Stuck in a Creative BLOCK? THIS 3-Minute Practice Will Unlock Your Creativity (This Quick Daily Act Will Help You Feel Inspired Again!) With Amie McNee

Today, Jay sits down with author, artist, and creative mentor Amie McNee for a heartfelt conversation about reconnecting with the artist inside all of us. Known for her honest take on creativity and self-expression, Amie opens up about her journey, from battling self-doubt and shame to finding her voice as a writer and artist. Amie shares real stories of rejection, depression, and learning to embrace imperfection, reminding us that art doesn’t need to be perfect, it just needs to be real. Jay and Amie explore the common myths that hold people back from creating. The idea that creativity has to be profitable, that art must be perfect to be valuable, or that we need permission to begin. They discuss how shame, perfectionism, and fear of judgment often silence our creative instincts, and how practices like journaling, self-mothering, and small daily acts of creativity can help revive them. They also reflect on the emotional vulnerability of sharing your work, the importance of protecting your inner artist, and the delicate balance between wanting to be seen and creating for the pure joy of expression. In this interview, you'll learn: How to Reclaim Your Creativity Without Shame How to Make Art When You’re Struggling with Self-Doubt How to Start Creating Even If You Don’t Feel Ready How to Deal with Fear of Judgment and Being Seen How to Turn Jealousy into Creative Motivation How to Promote Your Art Without Selling Out Whether someone is writing a novel, posting their first poem, or simply daring to call themselves an artist, this conversation is a gentle yet powerful reminder—they are on the path, and their voice matters. With Love and Gratitude, Jay Shetty What We Discuss: 00:00 Intro 00:49 Are We Born Creative or Can It Be Learned? 02:12 Why Everyone Is an Artist in Their Own Way 03:50 What Happens When You Suppress Your Creativity 06:37 How Journaling and Self-Compassion Can Heal You 08:30 You Owe Everything to the Past Version of You 13:03 How to Move Through the Fear of Being Judged 16:07 Why Art Exposes Both Light and Darkness 17:25 Let Go of Needing External Validation 19:30 Everyone Just Wants to Be Seen and Heard 24:31 Stop Dismissing the Parts of You That Want More 26:28 Stuck in the Wrong Job? Try Small Creative Steps 30:56 How Perfectionism Fuels Procrastination 33:11 Embrace the Beautiful Chaos of Art 34:17 What the 30 Circles Test Reveals About Creativity 36:44 How to Share Your Art Without Losing Yourself 39:07 Real Artists Are Meant to Break the Rules 40:29 What to do When No One Sees Your Art 41:54 If You Hate It, Stop Doing It 44:19 Don’t Chase Virality, Make Meaningful Art 46:40 Yes, You Can Make Money from Your Art 50:10 Every Creative Act Has Value So Honor It 53:12 Charging for Your Art Is Not Selling Out 57:39 Oversaturation Is a Myth, There’s Room for You 01:00:53 Your Voice Is One of a Kind Use It 01:02:25 Use Jealousy to Guide, Not Derail You 01:03:49 How to Inspire Others by Owning Your Path 01:07:12 Amie on Final Five Episode Resources: Amie Mcnee | Website Amie Mcnee | Instagram Amie Mcnee | Facebook Amie Mcnee | TikTok Amie Mcnee | Books We Need Your Art: Stop Messing Around and Make Something See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. 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.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by Mazda. Confidence isn't something Mazda finds, it's something they practice. That's the thinking behind every Mazda. With proactive safety features designed to help keep you more aware, more connected, and more engaged with the road ahead. It's why Mazda has been named Consumer Reports' safest new car brand and has won more 2026 IIHS Top Safety Pick Plus Awards than any other car brand as of July 2026. Visit www.iihs.org to learn more. A lot can happen when an accident doesn't. Visit MazdaUSA.com to learn more. Consumer Reports does not endorse products or services. This episode is brought to you by Amtrak.

• 1:12Jay Shetty?

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• 1:39Speaker 02

  Literally, the day I started journaling, I haven't stopped and everything changed because I allowed creativity back into my life, shame-free. I think so many of us are creating, but we've got so much shame around it. We're not good enough, it's not making enough money, my parents, you know, really think I should give it up. There's so many narratives that come with creativity. So many of us are just being held back, kept small. I want you to find out what happens when you take perfectionism out of the equation and you just let yourself create.

• 2:08Speaker 03

  The number one health and wellness podcast.

• 2:10Speaker 04

  Jay Shetty. Jay Shetty. The one, the only Jay Shetty.

• 2:16Jay Shetty?

  Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the place you come to to become happier, healthier and more healed. Today's guest is someone I've been wanting to sit down with for so long. I have stalked her on Instagram, shared a ton of her stuff, showed her work to so many of my friends and family members because it has deeply impacted me. It's a page that I turn to when I feel like I need someone to give me a bit of guidance, give me a steer, give me a direction to think in. And I can't wait to introduce her to all of you. I'm speaking about author, artist, creative and poet and so much more. Amy McNeely, please welcome to On Purpose, Amy. Amy, it is so great to have you here. I'm such a huge fan and I can't wait for your new book,

• 3:00Jay Shetty?

  We Need Your Art. I think it's going to be life changing for so many budding creatives, people who are just starting out, up and coming, and at the same time, established creatives who are trying to rediscover themselves. So as a fan, thank you for being on the show and so excited to have this conversation.

• 3:18Speaker 02

  Jay, I'm so grateful. I'm grateful for your art. I'm so grateful that you make the things that you do and I'm just very excited to be here.

• 3:26Jay Shetty?

  It's, I'm trying to remember when I first came across your work and I can't remember the exact moment, but I remember the feeling I had of swiping through, reading some of your work. You were holding up your pieces of board or card and, you know, with your thick marker handwriting. And I was reading it and thinking to myself, how can someone be saying things that are so sometimes difficult, uncomfortable, hard to say and hard to hear, but doing it in a way that was so clear and so powerful? And I wanted to start off by asking you, how do you see people? Are people born creative? Or can people become creative? And is everyone?

• 4:10Jay Shetty?

  In some way creative, because I think a lot of people listening right now are thinking, Jade, this episode isn't for me.

• 4:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:15Jay Shetty?

  I'm not creative.

• 4:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:17Jay Shetty?

  I'm not an artist. What do I do?

• 4:20Speaker 02

  I know. When I say, and I say it a lot, I say, we need your art. And I worry about the amount of people who are like, oh, not my art. But I'm like, your art. And I think we have a real, we can really pedestal the term art as to what it is. And we think it's, oh, it's fine art, or, oh, it has to be photography or a certain type of art. But art comes in so many different shapes and forms and we all have a capability and a desire to create. It's just that it looks different for all of us. So when I say we need your art, like I mean, we need your art. Like, we all have a drive and a desire to make stuff. It's so innate. It's so human. So I think we really need to take art off the pedestal. It's not just for fine arts, although obviously it is.

• 5:01Speaker 02

  But it's this, it's podcasting, it's, you know, watercolors, it's writing, it's planting, it's gardening.

• 5:08Jay Shetty?

  It's makeup tutorials.

• 5:09Speaker 02

  It's makeup tutorials, it's book reviews, it's cooking, like creativity, like it sinks into all aspects of our lives. And we all have a thirst for it. And so when I say we need your art, I'm talking about you.

• 5:21Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, and I love that you are broadening the definition of art.

• 5:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:25Jay Shetty?

  Because I think you're so right, like, growing up, I'm not, I wasn't good at drawing.

• 5:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:30Jay Shetty?

  And so I always thought I wasn't artistic. Yeah, it was so funny. I remember when I was finishing primary school, elementary school. And I remember we did this reflection exercise and it was like, what's your favorite subject and what's your worst subject? And I put my favorite subject being math, because I thought I was a geek, but I wasn't. And then I wrote down my worst subject was art. And then when I went to secondary school, high school, and when I finished, if you asked me what my favorite subject was, it was art. And if you asked me what my least favorite subject was, it was math. Because I had an art teacher called Mr. Buckridge at QE Boys School in Barnet that expanded the definition of art from day one. And it became about color, it became about juxtaposition.

• 6:15Jay Shetty?

  It became about meaning, it became about collage, it became about imagery, it became about my passions. It became about all these other things. And I then made him feel really upset because I sold out and didn't study art at university, even though I

• 6:34Speaker 02

  But in so many ways, you have studied art, you know, like you've kept that going in all aspects of your life.

• 6:39Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, but you've broadened that definition for everyone. And I think that's so needed because you are right, podcasting is art, writing is art, cooking is art.

• 6:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, the way we dress, you know, the way we express, like you can't, you can't not create art. And I think we need to reclaim that word for our, for ourselves. It is mine and you are an artist in some way, shape or form.

• 7:00Jay Shetty?

  What happens when we stifle ourselves? So what happens when you hold back? Sometimes today, people even know they're artistic. Maybe they even had a little skill when they were younger. Maybe they were passionate, maybe even now in their spare time. But they're blocking themselves, they're stifling themselves because they've heard things like, well, that won't get you a career. That won't pay the bills. That's not going to make you money. That's not a real job. And by the way, I heard all those things growing up. So it feels very familiar to me. What happens to us when we stifle ourselves and block ourselves?

