Finding Harmony in Uncertainty: Musician Ian McConnell on Navigating a Faith Transition, Acceptance, and Self-Discover

Music. Hey everybody, welcome to episode 426 of The Virtual Couch. I'm your host, Tony Overbay. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist and excited to get right to the topic at hand today.

So there's a famous quote by Carl Rogers, who was one of the founders of humanistic psychology. And the quote goes something like this, the curious paradox. So the curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change. And I think this quote just perfectly sums up the paradoxical nature of acceptance, accepting yourself and becoming a real motivating factor for actual personal growth and change.

But what I really love about this is if we follow up from the episode last week where I shared the selfish side of shame, where we still have this default setting to go to what's wrong with me, I'm a big piece of garbage as a way to improve our situation in life rather than a place of self-acceptance.

So Rogers suggests that self-acceptance rather than the self-criticism or attempts to force something to happen, force change, that that's what creates the psychological conditions that are necessary for actual growth and actual transformation. And Russ Harris, one of my very favorite authors, says the more that we try to avoid the negative experiences of life, the more that we struggle. So today I am interviewing Ian McConnell.

Ian McConnell is a songwriter. He's a musician. At first I thought he was a comedian who just happened to sing, but it turns out he's a a songwriter who is also pretty funny. But in this conversation, I think that we cover so many different things. We talked, obviously, about music. We talked about creativity. We talked about personal growth. We talked about mental health. We talked about therapy.

And there are a lot of things that I think come through in this interview, especially for people who are fans of mental health podcasts or things like The Virtual Couch. Because we talk about the concept of experiencing a crisis, a crisis of faith, or it could even be a crisis of your own worldview. And Ian talks open about how that impacted everything in his life, especially his creative pursuits and how that impacted his personal growth.

We talk about the challenge of finding motivation and purpose after you let go of certain beliefs or ideals, which can be really scary. As somebody who works with people that are navigating faith journeys and faith transitions on a daily basis, you often find that when people let go of some of that certainty, all of a sudden that uncertainty feels incredibly uncomfortable and boy, we are not wired to deal with the discomfort very well. So Ian and I talk a bit about that.

And he also talks about the balance of this desire for external validation, whether we talked about it from parents or in a relationship. With staying true to your authentic self. And especially as somebody who creates art, who writes songs, how he needs to really find his own voice in order to be more, and it's not even successful, but to be able to really feel like he's working in more alignment with who he is as a person.

And then I really appreciate it. We talked a lot about the ups and downs of social media success and how social media has impacted relationships that we have with ourselves, with our work and with our own self-image. And Ian has a very large social media presence. I think when we were going to press here, it sounds so fancy. As I'm recording this morning, 700,000 followers, I believe on TikTok, maybe 400,000 or 500,000 on Instagram, a lot on YouTube.

And so he has definitely dealt with a lot of feedback from people. And he talks about that in the interview. But I think that we touch on one of my very favorite concepts, acceptance versus apathy. Acceptance means to take in without defense in its entirety. And how that doesn't mean if I accept who I am or I accept where I'm at in life, that That means then just back up the floats to the lazy river and just call it a life.

No, sometimes that acceptance can mean now I've got that pressure off and I can just start to be and do. And I think Ian does a pretty amazing job at doing that. He is kicking off his primary source tour and it starts August 16th. It's in Dallas, Texas. But on August 21st, and he's going all over the country. I think there's 24, 25 dates, might be more. But on August 21st, Ian is coming to a city very close to me. Me, Phoenix, and he will be playing at the Rebel Lounge.

But honestly, I would hurry and get your tickets if he is coming to a city that is even close to you, because I kind of don't want to say this out loud. If you're in the area of the Phoenix area, I feel the same way about my beloved Salad and Go. Everything is so affordable that I don't want the Salad and Go folks to know about it because then they might raise the prices. I felt the same way when I went to buy tickets to Ian's show,

I thought, okay, this is like a really good deal. Where's the catch? And there really wasn't one. So I have tickets and I was happy to pay what I paid, but it's an incredible deal, especially if you're a fan of live music. So if you really like what you hear on the interview today, and if you go check him out, go get those tickets. And I will be at the Phoenix show. If anybody in the area is going, please reach out to me at contact at tonyoverbay.com.

Let's make plans to say hi, hopefully get a picture with Ian. And you can buy tickets through his website, Ian McConnell mcconnellmusic.com and that's I-A-N and then we've got a bunch of doubles here m-c-c-o-n-n-e-l-l music.com and I'll have the links to Ian's socials also in the show notes or just type in Ian McConnell wherever whatever social media platform you like and I'm sure that you will find him. So with that said let's get on to today's interview with Ian McConnell. Action.

And so it's funny because I thought when I see you on the phone, okay, he's talking to some big Hollywood producer. I didn't know it was Breakmasters. No, no, no. Yeah, it's Blue Ridge Automotive telling me I had to replace my battery, which was annoying, but not the worst. Okay. And then a lot of stuff, they're like, maybe you could do it now. You probably don't need to. And I'm like, can I make it 9,000 miles? And they're like, this, yes, this, no. I'm like, okay, do that.

Just do it all because no matter how expensive this is, it is less expensive than breaking down in the middle of the desert. I can't imagine my door on hold or anything like that. Yeah, man, it'll be fine. Ian McConnell, welcome to the virtual couch. I know you mentioned the desert and I'm in Phoenix. You're coming out to Phoenix and I'll tell the little origin story of reaching out to you.

And I'm so grateful that you were willing to get on the podcast, but I've only been in this Phoenix area for about three or four months and it is definitely the desert. 110, 115. So we want you to drive in here safely. That'd be a good thing.

