Rebelling

Amy Knott Parrish (00:44)
Hey, y'all, welcome back to Rebelling. This episode is part of the Social Security series, and I'm talking with my good friend Colin Ryan. Colin is a financial speaker, storyteller, and stand-up comedian. His new book, Epic Tiny Victories, is a funny, hopeful, and human memoir about figuring out how to manage his mental health on his own terms.

I wanted to have Colin on the podcast because he approaches money the same way he approaches mental health as a human experience shaped by relationships, context, privilege, shame, and the systems we live in. Our conversation is about how we can move from private dissonance, those unspoken struggles and judgments we carry alone into a shared reality-based understanding of ourselves and each other.

Here's my conversation with Colin.

Amy Knott Parrish (01:48)
I have not gotten into posting ⁓ videos yet. But maybe, is that okay? Do I have your permission to?

Colin Ryan (01:54)
Okay.

I I comb my hair, you

I went to all this trouble.

Hey, you do you. don't whatever editing can be a whole rabbit hole. I respect whatever you come up with. I was just curious.

Amy Knott Parrish (02:16)
I

would like to put video out and I mean, I have my podcast on YouTube, but I don't think I ever go over and actually upload the video to YouTube.

Colin Ryan (02:30)
you do the audio with like a picture. Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (02:34)
Yeah, maybe,

or I have no idea. Because it takes me a lot to just get it all arranged and together and then out. And so after I publish it, I just sort of go, ⁓ yes.

That's it. That's it. I was trying to remember what got our conversation started the other day when I was over visiting you and Lindsey and we started talking about like capitalism and the world and how things are. And I couldn't remember how we got on that subject. Do you remember?

Colin Ryan (03:21)
think you, you were taking the class. And so you were, you were plugging the class uproot and capitalism. And there's just a little part of me that lights up whenever not just like only capitalism or, or, or for against, but like how we manage our money, how we relate to our money, how we talk or don't talk about it. ⁓

It just affects me. Like it's, it's a subject I'm fascinated by. I'm troubled by, I wrestle with. And so I think whenever there's a chance to talk about maybe the kind of taboo part of how money affects us in a, in a pure, a very capitalist system without we're seeing more and more without really any, guardrails.

that used to create a little bit more equal outcomes and, and the kind of American dream of building wealth and owning assets and being able to retire comfortably. Like those things have just like gone off the rails. I guess guard rails being a very apt word. What happens when you don't have those guard rails or when they're like

whatever metal guard rails are, they're like removed and replaced with like tin foil guard rails. So then when you tap, they just explode and you go into the crash, you know, just think we don't feel protected the same way. So yeah, I don't know. And I respect how you look at all this stuff. And so, I don't know. I think it just.

Amy Knott Parrish (05:03)
Yeah.

Colin Ryan (05:15)
It's real. Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (05:15)
It fits.

Yeah. I mean, and I think we have both shared this fascination with like money and the role it plays and how we see it and what's underneath it and the things that we're told. And then also the things that are

not really true and

You know, I'd.

I didn't really think about it until we were talking the other day and I was like, well, of course, Colin should come on the podcast because you're a financial speaker. This makes total sense. And you have this way of looking at money really honestly rather than ⁓ like, here's a hack to get you more money.

Colin Ryan (06:03)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, well.

Amy Knott Parrish (06:18)
How did you get

to that point?

Colin Ryan (06:22)
Well, look, I was changed by the work that I did. ⁓ I'm not really like a hustle guy. Like, I like relationships. I like laughing. I like leisure time. You know, I like being creative. just, you know, I want enough money to keep doing my life.

That's, that's what I want. When people would talk to me about scaling and, know, making all these numbers, I just been like, ⁓ no, thank you. So, so I think there was maybe like a, a proclivity for, I was more interested in the human experience. ⁓ but the reality is when I went into personal finance as a speaker, you know, I'd applied for this job. I didn't have a lot of background in it.

I just had some public speaking kind of, raw ability and they saw that in me, this credit union. they hired me and then I just read every book I could find about finance so that I could be a good resource. And I'm talking to like high school students. So these are smart, interesting young people. And I got to know my stuff and, ⁓

It was a transformative experience. mean, I was just learning all of this stuff and, um, earning for the first time, like earning a real salary, you know, I had been a journalist, so was just like perennially broke, um, person in my, in my mid twenties and kind of like, found my thing and I'm talking to people about money and it's really meaningful. And at that time,

we understood, what we agreed with and understood. And even this is comes with asterisks, but what seemed to be most normal and mainstream was work hard, ⁓ get a good return on your investment, buy assets, not liabilities, know, ⁓ budget, build your credit, things like that. And you know, buy a home.

and you will get there. And it was very satisfying in this very, it's very straightforward. I'm not saying it's easy. That's that's its own. But it was very satisfying to like, learn that and then to teach that. So like the guy that I learned from was Dave Ramsey. I watched Dave Ramsey videos. And you know, this is 15 years ago, he was a religious guy.

But there wasn't really like a lot of pushback to his general message 15 years ago. And you know, the church part, was like, okay, but like, he was very good at making the concepts straightforward. So I kind of learned from that. I put my own humorous spin on it. I'm very curious. So I would always ask students about their experience. And I did well enough at the job.

that I started speaking to different types of audiences, not just students in traditional school, but ⁓ young teen moms with fixed incomes, struggling, young women who grew up in the crisis of poverty and have kids and are trying to manage a very small amount of resources. And I write about this in my book because this was

Amy Knott Parrish (10:01)
I was just about to

say that.

Colin Ryan (10:03)
this was a transformative experience. go into this. ⁓ It's called a parent child center. I'm doing my thing.

I'm doing my thing. I'm trying to be funny. I'm trying to be engaging. I'm trying to teach them about personal finance because what I know from reading about these folks, because I'm middle-class upbringing, is that, you know, they buy lottery tickets and they spend their money on cigarettes. And I know it doesn't feel good to say that, but that's what I, again, this was like more the normal ⁓ understanding.

was that folks who are in poverty, they did it to themselves. yeah, exactly.

Amy Knott Parrish (10:47)
Yeah, they're just not trying hard enough. If they weren't so

lazy and relying on a handout, they could probably do better, but.