• 7:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, if you will indulge me, I'll tell you a bit of my story because I feel like, and exactly as you said, you've experienced this, like all I wanted to do was tell stories. Like it's all I wanted to do, whether it was through acting or writing, I just felt like driven to express myself through storytelling. And once I left school, I was like, okay, I'm going to take this seriously. Like I really want to commit to this. And you know, from the age of eighteen to the age of like, you know, really recently, like I was inundated with, it's childlike, it's irresponsible, it's foolish to take the creative arts seriously. And I, I ended up with severe depression. I was so low because I was so embarrassed by this extraordinarily strong desire to,

• 8:16Speaker 02

  to tell stories. Like I just wanted to tell stories and I felt so ashamed about it and I felt like I couldn't be a real adult. I couldn't grow and So I withheld my creativity and I felt incredible amounts of shame and I felt so embarrassed and I didn't want to talk about it with anybody and it resulted in me being ridiculously depressed. I was so low, I had such low affect, I had no motivation. Um, because there was like a war going on inside me and half of myself was like, I have to tell stories, like I am here to create, to make art and to impact the world with my art. And then the other half of me was like, this is so irresponsible. Why can't you be a real adult? Why can't you just grow up, like get a real job? And that duality and that war within me left me like broken.

• 9:00Speaker 02

  And it wasn't until I, I started journaling and I started seeing the stories that I was telling myself. And I was like, this, I cannot live this way. And so I started rewriting them like with my pen on the pages of my journal. And I allowed art back into my life, like shame free art. And like since, literally the day I started journaling, I haven't stopped and everything changed. Because I allowed creativity back into my life, shame free.

• 9:24Jay Shetty?

  Wow, I love that. I love this on a shame free art.

• 9:27Speaker 02

  It's so important. I think so many of us are creating, but we've got so much shame around it. We're not good enough. It's not making enough money. My parents, you know, really think I should give it up. There's so many narratives that come with creativity. And so many of us are just being held back, kept small. Yeah, we need shame free art.

• 9:46Jay Shetty?

  How did you get the courage to allow art back in?

• 9:49Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 9:50Jay Shetty?

  Especially when you're in a dark place, like you're saying, you're experiencing depression. You're hearing all this negativity around you about the relevance of your art and the value of your art. How do you in that place go, I'm going to turn to art? Because it's the one thing that's been villainized and made to seem negative.

• 10:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was through journaling. It was a complete narrative shift. So I would write out the stories that I was telling myself. So why can't you get a real job? Why do you think this is possible? This is so embarrassing. You've got hundreds of rejection letters from publishers. No one's listening to you. And then I would write it all out so I could witness the stories I was telling myself. Like I needed to see the amount of shame I was in. Because, and it would shock me, like I would reread what I was writing and I was like, my brain is like a place of just like violence and vitriol. Like I'm speaking so terribly to myself and to my inner artist. And then at the end of my journaling session, I would be like, okay, well, how do I want to sound? And I call it mothering myself. It's like a reparenting exercise. And I would just be like,

• 10:49Speaker 02

  you know what? And I would treat myself like a baby. And I'd be like, baby girl, you are here to tell stories. I am so proud of you. I'm proud of the way that you are showing up. I'm proud of the way that you were rebelling against society's expectation. You have been put on this earth to make art, to create. And I'm so proud of what you're doing. And so no matter how much I spewed out crap, and there was so much inner critic rubbish on the pages, I always ended it with this voice that was like, okay, but I'm actually really proud of you. You know, you are here to make art and you're on the path. I used to tell that to myself all the time. You're on the path. You're on the path. So yeah, it was it was through words, which is so appropriate, I guess, for me as an author.

• 11:29Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, but it but it's so interesting that that wasn't a learned technique, or it was

• 11:34Speaker 02

  No, it just happened.

• 11:35Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, something that came from within, but now it's a practice people can follow through.

• 11:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 11:39Jay Shetty?

  And I love that repetition of you are on the path, because I think that's so, so true in that we think that we're either off the path or on the path. And we think that we're either going in the wrong direction or the right direction, rather than just recognizing that you're on the path either way. And I've I've done this often, and I've I've seen a lot of people do it, where we go, you know, up until last year, I was it was just a mess. And then I figured it out, which basically devalues all of that experience, all of that pain, all of that stress, all of the amazing journey you've had that brought you to that point, that actually inspires and powers this path. But you're like, now I'm on the right path. And so we have this

• 12:22Jay Shetty?

  way of devaluing past experiences, even when we say, I had this lightbulb moment, and then everything changed. And it's like, well, no, all of that got you to the lightbulb experience.

• 12:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, I love that, Jay. Something I say to myself. Is that, I mean, again, I repeat it all, all the time, like you are on the path, you are on the path, you are on the path. But it would have been so easy for me to say, oh, I figured it out. Now I've got the publishing deal. Now, you know, I've, I get to have an audience and now I've figured it out. But I actually owe everything to the girl that navigated silence, to the girl that navigated rejection, to the girl that had so much shame. Like, when I think about how I got here, I owe everything to her. And I tell that to artists all the time because, you know, so many artists, we are navigating, you know, we're sharing stuff on social media. No one's seeing it. No one's liking it. We're, you know, daring to put our art up for sale. No one wants to buy it.

• 13:16Speaker 02

  We are learning new crafts. We're being so vulnerable. And you, your future version of yourself owes everything to you for daring, to be brave, for being courageous, for taking up space, even when no one else is listening or no one else is watching. Like, I, right here on the Jay Shetty Show, owe everything to the girl who was sitting at a cafe extraordinarily depressed, but saying, you know what, I'm gonna dare to write today, even though nobody else wants me to write.

• 13:42Jay Shetty?

  I love that. I, I, I so love that because you made me think of, I remember when I started out and I think the first two presentations I gave, pretty much no one showed up. And then for years, I was doing events for five people, 10 people, and I loved it. And actually, I was so lucky because social media kind of kicked off a bit later than when I would have done that. So I never even had the pressure or the belief that more than five to 10 people could come. Because maybe I'd seen 20 people in a room, or 50 people in a room, or 100 people in a room. And so to me, 100 was a big number.

• 14:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:19Jay Shetty?

  And I was talking to someone just a couple of days ago, and they're a creator, and they were saying like, Jay, I just feel this pressure of scale, and I feel this pressure of like, not enough people have seen my work. And I was just thinking, you know, whether I had five people in the room, ten people, a hundred, or, you know, whatever it is now, it, I was always just happy and grateful to be with whoever was in the room.

• 14:39Speaker 02

  Love that.

• 14:40Jay Shetty?

  And so now I feel that same, and I know it's easy for me to, it sounds easy for me to say it now, and it's hard for me to reflect back from the external view of whether people believe me or not, but I can honestly say that I remember just wanting to spend the whole evening with the five people who turned up and answer their questions and share with them insights, and it was so beautiful and valuable and meaningful that that's what gave me the practice, it's what gave me the ability to understand different people's challenges and stresses. And everything that I've been able to create here is only because of that experience. It wasn't that I'm different now and I'm better now and I mastered something, it wasn't that. It was, it was all part of the same path.

• 15:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, we, we owe everything to that version of Jay, you know, and we get to experience you now because you dared and you enjoyed and you loved doing that work earlier on. Yeah, I love that.

• 15:31Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I feel like so many people have probably listened to this right now going, Amy Jay, I have an idea.

• 15:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 15:37Jay Shetty?

  Like, I have something in my head that really makes sense, but I'm scared to put it out there. And I'm sure you hear this all the time, but I see the fear of judgment and the fear of your art being shamed and the fear of people thinking it's silly, not good enough, as being such a blocker for people. And I wanted to ask you, how do you help people overcome that fear? Because it seems to be the biggest wall in the way of people and their dreams.

• 16:09Speaker 02

  I mean, there's so many different ways we can look at this. First of all, I'm so excited that you have an idea. Like, this is so exciting, let's cherish it, we need to take care of it.

• 16:16Jay Shetty?

  I like that.

• 16:17Speaker 02

  Like, I'm really being serious, like, we need your art, we need your expression, we need you to take up space. There are people out there in the world who need what you have to create, and if you choose to withhold it, they will never get to experience it. Like, you are a one-time phenomenon that will never, ever be seen again. And if you choose not to take action on this idea, then that's done, that idea is done eternally, will never be seen again. I just want to really enforce that because it can be so easy to be so flippant. Oh, it's just an idea, it was never gonna go anywhere. These ideas are so precious and we need to take care of them. The judgment thing, misunderstanding, the, oh my god, what's that dude from high school gonna think of me? Like, is so valid because art is so vulnerable.

• 16:58Speaker 02

  Creativity is like pouring a little bit of you into an external thing and giving it to the world. Like, that's super vulnerable. And so I want to validate that feeling of, oh my god, what will people think of me? Art is a courageous exercise. It is so vulnerable, it is so scary, and it's okay that we have these feelings. I think there are several things that we can do. I think the first one is come home to a truth, is that you will be misunderstood. And you will be judged. And it's still worth making the art. I can't let some random guy from high school stop me from doing my work, and I almost did. When I decided I wanted to really start taking up space as a writer, I was like, okay, I'm gonna start like an Instagram, I'm gonna start sharing my words. And I was like, no, I can't, it's so cringey.

• 17:42Speaker 02

  And I was like, that guy from high school, like Ben from high school, or like, I kept thinking of these random people, they're gonna see me and they're gonna be like, who does she think she is? And it stopped me in my tracks for ages. And I just love that version of myself because she was so brave and she decided, no, I want this life, I wanna tell stories. And so I started Inspired to Write, started my Instagram, and I blocked every single person I could find. And I sat there for hours being like, they would stop me showing up, they would stop me showing up. And I created a cocoon for myself to become the artist that I needed to be. And so I think, first of all, we do need to understand that we will be misunderstood, and that it is safe to be misunderstood.

• 18:23Speaker 02

  But second of all, that we can take precautions to make sure that we are, that we have spaces to create and that feel as safe as possible. But creation itself will never be safe. It's inherently risky, and that's why it's inherently rewarding.

• 18:35Jay Shetty?

  I love that. I love that you actually had a physical way of having a block.

• 18:40Speaker 02

  No, no, no.

