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9. Interview: Christian Reeve image

9. Interview: Christian Reeve

Pursuit Of Infinity
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Christian is podcaster, writer, actor, voice actor, musician, poet, marketing professional, and YouTuber. We get in to what it means to have a vast array of passions in a world that pushes us to define ourselves as one thing, usually informed by our career path. Referred to as the concept of Multipotentiality.

Visit Christian's Website for links to all of his content: https://www.christianreeve.com/

Christian Reeve Podcast: https://www.christianreeve.com/podcast

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christianreevepodcast/

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Music By Nathan Willis RIP

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Transcript

Introduction to Multi-Potentiality

00:00:00
Speaker
Hello and welcome to another episode of the pursuit of infinity podcast. Have you ever thought of yourself as a person with particularly strong intellectual or artistic curiosity, and you excel in two or more different fields or subjects of study, or you're an individual whose interests span multiple fields or areas rather than being strong in just one in a culture or family situation that pushes a philosophy of specialty.
00:00:26
Speaker
This is referred to as multi-potentiality.

Christian Reeve on Diverse Passions

00:00:29
Speaker
And today we have an interview with the perfect person to discuss this subject with Christian Reeve. Christian is a podcaster, writer, actor, voice actor, musician, poet, marketing professional, and YouTuber. So he does it all.
00:00:45
Speaker
We get into what it means to have a vast array of passions in a world that pushes us to define ourselves as one thing, usually informed by our career path. You can find all of Christian's links to all of his channels in the show notes below. So go check his stuff out and give him some support.
00:01:03
Speaker
But before we get to it, if you'd like to support the show, the easiest way to do this is to give us a subscribe and a five star rating on your platform of choice, as this helps us to broaden our sphere of listenership in this bustling world of podcasting. You can visit our Patreon at patreon.com slash pursuit of infinity. We're also on Instagram at pursuit of infinity pod. So give us a follow there and keep up with our musings. And with that, please welcome Christian Reeve.

Emily Wapnick and Multi-Potentialite Community

00:01:58
Speaker
Hey Christian, welcome to the show. Thank you very much for having me. It's a pleasure.
00:02:03
Speaker
I was on your YouTube channel doing some, uh, some listening to some of your podcasts and stuff. And the latest episode that I saw was on multi potentiality, which I thought was really cool. Um, I, I've always thought about, about multi potentiality as a concept, but I'd never knew that there was so much research being done in the subject professionally. Um, I had watched that Ted talk that you, uh, that you said that you brought up.
00:02:32
Speaker
by what's her name, Emily Wapnick. She is one of the foremost researchers in this area, correct? Well, she actually coined the phrase multi-potentialite. She's kind of authored the community aspect of this. So multi-potentiality had existed for, I believe, 10 years by that point.
00:03:01
Speaker
But as with most sort of new research or research in general, you know, different people get involved and kind of get, well, yeah, they get involved and they expand it. And she's really pushed this idea of a community and of people kind of having a place where, you know, they can be understood. Not to go into too much detail here.

Multi-Potentiality vs. Polymathy

00:03:23
Speaker
I don't want to like hijack, but basically, um,
00:03:28
Speaker
like we're obviously in this age of what we call like the specialism, the age of specialism and with that in mind you know like I'm sure anyone listening here when they were a kid they were told hey
00:03:42
Speaker
What do you want to be when you grow up or what's, you know, what's your focus? And if you say, oh, well, I do a lot of things, you know, that just makes it sound to a lot of people like, oh, you're just, you know, you don't know what you're doing. You lack direction, et cetera. And I think what Emily Wapnick was trying to say is that, you know,
00:04:01
Speaker
you don't have to feel that way. And there's lots of different types of people that fit that bracket. So maybe you're a scientist who is a violinist, or maybe you're someone who does, wears a lot of different hats, and you have potential in all of these different areas. You know, it's a relative term, but she's kind of pushing this idea that there's a community of people out there in the world who fit under the bracket of multi potential lights.
00:04:27
Speaker
So multi potential light or multi potentiality. Could you just define that

Historical Shift: Renaissance to Modern Specialization

00:04:32
Speaker
please? Okay. Um, from my best understanding of it, multi potentiality is essentially referring to our ability to have skills in a range of different fields and areas. And.
00:04:54
Speaker
Like I said, there's different interpretations of this. Some people refer to the potential aspect of the word being that you have potential in a multitude of areas. Other people say you have expertise in a range of different fields. And also, I just want to tag on to this.
00:05:16
Speaker
This is where there's some crossover with polymaths or polymathy, which is something I covered in my podcast. And originally I was only going to do just multi-potentiality, but when I started reading on both of them, I realized there's so much crossover and the best way to kind of understand the difference
00:05:37
Speaker
is that polymathy is generally regarded as someone who is an expert in a range of different fields, whereas multi-potentiality is someone who either has the potential or has some sort of basic skill in a range of different areas.
00:05:53
Speaker
So in terms of polymath, that's more suited toward like a professional type of environment as like a, so maybe if you consider a multi-potentiality or a multi-potential light and their ability to produce and make money. Um.
00:06:14
Speaker
Yes and no. I mean, when I was doing my research into polemacy, one of the things that I read about was this idea of the Renaissance man. So between the 1400s, 1700s during the Renaissance, the expectation on the average person was to be
00:06:32
Speaker
an expert in a range of different professions so you needed to speak several languages learn a language be able to read and write you know you had to do that that was an expectation it wasn't even considered as something very special it was just that's the expectation that's the standard if you don't meet that you're not in the
00:06:54
Speaker
I don't know what the term would be. You're not considered a complete person, shall we

