Ana Egge - who Lucinda Williams calls 'the folk music Nina Simone' - has released 13+ records, starting with her first in 1994, and including some produced by Steve Earle, is a luthier, and has toured with John Prine, Shawn Colvin, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Ron Sexmith, Lucinda, and Iris Dement amongst others. In one of our more intriguingly esoteric conversations, we talk a lot about meditation practice and how that influences your creativity and approach to your career as a whole, as well as how Ana stumbled across her incredible practice of co-writing with her own dreams!
Ana Egge - who Lucinda Williams calls 'the folk music Nina Simone' - has released 13+ records, starting with her first in 1994, and including some produced by Steve Earle, is a luthier, and has toured with John Prine, Shawn Colvin, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Ron Sexmith, Lucinda, and Iris Dement amongst others. In one of our more intriguingly esoteric conversations, we talk a lot about meditation practice and how that influences your creativity and approach to your career as a whole, as well as how Ana stumbled across her incredible practice of co-writing with her own dreams!
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All music written, performed, and produced by Aaron Shafer-Haiss.
Hey, and welcome to this week's episode of The Other 22 Hours podcast. I'm your host, Aaron Shafer-Haiss
[00:00:12] Michaela: And I'm your host, Michaela Anne. And this is our second year of The Other 22 Hours. We're so happy to still be here and so happy you're here with us. Cause that's the only reason we're still around.
[00:00:22] Aaron: Yeah. And. Even though we're still a small show, there is a lot that goes into producing this every week. it is just Michaela and I, and our editor holding everything down. And so with that, if you enjoy what we do here, we would love some help from you to reach a wider audience. There are three things that you can do.
The first and probably easiest thing to do is to just follow or subscribe on whatever platform you're on. You're using to listen to us right now. It takes two seconds Just click that and that will not only let you know when we have a new episode up But it'll also tell the algorithm that our show is worth 45 minutes of your time And I'll put in front of more people The second thing you can do is to share your favorite episode with somebody that doesn't know what we're doing put it on social media.
You can play it for a friend text it to a friend put it on at the holidays on your tv screen over the fire whatever you want to do and then finally we like to be able to present these conversations without interruption And so instead of selling ads we've started a patreon community where We offer a ton of things that allow you to go deeper into what we talk about here community, headspace, creativity, all of that.
You can find more at the link below in the show notes.
[00:01:30] Michaela: We really pride ourselves on these episodes being conversations rather than straight interviews. We are musicians ourselves. We're not music journalists. So these conversations get to feel like we're just sitting around the table after dinner, sharing the Vulnerable, honest realities of what it is to build a lifelong career around your art.
[00:01:53] Aaron: And as we all know, there are a lot of things in this career that are outside of our control. Who listens to your record, how many people come to your show? All of that is outside of our control, but what is within our controls, our mindsets, our routines, our.
headspace. And so we distilled all that down into a question that underpins all of our episodes, and that is what do you do to create sustainability in your life so that you can sustain your creativity? And we had the pleasure of asking that question of Ana Egge today.
[00:02:20] Michaela: Ana has been putting out records since she was 18 years old.
it's been 30 years of a career. She's on her 11th record, 13th record. She has shared the stage with Sean Colvin, Iris DeMent, Ron Saksmith, John Prine, Jimmy Dale and Lucinda Williams, who has called her the folk Nina Simone. She's had a beautiful, long, sustaining career with many ups and downs, and she shared so much, really, This was one of the more kind of esoteric episodes rather than the nitty gritty of industry talk, but really talking about meditation, mindfulness, inner work spirituality, the divine, all the stuff that I, we both really like to get into.
[00:03:05] Aaron: Yeah. I'll talk about headspace any day to no surprise of anybody that's heard one of these episodes before. The nitty gritty that we did get down to was co writing with your dreams, which is absolutely insane. And incredible. And we're both going to try to dive deeper into that and find out more about that.
But Ana explains that way better than we do here. And so without further ado, here's our conversation with Ana Egge.
[00:03:29] Michaela: Thank you so much. I know you and I have chatted before this but we're excited to just, dig in and talk about all that is living this life as an artist. and in my research, am I correct that you started putting out records before you were even 20 years old?
