#307 – Unpacking Shrinking Season 3 Creative Tools and Writing Lessons for Storytellers PLUS and addition to our GOATs List!

Welcome to another episode of Spun Today, the only podcast anchored in writing but unlimited in scope. I’m your host, Tony Ortiz, and in today’s episode, I’ll be breaking down Season 3 of the acclaimed series Shrinking through the unique lens of a writer. We’ll dig deep into the character arcs and narrative choices, extracting motivational and creativity-fueling takeaways to inspire your own storytelling journey. From psychological concepts like the "field" and the "shadow self," to lessons about character scars, growth, and the necessity of letting your creations remain human, there’s a wealth of creative insight to unpack. Plus, stick around for our favorite segment, "Goats Doing Goat Shit," where we shine a light on those making a positive difference in their communities. Whether you're a fellow wordsmith, a fan of Shrinking, or just on the hunt for inspiration, this episode is guaranteed to ignite your creative spark and encourage you to keep pursuing your dreams, one word at a time.

 

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Shrinking Season 3: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15677150/

 

WNBA Stary Paige Bueckers Helps Renovate Childhood Basketball Court: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrEhdfKEac0

 

https://bringmethenews.com/minnesota-sports/paige-bueckers-unveils-refurbished-basketball-court-in-hometown-of-st-louis-park

 

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TRANSCRIPT

Tony Ortiz [00:00:00]:

The goal isn't to become someone who hasn't been hurt. The goal is to become someone who can carry the hurt without allowing it to determine what happens next. And a fantastic writing takeaway for us there is, don't fix your characters. Let them be who they are. This is probably my biggest takeaway from the season. A character's scars don't have to disappear for the character to grow. In fact, The scars may be the evidence of the growth. What's up folks? What's going on? Welcome to the Spun Today Podcast.

Tony Ortiz [00:00:52]:

The only podcast that is anchored in writing, but unlimited in scope. I am your host, Tony Ortiz, and I appreciate you listening. This is episode 307 of the Spun Today Podcast. And in this episode, I'm going to give you the Spun Today breakdown from a writer's perspective of season 3 of the show Shrinking. If you're a fan of the show Shrinking, you can check out my season 1 and season 2 breakdowns in prior episodes. of the podcast, which are chock-full of writing takeaways and creative insights that I gleaned from watching the show. Also in episode 307, we are going to induct yet another member into the highly prestigious Spun Today Goats Doing Goat Shit list, your favorite segment and mine. So stick around for all that good stuff, but first I wanted to tell you all About a quick way you can help support this show if you so choose.

Tony Ortiz [00:01:49]:

And what better way to do that than to check out my books? I am a writer after all. Go to spuntoday.com/books. You'll find all my titles there with links on where you can purchase them. Make Way for You is my nonfiction, which is a writer or creative's guide to creativity. I call it the poor man's War of Art. If you're a fan of Steven Pressfield's work, you'll also find Fractal: A Time Travel Tale, which is my science fiction time travel novel. And you'll find Melted Cold, which is a collection of short stories. Once again, go to spuntoday.com/books to check them out and purchase in the format of your choosing.

Tony Ortiz [00:02:32]:

Here's another way that you can help support the show if you so choose, and then we'll jump right into the episode.

Speaker B [00:02:39]:

The Spun Today newsletter is available to each and every one of my listeners absolutely for free. All you have to do is go to spuntoday.com/subscribe and drop in your email address. What I'm gonna do is brighten up everybody's least favorite day of the week by delivering 5 curated things within my weekly newsletter every Monday at noon. You're gonna receive a photo of the week, a recommended podcast of the week, I listen to tons of podcasts from an array of varied interests.

Tony Ortiz [00:03:09]:

I cherry-pick the very best ones so that you can check them out.

Speaker B [00:03:13]:

I also share a video of the week, which can be anything from a tasty recipe to a dope rap battle to an enlightening TED Talk. I also share a quote of the week, and finally, for my fellow wordsmiths out there, a word of the week so that you can step up your vocab. Again, this curated list is yours absolutely free by going to spuntoday.com/subscribe and dropping in your email address, and you can unsubscribe at any time. Again, go to spuntoday.com/subscribe, drop in your email address, and you'll get the very next one.

