Speaker 1: I'm just waiting for this is the this is now
Speaker 1: the recycling truck that's gone on because the other guy
Speaker 1: was just.
Speaker 2: The regular trash.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Johnny, Johnny, I see him out.
Speaker 2: Great, Johnny's green, perfect. Great, there's another garbage.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know what. He's going back the other
Speaker 1: way now. And something's happening in my little community. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of trash happening.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of garbage happening. You know what. It's
Speaker 2: after the fourth of July.
Speaker 1: That's probably You're exactly right. He's doing a double pass.
Speaker 2: Great, he's like, Wow. People went crazy, especially since they
Speaker 2: were finally able to be social, so there's lots of trash.
Speaker 1: Hello, I'm mini driver and welcome to many questions. I've
Speaker 1: always loved Bruce's questionnaiw. It was originally an eighteenth century
Speaker 1: parlor game meant to reveal an individual's true nature. But
Speaker 1: with so many questions, there wasn't really an opportunity to
Speaker 1: expand on anything. So I took the format of Pruce's
Speaker 1: questionnaire and adapted what I think are se one of
Speaker 1: the most important questions you could ever ask someone they
Speaker 1: are when and where were you happiest what is the
Speaker 1: quality you like least about yourself? What relationship, real or fictionalized,
Speaker 1: defines love for you? What question would you most like answered,
Speaker 1: What person, place, or experience has shaped you the most?
Speaker 1: What would be your last meal? And can you tell
Speaker 1: me something in your life that has grown out of
Speaker 1: a personal disaster. The more people we ask, the more
Speaker 1: we begin to see what makes us similar and what
Speaker 1: makes us individual. I've gathered a group of really remarkable
Speaker 1: people who I am honored and humbled to have had
Speaker 1: a chance to engage with. My guest today on many
Speaker 1: questions is actor, producer and director Coleman do minga. Coleman
Speaker 1: is what I would call a connector. He connects people
Speaker 1: and ideas and moves through the world with a kind
Speaker 1: of creative joy. I sometimes imagine him like a fairy
Speaker 1: tale princess lost in the forest, where the path lights
Speaker 1: up with every step that they take, and they're followed
Speaker 1: by a gentle chorus of butterflies and birds. He is
Speaker 1: pretty incandescent. We talked about life and love, and particularly
Speaker 1: about change and how it's both a gift and a blight.
Speaker 1: I left our conversation with a smile on my face
Speaker 1: that has actually yet to recede. What person, place, or
Speaker 1: experience has most altered your life?
Speaker 2: Oh wow, I would say San Francisco. I moved to
Speaker 2: San Francisco when I was twenty years old, and I
Speaker 2: thought I was moving to San Francisco to become an artist.
Speaker 2: That I became a man. I thought I was going
Speaker 2: to become an actor. I became an artist there. It
Speaker 2: was transformative to me because I moved there just did
Speaker 2: redefine myself with very honest hat. A buddy who moved
Speaker 2: to San Francisco after college and he was like, Hey,
Speaker 2: I got this place in Nintendoline District. There's nothing but
Speaker 2: you know, street walkers and dereluxts, you name it. In
Speaker 2: the neighborhood. We live in a studio. You want to
Speaker 2: come and live in a studio with us. I'm like, absolutely,
Speaker 2: because that's what you do when you're twenty years old.
Speaker 2: You live with four other dudes in a studio apartment.
Speaker 2: And I literally slept in a closet. But it was
Speaker 2: a place where I feel like I grew the most,
Speaker 2: and I sort of redefined myself in every single way.
Speaker 2: I grew my hair out, I started to do hippie
Speaker 2: drum circles and do you know watsu and be on
Speaker 2: the beach naked. I became another version of myself. I
Speaker 2: became this weirdo artist boy. And then I got even
Speaker 2: more focused in terms of like what I believed, my intentions,
Speaker 2: where my purpose was, which was being an artist. So
Speaker 2: San Francis go hold so much of my heart because
Speaker 2: although I grew up in Philadelphia, I felt like I
Speaker 2: was raised in San Francisco and I was there for
Speaker 2: ten years. You were Yeah, I was in San Francisco
Speaker 2: from ten ninety one to two thousand and one.
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, did you become an act to that?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I became an actor there. I had this inkling.
Speaker 2: I took a few classes at the Walnut Street Theater
Speaker 2: School in at Temple University, and then I moved to
Speaker 2: San Francisco just you know, with questions and wanted to
Speaker 2: try things. And then I started get cast and then
Speaker 2: I had to actually learn about what I was actually doing.