[00:03:46] Ana: Yes, my first cassette, like EP, self titled cassette, came out in 94, so I was, yeah, I was 18. I was born in 76. Yeah.
so much. Did you put that out on your own? I did. I went to Austin and recorded it with Sarah Brown, produced it, the bass player and songwriter. through her I met a bunch of folks in Austin, including Dave Sanger, who's the drummer for Sleep at the Wheel.
And we recorded it at his house. in his garage studio and he and Sarah brought in a bunch of people to play on it.
Lots of folks that were in the wheel and amazing musicians in Austin. And then Dave started his own label and signed me to that. And so my first album River Under the Road, came out on his label. In 97.
[00:04:32] Michaela: starting so young it's always so interesting to me when, even if it's very like indie DIY of starting to put stuff out, like as a teenager and how that kind of informs your brain, in a way, as you're growing up.
did you go into it thinking, I want to do this for a career, or was it, I love making music, and sure, let's record some music.
[00:04:55] Ana: I think it was both at the same time. I hoped longed to be able to answer when someone asked me, you know, what do you do? I could say I'm a musician. I'm a songwriter. wondered if that would ever be real or true, and I also kind of wondered if it was what I was meant to do, or if it was enough, know, to do in the world.
But then, you know, things just kept happening that seemed to be paving that path for me. I just loved music, and I loved writing, and I I just started writing songs. I started learning songs on the guitar and mandolin, and and know, as a kid, I had this awareness that some of these songs hadn't always existed.
Therefore, someone made them up. Therefore, maybe I can do that. That simple kind of awareness was a huge My mom is a huge reader and language arts teacher, and she had us kids write in our journals every day, so I had a connection to writing and expressing, know, feelings and thoughts and stuff, and so that kind of naturally started happening, and then I started writing.
having the guts to share the songs that I was writing, really have, didn't know better not to, and had this sense since I was little, like, well, I want to do that. I want to figure that out. Whether it was, know, sports or skateboarding or, you know, trying to learn how to play the guitar,
[00:06:19] Aaron: skateboarded as a kid.
[00:06:20] Ana: Skating
Did you too?
[00:06:22] Aaron: Yes. Skateboarding. Rollerblading. But on the. I guess the aggressive side, I guess, is what it was called
[00:06:29] Ana: Uh huh.
[00:06:30] Aaron: Um. BMX biking, like all of
[00:06:33] Ana: Oh,
[00:06:33] Aaron: I obviously never like, followed through really hard with one. You know, I got to a point where, like, I could ollie and I could like, Sometimes, do like a nose grind on something and then I'd switch and then do something else.
But I also see even though I never like really Got super proficient on any of those like specific extreme sports I have always seen a connection between trying to learn a trick and Music I come from more of like a I guess a musician's sideman side, not a songwriter. And studied like a lot of classical music as a kid.
So it was very much like repetition and analysis at the same time
So I just find that intriguing, like the parallels between the two that you wouldn't necessarily see right on the face of it.
[00:07:15] Ana: I want to do, I want to be able to do that. And then you keep doing it until you can really pull it off. but then there's always something more that you want to try. And then you're looking back being like, oh, right, remember when I thought I'd never be able to Ollie?
Or, oh right, remember when I never thought I'd be able to play a power chord? Or an F I mean, That was a long ass time ago, but remember? It's like, yeah, I do remember that, you
[00:07:41] Aaron: and they both my experiences they both have The steep and then plateau feel to it where it's like you're working really hard and things are improving and then it just Your effort feels the same but you just seemingly plateau for a while and then all of a sudden something kind of breaks through And you're like, oh my arm doesn't cramp up quite as much when I'm playing, this bar chord or whatever it is That kind of dichotomy of and the struggle
[00:08:07] Ana: that sense of knowing that, and that feeling of, of It's the same thing with songwriting, know, you have these ideas or some inspiration or something comes and you work on so many different bits and songs and then there's the ones that are like, Oh, this is happening. This one's good. And you know, it, it's it's annoying, but it's from the constant, know, doing it that sharpens that. Edge.
[00:08:36] Michaela: I grew up playing classical piano. And then we both went to jazz school, we went to the new school in Manhattan. And I remember testing into the highest level of piano class, but I didn't know how to play jazz piano, but I went in and played high level classical piece and they were like, Oh, well you're in this level.
