Episode 6 (ft. Sami Rizk) - Entrepreneurship, Creativity, and Work Life Balance

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another week of the Let's Talk Social Innovation podcast. I hope you've had an amazing start to your week, but if not, we can kickstart that right here. I'm your host, Ian Kehinde, and y'all know the deal. Gotta get through this week's bulletin board. So starting off October 23rd from 6.30 to 8.30 p.m., join the Pitt Alumni Career Network and Frederick Honors College as alumni, staff, and students share personal, scary stories from their professional lives. Each speaker will explain how they pick themselves up from each fall and turn failures into successes. The doors open at 6.00 p.m. There will be refreshments and swag provided, and my boss, Rana Doko, and FAC diplomat and resident Sherry Zalika Sykes will be featured. October 29th from 2.00 to 4.00 p.m., stop by the Office of Community Engaged Learning's Community Engagement Fair in the University Club, Ballroom B. Network with 20-plus community partners working to drive change in areas such as youth development, social work, sustainability, health, and more like my colleagues from CivWiz. Learn how you can get involved in civic learning through volunteering internships or research. Snacks and honors OCC points will be provided. November 4th to 5.00 p.m., applications for FHC Research Fellowship, the Chancellor's Undergraduate Research Fellowship, and the Chancellor's Undergraduate Teaching Fellowship are due. Links to the application can be found in the description of this episode where you're watching or listening. Second to last, 3,122 children and youth were identified as experiencing homelessness by their allegated county school districts in the 21-22 school year. Come hear from Brian Knight, the Community Engagement Manager for the Homeless Children's Education Fund about the issue of child homelessness. November 7th from 3.30 to 4.30 p.m., you can learn from the HCF organization about ways you can get involved. It's an informal 30-minute virtual session with information and Q&A. All of these things listed will be in the description. And lastly, if you are interested in coming on the show, like my incredible friend Sammy here, make sure to fill out the form in the link tree which can be found in the description below. And lastly, if you are looking to take on the mantle of this podcast to become the host, as I am a senior and I will be out of here sooner than you think, it is a paid intern position. You will learn the ropes of how to handle the podcast and media. You do not need film or media experience. You can learn on the job. If you're interested in becoming an honor student or currently an honor student, the form to apply will be in the link tree as always. But with everything else aside, bygones be gigons, like I said, my incredible friend Sammy Riz, psychology major and creative entrepreneur. How we feeling today? I'm doing good, thank you for having me. I appreciate it a lot. Second time on the podcast now, so it's exciting. I got really excited when you hit me up about it and we ran into some difficulties trying to get here, but we're here now. Just a little bit. So it's been good. I'm blessed, I can't complain. It's good seeing you as always, my friend. And I see you've been doing some work on the intro. I enjoy it, you're professional with this. So as he said, anyone that's looking for the opportunity, please do, because you can learn a lot, as I clearly have seen from Ian over the year. And it's just a great opportunity to be here. So thank you. I appreciate that. People who are regular viewers, of course they remember you. But to this day, still the most popular episode of the podcast. I appreciate it. We'll see if this does numbers like that. We'll see. I'm excited. I feel good about this one. So as always, we will be going through Sammy's backstory, the current projects that he finds himself working on. We'll hit our artist spotlight. And then in the second half, we'll be touching on the topic of work-life balance. So with this being the first episode that we have a returning guest, I will ask that if you want a more detailed overlook of Sammy's backstory, feel free to find the first episode that we filmed with Sammy, season one, episode two, featuring Sammy Rizk. Feel free to listen to that if you want to know more about his backstory. But we're doing the spark notes here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just a quick one. Just a quick overview, quick summary. My name's Sammy Hennif Rizk. Born and adopted in Morocco, Casablanca. Or Casablanca, Morocco, excuse me. To two beautiful adoptive parents, Kareem and Kibera Rizk and Hennif. And I think, again, if you even read the title of the episode that I was on last time, it's embedded in everything that they taught me and that I've come through throughout my whole life and upbringing is just hard work. And going at things and looking at things through a realistic lens and a logical lens and taking it head on. So I was picked up by two headstrong people, two blue collared workers and immigrants who have done everything under the sun to provide me with these opportunities that I have. And in that, I've just been, I've been searching and working on these projects ever since. I've been an artist, a music artist and a athlete. I've been playing soccer my whole life and that has stemmed into hybrid athlete training, which is kind of just like triathlon training basically. But my main nature, my nature is running. That's what I do most. I could never. Yeah, yeah. I run into that a lot. But you'd be surprised, bro. You'd be surprised how much you could get done. Maybe we'll have to go on one soon. But I do that a lot. I've done music now for the past seven years of my life and just released a album in this past March, my third studio album. So it's been a good process, all of it. I study psychology here at Pitt, fourth year, senior. Finally, man. Finally. Been with this guy since freshman year, Holland Hall. For anyone that's out in