023: You Already Know
Artist and Author Scott Erickson (Scott The Painter) joins us this week to talk about what happens when a dreams dies, the ways vulnerability connects you to God and the world around you and how practicing the presence of God is practicing being known.
This week’s Practice:
Breathe In: Jesus
Breathe Out: You Already Know
+ 023 You Already Know - Scott Erickson Transcript
Scott: It's all coming together.
Chris: It all coming back.
Tim: Back. Yeah.
Chris: Coming back to me now.
Scott: [foreign language 00:00:08]. Did it.
Chris: Were you ever a musician or always kind of a writer?
Tim: Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on.
Chris: Okay. Fine.
Tim: Hey everybody. Welcome back to 10000 MINUTES Experiment With Tim Timmons, your host and your other host, Chris Cleveland.
Chris: Oh, hey guys.
Tim: And Emmoe Doniz. Oh, she's not here. She's not here. And to be honest, we asked her not to be here.
Chris: No, we didn't.
Tim: We've just had a lot of problems with her.
Chris: Everybody needs to take a break.
Tim: It's so true.
Chris: Have you seen that stupid meme? It says, "I'm for mandatory vacations." But it looks like vaccination. Gets people riled up on Facebook because they don't read anything. So stupid
Tim: Anywho, so Emmoe is not here.
Chris: She's on vacation.
Tim: She's on vacation, gosh.
Chris: Let's go.
Tim: The goal. And then we've got Mr. Scott Erickson with us.
Scott: Hello, hello, hello.
Tim: Scott is a dancer from Ireland.
Scott: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Tim: When did you lose your accent?
Scott: Co-creator of-
Chris: River Dance.
Scott: River Dance.
Tim: Really?
Scott: Yes.
Tim: Did I get that right? I was kidding.
Chris: I feel like it is.
Scott: It was River Dance. Who's the guy who created it?
Chris: It was a whole thing.
Scott: Michael Flannery? No.
Tim: No, that's the... Isn't that like Bart Simpson, Michael Flannery?
Scott: Mr. Flanders. Ned Flanders.
Chris: Ned Flanders. Yeah. Is that right?
Scott: No. In the, I think it's the '90s or the early 2000s. That was everything.
Chris: I remember the commercial.
Scott: And we're talking about something 20 years ago. Yeah.
Chris: I remember the commercial. All the men dancing. Yeah.
Scott: The upper torso arms down.
Chris: That's right. Straight up.
Scott: Below. These bubbles there's a flurry of activity from the hot tub.
Tim: We'll leave that right there. This is perfect. This is the perfect intro. All right, everybody. This is episode 23 of the 10000 MINUTES Experiment. So thank you for listening and jumping in so thankful for you. And if you guys want to get any more information on this, you can go to 10000minutes.com or go to our Facebook page or Instagram and page or like subscribe or comment. That would be wonderful.
Tim: We're trying to just figure out how do we join Jesus all week long? So these conversations hopefully are helping you. And if they're not, just don't tell us. If you guys also want to get the free text messages every week, you can also go to 10000minutes.com and figure that out or text, 10K to 55678. Once again, 10K to 55678.
Tim: This episode we've got my friends, Scott Erickson, or you might know him as Scott The Painter. Scott is an artist. He's an author. He's had his stuff on CNN, National Geographic, tons of magazines and newspaper outlets and books. So I think you're going to love this. This episode has some crazy profound moments and per usual, a ton of laughs. So get ready.
Tim: Scott Erickson. You, what we like to call, you draw and paint and you do the arts?
Scott: I'm an arts guy.
Tim: I mean, so people always ask, "So are you an artist?" I'm like, "Yeah." And they think, that I mean I do what you do.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: When you say I'm an artist to people, do they think you do musics?
Scott: No.
Tim: Gosh.
Scott: When I say I'm a full-time artist, it's like I said, I know how to fly. I don't know. It's people look at me like
Tim: How did you do that?
Scott: And it still amazes me that people are like, "Well, you can't make a living as an artist." And I'm like, "What? Have you not been paying attention? You can't make a living as a manufacturer. What are you talking about? The only way to make a living now is being an artist." It's so funny. I just think people are like, "Oh, you just don't know how to do that. How do you do that?" I'm like, well, this is what I tell people. I say, I-
Tim: Yeah. So I'm on a plane right now.
Scott: The umbrella. Yeah. I'm sitting next to Kenzie and-
Tim: Yeah. Everybody just so you know.
Scott: ... I make my living
Tim: Say what happened?
Chris: Yeah. I don't know, two or three years ago, my wife came home from a trip and she says, "I met them most amazing guy on my flight and he's,"
Scott: [crosstalk 00:04:03] to your husband.
Chris: ... an artist and an author." And she had like bought your books. And so it was-
Tim: It was John Stevenson.
Chris: Yeah. It was-
Tim: But you knew John Stevenson.
Chris: So yeah. We've been keeping up for years now. It's been pretty cool.
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: But we just met today.
Tim: Okay. So Kenzie meets you on the airplane-
Chris: And then you say, I-
Tim: "Hey, Scott, you're Scott. Well, I'm Kenzie. What do you do?"
Scott: Yeah. And I say, "Well, I'm an artist." And I think, I actually think I said that. And she's like, "Oh my husband's an artist." Yeah. If I remember correctly. When I tell people I'm an artist, I give them the, I'm like, "Look, I make my living as an artist. I do that by being an illustrator and a painter. I also make books and I'm an author. And then I do kind of public speaking, performing arts." This kind of a thing. And those are my three kind of buckets of work that I do. And all kind of tie in together, but that's the revenue... If they want to get into it, I'm like, "Those are my revenue streams."
