S3E04 with Toni Nuñez - Truth In Motion

Today’s guest doesn’t just move bodies ... he disrupts them. Toni Nuñez is a Southern California based, award winning professional dancer and movement coach who uses movement to shake people out of autopilot and back into themselves. His work is raw, embodied, and rooted in the belief that the body already knows the truth ... we just have to stop ignoring it! 

Toni’s approach isn’t polished for approval. It’s honest, physical, and sometimes uncomfortable in the way real growth tends to be. Through dance, he helps people break patterns, release what’s been stored, and reclaim a sense of power that lives below the neck. This is movement that confronts what’s buried, releases what’s stuck, and creates absolute freedom.

As a proud and openly gay man, Toni understands what it means to be watched, judged, and underestimated ... yet he refuses to shrink. He brings that lived experience into his work, challenging people to take up their space, trust their bodies, and show up without armor. He’s not interested in fitting in; he’s interested in waking people up.

This conversation is about a journey that is grounded in love, real, and unapologetic. No fluff. No performance. Just truth in motion. We had A LOT to talk about and you won't want to miss it!  

Welcome to the conversation! 

To follow Toni on Instagram, visit https://www.instagram.com/toni_nunez85/

Thank you for joining us and we can't wait to welcome you back again next week! New episodes drop every Thursday and can be found wherever you find your favorite podcasts!

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Want to learn more about our host, Eric Nicoll? Visit: https://ericnicoll.com

Transcript

0:06

Hello everyone, and welcome to season three of the Just Do You podcast. I'm Eric, Nicoll, your host, and I'm so glad you decided to join us today. Whether this is your very first time joining in on the conversation or you've been listening along since the beginning, thank you for being here. This podcast exists because of you. Your stories, your courage and your willingness to keep choosing yourself even when it's not easy. The Just Do You Podcast is a safe space for authentic, unscripted conversations that connect us, inspire us, and remind us of who we are at our core. Together we're going to explore confidence, voice, truth, and what it means to step fully into what I call the just do you sweet spot, that place where you are living honestly, intentionally and unapologetically. This new season is about growth, reflection. Possibility in community. I'll be sitting down with friends, colleagues, community leaders, and influencers who are willing to share their journeys, the wins, the challenges, and everything in between. We'll laugh. We may shed a few tears, but in the end, we're going to continue to remind one another that none of us is walking this path alone. So are you ready? Great. Let's do this. Welcome to season three of the Just Do You All right, everyone. Welcome to today's episode. I am really excited to welcome today's guest. I spend a lot of time on social media and I have found such great inspiration and really remarkable people around the world that are out doing amazing things. And one day I just happened to come across this one profile, and started to delve into it and I was immediately captivated. Funny enough, his husband was the one who introduced him to me. And the minute I met this guest, I fell in love. There is an amazing energy, which you're going to get to see. There is this vibrance of life that is really infectious. And I'm really excited to introduce you today. So I'm just going to jump right in and introduce everyone to Toni Nunez. Hi Toni. Hi. Hi everybody. Thank you so much, Eric. Oh. It's so good to have you on. I was trying to figure out how to introduce you today. So when you and I first spoke, we had an onboarding call, which was fantastic. I instantly felt like we had been friends forever. I was fascinated by your journey. But then when I asked if you wanted to sit down to record a podcast episode, you had a request, that we got together and actually danced. Now, for those people who know me, know that I love to dance, but I sometimes get a little bit nervous and a little bit confronted because I'm six four and I sometimes feel like a total clot, right? So when you said you need to come dance, I want you to experience what I do before we sit down and talk. I was a little confronted. So for those guests that are listening today, Toni e is an absolutely extraordinary dancer and is also a movement coach. And one of the reasons why he wanted me to come and experience his class with him is so that I could really see his process. And I am so grateful that I did, we did it last week. It was remarkable. I was sharing with Toni as I was keying up the podcast that I left the studio just smiling and happy, and that happiness and that smile have radiated throughout this last week. So Toni, again, welcome. I'm so glad that you're here today and I'm excited to sit down and chat with you a bit. Yeah, me too. Thank you so much. I'm so happy that we are actually able to get together too. Awesome. Let's just jump right in. I could read your list of Global awards. You are quite the dancer and I will let people learn more about you as we go through this episode. But I'd like to take you back a little bit as the Just a You podcast is centered around conversations about what it means to live an authentic life. And really important to that conversation is the journey that it took to get there. I'd like to take my guest back to their childhood. Give us a little background on young Toni, where'd you grow up, siblings, family, so give us a little glimpse into the young Toni and we'll get started from there. My family originally hails from the Bronx, so we are definitely New YorRican in, in every way Uhhuh. And but then after a little bit of time, I was like 7, 6, 7, 8. Right around that time we moved to like upstate New York. Okay. And I, dancing was always like away, actually. It started. In New York with my mom.'cause it was definitely cheaper than a babysitter. But I also was like taking classes at the Boys and Girls Club that were being offered that were like super great. That my mom didn't realize that she thought I was like doing like basketball or soccer or something like that. And and, but it turned out to be something that just was a great escape for me, especially in the different environments I wind up growing up in. And so it was, I would say for a long time it was my savior in many ways. So a lot of times we find those opportunities to escape and they then lead to. Opportunities to grow significantly and really shift and change? Was that the experience or was it just simply to get away and to escape the circumstances? I think like in, in the beginning we, it's natural for people to just run away into something, into, a place or a fantasy or whatever. But what I did not realize was that what it provided me was this amazing opportunity to create my own world. And to create a stability and safety for myself that I wasn't getting either at home or at school or in those types of environments. Sure. And I, I would say that it was like my saving grace for a long time, but. Eventually those things like evolve in you. You know what I mean? Like when you have a long-term relationship, right? Sure. It might start out as one thing and then it evolves into something else. And it doesn't mean that the relationship goes away, per se, but it just means that it evolves over time. So at that time, it was definitely something to indulge in. That definitely gave me just a completely different perspective on who I was and what I was doing in this world. Yeah. What did you like most about it back then, different than now, I'm sure. Actually so oddly enough the way that I felt about it back then is how, exactly, how I feel about it right now. However, there was a lot in between. I felt it, I felt very differently about it. In between with all of the experiences that I had. Yeah. But I do find myself at this stage, in my life, oddly enough, reverting back to a lot of childhood. Memories and fantasies and emotions, because I'm always checking in with myself like, Hey how would young Toni think about you right now? How I felt about it back then was it was the one place that I could fully express everything, who I was. And I could test that out in that world before attempting to trickle it into my existing world. Were you afraid of being teased or bullied at that point because of it? Yeah, you grow up the Bronx and then like in other cities that we were in as a family, like they just weren't the best neighborhoods and they just weren't. There, there is this a physical safety factor. I remember my dad was an amateur boxing coach, so he, both my parents at a very early age, they knew Uhoh, what