Speaker 2: So my productions were my conservatory, my books, my mind's
Speaker 2: and my Stantaslavsky you name it by Udah Hagan. Respect
Speaker 2: for acting. I learned blocking by doing it, by wondering
Speaker 2: what is blocking? What are they writing on stage? So anyway,
Speaker 2: I became a theater artist in San Francisco, and I
Speaker 2: learned to respect the theater and respect craftsmanship, and you know,
Speaker 2: I was securely in the theater for you know, I
Speaker 2: would say twenty six years in my career was fully
Speaker 2: majority ly up on the stage and writing for the
Speaker 2: stage and direct Yeah. Wow, golly.
Speaker 1: I always wanted to work in the theater and I
Speaker 1: could just never get cast. I remember I lived. I
Speaker 1: live around the corner from the Royal Court, which is
Speaker 1: this amazing theater in London. This incredible artistic director at
Speaker 1: the time of this guy called Max Stafford Clark. I
Speaker 1: literally used to go and I'd talk my way in
Speaker 1: through the theater and they'd be rehearsing in the studio whatever,
Speaker 1: and I'd find my way to his office and I'd
Speaker 1: be like hello, and he'd be like yes, and I'd
Speaker 1: be like, I'm a local actor. I need to work.
Speaker 1: I've auditioned a hundred times. Can you give me a job?
Speaker 1: And he would look at my resume and he would go, yeah, well,
Speaker 1: you've got no theater on here, and I was like, no,
Speaker 1: I know, so we can we can get some theater
Speaker 1: on there. I used to badger him and it was
Speaker 1: so funny. I just never I don't know what it was.
Speaker 1: I kept getting cast in television, and when you're young,
Speaker 1: you know, obviously you've got to pay the bills, you
Speaker 1: got to do whatever comes your way. But I never
Speaker 1: got any of the theater work. I don't really have
Speaker 1: many regrets, but that is definitely one of mine, is
Speaker 1: that I'd read them a million times, but I never
Speaker 1: got to play those women that I read.
Speaker 2: It's not too late, I think you never know when
Speaker 2: I don't know, maybe you've been just dating and holding
Speaker 2: this in for so long, but maybe that theatrical experience
Speaker 2: will now blossom out of you at this time.
Speaker 1: Why not you never know? I had a dream. I
Speaker 1: had a dream the other night. I'm not kidding. It
Speaker 1: has never been my dream to play Juliet. By the way,
Speaker 1: she's one of the least interesting women, right I've wanted
Speaker 1: to play. I actually auditioned for drama school in the
Speaker 1: role of Volumnia, Carilinus's mother. So I was seventeen playing,
Speaker 1: you know, a woman in her late thirties early forties,
Speaker 1: and they were so bemused. I think that's why they
Speaker 1: kind of gave me a call back. They were like,
Speaker 1: it's this weird child like playing a middle aged woman
Speaker 1: with a grown up warrior son. Like what you do?
Speaker 1: I was like, I saw Judy, don't do it. It
Speaker 1: was amazing.
Speaker 2: And they were like, if you.
Speaker 1: Took it upon yourself to think.
Speaker 2: That would be a good idea.
Speaker 1: I had this dream the other night that I was
Speaker 1: playing Juliet. It was so funny, and in one of
Speaker 1: the scenes with Romeo, it was actually the scene where
Speaker 1: they're respectively taking poison, and I sat up and went,
Speaker 1: I want to be you, I don't want to be me.
Speaker 1: Can we switch? And he said, well, yeah, but we're
Speaker 1: both still going to die.
Speaker 2: It was quite a cool dream that it's fantastic.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, Where and when were you happiest?
Speaker 2: Immediately? The first thing I think about is with my mother.
Speaker 2: I think probably sitting in the kitchen of our row
Speaker 2: home in Philadelphia around nineteen seventy nine. I'm probably doing
Speaker 2: my homework at the kitchen table while my mother's cooking.
Speaker 2: And when she would cook, like in the summer or
Speaker 2: something like that, she would cook in her bra. She
Speaker 2: was cooking her bra and her slip, and so I
Speaker 2: just thought, I don't know that's where my mother cooks.
Speaker 2: She gets very comfortable and she usually I can see
Speaker 2: her frying chicken and she's sweating a little bit, but
Speaker 2: she's also teaching me. She loved that I was curious
Speaker 2: about how she did things in the kitchen and something
Speaker 2: about that just with a mother's love and a kitchen.