Holland Hall right now. Shout out Holland. Finally, it's getting a little cooler. So hopefully y'all are feeling a little better and all that because it is hot as heck up there. But yeah, that's just a little summary about me. Again, as Ian said, if you guys wanna get a full in-depth review of who I am, how my parents even came to find me and how we got to where we're at, please go and peep the last episode for sure. But yeah, that's a little bit about me. So where did the love for the music start? I think it's always been there in hindsight. As they say, hindsight is 20-20. Looking back from even fourth grade, writing different poems and love notes and stuff like that in the form of poetry, writing lyrics before I knew it. I performed Bob Marley, Three Little Birds, my fourth grade year at the talent show. Always just putting myself in these, one, uncomfortable, and two, most of the times creative positions without being aware of it. And I think I actualized it my sophomore year of high school when I released the song Self-Healing that is honestly my mantra of life and the main basis of the last episode I was on self-healing and creativity. But I think it's just always been there. I found it in a really rough time in my life. And again, I actualized it when I was going, when I had lost somebody really close to me in my life. And I found it as a means to express and a means to start understanding myself at a deeper level, a means to start understanding other people and not just myself, but my role and myself in perspective of others and in terms and relation to this world around me and how it operates. So I've been searching for that for a while and I think that's a lifelong process. But I think music definitely showed me that and to expand that even the arts in general and diving deeper into all aspects of art and finding a true love and appreciation for that. And yeah, it's been a ride and a half trying to understand what it means to me and what it is of service to me for, you know what I mean, in my life. And I've grappled with that at times with whether it be trying to understand why I subconsciously want something like notoriety or fame or money and understanding that those things were traps at one point and just trying to, again, grapple with all that, learn it. But it's nothing less that I've, nonetheless I've been grateful for and happy to continue to venture on and explore within this next album that I'm working on, these creative projects that I'm doing on the side and stuff like that. It's been a fun time and an eye-opener. So yeah. Who inspired you in terms of your musical direction? Did you have any mentors? It's funny that you ask that because no one in my family that I could, like I couldn't put my finger on anyone that's inherently talented at music or has as deep of an understanding or appreciation for it as I do. I think it just kind of came, you know, by whether you want to call it God or the universe or just by blessing or birth. I just was kind of born with it. And again, hindsight is 20-20. But I look back and I find all these moments where I was putting myself in these, again, uncomfortable and creative opportunities. And I was, I think that's when I was most content, most happy, most curious and at peace and fulfilled. Honestly, I think when I'm keeping myself in those areas and pursuing and diving deeper into those concepts and thoughts and trying to become as creative as possible, I think that's when I'm happiest. I don't, I'd say more icons, more inspirational people that I'm not directly tied to. Tyler, the creator, he's dropping a new album soon. I'm so excited about it, dude, that I saw it and it caught me off guard on my timeline. And it felt like watching Tyler in like 2013 again. So I was really, really excited about that. And that kind of sparked some creativity in me again. But he's a huge one for me. Mac Miller, as always. Even again, these icons that aren't even from our time. Van Gogh and his intensity for his art and his work in general is something that I try to embody in my everyday. And I think about how he genuinely tailored his life to his art and the meanings were parallel to him at least. And some people think of that as crazy. I think of that as greatness. And I don't know, I really enjoy that type of stuff. So I try to study those greats and those icons. Sadly right now, ooh, excuse me. Sorry, sadly right now, I don't have many inspirations near me. I have people that I work with, I guess, and creatives that I truly respect and appreciate that I work with. But nothing like that recently. So the last time that you were on this podcast, you were talking about the release of your next album, which was originally going to be called The Eagle and the Shadow. And now that it's out, the album Idol. Idol, yeah. Man, it was a project that I've been working on since freshman year, since we touched down here. And I'm sure at times you heard me recording clips of that album without even either you or I knowing that it would be on this album. But something that I truly dedicated so much time and so much of my life to, and again, that intensity and meaning that we talk about, it was almost parallel. It was life or death for me. And this album was everything for me. But in a sense, I almost fell into what I'd call my junior year. A very colorless year for me. I didn't have much, many moments of vibrancy or many moments to express myself in the way that I wish I did. I put myself in, again, these pits of uncomfort. But this time, I think it was a lack of creativity there. And I wasn't putting myself in the right area, spreading myself or surrounding myself with the right person or around the right people, I should say, or the right things. And I think I sucked a lot of color out of my life. And given the title, Idol, I think, the description that I wrote in the moment for a lot of press that I was doing was a colorless reach for, or a colorless reach for something along the lines of just being very hopeless and reaching for something so colorful, but not seeing