sums up with this kid. So I remember my dad giving me boxing lessons and, he had this little boxing camp sometimes for the kids. And made me do that. And at the time I was like, oh my God, this is miserable. I was like, miserable. But at least I know how to throw a right hook, at least, comes in handy when you are as as fun as me. As fun as you growing up. Yeah. Yeah, but it's so in, in certain ways there was a component of. Not feeling safe. I think in a lot of ways, like my parents did the best that they could with what they had. But I think what's true, what happened with them, that happened with a lot of parents is that they raise kids out of fear. Versus love. And it's not that they don't love their kids, but the world is a scary place. Particularly for this small person that they're trying to have to protect. And at the time we don't realize that, we just going through and you don't understand me and all that stuff. But but ultimately, that's all they were trying to do. And I remember my dad giving me those boxing lessons and I look at the time I was so miserable, but now I look back and I just have this big grin on my face because it warms my heart. It was like time. That was spent with him, that definitely he was trying to, in, in a, in so many ways teach me how to fish for myself or defend myself or, try, protect myself and prepare me, yeah, like I definitely felt that even though it was an escape from that physical way, my parents were also really religious and my family was super religious, very conservative, like fundamentalist Christian kind of scenario. And that was another form of protection from them. Like they, especially growing up in not so good neighborhoods, we were always the religious family. And nobody ever really bothered us, so nobody, and and it was that was a part of our identity so we could procure safety and protection. Sure. In a lot of ways. And what ultimately wound up happening is that I, I'm a perpetual student, so I love learning. I love learning so much. It's just I believe it's what kind of, what always carves my craft as, as a teacher. In general. But so I, religion was no different. I just thought of it as like another subject at school and I just like really delved into it and I got into it. And so I think I was so focused as a, as a Pisces I'm a people pleaser, and I just especially with my parents, I just didn't want to disappoint them and I wanted to make sure that they were not worried about me. Of course, as a religious kid, you keep it to yourself and but as the dance world definitely provided this atmosphere where I could just like I said, just te test out certain behaviors or certain feelings, certain emotions of expression before I can infiltrate them. And so to this day, into my real life. And so to this day, that's the premise of what I use with my students is I use the dance floor and I use the dance lesson as a way for them to safely express whatever they need to express Sure. To see if it'll work in their daily life or not for them. Yeah. Yeah. True. You bring up a good point. I want to just back up just a bit'cause I think it's important for our listeners. And you said that your parents did the best with what they had. And I have said this multiple times this is not the first conversation we've had about parental upbringing. But it's interesting because we don't really teach our parents how to parent. And a lot of times they're learning by their parents or their grandparents. And I obviously think every child is special and unique and beautiful and wonderful, but there are some that are more fabulous and beautiful and wonderful than others that need a little bit of additional care. And I'm speaking specifically to those of us who grew up gay. And we don't teach parents that and so I give them a lot of credit at times for being able to navigate. I look at my mom and my mom didn't know she was a teacher, but she didn't really know how to handle, I didn't come out till much later much later, but she didn't necessarily know how to handle that, right? When I would come home from school and the kids would be calling me names because I happened to have a certain mannerism or I liked hanging out with girls, I just really enjoyed the girls more than the boys and got teased a lot about that. Got teased for my height and teased for a lot of things. And my mom was my amazing safe space, right? When I came out, she just didn't really understand and know how to navigate that, and it took us a little while to get into a place that was comfortable and so many of my guests share that same sentiment and say almost the exact same thing, which is my parents did the best with what they had, and I look at parents that are dealing with. A multitude of influences. Especially these days. I don't know how parents raise kids these days. It's insane to me with having to raise them, but then also navigate social media and all of the trappings that come with that hard, that part it's hard. The other thing I wanted to say too is that, I think every child goes through some sort of shift in belonging and being and as it relates to dance, I. Remember vividly days of being in the playground in kindergarten, first grade where you could skip around the playground and nobody would say anything. And then there was a moment when you'd skip around the playground and automatically you were gay or a girl or all of those things. And what's so fascinating to me, and I'm sure this will come out as we discuss this further in your movement coaching is. Someone says something, something happens and we immediately clam up. And I can remember that moment. I used to love to dance and be silly and act crazy. And I remember one person saying something to me at a school dance, and I just shut down. I will not forget that. And I'm 59 years old, this happened. I was probably in, fourth, fifth grade. So we carry that with us and we have to continually unpack that. And I was unpacking some of that when I was with you at the studio last week. Was I have to do this right. I have to do it's Toni, he's a teacher, he's a professional, he's an award winner. It's like a champion. I have to do all these things. And there was a mannerism in which you were coaching and teaching that allowed me to, as we joked, trip over my left foot or get off on the wrong count. And there was no fear of judgment. So it's interesting as I talk to a lot of guests on the podcast, that those moments are vivid and palpable in their childhood and how we carry those through today. And so you must deal with that quite a bit. We're going to get to that in a second. I have some more questions. So here you are off at the Boys and Girls Club and you're taking dancing. At what point did you have a thought that you could do this professionally? Or was this just a great. Thing that you did, for lack of a better term? I thought it was just my safe, special world that I'll always just have more recreationally. And I never thought I could do it professionally because I didn't give myself permission because my world didn't give me permission at that time. My parents didn, gimme, permiss say that permission at that time. Say that again? I didn't give myself permission because my world and environment at that time did not give me permission. That's brilliant. That's brilliant. Or my parents and and everybody who was in that. So I just always thought to myself I, so I went to school to be a teacher because I was like, I'm going to be a teacher because I love to share what I'm learning with people, so that's just what I want to do. And if I can't do it in dancing I'll just do it in a normal school settings. But I got a really good dancing job right before like my senior year of high school. Okay. I got a really good dancing job and it was like solid. So it helped me survive college financially in a lot of ways. And so I was like, oh huh. Then I like it got deeper as, as as far as level of importance goes. So like my school and then also the dancing. And then I realized a year after I graduate when I was actually trying to teach school I love the kids so much and I love being with the kids, but I just realized administratively the school system that we have is it's our second institution that we come in contact with in, in our lives in this country. And, and the first one is medical, and both are really inherently built for specific types of programming. And the programming that I realized that was happening in the school system was just so detrimental for our kids. And it was just really depressing for me. So I was like, okay this is not for me. I'm not going to have a job where I'm just going to be like eating the cookies that the kids make me and getting fat because I can't I can't motivate myself to really do much more than this because of how it was really affecting me, as an empath and a Pisces. I was like really absorbing, absorbed in