Text Brian & Shawna (Fan Mail)
Have you ever wondered what it's like to transition from singing on an air conditioner in the backyard to becoming a Christian Contemporary Music artist? Today, we are joined by the talented Joel Vaughn, who shares his musical journey and the ups and downs that came along the way. Be prepared for some laughs as Joel reveals his love for Call of Duty, alongside the poignant self-reflection of his struggles to maintain a flawless public image while grappling with his own brokenness.
From discussing his humble beginnings to the therapeutic journey of finding his authentic self, Joel takes us on a rollercoaster ride of his life in the music industry. His story is a testament of resilience. This episode isn't just for music enthusiasts, it's a powerful narrative of overcoming adversity and embracing your true identity. So tune in and get inspired by Joel's passionate pursuit of his craft and his relentless dedication to his music.
Learn more about Joel Vaugh's Music at joelvaughnmusic.com
Ways to Join Us LIVE 👇
Live shows are on Thursdays at 8pm EST (unless it's a holiday or fifth Thursday of the month)
Affiliate links are used when possible to help support this podcast.
Text Brian & Shawna (Fan Mail)
Have you ever wondered what it's like to transition from singing on an air conditioner in the backyard to becoming a Christian Contemporary Music artist? Today, we are joined by the talented Joel Vaughn, who shares his musical journey and the ups and downs that came along the way. Be prepared for some laughs as Joel reveals his love for Call of Duty, alongside the poignant self-reflection of his struggles to maintain a flawless public image while grappling with his own brokenness.
From discussing his humble beginnings to the therapeutic journey of finding his authentic self, Joel takes us on a rollercoaster ride of his life in the music industry. His story is a testament of resilience. This episode isn't just for music enthusiasts, it's a powerful narrative of overcoming adversity and embracing your true identity. So tune in and get inspired by Joel's passionate pursuit of his craft and his relentless dedication to his music.
Learn more about Joel Vaugh's Music at joelvaughnmusic.com
Ways to Join Us LIVE 👇
Live shows are on Thursdays at 8pm EST (unless it's a holiday or fifth Thursday of the month)
Affiliate links are used when possible to help support this podcast.
But welcome to today's podcast replay from the Killer B Studios. Let's go ahead and dive on in, all right. Well, our guest tonight, joel. He's actually going to be coming to talk about when you feel broken and beyond repair, and I would love to ask you guys all here, by just showing us some confetti, has anybody here ever felt got to the place where they just felt broken or unusable? Wow, okay, yeah, okay, all right, okay. So that's what we love talking about here at the studios is things that that really just struggles and challenges and wins, but experiences that we all can probably relate to. So I think this is going to be a great, a great show to have them come out and share. Well, okay, you know what? Let's not, let's not keep him waiting anymore. Arcane, can you hit the guest intro? And guys, let's bring him with some confetti. Let's bring out Joel, joel Vaughn, come on out, joel. It's like the price is right. There you go, you've been confetti.
Speaker 1:He's throwing confetti everywhere.
Speaker 3:Look at this confetti. Now I'm throwing up stuff that I don't need to throw up because I don't know what I'm doing All right, here we go yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome, that's great. We're so happy you're here. We're so happy you're here. I love that you took the time and and was brave enough to come out here and say I'm going to go see what this metaverse thing's about. We don't know each other out in all our real life. So he could easily say now, I don't think so. You seem a little weird, a little crazy. But here he is.
Speaker 3:I mean, I remember you shot me a message and I was like that is the craziest thing I've ever heard and I get a lot of requests. But I was like I can't say no to this. I got. I got to find out what what in the world.
Speaker 4:This is.
Speaker 1:You know, you know pretty soon like everything's going to be changing because we're preparing for Christmas, events coming up, and last year all I can say is last year there was a big blizzard that came in. Someone came and decorated the whole studio. There were snowflakes falling outside. I don't know exactly where it's going this year, but it's you never know. Before we start, I would like to give 30 seconds. Can you give us 30 seconds? Tell people who you are.
Speaker 3:Hi confetti Confetti. My name's Joel Vaughn, I'm a CCM artist, christian artist and I have been performing and writing songs and leading worship since I was seven years old. So that was that was a long, long time ago and way back in the nineties. Up to now, since I toured independently for a number of years and was offered a recording contract in 2015, signed it and then took off and do the radio thing and all that, and I'm on the road pretty much consistently 24 seven and when I'm not out on the road, I'm home or I'm in the studio with you guys now, apparently, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're really a fixture now, joel. Thank you, I'm permanent.
