On Chasing Dreams & His New Book “Beat The Devil”

Third time's a charm. Show favorite Mishka Shubaly returns to the podcast today for round 3 to chat about addiction, sobriety, rock ‘n roll, ultrarunning, relationships, writing, creativity and his fantastic new Kindle Single, Beat The Devil. But mostly we talk about chasing dreams. The inherent force, value & gestalt of a dream. How much you are willing to sacrifice in pursuit of a dream, even when it constantly deludes and eludes you, undermining, derailing and even destroying other important aspects of your life. How to know whether the dream you seek is the right dream. And when — and if — it ever makes sense to abandon a dream that persistently fails to materialize. Mishka and I have a shorthand. A large percentage of our friendship has taken place on microphone, but there is a palpable sense that we have always been friends. And that's because — although our life experiences are very different — our mental & emotional points of reference share powerful common turf. Indeed, Mishka is my brother-from-another-mother; and once again it comes through undeniably in this exchange. Our bond aside, I feel an imperative to share his palpable creative voice. A master of humility, self-deprecation, frailty and fear, his evocative prose is a dagger into the heart we all share — our common condition as human. It's an important voice, worthy of notice and praise. An opinion I harbor not in isolation, but one shared by the literati, including a top editor at The Atlantic who goes so far as to say Mishka is “the voice of our generation”. That phrase gets bandied about all too commonly, but in Mishka's case it's truth. With 4 consecutive Amazon #1 bestsellers ( Shipwrecked*, The Long Run*, Are You Lonesome Tonight?* and Bachelor Number One* ) he is a true master of the short narrative. Now he's back at it. Beat The Devil*– his newest offering — just hit #1 in Amazon's Kindle Singles category yesterday. A deep dive into the downtown New York rock ‘n roll club scene, Beat The Devil* is Mishka's first-hand account of battling ... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Rich Roll?

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• 1:05Rich Roll?

  Welcome to episode 65 of the Rich Roll Podcast with Mishka Shubali.

• 1:24Rich Roll?

  Hey, everybody. Rich Roll here. Welcome back to the Rich Roll Podcast. Thanks for all the great comments on our Best of 2013 episode. I really enjoyed re-listening to so many of those interviews and wanted to give a shout-out to my son Tyler once again for culling through all of the past year's episodes and pulling out those amazing clips. It was an amazing year for us, and we're so proud of the work that we've done. And we're so ecstatic that we have you guys out there, this amazing audience that's responding so favorably to our mission, the plant power mission, what we're trying to get across here.

• 2:07Rich Roll?

  And we appreciate all the great feedback and comments and all of that. So, so glad, we're so excited for what is to come in 2014. This is just the beginning. I'm committed to this show. I'm committed to the mission. And we got a lot of great stuff in store for you. I am on the final leg of this crazy worldwide little tour that I've been on. If you listened to the last episode, you know that I was recently in Bahrain, as they say it there, Bahrain, not Bahrain, Bahrain, where I gave a keynote speech to the YPO organization there. And then

• 2:45Rich Roll?

  I was in Morocco. I did the same thing in Casablanca, which was incredible. And then I went out to Marrakech for a day and experienced a different part of Morocco, which was stunning in its, in its beauty and its robust, amazing culture there. Such a blessing and a gift to have this experience, to get to travel so much and carry this message. And on my way back, I'm on my way back home, but I stopped into New York City for a couple of days to record a couple podcasts, episodes and see a few people. Today, it is Saturday afternoon in New York and it's snowing

• 3:29Rich Roll?

  like crazy, which is pretty exciting after being out in the desert in the Middle East. I've gone on some incredible runs here in the city. I love running in New York City. I think running in Central Park is one of my favorite runs anywhere. It's right up there with any beautiful trail or remote mountain landscape that I've ever been on. There's just something about being in New York City and the vitality and the energy that, that I really tap into and love and miss. You know, I used to live in New York City and it's just great to be back here and have, have that kind of experience. And I'm grateful for that.

• 4:09Rich Roll?

  I was supposed to do an interview with Dr. Frank Lippman today, who is a fellow wellness warrior, a pretty prominent holistic doctor here in New York City. But he lives outside Manhattan and because of the snow, he decided not to come into the city today. So I'm gonna have to catch him when I return. I'm coming back to New York in February, so I will make sure that that interview happens then. But in the meantime, we've got a great interview today. My friend Mishka Shubaly, who you might have heard on the podcast twice, now three times, actually. He, we bonded when we met when I was in New York last year. I don't know, eight months ago or something like that.

• 4:53Rich Roll?

  We had an amazing conversation. It was one of our most popular episodes. And then when the paperback release of Finding Ultra came out, I had him back on the podcast to interview me. And then he just made a cameo appearance in the 2013 Best Of episode. Now he's back again. So hopefully you're not maxing out on Mishka. I love him. He is a great guy. And there's just something about when we sit down together, we connect on such an intimate level that we're able to go deep and kind of pull back the covers on each other's experiences. And there's something really special about these conversations that seem to meander, but always kind of pivot around a specific thematic thread,

• 5:38Rich Roll?

  which is, I guess, vulnerability and authenticity, which are big themes in my book and big themes in these podcasts, about how you tap into your true purpose and lead a fulfilling, happy existence. And Mishka, if you're not familiar with him or you're brand new to the podcast, he is a fellow recovering alcoholic. He's a fellow ultra runner and he's a fellow writer. So we always have many points of intersection and common interest in things to talk about. And I wanted to have him back on right away because he has a new book out.

• 6:22Rich Roll?

  It's a Kindle single. If you don't know what a Kindle single is, Amazon has this program. It's very unique. It's the only one in the world where they put out digital format, short form narratives in all different kinds of subject matters. And Mishka has kind of become the king of this little fiefdom of writing of short form. And he's really a master of it. His stories are extremely raw. He has a, an incredible facility for humility and for allowing himself to be vulnerable, which I find to be very courageous and brave. You know, I butted up against that when I was writing Finding Ultra.

• 7:07Rich Roll?

  And it's a, it's a scary thing to do to lay yourself raw and bare and allow yourself to not look so good in order to kind of evoke some shred of humanity, which is something I think that we can all relate to. But he's got a new one out. His last one was called The Long Run. It was about his experiences as, as a drug addict and an alcoholic and discovering sobriety and embracing the sober lifestyle and then discovering ultra running and his experiences being a runner. And this one kind of takes off from a similar starting point, but goes in a different trajectory. It's called Beat the Devil.

• 7:47Rich Roll?

  And it is about, it is also about his experiences being a, an alcoholic and what that life is like, that dark, kind of desperate, lonely existence, and then discovering sobriety. But meanwhile, pursuing this dream of rock and roll in New York City. And it's a very raw and revealing take and look at the underbelly of what it's like to try to make it in music in a band in New York City. And it's incredibly descriptive in its sort of episodes of being in these grimy bars.

• 8:22Rich Roll?

  And butting up against some of these bands that were unknown and now are huge bands. And that's really interesting for anybody who's into music and likes to hear stories about the sort of pursuit of trying to become a rock star. But more importantly, and what what really kind of stood out for me and what spoke to me is uh is this idea of pursuing a dream. You know, how how much do you give of yourself to achieve that dream? What do you sacrifice to pursue that dream? What does that dream mean to you? What does it say about who you are? And at what point do you let go of it if it's not working out? Um, and it's fascinating because at the same time that he's pursuing this dream of rock

• 9:07Rich Roll?

  and roll, he continues to ignore the fact that he has this incredible facility for writing. And all these doors are cracking open for him to step into this world of becoming a writer. And he consistently ignores that in pursuit, this blind pursuit of becoming a rock star. It's heartbreaking, uh, and it's emotionally raw.

• 9:31Rich Roll?

  And I think on the flip side of that, it's transcendent. It's beautiful for all its vulnerable truths. And I think it speaks to what it means for all of us to be human, to be frail, to be afraid and to be hopeful at the same time. So I encourage all of you guys to check it out. You can find it on Amazon, of course. Click through the Amazon banner at richroll.com. It's only a dollar ninety nine and it's like fifty pages. I read it in like an hour and a half or less. So it's a no brainer. It's less than a coffee at Starbucks. I think that we should support this guy. I know and believe that he is one of the rare true voices of my generation. And I'm not alone in that regard.

• 10:14Rich Roll?

  There's an editor at the Atlantic who champions Mishka and has repeatedly told him that that he is, he is a, uh, an important voice in our cultural dialogue, one of the most important voices of our generation. And, uh, it's incumbent upon me to try to shout from the mountaintops that everybody should tap into, uh, what he is trying to say. And there's something quite beautiful about it and I'm proud and happy to call him my friend and to bring him back onto the show and give him a microphone. We have an amazing conversation today.

• 10:50Rich Roll?

  It's weird because we're close and we talk all the time. And I'm always worried, are we going to run out of things to talk about when we turn the mic on? And then we turn the mic on and then it just goes in a whole different direction that we don't anticipate. And what I love about talking to Mishka is I don't set an agenda. We just start talking and we see where it heads. And that's certainly what happens today. He also has some new music out. And we're going to take the show out with one of his new solo pieces. So that's another treat for you guys.

• 11:30Rich Roll?

  Okay, cool. So Mishka is coming up right now. I also am going to be sitting down later today with what might be the podcast favorite of all time, John Joseph, punk rock icon, Cro-Mag's frontman, writer. He's got a new book coming out called Meat is for Pussies. It's a re-release of a book that he self-published, but it's going to be coming out this spring from Harper. So it's going to get a wide release. John is going to blow up huge. And we had a great dinner last night. Mishka, his girlfriend Lucy, and John and I all went to Candle 79, which is probably the most prominent vegan, plant-based restaurant in New York City.

• 12:15Rich Roll?

  It was phenomenal, fantastic. The food there is wonderful. And if you are lucky enough to come to New York City, you've got to check it out. Bene, the general manager there, took care of us and we had an incredible conversation over incredible plant-based foods. And it was, it was, it was an extraordinary, amazing experience. So I'm sitting down with John later today. We're going to put that up the following week. Excited about that. All right, everybody, let's just get into it. I'm rambling. Ladies and gentlemen, my friend, writer, recovering addict, recovering alcoholic, ultra-runner, musician, the voice of our generation. Enjoy my conversation with Mishka Shubal.

• 13:04Rich Roll?

  You ready to go?

• 13:05Mishka Shubaly?

  Let's do this shit.

• 13:07Rich Roll?

  Dude, are we really gonna do this again?

• 13:10Mishka Shubaly?

  I feel bad that, I feel bad that I'm, no, I feel bad that I'm doing this to you and that we're sort of unleashing this on.

• 13:17Rich Roll?

  You're not doing this to me.

• 13:18Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, you dreamed it.

• 13:19Rich Roll?

  I'm doing this to you.

• 13:20Mishka Shubaly?

  You dreamed it. I'm here as the, the, the physical manifestation of your dream. You created this reality with your dream. I'm just here doing my job.

• 13:27Rich Roll?

  What, what reality is that?

• 13:31Mishka Shubaly?

  Us about to go, about, like, we're standing at the edge of the dark abandoned mineshaft about to put out our torches and go in to the darkness, blind.

• 13:40Rich Roll?

  I know. No agenda. Well, you said dreams. I dreamed it. And I think that's apropos for today, because we're gonna do a lot of talking about dreaming.

• 13:49Mishka Shubaly?

  Yes, the destructive power of dreams.

• 13:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah, the, the beautiful and destructive power of dreams and dreaming. I hope it doesn't become depressing. Are you gonna depress us?

• 13:59Mishka Shubaly?

  I'll do my best.

• 14:02Rich Roll?

  No, uh, thanks for coming back, man. I mean, usually, uh, I mean, I'm psyched to be sitting here with you. It's awesome, man.

• 14:09Mishka Shubaly?

  It's, it's funny to do it in a hotel room this nice, because whenever I'm in a hotel this nice, I always feel like I'm working.

• 14:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 14:15Mishka Shubaly?

  Like, I should be, like, cleaning up or something. No, I just, I'm just, I'm never in a hotel room that's this.

• 14:22Rich Roll?

  This is a nice hotel room.

• 14:23Mishka Shubaly?

  This uncrappy.

• 14:24Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I think I'm gonna stay here for a little while. It's pretty good. Um, no, usually, like, my sort of optimal scenario for the podcast is to not talk to the guests until they walk in and sit down and the mics are hot, you know? So it's completely fresh and organic.

• 14:43Mishka Shubaly?

  Uh huh.

• 14:44Rich Roll?

  But that's not our experience. You picked me up at the airport yesterday and we, and we drove all the way into the city from JFK and talked the whole time and went straight to dinner and talked all through dinner. And then we're like, oh shit, we should have just, and I didn't want to podcast last night because I was so jet lagged from flying from overseas and, uh, we could have just recorded everything we talked about on, in the car and that would have been its own podcast.

• 15:08Mishka Shubaly?

  I mean, it's cool. The NSA has all that information on.

• 15:11Rich Roll?