Tim: There you go.
Scott: It's like, "Sell artwork, sell books, sell experiences," I guess, how you'd say it. Yeah.
Chris: Did it take you a while to accept that you were an artist or did you always know? Because for me, I would never call myself an artist. It took me decades to be like, "Oh yeah, I'm an artist."
Scott: Yeah. I think because when we say artist, we think we need to be like Salvador Dali or Buick or somebody who's a little bit on the border of being like schizophrenic and homeless. But yeah, no, I think.. It was actually in my late '20s. I was a high school teacher, a high school art teacher, but I was 27. And I remember that year, I really had a moment where I was writing on my whiteboard during my prep period, and I just stopped and I was like, "There's something else I'm being invited to do. I'm not sure quite what it is, but I know there's something else."
Scott: And that began a conversation where I ended up going to New York to visit some friends and I met a bunch of artists and I just knew, on the flight back, I was like, "If I don't try to be an artist, whatever that means," because at the time I was like, what does that mean for me? "I'll always regret it." And that I stopped teaching. I kept my job waiting tables, which is, sometimes I'm like, "I don't know if I'm a good artist or not." I know I'm a really good waiter. And so in my darkest moments, I'm like, "I should go back to waiting table. I know I'm really good at that."
Tim: I mean, the cash is really good when you're serving."
Chris: Worst case.
Scott: Yeah. And then just started that journey, a long poverty stricken journey. Things I've worked out now, but yeah. You sign up for a thrifty existence for a long time I think.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: I had an old studio mate, Jason Renz. And he just was like, "This idea of the wealthy artist is a very new idea." He's like, "Mostly we've signed up for a thrifty existence.
Chris: I had this conversation with my wife the other day because she went and saw Eric Clapton and she was like-
Scott: Oh, yeah.
Tim: Another artist.
Chris: They're so old, right?
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: And I was like, "That just tells you that artists don't do this for the money." He doesn't need to do it anymore.
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: He could sit at home, but he does it because he loves it. And so it's the same drive when you're real rich and you just love it and you have to do it as when you have nothing and you love it and you have to do it. It's like the same thing that takes you through your whole life. It never goes away.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: When you say performance art. Are you doing like Lion of Judah, Jesus upside down pictures? Were those some of your first things you were doing?
Scott: I never did that. There was a guy named the Jesus Painter, Tim. It was his name. Tim's-
Chris: Yep. Was that where you flip it over and it's Jesus face.
Tim: Yeah.
Chris: Was it like I can only imagine?
Scott: Yeah. There's a number of artists who that's there's thing.
Tim: Yeah. Which is great.
Scott: It is fun. I have thought through a lot of, what is the attraction to that? And I guess it's for the audience to go-
Chris: "Oh."
Scott: "Oh, I get what's happening. And some like, "Oh cool. I didn't see that coming." I guess there's a craft involved, but I was like, mostly I think it's just people going, "Oh, I get it. Oh cool. I get it."
Tim: Yeah,
Chris: Yeah.
Tim: I mean, maybe you see Jesus in the mundane or in the chaos. Maybe you can-
Scott: I was doing one where I was making a French toast and fish sticks and then I flipped it, and then there was an outline of Jesus or Mary in it. And-
Tim: Did you really?
Scott: No.
Tim: I would love that.
Scott: And then we ate it and it was like a communion experience.
Tim: Scott, you-
Scott: Performance art. So performance art means, and this just has occurred in the last five years where I realized, I was like, unless if a studio artist, meaning I don't want to just sit in a room making things for eight hours a day. But I was like, "I want to create things that eventually land in front of an audience." Performance art that's non-musical, often we think of Maria Abramovic or these performance artists who do abstract work and eventually get naked at the end. I don't necessarily want to do that. I say in my show, "Say yes," because I do this dance at one point and I'm like, "I don't want to get naked. Although there was some significant mid drift just moments ago." That's like my first foray into it.
Tim: When you're reaching up higher [crosstalk 00:09:07].
Scott: Yeah. My arms are in the air and I'm wearing a crop top. It's that kind of stuff.
Tim: People, if you're not familiar with Scott's work, it is so good. And it's not just good, it's provocative. And I think with your art, you say so much. I know that sounds so cliche like that's what art is supposed to be, is a wonderful song from the '90s, More Than Words. That's really what your art should be.
Scott: By Extreme. Is that right?
Tim: Yeah. By Extreme. I love that song. I could play the fire-
Scott: Sounds good.
Tim: ... out of that song right now in guitar.
Chris: Would you just take a break, listen to it.
Tim: Oh, we might just take a break. More than words. But you inspire me with your art.
Scott: Oh thank you.
Tim: And that does not happen often. There aren't many artists that I follow. And I love your work because I get so much out of it. And even in the midst of this past season, you've done some pretty provocative pieces, but I really think they are in line and aligned in helping us realign to the heart of the kingdom and of Jesus. So number one, thank you. And we've been friends for a long time and it's just fun to watch you be awesome. So one of your books is called 40 Days of Practice and-
Scott: Prayer: Forty Days of Practice.
Tim: Yes. That's what I said, Prayer: Forty Days of Practice. And this whole 10000 MINUTES, what I love about this, is that we are so in on the same track. So 10000 MINUTES it's all about, how do we join Jesus in the 10,000 minutes of our week and not just in the 80 minutes that we gather, but all week long? How do we just literally join him in what he's doing and go along with him. Can you just explain a little bit about this book and what you're hoping to do? I mean, you've got, May It Be So, you've got a bunch of stuff out here. The Advent stuff was awesome. So people, if you want some beautiful things to look at, to read and to be encouraged by, check these things out. But what are you trying to do with your life other than look super hot?