Where did you come from? Where did you Northern California? I'm in a trauma bond with the Phoenix area because it's not treating me very well right now, but I've been told that the best is yet to come. There's eight months where it's going to be nice to me and it's going to be really kind. But right now we're putting up with a lot of garbage and we'll see. Okay. And then where do you live? I live in Georgia right now, just outside of Atlanta. Okay.

Let's jump into the tour because I'm so fascinated by this. Have you gone on tour before? I have. I have. I've done four tours. The first two were very, they were, I played only like house shows and bars and stuff like that. And I only went out for five days or whatever. And then I did two actual tours, headlining tours last year. One was seven shows and one was five shows. And both of those went fine. They, the first one went up kind of in the Midwest and the second one was all

East coast, which are kind of my markets. It's okay. I was in Nashville seven years. And so kind of staying where I could drive easily and all this stuff. But this tour is 26 cities and it's all the way around the country.

I'm leaving from Atlanta. On Wednesday, I guess, I don't know what day this is, but it'll be Wednesday the 14th, I'm leaving Atlanta and then I get back to Atlanta on September 21st or something like that, having gone all the way up to Seattle, to Boston and all that stuff, could be a lot. David Pérez- Had, did you have to plan or did you have to, did you get to plan that all yourself? Yeah. I have a booking agent who just was like, do you want to play shows in 2024?

And I was like, yeah. And he's like, where do you want to play? I'm like, dude, anywhere that will have me like, let's just kind of party. Yeah. Oh. And so he just hooked up a bunch of shows in a row and yeah, I'm going to drive my Chevy Malibu all around the country. Uh, see how that goes. I'm a big proponent of just kind of learning from the failures on the way. So I've done some of my planning and all that kind of stuff. I mean, I've performed many, many, many, many, many times.

And so I feel confident about putting on a good show and all this stuff, but I'm sure there are things that I'm neglecting that I'll realize once I get to Los Angeles a week and a half in, like, oh man, I really should have thought of this, but it'll be fine. You figure out on the way. If you believe it'll be fine, then it'll probably be fine. And so maybe that's a nice intro to, I've started getting more active on TikTok and the TikTok therapy is a thing.

I've got more videos going out there. So then the more time I'm on TikTok, I so want to know what the algorithm was hearing me or seeing me do. But then all of a sudden you start popping up. And I think when I reached out to you, I said, okay, I really liked the way, I don't know if you had an existential crisis. I don't know if it was just a very bad breakup, if it was all the above and I can't wait to hear.

But then I just felt like you were you're really speaking to where I'm I'm at as a therapist almost this place where people are trying to just make sense we desire certainty so much and.

Almost like that letting go of the fact that okay what if things don't really make sense and there's not a lot of certainty and how that feels so scary until it doesn't maybe you are my muse and I'm assuming that those are all the things you're going through and so then when I saw that you were on tour and you were here and it's in a couple of weeks I literally immediately bought as many tickets as I could. I will be there and might even buy another round of tickets.

I want anybody that is in the Phoenix area to come hang with me and we'll watch Ian. And, but then I, now I want to hear everything about, am I off base? Was there an existential crisis Ian? Or tell me about what, what motivates you with your songs? Oh, yeah. Dude, there's all of it. To me, like, everything that happens is a new piece to, like, add in, you know? You're talking about, like, you want things to make sense, but you can't make sense of them or whatever.

I believe in, I did have, like, kind of a religious crisis when I was four. Or I was, I grew up Presbyterian and I was very like everything I do, I do for the glory of God. I am pursuing a godly life. The things that are important to God are the things that are important to me. And that was great because I didn't have to make any decision for myself about what was good with that whole, you know?

And then I took, I took acid when I was 24 and I was looking at the sky and I was just, I just don't feel like if, I mean, there could be this God force, all this kind of stuff, But if there is, it doesn't make sense that God would have just been waiting around the whole time for the humans to be the important ones, you know? And that's where the idea of strong important comes from. I'm not important either. We've only been around a short amount of time in relation to the whole thing.

If there's a God, I can't imagine that it cares at all about anything. Caring is kind of something that I feel like we a little bit made up. And if it does, why should it care about us more than it cares about other creatures?

Years in which case what is good and what is bad and all this stuff so many that we think of as good are very centered on being a human you know and being good like humans which is something that i still very much want to do but i have to come up with a new motivation because i was on this reward system that was just like you do a good thing go to heaven you permanent reward everything is perfect and i'm like that is a very nice feeling to have i don't want to

i think that religion is like a super useful tool that is you know brought people together over the years as a community and all this stuff. But I feel like now we're in this age where we learn so many things about the way that the universe works, that there's new ways, I feel like, to find a good life in the world. That's really what my pursuit has been. It's like, okay, how do I live a good life? How do I live well? Yeah.

Age where there's a lot of information i'm connected to everybody i can communicate with everybody all the time and also we're learning so many new things about the universe that just a static view of this is the way things are doesn't feel like a useful way to interpret the world okay well and i'd love that you're writing my shit well it's good because i so appreciate that i think that that is i listen to your songs you can almost see this evolution of that process

it feels like even to the point where i think it was episode 12 of season 2 do episode 12 is i can do it i can do it is not that serious which is the one where i talk about it'll be okay yes but they kind of go together you know okay well and that's right it's interesting because i think when you start at the your first actually i was i'm gonna do this deep dive i want to pull this music critic vibe here in a minute like to

say okay i've got pulled out a bunch of these lyrics i'm so excited to hear what led to that but i want to i wanted to say because uh the virtual couch i've got a mental health podcast and i've got some very loyal listeners that i love to death. And I do a lot with faith deconstruction and faith crisis. And so it's interesting because I didn't know that that was part of what you were working through.

And I love it because it can really feel when people are going through that, they feel all of a sudden, and you have a line in one of your songs about, was it, I miss religion or I miss the... I miss religion, yeah. That spoke to me because so many people then when they go through this, they want to go back and just feel like, okay, no, everything makes sense and I know what to do.

