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Silence Your Inner Critic & Find Permission to Speak with Samara Bay · Just & Joyful with Kristin Carver Smith

• Kristin Carver Smith: I am so excited to welcome you all back to another episode of Justin Joyful with Kristin Carver-Smith today. I'm your host, Kristin Carver-Smith or KCS as most folks call me. I have a very, very, very special guest here today. Samara, you got so many various from me. ⁓ Samara Bay is not only one of my dear friends, but she is the global expert on leadership out loud. Samara Bay: Thanks. Kristin Carver Smith: and she has been working for quite some time now on helping to redefine what power sounds like in rooms, on stages, across the world. ⁓ She is a professor at USC Annenberg and is also the number one bestselling author of Permission to Speak. Check it, hanging out right behind her. Samara Bay: Cough Kristin Carver Smith: And she, that old thing, that old thing, the book that is really, I think the start of a revolution around how we speak and what power sounds like out loud. And Samara, I had ⁓ like a very specific reason for why I wanted to have you on today because the truth of the matter is, Samara Bay: This whole thing? Kristin Carver Smith: that I've had this podcast on my heart for a very long time. And I knew I wanted to have Samara on it years ago. And all of the different things that I wanted to chat about with Samara have evolved over the years. And after experiencing a mental health emergency, I had a very specific reason for wanting to have Samara on. And Samara, I think that you're often tapped as a podcast guest, as a keynote speaker. as a consultant, as a comms leader to talk about public speaking, but to, as you say too, talk about leadership out loud. And today I wanna talk a little bit more about the connection between our voices and our internal voice and external voice and also our wellbeing. And I cannot wait for listeners to hear your thoughts. on these topics because you and I have had so many conversations offline about these things. Samara Bay: Yep. And it spilled into all my work. mean, truly, you know, ⁓ when my book ⁓ was getting ready to launch into the world, just so y'all know, Kristen was my publicist. And that word does not in any way actually encapsulate what the partnership was. And the way that you talk about what I do and the way that you boost me up to remember what I do in my own moments. ⁓ has had an impact on not just my life, but let's say my soul. Kristin Carver Smith: you Okay, you'll have me weeping before we even get started and I know I'm gonna cry through other parts of this conversation. I know that, I already know I'm gonna be shedding tears in other parts of this conversation too, but that just, thank you so much. Samara Bay: Welcome to the podcast! Y'all were ever wondering is is Kristen like as much of a gift offline as she is on the answer is yes, if not more so Kristin Carver Smith: Well, and you already know that I feel the same about you. And I do wanna let listeners in for a moment to, know, Samara was one of the people who walked with me during this incredibly difficult time. And... again, when I was thinking about ⁓ what it would look like to start publicly having more of the conversations that I was having behind the scenes with experts, with therapists, with friends, with family members, with just an entire support system of people. Samara was one of those folks and I really, I started ⁓ thinking about how I was gonna share and tell the story publicly in a way that would also too like feel just and joyful for you know, for myself. And I started thinking about, you know, this reconnection that I was experiencing with my voice and all of the things that had shaped it and all of the things that had even traumatized it and Samara, and we'll talk a little bit more about how you see some of that in your work as well. ⁓ But I just had a million thoughts and I have had the incredible privilege of seeing. the power of your work firsthand in a lot of different rooms and a lot of different spaces. But I feel like it hit home for me in a way that I wasn't expecting for it to after, you know, after surviving what I survived. And I want to talk with you today more about what happens internally, that voice that is happening internally for us, more so than you know, the external piece of that. We'll get into that later in this conversation, but I think it's, I know that every listener is dealing with this because it's just something that is just human, right? It's innate to us is that we are going to tell ourselves stories. And so I wanna actually dive right into that. ⁓ Samara, like you have this really, really rare vantage point that most folks. I would say most experts even don't have into how people talk to themselves. And I'm really, really curious. What are some of the things that you've seen as you've worked with folks on that and through that? Samara Bay: So part of that vantage point comes from the wiggly career that I've had. And just to set the scene, after getting a master's degree in acting and really thinking that I was gonna do Shakespeare in the Park, I eventually found my way into dialect coaching, which is this really niche aspect of storytelling in both the theater world in New York and in the... TV film world in Hollywood and beyond, where either an actor needs to learn an accent to do the job right, or they need to minimize their own accent, which of course brings with it all kinds of questions around sort of cultural whitewashing. But the term accent reduction has been around for quite a while in Hollywood, and the idea is at its most basic, being clear, being understandable. making sure that anybody who's listening to this actor speak will actually know what they're saying. And so both sides of this, whether putting on an accent or taking off an accent as it were, is something that actors need help with. so a dialect coach is this, right, that's why I'm like, there's like basics to this. Like there's not that many dialect coaches in the world. And the ones of us that do do this job, no one else has ever met another one. You know, like we start to meet each other. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm-hmm. think most folks haven't thought about that, honestly. ⁓ people aren't... Samara Bay: But whenever I tell anybody I'm a dialect coach, no one has ever met another one, you know, unless they're inside, super, super inside the acting world. ⁓ Well. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that makes you rare in and of itself. I'm like, okay, number one, there's few of you. Samara Bay: And then those of us who, like me, really love on actors. So it's not just the science of the sounds, but it's also the psychology and the spirit of the human in front of us and the artist in front of us ends up getting recommended around and starting to work with more and more movie stars. And that's what happened for me in my thirties in Hollywood once I moved from New York to LA. And here I was talking about Vantage Point. working with some of the folks that we might all look at as being the most confident people in the world. And they had these inner voices just like you're talking about. And they aren't always just saying, you know, you're awful, you're bad, you're ugly, no one loves you, right? We all have some version of that that maybe triggers at certain points, but there's more specific ones that say things like, ⁓ no one will understand you, you will always be considered an outsider, no one will take you seriously. I have had... Kristin Carver Smith: Of course, of course. Mmm. Mmm. Mm. Samara Bay: a really named movie star that everybody will know, and I'm not going to say her name because I'm so classy, ⁓ tell me no matter what I do, they'll still just see me as an immigrant. And obviously she was not speaking ill of immigrants, but she was speaking ill of the fact that people have biases against those with English as a second language accent and jump to conclusions. They're not one of us. They will never be one of us. this is, this gave me this perspective that no matter how much confidence Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yeah. Samara Bay: we have, or no matter how much money we have, no matter how much status we have, we still get to, slash have to, deal with these voices. And some of them are accurate reflections of the world we actually live in, and some of them are leftover residue from earlier rooms we moved through that were meaner than the ones we're in now. And you all get to, you know, navigate that. It's so, it's so delicate. But that's so, in a way, comforting. We all have these voices. They all are in some way trying to protect us by basically saying, don't grow, don't change, don't expand. And then I started working with women who are running for office for the 2018 midterms, as you know very well, and a different, you know, a completely different like demographic psychographic of a client. And yet there we are. And yet there we are the exact same stuff. All these first time. