Coming highly recommended for you this week is a 4-part docu-series about the creative process. Shangri-La profiles the irreverent music producer Rick Rubin, whose clients include The Beastie Boys, Eminem, Lady Gaga and every other popular musician that you've heard of.
A living gandalf right down to the bare feet, he told Adele that her album "23" was rubbish and to go back and work at it. It was delayed two years, became "25", and sold a trillion copies.
One particular episode (#3) is a beautiful piece of art. Rick talks about all the famous artists that come to him, many who have had their dreams come true, yet still feel unfulfilled - one, in-particular, was rapper Mac Miller, who had visited Shangri-La and overdosed in 2018.
"It's hard to get really depressed until your dreams come true. Once your dream comes true and you realize that you feel the same way as you did before, then you really get a feeling of hopelessness. Because, you feel like, okay, I have this empty whole in me, but if I get to do this thing, this is gonna fill that hole. And you know, one-in-a-million get to do that thing, and then you realize "Oh, I feel exactly the same." Most worldly things tend not to be that satisfying."
On a similar topic, Will Smith, dropped the gem of a lifetime...
"When I started, I had all these grand ambitions of what I wanted to be and what I wanted to do. I wanted to be the biggest movie star in the world... and when I achieved all those things, I realized, on the inside, I was still that same insecure, little boy. I was doing all this to prove something to all the girls that had cheated, to my father and everything else.
I realized that you can't out-achieve your childhood wounds and traumas. You can't fake it.
Then I made the shift and what I realized is that the only sustainable mission, throughout your whole existence, is to improve lives. And as soon as I made that shift in my mind, away from trying to be big, and making money, and being popular, to making sure I changed lives every step of the way on this earth, all of a sudden I started experiencing healing."
Two great things to consider. It might be awesome to earn $5 million and celebrate by going back to your hometown to give everyone on Main Street the middle finger from your Maserati. Chances are it will be fleeting - maybe enjoying the process of attaining that $5 million will feel much better.
And, as cheesy as it sounds, if you are in a bit of a funk, then maybe you've got to help someone else in order to help yourself.
Kevin & Victoria
