He Stepped Out of the Spotlight to Hear Himself Again

00:00 There's a point in every journey where you realize the next chapter might ask you to let go of what wants to find you. Seth knows that feeling well, from Broadway stages to quiet nights in the wilderness. He's learned how to trust what can't always be seen and listen to what's calling from within. Seth shares what it means to live between worlds, art and spirit, noise and stillness, and how choosing to follow his inner voice changed everything. 00:30 me, me, me, in my own head, you love me on Broadway, ah you know, to what's going on on the landscape, what's going on in this spiritual realm that I can feel that I really need to pay attention to. I'm Maciel Huli, and this is The Life Shift, candid conversations about the pivotal moments that have changed lives forever. 01:03 Hello everyone, welcome to the LifeShift Podcast. I am here with Seth. Hello Seth. How are you, Matt? Pretty good, you know. We're just making it through 2025. We can't believe it's near the end. Somehow it just started, but also has taken forever to get here. Yes, feel the same. Thank you for wanting to be a part of the LifeShift Podcast. is... I'm going to say it again because my listeners hear me say this every time, but it's like this journey that I... 01:29 never could have imagined for myself to be able to talk to so many different people about really different lived experiences, but yet find how very similar we are in the way we feel about these situations, some external life shifts, some internal fires that light us and move us to new spaces in our lives. So thank you for just wanting to be a part of this. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. 01:59 Well, my pleasure, and we'll see by the end if you think it's your pleasure. So there's that. But to give anyone some context of the life shift, this show really comes from an idea of my own life shift when I was eight. I was visiting my father. My parents lived states apart. And my mom was on vacation. I was on vacation visiting my dad. And he brought me into his office one day to tell me that my mom had been killed in a motorcycle accident. And at that moment, I lived with my mom full time. Everything I did. 02:28 revolved around my mother only and I saw my dad on occasion and I knew that nothing about my life was going to be the same again. Not from my house, not from my family, my neighborhood, my friends, my school, my parent to uh move through the world. was going to be wildly different than anything I had ever imagined. And all the while, this is late 80s, early 90s, so you know, nobody was talking about. 02:57 grief or mental health or anything like that. Nothing was really that important or everyone was still sweeping things under the rug. And so I just assumed I needed to show everyone I was happy. And behind the scenes, super messy 20 year plus grief journey there. But I always wondered, do other people have these like line in the sand moments in which from one second to the next, everything is different? And now my naive brain of thinking everyone had one life shift moment has been 03:27 squashed by all my guests. And also, not everyone has this external life shift moment. And so I've learned so much from a lot of people who have created the life shift moments within themselves, this internal fire that caused them to make changes. So I say all that to say, to give some context of what the life shift is in my opinion. And I'm looking forward to hearing your story. First, I want to ask you 2025. 03:54 How does Seth show up in the world? Like, how do you identify these days? Like, who are you? I am a human having a human experience. I'm a spiritual being having a human experience. And I show up in the world with empathy and compassion, 2025. And all that I would like to say in moving forward in the future and probably always. I show up to serve and help. 04:24 as many people as I can, even sometimes when I can't. And I really believe that 2025 is a year to, in my process of wanting to help more, even if that's just speaking, is to make sure that I take care of myself as well. So that's Seth for 2025. That's a really hard part. I think that... 04:46 many of us that have some kind of empathy or a bit of empathy or a lot of empathy, it can be really draining if we don't have our own self-care, self, you know, practices. Even doing the show, sometimes I talk to people about the most traumatic events you could ever imagine in their lives. And I early on had to learn, how do I take care of myself so that I don't bring all of their story with me into my own life? So is that kind of what you mean by 05:16 making sure that you're putting yourself first, or not first, but taking care of yourself. Taking care of myself and realizing there's only so much that I can do in the world and just with people close to me. Taking it with me, I think I've learned in working with clients and things like that to not take it with me. However, we're in a different era, we're in a different year, and so it is a matter of choosing to take care of myself. 05:46 look at it like a path. I'm being called down this path. I have to keep going and I will help who I can along the way. And just making sure that I'm hydrated, making sure that I'm following my internal compass. That's what I mean by taking care of myself and wanting to even help others along the way. Yeah. Does that include wearing blinders at all in any part of that path? Or are you fully open and aware and want? 06:13 I think that blinders are good sometimes. I want to know what's going on in the world and around me. And at the same time, this has been a big year personally for discernment of, I have the capacity to help right now? And I either do or I don't. And it's kind of become very black and white, not for lack of empathy or lack of compassion, just a matter of. 06:40 I don't want to fracture myself, fracture my energy more in different ways when I'm already trying to retrieve more of it in this year right now. Yeah, it's almost like a capacity thing. It is a capacity thing. Well, I think that is beautiful. And like you said, it's 2025. But hopefully, as you move