Colin Ryan (10:57)
Yeah. And I hope you don't clip that part because that's going to sound really bad out of context. You know what I mean? But it is what people think and say, I think. So maybe it's good that it sounds bad to sort of externalize it that way.

Amy Knott Parrish (11:02)
I wouldn't. I wouldn't.

It won't, but.

Yes!

Well, yeah, because why pretend that that's not what, that's not, that's what I was raised with is, you know, go up and the person on the street and you're like, here, here's a dollar, here's $5. And my mom would be like, what are you doing? You don't give those people money. And I'm like, whoa, what? I don't understand.

Colin Ryan (11:44)
Hmm.

Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (11:52)
what you're talking about. So it is the undercurrent of like, these are just all the things we don't really say out loud. We just assume.

Colin Ryan (12:04)
Yeah.

Yeah. And, and I'd never questioned them and maybe I'd never said them out loud. So I didn't even get to hear like, Ooh, that's got a weird energy to it. That's kind of a mean way of, thinking and talking about, about people's experience. So I think you can see like just my, my, my personality.

Amy Knott Parrish (12:23)
dismissive.

Colin Ryan (12:32)
I am very curious. So I go into a room like that and I start to sense pretty quickly that

they are being very generous with me because they are tolerating me with a pretty good idea that I don't get their experience. And you know, I'm being positive and I'm being, you know, I'm not being a jerk, like, ⁓ there's this quote that, ⁓

I wish I'm gonna I cannot remember the writer's name. She's a researcher on poverty herself in poverty. Brilliant. I'll look it up. And she says ⁓ people in the crisis of poverty are used to being talked over about and never to and it's like we don't want to see it.

or we don't realize that we need to learn from them. And I just found myself being like, wait a minute, this is something about this ain't right. And what ain't right is I'm the only man in the room. I'm the only one standing. They're sitting in a circle around me. I'm the only middle-class person. I'm the only non-parent. And I go, I'm literally the center of attention. I mean, I'm...

standing in the middle of this room and like

I don't know, just had this instinct. So what I did is, yeah. Well, it's interesting too, because I hadn't really had much of an awakening yet about.

Amy Knott Parrish (14:20)
Wait a second, wait a second. What did that feel like?

Colin Ryan (14:33)
you know, gender and the way, you know, maybe female identifying folks are used to not being listened to. You know, I wasn't necessarily aware of these things consciously. I just.

It's a great question. I'm not sure.

I just felt like my ⁓

my reach had exceeded my grasp. I was in a situation where I had an opportunity to be a good resource to them and I couldn't be. Because I didn't understand their experience. You know, I mean, just as one example, when you're on a fixed income, you face a benefits cliff. So if you earn additional money, you can lose your benefits. So you're actually trapped.

You know, another one is that research tends to show these folks are not on it very long, a period of years, maybe a couple of years. This is not a lifelong thing that they're doing. ⁓ our assumptions are a lot, ⁓ harsher than the reality

I just sensed I was like, I'm not doing a good job. And I that's always kind of been my thing is like, I just want to do a good job. You know, and I'm not afraid to admit when I'm wrong. And so I've got it there. And I was like, you know what, I'm going to sit down. And that kind of got their attention. And I said, I just have this sense that you all have a lot to teach each other. And like, let's just talk.

about our experience with money. And, you know, one of the big moments that really blew me away, and this is kind of maybe what led me to sit down in the first place, was I asked them if I, if I didn't say I gave you $100, thank God, but I said, if you got $100 unexpectedly, what would you spend it on? And the three most common answers by the time all the women had answered were rent, gas, and baby formula.

There is nothing you can judge about those answers.

That is genuine need, you know, and providing, you know? ⁓

Amy Knott Parrish (17:01)
And it's

And it's interesting because like

first I think about the, you you knew like your instinct as a speaker and someone who gets up in front of people is you know when you're losing your audience.

Colin Ryan (17:25)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (17:27)
Right?

And so I just imagine you stand like, I am about to bomb here. Like, this is not going well. And being willing to take that chance to step out of the role that you were in and actually go connect with them and to in

Colin Ryan (17:34)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (17:55)
let them invite you in.

Colin Ryan (17:58)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (18:01)
ahead.

Colin Ryan (18:04)
Yeah, I think I, so I remember recalling as we're talking about this, I was doing standup comedy at the time as like a on the side or at night, you know, not, not in that moment, but there's a great, believe me, but there's a great skill that I learned through standup comedy, which is to read the room and to kind of try to detect the energy. Cause the obvious one is they're laughing. So you're like, great. It's working.

But you you can sometimes be unclear or you can hit a line in a way or like try to do an edgy joke and it doesn't land and you just feel the room kind of distance or whatever. It's hard to describe in a concrete way, but it's, there's a lot of data that's coming to you that you can play around with that you can benefit from. And so as a presenter, I would just do the same, you know, so I'm in.

In any room I was in, I'm like listening for when are they going, Hmm, you know, when are they nodding at me? When are they like making eye contact instead of discreetly checking their phone, you know? And so those are the things I just learned to lean into. And so in that room, my whole kind of mission was how do I gain their attention, you know, and their trust.

in a way that I can educate. Because I do know stuff. I read all these books, I do, I can be helpful. And what I discovered quite accidentally was that by sitting down and becoming on their level and joining the circle with them, that's how I gained their trust was because I was willing to, you know, just proceed without ego a little bit.

I mean, I'm a total stranger. This is the funny thing about my job is I'm a total stranger to this audience of people. And I'm talking about like a very sensitive subject. So you have to build trust and you can't technique your way to it. You can't fake it. You got to just care and you got to be curious. This is what works for me. Like I care. I'm curious.

I try to listen, make space to listen. And we ended up having this conversation that was just very informative for me. And I think was actually very respectful and meaningful to some of them at least. And I walked out of that parent child center, walked to my car and I was, I was like, I don't know what's happened, but I'm, I'm different now. I'm going to do this job differently. You know, I'm going to.

Amy Knott Parrish (20:56)
Yes.

Colin Ryan (20:57)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (21:01)
because it became not about, like this is another reason why I wanted to talk to you in the series, in the social security series that I'm doing, is because it became people in relationship rather than an expert giving instruction.

to an audience that could not relate to your, like you're in a different reality.