  They do, yeah. They're gonna be releasing, yeah, another version of the podcast in the, in the halls of Langley.

• 15:19Mishka Shubaly?

  I tried to swear as much as I could yesterday to get it out of my system for today, but I know I'm still gonna drop a couple of half-laws.

• 15:25Rich Roll?

  It's okay. I already, you know, we broke the seal with that, with John Joseph. So people are accustomed to it. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna do a podcast with him, I think, either tomorrow or the next day, probably tomorrow.

• 15:37Mishka Shubaly?

  Oh, awesome.

• 15:38Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So this is a, my tour through New York of, of repeat guests. And I'm supposed to do this doctor tomorrow to Dr. Frank Littman, but he doesn't live in the city and, and it's supposed to snow tomorrow.

• 15:52Mishka Shubaly?

  Oh, really?

• 15:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah, we're supposed to get a whole bunch of snow. So if it doesn't, he's not coming in. So we'll have to see.

• 15:57Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 15:58Rich Roll?

  But, um, good to be back in New York, man.

• 16:01Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I, you know, I've been in California a lot this year and, and coming back here, it's like, as soon as you get to the airport, you know, somebody's elbowing you and like, out of the way asshole. And I was like, oh, man, it's so good to be back.

• 16:15Mishka Shubaly?

  In California, everybody's like, ah, no worries, man. Ah, it's cool, you know, peace. And I just, that freaks me out.

• 16:22Rich Roll?

  People are perfectly nice here. I never had that experience here. I love it here, man. I'm happy to be back. I just went running in the park and, uh, my blood is thin, but, um, I was able to get through the 30 degree temperature. What is it, it's like in the twenties today, I think.

• 16:38Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, it's cold. I mean, I, I left the house for the first time on the way here, which I'm kind of embarrassed.

• 16:43Rich Roll?

  You've been writing all day?

• 16:44Mishka Shubaly?

  No, man. Well, I've just been writing emails, which is my least favorite form of writing. I'm in the process of doing all this promo shit for the, you know, for the new single. And I hate promoting, dude.

• 16:57Rich Roll?

  It's your job, man. We were talking about this the other day. You gotta suit up for that.

• 17:01Mishka Shubaly?

  I just, yeah, I just, I despise it.

• 17:03Rich Roll?

  Well, that's what you're doing right here. So you're telling me that you, you hate me and you hate being here?

• 17:08Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, no, this is different because you and I just bust each other's balls for like an hour and that, that feels natural. But, you know, when I'm, when I'm trying to compose like a hundred and, you know, 140 character blurb about like, you know, what a swell guy I am, what a great writer I am. I just feel like, I, you know, such, it just seems like such bullshit.

• 17:29Rich Roll?

  It's kind of contrived. And I, I think the, um, the sort of dirty little secret of journalism, especially when you're trying to promote your own work is if you're lucky enough to get solicitations from, you know, magazines or newspapers or blogs or online, whatever, uh, generally what happens is.

• 17:49Rich Roll?

  They say, oh, we really, you know, we want to run a piece on you or the book or whatever. And they end up sending you like 10 questions and then you write the entire article for them. Which is good and bad. It's good because you can control exactly how you want it to come out. And you know, you won't be misquoted and all that kind of stuff. But at the same time, it's a lot of work, man.

• 18:11Mishka Shubaly?

  For the record, that chime was you and not me.

• 18:13Rich Roll?

  I know. That was me. I, because I have my, I have my iPad out because I'm going to be reading from your new Kindle single. And I wanted to have it, have it here, but I didn't turn the volume off.

• 18:22Mishka Shubaly?

  It's, I, I don't mind those like 10 questions things where they, there's just sort of like, they just give you the same questions you get to answer them because, you know, the only things I do are like either email stuff where I write it all out, or, you know, interviews like this where the, the audio is going to be up. Cause I, you know, as a writer, I just had so many bad experiences with somebody putting down something that I didn't say. Or, you know, just getting it wrong. Which it sucks to say, to be a writer and say, I have no, no confidence in writers.

• 18:55Rich Roll?

  Well, I mean, you know, as you get older, when you're a kid, you think everybody who's a professional is really good at their job. And then you get older and you realize like, there's a lot of people that are lazy.

• 19:07Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I'm one of them.

• 19:09Rich Roll?

  You are, yeah.

• 19:10Mishka Shubaly?

  I know exactly how, how lazy everybody else is.

• 19:13Rich Roll?

  But I'm excited. Um, the new Kindle single is called Beat the Devil. And this is sort of a follow up to the long run. And what, what, you know, let's get into, before we get into exactly what it is, you know, what's the backstory and what motivated you to do another Kindle single?

• 19:30Mishka Shubaly?

  I just, there was a lot of story that had to be told about my missing years of, you know, being a, a rock musician, an unknown rock musician. And I never wanted to be a writer. I certainly never wanted to be a runner. And I definitely never wanted to be sober, but I wanted to be.

• 19:52Rich Roll?

  You're all these things that you didn't want to be.

• 19:53Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 19:54Rich Roll?

  The one thing you wanted to be.

• 19:55Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I just, I wanted to like shred guitar, man. And that's like the one thing that I can't do.

• 20:02Rich Roll?

  Well, you can.

• 20:04Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I'm a pretty weak guitar player still. I, uh.

• 20:07Rich Roll?

  For somebody, how many guitars do you own now?

• 20:10Mishka Shubaly?

  I, I've lost count, probably like 60.

• 20:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 20:13Mishka Shubaly?

  It's disgusting.

• 20:13Rich Roll?

  For somebody who claims they can't shred, that's a lot of guitars now.

• 20:17Mishka Shubaly?

  I don't play them.

• 20:20Rich Roll?

  You just collect them like Bitcoin or something?

• 20:22Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I, I should be on, uh, hoarders, not on your podcast.

• 20:26Rich Roll?

  They're like stacked up in your hallway and.

• 20:28Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, it's bad news.

• 20:30Rich Roll?

  Um, so yeah, I mean, in the long run, you know, you get into your, you know, your addiction, your alcoholism and your, your sort of journey to sobriety and your discovery of running. Um, and then, uh, in this, you sort of pick up kind of contemporaneously, but on a different track. I mean, it's, it's more of the past, but, but, uh, it's sort of a different, you take a tangent in a different direction through your sort of drinking and, and, and drug use and ultimately your sobriety. But it's a, it's a, it's a pursuit of a different kind of goal, right?

• 21:04Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I had, I had two sort of lightning strike epiphanies, um, in my life where, you know, one was when I was, uh, I don't know, 12 or 13 and I got drunk for the first time. And I was like, oh yeah, this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life. This is, this is what I'll, this is what I'll be. But before that, I had this epiphany when I was like six, where I was just like, I, I'm going to play guitar. I'm going to get up on stage in front of people and I'm going to play guitar and they're going to laugh and they're going to cheer and it's going to be awesome, you know? So that is sort of, I mean, I describe it as an addiction and that, you know, that was definitely, that was my first high, man, rock and roll.

• 21:47Rich Roll?

  Right. You describe in the, in, uh, in the single, can we call it a book?

• 21:52Mishka Shubaly?

  Whatever you want.

• 21:53Rich Roll?

  All right. In the book, you, you describe in, you know, very, um, specific detail, that experience of, of, you know, hearing, uh, Johnny be good for the first time and kind of what that catalyzed for you.

• 22:06Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, and you know, I still, when I think about it now, I still get chills just thinking about that song and how powerful it was to me. And, and, you know, my roommate's a guitar teacher and I heard him playing it through like three different walls the other day. Like I could hear just the faint and I was like, oh yeah, man. It was like a shark smelling blood in the water, you know? And, you know, it was just a tremendously powerful song and it just spoke to me and I, and it was, it was clear, like, this is what I was born to do. This is exactly what, you know, this is it. This is my thing.

• 22:45Rich Roll?

  Right. That switch just got flicked and, and that's what it was gonna be for you.

• 22:49Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah. I mean, everything else was just out the window. I, you know, I, um, my dad was a physicist. So for, you know, until I'd heard Rock and Roll, I was gonna be a physicist like my dad or a knife thrower.

• 23:02Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Where's that? I wanted to find that part in the book where you were like, you were considering as a child, what your careers might possibly be.

• 23:10Mishka Shubaly?

  I was just laying out all my options.

• 23:12Rich Roll?

  A mustachioed knife thrower.

• 23:16Mishka Shubaly?

  That's a good line of work. I mean, if, you know, I'm, I would still probably be into that now. If I could do that, I would do that.

• 23:22Rich Roll?

  Yeah. It's better than a fireman, right? As you said.

• 23:24Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah. All, you know, that other stuff just seemed ridiculous.

• 23:28Rich Roll?

  And when you're, yeah, when you're a kid, you don't take into account like what's a, you know, what's going to support me financially? Just everything's the same when you're a kid, right? It's like.

• 23:37Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, you, you're, no kid dreams of being an accountant, man. Like we, you know, we all have, we, we have big dreams and people talk about, you know, you gotta follow your dreams. You gotta chase your dreams and how important that is. But what they mean is it's important to have a calendar that says, follow your dreams. I think that they don't really mean for you to follow your dreams. Cause if we all followed our dreams, there'd be a lot of knife throwers out there, I think. You know, I think a lot of people would have more interesting careers than they have right now.

• 24:11Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, I think that there's something about that childlike quality when you're young and, and you haven't been sort of indoctrinated into, you know, the social norms, or you haven't been beaten down by society, or just plugged into kind of what you're supposed to do, where you're, you're sort of permitted and encouraged to have big dreams and explore your imagination. And somewhere along the line, that just gets eroded.

• 24:36Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I think, you know, I do think that people need to be encouraged to, to follow their first choice first. Whatever you're passionate about, you should be encouraged to go out and try that, you know? I mean, I have, um, you know, and I was lucky in that I was able to spend enough time and devote enough energy to trying to be a successful rock musician. Um, and see just how hard it was and how shitty it was and, um, you know, and then I sort of was able, so it's not, it's not something that was unfulfilled. Like, I don't still romanticize it that much.

• 25:19Mishka Shubaly?

  Cause I know people who are out there doing it and, and like in between tours, they're working at the bar because they don't have any money.

• 25:25Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm. Just to set everything in context, I mean, Beat the Devil is really your sort of mini memoir about, uh, living, living in New York City and trying to make it in a band and sort of the underbelly of the New York rock scene and, and kind of in very, you know, lifelike terms, you really feel like you're part of that scene and what it was, you know, what it was like around all these bands that, you know, some of which made it big and you've named these bands that we've all heard of and, and some of which didn't and just living in that community and exploring that world.

• 26:01Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, the, uh, the working title was, uh, Fail, Fail Rock and Roll. That was just about like 15 years of playing rock and roll in New York City and not getting anywhere, you know?

• 26:14Rich Roll?

  Beat the Devil's a better, I think that's better. It was the name of the band that you were in.

• 26:18Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I fought, I fought, I fought my editor tooth and nail on it, but I have to, uh, I have to concede defeat on that one. Everybody loves the name.

• 26:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's, it's the perfect encapsulation of, of what it's all about. And to kind of echo back to how we opened this, um, it really is about dreams. It's about having a dream. It's about pursuing a dream and it's about how far are you willing to go, uh, to see that dream realized? And at what point do you course correct or let it go or move in a different direction? And in certain respects, it's revelatory in that regard, and it's also heartbreaking, you know? It's sort of like the ying to Anvil's yang, you know, in cer- in cer- in certain ways.

• 27:02Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I, um,

• 27:06Mishka Shubaly?

  I was, I was thinking about you and Dean Carnese's this summer when I was writing this because you were pacing him at Badwater. And I was thinking about ultra runners and ultra running and you know, ultra endurance events where, you know, and I thought, I mean, I thought about like Dean's wife, you know, and I don't know what their relationship is like, but how

• 27:33Mishka Shubaly?

  sometimes your real life gets held hostage to the fiction of a dream. And I think, you know, and that was one of the things that I noticed, you know, when I was training really hard is that there was, you know, a lot of things that I didn't do, like a lot of shows that I missed with my band or a lot of phone calls I didn't return, stuff like that, because I was out for four or six or eight hours running. And, um, and that was nothing compared to, you know, how I held my life hostage to rock and roll, you know, and that was, that dream was everything. That was more important than, than any relationship, more important to my family, more important to my friends, more important to my girlfriend, you know, everything and anything was just that, uh,

• 28:16Mishka Shubaly?

  you know, and, and it's something ethereal too. It's not like, oh, if I get the golden banana or whatever, I'll be satisfied, but it's just, it's, it's just, uh, yeah, it's totally an addiction because it's just more and more and more and more, you know?

• 28:29Rich Roll?

  But where do you, where do you draw the distinction between an addiction and pursuing something that you're passionate about? I mean, that, and you're, you're like, you're saying that rock and roll held your life hostage, but in some ways that, that was, that was your life. You weren't holding your, your, your life hostage outside of rock and roll. Rock and roll was what you were living.

• 28:51Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah, that's absolutely true. Well, I mean, I think the way that we define any other addiction is, um, you know, is it harming your life?