through the years coming, that you'll continue your practices that fill your cup and help others. Because I think that's the best thing we can do is humans walking this earth, right? uh 07:09 makes everything better. Just I love, I believe in, you know, unity, like through diversity, like just living in nature for so long as I'll get into my story, we need biodiversity in nature. That's the way we're the healthiest. I believe that within that should translate to humanity and just really wanting people to find the unity and just letting go of the chaos noise around them. 07:37 so that we can light each other's fires. So that service to others or even just being an open ear or you having your podcast and that relatability for your listeners to me is medicine. It's lighting each other's fire to be like, I went through it too, or I went through something similar or even different and we're gonna be okay. We're still here. I just want us to keep lighting each other's fires in this wild world. Well, I hope that you're finding more people that want to do that as well. I think... 08:06 that the pandemic brought on a lot of changes in people, reflections of what they actually want in life. And so hopefully that even makes its way in a healthy way through 2025 and beyond, because it is challenging for a lot of people. So kudos to you for what you're doing to the world and for what you're doing for yourself, because I'm sure it's very fulfilling in a lot of ways. 08:30 Yeah, just want to answer, know, fully answer my internal vision, my internal call. Love it. We're not taught to do that. not. We don't grow up knowing how to do that. So good for you. So to get to your story, maybe you can paint the picture of your life leading up to this main pivotal moment and to give us as much context as you want. can go back as far as you need to. But we'd love to know who the before Seth is so that we can understand the after. 09:00 So I grew up in the Midwest. I grew up in Northeast Ohio, grew up playing sports, and I grew up dancing and just wanting to perform since I can remember because it was the 80s, know, early 80s into the, you know, early 90s, everybody was just dancing. I had this kind of juxtaposition in life already being mixed race and playing sports and then wanting to dance. And so I found really early in my life that I was kind of in an in-between space and had to figure out 09:30 how to navigate socially and culturally. I loved playing sports. I I wrestled for eight years. I played football for 12 years. And then I started dancing early, but really started taking it serious around like 10 years old. I had a great, you know, childhood growing up and, you know, sort of moved into really listening to what I wanted to do, which was to perform and... 09:58 I went to college for a couple years and kind of dropped out. I was homeless for about eight or nine months or just, you know, staying at friends houses. I was homeless in New York City. Probably more common than we for performers, probably a lot of couch sharing. A lot of couch sharing, like actually like, you know, living in abandoned buildings. And I was so young then that it didn't really bother me because to me it was a new experience more than it was I'm without a home. 10:28 To me, as long as I had a place to like lay my head, it was such an interesting time, but I wasn't scared, I wasn't nervous. And I think that's what's most interesting. It just felt like I couldn't give up on my dream. Otherwise I was gonna have to go home to Northeast Ohio. And I said, absolutely not. Even though I love where I grew up, I wasn't gonna give up on my dream. So that was a big kind of shift into 10:57 the rest of my life, which was trust yourself. Did you have a lot of that growing up? Like, were you really, was your family very supportive of all the things that you wanted to do or were you proven something or? They were, but I, you know, I was a hyperactive kid. I'm still very hyperactive and, you know, they, I got diagnosed with ADHD when it was really coming out in the 80s, but my doctor said, you know, he doesn't need medication. He just needs to stay active, which is true. 11:26 But I do have a very overactive mind and I've had to learn a lot of different meditation techniques what works for me and just really stay active. So meditation works for me, being out in nature works for me. So I've kind of had to combat that, especially in adulthood when I am less active for certain, you know, for reasons. But really my first big shift was when probably around 11:56 between 18 and 20 years old because that was when I took my first spiritual deep dive and rabbit hole and going heavy into meditation and astral projection and just study tons of different books and DVDs when we had DVDs and was really just working on myself spiritually because there was something in me that knew there was a beyond this physical realm. And 12:23 I was still performing, literally almost every night I was meditating for two, three hours, sometimes falling asleep. And I kind of woke up to a different reality, again, beyond the physical realms, and had to start to figure out how do I navigate now in the regular world. And it kind of brought that I live between two worlds. 12:49 sort of thread, sort of storyline. I live between two worlds, again, culturally, racially. I live between two worlds, between loving sports and entertainment and performing. You know, I'm learning. Midwest and urban. Midwest and urban, yeah, like New York and the Midwest. And then now this spiritual non-physical realms, and then the physical realms where there's not many people to talk to about it. And that sort of duality from 18 to 20, 13:19 lasted me all the way out through my career, all the way to where I am in my early 40s right now. So I up until this point have always bounced between doing the Broadway show and then going away to the woods for six months. And coming back, yeah, I worked at a primitive skills school for six months and I just lived in the woods and I learned primitive skills and nature philosophy. And then, you know, I'd come back six months, a year later and do another Broadway show. 13:48 And then I would, you know, after my last Broadway show, I left for seven years and just completely went on my spiritual journey. It's kind of brought me back to, I still help young performing artists and I'm still in my spiritual journey and just kind of learning how to do both because one is a passion, one is my calling and the other I'm really good at and I want to help those, you know, next generation to help themselves. But that first 18 to 20 years old, 14:18 It just opened my eyes to everything because I wanted to understand as a late teens, early twenties, what is going on here? What is going on on this planet? What triggered your interest in that? Or was that something always like as a kid, it just feels like it was a different, maybe it wasn't the time period that a lot of people were doing that. So it's almost like, I'm curious as to what triggered you to go deeper into that and not just dismiss it as another. 