Challenges for Multi-Potentialites in the Job Market

00:07:01
Speaker
say. But then somewhere after the 1700s, which is kind of around the time of the Industrial Revolution, which makes sense, we entered what we are in now, which is the age of specialism. So there was a real focus and a drive on being skilled in one particular area. And that's your profession. That's your skill. That's what makes you money.
00:07:24
Speaker
Now we're kind of entering what I call the neo-renaissance era or neo-renaissance man.
00:07:33
Speaker
the expectation is now to be skilled in a range of different areas. And this is evidenced in the fact that, you know, if you look in any job, anywhere on any website, I guarantee there'll be at least 10 different things that you'll be expected to do right off the bat. And they're all potentially different jobs. And in my podcast, I gave the example of marketing, because for example, if you look up your basic, let's say,
00:08:01
Speaker
be a good example. Let's say you're a entry-level marketing guy, okay, so you're starting in a company. You'll start doing basic things, you know, so maybe a bit of writing, maybe some social media posts, but I guarantee within a year you'll be doing SEO, maybe you're doing a bit of paid advertising, email, and when you break apart these roles, they are
00:08:28
Speaker
fields in of themselves. Like when I started studying and getting into like SEO, I realized, Jesus, this is a whole thing that you could spend all of your time doing in a work week. And here I am trying to juggle content and editing and SEO and project management and God knows what else. And that's kind of like the standard expectation in the job market these days is to be skilled in a range of different areas. I mean, I can't count of how many marketing jobs I've seen where it's like,
00:08:55
Speaker
maybe I have 80% of what's expected. But maybe I'm missing, oh, I don't have PPC. Oh, I don't have Google Ads. And it's like, does that really matter? If the job is marketing exec, and you, you know, you have 80% of the experience, does it really matter? Probably not. But that's the thing, the job market expects the perfect person. And if you don't, if you're not perfect, then you don't get the interview.

Are We All Multi-Potentialites?

00:09:22
Speaker
So
00:09:23
Speaker
So in that kind of a situation, would it be plausible to say that like technically everyone is a multi potential light or do you think it's more so a personality trait?
00:09:36
Speaker
This is one of the things I covered in the episode was I, and this is just my personal opinion. I think we are all multi-potentialites because come on, like we all have different interests, different things, you know, even if, okay, let's say you're a specialist and I don't know, you trained to be an electrician for argument's sake, but you can sing a bit. That makes you a multi-potentialite. You know, it means you can do two different things. And I think what Emily Wapnick was trying to push on is more to try to say that it's,
00:10:07
Speaker
You're trying to push the message that it's okay to have a range of different things and you don't have to feel bad about, for instance, getting bored, like you become like a
00:10:19
Speaker
really good at music, but you want a different challenge you move on to the next thing. That's what she was trying to drive out is that, you know, there's this boredom in chasing many different fields because you get to the end goal, and then you want to do something else because you feel like you've achieved everything you can in that field. And I partially disagreed with this because
00:10:38
Speaker
I feel like there's some people such as myself who continually want to work on things and never get bored of them. So, for instance, in my life, I'm a musician, podcaster, live streamer, writer, actor, voice actor, a lot of different things, right? But I never get bored of doing all of those things. There's always new challenges. There's always new things to learn. And the thread, I suppose, that links them all is creativity.
00:11:09
Speaker
But that was a major area that I agreed with Emily Wapnick, and it's not that she was stressing that as a big point she was just kind of making a general point but I thought that, you know, there's, there's, if you like, it's like a spectrum, there's some people that, you know,
00:11:26
Speaker
they do get bored and they move on to the next thing. There's people that, you know, maybe they have one specialism and then they just like a bunch of other things. And then there's people that want to just do everything and can't just pick one thing, which is where I fall. And does that answer the question?

Team Dynamics: Specialists vs. Multi-Potentialites

00:11:41
Speaker
I don't know. I have a tendency to ramble on, so I do apologize.
00:11:44
Speaker
No, I think you answered it absolutely perfectly. Yeah, for sure. One of the things that I thought that she was getting across in her TED talk as well was the fact that in our society, you're sort of tasked with finding your purpose. And I think that comes with a fair amount of anxiety. And I think she had asked all of the crowd
00:12:10
Speaker
You know, whether or not you've been asked this question and whether or not it has caused you anxiety in your life. And I think it is one of the biggest sources of anxiety within our culture because I mean, you're, you want to have a job that you spend eight hours a day on doing something that you're passionate about. So.
00:12:30
Speaker
In terms of your mental health, it's very important. And also, um, it sort of steers you toward specialism because, you know, are you a doctor? Are you a lawyer? Are you a designer? Are you this, are you that? So do you feel that our society pushes away people who have multiple interests and multiple specialties? Here's the thing.
00:12:55
Speaker
And I look at it with the project analogy. Okay. You need specialists and you need multi-potentialites. And I believe, I can't remember the name escapes me now, but there was a lot of research that I did into my episode on multi-potentiality and polymathy. And one of the key things that one of the authors I read had said, which applies to now is that in that kind of group setting,
00:13:23
Speaker
You need someone who bridges the gaps, which is where the multi potential would fit someone who, for example, if let's say I'm a specialist in. Let's say I'm a software developer. Okay. And it's a team meeting. That's my specialism. That's potentially all I know. Maybe I've got a rough idea of marketing and sales, but I'm focusing on software development.
00:13:50
Speaker
So in a team setting, that's the perspective I'm coming from. And whenever I contribute, I contribute what I know. And if you ask me on my opinions on marketing or something, I'll give my rough understanding, but, you know, you're not asking an expert in that field. Now, where the multi-potentialite would come into play is that they would then be able to be like, well, I've got a working knowledge of all these different areas. I can kind of tell you what I know.
00:14:16
Speaker
So I guess to answer your question, society needs both and it depends on the situation. Like in