• 28:58Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 28:58Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, and, and that's the thing is that I was just, um, you know, I sort of, I'd hollowed out every other aspect of my life just to devote as much resources and time and energy and money as I could to, uh, to touring non-stop on like, you know, six or eight or 10 bucks a day. And, you know, we're wearing the same pair of jeans from New York to Seattle and back.

• 29:22Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So yeah, what was it? How did you describe what those jeans smelled like when you were talking about that the other day?

• 29:28Mishka Shubaly?

  It was like, uh, like a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos that you had crumbled up and poured vinegar into or like ammonia.

• 29:36Rich Roll?

  Yeah. God.

• 29:39Mishka Shubaly?

  Horrible.

• 29:40Rich Roll?

  Um, so, so yeah. So, you know, why don't you like spin a little yarn, a little bit about what the book is about. So I'm not putting words into your mouth.

• 29:49Mishka Shubaly?

  Um, well, I mean, it basically traces my, you know, my New York history of the bands I was in and, you know, sort of what I was trying to do, starting with a band, uh, Come On, that I came out here to join without them knowing about it.

• 30:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 30:05Mishka Shubaly?

  With, uh, with my old best friend, James. And then when that band broke up, I, you know, I tried to do my solo stuff for a long time and that didn't pan out. And then I joined this band, Beat the Devil. And we got right to, you know, the brink of about to be doing something great and then just shit the bed at the last second. And then I joined a band, Fresh Kills, which was my last band, uh, with my old friend Zach. And, uh, that broke up in March of this year.

• 30:35Rich Roll?

  Right. And sort of the interwoven throughout this is kind of your drunk log and how you're sort of sinking deeper into, you know, drug and alcohol addiction and ultimately finding sobriety and coming to this realization with Fresh Kills that you gotta pull the plug on this and, and move in a different direction.

• 30:55Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah. And, you know, ironically, the

• 31:00Mishka Shubaly?

  I, I mean, I got sober by myself for myself, but it was the support that I got from my bandmates in Fresh Kills that enabled me to stay sober. And so, and ironically, it was like Fresh Kills supported me being sober to the extent that Fresh Kills was no longer as important to me. You know, and, um, sorry, guys. Like, you know, I don't know what to say.

• 31:24Rich Roll?

  Right. But how, how much do you think that getting sober and kind of gaining some mental clarity over your life played into your decision to change course with your music career?

• 31:40Mishka Shubaly?

  Well.

• 31:42Mishka Shubaly?

  I I really think that for me, I couldn't separate rock and roll from drugs and alcohol. The, you know, the, the well was poisoned, you know, that for me like, it wasn't just getting loud. It was getting fucked up and getting loud and, you know, and getting fucked up with my friends and like drinking at practice or whatever. You know, I mean, it was sort of our bowling league and stuff, but then, but then there, there got to be an increasing element of death woven into that, that at first, you know, first it was Johnny be good and just music and like the jams. And then it got to be music and getting messed up. And then it got to be,

• 32:27Mishka Shubaly?

  this will be how, you know, this is how I will die is I will die, you know, in a hotel room with a guitar in one hand and a bottle in the other.

• 32:35Rich Roll?

  Right. So as it progressed,

• 32:40Rich Roll?

  you know, where did, where did it become less about the music and more about the sort of party lifestyle? I mean, as a kid, you have this epiphany hearing Johnny be good and, and, and this passion and love for music and this idea of wanting to do that. But also,

• 32:59Rich Roll?

  you kind of allude to this at the end, when you tell that story about getting up on that platform on the beach. A part of it is just being on stage where eyes are upon you. And that's very different from the purity of the music. So how much of it became more about showmanship and the lifestyle as opposed to the music itself?

• 33:21Mishka Shubaly?

  I mean, I, I remain plugged into the music to the very end. I, you know, and none of the bands that I joined are bands that I couldn't defend musically. You know, I mean, there was at no point that I was ever playing with a band that I hated, but I was just in the band for, you know, for the coke and the whiskey.

• 33:43Mishka Shubaly?

  So.

• 33:46Mishka Shubaly?

  But you know, there were, it was definitely in, um, I would have to say it was in Beat the Devil that it became less and less about the music and more about getting fucked up. And the, you know, I mean, I just-

• 34:01Rich Roll?

  And the irony is that that was the best band that you were in. That was the band that was really poised to really do something big.

• 34:08Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I mean, I, I remember being on tour with them in the middle of the summer. It was like August and we're, you know, it was a Sunday night in this college town, which a college town in August on a Sunday night is just a recipe for suck city. You know, I mean, it's like a disastrous show like waiting to happen right there.

• 34:25Rich Roll?

  Because there's no students there and it's a school night.

• 34:28Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, there's no students there. It's a Sunday night. It's August. Everybody's fucking had it by that point anyway. And we were playing at like midnight and I was like this, this, okay, everybody ready for open band practice tonight? And by the time we roll in there, the place is packed, like just wall to wall. It's the second story of this, um, this, this club, The Union in Athens, Ohio. So it's so hot. Like when I got up there, I felt like I'd like pissed my jeans or something. It just instantly soaked with sweat. We get up there and the crowd, I mean, the kids are just going crazy. And we, you know, we end up, they, you know, we finish our set and then they, they physically won't let us leave the stage.

• 35:11Mishka Shubaly?

  So we play another song and then they, again, they physically, you know, until we've played every song that we know. And then finally I, um, we get off the stage. I, I shamefully have to admit that I did the thing that I would, I never do, which I took my shirt off because it was just so hot. And I get off stage-

• 35:30Rich Roll?

  Rock and roll cliche, one after another.

• 35:34Mishka Shubaly?

  I'm gonna, I'm gonna kill you when this podcast is over. So we get off the stage and I'm walking to the bar and I feel hands on me. And I, and like I look behind me and there's this blonde with, you know, this chick with long blonde hair down to her butt in like a tiny little yellow like summer dress. And she's, she ran, run her hands like one down my chest and one down my back. And I turn, turn back to look at her and she makes eye contact with me and just puts her hands on her face.

• 36:03Mishka Shubaly?

  And I was like, God, just kill me now because it's perfect.

• 36:06Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 36:07Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, and, um, you know, but I didn't, I didn't even like go home with her. I just like went, went to the bar and I was like, give me one of everything. And I like, you know, fell asleep on somebody's porch or something like that. On top of the van.

• 36:24Rich Roll?

  So, you know, to, I wanted to read a little quote from, uh, from the book. Which is early in where you say, uh, not, not everything that nearly kills you makes you stronger. Sometimes it just makes you hate yourself for being so easily wounded, yet unable to die.

• 36:44Rich Roll?

  It's, it's heartbreaking, man.

• 36:46Mishka Shubaly?

  You said we weren't gonna get depressing.

• 36:48Rich Roll?

  No, but like, let's explore this a little bit.

• 36:51Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, it, um, I think this is the, you know, one of the really faulty things with rock and roll is that it's dependent upon your, your value is assigned to you by other people. And, and you only get value by, from the, the amount of attention you get from other people. You know, so, I mean, you know, and that's why rock and rollers always do the despicable thing of like, don't you know who I am? You know, because they're experiencing this disparity between the, the worship they get from their fans on whatever their website or, you know, in, in Brazil or Japan or wherever their band is big.

• 37:35Mishka Shubaly?

  And then the door guy at, um, at whatever club they're trying to get into. And you know, and they're saying like, don't you know who I am? You know, and I think the difference with writing is that,

• 37:48Mishka Shubaly?

  I mean, you know, obviously I want everybody to like it. Otherwise I wouldn't put it out there. But if nobody read this story, I'd still feel really good about it. I feel good that I wrote it. I feel good that I was honest with myself about my, you know, the mistakes that I made and stuff. I, I feel pride, you know, pride about the writing, but, uh, music is so much more about performance and about like the eyes upon you. And I think to do something like that and to just.

• 38:20Mishka Shubaly?

  Not even for people to boo you, but just for them to ignore you completely, which is what happened, you know, in so many of the bands I was in. It's just heartbreaking, man.

• 38:28Rich Roll?

  Right. So you're almost compelled to develop this really unhealthy relationship with external validation, just by the nature of what you're pursuing.

• 38:38Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah. It's, um, it's about the applause, or the cheers, or the reviews, or, you know, something like that. Um, you know, the attention from other people and the, you know, the thing you create isn't, has no value in itself. It's just arbitrarily assigned.

• 38:54Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 38:55Mishka Shubaly?

  It's, it's like Bitcoin.

• 38:57Rich Roll?

  Right. It's like, yeah, exactly. There's an algorithm for it or something.

• 39:01Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 39:01Rich Roll?

  I mean, you know, a big theme, obviously, of the podcast is sort of pursuing or unlocking a more authentic version of yourself. And so when you think back on your, you know, pursuit of this dream of rock and roll and, and, and, and now you have this, you're realizing this, you're actualizing your talent as a writer. Um, you know, where do you, where do you see your most authentic self? Like, do you still feel like being a musician is you at your purist? Or are you able to access that and, and kind of embody that through the writing?

• 39:48Mishka Shubaly?

  I think I'm my, my most genuine now, sober. Um, I really, which, which isn't to say that who I, the jerk that I was back then wasn't me, because I really feel like it couldn't have happened, it couldn't have unfolded any other way, man. It had to be this way. I had to go out and do that, that crazy shit and, and make all those mistakes, um, to be who I am, to be where I am now, you know? And I think that, you know, there was, there was one point in my life where I was probably 22 or 23, and I spent, you know, six months preparing this application for Harper's Magazine for the internship, which is like the hardest

• 40:31Mishka Shubaly?

  internship to get. And I got it. And I couldn't believe it. But it happened the same summer that I was supposed to go on this sailing trip. And this sailing trip was going to be like six or eight weeks. It was going to be amazing. And I, so I decided to do the sailing trip instead. Took us five days to like wreck the boat. I had to like, you know, drink my own urine and like lost all my shit.

• 40:54Rich Roll?

  Yeah, the universe, the universe is constantly sort of pecking at you to come over to the writing side of the thing. And that's, that's the undercurrent throughout this whole book, which is you are grinding yourself down to, down to, down to dust to achieve this rock and roll dream. Meanwhile, uh, you know, this, the sky is falling with sort of reminders and opportunities that you're a great writer and this is something you should pursue. Everything from your mom, you know, sort of telling you this as a child and every time an opportunity arises or a door, you know, a, a door would open for you to, um, to come

• 41:37Rich Roll?

  into this writing world and it almost came too easy for you. It was almost like it was too easy. So you didn't want it, you know, and you're constantly ignoring this and ignoring it and ignoring it. And you fill out the application to go to, uh, the Columbia Writing Program grad school and it, it happens for you despite the fact that you could barely rub two pennies together and weren't even sure that was what you wanted to do. It was sort of like every time you knocked on a door, it opened for you. Whereas in rock and roll, every time you knocked on a door, the door kept shutting.

• 42:17Mishka Shubaly?

  The, the moral of the story is your mother knows best. Listen to your mom.

• 42:22Rich Roll?

  Listen to your mom? All right.

• 42:24Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I mean, I, I wrote about it once in a song, you know, and I said, um, every success shows the world is weak and every failure proves that it's me. And, you know, and that was just like, if I could do something, if it came easy to me, then it had no value. And if I could do something, if I, or if I, if I failed, if I fell short, then it proved that I was shitty and worthless and had nothing to contribute.

• 42:49Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, it goes all the way back. Who was it? Groucho Marx, who said, I'd never want to be a member of any club that would have me, right? It's, it's, you know, the, the, the, the level of difficulty in rock and roll was a great place for you to ply your profound level of self-deprecation, low self-esteem, all the way to the hill, right? Like, and that really comes across in the writing, which is your facility for self-deprecation. And, and, and that allows you to evoke a certain humanity that, that lets the reader inside your world to inhabit your world and to empathize with you completely.

• 43:28Mishka Shubaly?

  It's, it's funny, you know, because when I wrote this, I was like, this is going to be very meaningful to a handful of people and everybody else is just not going to get it. But I had a really interesting conversation with my girlfriend's mom the other day. Cause she's, um, she was a graphic artist and you know, and that was, that's, that was her dream. That's what she wanted to pursue. And she doesn't know any of the bands in this story. She was never, you know, a druggie and she never, you know, I don't think she ever played an instrument or had that dream. But she was like, man, I knew exactly what you were talking about, you know? And I mean, that's one of the things is that I think, I guess I kind of come down a little hard on myself and hard on the decisions, you know, that

• 44:10Mishka Shubaly?

  I made and the decision to follow that dream. But I think, I think I made the right decision by doing it because, did you watch Breaking Bad?

• 44:22Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 44:23Mishka Shubaly?

  I feel like that's the inversion of it, you know, where Walter White, as a young man, had, had dreams and ambitions and aspirations of being like a research chemist and doing, you know, huge, brave, cool things. And instead, he, he, without really trying for it, without pursuing it, he was just like, no, I'll do the, I'll, I'll just do this thing. I'll just be a, you know, a high school teacher instead.