any of it, being able to really actualize it. And I felt very, very stuck. I felt like everything I was reaching for, I was getting cut off right before I could get to it. And it was a frustrating time. But I think that album was the opening and closing and confrontation of all those feelings and what it meant to be idol in the moment and how to kind of get by that. It's a lot of deeper and darker emotions and stories within that album, but it serves tribute to that time of my life and how I got out of it. So I'm very happy about the product of it, the press afterwards, and everything in between. It was a process that taught me a lot and truly gave me another chunk of my discography career and story within all this creative nonsense. So, yeah. So in the self-reflection that led up to Idol, how do you put your life story to pen and paper? So I think the goal is, and I think for the longest time, everybody is convinced that making art is about meeting someone else's expectation. And to a point, the magic is being universally relatable. So how do I create and tell a story and something that I am so personally tied to that then reigns and relates to so many other people and rings this bell in everybody else's head that is like, damn, I had a moment like that. Or he's saying something that I didn't think anybody understood or could articulate. Or half of the time, I wish I could get off my chest, but just don't know how to get off my chest. So that's definitely the goal. But especially with Idol, I sank back in and started realizing that if I started creating for myself and from a true standpoint of relatability towards myself, like inward, if you know what I'm trying to say, where I wasn't trying to create these stems or branches of relatability for anyone else, but I was trying to do everything inward and truly understand why these things were happening for myself and stuff like that. I realized and started to understand those created the best outward branches for people to then latch onto and understand and relate and stuff like that. So it took me a while to understand that, but Idol definitely did a really good job at teaching me that process and start to tailor my music towards myself again, kind of creating my own narrative again, rather than constantly looking outward and searching in an external space for what my next narrative should be, what my next song should be about, what the next project conceptually should be about and stuff like that. I don't know, I think it gave me a lot more control and creative freedom. And again, it was hard. It was really nasty, horrendous, hideous work at time that I really didn't like to dig through, but looking back on it and being able to reflect and listen to those songs and put myself back in those moments and see how far I've come and see how far I can pull myself out of those crappy emotions and stuff is really cool. And it's really beneficial and I just appreciate it a lot. So how do you feel now closing that chapter that was Idol and moving into your potential next project? I feel amazing right now, both physically, mentally, spiritually. It's all there for me right now and it's adding up and I think it was through that process and trials and tribulations and grit and grind and again, like I said, that horrendous and hideous process of making Idol, getting through Idol, understanding what it meant to be Idol to me and then finally getting out of it and removing my way out of it. I'm not saying that I still have Idol days, but I think that process of it allows me to separate and get back to these good grooves and I have a lot less Idol days, a lot less consistent of them. If it's now, it's maybe six days of the week and one day of the week, I might have an Idol day if that, nowadays. And it's really nice to see that progress. Whereas last year, I swear it was for months at one point, I felt colorless. I was on the phone with my dad yesterday and we had a good conversation and I told him at one point, and I was like, listen, I've never felt this amount of happiness, excuse me, happiness, peace, fulfillment, discipline, responsibility and accountability in my life before and it's truly through doing a lot, a lot of these horrendous, hideous things. Before this podcast and the reason why we're late right now is because I was doing a nine mile run and I truly believe in, it's a little off topic right now, but someone very close to me in terms of inspiration, Nick Bear on the athletic side of the thing, he says, if it matters to you, you'll make time. And I know this podcast matters to Ian because he's taking more time out of his day, canceling plans that I sadly cut into to make time for this episode. And two, I think he understands how much my health and running means to me in terms of I had to make that time to go get my nine miles done today. So tying it back to that creativity side, it's like realizing my responsibility and capacity and what I can do and applying all of that. And it's been a really cool opportunity and process that I've been able to go through and I hope that I keep it. I fall into these moments of fear and I know you can relate where it's like, you're on such a good stretch of days, weeks, months and it's like, something's gonna happen. There's gonna be a booby trap somewhere or something where I fall through and something is gonna happen. It has to someday. And I've been anticipating and kind of preparing, but also knowing that, no, I'm in control of every day. And even if I have a crappy morning or a crappy night, it doesn't have to be a bad day. And this consistency can keep going and how I frame it and everything. So it's just given me so much perspective, really. Post-idol, I'm as colorful as possible. So I feel it and I'm really happy about it. So with you being a musical creative, I think that your life perspective can be different from those of us who are not because as you are maturing, both physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually, you can see how that changes your creative process. What has changed