Scott: Well, let's go back to just, what am I trying to do with my life? That's a bigger question.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: Let's go back to, how do we participate with Jesus, the Christ, the giver, the Holy mystery of all of existence? I would say the biggest significance that has happened in my spiritual practice over the last decade. And this is coming partly when things stop working for me, meaning my practices, meaning the way that I chose and lived in the world. I had to reexamine those because the way that I was doing before, that was informed by the sacred narratives I had thought or the scriptures or what I was told to think about, they just didn't work anymore.
Tim: What's that, and can you give an example of that?
Scott: Yeah. Bluntly, I've had a number of friends die of young ages and mostly cancer and some suicide. And I realized just with that conversation with death, I found that, and I really enjoyed how I grew up. I grew up in a great church, so I'm not like, "I got to... Oh, those guys ruined me." It's not like that at all.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: But I realized that the Christian culture that I was in, spend a lot of time obsessing about afterlife. And this is why nobody asked me to come to conferences. The truth is that, nobody knows. Nobody has any idea what's after this, if there is even anything. And I say that as a person of faith who thinks that there's something. The farthest I'll go is that I've received grace here and I think grace will be there too, whatever that is.But there is this unknowing and this lack of control about that.
Scott: And then I started to see that, wow, the end times obsession that I grew up in, the afterlife, the heaven, that's all just trying to control a mystery that's scares the bejesus out of us.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And I was like, is there a spiritual practice, a spiritual way in the world that acknowledges that there is this lack of control, that acknowledges there's this great unknown mystery? And does it actually have something to do about today in the life I'm finding myself in? I think I found myself in the midst of a church culture that knew what to do with afterlife, but kind of didn't know what to do with this life.
Tim: Wow.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And besides judge others and blame the gays for hurricanes. So I found that... And it was Father Richard Rohr, Franciscan friar, Richard Rohr, who spoke about Franciscan practices. And he summed it up this way, he said, "The basis of Franciscan spiritual practices is that the physical world is the doorway to the spiritual world, and the spiritual world is much, much larger."
Scott: And so what he's saying is like, there's no way to access this larger reality, which, this reality of the unknown or the unseen, there's no way to access it except through what is seen and what is real. For example, Jesus says, "When you gave somebody something to eat, that was me, or something to drink." So there's this very tangible interaction with a physicality that then opens some kind of doorway to a larger thing. And I think we've all kind of experienced that in some way where we're doing acts of kindness or grace or forgiveness or love, and then that we have some kind of, there's something larger going on in this moment that's capturing us.
Scott: And so that helped me go, "Well, how do I interact with God today in the simple things I can do?" And I trained as a spiritual director and I finished that training, and where Justin McRoberts and I wrote the prayer book was from, was, this is the biggest change for me, is that prayer is not about getting God's attention like pots and pans like, "Are you listening?"
Tim: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Chris: Yep.
Scott: Prayer is about becoming aware and awakening to the work and voice of God already in your life.
Tim: Right.
Scott: A spiritual director is not like, "Well, let's see if we can ring God up and talk to God today." A spiritual director is like, "How can we find where God has already been working in your life, and maybe you're just not seeing it because of busyness, noise, fear, these things, being closed off, a lack of vulnerability, a lack of repentance, or acknowledging I need help, whatever gets in the way of that?"
Scott: So that has engaged, even today I was like, man, I took my kids to school and I'm going on a trip tomorrow so I stopped by this coffee shop to get some coffee, because I'm a coffee snob when I travel so I bring my own stuff. And I was in the car and I was like, "Okay, I don't know if I'll have any real poignant, quiet time today, but this is my time in the car to go to be open and aware and just say I'm listening. What is going to happen today? Who am I going to interact with? How can I stay open to your work and voice?" And I don't know if God's like, "There's something going on in the capitals with all the world leaders, Scott Erickson get in there."
Scott: Like probably today it's like, "Your son's got a dirty diaper. Get in there." Like that. It's probably a lot more humble. And we could even get into seasons. Like I have a three year old at home, and we're in the middle of a home renovation. There's just a lot that's demanded of me and I keep butting up against these self-imposed expectations of what I should to get accomplished. And I'm coming out with a book this year, my wife is coming out with a book next year and we're just busy. And we're like, "Wow, next fall when our youngest is in preschool, that'll be just a different paradigm for us."
Chris: It is, for sure.
Scott: Yeah. And so like recently a friend encouraged me. She heard story that Glennon Doyle, the author, a woman brought her young baby to her and was just like, "I want to do more in the world. And I'm trying to do as much as I can." And she just looked at the mom and she goes, "When this child is in kindergarten, we'll be ready for you."
Scott: And I think that's just a good, gracious piece of advice that sometimes we have to acknowledge that we'll find ourselves in certain seasons and we will be like, "I got to do all this stuff." And I think if we paid attention to how the spirit is working with us, the spirit might be like, "I've given you this thing to care for." And this is all that you need to do today. That's fine."
Chris: Do you think those practices that you have helped ground you in that and say, "Oh, this is like," talk about like the faith you inherited didn't care much about this life but cared more about the afterlife. Do you think these practices help you care about like the dirty diapers and the craziness that's going on, and the chaos of life. And see the Kingdom within that more so than, like if you're a Christian waiting for heaven or a dad waiting for kindergarten, to be able to sit in those moments and find Christ in those moments, even in the chaos?