Speaker 3:But yeah, I've been doing the music thing for, you know, most of my life. It's crazy to think 30 years that I've used my musical talents, 20 years that I've been doing professionally Wow.
Speaker 2:What are you? How old were you when you learned guitar? How many instruments do you play?
Speaker 3:I play all the basic instruments. So I play keys, guitar, bass and I sing, so all the guitars, so electric acoustic. I'm a producer as well, so I produce music.
Speaker 4:Oh, nice, yeah, Nice.
Speaker 1:And so what is your favorite thing about? You know, playing music and being on the road, Like what's the part that you love the most.
Speaker 3:I love playing, I love doing the music part, but I love meeting people and getting to hear their stories and how my songs have affected them. And that kind of gives me, because sometimes I get to a point where I'm like you know, what am I doing this for? And then when I hear how my songs have impacted somebody else, I realize yes, this is why I'm doing it. It gives me more motivation to keep going. So that's what I love the most.
Speaker 5:Awesome.
Speaker 1:Did you? Is that where you started? Was playing like CCM music, or did you start playing a different type of music?
Speaker 3:It's more embarrassing. So I started on the air conditioner condenser in my backyard in Columbus, mississippi, in 1991. And I sang a song by America's heartthrob Donnie Osmond called soldier of love. That was the first song I remember singing and the also the first song. I should never mention that like yeah, I think that was the first song I remember liking and performing. I didn't perform it for anyone, I was. I was standing on the back of an air conditioner because I saw do you all remember it? Like Michael Jackson had a movie called moonwalker back in the yeah, so we had that movie and he would.
Speaker 3:he would stand over like those vents and the air would blow up underneath the shirt. He knew the thing, or whatever, and so I was just copycating that. As a five year old, I thought that was the goal I was like oh, and then I would sing.
Speaker 1:So now you're going to go out and do that with and throw a confetti in here Right At the same time. We're going to do like a moonwalk in here.
Speaker 3:I feel like I can moonwalk in here. Maybe I bet you could. Probably not today, since I'm only what an hour old, maybe an hour old.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, you want to take it easy, you want to take it slow.
Speaker 2:Take it slow, although you seem to be advanced. I think advanced, and I played enough call of duty.
Speaker 1:So I think I'm you know there's some pretty cool games in here too, like we have a game night and there's a pretty cool shooting game that like a lot of people like yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, pretty cool.
Speaker 1:Well, you're going to have the headset for a while, so you should actually go check out Super Rumble and you have to check it out.
Speaker 3:Okay, it's pretty cool, but yeah, my son saw this earlier and he was like, dad, I want to play that and I was like, no, but no, you should let him go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let him go, Like definitely play it man Like let him play it. I mean that's up to you, but yeah you're welcome.
Speaker 3:You're welcome to Right now. He's like cool, does that be like a group right now?
Speaker 2:I'm like yeah if you'll do the interview for me, son. Yeah, just snap it right off your head Like say people no, it's a lot of fun you got to work for it.
Speaker 3:You got to work for it.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's right. No, you'll have a blast. You'll have a blast. No, that's cool. Well, great. Well, thank you for giving us a little bit of insight of who you are for those people here that don't know who you are yet. Like you know, when we first talk, when we first met, we're talking about you coming, and I was sharing what the studio is about and you you mentioned about how you you would like they maybe come and talk about a time that you felt broken and and sometimes beyond repair. So I thought maybe we should start there. So I guess let's start with why the topic of broken and beyond repair? Why did that come to your thought?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's, it's. It's definitely one of those subjects that it's like. It's like it's only so much you want to share, but also it's. It's one of those things that I know a lot of the people that I work with in this industry behind the scenes, they have this sense that they have to Present a perfect version of themselves, because we often, as human beings put you know, pastors, leaders, christian artists, anybody who's Faith-based and and a leader like up on a pedestal, so they feel like they have to have it all together constantly and and and.
Speaker 3:That kind of stinks for a lot of people, because then they start to struggle with Sometimes sin patterns, issues or things that happen to them, that happen to literally everyone else, but they're struggling with it behind the scenes because they feel Like they have to have it all together and so that's that's been something that in my life. So, you know, I I graduated high school in 2003 and, like, out the gate was leading worship. You know, I was leading worship in high school with my brother, but I was always in a position where I was in some type of ministry. You know, even when I wasn't ready for it, it was like all right, you can sing, you've already been using your gifts for the Lord.