Colin Ryan (21:37)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (21:40)
And the context is so important. And it's so interesting to me what you were saying earlier about like, you you have the benefits cliff and then like, ⁓ now you're not helpable anymore. And the way that we.

have this moralistic judgment of people and money when there's so many different experiences of money?

And before this day, like you didn't understand that there could be an entirely different reality.

Colin Ryan (22:30)
And look, I would say to kind of touch a third rail here, verbally, like this is privilege. Privilege is not, it's not your fault. It's not a flaw. It's not, it's not a judgment on you. It's, it's, it's just identifying that there are things that you didn't have to experience by luck.

Amy Knott Parrish (22:38)
yeah.

Colin Ryan (22:58)
by where you were born regionally, by the net worth of your parents, by the color of your skin, your gender, you know, your sexuality, whatever the case may be. And I say this as a person who I'm in like nine out of the 10 privileged categories, you know, and I've done my work around that because I'm not defensive about that. And I'm not embarrassed about that because I just showed up here and unearthed.

Amy Knott Parrish (23:17)
Right.

Colin Ryan (23:27)
this way. I didn't pick the identities that I have. It's just it's just what I got. And so I think with that comes a responsibility. And I like to call it out to just say, Look, like, that's, that's what privilege can look like. It's a blind spot, because you didn't experience something that is someone else's reality. And then you're giving advice, or you're explaining the rules.

based on your experience, not theirs. And so I, it does. Yeah, it does. And I think, tell me what you think about this, but I think for a lot of people we're busy, we're in a hurry and uncertainty is very, can be very stressful. So this is hard. It's easier to say work hard.

Amy Knott Parrish (24:03)
It changes the whole thing.

Colin Ryan (24:27)
make good decisions with your money and it'll work out like that is there's something comforting about that. problem is

The data does not support that. And it supports it less every day. And I think, I don't know. I think it's I think it's not serving us. I think it's inadequate. ⁓ I think it's okay to be uncertain, and to be malleable and to adapt to different, different needs and different challenges. And I

I honestly prefer it, but I guess I wanted to give you that narrative about me because I was a person who came into the work being like, here are the three steps to financial success. And I had to go on a very, I would say almost a spiritual journey, like a mental health journey, like a real.

like, what do I what's, what's, what's honest? What's ethical to say? What's, what's true in a complicated world? I don't know. I just, I think it's made me better, but it's, you know, there are times when you're like, man, it was great back then. Not, not only in the sense of like, when I thought I knew everything, that was great. I didn't, but you know,

Amy Knott Parrish (25:58)
That's

it.

Colin Ryan (26:04)
Anyway.

Amy Knott Parrish (26:04)
Well, and isn't that like,

I mean, what you just said makes kind of a, you know, it's a little uncomfortable, but it's also makes the point of like romanticizing. ⁓ you know, just do these top three things. And then next thing, you know, you know, at all and everything's all good. And, and I feel like that has been something that we've clung to.

Colin Ryan (26:18)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (26:30)
So you let me see if I could explain this like if you're operating from morality and good people do this bad people do this it's such a shortcut

to like you just, ⁓ plop people in buckets and then you don't, it's, you don't have to have the humanity. And so.

Colin Ryan (26:48)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (27:01)
We just dehumanize all of us so that, ⁓ yeah, good, bad, good, bad, good, bad. And then who takes the blame? Well, the individual instead of the system.

Colin Ryan (27:09)
Mm-hmm.

Thank

Yeah, I mean, you know, what are like two words to describe American society at the moment on an individual level? we feel divided and we feel isolated. So like what you said feels intimately linked to that. We have this brain that, that wants to sort, but that's fine. That's that is that that can be overridden. That's not.

a rule that's just like how it goes but when you're in a society that's structured where you don't have enough time you don't have enough resources and all of the people with loud voices are encouraging you to be divided and isolated this is the outcome you get and I think it has tremendous human cost go ahead

Amy Knott Parrish (28:11)
Yes, yes,

but it's call it, it's so.

It's so interesting how that system needs everyone to be guilty and ashamed and blaming themselves if things aren't going well. not, I don't have enough resources to support myself. That's my fault. I did this and

Colin Ryan (28:30)
Hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (28:50)
what it would be like.

to have the humility to be the person hired, to be in the front of the room and to be able to say, you know what? I don't know what your experience is like, but I wanna know. And so let's talk about it.

Colin Ryan (29:11)
Yeah, let's

talk about that.

Amy Knott Parrish (29:15)
Instead of.

You know, I think so much, I think a lot about how money is the thing that's supposed to give us security and certainty. And yet it's one of the most uncertain things that there is.

Colin Ryan (29:36)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (29:37)
And it prevents us from being

in relationship with each other because you have to hide.

Colin Ryan (29:44)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (29:46)
if you're not doing it right.

What do you think?

Colin Ryan (29:54)
I mean, I fully agree with you. I think the logical conclusion is my financial mistakes are my fault. They say something about me. think, I think we are encouraged to think that I think it's easy to think that. So let's talk about the secrecy piece, like the, the, the private, this is a private topic we don't talk about. I talked to this woman years ago. She's a financial psychologist. name is Shell Tain.

Shell told me this thing I've always thought about. said, most people at a young age as a child, the first thing they observe about money is that it makes people uncomfortable.

So if that's your first impression about money, how does that affect the rest of your life? And then, you know, you grew up in an environment where people don't talk about it and you don't know how much money your parents make and they're afraid to tell you because they're afraid you'll tell your friends and your friends will tell their parents. And that to me is all based on a very questionable ground, which is

that your salary or your net worth has some sort of meaning about your value or your human worth. I don't think that's true. I mean, just to say it out loud, I think that's obviously not connected. know, a cute way of saying this ⁓ is your self, your net worth is not the same as your self worth. But we live in an environment where we are encouraged to think they are the same.

Amy Knott Parrish (31:36)
Yeah.

Colin Ryan (31:42)
And I will say as an entrepreneur, I've been doing this 15 years in the years when I do really well, because my income is different every year, depending on how the business goes. And in the years when I historically have made a lot of money, I feel

like a more valued member of society. I feel this confidence. I feel this, this, ⁓ you know, my shoulders go up, you know, I feel proud in this way. I had a year, few years ago when I made not even enough to make a living. And this was like, in the, in the long running successful business, all of a sudden I couldn't make it work.

