Me Time✨

Good morning, everybody. Happy Sunday. My name is Jean Mitchells. I'm excited to be here with you today. Coming into hot on Pride weekend in Minneapolis. It's a big celebration. There's a parade today. I'm actually not in Minneapolis. I'm in Denver, Colorado, for some me time today. So as always, I'm really excited to be here with you. I get excited anytime I get to be on these calls. Good morning, Tokaboom. Good morning, Tanra. Good morning, Dante. Good morning, everybody. Happy Sunday. My name is Jean Nichols.

If you are not driving a car and you're willing to type in the chat, I'd love to hear where you are from, where you're calling into today. Learn a little bit more about you. So, as I started to mention, depending on where you live, it is Pride weekend in Minneapolis. It's been obviously pride month all month, but this is the weekend that it gets to be a little bit more exciting because there are events happening all over town. I'm visualizing there's a park that has booths up. There are drag queens that dance on stage.

There's a parade today. It's a really, really exciting weekend in Minneapolis. I always hate when I have to miss this weekend in Minneapolis. I'm actually dialing in from a hotel in Denver, Colorado today, and it is part of my story or my share for me time today. So my name is Jean Nichols. If you're new to me, I'm really excited to meet you. I am from Minneapolis. As I mentioned, I'm in Denver, Colorado today. Hi, Jules. Good morning. And the reason why I'm in Denver, this is going to sound a little crazy, but I flew in yesterday.

I landed at 04:00. I got to a hotel, I changed clothes, and I went to a concert in Boulder at Folsom Field. Ooh, you're in Maine today. I love this. So I literally flew in yesterday to go to a concert last night. Today I need to travel to a different city for work. But. But I wanted to share a little bit more. Why? So I love music. One of my other hats that I wear in my life is I'm an indoor cycling instructor at a studio in uptown Minneapolis called cycle bar. The studio will be open eight years this fall.

And coming through a pandemic that's kind of a really big deal in the heart of where a lot of the George Floyd, um, the George Floyd uplift had happened. And I call it an uplift for many reasons. I'll share more closer to that date, but the reason why I'm in Denver is to go see a band called Odeza. If you've never heard of them, I will pipe a link to some of their music in the comments on the chat. It's one of my favorite groups, or at least favorite top, probably top five, maybe top ten. It's hard to narrow it down, but I've now seen their performance live in the last two years.

I think last night was my fifth time, and that might sound really crazy. I traveled to Los Angeles. Good morning, Christy. A couple weeks ago to see them. They are on the last four shows of this tour, and the very first time I saw this show, I'm gonna try not to cry, but I might cry. So I'm giving you a heads up. The first time I've listened to their music for years, but the very first time I saw them perform live, it was shortly after my father had passed away. He passed away in September. It will be two years.

Yeah, two years. And I was really, really close to my dad. He was like my best friend always. I miss him every day. But it was really cool because right after he passed away, I got randomly to see these two concerts, and I shouldn't have been able to see them. The first was a concert by Rufus Desol. And I'll get somewhere with my story, I promise. And we had gotten to the concert late. We didn't have tickets. We thought we could just get them at the box office because we knew that they weren't sold out.

But the main performer had gone on stage two minutes before we got there, and they don't sell tickets once the main performer goes on. So there was, like, zero chance. And I was one week after my dad passing, so I was super emotional, and I just. Music feeds my soul. So I went up to this lady and asked her if there was any random chance. I said, listen, I just lost my dad. I'm sure you get a bunch of stories, but is there any random chance that you have four tickets that we could just buy? Like, I'll venmo you.

It's really important to just go see this show. And the lady turned around and she pulled four tickets out of her vip bag. Cause she was waiting for ViP's to get there and hand out free tickets. And she just handed them to me. She looked me in the eyes and she said, go. Enjoy this show. Just go. And she gave me the tickets, and we ran in, and I just literally felt like my dad was there with me. And then a week later, a friend invited me to the Odeza concert. And I literally felt like I had an outer body experience.

The music was so incredible. The lyrics are so positive, and the way that they do videos on the screen, it almost felt like a very spiritual experience. And it was really strange because I see different animals that represent kind of my dad, or I see different symbols that I feel like represent something my dad and I shared. And I had many of them at that experience, at that concert. And so I went to see them a couple more times, and I had the same experiences each time with same friends or different friends.

And then fast forward this past October, I lost my mom. So just over a year after I lost my dad, I lost my mom, and I got to see Odeza again right after that, and it was the same experience. So, for me, they only have four more shows before this tour is done. Who knows if they'll tour again? Maybe they will, maybe they won't. But this experience of this particular tour might not be the same because of what I've been going through, trying to just heal my heart about my mom and dad. So, last night, I flew in, and the girlfriend that was supposed to go with me couldn't come.

