- Hey everybody. Welcome to the Hoffman Podcast. Sean Amos is our guest today. He's an author, he's a musician. He plays the harmonica. Sean does so many cool things. I hope you enjoy this episode. Before we start, I'll just mention that there is mentions of child sexual abuse. This episode contains brief mention, so that may not be suitable for all listeners. Please enjoy Sean Amos as he reflects on his life and his process.
Welcome to Love's Everyday Radius, a podcast brought to you by the Hoffman Institute. My name is Drew Horning, and on this podcast we catch up with graduates of the process and have a conversation with them about how their work in the process is informing their life outside of the process. How their spirit and how their love are living in the world around them, their everyday radius. Hey everybody. Welcome to the Hoffman - Podcast. Sean Amos is our guest. Sean, welcome.
- Thank you. It's great to be here, man. It's great to be here. - It is great to have you. You did the process in what month? - Oh, boy. I did in 2008. I'm certain about that. I think it was August. I'm pretty sure it was a, a summer - August of 2008. Wow. Yeah, - I know. A long time ago, - . I didn't realize it was that long ago. - Yeah, 2008 BC - . You have done so much in your life. Will you introduce yourself a little bit? There's so much to share about
who you are and what you've done. Yeah, I, - I, I worn a few hats. I guess. I, I spend a chunk of my time singing and writing and recording and performing blues music, uh, under, I guess a bit of an alter ego that the Reverend Sean AMO is what I perform under. And that's a, a big chunk of my time in a, in a big piece of my heart and in a good year.
I'm playing in Europe and the us you know, a hundred dates or so a year, managed to get, you know, recording out every, you know, year, a year and a half or so, new, you know, album's worth of material. Currently writing a new album that hopefully will get out next year. I spend part of my time as a partner in, uh, a communications agency that's based in New York called Hudson Cutler. My, my title there, there's Partner and Chief Storytelling Officer, which is a, a little pretentious.
But I, I spend my time helping clients, which are mainly in the B2B space, manage their sort of, uh, content, you know, help help them figure out how to tell their stories to various constituencies and do a lot of media training and helping executives communicate and, and present themselves more effectively and, and close the gap between how they wish to be seen and how they are seen.
And then as of late, I, I, I've become a children's book author, I, I, I wrote a middle grade, uh, novel that was published last year called Cookies and Milk, which won an NAACP image award. And it's a semi autobiographical novel about a kid named Ellis, which is my son's name, who grew up in a cookie store in Hollywood in the 1970s, which is essentially my own childhood. And the sequel for that book is coming out in October of this year.
Those are the three ways that I make my living and, uh, the three ways that I sort of work out my work out my stuff. , - There's so much there. Author and musician and writer and podcast host. - Yeah, we did a few podcast series where I interviewed called The Cause of It All, which was named after an album I put out by the same name. And it was me interviewing the offspring of famous blues musicians and sort of this a chance to talk about legacy.
'cause I live with a bit of that with my own father and talk about race and talk about how to, you know, get out of a shadow of someone else and, you know, stand in your own son. Right. A little bit. - And you alluded to being the, the son of a dad who has a famous cookie company. - Yes. My, uh, my father, Wally Amos was known as Famous Amos. So he, he was a talent agent back in the sixties.
Uh, he was the first black agent at the way Morris Agency booked bands like Son Garfunkel and The Animals and Solo and Burke, who I later got to work with ironically. And, uh, and he became a, a talent manager, and they started a cookie company called Famous Anderson. And that's, that's become his, you know, what, what he's most known for. - So all of that, back in 2008, what was the cause what was the pain point that had you say, let me back then, the process was eight days.
Let me take eight days outta my life at least, and step into this Hoffman experience. - So the short answer is that Rona Elliot and Roger Rossi, uh, who are dear old friends, and Rona and Raz have known each other since the Halian days of the sixties. And I've known Rona and Roger since I was a child. My father actually officiated their wedding. And so I've known them since I was, since I was a kid. And they had a front row seat to nearly all of the pain and trauma in my life.
They, they, they witnessed the, the, a lot of the, the chaos and neglect just, uh, uh, unfortunate circumstances that, that were a part of my childhood. And they sort of played this, you know, guiding hand in my life forever. My, my, my youngest child's middle name is Elliot after grandmother. So they've known me more than anyone else. And being the Hoffman grads that they are and, and being the astute spiritual beings that they are, they had known how bad they, I needed something like that.