• 18:41Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. And I think we don't think about it that way sometimes. We think that... Oh, we we should have got over that feeling first. Like, I should be over the fact that my parents think this is a bad idea before I create. And it's like, well, no, you're probably gonna have to create while they think it's a bad idea.

• 18:56Speaker 02

  Oh, my god, we can't become like, fully actualized before we create art. And art's gonna reveal all of your lightness, but also a lot of your darkness. So there's gonna be so many things that come up as you dare to do the brave thing and create stuff. Like, you're gonna see a lot of narratives, you're gonna see a lot of insecurities. Because, again, making art's so vulnerable, you're just gonna see a lot of the hard things within you. And you can't wait till they're healed to begin creating. So, yeah, do what you need to do. And for me, I needed to block every single person I could think of. And now everyone's unblocked. But I needed that space away from eyes. I didn't want their perception of who they thought I was to interrupt my journey of who I was becoming.

• 19:35Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 19:36Speaker 02

  And so I claimed space for myself. And I invite artists to, however it looks, put boundaries in place so that you can do this work. And you can feel as safe as possible. And no, you can't protect yourself entirely, but you can do a little bit so that you've, you know, feel a little more comfy, a little more cozy as you do the brave thing and start, you know, making some ideas.

• 19:54Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I feel some of us have this feeling of, I wish the people who loved me believed in me.

• 20:02Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 20:02Jay Shetty?

  Right? And I feel as artists, because you can have a softer heart, you're more empathetic, you're more in tune with some of these emotions and feelings, there's a sense of, why don't you believe in me? And if you believed in me, I could do it. And if you believed in me, then I might get there. And if you believed in me, then I'd feel better about it. How do you let go of those kind of expectations that we often have of the people around us? There's a heartfelt part of that, but really, it's a hurtful part because it stops you from starting.

• 20:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's so hard. I speak to so many creatives who whose closest people aren't backing them. I think when we commit to art, we often trigger a lot of people. And we trigger the artist within them that they squashed down and that they repressed. And so when we say, oh, I'm actually being incredibly brave and I've decided to write a book, we trigger a little part in them that says, well, I never let myself write a book. I thought you needed permission to write a book, and here you are, just taking up space, writing a book. And I don't know that they necessarily know that that's what's happening. But I feel like when we commit to art, a lot of people find that confronting. And so that's important for us to realize is it's not us. It's often there in a child that just hasn't had a chance to express ourselves because we don't live in a world that really encourages

• 21:17Speaker 02

  art, that encourages creative expression. It's something to do when you're young and it's something to do when you're retired. And when we dare to do it now, you know, in like the mid of life, like I think it's, people are like, oh, well, who gave you permission to do that? And it's like, well, I did. And a huge part of my journey has been permission giving. Like I thought I needed to wait for permission for the gatekeepers, from publishers. I thought I needed someone to say, you are now allowed to make art. One of the biggest revelations, and again, it came through journaling, was, well, no, I'm just going to give myself permission. And I didn't need it through my parents. I didn't need it from my friends. I just needed to literally be like, I give myself permission to take this seriously. It was the most profound permission slip I could have ever given myself ever.

• 21:59Jay Shetty?

  I remember that as well for myself. When I started to create videos eight years ago. And it was that same sense of feeling that before I did that, I was asking people to give me a job to do what I wanted to do. And I knew there wouldn't be an exact job for it, but I was even willing to sacrifice my art to take on a job that might evolve into the artistic version of that. And so I remember pitching myself as a tradie, trainee video producer at lots of companies in London and being turned down because I didn't do communications at college, or I didn't do video production at college, at university. And then same thing with trying to meet editors of magazines and say, oh, maybe I can get in this way.

• 22:44Jay Shetty?

  And again, getting rejections. And then it was actually Raj who messaged me. I think it was like, gosh, like 2015 Christmas time. And he was like, yeah, you've been giving a lot of talks. We should get out there and just, you know, maybe we should record some stuff. And I was like, I don't know. I haven't really made a video before. And I was like, I haven't really got any scripts. And he was like, let's figure it out. And so I scribbled some stuff down that I've been thinking about. And then we just went out there and we shot these four videos and then we released them later on on YouTube. And it was the best feeling in the world. Like I've never, I wish I could bottle up that feeling and give it to other people and well, well, you can with with the work you're doing. Your book is that, uh, we need your art. That's what the book is going to do for people. It's going to give people that feeling of freedom.

• 23:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:27Jay Shetty?

  And it was the first time I felt free because I would constantly been waiting for someone to give me a job, give me a title, give me a position, give me an opportunity and a break. And you're so right. Like as an artist, you're constantly waiting for someone to say, yes, your art is valid. It's valuable. And it's almost like, how do you get to a point where, I want to ask you this because we almost oscillate between two ideologies, which is like, you should just be happy making art and you shouldn't want anyone to see it. And then on the other end, it's like, well, you have to make sure people see it. Otherwise, what's the point of making it?

• 24:02Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 24:02Jay Shetty?

  And so people get scared. And this is partly why I love your work, because I think it really gets into the nuance of that.

• 24:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 24:09Jay Shetty?

  There's this feeling of like, well, it's weird to promote yourself, so I shouldn't promote myself, but then no one sees my art and then I'm a starving artist.

• 24:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 24:17Jay Shetty?

  But maybe that's my badge of honor and that's what makes me credible and valuable. And then there's the other side of, I'm just going to sell out and make what everyone else wants me to make. I'm going to go with the clickbait trends and I'm going to do whatever it takes, but then I don't really like myself at the end of the day because that's not what I set out to do. How do you make sense of that when you're starting in the beginning and you're like, gosh, I don't know which way to go. I don't know how to figure it out. How do you help people think about that spectrum? Before we dive into the next moment, let's hear from our sponsors.

• 24:48Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by Indeed. I know how important every hire is for a business. If you need to make the right hire, this is a job for sponsored jobs. Indeed sponsored jobs helps find quality candidates when you need the most. You can reach who you need based on whatever criteria you're looking for, like skills, certifications or location. In fact, people are finding quality hires on Indeed right now. In the minute I've been talking to you, companies like yours made twenty seven. Hires on Indeed, according to Indeed data worldwide. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit at indeed.com/podcast.

• 25:31Jay Shetty?

  That's indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. This episode is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. One of the greatest gifts we can give ourselves is the chance to step outside of our routine. Travel is a way of slowing us down and shifting our perspective. And with the Chase Sapphire Reserve card, every journey becomes even more rewarding. Earn four times the points on flights and hotels booked direct. Enjoy access to award winning airport lounges, three times the points on dining and reserve exclusive tables. Learn more at chase.com/sapphirereserve.

• 26:13Jay Shetty?

  Cards issued by JP Morgan Chase Bank, NA member FDIC. Subject to credit approval, terms apply. This episode is brought to you by Orange Theory Fitness. One of the best investments you can make is in your own strength. The choices you make today can help shape how you feel for years to come. Orange Theory Fitness provides a one hour workout to build strength, burn fat and build muscle. With an expert coach guiding you every step of the way. Head to orangetheory.com/onpurpose to learn more and get your first class free. Orange Theory Fitness, helping people live longer, more vibrant lives. Terms and conditions apply. See webpage in studio for details. And back to our episode.

• 26:56Speaker 02

  This is such a nuanced conversation. I'm so glad you said that because it is so complicated and it's so very valid to want to just make art for art's sake. To just want to play and create. And in fact, I think that's an imperative part of every artist's journey, like. Have fun, like that's so important for us. But there are so many narratives around, you know, how to do art properly and how you're meant to be an artist. And you should make a certain amount of money and you should be showing up in this way. There are so many stories that I think mean that we start feeling, it can be incredibly stressful. Being an artist on social media is so stressful. How do I put myself out there? How am I meant to promote myself? Do I, should I want to promote myself or should this be a private practice? I think this is an intensely personal thing that you need to sit with and decide where you're at.

• 27:39Speaker 02

  But for me, my calling is to be seen. And I love supporting artists who want to be seen. And I think there's a weird amount of shame that comes from a creative who wants attention for their art. And so my new thing at the moment is to say, I create art for the attention. Because I create art to connect with people. And I think a lot of artists do, like we create because we want to show you. And it's a really beautiful thing to do, to make art and say, here, do you see yourself in this? Like, I made this, what do you, how do you find it? And so I want to really validate creators who are creating stuff because they want to connect. I think we get this other story that is again, a very valid story that says, you should only want to make art for yourself.

• 28:24Speaker 02

  Like Rick Rubin talks about this a lot and I love what he's saying because if we do get too focused on the external and we start thinking, okay, well, I'm gonna make art only for other people can really muddy the waters. We get very confused and we lose our internal like compass of what it is we want to create. But I think there's this balance to be struck because yes, we have to love the process. We have to love the, the act of art of creating. But at the same time, it's okay to want to connect with other people. It's okay to wanna have a relationship with audience. It's okay to wanna be seen. It is so human to want to be seen. And I want artists to feel very validated, that that is a beautiful and normal, almost wholly part of this. I love artists that are out there asking people, hey, can you witness me? I made this thing, will you see me?

• 29:09Speaker 02

  Like it just sets me alight. I'm like, yeah, I do wanna look at you. I want to see, I wanna give you my attention.

• 29:14Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, and you're so right, that so many artists, and I know I carried this at the beginning, there's the sense of shame and guilt in, well, am I less than if I want my art to be seen? Am I, am I doing something wrong if I want my art to connect with people? Am I? And and I agree with you that that can be such an excuse for us to not create and for us to not make. Or we create, but then we play small and we hide. And we kind of keep our work very, very separate because we want to. Or we say things like that where we say, oh, yeah, I mean, you know, I don't really care about followers. I don't I don't really care about how many likes it gets and inside it's eating us.

• 29:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:55Jay Shetty?