Once I got in there, I was like, no, I'm not, I don't know how to do this. And I had never heard of inversions, playing chords and different inversions. I remember like still the painstaking way of like, I would have to write out the notation for every single chord inversion, like voice leading to the next one and really do all the mental steps and see it on the page and play it and then I don't remember when it happened, but.
And now I don't have to think about that. I can play every inversion of every chord, very quickly, it's completely second nature. And I always use that as an example of like, I remember what it was like for something to feel so hard and impossible and so tedious. And you do it enough and enough and enough.
And now it's just like breathing. I don't even have to look at my hands. And that's like the challenge of everything in life, also being okay to, to fall, to eat shit sometimes and like, get back up.
[00:09:53] Aaron: you know, mountain biking was my kind of extreme sport of choice. And the first time I rode a bike was off road and, my cousin took my training wheels off and I just went flying down this dirt road and I was like, that's it. I love it. But in biking all the time and I biked with my dad and other adults and people that have done it, for, Many decades.
And somebody once told me, he's like, the number one thing you can learn about mountain biking is to learn how to fall, not learn to not fall. Cause you're going to fall. So you have to learn how to fall that when you do fall, you don't hurt yourself. And I just think that's such an appropriate metaphor for trying to build a career around your art is you have to learn how to fall because you're, going to, you're there's going to be disappointments.
You're going to skin your knees
[00:10:30] Michaela: That is a great analogy and a great segue to prompt a question that I have.
[00:10:36] Ana: What's your question?
[00:10:38] Michaela: Well, On that, for someone who has been doing this for multiple decades have you had times of what has felt like falls or. Disappointments, or for lack of a better term, failures, not meeting expectations, and how have you learned over the years to grapple with that?
[00:10:57] Ana: So many disappointments.
Mm hmm. Mm is my 13th record coming out.
hmm. Mm I don't Even know what to say. Like, there's so many byways that I could go down that would be, not necessarily helpful. But, yeah. I think the big thing is that there's different ways to look at success and, obviously some sort of acknowledgement always feels good and, part of the completing the circle of making, Music is having people hear it and having other people experience it, other than oneself.
And so that of course is always something that I, hope for, is that it reaches people. I've struggled with how to reach people more. With the primary thing being, feeling like you know, I'm happy with being able to continue to make the music that I make. Music that doesn't always fit into specific genres or, being who I am, don't even fit necessarily into a specific genre or gender or, being gay and, you know, just all of these things, it's kind of like There's not clear avenues always for who I am in the world or what I make in the world but I always have continued to, make this work and It's a miracle that I've been able to continue to write and make 13 albums and tour and still love it
[00:12:20] Aaron: I think that's the rocket fuel that you can keep in the tank Being attached to the joy of creating and the love of creating and not really get caught up in the branches of the commerce end of everything.
[00:12:32] Ana: know, growing and throughout my life I've always know, I guess you could say a seeker. And had a deep, you know, connection, real connection to spirit or divine or whatever words work for that. And so when I was saying earlier, I didn't know if music would you know, enough or the thing to do.
It was kind of that sense of, I, Don't know if that's really my path, the writing has always been like a real connection to that that way of of being, the path, whatever, I don't know, and that feeling of knowing when you know, I guess, to go back again, when I was young, and I didn't know if that was the right um, These things kept presenting themselves as obvious encouragement and, know, people showing up encouragement with songs, this, that, this great guitar maker offering for me to work with him, you know, I built my own guitar with him when I was 16, things like that, that are like, well, that's a pretty obvious help like, you know, the universe saying something you know, throughout this sense of like longing and love for others and for, know, the divine.