And I love what you said there about it does take a little bit of that accountability away because then if i did this thing and well i mean god told me to do it so it's not not my fault or if something didn't work out then what was i supposed to do i think that's a pretty fascinating concept so when people go through that faith deconstruction it feels like they're just kind of floating out in the in space for a little while and nothing to

really tether to and that's where i think even in the email i sent you, I said, sometimes with clients, we'll call it the nothing matters club, but if you welcome someone there too soon, they don't think it's a very fun club, but if they, yeah. But if they get there over time, it's a pretty fun time. Yeah. I posted clips of my song, Important World, where I talk about, you know, I'm pretty sure life doesn't have like a meaning, all this stuff.

And I get, you know, there's always a number of comments that are like, what a depressing way to view the world. And I'm like, well, I mean, if it is this way, maybe perhaps it's not, I could be wrong.

I like truly don't believe, especially having like been so firm in my belief of what the world works and faith and all this stuff at for most of my life i get really hesitant being like this is the way that things are because i'm like dude i could be totally wrong i've been, dreadfully at least in my view wrong before and i don't want to be like so i don't want to hold so tightly into like this is the way that things are but if if that is the way that things are that

nothing like inherently matters or whatever then it's only depressing for as long as you You let it be. I kind of feel like you kind of just be like, this is the way things are. Let's just adapt to our circumstances. Humans are super good at adapting to their circumstances. That's why we have people of all skin tones living at different latitudes than they were. You know, it only came up in this stuff. We figured out ways to live healthily and safely in different ways. Yeah.

It really is. Okay. Now, are you cool if we do a little bit of the, let's go all therapist approved, like, okay, mental health, deep dive. How long was that process for you though? Where you felt like this, did it feel scary for a little while when you deconstructed your faith? What was that like? Yes. The process, the way that I generally make decisions is things kind of stew underneath for a long time and then they burst forth in clarity at some point. Yeah.

And so this was one that had been stewing for a while and it had burst forth in clarity. I had been feeling myself kind of like drift away from the idea of like, I do all things for the glory of God kind of situation.

And I've kind of had built myself drifting away and I was like, oh, I should go back to this. But then I started in my mind, but why should I go back to this? What is it that I'm searching for here? Is it that I don't want my parents to know that I don't care their religion? Is it that I am afraid of letting down a past version of me and recognizing that there were things that I felt shame about or guilt about in my life? I didn't seem to have real negative human consequences.

And do I want to feel some kind of regret over like a feeling of missed time or wasted time or something like that? What is it that I'm afraid of? And, you know, just over time it came, it just came forth and I was like, okay, well, if this is the situation now, I definitely spent a little bit of time depressed. That all happened right when COVID hit too. So there was some time, a lot of time on my own to like, think about these things

at a time of like great outrage and stuff. And so there's plenty of things to think about. Um, and by the time that COVID and then the whole election that year kind of died down a little bit, I was like, all right, what can I do here? Because I can either choose to be very upset or angry and all those things. And I know that some things are out of people's control and all this stuff, but to the extent that I can control these things, how can I come up with a way of viewing the world?

Doesn't make me really, really bummed out. I love it. I do. And so are you familiar with or have you heard of the concept of differentiation? It's a good psychology buzzword, but it really just means this desire we have to maintain connection while developing our own autonomy or holding onto ourself.

And so it's a difficult process because we typically find ourselves almost in this codependent and meshed relationship with fill in the blank, whether it is our church, our parent, our significant other.

But then we start going through life and having our own experiences and then and now we have these feelings but now we're afraid that if i really express them will this person like me they want to run away and so we're negotiating how much do i share about myself and i think that's part of that whole thing where that's so scary that then we'll just kick the can down the road and i'll deal with it later but then i like what you say but then all

of a sudden bubbles up i got to deal with this and then i i often find that then it isn't whatever it is isn't as scary as one thought it was and it's that fear of that unknown i mean do you feel like you can relate to that very much so yeah so i definitely i am somebody who in theory holds on to things with open hands but in practice clings to everything that is close to me you know i cling to my identity as an artist i cling to my identity that

i feel that my parents have of me i cling to a certain way that a relationship is going even when i feel things starting to like shift in a certain direction I'm like, no, no, change is bad. Change is bad. Yeah, exactly. And, um... I definitely feel that way and then become dependent on the outcome of whatever those. Yeah. So then we're trying to predict that, that future outcome. And so showing up, not our authentic self. And you've got some really cool stuff. I did.

I read a couple of interviews with you. So I want you to know I'm prepared. And I don't remember all of the interviews that I've done. They were very good. Okay, cool. Because on one of these, what I liked that you said was you said the importance of doing something you love because you love it, not for the appeal of others. So then when you look at this differentiation thing, with so many of the things we do, we're doing for validation.

I want to know that somebody sees me. I want to know that they approve. But I don't know, when I read that line of that, you doing something because you love it, not for the appeal of others, I wondered, was that just something that came natural? Was that a factory setting for Ian? Or was that something that you had to develop? No, no, dude. I have been spending the last several years trying to figure out what is it actually that you love? Because what it was that I loved was chasing things.

I love chasing things. I love wanting something and going after it. And you know, when it was doing well in school, I was like, I'm going to do so well in school. I want to be a great student, all this kind of stuff because I'm interested in the material. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But really, because then the teacher will be proud with that

validation, right? Yeah. And you know, I lived in Nashville and i was making country music for a while and i was like i don't even know i didn't even know if i loved country music i like country music i love that there was a formula to be perfected you know i was like i can use my puzzle skills to find a way to be this unlikely force in this area and that was a great motivator um and then i gave myself modest goals in that arena and then i reached those modest

goals and i was like that's so great and everyone's like cool so now you're going to the next level of whatever and i'm like yeah i don't know i kind of did that one that's fun like okay so now what do you love if I'm not searching for the validation if I'm not searching for I'm not searching. The approval of my parents, you know, my parents have been very clear as I have branched out in my artistic thing that they have been like, we support you becoming the person that you are.