these kids' stories and I was like really sad and I was like, Ugh. No. I was like, I had to go back to the the dancing. And so that's where it took a very serious turn. It's interesting when you say. Or describe it that way, that it's the second institution that we are introduced to. I have never thought about it that way. And you're right, both are flawed and can be incredibly detrimental to our upbringing. And that's what I loved about my mom because she taught for 35 years. And this was quite a while ago. And I know she bucked the system a lot in order to be that for her children. Be that teacher for her students, and those kids. But also that student for her children and that student for her children. That's what we're Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. But I, that's a good point.'Cause she really did. Care about the students. And there, what was really interesting was when we got her on Facebook. She would teach for 30 years and all these kids would come and go. Come and go. And if they didn't stay in the small town that we lived in then my mother never saw them. And it wasn't until Facebook came out and a group was formed of the city that which we lived in, that kids found her and were able to share with her the difference that she made. I remember teachers that were not that to their students, and we were terrified of them. Terrified. I was terrified that this one teacher was going to out me. I was, I didn't come out until I was 24 and I was in seventh grade and she asked my mom if I was gay. So fortunately I didn't know that back then. I know it now and it still just rocked my world. But I get what you're saying and it's true that for you that square peg didn't fit in the round hole. And what I think is great, Toni, is that you went out to try to find the square hole and say, where can I fit in and where can I make the most impact and where can I do something that lights me up? I think way too many people don't follow their passions like you said, your Pisces and what was the other thing you said? Pisces and what? An empath. Empath. That's right. So interesting combination. So you know that you found something that really works for you. And I think that's super cool because then it just impacts the people that you're in contact with so much more than if you're trying to force it. Yeah, absolutely. Interestingly enough, like I feel that when I, you're right, that was definitely, I felt like the school scenario, the school teaching was like a closed door for me. And then interestingly enough in many ways I felt that dance world was a closed door for me. And just based on the details of that world, which I'm we'll get into soon. But ultimately what wind up happening is I had to stop thinking about them as closed doors or things that didn't materialize into a way that I wanted it to. And I had to start thinking about them more so as rooms that I had to visit, or spaces that I had to visit to collect a lot of tools and a lot of things to create for myself, the space that I'm supposed to be in. IE that, that square whole scenario. Yeah. It's important. Say more about that if you can. Go ahead. Sorry. No. I was just going to say more about that because I think that's really important.'cause some people will get to that point and stop and not push through to find that. Yeah. So I, part of our ongoing journey in our life is to constantly deprogram ourselves, right? So that way we can be open to the infinite possibilities that are there for us. And so the more that I learned about things, the more that I realized, like I didn't have to assimilate a hundred percent to those things. I just had to learn very valuable lessons from them. And I used those lessons. For my debugging process, for my deprogramming process. And within that deprogramming process, like I've discovered this way of being able to create for myself a world that doesn't have the limitations of the environments that I grew up in or that I had to learn in, or that I had to, acquire all my skillset, a lot of my skill sets from. Because nobody is me nobody's me. So even when, like when I went to school I went to Cleveland State University and I didn't go to school for specifically education, but I went to school. They had this program that you could create your own major. So I went to school for bilingual education with a minor in the arts. And I. Even that process, like I couldn't just go a normal route. Like I had to go a very specific something for me. I always had to do it my own way. And so that's that's what I learned about myself. Like I, there is no box for me, so I'm still in the process in a lot of ways of kind of building my own box. Yeah. I don't think we ever stop. And I think you bring up a good point is that we are, as a society, really good at putting every single person inside of a box. And then we wonder why there's issues. We wonder why there's depression or anxiety or acting out or, I know several people who are lost in that box right now and they can't find it. And I, we can see from the exterior, we can see brilliance and. Amazing opportunity, but they're stuck in the box and it's really sad.'cause that's definitely childhood generational trauma. I think it's just blatantly. So to be able to say that there's no box is really powerful. But it's also probably for some people that are listening a little scary because we've grown very accustomed and very comfortable to that box. And those four walls that we operate around, I'll speak for myself specifically when I went to school, I don't want to say forced'cause no one said this is what you're doing. I felt compelled to do it because I thought it would make someone happy.'cause I'm the people pleasing Scorpio. But I went to do something that I thought that this person would be very proud of, and I was miserable. I remember sitting in my first class at USC and I'm like. Oh my God, this is the biggest mistake of my life. This is not where I belong. And I had this entrepreneurial bug built into me from my grandfather, and I didn't follow it until after that I finally came home from my first semester. And I'm like, I can't, I, this is I will not survive this. It will be a disaster, and I'll be incredibly in debt with nothing. Something you hate, and something I hate. I don't want to do this. And so I see a lot of people in that same box kind of breaking out. And it's been a, seven year journey of really breaking out of that and saying, first of all, no one cares outside of me what that box is or isn't. They really don't. Yeah. They don't have an opinion on that, but it doesn't matter, so there are people, they don't care. But more importantly, I no longer give up myself. So interesting that it took me to almost 60 to say, I just don't really care anymore. And now I want to go out and do the things that I want to do. I'm going to be the person that I want to be. I'm going to experience the things that I want to experience. And I'm telling you, I've had a great career the last 30 years. Is it the career that I think it would've been, had there been other opportunities to explore? No, it wouldn't have been. And so what's interesting at this stage of my life, having just had my birthday in October and then going through, a recent little health scare, I thought, we don't have time. We don't have time to question it. We don't have time to wonder what, if we have time to make it happen. So I, it excites me with what you do, because I think not only have you experienced this, and you've said it multiple times since we've been chatting, is that. This is what is propelling you and moving you into this space where you're now going to help other people. This isn't just about you dancing and winning that, global championships or world championships. It's about you taking all the things that you've learned, the insights that you have gained, and your just innate ability. If I can be so bold, I find it very palpable with you is that I don't think this is a mistake because it's just the energy is just literally vibrating transformation. So I think that's great and I think it's cool, but it's also very typical. So if you take the two scenarios, one, you've gone through this journey, you've gone into all those rooms that you had to go into, right? To gain the knowledge, to build the toolbox. To do what you're doing now. Is what you would've done had you not had to go that route. You just went that route to get there, right? Some people never find that. Some people never find that. Not only do they not find it, when they find it, by the time they potentially find, let's say you to have them coach you, they may feel like it's too late. They meal may feel like it's a done deal. So if you can talk a little bit about how you then formed this. So if you want to transition into your dancing and then all of these world championships, and then how do you then wake up one morning