DO THIS To Let Go, Destroy Fear & FIND YOUR PASSION! | Pascal Monmoine

Little by little, I will see somebody doing, saying something different or I would think, oh, that's a better way to do this. Let me try to repeat it, let me try to embrace it. And then before you know it, it becomes your character.

Well, dude, you know, you and I have known each other and love each other like brothers for, gosh, pushing three or four years now. And, you know, it's been really inspiring to watch you help a lot of people transform their own lives through the. Just through the sheer act of love and kindness. How did you discover that love and kindness was such a pivotal part of your life? And why do you go out of your way to exhibit it to other people?

That's a huge question and one, you know me, usually I get quick answers. That's a huge one. I don't take any credit for it. I will say mostly it's from my own suffering, from my own discoveries. I was drastically different at 10, that I was at 20, that I was at 40, that I was not. Almost 57. You know, like most people, we change a lot. And for me, I went from being super shy, super introverted when I was a kid, having no emotional or intellectual connection to my parents. I mean, I love them, but I could not relate to them emotionally or intellectually. And they were super loving. They are wonderful people. But I didn't have a connection. So I went into my little shell. I had no friends, I was bullied a lot in school, you know, a lot of different stuff. I. I felt super shy, super introverted. And so I started to evolve that a lot in my twenties, simply because I was not happy being like this. So I just, little by little, I would see somebody doing, saying something different or I would think, oh, that's a better way to do this. Let me try to repeat it. Let me try to embrace it. And then before you know it, it becomes your character.

Yeah.

And I did the. And then around 40, after really, really bad, really painful divorce, I also started to learn many things. And, you know, I always feel like we are super lucky. It's pure luck if we take the path of kindness and love, because it's very easy to take the path of bitterness and being angry at the world and why me and bad luck. So, you know, I learned a lot there. And then I learned a lot again in the past four or five years because my health has been crapped. I died twice. Eight surgeries.

We're into that, by the way. So we're going to dig into the dying twice thing. You just kind of glossed over it like it was no big deal.

I know that's kind of like a summary, but basically, you know, and see, I made a way too long answer for you and I apologize.

I will say, if I had to summarize. I learned from my own suffering. And then whenever I have my own suffering, first I assume very easily that others have it as well. And it's not visible to the eye. It's not something you hear necessarily. You don't know. You don't know how deep their scars are, how deep they have been hurt so much. And you know, they are smiley and they dress well and you go through the day because that's how we do it through life. But you don't know how deeply they are scarred. So I just assume that anybody I bump into, whether in a grocery store line or a friend or dear friend like you or my many dear friends, I. I know that you're suffering, that you have suffered, and I choose to embrace that. It doesn't mean we're going to be sad and cry and all of that. If we need to, we do that. But it just brings me. It brings my heart to such a different place than going, oh, I'm going to judge him or her, or how do they. They're complaining about that or how, you know, why are they bitching about this? No, maybe something really bad happened both 15 years ago and two hours ago. I don't know. And I feel horrible as a human being, if I was not nice to them and something really bad had happened to them. And plus, it makes the experience so much happier to just bring love and bring compassion and empathy, all of that together. I don't know. It's such a better way to leave your heart, to leave your day, to live your life. At least for me.

Yeah. I mean, you know, and it's funny, as I hear you explain that one of the things that comes up in my mind is there's a sincerity about you that I've always admired. Like, there's.

Thank you. But you know, seriously, there's a. There's a super. There's a level of empathy. And I wouldn't even call it sympathy. I would call it empathy of. Into intuitive feeling of another human being that as one of the world's foremost photographers, and I know you're not doing it as quite as much anymore, but you have the ability to capture souls on film. That was the very first thing when you took a couple of my headshots, obviously, used to take my wife Karen's headshots a Long time ago and had these beautiful photos. But I remember showing that first bridge photo we did in Durham to Karen and Karen's mom and they said, that's how we see you. We. He captured your soul on film.

That's so sweet to say.

Do you feel like that the fact that you seem to be able to see people as they are has helped you in filming and photography and understanding kind of what, what, what they're going through?

It does, you know, it's really. I mean the photography. I decided I knew nothing about photography my whole life. 0. I had the tiny point and shoot camera from Best Buy, you know, for most of my life to just capture my kids and going fishing. And so I got one day after I was pretty big into day trading, which also I picked for passion. I only pick things for passion. The moment I'm both with something, I will let let it go. It doesn't matter how successful by other people's standard it is, how much money it might make. All of that I do not care. Because I know that today is not expendable nor replaceable. If I leave it going, counter love, counter passion, counter my soul, I'll never get it again. And now I know it even better because I died twice. So it's pure miracle, pure light that I'm back here, you know, I will not change a single thing about that. So yeah, so I was saying the photography, I got into it, the day trading, I loved it. For 10 years I gave seminars in the Caribbean, in Paris here. I was super lucky to touch people's life and to change the life of some of them by allowing them to become day trader and make a living that way instead of doing a job that I didn't like. But one day I was tired with all of that for whatever reason, I'm not even sure why. And I was like, oh, what about photography? Because I used to be an artist for a couple of years and I will paint and do commissions and sell my painting in exhibits. But I got both with that too because I get bothered with things and it's just the way it is. And so I was like, you know, instead of spending eight hours on a painting, I can go snap, boom. And the beauty that I see everywhere and in everybody now it's captured. So I got into it. I learned how to photograph. My first photos were absolutely ugly, horrible.