I love it. And I'm like, that's so great. But like, I still, I'm still trying to figure out how to like, believe you and feel it. And I do believe him on a mental level, but on an emotional level, it's tough. Yeah. So now you do something to do it because you love it. What do you actually love doing? Is it making music? Is it getting, maybe it's getting the likes on Instagram or whatever. ever, but diminishing returns. So I'm just trying to figure out what it is.

Yeah. How do we find out who we are? And I think it's what you're saying is I have to do, and I will often have people say, well, do what? And then it's anything, because once you're interacting with something, then you will figure out if you like it or don't like it. But then I think that fear of that unknown is that we hooked to that story of the, I don't even know what to do. And then that way I can kick that can down the road another week or two. I still got to figure out what to do.

So over time that I'm not doing that and that becomes what I do, I'm good at not doing so it does sound like you've done a lot of different things i really want to know hello i love your honesty about you weren't even sure if you like country music so what was that experience what led you to the country music uh market and then what was that like what'd you do there did you perform a lot did you write well i knew that i liked country music i knew that i liked zooming it i was always kind

of i was just like it always feels good when i'm listening especially i started listening to country music in like 2013 through 2016 area era right before i moved to nashville in 2017 okay that was like kind of the rise of this like pop bro country oh yeah.

And also on the other side there was like casey musgraves um and like some really talented moving songwriters and i was like this is a cool scene and the biggest appeal of it was that i was in college in greenville south carolina and nashville was not very far and i was like okay i'll go to National. And I went there for the summer between my junior and senior year of college. And I had no idea what I wanted to do after college or anything like that.

I spent three months there just in the summer and I was like, this is a game that I could definitely play. So I'm going to plan to come here and do this. And I just kind of threw myself into the scene writing songs. You kind of like adopt the goals of the community, you know? So like that was big on like, and then if you write a number one song on the radio for a country music, you'll get $200,000 and like, that would be crazy. And everybody will know your name and you're going to be so popular.

And I was like, all of these things sound amazing. amazing and so you just i wrote like a gazillion songs and almost all of them were bad but almost all of them had some nugget of something that i was like okay that's good that's okay okay see what's going on here and i worked really closely with my friend lydia doll we wrote like 160 songs in the first three years i was there with there was always like a third artist there i was artist for a long time i just went to write songs because i

was like i really love the process of crafting the puzzle but i don't really want to be looked at okay one like to attract attention really so like i'll write these songs for these other people to sing and we had some fairly popular songs artists who were not popular or whatever we had like the top song on lots of unpopular artists.

Thing or whatever uh which is super fun how to write and then after a while i was like i'm starting to write these things that i just don't believe that anybody else is gonna say or sing, so i'll start putting things out myself but i'm still like kind of country and so i was marketing my music as country to spotify and you ordered a different name at that time right because i went and uh found okay tell me about that i didn't i went by a different name when i was in college

i was mac russell yeah okay mac russell yeah okay mac russell has an album i don't know if you can find it anymore. I tried to remove it from everywhere when I was just starting out the Ian McConnell thing. Now I wish it were still there, but at the time it was important to me for it to be gone. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, and I want to say also, Ian, what's interesting is there's a book called Atomic Habits. I don't know if you've ever heard of it by a guy. Okay. James Clear.

And he does mention that the dopamine dump really comes in the pursuit or the anticipation. And I remember reading that and I just thought that resonated with me so much.

And it sounds like is that part of what where you get that rush it is that anticipation or okay and then once we get there then it's and i think in the type of therapy i do it's called acceptance and commitment therapy or act and there's you live a lot in this place of i'll be happy when but then you get there and then it's okay that maybe wasn't it so it must be this next thing and then that chasing that always so is that part of what that feels like or has felt like that has been a fundamental

change for me since I probably turned around 27-ish. I'm 29 now. And I was the best at, I'm going to be happy when blank. I'm going to be happy when blank. And not that I'm unhappy now, but like, oh, but just imagine when I get there, just imagine when I get there. And you know, when you're in school, you always have a next thing. And then getting started in a community, you always have a next thing or whatever.

And then once I kind of branched out and started doing my own thing that was outside of the community, but I found success doing so on Instagram and TikTok and Spotify and all these things, or to be able to pay my bills, all this stuff. I was like, okay, well, this is cool. This is super cool. But it definitely was the chasing something that was the happiness. So I've, but at the same time, I've lost now my main motivator, which is I won't be happy until blank. I won't be happy until blank.

I'm like, well, life is too short to not be happy. Yeah, but it is fun to chase something.

So I guess I got to find some kind of middle ground. Can I somehow construct a goal from something that I currently don't care about? You know, is it about being creative and finding a goal or is it about searching the world?

Around you and being like what's what do i still have questions about and that's kind of where i'm now okay that's brilliant how does the world actually work when i'm consuming music art film whatever it is what is it that i feel like i'm missing that's what i can create you know i'm looking at why is the tree like that i can go learn about these things and okay that's not that dissimilar from the way that this works it seems that things grow and they fell things go

in waves, whatever. I'm getting a little dumb over here. Yeah, no, what's brilliant about this, honestly, and I'm not just trying to give you this continual validation party, but you are my muse. I really enjoy where you're at with this because as a therapist,

as a human, part of, I think, my own journey that I didn't figure out till pretty late in life. And thankfully, it's part of, I think then I can bring it into the therapy world. But it is that when people are so worried about what's wrong with me or I'm broken or why did I think that thing or am I doing it right or I need the validation.