maturity-wise since the last time you were on this podcast? Excuse me, ah, that's a good question. I think I'm not doing things from a route of ego anymore. I think everything's derived still from the self and it's internal. I'm trying to work and it's intrinsic motivation and I'm trying to pull inward and work on myself inward. And again, it's self-centered, I think, to a point. But again, it's just a different intention. Everything is completely different intention-wise. And I think intention fell at a lower list of my priorities in the past and I kind of reprioritized my perspective in a lot of ways. And intention and urgency has now fallen at the top two or three of my priorities in life now in terms of urgency being, what is your level or degree of energy and will to get out and go do something, right? And even like, what is your level of urgency, okay, to even pick up the phone and text someone to go make that plan, lock it in, go do it? Or what is your level of urgency to get out the bed, to redeem that promise that you made the night before, to go on that run, despite of how you're feeling, you know what I mean? And with that intention, it's like understanding why you're doing these things. Because if you're just driving, if you could have a Ferrari with no wheel and you could have all the drive in the world, there's zero direction or intention behind it, you're not going anywhere, you know what I mean? And at some point, you're gonna run into a wall and if you don't understand why these things are happening, you'll never get to these points that you wanna get to, excuse me. So with intention, I've just been trying to understand, and I'll say this slowly, and I've been journaling about it a lot in writing, but it is so important to understand and for all you psych heads out there, I think you'll understand this really well, hopefully, is for any given goal, any given behavior, any given action, your first base intention, subconsciously, but I encourage you to make it conscious, is you just wanna experience. Why do you wear a certain outfit? You wanna experience a new look. Why do you get a new haircut? You wanna experience, again, a new look. Why do you go on a run? Why do you challenge yourself in these different ways? It's experience, that's your base intention. Once you understand that, you can start assigning a different perspective to all these different things. Understand that base intention and then understand too, for any given behavior or goal, you have a million, or I won't say a million, you have a good amount or multiple trains of thoughts with multiple different underlying intentions, right? And some of these intentions are good and some of these intentions are bad. In the past, I used to go on runs and I used to bring my phone with me and some of these intentions for going on the run were, let me take a picture of myself to post on Instagram for other people to see to give me a spark of dopamine and a spark of validation. And it was so toxic because it's like, sometimes if I bonked on my run or if I hit a wall or something like that, I was more mad about the Instagram post than I was about the performance, you know what I mean? And I didn't understand that intention for the longest time but I think rewiring and reprioritizing that perspective, okay, of like, okay, this is my pure intention of one, I want to experience this, why do I want to experience this now? Because I want to get better, not because I want someone else to see it or tell me that I got better, but it's because I want to actually grow, you know what I mean? So I think rewiring and channeling your intentions is very, very important. I think that's something I learned recently and something that I applied to mature and grow, so yeah. We love to see the growth. I appreciate it, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're talking to our psych eds, this next section is going to be for our psych eds. How are you in your journey of pursuing your psychology degree? I love it, I absolutely adore it and appreciate everything that it's given me in terms of opportunity professionally and educationally. Excuse me. Again, I'm in my fourth year now, senior year, fall semester. Last fall semester, hallelujah. So we're getting through it, but I've been enjoying it a lot. This has probably been my most efficient and proficient semester in college yet and I just love to see the progress, honestly. That's all I could really ask for. In terms of the classes, I'm loving the upper level classes that I'm finally taking and the opportunities that I get in them. They're a lot smaller set now rather than like 200 plus lectures. We have, you know, 25, 30 kids in our class. So you can really, and most of the times it's people who are quite passionate about it and a professor who is quite passionate about it as well. So it creates for a really cool atmosphere and a really cool opportunity for some really in-depth and educational dialogue, things that I haven't even considered or thought about. It's really, really cool. I appreciate the program here at the University of Pittsburgh and it's given me a lot, honestly. I've met a lot of cool people through it. Professionally, I've started to work in the clinical side of it and I've loved every second of it. It's been awesome and not to say that there haven't been downs with it, but working in that sector now has been really cool. So it's been eye-opening and it's been an awesome time. Tell us more about the clinical work. So I'm working, shout out to the Bradley Center, I love them. They are a, excuse me, RTF, a residential treatment facility for traumatized adolescents. They are also a school program too. So I work on the clinical side. Sometimes I'll pick shifts up in the school program too and stuff like that where they're doing their educational side of stuff. But mostly I'm on the clinical side, working with, again, six through 18 traumatized adolescents who have been through some really, really rough experiences and I don't know, you talk about levels and I thought I had