and say, wow, I could use, really utilize this to make an impact in people's lives through coaching. What, how did that happen? Like where did that come from? Did it just meld the teaching and the dancing, or was it really a moment where you said, wait a minute, I have this gift that I now want to give to others? Yes. That's a lot. Okay, where do I start? I guess first off, I would, when we talk about people in their learning process, I think the biggest stifling portion to people in their learning process or the biggest roadblock is that they're doing it out of a fear of a lack of time. They're desperately trying to seek this knowledge or seek this path in a hurry. And when that comes into the picture, it stifles the learning process because it puts a an anxiety in the learning process, right? And so my job is to make sure that I consistently let them know. They are exactly where they need to be, right in this moment in time. And this happened exactly when it needed to happen. Because if this exchange, this energy exchange or this knowledge exchange would've happened five years, 10 years, 15 years prior, it would not have been the same person in the same way, doing the same things. And so this really, everything, is not really coincidence when it comes to those types of things, a con in conjunction with our our our journeys and our paths and our growth paths. But on the contrary it's, it, we get there when we're supposed to. And I think, you're going to, you're going to probably ask me later on, what do you want to tell your younger self? And I'll tell you that right now. What I would want to tell my younger self is always, there is always time because everything. Is being introduced right when it needs to be. And if there's a mantra to follow, it's I breathe with time breathes with me, and I use the, I use breathing because I use that in my dancing. I use the breathing, as you experience in the class, as a way to get out the body's energy, whether it's tense and anxious energy or just, excited energy, but to move it through the body, I use the breath. So that way you can actually have this exchange with this person this partner that you're dancing with. That is more of an authentic expression of your actual body's natural movement versus something that is just copy, repeat, right? And understanding that element of it. Now I can go back to, so I'll go back to how like my career started. I like I said, I grew up in the in very religious very conservative and I hid my sexuality for a very long time. And I, when I was 17 a boyfriend that I had was going away to college and we had he had just broken up with me because I was like, obviously he's going to college and he's trying to get some action. He doesn't want to be, hunkered down, but for me, he was just like everything, because it was like the only place that, the only person I could really fully express my full self, right? At that time, when you have your first love or whatever. And so I was devastated. And, we we, we, he, we were at a park, we were on a date in a park and he broke up with me. Then he drove me home and I was so mad. And he was really upset that I was mad. And because at the end of it, we were just really good friends who cared about each other too. And so he kissed me goodbye. He like grabs me to kiss me goodbye. And my. He I, we were crying and it was a whole big silly mess. He gets in his car, he leaves, and then I hear and I look up at the porch and my mom and my stepdad were there and they had seen the whole thing. And I was like, oh shit. Things happened. And I won't get into too much of that detail because it was definitely it wasn't a good moment for my parents. But at the end of it, they gave me an ultimatum and I decided to leave at 17. And so I did my entire senior year, just like couch surfing off of different friends' couches and not really living at home and trying to just, just, I was like, I was, I didn't want to be a victim of that circumstance, so I really fought to be like, no, like this is my senior year. I'm going to enjoy it. I want to be there with my friends and all that stuff. And so that's when I got the dancing job. And so when I got that dancing job it was it was to be a ballroom dance instructor, and I had already been in, classes for ballroom dancing before that. So I was somewhat familiar and I was just like, oh my God I'm going to get this job. And to have a male instructor it was super rare back then, that could actually dance. So they were just like, all over it. And they were just like, okay, we're going to pay. I had a line on my resume and say that I was 18. They were like, okay, we're going to pay you this much a week until you build up your clientele. And I was like, sick let's do this. So I went from, at that moment I realized that the switch of my family life turning off go, going to my dance family life turning on it was just me taking all that family energy and putting it from one place to another, right? So I left one room and I officially entered into the next room. And I was so into it for so many reasons, for so long. Years later I had this one lesson with this coach. And looking back like I could, I remember what he said he asked me and my partner at that time, he said what's your relationship with dance like? What is dancing to you? And these people like, and we were just like, both, both her and I, we were just like, dance is everything. If we can't dance, tell me, we're just like so dramatic and blah, blah, blah. And he was like, okay. He says I will tell you this. He said, the day that you lose your attachment to dance is the day you'll have your best result in your career. And I was like, like record scratch, this is such a big, that statement was so profound to me. It was so like, like internally shifting because at that point I had, up until that point, I had taken all of the co-dependencies I had picked up from my family life and pull out them into my dance life. And it just one thing replaced the other. Sure. And so that's that's where I was with that. And that's why I was saying like where I feel now with my dancing, where I felt when I was a kid is more so on the same wavelength versus all of the crazy shenanigans in between, right? That was very interesting. And because had I not would've had, I would not have brought those co-dependencies into the dance world, I probably would've navigated, no, I would have definitely navigated it completely differently than what wound up happening. I probably would not be where I am at like results wise or accolade wise. Not that I went out for any of those types of things, but ultimately I wouldn't, I probably wouldn't have gotten those because it, the dance world, believe it or not, was, especially the ballroom Latin dance sport world is extremely conservative. I always say that it's a microcosm and I think ice skaters have a similar dynamic in this sense. So the majority of the participants are in this country anyways of ballroom dancing are, the students are, upper class wealthy or people just with enough disposable income.'cause it's not like a cheap thing. Sure. Some would call it like a lu a luxury hobby, like golf or something like that. But who makes up the industry in this country are a lot of eastern Europeans with a lot of the very old European traditional kind of value system. And a lot of Mormons. A lot of Mormons. So when I entered into that world, that was the flavor. And I had, my first two bosses were two gay men. And they were, they had been partners in business and love for, in life for 50 years. Before one had, one had passed away. And they but they, how they, how their generation came up on top was they didn't really, I remember them saying to me, do you know everything about your doctor? Do if they're married or where they live? They, so they're like, so if your student, like the less your students know about you, the better. To the point where sometimes, like they were encouraging us to have to make up a different last name than what our real last name is. So they couldn't look us up, on like social media or online or a little before that, before social media on the yellow pages and all that. So you're just like, oh, okay. You, I was in this. World where of course they were gay men they were gay artists in the world. But they, the way that they had functioned and survived was to hide who they were. Even though people knew, okay, they're, they have a little extra flavor, but that's what makes them so good at this industry and what they do. And that's what, people idolize. But it still was the white elephant in the room for a long time. Sure. I remember, it wasn't until 30 years ago where you could not be in a world final if you were not married to your. Professional dance partner. Wow. And yeah, that was, it wa It wasn't, yeah. It wasn't, that wasn't my lifetime that still was the case, which is like wild