One lets go of that it's wild i call it like a it's freeing up of emotional calories spent and so now it's like the world has suddenly opened up to if i'm not worried am i doing it wrong am i doing it right or is this going to be okay i i think that that's something that we when you don't know what you don't know that just feels like the way it is and then when you can let go of that then all of a sudden there's so much stuff

to take in in a cool way and then i think i've and i think some of your songs allude to this too where I challenge often the right wrong concept not saying you know like murder unless they need it murdering I think in words like a Johnny Cash but if it's okay I did this thing and then if somebody says oh I don't like that you did that

then we have a tendency to go oh did I do it bad but if the other person says I like that thing I'm like oh whoo okay good I did it good and so that just had me starting to think about I just did a thing so check that out and then removing some of that judgment and so I don't know if that, If you can resonate with that, burning of emotional calories that are spent. With the what's wrong with me.

Very much so. I, yeah, that concept of universal right and wrong, I've been considering for a while, really, since I read this book called The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt. Incredible. Incredible. Very points out. It has a couple ideas, mainly that your idea of right and wrong are really, subjective based on what culture you grew up in and your environment and all all these things and also that humans make decisions primarily based on their emotions.

Yes. And like, we like have 10%, 10% control or whatever. It's not exactly that or whatever. No, I hear you. You have like your rational mind is the writer on your emotional elephant. You can, as a writer, be like, let's go this way. But if the elephant doesn't

want to go that way, it's not going to go. Yeah. So trying to like, I'm living, trying to create situations where my emotional elephant that's going to go wherever it's going to go, wants to go in the direction that my brain wants it to go rather than my brain trying to force it to go. You know, you want to create incentives to move in a direction that is positive. Yeah. Yeah. There's a book called I'm Being Certain that I wondered even if you were going to mention that one.

And that one has a similar concept where this neurologist, a lot of his life's work was not just one experiment, but this one blew my mind where there's a, I guess there's a button and then they've got him wired up to a nice functional brain scan and they say, okay, press it with your left or your right hand and he can do whichever one he wants, but you could tell which direction he was going up to three or four seconds before he actually made the move. So those neurons of synapses start firing.

And then based off of that hypothesis, there was a lot of work done around, yeah, we're basically three billion neurons walking around in a human meat suit reacting to things but then we want to make we want to make sense of what we did we don't want to think that we just reacted so but then it's not it's not entirely that so i like what you're saying whether it's 10 20 percent or whatever it is so then in the type of therapy i i do it so that happened now what do i do next versus why did

i do that and i love that concept yeah okay this is uh i feel so validated ian that it when i found you right like okay this is good stuff okay can we well let me ask you the pandemic i am curious so when you said that that was that was a little bit of a rough spot how was that when you were deconstructing the faith when the world shuts down were you pretty isolated where did and what did that look like sure yeah i was in nashville my main source of income was actually

really my almost exclusive source of income was playing cover songs in bars which shut down for a a while um but in in nashville nashville an intentional job of trying to open up as soon as possible and so they opened up for like a month nashville bars opened for like a month in june of the pandemic year and then everything got shut down again because the numbers skyrocketed so i suddenly had a lot of time because i was spending all

my time before that writing going to other people's places writing with them and then going to a gig downtown or whatever and so So I didn't have Zoom rights, but I was like, I don't love doing this. So maybe I'll just take this time, like work on my own thing.

You know, I'm trying not to get myself sick or other people sick. I still have never gotten COVID. I don't know. Okay. And we're the only two. I'm the same. Same. We're the only two that haven't. Cool. Yeah. It's nice. I would prefer to continue to not. Same. But I just spent a lot of time.

Writing and stuff like that and then i was like i could be doing stuff on tiktok i saw tiktok kind of popping off or whatever okay making three or four videos a day just kind of throwing stuff at the wall for a while until i got a couple that stuck which were me singing little one-liner jokes that i came up with really okay and then i got really into that for a while posting for three or four videos a day singing little joke songs like i had this one i was like bees are

starlight commitment because i run away from both of them and that was very popular it's very well like it yeah um

and uh yeah doing that while also my country music started to get playlisted on spotify which was a big like a big deal especially in nashville for street cred and as well as getting some extra money you know okay because the streams would go up or whatever i got a song on the hot country playlist on Spotify. I was like, that's so incredible. That's so insane. And the guy who put it there, the guy who was in charge of like country music outreach for Spotify or whatever, got fired soon after.

Possibly because you're putting people like me on the playlist. Oh, you're trying to make sense of things, Ian, right? Okay. That's right. Yeah. And I was living with my roommate of two years at the time, and we just kind of spent every night together for like four months.

And then things just kind of went south there. like we just started kind of getting sick of each other we had like some competing ideas about how music was supposed to go we had been working there but then we stopped working together and there was just kind of this tension at home I got into a relationship, That was very, very clingy, very, this is what you're allowed to do. This is what you're not allowed to do. And I was just like, well, I'm not doing anything else in COVID.

So like, sure, sure. These were fine by me. And that's something that I have noted in myself is that whole adapting to your circumstances thing. Do that in relationships too. Pretty hard of like, okay, this is how you live. I will just completely conform into the way that you live and see how that works. And then often I get really burned out. Okay. That's one. Okay. okay, I was going to say, we should talk about that

one, Ian, you know, but lay down while we go over that. Because that is one of those where I think it's fascinating. So, I've got a separate podcast called Waking Up to Narcissism, and that one's actually more popular than the virtual couch. I never anticipated that. But early on, I identified, okay, everybody throws around the word narcissism, like everyone is narcissistic, but really that's three to five percent of the population.

But we're all emotionally immature, and we kind of mistake the emotional immaturity for this narcissistic personality disorder, but there's narcissistic traits. But you find that There's this, they call it the human magnet syndrome, and often it's that pathologically kind or that I'll do whatever you need me to do person with the more emotionally immature person who then, okay, well, this is the way I feel love is control, and those two form that human magnet.