Speaker 2: My mother always just she was just a real cool,
Speaker 2: fun sweet woman. She's no longer with us, and I'm
Speaker 2: not seed to angelicize someone, but my mother was really awesome.
Speaker 2: She was funny and fun and interesting and always curious
Speaker 2: and inspiring me to be curious as well. So, you know,
Speaker 2: late seventies, early ladies, sitting in the kitchen with my mom.
Speaker 1: Do you think those are the cornerstones of happiness for you,
Speaker 1: which is comfort and homeliness and feeling safe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think many. That's why I tend to have
Speaker 2: people over to any apartment or house that I've ever had.
Speaker 2: I'm always the hub. People know that I will have
Speaker 2: a dinner party just because come over for dinner. I
Speaker 2: love to feed people. I have a beautiful garden pool,
Speaker 2: and I want people over enjoying it at all times,
Speaker 2: because I think that's what maybe I was taught that
Speaker 2: you share these things, you always have a sense of
Speaker 2: love and comfort and safety when you have people around.
Speaker 1: I love that. It's so funny because you'd invited us
Speaker 1: over on July fourth, and I wish I could have
Speaker 1: got there, because your home does look absolutely spectacular. It
Speaker 1: looks like it's set up for you to never leave.
Speaker 2: It, you know what. Listen, we're the second owners after
Speaker 2: the first owners built the house, and it was built
Speaker 2: by a Jewish doctor and his wife in nineteen sixty four,
Speaker 2: and he built it to be the house that he's
Speaker 2: in forever, and he was until he was ill and
Speaker 2: his wife was ill, and then the house went to
Speaker 2: the children, and then they finally sold it to us.
Speaker 2: And I feel, honestly like the caretaker of the house.
Speaker 2: I feel less like, oh, I bought a house and
Speaker 2: we made it our own. But I felt like I
Speaker 2: wanted to love this house because you could tell it
Speaker 2: was loved. You couldn't feel it. And when anyone comes
Speaker 2: over to the house, they're like, oh, no one ever
Speaker 2: wants to leave. By the way my party it started out,
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, we'll have an afternoon hang. It
Speaker 2: started at two o'clock and it didn't undil two thirty
Speaker 2: in the morning.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I wish we'd come.
Speaker 2: It's that house, I'm telling you, and it happens consistently.
Speaker 2: I'm just like, no one ever wants to leave my house.
Speaker 2: I want people to feel loved, and so I'm like,
Speaker 2: take a nap. There, go jump in the pool, there,
Speaker 2: go use this. There's lotions, whatever you need. The house
Speaker 2: is open for you.
Speaker 1: You know, it's a very particular thing being a host,
Speaker 1: and there is a huge amount of generosity. And I
Speaker 1: must say that's what I think of when I think
Speaker 1: of you as an actor. Thank you, generosity. Being part
Speaker 1: of a cast or a collection of actors, it's such
Speaker 1: a particular mindset.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, it's wild. I think I've always approached
Speaker 2: what we do many as a service job, that we
Speaker 2: truly are in service. And I think those routes started
Speaker 2: in the theater, where it's like I knew the task,
Speaker 2: I knew what the assignment was, which was to be
Speaker 2: in service to the audience, to be in service to
Speaker 2: the story, be in service to what we're creating, to
Speaker 2: not come in with any preconceived notions, but do as
Speaker 2: much as I can and then see what I bring
Speaker 2: to the table and then welcome what someone else brings in.
Speaker 2: To be honest, if I know one good thing about myself,
Speaker 2: I may not be the best at many things, but
Speaker 2: I know I'm a good host, and I know that.
Speaker 2: That's why I become a director, because I know how
Speaker 2: to throw a good party. I think there are skills
Speaker 2: of yours that you need. You're like, oh no, I
Speaker 2: know my parties are good because I know about the music,
Speaker 2: who to invite, why to invite them, the kind of vibe.
Speaker 2: I'm curating the whole thing, you know, and I'm leading
Speaker 2: the vision and then just welcoming what everyone brings to it,
Speaker 2: like bring something, bring a cake, bring nothing, bring your
Speaker 2: bathings to but bring something that is going to help
Speaker 2: generate this huge, I don't know, epic experiment of communication
Speaker 2: and love. That's why I invited you, guys. I felt
Speaker 2: like I knew what you would bring and whatever that is,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: I would have bought ribs and a good attitude.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, thank you for bringing the ribs. I appreciate that.