• 44:48Rich Roll?

  Well, he had that company that he founded though, and then he got kind of pushed out or whatever, right? So

• 44:53Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, it sounds

• 44:54Rich Roll?

  So it's almost like, uh, you kind of, uh, you know, at the bar and the other band that's playing is the one that breaks huge and they're not as good as your band, right? That's the analogy to that.

• 45:05Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I mean, for for him, though, I mean, I felt like he he didn't really like pursue that dream all the way. And then it came back as something. You know, I think of that, you know, Langston Hughes poem about Harlem, he says, you know, what happens to a dream deferred? You know, that. You know, for Walter White, it came back as as a malign, cancerous thing where he was like, oh, I've just been a schlub my whole life. Now I want to feel what it's like to be a star. You know, and everybody, I mean, that's the thing is like, being a rock star, that's like such an analogy for everyone. It's, you know, you talk about the rock, the rock stars of the running world, or like, you know, I was listening to like Jay-Z and Danny

• 45:47Mishka Shubaly?

  Brown before, and they both have songs about like, party like a rock star, or die like a rock star. It's a beverage now.

• 45:53Rich Roll?

  Right, exactly. Yeah.

• 45:55Mishka Shubaly?

  You know.

• 45:55Rich Roll?

  It's branded as a lifestyle, average with products you can buy and everything.

• 46:02Rich Roll?

  Well.

• 46:05Rich Roll?

  You know, I think that that. The thing that you've always done, though, is you've lived life large, not large, you know, monetarily, but you've lived, you've lived like, you've lived, you have a lot of experiences in your life, you've collected amazing experiences. So you have this tapestry that you can now tap into as a writer. You have things to write about, you have things to say. And yes, you know, Beat the Devil is very specific about this rock and roll world and downtown New York and Brooklyn. And, you know, and you name all these bands, like the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs and the Strokes. And what are some of the other bands that you're like, kind of bumping up against throughout this story?

• 46:45Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I mean, there was, you know, the whole sort of post Strokes, rock and roll gold rush in Brooklyn, you know, and we had the Libertines come through, the Walkmen, the Secret Machines.

• 46:56Rich Roll?

  Vampire Weekend.

• 46:58Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, opened up for Vampire Weekend for their CD release party. They were fans of Beat the Devil.

• 47:05Mishka Shubaly?

  We were on the B side of a Bruce Springsteen uh single that was a benefi-

• 47:10Rich Roll?

  That's amazing.

• 47:12Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, it's just so ridiculous.

• 47:13Rich Roll?

  So, but the point being that uh that yes, it's a very specific world, but the humanity uh is universal, you know what I mean? So even though it's your story of of kind of navigating, you know, the underbelly of this subculture, um you know, it's your human reactions, it's your frailties, it's your courage to be vulnerable uh in the pros that that makes it relatable. And that's why your girlfriend's mom, you know, can enjoy it and tap into it, even though it's a foreign country for her. I mean, every, you know, great story should transport you to a different world,

• 47:55Rich Roll?

  but it should have universal truths about it that we can tap into that that help us learn something about the human condition, right? And so it certainly does that.

• 48:04Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I mean, I learned a lot writing this as well. You know how how hard I try not to learn anything.

• 48:14Rich Roll?

  You're very resistant.

• 48:15Mishka Shubaly?

  I uh but man, when I sat down to write this story, I was like, there are just, you know, these, you know, a couple of people in here that I'm really, really angry at, you know, because they really, I really got hosed, man. And then in the process of writing this, I was like, man, I can't believe I have any friends at all anymore. Like, you know, you know, there are a couple of people that I'm pretty angry at that, you know, and with good reason, but man, they have a lot of reason to be mad at me, too, you know, and like, we all acted like just animals.

• 48:47Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 48:48Mishka Shubaly?

  And um I really realized that I had to uh, you know, I had to forgive myself for like the crap that I did, but I had, I really had to forgive other people, too, because we were all just. We're out of our heads, man.

• 49:03Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm. And how many of these, most of the people that you played music with really aren't doing it anymore, right? Or they're not doing it professionally or full time. I mean, Shilpa has music that's coming out and she, she was the lead singer in Beat the Devil.

• 49:17Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, she's, she's doing great. She's signed to, uh, to Nick Cave's record label. She has a new record out and I think it's called, Everything is Self-Full A Show. And I, I absolutely recommend her music, uh, even though she probably hates my guts for everything I wrote in this story. I still, I still think she's a brilliant artist.

• 49:36Rich Roll?

  Well, you were very, uh, demonstrative in, in, in speaking to her talent as being, you know, this sort of iconic voice.

• 49:44Mishka Shubaly?

  Oh yeah. She's, uh, she's absolutely one of a kind. Um, she's a genius, period, you know?

• 49:52Mishka Shubaly?

  And, you know, another person who I wrote about that I said some, some pretty hard things about was, uh, my friend James, who was the bandleader in Come On. I, I wanted to tell you this last night so bad, but I forced myself to save it for today.

• 50:06Rich Roll?

  Okay.

• 50:07Mishka Shubaly?

  James read the story and then we got in touch and we talked. And he invited me to join a band with him and Zach, the singer from Fresh Kill.

• 50:22Rich Roll?

  You have to read the story to know how funny that is because basically the story is sort of closing the chapter on, you know, being in bands with these guys. And you had not spoken to James for quite a long time, right?

• 50:34Mishka Shubaly?

  We hadn't spoken for eight years.

• 50:36Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow.

• 50:36Mishka Shubaly?

  And then we got together like two days ago and we're sitting, uh, in the, in the corner, you know, in the window of a neighborhood bar. And, uh, Dave Burton, who was the tour manager for Yeah, Yeah, Yeah's and, you know, a ton, just, he just came back from Sleigh Bells and he, you know, he's been around forever. And he was one of our buddies back in the day when we were, you know, drinking at Mars Bar and falling off our bar stools. He walks by the window where James and I are sitting, recognizes me first and puts his left hand on the glass. And then he looks over and he sees James and, and, you know, he immediately has sort of like a what's up because he hasn't seen us together for almost 10 years.

• 51:11Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 51:11Mishka Shubaly?

  Puts his other hand on the glass, then looks at us and then with one hand makes a fist and with the other he's, puts his finger in his fist, the international symbol for, you know, you guys are doing it.

• 51:21Rich Roll?

  Right. Wow. So what did you say to him?

• 51:27Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, you know, and this shit is hard because

• 51:33Mishka Shubaly?

  to live as an alcoholic for 20 years, you become an inveterate apologizer. You, you, you're apologizing, or you're apologizing muscle gets very strong, very limber. You know, and you can apologize to anyone for anything. And

• 51:51Mishka Shubaly?

  and, you know, so it's easy for me.

• 51:53Rich Roll?

  I'm gonna interject right now. I'm just gonna read from, because I highlighted, I love like on that Kindle, you can highlight stuff. So I highlighted a paragraph on that very subject that you wrote to here where you say,

• 52:06Rich Roll?

  this is the one, one of the many, uh, you're, you're, to introduce it, you're, you're about to have an encounter with someone who you owe an apology to for this very thing, right? And you say, this is one of the many tiny indignities of being a sober alcoholic. You are forever being asked by people who care about you, whether or not you are okay. They mean well, but the aggregate result is that you feel you are teetering on the edge of some fearsome precipice, at least in their own eyes. I certainly have had that experience. I mean, it doesn't happen so much anymore, but yeah, like, hey, how are you? Are you okay? Are you okay?

• 52:39Mishka Shubaly?

  They italicize the R, but like, how are you?

• 52:44Rich Roll?

  It's very loaded.

• 52:45Mishka Shubaly?

  It's like, I'm not drunk, man. Relax. Like, let's talk.

• 52:49Rich Roll?

  But, you know, that's an accomplishment in and of itself.

• 52:51Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 52:51Rich Roll?

  Right? So.

• 52:52Mishka Shubaly?

  But when I had this conversation with James, you know, I, I had to apologize to him for how I had, I had acted. But I also had to tell him what I was angry about. And I had to say, I, I'm mad at you for this and this and this. And then he was like, well.

• 53:07Rich Roll?

  You just failed at making an amends.

• 53:11Rich Roll?

  You violated the cardinal rule.

• 53:14Mishka Shubaly?

  Are, are you not supposed to, uh, are you not supposed to?

• 53:16Rich Roll?

  You're supposed to just.

• 53:18Mishka Shubaly?

  Just give them.

• 53:18Rich Roll?

  Just, just own your own side of the street and clean it up and, and, you know, leave the rest alone.

• 53:24Mishka Shubaly?

  That makes sense to me.

• 53:25Rich Roll?

  You can't like do the, you know, I'm so sorry. I did all these things, blah, blah, blah, list them all and go through all that and then go, but and get in and then start, you know, taking the other guy's inventory about all the things that he did wrong. That, that undermines the, the healing power of.

• 53:42Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I, I didn't phrase it as a quid pro quo, like I'll apologize for this if you'll apologize for that. But one of the things that I've found is that. Sometimes by the it's hard to move past something without expressing like, um, you know, Rich, you left your socks on the floor yesterday. Like it annoyed me, you know, and then you can move forward with, you know, where you'll say, oh, I was just really tired. I won't do that again, or whatever, or but but then that way I don't harbor like,

• 54:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I get that. That's more like healthy boundaries, setting healthy boundaries. So you're not holding on to some resentment.

• 54:15Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, and I've been holding on to this for fucking ever, man. And it was if it felt so liber- it was it was also terrifying to sit there and to be like, this is what I was angry about. And then he was like, oh, well, you know, and I just, I mean, I said, I'm mad that you didn't call me when you knew that Allison and I were on the rocks. You were supposed to be my best friend. And he was like, I know. And that was sort of it, man. And then he was like, okay, these are the songs. And I was like, all right, great. And like, we have practice in a couple days.

• 54:43Rich Roll?

  Oh, my God, you're going back in.

• 54:45Mishka Shubaly?

  I know. It's total like recidivist. I just, I can't believe it. And I'm doubling down to it. Now it's in a band with like James and Zach, the guys I met when I was 15 and like started, they were my first band, those guys. And now we're all old and we're still doing it.

• 54:58Rich Roll?

  So you're gonna have an Anvil story yet, basically.

• 55:03Mishka Shubaly?

  I'm I'm I'm embarrassed to tell you that I'm like going back into the practice space, but I'm also, dude, I'm fucking thrilled. Like, I'm already planning, like, oh, I'm gonna play this bass, or maybe I'll play that bass. And like, I can't wait to get in the room with those guys.

• 55:18Rich Roll?

  Well, it's also an opportunity to have that that experience when you're in a very different place. You're not, you know, you have, you have your writing, uh, you know, you're on, you're standing up on two feet, you're financially solvent, you know, I don't see you like jumping in your van and driving across the country by yourself without changing your jeans, you know, like, I just don't, you know, you're not 15 anymore, you're 17 now. You know what I mean? Like, and and you get to have, and you actually get to have that experience with a different level of consciousness and awareness than where you were at, you know, the last time you went through it. So it could be a completely different experience for you. You know, that's, that's kind of cool and exciting. And, you know, what I always say

• 56:02Rich Roll?

  in in sobriety is, is, uh, you know, there are few.

• 56:08Rich Roll?

  Few, if any, places or opportunities that you have in life where you can just hit the stop button and then hit, you know, reset and wipe the slate clean and try to reconfigure your life completely from the ground up, you know, and when you, when you get sober, you have that opportunity. Not everybody takes that opportunity, or some people will do it with half measures. But if you really decide you're gonna create a completely new foundation for your life emotionally, mentally, you know, spiritually, all of these things, then you have an opportunity to experience life completely differently and, and to embrace

• 56:50Rich Roll?

  life and live large, like pursue your dream, you know, it's like I didn't get sober to live small or be in fear, you know, I, I got sober, I, you know, I, I meddled through that experience so that I could have a better life and that I could approach life not afraid.

• 57:11Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, and you know, I, I think that, you know, that's, I think that's why you and I keep coming back to like, talk about this because that's the thing is the better life, living better, getting better. Um, you know, and one of the things that I really realized with James and with this ancient beef is that, um, not every relation, you can't repair every relationship that you've ruined. But I knew that if he and I could just sit down and just talk about stuff that like, we might be able to reset it, you know, and that we might have that opportunity to start over again clean. And, um, you know, James and Zach really are like, you know, my best fucking friends, you know, and, you know, and we've

• 57:55Mishka Shubaly?

  been, been through so much crap together that, you know, when Zach and I were on tour together, somebody would say something and Zach would like, give me a look. Which was just with that look, he was referencing something dumb that I'd done 10 years earlier. I would feel bad and then he would apologize and we'd both laugh without anybody saying a word.

• 58:16Rich Roll?

  Right. You have a shorthand in your history with this person.

• 58:20Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 58:20Rich Roll?

  So what's the new band gonna be called?

• 58:23Mishka Shubaly?

  Oh, man. We might break up before we can decide on a name.

• 58:29Rich Roll?