Speaker 3:So you are now a worship leader congratulations. And I'm like, okay, I have no pastoral training, but here I go and it's like let's just throw him out there. And so that's just kind of how my life went and I got to. So I met my wife in 2003 and you know, I knew I was gonna marry her in 2003 and her dad was like yeah, no, you're not, You're gonna go to college first. Smart, he's a much smarter man than me. I was like we live on love and he was like no, you can live on money, You're gonna provide for my daughter so.
Speaker 3:I did propose to her in 2004 and Well, I kind of sort of we I didn't really propose so much, as she knew that I had ordered a ring and it came in the mail, and so it was kind of a. It was the surprise, was not there? Proposed to my wife. Well, I mean, I kind of did, I kind of did sort of, but I didn't get to do the down on Been in me. She was just like it. She's like the answer is a yes and I'm like, okay, cool, that's, that's good. So, anyway, proposed. We got married in 2006. My first job in in in ministry was doing music, and so I was a worship leader for a small group of actually, it's a large group of students for somebody as young as I was In a little town called Borger, texas, and that's about 35 miles north of Amarillo. Anybody know where Amarillo is? Yeah, okay, so Amarillo the only thing that we're known for is the 72 ounce steak and yeah, and if you can eat it in less than an hour.
Speaker 3:You get it for free and then your doctor bill. Your doctor bill is not free. Oh and then, we have some Cadillacs that stick up out of the ground.
Speaker 1:So there's that he said 72 ounce steak Like 72 ounces.
Speaker 3:Yes, sir, like it's basically a slice of prime rib, not slice.
Speaker 1:It's like. It's like a.
Speaker 3:Why? Why would anybody do that? I don't know, I think. I think the person that holds the record is like a 90 pound woman and she did it in like 11.
Speaker 1:Are you serious?
Speaker 3:Wow.
Speaker 2:Gugling this when we're off the show you need to.
Speaker 3:They have a thing called the wall of shame and most of them like they get to Write their little comment and his this one guy said never again. And that's that said everything.
Speaker 2:I'll never try this.
Speaker 1:That sounds like bad news, so oh it's terrible. It's terrible.
Speaker 3:So, anyway, I worked. I lived in Amarillo Canyon. That's where I went to school, that's that's where my children were born. When we got married, we married in the church that we met in me and my wife and then we moved to Canyon Amarillo, went to college, so I did get to marry her before I finished college.
Speaker 3:So that's that I did pull a fast one on there. But a Year later, I'm a year in and I'm already starting to realize you know my brokenness. I grew up in a home where we moved around a whole lot. When I was seven, my parents, my dad, was in the Air Force full-time, but when he came home we, I guess things just didn't line up the way that they had envisioned and we, my parents, had to file for bankruptcy when I was seven years old and so we lost everything when I was just a little kid, everything we bounce from house to house to house.
Speaker 3:A lot of people were like, well, why did you move around so much? Like, well, we were in the military and then when we got out of the military we lost it all. And so we kind of bounced around until we ended up in Texas and that's like I said, where I met my wife. But that kind of stuff affected me as an adult and I didn't really realize, and I carried that pain with me and a lot of other stuff that happened behind the scenes too, into adulthood and I didn't realize how broken I was until I started working at this church in Amarillo and realized that my whole life I had been, I had been kind of hiding behind this mask of performance, because I start, like I said. I started started singing when I was five, five years old. Started singing on a stage when I was seven, so when I was seven.
Speaker 3:I'm performing and so, like, all I knew of who I was as a human being was Joel the performer. Joel the guy that everybody liked the way that he's saying and like if there was nothing else about me, didn't like like I Could put this out there, and so I kind of hid behind that mask for a while until I realized I couldn't do it anymore and I didn't even like me, and so I resigned from my position as a worship leader at this church. It was my dream job. It was a, you know, probably I don't even know how many members there were at that point something north of ten thousand. It was a very large church.
Speaker 3:I was one of thirteen worship leaders and I resigned so that I could work on me, and my daughter was born that year and that was our fifth anniversary. At that point, and I just I wanted to know who Joel was apart from doing music and who I was apart from all the things that I struggled with.