Strengths of Multi-Potentialites

00:14:24
Speaker
that group setting, you've got a specialist and you've got a multi-potentialite and they're working together to create something. In some jobs, some areas, you do need a bunch of specialists focusing on what they're doing for efficiency purposes.
00:14:40
Speaker
in more collaborative positions or just industries like marketing or sales or whatever, unique creative people, people that can kind of draw an inspiration from lots of different areas and then turn that into something because it's very important
00:14:57
Speaker
just as a business person to have a working knowledge of what's going on in the company in different areas. For example, when I was working in corporate years ago in marketing, our marketing and sales departments weren't working together, they were separate. And a lot of companies vary with this, some work together, some are separate, you know, depends on the structure of the company. And for a particular project, I can't remember what I was doing, I spoke to the sales team for the first time.
00:15:27
Speaker
And I learned so much from the sales team as far as like how to approach things, how to voice things. And it really helped my creative writing and my sales texts and everything so much more because I was coming at it just purely from a marketing perspective, but they were able to kind of show me different avenues, different ways of looking at things. And I think that when you have specialists and multi-potentialites kind of working together, you learn from each other and you bounce off each other.
00:15:57
Speaker
Now, from a wider sense, I'll try to wrap this in a bow. The job market is looking for both. And again, it's always circumstantial it depends on the job depends on what we're trying to achieve, but you need both.
00:16:13
Speaker
I think it will always go in waves. It really depends on the overarching things that are going on in society. You know, I don't know that there'll ever be like a new industrial revolution. I think the closest thing to that maybe in the future will be like a
00:16:28
Speaker
AI revolution maybe and maybe then we can have a discussion about specialists in terms of specialists in robotics and stuff like that and AI but it'll always be waves you know and you'll always need one or the other you'll need someone who's focused in one area and all their attention is in one area and then people that can kind of look at the bigger picture
00:16:51
Speaker
So

Societal Pressures on Identity and Career

00:16:52
Speaker
Emily had went over three specific ideas that she thought that multi potential lights excel at. The first one being idea synthesis, which is basically just combining fields to create something new like multiple ideas to create something that is better than the parts individually.
00:17:12
Speaker
Um, also rapid learning. So like very quick learning, uh, being able to, to catch onto things very easily and, uh, an adaptability, which is, which sort of works its way into rapid learning as well. Um, so do you find that these skills are, uh, something that you have?
00:17:31
Speaker
Yes, I think so. I hate saying things like this. It just makes me sound like such a tool. You know, it's like, yeah, I'm great. I'm brilliant. I can do it all. You just you do so many things. You know, do you know what, though? Like it's that's not a big deal. A lot of people do. Look at any anyone watching this, listen to this right now.
00:17:54
Speaker
Think about your own life, think about all the different things that you can do. Maybe you do cooking, because here's another thing as well. We'll often
00:18:05
Speaker
dismiss things in our lives, or other people will dismiss them on our behalf. Like I've had people say to me, oh, all these things you do, they're hobbies, or you like your hobbies, you enjoy doing your hobbies. I take that as an insult. But I understand where they're coming from. Because yeah, okay, I'm not a successful actor. I'm not a successful podcast or a musician or whatever, you know, and people often tend to measure the worth of someone or
00:18:31
Speaker
mark of someone based on their success in those areas. If you're not successful in those areas, then it's just a hobby. And I disagree. But a wider thing, I wanted to tag on to this earlier, actually, which I think is very important, is this idea of identity. If you're a multi-potentialite, or you subscribe to that, or a polymathist? Sounds right. Polymath? Polymath, yeah. I don't know, making up words. You know, it's like,
00:19:01
Speaker
Well, let me, do you know what? Let me frame it from my perspective. When I heard this term, cause it was introduced to me by a friend and I'd kind of had rumblings of this, but I watched the talk, it triggered some bells. And then I really started getting fascinated by the topic and I started looking into it. And I was like, this is what I am. This is me. This is exactly what I am. And I started feeling for the first time, like good about myself as far as like, Hey, I'm not a guy that lacks focus or direction. I'm not like a weirdo. Cause for
00:19:30
Speaker
For about a year, I was calling myself a multi-content creator, right? Not knowing about multi-pods, polymaths. I didn't even know that was a thing. And then I was like, oh, this makes sense. This is why I've always been into lots of different things, but I've never been able to decide what to do because society, school, whatever, it forces you to pick, it frames it. It's like, well, you can't do both. You got to choose, you know? And it's like, well, why do I have to choose? Says who?
00:19:58
Speaker
You know, if I can balance my time effectively, I can do these different things, you

Embracing Multi-Potentialite Identity

00:20:03
Speaker
know? And I mean, people do it in everyday life. People balance being a mother and a father, a parent, and then having a job, having a social life. That's multitasking. That's, you know, being a multi-potentialite, doing a lot of different things. You know, we're all multi-potentialites. I fully believe in that concept, and I think that
00:20:25
Speaker
The problem with the identity aspect to it is that you think about when people first meet you, what's the first thing they ask you? What do you do for a living generally?
00:20:36
Speaker
Or maybe, you know, I like to ask people what they're passionate about. And that's a better question. But when you ask people, or what do you do for a living, they'll just say whatever they do for a living. And some people would be proud. Like, yes, I am a business analyst. That's what I am. That's who I am. Other people will be like, Oh, well, you know, my day job is working sales. And that means, yeah, I got a job, but that's not me. That's just a thing that I do for money. Right.
00:21:03
Speaker
And it's a funny concept when you think about it, this idea of identity and how it pertains to what we do in our lives. Because when you think about the things you do outside of work, assuming that your day job is not something you're super passionate about, those are the things that make you, whether that be going out rock climbing, travelling, going to the theatre, that's you, that makes up
00:21:29
Speaker
everything that you are, you know, it's the things that you're passionate about. That's what makes you who you are.
00:21:36
Speaker
I guess for me, growing up, you know, I didn't know what I wanted to do in my life. I mean, yeah, I imagine a lot of people listening to this. It doesn't matter what age you are. You could be 14, 18, 25, you know, people don't always know exactly what they want to do with their life. Some people were born and go, I want to be a gymnast when I'm older. Other people don't know what they want to do until much later in life. And that's okay. And I think that this whole multi-potential light, the limithist,
00:22:07
Speaker
theory, idea, whatever you wanna call it, it enables you to kind of look at your life and say, hey, I can do a lot of different things. I don't just have to pick one thing. I can be all of these things and that's okay.