Speaker 2: Pork ribs or beef ribs, many pork or beef pork ribs,
Speaker 2: pork ribs, same here. Thank you I'm committed to pork.
Speaker 2: I don't understand the beef ribs. Too big, too.
Speaker 1: Much, too big, and too much.
Speaker 2: Too big, too gaming exactly. Yes, thank you so many.
Speaker 2: I knew you were invited to the cookout.
Speaker 1: I know I'm coming to another cookout. I want to
Speaker 1: stay at a party till two thirty in the morning.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. It just kept going, Oh, I love it.
Speaker 1: I love it when the right people won't leave. It's
Speaker 1: the worst thing when the wrong people start. But then
Speaker 1: you really have only yourself to blame for having invited
Speaker 1: them in the first place. So you just talked about
Speaker 1: being able to appreciate that about yourself, which I love
Speaker 1: so much because it means that you can actually consciously
Speaker 1: add that the things you know you like about yourself,
Speaker 1: you can consciously bring them to the things that you
Speaker 1: do in the way you move through the world. So
Speaker 1: tell me what relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you.
Speaker 2: I think, to be honest, I just have to say
Speaker 2: to my husband, m Raoul is one of a kind.
Speaker 2: I admire him. We've been together for seventeen years, and
Speaker 2: I really admire him. It's not only just about our love,
Speaker 2: but it's also about our brotherhood, about our friendship, about
Speaker 2: our patients with each other, about a stepping outside of
Speaker 2: the unit and saying what do you need? Where are you?
Speaker 2: And he's gone off and saved whales turtles. He went
Speaker 2: off and he went to a turtle arm custory. It
Speaker 2: for a month. We didn't peak to each other for
Speaker 2: a month because he was committed to this thing. I
Speaker 2: went to London for a while for six months to
Speaker 2: do a couple plays, and his schedule woudn't allow him
Speaker 2: to be there. But I was like, go on your journey,
Speaker 2: trust that I'm here for you. It doesn't fracture our
Speaker 2: relationship as anything. It allows us to grow in another
Speaker 2: way that it allows us to be independent in some way.
Speaker 2: When we first met seventeen years ago, I'd been through
Speaker 2: a couple other relationships and I was sort of exhausted
Speaker 2: with presenting the person that you want me to be
Speaker 2: at a relationship and actually denying actually who I was,
Speaker 2: and vice versa. I was like, no, so actually I
Speaker 2: became an interrogation when our first dates, it was like,
Speaker 2: what are you really about? Who are you? What do
Speaker 2: you really like? What do you want? Because I want
Speaker 2: to know who you really were. Don't be afraid tell
Speaker 2: me exactly the things that you think are ugly about
Speaker 2: yourself that are beautiful and that you hope you can
Speaker 2: be better. Because if we're really dealing with each other
Speaker 2: in that way, that's real love. I think. I think
Speaker 2: I'm experiencing real love with him because it does mean
Speaker 2: we can truly be and exist and accept each other
Speaker 2: for who we are and also inspire each other to
Speaker 2: be a little different.
Speaker 1: You know, do you think that it's different like that
Speaker 1: what you just said, This is what real love is.
Speaker 1: This is what it is I think I'm living in.
Speaker 1: Do you think it's very different to the idea that
Speaker 1: you had growing up of what love was? Because I
Speaker 1: know my love is. I can't believe it. I love
Speaker 1: this person that I am with so much, but in
Speaker 1: this way that I never thought love would be this,
Speaker 1: but it is. I always thought it was something else,
Speaker 1: and actually my previous thoughts were erroneous. It wasn't that.
Speaker 1: It is this.
Speaker 2: I agree, Mannie. I agree because I think a lot
Speaker 2: of times were taught that with love you have to
Speaker 2: give up something. I don't think it's about giving up,
Speaker 2: It's about like being open to shift or grow. But
Speaker 2: I think it's like I've always believed that love was available.
Speaker 2: That's something that I know that some of my friends
Speaker 2: have not thought or believed, or they come into believing, oh,
Speaker 2: my relationship will be these things, and they have these
Speaker 2: parameters set up. Oh it must be this, it must
Speaker 2: look like this, and like you're creating something in your
Speaker 2: own mind that doesn't exist. Because when you see that
Speaker 2: thing and you have that spark, you have to accept
Speaker 2: what is. And I think love is imperfect. You bend,
Speaker 2: you grow, you cry, you hurt, you all that stuff.