I really have a hard time believing that because your photographer, trust me, my.

Friend and I when I see them now, I'm like, why in the world did the human being was kind Enough not to say, Pascal, this looks terrible. This looks like. But they didn't, they were happy with it somehow, the first clients. And. But, you know, it's like everything else, we learn by doing. And, and it's the same in the way I think we craft our heart and our soul. We learn by doing, we evolve by doing. If I choose kindness 30 days in a row, every time somebody cuts me off in a car or something explode on the floor on my house, or some minor bad news happen, you know, by minor I mean anything except people getting hurt, help or dying. Everything else is truly minor. You know, things don't go your way then short of that, you know, you, if you repeat to yourself that you're going to accept it, you're going to accept everything. Acceptance is probably my biggest learning of the past 10 years. And you repeat it and you not you repeat it like, you know, like blah, blah, blah, blah. You react becomes you and one day you don't even. You can't even conceive. Oh my gosh, I used to be upset at that 15 years ago. Wow. That's a whole different person. And that's beautiful. We have such a capacity to evolve by either repetition or surrounding ourselves with people who inspire us, who bring us up instead of bring us, us down. Bring us, bringing us down. I can't even say it. 30 years here and I still can speak English. And so, you know, it's repetition. And I truly believe we can change for the better. Our heart, our soul, our spirit, and definitely our mind.

Why do you think so many people find it so hard to let go and kind of move in that direction?

Because they. There is a fear. Also I'm going to use a bad word and a word that I despise the way it is used, which is the world. And I'm going to say, because that's what I repeated myself a million times. Momentum is a pitch, meaning that if for 35 years you have thought this way, you have done this that way. And for me, I was raised in France. In France, people are, you know, not everybody thanks God, but most people are very bitchy, very negative, very critical, very racist, very pessimistic, that just who they are. No judging of that, of course, Yeah, I just moved away from them, that's all. And so, you know, if you hear that like I heard all of that and I was raised that for 20 years, then that's who I was. You know, let's say my daughter is in, is big about nature and the environment. She did environmental studies and she trained me a lot in the past many years to be super mindful of nature. To never trash something bad, do really good with plastic or better, never done something in a forest. And guess what? 20 years ago I was raised French and if I open the wrap of a gum, I dump it in the forest. I don't care. The forest is my trash can, you know, Or I throw something away. And now, today, by repetition, I could never do it again. Never. It is the same, I believe, with our soul, our reflexes, everything. But you need to want it. You need to say, today I'm going to do baby steps. Critical to do baby steps. Never big steps, never. Like I'm going to become the Dalai Lama in two months. No, no, won't happen. And president want it because you want to be you. Just, you know, the better version of you that you can every day. And, and so baby steps, very tiny steps. Today I'm only going to do one tiny thing where I'm going to think slightly better, slightly more evolved, if we call it evolved, just tiny, just one, not 15 times one. And you do the same tomorrow and the same tomorrow. And guess what? By day five, you'll be the one starving. Oh my gosh, it feels so good. To my heart, to my soul. Let's do it three times. Because it feels good, not because I have to. So, you know, baby steps, so very long, Way too long answer. I apologize to you.

Nothing to apologize about. I mean, this is great.

So very long, very long answer. Why do we. Why is it so hard for most people? Because either they want to change too drastically or too big. And they don't have any protocol to make it happen. And life is going to be tough, you know, you say, okay, this week I'm going to do one tiny act of non judging once a day. Guess what? Within two days you have a terrible day at work, something is bad in your relationship, your kids are challenging, you broke your foot, whatever, you go, the hell with it. I'm not going to work on that, right? Which is totally human, totally understandable. But you don't want to do it too big and you want to do tiny, tiny steps. And you want to have great self compassion. Because guess what? You can't extend compassion to people unless you extend it to that one first. Meaning whenever I fail, the world fail is terrible whenever, you know, things don't go as I wish they had gone. But it's okay, it's really okay, you know, you make a recipe, doesn't taste great, you still edit, it's Wonderful. Same thing with you. You know, have compassion, self compassion for. I didn't do my five step this week, but it's okay. Did you do one? Fantastic. Even if you did zero, next week you try again. You know, you just love yourself, and then you can extend tremendous love and compassion to others.

Do you think it comes from an expectation of.

Lack of a better word, failure? They just. There's their afraid to take steps because they're afraid they'll fail at taking the.

