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Speaker 1: Creativity is an addiction, unplugged because we will always say

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yes to creativity, totally uncut because we all make mistakes.

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So turn it into a tool. This is arrow unplugged.

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I write in a forest. I go there to listen.

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What started at the Billigram Library in twenty fifteen in Charlotte,

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North Carolina has evolved into a lifelong commitment and journey.

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Something is always moving through each and every one of us.

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I say it's a calling. These aren't my words. These

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are the lyrics from Billy's Forest, chapter number three hundred

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thirty six. October two, twenty twenty two, the week of

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Hurricane Ian. Although this tiny forest didn't take a full

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head on punch, the tropical side of Ian did its

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fair share of ripping leaves off the trees and dropping

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the weak limbs to the anxious awaiting ground below, waiting

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to devour each in every limb. The days after Ian,

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I stood on the forest floor, looking upward at the

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top of the trees, assessing all things connected. For in life,

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the stories of past storms tend to unearth in future

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times of struggle and change. I can't predict which tree

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might be the next to fall to the earth after

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a moment of nature taking its toll, I'm able to

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study areas that may invite a different experience at a

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later time. Our personal lives are no different. How we

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act and react in public gatherings is no different than

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trees in a forest. It doesn't have to be on

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a mountain side, and you don't have to be at

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a festival. The stories that made you can physically break you.

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The stories that made you can physically break you. One

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great example of that is how we like to grip

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what we think we should have become and we never

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let it go. And everything that we evolve into after

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that dream falling apart was poisoned because the stories that

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we carried with us broke us. We wouldn't officially turn

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ourselves free into a newer field. You know. We've always

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heard those stories where they take a horse or a bull,

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or even a dog and they set them free in

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an open field, a new field where they can just

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kind of just take it easy in life. But we

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don't want to be that generation of people where when

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we get older, it's not that we want to take

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it easy, we just want to be free. But the

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strangest thing about being free as you get older, is

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that it opens up your life? Yes, but then you

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crowded up with little things and now you're back to

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where you once were the stress of having to keep

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up the stories that break us. That was just one example.

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But what about other things in your life? What is

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it that you are holding onto in your heart that

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refuses to let you become who you need to evolve into.

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I'm always reminded of Yoda in Star Wars, an ancient

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man with so many wise lessons in life. It didn't

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come to him being somebody who serves food at a restaurant.

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He didn't become wise in his generations because he chose

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to be Well, I'm going to be a fighter, and

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I'm going to stay a fighter, and I'm always going

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to be a fighter. It's like broadcasting. I always call

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myself a broadcaster of forty four years. But broadcasting is

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not podcasting yet my heart is telling me, yes it is,

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Yes it is, you're still broadcasting. No, let it go,

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Let it go. What are the labels that you're carrying

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with you that are costing you time? It's breaking You

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have the talk with yourself, ask the question, question the answers,

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and then set yourself free, start living your life. Stop

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living your past. I Maril, these are not my words.

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These are the lyrics from Billy's Forest