Speaker 2: But I think if there's the underpinnings of saying I'm
Speaker 2: committed to wanting to do this, and explores this with
Speaker 2: you and explore grace, explore kindness, openness. Someone told me
Speaker 2: this many years ago and never forgot it. I asked
Speaker 2: this older couple what was the key to their success
Speaker 2: and they said, and I think this woman, she says,
Speaker 2: you've got to be alone for the ride to know
Speaker 2: that they're going to change and it's going to have
Speaker 2: nothing to do with you. And that's okay. I think
Speaker 2: that's what we have to love people, right, I mean, yeah.
Speaker 1: You have to love them with loose hands that's it.
Speaker 2: You can't be tight. I think the fear people always
Speaker 2: think that someone's going to leave you. But I'm like,
Speaker 2: if someone's gonna leave you, they're going to leave you.
Speaker 2: It doesn't You can't hold tight to it. You just
Speaker 2: have to invest and pour all the love and care
Speaker 2: that you can to it and trust it it'll be
Speaker 2: for the time that it's supposed to be. You know,
Speaker 2: we hope things can be happily ever after, you know,
Speaker 2: and told fairy tales. Happily ever after? Is that the truth?
Speaker 2: That's the hope. I believe that's the wish. But you know,
Speaker 2: maybe happily ever after a few years or a couple
Speaker 2: of coffee or if you laughs, I don't know, or
Speaker 2: fifty years.
Speaker 1: It's really true. And we're never really asked to investigate
Speaker 1: the fairytale. We're never asked to kind of cross examine it.
Speaker 1: I know, I grew up with this idea that that
Speaker 1: is what you do. You grow up, you fall in love,
Speaker 1: that person loves you back, and then you have a baby.
Speaker 1: And that is not how my life turned out at all. Right,
Speaker 1: I grew up, did not fall in love, had a baby,
Speaker 1: did fall in love, broke up with them fell in
Speaker 1: love with someone else, but all the time sort of
Speaker 1: mining for the parameters of what that love is, and
Speaker 1: it's so far away from the initial idea. And you're right,
Speaker 1: you have to keep growing, you have to keep doing
Speaker 1: the personal excavation and allow your partner to do that
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, because you never even know what your
Speaker 2: family is supposed to look like exactly. I think. But
Speaker 2: we're set up. We're thinking what you said, You're set
Speaker 2: up thinking, oh, you fall in love, you have a child.
Speaker 2: It becomes this sort of thing. But no one even
Speaker 2: knows that maybe you fall in love, you have a child,
Speaker 2: you don't have that love, you have another relationship that
Speaker 2: you become best friends with the person you made that
Speaker 2: child with, or whatever. Maybe your family is supposed to
Speaker 2: look like this whole other creation based on the actual
Speaker 2: reality the people that are involved in it, instead of
Speaker 2: some ideological thing, this fairy tale looming over all of us.
Speaker 1: You know, that's I'm so interested in. How do we
Speaker 1: disseminate what other good ideas to hang on to and
Speaker 1: what are the ones that we should really go Nah,
Speaker 1: that's not going to serve me, because you can only
Speaker 1: do it by living it. Really, and then circumstance will
Speaker 1: slap you in the face and go, that was a
Speaker 1: really terrible idea to have hung on to you for
Speaker 1: so many years, and now here we are.
Speaker 2: Well, that's any good drama, right, Isn't that the human condition?
Speaker 2: I think it was Martin knocks and great showrunner. She said,
Speaker 2: a great story is a great protagonist. That is one
Speaker 2: and commit it to a wrong idea of themselves.
Speaker 1: Ha ha ha. I love that.
Speaker 2: Inn it's about the film or the series or something
Speaker 2: that's trying to challenge them to change.
Speaker 1: That is really good.
Speaker 2: Well, I always attached to an idea about ourselves that
Speaker 2: we have to smash and have to let go of.
Speaker 2: At some point you have to realize how long is
Speaker 2: it serving you? Is this really serving you? Are you happy?
Speaker 2: Are you getting what you want?