Scott: Yeah. I mean, I think that there is, that life has this paradoxical nature to it. And a paradox, if those listening are not familiar, paradox just means, the space in which two seemingly opposing truths exist at the same time. And I learned this from the writer Parker Palmer, and when he said it, he was like, "At the core of the Christian faith is a paradox. We have Jesus who is man and God at the same time, which is too opposing truths. But so it's not a solvable paradox. What we do is we enter into the mystery of that, and that's how we're transformed."
Scott: And so what I have found in my experience is, that life is what you make of it. life is asking you to participate and if you don't want to, you don't have to. So it's up to you in some ways, what do you want to do? How do you want to be? What are the things you want to accomplish? How do you want to be in the world? That's up to you. But there's a part of life that's going to happen to you. And we could say, and I'm hesitant to say God is involved with that, but in some way you're being led in a way that is a mystery unfolding. And how do you be open in saying yes to that? Because-
Tim: This is literally, I think your book of, Say Yes, right?
Scott: Yes.
Tim: Isn't this kind of the whole concept of that-
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: .. is discovering the purpose of life beyond the death of a dream, right?
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: So this is like in the frustrating stuff of life, yeah. Keep going.
Scott: No. Yeah. So the death of a dream is basically that moment of where you're like, "I thought my life, this situation, I thought I would be different by now.
Tim: Yeah.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And the death of a dream is this real poignant, painful moment of like, "Oh, this happened to me or I'm at the spot and I can't change the past." But I think, and I'll give away a spoiler alert, what a death of the dream is, is what needed to die was this image that you've had about yourself, your life, that is a life without vulnerabilities.
Scott: None of us, when we imagine our, "Dream scenario." We don't go, "Man. I can't wait to accomplish that marathon." What we don't imagine is going, "Man, I had to do eight months of physical therapy with a PT because I'm in my forties and my knees don't work very well anymore."
Scott: When we imagine opening us the business we've always wanted to open, we didn't imagine that we would actually have to partner with somebody to get the capital to start our business. And now we have this kind of tension and weird relationship with somebody else. Vulnerability is not our weaknesses. Vulnerability is our relationship with our weaknesses. And we live, especially as men in a culture that's like, don't let your weaknesses show, so when we feel vulnerable, it's like, "Oh, I have an uncomfortable feeling with my weaknesses." But we can learn that actually our vulnerabilities like, "Hey, I'm aware of that I need help."
Scott: Vulnerability literally means just to take off your armor to make yourself touchable and available. And that I have found is actually the only way to connect with the world, each other, and to God, Honest Advent, which is my advent book, the whole mentality of that book was like, Jesus came into the world just like we all did, which is through human vulnerability, through weaknesses. And it's a meditation on the weaknesses that are embedded in humanity that Jesus participated in. And that's how we find Jesus in our lives today still, is through these kind of places where we need help, we need others. We don't have it all together. It's the antithesis of perfection.
Scott: And so what I submit in, Say Yes, is like the death of the dream was necessary because it was the thing preventing you from getting to the life that you're being invited it to. The perfected image of yourself is the thing of the way. So the giver of your life is okay getting that out of the way because there's a life beyond this death of a dream, which is a life pursuing the desires that are in you, a life that you're being invited to. And it's kind of that, it's this co-creation of life. And so-
Tim: What's a dream that you had and have had that you had to kind of die to that in a sense, to say yes to what was reality and what was now?
Scott: Yeah. Well, this was the catalyst of the whole thing. So I'm 44 now. And when I was 39, about to turn 40, I had this experience that I was not in control of, I guess. I put my kids to bed and I walked out in the living room and I found that I was crying, not because we had had a magical bedtime story or anything, but something was happening to me and I couldn't stop. I ended up going into our only little bathroom in the whole house and I just sat on the toilet and I just wept for like 45 minutes.
Scott: And my wife found me and she's like, "Are you okay?" And I was like, "I don't know what's happening to me. Something's going on." And I was having this moment where with some reflection, I was like, "Oh, a dream." I actually know who I kind of want to be in the world, which is, I want to be a performing artist. That sounds so like [inaudible 00:23:36] Four. No, but what I was crying, it was that I was going, "Man, I wish I knew this when I was 18." Because one of my creative heroes, a comedian, he knew at 18 and he's created five one-man shows and directed three films. And I just feel like I've been stumbling through my life, I say, like falling down some stairs to my present day.
Scott: And the big question, when I was like, "Well, why can't I do this?" And then the voice of fear, or I say, the voice of giving up was like, "Nobody cares about an almost 40-year-old man trying to do something new." And I was like, that's a real strong argument because it sounds embarrassing. It sounds really vulnerable. And I had to, Say Yes, the show and then the book, is about the mental health and spiritual practices I developed to move past that argument, about how to be a contribution, how to let this old dream die and resurrect to the desire that was calling my name today.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: And when I talk to other creatives or other people who are like, "Am I too late, or I want to do this thing," it's 200 and something pages, it's a lot of material, but the summary is like, you can spend your whole life hating the miracle that you've been given, which is your existence, or you can just start saying, yes to it. And that means saying yes to the body you're in, saying yes to the life you're in, saying yes to the time you're in, saying yes to the weaknesses and vulnerabilities and the strengths and possibilities that you have. There's no other place to start except for where you're at right now.
Tim: Right.
Scott: And so you just have to just say yes to that. And-
Tim: How does that work with Jesus? So this episode is actually a lot about practicing the presence of Jesus. We've been doing about six episodes on this. So what does it look like to practice the presence of Jesus in the midst of this?