  As opposed to accepting and saying, well, maybe I do care and I don't care. There's there's two sides of me. And and I think I've always, I I feel that balance that you speak of is so true because there's a part of me that cares about everyone listening to this podcast right now. Because I want to, because I want to have a connection. I want to create something of value for you that benefits your life and changes your life. And you'll listen to this and it will be the reason three years from now you'll say, I listened to that episode with Amy. And I started creating and all of a sudden I'm writing a book and my art's in a gallery or whatever it may be for you. I want that feeling, I do.

• 30:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 30:29Jay Shetty?

  And at the same time, I don't care because I just want to have a conversation with Amy. And so both of those things are true. But when we start denying parts of ourselves, it's almost like we start lying internally to ourselves. And when you do that, you then really disconnect.

• 30:43Speaker 02

  There is such a duality to being a human being, especially in being a creative. And I love that, like, I I care about my art impacting people. But I also want to make sure that I'm making art that I want to make and that I'm not making art just for an audience. And these two things can be true at once. And we can honor both the fact that, yeah, I make art for the attention and I also make art because I just love to tell stories. And these things are true at one time and we've got to honor both those parts of ourselves.

• 31:10Jay Shetty?

  You've done a lot of different jobs on the way here. I believe it was like you you were a waitress at one point.

• 31:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:17Jay Shetty?

  You were a trainer. You've done financial planning. I want to hear.

• 31:21Speaker 02

  I wouldn't say I did financial planning. I was a personal assistant for a financial planner.

• 31:27Jay Shetty?

  Right.

• 31:27Speaker 02

  So I was financially adjacent, terrible terrible at that job too.

• 31:31Jay Shetty?

  But I want to hear about that journey because I think that's what I find fascinating about artists. Like, as an artist, you're always having to pay the bills, finding a way to solve this until your art becomes.

• 31:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:41Jay Shetty?

  You know, enough, quote, anyone who's, I'm doing air quotes next to enough, to be recognised, et cetera. Walk me through that part of your life where you're like, doing things that keep you afloat and at the same time trying to keep your art alive. What was that like? Because I think a lot of people listening right now, they may be working a 12-hour job a day, they're working three jobs a day just to survive, but they're like, they've got this skill in art and really when they get home at the end of the day, they just want to switch on a TV show and escape and switch out. Like, how did you keep both alive when it wasn't your main thing?

• 32:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, one of the things that makes me angriest is how much life robs us of our art time. Like, I want so many of us to have the time, the energy, particularly to come home and to create, but for so many of us, it's just, it's not possible. And balancing a regular work and a creative life is hard. And I really want to validate any creative who's navigating this, because I think we get a bit of the hustle narrative where it's like, just make it work. It is hard to balance your creativity and your real-life job and, you know, caretaking and being a kid and just being an adult in general. Like, I can, it's huge. And I really struggled with it. I was waitressing, I was doing all these little jobs because I was trying to fit art around them. So I was waitressing because I could,

• 32:58Speaker 02

  then I could work after 3pm maybe. I was a personal trainer because I would train clients in the morning and the evening and I'd try and write in the middle of the day. Like, I was trying to choose jobs that would work for me. But it was exhausting. And especially because these jobs were so like the antithesis of Amy. Like, I'm not made to serve people. Coffee, I can't hold the skim milk situation in my head. Like, I don't care, so I don't pay attention, so I'm not a very good waitress. I'm exhausted by the end of my shift. Then I get home to my writing and I think, okay, well, I've got to write two to 3,000 words. This is too much. And so I would let myself down. I would feel like I betrayed myself and I would get in patterns of Of constantly feeling like I've betrayed my inner artist, I betrayed my dreams, I can

• 33:43Speaker 02

  never reach up to this level. And I think I see it all the time, like artists are like, okay, because I didn't write it all this week, okay, I'm gonna, weekend, I'm gonna do, I'm very biased to writers, but any sort of creating, I'm gonna create for like six hours to make up for it. And then they can't do it because they're exhausted and then in this pattern of self betrayal and they start not trusting themselves that they're gonna follow through. But I had a real breakthrough when I decided that I was only gonna write three hundred to five hundred words a day. Just baby steps, small steps.

• 34:12Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 34:13Speaker 02

  I realized that that was a promise I could keep. Three hundred words could be done in like twenty minutes, fifteen minutes, they could be crap. That was another big thing. I think we demand huge amounts of time for our art when we're already exhausted and we're like, and they better be perfect. It's so unfair, so unfair. And it, and also it's a recipe for absolute disaster. And you're not gonna be able to finish your creative projects because these working conditions are horrendous. So it was three hundred shitty words was my bare minimum. I also had a bare maximum so that I couldn't keep going. So I could contain my energy. So I wasn't allowed to write more than a thousand words. And that's how I wrote my books. That's how I still write my books. Three hundred to five hundred words a day. And it's so doable. And when you come home from an absolutely

• 34:58Speaker 02

  hectic day, you can say, okay, three hundred words, three hundred potentially crappy words, or ten minutes on the guitar, or I want to take three pictures with my iPhone. You know, whatever it is, it's just really small, really doable. And then you start accumulating wins. So if you've done that like three, four times a week, you're like, okay, maybe I could do that again next week. And by the, you know, end of the year, you have a portfolio of your creations. And you've become, you know, you've improved as an artist, you've got something to show for yourself. Some of you will have a finished book if you've chosen to write. We ignore the magic of the baby steps so frequently because I think we're just such a go all in or go home culture.

• 35:38Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, and that, you're so right, that. You know, go all in or go home culture, just it blocks us the most because it's also this comes from like a bit of ego where it's like, I want to be the best at this, like this has to be incredible. And it's almost like, well, maybe I'm not going to be the best at this the first time I try or for the first year, or maybe for the first 10 years. And that's okay, because I'm just trying and I'm just learning. But that requires a sense of detachment and ego lessness to be like, it's okay to make bad stuff. And I know you are the biggest proponent of this.

• 36:11Speaker 02

  Shitty art.

• 36:12Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. And that's really been validating for me. Like every time I read you say something like that or write something like that, I'm like, yes, thank you, Amy, for giving me permission. Walk, walk me through how we, because I think we oscillate between procrastination and perfectionism. And so this kind of solves both of them, really. But walk me through that.

• 36:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, they're so closely related procrastination and perfectionism. One causes the other in such a like perfectionism will mean that you procrastinate. So my ethos is like shitty art. Like if you can't point to a giant pile of shitty art that you've made recently, then you're not doing the work. And I think so many artists see that as a sign of failure, but to me, that is a sign of like giant success. We have to connect to that messy playful part of ourselves when we create. That's when the best art is made. I watch artists finesse and finesse and they're trying to get it so right. And they're like narrowing and narrowing their point of view and they're getting so constrained and they're losing, I think, their own creative voice almost by these huge restrictions to be

• 37:12Speaker 02

  perfect. Whereas if you just say, make shitty art, and I often do this at workshops, they say, I got three minutes, just make something shitty. And the cool stuff that comes out of that shitty poems, shitty drawings, there's also that little element of magic to it. Because when you just let yourself play like a child, it's so fun. There's a lightness to it. Ideas come in, like perfectionism is rigidity. And we think perfectionism is the answer. It's like, oh, if I'm, if I'm a perfectionist, it's like, that will get me to where I want to go as a creative. It's like the one fault that we're allowed to have. But perfectionism will destroy your creative career. It will destroy it. We need mess, we need play. That is when you will become the best artist you can.

• 37:54Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, and and and that's actually often where I find the seeds of great ideas come.

• 37:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:59Jay Shetty?

  Like you, you did something bad, you did something random, but there was one word or one line in it, or there was one dot or whatever it is for you, there's that one thing that you go, oh, that was the real thing. That's the thing I want to create now. And all of a sudden it sparks it. But if you didn't allow for that messiness.

• 38:14Speaker 02

  It was never gonna happen.

• 38:15Jay Shetty?

  You'd never have seen it, you would never have found it. And that to me is is definitely why I crave more play and more messiness in my life, because there's a sense of the the profound will only come from playfulness. It's not gonna come from trying to be profound or create something profound. It doesn't, it doesn't originate that way.

• 38:35Speaker 02

  I think so many of us think that art is like a child thing. And so we're trying to be like adults creating. And adults would create in very structured ways, like we'd have rules. You know, we'd follow an expert and we'd do exactly what they say. And we try and make art a very responsible and neat thing. But art is like that in a child playing. Art is messy and it should be a kind of a chaotic experience.

• 38:56Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 38:56Speaker 02

  We've got to invite that back into our, into our lives.

• 38:59Jay Shetty?

  Yes, I do this activity that I got introduced to many years ago. It's, it's known as the thirty circles test. I don't know if you've ever seen it. So it's basically an A four piece of paper with thirty circles printed on it. And I often hand it to executives at corporate coaching and corporate clients that I have. And the task is you have to uniquely fill and complete and use thirty circles in thirty seconds. And the clock starts and everyone starts scribbling away, doing their thing. And then clock stops at thirty seconds. And I ask them, what have they done? Over fifty percent of the audience will have done one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight to thirty, or A, B, C, D, E, F, G to Z, uh, Z to A, B, C again. And so they will have done that. That's what over fifty percent of the audience has done.

• 39:44Jay Shetty?

  Some of the audience has done squiggles, just random squiggles, nothing there, maybe noughts and crosses. Or they've, some people have done emojis and some people have done like footballs and soccer balls and pizzas or whatever, like using circles.

• 39:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 39:58Jay Shetty?

  And that's generally runs the gamut of ninety nine percent of the audience.

• 40:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:02Jay Shetty?

  And maybe in the adult side, you'd get one, but they also did this with lots of ten year olds. And I tried it out with ten year olds as well. And some of the stuff that comes out is unbelievable.