14:47 thought that you had? I've never had that question asked to me in all the podcasts. that I love that question. Thank you, because I've never thought of it. But as soon as you were saying it, I was living. I wasn't living in Harlem. I was living in Manhattan still. And I would go up to Harlem all the time because I just loved the culture. That's where I would shop. And there was one guy, his name was Ra, and he sold all kinds of spiritual esoteric DVDs. 15:18 And I would walk past multiple times and something about his table kept like alerting me to look. And so I, after maybe three or four times, different times, I started to buy some of his DVDs, which was David Icke and about extraterrestrials and angels. And it was more of a breadcrumb. I call it a breadcrumb or something that just pulls your focus out of all the chaos of New York City or wherever you live and says, focus here. 15:48 That was more of the trigger. I we have an internal, we have, you know, Claire audience as we have Clairevoyance. There was something Claire audience happening that I couldn't recognize at the time until now that kind of pulled my ear and my focus to start to gather some of the information that he was providing. But no event in my life, just a, it was the beginning of me learning how to listen internally. Yeah. 16:15 But I mean, it kind of is an event because like, what if you didn't set up that day? What if, you know, or what if you'd walked a different street or who knows, you know, life can do that. And curious, I was just curious because sometimes those thoughts that are maybe, and this is not meant to be demeaning in any way, but at the time were not mainstream kind of conversations. They weren't things that... 16:42 that people were talking about openly in all public spaces, right? Like they were just, it was something that existed and people were doing and thinking and talking about clearly, but it wasn't like an 18 year old, 19 year old, 20 year old was typically talking about. I'm just curious of how you would choose to do that, but it sounds like it was this inner fire that also saw the invitation on the table. 17:08 Yes, all the invitation and after getting a couple of DVDs of information, some of it was really left field, but it was information that I had never received before. Some of it hit so deeply within my soul that I'm like, this makes sense compared to a lot of else of what I'm seeing because I live between spaces. Living between those spaces and starting to understand that at 18. 17:35 I was trying to understand what was going on in the world and within society. And for me, this was information that helped me see between the spaces of why we are where we are in society at this up to that point, and even up to today. were more advanced for an 18 year old than a lot of 18 year old brains because 18 year old are like, where are we going to go next? what are we going to That was still me. Oh, okay. I was still partying like hard, but 18:03 It was that kind of duality of my life where Fridays and Saturdays, I mean, that was in New York City. But then sometimes I just wouldn't go out and throughout the week I would study or meditate. Yeah. Did you grow up in religion at all? No. My parents came from different religious backgrounds, but they weren't practicing. I was reading and going to like different churches. I was reading different material and so... 18:28 All of that to kind of come full circle, it's a part of who I am. I remembered who I was after this long, you know, 20-plus year journey. Yeah. So growing up, you didn't have like the organized religion structure and you were searching for like the meaning of life essentially, not in a... Essentially. I mean, we had, you know, my mom, with my mom we celebrated Hanukkah, with my dad we celebrated Christmas. I mean, the family celebrated both really, but my parents came from two completely different, but... 18:58 having to go to church or temple or anything like that, we didn't have to do. Yeah, and you didn't have to like, same thing, like growing up, my dad is technically Catholic. Did we go on Christmas and Easter? We sure did, but did we know what they were talking about? Did we follow any, you know, like, it was like a checkbox. It was just something that we did. And the reason I ask that question is not anything about religion, but I think that those that have grown up in religion and 19:26 don't necessarily buy into the religion that they grew up in because, know, they're kind of just, it's part of their family. It's not something they got to choose at first. I think if those people kind of tend to seek out more, where they feel more spiritual and they kind of move into this, okay, I understand this, but like, what is it really? What does it really mean? 19:50 And religion is different from spirituality and what you do and all that. understand that. But just curious if any of your upbringing pushed you in a direction. Sounds like not really. It was more just like an open space, like, because it was already an acceptance, you know? Did you... This is, sorry, tangent, this like squirrel moment. Go ahead. Did you feel like you belonged in all of your spaces or did you always feel like... 20:21 some part of you was not in the right space? I