Speaker 1:And so my son's tapping me on the shoulders Well, that's, that's so so, as you, as before, we continue the story, some of the things that you're talking about there.
Speaker 1:I would love to touch on some of that, like Well, first off, I really think it's important to like you're talking about how you know, as an artist or somebody that's in the church, like if you're a worship pastor or someone that's even a Christian, we kind of can really start hiding behind a mask when we deal with these things. And I know, like one of our co-hosts, meta Olivia, has shared Her. She's not here tonight but she talks about. You know, she goes to therapy now and she's like a big fan of that and but she said she was at a point where, you know, as a Christian, she kind of hid that because she felt like something was wrong with her. Yeah, because she felt these things and and what I? What I think is surprising is, in the industry that that we're in, and their radio industry or any kind of entertainment industry, I Think that we do see people, you know, we know people are put up on a pedestal and it doesn't give them the freedom to be real about.
Speaker 1:They actually are who they actually are. Yeah, because I mean we've seen it, I know Don will know there's some people in here and radio that's in here tonight and we know like it's kind of a. It's a hard place for them to be real at times because people Do look at them on that pedestal and then if they do one little thing wrong, they forget they're humans just like all of us here, and we all like, how many here have messed up this week? There's some confetti right. How many here would say like, okay, I just something that I regret this week. Or yeah, okay, yeah, so here we are, so and and that's hey, sales, how you doing?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's that's important for us to remember that, even for people that are Performers or entertainers or actors or whoever, who ever, even somebody, that it doesn't have to be an entertainment, it's somebody that you might look up to. They have struggles too, and I think that's really important to to wrap our minds around, because that helps us show grace and stuff. So when you, when you got, you got this, you resigned and you go back and you're with your family and you're on this, this place of discovery, it's discovery who you really are. Take us back there. So what? What are some of the things that how your life started changing a little bit?
Speaker 3:I mean, you kind of tapped into it. I. I went straight to therapy, like I did that for there wasn't like I'm gonna do this for a certain amount of time and Hopefully it sticks. You know kind of thing I started with with with a therapist, and you know it took me some time to find the right person to talk to you that I could share everything I'd been through with, and so I ended up in therapy for 18 months with with a therapist, just talking, talking through, like learning how to, you know, not hide behind the mask and and realize not who Joel thinks he is or worry about who everybody else thinks Joel is, but who does God say that I am? And so, like that.
Speaker 3:That was a.
Speaker 3:That was a process that I went through for, like I said, 18 months, and At near the end of that process, there wasn't like, hey, you're gonna take, take some time away for 18 months or 12 months or whatever, or a year or even six months.
Speaker 3:You know there's no timeline on this, I guess, is what I'm getting at and so I started leading worship again near the end of that, in December of 2012, something like that anyway, and and I didn't know if I felt a calling to even really do music anymore. But if I did, I wanted it to be absolutely loud and clear and I thought it would be in the church, you know as a worship leader, and what it ended up being was stepping out on the road and Doing music full-time and and that's kind of what, what? I didn't think that that would be something I would do but, like God had other plans and in February of 2013, I stepped away from a job at a church and Was like I don't know if this is nuts, if this is what I'm supposed to be doing, but it seems like the direction I'm supposed to go, and I booked 96 events on my own without.
Speaker 3:I didn't even really try Like doing that now, even as an artist that I've had multiple like songs Chartered on billboard. That's difficult now. Nobody knew who I. Barely anyone knows who I am now, but really no one knew who I was back then and people were calling me left and right like, hey, we've heard your story in which we're about would you come like speak to our youth?
Speaker 3:Come share your testimony and and share your music, and I was like, yeah, like what you know, why not? Some of it was you know, do it for free, and some of it was you know we'll, we'll take care of you. You know, because that was my biggest concern is, like, at the time, my daughter was only two years old. She's 12 now, but she was two years old and I had to think about like well, I have to have a job to take care of my family, and God absolutely provided that year, like we had more than enough to get from point a to point B and for me to be able to do what I was doing, and so it all just kind of worked out.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow.
Speaker 2:That's awesome.
Speaker 1:That is amazing. That is amazing. The. What I love, too is like I love that. You know you can look at that time. First off, when you went to therapy, you said it was 18 months. It wasn't like a. This wasn't like a quick thing, and I think that's kind of the. The Culture in the world, the cultural culture in the world that we're in, we kind of look for this quick fixes. We want a quick answer. How do I get through this? How do I stop doing this? But that really takes some something. And tension I don't it's really the right word Tensionality actually step back, slow down and really go through that process of discovering. And that's not a quick thing Over night or in a week.