So do you feel like you were a bit of that magnet? I do. I do. I hesitate to. I mean, I think that a lot of the issue was that I was also emotionally immature.

Absolutely. Yes. That's not saying, of course, I've surmised that. No, but it's like, yeah, that's what I think is right. Because we all are. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, each, I've been in like four major relationships in my adult life. And each time I have found that my tendency to try to like, just please you, anything that I people please are happy. Like, that's my, like, the feeling that I feel like I'm often pursuing is that kind of validation.

Yeah. Gosh, you're such a good boyfriend. friend you're such a good totally friend you always are thinking about me i'm like yes this is what i'm being celebrated for so i will do this to the total top of my ability all the time and then that just always kind of leads to strange situations you know i'm not sticking up for myself but mostly because it's i don't know what it is that needs to be stuck up for i'm just yeah i don't you know i have a therapist i was seeing a therapist

before this therapist when i was in Tennessee for two and a half years. And, you know, you always talk about like, okay, this time we're going to draw boundaries or whatever. So I'm totally going to do that. And then you're like, but what boundaries do I even draw? I don't even, I don't want to draw that boundary because I want to hang out with you. But somehow when we hang out, things turn into this or whatever it is. So I think that I am still, I think I have a lot of emotional feelings.

Like data that has been over the past three and a half years or so to like that i'm still kind of synthesizing into ethereal how do i approach relating to other people yeah i've tried some current approaches now and none of them have been quite on the money okay but what i so appreciate and i love that you're talking about going to a therapist i always appreciate that because i think that there's so many people that still feel like they need permission to go and when they hear

other people talk about it and the fact that you just said that on a podcast like mine where a lot of people are listening because they're almost trying to glean a little bit of free therapy because they want to, but they're afraid to. I guarantee that the fact you just said that just had people say, okay, you know what? I'm going to do it. So I appreciate that. That means a lot. But what I really like too, it kind of goes back to what we were talking about

earlier. If everything we interact with is an opportunity to self-confront and grow, then as is the relationship.

But then when people are stuck in these people-pleasing relationships, emotionally immature relationships, when you try to get somebody to set a boundary, a boundary it's an adorable challenge for the more emotionally immature because you're basically showing them here's what's important to me i think if that's okay and then yep yep yes yes yeah so no that's that's not that but it's all for a good and uh okay and when you were

jumping on tiktok and starting to go on the social media accounts this is a little bit of a selfish question to ask you have a huge following i think when i was looking this morning 700 000 people on tiktok and what is it? Is it 600,000 on Instagram? And 400,000? Actually, it's 398. So are you really? Yeah. Okay, listeners, come on. I'll put the link in the show notes.

I've been really blessed. The podcasts have done well for the last decade, but podcasts, you put it out there before people were putting them on YouTube and I'll get some emails, but I can see the numbers and it blows my mind. But I throw myself on TikTok and it's wild. I never thought I cared about the numbers until one goes pretty well. And then that is a rush. It feels amazing, Ian. What is that? Are you chasing that? Not anymore. I have done that. I might do it again. I might do it again.

The videos that I made for my most recent album, Season 2, I did everything

myself because I was really trying to challenge myself to, Figure out what it is that you do well, figure out what it is that you don't do well, and then figure out which things that you don't do well. Are you willing to put in a lot of time to get better at and which do you need to ask other people for help? Because I have been working with other people my whole career. I just kind of got like, what would happen? I just, I run a lot of experiments. I'm a very pendulous.

I am like, hey, I know what it's like to work with lots of people. What is it like to work with absolutely no people?

What are the consequences? consequences and i don't have a visual i don't have like a visual aesthetic eye that like i create something i'm very pragmatic i'm very like well all the information is there so that should be plenty i have a song the song is good if i'm just standing there and doing this like that should be enough or whatever um and a lot of times it is you know a lot of times i think that people generally come to me because of the things that i talk about

in my yes and probably because it It sounds interesting to listen to that stuff. And I think that's why I keep people. But I think that for the purpose of gaining new fans, like a little bit more mature video style or just something maybe a little more grabby that I don't feel like I have the instinct for, which would be very helpful. And so all that to say, in my last album, season one, I had lots of videos that went viral all the time.

And it's fantastic. I always got that rush and then things would start going down or whatever and I would start getting this sinking feeling Oh, it's ending. Oh, no, but now i've been through enough cycles and i'm like it goes up it goes down It goes up it goes down this time around I was like i'm gonna do this if they pop off great if they don't pop off fine. I'm gonna learn what i'm gonna learn and I Specifically have not been watching numbers on this. Okay.

I just made the thing that at this moment in time I wanted to make So we'll see what happens. Maybe Maybe it will be popular down the road. Maybe it will be super popular tomorrow. Right now, it's very popular with people who already like me. But it gained a lot of new audience. Okay. And what I appreciate, it was funny too, when I started looking at the accounts.

So when I was following you and it tells you the people that I follow or follow me that follow you, there were several therapist accounts. And that did make me feel a little bit more validated for some reason. I'm like, this guy, this is some good mental health stuff. I love that you're writing about your experiences. Are you aware of the positive impact that it can have in the mental health field? I am. It was not my intention, but a lovely side product. Yeah. I said I'm looking forward.

Yeah. I have found that when I consume stuff, the thing that I'm most drawn to is an honest portrayal of somebody's human experience, regardless of what it is. Regardless if I'm going to think, well, they're a bad person. They're a good person. I don't do that anymore. I always am like, okay, like I can see what would happen if a person acted like this under these circumstances or whatever. And so I feel like what I'm trying to do now is be like, well, how do I act under my circumstances?