Scott: Yeah. Well, when we say Jesus, so Jesus is a lot of our own projections in some way. So-
Tim: Yeah. Which Jesus are we talking about?
Scott: So, we have this Jesus Christ. So we have this Christ who John at the beginning of John says, "That off this word of God, all things were made through him, all things by him." So we have this front facing part of God that's threaded through all of existence. And then we have this particular manifestation that happened on the world that his name was Yeshua and he was born of Mary and this whole thing. And then those two have connected somehow. So I'm Christian, because I've had some kind of experience with this presence, this Jesus, this Christ, this, sometimes the names change, however you want to say it. And so going back to the practices again is like, can I find that voice and work of that Christ already in my life?
Scott: One of the things I say in the show and in the book is, and it's kind of the center of the book, the center of the show is, so we know God is love. So love wants to, and I have this picture that I show of this picture of water trying to pour in a glass, but the glass is moved and the water is just pouring out. And the picture has a bit of a heart shape. So it's like, love wants to pour itself out into you, but you can't receive love if you hate who love made you to be, because this is the only, you are the only container that love has given to pour itself into.
Tim: Yeah.
Chris: Wow.
Scott: So God is inviting us to have a co-creative life. It's that paradox of, there is you doing something in the world, but there's also you paying attention to your deepest desires, which St. Ignatius long ago said, "That is the calling of God in your life." That takes discernment, because desires lead to all kinds of things, but they lead to flourishing. So God has kind of put a roadmap or a pathway in you and is leading you somewhere.
Scott: So I think it's paying attention to that and then having to say yes to this container. Instead of going, the whole middle section's on comparison, because we live in this massive culture of comparison, and we have to move from comparison to contribution. So often where we get all messed up is like, "Well I'm not this person," or, "I'm not this person."
Scott: And in the Say Yes Show, I actually act this out, where I'm like, "You can be a follower of Good News and be at the party going, "This is amazing. Oh, Hallelujah, praise." And then just looking around and inwardly you're going, "Well God, how come I'm not like them? Do you like them more than me?"
Chris: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Scott: "Because their life looks awesome and my life really sucks right now. We're doing the same thing. I don't understand. Do you have favorites?" So you could have this outward, "It's all great. I love it so much. Praise, Maranatha." But inwardly, you can just be like, 'But how come I'm me?"
Tim: Totally.
Scott: "How come I'm not like them?"
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And that is the deeper thing that we have to talk about. That is the deeper prayer that we need to deal with. Forget about manifest all this stuff in my life, let's start with, Do you love the gift of your existence?
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: Because if you secretly hate your existence, then that how can love really be working through you? How can you be a conduit of that love into the world. This is why Jesus says, "Love your neighbor as you love yourself." Like there is this kind of symbiotic relationship of, if you completely hate yourself, what capacity of love do you have to give to others?
Chris: Right.
Scott: I'm not saying being self-focused, we have TikTok for that, but I'm just saying, it is the well from which you draw from. What is the well from which you draw from? Is it from religious obligation? Is it from codependency or is it from like, "I actually have this spring of love that flows and flows, and I have thing to offer all the time because of that?"
Chris: The first step is awakening to the Christ in yourself-
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: ... a little bit. And so what is the first step, I think for people who have been given, "Don't trust yourself, don't trust your feelings. What's in you is bad."
Scott: Excuse me.
Chris: That kind of stuff.
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: Which I think a lot of us got, which then makes us think, "Well, if we're made in the image of Christ, if Christ is in us," what you're talking about, "Then how do I know what's Christ, and how do I know is the bad stuff that I'm supposed to get rid of that church told me to as I was growing up." What's the first step to get out of that and into this framework that you're thinking about?"
Scott: Yeah. And that's such a good point. In fact, as I started doing, Say Yes, around the country, I would hit upon this where people are like, "Well, you're not supposed to love yourself." And I was like, "That is crazy talk. What are you talking about?" I get it. Maybe don't. I mean, if you're saying, "Don't be so self-involved and narcissistic." Sure.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: "Hey, boomers pay attention." But this is a really great question. I don't have a stock answer, so let me just talk through it. Again with this paradox idea, I think there is this inner work we have to do and then this outer work, and those two will be partnered together. There's this great book by Twyla Tharp, who is a famous choreographer in New York City. She's done a lot of ballet and dance choreography. She has a great book called Creative Habits.
Tim: Oh no.
Scott: Just look up Twyla Tharp's book.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And she gives all these exercises about developing creative work. It's really great. She has this really interesting one where she says, "For a week, don't look in a mirror." And what she's saying is, when you see yourself in a mirror, you are judging who you think you are. And she's like, "Pay attention to," because you're like, "Well, I have a zit. My hair is out of place. My eyes are off center." I don't know. You're basically Sloth from Goonies, but you're making all these judgements and diminishing what you think you can do or how you can be in the world. But she's like, "Spend that week paying attention, not on your own filter of how you judge yourself, but on how you see others reacting to you."
Scott: Like when you're kind to them and they're kind to you back, or you have friends who love you and they didn't go, "Hey, are you all put together today before I see you?" And then you realize you have this kind of rubric of judgment that you're always assessing yourself on. And that's not really reality, it's just your made up narrative about yourself.
Scott: I think that's a really interesting, it's a creative exercise, but I think it's actually a spiritual exercise. We often go like, "I can't be a contribution until I do this." But really just showing up, being kind, being gracious, focusing on others, is a way to go, "Wow, I can really contribute something to the world." So I think that, and often we have to move our bodies into understanding.