Tony Ortiz [00:03:50]:

Shrinking Season 3. Shrinking follows Jimmy, a grieving therapist who begins breaking the rules of his profession By telling his patients exactly what he thinks they need to hear. What starts as an unorthodox attempt to help other people becomes a messy process of Jimmy confronting his own grief, guilt, relationships, and inability to move forward. By season 3, we see that the show has evolved beyond Jimmy's grief. All the characters are increasingly forced to confront the things that they've spent years avoiding. Paul, for example, is facing the reality of Parkinson's and the end of his career. Gabby is questioning what she wants from her own professional life. Sean is trying to figure out what comes next.

Tony Ortiz [00:04:39]:

Alice is going off to college, leaving the nest. Brian and Charlie are dealing with parenthood and becoming new parents. Liz and Derek are dealing with infidelity and mortality. And Jimmy is finally confronting the possibility That his fear of loss has become an excuse to avoid living. And underneath all that is an idea that the season keeps returning to. Maybe life isn't something we're supposed to control. Maybe it's something we're supposed to pay attention to and be present within. The season uses and revisits this psychological term a lot, or idea rather, of the field.

Tony Ortiz [00:05:19]:

Which is a mysterious, almost spiritual force that seems to reveal what you're supposed to work on in life. It's like a kind of metaphor for awareness. And it's like once you recognize what you're struggling with, you start seeing reminders of it everywhere. And that becomes one of the season's biggest ideas. The universe may not be giving us new answers. We may just be ready to notice the answers that have always been there. Now, before we jump into all the writing takeaways, as we like to do here on the Spun Today Podcast, let's shout out the writers that put this season together. Season 3 of Shrinking was written by Bill Lawrence, who's also a co-creator, Jason Segel, who's also a co-creator and main protagonist Jimmy, Brett Goldstein, who is also a co-creator and plays Louie or Louis, And also written by Neil Goldman, Brian Galavan, Rachna Frushbaum, Annie Mabane, Bill Posley, Wally Barham, and Sophie Selig.

Tony Ortiz [00:06:27]:

Shout out to each and every one of the writers that put season 3 of Shrinking together. Now let's dive into my takeaways of the episode and let's speak a bit about the psychological concept of the field. And seeing what you need to see. Gabby, which is played by Jessica Williams, has a version of the field, which is that it's a mysterious cloud of intelligence and energy that you can supposedly walk into and ask for answers. Her belief is that once you realize what you need to work on in your life, you begin seeing it everywhere. And Sean, who she's telling this to, which is played by Luke Tenney, responds with a funny line, which was, yeah, but that's just like Jesus, right? And there's something I really liked about this idea because it doesn't necessarily require the audience to believe in some literal cosmic force or deity. It works just as well as a metaphor for awareness. If you're struggling with something, suddenly everything seems to remind you of it.

Tony Ortiz [00:07:37]:

You hear a conversation that relates to it, or at least it does in your mind. You notice a character in a movie dealing with the same thing. Somebody gives you advice that somehow lands differently than it would have 6 months ago. And maybe the world isn't actually sending you more messages. Maybe you're just finally listening. And a great writing takeaway for us there is, give your characters a theme that they can't escape. A strong thematic idea doesn't have to stay contained to one conversation. Once you establish what a character needs to confront, let that idea start appearing everywhere to them.

Tony Ortiz [00:08:16]:

The character doesn't have to consciously recognize the pattern immediately. In fact, it's often more interesting when the audience sees the pattern before the character does because it builds anticipation of when are they going to figure it out. And the theme becomes almost like a gravitational force pulling the character toward the thing that they're avoiding. Another psychological tool referenced this season is the shadow self, which is the person that you were which is still inside you. Paul, played by Harrison Ford, gives Derek, played by Ted McGinley. This tool, which I actually remember from the book Tools that I've spoken about in prior breakdowns of this series— definitely check that one out— which in that book Phil Stutz depicts it as the idea that the vulnerable kid that you were when you were younger still exists inside the adult. And that's essentially the shadow self, the parts of ourselves formed When we were younger that doesn't necessarily disappear just because we grew—

Speaker C [00:09:20]:

grow older.