Steps a tiny bit. I mean, you know, there are many things I love in the American culture, but there are a few things that I'm less in big favor of, which is success, you know, and success, of course, comes with failure. Night comes with day. You know, wet comes with dry. You can have one without the other. So, you know, I don't know. I always say I've never had goals in my life. I just go with the flow of my soul and my heart on any given day.

I mean, the only person you need to feel good about is you in the end, you know, so. And once you do that, it doesn't mean that you don't do things where you go, oh, shoot, I wish I had done that different. But guess what? Then the next time, or the next, next time, you do it slightly better. And if it takes three times, you love yourself, you have compassion for your limitations today and maybe tomorrow. And then the third day you'll be like, oh, it felt so good to do that. Yeah, different. AKA better.

So the whole success, failure. If you remove the goal of success, there is no failure possible. It's just you living. It's just you being. You know, it's like when you take a shower, you don't try to achieve, oh, I'm going to dry the 1869 water drops on my body. You don't do that. You just dry. Some body parts are not dry. It's fine. You know, kind of do the same with your life and with the things that you do. Accept everything, just accept acceptance. I go back to it. But to me, it has changed my life tremendously, especially through all my health stuff, because otherwise you go crazy. Because for anybody, too much is too much.

Yeah. You know, when you. It's funny, you know, obviously you and I have known each other for a few years now, and one of the things that I've always appreciated about you is the ability to just walk away from things you don't love. I'm a huge proponent. I've been on, you know, doing this, whether I'm doing The show, whether I'm speaking somewhere or writing my own books or whatever. One of the things that I'm a huge proponent of is doing the thing that you're called to do, doing the thing that you're passionate about, doing something that you love. Because I believe if you do something that you love consistently enough, eventually you'll be rewarded financially or you'll at least be able to take care of your means and be fulfilled and content. Now you mentioned walking away from day trading and some other very lucrative businesses and all kinds of things along the way. Was that a very easy transition for you? Did you have to fight what the American culture would fight of, you know, am I making the wrong decision because I'm walking away from something that's very lucrative into the unknown or.

Well, that's a great question. Yes and no. Because I'm super lucky that I never make decisions based on what people think, including my family, you know, into the great despair of especially my mom. My dad passed away, but he felt the same way before he did. It's like, oh my gosh, are you changing profession again? Are you changing your work again? Which I've done day trading and photography are just two of them. I probably have done 15, 20 things, you know, over my other lifetime. And the same sometimes in a relationship they don't realize that.

You know, like a relationship unless it's truly fulfilling, it brings tremendous love to my soul, to my heart, and I can do the very same. And it's 90% happy. You know, it's hard to describe, but happy. And the same with any work journey that I do. I just, I just let it go otherwise because life is short. You can be, it's very ephemeral. God knows I know that. And you know, it's, it's very fragile. So unless you go to bed tonight and you go, you know, I live this day with love for the people close to me, with love for myself. Of course I'm always saying that in a non ego, non self serving way, you know, just love for yourself. I mean, that's a whole different question. I'm not going to get into it, but you know, in a very kind, very caring, very nurturing way. And then you can extend it to everybody, you know, kind of like you cannot teach people how to grow flowers unless, you know, you have grown your own flowers, of course. So in terms of the, the whole letting go, to me it was never hard, you know, and I went from, for drastic changes, you know, let's say from day trading to photography. If you want to talk numbers? You know, I don't know, my income went down by probably 30 fold, you know, not three times. 30 times. You know, I went from driving to gorgeous Porsche, you know, to beautiful sports car and having tons of vacation in the Caribbean and everywhere, you know, every year and a great lifestyle for my family to now driving a little, little, I think it's in Nissan. I'm not even sure what it is. But playing car and, and not taking all those vacations. But I'm the same happy. So, you know, you adapt. There will be no nothing worse. I see that in America so much where there is only one way to rate your life and you self worth, which is money and business success. Yeah, I wish there was like Instead of Fortune 500 magazine, there will be like heart or love 500 people. You know, it's like people who have nothing to do with money, no writing, but they transpire love and gratefulness and kindness and sweetness. To me it's really that spirit more than anything else. So if you don't rate, if you don't measure it by other people's standards, you, it cannot be too hard to change anything because it's your own standards. It's your life. It's very important to always remember it's your life. Not mine, not Stevens. Your life. Whoever is watching this.

That's right. You know, you mentioned you didn't want to jump into self love. That's where I think I want to go next. And I'll tell you why. My wife would gladly tell the world that Pascal made a huge impact in her life teaching her how to love herself and not to accept crap. In fact, my understanding is a story prior to her meeting me was you grabbing her face and saying stop playing in the dumpster.

So I know you've done, I know you've done that several times with people just trying to get them to understand that they're worth more and that they matter. Yeah, I think I feel like self love is at the root of all selfishness or the lack of self love.