Scott: So I think you have that, and then I think you have this other aspect which is this inner conversation. And I would say start that conversation by being silent. So you can if you need to, write all the things out and get it all out, but Jesus says before he gives the, "Lord's Prayer" He says, "Your Father in heaven already needs before you ask. So just," don't be like the pagans with all their words and words and words. And I remember probably right before I participated in writing, Forty Days of Practice, I just was like, "So my Father in heaven already knows everything I need." So what do you talk about?
Scott: And what I did for around a year, is as much as I could, some mornings I didn't, but I'd wake up really early, I'd make a cup of coffee, and I'd just sat in my living room in the dark. I think I started lighting a candle, just lit a candle, and I just sat there for 20 to 40 minutes. And if I needed to, I'd repeat and be like, "You already know." Because stuff would come up, I'd be like, "What about this? What about this?" I'd be like, "You already know." What is it like to spend time in the, "You already know?"
Chris: Wow.
Scott: And I found that a lot of my fears and anxieties and shame was rooted in not believing that God already knew.
Tim: Right.
Scott: And I needed to begin to kind of... I needed to... I knew that God knew, but I needed to know, and you, the listener, I'm holding my chest and body, I'm like, I needed to know interiorly that God already knew. Because I didn't know. And I had to spend time practicing that. And when that began an intimate conversation of being known and knowing, and it didn't need a lot of language at first, it needed presence. And we've talked about practicing the presence of Jesus, I needed to practice being in that presence of knowing.
Tim: Yep.
Scott: Because there's a lot of head knowledge of, "I know this story and this story," but I didn't know what it was like to just rest in all my anxieties and fear and have God, "I already know. I already know everything you need."
Tim: Wow.
Chris: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Scott: Then when you see the Lord's Prayer, the Lord's Prayer is not a checklist of things to say to God, the Lord's prayer is the practice of being known. And it's a reminding yourself of what God already knows. Like God is in heaven. This will is being done on earth as in heaven. What we need is what we need for today, and then I need to be healed and forgiven just as I need to heal and forgive others. It's this like, "Yeah, this is what I'm invited to do today, is to have this knowing in me."
Chris: Yeah.
Tim: I mean, it's a practice of knowing and being known.
Scott: Yeah. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Tim: I mean, really if you look through that prayer, half it's about Him.
Scott: Yep.
Tim: But here is the actual theology you need to know about God.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: And then him knowing, that's really great, Scott.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: I mean even just for fun people if you're listening, hopefully somebody is listening. That's going to be my practice this week. Actually, I'm going to join you in that Scott in spending time in the morning or when you ever need to, just sitting there quiet saying, "You already know. You already know." Gosh, I love that.
Chris: Yeah. That's cool.
Scott: Yeah. Are you friends with JJ and Dave Heller? Do you know them?
Tim: Yeah. Yep.
Scott: JJ actually wrote a song based off... We had a conversation and I said that to her and then she wrote... I think I did an Instagram post about it too. And then she wrote a song called, You Already Know. It's a really great song.
Chris: Which is probably the most beautiful song ever because she's amazing.
Tim: Yeah. I don't like her much. But great-
Chris: Just a little jealous.
Tim: Yeah.
Chris: I love the way that you're connecting the mind and the body, because I think for me, a lot of times I'm in my head on it, but I'm also multitasking, right?
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: So I can be in my head saying, "God, all these things," blah, blah, blah, but I'm taking care of kids and I'm doing all this stuff, or working or trying to do whatever. But rarely, rarely do I say, "Oh, I'm going to sit my whole body down and really engage in this." And so that's really powerful. Yeah.
Scott: It doesn't have to be stillness either. I don't know if we were recording when we were talking about the walking, but walking has become a real important, I mean, spiritual practice and physical, mental practice. I mean, there are studies that say, just walking improves your mental state, your happiness levels, all of that. So my friend Lindsay, who happens to be a therapist here in town, she was like, "If you had three hours to do whatever you want, what would you do?" And I immediately was like, "I'd go on a walk in the woods." It was like, that's all I want to do is go on a two-hour walk every day, and that's a little not possible right now.
Scott: But I went on a 30 minute walk last night after dinner. It was nice out. I was like, Can I just... I'm going to go for 30 minutes." And it is, it is less about... See, I think what's moved for me, and I think anybody on the journey of dealing with God or life and stuff, it might not be this way, but I feel like what happens is prayer and presence is less and less of a shopping list of things to cover and more about engaging in the presence that's already available right now.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And people go, "Well, how do you mean? God's available right now." The work is really just to remove what's getting in the way. It's not to, "Oh, I need to all of a sudden do this stuff so then I can finally connect with God." I actually... What if you started from the place like, "I'm already connected with God." It just feels a lot less shiny than what you think it's supposed to feel, but I'm already connected." But maybe what's in the way is the noise and the chaos and the busyness and the expectations and the shame and the guilt and all of these things that I put on it-
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: ... that gets in the way. There's a little drawing at the beginning of the prayer book, which, because when we were putting that book together, we were like, "This is not a book of prayers, this is a book of excavation tools.
Tim: Right.
Scott: The prayer is the hidden ongoing secret interior conversation you're already having with God, or about existence and the giver of existence. And so we use a tuna fish can. So we have, the prayer is the tuna fish. That's what's already in you, now life creates a hard casing around that, which is your ego and fears and noise. And then we showed a can opener, and on the handles was words and images. That's what our book is, words and images.
Scott: And this is a can of opener. That's all this book is, is a book of can openers. The prayer is already in you. How do we know this? Because when... Has this ever happened to you? When you get in your car, you turn on the radio and a song comes on, and you turn it up and you're like, "Ho, ho, ho. This is my song."