• 40:13Speaker 02

  So cool.

• 40:13Jay Shetty?

  And so this one girl had done all this like intricate shading on it. And when we asked her what it was, she said it was a chessboard from a bird's eye view. And when you ask another kid what it was, they had put like a line around it and put a little thing on top. And they said it was a bag of marbles and they put five dollars on the bag of marbles. And this was my favorite one. Someone had done all this intricate shading, this little girl and put all this like curves and all this stuff. And when I asked her what it was, she said it was bubble wrap.

• 40:41Speaker 02

  Oh, my god.

• 40:42Jay Shetty?

  And it was so creative.

• 40:44Speaker 02

  So genius.

• 40:45Jay Shetty?

  Yes, genius. And it's so interesting. What you're saying is so true that when adults hear thirty circles, thirty seconds, we go logical brain.

• 40:53Speaker 02

  Structure, yeah.

• 40:54Jay Shetty?

  Structure, completion, deadline. So we switch off the part of our brain that has any.

• 41:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, I can you can imagine how many of those adults are thinking, there is a right and wrong way to do this.

• 41:05Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 41:05Speaker 02

  And I'm gonna be marked on it. Whereas these kids are just like, it's so beautiful, so playful. And when we talk about creative genius, I think we often think of some of, you know, the greats like Mozart or something. But like, look to the kids, because they are finding out fun stuff.

• 41:20Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 41:20Speaker 02

  They are the creative geniuses. And we have that within us. It's just that we've been told to squash that part of us from our culture, really.

• 41:27Jay Shetty?

  How do you start to structure and strategize art and promote it in a way that then it does allow you to? Because it's almost like we're trying to become adult about our art, not adult about how we market, promote and strategize our art.

• 41:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 41:43Jay Shetty?

  Like, it's almost like the art should remain playful and messy and truly creative. But then how we get that art out there should potentially have structure and strategy and

• 41:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm gonna disagree with you.

• 41:54Jay Shetty?

  I want to hear your thoughts. But first, here's a quick word from the brands that support the show. This episode is brought to you by Vinted. Value can be found anywhere, even in the clothes sitting untouched in our closets. That's where Vinted comes in. Vinted is a secondhand marketplace app where you can sell clothes you no longer want and get more value out of them. Whether you're running out of space, moving, or simply updating your wardrobe. Listing items is a quick and simple process, and once something sells, Vinted creates a prepaid shipping label for you. And the best part, there are no seller fees, so you keep what you earn. It's a simple way to clear out your closet, be less wasteful,

• 42:35Jay Shetty?

  and maybe make some extra money along the way. Give your clothes a second life with Vinted. Download the Vinted app for free to start selling with no seller fees, so you keep every dollar you earn. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. We talk a lot about intentional decision making, and that extends to the practical stuff too, like making sure your coverage actually works for your life. State Farm is there to meet you where you are, and they know how sweet it is to feel good about your decisions. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can choose to bundle and save with a personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state, coverage options are selected by the customer, availability, amount of discounts and savings,

• 43:19Jay Shetty?

  and eligibility vary by state. This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market. If you're talking about quality food, you can't forget Whole Foods Market, who've been holding themselves to the highest standards since they opened in 1980. That means you'll see thousands of organic products across their stores, from the produce department to the aisles. It also means you'll never see certain ingredients. They've banned artificial sweeteners and colors, high fructose corn syrup, and more, so you can shop with peace of mind. Shop Whole Foods Market in-store or online. Show. All right. Thank you to our sponsors. Now let's dive back in.

• 44:00Speaker 02

  I think there's a lot of room for mess, for playfulness, for the chaos, the traditional creative chaos in marketing, putting your art out there. I think we get really stuck on, okay, well, I've made my art, it's incredible, it's beautiful, it has my inner child infused within it, now I'm going to market it, and now I need branding colors, and I need a social media scheme, and I need to be, I need to be doing, you know, four to five consistent posts a week and three reels, and all of a sudden that like, I see it, like artists just shrivel, like, we don't thrive under those kind of circumstances. I think there's so much room for, I think, marketing is an art form in itself.

• 44:38Jay Shetty?

  Agreed.

• 44:38Speaker 02

  And therefore, I think that when we put our art out there, when we promote our art, there is room for mess and there's still, like shitty art should still be a part of it. Like, we should still be playing around, seeing what works, having fun when we promote our art as well. I, I think artists feel so claustrophobic when they feel like they have to niche down or they feel like they have to, you know, neaten up their Instagram grid. Like, be messy in the promotion process. Like, we're out there looking for real humans to connect with, not, not brands, not companies. I want to connect with artists who are real human people. And so I want to invite artists to bring that mess into the marketing process as well. But I think it's very easy, like, for our perfectionists to flare up when it comes to sharing art,

• 45:23Speaker 02

  because not only have we just done the bravest thing, which is make art, now we have to share it. And so perfectionism is gonna flare hugely because we're like, I've gotta protect myself. Because this is the moment where I, like, put it out there and people are gonna see me as the artist. They're gonna see my art, they're gonna judge it. So we start trying to structure it really heavily in order to feel safe. And I just think we lose so much of the magic when we do that. I wanna see the artist, I wanna see the human, I wanna see your mess, I want to see you playing, I wanna see, I just wanna see grit. When it comes to promoting.

• 45:55Jay Shetty?

  No, I actually agree with you, I actually agree with you. I definitely, when I was doing my structure and strategy, maybe I used the wrong words, I definitely don't mean, definitely don't like the idea of people having to, you know, like you said, choose brand colors and be organized.

• 46:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, very neat.

• 46:10Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, no, not in that way at all. And, and, and I couldn't agree with you more that often that's the stuff that stifles even more creativity because you're now playing a game that you hope to figure out.

• 46:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, I see artists, you see it everywhere online, especially in the space I'm in, because I'm so in, you know, the creative space. Artists are just so tired of, of having to show up in specific ways online in order to please the algorithm. Like, there's a weariness that I see in creatives that's so heartbreaking. And I just wanna say, like, first of all, I know it's hard to navigate these systems, but second of all, break all the rules, rebel. Like, artists are inherent, like... Rebels. We break the rules. We've already broken loads of rules because we've created stuff in a world that wants us to stay small and compliant and silent. Now it's time to break the rules with how we put our art out there. Do whatever you wanna do. Do what makes you happy. Do what feels creative rather than, you know,

• 47:04Speaker 02

  constantly obeying what's gonna go, you know, what what we think might go viral or what reels are preferred by the algorithm. This stuff is making us feel like shit. And it's not, I don't know that it's helping us.

• 47:16Jay Shetty?

  And and how do you feel like if someone's doing that, but then they're also like going months and years without feeling like their work's being seen?

• 47:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's so hard.

• 47:24Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 47:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, it is incredibly difficult. And there's nothing, I've, to me, there's nothing more painful than when you're sharing your art and nobody is seeing it. Like, there is an exquisite pain when it comes to that silence and navigating, like, putting something out there that you've just created and having no one respond. Like, for me, when I was navigating that, like, I was very, very upset by it. And I felt almost ashamed by how upset I was by it. Again, it's that idea that artists shouldn't want attention. But I wanted attention. I wanted people to see and read my books. I wanted to be witnessed. So when artists aren't seen and when we're like, okay, I'm gonna break all the rules, but it feels like by breaking the rules, you get missed or you get put to the side. That can be incredibly difficult.

• 48:07Speaker 02

  I think there's a way to kind of toe the line and play the game, but at the same time, make sure that it feels good to you. Certainly for the way that I like to share my art. I don't want to do what's going viral, but I will still consider, like, you know, how it's gonna impact my audience and what people have enjoyed of my content lately. Like, there's a game that I'm playing and it's a balance that I like to, there's a line I like to walk that makes it, so it's still creatively fulfilling for me. But I'm not going to obey whatever the next niche thing I have to do in order to be big on social media.

• 48:40Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 48:40Speaker 02

  Do you find that, like, in terms of your creation?

• 48:42Jay Shetty?

  I mean, totally. I mean, we, in the beginning, you know, for me, the videos that I started with were me just Freestyling almost, uh, kind of rough words, poetry on topics that I loved. They went viral by chance, like they weren't crafted for a particular time length or a particular editing pattern, because I didn't know them. I ju- I was just making videos. And, and they went viral and people loved them. And then I made more of those because I enjoyed them. But the day I stopped enjoying making them, we stopped.

• 49:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, beautiful.

• 49:15Jay Shetty?

  And then we created a new format where I'd seen a lot of comedians who would do sketches. And there'd be hilarious sketches of real life. I was like, well, what if I did sketches of real life? Like, what if I was to create real life experiences as dramatic performances with messaging? So we did those and I loved it and those went viral. And then there was a day I didn't enjoy making those anymore. I felt like I was trying too hard to, to come up with storylines. And then, so we stopped doing that. And then I started the podcast, which I'm still doing today because it feels like the most realist, fluid form. Because there is no set structure to make a interview go viral. It's truly a, a deep conversation.

• 49:57Jay Shetty?

  It's far less, there's not a science to that as much. And if there is, I don't enjoy it. Because I choose not to ask, I have a rule that we have of not to ask gossip based questions, clickbait questions. Or because that's how we protect our art.

• 50:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:13Jay Shetty?

  In that I want the conversations to be true and genuine and sincere. But basically, when I've stopped finding something fulfilling as art, I've stopped doing it. Because I've found that if I keep doing something I hate, I'm gonna end up hating parts of myself.

• 50:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:26Jay Shetty?

  And I'm gonna feel disconnected from myself.