to me. And so then you had, that's this whole, yeah. You had this whole coalition of gay artists who had to marry their best friends or their dance partners, but not necessarily and love them of course, but not necessarily in that way. Yeah. And you had this whole because the whole projection of a ballroom or Latin Couple is a very patriarchal, heteronormative narrative that has been around since the inception of this industry a hundred plus years ago. Sure. The whole goal was to fool the audience. On this relationship on this connection. And or at least that's how it felt like to me now later on. A lot of the ways that the judges and coaches who were, who are gay, who looked back on their career, who gave me advice the way that they thought it about it at that time was, I do care about this person. I do love this person. We do have a relationship. Just not this type of relationship, but I can still use authentic emotions to convey this narrative. Sure. And it adjusted my opinion about it after a while, but it still didn't feel right to me, it still didn't feel like why? Okay, so all these men and women who are not gay get to live this very true and authentic narrative in their careers for themselves and tell those types of stories. Why can't we do the same thing? So I remember in my industry despite my, my bosses telling me, discouraging me from it. Like I was one of the first kids in my generation that were active, professional competitors that was also actively out. Not necessarily, there was just a very few of us at that time and because in my brain I was just like, there's just no way I, I gave up my family life for to be who I am. Why would I sacrifice that in my career? Yeah. Why would I have my career replace that? That's just not a thing. Yeah. Toni, that's, I don't mean to interrupt, but I think that's another important, you're just dropping these golden nuggets throughout this conversation, but that's important for our listeners as well. We fight so hard and many go through. Tumultuous pathways to get there. And people don't realize that we have to give up so much sometimes to simply be our true selves, which is one of the reasons why I think we are so ostracized and criticized is because, like you said earlier, we get to live our lives full out. We've suppressed it for so long that when we come out, we are out. Some of us are way out, some of us still are a little conservative, but I think they resent that. I think people really resent the fact that we, and I say this about the trans community especially because if there is any part of our community that is living full out unapologetically themselves, it's the trans community. Because there is no other way, and I think that's why they're getting attacked so much. So we have to constantly fight these. It's not only fighting the coming out process, it's fighting all of the little nuances that people throw at us. And when you say that we have to sacrifice, I think it's important for people to hear that because it's just not the same waking up as a cisgendered straight person. It's just not. And it never has been, I long for the day that it is, that we just wake up and we're like. You're amazing, Toni. I love you for who you are, and there's no discussion about it at all. No discussion. But I think that's interesting though as a kind of transition point to what you do because one of the things that I noticed when we were dancing together is. The F there, there were moments of course, I'm going to count wrong or trip over my left foot. But there were more moments of this freedom to just simply be and to let go of everything. Because you cannot be in your head thinking about all of those things that we think about on a daily basis in this crazy world we live in and dance. You just can't. Correct me if I'm wrong. I don't think you can. And so what the good lesson was for me in that hour that we spent together was you have to consistently let go, release, let go. Thank you for sharing. Let go. In order to be free, and it's a great metaphor for our community, is that we have to let go in order to be free and in order to dance. Am I? Am I tracking on that? Is that a good description? Absolutely. Yes. Rachel Maddow, you named it. You nailed it. Oh, I would so be Rachel Maddow. She's actually, I told my friend last night, she's on my bucket list. There are a couple of guests that I want. She's one of'em. Anyway, I digress. If anyone's listening hook, hook me up. So I want to talk for up Rachel. Yeah. I just want to talk for a couple minutes so we don't lose sight of that purpose. So you go off and you dance and you obviously have great success. You are a beautiful dancer and an incredible energy. So you have achieved a lot. You were sharing with me a little bit when we met about the transition from that to now this movement coach. Can you talk a little bit about that, and I want to make sure that we get in and the time that we've got to talk about that process and to talk about why you're doing this now. What are you seeing as a benefit to this movement coach? What type of experiences are your students having and the transformation that comes from that. I'd love you to share a little bit about that because I think that's super powerful. Yeah. So I, you were talking a little bit about the letting go process. And I always say that 50% of dancing is making it happen, and then 50% of it is letting it happen. And the reason being is because that's how energy works. Like physically, it's just science, right? There is that thing where we, if you go to hit a ball in any type of sport there's the initial impact, but then there's this follow through that happens. What tends to happen is that, that we, the reason why there's such a therapeutic process in dancing is because. It gives you enough of the make it happen energy, but then it makes you surrender to the let it happen energy, right? Because and that's the balance that we're always trying to achieve as humans, right? We, when you think about it from that perspective going when I felt the initial spark that kind of go down, that pathway is definitely, I had that lesson with that coach that I was telling you about. It was a little bit before the pandemic. And I was in a very competitive partnership at that time. I was dancing with this beautiful Russian girl, and she is a really close friend of mine. We called each other twin because we had the same birthday. And so we, and again, we, we both come from like different backgrounds. But we were similar in so many ways that we just were obsessed with this journey together. And we felt that the validation that we would get in this dance world from this thing that we pro we, held so dear to us in our hearts was the thing that was going to save us, and when that coach said that to us, I remember looking, when we looked at each other, like I remember it hit I remember how it hit me. And I know it impacted her. I just didn't know in what way it impacted her at that time. And so that later on that year, I had just made it. Like I had realized as like this, everything that I had been pushing for, everything that I had been, striving for has been my extreme joy, but also my extreme sorrow simultaneously. Because for more than one reason, I guess maybe the intention was just out of that constant seeking validation for myself. Sure. And I realized at that moment I'm like, look, I need to take a step back. I need to take a breather and I need to just let things like I did, I just needed to take a breather. And so I pulled back a little bit and I was like, okay. I. I'm not sure how I know I want to do this, but I'm not sure how to keep doing this and how this is going to work. And I realized when that moment happened, just these very big, like iconic, momentous moments of my career just slapped me in the face, like and it was, and I had, and looking back on it, I realized it was when I had let go. That these things just came and at first in thinking, oh, this is what I had been working for. This is what I prepared for. This is what I, and to a certain extent, yes. But if I did not take that breather and take that step back, oh, things would not have played out the way that they played out. Sure.'cause I stopped chasing at that point, and I just received, and as a lot of people who grew up in a lot of codependent environments and atmospheres realize you, your programming is to chase, to make sure that people are not running away from you. You're going to catch'em and keep them and all that stuff. Or things that you love. But when you when it hits you oh, like I can just exist and the universe is going to give me these things that, you know, that my heart has been yearning for. So later on that year. We had started dancing in this different federation, which was really cool. Because we definitely like in the federation that we had been in there was definitely a specific