  We don't want to be, let's just keep it on the DL right now.

• 58:33Mishka Shubaly?

  You'll be the first to know.

• 58:34Rich Roll?

  All right. Well, cool, Matt. I'm excited for you. So the other thing that's going on is you're dealing with a little bit of an injury, right? To put it mildly, you called me the other day. You're all excited because you emailed me and said, you know, I put in 100 mile a week, 100 miles of running in one week. It was the first time you put in 100 miles and you were feeling good. And then you picked me up at the airport and with a different look on your face.

• 59:01Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I was making jokes about it the other day because I was like, oh, I think I have a stress fracture of my right nut. But I went to the doctor yesterday and I have a hernia and I think like I ran 100 mile a week with no problems, like running strong and then picked up a dresser with my buddy the other day and and just it's like the warranty expired, man. I'm just falling apart.

• 59:28Rich Roll?

  No, you see, you're just extrapolating on one thing that happened and making a judgment call about your age and all sorts of other things. You just, it happens, man. You got a hernia. It's probably, I mean, I wonder if it was from, I mean, we were talking about this last night, but you kind of pulled that 100 mile a week out of thin air. Like you didn't really build up to it in a rational fashion. You did it very alcoholically.

• 59:52Mishka Shubaly?

  That's my specialty, dude. This is the thing is that if, and I was thinking about this on the way up here is that if you, if you said, all right, I'll give you a million dollars if you run 100 miles in the next, you know, 30 hours or whatever, I would do it. I could do it. If you said, I'll give you a million dollars if you run four days a week for the next year, any distance, just run two, two miles, you know, four days a week for the next year, I couldn't do it. I just, I don't have that like.

• 1:00:29Mishka Shubaly?

  My brain doesn't operate that way.

• 1:00:30Rich Roll?

  Can't structure your life.

• 1:00:31Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, inconsistency like that.

• 1:00:34Rich Roll?

  Well, you're only seventeen. Next year you're gonna be eighteen and we'll see, right?

• 1:00:38Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, the other thing too is that I know, I think I know how I got this hernia and it's by not following my own advice. When I was doing renovations on the house this summer, I like threw my back out. And then I, it's been bothering me since then. It's been bothering me for like four months, but I haven't fixed that problem. And then when we were moving the dresser the other day, I was like, I know I can't lift with my back because my back's hurt. So I really bore down on like my core muscles when we were lifting this thing and I really think that's what did it. And if I had dealt with my back issue, I bet I would be fine. But right now, I just feel like.

• 1:01:16Rich Roll?

  Right. So no more running. You gotta have surgery. Dude, you were gonna come out to LA. We were gonna do all this running.

• 1:01:22Mishka Shubaly?

  Everything falls apart.

• 1:01:23Rich Roll?

  We were gonna write something together.

• 1:01:25Mishka Shubaly?

  I know.

• 1:01:26Rich Roll?

  Come on, man.

• 1:01:27Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I have my, you know, I have my next story all set up. My hernia.

• 1:01:31Rich Roll?

  Your hernia, my hernia.

• 1:01:33Mishka Shubaly?

  Me and my hernia.

• 1:01:34Rich Roll?

  So, um, yeah, you've kind of made this pronouncement after that, that now that Beat the Devil is out, that you're done doing Kendall Singles. But, and I asked you, you know, why is, why, why do you feel the need to make that decision?

• 1:01:47Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, you know, for a bunch of reasons, I, um, it's, it's exhausting and stressful to, to sort of stand naked in front of the world. Um, and, you know, in all your deformity, just so anonymous commenters can be like, ew, look at the second toe on his right foot. It's like longer than the other ones. That's so gross. You're disgusting. You know, I, and I've just taken, taken a lot of shit and I, and, you know, also people are saying like, oh, you're just, you're just doing this for a story or you're, you know, no, I'm just living. I've been doing stupid shit since I was a kid. The only difference is I'm writing about it now, you know, and, and people seem to have.

• 1:02:34Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, they're putting the cart before the horse. Um, I, you know, I have other stuff I want to focus on. I want to, you know, I want to write a book. I want to write fiction. I definitely want to write something with you, but I want to do other stuff. Stuff other than letting the world read my diary.

• 1:02:53Rich Roll?

  Right. But a Kindle single doesn't have to be a memoir. You could do, can't, don't they do, can you do fiction? And do they release fiction in Kindle singles?

• 1:03:01Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah. I mean, I, I'd be open to, uh, to publishing, you know, fiction through Amazon. It's just, it'll be the last one of these.

• 1:03:09Rich Roll?

  I got you.

• 1:03:10Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, incredibly intimate, you know, portraits of my life.

• 1:03:14Rich Roll?

  Well, I mean, yeah, you deserve a break from that for sure. You know, you've, you've, you've done that, you know? We get it, dude. You did a lot of drugs.

• 1:03:24Mishka Shubaly?

  I feel like, it's like, I feel like everybody knows what my laundry smells like, just from like.

• 1:03:29Rich Roll?

  Well, you're so specific about what it smells like. How could we not, right?

• 1:03:34Mishka Shubaly?

  Some things you can never forget. They're just too horrible not to, uh, to permanently, permanently record.

• 1:03:41Rich Roll?

  Well, um, I'm going to say, cause I know you won't, cause you're too, uh, what was my phone? Cause I know you're too humble to do it, but, um, you know, we were talking about other writing opportunities for you. And, and I know that there is a, uh, there's an editor at, uh, the Atlantic. Who's gone so far as to say that you are the voice of the, of, of our generation. One of the voices of our generation. And I think that that, I think that there's a lot of truth to that, man. And, uh, and so you need to, you need to keep going. You need to, you know, you need to not get too distracted by rock and roll. So that you can understand that you have an incredible talent for writing that you need to stay focused on.

• 1:04:25Mishka Shubaly?

  I, I've been threatening to give you a charlie horse since the first time I met you and today you might actually get it. I, um.

• 1:04:32Rich Roll?

  Are we gonna have, are you gonna make me edit that out?

• 1:04:37Mishka Shubaly?

  I mean, fortunately, you know, thank God it's a podcast and nobody can actually see me blush. And, um, you know, they also won't be able to tell that I'm wearing the same clothes that I wore yesterday.

• 1:04:47Rich Roll?

  I know that.

• 1:04:48Mishka Shubaly?

  Don't tell anybody.

• 1:04:51Mishka Shubaly?

  I, uh, well, I mean, thank you, you know, and, you know, that's the thing is, I guess.

• 1:04:58Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, at this point, it's just gratifying for people to get it, for people to understand it, you know, and, um, and, and also, and not just, you know, you know, bitter men of a certain age who have too many guitars, but also like, you know, the moms in, you know, Chesterfield, Missouri and, um, you know, and, and other writers, um, that's incredibly meaningful to me, you know, I mean, I, I'm trying more and more to assign value to things in my life according to how I feel they're valued and not how other people feel they're valued. But when somebody who writes for the Atlantic says things like that for, you know, about your writing, it's, it feels fucking great, man.

• 1:05:41Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's incredible. Um, and

• 1:05:43Mishka Shubaly?

  I totally disagree, but it feels great.

• 1:05:45Rich Roll?

  Well, of course you do, but you know, what is the feeling that you get, uh, in terms of, uh, satisfaction or a sense of accomplishment from putting, you know, putting your written work out there and having it be well received versus getting up on stage at a crappy bar, but getting to, you know, jam the way that you want to.

• 1:06:15Rich Roll?

  Cause it goes, it, I mean, I want to get back to this idea of pursuing your dream, pursuing an authentic version of yourself and trying to, um, be tapped into, you know, I think that that sort of being tapped into that is a recipe for being fulfilled. Right? And so how do we be more fulfilled in our daily lives? How do we tap into something that is, you know, primal and authentic that we can express more fully? That will give us a greater sense of satisfaction, service, you know, groundedness or what, or, you know, just, just a greater sense of.

• 1:06:53Rich Roll?

  You know, where we, or I should say, I or you, you know, stand in the world.

• 1:06:59Mishka Shubaly?

  There, there were certainly nights when I was, not when I was playing somebody else's music, but when I was touring as a solo artist, you know, and there were some, I remember one night in Albuquerque, it was like a Monday night and I was playing my songs and, you know, everybody was like in the other room, sitting at the bar. And then as I was playing, I could see people getting up from the bar and then like coming into the other room to hear me. And then there were a couple of times where I'd say a line and people would applaud so loudly that I'd have to like loop, you know, through the verse, you know, to sort of let the, you know, let the applause die down before I could sing the next line.

• 1:07:39Mishka Shubaly?

  That, that was like the greatest experience of my entire life, you know, where I felt like they got it. They re, they understood. And, but also I was shitfaced. And now, you know, with writing, it's, I, it's less of the, you know, it's less of the immediate, visceral rush and more of a, um, you know, a sustained and sustainable thing of me making myself miserable in my room, trying to write this shit honestly. And then to have,

• 1:08:22Mishka Shubaly?

  I mean, to have somebody like you get it, you know, to have you understand it, you know, I mean, I felt weird like sending you this story and being like, ah, Rich, you know, this is like my rock and roll story. It has nothing to do with like, you know, being an athlete or a triathlete or being a vegan or, you know, it's just, it's about, it's the drunk log, like you said, but, but the part about dreams in it, you know, speaks to you. And, um, and it's spoken to a lot of people.

• 1:08:48Rich Roll?

  Right. And you know, the way you just described it, it's almost like an analogy for sobriety. Like when you're out using drugs and getting drunk and doing all that kind of stuff. You know, the highs are very high and the lows are very low. And you're just constantly rubber banding between, you know, these two very pronounced extremes. Like you're on stage going crazy or, and then you, you, you wake up in a gutter and you don't know where you are. It's four days later. You know what I mean? And, and then sobriety is just kind of this even keeled sense of well being, you know, without the, the super high highs and the super low lows. And it takes some adjustment, you know, when you're, when you're new in recovery, you're not used to that. And that's why you see a lot of people acting out.

• 1:09:33Rich Roll?

  They're trying to create drama in their life because they need that spike, you know? They need the, they need the up and the down. That's what they're used to. That's what they're programmed for.

• 1:09:42Rich Roll?

  And the writing is kind of like the sobriety parallel to the music. You know, it's, it's hard. It's hard fought. It's challenging. And, and you're doing it quietly in your room and it's painful. But ultimately it sustains you and it has a level of, there's a, I would imagine there's a level of satisfaction with that. That's different from the music, like in a kind of deep, personal way.

• 1:10:07Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah. I mean, it's funny, the, you know, Chuck, who, the guy who works at the deli around the, you know, the corner, around the corner from my house, you know, I think he can tell when I've had a good day writing. Because I go in there and I'm like, yo, Chuck, my man, what's up? You know? And then other days I'm like, yeah, how much is it?

• 1:10:24Rich Roll?

  In your pajamas.

• 1:10:27Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:10:28Mishka Shubaly?

  And that's the thing is that, um, nothing's changed. You know, when I have a good day writing or when I have a bad day writing, there's, I'm not getting any outside stimulus. It's just, it's all in my head, you know, and I'm like, I'm figuring it out or I'm not figuring it out. And that's very much like sobriety. You know, I mean, the. The shittiest, most frustrating thing about writing is that no matter how well you write, it never gets loud. Like, I can't write loud yet. And that's frustrating because I remember, like, I can remember times when, you know, I was, I was not a great player, so I was a real specific tone nerd. Like, I wanted my bass to sound a certain way, like,

• 1:11:13Mishka Shubaly?

  it had to have this, you know, a little bit of grindy high end and also that, like, booming low end to make me feel like you had to take a shit. And, you know, and the fuzz pedal had to sound like this. And I'm in, and usually we'd be playing through somebody else's gear. So I, you know, or the sound, you know, the setup, you know, stage wasn't set up right. But every once in a while, I would get to play loud. And I, and I would have all my gear and it would be like sounding perfect. And I just remember like burying my face in the speaker cabinet and it just like feeling it, it's like water rushing past you. And there's like, you know, Kenny, you can't even think of anything. It just felt so good. And you don't get that writing.

• 1:11:50Rich Roll?

  No, uh, there's a writer-director. I don't know if it was his quote, or he was quoting somebody else. Um, he was talking about the process of writing. I think he was quoting someone else. But in many events, this guy Stephen Gagin, he wrote Syriana, he wrote the movie Traffic. And he was saying that writing is like, you know, pushing a rock up a mountain, you know, like pushing it up Mount Everest. And, uh, and directing a movie is sort of like having sex constantly, something like that, you know, like two different, you know, completely different creative disciplines. And, you know, maybe, you know, sort of swap out directing for playing music.

• 1:12:44Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, the best and the most frustrating thing about me, you know, playing music is that it's collaborative, is that you're working with other people. And when things are working well, there's nothing better, man. And when things are working badly, it's just, there's nothing worse. It's just horrible. And, you know, writing, most of it is, you know, 90% of it is just me by myself. And it's almost like I have too much control. Like, I'm like, you know, can somebody else come in here and like, can you make a contribution? You know, because like, I'm kind of fucking sick of looking at this shit, you know, like, I've been over it like 10 times, you know?