Speaker 1: But you're probably lucky if you get to smash it
Speaker 1: or even have the impetus to do that, because a
Speaker 1: lot of times I think people will use the quick
Speaker 1: fixes to stop feeling bad about that thing. And all
Speaker 1: of the available stuff that we have in our world
Speaker 1: of consumption, various things from addictive to non addictive, but
Speaker 1: repetitive behaviors becomes such a sort of immediate way of
Speaker 1: dealing with it, rather than going question the fundamental idea
Speaker 1: about why you want to keep doing this thing and
Speaker 1: if it serves you.
Speaker 2: I have a question for you. I think by like, say,
Speaker 2: let's say, by smashing these things many if you like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, how have you been as a person
Speaker 2: when it comes to change?
Speaker 1: Terrible? Terrible, really terrible terrible with change?
Speaker 2: I say to myself, if you change, change everything, I
Speaker 2: think it's I have a fearlessness with that. And somehow
Speaker 2: it served me because I think I checked. All I
Speaker 2: have is my gut to trust that. So why has
Speaker 2: it been difficult for you? You know what?
Speaker 1: Because because I actually feel exactly how you do, which
Speaker 1: is if I have a gut feeling about something, I
Speaker 1: have to act on that, and that has often meant
Speaker 1: in gendering change. But the change itself I loathe. It
Speaker 1: feels unstable and terrible and queasy and like like I
Speaker 1: have permanent sea sickness, and it's powerful, but I have
Speaker 1: this terrible volition to do it. And I think that's
Speaker 1: one of the things, like if I could wave a
Speaker 1: magic wand and change something about myself, it would be
Speaker 1: to more readily embrace change to love it. Nothing in
Speaker 1: life is stasis. Nothing. Everything is cant the moving and evolving.
Speaker 1: So get on board, woman.
Speaker 2: That's come on, man, get on. That's exactly it.
Speaker 1: Come on.
Speaker 2: It's so it's so true. I remember I moved from
Speaker 2: New York years ago and people were so like, I
Speaker 2: had a rent stabilized apartment. I had a wonderful career
Speaker 2: in New York, and people felt like, why why do
Speaker 2: you want to leave New York? You got a rent
Speaker 2: stable apartment.
Speaker 1: And I was like, you know what, you got a
Speaker 1: job in an apartment.
Speaker 2: Why you got a job an apartment. You're working on Broadway,
Speaker 2: you're doing doing, Shut up. But I felt like New York,
Speaker 2: like I trusted that New York was just not my
Speaker 2: vibe right then and there, I thought like, I'm not growing.
Speaker 2: I feel the winds of change coming and I've got
Speaker 2: to go with it. And so at some point I
Speaker 2: just I'll think about it for a moment. But then
Speaker 2: at some point I just cut it all off and
Speaker 2: I give up the apartment. And people are like, no
Speaker 2: one gives up a rent stabilized apartment in New York.
Speaker 2: You hang on to it and until they pull it out.
Speaker 2: A claw under your dead hand, you know. But I
Speaker 2: was like, I gotta go. I said, I gotta trust
Speaker 2: that there's more I gotta trust, And you know, then
Speaker 2: I got a rent and Los Angeles that I never
Speaker 2: would ever imagine paying for because I was kind of like,
Speaker 2: you know, I was a working artist. I never I
Speaker 2: just thought in a company of working class family. I
Speaker 2: felt like, oh, we don't spend that kind of money
Speaker 2: in an apartment. But I decided to do that because
Speaker 2: I thought, let me trust the universe, that the universe
Speaker 2: will provide because this is what I need. And then
Speaker 2: it kept providing that. So I think maybe that's because
Speaker 2: I've done the math of it. Now after living in
Speaker 2: this body for fifty one years, I've done the math,
Speaker 2: and I see that when you trust your gut, when
Speaker 2: you go with that feeling, it works out. I feel
Speaker 2: like I feel like I'm starting my own church right
Speaker 2: here on your podcast.
Speaker 1: I love it. I feel like you have a philosophy
Speaker 1: that is underwritten by New York real estate. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's a pretty interesting way I'm kind of feeling.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to figure out the stabilize your life.
Speaker 2: Stabilize your life with from real estate to.
Speaker 1: From real estate to real good vibes.
Speaker 2: There we go. That's good, perfect, I'll take it.
Speaker 1: What question would you most like answered?
Speaker 2: Wow, that's a great question because I think that's a
Speaker 2: question of the heart. Is there heaven? Hmm? And will
Speaker 2: I truly see my loved ones again? Because you know,
Speaker 2: I've lost some really terrific people in my life. One
Speaker 2: recently one of my dear friends Ari, and I lost
Speaker 2: my parents. And you know what I love, I love
Speaker 2: so deeply because I feel like I've been attracted to
Speaker 2: I don't know these dreamers, these people who believe in magic.