Can I describe what my circumstances are and the way that I'm reacting to them and come up with some way of making sense of all of that in a digestible way, which hopefully, I mean, that's just doing the same thing back that I thought was helping me. So I'm glad that it's helping. I love it. It really is. And that's what I'm excited about when you responded that my podcasts are primarily to a mental health audience.

And so I think that that's going to speak more to the people that are listening to this podcast than they are aware of. I just think that people are going to really resonate. And what I appreciate too, and I'm curious, the way you released your music, I really enjoyed that. So this season two, you had the video every week. So was that just an idea? 13 weeks. And was that just an idea that you had?

Have you seen that done before? so this was season two i did season one when i was back in nashville um and i released season one that way okay working with like a management team um it was three of us and then the guy there was the main girl and then the guy who owned the company and then a girl who was helpful and the guy who owned the company had the idea of releasing things like a television show his name was stephen lynn oh okay i haven't seen him in a long time

but we have all stopped working together since then but that was his idea so i definitely want to credit him i like releasing on a week i also just think it's super cool because you can that way expand instead of being like here's 13 songs i hope you're trying to work with them right now because i'm you're not going to hear about it after this week like hey there's another thing thing and even if the first song you see is episode nine you're like well this is

episode nine so there's other stuff yes that got me perfectly and then i'm trying to make sense of the okay what's is there a through line here What's the story? And then I even like the fact that then your songs themselves caused me to think and wonder about what that experience was. For people listening that are going to go listen and they're going to check out both seasons, was there a theme of season one? And would you say there's a theme of season two?

I feel like season one was kind of diagnosing. Okay. Where that I like that. The one was very like, well, I want, I mean, I have this song friends of all the things that I want to be true and it cannot make them true. And I have this thing. I am clearly an adult now. What does that mean? How do I deal with that? What is my view on friendship? What is my view on like, how am I treating things?

And then I have this song hating stuff about, you know, I don't really know what's going on, but I'm going to focus on the things that I like and see what happens. And around, was focused on being by myself. What happens? I'm spending time by myself. What are the things that I think about? What are the things? How does the way that I talk to myself affect the way that I perceive the world or the actions that I perform?

Yeah. Yeah. There definitely is an arc of, there's a little bit of a redemption arc of just starting from a low place, going into a place like. But this is the way things are. So let's figure it out. So if you've got a few more minutes, Can I go through some of the lyrics? Okay. So season two, episode one. Okay, right here. I know. So yeah, let me regale you with your powerful lyrics because I love them. I really do. I bolded some. So season two, episode one, level 429.

And as a person that has been stuck on games like Candy Crush and whatever, and embarrassingly high levels, I was drawn into that one immediately. You're talking about, okay, I sort of kind of auto-playing while I spiral.

I'm a mess, but I'm fun about it. I'm a mess. So what about it? and then there's a section where you say i don't know what i want from this i don't know what my purpose is i don't believe in purposes i don't believe in permanence i don't believe in much these days that's where it was i miss religion i miss faith i miss community and praise there is so much there what do you remember writing that talk about that yeah i was

stuck on level four it was actually level like 433 of bricks and balls okay okay where you like shoot a number of balls and try to break all the bricks, you know, um. Watching the Larry Sanders show on HBO, um, at my, the only house that I lived in by myself in Nashville. And yeah, I was, I was, I had gotten drunk. I had gotten high and I was just sitting at the piano, just being like, what is the state of now?

What am I experiencing right now? And I, to me, I listened to that song. I'm like, it's funny. This is a funny song to me. I don't know if I sold it funny enough. Okay. Yeah. These things are, they are funny. They are funny, you know, to be. Like, oh, things are kind of a mess, but like, it is fun. It is fun to be in this situation and be trying to figure out all these things.

The religion thing was, has been tough for sure. And I remember that night just feeling like, I don't know what to, that thing we were talking about, I don't know what to pursue now. I don't know this God shaped whole of this is my goal. Get to the eternal life. Please the Lord. Do all these things.

Who am I trying to please? please, I don't want to turn another human into a God, but I sometimes do that when I am dating somebody or whatever, because I have this God shaped hole and I'm like, I need somebody to please somebody to tell me I'm good and tell me I'm good. Yeah. And so, yeah, that was really just diagnosing the state of where I was in April of 2023.

Okay. And what I can, man, I can identify what you're saying there of, I thought this was fun or I thought this was funny because when I first discovered you, honestly, I think that was what I was so intrigued by was, is this a person that I'm watching the depths of despair, but he seems like he's kind of having a fun time with it.

But so this cognitive dissonance, and that's what caused me to just, I would watch more of your content. And then now thank you algorithm in that scenario, because then every day when I'm getting on TikTok, there's more of you, more of you. He's kind of a fun hang. But then I love that, that it was like a paradox. Season two, episode two, I just school chunk out of here. Now, and now I love knowing this backstory too, but then it was, what if I accomplished nothing? Would that really be so bad?

What if I make enough to live until I die and leave no mark behind? What's really wrong with that? Why am I any different from your average bird, bacterium, or hanging fern that takes a turn alive on earth that then feeds the worms? I'm guaranteed that one thing. So what if I accomplished nothing? I think why I like that was, I think I remember when I first heard you singing that, it's the, okay, yeah, maybe he's accepting the fact that maybe I can just be,

it's okay. I don't necessarily need to accomplish anything. But then all of a sudden it's, and why am I any different? And it went from bird and bacterium and firm, and all of a sudden I'm feeding the worms. I was like, okay, I'm not, I'm not sure then. Is he having a fun time or not? That's interesting. So for you though, let me talk about that lyric, what was going on there.

Yeah. I mean, that's kind of that idea of like, why is it special to be a human? And like, I feel like the rest of the album kind of does tackle like, why is it special? Yeah. My therapist that I had in Nashville, who I got along with really well, I miss him, man. He just can't practice in the state of Georgia, but he, anytime that I would ask, well, but what if like, he would be like, answer that question, answer the question.