Tony Ortiz [00:09:21]:

And that idea becomes particularly relevant to Jimmy, which is played by Jason Segel. And we see that center stage when Jimmy's father, played by Jeff Daniels, comes to visit for the first time in— at least in the series. And we learn that their relationship is like semi-strained. And we begin to see where some of Jimmy's underlying daddy issues come from. Jimmy's father's like this really charming and gregarious guy, but that's almost the problem. He seems to show everyone else this great side of himself while repeatedly failing Jimmy. And he comes to town for Jimmy's daughter, his granddaughter Alice, played by Lukita Maxwell. For her graduation.

Tony Ortiz [00:10:09]:

And then, just like he apparently did throughout Jimmy's childhood, he just decides to bail for some selfish reason, like a once-in-a-lifetime quote-unquote fishing trip with his friends or something like that. And the adult Jimmy, psychologist Jimmy, knows how to process this intellectually, but the younger Jimmy that's still inside him is scarred internally from The all-too-familiar experiences that he's now reliving, and he desperately wants to shield his daughter from that type of pain. And a writing takeaway for us there is, don't make childhood wounds disappear because a character got older. One of the things that I think that Shrinking does really well is recognize that adult behavior can be the continuation of childhood behavior. A character doesn't necessarily get over something. They can also learn to function around it or with it. And that gives you, as a creative, opportunities to create emotional reactions that are bigger than the immediate event. The graduation isn't just a graduation.

Tony Ortiz [00:11:18]:

His father's departure isn't just his father leaving. It's another piece of evidence confirming something that Jimmy already believes about himself. And his relationship with his father, and it's reinforcing those ideas for him. And just how we see here with this dynamic between them, the past in your characters' lives should have a present tense effect in your stories. Now speak about one of the GOATs of the series, Harrison Ford, who's playing the character of Paul, who has one of the most powerful threads of the season— of the series, really, because it's Definitely a continuous throughline of his battle and relationship with Parkinson's. In season 3, we see that Paul continues coming to terms with his deterioration and begins working toward retirement from practicing therapy. He's also going to the doctor as directed and really doing what he needs to do to look after himself. And at the doctor's office, actually, there's also a great cameo by Michael J.

Speaker C [00:12:19]:

Fox.

Tony Ortiz [00:12:19]:

Who has the Michael J. Fox Foundation, is like one of the premier voices in spreading awareness, uh, for Parkinson's, has famously had Parkinson's since a very young age. And he makes a cameo in this series at the neurologist's office and introduces himself to Paul. They have some banter back and forth, and they talk about Parkinson's and the hallucinations that can eventually come with it and tell each other Like the different struggles that they deal with, you know, Michael J. Fox being clearly like much more far along in the progression of the disease. And they end their little back and forth with a wonderfully simple sentiment, which was, fuck Parkinson's. And that becomes kind of like a shorthand amongst, you know, Paul and all the protagonists in the series, like within their friend group. But what's cool is that The season doesn't reduce Paul's story to the illness.

Tony Ortiz [00:13:15]:

It's really about what he chooses to do with the time that he has left. And at one point, he puts it beautifully in one of my favorite lines of the entire series. And he says, quote, I can be a self-pitying shithead, or I can suck the marrow out of what's left of life. And that there becomes the choice. And an important writing takeaway for us is don't let an obstacle become the character. A lesser story could have— could make Paul's Parkinson's the story. Instead, the illness just creates the circumstances that force Paul to ask, who am I going to be now? And the best character obstacles don't simply create problems for characters. They force characters to make choices that reveal who they really are.

Tony Ortiz [00:14:08]:

Now, let's speak a little bit about Jimmy and his fear of living. Jimmy finally admits that he's afraid to pursue a relationship because they always end badly. He says that someone falls out of love, someone cheats, someone dies, and after everything he's experienced, Jimmy has this Essentially built a worldview around the idea that attachment inevitably leads to pain. And Paul, being the GOAT psychologist that he is, recognizes something deeper in him. Jimmy is always imagining the perfect way something is gonna go, which is something I'm sure a lot of us can relate to. I definitely know I can. But as Paul alludes to, Life is busier than that. Like Jimmy, for example, tries to envision and control the outcome because of every, you know, given situation, because life previously threw him a curveball that he couldn't control.