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: What are we saying there? We're saying somehow lyrically and sonically, which is, I think what you guys try to participate in, the artist has perfectly depicted what it feels like to be in my own skin. They gave me words and they gave me the harmonies that emote. And it goes, "Gosh, this is how I feel. Yes. This is exactly how I feel in this moment."
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: So the prayer is not the song, the prayer is what's already in you that the song is pulling out.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: This is why when somebody says something and we all go, "Mm." It's because they're resonating what's already in us. And so prayer is about, I think a lot about getting in touch what's already in there. What's already happening in there. And it's helpful to have words, songs, images. I think that's why the Psalmist goes, "The heavens declare your glory." We can see this stuff in nature and the world around us. It's mirroring, it's resonating. It's like a tuning fork. It's a tuning fork that's helping, it's humming inside of us already, and it's getting in touch with that. That's, yeah.
Tim: Wow.
Scott: Are you going to sing a song right now?
Tim: (Singing).
Tim: So more than words is all I have to do to make it. Crap, I forget the song, but it's pretty good.
Scott: Man. If we were editing this for NPR or something, it would definitely be like More Than Words is the actual song to this conversation.
Chris: More than words.
Scott: You keep talking about words and prayer. More than words, and you're saying my song. You're talking about a song coming on the radio. I mean, I don't think that song has come on the radio in the past 45 years.
Scott: I'm sure it's on like Jack FM or something, decent rotation. That great.
Tim: Speaking of Jack FM.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: [inaudible 00:41:35] good.
Scott: Segue
Tim: Can't segue at all.
Scott: Jack FM is just like, "Let's just throw everything in there." Easy. They're just like one-
Tim: [crosstalk 00:41:45].
Chris: [crosstalk 00:41:45].
Scott: It's like a 350 hour playlist. They just have robots. There's nobody in there. It's just constantly running through with commercials built in.
Chris: That's funny.
Tim: It's genius.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: It's genius.
Scott: It's one guy runs it.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And his name is Jeff. Yes.
Tim: Scott, speaking of Jack, there's so much good stuff in there. So thank you. So once again, speaking of Jack, it's now time for Scott Erickson 10000 questions.
Scott: Okay. Ooh.
Chris: Ready?
Scott: Ready.
Tim: Buddy, this is rapid fire and you better do good. Is what I'm trying to say.
Scott: Okay.
Tim: Does that make sense?
Scott: Yeah, I'm going to get in a place to [crosstalk 00:42:26]
Chris: [crosstalk 00:42:27]
Scott: ... physically I'm ready to answer. Yeah.
Tim: When I dance, I look like-
Scott: Elaine from Seinfeld.
Tim: Gosh.
Chris: Ooh. I like that.
Tim: I believe that. Three favorite shows.
Scott: Favorite shows, What We Do in the Shadows, Battlestar Galatica and MacGyver
Tim: Old or new?
Scott: Old.
Tim: Okay.
Chris: Nice.
Scott: That probably doesn't work. If I watched it now I'd be like, "It's not,"
Tim: It probably doesn't hold up.
Chris: Just keep it where it's at in the memory though.
Scott: How about saved by the bell. Let's just say.
Chris: ... Come on.
Tim: I'll get my guitar for that one again.
Chris: I'm saved by the bell all the way through, college years and all. Let's go.
Scott: Oh, yeah.
Tim: Gosh. That was a little later for me.
Chris: Was it?
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: Do you know they made, here's, my name's Scott Erickson. They made a Saved by the Bell, the new class. It only lasted one season, and it was kind of all the same characters, but with different... The main character, the Zach Morris character, his name was Scott Erickson. It's true. And you can't really find these episodes anywhere.
Chris: Was Screech a teacher or something in that. Did they bring him back for a second?
Scott: So the Zach Morris, the Scott Erickson, he had black hair. The guy who was A.C. Slater was more of a rocker, but a big guy. He had long black hair.
Tim: It wasn't really them older?
Scott: Screech... No, no, no. It wasn't them older, it was a whole new cast. And it didn't take well, so they only did one season and they were like, "No, no, let's not do it. It's true.
Tim: What's your best feature. Speed around. This is a speed around.
Scott: I'm going to say my smile.
Chris: That's my best feature.
Tim: I agree with that. I think you've got a great smile.
Scott: Thank you.
Tim: Pet peeves.
Scott: People who don't use their blinker and... it's mostly people who don't use their blinker. That's it.
Tim: That's it?
Chris: Are you okay with late blinkers? Are you a blinker [crosstalk 00:44:14], right?
Scott: Like while they're turning, they turn it on?
Chris: Yeah. I feel like the blinker has to come on before the brake light.
Scott: When they do it I'm like, "At least you tried." Yeah.
Chris: Yeah. Okay.
Scott: So I have a little more grace for it. But when they just turn, I'm like, "Why do you think they put that in the car?" That's the, I don't want to know.
Tim: Three words to describe yourself.
Scott: Moody, creative and Norwegian.
Tim: If you could go anywhere right now with your family, where would you go?
Scott: All expenses paid?
Tim: All expenses paid by 10000 MINUTES [crosstalk 00:44:43].
Scott: I want to go to Iceland so bad.
Chris: Ooh.
Tim: Done. Look in your email in about an hour-
Scott: Yes.
Tim: ... and you just won-
Chris: We're going to give you two train tickets to Iceland.
Scott: Today's podcast was sponsored by Icelandic Air, and you answered correctly.
Tim: Right. What if that was true? Last time you cried?
Scott: Yesterday.
Tim: Okay.