• 1:13:21Rich Roll?

  What is it? What's your process? I mean, do you, you know, I think I know you well enough that you're not the guy who wakes up at the same time every morning and says, you know, for the next, for these certain hours every day, you know, I show up for the page.

• 1:13:34Mishka Shubaly?

  I resent that.

• 1:13:36Rich Roll?

  Tell me I'm wrong.

• 1:13:38Mishka Shubaly?

  I wish, I wish you were. I wish you were. No, I mean, I will, you know, wake up, plan to write, not write at all. Then the next day, I wake up, plan to write, not write at all. And then the third day, I'm like a nervous wreck. And I wake up and like, just like, make a pot of coffee in my boxers, and then sit down with a pot of coffee and like, start writing. And then like, it's midnight. And I'm like, oh shit, I gotta go to sleep. And then I wake up the next day and I'm like, I don't need to write today. And then that cycle, you know, every three or four days, you know, my anxiety builds to a point where I can't bear it any longer. And then I sit down and just hammer the shit out and like, really, just suffer in front of the screen.

• 1:14:21Rich Roll?

  Right. But you're doing, you're compelled to do it. You're suffering from not doing it also.

• 1:14:27Mishka Shubaly?

  Oh, yeah. I, um, yeah, I hate doing it. And I hate not doing it.

• 1:14:31Rich Roll?

  Right. So what does that tell you about yourself? When you, when you, the anxiety that you experience when you're not doing it?

• 1:14:37Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I mean, it tells me I'm a big baby. And it'll, I mean,

• 1:14:39Rich Roll?

  No, but it tell, it tells me that that's, you're being drawn to do it. You're, you feel compelled to.

• 1:14:46Mishka Shubaly?

  Maybe I should have my mom here doing the podcast with you. And you guys can just be like, that Mishka, he just won't come around.

• 1:14:55Rich Roll?

  I think you're coming around.

• 1:14:56Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I'm starting to come around. I mean, I, you know, I mean, apparently, I don't have any future in moving furniture. So I gotta make this writing thing work.

• 1:15:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:06Mishka Shubaly?

  I can write with a hernia.

• 1:15:08Rich Roll?

  You can, if you, if you don't get too distracted by this rock and roll dream of trying to intervene and crater your writing career.

• 1:15:17Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I have it under, I have it under control this time, man, I swear.

• 1:15:21Rich Roll?

  Yeah, exactly. You just put out this book about your addiction to rock and roll. And essentially it ends with how you're recovering from this and now you're going back in.

• 1:15:29Mishka Shubaly?

  It's, it's different, man. I'm just gonna do it on the weekends, you know, or I, I'm just gonna play rock and roll in other states.

• 1:15:38Mishka Shubaly?

  I'll be sober in New York. No, I, I think it's gonna be, I think it's gonna be different. Time will tell.

• 1:15:44Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, how is, you know, how, since the last time you were on the podcast, I mean, has your perspective on sobriety changed at all? Or how are you, you know, how are you, what's your, what's your approach towards maintaining that these days?

• 1:16:00Mishka Shubaly?

  I mean, it's constantly evolving. One of the, one of the things that I realized is that, um, you know, that I felt like I chose the hardest way by getting sober on my own, but I'm starting to realize that I chose what was the easiest way for me was to be alone and not to let other people in. And, and by just relying on myself, I actually made it easier. And what would have been harder for me would be to ask for help and to connect with other people. And, um, so that's one of the things that I'm really, well, I mean, you remember when I was at your house this summer and then like woke

• 1:16:44Mishka Shubaly?

  up the next morning and I was, and I read on Facebook that a friend of mine had died and had to make that like weird, dramatic exit.

• 1:16:51Rich Roll?

  Died of a heroin overdose, right?

• 1:16:53Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah. And I, you know, I really loved him and, uh, but we didn't hang out as much as we should have because.

• 1:17:06Mishka Shubaly?

  I've lived in New York for a long time and I've gotten really good at being insular and good at keeping people at arm's length where I can, where if they hurt me, it doesn't hurt that much. And, and I've gotten, you know, I feel in a lot of ways like I've forgotten how to connect with people. And, you know, I mean, that was, you know, so I feel like, you know, something was in the air, you know, I mean, when, you know, we talked to this summer about getting together and you were like, oh, that's the night that, you know, an AA meeting happens. And I was like, oh yeah, fuck that. I'm not coming in. And then I was like, that scares me, the thought of going to an AA meeting and being in a room

• 1:17:49Mishka Shubaly?

  with a bunch of other people like me. So I should do it. And so, you know, you know, that 24 hours of like going to that meeting with you and then finding out that my friend Adam had died, you know, it made me realize that the next adventure is not running 100 miles or doing an Ironman or something like that. The next adventure is like trying to reconnect with people.

• 1:18:20Rich Roll?

  That's the ultimate adventure. I mean, you, you know, I'm listening to you say all this and, you know, you realize, of course, that this drive to remain isolated is the very essence of alcoholism. That is alcoholism. It's that, that need to be alone, to be disconnected from, you know, your fellow man that is a impediment to personal growth.

• 1:18:46Mishka Shubaly?

  But I'm so good at it.

• 1:18:47Rich Roll?

  Of course. All alcoholics are good at that. You know, my, my natural state is to be alone away. Like, I don't want to have to deal with anybody or anything. You know, it's like my, my fantasy is to like be completely apart from all other human beings and be just left to my own devices. You know what I mean? Like, it's the most unhealthy thing. Like, when I'm, when I'm allowed to do that, then that's not a healthy place for me. And that's where I start to, you know, regress. So I think that, that the idea of

• 1:19:21Rich Roll?

  Confronting that in yourself. I mean, I'm glad that you're acknowledging that and you're, you're grappling with that. But the idea of letting people in is the beginning of healing. You know, it's like, I talked about this in my book, too. Like, I don't want anyone to help me. I don't want to ask for help. I don't want to accept help. I don't want to believe that anybody has a better idea than what I have. And I would prefer to just be left alone. Like, I'm terrible on airplanes. I don't, I never want to talk to the guy who's sitting next to me.

• 1:19:49Mishka Shubaly?

  Me too.

• 1:19:50Rich Roll?

  You know what I mean? Like, that's a nightmare for me if the guy wants to strike up a conversation.

• 1:19:54Mishka Shubaly?

  I put my headphones in and don't put any music on.

• 1:19:57Rich Roll?

  Like, I have a whole routine so that I put, I put the vibe out that I don't want to, you know what I mean? And that's not healthy. That's not, you know, that, that's not what normal people do. And I can say, oh, this is just my personality, or my peccadilloes, or whatever. But what's behind that is really this unhealthy desire to be disconnected.

• 1:20:17Mishka Shubaly?

  What's, what's ironic is that

• 1:20:22Mishka Shubaly?

  when I was, when I was drunk all the time, I hung out with everybody. I would talk to anybody. I would hang out with anybody.

• 1:20:30Rich Roll?

  Well, of course.

• 1:20:31Mishka Shubaly?

  My greatest fear was to be alone. And then when I got sober, it's like I developed a new sickness of being alone, like wanting...

• 1:20:42Rich Roll?

  Right. But when you're, but when you're under the influence and you're interacting with people, that's not really you. You know what I mean? It's that you have that social self that allows you to be connected with people. When you remove that, it's terrifying to be amongst other people. Because you're, it's like, you're able to be really vulnerable and raw and truthful in your writing. But are you able to do that just walking into a room and interacting with another human being in a basic form? You know what I mean?

• 1:21:13Mishka Shubaly?

  Sounds terrifying.

• 1:21:16Rich Roll?

  Right. So, so that's, that's the challenge. That's the work. You know what I mean? And I think that's the road to, that's the road to, you know, true recovery and, and, and breaking the glass ceiling on where you're at and gaining a greater perspective and a sense of connectedness with other people. I think that, that if you're able to confront that and to start dealing with that, then I think your world will blow wide open.

• 1:21:42Mishka Shubaly?

  Human beings are such a reliable disappointment, though. It's like, I, you know, I just.

• 1:21:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but that's your, that's your defense mechanism. Let go of that. Like, why do you, forget about what, you know, how you're gonna.

• 1:21:54Mishka Shubaly?

  I don't want them to be that way.

• 1:21:56Rich Roll?

  You. It's just about your willingness to be open to the experience without judging it.

• 1:22:04Mishka Shubaly?

  I, I hear what you're saying. I, one of the reasons that, that I think I have some resistance to it is, is because of my mother. Because my mother would always take the higher ground and she would always forgive people. And she was always, you know, she is always very good about, um, you know, sending out what she wants to receive and, and man, she's just gotten fucked so many times by, you know, and that's, and that's why my impulse is to say like, no, I'm gonna fight you to the death for this because like.

• 1:22:40Rich Roll?

  Well, in other, in other words, what you're saying is people let you down and you don't want to be vulnerable and put yourself in a position where you can be hurt.

• 1:22:48Mishka Shubaly?

  You are correct.

• 1:22:49Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm. Yeah. Right. So that's, that's the, uh, that's the challenge, man. You know, there's always a reason. It's like, well, I, my mom, my alcoholism, this happened to me as a kid. This is why I like to be isolated and alone. All the, I mean, everybody's got a battery of, of reasons for why they think it's a good idea. But ultimately, you're the one who ends up suffering.

• 1:23:14Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I mean.

• 1:23:17Rich Roll?

  I should just speak for myself. I shouldn't speak to you, you know, I shouldn't speak to you. I just know, I know that for myself, for sure.

• 1:23:22Mishka Shubaly?

  That, that was one of the things I really found when I sat down with James and we finally buried the hatchet, that this like cold war that's gone on for eight years was finally over. Was that I didn't realize how much energy holding that grudge took until it was gone. And then I felt like when you go to the chiropractor and they like crack something, you're like, oh, you know, and I, and, you know, and then I was just sitting there with my old buddy and we're like making the same jokes we've been making since 1993, you know? And, uh, and you know, and it was great. And like, um,

• 1:23:57Mishka Shubaly?

  you know, it, um, and you know, and I'm so excited about it. It feels like.

• 1:24:02Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, it feels like falling in love again with somebody you know very well. You know, I like my, my old buddy, you know, Jimmy is restored to me.

• 1:24:13Mishka Shubaly?

  But, um. The, you know.

• 1:24:16Rich Roll?

  But he, how did that happen? Did he reach out to you after reading this? Cause you hadn't spoken to him or did you, who was the first person to call who?

• 1:24:23Mishka Shubaly?

  Uh, he reached out to me. And you know, and I was the one who froze him out initially too.

• 1:24:27Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:24:28Mishka Shubaly?

  I'm good at that.

• 1:24:29Rich Roll?

  So that in and of itself is interesting, right? Because what would it have taken for you to pick up the phone and call him?

• 1:24:36Mishka Shubaly?

  Never would have happened.

• 1:24:37Rich Roll?

  Right. So when you say like, who's suffering from this resentment? Look what happened because he picked up the phone, you could have made that happen as well by calling him. Who are, who are the other people that are out there that you could have that experience with? If you took the initiative?

• 1:24:55Mishka Shubaly?

  How much time do you have?

• 1:24:56Rich Roll?

  So, right. So this is the, but this gets to the core of what it means to be isolated and create this, you know, this arsenal of, of tools and rationales as to why this is who I am. And this is the way I like it and this is what makes me happy. And you build this fortress around yourself.

• 1:25:17Rich Roll?

  And ultimately you're just cut off, you're cut off from a lot of good things in your life, I think.

• 1:25:23Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah. And you know, I think a lot of it is about control too, you know, that if, um, you know, you know, part of it is, um, if you, you know, if you don't submit your writing, or if you don't try and book a gig, or you don't try and get, you know, the label to listen to your record, then you can guarantee that you won't fail. You know, by, by not trying, you're able to control that, you know, so, so you won't fail. Or if you like, you know, if you, you know, catch the eye of the girl in HR and you feel like then you want to ask her out, you know, you can't control whether she's going to say, you, you can't control her saying yes, but you can control her saying no by not asking her. So you won't ask her, there'll be no connection, but at least you're in control of it.

• 1:26:08Rich Roll?

  Well, yeah. And it's. You don't have to deal with the fear of, of rejection and all the uncertainty that comes with it.

• 1:26:16Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:16Rich Roll?

  The risk, you're taking on this risk, it's terrifying, right? And one thing that always helps me when I'm confronted with this sort of thing is something a friend of mine always says, which is whatever happens.

• 1:26:32Rich Roll?

  Whatever result occurs by putting yourself out there and whatever emotional experience you have as a result, they're just feelings, man. They're just feelings. They're not going to kill you. You can feel them and feelings change. So you'll feel one way and then an hour later, a day later, you'll feel differently, but you're not going to die. And I think there is that, like, I've had that sense of panic, like, I really do feel like I'm gonna die if I take that leap or do that thing.