Speaker 3:It takes time when I really had to take music off the table, Like you know, it's not that I didn't have aspirations or dreams to you know, Be a signed recording artist like. Like I said, I stood up on an air conditioner condenser when I was five years old. I was like I'm Michael Jackson or I'm Johnny Osmond, whatever.
Speaker 1:Oh, you can stand up on this table right. You know I can do it If you jump there you go. Oh, I Felt like.
Speaker 3:Tom Cruise just now.
Speaker 1:God's looking down and I was saying you are breaking. Joel. Would you stop please. Like no, what I, what I love about that, that's a big, that's a big deal. What you just said there.
Speaker 1:Like you, you put music aside, like you knew, like that's what, something you had to do to be able to find who you were and God, like your identity and him and what he was doing and, to be honest, it's I'm so glad that to hear, like I don't know Joel, that much I'm gonna know more, just like you guys are right now, you know, with being in entertainment industry and stuff.
Speaker 1:I love to hear that you went through that, even though obviously it's not something any of us want to go through. I'm glad that you went through it and learn that before you started hitting the road and performing because now that's what I love I hear people coming to you because they wanted you to share your story, help their youth, because it's so important to to let them see like, hey, this is real, like we all struggle through these things. You're not alone in that, because I think, like everybody here throwing confetti, they felt broken before, they felt beyond repair, they felt unusable. This isn't something that you is not normal for a lot of people. A lot of us go through it. We just all put on the mask and say, no, you hide behind it.
Speaker 3:Yes, we hide behind whatever our vocation is or a hobby or whatever else you know that we can absorb ourselves into, and something that you know like, yeah, something that we don't have to project what we're really dealing with. So Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to say that. I think it's hugely encouraging to me and I'm sure to a lot of other people to hear that you know and I'm sure, like that 18 months, there's still things you probably work through. Like you know, you learn the tools to work through and things.
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:But, like you know, sometimes a problem presents and you think, all right, well, I just got to get this handled. I'm going to read some articles, I'm going to read a book, whatever and get through this. But, like problems that take years and years to damage, you can't just be fixed you know, in a couple of days.
Speaker 2:So I think it's really encouraging, like to think about if there's something that you're dealing with and you don't see it getting better right away, keep pressing in and getting those tools that you need and talking to someone and, you know, working with God through those issues, because it takes time, right, it does.
Speaker 3:It does, and you know that what I found is that that not only applied in my spiritual life, but it also applied in my physical life, like one of the main. Well, one of a few of the reasons why I did this is because when I was physically unhealthy in 2010, I had a routine surgery, like a basic hernia surgery, that nearly took me out because I was so physically unhealthy. I was about 100 pounds heavier than I am now and it was just. It was one of those things that, like you know, for some people it may not have been a big deal, but I struggled with high blood pressure, you know, and I needed to do everything I could to make sure that I would be around for my kids later and I wanted to be the best father that I could be. But I also needed to physically be better, because I had doctors telling me that, like dude, you have the genes of a 75-year-old man at 24.
Speaker 3:And so I started running in 2010, right Right after that surgery, and I like I haven't looked back. Like it started with like trying to change things physically, you know, and then I realized like it's something deeper, you know. Yeah, sure right, but and I never really got well physically until I addressed the spiritual and the mental, Like a lot of people probably think like Person, they'll get right there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean honestly and you can see, I can share pictures of what I looked like before and after that 18 months. I really didn't do anything all that different physically, like that diet and the exercise, all that was pretty much the same. Only it just felt like things started like when the emotional baggage and when the spiritual baggage began to come off, so did other stuff and so yeah, because it's so stressful on your body when you're carrying trauma. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2:So that's just you wanna hear something interesting, joel, we have had another guest on this show that was almost taken out by a hernia surgery.
Speaker 3:Isn't that interesting? Yeah, that is very interesting. His name's.
Speaker 2:Todd Stack. His interview was fascinating, Like if you ever want to, you should check it out. I know Todd.
Speaker 1:That's how you might know Todd. Yeah, you might know Todd, but I didn't think about that.
Speaker 4:Yes, I didn't know he had that in common.
