our lives.
It's just it's just not how it works. You know, there's only so long that we can like pretend that we have our shit together that we, you know, have it figured out before like that is all just going to like explode. And we're going to realize like, oh, no, I actually do have to do the things to take care of myself, whatever that means for that particular person.
Right. Otherwise I'm kind of useless out there in some ways. At least that's been my experience, but that's also coming from like, you know, a highly sensitive person or someone who gets a lot of feedback from their body. And like my body kind of demands like your body seems to demand that I do something about the things that are building up in me. Yeah.
T: Like when we think about the self as a tool, right? My, my self, my human body is for me to enjoy, for me to explore, but also to be a force of joy for others.
Right. So example, I have a child, you know, when my child was young, she wasn't as rational as she is now, but from the minute like her entire life, she would have to come to me, come with me to my dance classes. If I was teaching, if I was going to a dance class, I was teaching a dance class, if I was at home and I wanted to move, she would have to come with me and she would play and wait for me to be done. I would bring her a bag of babies and I would be like, you play and I'm going to move my body and then we were going to connect.
And if she was like, no, I want to play now or whatever I want my needs about now, it was always very clear. I was like, in order for me to meet your needs authentically and to do what you want to do and to play, you know, like very far outside in the woods, which you want to do. I have to first do what I need to do, which is like be in my body.
And then we do what you need to do. Like I asserted my humanity with my kid her whole life. And that is, I don't think that mothers are given permission or give themselves permission to do that. So it's like, oh, I don't have time to exercise. I don't have time to do this because I have the kids. Your kids can watch you fucking exercise.
Your kid can be there while you do it. And they don't have to be on a screen. They don't, they can be bored even. They can be like, oh, slow bar. And you can be like, that's fine. That's your board. I'm going to do this until this time.
And that is what is happening. And then I will hang with you and we will connect. And I just like my wish for, you know, women, mothers, wives, whatever, people, women that are part of like systems where they're so often erasing their bodies and erasing their bodies needs, you know, is to just keep reminding your family like, no, no, no, no, no, no. This is a non-negotiable.
This is me connecting to my body so I can show up for you and I can show up for myself and I'm not, I'm not erasing myself for you. You know, like that's not being a good mom. That's not being a good wife.
That's not being a good partner. That's actually just allowing you to overtake me. And then how are you going to, you know, then you're going to over earth. You're going to overtake mother earth.
You're going to overtake other women in your life, you know, like. Not to be all about gender, but like these are things that we gendered as female. We gendered earth as female. And yet we continue to rape, abuse, extract, you know, all of these things that we do to women we do to the earth because we gendered her as female.
So long story long is that like by prioritizing your body and like having a connection to your body and getting to know your body, being curious about your body, going to the healer, going to whatever the fuck you need to do for your body. Like that is you being a good community member.
A: Oh, hell yeah. And like for your kid, you're showing them how to take care of themselves. You're showing them how to do that, right? And they will learn that. Yeah, he came in, my kid just like pop his head out.
T: But that's partnership, right? Like your partner understands. Oh, my wife or partner, she's busy. You know, like I am going to be the nurturer because my partner is busy. Like that's not a mind blowing concept. But obviously this is a culture of your family, which is like that you are the priority right now. Oh yeah. Totally. These are the priority. And like that is so important for women to prioritize themselves within their family. And that is not being selfish. That's actually creating a healthy culture within the family to let yourself be a priority.
A: Thank you. I received the positive affirmation of like what just happened because like it's something I don't see all the time. Like sometimes, you know, my kid is like whiny or upset because I'm like, no, I'm taking the time to like do the things that I need to do because I do that a lot. I let him know and I do take care of myself first before, you know, I read him his book. Like there was this dumb thing that we did early on where he would like not eat his food unless I was feeding it to him.
And so I would like read him a book sometimes while he was like finishing his food. Well, now he's five and he still wants me to do that and he wants me to do that while I'm eating. And I'm just like, it's like a no. Like he still asks me, but just like, no, I'm going to eat my food and I'm not going to. And he's like, it's okay if you take bites while you read me this book. And I'm like, that's not okay with me. That's not how we're doing things, you know. But like, I think that, you know, once people have set some kind of standard in their world, they're like afraid of deviating from it. They're afraid from mixing it up and changing things because yeah, people are people, your husband, your kid, whatever, are probably going to complain a little bit because it's different than whatever they've been, you know, operating under before.
I like what you said about they don't have to be on the screen. They can be bored. They're allowed to be bored because then what happens? You grow up and you have a kid and you're like, why does my son like not take care of himself? He just lays around and plays video games all the time and like it doesn't take care of his body.
Like what's going on? Why does he do that? And it's like, well, what did you show him? You showed him you not taking care of yourself, you know, in your childhood, you know, not prioritizing taking care of yourself. And so, you know, and then anytime that you were doing something, maybe you just had him like on the phone or playing his video games instead of giving him that tolerance of like nothingness, the tolerance of being bored, right? And then also demonstrating what it means to actually maintain your physical body. Yeah.