I thought. I totally agree. And you know, and in the, in the case of Karen, you know, other people with who I've modestly done that, it's never, you know, in friendships or relationships, the number one thing you never want to do is say do this. But if the person is ready to do something really hurtful, you know, to their soul or to their body or to their mind, then with all the compassion and all the love in the world, you can grab their face very gently and go Please don't do it. Please. I love you either way. I'll support you and be there for you whether you do it or not. But please don't do it. You know, kind of the same with our children. It's always like, okay, if you pick choice A, here are the consequences and the pros. If you pick choice B, here are the consequences and the procedure. What are you going to pick? And I'm going to love you and support you the same way either way. Because guess what? I'm fully aware that this is your life and it's going to be your mistakes and it's going to be your joys, not mine. But I'm going to be there for you. And so in terms of, you know, telling people.

You know, you don't want to tell ever tell them what to do. But if you extend some true love where there is nothing in it for you, you're not trying to get anything from them, there is no benefit. You're just expressing pure love of like, I just want to try to help you avoid suffering that you're going to create if you make that choice.

Yeah.

And, you know, but I'm there for you either way. And you know, we, we do that too rarely, most of the time when we help people. And I know that, Steven, you're amazing at that. You know, from your journey, which has been also filled with pain and beautiful things and the whole roller coaster coming with it. You know, you give out of love. You know, you give attraction out of it. You give because you love people the same way that I do. So it's very important to give us as a true gift with absolutely nothing in it for you except having a chance for that beautiful human connection which is the biggest gift of life, you know?

Yeah. I mean, when it comes down to self love and stuff like that, I.

Mean.

I've witnessed you working with people. And when I say working with people, for everybody listening and watching, what I mean is he's actually being intuitively relational to people. He's not trying to go to work on them. He just loves them in the moment. He exudes it. And because he exudes, it's like gravity kind of pulls people towards them, which is really cool to watch. What are some of the maybe top three to five things that someone can do to begin to grow self love? Because I would dare say that most of the evil in the world comes out of a place of not feeling wanted, loved or appreciated.

I totally agree. I totally agree with you and I totally believe that if we are all the first year of life, everything is about us. You touched, you have tenderness, you have love, you have caring. Nobody is going to yell at you. Nobody. I mean, for most people, nobody is going to be unkind to you. It's like pure receiving. If we kind of had that and extended to all of us for the 31st years of our life, can you imagine what the world will be? I truly believe there will not be much, you know, like violence or evil or whatever we call it, or darkness. So I tr. I truly agree with you on that. And so in terms of the four or five things that people can do in. It's a huge question. But the, you know, it's interesting in. In a book that I put together a few years ago. So it's like a hundred inspirational quotes that came to my mind. They are all from my own journey. You know what I was explaining earlier where I say I will bump into a situation, I will go like, okay, that hurts. That creates hurts to me. Hurt to me. That creates hurt to others. How could I think it, do it, feel it, express it differently or embrace it differently? And then because I love words, it will come in a form of a quote to my mind. And then I started to post those on social media to my followers online and. And little by little, I realized that people were like, oh, my gosh, I so needed to hear that today. The number one comment is always, I so needed to hear this today. Wherever they are in that moment, that's what they need to hear and it helps them. So. And for me, they just helped me tremendously. And I still read them on and on. And so if I try to extract the biggest concept from all those quotes of concept, I mean, the number one will definitely be. There is probably a tie of number one. But the number one that comes to my mind will be, you need to live your life. This is your life, yours. You know, there is one quote that says, I'm not saying that you're right or wrong. I'm not saying that I'm right or wrong. All I'm saying is that this is my life. So it means you don't let somebody else judge you. You don't judge yourself. You don't judge them. You have that whole trio of setup, that triangle of. Of true mix of compassion and love to others and to yourself, and you respect your life going, this is all, all going to be my decisions. And guess what? Whether you make decisions to try to please your family, your spouse, your friends, society, the cliches, whether you try desperately to do that or you don't. You're going to be judged. So what about you? Just do it all for yourself, by yourself. You just define everything. If you want to do this this way, do it. It's your life. You're not going to live this day again. You won't. This day will not happen again. You won't have that choice. To leave it the way you want, the way it feels right to your heart, to your soul. You won't have it again. So do that first. Do not give a crap. To use a more simple world about what people think, about what you do and your choices ever. Just don't. Now when they say something, I always look for, if there is a critic, I'm like, what could be right about it? But guess what? I decide what could be right about it. And if they are right about it and I'm doing something that I could do better or different or that's not good, I change it, but I define it. So live your life by your own standards, 100%. So that will be number one. And the number one tie that I will throw in, there will be acceptance that I mentioned earlier. Acceptance will be like, you know, another quote in, in my book is to the spirit of.

Most of our suffering only comes from knowing that things could be different. And, and what that means is that if in this moment, let's say I have 12 worries right now, you have 12 worries. Whoever is watching this has 12 worries. Imagine for an instant, it's a very interesting exercise to that you truly, in this moment, accept.