And so they'd mentioned you, they dropped hints about over the years and sort of mentioned it, and I was aware of it. And like most people, I kept it at an arm's length. You know, I was very reactionary. This, this sounds like a cult. This sounds weird. It is too hippie dippy. This is too, has eight days to go away, you know, every sort of reason in the world to dismiss it. And it was never like a hard sell or anything.
But whenever it was mentioned to me, those reactions I just mentioned were really sort of inner dialogue things. And Nate tensing up about, about the whole thing. And then I hit a bottom. You hit multiple bottoms, right? I mean, there's, there's always like a new trap door to fall through. And so the first trap door was, I was married and I had an affair, and, and it was horrible.
And I've been in, in, out therapy my whole life, and I was fairly aware of on some level of, of unhealthy patterns I was repeating in my life. And then there's some that I could draw a line to and say, oh, yeah, this is why this happening. But for whatever reason, I'm uncap, I'm incapable of cutting that cord or fixing it. And there are other ones that work a mystery to me. Why am I behaving this way?
Why, you know, someone who has a set of values in a sort of moral code that I live within, why am I stepping outside of that? I have no clue why. So there's two buckets, right, of like things for which I had answers, but for whatever reason, fear, I was not willing to address them in another bucket of things for which I had no answers, but was frustrated by this unseen hand that was seeming pulling strings on me. - Wow. That is fantastic.
Descriptor of awareness and consciousness versus, you know, being unconscious and yet being aware of the impact of what's happening. - Yeah. We're constantly coming into consciousness, right? I mean, and first, as conscious as I prided myself on being in some areas, you know, I was completely unconscious in other areas. There's a whole other room that existed in my brain that was completely unknown altogether. I mean, like I said, that is sort of unconsciousness.
Anyway, so I, I knew that I wanted to save my marriage, that that was not in doubt to me. And I knew I had to begin a, a journey of, of reconciliation and of redemption and just sort of piece this thing together. And in the brief period that separated from my wife, I stayed with Ronan and Roger, and once again, they said, , you should probably go off. And that was the moment where it, it made complete sense. And, and where else would I go in, in that moment? So I went, and that was the beginning
of the end. And the beginning of the beginning. - Wow. The beginning of the end. And the beginning of the beginning. So take us to your process some 15 years ago. What do you remember what happened for you? Take us into your week. - You know, I, I was, um, I was terrified. I was totally terrified. So I had this sort of, I felt like I was driving to my funeral or something, and, and, um, I, I remember just my, the cynicism I had, I, I call myself a skeptic now. I was a cynic then.
And I remember just the knee jerk reaction I had to anything, the loving language and the, the expressions of, you know, non-judgment and safety. Really, I, I, I, I thought that was like fake and phony and like, oh my God, I'm not gonna make it through this thing, you know, uh, this, well, I'll make this. And I remember hearing words that were very dissonant to me together.
There was, um, you know, this idea of disassociating passion or compassion with manipulation or disassociating, the idea that one can be sensual but not sexual. There was a lot of unhealthy intertwining of different emotional language. I live very firmly in my intellectual, we talk about the quad, right? And so all the emotional language was really challenging for me at first. But there's a moment when I decided, you know, I'm here.
I'm wasting a lot of money and a lot of time if I just don't go all in, I remember early on, you know, day two, maybe a bit where I just made a conscious decision. I was just gonna drop it, drop this in the system, and just, you know, go all in. And I did. And it was, it was hair raising, - Interesting. Hair raising. That's not what I expected you to say. - I tell people that it really, it's like getting the owner's manual to yourself. And I feel like I just realize, oh, wow.
I, I've had no idea all these unseen forces that have been moving me through the world. There's, there's analogy that use it very often about being blown by the breeze and, you know, versus being able to sort of like, stand firmly. And that was me. I mean, a hundred percent, I, I, I was just at the whim of all of these unseen forces and past traumas and, and unconscious reactions to my parents and this and that. And so to get control over myself was really profound.