Speaker 2: One was my mom, other was my dad. One of
Speaker 2: my best friends Ari. And you wonder, You're like, are
Speaker 2: you there? Are you in another realm Am? I just
Speaker 2: hoping and wishing and believing. But I want to know
Speaker 2: is that is that true? Do we really go to
Speaker 2: the other place? Are you watching over? Are you listening?
Speaker 2: Are you speaking to me? Are you walking with me?
Speaker 1: I wonder if knowing, would you know how when we
Speaker 1: find magical things out as people, and then there's that
Speaker 1: moment of starting to put it into practice and it's
Speaker 1: incredible and amazing, and then pretty soon this magical thing
Speaker 1: becomes part of your daily life, and it no longer
Speaker 1: becomes special and magical. It just becomes part of the kutaden.
Speaker 1: And I wonder if we just can't hold that much
Speaker 1: information and keep it as magical as it's supposed to
Speaker 1: be down here on Earth in all of this thick
Speaker 1: vibration of being in a physical body on a planet,
Speaker 1: and that that whole etheric idea like that, we couldn't
Speaker 1: hold it without corrupting it in a way.
Speaker 2: Wow, I think that's very valid. As humans, we do
Speaker 2: corrupt the magic.
Speaker 1: Right, we kind of do, And maybe reaching for it
Speaker 1: is better watching this and feeling like, you know, when
Speaker 1: I go and try and find my mom, I really
Speaker 1: have to feel for her. I have to let go
Speaker 1: of all of the shit that I've been thinking about
Speaker 1: in the day, and I have to connect with nature
Speaker 1: or she always used to tell me to admire the
Speaker 1: infinite sky, and I wonder if that that is as
Speaker 1: pure as it could ever be, and that if someone
Speaker 1: could tell me if there was a heaven, I probably
Speaker 1: only ruin it by it then just being another thing.
Speaker 2: In my purse, just another place that you know, kind
Speaker 2: of yeah, And you're right, because maybe I feel like
Speaker 2: you're saying, maybe I want to know because I'm reaching
Speaker 2: out towards it and it's a burning question in my heart.
Speaker 2: But it also keeps us in that realm of magic
Speaker 2: and that dimension of space and time and transcendence and
Speaker 2: the things that we don't know. Maybe you're right, it's
Speaker 2: maybe maybe we're not supposed to know everything.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's it, And it's in the not knowing that
Speaker 1: you can actually stay connected to spirit and that if
Speaker 1: we drag it down here it wouldn't be that. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I've been giving it a lot of thought
Speaker 1: because my mama died quite recently, and I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: what I think about all the time. Actually, but I'm
Speaker 1: glad that you think about it too. I'm glad that
Speaker 1: it's one of those things that we wrestle with.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, because I think I don't know. I'd
Speaker 2: like to believe, as we know of people who have
Speaker 2: experienced a tremendous loss, especially mothers. I know when I
Speaker 2: lost my mother. My mother was my best friend, and
Speaker 2: when she passed, a sound came out of my body
Speaker 2: that I don't think i'll ever hear again or want
Speaker 2: to hear. It was animalistic. It felt like something that
Speaker 2: was being severed in some way, shape or form. And
Speaker 2: then I think have constantly been like like, I know
Speaker 2: and feel her presence and all that happens in the world,
Speaker 2: all the people that are sort of gentle reminders of her.
Speaker 2: I do understand that it is a thing. I guess
Speaker 2: you're not supposed to know until you do know, because
Speaker 2: I think you're supposed to have some faith that there
Speaker 2: is more. I think that's what keeps you mo mo
Speaker 2: moving forward, because you know what the end is. We
Speaker 2: all know what the end is. It's very clear what
Speaker 2: the end is. It's definitive that we all will die,
Speaker 2: but there's a promise that we will live on and
Speaker 2: we will see each other again. And so I think
Speaker 2: we keep moving through space with the hope that I
Speaker 2: want to see that person again until I get that.
Speaker 2: I'm going to keep doing things out down on this
Speaker 2: plane and hopefully making a difference, leaving some fingerprints on things,
Speaker 2: and making hopefully the spaces that we're in rich and
Speaker 2: full before it's our turn. But we want to know
Speaker 2: that when it's our turn, that someone's there, that you're
Speaker 2: not alone, and that's something we don't know. We just
Speaker 2: have to have faith and believe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, and maybe that faith is what can make
Speaker 1: being here a little freer because it's like, we just
Speaker 1: get this one as far as we know. So play.