And it was a very, had to deal with real shame and, self doubt. And I kind of emerged on the other side of that realizing that both, both reactions are wrong. The one where I made a lot of money means I'm better. And the one where I didn't make a lot of money means I'm worse. Those are both like wrong conclusions. I think, ⁓

Amy Knott Parrish (32:47)
Hmm.

Colin Ryan (33:01)
And so I completely lost the thread of what we were talking about.

Amy Knott Parrish (33:06)
No, it's totally good because you're

I mean it is what we're talking about is

If money is makes you uncomfortable from the get go and you know, I'm in my mid 50s. So the, the rhetoric around money was nice. People don't talk about money and people who have money don't talk about how much things cost. so anybody who talked about money or how much things were was kind of,

Colin Ryan (33:19)
Hmm.

Mm.

Amy Knott Parrish (33:45)
low class, right? And so you just don't like so that's a very it's a great way to just shut everybody up because if I say you know ⁓ gosh I hope this $500 Datsun gets us through the winter you know you don't say that because then people are gonna know that you're not making enough money and then

Colin Ryan (33:47)
⁓ yeah, yeah.

Right.

Amy Knott Parrish (34:14)
You're not. You're not a good person.

Colin Ryan (34:21)
Okay. So I want to share this thing with you because this is like the little miracle of my career moment that I always, I wonder what the greater meaning of it is. I started asking in my presentations who in here has learned a hard lesson about money. It's a hand raised question. No one has to put their cards on the table.

bunch of hands go up. Half more than half, you know?

And so I go, we'll look around. So there you go. This is not, you're not the only one. This is, this is probably our more dominant experiences. We learned a hard lesson about money.

Then I go, is anyone willing to share what happened?

And then I wait. I count to five, take a drink of water. And almost every time I have done this, maybe every time I have done this, someone has shared. And what's fascinating about somebody sharing a mistake is that, well, there's all these things that are interesting about it. Number one,

Amy Knott Parrish (35:21)
you

Colin Ryan (35:45)
people around nod, okay? So I'll call attention to that. And I'll go, look, you're not being judged by the people around you, despite all our programming that says you are. And so this is, I wanna get your reaction to this, cause I feel like this is a, both can be true, right? Like you can be judged by others about the Datsun or by talking about how much things cost.

But there's also this like little social experiment that I get to do where I create a space where people like they they're very vulnerable and then people don't judge them. And

like people relate, people laugh in an appropriate way, like a laugh of like, share your pain. ⁓ The room feels different.

And so that's my little like, ⁓ You know, I'm not I'm not a religious person, but that's my like, we just did something that feels like ⁓ really special in a way. And so I get the the ⁓ rare ⁓ form of wealth of knowing that that exists and that happens and that can happen in a room of strangers or

Amy Knott Parrish (36:50)
Mm-hmm.

Colin Ryan (37:15)
coworkers or, whoever I've done this at prestigious universities where they're really not wired to admit mistakes or, you know, be vulnerable. I've, ⁓ I've done this with lots of different, different, different rooms. So anyway, I wanted to get your take on that because

That's just one of those things I stumbled into and it always seems to create a cool, a cool moment.

Amy Knott Parrish (37:49)
What it made me think of Colin is ⁓ what I talked to my last guest Kelty about ⁓ independence and interdependence and that when you know you're doing it yourself just work hard it's very individual and then you have

in a room full of people, people who feel like they're the only one, and you actually name it out loud in front of everybody. And then people, yeah, me, me, that's happened to me. ⁓ that's happened to me. And when you see yourself mirrored back at yourself, it...

Colin Ryan (38:33)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (38:44)
It changes the energy of the room.

Colin Ryan (38:48)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (38:50)
because you're not hiding anymore.

Colin Ryan (38:56)
Yeah.

Well, you know, you mentioned shame earlier. And one of the examples that it still gives me chills to think about was I asked that question to a room of financial educators. This is like a little sneaky, ⁓ mission of mine is I get to go talk to the experts and give them a space to say, I don't know. You know, I'm a human being. I've walked directly into the scam or

the bad APR on the car loan or whatever. And I give them a chance to do it too. And so I did this with a bunch of financial educators and this woman raised her hand and said her hard lesson was that when she was in college, she knew she had to sign up for a credit card, but didn't know how it worked. So her parents co-signed.

And the problem with getting a credit card in college ⁓ is fairly straightforward. Like you're having this special growing up experience. You're surrounded by really interesting people. You like to socialize. Now you have a form of currency that can allow you to like, enjoy the moment. And I don't say that with judgment. I think it gets set up.

to, you know, that's why they had to fight to make the age of a credit card holder, the minimum age higher because they were predatory on college students in the, you know, decades ago. And so when I talked to educators, credit card, horror stories, like everybody's got one. And this woman shared that. And she said, she got in way overhead. She didn't understand the late

fees and the grace period and the all of it. And why would you it's in tiny print, you know, on the thing you sign or whatever form you click. And she said I ended up wrecking my credit and I wrecked my parents credit too.

Amy Knott Parrish (41:01)
Right.

Colin Ryan (41:13)
And it was just this like, really sad human moment, like in the room, you know.

Amy Knott Parrish (41:20)
Mm-hmm.

Colin Ryan (41:23)
And I just thought, well, I better say the right thing. This is a very vulnerable moment. And so I said, does anyone in here relate to that story in some way? And it was like every hand went up, like they were just waiting for an excuse to like meet her name is Jessica, like meet Jessica where she was. And I mean, it was cool. And I had a million things going on. So I just went on to my next point.

And then Jessica emailed me like a week later and said, that was like a light bulb moment for me because I realized I'm like deeply ashamed of that. And I've been carrying that shame and here I am. And I'm, I'm getting like chills remembering those. Cause she's like, I'm a financial educator. And I have this like black mark on my history, you know, that I have this like perfect ex.

Trigger for self-doubt and imposter syndrome

And she was like, I don't know, when I, when all the hands went up, I realized, I think I can let it go. And then she said, I realized my mistakes don't define me. My mistakes are lessons I can teach.