Each of the situations triggering those worries just the way they are. Accept your children exactly as they are. Accept your spouse exactly as they are. Accept your work situation exactly as they are. Do not let your mind go but this, but that, but he could do this, she could do that, it could be this. Why is this happening to me? No, no, no, no, no. Freeze the time and go. I accept everything as it is. It doesn't mean you're not going to try to improve things for the things that you can, but accept deep, serene acceptance in that moment. It's super not easy neither to explain nor to do at the beginning, but I hope it will be clear enough for you guys to try. But it brings so much peace if you accept all of it. And to me, the extreme version of that was when I died twice and I went through all the aid surgeries and so many other procedures and struggles if I did not accept all of it, at some stage you go, you know, life is too hard. It's too much pain. It's too much nonstop. And whether it's surgery or other issues, we all have it. We all have had that kind of situation. So acceptance will be the number one tie or number two.

Love it. Yeah. So I mean, my takeaway from that in the bite sized moment was take ownership. It's your life.

Live it.

Except where you are. I think it's also just as important to accept where you can go if you would just lean into it. Right. And not be. And not be held hostage to limitations or expectations by other people. You know, I'm a. My journey has. Has ended up where it's ended up to date because I refuse to let other people's other people define who or what I could be if I was willing to put in the effort and the work.

And like you, you're such a great example of that.

Oh, thank you. Like you though, I've also discovered that money, wealth stuff is nowhere near as fulfilling as just having deep, meaningful connections to people and then taking everything that you've learned and then giving that as a gift to someone else so they don't have to suffer.

Absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, and the acceptance is also in terms of the limitations. You know, as you evolve in life, sometimes you have great health. And I'm so happy that in your case, for example, you have great health and a very able body. In my case, I've been super banged up now. You know, I have 26 screws in my face. I have a defibrillator in my chest with two wires in my heart. Half of my heart is gone. Like 40% of it died. Scar tissue in my first heart attack. I mean, I can't even run. Even if it was to say my life. There are so many things I cannot do physically. I get exhausted super easily. It doesn't sound like it. I know.

Because my sitting down, it's all good.

My spirit is not exhausted.

The spirit doesn't match the body, huh?

Exactly. But my body is extremely exhausted. But my point is, I used to do martial arts. I used to do tennis. I used to do so many things. And guess what? I'll never do them again. Never. It's not like there is hope that my body will get better. It won't. But without a deep, serene acceptance of that drastic change in my life.

I mean, my. My days will be horrible. Spirit wise and soul wise. And I will be missing the great beauty that I can still find in things. You know, today I walk 30 minutes. You know, before the first heart attack, I used to swim 120 laps three times a week. Guess what? Now I swim maybe 30, 40 laps and I'm exhausted and I have to take a nap, which to me feels like being old. You know, it's like. But I accept all that stuff and it is not. And you know, it is not easy, but you just do it because you do it with baby steps and you do it as accepting things as they are right in this moment. And it's just such a better way to live your life because is going to end either way. Either you fight it and you swim against the current many days or your whole life and then in the end you die or you accept and you go, oh, here is a little rock on the river, maybe I'll pose there. And instead of going through the whole river, I'm going to stay there for a couple of years. You know, it's like that. Adapt and accept. Those are two critical, critical elements. Same thing in relationships, same thing in your friendships, Same thing in everything.

Yeah. What led you to actually write the book? Choose your words, choose your world. I mean outside of the fantastic, outside of the fantastic photography inside of it which everybody, everybody should buy the book. And actually not only read the book, by the way, it's. This book is designed to inspire you when you need it most. It's not when you pick up and just read word for word for like you and you're done with the book. This is something that needs to be on your reading table that you just pick up anytime you're in need of a little inspiration or a little wisdom. But I'm curious to know what made you want to write it and put that book into the world.

So super simple answer for once. I have a simple one and a short one. I never thought in my lifetime I would first write so called inspirational quotes. They were just little memorandums, memos to my own journey to repeat myself. Things, things and to evolve on them. And then I never ever thought I would share them with people. But now we live in a world where we can share things with many people, which is wonderful. And then I never ever thought I would put in a book. But I started to share them. Like I mentioned before, it helped people, it touched their life. It made my heart so happy. Of course a book like that has nothing to do in the world with money. You don't make money whatsoever with something like that.

And nobody makes money from books.

Purely an act of love. And it took me tremendous work because I'm very anal and I will be moving one quote there and One photo there and this. And my daughter was like, that. It's perfect. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. I need to have it perfect my way.

And.