a rough end of things, but you realize how rough people do have it and how rough people can go through things and how they're still kicking it and how some of these kids are so resilient and still getting up every day despite sometimes being a pain in the butt, they are some of the most awesome and inspirational kids that I've met in my life and some are insanely talented with the creative sides, art, athletics, you name it, honestly, and you can find it there. So people try to think about that stuff and alienate it or make it different, but they're just kids and I really do enjoy it. I've been able to do some therapy strategy there, supervision with the actual kids and working with them, activity and wellness programs as well with them and just getting them through their treatment there and their programming there so then they can get out into the real world, whether that's from a foster system. A lot of them are already in the system and go out to these group homes and stuff like that, but it's really, really cool to see these full circle moments and it's always awesome to see one come in who is cursing you out constantly and who doesn't trust you at all and months later they are on their way out and they're giving you a high five every day, asking you to pick up another double or something like that. So it's been a really, really heartwarming and fulfilling experience to work with these kids and be able to give them a little bit of my life and I'm an open book, I try to teach them everything that I know about this life in a healthy and therapeutic way and I tell them about my music, about my athletics, to give them a open avenue and vision towards all these things are so obtainable and possible. I tell them before I come into the 6 a.m. shift sometimes and I'm like, yeah, I just ran five miles, you could do the same and I take them out for morning walks and stuff like that to influence these type of behaviors and stuff like that and I think with this next generation coming in, I have a lot of hope and optimism for better treatment with especially our younger youth and adolescent groups and yeah, I'm just excited to see some change and apply it as well myself, so yeah. You think you'll still be working with children, adolescents in the future or where is this psychology degree taking you? That's a hard one, it's a hard one to understand especially with all these side projects that I intend to pursue and I'm trying to pursue and getting running, I wanna be a company owner too and we can get into those talks later but that's something that I'm truly passionate about and working on on the business side of things but I would love to work with children and I have in the past in terms of just coaching for soccer and stuff like that and that was an awesome experience. So whatever really comes my way in terms of working with children, if it's this direct line of work again or something else within owning my company and even creating a children's line for the athletic wear that I'm making and stuff like that, it would be awesome to get those kids incorporated and even incentivize them and help them benefit a little bit and see how things work, so it'd be awesome. That's a good question, I haven't really thought about that much but I've been so present with it all but currently I do love working with children so much. It's been an awesome experience and an eye-opening one. You have time to make that decision. The last guest that we had on, Vidya Sirti, one of her pieces of advice was to fail early. Say it again? Fail early. Fail early, okay. Because failing early while you don't have your roots set down, it gives you the most chance, the most opportunity to grow. Oh, for sure. So you have time to figure out what you wanna do. Never feel rushed. 110%, 110%. I think people are scared to fail as well. I think that's what stops a lot of people from starting in the first place is failure because it's like, why would I wanna start something if I'm gonna fail and fall so many times? But I think that's where the reward and true progress and magic is in. I say it and I said it in recording a commercial for my company yesterday. It's just like, the magic that you search so and pray so much for is in this hideous, horrendous work and in this hideous, horrendous process. And if you never intend to go through that, then I promise you, you will never reap that reward. So you quite literally reap what you sow. So before we hit this week's Artist Spotlight, walk us through your role in entrepreneurship. Yeah, you want me to introduce the project? Yeah, excuse me. So right now, I'm working on becoming, and I am, honestly, I need to start becoming better at labeling myself that. It's a new label, so I'm trying to work on it. But I am the CEO and founder of Rizk Fit, athletic apparel and supplements. It's a company that I've been working on now for about a year and finally have gotten our base designs established and successfully completed. And we're working on now the actual supplement production part of it, working on proportioning our ingredients to the right way. And I have a small team who I've been working with, but mainly just trying to research on my own for now a lot of these different things. I'm also working on a huge, I shouldn't say huge, but a pretty cool athletic line as well, athletic apparel line for both men, women, and children. And slowly but surely, we're just getting all that stuff together. And it's been a really, really cool process. I've been enjoying it a lot. It's been cool learning about it while also like kind of venturing through my own athletic journey and process and learning what I am good at as an athlete, not so good at as an athlete in terms of fueling and my body and stuff like that, what I lack in naturally biologically and stuff like that. And how do I make the best product for myself? And I think that's what will attract like-minded people and like-minded athletes and even similarly, body type wise and stuff like that. So I think it'll attract really good, cool niche. And it's