narrative about us. We were like the wild kids and the twins, we were crazy and we had so much energy. And also too, I, we both did any style that we did like multiple styles. So in the ballroom world, there's like about four main dance styles American Smooth, American Rhythm, and International Ballroom Standard and Latin International Latin. And, the Latin and standard genres of ballroom dancing are more Eurocentric and then American style. Are more American as well as Caribbean of origin. And we did ance, which is both American styles, American smooth and American rhythm. But the American smooth is definitely, there's not, there's way less black and brown people in that, for lack of a better explanation, in that particular spot style. There's way less black or brown people in the international styles like Latin and standard just based on accessibility. And also programming, right? The world has, that particular world has received a very specific programming. That, that fra, that federation just again, had us in a very specific category. So I just told my dance partner, I was like, Hey, why don't we just let's just dance in a couple other federations and see how it goes. And it was like the best thing we could have done. And so we wind up winning a silver medal for the, for the nine dance, and specifically silver in the smooth dances, which is long flowy dresses if you want to have a visual image. And the the worlds the top two couples had to represent the United States in the worlds and the worlds that year were in Moscow, Russia. At the Kremlin. And that year of letting go was part of all of that kind of coming to us. And it was an experience that I was just like, what is this really happening? They got my visa so fast, I went over to the country and it was like a wild experience. But we wind up doing extremely well and we wind up like, how it works in the dance world is, there's dancers from all over the world. They were like representing their country. Bulgaria, Canada, Holland, England, France, Spain, like all, all over the world, Australia, different places. And so there was a lot of different couples. So you have to work your way through the rounds. And so there's like quarterfinals, semi-finals, and then eventually a final. And we. We're finished with our semi-final and my dance partner's parents were there. And it was the first time they had seen her dance in like in person.'Cause she had not been able to go back to Russia for a long time until she was a citizen or at least dance there. And it was the first time that they saw her dance in person for since she was like a little girl. Wow. And so they were like sobbing at the end of the semi-final. And I just thought that they were like, oh, they're just emotional. But then they kept saying to her in Russian oh no you guys made it. I know you made it. We know you made it. And sure enough, we made the final, which is basically the top six couples in the world. And we wound up placing fifth respectively. We were the only non Russians couple or at least the only couple that represented a different country outside of Russia that were actually in the final, which I guess in Roscoe you expect that, right? Yeah. Yeah. But I was nonetheless so grateful. And afterward the the organizer of the competition said to me he said, this is so crazy.'cause obviously I don't look like any of the other white dancers that showed up right, from any corner of the planet, but I was pretty much the only brown one. And and they were, and he was like, I just want to know more about your story. And so I just, ba basically did a brief a brief like chat with him over Russian standard vodka. And he looked at me, he was like I can definitely like confidently say that this is definitely the first time in history that a gay new Eureka ever made a world final in the Kremlin. Amazing. I was like. Okay. And I was like, wait a minute. Like I didn't just him in his, I don't want to say basically English, basic English,'cause he's dance, he spoke English really well. But in his very direct, simple way of saying that, I was just like, it, like it really hit me and I was just like, oh. And at that time I still really didn't get it, that it was really from just letting things happen. You know what I mean? After you put in the work, just really from letting things happen. And so then fast forward the pandemic happens and I see my students like struggle. Because of this thing that they love to do so much. And then and most of my students, like a lot of them, they're not going to outwardly admit this, but they have a lack of intimacy in their life whether they're married with somebody and children or not. They have a lack of intimacy in their life. And so what I've always been, happy to provide is a safe space for my students to have that intimacy. And they weren't missing that for sure. And I was like, okay, how are we going to do this? Zoom is only going to take us so far. Yeah. So I started to work. I started to, I looked I, I found that coach who told told me about our attachment to dance and how we needed to, cut that shit out. And and I started to work with him. He had this really great program. That was an incredible focus on just, not just proprioception, like basic mechanics of proprioception, but how internally mentally and emotionally and psychologically, how that kind of manifests differently in each person. So I got a couple certifications in that, and then along with all the years of therapy that I had acquired and pushed myself to do and the different forms of it for various reasons, I really started to format my own program during the pandemic of how this was going to work for my people. That I draw to me, and so I started to test it out over Zoom and the students were able to really get that fulfilling shared intimacy with, even though we weren't necessarily touching, and so when we were able to start coming back to it, it started to really and actual touch became part of the process again. Sure. It blew up into something I had never anticipated as far as having the type of impact that it did. Yeah. If you think about that time in our lives again, you just, it's like rapid fire. You're just firing off all these amazing insights and I wish I had my pad of paper with me in a pen. I would've written down half of them. But to ask you. When you think about that time that we went through we didn't have intimacy and I think even couples that were together, it was such a strange time and it was such an an emotionally disruptive time that the intimacy dropped. The second thing that I. Wholeheartedly believe about intimacy is when people sexualize intimacy. So intimacy does not equate to sexual connection. Intimacy relates to a connection, but it doesn't always have to be sexual. And I think that's the one thing that really bothers me the most is when I hear people say, oh, I don't have any intimacy. I'm like, no, you don't have sex. There's a big difference. There's a big difference. And you need to learn the distinction between the two. There is I meant to find it and I've just been a little busy since I saw you, but I want to find it and send it to you. I think it's European, but there is this, instagram account, this platform that is all about what I think they call free dance. And it's, what I love about this is and I just love the style of dancing. It's super cool, it's very unique. It's very different. But this particular account shows men and women dancing together, women and men dancing together. And I gotta tell you, there is this couple as I'm trying to find the video to send you. And when they dance together, these two guys, it, my heart races, it just, there is a connection there and an energy that is so palpable and I love it. And so I remember watching a lot of those videos and a lot of their content and just saying, that's really something that I would love to do, is to be able to have that kind of connection with someone. And you talk a lot about that. And even when we were working together in that brief session. What I think people forget is that energy connection that you talk about can be felt, right? So I walked into your studio very isolated, right? It had been a day I had to get in the car and drive. I was a little nervous about what was going to happen. Not nervous, you but nervous.'cause I didn't know what to expect. And the minute I walked in and met you face to face as you walked into the lobby, there was this ease and this connection. So immediately when someone comes into your space there, diffused is that anxiety. And it's, I'm sure it still lays on the surface, but that's powerful because it happens before you even hit the dance floor. And walk them through the process of letting go, of staying focused, of just having fun. And we have so lost that ability to just have fun. Many people have, we have not had a chance to exhale in the last