And so. So anyway, so many, many of my followers, you know, loved it so much, and they were like, you need to put that in a book. So instead of having one every day from you, we have all of them together and we can share them as gifts for friends, as gift for family. So that's. After hearing that, you know, 500 times, I was like, okay, like a few years ago, I'm going to put it into a book. And. And it took tremendous time again, because I'm very anal about it and very hard to pick the quotes, very hard to pick the photos. And then I just put it together. And one thing that might be helpful to people is I always say to myself, I say to myself, with a book, if I were to die two days after I published a book, will it be a good allocation of my time in a loving way, in a soulful way to my own journey, Would it make my soul and my heart happy from having touched people? The answer was yes. And so I say, okay, I'll just do the book. That's it. And without a single, you know, you cannot do a book like this or anything else without thinking, oh, it's going to become a bestseller. Oh, I'm going to do marketing, blah, blah, blah. Actually, I never, ever do any marketing for it because I don't want to bring marketing to it. You know, if it touch one person, it's worth it. So maybe that's a good way to approach things. If you think, is it really an act of love and is it going to bring something good to at least one person, then it's worth it. Not, is it going to make a million bucks? Is it going to make me famous? Blah, blah. All those are horrible way to live, at least in my modest opinion.

Awesome. Awesome. Well, I have a selfish question, selfish question for you now. It's very selfish. Very selfish, very selfish.

I'm sure it's not.

How did you know I was going to be good for Karen?

That's a great question. That's a great question. Well, you know, you're one of those people where it's so interesting where, I don't know, it almost feels like I'm a sponge for people's vibes, whether it has been in my friendships, in my relationships, in the line at Harry Cedar or the grocery store. I don't know. I. I feel that if you truly listen to People's voice and words and heart, they tell you who they are. And right away, I mean, when I met you. And you know, and as you know, you probably know and you already know that, you know, I love. I love the spirit of love women much more than men in general in many ways. And it just me being like this, just more sensitive. I love emotions, I love sensibility, I love to talk about life stuff. You know, I'm not into sports. I'm not like a guy's guy kind of stuff. So this is just to say that most of my friends are more women than men. And then when I met. So it's very rare for me to connect to men in terms of friendship. And when I met you, I was like, okay, that guy is so truthful, so full of love, so genuine, so joyful. And you went. And when I started to also learn your story, you went through hell and you transcended it. You made things beautiful. You touched people's life. You created things that bring joy to people. And I was like, oh, my gosh, this is like the ideal person for Karen. And also, you know, you always wanted to be a dad embracing your babies, which is so beautiful. And you're such a great dad to them.

Now these babies are like this tall.

I know the last time I saw one, I was like, stop watering the.

Boy because I can't keep my refrigerator.

So, yeah, don't water him. Stop that. No more showers. And so, you know, you just. I mean, Karen has a huge heart, huge soul, and crazy kind and crazy sweet. And she absolutely deserve. And I'm sure you deserve the same with her, you know, somebody with the exact same kind of soul and heart. And it's so critical. That's one thing that's very critical in relationships and friendships. You know, I've even broken up friendships. If somebody has a great soul and all of a sudden starts to make very hurtful choices, you know, cheating, being unkind, being racist, lying, but, you know, stuff that's really not good, then I will let go the friendship. It doesn't matter how long, you know, I've let go. I've broken up friendship with guy friends that were for 10 years. But if you keep bringing her to the world, I will have great compassion for you. But am I going to spend time with you? No, I just won't. Because I'd rather spend it with somebody like Stephen or like Karen. You know, people where we are very alike. We live in the same planet in terms of kindness chosen kindness chosen caring. So, no, you guys Were like the perfect match. It made my heart so happy. So happy.

We went from zero to 60 in under six seconds. We were met and engaged and married within six months, which was fantastic, which is just crazy. It had a mind of its own. It was wild.

So beautiful. Absolutely. Such a gift.

Yeah, it was beautiful. I want to go back to the story of accepting. Yes, here you are, especially in physical.

Physical roadblocks. So we both know people that struggle physically now. And one of the aspects that you just mentioned is obviously the physical limitations have not changed your love for yourself or for the world. In fact, for you, it's made it brighter. But some of the folks that I know that are suffering with various physical ailments see it as in.

For lack of a better word. And I'm trying to articulate this right way, but I don't. The only other word that's coming to my mind is death sentence. Like, it's.

What? I'm sorry.

It's like a death sentence. Like, you know, I'm. I'm done. My life is over. Because I'm.

It's like, I got cancer. I got a heart attack. I got this. I lost a leg. It's over. Yeah.

Yeah. How have you been able to transcend that? And maybe what is. What is something that you would share with them to help them transcend that as well? Because while you do. I mean, you do talk about the various. I mean, you're walking Walgreens most days with all the stuff that you've been through. And I say that with utmost love, of course, you know, you've been through a lot physically, especially recently, in recent years, but you still do carry yourself with love and compassion and empathy towards other people. When most people I see that have similar ailments or even any combination of some of the things that you've been through become very reserved. They kind of pull in. They kind of shun the world. They kind of become very isolated, and you tend to put yourself out there, especially now that you can get out there and move around a little bit now. So what's the difference?