• 50:28Speaker 02

  We get a lot of bitter artists when we have, you know, a practice that we're doing, whether that's in the creation process or whether it's when we share it. If we, if we don't like it and we keep doing it, we are going to become bitter. We see a lot of bitter artists out there who are just so angry at what the world has made them do. You know, whether that's to sell their books or sell their art or to be seen on social media. And they're so pissed that they had to sacrifice their creative integrity in order to be seen. And it just cannot be worth it. I just, I want creatives to. Create with what feels good, exactly like you, Jay. It's such a beautiful example. When it stops feeling good, stop doing it. Try something else.

• 51:06Jay Shetty?

  Cause it did feel good at one point.

• 51:07Speaker 02

  Of course, yeah.

• 51:09Jay Shetty?

  And it was new and fresh and it was creative. And the funny thing is, there's parts of me that wanna go back to some of those now.

• 51:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 51:13Jay Shetty?

  So it's like, because I'm like, oh, I used to love those videos eight years ago. Maybe if I reconnected to them, I'd come at them from a really genuine place. And so I can now go back home feeling happy, rather than go back home feeling bitter, because I feel forced to be there.

• 51:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 51:28Jay Shetty?

  And so I feel like when you let the algorithm dictate what you make, you feel forced to be there. And it's almost like your parents forcing you to come to family dinner, and you don't wanna be there.

• 51:37Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 51:38Jay Shetty?

  And I love what you said about artists being rebels, because I remember when I wrote Think Like a Monk, my first book, and fourteen out of seventeen imprints that I took meetings with at different publishers, told me not to call it Think Like a Monk. Because they were like, Jay, who wants to think like a monk? No one wants to do that. And it was this big thing that I remember this conversation. And we were talking earlier about when you're writing your first book, you don't know how much to push for and how much not to. That was something I pushed for wholeheartedly. And I'm so glad I did.

• 52:07Speaker 02

  I'm so glad you did.

• 52:08Jay Shetty?

  And, you know, it's so interesting, because same with my second book. I was like, I had this view of an artistic cover. And I pushed for it again, because I believed in it so deeply. And I could have gone for the cover that they thought would sell the most, or whatever. And it was never that. It was always like, I wanna create something that I think is beautiful and powerful.

• 52:26Speaker 02

  I love that.

• 52:26Jay Shetty?

  And builds a movement.

• 52:28Speaker 02

  Yeah. I think we've been taught to, we've gotta create the thing that's gonna go the most viral. But what if we create something that impacts, you know, a hundred people? Like, that's still incredibly worth it. I think we're always aiming for virality. We're always aiming for like, again, it's that big or go big or go home. Like, what if we make art and share it in a way that, no, it doesn't go viral, but it connects and it impacts. And it maybe only finds one or two people, but it does its thing. And it resonates with them. I feel like artists are always told, you know, go viral, be Taylor Swift, or be a starving artist. And it's this binary that doesn't serve us. I talk a lot about like, I want the, I want this to be the era of the middle-class artist, where it's like, we don't need millions and millions of dollars.

• 53:12Speaker 02

  We need, you know, a stable income and we get to enjoy a stable income. Um, and we're not the starving artist and we're not J Lo. But we are thriving, joyful, you know, financially secure artists. Like, that's what I want for us. And I think it's much more possible than we realize.

• 53:27Jay Shetty?

  You just talked about how you want this culture of middle-class artists, which I love that, like, that's such a, such a great vision and such a great mission that you're on. Like, I really like that. Because, like you said, I think for so many years, we've been told art's not a real job. It won't make you a living. What's the point? And we've subscribed to that and then you do a safe job and then you realize you left your dream back there.

• 53:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:48Jay Shetty?

  Or you got lucky enough and art did become a really big thing, but then maybe you lost touch with the art you wanted to create and you felt like you sold out. And I've always described it as the selfish artist or the sellout artist. And it's like, the selfish artist only creates them for themselves, but then they don't ever get to feel what it feels like to share their art. And the sellout artist only creates for the audience and then they never create what they truly want. And the balance is in between.

• 54:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:14Jay Shetty?

  But when it comes to monetizing your art, I feel like people are scared of asking for money. We're scared of valuing our art accurately. And then at the same time, we're struggling to pay our bills at points in our life. How do you encourage people to think about monetizing their art and becoming a middle-class artist?

• 54:32Speaker 02

  There's so much shame around, for all of us, whatever we're doing, there's so much shame around money. But I think for artists, there are so many narratives. There's this almost glamour around being the poor artist. And then, as you say, then there's the glamour around being like the super mega famous artist. And there's no healthy story about an artist who gets paid for what they do and can live, you know, a sustainable life. And, you know, there's a value exchange and it feels good and the exchange of money feels good. And I feel like for me personally, on my journey, like, it's been the most beautiful thing to realize that selling my art has felt really good. And selling my books has felt so aligned. I know that my stories are going to serve them. And there's a value exchange and they pay me for my stories or they pay me for my words.

• 55:17Speaker 02

  And it's felt really beautiful, like a very- Like a relationship, it's felt very intimate, it's felt very aligned. And I always thought that it was gonna feel icky, or it was gonna feel yucky, or that I was gonna feel like I was taking advantage of them or manipulating them. But I've found a space where it feels good, and I want artists to understand that selling your art can feel good. And so I want artists to start getting comfortable with the idea that art is valuable. And perhaps that's maybe the part of the problem, like, we don't understand that art is valuable. People think, oh, you know, food is valuable because it feeds me, or, you know, I need a computer because I need to do work on it. But we don't really understand the value of art, and it is incredibly hard to put a monetary value on art.

• 55:58Speaker 02

  I mean, I have so many conversations with creatives, being like, how do I put a dollar sign on my art? And that is hard, it can feel very arbitrary, but art has value. Art brings so much value to other people, and the artist needs to learn that. Because I think there's too many creatives going around out there thinking, oh, I'm just, I'm making decoration for the world. Or I'm just doing something so silly, I'm telling stories, I'm making movies, but it's just, you know, it doesn't make a difference. Art makes a difference, and we're getting some very cool research coming in about how art impacts us physically, how it impacts our mental health, how it impacts our communities. Like, art changes us, but artists don't recognize that, and we still think we're doing something frivolous.

• 56:42Speaker 02

  When in reality, we are doing something incredibly profound, that is making real change, political change, personal change, biological change to other people around us. You deserve money for that. That story needs to sink in, and then that value exchange is gonna feel so much better.

• 56:58Jay Shetty?

  So powerful. I'm so glad you made it so easy and clear, and it's so true, I have so many friends who are artists who do something, and it's quite easy for them, or it's effortless for them. And then they're scared, and there's this beautiful old made-up story that I heard a long time ago, where it's not true at all, but it's got a nice message. And Picasso walks into the marketplace, and this lady sees Picasso, and she says, Picasso, will you draw me a portrait? And he says, sure, I'll draw your portrait. So he grabs a pen and paper, and he draws a portrait of her, and he gives it back to her, and she says, Picasso, that took thirty seconds. And he's like, it took me thirty years to do that in thirty seconds. And it's like, when you're working as an artist, you're almost recognizing and reminding yourself that When you're putting a value on your work, you're putting a value on all the training,

• 57:43Jay Shetty?

  all the pain, all the stress, all of that that went into that piece. That's maybe have taken you twenty hours, maybe took you two hours, maybe took you two minutes. But there's so much experience that went into that piece. And so whether it was a quote on Instagram or whether it was a piece of art, we're always valuing how long it took us to do the thing, not how long it took us to live what it took to do that thing.

• 58:07Speaker 02

  I also think we think that because art can be joyful or easy to make, that it shouldn't be worth money.

• 58:12Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 58:13Speaker 02

  Because I had a really good time writing my book, I should give away it for free.

• 58:16Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 58:17Speaker 02

  Which is ridiculous. I think we we almost feel like we've got it too good. Could I love the process and be paid for it? Yes, you could, because your art has a lot of value and you deserve to be paid for it. Again, I I want artists to understand that what you are making has value. You deserve money for it.

• 58:36Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, no, and I think about it all the time, like, there's also this feeling of, if you're doing something truly to help people, it should be absolutely free.

• 58:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:45Jay Shetty?

  And and that's a really interesting one. Go on, you have a reaction. I can see your reaction to that, so like.

• 58:51Speaker 02

  I think it happens for artists a lot, too, and I I get a lot of creatives telling me that, oh, their family members are asking for free art. Or, you know, if you really wanted the world to change, you would give it away for free. Lots of narratives, again, constantly asking artists to work for free, devaluing creatives, devaluing artists. And it's so painful because it's it's kind of a seductive narrative. I actually really want to hear what you have to think about it. But this idea that it's only generous if there's not a value exchange is just so cruel. And it leaves artists, first of all, it perpetuates the scarcity story and the artists are poor, that we have no money, which means we end up not creating that much, which means we don't have the money, which means we're working multiple jobs, which means we can't create the art.

• 59:33Speaker 02

  Like, if we don't support and nourish artists with money, we lose artists. So we need to be paying our artists. If you want more art, if you want an art, a world that is filled with books and movies and creations and musics and beautiful gardens and good food, we need to support our artists. And I still think that when we put our art up for sale and when we sell it, it is a profoundly generous act, especially when we ask for money for it in return.

• 59:59Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, you asked my opinion on it. It's similar to yours. I remember at one point in my life, I was, I had a hundred million views and I was four months away from being broke. And. I was starting to think, okay, I'm gonna have to go back to work. I'm gonna have to get a job again. And I know that the job I would probably get would be demanding because that's the job I'd get with my education and everything I have. And therefore, I'd probably not be able to do much of this anymore. And that means if I can't make this anymore, but the hundred million views I have, the comments and everything I'm reading are, Jay, this really helped me, this changed my life, I shared it, I, like, all the comments I'm reading are like, people have benefited by this. But I'm not gonna be able to do that anymore because I don't know how. And I remember going through that whole process and I was thinking, well, wait a minute.