Christian's Journey Through Passions

00:22:20
Speaker
And I think that's the bigger point at play here that's really important that should be pressed is this idea that if you feel in your heart that you wanna do these things, pursue them. No one's telling you you can't, go for it, see what happens.
00:22:36
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. Has there ever been a time in your life where you tried to focus on one particular thing and you sort of like straight away from the multi-potential polymath framework? Kind of yes and no.
00:23:01
Speaker
I don't want to give like a life story. Cause I don't, I don't want to bore people, but I guess you can definitely give whatever life. Yeah. This is all about stories, you know, whatever you want to say. It's all good. I pride myself on being a storyteller. At least I'm told that I'm apparently in the storyteller. That's what I want to be. Um, well, let's, let's walk it back a bit. When I was about 18, 19, I was working in like supermarket and I was in a band. I was pursuing music and that's what I wanted to do with my life.
00:23:31
Speaker
And I suppose technically I wasn't multi-potential. I was balancing those two things, you know, for me, the supermarket job was just the day job, you know, make money and use it to fuel my passion of music. And then, you know, things didn't really work out life, you know, and people, here's the problem. And for anyone that's young, listening to this, watching this, pay attention.
00:23:58
Speaker
I let people get in my ear. I let people get to me. I remember sitting down and having a conversation with this guy who's about 60 years old, retired teacher. And at the time my band was either failing or about to end and I was kind of at a loss. I decided not to go to university at that point.
00:24:21
Speaker
um because I thought I wasn't intelligent enough which is hilarious because some of the most stupidest people I've ever met in my life went to university so that was funny in hindsight but anyway uh I let this person you know okay this is how I remember it I said to this guy what I'm pursuing music and he gave me a look like
00:24:45
Speaker
like that for those listening basically a judgmental silent death stare as if to say well you're an idiot for that you need and then he kind of followed that up by saying you need to have a specialism
00:24:58
Speaker
You need to have a job, something. And normally I'd be like, screw that. I know, I know what's right for me. You know, cause I've always been quite stubborn and I've always pursued what I feel is right in my life. That's something about me as a person. But in this moment, I was like, you know, maybe this guy's right. My music isn't going anywhere. He's older than me. He made a successful career in teaching.
00:25:23
Speaker
maybe I should listen for a change and do what this guy says. So I did, I pursued marketing. I looked into things that were creative, that were business orientated, because I've always liked business ever since school. And so that's what I went and did at university.
00:25:40
Speaker
And to answer your question in a long winded way, that was me chasing one thing because I'd given up music, I'd given up all things creative because I looked at it like, oh, hey, that's just the pipe dream, right? All those things that you wanted to do that, you know, your heart tells you, this is what I want to do with my life because, you know, I want to be the biggest success I can be and I want to do what's passionate and I want to love what I do for a living. That side of me, I just put in a box and said,
00:26:08
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. That's a pipe dream. Let's just get a job and be just a normal adult. You know, uh, guess you can't, you can't have it all. Not everyone gets to follow their dreams. Right. I was, that was my mindset. I was like, but I wanted to give marketing a real go, like genuinely. And, you know, six months, a year into this first job I had.
00:26:28
Speaker
I really liked it. I was like, I can't believe they pay me to do this. This is ridiculous. Here's a guy that used to spend all his time busting his last parliament language in hospitality, cleaning dishes, cleaning supermarkets, every customer service job you can think of. I did it all. And
00:26:52
Speaker
Now I'm sitting at a computer just writing articles, few social media posts, and they pay me to do this. This is ridiculous. So it's great. And then inevitably I got bored.
00:27:08
Speaker
And I was like, I'm not passionate about this. I like it. And I still like marketing. I still do it to this day, but I don't wake up in the morning and go, yeah, this is what I want to do with my life. Yeah, I'm so passionate.