• 1:27:02Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, you know, people say like, man, you know, you go out and run these like crazy races, like, you know, doesn't it hurt? And I'm like, yeah, of course it hurts. But it's just, you know, it's just pain. It's like, it stops eventually. But like,

• 1:27:16Rich Roll?

  What if you could have that approach to emotional challenges? The same approach that you have to the running and the physical challenges?

• 1:27:25Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I hate it when you like turn my advice around. Make me take my own advice. Yeah, you know, I

• 1:27:35Rich Roll?

  I'm saying it for myself as well. I'm not, please, you know, like, I'm not up on any kind of high pedestal on this at all. Like, I struggle with this stuff mightily all the time.

• 1:27:44Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I think you're totally right. And I think that that's the way to do it, you know, and but for some reason, I can deal with, you know, physical pain is much less scary for me than emotional pain. That shit hurts, man.

• 1:28:02Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:28:02Mishka Shubaly?

  I'm a sensitive dude underneath all of this.

• 1:28:05Rich Roll?

  Also, sometimes the physical pain is a coping mechanism for the emotional pain. It's very easy, and I've experienced this myself, to kind of pursue the physical as a means of kind of quieting the emotional chatter. You know what I mean? Like,

• 1:28:26Mishka Shubaly?

  Absolutely.

• 1:28:27Rich Roll?

  That pain can surpass that whatever pain I'm feeling from something emotional that I'm going through. And it makes me feel like I've dealt with it, or that that it's not a problem for me. And I think that's where you can get into trouble, particularly as, you know, a recovering alcoholic, in misplacing that or misreading those cues.

• 1:28:54Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I mean, I think that's a lot of what appealed to me about, you know, running distance is that it hurts so much. And, uh, you know, and I could fight it as hard as I could and, and I wouldn't hurt anyone. And, um, also, you know, I, you know, I felt like I needed to be punished, man.

• 1:29:16Rich Roll?

  Right. It's, it's almost like you can have a very unhealthy relationship with it that almost you're almost like a cutter. You know what I mean?

• 1:29:24Mishka Shubaly?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:29:24Rich Roll?

  You know?

• 1:29:25Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:26Rich Roll?

  And, uh,

• 1:29:27Mishka Shubaly?

  I, I was a cutter for a long time.

• 1:29:29Rich Roll?

  Oh, you were? I didn't know that.

• 1:29:30Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah. From like eight or nine, uh, up until I quit drinking.

• 1:29:37Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 1:29:38Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:39Rich Roll?

  That's, that's something I have no like understanding of really. I mean, I understand intellectually why people do it, but I can't connect with that emotionally. Like what would drive you to, to do that?

• 1:29:51Mishka Shubaly?

  It's, you know, it's been, it's been such a long time that, uh, I have a hard time recalling, you know, I mean, the thought of doing like that, you know, doing something like that right now. Just, uh, you know, it just seems alien to me. I'm like doing everything I can right now to keep my body together, you know, not to, you know, and not destroy it. But, um, yeah, I mean, I, um, I smashed an empty whiskey bottle with my right hand and got 14 stitches and almost lost, uh, extension of my index finger and uh, almost lost a huge chunk of skin off my knuckle. And, uh, it just, um,

• 1:30:32Rich Roll?

  But is that, is it like a control thing? Like it's also a means of trying to control your, how you feel emotionally? Or where does, I mean, what is it? Or is it like a low self-esteem thing where you just, you feel like you deserve to be in pain? I mean, what is the driver?

• 1:30:46Mishka Shubaly?

  Um, yeah, I mean, for me, like, you know, part of it was definitely low self-esteem. And, uh,

• 1:30:55Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, I wanted, I wanted to die, but I didn't have the courage to go through with that. And, uh, and also you, when you're in emotional pain and then you feel physical pain and you see physical damage, it, um, it makes sense. Like,

• 1:31:18Rich Roll?

  So it's not that it numbs out the emotional pain or supersedes it. It's just,

• 1:31:24Mishka Shubaly?

  It just,

• 1:31:24Rich Roll?

  Gives it a, gives it a, a physical context?

• 1:31:27Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, there, it's a physical manifestation of what you, how you feel inside.

• 1:31:31Rich Roll?

  Hmm.

• 1:31:32Mishka Shubaly?

  And, uh, yeah, it's horrible shit, you know? I mean, my sister's got four little kids who I love to death and the oldest is 11. And by that time I was already cutting. And, uh, you know, at a certain point, it's going to get to, you know, the time where, you know, I take him out to Denny's and I say, you know, you know what an alcoholic is? And I'll tell you, I'm not looking forward to that conversation at all.

• 1:31:59Rich Roll?

  Are you already rehearsing that speech? I mean, why do you feel like you have to have that talk?

• 1:32:04Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I, you know, I don't want him to hear it from somebody else. Hey, your uncle's a, your uncle's a fucking alcoholic, you know? And I, I would rather, you know, I would rather be able to adjust that message, you know? And also, I mean, I think that people who aren't alcoholics gotta know that like, we walk among you, you know, that like, there's lots of us out there, you know? And, uh, and you know, and anybody could be an alcoholic or in recovery for anything, you know, drugs or alcohol or eating disorder or cutters or, you know, whatever. Um, and that, um, you know, that we make a contribution and

• 1:32:47Mishka Shubaly?

  that like, we get hungry and, you know, in a lot of ways, we operate just like normal people, you know?

• 1:32:53Rich Roll?

  Right. I mean, what's, uh, you know, what do you think is the, is the, the next thing for you?

• 1:33:01Mishka Shubaly?

  The next addiction?

• 1:33:03Rich Roll?

  Well, no, I was, I was thinking more, yeah, that's a good one. I was thinking more in terms of, of, uh, turning the volume up on recovery. Like, you know, what are you dealing with right now that you would like better mastery over?

• 1:33:20Rich Roll?

  We talked about the, you know, overcoming the isolationism. I mean, that's a big one. So.

• 1:33:25Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I mean, you know, it's a big, you know, I mean, I have a new girlfriend who I just started dating this summer and it's, you know, and I'm putting a lot of effort and energy into making that relationship work. And it's,

• 1:33:41Mishka Shubaly?

  it's an interesting venture because it's, you know, it's sort of like God said, well, here Mishka, if you can't get along with this girl, you can't get along with anybody because, you know.

• 1:33:53Rich Roll?

  Well, that's one way of looking at it. But the other way of looking at it is, is, you know, water rises to its own level. And I always like to think of it like, like you're emitting a certain level of vibration, right? You're putting out of, you're putting, you're putting out an energy signal like a radio tower. And that signal is, is finely tuned to wherever you are, kind of emotionally and spiritually, et cetera. And, and you will attract people that are kind of vibrating on the same frequency. So when you're hanging out, you know, in the basement of whatever bar and playing in these, you know, doing all that kind of living that lifestyle, then the frequency that, you know, the, the radio beacon is putting out a certain,

• 1:34:35Rich Roll?

  you know, it's putting out a certain, you know, frequency, right? And those are the people that you're going to end up hanging out with. They're the people that are going to be attracted to you. And you're in a very different place now. So you're putting out a different frequency. And you've attracted somebody very different into your life from what you're used to. She's a beautiful, wonderful girl. And you have an opportunity to have a sober relationship with this girl and do it in a completely new way. You don't have to do it the way that you've done it in the past. You can learn from your mistakes. You can manage your confrontations completely differently. And so when you say, oh, God is sending this to you, like you almost say it in a pessimistic way, like God's sending this person to you to see if you'll screw it up. And I'm looking at it like,

• 1:35:18Rich Roll?

  You're being rewarded. You're you've been given this gift and this opportunity and and you can have a completely different experience, you know, throughout whatever rulebook you were using before and do it in a different way.

• 1:35:30Mishka Shubaly?

  Mm hmm. Yeah. No, you're you're totally right. Um, and, uh, you know, I really am trying to

• 1:35:40Mishka Shubaly?

  just, you know, review what I what I used to do and then do the opposite thing, you know, and, um.

• 1:35:48Rich Roll?

  And also, this is a good thing where, you know, the isolationism might not be such a good idea. You know what I mean? It's like, you can call me up at any time. You can go, who are my buddies that have had, you know, productive, healthy, long-term relationships? Who maybe have had an experience that I'm having right now and can help me make the right decision? Hey, I'll call. It doesn't. I'm not saying me, but like any, you know, what? Call somebody up and say, hey, this is what's going on. Like, what would you do?

• 1:36:15Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 1:36:16Rich Roll?

  You know what I mean? Like, that's that's the opposite of like grinding your teeth, you know, and drinking a ton of coffee and trying to bang out your your next whatever you're writing and not talking to anybody.

• 1:36:27Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I I'm really trying to, uh, you know, since my friend Adam died, I'm really, I'm trying hard to to affect a sea change in my personal relationships. And, you know, so when I came back to New York, you know, I mean, that was a big thing is that, um, you know, I met Lucy right around the same time that my friend Adam died. And then I just had this epiphany that I was like, man, there's, you know, there's this beautiful person here, um, who's willing to like, take a shot on you. Like, are you gonna keep her at arm's length too? You know, and, uh, I was like, fuck it, man. Just go for it. You know, um, what's the worst that's gonna happen? It's gonna hurt, you know, and like you've been through that before.

• 1:37:08Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:37:08Mishka Shubaly?

  Um, and then when I came back to New York, I, you know, I reconnected with a lot of my old friends and I was just like, oh, hey, I see you're DJing at this bar near my house. I'm gonna come out. How are you? You know, or like, I'm really bad at like getting lunch with people. Like, I'll I'll do shit with people. Like, if there's a job that needs to be done, I'm there. You know, if you need me to help you, like, you know, move the piano or whatever, I'm there. But if we're just gonna sit and talk, just interact, socialize, I can't deal with that. We have to be doing something.

• 1:37:35Rich Roll?

  Well, that's what we're doing right now. Well, I guess we're doing something though, because we're doing a podcast, but.

• 1:37:41Mishka Shubaly?

  Well.

• 1:37:43Rich Roll?

  There's another purpose going on simultaneously with the conversation.

• 1:37:47Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah. But, um, you know, so I'm trying, you know, you know, my friend Aaron, like I've, you know, he's been, for some reason, he's been my friend forever. He's stuck by me, you know, so I'm making an effort to just leave, put pants on and leave the apartment once a week to go into the city to meet up with my old friend Aaron and, and talk about whatever, you know, and, uh, you know, just, you know, trying to, it seems so, you know, it seems so ironic, man, that like, you know, a couple of years ago, the problems I was having was like, you know, not throwing up in the morning

• 1:38:27Mishka Shubaly?

  or like, you know, not doing shots or, um, not drinking or keeping a job. And now I'm getting it down to like, you know, my big, big struggle is being more social and talking to people and letting people in.

• 1:38:44Rich Roll?

  It's called, it's called quality problems. You have quality problems these days.

• 1:38:50Mishka Shubaly?

  These are so much harder.

• 1:38:53Rich Roll?

  What am I going to do with my beautiful girlfriend this weekend?

• 1:38:56Mishka Shubaly?

  I know, right? I have, I have zero sympathy for myself.

• 1:38:59Rich Roll?

  What is my, what is my next writing project? I need to call my agent and talk to him about that.

• 1:39:05Mishka Shubaly?

  Cause I was really good about like, either not throwing up when I had to throw up or throwing up on the sly, like in between the train, the cars on the train.

• 1:39:14Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, my favorite, my favorite throwing up episode in the book is when you have no money and you're drinking a 40 and you're, you're so sick and you're feeling like you're going to throw up and you throw up into the 40 bottle because you don't want to lose all the booze that's in your belly. And then you drink it back down again.

• 1:39:36Mishka Shubaly?

  Mom, I'm sorry.

• 1:39:38Rich Roll?

  She's read it.

• 1:39:39Mishka Shubaly?

  I'm so sorry. I'm just sorry for everything.

• 1:39:42Rich Roll?

  I've been there. I've swallowed more than my fair share of cigarette butts and half empties laying around the bar. You know, I've, I've done that. I mean, you know, when I lived in New York City, I made, I mean, I was, you know, drinking really heavily and partying a lot and had zero money. So it was all about like, where's the reception with the free beer and the free food?

• 1:40:01Mishka Shubaly?

  Crashing weddings.

• 1:40:02Rich Roll?

  And then where's the happy hour thing where you can get, you know, as much booze for as little money as possible? And carrying that out, you know, throughout the, the whole night until you're in some bar or club and there's half empties sitting around all over the place and surreptitiously trying to drink those without people noticing. And, and of course, you know, ending, you end up doing it and swallowing cigarette butts, like having all the time.

• 1:40:24Mishka Shubaly?

  We did, uh, we came up with two drinks. One was the, uh, the matador where you take the bar mats when you're cleaning up at the end of the night and pour, pour off the bar mats into a glass. That's the matador. And then.

• 1:40:39Rich Roll?

  That, I, that I did not do.

• 1:40:41Mishka Shubaly?

  We had, uh, I mean, this is shit we did on dares, but then we had the slot bucket that we would put like the dead drinks in, and that was the Phantom of the Sloprah.