• 1:00:44Jay Shetty?

  And, and at that time, I was shaming and guilting myself for even thinking that I could charge for something. And I was like, well, but how do I do that? And like, but people are getting value from it. But then I really wanna do it for free because that's how I was trained to always. And obviously with my monk background, it's like, everything was for free and everything was charity work. And so I really had that conditioning. And then I thought to myself, well, if I give up what I love, that helps people and serves people. And I can't do it any longer. Is that the world I wanna live in? And it was a really clear answer where it was like, well, no, I wanna live in a world where I can do this forever. I can help more people do what they wanna do. We can even create teams that will all be living a purposeful life that they wanna, excuse me, that they wanna live in.

• 1:01:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:01:28Jay Shetty?

  And will be able to hopefully impact so many more people who will create amazing journeys for themselves. And I'm so glad that despite any criticism, shame, guilt that comes with that path, I'm glad I made that choice. Because I'm far happier having pursued that than I would have been if I just went, okay, well,

• 1:01:46Speaker 02

  I'm done.

• 1:01:46Jay Shetty?

  I'm done now because I can't afford to do this anymore.

• 1:01:48Speaker 02

  What a huge loss for the whole world if you would have been like, I'm done.

• 1:01:51Jay Shetty?

  And for myself.

• 1:01:52Speaker 02

  And for you, yeah.

• 1:01:52Jay Shetty?

  And, and the creative of like, just also just not, just thinking about, well, I can't make more if I don't have enough to make with, like,

• 1:02:02Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:02:02Jay Shetty?

  Who am I gonna pay to edit the video?

• 1:02:03Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:02:04Jay Shetty?

  How am I gonna film this? And how, how, all of this? And there was, even, even with the podcast, which, which is free. And I always thank everyone for us allowing to have our sponsors and our ad partners, which is the way we're able to do this. And we're so, I always say this to everyone, well, not everyone, I say this to my friends behind closed doors. I'm like, we're so selective over which brands we work with, which companies we partner with in order to present that to our community. And we probably leave more on the table than we even make because of that desire to get it right. And I'm not saying that to sound holier than thou or sound, what I'm saying is, everything's done intentionally. And I think if it's done intentionally, there's a heart there and there's a truth there of wanting to serve and wanting things to be good.

• 1:02:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:46Jay Shetty?

  And the podcast is absolutely free, but there are certain things that may not be if that person wants to hold that integrity for themselves.

• 1:02:54Speaker 02

  I love that. No, it makes a huge amount of sense. I think artists are just constantly, people always want to call them out for selling out. And I don't know why we're so vulnerable to that narrative, because you don't go up to your accountant who's doing, you know, important work and say, why are you being paid for this? We don't go up to, we don't ask other people, why do you want money for your job? But we ask artists that all the time. We ask creatives that all the time. And it's interesting and I don't fully understand the narrative there, but I question it. And I want to like double down, like we deserve to be paid and we deserve not to be questioned about that as well. Like, of course, we bring value, we deserve money.

• 1:03:35Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, yeah, I think it's because, and that's a great point. It's like wanting to understand it. I think it's because emotional and spiritual exchanges are not valued in society as deeply.

• 1:03:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:03:46Jay Shetty?

  Right? Like you can't, we all know there's people you meet that energetically make you feel better.

• 1:03:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:03:52Jay Shetty?

  Because you don't know to pay for that as an energetic exchange, you almost think it's impure if you had to pay for it. So we see money as impure and we see art as pure.

• 1:04:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, and we don't like them touching.

• 1:04:03Jay Shetty?

  Correct.

• 1:04:03Speaker 02

  Whereas I want to very gently suggest that art is like messy, human, like not pure at all. It is holy and incredible and the most important force ever, but it's messy and it's human and it's ugh. Same with money. It's like, you know, none of these things are impure or pure. They're all very human ideas. And I believe art and money belongs together.

• 1:04:24Jay Shetty?

  No, I love that. I want to ask you a few more about some emotions that artists often go through. I think one of them today is oversaturation.

• 1:04:33Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:04:33Jay Shetty?

  This feeling of it's oversaturated. Like I was looking at someone the other day, a friend of mine said to me, they said, Jay, I feel like you were one of the first podcasts. And I was like, I think you must be kidding, right? And they're like, no, no, no, I think you were like one of the first podcast. I was like, I launched my podcast in 2019 and I pulled up this chart. I googled it. There were three hundred and thirty six thousand podcasts that existed in 2019. And of course, there are so many before that that were that were well known and and big as well. And it was like, but to them, because I was the first podcast they'd discovered, I must have been the first podcast. And I was like, it's rarely the first thing of anything that takes off, has lessons, is whatever. Today, I think there's over probably.

• 1:05:13Speaker 02

  I was about to ask, do you know the number?

• 1:05:14Jay Shetty?

  I think I could be wrong, so but maybe like two million maybe today?

• 1:05:17Speaker 02

  Okay, cool, yeah.

• 1:05:18Jay Shetty?

  And so I'm sure it's high because it's been five years.

• 1:05:20Speaker 02

  I still, I want to say though, like two million isn't that high.

• 1:05:23Jay Shetty?

  Not for the world.

• 1:05:24Speaker 02

  There's seven billion of us. People are like, I couldn't start a podcast, it's saturated. I'm like, it is, there's two million podcasts, there are so many of us, there are billions of us. I think we can kind of get the scale a bit confused sometimes.

• 1:05:36Jay Shetty?

  Totally.

• 1:05:36Speaker 02

  But yeah, whenever anyone says, I can't, it's oversaturated, no.

• 1:05:43Speaker 02

  Plus, there's no noise like your noise. There's not that you, again, you're a one time phenomenon. You're never going to be repeated. You have something to say that's never been said, you have a viewpoint that will never be replicated. You almost have your own market.

• 1:05:56Jay Shetty?

  Yes, there's so much, I I see that more and more when I see creators come up and I'm like, there is so much demand in the world.

• 1:06:04Speaker 02

  We're so hungry for art.

• 1:06:06Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, for art and to be seen and you can make people feel seen in a way that no one else can. And that's your superpower and that's what's so beautiful about you and that's what's needed. Because you're going to make someone feel seen, heard and understood in a way no one else can, in a way I can't, in a way you can't, in a way.

• 1:06:23Speaker 02

  I love that.

• 1:06:24Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:25Speaker 02

  I really, I often use this example when people talk about oversaturation and art. Because I think art sits in a really different space to other products. So for example, like a toaster, I only want one toaster. Or I could maybe want to, but basically I want one toaster, but I want hundreds of books. I want, I can watch so many films. I can have so much art around me. Like I want so many different types of plants for my garden. I want, you know, to try different types of food. Like we have a really, really big appetite for art.

• 1:06:54Jay Shetty?

  That's a good point.

• 1:06:55Speaker 02

  And so when people come in and say, I couldn't possibly be a writer. There's so many writers in the world. I'm like, I can't have enough books. Like I'm mainlining them on audiobooks, like just all the time. Like art is not toaster. It's not a fridge. We don't need just one of them. Um, we have a much bigger market than you realize. And I, I always feel whenever a creative, I very gently say this, when a creative comes to me and says, I can't, it's over saturated. I go, there's got to be another reason.

• 1:07:22Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 1:07:22Speaker 02

  You're playing small, like, cause it's a, it sounds great. It sounds like a perfect excuse, but we need your voice. There is no noise, no noise like your noise. Start taking up space.

• 1:07:34Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 1:07:34Speaker 02

  Again, like two million podcasts, seven billion of us, and I want more podcasts. I listen to new podcasts all the time.

• 1:07:40Jay Shetty?

  Totally. And, and most people I've found listen to a collection of podcasts.

• 1:07:43Speaker 02

  Totally.

• 1:07:43Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, people, and people always ask me that, like, oh, how do you feel about so many other podcasts coming up? And, and that's the funny thing. It's like, that's the conversation when you're established and the conversation when you're new is there's too many.

• 1:07:53Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:07:53Jay Shetty?

  And when you establish, everyone's like, oh, and I'm like, I love it because most people are listening to like two or three different podcasts at the same time. It's how we, like, we don't all go, I only watch Netflix. It's like, no, I like shows on Apple and I like some shows on whatever else there is here. Sorry. I'm, I only know the channels in America. Yeah. That HBO and Hulu and whatever else there is. It's like, you don't just go, oh, no, no, I only watch this one platform.

• 1:08:16Speaker 02

  We have a huge appetite.

• 1:08:18Jay Shetty?

  I don't use Instagram. Like it doesn't work like that.

• 1:08:20Speaker 02

  No. And like on Instagram, it's like, oh, there's an over saturation of poets. I'm like, I, give me all the poets.

• 1:08:27Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:08:27Speaker 02

  I'm not just following one poet on Instagram.

• 1:08:30Jay Shetty?

  Totally, totally.

• 1:08:31Speaker 02

  And there's a renaissance for so many art forms at the moment because of social media, because we have this like connection economy and there is more space than ever before. And it can feel like there's a lot of noise because of these spaces and because when you scroll through Instagram, you can see a lot of creators, but it's because we're hungry. For it. And more than ever, we're hungry for very vulnerable, real connection. We're hungry for art.

• 1:08:53Jay Shetty?

  Yes.

• 1:08:54Speaker 02

  In a world where we're showing a lot of, you know, listicles or like viral content, like we're hungry for human expression. And so it's time for artists to step up, take up space, share their art, make things because we're desperate for it. So yeah, I really want to hear anything to do with the saturated market. I will shut that down.

• 1:09:11Jay Shetty?

  That's a great answer. I love it. Another emotion I think a lot of artists experience is jealousy.

• 1:09:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:16Jay Shetty?

  If we're being really honest, jealousy and envy of like, I wish I had that. I wish I got those views.