always felt like I was home in different spaces, but I think I learned how to chameleon very well, very quickly. I just had to find relatability in whatever space I was in. Now, did I get made fun of from kind of crossing over in these different spaces? Yeah, but not within the, not within my football team, not within my choir, not within my dance team. 20:51 It was just people that didn't see and didn't understand because of their parental programming. Yeah. Just curious. Because I think sometimes people that talk about, you know, having these opposed, I don't want to use opposing, but two different things that seemingly are opposing, they should, mean, sports is performing too, right? I could feel like. And dance is athletic. Exactly. So, but I feel like sometimes people that they just mask. 21:20 in those spaces. They mask that they're, they fit this box and then when they go over here, they put on that mask. I'm so curious if you felt like you fit, but it sounds like you did. Yeah, I didn't mask because I had too much uh energy to pretend. You're like, I just love it. And here we go. Let's go. that's better or worse. Yeah. Well, we've all done that. Whatever we're in. But I love that. I love that as an 18 year old that you had enough 21:49 and confidence in yourself to like dig deep into these areas and still fulfill the other parts that they enjoyed you, like go into an area that seems like maybe different than others. Curiosity. Yeah. But like you went hard though. Like some people are curious and read a book, but like you were like, let's I was devotional. Yeah. And did you find it was changing your life? That was like... 22:17 That was like one of many first big life shifts because things started to make sense to me because I wanted to understand. I already I still remember my my my initial reasoning even as a teenager in high school. I want to understand why is it so hard for people to be happy? Why is it so hard for people to make money? Why is it so hard? Why are we all fighting? You know, why are we? 22:46 Going to these wars, know, mean, 9-11 happened when I think my junior year. Why do they want to, why does one government want to hurt another government or one country? I just had too many whys. And then I really started to dig in, not just the spiritual aspect, but the geopolitical aspect of why things happen within this world, you know? My dad's black, my mom's white. Why can't they go anywhere without their every once in a while being criticism? 23:15 you know, like friends and, you know, in the dance world, if you come across, like, why do... I'm not gay, but why do you make fun of my gay friends? Or if I was gay, why? What are we doing? Like, why can't we just... Why can't I be who I am? Why can't you be who you are? And we just chill out and have fun. Yeah. I think a lot of us have this question still. So we're still there. And I just, I mean, I've come to many conclusions since then, but that... There were so many whys of... 23:44 what I was observing and I was like, this, where am I? This doesn't make sense. Yeah. So 18 to 20, you're kind of dipping your toes in this or you're getting soaking wet and then you start to live this or not start, but you more intentionally live this duality out loud. Like you've run off, you do your show and then you take some time and do something. What does that look like for you? Give me an, I don't know what. 24:13 this means, but like, why, what was the first time you chose to say, okay, show's over? After I did my second Broadway show was in the heights. And after I did that, I pretty much pretty soon thereafter, and I had a business and everything too. I was taking skills at a primitive skills school where you learn how to make a, you know, natural fire, how to find food and build your own shelter. And 24:42 Being outside. In New York? It was in New Jersey and believe it or not in the uh National Reserve and then in Northern California. But when I was outside all the time, I'm like, oh, this makes sense. I don't know how to do this. Why don't people know how to do this? Why are we not taught this in school? Why is this not like a course sophomore year, freshman year? I was like, I had an aha moment and I was living out there. 25:09 And so when there wasn't classes, it would be me or two or three other people just on thousands of acres of just open land, unless there was hikers passing through. And I had a lot of spiritual activity start to happen at night. I started to have to learn discernment of what does this cold energy passing me feel like? What does this warm energy feel like? So I had to differentiate between benevolent spirits and malevolent or not so benevolent spirits. 25:39 And again, so my world went from me, me, me in my own head, you love me on Broadway, ah you know, to what's going on on the landscape, what's going on in this spiritual realm that I can feel that I really need to pay attention to. Did it feel like coming home to yourself? Like feeling like this feels right, even though the other one also felt right? It did. And. 26:07 I thought I had to in that period, right? I thought I had to just be done with the entertainment industry and done with performing because this other thing really made sense to my heart. There was people coming from all over the world to learn these skills and we would share food and that made sense to me. And we would share stories around a fire and that made sense to me. And we could, you know, you'd have a... 26:37 a CEO from a Wall Street company or a Wall Street bank, and you'd have a woman that, you know, sews hats for a living. And you'd have these people come together and there was unity and that is what made sense to me. And then after I had that experience, you know, the stage called me again and I was like, you know what, I missed the stage too. But I realized that I didn't know before was that if I love what I do, 27:07 And I perform and people feel good. I'm doing something good for the world. And that makes sense to me. The way it's, it doesn't have to be escapism, but storytelling is as old as that fire that I sat around for six months. And so things kind of started to like, make sense that there is a duality in this world. You could try to choose one side or the other, but both are going to exist. There's going to be dark, there's going to be light, and there's going to be in between. 