Latest / The Inner Well Podcast / Catching Big Fish: TM, Creativity & Authentic Living with Criss Cain
Transcript
- The Inner Well Podcast: We all contain a space within that when enlivened and nourished will support us with unwavering stability, expansion, and peace of mind. Join us each week as we dive into honest, grounded conversations about transcendental meditation, consciousness, and growth, and what it means to live an integrated life supported by a foundation of creativity and calm. This is the inner world. Well, Chris, thank you for taking the time. Be here with me and have this conversation about your journey. And I always remember the first day we met so clearly. We were at brunch at our mutual friend's house. And it was shortly after David Lynch had passed. And so his name and just that conversation was so lively in. I feel like the collective at that point, but definitely that day at brunch. Yeah. You quoted him and I was like, I just watched Blue Velvet last night in honor. So we hit it off. Yeah, I don't know. I remember going home and telling the people I live with about meeting you and my boss, which I'm sure we'll get to, but Ann Wilson, the singer from Heart, had raised money for TM with one of her last solo albums. So I had been sort of taught about it a little bit, but then I met you, I'm like, ⁓ I'm supposed to. It felt like, which many of my encounters in Nashville over the last year definitely feel like fate. And I'm leaning into all of that and making sure I stay as connected as I can with the people that you have that feeling about, because it's real. It is. When you say it felt like fate and I'm supposed to be doing that. Like what was that feeling? Like how did that come up for you that it was a clear? Well was just so in the David Lynch headspace and I, you know, masterclass.com, he taught one of the masterclasses on filmmaking and and his catching of ideas, which I love. I still every time I sit down to write, I ⁓ picture his metaphor about catching the ideas. Sort of like your fishing. Yeah. Will you t tell us that metaphor? I can't say it as well as him, but go to masterclass.com because he's the genius in that department. But inspired me too. So he always says ideas are like fish. And if you want to catch the little fish, they hang out on the surface. And if you want to catch the big fish, you have to go deeper. ⁓ and he talks about how TM is what's allowed him to access those deeper levels of his mind and But not necessarily that like during the meditation we're going fishing for ideas, but just but that by regularly accessing those deeper levels of the mind, which is that source of creativity and intuition and ideas and that then naturally when he came out into his work or whatever area of life, ⁓ that there was more access to that. And naturally it flows. Yeah, and for me. My creativity prior to TM was very chaotic. And I am or have been told I'm ADHD and ⁓ Definitely just the the break that TM gives my brain because I'm I'm my mind isn't as wild while TM is happening. And it just makes sense to me that things have slowed enough to kind of blank the canvas properly for me. So I can focus on things one by one after a TM session, unlike I'm able to do without it. Tell me more. What are some of the creative things that you're working on. And I always remember that moment when you know, it it even I think it was day two of the four-day TM class, you came back in and had just so much excitement and enthusiasm about the creative, productive day that you had had and just like the breakthrough, I think, in some creative blocks that you'd had even after a day of practicing this. ⁓ Do you want to share about that experience? Yeah, and like right before I'd met you, I'd started to implement a a schedule into my life kind of for the first time. I've been very against schedules for so long. Like waking up when I wake up, staying up as late as I need to stay up. And then I had implemented a dance routine into my schedule at that point. Where every day, and I'm doing it still, but every morning before I look at my phone, I dance to like a song that makes me laugh. You know, so that's Oops, I did it again by Brittany Spears or ⁓ a lot of Taylor Swift lately, or you know, just like goofy things that will put me in a decent mood right away. And then I feel like I can take on more stuff. But then once I added the T ⁓ to it to it, added another thing onto the schedule. So I started to implement those things into a schedule. So even if I'm not in the mood at the beginning of the day, I'll dance, I'll do T ⁓ Which will like me put me likely put me closer to in the mood if I'm not fully in the mood to write. But then if I set a timer for 10 minutes or 17 minutes, that seems to really kick me into a a much better gear. And I do it right after TM for your write. So you'd already incorporated the dance before you added TM into this routine. And what is the biggest shift that you noticed when you added TM into the mix? I definitely utilize it as a ⁓ Kind of a get out of mental jail free card, too. But yeah, I would say it just definitely slowed me down in general and gave me a way to be less freaked out. I just moved to Nashville like a couple of months before