• 1:09:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:21Jay Shetty?

  Why they?

• 1:09:22Speaker 02

  I'm jealous of you, Jay. But I am. But I see jealousy as a compass. I think it can be a beautiful emotion. If we let it fester, it can be toxic. I love the way you use your platforms. I love the art you make. I love the way that you use this podcast, like, and then there is a definite, like, almost, it feels a bit like jealousy, like, I want what you have. But I can use that in a way that is incredibly inspiring to me in my art. And I know where it is I want to go. I can learn from you. I can be taught by you. I can follow in your footsteps. And if we can use jealousy in that way, rather than sinking down into patterns of comparison. So instead of me sitting here and being like, oh, why am I not in Jay's position and like listing the reasons why and like comparing

• 1:10:05Speaker 02

  two incomparable artists, I can say, I can use jealousy as a compass. And I really wish that artists could see it in that way because again, it's another emotion that can take us down. We can feel constantly less than, never enough. And I also feel like it's an emotion that maybe doesn't go away. I'm not sure if that's been your experience, if you've seen that, like, it doesn't matter how big you get. There's always someone who's got something that maybe you want or something like that. And it just, if you don't get a handle on it, I feel like it's not something that, yeah, it doesn't fade away with success.

• 1:10:35Jay Shetty?

  Yes. Yeah. There's two questions I ask clients of mine when I'm coaching them. And the first question is, who do you envy? And there's no one that I've met, no matter how successful they are, that doesn't know that word on the tip of their lips, like that.

• 1:10:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, they've got them there.

• 1:10:51Jay Shetty?

  They know it. And I've found that learning to deal with envy and transform it is core to happiness and fulfillment in life because.

• 1:11:02Jay Shetty?

  You can't forget even how much you do what you love. Even if you did what you love every day and it paid you well, you'd still be unhappy if you had envy in your life. Like envy is that force that what you're saying to use it as a compass. And what I often do, and I said this to you the moment you walked in because I love it the way you write. I said to you, oh yeah, I probably need to take a workshop with you. And that's me saying I'd rather study with you than envy you.

• 1:11:27Speaker 02

  I love that.

• 1:11:28Jay Shetty?

  Like, that's the choice I get to make. I'd rather study you and your work and how you've learned that and study with you and grow and have a relationship with a mentor than to envy that person and and want to never give myself the opportunity to grow and become, but only to unbecome and unlearn and kind of go backwards.

• 1:11:48Speaker 02

  That was stunning. I loved everything you just said so much. I feel like that's so beautiful, the idea that it's an it's an opportunity to level up soon as you feel that jealousy and envy. I think you've got two options. It's like you could really let this take you down or you could really let this take you up. So it's very exciting.

• 1:12:04Jay Shetty?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's similar with imposter syndrome. I have to feel like imposter syndrome is a sign that you've leveled up as well.

• 1:12:10Jay Shetty?

  Yes, yes.

• 1:12:11Speaker 02

  You're in that new skin and it feels like uncomfortable. But yeah, it's it's an opportunity to say, no, I'm gonna learn from you. I'm gonna, yeah, sit at your feet. I love that.

• 1:12:20Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, absolutely. We Need Your Art is out right now. I'm excited for everyone to grab a copy of the book. Amy, is there anything that I haven't asked you that's really on your heart or something you wanted to talk about that we somehow didn't get to that you want to share now that intuitively is coming to you?

• 1:12:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, we could talk for a long, long time.

• 1:12:36Jay Shetty?

  For sure.

• 1:12:38Speaker 02

  I think I want to talk about how when I wrote We Need Your Art, and it was, you know, not long ago, I love that I got to speak to the creative experiences from in the trenches and because it can be such a challenging experience navigating yourself as a creative. There's so much rejection, silence, you know, imposter syndrome, comparison, like so much of what we've spoken about. And I love that I got to write this book. In it, like I'm still experiencing rejection, I'm still experiencing violence. Yeah, exactly. And I love that I got to, yeah, delve into this topic with everyone as we all navigate it. Um, and yeah, I'm very excited for people to get to read this book and to, to, for me to be on that journey with them.

• 1:13:22Speaker 02

  Like the greatest privilege in the world for me is to sit by an artist and watch them create. Uh, there's no greater honor to me. So yeah, I'm very excited for this, this book baby to be in people's hands.

• 1:13:32Jay Shetty?

  That's beautiful. Me too. I really believe it's gonna be that, you know, that generational book that's gonna inspire all these new creators and artists at a time when I don't feel ever since social media took off, we've really had a book that speaks to that dilemma of being an artist. And I feel like we need your art is that book.

• 1:13:52Speaker 02

  Thank you, Jamie.

• 1:13:53Jay Shetty?

  I'm really excited for you and excited for everyone to have it, excited to read it myself and have it. Uh, but Amy, we end every On Purpose episode with a final five. These have to be answered in one word to one sentence maximum. So Amy McNe, these are your fast final five.

• 1:14:08Speaker 02

  I've been preparing.

• 1:14:09Jay Shetty?

  I love it, I love it. Uh, question number one, what is the best advice you've ever heard or received?

• 1:14:15Speaker 02

  I love what Liz Gilbert says when she says, this world is just a school for endless learning. I love this idea and I feel like you embody this so much. It's like, this is just a school for endless learning. We just get to keep being curious, keep learning, keep making mess and then finding something magic within it. And I love taking that into each day because it allows for so much room and it gives me, even if it's shitty or even it's good, I love it.

• 1:14:41Jay Shetty?

  I love it. Uh, question number two, what is the worst advice you've ever heard or received?

• 1:14:46Speaker 02

  Honestly, like in a more general term, it's about be careful. I wanted to recklessly pour myself into my art. I wanted to be risky. And the words I kept getting was be careful. And it made me feel like I was doing something wrong. But I love the invitation for artists to rebel, to be the revolution, to just be messy and recklessly like throw themselves into this creative life.

• 1:15:10Jay Shetty?

  I just got goosebumps. I was like, that's really like, they're so right that that cautiousness, which is for safety, but always ends up feeling like it trapped you instead of keeping you safe. Yeah. That's beautiful. I love that. Uh, question number three, what is the worst piece of art you've ever made?

• 1:15:29Speaker 02

  Oh man, you should talk to my, my partner. So we write books together. And so I'll write the first draft and then he'll read it. And watching his face as he reads my first draft, he's like, what is this?

• 1:15:42Jay Shetty?

  He's here right now.

• 1:15:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, it's because I, and I pride myself on this, I write spectacularly shitty first drafts. And I'm genuinely proud of it because I just word vomit, just la, la, la, la, la. There's so much magic in there, but it is difficult to navigate as an editor. And poor James really has to wade through some shit. But I'm incredibly proud of my first drafts.

• 1:16:03Jay Shetty?

  I love it. That's great. And what is the, your favorite piece of art that you've ever created?

• 1:16:08Speaker 02

  I wrote a fiction book called Regrettably, I'm About to Cause Trouble. And it's just that, it's that don't be careful kind of vibe. It's a witchy historical fiction, like rebel book. And I love, it was this reckless abandon novel of just throw yourself in. So she, she has a special place in my heart.

• 1:16:27Jay Shetty?

  I love that. Uh, fifth and final question, which we ask every guest who's ever been on the show. If you could create a law that everyone in the world had to follow, what would it be?

• 1:16:36Speaker 02

  I want people to make some shitty art. I want you to find out what happens when you take perfectionism out of the equation and you just let yourself create. So yeah, make shitty art. That's all I want.

• 1:16:50Jay Shetty?

  I love it. Amy McNeever on the book is called We Need Your Art. If you don't follow Amy already on Instagram, inspired to write. Uh, Amy, it's been such a joy. I look forward to getting to know you so much more. I'm so excited for you to continue to create art in this world and we definitely need your art. So.

• 1:17:07Speaker 02

  Thank you. I'm yours, Jane.

• 1:17:08Jay Shetty?

  Happy to have connected with your work and found it organically, fell in love with it. And it honestly does work wonders for me when I'm struggling and figuring things out. And I'll just go to your page and find something that resonates very, very deeply. So. And anything I do that helps anyone, you get the credit for it too, because.

• 1:17:23Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:17:24Jay Shetty?

  It definitely, I wouldn't be able to do it without people like yourself. So thank you so much.

• 1:17:28Speaker 02

  Thank you for your art. We need your art. I'm so grateful for you.

• 1:17:31Jay Shetty?

  Thank you. If you loved this episode, you will enjoy my conversation with Meghan Trainor on breaking generational trauma and how to be confident from the inside out.

• 1:17:42Speaker 05

  My therapist told me stand in the mirror naked for five minutes. It was already tough for me to love my body, but after the C-section scar with all the stretch marks, now I'm looking at myself like I've been hacked. But day three, when I did it, I was like, you know what? Her thighs are cute.

• 1:17:56Speaker 06

  Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, the House Majority PAC dot com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.

• 1:18:26Speaker 07

  Mr. President, my company informed me of the explosion on our rig on October 2nd. Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all keep the blame on me. Tom Cruise is. Digger got us into this mess, and Digger's gonna dig us up. From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:18:43Speaker 08

  What would happen if I stopped drilling? You stall, you freeze to death, that's what.

• 1:18:47Speaker 07

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 1:18:50Speaker 08

  I'm not the first nanny.

• 1:18:51Speaker 07

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17, not a minute without parent.

• 1:18:56Speaker 09

  Espolone Tequila. Balanced, delicious. 100% agave, 0% ego. Just add ice, lime, and your mouth. For real margarita, ride the rooster.

• 1:19:06Speaker 07

  Espolone Tequila, 40% alcohol by volume, 80 proof. Copyright 2026, Campali America, New York, New York. Drink responsibly.