Pursuing Passions Unconstrained by Society

00:27:20
Speaker
And I love this. I just see it as all right. I look at it as this is a way to make money, a good way to make money, but I'm not passionate about it. And then somewhere around 2019, I've been doing
00:27:34
Speaker
marketing at this point for about two years, someone just randomly came up to me and said, because I was living abroad, I was living in Europe, and this person come up to me and said, hey, there's this short film that these group of people were, you know,
00:27:50
Speaker
trying to get people to sign up for. And they're looking for an English guy from London. And I just thought that was really funny. I was just like, I feel because of course they are like, I'm let's just do it. Let's do it for a laugh. Right. And I thought it'd be fun acting. I'd never really done it before. I didn't know anything about it.
00:28:10
Speaker
And then I find out it's the lead role. And I'm like, oh, oh, damn. So I've got to learn a bunch of lines and like really do this. And I work hard, sometimes too hard. I'm a bit workaholic. I have to force myself to take breaks. It's a bit of a thing. But, you know, I took it seriously. I learned my lines and I did it and I loved it. And the first thing I thought was, this is like music. This feels like performing. Why have I never done this before?
00:28:39
Speaker
And then, you know, one thing leads to another. I started up my YouTube channel properly.
00:28:44
Speaker
started uploading stuff on there. Then I started a podcast, then I started live streaming, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And then we get to fast forward to where we are now. And this is just my life. I do a lot of different things and I love it. And when I found out about all of this stuff, multi-potentiality, polymathy, that kind of reinforced what I already felt in my heart was right and what I felt was
00:29:10
Speaker
the way I am. But now that I can put a name to what this is, it's a legitimate thing. It's a real thing. It's a group of people around the world. And to be honest, I think it's more of an acceptance thing. We are all meant multi potential. It's 100%. I fully believe that. But maybe not all of us accept that.
00:29:32
Speaker
Maybe that's because we've been told and we're convinced of the box thing of you could only be one thing in life and that's it. Or we've got pressure. Maybe we've got parents that said, oh, what's that? You want to be a dancer? No, you've got to be a doctor. You know, that that's the thing. You know, some cultures are really I know in India that there's like a real
00:29:53
Speaker
push on that you know it's like you know you have to be a lawyer or a doctor, at least like classically that was the kind of mindset I don't know maybe it's different now but from a cultural perspective, that that's
00:30:04
Speaker
generation to generation that was always the focus you need to do these things and I think a lot of that to be fair comes from the fact that like those are secure kind of um high paid job roles to have you know like you'll always let's be honest always need a doctor always need a lawyer you know what I mean it's they're needed and this is why I think by the way that specialisms will never die because you need those people that
00:30:30
Speaker
know what they're talking about, you know what I mean? Like what use is having a guy that knows a bit about medicine, you know, operating on your heart? No, I want a guy that a woman or whoever that knows exactly what they're doing, you know? Yeah, for

Cultural and Economic Pressures on Specialization

00:30:44
Speaker
sure. And like you brought up before, it seems that the best way to approach these types of situations are like a team setting where you have
00:30:53
Speaker
like somebody who's skilled in a bunch of different, um, like avenues that can help to, um, to aid the specialists, you know, to help the surgeon or to help the lawyer in, uh, in seeing perspectives that they may not have been able to see within their narrow range of focus and things like that. But in terms of finding your purpose, um,
00:31:18
Speaker
That is, that's a big thing because along with, um, the, the push in our society to, to find a specialism, people want to translate that to saying like, okay, well, I, now I need to find the one thing that I'm meant to do in this world. And that to put that much pressure on yourself is it can be crushing. So I came across this concept.
00:31:44
Speaker
a little while ago and it was so the idea is like to find your your purpose find like your three favorite things to do the three things that you're most passionate about whether it's you actually doing them or if or it's like something you're passionate in terms of like researching and find where those three things intersect and that's where you can apply yourself to to try to find like a professional avenue
00:32:14
Speaker
where those things intersect. And it seems to me like the first step of that process is accepting yourself as a multi-potentialate, like you said. So how important to you and your process was it to accept yourself as a multifaceted multi-potentialate? Okay, before I answer that question, what I will say is what you just read out there, I still think that
00:32:44
Speaker
pushes the idea that you need to be a specialist. Because let's pay attention to that one thing. You said, find three things that intersect that come as a whole. So basically, find yourself a job where you can do all those different things, but it's still that one thing. See, there's always that kind of push, oh, you need to do this one thing, you need to do this one thing, which I totally disagree with. And anyway, to answer your question, it's a recent thing.
00:33:14
Speaker
You know, it's not like I woke up one day and I was like, yes, I accept it. It's like I started feeling this way years ago. And I think right around the time that I started acting and doing the YouTube and doing all these things again, somewhere in my head, I thought, you know what, I'm going to give this a go.
00:33:34
Speaker
I'm going to try. I'm young, you know, I don't have responsibilities, don't have kids, don't have a wife, anything. And you know, that's, these things are big factors. They, they affect your decisions because, you know, if you're just doing everything for yourself, great. Do whatever you want. You can take those risks. If you have a family, you have a wife or husband or whatever, like you, you can't, you just can't, you, you now, now things different. Now you have to think about other people.
00:34:02
Speaker
And it's not about being selfish, it's about the fact that your decisions can affect them potentially in a bad way. So it's the freedom, I guess is my point, to pursue these things.
00:34:20
Speaker
I'm still relatively young-ish, 28. I mean, I think I got white hairs, so it's not looking good. But I think, you know what? I'm going to give it a real go, because at least if I try, if I do my very best and I say, hey, I've given it my all, I think I could be happy with that. But I feel there's like an inner need to do all these different things. It's like if I don't do them, I feel suffocated.
00:34:50
Speaker
You know, like sometimes I'll have a bad day and I just write a song and that that's my therapy. That's the way I do. I know it sounds douchey, but it's it really helps, you know, communicate that message onto paper. And then suddenly it's not eating at me anymore. Now it's just a thing. Now it's it's art, you know, and I know there's a lot of people out there, particularly like artists when they draw.