Holy crap.

Amy Knott Parrish (42:47)
Yes.

I mean, I also have chills because I'm just thinking like, this is exactly the definition of social security that I'm thinking about. And I never thought about it quite like that before. But in that situation, because it was a social situation, it created...

Colin Ryan (42:50)
Yeah.

Hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (43:19)
The honesty created the courage that it took to like take out something as a financial person that she was so ashamed of that she could say, this is me. I'm a financial educator and I also have made mistakes. They're both me.

Colin Ryan (43:46)
And I think I love that, by the way, like, I love this whole concept of social security and, this idea of like, when your chips are down, when you're in real need, like people will, people will show up for you. And like, we have so much proof of that. But none of it gets broadcast on the largest channels. It doesn't. It doesn't send.

Amy Knott Parrish (44:03)
Yes. Happily.

Colin Ryan (44:16)
the same way. It's not shareable the same way people share outrage. People share, frankly, hatred. They share mockery, like it evokes something in us. It's like, you know, who are your people and who aren't your people? And

It's sad, like just to say that out loud and I'm a victim of it too. I'm not above it. But, but the thing is what I'm getting at is like, there's a website called good news network. And it's like both as cheesy and as wonderful as it sounds, you know, it's just man feeds birds every day for 50 years. I mean, it's just, you know,

Amy Knott Parrish (45:02)
Right?

Colin Ryan (45:06)
But it's kind of framed like news stories. And that's like, that's the example I came up with. mean, it's beautiful. can think of one, ⁓ a high school student saw a stop sign had broken off by a very busy intersection. And so he went and he held the stop sign up until, ⁓ public works could come and replace it so that there wasn't an accident. Like that happened.

And no one knows about that except like the, the local news did a fluffy little segment on it. But like, to me that's people that's, that's, that's what we got going on. And so I just think one of the hard parts about the system we live in is I just think those stories are suppressed. think those stories don't support.

consumerism and division and scarcity. And so they just don't get out there. But everybody loves those stories. Like, if you just take it, if you go look for it, it's there, you know, go ahead.

Amy Knott Parrish (46:18)
Well, and it's,

It's like, feels like that the story has to be big, right? That it has to be this big triumphant thing when it's just like, I mean, it's making me think about your book so much about just like the every day, day in, day.

Colin Ryan (46:30)
Hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (46:51)
out stuff that feels inconsequential or not important or not big enough to say anything about or like just not a big deal.

Colin Ryan (46:59)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (47:13)
I don't know, I'm think I'm formulating this in my head right now, but how that, how socially and relationally it is actually the, the little things that are what makeup are our lives. And by ignoring those,

It erases our humanity.

Colin Ryan (47:55)
mean, I'm just sitting with that. You know, like, So my book, Epic Tiny Victories is really inspired by this idea that when you feel stuck or overwhelmed or hopeless,

the smallest step that you take, like as a little bet on yourself. And I mean, small, like you ride an exercise bike for five minutes when you'd rather stay in bed or you text a friend and say, can we chat? Or you give $5 to a person who's standing at the median of a busy intersection. And you've seen them there every day.

And you're like, this is nothing, but it's, it's what I got. Like those little actions are almost nothing in the moment. But if you do enough of them, you look back and you go, those were epic. Those, those got me here. So, so the whole premise of the book was built around this moment for me. So basically

Amy Knott Parrish (49:05)
Yes!

Colin Ryan (49:17)
I am a person with chronic depression. And as a young person, a horrible paralyzing fear of rejection. And I reached this point in my late 20s where I was like, I, my life is so small and sad and lonely. I don't mean to laugh. was really awful. I just like, I got to change the there's a joke in the book. say, ⁓

I'd heard somewhere that when you need a change, any change will do. And then I was like, I think that might've been like a haircut store commercial, you know? Like, I have no idea where I heard that, but I remember being like, yeah, like any change will do. And my change was, I signed up for a standup comedy class at like a local performing arts venue.

Amy Knott Parrish (49:59)
You

Colin Ryan (50:16)
I'd always loved comedians. always wanted, I love joking around with people. I was afraid of public speaking. I was afraid of rejection. I was afraid of failure in front of people. mean, I had way more reasons not to do it, but I was so desperate that I was like, I just need to do something that is different from like what my life looks like. And I walked into that room and I felt like I was walking to my death. I was like, this is the scariest.

room I could be in and I chose to be here. This is nuts. And I got up there when it was my turn and I told a couple jokes and one of them got a laugh. And it was like the most incredible feeling because I was like, A, I just did the thing.

that like I was terrified to do and a lot of people would be terrified to do and be like, I might have the potential to, to be good at this. I mean, I got the ultimate reward people laughed. And so I, became hooked and I kept doing comedy and I became much more confident. I became much more on my own team. You know, I was not fixed. had dormant mental health.

challenges that that we're going to come back again, but for a brief period of time, I demonstrated this totally different version of myself to myself. I was like, dude, you are brave. You're brave. And people would say you're brave. And I wouldn't be like, you're right. I am brave. And it was just transformative. And again, this is my image of like, a very, very small decision.

pay $135 and take a standup comedy class in a safe environment with a bunch of other terrified people. And it like changed my whole thing, changed my whole like what felt possible. And it kind of gave me the tools to take a much more active role in my life. And the reason I like take the time to tell you that story is because

I think that the stories that we get that are like grand and inspiring and about success are very, they're very grand. They're like, I'm the star shooter for an NBA team. And I grew up in poverty and I had a life threatening condition and no one believed in me and I did it. And it's like, that's awesome, but you can easily feel like, well, that's

I'm much smaller than that. Like that is not, that's too, too hard to see yourself in. And so I like to point out that I didn't, I didn't fight in a war. didn't survive a life threatening illness. didn't climb Mount Everest, but I, I completely changed my life by being willing to be courageous. so

I like to think that any of us can see ourselves in that story. You know, that's, that's epic in a very everyday kind of way. And so that was kind of the vision for the book was like, you know, your story matters as an individual, you have something to contribute that we would love to hear that would really help. ⁓ you're not alone.

you know, if you feel small or if you feel alone, like you're not. And yeah, just do something small, you know, and that could be really, really meaningful.