And so I ended up knowing a bunch of people that were at this show, but there were, like, I didn't even know an insane number of people at the Folsom football stadium. And so the odds of me finding the friends that I knew that were there were really, really small at this point. And I was driving in an Uber, and the sweetest girl was my Uber driver to get to the show. And she had just moved to Boulder, Colorado. She had changed her whole life. She was a caregiver, and she decided at this young age that she couldn't do that anymore because she had lost so many of her patients.

It just reminded me of my mom, who is a nurse who is always taking care of patients. And so as we're in this 30 minutes drive to get to the stadium. Cause there's so much traffic, I just said, you know, I have an extra ticket to this show. And my friend that was supposed to come with me couldn't come. Would you like to go? And she thought about it. I said, you know, I know you're working. You just moved to a new city, and I'm sure you need the money, but if you decide that you want to go between now and the time we get there, you're welcome to join me at the show.

And about ten minutes away, she said, you know, I think I'd like to go with you. And I was like, cool, let's do it. And so I gave her this ticket. We got into the concert. We were on the floor, and the concert was surreal. What was even more surreal is watching this person, who is a total stranger, say yes to going to this show with me. And it just reminded me again of my mom and dad and just how kind they were. Sorry. And how kind I want to be so. And today, when I talk about me, time concerts is what filled my heart.

But what fills my soul is being able to make an impact in somebody else's life. And last night, in that moment, I got to share something that means so much to me with a total stranger, and it now has a new meaning to them. And I know that that is a part of my mom and dad living through me. So I apologize for this. Happy Sunday. I didn't intend it to go this way, but I think that's how life goes, right? And so when I think about Sundays, for me, like, I really try to make this time about Sundays in general, time that I don't schedule, which is really hard for me to do because I work a lot.

But it's been really refreshing over the last year to just prioritize Sunday to do something strictly for myself, not selfishly and not shirking anybody else, but just to try to be able to have more time to take a pause on Sundays. And, you know, something that I found that has brought me joy, that has connected me with people, that has helped me to just celebrate life is live music and going to concerts and being able to have that shared experience with so many people, whether it's a small venue of 100 or 50 or a huge venue of.

I don't even know how many people were there last night. 50,000, maybe. It was crazy. And just being able to take that and find those little snippets of things that fuel your soul, that help you heal, that help you feel connected to something greater than ourselves. So I don't know if you love music or concerts, but if you're taking time for you, what would be that thing that you would do more of? And my invitation to you, or my question to you is, what's stopping you from doing more of that now?

In this instance, going to concerts around the country, it can be expensive. You have to take time off from work. I saved up for these so that I could go. There's one more next weekend. That would be the very last show that I don't think I can make it to because it's in Seattle, Washington. And. And that's okay, because I think if this is the last concert with this group that I get to see, it's gonna be the top. One, because the music was incredible. But two, the experience that I got to have that was me living my truth.

And living the parts of my mom and dad that feel like they've stayed is probably at the very, very top. So what will you do for you on this pride weekend in whatever city you're in? I am hopeful that maybe all cities across the country are celebrating pride this weekend. And to me, it's about celebrating love, the freedom to choose love in a different way. Whatever your beliefs are, I totally honor and respect that. So excited that it's pride weekend. I have my pride shirt on. I'll be wearing all day while I travel today.

But what are you doing? My key question back to. My key invitation to you is, what fuels your soul? What brings you pure joy? If you could do anything today without the list of everything else, what would you do that can help you reconnect, rediscover, connect to something outside of you? Jules? Taking a walk in nature. I love that. And how am I not surprised? That's what you're doing today? So I am in Boulder, Colorado, today. I am flying to a new place tomorrow. So if you dial in on Monday, I'll let you know tomorrow where I land, literally and figuratively.

But I simply invite you to take ten minutes. Take 15 minutes. And maybe the thing that you love to do isn't something you can do within that 15 minutes period of time. But maybe in that 15 minutes period of time, you can do some research, or you could schedule at a future date. Whatever that thing is for you. Maybe it's a concert. Maybe it's a play. Maybe it's a walk with your best friend out in nature. Maybe it's a walk by yourself. Maybe it's going to the humane society and walking dogs for the day or volunteering somewhere.

Who knows what that is for you? But that's my invitation for you today to either make space to do the one thing that lights your soul on fire, and we probably have many, but pick one. And if you can't do it today, my invitation to you is to take ten or 15 minutes to register for it, buy a ticket for it, find time for it, and make that happen. I hope you all have a great day. I apologize again for so many emotions. I really didn't expect that. But I'm a very emotional person, so sometimes it's gonna happen.

But you get all of me every time I show up whatever I'm going through in that day. And I just send all of you so much love. And I hope you have the best day today and I'll see you all soon. Have a great one.