Educational System's Shortcomings

00:35:13
Speaker
You can see a lot of horror and tough emotions displayed on a canvas, and that's an artist's way of just getting out there, getting through the motions and putting it on into something that is now it's enjoyable, now it's something that can be shared and enjoyed and intrigued by it and such.
00:35:36
Speaker
I don't know necessarily that it's important or not to accept being a multipotentialite or being a polymath. You know, you can accept that, you can take on that and own that if you want to or not. I think the more important thing is that you just pursue the things you want to pursue and you don't let people get in your ear and tell you that you can't. I think that's the more important thing. You know, I think it's important to remember that, hey, school,
00:36:03
Speaker
It's an agenda thing, you know, I'm not trying to play conspiracy theorists, but like at the same time, when you really look at it, it's, it's, it's trying to set you up for life and school is important. And it does give you a lot of skills and things that you need, but it doesn't teach you for instance, how to be independent, how to pay your taxes, how to, you know, deal with depression, you know, these kinds of things. It doesn't teach you that it teaches you the basics that you'll need for the job market.
00:36:29
Speaker
And it pushes on you this idea of, well, you need to pick a thing, you need to pick a thing. I found it amazing. For instance, my school, when I said I wasn't interested in going to university straight away, I was having doubts. They dropped me like a dead weight.
00:36:45
Speaker
straight away it was like oh okay uh go down the hall to this class and uh you can go to the world of work workshop or whatever i kid you not they just i walked into my sixth form common room and it was just a bunch of wasters who didn't want to do anything with their lives or just sitting there like that all right yeah what we're doing what we're doing is like that and i was like oh no is this what the world of work's going to be like
00:37:14
Speaker
Seriously, am I making the wrong decision? I needed someone to sit me down and be like, Hey, what do you want to do? What do you want to achieve? You could do anything. That's what I needed to hear, but there weren't those people around at that point. Yeah. See, that doesn't actually exist within the schooling systems of developed countries. Cause yeah, I've, I experienced the same thing in general.
00:37:34
Speaker
Yeah, in general, because it seems that our schooling was based off of, like you said, it's based off of getting you ready for the job market and getting you ready for this society. And if this society and this job market just conceptually is sick, then
00:37:52
Speaker
You're schooling to get you prepared for that sickness is it's wrong. So how do you see a way to fix it? Cause I know that there's, there are countries, I believe Finland is one that has one of the best schooling, uh, situations in the world.
00:38:10
Speaker
And a big part of their, their framework is to really cultivate the skills, interests and passions of their children and not just drill, um, like facts and knowledge into their head to get them ready for a test in order to get them ready to listen, to pay attention, and then to, you know, to succeed in, in a job market and, or go to college. So.
00:38:36
Speaker
What do you think needs to be fixed or changed in order to sort of adapt to this within like our schooling systems? The difficulty with this is you need some degree of a generic template in order to accommodate for a large group of people. If you've got like a thousand kids, you can't really sit and take the time with each child individually
00:39:05
Speaker
I mean, it depends on time, really, doesn't it? It depends on a lot of factors. I know it's very easy to criticize the school system and be like, it's like this, it's easy, this is what they should do. But the actual day-to-day of that is a lot tougher. However, I think that if you can understand, firstly, that kids learn in different ways, and this is one of my frustrations when I was at school,

Proposing Diverse Teaching Methods

00:39:32
Speaker
I was the type of kid and on the top of human being now that adult where takes me a few times to get something I just have to kind of work out in my head in my way. So, for instance, if someone's just talking at me and they're like, Oh, you need to do this and then this and then this and then this and you understand, yes, I'm like, like, if I get out of a meeting, for instance.
00:39:52
Speaker
I need to kind of sit down and think about it and absorb it. And I make notes and I kind of, that's how I get it, right? But I'm not going to straight away do that thing until it clicks for me. When I was at school, I was told that I was stupid for, you know, asking questions. You talk too much. You ask too many questions. Just accept it. I was like, that's stupid. What do you mean just accept it? I don't understand. If I don't understand why this is the case,
00:40:19
Speaker
You know, maths used to frustrate me. You know, I was a creative minded person that succeeded in English class, but I suffered in maths and I wanted to understand. I really did. And I'd ask questions and I'd be like, but why is it that way?
00:40:34
Speaker
And they'd just be like, it just is. They could explain if they really wanted to, but they wouldn't. And here's the thing with maths, you know, some days I'd do well, some days I'll be like, oh, this is, I'm beginning to understand it. And then they just throw something else at me and then it would just shatter everything. I needed confidence. School systems need to inspire confidence in children. They need to, if they noticed that a kid is particularly talented in art, let's say,
00:41:06
Speaker
come up with some extra curricular activities that would help cultivate that you know you can do that you know schools do that. Have extra you know they still have to follow the curriculum and stuff right, but they can have that extra time that helps them to grow and prosper, you know. You can't put all kids in the same box.
00:41:24
Speaker
You just can't, you're going to have scientists, you're going to have future politicians, you're going to have future musicians, you know, and you need to kind of work out a way, a system or an approach that means that all of those kids can follow their goals.
00:41:45
Speaker
individually, and also collectively, if that makes sense, because, you know, you do need to do these things, you need to have a working knowledge of English and maths and etc. Like you just do. But if your teachers notice that you're doing well in particular areas, work around that, find, you know, ways you can help
00:42:06
Speaker
you know, like, for instance, it doesn't even have to just be school, you can, I mean, we are the internet now, you could push them and be like, hey, look into this in your own time. Hey, did you know there's this free course on like, like, do you know what I mean? It's it's we live in a different age. If this was the 90s, the 80s, it's a very different story. But we live in the 2020s. God. So there's all these resources and things you can do outside of school that can help
00:42:31
Speaker
them to build the person that they're going to be. And you know what, why not start now? Why does it have to be once your college university age that you start doing those things? Start now, the younger, the better, you know, you could set yourself up for the future in a really positive way. I think that might help. But that I don't know, who am I? Right? I totally agree with you. I totally agree. And I think