Amy Knott Parrish (54:25)
The thing that stood out to me when you were telling that story and you said, you know, I got up and I got a laugh and like that is a connection.

Colin Ryan (54:35)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (54:37)
it it it is

getting out of isolation and I got to do this by myself and I'm alone and you put yourself in a position where you not even on purpose, but that laugh was reconnecting you into your humanity and your

Colin Ryan (55:06)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (55:10)
I say this and you were just talking about like it not being grand. And so when I say it, it might sound like grand, but I don't mean it. But like it brought you into your place in humanity. Like I have a place here. I have a place here.

Colin Ryan (55:26)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

I started to use my voice. Like I found my voice for the first time. Like I'd been a writer before that. That was my first dream. I'd been a journalist, which I was pretty good at, but I wanted to write novels and I was so hard on myself and I never let anyone read what I was writing. And I just became miserable. ⁓

Amy Knott Parrish (55:58)
Right? Why? Colin,

why is that how we do things? Like, why?

Colin Ryan (56:06)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (56:10)
I just think of us as kids and you just like run up and you're like, I threw up three times last night. And you know, your parents like, shh.

And so you just are like so candid with everyone until everybody hushes you enough that you understand that I better be quiet. People aren't allowed to see the real me.

Colin Ryan (56:26)
Yeah.

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (56:41)
And that's kind of like as I've read the book, I was like, this is just chapter by chapter. You just like get seen and get connected and get seen and get connected. Not in this, know.

Colin Ryan (56:51)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (56:59)
fanfare sort of way, but just in these little ways that I don't it just seemed like you started to believe in yourself.

Colin Ryan (57:09)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (57:11)
and that you were actually part of.

the world.

Colin Ryan (57:17)
Yeah, I mean, it's interesting you say that because my particular career and what I do, and I actually think this is very common, but I'm just realizing this right now happens in relationship. Like I do not, what I do is not, is always to a listener who can give me feedback back and I want to hear it. You know, it's like you told me you read my book.

And you wrote this beautiful review on Amazon, but I still emailed you anyway. It was like, I have questions because that's what I live for now. Like I, okay. I did my best. I wrote the book. I'm glad you like it, but I want to know more about what you took from it. And so I think.

think that is something I'm very grateful for and lucky in is that what I do is always in, in an exchange with other people. So I think this is probably another reason my perspective on money has changed so dramatically is because

I grew up with all the same messages that so many of us did. It's a doggy eat world. Money is taboo and a secret. Your net worth is your self worth all these things. And I had a deeper self and a deeper set of values that ultimately was given a chance to blossom. And it was just too powerful for all that. And I was like, I call BS on all that.

And I started, and I didn't really know it explicitly, but I, sensed that.

I mean, I knew this explicitly people are more than statistics, right? So in my work, you go in and you got the stats. You know, this is how cringy to say, but it's like kids spend all their money on games on their cell phones. You got to talk to them about delayed gratification and you got to talk to them about go touch grass or whatever. You know, it's just like so antiquated. But anyway, I think, ⁓

Then you talk to them. And you they're like, No, I'm part of this community. I started a subreddit. And we hang out. I'm on Twitch and we have all friends all over the world. And, like, I watch mental health videos on tik tok. And you know, like these really like meaningful things people are doing. And so I think that those kind of like distancing, isolating myths,

about finance and about success. think for me, they have fallen away. And I have people to thank for that because I don't think I could have got there on my own. You know, like, the people I have met through my work have changed me. And in a weird way, I have a lot of hope because of it.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:00:36)
Yeah,

yeah, same.

Colin Ryan (1:00:38)
I think

we need hope more than ever. Same go ahead. What why for you?

Amy Knott Parrish (1:00:42)
Yeah,

because

I think when we take apart the idea that our worth is represented by a dollar amount.

And when you step back and you understand what is enough,

that you don't live in scarcity even when you have enough.

Colin Ryan (1:01:19)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:01:22)
And so all of the energy that goes to like stockpiling as much money as possible can go into other things. And I have a lot of hope because I feel like I just see people getting really tired of living this way. And that

what was true 20 years ago, what was true 40 years ago, what was true for my father isn't true anymore. And it's very clear and obvious that it isn't true and that there are other ways to be successful.

I support myself with my coaching work, which I never would have thought that I would have done. But I did. I mean, I waited tables until just a few years ago to supplement, but it doesn't.

Colin Ryan (1:02:20)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:02:34)
like it

It can be so many different ways and then it can change also.

And I just think people are getting more and more willing to

be uncertain.

Colin Ryan (1:02:57)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:02:59)
and not know.

Colin Ryan (1:03:04)
Well, and I think that certainty and self sufficiency, wonderful though they are, have the distinct outcome of keeping you separate from other people. I always give this analogy that in a consumer society, which we are in, in a, like

Well, here's the visual. I live in a neighborhood. There's probably, I don't know, 253, 300 houses in my neighborhood.

I bet you there are 300 ladders in my neighborhood.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:03:43)
Great. ⁓

Colin Ryan (1:03:46)
in 300 garages, you know. And so that's consumerism. Like this sounds so benign, but I think it's really profound. The feeling it would be awkward for me if I asked my neighbor to borrow his ladder. I think that that feeling was created and nurtured somehow. I can't say exactly how because that directly supports

Capitalism.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:04:18)
I have an idea how I think about how when I was a kid, you know, if my mom needed a cup of sugar, she would send me over to Charlotte and Johnny's to see if they had a cup of sugar we could borrow. And you go over with your cup, Charlotte brings out the thing or Johnny brings out the sugar bowl and scoop your cup and you run back home. Here you go. That became shameful. You don't have, you ran out of sugar.

Colin Ryan (1:04:19)
Okay.

Hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:04:47)
which makes

me think about like places like Costco. Where it's like, ⁓ no, now you can go and get a ginormous thing of sugar and so you'll never run out. And then you never have to go talk to your neighbor and your neighbor won't know that you are the kind of person that runs out of sugar.

Colin Ryan (1:05:08)
Wow.

And it's based on the premise that your neighbor actually thinks that. I mean, I could be wrong, but it sounds absurd that your neighbor had been like, you're the kind of person who doesn't have sugar, but it's easy to think that in your own head. Right? Yeah. It's very defensive.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:05:20)
Yeah, because...