for many years, it was about, Intellectual knowledge and feeling, like reading every possible thing over the years, so many different, you know, the Bhagavad Gita, the Dada Ching, Thich Nhat Hanh, you know, translations of Testament uh, Apocrypha, Kabbalah, you know, everything, and the beauty that is lived and written and shared and, it, but it was intangible, it was besides poetry and music that I've experienced and, know, through love of others and caring for others. And then through writing myself but like we were talking about with sports, you know, I've always been a very a present person in my body, loving sports and carpentry and working with my hands and things, learning by doing, but somehow, you know, it didn't ever really like spiritually didn't never really connect that way. But I think, know, When I felt like, really off the path and that I wasn't, it you know, when I really, life really hit me I was focused too much on the outside. I wasn't taking care of myself. I wasn't you know, truthful with myself. I wasn't caring for myself enough. You know, I was drinking too much. I was smoking too much. I was wrapped up in the drama of my family. And so a lot of hard things happened to where I then realized I had to deal. And then in dealing, you know, through therapy and couples therapy with my wife just a lot of acknowledgement of suffering and trauma. kind of got back to where I started from a little bit,
This sense of really loving, feeling connected and loving making music in that sense of knowing and acknowledgement what is happening is meant to happen and it's not about how many fans you have. know, It's not about any of that.
don't, I'm not in control of of all that.
And, Meditation. I started doing The experiment like, in my body, the doing the working on trying to OLLI like, the working on trying to observe my thoughts.
[00:15:37] Aaron: Mm
[00:15:38] Ana: hmm.
Two years ago, you know, every day, and so now I'm meditating twice a day every day, and You know, It's an extremely humbling practice, but it helps with every single thing. And just like anything you do regularly, the practice opens up and things that you thought you wouldn't be able to do, you can now.
this sense of, Oh, some people can make up songs, I guess I can do that too.
It's so much more playful now. Oh, it's like when I was a teenager and I didn't know I be able to write a song. oh, I have this idea. And then sometimes it's good and I know it and sometimes it's not. And I'm like, me
Yeah.
on time to make Mm hmm.
[00:16:16] Aaron: Yeah. I have practiced meditation to varying levels of commitment for the last two years. She's almost 20 years probably
That's insane to say With a hefty dose of on and off, been in a Much more consistent daily meditation practice for the last three months
[00:16:32] Ana: Oh, that's awesome.
[00:16:33] Aaron: But it'd been very infrequent for, two years before that, cause we had a newborn baby and wrapping our heads around parenthood for the first time, which, I did not have time to, for like a formal, like meditation practice.
I did a lot of like mindfulness and doing things in presence
[00:16:51] Ana: Mm-Hmm.
[00:16:51] Aaron: like having a, human being that I'm responsible for right in front of me is a good thing to keep you like in the moment. what I realized when I'm like consistently in a meditation practice is that letting go of attachment and like understanding just transient nature of kind of everything.
if I'm having a really hard time working on whatever song that I'm working on.
I'm much less likely to get caught in the mud of that struggle and the spiral of it's always going to be like this. It's always going to be hard. Maybe I'm not good. Maybe I should find something else like all of that.
I'm able to just let it float on by and be okay with choosing something else for the
[00:17:27] Ana: Yeah,
[00:17:28] Michaela: The thing, the thing that I find so interesting about all of the conversations that we have and also just I work with a lot of students, I coach songwriting and a lot of my students aren't pursuing songwriting in a professional capacity. They have other career paths and everything, but it's the same story for everyone over and over again.
the story of having to work to stop being so pulled on the outside. Of how we are received, who are we to think we can do what we want to do? And I used to think, Oh, am I the only one that struggles with this?
Is it easy for everybody else? And more and more, even though I know that's not true. And now I learn it. All the time, no matter what, through these conversations, no matter what level of quote unquote success or affirmation or adoration someone has experienced in their life, it's the same struggle at any given point of our relationship to our creativity, our work, our self, being pulled and morphed and You know, maybe abused or harmed by our relationship to the outside.
Whether it's perceived or real and I think it's probably harder than ever because we have so much access to the outside world through our phones we constantly can see what's everyone else doing. What's everyone thinking of me and my perception based on whether I'm getting likes or not my numbers.
Brene Brown has started this new series and her podcast something about like having a human scale issue of like All of the quote unquote progress we're making with AI and technology and how positive social media and this connection can be of informing us and connecting us.
But then also, are we biologically, mentally, emotionally wired as human beings to actually have the capacity to function in this way? I was listening to it and her first conversation is with Esther Perel psychologist it was fascinating because I feel like sometimes why is this so hard for all of us?