something I'm truly passionate about. I'm not really even thinking about the business side of it more as I'm just kind of considering again, tapping back into the opportunity to literally give somebody else a window of vision, a window of opportunity to paint something for someone to be like, oh, this is obtainable and this is how you go up and get it. You know what I mean? Because at one point, I wasn't an athlete who could run nine miles. I wasn't an athlete who could run one mile at one point in my lifetime. You know what I mean? So we all start somewhere and I'm telling you, I've run into more people than not who tell me, I wish I could be like you and my response always is and it's not supposed to be condescending even and I wish people didn't take it like this, but I always say you can. There's nothing in this world that is stopping you right now unless, you know, there are some things that compromise our health and stuff like that. I fully understand that, but for the average person, I tell you, you can get out and do this and I'd love to paint again or give people a window, a vision of not only to see other people doing that, but give them a way to do it too and kind of bridge that gap between the highly experienced and these beginners who fantasize and pray so much about getting to this point, but might not necessarily understand how to. You know what I mean? So it's been a good process. Well, this is a good segue to get into this week's Artist Spotlight. We playing The Ego and the Shadow by Sammy Riz. So I hope y'all enjoy. ♪ 2 a.m., I'm reading scripture, trying to find my place. ♪ ♪ I went from Bible to Koran, I really can't relate. ♪ ♪ I'm finding demons in the place where I thought I was safe. ♪ ♪ It's a war between the ego and the shadow, it's exhausting. ♪ ♪ It's got me held up like a hostage, paying homage to the greatest. ♪ ♪ Me, my God, and I, the latest. ♪ ♪ And try to remember the self is what you make it. ♪ ♪ Trying to find myself some patience, turning out to be the patient. ♪ ♪ Chasing, I'm the latest in my lane, there's a evergreen. ♪ ♪ Growing with my golden soul, that's the pain in my spleen. ♪ ♪ And I guess it's on me, look. ♪ Hope y'all enjoyed this week's Artist Spotlight, The Ego and the Shadow by Sammy Riz. You'll be able to find the artist description in the description of this episode, whether you are watching or listening. Now, the second to last episode of this month's theme of Power in Academia, we will be focusing on work-life balance. I leave the floor open to you, Sammy. I appreciate that. I appreciate the Artist Spotlight as always. Thank you for the opportunity again. And to kind of segue off what I was saying about the company first is another thing too, and I think this taps into our generation heavily, is a lot of the hyper-successful athletic entrepreneurs that I see nowadays at the top of our game, one, aren't from our generation. And two, kind of inspire this and highlight this grind set or process that is very, again, colorless and black and white and put your head down and get to work. Don't let anybody know about it. Don't let anybody hear about it. Let them just see the progress, I guess, or the performance. And although I do understand some of the logic towards that, I think one thing that I'm trying to do with RizkFit is tap into the hypersensitivity that our generation possesses. And no one in general, I think, wants to be at the top and be colorless. I think we all want to do it with a little bit of flair nowadays. I think we all want to do it with our own color and our own palette in mind. So with that being in mind, I'd love to, again, create a space for young, highly motivated, high-functioning athletes and others that want to get after it and, again, create their own colorful process with it and have fun with it. So I just wanted to say that before we get into the work-life balance section of it. But with work-life balance, I think it's so, so, so important. And it's something that I learned this past summer with working at Bradley. I was working 60-hour weeks. I'm talking about maybe for a month and a half straight at one point during the summer. And it really took it out of me. But what helped me so much was understanding that you have two different identities that complement each other, which is your professional self and your personal self. And how you sustain and contribute to these two identities is, excuse me, so vital for how they perform. You know what I mean? So what I mean by that is when you look at your professional identity, quite literally, what are you doing? First of all, what's your occupation or job-wise, education-wise? I'm a student now, too. So that is a part of my professional self. And I have to understand what is required of me and what capacity I need to be a successful student, be a successful and professional clinical worker. You know what I mean? Be a successful business owner and stuff like that. And once I have, again, the understanding of the prerequisites for these things and the standard that I want to achieve for all these things, I can then understand, again, tying back in to the intention behind all these things and how do I achieve all them? And why do I even want to do it? And then I can start cutting things out like, okay, do I want to be a student? Yes, that is of top priority to me and to increase my education and pursue higher levels of it. Do I want to do this CEO thing and become a business owner? And why do I want to do it? And I really have had to grapple with that and understand it. Do I want to be an artist and what it means to me to be an artist? And do I want to chase this quote-unquote fame and notoriety and this, you know, Hollywood life? And we see all this crazy stuff happening in Hollywood right now and that has definitely reformed my perspective on all of that stuff as well. But taking that all into consideration, you also have your personal self, right? And I've kind of moved, some of these labels kind of swing under different things and kind of maybe share, again, this intertwined