It was really profound. And the chance to forgive all involved, right? You know, this forgiveness exercises are so heavy, and, and there's tools I still use, but the events that stuck with me were the funeral. Whole exercise was really a powerful day for me. The letter writing experience, particularly with my mother, flowing her voice through me and having her write to me began a journey that has continued to this day. And the day of silence was profound.
Those are the things that have, that have stuck with me. It started of putting words in most, you know, I haven't talked about this in a while, and, and I still use this language. I mean, I, I use some of this language in my life all the time. I teach staff at my agency sort of language that's Hoffman inspired the idea of like, I'm experiencing you as this, you know, this versus you are, I mean, that was like that, that's a game changer.
And I've used it every day since, you know, I run part of a communications agency, right? So it's like Hoffman helped me, you sort become a better communicator for myself and for the people around me. Yeah. It, it fundamentally rewired my brain, man. It, it's really did. - Wow. It's not every day you can say that about an experience that it fundamentally rewired your brain.
- Yeah. And you kind of realize how, I mean, you know, the more you get into it, I mean, I think for most people would know or or led to belief that this process pulls upon lots of different influences. I mean, there's, there's aspects of it that are akin to cognitive behavioral therapy, and there's aspects of therapy akin to Buddhism, and there's, things are akin to it, Taoism and Christianity. I mean, they sort of pull from all this stuff.
It's a great, you know, mix tape of, of all these sort of different psychological and spiritual practices that have been proven, you know, over years and years and years and years.
And it's helpful to go into it having had some background and, you know, having had some therapy to begin with or, I, I sometimes think about if I went in there just totally cold and had, you know, zero therapy in my life and zero opportunity for any kind of self-reflection, I, I think that would probably be a difficult place to start from.
The mistake I made at Post Hoffman was thinking that all the trap doors had been opened up, you know, and, and so then all the corners of my, you know, brain and, and, and psyche and, and heart had, you know, all the light was shining everywhere. And, and it wasn't the case, you know, at all. And when, you know, a new trap door opened up many years later, this, this would've been now 2017, I guess 20, you know, where I went through, um, another marital challenge and, and ultimately got divorced.
And the failure of that was so profound, and I'm like, oh my God, it didn't work. It didn't, it didn't work. I failed Hoffman . But the new sort of, you know, the mindset, this is this great book, the, the Body Keeps the Score. When I did that letter writing exercise, I said, it began this process with my mother and my mother severely mentally ill, my whole life, her psychosis set in before I was born. So I I, I was born into this psychotic woman's life.
When I did that letter writing exercise, when I began to suspect in one of those sort of hidden hands, is that I was sexually abused by her. And I made that realization at Hoffman in that letter writing exercise. It, it was fuzzy. You know, I, I knew it happened, but I couldn't quite see it. I couldn't tell you when it started, when it stopped, but I knew it happened.
And it's something I'd sort of suspected it, it made a lot of other things make sense about some of the, um, creepiness, frankly, I felt around her my whole adult life. And, and how I kept her at distance. It gave me answers as to why I had made some of the mistakes I made around, you know, and infidelity.
It made sense around why I felt uncomfortable, like hugging my kids sometimes, because that was in the bucket of things that I knew was odd, but couldn't figure out why the hell that was a thing, right? So it, it, it answered a lot of questions, but it didn't give me any detail around the actual incident or incidents with her at all. And I remember my Hoffman teacher said, you know, sometimes knowing is enough and you don't need to poke at it.
And I took that to heart. It gave you permission to sort of like, leave it there. And then my marriage fell apart and I was battling a whole other level of challenges that had to do with that abuse. But again, I couldn't quite connect the dots, right? But the Hoffman work allowed me to navigate it without completely like, falling off the rails to sort of put some guardrails up against me.
And then a moment in 2018 where out of nowhere I got a whole bunch of images, I, I, for the first time, I, I just saw a couple incidents in great detail from start to finish. And from then until now, I mean, I've been in this journey for, what, five years now or so after having a divorce and, you know, rebuilding my relationship with my children and rebuilding my relationship with my ex-wife and building a new, you know, dating relationship.
But all this with the fullest consciousness I've had about what my limitations are and why I have those limitations with the clear understanding of where I need my boundaries to be and why. But the, my ability to navigate that and get myself from A to B2C to D is all been powered by often without having done that work, these revelations and these sort of new trap doors that keep opening up with these new discoveries.