Tony Ortiz [00:15:08]:

And a great writing takeaway for us and writing tool that we can use to kind of set a character up to fail in a sense is give characters a false solution to their real problems. Because Jimmy's problem isn't that relationships don't work. His problem is that he's trying to prevent the future pain by refusing to fully participate in the present. And that's a much more interesting character problem. The thing he thinks is protecting him is actually keeping him trapped. And that's a useful question to keep in mind when developing any character. What coping mechanism does this character believe is helping them that is actually keeping them from getting what they want? Now, eventually, after stepping away from the practice and moving with Julie, played by Wendy Malick, to his daughter's, Paul eventually flies in for a goodbye breakfast with Jimmy. They had a bit of an argument.

Tony Ortiz [00:16:05]:

They never had the goodbye dinner that they intended to. So Paul winds up surprising him and flying in for this surprise breakfast. And he explains to Jimmy that because life threw him a curveball, he began envisioning how everything should go in his head as a way of trying to control things. But he explains to him that life doesn't work that way. And then Paul does something wonderfully circular to Jimmy. He Jimmies Jimmy. This breakfast that Jimmy is hyped to meet him for because he wants to apologize for Not meeting him for dinner before he left, so on and so forth, was really a surprise breakfast that Paul set up for Jimmy with Sophie, played by Isabela Gomez, which is the woman that Jimmy had abruptly broken things off with, but seemed to be like the one that he should be trying to have a real future with. And it's a funny moment, but it also validates the therapy approach That Jimmy has been developing throughout the series.

Tony Ortiz [00:17:08]:

The mentor, being Paul, uses the student's own methods on him. And I'm gonna circle back to the conversation they have there at the end. It's pretty much like the, the end of, of the season. But first, I wanted to touch on a writing takeaway about that point, which is let your character's lessons come back around, because there's something satisfying about dramatic symmetry. And Jimmy has spent the entire series intervening in other people's lives, pushing them toward uncomfortable truths, trying to sell this breakthrough idea, in his mind at least, to Paul and Gabby, who never really like co-signed it. And now his mentor essentially turns those same techniques, which he hadn't fully validated to this point in the series, back on him. So the lesson isn't simply spoken, the character actually experiences it. Whenever possible, let the lesson of your story become an action rather than a speech.

Tony Ortiz [00:18:01]:

I think that's a good takeaway for all of us there. Now I'm gonna circle back to that scene at the end of this little breakdown, but moving on, let's speak a little bit about Derek's heart attack and Sean's next chapter. So Ted McGinley, who plays Derek, begins to become like a mentor of sorts for Sean, who is offered a sous chef position with a famous chef and starts contemplating closing his food truck business down because this is such a huge opportunity. But he's hesitant because his army buddy who's been helping him on the food truck would lose his job, and he feels like he'll be, you know, turning his back on him. But then Derek reminds him that— or reminds him of, rather— the idea that the universe will let you know when you're ready. And then he winds up telling him something like, And you know what the universe is telling you? Or doing to you? Or something to that effect? The universe is dipping you in butter and seasoning you with Lowry. And like, that eventually gives Sean the nudge that he needs to accept the position with the famous sous chef and have the difficult conversation with his army buddy that's working on the food truck. And then soon after, we find out that Derek winds up having a— what they called a widowmaker blockage in one of his arteries and has a heart attack and requires emergency heart surgery.

Tony Ortiz [00:19:26]:

And suddenly this, like, loser dependent son that Derek and Liz have, who has been struggling to step up in anything, winds up stepping up. And he helps his parents, he talks to the doctors, he becomes, like, super useful. When his family actually needs him. And I thought that was like a cool little subplot in the series. And a good writing takeaway for us is give characters opportunities to prove that they've changed. Don't just tell us that a character has matured. Put them in a situation where maturity is required. And if we dig a little deeper, we can see that Sean's question about his career is mirrored by Derek's medical emergency in that both events force the characters to move beyond the comfortable, comfortable version of themselves that we've come to know.