What if you did that? So I'm like, okay, I just did that with accomplish nothing. What if I accomplish nothing?

This is my deepest fear. My deepest fear is this failure or failure to leave a mark on things or whatever first of all you're gonna leave a mark you're gonna be food for something you know all the things that you've interacted with are slightly different because you've touched them yeah you know buddy that you've affected all this kind so you can't really accomplish nothing and i don't really get into that in the song oh that's

a good i like that that's a good point you can't really accomplish nothing but if you do accomplish nothing what are the real consequences of doing so and it doesn't you know in the bacterium hanging from like, what are the real consequences of accomplishing something. Nothing. Maybe I just haven't discovered them yet, but also it's difficult. You would really have to try to accomplish nothing. So it's really more of like, what if I accomplish nothing now or today or there or whatever.

When I was mentioning this therapy modality act earlier in ACT, we talk about that we worry about the future and we ruminate about the past in an effort to try to make sense of right now, but it's this flawed premise. And I love what your therapist is doing Because if somebody's saying, yeah, but I did these things in the past, then I'm always like, totally, you did those that those are things. And then, but what if this, what if I don't do this thing in the future? Well, that will be a thing.

But then what about the now? And it's all that version of this is all we have any bit of a semblance of control over is literally right now. And now that's already gone. So with next, so I love that. So we, our brain thinks it's doing us a solid by worrying about the past and worrying about the future. And, but those are things. Yeah. Yeah, those are things that were really helpful for humans getting to this point.

Yeah, you're right. Yes. The collective idealizing of what do we want our world to be? How do we create that world? Like, is why we have created all these great technologies that help us talk. You're in Phoenix. I'm here. We're talking. It's amazing. And, you know, becoming just what it means to be human is based on all of those things. But that indomitable human spirit, when it doesn't feel like there's enough to get done.

Or okay there's a lot to get done but i don't feel that i can affect global politics personally you know or at least i don't think that i can affect it with the amount of effort that i'm willing to put into it so instead of being like just angry and spinning my wheels how can i, push myself away from that and be like i'm going to observe that and see what happens and anytime an opportunity falls to me to affect this like voting or something yeah i'm like we'll do that.

That's great. I would love for my voice to be heard, but in terms of how these things are affecting my life, like, how should I. Just control the things you can. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. No, I love it. And I do. And I know I wish I did not have a client at noon, Ian. I'm like, I can't believe this went so fast because I have more lyrics there.

But I do want to, what I like where you're going with that too, is I often talk about acceptance and we think that acceptance and you use the word apathy in one of your songs. So I always like when somebody can pull a good apathy reference, but acceptance doesn't mean apathy. If I accept the fact that this is where I'm at now, it doesn't mean that I'm just like Like laying down and doing nothing for the rest of my life is acceptance and commitment therapy.

Acceptance means to take in without defense in its entirety. So I give that example of if somebody says, yeah, but I don't want to be anxious. So I'm going to avoid the things that might cause me anxiety. And that anxiety is the thing. But if I accept it, then that means it is there. I will go do things and then there will be the anxiety. But then I still get to do things. Oh, yeah. And then here the anxiety is coming along with me for a ride.

And it turns out it's maybe not as scary as I thought it was. but that's such a foreign concept though when we want i don't want to feel it oh it's like oh yeah it's a hard hurdle yeah it's a tough hurdle to get over i do tend to especially when i'm like this is uncomfortable whatever it's okay it's the easiest thing to control it i can just remove myself totally at least long enough to try and think about it and be like what the heck is wrong with this situation yeah i'm still still

working on accepting all these things and then when you talked about the uncomfortable that's my biggest fixation is around that concept of differentiation we're all wired to get rid of discomfort but then really sitting with the discomfort turns out i'm okay and that's where growth occurs i love that concept but it's such a. Difficult one because your brain's also telling you hey you're uncomfortable man hit the brakes why are you sticking around or is

it the okay or is this my opportunity to grow and that i think that's even a little bit of a fine line at times i have to ask on that note too you've performed a ton do you enjoy the performing part do you get nervous before what will that be like when i see you in phoenix yeah i love performing it's super fun i go up and i have a list of all the songs that i plan to do and then there's a puzzle that i do every single night of

like how am i going to connect all these songs together in a way that seems coherent and all this stuff and how.

Without just talking about i try to do very little talking about the songs that okay i the songs are really almost like resting points in the narrative of this whole thing trying to figure out what does it mean to live a good life what does it mean to try what does it mean to love people what does it mean to be loved like how do we do all these things in an age that looks like this that is not like the age of our parents and not like the age of our parents

all this kind of stuff yeah and so So I totally get nervous because it's always, there's always that element of uncertainty, but yeah, I love uncertainty is just, it's just always going to be, it's always going to be an adaptable self for yourself. Ian, I cannot thank you enough for responding. That made my whole day. I got all excited. I group texted my whole family. I was like, oh, listen to all his songs and he's coming on the podcast and I can't wait.

I will, I will hopefully get to shake your hand when you come to Phoenix and then I'll I'll put the link to where they can, people can find you on all the platforms, but buy tickets, go see Ian, whether you're here in Phoenix and you can get a picture with us both. That's me like wanting to make sure that I can get a picture with you while you're here, Ian, or you're playing, you're playing all over the country and you're just, you're right.

Okay. And I think Phoenix is the fourth or the fifth stop. So get your tickets. And the good news is the podcasts are pretty evergreen. So there are going to be people that are going to hear this for the next few weeks. And if you're hearing this in a year from now, I'm sure now you're playing arenas. So look for him there. Right. Okay. All right. Okay, it was you too. And I can't wait to see in person. And I am a fan and I will do all I can to spread the good word of Ian.

Heck yeah, thanks. Okay, all right. Thanks a lot, Ian. Okay, take care. Music.