T: And like, I get it. Like kids can be annoying, you know, like I have a kid who could be annoying and who sometimes is like, oh, and complaining. I just happen to be comfortable with like letting her complain or letting her be mad at me. You know, I'm like, OK, you're mad at me. You can be mad at me.
That's fine. That's a reasonable reaction to not getting what you want. However, you know, I'm not going to do what you want just because you're mad at me or I'm afraid of your reaction. Like your reaction can be valid. It can be annoying. It could be explosive.
It could be whatever it is. I'm not taking it from you. Yet your reaction doesn't have to dictate my actions, you know? And like, I think that's where like partnership when you have a partner, you know, like sometimes you're on your own or whatever. But like the partnership is, is that like just reminding the child like, oh, like, you are my priority at this moment, but you are not mom's priority at this moment. You will be again, but not right now, you know?
And even when you're just alone with your kids, sometimes you have to be like, hey, I have to do this thing. You're not my priority at this exact moment. We will return to being my world. And the only thing I'm paying attention to in X amount of time. But however, you know, like I am going to prioritize this thing because this is what I need to do or I'm choosing to do or I want to do.
And I think there is like a transparency. I mean, I know we're like on a whole parenting tip, but like I talk to my kid all the time about how I am parenting her. I will say it is not good parenting for me to do that. Like I understand that you've asked a hundred times and like respect your tenacity. However, it would be very bad parenting for me to give into you because then I'm showing you that you just have to ask me a hundred times and eventually you'll wear me down.
So even though like you have successfully worn me down, I'm still saying no, you know? It's better parenting. And then what does she say to that? You know, sometimes I'm even like, well, what would you do as a parent? And she's like, I don't know. I'm not the parent. I'm like, well, do you have a better piece of advice for me?
Because if not, I'm going to continue with this strategy of saying no. Yeah. She's just kind of like, oh, I'm like, well, I get you. You know, like I'm parenting you as what I'm doing. This is the parenting process. Saying yes is easier, yet that's not good parenting all the time.
A: Oh, man. Yeah. Like, I love it. I love what you're saying. It's like it's good medicine for me to hear it because I definitely was raised by a more permissive parent. And so there are times when like, yeah, my kid like has worn me down like, you know, and I'm just like, OK, fine, you know, but then I want to change that.
I do. I actively work to change that and to like hold that integrity again and like, you know, reprogram that, you know, message that I received from my, you know, more permissive parent. But, you know, I just have loved this conversation today.
We've gone over like a whole bunch of different gamuts here. And, you know, one thing that I want to just kind of tie in with what you just said was like this little bit of like detachment of like letting your kid have their own experience, right? And just being OK with them being mad at you, being OK. That kind of goes back to like that, you know, Venus and Aquarius, that like, you know, the gift of the avoidant attachment style, you could say, you know, because I don't think these things are all like just good or bad.
They're like human experiences that we've given these like labels, right? But your specific like imprint and what you're kind of sharing with us today, like there's magic in that. There's magic in having that bit of distance. And I think that that's part of how you're able to be so profoundly impactful as a comedian doing this really edgy kind of work where you're bringing in these painful, serious world issues, and you're bringing in the element of the clown, the element of comedy, the element of like self-referential, like, you know, just digging in to like yourself and sharing with us that self.
It's like that's part of that gift that you have of having that like compartmentalization, that distance between things, right? And so I just want to say, like, I think that you've been able to, like, share with us some of that today, and people have been able to like, receive that. I know I did, and it feels really nourishing. So thank you.
T: Okay. Yay. Let me draw. That fills my heart. That fills my cold black heart. Yeah.
A: Cold black, distant dude heart. Yeah.
T: That fills my ball. Thank you.
A: Wonderful. Well, this has just been super fun. I knew that like I would have a blast hanging out with you. And I'm so glad we get to share this conversation with everybody. You know, if people like want to catch any of your life performances in the next year, do you have anything coming up that you want to like drop into?
T: I have so much. If you go to my website, ToniNagy.com, T-O-N-I-N-A-G-Y. I often put things on there. And then my social media, you know, I'm always promoting shows. So follow me on Instagram. That's where you'll really get the little story. You'll get the juice of it all.
A: Fantastic. Yeah. Well, I highly recommend if you haven't heard of her before and you're hearing of her for the first time today, go check out. Follow her. You won't regret it. It will take you on a wild ride through human consciousness and, yeah, be beautiful and terrifying all at the same time.
T: Thank you. Thank you so much.
A: You've been listening to the Free Your Soma podcast to find out more information about today's guest. Check the show notes. And to find out more information about me, Aimee Takaya, and the Radiance program, visit www.freeyoursoma .com.
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