Scott: Do you want to know the story?
Tim: Sure.
Scott: I was retelling the day before and it still brought me to tears, my toddler, he got a fever over the last few days. And then two nights ago at 4:00 AM. we got up to get the medicine, and he was hot. His body was so hot, I've never felt any of my three kids that hot. And I tried to go back to bed and I couldn't. And I just was like... And it wrecked me.
Scott: I told that story twice that day and I cried both times. And then I told yesterday and cried a little bit. Because this year I lost a friend of suicide, I've had friends lose kids, and I'm just like, it's so hard to love. It's such a risk to love something because it can easily be taken away. And it got me so good, where I was just like, "These kids annoy me at times, but man, I love them and I don't want to lose them." So that was just like... There's moments I think when you're a parent, that just the toughness wears you down and you're just like-
Tim: Yeah. It does.
Scott: "I'm slayed by love for you."
Tim: Yep.
Scott: You got me. Yeah. That's what got me.
Tim: Most quirky part about you. What is a quirk of yours?
Scott: I'm obsessed with nachos.
Chris: Ooh, what kind? All kinds?
Scott: Just all kinds.
Chris: Mm [crosstalk 00:46:20].
Scott: Just, that's all I want to eat every day, is nachos.
Tim: Drip cheese, like nasty cheese? What's that kind of cheese?
Chris: Ballpark cheese.
Tim: Yeah. Ballpark cheese or actual [crosstalk 00:46:31]
Scott: I mean, I'll do a good round chips with the cheese out of the-
Chris: The pump?
Scott: ... dispenser. I mean-
Chris: [crosstalk 00:46:37].
Scott: ... my more favorite, a favorite is Oven Sheet Pan Nachos.
Chris: Are you getting [crosstalk 00:46:45] though.
Scott: Just get it all mixed, meat and jalapenos and all things and just let it all cook together. Damn, that's the best. That's the best hangout food.
Chris: My dad used to just, yeah.
Tim: [crosstalk 00:46:57] get the nachos.
Chris: My favorite meal as a kid was when my dad would make nachos, which was basically Doritos.
Scott: Yeah.
Chris: And he'd get cheddar cheese, the brick and just cut cheddar cheese and just slap it on every Dorito throw it in the oven.
Tim: Oh, my gosh.
Chris: I thought it was gourmet.
Scott: That's great.
Chris: It was the best.
Scott: That's great. My favorite thing is a weekend with friends or something. We'll have had dinner and then we're up late and then somebody's like, gets up and just goes to the kitchen. And I'm like, "What are you doing?" They're like, "I'm making nachos for everybody." And we're all like, "Yes, that is the right move at this moment."
Tim: Okay. Well, if we ever go on the road again together, let's make some nachos.
Scott: Let's make some nachos.
Tim: Dude, you're awesome.
Scott: Thank you.
Tim: So great.
Scott: Appreciate the love today.
Tim: Where can people find all your stuff?
Scott: I'm trying my best to be on Instagram.
Chris: You and everybody else.
Scott: I'm Scott the painter on all. I have all these ambitions and I'm just really paralyzed by moving and childcare right now. Yeah. All the things are there. I'm slowly putting together shows around the nation for Say Yes. The book comes out at the end of January, so pre-order now if you just type in Scott, Say Yes, or Say Yes, Scott on Amazon, it'll come up. And kind of just want to... It's a material that I've been working on for like two to three years, and it's been a weird couple years to do anything, but I was like, "You know what, one last go. Tour it as much as you can, a book's going to come out, I'm going to film it really well. That's going to happen in the spring. And then be like, here it is."
Tim: Yeah.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: And so that's kind of... In fact, this morning or even last night, I was like, it's funny it's called Say Yes. I'm like, "I have to say no to everything so I can say yes to this." And I just was like, you actually snuck in on a good podcast, because I was like, "I kind of need to push podcast for a while." I mean, I think I have book promotion, so I have to do podcast. But-
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: You know what I'm saying? When you know you need to do something-
Chris: Yeah. I get that.
Scott: I had to shut everything down to get this done.
Chris: Yeah. That's right.
Scott: Yeah. And I just, I'm thinking through that stuff. Yep.
Tim: We would've found you at your house if you would've said no. So I think you're doing great. We're doing great.
Scott: And that means I'm coming to Nashville. I'm already talking with somebody, I'm looking for a venue. Do you know Taylor? Leonhardt?
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: Yeah.
Tim: Oh, her new record is so good.
Scott: Yeah. I just did an Instagram live with her two days ago. We were talking about coming to Nashville.
Tim: She's awesome.
Scott: She's great.
Tim: She's awesome.
Scott: Has she been on your set to podcast?
Tim: Not yet. Not yet. She's one of them. She's a fave.
Scott: It's low hanging fruit right there and she's short. So that metaphor.
Tim: Oh, gosh.
Scott: I called her the smallest giant in Nashville.
Tim: Yeah.
Scott: And she's like, "I think I'm just going to make that my tagline. As long as [crosstalk 00:49:42] Nashville.
Tim: Yeah. I [crosstalk 00:49:42]. That's really strong.
Scott: Yep.
Tim: Well, she does have feelings and she is really particular about being called short. So hopefully you might need to go and-
Scott: I asked her.
Tim: ... make amends.
Chris: No, it's okay. She loves it.
Scott: She owns being five foot.
Chris: Yeah.
Tim: Yeah. She laughed but underneath she told me, she called me, she's like, "He is a jerk." All right. Speaking of Jack. Thanks Scott.
Chris: Yeah.
Scott: Thanks a lot, man. It was great.
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