So I will say, I mean, the only difference is that I'm super lucky that I'm able to transcend it somehow, you know? And there is absolutely not a single thing wrong in their world. It just pure luck that I was able to take a different path with it little by little, you know, step by step. Of course. Baby steps. Baby steps. And so the number one step will be to what you're saying is acceptance. Okay, I have cancer. I have A crappy house. I have anything big, you know, like not little Boo Boo, like big. Like for example, I had a spinal fusion because I lost the use of my right arm out of nowhere. So they had to go inside my neck, move the throat, go inside, use the back. It was not fun, you know, it was not cool and I wish it didn't happen, but it's not huge. It's not fun, just not huge. But for all of them, acceptance. So that's number one step. So whatever just happened to you. Acceptance. Don't go to the why me? Why now? It shouldn't. It couldn't. You know, it's unfair. Like there is nothing worse than the unfair concept. Life is not fair. Life is zero. Fair, zero, zero. You know, one of the quotes in the book is good things happen to bad people all the time. Bad things happen to good people all the time. Get over it. That's, you know, it's the same way that if you have a cold, your nose is going to run. You don't, you don't like super. Spend your life complaining about it. You accept it, right? So life is not fair. So why me? Forget that, it just happens.

So once you are past this, then you can shift to the next step, which is.

It'S a combination of two things. As I will see it if I analyze it. I mean, of course I never analyze it in detail to myself. I just go with it. But it will be a mix of.

Having a hyper awareness that this day, this hour, this moment, I'm not going to leave it again. I won't. Doesn't matter if I'm Bezos and I'm a billionaire. You won't leave tonight again. And I won't either. And you won't either. So a hyper awareness of it's not going to happen again. Now, within the coming six hours before going to bed, can I find any kind of joy, wonderment, gratefulness? Can I look at the squirrels on the tree running after each other? You know, can I share a smile with somebody? Can I share a tear with somebody? Can I cry in the arm of a friend? You know, can I have something that's love and gratefulness and appreciation? Can I realize that? Sure, I have a cancer. But look, my two eyelids are still working, my mouth is still working, I can still move my hand. Maybe somebody else don't have cancer, but they just lost the arm in a car accident, you know, and they are thinking, you know, that they are really feeling terrible because they lost the arm. It's more a matter of that whole thing called the body is like a freaking million miracles in this moment that it function. I have so much crap in my body, so much pain in so many origins, so many sources, but yet I have 900,469 things that work. You know, I can hear you, I can be on the phone with you. I was able to eat before coming here. You know, I'm not going to faint in the next hour. Maybe I'll faint in two hours because I faint all the time, but not in the coming hour. Maybe so, you know, it's. It's like a mix of deep gratefulness for the things which still are so very, very important things that still are focusing on that. You can also focus on complaining and feeling more miserable and pity for yourself for the coming six hours or you can try to shift and you don't have to be great at it. It doesn't have to be oh, you all happy for the coming six hours? No, there are times where I am down, you know, I can tell you after the first massive heart attack why died for six minutes the next few days I was like banged up. I could not feed myself after the spine surgery. I mean so many things were I'm down like everybody else. But guess what I do when I'm down. Self compassion. Take the love from the people who bring love to you. Very important to to surround yourself with the right people who will bring love to you the same way you will bring love to them when you're the one able and they are not. So, you know, so mix that the hyper awareness of how ephemeral and fragile and non repeatable are the coming few hours, what am I going to do with them? And acceptance. That's a long answer and I'm sorry, I make my answers way too long.

No, no, the long answers bring wisdom and insight and I think are where people find the nourishment from. I think people are tired of the a surface level answer just in general. They want deep. Right. You know, you mentioned earlier the hunger for deep connections and deep conversations and stuff like that. I would dare say that everybody hungers for that kind of, that kind of conversation and connection even though they're probably not getting it on a consistent basis. Too much of. Hey, how you doing? Yeah, the kids are good?

Yep, yep.

Okay.

We're good?

Yep. Okay, cool.

That's a really good point. And you know, it's interesting because when I was going either, I mean through the huge pains of my life, which was the divorce or trying to recover like the first time after the heart attack, that you go back to the world, that you go back to a coffee shop, you're scared to walk around. You're scared of everything. You feel so fragile. And when I died the second time, I died from a sudden cardiac arrest. So my heart went to 297 beats per minute. I know that's a big number. That's not a typo. And I only know because I have the defibrillator inside and it records everything. And so they told me in the emergency room a few hours later. So it went up there. I totally passed out. No more brain, no more blood everywhere. And I hit my head really bad on the concrete. I had a huge bump with blood everywhere. When I woke up, I thought that I was, you know, having, like, my brain bleeding out. Why am I mentioning that? Oh, because in. In terms of how things feel, you know, in terms of the. All those things happening, then you just shift, you really shift to transcending them and to, again, accepting all of it. And when you feel down, you do feel down, but the. The little baby steps you can do or, oh, I'm going to embrace this a little bit. So, you know, like I was saying, I will be at a coffee shop and a friend will come and say, you know, how you feeling? How are you doing? Which is the American expression. And I will go, like, I feel terrible, you know, and it's okay. I feel terrible. Now when you say that, people have no clue what to do with it. And like you were saying to the spirit of what you're saying that people want a quick fix. Like, just do it. Sure. You know, there is a great TED conference from that lady who went through hell in terms of mental health and who almost suicided so many times. Deep depression, everything. And she has a great thing, she says. I still remember her voice because when I swim the laps, I have a snorkel and I listen to TED conferences through a player on the. On the cradlebone, because I can learn something more because I always want to go more. And so she say, when I was super down, people will tell me, just shake it off. You know, talk about, like. What did you call it, Stephen? The quick. The quick fix advice.