that. So it was like it was also just a period of me wanting to do new things and sort of start fresh in a lot of ways. With that's why the dancing thing started first. That was the first big change. Like, let's try this. get yourself to move in the morning some like trick yourself to move because I hate running. I hate the gym. It's not it doesn't work. So I just get a yoga mat and dance to some Backstreet Boys. I love it so that'll be my way. It's so good. What was that first day like when you came out like the first you walked in for our first TM session? What was that experience like for you? It's just another one of those moments where like, ⁓ my people Like people that are searching for something more real or well, obviously easier, like to make life a little easier for yourself, hopefully. I don't know, it's just a room of people that aren't settling with what all of society thinks is normal sometimes, you know, or or branching out, testing something else, seeing if this'll be the thing for you. So that was inspiring. Then over those coming days and weeks, I just remember you having a lot of enthusiasm for the things that you were noticing. anything that like stood out or you want to share, like what you noticed opening up or unfolding? A lot of self-confidence ⁓ in my work because I think I was able to. Just get out more ideas or catch more ideas. During that time, it wasn't like all of my ideas were fantastic, but there were so many more of them to comb through that that I found good ones and I had big projects that took off. And I launched a podcast with Anne that is called After Dinner Thinks with Anne Wilson. And we'd been talking about it for a few years, but really right after TM NAT launched and You've had people like Billy Bob Thornton and Lucinda Williams and Chapel Roan. So that one took off. That was cool. How fun. Where did that idea come from? Yeah, I obviously Ann Wilson's voice is such an iconic thing that I was like, Well, ever other people are recording her singing. I can record her talking. We'll get her speaking voice into the world too, because it's beautiful. Her speaking voice is just as beautiful as her singing voice. And at this point, we'd had seven years of dinners, you know, around the table. And I she's one of the just most intellectual people I've ever met, and her husband as well. And so the convos are never about the weather. They're deep and they're meaningful. And if you got shit going on, let's lay it on the table, literally. And so I just said to her after the TM stuff has started, I'm like, ⁓ I have the podcast idea now. Like It was always just do a podcast of some kind, but was like, ⁓ your dinner table. Let's just do it after dinner. And put lapel mics out and just capture what we normally do. So the first few episodes we didn't have a guest, it's just her and I, which honestly are my favorite episodes anyway, because that's our relationship that we're capturing, which I think is why it works. but then yeah, we started to get a few other people to come to the table and Like talking to Lucinda Williams about my my being a closeted gay man with Ann Wilson, what a badass conversation to have on tape for my niece, you know. Whatever it's cool. How beautiful. What are some other highlight moments that have come up from that? I mean, just our relationship deepening. Just being closer in general and being more vulnerable. So yeah, it's a number of things that I decided to implement into life that were just like, let's get out of the old and try, I don't know, some capital L love. Why are we here, if not for more of that? If there's love, you it's fine. Always. So beautifully said. Thank you. If it's if there's love, it's fine always. I'm gonna take that. Yeah. ⁓ we've mentioned tour a couple times and your boss. And it I know you have lots of different creative endeavors, but what is it that you do in the world? Tell us a little more about your world and work and I definitely Anne Wilson was my favorite singer of all time, the singer from heart. Barracuda, crazy on you, straight on all the songs alone. ⁓ and when I was about twenty nine, twenty-eight, I was working part-time as an athletic study hall monitor while I was like while I was editing videos and making little short film projects and trying to do stand-up comedy and improv. And so I had this part-time gig where I just had to Tell athletes to stop watching Netflix, you know, and do their homework. It was awesome. And just decided one day to send an email to Hart's manager at that time because Hart had just gone on a hiatus and Anne had announced that she was going to do some solo stuff. And I'm just a huge fan of her voice. So if Ann Wilson is singing an Aretha Franklin song, I actually might prefer that over Hart. So I wanted to work with her solo. I just sent an email out of the blue. Pitched a video idea, and I heard back from her husband like a few hours later, inviting me to their house to film rehearsals. And it was such a whirlwind, quick, you know, study home monitor to her video director. And then she, when I was there, we we it's cool because I have our first encounter all on tape, which is so beautiful for me now that she's like my family. And we really do become