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: candidates for what became the Blue Wave, but we didn't know it. All we knew was a bunch of women who were members of their community thought, God, if I want a good leader, maybe it should be me. And, you know, I got to, I got to plug in right when they were like, ah, and they had, you know, in this case, move on.org, but really there were so many great organizations jumping in and saying, oh, we should connect them with training or with funding. And I was one of the trainers and they brought me in and Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. you Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: It was my first time really doing it too. You know, I had coached some of my actors on public speaking. I had this moment I actually ended up talking about in my Ted talk, which, you know, I've done, but hasn't come out yet. But I ended up talking about, I ended up talking about one of my actors who came to me really, I mean, this is sort of, you know, just proof of what I was saying, but came to me really insecure because he had. Kristin Carver Smith: Yes, I cannot wait for us to get into that too. Samara Bay: been asked to give a speech at the United Nations. And it was on a really risky topic. And he knew he wanted to do it. He knew he was in it. in terms of his bravery, he was all in. But in terms of like the actual mechanics of how, what should he say, based on this sort of general speech, someone had written for him that didn't feel entirely right, you know, but also how should he say it? How does he show up as the person that is actually him instead of the role of Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Mmm. Samara Bay: you know, whatever has been handed to him. And in some way, all of us deal with that. It doesn't feel quite as obvious. We might not use like actor speak like the role that we're playing, but really all of the advice we've all gotten on the internet, be yourself, be yourself. It's like which self who, what is she like? How much does she swear? How funny is she? How much range of movement and motion and laughter does she have? Like I'm not the same. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: me with this group of people as I am with this group of people, which one's the real meat, right? It brings up all these questions. So I had done some of that. And then here I was doing it with these women running for office. And then just to, you know, finish the story in a way. Now I'm doing it in more and more industries and working with CEOs and rising leaders and working with athletes and like it's heartening and heavy to acknowledge that everybody, whether they're as you say, developmental, right, emerging, starting out. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: or at the top have these voices, think what changes is our relationship to them and what we say back. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm, mm. I love that heartening and heavy. And, you know, I know that you take this work so seriously and I know that you count it such a privilege to like be inside of these very private moments with people as they're working this out. And I've told you this, but I'm like, doesn't, you know, while... it's very important for me to say, Samara is not a therapist and I'm not saying that Samara is a licensed therapist and there is something therapeutic about that experience with you. And again, there is this privacy, this confidentiality, this also safety that you create for individuals to be able to hash it out with both themselves and with you inside these rooms to figure out what is the story that I want to share? What is the thing that I need to tell? What is the persuasion that has to also occur in this space? And then how do I retain my humanity in the midst of that too? Samara Bay: How do I access my power while retaining my humanity? Yeah, totally. I think the safety thing is like so fundamental and it wasn't necessarily what I thought I was going in with, but I did notice. I did notice that part of what was making my actors feel good and recommend me was that I was able to make them feel safe. And honestly, when you're a public figure, you don't trust anyone because everybody wants something from you. you know, creating safe spaces for them to actually, ⁓ as I like to put it, be bad at something before they're good. We all need those. We don't always have them. As a parent, I think about it a lot. And really, you know, my book has this word permission on the cover six times, like it's, you know, it's sort of comical. But the idea of permission is not necessarily permission from someone else or a permission slip that you're handed. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm. Yeah. Samara Bay: or licensed to do something. Permission is this felt sense of safety that allows you to really come out of hiding and allows the versions of you that have been dormant and scared to come out of hiding. And what we're really talking about there is creating conditions, creating conditions inside of us to explore, to play, to bring this side of us out, to have both power and humanity, authority and humanity. And you know. For many of us, have to be bad at it before we're good because like who gets those spaces? Who builds those spaces? Who walks into those spaces? It's not a thing. I mean, more and more I'm finding my people and I'm finding the facilitators who have, you know, made it a thing since before, you know, the term safe space was popular. But we're just all over here being like, gosh, when I say things a certain way, when I invite people in in a certain way, when I make it really clear in my behavior and not just my words that Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's so true. Yeah. Samara Bay: when they try stuff and it doesn't quite work, that's okay, there is no additional shame besides what goes on inside of them and they get to just like process that and try to release it. When we create these spaces, we discover, ⁓ gosh, people show up in those spaces. Gosh, this is how it works. I'm creating this in my classroom right now at USC, you know? And I can tell that I don't wanna speak ill of anyone else who teaches there, but they're not necessarily prioritizing that overall else, and I am. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yeah. Samara Bay: Because I know that creating small safe spaces to practice showing up allows folks the opportunity to work that muscle into bigger and scarier spaces. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Even as you're saying that I'm thinking, you know, so listeners aware of this has even sort of shown up for me as I think about, know, I've shared with you all that I, you know, after I was hospitalized, I moved into something called partial hospitalization for about two weeks, which looks like kind of like going to, I call it therapy school for, you know, from 9 a.m. to about 3 p.m. every day for two weeks. And then I moved into intensive outpatient. Samara Bay: Thank Kristin Carver Smith: which was from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. each day and smart, it was this small group space in both settings. And there was this opportunity when you experience something so traumatic to be able to process it obviously within boundaries with facilitators, right? With people who are helping to hold. rules and rooms and ⁓ boundaries and things in the space is so, so helpful, but smart. was really useful for me to also have that be a space where I could talk about what I had experienced, where I could sort of like, I don't not tell it cute, not it be perfect. And as a publicist, I think that's something that's also been interesting for me to continue to relearn, right? Of like, how do I want to continue to share and talk about my own healing journey without the voice inside my head that says it needs to look like this and it has to be packaged up this way and you've got to present completely well and like you've got it all figured out and all of those things now with a bow. Samara Bay: And packaged with a bow, right? Like the type of thing where we've been through it and we can look back, you know, and package it for others. But when we're not there yet, and maybe never, you know, yeah, where do we have permission to explore how we feel, how we felt, what we're doing, it meant, what the story is that we actually want to tell rather than the one that's like, I don't know, we rush to sort of sounding perfect around. I mean, a lot of this is also just not just, but a lot of this is perfectionism. Kristin Carver Smith: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Samara Bay: that many of us have been rewarded for. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, I think a lot of times we wait to share and, you know, our, whether again, that's our stories or even, you know, with a friend on stage, all of the things, it's like we wait until that, hey, I really want that like extreme home makeover. Here's the before, here's the after. I don't wanna like show you the messy middle as it's happening, all of those things. You did something recently that I wanted to ask you about because it's a, feel like for our listeners, ⁓ again, I've watched you model both and for so long. Like when I think about Just and Joyful, I think that you're such the embodiment of it, but I've watched you walk and hold both of those things where justice and joy are having to coexist at one time or where it's grief. and ⁓ I can't believe this opportunity is coming my way, right? And you recently did that. You delivered your father's eulogy, what, a week or two apart from your TED Talk. And the two of those things, I just, I think again, so much of our listeners right now who are tuning in going like, God, I can like name a lot of instances in which. One of the hardest things happened when something else awesome also happened at the same time and having to do both of those things and try to figure out how I'm gonna do it and do it well was really, really hard. I just, I'd love for you to walk us through what that was like for you. Samara Bay: Yeah, thank you. ⁓ Chris was the first person who really went out, talked about this months ago, and I was prepping for these things. You were the first person who was like, ⁓ that's a lot. I was like, I was thinking that on the inside and I'm flattered and validated. Acknowledge that on the outside. Kristin Carver Smith: Sometimes we just need our friends to also say that too of like, I am so excited for you and I'm devastated for you and how, like, this is so much, are you okay? How are you doing? Samara Bay: It's a lot. Yeah. So thank you. You helped me really like tie those two things together in my mind as like a, I mean, a sort of a tour de force, you know, what it really, I wasn't thinking of it as much as of like a boo and a yay together. Cause they both are, they both were complicated. I mean, mid February of this year, 2026, my mom and I, Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Samara Bay: held a memorial for my dad and he had died a few months before that. So we had some time, know, I was not really how grief works, but like, you know, we did have time to process and we had time to think about this event and how we wanted it to be a celebration and memorialization, meaning like shared memories, rather than a proper funeral that felt, you know, like it was, it was the primary tone of sadness. However, Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: I was also sad and because of the nature of what I do and because my family unit ⁓ at its basic form was my mother, father and me, ⁓ it was very clear that I should be the one to sort of emcee and facilitate this ⁓ memorial and my mom, it mattered to her and we knew that it would have mattered to my dad. to me, ⁓ thinking through how to facilitate this thing and have others speak and also do a eulogy and yes, write that eulogy. ⁓ Was happening at the same time as my first ever TEDx, TEDx Culver City, which we don't have a date yet on when it'll be out, but shortly, one imagine, which was, yes, two weeks, less than two weeks later. And... ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, yeah. Samara Bay: The way that I think any of us put our thoughts together on what we want to say, if we give ourselves permission, requires faith and trust. ⁓ And so I guess I kind of had to make both of those things when I didn't necessarily have them in my schedule. And so I did clear away stuff. I did have to teach. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. That's Samara Bay: but I really did try to say I'm not available for anything else in February. ⁓ And I tried to take the teachings of people like Trisha Hersey around rest seriously, not just rest in order to be productive, but rest in order to rest. ⁓ But often what also happens for me in rest in literally like, Kristin Carver Smith: Yes. Samara Bay: giving myself an hour or two with no set end time in my hammock. By the way, I live in LA and it's hammock weather all year round. I'm so sorry. ⁓ So we're talking like late January. Kristin Carver Smith: which I'm sure does wonders for your mental health. Samara Bay: looking up at the sycamore trees and I mean it's, you know, not every day is stunning but a lot of days really are. Kristin Carver Smith: And those of us living in the cloud dome are green with envy right now. So we love this for you though, Samara. We love this for you. We're happy for you. Samara Bay: ⁓ and thank ⁓ you. But there are other solutions, obviously. I like a good heating pad in a bed. Gives you also a sense of luxury if you let yourself. And allowing rest to really be downtime, which is the spirit of rest is resistance. But also knowing me, it is when, ooh, I wonder, thoughts emerge. ⁓ I wonder, maybe it's that story. Kristin Carver Smith: Amen. Amen. Samara Bay: What we used to call in acting school, soft brain. It's like hard brain, my interpretation, hard brain is like furrowed brow. Gotta figure out this problem. And of course, although our intention of figuring out a problem is completely understandable, often the furrowed brow hard brain approach to solving something actually gets in the way of solving the thing because it gets in the way of our deep intuition. Kristin Carver Smith: Hmm, say more about soft brain. Yeah. Samara Bay: which is waiting there all along with all that knowing that we're either ignoring, know, or dismissing or listening to. And so I find that in those quiet times is when I get to actually hear some of those voices, the quieter ones underneath the mean one. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: they do have actually kind of a lot of play and curiosity. And to me, they are sort of embodied by that idea of right? I like write this down for my students, O-O-H exclamation point, like look for your ooh, Because they're, they doesn't have to be a massive gasp. That's what it is, right? But like an ooh is really like following your nose. Or as our friend Jade says, and I have it, I have it. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. you That's good. Yeah. Samara Bay: hosted here because it's a major way that I make decisions in my business. Ask and listen from your pelvis. Interpret it as you will. It doesn't even have to be the pelvis. I do think that the idea of listening from somewhere deeper, literally in our body deeper than our brain helps us to listen to what's really happening and not this hard brain thing. So the soft brain, all these other ways of thinking about it, you know. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Ooh. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: There are ways of saying we all have quite a lot of wisdom, quite a lot of hard earned wisdom from the world and from our intuition. And the question is, what do we do with it? Do we dismiss it? Cause it's not, you know, the practical thing to do or the packaged thing to do. Or do we go, Ooh, ooh. So, you know, I OO'd a lot, trying to think about ⁓ my dad and how to, you know, Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: package, how to offer something ⁓ that would feel like it was for my mom and for me and for him. And then I tried to think about the TED Talk in terms of a really different audience, right? It isn't really for me and it isn't for my mom and it isn't for my dad, although, I hope in various ways they're delighting in it. the TED Talk, the whole Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: of the TED Talk is what is an idea that you have that is worth spreading. And, you know, for people like us who sort of love to ideate all the time, ooh, all the time, you know, what is the central core one? Is such a, it can be, if you get hard brain about it, a terrible question. ⁓ God, I'm gonna get it wrong. ⁓ God, what if I pick the wrong? Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: essential question. What if this is my one chance at doing a TED talk and my idea worth spreading, not the one that's going to spread. I had all those thoughts. Also, I guess being gentle with myself during that month was also acknowledging like, okay, thank you. Thank you. That side of me, that little voice inside that is trying to protect me and keep me, what did I say earlier, from growing. I hear you. ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: I'm going to let the perfectionism go. I'm going to gamify this. How can I gamify? I do this with my clients all the time, right? How can I make a game out of this? Let's think about, well, first of all, let's decide this is one of many TED Talks I'll give. Okay, that instantly makes me feel less stressed out. Okay, great, great, great. This is just my first one. Cool. And then think about like, what are... Kristin Carver Smith: Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. It's a move from scarcity to abundance, right? Samara Bay: 100%, which is a permission move for sure. It just releases, it just loosens us up instantly. Oh, well, what would my first one be about? Okay. And then, what is my favorite thing to say these days? That's a good question. I love us. love, you know, like what's my favorite thing to say these days? What do I keep finding? Yeah! Yes! Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good question for our listeners. Like what is your favorite thing to say these days? I don't know. Samara Bay: like, how do we even know the answer to that? Maybe go back and look at you know, if you if you have had a few meetings lately, and you record them with, you know, AI, go back and actually look and see what we're in what moment you look the most lit up. Or ask them friends if it's more of a social thing, right? What am I what am I on about all the time these days? I can't even remember. And they'll be like, you will not shut up about you know, and even if it's like something that seems lowbrow, you know, like whatever this TV show or whatever, I bet you can do a little on what do I really love? Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. good. Samara Bay: ⁓ I love how this version of the world is what we're seeing. I want more of that version of the world. You know, we can dig a little bit and then there we are. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'm thinking one that feels extremely practical. And I know that you and I are always on the like, like we do love to ideate. That's like, if you hang with Samara and I, you, if you take a trip to the beach with us, which is where we like to, which is where we like to frolic and ideate, you will find that we enjoy that. And we are the people to you who like to land the plane, like after spending time at Samara Bay: Thanks ⁓ yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: 30,000 feet and then some, we do like to come back down to earth and go, okay, but like real, real, what do we actually do with that? And Samara, I love that, I feel like you've always been about that. And even just giving our listeners right now, the, ask yourself that question. I also love the, we started this conversation talking about that inner voice. And I think what's so powerful too is like, you know, using some of the people around you too to be able to, sometimes it's like I need to actually get out of my inner voice, like it's not actually helpful for me right now, like getting outside of myself and tapping some of those other folks to be like, what am I always saying? What am I always going on about? Samara Bay: Yeah. And also, also this, you know, depending on, you know, those of you listening, depending on your, your work environment, right, like, obviously, try this on for size and discard if it's awful. But I also asked LinkedIn, because why not start engagement with my audience early? In my case, I asked, what should my title be? But that did lead to conversations in my comments of like, wait, what, is it really about? And, know, and I was like, what do you like it? And I've seen other people even do more like, Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mmm. Yeah. Samara Bay: on the nose of if you heard I was doing a TED talk, what would you think it would be about? Which is like serious crowdsourcing. ⁓ And, you know, obviously then there's a discernment factor. You get feedback and you don't have to take it all. But how useful to start with dialogue, start with community, start with I am, you know, in relationship rather than I'm this like lone wolf who has to solve it all on my own. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm, which again, I mean, I. Samara Bay: So I do tend to ask people three questions. I don't know if this is, but like I tend to ask people and so I did it for myself, of course, three questions when we have a forum and we don't know what we're gonna say. That's not always the case, right? Sometimes we're being asked to speak on behalf of our company on this very narrow topic, like, okay. Maybe even then you can apply this, but especially when it's like you have 10 minutes, you have 20 minutes, have 18 minutes, Ted talk like, you have an hour ⁓ and you really could talk about a variety of things. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, go. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: I find it, it's really helpful. And yes, I am a big fan of if it doesn't work, doesn't matter. See if this works. I have three questions to ask yourself. The first is what, does your audience really, really need? And you don't always know. And that means you have to do research or whatever the next step is. think a combination, frankly, of research and imagination work, we kind of forget that we're allowed to sit there in the hammock slash heating pad and go, who do I know from that audience? What's really actually stressing them out? Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: you know, old 3am question, but like what, you know, what really is hurting right now? What does my audience need that I might have? Two, what's my favorite thing to talk about these days, right? That's the one we were already talking about. Centering our own joy as an actual practice and how we figure out what to talk about is the more, you know, radical act underneath what I'm saying. Like really deciding that what lights you up matters. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Samara Bay: It matters to how you'll show up there. matters to what they don't even necessarily know that they need yet. But it's trusting that our own noses that are nosing out the world right now, matters, is interesting, can spread. And then the third thing is what's the most dangerous thing I could say in this space? What do you think is the truest truth that they might not be ready to hear? Kristin Carver Smith: Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Mmm. Samara Bay: And the reason to ask that question is not necessarily because then you're on the hook to do it, to say it. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Samara Bay: but it does tend to unearth sort of extreme of what they might need, but don't know they need what might be fun to say, but would it be fun or would it actually feel like treacherous? know, but really what's the biggest swing? And is there some version of that swing that you can actually slide in? Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I love those. And again, I think those are like three extremely practical questions to be asking ourselves. And I'm really curious as you asked yourself those questions, like, were you surprised by anything that bubbled up? Were you shocked by any of the responses that you had for yourself? Like when you, like I think about like the biggest swing is interesting because Let me give you an example of this. I was working with my voice coach as we're preparing for some of these performances. And I remember going through this exercise with her where she was like, I want you to give me the most like over the top performance of this song. Like what feels like just, you know, go for what would feel like that is so much that's all it's too much. This is extreme, right? And she's like, just go for it, I'm gonna video. I remember watching it back. And I remember as it was happening in real time, I was thinking to myself, this is so uncomfortable. I look absolutely ridiculous. All of the things. I watched the video and I'm like, I'm so restrained. And so I say that of like, I'm curious when I think about the biggest swing, I almost think about like, oftentimes for us, the biggest swing, right? Feels like to someone else, it's like when you say the most dangerous thing, I'm like, gasp. I mean, you know, in the world that we live in right now, oh gosh, like, you know, what could that, that could be a myriad of things. And also, like there is a little bit of like us tending to play it safe and I realized that when I watched this performance of myself back of wow there's still like what would happen if I like gave myself even more room to play here. Samara Bay: Yeah. Well, okay. think this is partly why I really was trying to process as you asked that question because, in, the game of the Ted talk. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, which I love. Samara Bay: There were two things, there were two major things I needed to gamify, maybe three. There were three things I needed to gamify. One was, yes, how do I talk to myself so that I give myself permission to say all the things? But two, TED Talks need to be, according to TED headquarters, apolitical. And three, although we are allowed up to 18 minutes, I was told by a number of people to keep it closer to 10. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm. Samara Bay: So biggest swing while not horribly offending my own sensibilities, following the guidelines in 12 minutes or less. That was the actual game. And so I didn't actually feel like I could totally safely take my own advice around biggest swing or rather I had to define biggest swing, not in terms of our current political climate, but in terms of what has historically never been discussed. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mmm. Yeah, yep. Samara Bay: around the world of public speaking or how we show up. And to me, that was much juicier and did end up being the idea worth spreading. Which now I feel like I'm either gonna say or just tease. That's the tease. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mmm. Yeah. Yeah. We're gonna obviously share and drop it when we see it out in the world for sure. And we will update the show notes and all of the things so that you can hop from this episode right into Samara's TED Talk. And Samara, I feel like what I'm also hearing you say is the biggest swing with context too, right? Because this had like, it absolutely had context around it, right? And parameters. Samara Bay: 100 % and partly that's partly that's I don't love parameters. I don't love compliance. You know, one thing we haven't a word we haven't brought into this conversation yet, but they Kristen and I both know like lives right under the surface with all my work is mischief. And part of my interest in the spirit of mischief is that mischief is both a sense of joy and play. And also a sense of rule breaking and a really radical sense of what are the rules we've been handed and do we need them? Kristin Carver Smith: Yes, yes. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: and are they for us and are they in our best interest and what would breaking them or rewriting them do in terms of both our freedom and our safety. And these are questions around public speaking, but of course, they're questions around the ways we show up in the world and how bold and brave we can be in different spaces. And thus, it's a context question. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. You know, as you say this word, Mischief, I think back to... when I decided to share this story, to share my story of healing and processing and, you know, again, continuing to shine a light on all of the experts and dive into all of the different layers of mental health, because I think when we talk about mental health, we're always thinking about the therapeutic aspect of it, and we don't realize, right, that it's it's touching a million different things from, again, how we actually show up on stage and how we show up in the office to how we show up in our relationships, our friendships, our style, all of it, right? Like how it actually impacts our audible voices. And, know, Samara, I think about, so when I decided to put pen to paper, I originally, you know this because I shared this with you in advance, I originally was gonna tell this story in essay format, right? And I did not originally have plans for it to be on the podcast. And then the mischief piece happened, which is, okay, what if... I took this podcast idea that I had always had. What if I actually played with the format of sharing the story? What if people got to hear the essay in my own voice, got to hear my words in my own voice? And how would that feel for me? What would that look like? Would I enjoy that? I allowed myself the time and the space to sort of experiment with that. I even allowed myself the time and space to If I didn't wanna, I invited Angelina to sit with me in that conversation because I said, you know, I don't have to show up alone for this. I could actually like show up with a friend or a pal and I don't even need them to, you know, pat me on the back the whole time. I just need them to sit there with me in something hard. And I think about this, you have invited me into that so many times of like, what would that look like? What would it look like for you to play? And I see how you've done it with so many of the clients that you've worked with too. And I'm, you know, I'm, curious as we have listeners who are considering, I think we have a lot of folks that tune into this podcast who are not only on their own healing journeys from whatever trauma that they've experienced, but they're also trying to figure up like, how do I show up the meest me? And you and I have talked about this like, the US to you. And, you know, I'm like, I'm curious what wisdom that you would share with them around this mischief piece that's really worked for you. Samara Bay: Okay, I have so many thoughts, but here's a few. One is what I'm hearing inside of the part of the story that you just shared is that when we have these sort of, know, feel like we have to put quotes around it these days, but safe spaces. Like when we have spaces where people are holding it, containing it, and allowing us to be bad before we're good or to explore without ⁓ putting a pretty button on it. ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Samara Bay: Then the question is then what? What do we do about the other spaces? What do we do about the public with a capital P, which really in many ways means social media now, as well as obviously physical spaces, Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Yep, yep. Samara Bay: And the unspoken part of that is there are agreements in quiet spaces. There are agreements in one-on-one spaces with a coach who really knows how to hold you. And there are agreements inside of therapeutic spaces. There are agreements inside of friend spaces. Sometimes they get trespassed upon, know, transgressed. But there are agreements inside of our smaller private groups. And when we bring things into the public. We cannot trust that anymore. And on the one hand, we know this, right? It's so obvious. It's like, even say it? But on the other hand, what we're talking about is scaling up our sense of comfort, our conditions we've created for ourselves into spaces where we no longer can control anything. And I don't even need control. mean, predict. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yes. Yes. Samara Bay: And sometimes there are like these gray area middle spaces where maybe we're speaking on a stage in front of 150 people, we've room has been really warmed up by the person who introduced us. And we, I'm talking about myself in this moment, create pop-up rules at the top inspired by Priya Parker, where we let folks know this is the kind of space where this happens, this happens, and this happens. And we trust a little more of that. We get the nods, we see the smiles, we see the warmth. Okay, so now we're not in private, but we're in a kind of public where we sort of can predict. We can contain it, we can hold that. Okay, so this is an interesting place to play. And then there's the internet, right? Or whatever, the biggest possible platform. And now we really are playing with, and it does not always feel like play, this idea of the public, which has evolved, of course, over centuries and in our own lifetimes, obviously evolved massively even from the 90s. But nonetheless has always been a space. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: that is easier for some folks to navigate than others. And I'm obviously speaking particularly about the intersection of white supremacy and patriarchy and capitalism, and also I'll add in sounding like you're a native of the language you're speaking in. These are privileges that in the voice we don't think about. And so I like to, ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Yep. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ⁓ Samara Bay: throw income invisible and just remind us that that's what's happening when we don't sound or show up in that way that most matches that standard of what powerful people have historically sounded like. This is a lot of what my book is about, so feel free to start it. But that's what's happening. Just to honor, that's what's happening. And it's a nervous system thing. Scaling is a nervous system thing. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm-hmm, yeah. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yes. Yes. Samara Bay: So it's okay to just acknowledge that like now this version of, know, I'm going to write an essay. I'm going to tell friends privately. I'm going to write an essay. I'm going to read that essay out loud. And then I'm going to publish that podcast that I've read that essay in to the public are really different stages in your play with mischief and like no rules, no shame, no anything for any of us as we think through that. But Kristin Carver Smith: Yep, yep, yep. Yeah. Yep. Samara Bay: But we do also have this alternative mental model, which is on the one hand, it gets scarier and scarier, on the other hand, more and more potential for impact. And so we begin to be okay with taking that risk. And this is where the just and the joyful comes in and we're like, well, it would not necessarily even feel just. Kristin Carver Smith: Yes, yes. Yes. Yeah. Samara Bay: with my close friends because who else needs this and can I make it joyful? Kristin Carver Smith: That part, that part. Yeah, yeah, that part. Samara Bay: to do this riskier thing. Kristin Carver Smith: You said something and again, this is, it's related and incredibly specific. I'm curious because you talked about that scaling ⁓ for the public piece. one of the things that people, that I've watched this happen in rooms that we are, that you and I have obviously been in. I have ⁓ had friends ask these questions too, ⁓ or make this comment. I don't know, it was so hard to tell because some people's faces were just blank or it just seemed like there was no reaction or no response. it's so those comments are made. And then I look at the internet, right? And it's essentially like we're posting to a sea of blank faces, right? Cause if there's no, we can't gauge. We can't read into like how, how are people receiving me in this moment? And Samara Bay: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. And. Kristin Carver Smith: How have you navigated that when you have presented and talked to a sea of, I don't. Samara Bay: And also, and also just to add in because I think this happens for many of us, ⁓ the zoom version of that, where we're doing some sort of ⁓ zoom speech, and they've set it on webinar, and we see literally nothing but ourself and maybe our deck if we have a deck. And we just have to use our imagination to be like there are people out there and they're liking them. And obviously, that is such a recipe as you are suggesting for ⁓ the type of disaster that comes in the form of Kristin Carver Smith: ⁓ yeah, yeah. Yeah. ⁓ huh. Samara Bay: all the meanest possible voices in our head being like, surely they hate this. Surely they are reconsidering having brought me in. Surely they're going to throw tomatoes or the online equivalent, which is much scarier. Well, less messy, I guess, but more emotionally scarier. And like that, oops, they must hate me has an impact on the next thing we say and the next thing we say and the next thing we say. And then there goes our talk. Kristin Carver Smith: Yep. Yep. Yeah. Samara Bay: ⁓ yeah, I have a thought. Here's okay. So we talked about this very early on this idea of like our inner voices, right? But just to get really, really literal, I have found that it really helps to just acknowledge that the way we talk to ourselves about the way we talk to other people determines our destiny. the way we talk to ourselves about the way we talk to other people. So these are these moments where of course those voices happen. They just happen. They happen to movie stars. They happen to the rest of us. And then the other part of it, which is how do we... Kristin Carver Smith: Let's