Speaker 2: Can I ask you a question, Manny? Can I ask
Speaker 2: you a question?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: When your mother passed you were very close, am I right? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Where do you think the love goes? What do you
Speaker 2: do with that love?
Speaker 1: Good Lord? Well, the funny thing is, I don't feel
Speaker 1: like it's gone anywhere. I feel like, in a way,
Speaker 1: it has become distilled because the fact that she's not
Speaker 1: here to kind of talk about all the stuff, so
Speaker 1: all the bad stuff, all the difficult stuff, all the
Speaker 1: amazing stuff life in general, because all of that has disappeared. Really,
Speaker 1: what's been left in this kind of relief is the
Speaker 1: grace and the laughter and the humor, and all of that,
Speaker 1: for me is love. And I feel it so intensely,
Speaker 1: And even though I can't talk to her and tell her,
Speaker 1: I feel like that was the gift that she left
Speaker 1: me with was what survives of us is love? Like
Speaker 1: that is quite literally what survives of us is that
Speaker 1: vibration and that feeling. And to be able to give
Speaker 1: that to your children and for them to continue to
Speaker 1: feel after you're physically not here anymore. I think that's
Speaker 1: the point.
Speaker 2: I think passing the baton right, yeah on.
Speaker 1: H And I was explaining that to my son the
Speaker 1: other day, and I think it was really amazing being
Speaker 1: able to tell him, and I know he won't forget.
Speaker 1: I have all of this love, all of this love
Speaker 1: that mom left me with, and it's so incredible to
Speaker 1: be able to tell you about that love and that
Speaker 1: when you see it, you'll know it. You'll see because
Speaker 1: you'll recognize it in you, and then you'll have it,
Speaker 1: and so it goes on, and so it goes on.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm sorry you lost your mum and
Speaker 1: your dad. I mean, we all do it. It just
Speaker 1: it's just what happens.
Speaker 2: We do, we do, and you know it's for those
Speaker 2: who haven't, if anyone's listening out there who haven't, and
Speaker 2: I think it terrifies them knowing that if it happened,
Speaker 2: they don't know what they would do. Yeah, And I'm
Speaker 2: always telling people, well you will. I grieved and I
Speaker 2: leaned into it. My friend Melissa was the one who
Speaker 2: gave me the advice I said, because I felt like
Speaker 2: I was such a good son. I loved being a son.
Speaker 2: I loved my parents, And she said, you're going to
Speaker 2: pour that love into everything that you do, and so
Speaker 2: I think that, I know that, I know it was
Speaker 2: a definitive moment in my life where the choice was
Speaker 2: to use that love with even more conviction, and like
Speaker 2: you're saying, to distill it, to say that this is
Speaker 2: what purposes, what my intentions are, Who I love, how
Speaker 2: I love. Not that I flitted it around, but I
Speaker 2: guess I did. I just had it was more out there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it focuses you, Like that's the thing when you
Speaker 1: lose someone, even though you don't lose them, but when
Speaker 1: they are physically gone, it is so focused because you
Speaker 1: so clearly feel what it is that you felt about them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it certainly made me question all the stuff that I
Speaker 1: gave a lot of energy to that really didn't deserve
Speaker 1: that energy and didn't need it and didn't require it.
Speaker 2: Done with that.
Speaker 1: Right, you can see Coleman in Zola, which is in
Speaker 1: theaters now and it's honestly the most radical and best
Speaker 1: film of the year in my opinion, maybe in many years.
Speaker 1: Run don't walk to see it. And Candy Man which
Speaker 1: is released on August the twenty seventh. This year, Mini
Speaker 1: Questions is hosted and written by Me Mini Driver, Supervising
Speaker 1: producer Aaron Kaufman, Producer Morgan Levoy, Research assistant Marissa Brown.
Speaker 1: Original music Sorry Baby by Mini Driver, Additional music by
Speaker 1: Aaron Kaufman, Executive produced by Me Mini Driver. Special thanks
Speaker 1: to Jim Nikolay, Will Pearson, Addison O'Day, Lisa Castella and
Speaker 1: Annika Oppenheim at w kPr, Dala Pescador, Kate Driver and
Speaker 1: Jason Weinberg, and for constantly solicited tech support, Henry Driver,