identity. With your personal self, I have now moved a part of my artist label into this personal self and understanding that my art is of service to so much more than just monetary value, notoriety, or anything like that. It is my soul. It speaks so much more to who I am than what I am, you know what I mean? Or what I'm trying to do. So just, again, reprioritizing my perspective on a lot of things like that, understanding those two different identities and how they complement each other, and how making the time to eat well, making the time to sleep well, making the time to study but also have fun and, you know, go kick back and watch a movie or something like that, how that affects my performance in my professional life and professional self. And again, how the professional self affects yourself, your personal self. A lot of selves right there, but something very important and something to ponder on for sure. Another thing with this whole work-life balance, I think it's very cyclical. And as we grow up, I think we start to understand that week by week. Our perception of that time gets a little shorter. So when you get to that Monday, that reset button feels so much harder at times. But I think coming to peace with that understanding that this is just such a cyclical cycle and you have to keep going after this consistent grind and it's, again, hideous and horrendous, but it's a process nonetheless. And if you can reframe and look at it as beauty sometimes and see that magic within it that you so much long and pray for, I promise you, you will reap what you sow and you will reap the benefits and rewards that, again, you have been praying and hoping for for so long. And that is only if you put in that work and find that balance. A lot of the pillars that I kind of mentioned before, consistency, urgency, intention. Another one, intensity. I think everyone should lead their life with a little bit of intensity and have a level or degree of intensity in their life. You don't have to be as intensive as me, but with me, I'm all-in in everything I do. If I'm choosing to do it, there's no point of doing it at a 50% level. So everything for me is perceived at 100% and I'm doing it for a certain reason. And once I assign that intention and I understand it's positive and I can find that urgency within myself, the intensity is there and we get going and we get it done and then we're on to the next thing. So organizing yourself to be balanced, organizing yourself to be structured and have a system. It's not just going to get done. You really have to place these blocks in a place that you can step on and it's not going to fall through. And, you know, get yourself to that point that you envision. Vision is everything. Belief is everything. And, you know, create these pillars and definitions for yourself and then operate by them. Create that system and work. You know what I mean? That's all it really is. Work, work, work, work, work and work. That's one thing that I've realized too and I tried to beat around the bush for so long and find these corners to cut. But work, organize yourself for the balance, create that system and operationalize for yourself and it'll work. You know, I mean, everyone's process is different. So I don't expect anyone who's listening in this to emulate my exact process and find the peace or joy or happiness or fulfillment that I found. But I think you can surely take some of the pillars that I'm explaining right now and apply that into your own system and make it work for yourself and get it done, get after it. That's really all it is, to be honest. I think a big part of that balance is staying in it and staying consistent with it. So, yeah. I will say, one of the best pieces of advice that I've heard in my year and a half of doing this podcast came from Morgan Overton. She said that rest is resistance. Yeah. And rest being resistance is a really interesting topic because of the society that we live in, which is, you know, a capitalist society where we work nine to five or even more than that. We put in a third of our entire lives into work that resting and doing absolutely nothing is the biggest way that you can give the middle finger to the system. Not only are you also giving the middle finger to your system, but you're also giving yourself time to recover so that you can better apply yourself to whatever you're doing. How does rest fit into your life and your schedule? That's an interesting quote. I never really, and you talk about reframing and all that. I love being able to carry an open mind to hear these things like these and then apply it in a different light. I think, I heard this quote one time from a Buddhist monk. He said, sleep when you need to sleep, eat when you need to eat, and work when work is required and everything outside of that is simply a distraction or a negative stem towards what you're trying or supposed to achieve in this life. And I kind of took it quite literally and like, I only sleep the amount that I truly need to sleep. I don't think there's much point of clicking snooze on that button unless I really deserve it or unless it's, you know, one of those days that you truly do need it, which is very rare in my opinion. But I think, yeah, again, and then just doing the thing at the right times when you're supposed to do that. We all understand that we're supposed to be doing something at a certain time and sometimes we might be slacking into that or, you know, on this scrolling and you literally have the time right in front of you and it might hit your thoughts that, oh, I'm supposed to be doing this right now, but somehow you can't break out of that trap of, you know, scrolling or something like that. So really just being consistent and intentional with why I'm doing those things and, again, when I'm supposed to be doing them and how. Yeah, yeah. So in terms of work-life balance with you being a creator, being an entrepreneur, being a student, and being a friend, how do you balance all of those so that you don't fail in any category? I think I had a hard