I'm like, Oh it's inherently hard for all of us. And then we live in a society that's built basically to prey on that. really in a lot of ways, the technology. listening to you talk is like one of the steps is maybe the acceptance of it's going to take work for me to feel more connected to myself.
sometimes I feel like there's a layer of shame or apprehension or resistance to that of this shouldn't be so hard to just feel okay. Or feel playful or feel light. And I think the lesson that I keep learning from all these conversations is, no, maybe it is. and how much discipline and.
intention and conscious planning it takes to get back in touch with what we see honestly in our children.
[00:20:25] Ana: mm. our two year old who's like painting and singing songs and insanely joyful for no reason.
right. Because she's so In touch with that's that's what you're saying is I think which self is the one you want to love. And so what is self love, like getting in touch with the self that is a child self like your daughter, she's not thinking about whether she has any acne, or if she's going gray.
You know, Or if she's gone up a size for her swimming She is not thinking about her exterior, the way she comes off, one No. Not at all.
and and so self love the first step towards that for all of us, and all therefore loving others, is, I think, going within, paying attention to yourself that is within, that is not the exterior. who am I inside,
know? And loving that me, that I, in thought and action, and supporting, you know, that self. The ripples have effect on the exterior self, turns out.
know, and it's not like we're not connected in one of the but self love can't just only be about going to the spa and the gym, cause that's the self that. isn't as important. Everyone knows people who look beautiful and perfect who are miserable. And we also probably all know people who are not super attractive and joyous.
[00:21:51] Michaela: Yeah.
[00:21:52] Ana: I mean, That is like the biggest teacher.
[00:21:54] Michaela: Yeah, and I think one of the challenges when you're an artist is you're basically like taking your insides and saying, Here world, I've been focusing on my insides and now I've excavated them and I'm sharing them and I want to like be strong in this and love this, but also at the same time I want it to connect and then it's feels so challenging to be okay with it connects with who it connects with and how to focus the ego driving that how often you let compliments go in one ear and out the other, but the person who, goes to the bathroom during your show or writes a bad review or whatever, those are the things you hold on to. So it's like how to stay so rooted in yourself in that practice the one negative thing doesn't pull you out of it or change your whole sense of who you are.
Yeah.
[00:22:46] Ana: being rooted in the inner self as opposed to the outer self.
ego Self, that, that's the self on the outside is the one that's attached to those things. Again, your daughter's the perfect example, a lot of my deepest big shifting work has been around being a parent, know, and my daughter's 10 now, so I've had 10 years of a lot deep and really difficult shifts, you know, and changes, and it is, it's so much about that. what do you even call it? Like. No self consciousness as far as how kids are in the world, know, they don't like broccoli They don't like it. You know what I mean? They're not gonna pretend. You know what? That's okay. And it's okay for us to feel that way too. We don't have to apologize We don't have to fit ourselves into these narrow little weird things.
like, oh my god, how refreshing is it when an adult is like, Ew! You know? You don't like that thing.
[00:23:45] Aaron: Mikaela mentioned, you know, we went to jazz school and I feel like I'm I'm still struggling with accepting what I don't like. speaking about art here, where
going to jazz school, people were very opinionated on what was good music and what was bad music.
And, people listening to some really weird music, some of which is great. I like really weird music too. somebody would have think we were crazy. You know, I was my last three years of college. live with this one particular friend where we would just listen to Balinese gamelan like really loud and play chess for hours and if somebody walked into our apartment they'd probably think we were crazy but I loved it and it was amazing
but some other types of music way you know much more in the like avant garde deep downtown Manhattan kind of stuff that
[00:24:32] Ana: Mm hmm.
[00:24:34] Aaron: there and be like, yeah, and just like not get it.
I'm like, you know, this is, I'm abusing myself by trying to sit here. Yeah, but it's,
[00:24:43] Michaela: it's the vibe of like I don't need to be offended if you don't love the thing that I love But also you don't need to insult the thing that I love by sharing that you don't love it Like I didn't want to be
[00:24:57] Aaron: found out, I just didn't believe in myself enough and didn't believe in my opinion enough.
I just thought that like I was missing something and I was flawed for not liking that. So I was like, no, I like this. This is great. Oh my God. And I
[00:25:08] Michaela: was there listening to the same stuff, secretly being obsessed with, uh, Shania Twain. I was like, I, according to these people have the worst taste in music.
Yeah.
[00:25:23] Aaron: anyway, it's that, just generally that acceptance of your opinion and ownership of your opinion without judgment.