best friends in that hour. Like you could just see it. We're supposed to know each other. ⁓ I love that. Yeah. And so now I'm just wherever she goes, I'm there for the last nine years. And I think you play a lot of different roles in that. What are some of those? I do marketing, press, ⁓ the tour photographer, walk her out on stage and off stage, which those are totally my favorite moments in my life. Behind the curtain before the show starts. And well, a little just a personal one is like I getting ready for the curtain to drop, and I'll just like give her a little kiss on the hand. And for the last few shows on the heart tour, she kissed my hand back, and it just like made me cry every time. So those are the moments I are so Beautiful. That's the love thing. The love thing. That's what I was hearing as you were saying that is just that pure unconditional love. Yeah. And so it's hard for me to work on a lot of things creatively this these last few years for myself because I am so obsessed with helping her. I want and have always wanted her career to be as cool as it can be. So for now, that's what I'm focused on mostly. I remember I think around the time we first met and you were starting TM, you were I think about to go out on tour with her and playing a new role in that of opening, like doing stand-up comedy to open the shows. There was an interesting moment on. Tell me about that exactly. I forgot about that. I just I always remember being so in awe of that. Because to go out and do just warm-up comedy before a concert in large venues. It was the perfect way to get to like play with an arena crowd for me because I wasn't being billed as a comic. What happened was Anne fell prior to that tour and had broken her arm and was in a sling and ⁓ decided because she had a pillow under her arm to like make it feel better. And so it was The moment before she was going to go out on stage for the first show back, and she decided she wanted to stay in the wheelchair because it was more comfortable on her arm. And Anne is the most authentic singer I've ever met, or person. Like she can't, she can't bullshit. She can't do it. It doesn't she just doesn't know how to fake anything. Like if she's singing at a sound check, she's singing full voice barracuda. She's not like, Singing it quietly or just doing it for the band or anything. It's like she doesn't know how to do anything other than complete full on. And with the wheelchair thing, she decided, well, who cares? Like I'm singing. What does it matter if I'm in a wheelchair? So she does the first show in the wheelchair, which to me was just so rock and roll. Because the whole industry is like, You gotta get a fancy throne or do something else. This doesn't look right. And she's like, What what's wrong with the wheelchair? I'm singing. Let me sing. I'm gonna sit in the sweet. So they did the first show, but a lot of the audience was worried about her. You know, they didn't know and she didn't really say anything during the show to ease their fears that she was not or she was okay. So after that first show, she came to me the next day, the next show, was like, Hey, do you mind going out on stage and letting the audience know that I'm okay and that I wanna be here and it's I'm fine. It's just my arm, but I'm more comfortable in this chair. So I'm like, in in an hour, like go out in this arena and just talk to these people. I hadn't tried stand-up in quite a while at this point, but I was like, okay, sure, I'll whatever for you. Anything you ask me to do, I'll try it. So I made it a game to not freak myself out or get into my head, and I definitely use TM. Before every one of these things, where I didn't allow myself to think about what I was gonna say, except for the two lines that I had to deliver. And then I had, you know, three to five minutes to just play with an arena crowd, really, in my mind, with the goal of keeping them happy while delivering the news that Ann Wilson's gonna be singing in a wheelchair. So it was a very weird task. Like one time in life, probably chance to do this. And for some reason I was so revved up by this. Like it gave me this really kind of fun thing to do where I each city we'd go to, I'd go out the day off or whatever, find something, and then 15 minutes before I went up, I'd try to write an anecdote about it. But I didn't give myself more than 15 minutes. Otherwise, I'd have been pacing every hotel room the night before, ruining the rest of my job because I too focused on a joke. And how did it go? It was so fun. I did a Wahlberger joke in Boston. Like there were just all these moments that I went, we were in Montreal, and I decided last second to try to do a joke in both French and English. And it worked. And it I went back behind the curtain and Ann was like, yeah. And I was like, ⁓ that's all I need. Her to give me a thumbs up after. And then we did Radio City Music Hall. That was the last one on that run. And Sandra Bernhardt was in the crowd and she complimented me on my joke that I made. Like that was so yeah, fun. And again, I wasn't built as a comic, so it wasn't like I was coming out and the audience was waiting for me to be funny or judging me if I wasn't funny. But then if I was funny, it's