Teaching Independent Learning Skills

00:42:51
Speaker
it's a great point to bring up that we were living in a time where
00:42:54
Speaker
now we are able to look into these things and to change our systems in order to adapt to people who have multiple skill sets and have multiple interests because not everybody is the same. And like you said, the school system, of course, it does have to have some uniform way of getting everybody prepared and making all of these children
00:43:23
Speaker
Essentially there's like a bar of knowledge that we all have to sort of get up to in order to contribute to our society and the ways in which that it requires us to. So there is that, but like you said, yeah, I think that they really should find a way to instill confidence and love because if you don't have confidence in yourself.
00:43:45
Speaker
or confidence in your thoughts and your beliefs, you're never going to be able to manifest them to their full potential. And you know, for me, it was, as you said, like after
00:43:59
Speaker
After high school, mid college, where I started to understand like, okay, I can go out and use the internet, use the tools around me to, to, to further, you know, my own processes within myself. And I think that was key to me doing everything creative that I've done since, uh, since then.
00:44:21
Speaker
And a big part of that as well, which is a problem is that when you're at university or college, essentially what they have to do in that first year, which now, you know what, people get annoyed about the foundation year, you know, it doesn't count and it's pointless and stuff. And they give different reasons from a marketing perspective, like what, what this is supposed to be, you know, it's not just a complete wasted, blah, blah, blah. But the biggest thing that they do right off the bat is your D learning.
00:44:47
Speaker
you are learning to do independent study and think independently, critically think, you're learning to how to learn again, because in school and college, we call it here in the UK or the two years after high school, basically, your spoon fed everything.
00:45:07
Speaker
And there are elements to it. There are sorts of courses that help to foster independent learning, but mostly your teachers are guiding you. Whereas at university, it's like the other extreme. It's like, okay, here's a reading list. Here's the topic, go. And you're like, well, what the hell? What do I do? It's up to you to figure it out.
00:45:30
Speaker
but they are guiding you. For instance, the reading list is suggested works. Most people assume, oh, I need to read all of these things. You need to pick from that and potentially go outside of that and find that your other sources because those reading lists are essentially directions.
00:45:51
Speaker
it's like, you can go this way, you can go that way. Because if you pay attention to your reading list and you read a couple of entries, they'll have different opinions, different journals that contradict each other and have different opinions. And that's done on purpose. So it drives what your future essays will be in different directions.
00:46:11
Speaker
Basically, my point being at school, they need to teach you that and also help you prepare for not just university. I mean, look, university is a choice. You don't have to go to uni. But you will definitely need that independent mindset in anything you do in life.

Critique of Exam Focus and Student Stress

00:46:30
Speaker
You know, it's just an important mindset to have. It's important, as you said,
00:46:36
Speaker
talking about confidence, it's important to have the confidence within yourself to be able to pursue your own lines of thought and not worry like if you're wrong, for instance, or if you make a mistake, it's okay to make a mistake. It's okay to be wrong. You learn, you move on, you go forward, right? But I don't know, I feel like school, it almost kind of cultivates this feeling of fear where making a mistake is the worst thing you could do.
00:47:06
Speaker
failing your school is the worst thing you could do. No, it's not. There's people that have failed school and become some of the most successful people in the world.
00:47:16
Speaker
You know, just because the system is constructed in a way that tells you this is how it is, doesn't mean it is. There's a lot of different ways to do things in life. And the internet has exposed that in many ways. You know, there's a lot of different ways. There's Jesus, like high school kids that are becoming millionaires at the age of like 15, 16, because of just trying different things that are outside of the box. And, you know, one of the biggest failures, I just want to take this onto the schooling system, which I'm still dumbfounded about.
00:47:45
Speaker
is like how exams work. You spend however many years learning these, all these different topics, and then you do your final exams in which your knowledge is not being tested. Your memory skills are being tested.
00:48:03
Speaker
Because for whatever it is half an hour hour two hours, you have to remember everything. And they don't tell you what to remember either so they make it extra hard. And that's all it is, and you know people, people burn out people get worried people have mental blocks that's a thing. There's someone in my live stream community, who's.
00:48:23
Speaker
She's a young lady who's doing, we call it GCSEs here in the UK. So basically for American viewers, instead of just doing education from five to like 18, which is what you guys and pretty much all of Europe does. The UK, we decide to do education from like five to 16 and then between 16 to 18.
00:48:45
Speaker
you have optional education, you can do like an apprenticeship or you can do two years of what we call college, that's why it's confusing, or sixth form, and then that gives you what we call the A levels, right? So anyway, this girl is doing her GCSEs and she's studying really hard and she's been doing it right from the beginning of the
00:49:08
Speaker
the school year, and we're all really proud of her. We've barely seen her in the streams anymore, so we know she's working hard. And one of the things I said to her as advice is make sure you don't study too hard because you can have that mental block where on exam day, you just can't remember anything. Be it nerves, be it, I don't know, just too much. You're asking your brain to do too much. It's a nerve-wracking thing. I mean, you spoke of anxiety earlier. Schools give you anxiety.
00:49:38
Speaker
they do. The whole thing is not a great situation to