• 1:40:49Rich Roll?

  Uh, that's bad too.

• 1:40:50Mishka Shubaly?

  Drink of the slot bucket. I was an animal. I was a fucking animal.

• 1:40:57Rich Roll?

  I'm so glad that I don't live that way anymore. It's exhausting too.

• 1:41:01Mishka Shubaly?

  I know, I know. I think about, you know, and people say like, how do you, how do you stay sober? I have a good memory. I remember what it was like waking up after those nights, you know, and, and like your hands are frozen into claws or you have like broken glass stuck in you somewhere. Or just, just waking up and just recalling the events of the night before and just being like, I think I can die. I think I can stop my heart out of embarrassment for the shit that I said last night, you know?

• 1:41:32Rich Roll?

  I have to stay very plugged into recovery in order to make sure that that memory remains in the forefront of my consciousness because because I forget, you know, like I need to be reminded of what it was like because my life is really good right now. And so I don't think about it that much. And if I'm not reminded, it's very easy to forget. And then once I've forgotten what it was like, then it's very easy to slowly start to regress.

• 1:42:07Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:42:09Rich Roll?

  And the longer you kind of stick around, then that becomes more of a pressing reality.

• 1:42:16Mishka Shubaly?

  The do you do you still get acute cravings like from time to time? Or do you find yourself thinking about, oh, one glass of wine or that kind of shit?

• 1:42:26Rich Roll?

  Once in a while. It's not something that like haunts me. It doesn't happen that often, but it does occasionally occur. But it's not like an obsession. It's something that comes and goes relatively quickly. And and so it's about being able to kind of notice it for what it is and taking the appropriate actions to not like, sort of, you know, delve into that and explore that, you know, idea in your mind so that it doesn't start to grow roots.

• 1:42:58Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:42:59Rich Roll?

  And a lot of that is like picking up the phone, you know what I mean? And calling somebody else like I can't if I isolate with that, then that's not a healthy place for me to be.

• 1:43:07Mishka Shubaly?

  The weird thing is like, you know, the thought of meeting up with a friend and talking about like, my feelings or problems at home or something like that, just like, gives me hives. But I don't need to talk about my feelings with my friends in order to feel better. If I mean, I have awesome friends. They're fucking hilarious, you know, and getting lunch with, you know, my friend Billy, who's just takes profanity to a new level. He's he's Irish, and he just has this gift for saying the worst, vilest, most fucked up things. It's amazing. And I could, I could sit down with him and we can talk about, you know,

• 1:43:48Rich Roll?

  That's great for our health and fitness podcast here.

• 1:43:51Mishka Shubaly?

  We could just talk about just construction and like, you know, something like that. And I'll feel better just from hearing his voice, just from having connection with him and just from like the back and forth, like, you know, ribbing each other. Um, I don't have to talk about the heavy stuff, you know, you know, in order to have the connection.

• 1:44:11Rich Roll?

  I understand that, but you are connecting with him in a different way. But I think that the cliche is also true that you're only as sick as your secrets. And when you're harboring like, you know, as an, as an alcoholic, that become, can become a very acute scenario. If you're sort of, you know, keeping things to yourself and holding them in and that, that will lead you back to a place you don't want to go.

• 1:44:33Mishka Shubaly?

  Well, I think you know that I have no secrets.

• 1:44:37Mishka Shubaly?

  You read the last story.

• 1:44:38Rich Roll?

  You might have a few still, you know, we'll have to come back for podcast four, find out what those are. We're going to peel back another layer.

• 1:44:47Mishka Shubaly?

  I don't know if I can take it, dude.

• 1:44:48Rich Roll?

  Like your skin has been peeled off.

• 1:44:51Mishka Shubaly?

  I get so raw during these, dude.

• 1:44:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:54Mishka Shubaly?

  You know, I've, I've never talked to anybody about the cutting thing. You know, much less on something that's going to be broadcast.

• 1:45:02Rich Roll?

  It's just us, man. No one's listening.

• 1:45:05Mishka Shubaly?

  Just me and you in the NSA.

• 1:45:07Rich Roll?

  That's right. Uh, well, I appreciate you, um, opening up about that. I mean, I think that, that in the balance of things, I mean, look, there's always going to be trolls and snark and online anonymous commentators who like to, you know, throw arrows and all that kind of thing. But in the, in the balance of things, you know, the response has been overwhelmingly, um, positive. And you've been embraced for your willingness to, to be so vulnerable. And it takes a tremendous amount of courage, uh, to do that.

• 1:45:40Rich Roll?

  And, uh, you have a, a gift for doing it in a way that makes us all able to relate to it. So I understand that you don't want to, you know, it's time to, as a writer, you have to grow, right? You're going to, you, what's the next thing? Like you can't keep doing the same thing. You've got to do something else and, and I'm excited to see what that's going to be.

• 1:45:59Mishka Shubaly?

  Me too. I don't know what it is, but when I find out, I'll let you know.

• 1:46:04Rich Roll?

  All right, cool. Well, hopefully we'll figure out something to write together because I would like to do that.

• 1:46:08Mishka Shubaly?

  Let's absolutely do it.

• 1:46:09Rich Roll?

  Right on, man. So we should probably wrap this up.

• 1:46:12Mishka Shubaly?

  Let's eat.

• 1:46:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you want to eat? We're gonna go meet John Joseph for dinner.

• 1:46:16Mishka Shubaly?

  That's gonna be awesome.

• 1:46:17Rich Roll?

  So sober musician, athlete, New York City dweller, right?

• 1:46:24Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:25Rich Roll?

  You haven't met him before, have you?

• 1:46:26Mishka Shubaly?

  No, I haven't. I'm totally psyched, man. I mean, I feel like between you and John Joseph, it's like the Alpha and Omega hardcore.

• 1:46:34Rich Roll?

  I mean, that guy, you know, he's awesome, man.

• 1:46:37Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, I'm totally psyched. It's gonna be great.

• 1:46:40Rich Roll?

  Cool. So the Kindle single is called Beat the Devil and you can get it on Amazon, but only if you click through the Amazon banner ad at ritual.com first. For like, what is it? Like, how much does it cost? A dollar ninety-nine?

• 1:46:55Mishka Shubaly?

  It's a dollar ninety-nine. Oh, um, maybe your Ace Sound Guy Tyler will throw in my new song.

• 1:47:04Rich Roll?

  We're gonna take it out with the new song. What's it called?

• 1:47:06Mishka Shubaly?

  Uh, it's called I Can't Remember When You Were Mine.

• 1:47:09Rich Roll?

  All right. Why don't you tell us a little bit about the song?

• 1:47:12Mishka Shubaly?

  Um, I wrote it ten years ago. Ten years ago? No, I wrote it eight years ago. Um, about Allison, when I moved out, she threw away all the pictures of her and I together. So this song is about having only your memories and then not even having that.

• 1:47:35Rich Roll?

  So we're gonna take it out on a very uplifting note, right? This is so, such an inspirational podcast that we've had today.

• 1:47:42Mishka Shubaly?

  It's a jam, though. You can dance to it, I swear.

• 1:47:45Rich Roll?

  All right, cool. So Beat the Devil, and can you buy, can people buy your music?

• 1:47:50Mishka Shubaly?

  Yeah, yeah, the, the new song is up, um, and.

• 1:47:55Rich Roll?

  Just Mishka Shubaly on iTunes, or why should they do that?

• 1:47:58Mishka Shubaly?

  Yep, just search my name on iTunes. I'm on Bandcamp, CD Baby, everywhere.

• 1:48:03Rich Roll?

  All that kind of stuff. And on Twitter, Mishka Shubaly.

• 1:48:07Mishka Shubaly?

  Yep.

• 1:48:07Rich Roll?

  Facebook, all that kind of stuff. Everything, if it exists, I got it. You and I are friends on Pinterest. Yeah, Pinterest. Alright, and so, uh, look for his new band coming out soon, right? Yeah. That's the moral of the story today. Yeah, Geezer's United. Right. Alright, dude. The, uh, Rich Roll Podcast with Mishka, Volume Three, wrapping up here, right? Yep. Alright, man. Thanks for doing it. Thanks. Alright, peace. Plants.

• 1:50:23Speaker 02

  ... You were mine Two thousand three feels like nineteen eighty-nine

• 1:50:37Speaker 02

  Sweet child of mine

• 1:50:46Speaker 02

  All those messages that you've been receiving That I can't remember leaving It's a small relief still, it's a good thing You're deleting without listening They disappear like pennies Down a wishing well Tiny good intentions on the road to hell

• 1:51:27Speaker 02

  But I'll go bankrupt and that well will overflow Before you'll forgive me and let me come home I can't remember when you were mine No, I can't remember when you were mine No, I can't remember when you were mine

• 1:52:10Speaker 02

  I can't remember when you were mine No, I can't remember when you were mine No, I can't remember when you were mine

• 1:52:49Rich Roll?

  All right, people, that's it. Thanks a lot. Thanks for stopping by. Thanks for lending in here. I hope you enjoyed the episode. Hope you enjoyed Mishka. I thought it went pretty well. I love that guy. He's awesome. Leave a comment at richroll.com and tell us what you think. And if you have an extra minute, leave a comment on the iTunes page for the podcast. The comments there help us out a lot, and we appreciate all the great feedback that you guys have been giving us. If you want to support the plant power mission, best way to do that is to use the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com. You got to do all this shopping for the holidays, right? You're probably going to use Amazon. Well, click through the banner ad. Won't cost you a penny extra on your purchases, not one penny extra, and

• 1:53:30Rich Roll?

  it will not even take you any extra time. But Amazon kicks us some loose change and that puts wind in our sails. So, thank you for everybody that's been doing that. We appreciate that tremendously. Also, if you want, you can donate to the podcast, too. We have donate function at richroll.com. So, throw us a little support that way. You can do it on a one-time basis, weekly basis, monthly basis. You set the terms. And thank you to everybody who's doing that. That means a lot to me that you would voluntarily do that. This show is free. It will always be free. It's up to you. But we thank all of you for that. We've got products at richroll.com. We got a cookbook, digital e-cookbook. We

• 1:54:13Rich Roll?

  have a meditation program. We have my Jai Repair, post-workout recovery supplement. We have a vitamin B12 spray. B12 is really important, especially if you're on a plant-based diet. It's the one thing that you really need to make sure that you're supplementing with, because you cannot get B12.

• 1:54:34Rich Roll?

  On plants only. It's the one thing you gotta make sure that you stay on top of. So it's a great supplement. Check that out. And what else? We have T-shirts coming soon. I feel like a broken record saying this, but we're really trying to revamp the website in the right way. And that takes time. That takes effort. I've got a great team of web guys working on it. And I've seen the proofs for the new site and what it's gonna look like. And it's amazing, but it's just taking a little bit longer. We wanted to have the T-shirts up in time for Christmas. I'm not sure that is gonna happen, unfortunately. I know I've been getting a lot of messages from you guys who, you know, people out there that wanna get them as gifts, etc.

• 1:55:15Rich Roll?

  I would rather, when I put the site up, have everything be functioning perfectly than rush it and get it up and have orders get screwed up and all that kinda stuff. I'm not gonna do that. So it will go up when it goes up. Most likely, January 1st is our absolute deadline goal. But it's gonna be a cornucopia of amazing stuff. We're gonna start putting up more and more products over time and really build it out. And I'm excited about the future with that. So I'll keep you apprised on the development there. If you wanna learn more about how to eat plant-based, you wanna be plant-powered, I get a lot of messages all the time. How do you do it? What do you eat before you work out? What do you eat after you work out? How do you make it work with kids? What do you do when you travel?

• 1:56:00Rich Roll?

  How did you do it when you were in Morocco? How did you do it when you were in Bahrain? All of these questions, I took all the top questions that I get all the time. And we put it all into this program, this online educational program that Julie and I did called The Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition. And you can find it at MindBodyGreen.com or there's a banner ad on my website that I'll click you over to it. It's three and a half hours of streaming online video content, broken down into five to 10-minute segments. Each little video on a specific subject matter with a forum beneath each video for questions and discussion about how to do it. And I'm really proud of it. The production quality is very, very high.

• 1:56:45Rich Roll?

  And I encourage all of you who want to learn more to check that out, whether you've been vegan, plant-based for a long time, or you're just curious. About whether or not you might want to do this, or maybe you just want to get more plants into your diet, regardless of whatever your dietary protocol is. We all need to eat more vegetables in our diet. And despite what you might have heard, I believe we need more fruits, legumes, all these good wholesome whole foods into our diet. And this is a good roadmap on how to do it. So check that out, mindbodygreen.com. All right, you guys, we're out of here. Thank you so much for all the feedback on the best of episode. We're excited about 2014. We're gonna rock it.

• 1:57:29Rich Roll?

  We're gonna take everything up to the next level. I've got some great guests coming up and thank you so much for the support. It means a lot to me. It means a lot to my team. And I'm wishing all of you guys a wonderful, happy, safe, healthy, plant-powered holiday season. All right, peace. Plants.