As I continue to unwind this deep trauma, uh, without talking, I'd probably be locked up somewhere , you know? Uh, so, so it is sort of the gift that keeps giving, even if I had the mistaken notion upfront that, oh, it's sort of mission accomplished, right? I mean, there's, there's never a mission accomplished, like ever. You know, it's just sort of, okay, well, how do you have the tools to keep fighting the mission to keep forging ahead on, on the mission?
- You know, when you talked about it both helped you in your process, and besides that little blip of mission accomplished, the falsehood of that, that it's continued to help you navigate any current trap doors, as you say, that pop up in your life without getting so overwhelmed that you can't continue the process. - Yeah. Like the whole thing is need to get blown up. My sister is a, uh, producer for Conde Nast, and they just premiered a, that my sister executive produced on Hillsong Church.
And so I was watching it because my sister produced it, and I wanna support her episode between four Takes His turn, where Lance is talking about his sexual abuse as a child, which is part of what fueled his wrong turns.
And then they interviewed these older child abuse victims who are now in their sixties, seventies, and the way in which they're talking about it, a phrase, these turns of phrases they used that just like triggered me, man, it, it just, it hit me and opened up another patch of, you know, memories. And I'm like texting my sister. I'm like, well, I wasn't prepared for this on this, you know, series. But going back to your point, you know, it sort of get me, got me in this introspective space.
I knew what I needed to do. I started, you know, I meditated on it. I was thinking about it. I had to fly to New York on Monday for business, me and my business partner, he's like, what's up? I'm like, I'm just, I'm, I'm navigating this little, this little wave right now. I'm just trying to, you know, navigate this wave right now.
But you know, all of the ways in which I could view that moment and, and I could discuss that moment and give myself grace, you know, why versus saying, oh my God, it's all, you know, it's all falling apart. It, it was that, that's that you're saying that that's it. That that's the gift of Hoffman. I likely would've had this breakthrough in some way down the road, right?
Because it seems like everyone does, you know, if you're a victim of any kind of trauma, there's a point in which you get some kind of answers, you know, within yourself. I can't imagine having had these revelations, you know, in 20 17, 20 18, and not having any tools I having to rely upon. I, I just, I can't imagine. Yeah. It's sort of a, you know, girds my system, you know, - The girding that your connection to your helps you navigate these new insights that happen. Yeah.
- It's like the scaffolding, you know, that I can, you know, hang everything on, you know, the good, the bad and the ugly, you know? And, and, and it gives me a navigation system and, and a way to, to frame all of this, you know, so the highs aren't too high, the lows aren't too low, you know, you don't get too attached to any of it, you know, for very long, at least. - Sean, I wanna ask about music and creativity and writing and your harmonica playing. Why the harmonica?
- Well, I've had two sort of musical wi, so when I first started playing music, the first one I picked up seriously was saxophone in college. And it's because a woman I was dating at the time, college didn't said I'd look really sexy playing saxophone. And so that was , that was enough for me, . And so, uh, when I got it, I realized that I was, I had an intuition about it. I, I could intuitively get myself around the instrument.
I never learned to read music, but I could fake it and I could hear things by ear and, and pick them up. And I'm asthmatic and I've been asthmatic my whole life. And the sax was also really just great therapy for me. It just helped me breathe deeper. I developed this fear of breathing, you know, this fear of my lungs because I, I had such a challenge breathing my whole life.
And so I had this sort of fear of taking deep breaths and, you know, I sort of freaked out that I wouldn't, the breath wouldn't be there. And it was this really complicated relationship I had with my lungs that I didn't fully realize until I started getting talking to my body, the physical part of my quadrant. Then Sax was helping with that, even though I didn't consciously know that at the time, but it totally was so flash forward, I stopped playing sax.
When I started songwriting and fronting a band. I started singing and fronting a band, and I started songwriting, which is an extension of writing I, I've always done. And I wrote initially, you know, singer songwriter folky songs, you know, and then, and the tempted vein of my heroes, Dylan and Paul Simon and Joan Arbitrating and all this stuff, classic singer songwriters.