kind of like a teacher being funny. It's everybody thinks it's hilarious because, ⁓ this person's actually funny. So fun. I just like games like that. And that's a good kind of fear. I'm not much into motorcycles or skydiving, but I'll go out on arena stage and try to bomb like a joke. Like just That is incredible. And I mean, I see that as incredibly brave. Like that I I would never, I could never I did one night. And I loved that it was just fun to you. It yeah, it was. I I was like, well, what else is it gonna be? It's gonna be terrifying and horrible or I'm gonna make it fun. What are you working on now? More podcasts. Trying for Jack White as a guest soon, right now. And So now that it's been what a little over a year now since you learned TM, what has kind of continued to unfold for you? Because that's one thing that I think is so profound about this practice is that it's something we show up and do, those ideally 20 minutes twice a day, but the way that it unfolds and Influences and integrates into every person's life is so different. And what has that looked like for you kind of over time? I feel like there's just a lot more space in my life. In my speech patterns. It's just slowed me down in the good ways. I can still be a psycho in my mind whenever I need to be, but I also can just slow down. I will say one of the thing my favorite games in that arena thing that I was doing was to try my best every night to get the arena to be dead silent at some point. Like to work them down to silence. And it happened many times. And the it didn't happen because I was going, Hey, how y'all doing tonight? It was when I'd go, Welcome to the show. My name's Chris. But I'd speak it into a microphone so they could hear it, but they had to listen. And that taught me a lot about what actually pulls people in to listen to you. it's not abrasiveness or look at me, look at me. It's I mean, it's that authenticity. There's just such magic in that and such power in that. And I see that in you. And thank you. From the The entertainment industry is a tricky place to exist if you need to be authentic all the time. Because I've had to learn how to get more confrontational because there are a lot of people in the industry, managers, lawyers, all these things that really want you to just shut up and do it the way it's been done. And I am so not cool with that. I mean, if Anne wasn't my direct boss, I'm sure I'd have been fired ten times in the last decade because I do not follow all of the rules very well. Ever. So the name of this podcast is The Inner Well. When you hear that, what does that mean to you? It means ⁓ a place to dive for sustenance of well it's very it's heart centered for me. I love that sustenance. When your friends or roommate or Colleagues, anyone, you know, it comes up, what do you share with them about TM? I think a lot of people just have it in their mind that you're gonna get a mantra that tells you what you need to know, like how to fix your life, like sleeping now, or whatever. If you're gonna have a word or a phrase that you need to focus on, I'm sure there are types of meditations like that. But That's the whole key is that it doesn't actually mean anything. So you it's you're not trying to teach yourself a lesson every time. Yeah, there's no you're not trying to trick yourself into anything or being a better person or there's none of that. It's just break time. Such a good, yeah, important piece of it. ⁓ 'cause mant I feel like that word mantra has been so just kind of adopted in our society to mean. you know, a slogan or a personal motto or, you know, company's mantra is that, you know, that it has meaning. You know, it implies meaning. The Sanskrit word that it comes from simply means a sound whose effects are known. And that's what the mantras that are used in TM are what's considered root mantras. So even in the Sanskrit language that they originate from, there's no meaning to them. And that's intentional. It's just for that sound value. And there's specific sounds that are known To have that very settling effect for the mind, body, nervous system. The mantra is an important piece of it, but I think, you know, equally as important, I might argue, if not more important, is how to use it properly. And that's what, you know, going through the the four-day TM class really kind of refines the understanding of how to use it properly in that very with the ease that you're talking about and with that effortlessness. Cause, you know, the other thing that we've been conditioned our whole lives is, you know, the harder we work and the more effort we put into things, the more we're gonna achieve. Really that's quite opposite of how we approach it in this. And that's the kind of the value of the process of learning. Did you find that there was value in the kind of the what the process of learning looked like? ⁓ yeah, getting the mantra, going home to practice a couple of times, coming back to discuss it and refine the understanding of it. And the The ceremonial aspect of it at the beginning too was so great because ⁓ you can you can say it better than me, but there was a moment you were teaching us about how thinking of a sound can actually affect your body's chemistry, even