[00:25:30] Ana: Yeah. that it's just an opinion.
like, there's a reason for who we are and why we are, but also, it's like, being attached to that also it's not like I'm gonna need to arm wrestle somebody over
Yeah. Yeah.
do like, you know, Who's bed have your boots been under by Shania Twain?
And if they don't, I'll be like, Look it! But I really love it. Yeah.
[00:25:50] Aaron: And, And being open to the change, I can remember I liked Shania Twain because that kind of like was crossover and I grew up hearing that kind of stuff. But like, admittedly, like when we started dating, like I didn't love George Strait or anything like that. It was.
You got
[00:26:02] Michaela: into George Strait.
[00:26:03] Aaron: Very much so. and I remember specifically what it was. We were with your parents. We went somewhere in Michigan and we bought something
[00:26:10] Ana: it was a CD.
[00:26:11] Aaron: We didn't buy the CD. That CD came with a pair of pants or a hat or something from yeah.
You know like. Like a feed store. From like a, yeah. Like a seed and feed store in rural Michigan and it came with like a bag. Six song, George Strait sampler.
I'm going to say it was in the time that my car only had a CD player, but I have the same car. So it's, you know, in this current time, and it's probably actually still in the CD player.
And this was, 15 years ago, but it was a long drive by myself and it just clicked and I was like, this is incredible. And I listened to that thing like endlessly I went from hating it to be like, this is really great. And so just the openness to like opinions change.
[00:26:46] Michaela: Also remembering, I was just telling a student this yesterday, that feeling that you had of like not liking some, type of music, a person's music or whatever, and then hearing that same music in a different time in your life. And it. resonating,
[00:27:00] Ana: Mm-Hmm.
[00:27:01] Michaela: have to remind ourselves as people who create music the same way that we feel about different artists.
One of our all time favorite artists. We might not love every single record they put out, but we're so thankful they're still putting out records people feel that way about us too. And that's okay. one of the things I wanted to ask you about, Ana, was, I'd, Don't know if we met before this, I definitely was around you at like different Folk Alliance things and back when you were, you had the Stray Birds play as your band, but You and I really more so connected during the pandemic when we were both online doing work with Western State Center, a great nonprofit that at the time was helmed by Eric Ward working on inclusive democracy.
And you Do a lot of work that's all connected through your music and art. Um, That's advocacy activism. Can you talk a little bit about that relationship of, you know, you and I had a conversation about this stuff last week of just how it feels. It almost gives more purpose. like they need each other.
And can you expand on that for yourself and how that has grown for you?
[00:28:08] Ana: Yeah. them, I used to think of that world as, as something else unreachable, sort of in the way that I used to think of know, the religious or spiritual life as something that was rarefied, know, or intangible.
But. Not true.
Mm
all so very, very They're all so basic about
mm you live your life and and how one connects to other people, and what deep values we all have. I think that was the big shift, was Eric I don't remember how he first found my you know, he's a huge music band. Obviously that's how we all know him.
And he told me, you know, a couple of years before that cohort became real. That was that he wanted to do something like that. And would I be interested, know, and I just was overjoyed. I was like, Oh my God, really me? Yes. What? You know? I have so much to learn from you, And so as it started to get closer to becoming real, I was intimidated and I didn't know what it was going to be.
but it's just so very basic, right? It is absolutely about being, honest and caring and loving and how you operate in the world. And it's a lot about unlearning. about peeling off these layers of. Things that we've come to accept the way that things are supposed to, or have to be, which aren't based on this inner self of your daughter.
Or this, all I need to know, I learned in kindergarten stuff. It's not. It's all this imposed BS. This built up about control and grief. pulling, it's peeling that stuff off on learning, as we say, Seeing people for who they are, and that means listening to them about what that means about who they are.
What no matter what skin color they are or how they express their gender or anything, oh, what's your name? Oh, you know, what are your pronouns? What do you like to do? It's so much more simple than anything that anyone would want to build it into being But getting to that simplicity can be a lot of work It is work for all of us, but it can be more work for some take just dismantling the stuff all these that kept us all away from each other and from our inner selves.
[00:30:21] Michaela: Has that work inspired your music in a different way or also not just the actual music but your approach to your music career and your feelings about career aspirations?