Speaker 2:When you said that about the hernia surgery, I was like what are the chances If?
Speaker 1:you ever wanna hear his story, go to the Killer Bee Studios website and go to the podcast. You'll find in there that his story was. You know he had a hernia but the doctor messed up and cut something like a main artery or something and he almost died, oh my gosh. And then he had to forgive. He had to come back and God told him that he had to forgive that doctor. Going through this transition, you know, of discovering who you are, of God and stuff how did Grace play a role in this with you twin God? Well, they had to play a role, right.
Speaker 3:Absolutely played a role, like when I said you know, I took a step back, I had made a lot of mistakes, I had been living in some pretty unhealthy sin patterns and people had to forgive me, but I learned that I needed to forgive other people. You know, not everything was rosy for me growing up and Unforgiveness was absolutely one of those things I struggled with for a long time and, honestly, I, even after the 18 months In parting ways with with that church, I still dealt with unforgiveness for a number of years and I'm like I don't know why I can't get past this, because, you know, I thought I'd worked through this. I have all these tools. I know what God, you know, says about forgiveness and grace and I know what he's done for me. Why can't I extend grace? And if it wasn't for the people that extended grace to me Namely my wife, to be perfectly honest, my wife and and other people that I worked with I don't know that I would have ever been able to extend grace to someone else.
Speaker 3:And so the lens that I view other people through now is Is vastly different than the way I used to view them Years before. Like, if somebody makes me mad, you know I do like I'm not perfect man like I. I get angry and, and you know, offline I'm like I don't like this and I like this about this person and he did this and he did that and I talked through it and then I realized, just like me, they are a sinner that needs Jesus too you know, like, and then I forget about that whole log that's in my eye when I'm pointing out the speck in their eye.
Speaker 3:It helps me To you know, understand my neighbor Like my actual neighbor and my neighbor like just you know yes, my fellow man, but like in my case, you know my actual neighbor, some of the stuff that he's, he's dealing with, I mean like what he was going through actually him and another guy from 10 years ago and helped inspire a song that was about grace that I'm gonna sing tonight. And you know, I see what God's brought me through and how he changed me, how he changed my heart Through the grace that he extended. Like I, I thought I understood grace and and what Jesus did on the cross for me at a Young age because I accepted Christ, you know, as a kid, and it wasn't until I had failed Massively and saw grace from other people that are really understood.
Speaker 3:You know what that meant, you know, and so I see that and other people now and I'm like I I am not judging you, I'm not shaming you, it's not my place. Like, my job as a songwriter and as a Christian is to lead you to Christ and and that's that's all I really want to do, like I want to share my music and I want to show people what God's done for me.
Speaker 1:All right, let's bring up the Q&A for anybody that has a question or a thought. So the mic will work where one person getting in at Time. So if somebody has a question or thought that they would like to ask Joel or anybody up here, feel free to come on down the mic and everybody will be able to hear you. So here comes Don.
Speaker 3:Could a woodchuck chuckle Come on?
Speaker 5:I Am here right now representing some of our listeners, because they don't have headsets and I told them that we were doing this tonight and they want to make sure that you knew how much friend meant to them and to me as well, when I, when I heard it for the first time, before we even aired it, I lost it, because there's so many times, you know, I came into radio kind of sort of by accident. I didn't go the proper channels of going to school and communications or any of that. It just kind of really stumbled on my lap and I had a lot of thoughts of am I really Kind out for this? Am I in the right spot? Is this where God really wants me to be? And, you know, am I doing, you know, whatever? But then that song came out and I'm like, okay, even when I'm my own worst enemy, I still have Jesus on my side and that's all it matters and everything's kind of fell in, fall into place from that.
Speaker 5:But I wanted to probably tell you kind of they're gonna be listening to the podcast and they'd be mad at me If I didn't tell them but how much that song meant to them. Well thanks for letting me know, and I don't know if you knew this, don, but I have a broadcasting degree, and now I'm in music so that I who else here can say that they had a jingle written for them from Joel Vaughan? Two, three years yeah, I still have that.
Speaker 3:I don't know that.
Speaker 5:I remember the jingle to be hey, I'm here to proclaim and you winked.
Speaker 1:You are totally double-jointed, mr Killer B, like you see, yeah, we do like a talent thing, like watch this. Oh, we're gonna have a talent show here. Yeah, I'll explain it to you later. I'll explain to you. Yeah, just do, the robot will explain to you later it. People aren't gonna want to know, they're not interested in that. I Would you know. I would say you know that's very interesting because, mrs Killer B, what did I tell you today?