whether you hear it or not. Like if it's in your head and you're hearing it. Do you remember what you were talking about? Yeah, well, I o I'll often to illustrate that point, use the example of like if there were a chalk cord right here. And I go like this. That like inevitably when I do that in a r group of people, like someone cringes and it's like, no, don't. I'm like, you didn't even hear that sound. You thought that sound. That. It's so fascinating to me. Even just thinking that thinking a sound has an effect. I just loved that. That was a big one for me of like, ⁓ this stuff is untapped still in the world. Like we just don't. know what's capable with all of it yet. When you mentioned kind of the ceremonial piece of it, I just want to kind of touch on that. What you were referring to is in that first session, we always meet one-on-one, and before I give you the mantra, which is the specific sound, David would use the word sound vibration thought, which I just think it captures it well. Before you learn the technique and and get your mantra. Any certified TM teacher will always do this short ceremony of gratitude. It's a piece that was put into place to ensure that we continue to teach this with respect and with integrity. Because I didn't make this up, David Lynch didn't make this up. This is a technique that's been around for thousands of years. It comes from the ancient Vedic tradition. And it was revived and brought to the West by. Maharishi Mahashiogi, who often people know of as being kind of the Beatles teacher. But ⁓ you know, even he was the one who you know brought it to the West and at some point realized that there was a much greater demand for it than he would ever be able to meet as one teacher. And so he began to systematize it so that he could train teachers to so that this could continue to be available in the modern day. And the connection to the lineage that this technique has, I think, is one of the things that really sets it apart. Yeah. And, you know, it's there it seems like it's a one-time fee that you get forever hangs out of. No, this is it for me. This is good. This doesn't feel culty, of course. It's Yeah, was that a perception that you had before learning TM? Any group of people can I my I'm leery of. Maharishi, who, you know, is considered to be the founder of TM, even though you know he didn't make it up. It's he's the one who brought it from India to the West and kind of coined it as transcendental meditation that we know it today. But you know, it was never about him as a leader or as a, you know, he didn't want people to follow him. He wanted people to have this technique that allowed them to follow themselves, to be connected with. their truth with their inner knowingness with their intuition with their and with the mantra having no meaning, it allows for that. My favorite little nugget from David, he said the thing about meditation is it makes you more and more you. So good. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I mean, David has all the the best little nuggets. That's one of my many favorites. Yeah. ⁓ but you know, to me that's what This is all about. ⁓ and I even sometimes people have this idea like, ⁓ meditation, I'm gonna have to become, you know, woo-woo or start walking around, you know, dressing different or become vegan, or like they're just have or are some of these stereotypical associations with it. And I feel like David really cuts through that and breaks that. There's a there's a viral video of him online, I'm sure you've seen it, where he's very upset about someone telling him how many days he can shoot. A certain scene in on a film, and he just keeps saying, like, who is telling who is telling me that we're not allowed to shoot anymore? Like, what are you never gonna let me get dreamy? And I'm like, this guy is so cool. Like, who says that? I don't know if You're never gonna let me get dreamy? Again, he's so mad that there are of course comments like, ⁓ he's an asshole. It's like, no, no, no. This guy knows what he wants and is taking charge on his set and is frustrated as hell because he's not allowed. To get dreamy because of time frames, you know, time restrictions and budgets going over. I'm like, that's my guy. If someone wants to find your podcast, your art, your work, where would they find that? After Dinner Thinks with Ann Wilson. It's on Spotify and YouTube, and I don't know if it's on Apple Music yet or not, but it's there somewhere. And I'm on Instagram at the Chris Kane, C-R-I-S-S S-C-A-I-N. And then Anne's socials are all my photos of her on there. Which I'm very proud of many of those. So look at those. I love it. Awesome. Thanks so much, Chris. Thank you. ⁓ That's a wrap on today's episode of The Inner Well. Please subscribe and leave a review. Your support means the world and helps others find us. And if this conversation added something to your day, don't be shy. Share it with someone it might resonate with. Also, please follow us on social for more between episodes and send in your questions, your stories, or the topics you'd like to explore with us. We genuinely love hearing from you and this podcast exists because of you. So keep showing up for yourself and we'll see you next week.