Yeah, quick. I mean, just, you know, it's. It's you. Surface level stuff. It's, you know.

Yeah. Service level. So it's like, just shake it off when you're super depressed and suicidal. And she was like, like, I did not think about that. I did not think about checking it off. I'm feeling horrible to the point of suicidaling. Of course. I thought of shaking it off, but guess what? I can't. Yeah. So I. Either bring me some love and some help and support or don't tell me to shake it up because it's absurd. So, you know, that's. That's very important, like what you say. We cannot improve things drastically without giving it some deep depth and repetition and deep concepts and not just a quick fix of just shake it off or just do it. It's not that simple. You know, it's. Oh, it's not. That's never going to be efficient.

I love it, man. Well, I know we got to wrap it up, but I just wanted to say thank you. You're amazing. I love hanging out with you. I love hearing your insights.

You know, you're super sweet. I love you, my dear friend.

I say what I say.

I love you, my dear friend.

I love you too, my friend.

Thank you so much for having me. And I love all your podcasts. It's such a joy. You bring so much love and inspiration to everybody by bringing the beautiful mind and souls and thoughts of so many of your guests. It's. It's a great delight. And you're the one touching people's lives every day, and I'm so grateful for you.

Well, it's because of inspirational people like you that I get to follow and stay connected with. So we all get to make an impact and we all get to shine a light. But before we go, where can people get. Choose your words, choose your world. Where can they buy it?

Amazon. Just Amazon. You know, that big little thing that invaded our lives, both for the good of it. Not so good. But guess what? We are going to focus on the fact that it's free for the good and the great, because it's extremely convenient, you know? So, yeah, just an Amazon with my name.

Awesome. Where can everybody stay connected with you and learn more about you?

I'm sorry, say that again.

Where can everybody stay connected with you or learn more about you?

So, I mean, I. I use. I use a lot.

Sorry, Facebook, but it's very limited because it sucks because it's limited to 5,000 people.

So, I mean, that's what I use just because so many of my friends are on there. But otherwise, through. I'm going to create a blog eventually through my website, which is photographybypascal.com and I also have a YouTube channel on which I post videos, which I create just for love. Just capturing the beauty footage. Yes. Through drone. A lot of drone footage. Because our planet is so Magical. From up there. So you can follow me, you can subscribe to my channel. I use Instagram, but I don't do a good job at updating it because, you know, too many social platforms. But Instagram is super cute too, so you can follow me there. And, you know, I just go with the flow. Sometimes I post a lot, sometimes I don't post for several days, either because I don't feel like it or, you know, because I'm struggling and I don't have enough energy to do it. And I just accept that I'm struggling right now. And then, you know, when a tiny bit of spark of energy comes back, then I share things again with people. So you can follow me and on any of those. And for the book, you know, I designed it so you can have it by your coffee table, gifted to a friend, take it with you to the beach, have it by your toilet. You know, if you read on a toilet, you know, they're very practical. You just take a peek and hopefully it will bring a tiny bit of love and a tiny bit of something helpful to your day. And that makes my heart super happy.

I'm going to recommend that anybody watching and listening not only buys the book, but more importantly, go to one page, enjoy the photography that's with the quote, and then meditate on the quote.

You're super sweet to say that a.

Single quote in your book that cannot add value to someone's life if they'll sit and reflect on it for a. A few minutes.

Yeah, you're super kind to say that. And you know, it's only. Basically, it's like the little steps of my own journey and I keep, you know, having quotes coming to my mind and I stop publishing them now for a while because the ones in a book are the core principles that allowed me to go through life and to go through to where I am. And I'm just so grateful for that. It just comes, you know, it just, it just pure, pure luck. I will never take credit for any of it, ever.

Rock on. Well, I love you, my friend. I know we gotta run, but I can't thank you enough for spending some time with me today. It's been enjoyable. Loved it.

I love you too, Stephen. And all of you guys out there, please start by loving the person in a mirror, AKA you. Start there in the morning, look at the body, look at the soul and go. Thank you so much for being a road to live this day, for all. Everything that function in my body, even if some things don't function at all. Or you're dealing with somebody really bad. But guess what? There is still a million little things that function so amazingly. Try to shift your focus to that and then look for the smiles in a day, wherever they are.

If you love that interview, go ahead and check out this next one right here.

And I just started crying, and it was like the most powerful experience because I shed so much.

And what I realized I was running.

From was who I thought I was.