Tony Ortiz [00:20:24]:

And character development like that becomes much more satisfying when the story creates a situation where the character's growth is necessary rather than just optional. And looking at Liz and Derek's son as even more of a storytelling mechanism, we see that he's always been overly dependent on them and generally just a fuck-up. And then Derek's heart attack forces him into a position where he has to step up. And that, like, kind of throwaway aside storyline in the season ties to larger theme, which is that sometimes people don't become capable because you tell them that they need to become capable. Circumstances make them capable. And something for us to keep in mind from a writing perspective is that pressure reveals character. Put your characters under pressure and then get out of the way. Don't tell the audience He's finally becoming responsible.

Tony Ortiz [00:21:29]:

Give him or her a situation where somebody needs him to be responsible, and then let us watch what they do. Now let's speak about Gabby's crisis and what she's dealing with this season. Gabby, played by Jessica Williams, which is definitely one of my favorite characters of the show, begins imagining a future where she creates her own trauma center after Paul retires. And the practice eventually sunsets. But then one of her patients dies by suicide. And Gabby had been trying to get closer to this patient, much like Jimmy does with his patients. And the loss really hit her hard because it's like she couldn't reach her. And she wound up, you know, doing this like Hail Mary attempt of trying this Jimmy-ing strategy that Jimmy has been pushing on everyone.

Tony Ortiz [00:22:18]:

And it seems to be working. And she's getting somewhere with her patient and they become friendly, but then she winds up committing suicide. She, she was someone who, who was battling depression. So after this happens, she decides to take a few weeks off from work. And this is important because Gabby's professional ambition isn't treated as automatically noble. She wants to help people, but helping people can also come with enormous emotional consequences. And a writing takeaway for us there is, complicate the thing your character wants. Gabi thinks she has discovered what she wants next.

Tony Ortiz [00:22:56]:

Then reality comes in and complicates it. And that's useful dramatically because the story doesn't simply reward ambition. It asks whether the character understands the cost of getting what they want. So whenever you give a character a goal, Ask yourself, what happens if they actually get it? And then, what might they discover about themselves once they do? Let's go back to Brian and Charlie, who finally become parents. Brian, played by Michael Urie, another one of my favorites on the cast, and Charlie, played by Devin Kawioka, finally get their adopted baby. And it's a payoff to a long-running emotional thread In the series. And what I like about this kind of storyline is that the show has allowed the audience to sit with the desire long enough that the payoff actually means something. It's not simply they wanted a baby, then they got a baby.

Tony Ortiz [00:23:55]:

We've spent time with their relationship and their frustrations and their hopes and them getting denied for adoption, and then A potential baby coming a lot sooner than anticipated, and then that falling through once they came to terms with wanting it, and then so on and so forth. And a cool writing takeaway for us there is earn your payoffs. Emotional payoffs work because of accumulation. The more time is spent between said goal and the accomplishment of that goal, the more time you spend allowing an audience to understand what a character wants, And why, the more meaning there is when they finally get it. And the trick isn't simply delaying gratification. It's giving the audience enough emotional investment and the desire that the eventual payoff feels like something we've been waiting for too. There's another tool, that psychological tool that Paul shares with Sean about controlling the mind by Letting go. And Paul tells Sean to use all the tools that he learned with him in the sessions that they've had together whenever he starts getting anxious about the future, to essentially shut his brain down rather than allowing himself to spiral.

Tony Ortiz [00:25:16]:

And that fits beautifully with the season's larger philosophical thread. The characters repeatedly want certainty. They want to know what's coming. They want to know that they're making the right decision. They want to control outcomes. And again and again, the season suggests that maybe the answer isn't more control. Maybe it's learning how to live without it. And a writing takeaway for us is let your story's ideas echo across characters, because they all seem to be dealing with their version of of the same shit.