couple years. We've not had a chance to take a breath. We haven't had a chance to dance freely. I always said a great thing as if we just got all of us in a room and just turned on some like crazy ass music and just let go. There's another guest of mine, Tanner, who I saw on social media, and he made a commitment to himself to dance in public. Every day for 30 days. And to ask someone to record him dancing. I was sweating bullets throughout this entire interview. And I got to the end of it. Yeah. And I got to the end of his 30 days and I realized how important it was. So I hope that our listeners will be able to resonate with areas in their life in which they are holding on to something that's no longer serving them. They're holding back on just letting go and being able to find someone like you or find a situation where they can go in and just be themselves a hundred percent unapologetically, be themselves. There's a process that you obviously walk them through. We're going to make sure that people have access to your information so that if they have questions they can find you. But I have a couple last minute or last moment questions. I want to be respectful of your time, if you don't mind, can stick around for a couple more minutes. Sure. What has surprised you the most in working with your students with this process? What's one thing that has surprised you the most? I would have to say that no matter the background or the walk of life that we're in, I think, sometimes we get into the habit of comparing traumas, sure. And and it's true some of us have had it worse than others on a, on paper status. However it doesn't make experiences any less traumatic internally for the person just because it was like maybe externally less dangerous, right? As what I've learned over, over, over the years. So instead of approaching people with this mindset of okay, what are we trying to shake off today? I feel like just allowing them to be in the space for them to just. Have access to their emotions. Have access to how certain things made them feel or currently still make them feel really does not matter what the experience that sparked it was. What surprises me the most is how insanely human, like, how insanely the same we are from a human standpoint. We're just we're just not different. And I'm, I like, and I know that sounds corny and like whatever. But at the end of the day, we, yes, we talk about how divided we all are. We talk about how, one side cares about human life and the other side doesn't, and that very well fundamentally may be true in a lot of ways, but at the end of the day, I feel like the more we, doesn't matter the side. Ignore our humanity. The more we like, the forever divided we will be. Yeah. And so when I say ignore the humanity, I don't mean for you to see the humanity in somebody else. I mean for people to see the humanity within themselves first. And then it's easy for them to see the humanity in somebody else. So when we come in contact with these people that are so far from us on other ends of spectrums, we have to really understand they haven't come in contact with their own humanity yet, or fully or even partially at all. At all. At all. So I'm three seasons in to this podcast and there are always moments where. I call it the Willy Wonka ticket comes out, yeah. And that was just it. Amazing conversation the entire time. And the one moment where you said, we don't even know, we're not connected to, we're not aware of our own humanity, is the moment that every single person needs to hear. I am not just blowing smoke, but if everyone that's out there spreading all of this hate and all of this judgment and all of this, would just realize their own humanity and be able to relate to their own humanity and embrace it and cherish it and respect it. I know we'd have a cosmic shift in what's happening in our world today. Because exactly what you said, the division comes from us not being whole and complete in our own selves. Yes. You're providing an opportunity for people. And some may sit back, Toni and say, how does this come from dance? And I want them to realize that to me, the dance is the vehicle to finding that space with you and. Again, I just got so emotional in the car because I so connected with you. I felt like we've been friends for a hundred years. I could have danced for the next six hours. I could have just uncovered. I told you when I got home, it opened something up because there was so much emotion there and for people to be able to experience that in difficult moments. I said a lot this last season, who we are in the world is not our circumstances, and I really believe that a lot of people are responding to their circumstance or their perceived circumstances, and if they realize that who we are not our circumstances, who we are is giving, caring, empathetic, loving, kind, all of those things, those aren't circumstances. Those are. How our makeup is made, right? So having an opportunity to come and just play with you in that space is really powerful. So we're going to encourage people.'cause my new mantra for 2026 is, it's great to have these wonderful conversations, but it dies on the vine if there isn't a call to action. So if you had a call to action to somebody who may be sitting home and listening and wanting to go dance and wanting to experience it, what would be the piece of advice that you would give them? I feel like dancing's a tall order because if there's so much stuff that people put on it, sure. Also too, not everybody's in a space where they want to be that vulnerable at this moment in, at this moment in time in their life and their part of their journey. It's scary. It's very scary. I just say first. In the process of getting to know yourself. Because we have to constantly re-get to know ourselves like every very frequently because we're constantly changing, right? But in that process, make sure that movement is a part of that process, whether you are, stretching, doing yoga, running working out at the gym some type of contact sport where there's a socialization aspect to it. Movement has to be a part of that process because when you are used to moving your body in different spaces or just on a regular basis, you really start to understand how worthy it is to take up space in any given environment. And so that's the first kicker of, or the first layer of getting people to actually. Get into this type of understanding and space. Once they're in that space and awareness, I should say once they're in that awareness, then they are a lot more susceptible to being able to have intimacy with a partner dancing wise. And like when you and I had danced together yeah. We used mo movement and music and we were moving together and we had little systems or whatever, but I didn't teach you any specific formal dance. No. But what I did is I teach, I taught you communication, how to give it, how to receive it how to go assertively in different directions and also how to release and let go so that state of flow can come through. And what that does is it opens up the, it opens up the intimacy. And the vulnerability is now safe. You're safe to be vulnerable versus, oh, I gotta do this and it's going to be embarrassing and I don't know what I'm doing. Because most of the time people just, like you said, you were nervous coming in'cause you didn't know what to expect. But also too, like no matter what type of background you have in movement or dance or none, whatever we think that, based on what we think it is we have these anxieties getting into it. Most of the time people have the anxiety of not wanting to disappoint the person that they're with. And that is a very, that is a very common regular thing that comes into the picture. And I can have, I have students for over 20 years who say the same thing. Still to this day we have this great relationship. They're very comfortable. We're very, we're a very much so like family and we'll come off the competition floor and I'll be like, honey, are you okay? You're a little stiff there. She's just so they'll be like, I don't know what it is like. I just didn't want to disappoint you. And I'm like that's silly. Look at what that got you. It's true. Just it's true. But we need someone to call it out. And I think that's the important thing about coaching. And I am a firm believer in coaching. I call it my, you know how some of the housewives have glam squads? I have my life squad. Yes. I've got my coaches in my pocket, and I would not be who I am today if it wasn't for my coaches, because they call out things, they hold accountability. So I guess my call to action in response to that question is whether it's dance or whatever, is to get moving. Number one, get that movement going, and additionally find someone that you can do it with. I feel like we're so insular right now. We are in these little silos of our own making, and we as