[00:30:33] Ana: I became aware of how few people of color, women, and queer people I work with.
Mhm.
And so I've, actively changed that.
Mhm.
so that's been really cool and very, very, active practice. like becoming a part of different communities, and showing up in that way. that that definitely informs my music too, the more I learn about people's suffering, the more I realize how I do not have anything to bitch about. I mean, literally, I don't. I have a great life, know. I grew up really poor and had a crazy family, but man, I have a lot that I can do to help people. Mhm. a lot of the time I don't know what that is, again, without asking what people want.
we're all so much more alike than that. You know, A lot of this new way of writing that has been happening lately for me, it's, well maybe it's just natural, but I think it has a lot to do with this practice. that I've been doing. I read a book about this inventor and mystic Swedenborg,
did this Practice for a while where he would write out his dreams and identify with every person in the dream. And I thought, oh, That's cool. So I started doing that and I did that for a long time of course the big breakthrough aha things were when I would have a dream that I did not want to identify with the other person, for example, who raped and shot me in my dream. But in, in writing these dreams, if I'm everyone in my dream, I am this person. I am this person. I am that person. and just like for writing songs, I don't know if you guys feel this way, but when you're actually in that practice, when you're doing it, You're more than yourself when you're not.
Something's happening in that action that you can't necessarily think of or access except for when you're doing it. Just like you can't ollie on a skateboard when you're not on a skateboard trying to ollie. It won't happen. So when you're writing, sometimes you write something and you connect and oh my god, that's the part of my brain That's what's going on in my psyche that appeared in my dream as that first, as that
Mm and so, and also like very, very humble and I'm, these are all aspects of the me, the I, hmm. Mm hmm. I think through that practice. Anyhow, at some point, I started becoming aware of music in my dreams. I started hearing it, realizing that I was dreaming. And making myself wake up and humming it into my phone.
Woah.
and so sometimes that happens and it's like lyrics and a melody. then I get to co write with my dream, It's frickin so cool. And then sometimes I listen to it and I'm like, ugh. Or sometimes it's like, uh, uh, uh. Like, I'm like, is there a melody in there? Clearly, I thought there was, because I made myself wake up and this says 3. 22am, you know, on the voice memo. But the majority of the songs I've been writing start with That's
[00:33:40] Aaron: incredible.
[00:33:41] Ana: It's a huge gift. And again, is, these are the things that I think are connecting the dots towards that happening. But then of course there's the craft and the, you know, inspiration getting to work with those snippets and then finish writing a song,
but It really is again, so much more not attached unattached because I'm like, Ooh, I'm already listening to these voice memos being like, nah, nah.
And then I hear one, I'm like, hmm. That's cool. What happens if I'm playing my guitar now and oh, that's interesting you know
Mm hmm. I get to have an opinion as if I didn't come up with that or this is as if You know like when you and you have someone send you something they want to co write It's so much easier to be like yeah, I like that part.
I don't like that so much, but if you wrote it yourself Sometimes it's like you don't have that separation, you know to have an opinion that's kind of what's been happening lately
[00:34:31] Aaron: I really love that. So just synthesize everything in my head. you came at this by putting pen to paper to identify with the characters in your dreams. And the more that you did that, your awareness of your dreams increased.
[00:34:44] Ana: Mm hmm
[00:34:45] Aaron: I love that. To the
[00:34:45] Michaela: point that then you started hearing music.
[00:34:47] Aaron: Yeah. I love that.
[00:34:48] Ana: Well, I think I always did hear music. I just didn't necessarily part of it discipline of Making yourself write it down
Not saying oh, I'll remember it. You know, you won't you will we will not remember it so you start and you write it down and you show up just like You show up when you're doing anything
or whatever you've decided you're going to work on, just Keep doing it, this And so then also making myself wake up. Like sometimes even when it's like, Oh, that's so pretty. Oh, I don't want to wake up. And then I'm like, wake up, you know, like, are you kidding? This could be great. And then sometimes it's just not, but I still woke up and I still fall back asleep. like, even in that state, This drag like, oh,
[00:35:28] Aaron: Yeah, I'll remember this.