Tony Ortiz [00:25:50]:

One of the strongest ways to reinforce a theme is to give different characters different versions of the same problem. Jimmy wants to control relationships. Paul wants to control how he spends the remainder of his life. Sean worries about his future. Gabby is trying to determine what her future should look like. They're all dealing with uncertainty differently, but they're dealing with uncertainty. And doing that creates, uh, thematic cohesion without requiring every character to deliver the same message. And now circling back to that great conversation that Paul winds up having with Jimmy at the end of the season when he Jimmies him into a surprise breakfast with Sophie.

Tony Ortiz [00:26:37]:

It's one of the strongest exchanges of the season, and it comes down to Speaking about scars, and Paul tells him, letting go of your past just means you don't allow your scars to hold you back anymore. And Jimmy frustratedly responds, but look at me, Paul. I'm covered in them. I'm covered in scars, Paul. And Paul answers, à la Jocko Willink, good. And he tells Jimmy that it would be a shame To be 42 years old and not have any scars. They're evidence of a life fully lived. And that to me really feels like the culmination of what Shrinking has been saying throughout its 3 seasons.

Tony Ortiz [00:27:22]:

The goal isn't to become someone who hasn't been hurt. The goal is to become someone who can carry the hurt without allowing it to determine what happens next. And a fantastic writing takeaway for us there is, don't fix your characters. Let them be who they are. This is probably my biggest takeaway from the season. A character's scars don't have to disappear for the character to grow. In fact, the scars may be the evidence of the growth. Let your characters remain damaged if that's where your story lands.

Tony Ortiz [00:27:56]:

Let them carry contradictions. Let them screw up. Let them be human. Then show us that they're making different choices despite all that. And in closing, I'd say that there's a recurring idea throughout season 3 that really ties everything together, which is life doesn't necessarily give you the answers you're looking for. Sometimes it gives you the same lesson over and over. Until you're finally ready to hear it. Jimmy has spent years trying to protect himself from loss.

Tony Ortiz [00:28:31]:

Paul is confronting the reality that he can't control how much time he has left. Sean is trying to figure out when he's ready to move forward. Gabby is questioning what she's supposed to do next. And all of them are in their own ways learning the same lesson. You don't get to control what happens to you. You only get to decide what you do with it. And maybe that's what the, the field really represents. Not some mystical force or deity handing us the answers.

Tony Ortiz [00:29:02]:

Maybe it's simply the moment when we're finally paying enough attention to recognize the answers. If you enjoyed that breakdown, please go back and check out my breakdowns for seasons 1 and 2 of Shrinking. And you can check out all seasons of Shrinking streaming now on Apple TV. Goats doing goat shit. This is the segment of the Spun Today podcast where I like to highlight folks that go above and beyond and do something altruistic or generous or noble in some sort of way. And this episode's inductee is WNBA star Paige Bueckers, who recently donated $45,000 towards renovating the basketball court at Blackstone Park in the Minneapolis area where she grew up playing. She described the court as a refuge during difficult periods of her life growing up, and the playground at the time consisted of just 2 crudely lined basketball keys and a hopscotch court. Now the new and improved renovated version now features new updated purple surface, painted lines, and Wecker's signature, along with other elements commemorating her connection to that place.

Tony Ortiz [00:30:22]:

And I thought this was cool because it's not just Paige donated money to some charity. She specifically went back to the place that helped make her who she is. And invested in the next generation of kids who will be able to use it. And that is why she is this episode's GOAT. Paige Bueckers, welcome to the Spun Today GOATs Doing GOAT Shit list. And that, folks, was episode 307 of the Spun Today podcast. Thank each and every one of you for taking the time to listen. I really do truly appreciate it.

Tony Ortiz [00:31:02]:

If you enjoyed this episode's breakdown, I do similar breakdowns to all different types of movies and TV shows and books where I try my best to highlight moments within them that resonated with me and tease out writing takeaways and tools that we can use as creatives to implement in our own creative works. And I hope you're able to take something away from these episodes that you find helpful, or at least entertaining. Don't forget to check out my books at sponsorday.com/books. They're available in digital ebooks, paperbacks, hardcovers, you name it. Check them out at sponsorday.com/books. And if you stick around for a couple more minutes, there are a bunch of great ways you can help support the show, such as you Using my affiliate links, checking out my merch, so on and so forth. Here are a few of those ways, and then I'll check you guys out next time. Peace.