Speaker 2:I think you tell me a lot of things today, but which thing in particular?
Speaker 1:I mean, this is what's good, is like Don just shared that and people raised their hands like I'm. I've been preparing for I gotta do two talks at a conference and less than a week and there's a lot of stuff that I'm trying to prepare. I got talk about AI and then I got talk about the metaverse and I've been preparing this AI thing and I've been getting in my own head and what did I come out and tell you today?
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, you're so putting me on the spot.
Speaker 1:I'm putting you on the spot.
Speaker 2:That you said you just got to talk about what you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, that's not what I was looking for. But what I was saying was basically like I don't feel like I can do this, like why do they want me to come talk about this? I was like I'm having a hard time, like I was like you know, I just there's probably somebody better and it's getting in your own head too, and you, you know. You said you know God's prepared you for this too. Like there's a reason, like they saw they aren't just going to ask anybody to come share and talk about this stuff. Like they see something in you and but it is, we get in our own heads in so many different areas of our life. But I think that's so important, like you're saying, mrs Killer B now I know that you didn't listen to me, so so we can talk about that during honey talks next time.
Speaker 2:So you guys know where we're going. We're eating so much water. Now, yeah, exactly, we're eating so much water to sink.
Speaker 1:Yes, I got wot, wot, wot over here, not even on the sound board. Yeah, you didn't need it. Yeah, no, that's great. That's great. No, it's a, it is. It's important to see Fated. Come on down, man. Come on down. If you got a question, come on up to the mic, man, you don't have to raise your hand, just come on down the mic and and uh he's, he's unmuting himself. Okay, cool, awesome. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 4:Fated hey good to see you, man, can you?
Speaker 1:hear me, we can hear, you, man, we can hear you man Gotcha.
Speaker 4:I don't have a question. I should have a statement. I'm saying that I don't want to feel like I'm sorry. My biggest interview like to change my family's life and before I went there I listened to your song. I look at you because I was so nervous and I haven't been to an interview like like 15 years for a new job and I played that song and it took a lot of weight off of me and I got the job and I just want to let you know that. Thanks, man.
Speaker 1:So man, that's amazing. Fated, what is a pop song? Thank you, man. Thank you so much. That's awesome. That's awesome, I love it.
Speaker 3:That's beautiful. It's going to make me cry. I listen.
Speaker 1:So just to let you know, you have the quest too, and it is not good to cry on those. I mean, fated's probably like, he's probably got sponges. He's coming out right now and trying to just drip the tears out Now. I love that man. Thank you so much, fated. I love you, man. It's not the first time.
Speaker 2:I've cried on a headset. They'll be fine, don't worry, it's not.
Speaker 1:I won't, I won't. We always ask our guests to share, like, to kind of give us like a closing thought, and I would like to ask you, I would like to ask you, I guess, two things Before you give us your closing thought. I always said, let me give you one more thing, but let me get asked for two more things. I'm always asking for a little bit more. So, no, I would like to ask you, what advice would you give to someone who might be feeling like they are beyond repair or used up? You know there's going to be people listening to the podcast. What would you say to people that's in the place where you were before?
Speaker 3:You are not too broken, you're not too used up, you are not too far gone. You can always, always run to Jesus, and sometimes I mean first and foremost, run to Jesus. He's listening, he's there, he. You know like that's first and foremost. And secondly, you probably have a lot more friends than you think you do, and but even even if you don't cry out to Jesus and he will lead you to those people, I truly believe that he led me to those people and he led me to the right person to help me, which ended up being therapy for, like I said, 18 months.
Speaker 1:If there's one thing that you would hope people would take away with them tonight, what would it be?
Speaker 3:Kind of just what I said, like if you are struggling with that, you know, I know not everybody's struggling constantly and some people are in better places in life mentally and spiritually I know I am than than what I was 10 years ago or even two years ago. But sometimes you could be walking along and then life just throws you a curveball and suddenly you feel like you're right back at step. It's like two steps forward, 14 steps back. You know, get back up and keep moving. There is a light at the end of the tunnel and even if you can't see it, look for the pinhole, like look for it and keep digging and keep moving. It's worth it, the work is worth it.
Speaker 1:Thanks for tuning in to the Stories we Live podcast.
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