I played, you know, the harmonic with the neck brace and huffing and puffing and, you know, there's not any real artistry to it. And then in 2012, I was invited to go to Italy with an old band mate of mine who had an opportunity to play some blues for basically a wealthy Italian who liked the blues. And so he asked me to come over 'cause he knew I was a fan of the blues, and I knew the songbook really well, even though I had played it.
So I went over there, and that was the first time I played blues harp. You play a, you know, folk harp, and it's like this Bob de You, Right? That's like the classic, I'm exaggerating, but you know, that's like, that folky kind of like, you know, but, you know, blues harp is like this whole, you know, There's just a whole other part of one self that's accessed playing, you know, blues harp.
And so when I played it, the combination of playing the harmonica and singing blues music really for the first time, connected me to my ancestry before the sort of discovery of my sexual abuse, my biggest conscious, I wouldn't call it trauma, but the, the battle I was waging inside of myself, the battle I was, I was consciously aware of. That was my biggest one, was about race and identity. You know, I, I grew up in all white neighborhoods.
I went to all white schools. This is part of the book I wrote, you know, how do I identify as a black man? I, I didn't hold a lot of the stereotypical hallmark hallmarks of, of a black male. And, and so am I really black if I don't do this or I do that. So I had a lot of identity stuff. I started playing the harmonica, and I felt black in the best way. I could feel myself through the breath I was drawing through this instrument.
I could feel myself connected, you know, from the people who came before me, the people who came after. I could see myself in this continuum. Every time I draw from this thing, I feel it. It's just like, connects me to every aspect of that. And so it was from that moment, I'm like, this is it. I'm dedicating myself to this, to this instrument. The book I wrote is a bit of a love letter to the harmonica Ellis, the kid in the book carries a harmonica. Everywhere he goes, he plays harmonica.
And I did not play harmonica as a kid. The music, I make it, it's just become fundamental to my identity. And it continues to be this, the breath I get allergic asthma reactions. It's a lot pollen here right now. I, I get allergic reactions. I'm around cats. I get allergic reactions to my drink. Certain foods. I mean, my life is, I'm very aware of breathing on a day-to-day basis. And to connect myself with this thing is really, really therapeutic. Almost puts it too, too lightly.
- Yeah. Sean, I wanna ask about your connection to your ancestors and race. And given that the process doesn't really talk about culture or race, we stick with parents a lot. How were you able to use the process as a part of that journey? Connecting to your ancestors, understanding your blackness? - Yeah, I think it's an extension of the family thing, right? Because, you know, we talk about, talked about the process.
This idea that most everything you do is either in, you know, opposition of or in support of what your parents did, right? I mean, that whole questionnaire you thought before you go to the process. I mean, that was like a mind bending thing, right? And so, you know, your mom kicked dogs, so you kicked dogs, or you know, your dad was a spin thrift, so you blow through money. I mean, all these sort of opposite and likenesses.
And, and so if you extrapolate that out, it would stand to reason that, well, where did they get it from? Right? And there's an exercise towards the end, if I recall, where you sort of see yourself sort of connected to your parent and you grab, so that whole thing, right? So I mean, it's, it's there anyway. It's there in the process, right?
It's not through the lens of like race, but this ancestral thing, Raz, who was extremely helpful in the early days of my divorce and, and when I was discovering a lot of this trauma, said, we are all suffering for our ancestors, you know, sins and our ancestors damage, right? We're sort of, we're living the pain of our ancestors. So that was the foundational piece. It just clearly made sense.
And then events that happened, the world and the country and covid and everything else sort of accelerated it for me at least, accelerated that learning and accelerated that healing. The pillars for me were that parental slash ancestral piece from Hoffman that's like one solid pillar, you know, this pillar of the blues for me.
And then this third pillar of the global conversation, you know, that was going on at least for a time, you know, the conversation just seemed to die down a little bit, sadly. But, you know, that moment that jump started it all from me. - What's next for you? Uh, you've, you have how many albums that you've published? - I don't know, a lot , I think it's like six or seven blues albums, three sort of pop folky albums before that. So this is maybe close to 10 albums out there.
But I'm writing a new album and I'm excited to get in the studio later this year and record that. You know, writing the book was interesting. I wrote two books in basically two years, these two middle grade novels. And that was a wonderful experience and it was a little bit tricky to pivot back to songwriting after that. But I, I've made the pivot back. I'm in, in the songwriting space right now.