Embracing Failure and Rethinking Success

00:49:41
Speaker
be in. You're all teenagers, you're all not feeling very comfortable in general, you know, everything's changing. It's just not a comfortable time. You have happy moments, but there's a lot of dark moments, hard moments, etc. And I feel like school
00:49:58
Speaker
exacerbates these things in many respects, you know, they make it harder for you unnecessarily. Like I was terrified about my final grades, my final GCSEs, they made it seem that like if I finished school and failed, that was going to be the worst thing ever, I'd just be a failure in life. And you know, I remember, for instance, I didn't get my maths grade, I got a
00:50:20
Speaker
all right, like a pass, but not very good. And they made it seem like that's going to be the worst thing ever. That's that's going to destroy your life. I mean, I don't even think it literally made no difference to my life at all in any shape or form. So yeah.
00:50:35
Speaker
It seems like, like you were saying, it's that, that fear of failure. And, you know, to go back to that story that you told about that person who, uh, when you told them that you wanted to pursue me, pursue music gave you that, that stare of disappointment. You know, it seems that school trains people to give others that stare of disappointment when they don't adhere to like the way that they think that a person should act or apply themselves in the world.
00:51:02
Speaker
And that might be just like the fundamental problem. Here's what they do as well. Let's say you say to them, ooh, I want to be an online content creator or ooh, I want to sell NFTs. They'll roll their eyes and they'll be like, well, you know, eventually you need to get a proper job and you need to do these things. Well, why? Why do I? Because society says I must have a job. Says who?
00:51:32
Speaker
There's loads of people that don't have jobs that basically have, they're essentially like business investors, put it bluntly. And they do very well. Why? Because they're looking in different frames. They're looking at life from a different perspective. They're trying different things, things outside the box. Yes, it's a cliche, but you know what? It's true. If you try different things outside of what society tells you you should be doing,
00:51:58
Speaker
you might find success. You might not always, you know, and that fear of failure thing. Yeah, you're going to fail all the time because that's what life is. Life is a series of failures and successes, more failures than successes, because let's be honest, if you succeeded at everything, you wouldn't learn anything. Failures are what teach us and help us to grow and become, you know, more rounded, wise human beings, right? But not everyone realized that. Everyone,
00:52:27
Speaker
more often than not is taught to be afraid of everything and that you know failure is the worst thing ever because oh no people are going to judge you oh no this is going to happen that's going to happen like who cares if people judge you like does that affect how you live does that affect whether or not you have you know food on the table no you know like the only person that decides if you're a successful failure is you
00:52:51
Speaker
because it comes down to your happiness and whether or not you're actually doing what you want to do in life. Because that's the thing, a lot of people, and sorry to go on a tangent here, but I just feel passionately about this. I've had so many people over the years be like, oh, is that what you're doing? Oh, okay. Oh, you're doing that? Oh, okay. And I'm like, ah, screw you. I don't care what you think. I'm happy.
00:53:18
Speaker
As far as I'm concerned, that is the ultimate goal is to be happy and feel that you're contributing things, you know, to go back to an earlier important point that you made this idea of pursuing purpose. What is my purpose? What am I doing? Well, you know what? I think being happy in life is a pretty
00:53:35
Speaker
good purpose to have contributing to life. I like to think that everything that I do online and all the goals and passions I have in life, they're to

Prioritizing Happiness and Fulfillment

00:53:44
Speaker
make me happy. And they're also to contribute something positive to the world. You know, I know that's a big goal to have. I know it's outlandish. You know, who's this guy? What he thinks he can contribute something? Yeah, you know what? I do. I really do. Because that's the attitude you need to have. You need to believe in yourself. Stop being afraid.
00:54:03
Speaker
I totally agree, man. And I mean, I, I can't, I can't think of a better way to end it. I think that that was well, very well said. And we're, we're about at an hour here. Um, Oh, wow. Is, uh, is there anything else that you want to, that you want to go over anything else, anything else that you wanted to hit on?
00:54:26
Speaker
Oh, you put me on the spot now. I don't know. I just, I just like to talk, man. You know what I mean? I have a lot of fun sharing ideas, having conversations. I share one thing, actually. Might as well plug that I have a podcast as well. It's called the Christian Reeve podcast. Go check it out. When I started that podcast,
00:54:48
Speaker
I did it because I wanted to do it. I just wanted to do it for years. I wanted to do a podcast. Don't know why. You know, normally I have a, you know, a reason with these things, but for some reason I just wanted to do it. And I started doing it. And you know what? In the beginning, not that good, not bad, but not good. It's just kind of okay. Right. And I think a lot of that came down to the confidence factor. It came down to knowing what I was doing.
00:55:15
Speaker
And the more I did it, the better it got and the more confident they became.
00:55:20
Speaker
And I started to study, you know, other people that do this and the structures of podcasts and the formats. And I realized that a lot of that really helps what you're doing, not just with podcasting, but in life in general, just having a structure, having a way to approach things, continually reviewing that, always making sure that you're making an effort to grow and try new things, go out your comfort zone, etc. You know, that's very important.
00:55:48
Speaker
And I suppose my point with this is that the more and more I had my guests on my show and the more discussions and things that I would talk about, the more that I realized I love talking to people, learning about people, exploring new concepts, ideas, just learning. It's a big thing that I like to do. I like to just kind of see what's out there, learn about people, learn about different things like,
00:56:15
Speaker
and really engage within that, be present within that. I had a recent comment recently where someone said, I like listening to your podcast because you actually listen to the other person and engage with them. And I was like, of course. But then when I really thought about it, there are like a million podcasts out there where the host asked them something and then they're just like, uh-huh.
00:56:40
Speaker
Yeah, okay. Yeah, because it's like, I don't know, they're getting their content, whatever. But no, be present. Because that's when the magic happens. You know, like, I always have a bunch of questions lined up and whatnot. But like, sometimes I don't even ask those questions. I just ask a few, get a conversation going, and then just listen and be there. And sometimes I get so engrossed in what we're doing, that I forget that we're doing a podcast and I'm like, oh, yeah, crap, I better
00:57:08
Speaker
Yeah, so on to the next thing. But like, you know, that's how it should be. You should be engaged and excited in what you're doing, because that is what people are drawn to. They're drawn to confidence, they're drawn to passion. And I think that those things are things we should always try to have within our lives, whatever we do, you know, whatever you do in life, don't let other people try to
00:57:35
Speaker
you know, like stop you from chasing your passions or make you feel bad about what your passions are. If you're passionate about something and you love doing that, chase it to its fullest extent. Beautiful Christian. Thank you so much for coming on. Thank you, sir. Thank you for having me.