Speaker C [00:32:05]:

What's up folks, Tony here. I hope you're enjoying the Spun Today Podcast as much as I enjoy producing it for you. Here are a few ways you can help support the show. You can help support the Spun Today Podcast by shopping my merch store. Section. Go to sponsoredate.com/support and navigate to the merch section. Here you'll find the iconic Podcast vs. Anybody tee, which comes in many different color schemes and all different sizes.

Speaker C [00:32:31]:

There are a bunch of other designs available as well, including writing-themed shirts, cycling shirts, and the classic Dominican escudo, and much, much more. And if t-shirts aren't your thing, all designs, also come in pullover hoodies, zip-up hoodies, sweatshirts, and tank tops. You can also shop the Spun Today coffee mugs, which has the Spun Today logo on one side and the tagline that I end every episode with on the other, which is start taking steps in the general direction of your dreams. Once again, for all Spun Today merch, go to spuntoday.com/support and navigate to the merch section. Another great way for you to help support the show and also take care of your foundational health is by going to spuntay.com/support and clicking on my affiliate link for Athletic Greens, AKA AG1. One scoop of AG1 in your water helps to fill nutrient gaps, promote gut health, and support whole body vitality. Just one serving delivers a comprehensive blend of 9 products. A multivitamin, minerals, prebiotics, probiotics, adaptogens, and more, all of which work together for the strongest foundation for better health.

Speaker C [00:33:47]:

I personally take AG1 and really appreciate the peace of mind of knowing that my foundational health bases are covered, even when I know I'm not eating as healthily as I should be. Also, by using my affiliate link at sponsay.com/support, you will get 1 free year of vitamin D3, as well as 5 AG1 travel packs absolutely for free. Again, go to spuntoday.com/support and click on the banner for AG1.

Speaker B [00:34:14]:

If you're a fellow creative, a cool way that you can help support the Spun Today podcast and actually be part of the podcast is by filling out my 5-question questionnaire located at spuntoday.com/questionnaire. Here you'll find the 5 open questions related to your craft, your art, what inspires you to create, what type of unrelated hobbies you're into, and what motivates you to get your work done. You can choose to remain anonymous or plug your website and your work. And once you submit your questionnaire, I read your responses on a future episode of the Spun Today podcast. It's completely free at no cost to you. And what I like to say about it is that if your responses could potentially spark inspiration in someone else, why not share that? spuntoday.com/questionnaire. The Spun Today newsletter is available to each and every one of my listeners absolutely for free.

Tony Ortiz [00:35:06]:

All you have to do is go to spun today dot com forward slash subscribe and drop in your email address.

Speaker B [00:35:12]:

What I'm gonna do is brighten up everybody's least favorite day of the week by delivering five curated things within my weekly newsletter every Monday at noon. You're gonna receive a full. Photo of the week, a recommended podcast of the week. I listen to tons of podcasts from an array of varied interests.

Tony Ortiz [00:35:31]:

I cherry-pick the very best ones so that you can check them out.

Speaker B [00:35:35]:

I also share a video of the week, which can be anything from a tasty recipe to a dope rap battle to an enlightening TED Talk. I also share a quote of the week. And finally, for my fellow wordsmiths out there, A word of the week so that you can step up your vocab. Again, this curated list is yours absolutely free by going to spuntoday.com/subscribe and dropping in your email address, and you can unsubscribe at any time. Again, go to spuntoday.com/subscribe, drop in your email address, and you'll get the very next one.

Tony Ortiz [00:36:11]:

And as always, folks, substitute the mysticism with hard work and And start taking steps in the general direction of your dreams. Thanks for listening.

Speaker B [00:36:34]:

I love you, Aiden.

Speaker D [00:36:35]:

I love you, Daddy.

Speaker B [00:36:38]:

I love you, Grayson.

Speaker D [00:36:40]:

I love you, Daddy.