- Do you have a sense of how the process and your understanding of it and your time there has supported the creative process of writing music, of writing books? - I was a firmly creative being going in there. I mean, I always have been, you know, the writing has always been my safe space, and it's always been the way in, in which I have found it the easiest to express myself. I've always, you know, writing has always been the easiest way for me to express myself.
If I'm in pain, the first thing I do is start to write. If I have some intellectual or emotional curiosity, I want to itch, I'll write about it. That this is my go-to it always has been. So, I, I can't say that Hoffman contributed to that in any way. It goes back to the forgiveness thing.
You know, I'm, I'm forgiving of myself If my writing process leads me to, you know, put the pin down for a little bit, or if I am less productive in one moment than I am in, in another moment, I, I, I have a lot more faith that the words will come. That every song is not my last song. . Every book is not my last book, which I, which is a bit of a, of a tendency of mine before. There's a little bit of element of panic around the creative process for me beforehand.
If I, if I think back to sort of my pre Hoffman period and, and that panic is gone, I'm pretty comfortable with wherever I'm at in that creative process, right? Where whether I'm, I'm really productive and, and prolific at any moment, or whether, you know, I'm just writing, you know, a line here and there on a, on a matchbook in a restaurant or something, I'm less, uh, prone to, to judge myself. - So Sean, you, it's really interesting. I mean, the forgiveness applied to creativity.
Most people relate it to relationships, forgiving their parents, forgiving someone to hurt you. But I just love what you're saying around how forgiveness supports the creative process. - Yeah. I mean, forgiveness supports everything, right? , I've always known that I created work out of pain, but I didn't feel like I had to be in pain to create work. Rather, I was grateful that when I was in pain, I had a means to express that and, and, and a means to make something out of that.
That was my gratitude in those moments. But I, I didn't feel like I had to live some tortured life in order to create art, you know, even though I, I've created a lot of stuff while I was, you know, tortured, you know, I'm a natural optimist, you know, I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm pretty wired to think the glass is half full. That just, that's how I roll, you know, the music I play, I, I I I play joyful blues.
You know, when, when I go on stage, I have a harmonica case and I open it up and the back of the case is joy, and that sits on the stage all night facing the audience. And so I, I'm, I'm a big proponent of joy. At the same time, I'm a workaholic or maybe hopefully recovering one, and I'm competitive and I, you know, have things I want to accomplish, and I can put pressure on myself like anyone else, you know, who, who is, um, pursuing goals that are important to them.
And so that combination can lead to a lot of unhealthy dialogue, right? And that can shut your ass down, . Yeah, I just learned that, man, you wanna keep things, you wanna keep things light. You know, I tell my kids this, it's like, man, it's hard to find solutions when, when the temperatures just turned up and you're tight and ratchet up. It's just much easier to get shit done when you're chill . And I, and like I said, I, I think I, I've been like that.
I think that's what's got me through the traumas of my life and, and the challenges of my life is that I'm relatively a chill person, but I had no tools to put me back to that position quickly when either my dark side monster, you know, was on my shoulder or whether or whether I was getting some outside, you know, interference, whatever it was, I, I didn't necessarily have the means to get myself back to that more or less pre natural state.
One of the teachers was telling a story about, I dunno, a zen master or something. And, and, and then the teachers were watching this master, they were doing balancing exercises, and then they're saying, yo, master you, you never, you never lose your balance. And the master said, I, I do, I I just recover quickly that idea of like, you know, how quickly you just regain your balance again.
You know, it's like you stand, you stand on one leg and lose your balance, and you get back on two, can you regain it so quickly that no one ever sees you lost it to begin with? Can you like regain it? You know, so quietly and so stealthily that everyone's presumes you never lose your balance. Like that's a master, right? I love that. That's sort of the thing, you know, stay soft, right? Stay soft and, and just get back to one. Again, it's this language, right?
It's literally like, it's like any other language. It's like, it's like music. You practice, you practice, you practice. Then when you're on stage, you have all these tools to draw upon and you can rely upon inspiration. It's like you don't go on stage and do scales. That, like I said earlier about the clients I work with in this, in this media training, it's like, how do you close the gap between how you wish to be seen and how you are seen?