27:37 And that was around like 28 years old where it started to click. Like there's nothing I can do to always be on the light side. I'm gonna have, I'm gonna crash out every once in a while or I'm gonna want X, Y or Z. And that was that next big shift where I was like, the world is the world and I get to choose where I wanna be in it. When you went back to Broadway or back to the stage, did... 28:05 Performing feel different after that experience because I feel like maybe you felt different I'm wondering if if it changed how you performed or how you? the experience itself, yeah, it it I Was different and it was very hard to come back and live in New York City again. Yeah and Eat fast food. No or eat. Yeah, just not food from the world or Mary not a blueberry. Yes 28:34 The hardest part I had was I was turning on my facilities, my internal facilities to feel like physically like on a landscape really, really far to know is there a coyote over there or is there a deer over there? Should I leave that alone? And then on the norm and then expanding my spiritual capabilities to when I came and living back in New York City or just being around people in close proximity, I was starting to pick up on all of 29:02 what they were, I could see behind their mask and it bothered me. And so I had to learn that I had to create this kind of dial where I had to dial down everything to be like, I don't believe in looking into other people without their permission, right? I don't believe in, um I just don't believe in that. And so it was happening naturally and I had to like pull back all my energy and that was hard. But when I got on the stage, 29:31 I could let it happen again because when you're on a live stage, you have to be laser focused. Somebody could fall, you gotta pick them up and keep saying your line and keep moving. That is where I could kind of get back to that um natural awareness. And then after I did that last show, I left again and I left for seven years and was like, I got a spiritual tap on my shoulder and I was like, this is your last Broadway show. I heard my... 29:58 higher voice, my higher self say, this is your last show. And it was scary and it was sad and I never, didn't tell anybody. So how did you, you just left? Bye. I had, I had three, four months left in my contract and I knew I wasn't going to renew and I knew I was getting called to travel and I was going to be led spiritually as long as I like prayed and was in my heart. So I left for. 30:29 since uh mid 2017, finished my Broadway show and then I just was going to Peru, going to Mount Shasta, going to all these mountains and jungles and just learning different sacred techniques. I had multiple awakenings there through plant medicine. No surprise. Never heard people do that. Yeah, right? And so it's just... 30:55 Maybe I'm jumping ahead and bouncing around. So my apologies for my swirl way of thinking and explaining, but I've kind of come full circle to realizing that life has many little shifts and then major shifts, know, big traumatic experience. Like I lost my father to cancer. were going to lose, you know, parents and it hurts and we're going to lose family members and friends. 31:23 And sometimes we lose family members and friends to their own depression or to their own psychosis. And I just am at the point now where I'm trying to understand, which is what I share with my friends and people that I care about, is how can I navigate my own path? 31:46 and kind of like, kind of see it as a boat on the ocean. How can I navigate my own path? Because we're all on this ocean of life. It's just how I've begun to see it as of this year. The waves are gonna get crazy. And then sometimes it's fine, but when they get crazy, how can I navigate my ship? Because I know it's, I know where safety is. I know how to ride these waves now. And how can I... 32:14 help other people on their ship because people are drowning through or getting ready to be capsized per se because these waves are so drastic within society and spiritually and geopolitically and I mean, you name it. And that's kind of been my focus is to really help people stay grounded within themselves. 32:41 and be able to navigate their own ship through these waves. We're gonna get through them, but... It's hard though, in the moment you... Most people don't think you'll... Like, it's impossible. How are we gonna get through this? Like, for instance, when my mom died, I was like, no chance. Like, life is not really possible after this. Because I had... There was no picture of it anymore. I was like, let's wipe that slate clean. And I was eight. So... 33:10 I don't know, I can't, I didn't imagine much more than nine, you know, like I was ready for my next birthday party, whatever that was going to be. But I've talked to so many people that they hit these moments in their lives in which it feels really insurmountable. But we talk through the conversation, right? And we get to this 2025 version of them and they look back and you're just like, who knew that the human spirit is that resilient? Like we knew logically, I think, but personally, 33:39 It's really hard and maybe not for you because you have more awareness in that space, but like for people that don't go down that road, we're like, it just feels impossible. So I love that you're helping people. Yeah, because it hurts. mean, I think. Do those things hurt for you because you are aware and you have the answers to some of the whys? Like, for instance, when this is going to sound terrible, but I don't mean it in a terrible way. When your father passed, as much as that hurts, did it 34:09 hurt differently for you because you had this more awareness of other pieces of the wise? It did. I mean, I couldn't imagine going through it at a younger age because I would have been in shambles, you know, and I needed my dad because again of my hyperactivity, he kind of really kept me in line. So when he passed away, I had to step into manhood in a different