Right, because your neighbor,

your neighbor would never, your neighbor would probably not think that. People love to help. And so your neighbor would probably be like, right, like here, have some, great. And then you, right. and then you take them cookies. Here, look, these are the cookies. And then, ta-da, you're connected. There's, there's.

Colin Ryan (1:05:40)
No. Why would I care if you don't have sugar? Yeah.

Sure, thank you for asking, for sugar.

Yeah. Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:05:59)
There's all of these places where we assume stuff that isn't actually true, but we just pretend like it is, even though

I mean, I'm really hard pressed to imagine going over to borrow an egg or two and my neighbor being like, you don't have any eggs. I can't believe that. Of course you can't have any of my eggs. These are mine.

Colin Ryan (1:06:30)
Yeah, because your neighbor will say, I'm sorry, I don't have, I can't spare an egg. That's or here have an egg. You're right. There's no reality in which well, I'm sure there are neighbors who are rude, but like

Amy Knott Parrish (1:06:36)
Yeah.

I mean, you

do have those one neighbors, but we won't go into that.

Colin Ryan (1:06:49)
I have one neighbor I would not ask. They're grouchy. They always

seem very grouchy.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:06:57)
Yeah, but then you read the room, right? Like you were talking about before. ⁓ if I need something, maybe the people who don't want to relate to anybody while they're out for a walk. Maybe that's not the person I go ask.

Colin Ryan (1:07:09)
yeah.

And I've got five other neighbors that I think three of them are even closer than that neighbor who would happily. So I it's yeah, I think that's really, so I wanted, I want to share a social security story that came to mind recently. So I don't want to forget to share that, but

Amy Knott Parrish (1:07:15)
Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, do it because we should.

We'll do this and then we'll start our wind down.

Colin Ryan (1:07:35)
Okay. Before I say that, I do want to quickly say another big belief I have, and I wrote about this in my book, which is really about mental health and, and personal purpose and living a bold life. It's not directly about money, but there is a thing that happened, which was I was a kid who's my parents split up when I was young and they lived on opposite coasts. And so

and they didn't really ever speak of each other. And so I became a child who was trying to make sense of a thing that nobody would talk about. So I came to conclusions that I never said out loud, because who would I say them to? And if I had said, if I had said one of them out loud, I'll give you an example. I'm a member of a family.

that everyone would rather forget about.

mean, that's heartbreaking. But if I said that out loud, somebody would go, buddy. That's not fair. That's not the way you should think. You're the miracle that came out of this very short relationship. And and we would do it again, if we could have you like that's what they would say. But because I never said that out loud, I never had a chance to hear it or to be

given more information. And so I think this is a perfect parallel for the beliefs and thoughts we have about money is when you live in a cone of silence, you never say these things out loud. You never share that horrible screw up that you made with money. Um, the time you got scammed, the time you, you know, went bankrupt, the time you bought a brand new car and crashed it and lost, you know, $25,000 immediately because you hadn't

got the right insurance or whatever the case may be. If you never say it out loud, you never get a chance for forgiveness from other people or from yourself. And it just becomes just turns into shame and self judgment. And so I see that as a very specific journey that I undertook. That's part of what fuels the work is I want people to say it out loud and just hear how it sounds.

And feel it feels when like, everyone doesn't slide their chair away from you. You know, like you think they're going to. ⁓ yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:10:19)
I want to, I want to,

I want to put a little thought in there because it's so important to say all of these quiet things out loud. And then it's also important when you say the quiet thing out loud, or if someone says it to you, that you get curious instead of, oh no buddy that's not true. Like you're a miracle. Like they would do it again, but that,

Colin Ryan (1:10:22)
Please

Hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:10:48)
doesn't give you what you're looking for. You're not looking for an answer, you're looking for understanding. And I think those things are different.

Like what would have been like for somebody to say, ⁓ wow, tell me why do you feel that way? What makes you think that's true?

Colin Ryan (1:11:13)
All

Amy Knott Parrish (1:11:15)
Well, because mom and dad never talked to each other and like I'm just going across the country three times a year and nobody ever tells me why and I don't understand what happened.

Colin Ryan (1:11:26)
Right.

That's a great expansion because it isn't about not having the thought anymore. It's about understanding the thought process and, and, is it, is it good? And so in my case, that was part of what led me to create this very, very strong machine of self judgment and internalizing.

and drawing conclusions and then like whittling them down into these perfect phrases that I could repeat that just made me feel awful.

And there was no learning about, what's this thought process that you you're repeating this? Is this right? Is this, can you verify this? Is this helpful? Is this fair? You know, you start reading about things like shame and the power it can have. And in my personal experience, you start doing things that fulfill it.

And then one day I did something that defied it. And it was the beginning of a change because I learned that judging myself, beating myself up was it's still a choice. It had become a pattern and it had become a process that was so strong and so subtle that I wouldn't have thought of it as a choice, but I was able

to identify it and learn to refute those thoughts. And so now I am a person who is very, very kind to myself. Not all the time. I'll never not have to work this muscle, but I become a person who looks out for me. And so when I say one of those things to myself, go, mm-mm. Nope, not my guy.

He's better than that. He's not like that. That's not all he is. Right. And so I just, that's just a reaction to your comment. You're right. Like I didn't need someone to correct my self judgment. I needed to understand why I was judging myself and I needed to understand that I could do something better and healthier and more true.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:14:06)
and that you can be, because the way that I think about it is

You need somebody to be with you where you are and to be able to be in that moment with you of like and be honest and not not.

Colin Ryan (1:14:29)
Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:14:33)
I don't even know how I wanna say it because it's not like you wanna make it better or you not, I'm not thinking about like.

covering it up or performing in any way. But is there someone that can just be in that place with you, even if it's yourself, and to be able to go, huh, so this is the reality right now. Okay, all right, yeah. Whether it's awesome, my God, because we're just as like, it's just as hard to be enthusiastic about ourselves.

as is to be kind to ourselves.

So I'm going to think about this a little bit more.

Colin Ryan (1:15:23)
Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:15:27)
the ways that the, ⁓ this is what I was thinking about, the coping mechanisms that we establish to survive. And then what you've done over the course of your life is you've figured out how to not live in survival, but also live in relationality as well.