How do you close the gap between what you wanna say and what you're able to say? I was with a client in New York City, and I, I was leading a workshop for a brief moment. I got a little nervous, you know, going up and, and, uh, I just sat there. I, and I just did this, I brushed this dark side monster off my shoulder, which is, which is the little thing I learned in Hoffman class. We had just visualize this.
It's like, you know, the devil in the shoulder thing where I just like this sort of somatic exercise, right? You know, I just did that before I stood up . I, I, I didn't realize how much I'd draw on these things. It's such a part of my, my makeup now, you know? Um, so yeah, it's, it's just this language that you sort of keep practicing, keep practicing. I still do quadree checks. I mean, it, I ask my body what it needs all the time. You know, I, I apologize to my body if I'm pushing it.
I know I'm pushing you hard. Let's just get through this one day , I promise you'll get this. I mean, this dialogue and this relationship I have, it's just like the air I breathe at this point. It really is. It really - Is. We all have that dialogue. But what, what I hear in yours is kindness, a kind of truth, uh, a, a listening as well as speaking with the different parts of yourself. - Yeah. The forgiveness part has been a journey, right.
You know, I've had a lot of, you know, forced errors and I've had, um, a lot of errors, you know, forced upon me. And the forgiveness thing has been a journey. Yeah. I went to my, uh, my daughter's, I went to her college graduation a couple weeks ago, and it was me and her, you know, her younger brother and sister, my ex-wife, my stepmother, my sister.
And it was the first time we've all been together that configuration for almost five years since my daughter's high graduation, which was right as we got divorced.
And to sit around with that group of people, and for all of us to love each other, you know, and to forgive each other, we cry , - What a moment in time to, to both treasure celebrate of your family coming together - To know that, um, there's a, there's a, sorry, , there's another Hoffman phrase that, uh, was great that helped me, and it was said in relation to my mother.
I've used it for myself, which is, um, you, you're guilty, but not to blame, you know, we, um, you're still family no matter what. That's the thing, right? You know, living often, right? You're still, you're family no matter what. You know, it's like, it's this just sort of a, I texted my kids after the, you know, my son had said, uh, was, we're flying back from the graduation, and he had said, uh, you know, oh, it almost felt like we were, uh, a family again.
And I said, dude, we're always family, you know? And I said, it's, it's start. It's our dumb luck . We're we're stuck with each other, you know, for better or for worse. And so, uh, and that, and that's one of those cycles they got broken. You know what I mean? It's like, you know, my, you know, I'm, I'm a productive divorce. My grandparents are a productive divorce.
You know, and that whole ancestral thing, I mean, I, I did my, my whole ancestral rabbit hole diving realized that on my mother's side of the family, my maternal grandmother's side of my family began as the product of a rape between a Scottish slave holder and my great-great-great grandmother, right? I mean, that, that's like the origin of a chunk of my family. I mean, so it's like top of the ancestral pain, right? Yeah. It's, it's a miracle that anything happened, positive .
And, and so for me to have, you know, I, I didn't break the divorce cycle, but I live 10 minutes away from my kids. I, I drive them to school, I pick them up, they, you know, I, I'm, you know, deeply involved in their lives, and then they know they have, uh, parent who will keep them safe. That's like cycle broken, man, thank God. - And breaking those cycles is no joke. That's hard work. It's gotta be deeply intentional, right? - Yeah. And that, and that graduation was, uh, poof of it.
Yeah. So, uh, yeah, man, so the, the journey continues. The journey continues, the struggle continues, and, and there's, there's no, uh, there, there's no destination . And so it's just, you know, how do we just be kind as we, uh, ride along, you know, be, be kind to ourselves and kind to each other as we, as we ride along? And that's what I'm looking to do. - Sean, I'm grateful for your time, your heart, your vulnerability. What a, what a conversation. Thank you.
- Oh, thanks, man. I hope that, uh, this podcast, this conversation, uh, doesn't good for folks on their journey. - Thank you for listening to our podcast. My name is Liza in Grassi. I'm the CEO and President of Hoffman Institute Foundation, - And I'm Rasi Rossi Hoffman, teacher and founder of the Hoffman Institute Foundation. - Our mission is to provide people greater access to the wisdom and power of love - In themselves, in each other, and in the world.
To find out more, please go to Hoffman institute.org.