way. But I already knew there's life for me. My personal belief is I believe that there's life beyond this physical realm. So I was OK. 34:40 But it doesn't take away, you know, him dropping 60, 80 pounds and me having to lift my father. So it still hurt. But because I had that awareness of there is something more for him, there's something more for him beyond his suffering. There's something more for me that, okay, because I was angry at my father for different reasons, even though he was a great dad, he wasn't always a great husband. But I realized like he did so much and that's what I need to focus on. 35:09 and that I am the evolution of my parents. So I'm the next best evolution of him and then my mother. And what can I do to be that better evolution of our family? But it still hurts. And so I think that's what's keeping me going throughout this year, 2025, is that we have to know that there's a 2026, 2027, and 2028 up into 2030 and beyond. And it's going to be scary. 35:39 Yeah. And maybe we can't, I think most of us can't really see past these next few years. But I think we have to train ourselves to believe it and to like take care of ourselves and just check in on our friends and our family. Like we just have to ride the waves. It's really hard. I'm sure you see this with people that you encounter as potential clients or something like that. we've, and those of us that grew up in the 80s and 90s, maybe the 70s too, 36:08 We're just conditioned to have a lot of these feelings that we have, right? Like there's a lot of things that we have to shed. For instance, like half the, more than half the conversations I have on this show are about things that growing up I was not allowed to talk about. Like that was like private. We don't ask these questions. We don't ask questions that could potentially make someone uncomfortable. And I'm like, now that I've kind of. 36:35 quote unquote, completed my grief journey with losing my mom, I'm like, Matt, just ask the questions because that's how we learn. That's how we'd, like, I would love if I ask a question to people and they're just like, no, you're wrong. And that would have been so scary as a 10 year old, a 15 year old, a 20 year old. So the conditioning that we had is what so many of us just need to like let go. And I bet that's challenging for you. 37:03 shed it with our parents were trying to teach us etiquette, but we needed answers. We needed to, we needed the answer to the why even if you saw them. Yeah. It's like we did some of us didn't. Yeah. Or just say, you don't know. And we say, okay, you don't know either. Okay, great. You don't know. But yeah, we needed the wise and, but again, there's evolution because now we can have those conversations. But I think people in seventies, eighties, nineties, we also have a different tenacity and a different. oh 37:31 a different tenacity and a different grit that we can help the next generation kind of move through these next three, four years and kind of tell them honestly, like, it's gonna suck. It's going to suck, but you have to stay strong because they didn't go through what we went through. Yeah. Well, and it's interesting too, because you said that you are helping younger... 37:56 performers and whatnot. So you're probably talking to a bunch of like Gen Z young. They probably have different mindsets than we did growing up. Are you seeing that? That they're more open to things? They're more... they're definitely much more open, but they definitely have a... Let's put them on blast. I'm just Yeah, let's put them on blast. mean, God bless them. They went through a pandemic. They went through so much stuff. My, you know, so... 38:25 I help men in men's wellness and then I help young performers. One of them just said, you you give me permission to dream. And that was huge. And that just touched my heart. like, that's why I still want to help them. I want to keep that. It makes me emotional just talking about it, but I want to keep the dreamers uh imagination and belief alive because they're our storytellers and we need storytellers. But they have a lot of uh crushing feelings. 38:53 So when we weren't, our generation wasn't allowed to feel and wasn't allowed to talk, they get the benefit of talking, but not that thick skin that we had to have. And so I think that we were over here and we were over here and now we have to find a balance of communicating like their generation, but us teaching them to have a tenacity to just sometimes you gotta put our feelings and just keep going until, know, and find a balance of both. But yeah, there are a lot of 39:23 Beautiful younger generation and just to be honest like they I tell my my students I was like you got a buck up. This is the time to fight for what you believe in Yeah, and it was harder for us to quit. I think I think I'm easier quit. No, or we a fun of or or I'm get in trouble at home, know, for me It was a different experience because losing my mom felt like abandonment 39:49 in a small brain, like a young child's brain. And so I took on tendencies of perfectionism. so I just figured I had to be perfect or my dad was going to leave. And that lasted until I was like 20 something. And so there was like, it was like complex. I couldn't quit. But I also stifled myself because I chose only the things that I knew I could be semi good at. So it was like there was no challenge there, which I'm like, 40:19 Man, had we had the tools in the early 90s for mental health and grieving and all these things for little kids, I'd be in a different place. We wouldn't be having this conversation, but I might have tried a lot of cool things. you know, we're all, I guess, our circumstances bring us to where we need to be, you know, and in time, I guess. That's what I'm giving myself excuses right now. 40:41 No, no, I don't think it's excuses and I'm just really grateful because I have a hard time giving myself patience and giving myself gratitude for my journey. My journey looked to the outside, looks like maybe accomplishment, but inside I'm just trying to keep this calm, keep my mind calm and stay in my heart. But I really do believe that because we ask those questions and