Colin Ryan (1:15:50)
Yep.

Yeah. Yes, I had to heal and change my relationship to myself. And I want to say that one of my non negotiables about living a happy life, a life, a genuine life is community. And so I have close relationships. People like you. I have people I call every week.

I have people who are, and these relationships are built on authenticity and vulnerability. And so I don't have 900 friends like that. And I don't want 900 friends. I just wanted a few who I can call on my worst days and be genuine. And those people have me. They are my net that catches me, that lifts me up. And I'm that for them. And so this is why I

Amy Knott Parrish (1:16:28)
You

Colin Ryan (1:16:50)
Yeah, I just I love this this idea of social security because I think that

the people around us are our greatest resource. And we were talking about this before. People want to be asked to help. And we've been taught that they don't want that we should never ask for help. And we've been taught that it's uncomfortable when people compliment you, or help you that you're supposed to like, apologize for it or, you know, deflect it in some way. And it's like, no people

would love to help you if you ask. And if if they don't, then they won't. And you'll know. But most people are like, thank you for asking me to come over and help you paint. Because I would love to do that. I would I come over a few hours. I help you with a real problem. You have you feel great. I feel great. Yes, please. Thank you for asking.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:17:52)
right

It's one of the, there's so many paradoxes about our experience and how like people love to help, but they hate receiving help. People strive to be their best, but they don't want you to tell them, give them a compliment or feel proud that they, yeah, my God, thank you for noticing. I worked my ass off on that. Well, no, you would never say that because then you're being so,

Colin Ryan (1:18:07)
Yeah.

oooo

Yeah.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:18:27)
There's all of these ways that...

It boils down to like the work your ass off, but then don't be proud of it. Like make sure you want to help other people, but don't be good at receiving help. Wait, what? Like it, it, it doesn't make any sense.

Colin Ryan (1:18:53)
Yeah,

well, it complicates a very beautiful and pure and somewhat straightforward thing, which is like friendships and community support. it's very simple. Like, look, when the gentleman at the median of the busy intersection, and I'm thinking of a specific guy who's been there the past few days, when he holds up a sign, and he's looking for money, or this actually happened, and I'm not trying to take credit, this is a very, very small

Amy Knott Parrish (1:19:03)
Yeah.

Colin Ryan (1:19:23)
thing that I can do. ⁓ he's sitting out there and it's pouring rain. And so I bought him an umbrella and just parked my car and walked it to him. Now in my head, what's happening right now is I'm going, Colin, you could have done a lot more. So that's my own stuff. But, but I'm telling that story because it's like, that was a very, very small thing I was happy to do. And I think it was pure.

And it was like, for 15 bucks, I made someone's experience of that moment actually tangibly better. So that to me is like, that's community. Go ahead.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:20:04)
Yeah, and-

And it's funny because you say, you know, it's not much or I could have done more, but actually why, why can't that just be enough? That was, that was, that was what I, that's what, I had that day. And then it doesn't eliminate the beauty of that, like that epic tiny gesture.

Colin Ryan (1:20:15)
Yeah. yeah. That's true.

I will receive that.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:20:42)
Thank you.

Well, this is a conversation I would love to keep having with you. And, you know, I just appreciate your time. I appreciate the ways that we talk about this, not only here, but outside of this format formula, whatever it is. And I think it's just like, I think talking about it, particularly talking about money and talking about the ways that money shows up and how

money is a resource and our communities are also a resource and how can we take all of the importance of money as the resource that will save everyone and can we add our humanity back into that?

Colin Ryan (1:21:20)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm. I call that the human side of money and it's most of it. And it's the best. Yeah. Oh yeah. And it's the best part of it and it gets lost a lot. And so, yeah, like I'm, I'm honored to have this conversation because I think this is what I, yeah, I think in our own, each in our own way, this is what we're trying to, to, um, platform and promote.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:21:44)
Yeah, or all of it.

Colin Ryan (1:22:07)
is like a hopeful vision of community just having a much bigger role in our daily life because it can and it takes a little courage and a little vulnerability, but like the rewards are there. And ⁓ you know, this is what I'm continuing to do is explore the intersection of money and mental health.

and the human experience. And it's, you know, it's, it's changed a lot over the past decade. ⁓ and it should, because society is changing and we know more than we did before and things are more complicated, but they should be like life is life has always been complicated. We just, we only let like six voices tell us everything.

And so I thank you for this. love that. And I love that you use the phrase social security, but you're like reclaiming it from this like private financial vehicle that we work our whole lives for. And some of us get, and some of us get it taken away and it's not enough, you know, like the actual vehicle is a very insufficient and concerning thing. And you're kind of like, well, that's just, that's the

That name means more that name means something much more profound and human.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:23:41)
much, much more, much more. Yeah. And you know, the way that I think about it is like, we're just figuring it out. And so I love that you said like, you know, we're just, it's different than it used to be. And we're just in process of figuring it out. And can we do that in front of each other so that we don't just sit here with a bunch of answers, but that we just talk about whatever comes up and then that comes out of it. And then it,

Colin Ryan (1:23:44)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:24:10)
moves and it evolves into something else. And it's relating instead of educating or I don't know, something like that.

Colin Ryan (1:24:18)
Hmm.

Yeah, top

down, right? It's, it's a cross.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:24:26)
Yeah, yeah, it's all across like like a big net. All right, Colin, I'm going to push stop. Thank you so much.

Colin Ryan (1:24:28)
Mm-hmm.

Yay!

Thank you.

Amy Knott Parrish (1:24:44)
Many thanks to Colin Ryan for taking the time to have this conversation. His new book, Epic Tiny Victories, is out now, and it carries the same mix of honesty, humor, and deep humanity. You can find him at colinryanspeaks.com, and you can find the book on his website and wherever books are sold. What keeps coming back to me is this.

The shift happens when something is spoken out loud and actually heard. When shame loosens, when the room changes, when what felt like a personal failure or like I'm the only one becomes something we can understand and connect to.

Where the truth gets said and we realize we're not alone and we're not a problem. That's the kind of social security this series is exploring. The security that comes from seeing each other clearly together.

Thanks for listening. See you next time.