time and I'm finally falling into the freedom and allowing myself to categorize in this way, but I think for the longest time I was all, I thought I had to be all-in in just one category. Like, oh, I couldn't be a business owner if I was an artist. Or, and then vice versa, I couldn't be an artist if I was a business owner. Or I couldn't be, I can't be a student and work on my album the way I want to. And a lot of the times it was, again, from that fear of failure or pushing those boundaries and finding out if I could or couldn't and stuff like that. Or from the idea of possibilities and understanding that limitations are just a perception, right? And quite literally, my perception was I looked outward into the world and I'm like, where are there hyper-successful entrepreneurs slash artists slash creatives, like all these, you know what I mean, athletes, all these things. And I couldn't find one person with these labels that were hyper-successful in each of them. And for the longest time I was telling myself, I was like, oh, you can't do that because there isn't anyone else who has really done that. Okay, go do it yourself. Go be the first to go do it. And I think that flipped in my mind at some point. It's just a matter of framing, you know, if you can or can't. I heard this quote or this statement from Alex Formosy on the podcast with Chris Williamson. He said, you know, when I'm in the gym and my heart rate is at 183 BPM, I'm sweating my butt off and I just took a shower or something like that. I'm on the ground about to pass out. I am in love with that feeling. I am so happy, overjoyed. I understand I'm growing. I'm making progress. If the same thing, that same situation physically was happening to me when I was driving to work in my car, I'd probably pull over and call an ambulance, think I'm having a heart attack or something, right? And in that moment, it's like everything is framed, you know, everything is perspective. Everything is framing, how you frame a certain situation. So it's like my therapist personally asked me all the time and helped me reprioritize this perspective of what a good or bad day is. And a lot of times I would come to her and be like, oh, I had a crappy day, a really, really crappy day because of one or two things in my day when I did all these other things. And she would always ask me, well, what would it take to make this situation amazing? And a lot of times that's all it takes, thinking, okay, what would it take to make this situation absolutely great? And just a quick perspective switch really changes everything in that. So yeah. I think my opinion is there are seasons of give and there are seasons of take. Yeah. There are some times in life where you need to put your head down and you need to focus on your academics and you'll have to take somewhere from that, whether it's hanging out with friends or indulging yourself in your hobbies and whatnot. And it also goes vice versa. There are times where you realize that you're not giving your friendships the time that they deserve and you need to lock in more with that and you need to let off on the hobbies or you need to relax off of school. I'm not saying that you should be failing your class. Obviously, with the Frederick Honors College, I'm not saying that. But there are times where there are seasons of give and there are seasons of take. I like that. I like that a lot. I really do like that. Yeah, I'm definitely not saying, I don't know if I commented on it, but definitely look for, I am an advocate for self-feeling and looking for the times where you need to allocate more energy into whether it's your mental being or your physical health or something like that more than something else. Definitely pay attention and pay close, just have a sensitive awareness towards those things in your life and accommodate and adapt as you need to. Also, never hesitate to look for help. That's on the side, kind of. But just never, ever hesitate to look for help. I mentioned therapy and my own therapist and stuff like that. And whether you're a Pitt student here, we have so many resources. And I don't know if any of you guys know, but you guys pay for it anyways, whether you use it or not. But you pay for the psychological resources here. So please do use them when you are feeling down and low. We have them here for a reason and they are out there in the world as well. If you need professional help, it is there. Don't resort to any of these negative stems that we see a lot of people sadly succumb to. So yeah, that's a side note. But definitely never hesitate to ask for help. Never hesitate to give help either. Be a shoulder that someone can lean on and open ear and open mind. It can really help out. It can really, really help out. So yeah. I think that's a wonderful notion to leave off on. Is there anything else that you'd like to get across to our audience before we get out of here? It's getting cold. I personally don't like it, but I've been trying to adapt and get better at it. And again, I keep on saying this, but reprioritize my perspective of what could make this absolutely amazing? What makes the cold weather amazing and why? Because I'm going to be here anyways for the winter. So how can I enjoy it? And I think you could ask that question or apply that to literally anything in your life. Consider anytime you're about to say you're having a bad day, consider if it's actually a bad day and consider someone else's version of a bad day. You know what I mean? And try to go with that. Carry yourself with a little bit of gratitude. Thank you so much as always for having me on here. It's a blessing and a great opportunity. So, thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you for coming on, Sammy. Thank you. Now, for everybody watching and listening, all things Sammy and his brand will be in the description of this episode, whether you are watching or listening. I'm your host, Ian Kehinde. This has been another excellent episode of the Let's Talk Social Innovation podcast. And we see you next week. Peace out, everybody.