because we want to... 41:07 help others in another way. mean, you said you've done 200 and how many episodes already? This is 224. This is 224. So people have an opportunity to listen to 223 other episodes of you just wanting to have a safe space and a safe container. And for that, I give you gratitude and I honor you because so many people need to hear your story and the stories and the container that you have with others. And so it's like, 41:37 We got to give ourselves credit, even if it's in our 40s and 50s and 60s, because I don't care if we only help like three people in our lives. That's three more people. I'm trying to remember that movie now that I was from the 90s. It was like, it was like the kid that was like proving the point that if you help one person and they help one person. Pay it forward. Yeah. And then you pay it forward. And then as a tragic set. Yeah. Pay it forward. That was the name of it. Yeah. Yeah. I believe in Helen Hunt? 42:06 Yes, yes, I believe in that. Yeah, I agree as well You know something you said when you said that that your student said you're just giving me permission to continue dreaming or whatever that particular thing is that's what I think of This show is is a permission to other people to share their story because their story matters and I found that Storytelling in whatever way you do it, but specifically through a podcast 42:33 Storytelling has such a power and I know it sounds cheesy and I think it's logically makes sense, but I've really seen or witnessed people telling their story for the first time and seeing the power that it gives them to do things afterwards. Like I had a guest who came on, talked openly about her fertility struggles to create a family. And this was the first time she had told anyone or talked about it besides her husband and like her mother or something. 43:03 And I say that because there's a lot of power in that, it actually, what happened is she felt so confident after talking about it, because people were reaching out to her and saying they have the same situation and, I felt so alone, blah, blah. But she went to the HR department at her company, and now her company gives like a $50,000 stipend to family support, like fertility treatment and or adoption. 43:31 That's the power of story to me now because I have that example. It's like someone telling their story, it might change their life just by getting it out of their head, right? And sharing it with someone and hearing, oh, I did that too, or I felt that way too. Because we have a lot more in common than we have that separates us, and that's cheesy, but it's true. I don't think it's cheesy. And I think that in a world, again, that is trying to divide us, I don't think we're trying to divide us. I think there is a program, a system that is trying to divide us that 43:59 these podcasts, the storytelling is the threads that are connecting, keeping humanity together, which is that care, that sharing. So. Except we're battling all the podcasts, the super popular ones that like to divide us. That's OK. I think there's enough to go around. mean, maybe not we may not all get paid from it, but I mean, I don't care. I love talking to like other people and sharing and learning from them. Yeah. What what do you think like? 44:26 is the most different about you now versus, say, 15? 44:36 Wow. um The most different. It's not about me anymore. It's not about me anymore. That's the biggest thing. It's about what I can leave behind in terms of lighting up other lights. I know I said it before, but in terms of keeping the dreamers, know, helping men, helping my partner, you know, learning from my partner and helping my partner learn and grow and just... 45:05 remaining a good human in a wild world. And so even the changes that I do within myself is also to make sure that people can see that there is growth, that there is evolution. I believe in evolution. I believe we as humanity are meant to evolve into a more loving, higher dimensional, higher spiritual, even technological way. And so it's not about me anymore and what... 45:34 and everything that I want to do, it's how can I do what I want to do and help people along the way? Yeah. I mean, that's big and beautiful and it's so like simple but complex. It's very interesting, right? Like you say it, sounds so odd. It's not about me anymore, but that is, it's huge. It's a huge foundation that has to come with that. I can't help because I did like theater in high school and had a great time with it. It wasn't good, but it was fun. Do you miss? 46:03 the stage? there pieces of you that feel like you should be back? I'm here. Is there a piece of you that might? There is a piece of me that might. So I'm leaving it open to the universe. I'm I'm just doing the next best part. I'm just doing the next part of my journey the best that I can and what I think I should be doing. There's a part of me that knows what I should be doing. And but there's that other part of me that I'm like, I'm just going down this way. I have no idea what's on the other side of once I get over that mountaintop. But 46:33 There is a part of me that misses it. just don't want to, I don't want to work in Times Square, least for Broadway, but maybe it's not on Broadway. I would do, I'm open to it. I think it just had to be show that I would want to do eight shows a week again. That's the thing. Yeah, that's challenge. What was your favorite show to do? 46:53 Is that like picking your favorite kid? Yeah, I I toured with Madonna and I loved being on tour. So, and I loved just when people can scream back at you because they're having an amazing time. That was one of my favorite shows, tours. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I think it's people fantasize about these things and then they don't necessarily think of all the details that come with doing eight shows a week and... 47:19 what that actually looks like and the rest that you need and the self-care that you need to survive that. Maybe after you turn like 25, I'm sure you could probably barrel through in the early 20s if you needed to. Yeah, you don't have a life and after 25, you're definitely, you know, holding your self. and just it's real, but you don't have a life outside of it. In a way, in a way you don't really have one. And your life is probably centered around the people that you work with just because you're 47:48 with them so often. It is, and so it's kind of been difficult in some ways to kind of leave, not leave it behind, but you know, I'm still triggered in it to a gig economy and kind of had to figure out, I know what to do on stage and I know what to do in the mountains and in the woods, but what do I do in the regular like time and all I could do is just create. So I've created my own things for myself. 48:17 Yeah, because you still have to pay the bills and the things that come with this version of the world we live in, right? So finding a way to pay those bills with something that feels really heart-led, soul-led, however you want to describe it, I think is really beautiful and commendable. And the trust that you had in yourself to find that path or to follow it, I think is bigger than a lot of people might recognize, or maybe even yourself. 48:44 Yeah, I still have to do jobs that I don't want to do, just like everybody else. And I still complain about it sometimes, and then I tell myself not to complain, but I just... It's allowed. Yeah, I just, I've seen that when I do something, even if I don't get paid for it, and I love it, what I get from giving, it's not even that I'm looking for a return, but it's like, it's almost like it feels good to get it out, or if there is an energy return of... 49:12 somebody's light bulb goes off, that's beautiful for me. I think that's, you know what I say Matt, if I had like $10 million, I'd probably just volunteer. I have like four, maybe two that I can think of off the of my head, but I'd probably just volunteer the rest of my life. That's a lot better than a lot of people's answers. Yeah. I mean, I'd have a Ferrari probably. Well, that's fine. You gotta get there. gotta get to the volunteer spots. Yeah. And then most of time I'll go like be cleaning up the ocean with, you know, some of these companies that 49:41 I follow and yeah. If 2025 Seth, if you could talk to the Seth that was kind of bouncing around to different couches, maybe living in abandoned buildings, is there anything that you would want to tell him about this, this journey he was going to continue or follow through with? I wouldn't want to tell him anything. Nothing. Nothing. 50:09 Actually, the only thing I would say is keep trusting yourself. Yeah, because you don't want to interfere, right? Don't want to interfere and I don't want to know my future. And as crazy or as beautiful as it might be, I would just say keep trusting yourself. And that's what I would say to anybody. Even if you don't, then just get quiet and start to listen to what your heart wants. 50:39 regardless of what's going on around you or what people might say around you because it is the only thing that will keep you sane is you Doing what your heart wants because that's all we get we take nothing with us except our experiences and the love or lack of love, you know in in in in the world and so we can choose to love we can choose to trust ourselves and we can choose to 51:07 in our free time, do what we want. ah Quiet, the noise is probably one of the hardest things that people would have to do. But once you find it, I think you're able to really tune in to what fills your cup. That's kind how I think of doing something that feels right in my heart. I say it fills my cup. I know it's not unique, but in a way, it gives a good visual for me to be like, oh, I'm pouring into the right one today. oh 51:36 When I'm doing something else that I don't really love, I'm wasting some of that water or whatever it is that we're putting into it. So I love that you trust yourself this much. And I also love that you still have moments where you're not perfect, because who is? None of us. And I say I trust myself, but I'm trusting myself to be like, my. And deep down, I'm like, oh my god, where are you taking us? 52:01 But you know, this is our life to live and I think so many of us grew up with this like assembly line life that we were just kind of checking the boxes and doing. So I love that you leaned into so many things that I think a lot of people in your cohorts probably would not have. So I think it's probably brought you a lot more joy than maybe you would have had otherwise. Yeah, thank you for that. Yeah. If people want to like... 52:30 learn more about your story, learn more about you, connect with you, tell you their story. Like what's the best way to get in Seth's orbit? Yeah, my website is imsephstewart.com. I just came out with a book two months ago called Follow Your Vision, Live Your Truth. As cliche as that might sound, it's been the theme of my life, but Follow Your Vision, Live Your Truth is on Amazon and on my website, imsephstewart.com. And my social media handles are all the same. I am Seth Stewart. Perfect. That makes it easy. Yeah. Yeah. 52:59 No, I really encourage someone, and hopefully you don't mind this, but I encourage someone if they're listening to your story and they feel like some part of it mirrors something that they've experienced and they're struggling to push past that barrier to reach out to you and just tell you, or tell you that your story resonated with them and made them feel allowed to be who they are and what they're doing. Please feel free, because we need community. 53:24 And I'm just a I see you, so I see you. I see you, I hear you, I understand you. I think all of those are so powerful and a lot of things that we don't often hear. 53:36 So thank you for just being a part of the LifeShift Podcast. I feel like we went down some squirrel tangents and I think they were beautiful and they were meant to be. So thank you for that. Thank you so much. And you would think after 220-something episodes I would know how to sign off. Not really good at it yet. So I just want to thank everyone for listening and let you know that I will be back next week with a brand new episode of the LifeShift Podcast. Thanks again, Seth. Thanks, Matt. 54:14 For more information, please visit www.thelifeshiftpodcast.com