a. Community. We as a country need to get out of the silo and start to connect. Otherwise, we're in for a heap of trouble. Heap of trouble if we don't know how to communicate anymore or to connect or to be vulnerable. You talk a lot about that in this conversation. We I think also because everything is so heated right now, and there is so much divisiveness that we're afraid to show our vulnerability or our opinions. And so if that continues, we're in for a big heap of trouble. So find that movement. If you need someone, find that accountability partner, whether it's a coach or someone that you know, and get out there and get vulnerable, get connected, get intimate, get in communication with people. It's so important. Yeah. I, yeah. My brain spinning. Since you asked my ending question that I ask all of my guests early on, I will I will make it one final question and then we'll say goodbye. But what is next for Toni? What do you see is next for you in this world? I, all the different rooms that I've visited in my life where I acquired great stories and tools and skills and all sorts of different co colors to paint with. I am trying to get, every year I try to get closer and closer to putting it all together. So I'm going to be doing a dance wellness retreat this year in Hawaii. First and foremost. And then basically what it is it's we're going to have several ballroom practitioners that definitely are on the same page as far as more spiritual of their spiritually on their journey of the ballroom world. But we will also have wellness and spiritual practitioners as well. So there'll be nice there'll be Peruvian guitarists, doing Mayan sound baths. There'll be, yoga meditation people. There'll be different modalities of movement and coaches within those modalities to really bring out the idea and the basic concept of being able to have to making the connection to ourselves first before we connect to anything external whatsoever. Because if we are not connected to ourself, it doesn't matter what the external influence is. Another person, the music the room that we're in, it will all be perceived as something volatile unless we connect to ourselves truly first. And then we will be able to. Peacefully harmoniously connect with the energy that is being presented because we're going to be in spaces no matter what, where the energy is going to be high and low and intense and, but how we perceive it is directly contingent upon how connected we are to ourself. And that's the biggest missing component that I feel is missing in society today. We lose the art of the intuition and the connection itself so much. Oh yeah. We don't know what's healthy for us to eat anymore. We don't know, what's healthy for us to drink or to be exposed what type of crowd to expose ourselves to and what type of socialization to have. And getting to that space of being able to connect to ourselves is so important. And I really I've been doing this for a long time and I've been, I'm just wanting to get to that place where I can bring people to just a beautiful place where we can, number one, respect the indigenous community and that is there and have them lead us off in that search of that journey. Because I feel like that's just a magical approach to it. And then number two, just what, making sure no matter what happens, that no matter what changes,'cause everything changes all the time, that you will always have you and you will always be connected to you. So that's the biggest thing that I want to do. And then, also this year, I haven't been on the professional floor in a really long time because I just didn't find that competitive world fulfilling in a lot of ways. But I found a way I just started practicing and dancing with a really good friend of mine recently. And we are definitely both on the same page, very similar upbringing and very similar in our approach to artistry. But he's also gay, he's also married, he, lives in Phoenix. And we are just really great friends and we are, we had started producing these shows and these really good art and I was just like, these, this kind of be, needs to be on the competitive floor, because we keep seeing on the competition level, we just keep seeing all these people with their heteronormative, patriarchal stories that just a different version of it. So finally, we're going to come out on the floor and we're going to be finally just, our goal is to show as many different types of gay narratives as possible that is close and near and dear to our heart. Especially because there's such a new generation of kids. The Gen Z kids are twice as as identified. Like they identify as queer twice as much as millennials. And then Gen Alpha identifies themselves as queer three times more than millennials. So if that, if those are the statistics and those are the numbers, we really have to make sure that these kids like, we Jacobi is my new partner. We had not seen that for ourselves. We saw gay men trying to do a heteronormative story, but we had not seen queer stories for, in what they are in the existing world when we were being brought up in the industry. And so our goal is to put that out on the floor this year. I love it. Yeah, I will be front and center. Send me the date and the address. I'll be there I think. Representation matters. Representation matters. And those of us who are out committed to tell the stories, not only for ourselves but for others, are the true change makers in this dialogue, that some people are having about our community. But I think it's so important. So I want to say two last things. One, will you come back again and let's talk some more. You're always welcome. Yay. Your energy, like I said, is just awesome and I'm so blessed to have had the opportunity to not only meet you I now have to meet your husband and say thank you for the referral to come on the show, but I could talk to you for days on end. Thank you for being here, number one. Thank you much so much. Number two, thank you for giving me what you gave me the other day on the ballroom dance floor. And I want to say this, and that is that I believe that there are angels in this world whose sole responsibility is to land gently on our shoulders, to wake us up so that we don't miss the rest of our lives. And although you did not land softly on my shoulder, you certainly landed. And this world is a better place with people like you in it, Toni. And I think you're out to make a huge difference in the lives of people that are ready. And I'm just super grateful to have met you and to be able to share your story today. So I'm going to make sure people know where to find you and how to follow you. And I'm just really grateful for your time today. I want to thank you for being here. Oh my gosh. Without getting. Too emotional. I just want to I want to say how much I appreciate you, not just for this time, there's so many of us that just don't have a voice in the capacity that we see other people having voices. And for you to provide a platform where we can is there are no words, so thank you. And in any way, in any capacity to support this endeavor of you changing people's lives. I will be there. We're back for season three. You're in it and I appreciate that. It means the world to me, and we will talk about me getting back out on that dance floor at another time. With you would be so much fun. So much fun. I'm holding you to it. You to it. You already said it. As I was walking out the door, you're like, you'll be back. And I've told probably 10 or 15 people about how cool it was and how much fun it would be. But thank you for those words. It's something that is, as you know with your work, it's a lot of work to be able to put something like this out and there are moments when I wonder if I have it in me to do it again, and then I hear. Feedback. I hear someone talk about a particular episode and how it moves them and how it resonated with them. And I now can honestly say that it's my favorite part of my day is sitting down and having conversations with people for them to share their stories. So there will be more of that. There'll be more dancing and maybe we'll combine the two. And we'll definitely see you soon. Okay, perfect. Definitely. You take care. You too. Sweet. Bye. All right, everyone. Thank you again for joining us on today's episode. I hope our conversation resonated with you like it did me, and I cannot wait to sit down with you all again next week. Remember to subscribe to the Just You Podcast on your favorite platform so you can make sure not to miss a new episode, which drop every Thursday. If you like what you hear, you could easily share the podcast and episode directly with your friends. And if you would rate us and leave us a review, we'd love to hear from you. You can also follow us on Instagram at just Do You pod as you go out back into the world today. Remember to just do you. Alright, talk next week.