[00:35:30] Michaela: that just is even more support and evidence for what I was talking about of feeling like, Oh, it takes a lot of energy and work to Think, be, feel in the way that like, I want to be aware of or want to be, and also that coming off of you developing a dedicated meditation practice and you're accessing these layers of your subconscious by doing that work that otherwise you they would be happening, but you wouldn't be connected to them and you wouldn't be able to feel them and see them.
And that's So cool. one side note, I just, I'm going to go back to school for depth psychology of creativity, which is like this like dream type of work. And you just sharing the story made, just like gave me shivers of like, Oh yeah, I want to know more about this stuff.
But This weekend I told Aaron this morning I had multiple dreams all weekend that were really disturbing to me because it was images of like Palestinians in Gaza a lot of the imagery that I have the horrible I don't even want to say imagery that What is happening and real people in my dreams mixed in with like mom, fluencers that I see on Instagram who are like sharing silly things their kids said or whatever.
But it was like all a mashup in this dream. And. It like really disturbed me and Aaron was like, maybe a sign of like, scrolling Instagram too much. that and what you just said is a combination of like, being conscious of what we feed our minds.
Laura Veres was on this. Podcast as well and she talked a lot about how she became very aware of like, what I take in and having the discipline, like she got off Instagram and this isn't to say like. get off Instagram. This is just to say, Oh, it takes so much energy and discipline to decide what we want to feed ourselves mentally, intellectually, emotionally, and how to keep doing that and really recognizing it changes what we receive from ourselves
how we feel on a daily basis. And yes, it is a lot of work. It shouldn't be easy.
[00:37:41] Ana: I've, I put Instagram on and off my phone. like when I have a single out or something, I'll do it multiple times a day Again, because it's fun, like, because it's enjoyable, because I follow so many friends.
Do I need to do that now?
And I mostly do not have it on my phone. it's just a time
suck. all these are exciting and distractions and excitement on the outside, and it makes more noise and more things to peel away to get back to that self that we really want to be. And the dreams are a reflection of that, and getting to that place of witnessing all of our myriad selves in our dreams. then we're closer to child that's not necessarily so attached to one or the other. we're just witnessing it. We're just like, oh ooh, know, like what's happening?
and yet, it's all us. who else dreamt that,
hmm.
dreams are amazing and then there's sometimes dreams are not like that and they're different You know, sometimes when you have a dream and you're like, whoa, that was a different kind of dream know just like how we all have these moments of knowing
Whether it's a How we want to call it a psychic moment or like a thing, you know Someone's dying or everyone has had these moments, Sometimes you have those dreams where it's like what? Was that?
Yeah!
And yet, you don't have to because it is like the deepest communication, definitely.
[00:38:59] Aaron: And there's always such a I want to say like residue to those dreams, they linger, whether it's for me, whether it's like a tangible memory of what the dream was,
A lot of times it's like the feeling of that dream radiates for like days.
[00:39:12] Michaela: Yeah. this has been such a cool conversation and not anywhere that I thought it was going to expect to go.
I love it.
[00:39:19] Aaron: It's perfect.
[00:39:20] Ana: yeah. I'm curious if you guys ever, start doing that that dream work. It's so fun and it's challenging. Like I said, the ones that you really don't wanna write are the ones that are whoa.
[00:39:31] Aaron: Yeah.
[00:39:32] Michaela: Incredible.
[00:39:32] Ana: the uncomfortable Freudian dreams that that happen, and you're like, eh, I don't ever wanna think of that.
Right.
[00:39:38] Michaela: I've had some that I've told Aaron and Aaron's been like, I'm like, don't judge me.
[00:39:44] Ana: He's like, stop talking! I cannot hear
[00:39:46] Aaron: Yeah. That's where I like force myself into non attachment. I'm like, not that I'm not saving that one in my psyche. I need to eat breakfast with this person for the next 40 years.
[00:39:56] Ana: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:39:58] Aaron: Well, Ana, thank you for taking time this morning to have this conversation with us.
[00:40:03] Michaela: Thank Thanks for having me
hope
[00:40:05] Ana: Yeah, it was a real pleasure.
[00:40:06] Michaela: to see you in person, but I know we'll be in touch. So thank you.
[00:40:10] Ana: Yeah.
[00:40:10] Ana: Nice to meet you,
[00:40:11] Aaron: Yeah. Nice to meet you. See ya.
[00:40:13] Ana: Bye bye.