go. Let's go. You hear that people? They happen to movie stars and they'll happen to the rest of us. Okay? I feel like again, but for real for real. Samara Bay: They're just like us. ⁓ is this other part of it, which is what can we say back? Right? What can we, yes, are those voices happen to us? How can we happen to those voices? Kristin Carver Smith: just need to, we're gonna have to on that. I need you to say it again, Samara, for the people that need to hear it again. I just need you to run it back one more time. Samara Bay: The voices happened to us and we happened to the voices. We do something back. Ideally with a sense of mischief, which in this case, think means kindness, but boldness. So we might say to that voice, thank you so much. Thank you so much for trying to protect me. I'm doing something else right now. I'll put you over there and I'll give you a hug later. Right? This is like also classic parts work, right? I am not a therapist, but. Another thing we can do is plant a more useful generative thought in there, which of course sounds like a thing that won't work and then turns into a thing that is so doable. It would change the world instantly if we just decided let's do that. And so here is a useful thought to have in your back pocket and put into your brain when you notice that you're starting to think, I can't see them. They must hate me. What am doing here? I'm irrelevant. I'm useless. I'm yeah. And that thought is they're choking. They just don't look like it. Good thing I know CPR. Kristin Carver Smith: Yes. Samara Bay: And I tell you, this is high mischief because if we're in a room and we're looking at faces and they do look blank, it really is a choice to decide what the story is. We actually can't read them. We cannot. They are unreadable. They're giving us their Netflix face. They've been watching Netflix for which they do not need to show up as an audience. And now they're bringing you that version of themselves. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Samara Bay: and you can't read them, you cannot read them. And even if they look hostile, if they're not telling you, I hate this, you don't actually know. We do not know what's going on inside of other people's brains. They may be looking hostile because they're thinking, God, my niece really needs this advice right now because she's having a really hard time. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Samara Bay: We cannot know. And so we get to make up a better story than the one where we're like, they must hate me. And the better story from me, yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: I like to... I like to say, perhaps the chairs are uncomfortable for their lower back just like they are for mine, right? It's like... Samara Bay: Indeed, indeed. ⁓ my gosh, so much generosity, empathy, and that. Kristin Carver Smith: I'm so glad though that you're saying this because again, mean, it's, as you said, we started off this conversation talking about this inner voice and we know that our inner voice absolutely has an impact on the audible voice, right? On what's actually coming out of us and how we're sharing and how we're moving in rooms and all of the things. I, you know, I'm hopeful listeners that you will take this wisdom from Samara and happen to the thought. that you are having. And it reminds me, when I was an intensive outpatient, one of the techniques ⁓ that they would sort of call this was putting the thought on trial. And so taking that thought and digging into that and going like, am I really unloved? No, I'm not. And so I think this... peace and as you said it feels like in the moment like this isn't going to do anything and yet once you start doing it the dividends Samara Bay: It is the returns are returning. And you feel it in a few ways. One, you relax a little bit. ⁓ my God, they're choking. Good thing I know CPR. ⁓ right, good thing it's me. My favorite thought for my clients to have, thank God it's me. Thank God they brought me in and not that other person who wouldn't be taking as strong responsibility for my audience right now. Thank God it's me. Right? That happens. And this other thing happens, which is that you're aware that you just did that little game and you get a little mischievous twinkle in your eye. And I believe this is the heart of that old wisdom of picture them naked, right? I don't actually think it's about nakedness. I think it's about, I'm doing something on the inside and they don't know and it's making me show up a little differently. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. And I'd like that song recorded next. Can I request that we hit the studio and get that song recorded? I think that's what we got to cut next. We'll work on the writing, but I trust that Skylar's going to have us with the beat. That is, I love it. That's true. Samara Bay: We might need to massage the rhymes, you know? But you know, like, and then you're like bopping along being like, I have something going on on the inside. And they're like, they don't think she's having a clever inner thought that is, you know, resulting in, they're just thinking, God, she's so great. She's really taking care of us. She's really, I feel great. Look how lit up she is. Look how lit up I feel. Kristin Carver Smith: She's so great. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: You know, the audience is just not having a particularly hard brained reaction to us when we really show up. They're just thinking, you know, that classic, my Angelo line of, I might not remember what they say, I might not remember what they do, but I will remember how they make me feel. Kristin Carver Smith: I adore you. Such a juicy, we're gonna have to have you back because I have a million other questions. I mean, absolutely. And I have a million other questions for you, including, you mentioned acting and I'm like, is the door still open for acting for you? Samara Bay: Oh I didn't know that was an option! I always thought I wasn't gonna wait around for my, you know, beloved starving artists community to come into power, but maybe when they were, and it is starting to happen. So I will pin it with that. Kristin Carver Smith: for the second combo, we are revisiting that, because I am so curious. And honestly, I don't know that we have even had a lot of conversations about that, so. Samara Bay: Mm-hmm. Well, I'll tell you and I'll be totally honest because of the context that we're in. My 20s, which was going through acting grad school and then spending years in New York trying to make it as an actor. And I was one of those people who didn't have an end plan. I wasn't like in three years, if it doesn't work, I'll leave. I was like, no, I am in it. I am in it. ⁓ It was the most heartbreaking decade. ⁓ It was, I felt so underseen. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Samara Bay: You know, people talk about rejection. was never that I was, felt like I was seen and then rejected. It was that I just felt like I was just a total blip. And because maybe I seemed, you know, ethnically ambiguous, which was a big deal back in the off ⁓ or because I didn't have the, you know, super skinny, you know, body that, that codes for she's a leading lady or because I was. Kristin Carver Smith: Right, right, right. Yep. Yep. Samara Bay: good at singing, but maybe not Broadway star level. My real talents as an actor and as a deep appreciator of language and how to make it come alive just never felt like it found its people. And I didn't know what to do with that except to just feel sad. And I'm not def- Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: describing an artist's life that's unlike many others we've heard of or maybe some of you know. But I do want to acknowledge that it's the part of my life that felt the most heartbreaking for the longest time. And so when I found this other stuff, when dialect coaching started to light up my actors and I got to frankly act opposite incredibly impressive movie stars, but in their trailers when prepping them. Kristin Carver Smith: Yep. Yep. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: and then they'd go on set and then we'd have little like, you know, inner jokes about the other actor who they were actually playing against, not, not, you know, interpreting it as I would have, you know, this, I got to find my joy somewhere else. And then, and then frankly, the big pivot that you know, well with the book and the, ⁓ the larger work for me felt like what I was looking for all along, it was in the way my own homecoming. But the actor question is, you know, Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: It's still there. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, yeah. I'm excited. yeah, I'm just, I'm seeing so many homecomings happening right now for so many people. And I won't be surprised if it comes back around for you. And if it not only comes back around for you, but comes back around for you in a much juicier manner, right, than you would thought. And on your own terms, yeah. Samara Bay: and on my own terms, and on my own terms, which really was, I think, the problem. And the odds were just a different time in many ways, and I was a different me, and didn't necessarily know how to ask for what I wanted. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah, and look at you now. Samara Bay: Look at me now! Kristin Carver Smith: And look at you now. Okay, before we let you go, we have a couple of rapid fire questions that we always ask. And so I'm so curious. What are the TV shows and books, since you are an author yourself, that you are obsessed with right now? Samara Bay: I'm gonna answer this little sideways and say podcast, a different podcast. ⁓ And I feel like this is gonna come out of the blue and so I just, I'm I'm modeling that that's okay and that we're allowed to multi-faceted. I fricking adore, and it has led to so many fresh ideas for my own work, a podcast called The Swiftie and the Scholar. Kristin Carver Smith: Up for it? Okay, yes, yes. Hmm Samara Bay: where this lovely woman who is a lifelong Swifty has her uncle who's a retired literature professor on and they do ⁓ a song, an episode from the Taylor Swift, you know, oeuvre. And look, the English major in Maine just loves the fact that he approaches it as poetry. And there's another part too. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Samara Bay: which I was realizing is part of why it feels like it's so juicy. And I don't know who else is listening will feel like this is what you need right now. But in case there's someone, I'm gonna say it. The scholar, the retired guy. is modeling a kind of retirement I don't think I've seen in my life. He has hobbies, he has delights, he has collections. He's a dreamer and a thinker and a, you know, he's clearly back in it and loving tearing apart this literature, but in this way that feels just so easeful. And I'm just listening, feeling envy around that because I'm not in the same, you know, era of my life. And also because frankly, a lot of the ways that Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: ⁓ the world we're in and how chaotic it feels he may be, you know, sort of buffered from. But it's a certain color on the palette I didn't know I needed and I find it so calming and delightful. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, yeah. Mmm. What a treat. All right, I'm gonna have to add it to my list, absolutely. Okay, what's your go-to tool or resource or even a move whenever you're feeling overstimulated? Samara Bay: I love to do a little downward dog. I love to do a little ⁓ twisting. My mom got into Qigong, Q-I, G-O-N-G, not that well known in the land of Tai Chi, but not, but Qigong. ⁓ And there's really simple moves, like twisting moves that are ⁓ so lovely for waking up your spine and bringing you back into the present moment and grounding you. I love this one where you go like this. Kristin Carver Smith: Okay. Mmm. Yeah. Samara Bay: bilateral stimulation, one at a time. It's just that plus breathing. I mean, I have to say breathing because I'm a voice person. Kristin Carver Smith: This is nice, yeah. Yeah. Samara Bay: a little bit of, you know, if I'm home, a little bit of a weighted blanket, a little bit of just acknowledging, you know, hugs, cuddles and hugs. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Hmm. ⁓ cuddles and hugs. ⁓ You're the first person to say that. I love that. Yes. Samara Bay: And finally, I'll say, really? It's the best. ⁓ It's just, I guess it came last in my list because obviously it does somewhat involve another person and consent. But if there is another person handy who would like a cuddle or hug as well, that is a real go-to. And the final one I'll say is texting Kristen Carpenter-Smith. Kristin Carver Smith: Right, right, right. Yes, we should say it. Consent, please. I'm not giving my number out people, it's not happening! Samara Bay: which is only available for some of us and those of us who have it are very grateful. Kristin Carver Smith: Available to SmartBay. Oh, I love that though. That just breaks me. You just bring me so much joy. Can't wait to see you so very soon. Samara Bay: Also, I just want to honor the question under your question, which really is, we just add things to our toolbox, and when they don't work, we very lovingly discard them. And when they do, we hold them close, we acknowledge that our bodies and our brains, although the mechanisms are very similar to other people's, just work differently. And we get to find what works for us and not try to shoehorn ourselves and find other ways to of shame ourselves accidentally. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yep. Yep. Samara Bay: because that way doesn't work. know, a box breathing does not work for me. Four breaths in, four breath hold. The four breath hold, all of my like yoga training, all of my voice and speech training is yelling at me going, we're not supposed to hold on the top. It's like a tide, it comes in, it goes out. Okay, well, instead of resisting or getting mad at anyone, just don't do that. Just don't do that. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm. Yep. Yep. Yep, yep. Yeah, Chuck it and pick something else. Yeah. And this is why we like to ask this question because I think, again, it's just so helpful for listeners to see the breadth and depth of, there's so many different things that we can do. I know one of mine, if I'm really at a place where I just can't take it anymore, is an ice pack. It's like the sensation of hot and cold can help. Samara Bay: and pick something else. Mmm. Mmm. ⁓ Yes. Yes. Kristin Carver Smith: really ground us or sometimes it shows to actually carry a smooth rock around with me. And if I feel like I need like a, like a texture, something, sometimes I'll rub the rock. Like it's, there's so many different things that we do. Yep. Yes. An essential oil, right? A roller, like a scent. So I love, I love, I love. Okay. Final question for you. What's bringing you joy right now? Samara Bay: Yep, yep. And people do this with jewelry as well, right? Like a real touchstone, literally. Mmm, lotion and love. not to be super basic, but this conversation on and truly and truly conversations with friends. I mean, we all know that we live in a society that over indexes on romantic relationships and under indexes on friendships. And yet friend breakups are as painful as romantic breakups and friend misunderstandings, know, mess up our nervous systems as much as anything else. ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yes. ⁓ my gosh, Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. Samara Bay: and from seeing us make us feel more powerful. And that is so helpful. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Samara, thank you so much for joining us today. I just adore you. Samara Bay: Feeling virtual.