Date: 07-27-2010
The raw audio from the Joe Rogan weekly live USTREAM video show with redban and Bryan Callen.

 

 PODCAST #32 - BRYAN CALLEN: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

My pal Joey “Coco” Diaz told me about this cool spot that just opened up in L.A. called “Sal’s Comedy Hole.”  Right away I loved the name, and when he told me that it only seats about 100 people I loved it even more.

I love doing little intimate venues.  I used to really enjoy performing at them when I lived in NY, and hearing that there’s someplace like that in L.A. – especially something with the Joey Diaz seal of approval – was very exciting.  There’s just something extra raw about comedy when the people are all jammed into a tiny place and they’re right on top of you.  It’s extra real, and the connection is completely different than say doing a theater with 2,000 people in it.  It’s even different than doing a 300 seater.  It’s just much more dialed in.  You can see the fat in the material much clearer.  There’s less room for bullshit.  The laughs are much more personal, and the strange connection you get there takes the material to deeper and weirder places.  This weekend is going to be my first weekend working there, and since I’ve got a bunch of new shit I’m working out I’m really excited and looking forward to it.

I like to smoke pot and work out.

To the ill informed or the uninitiated in the magical ways of the sacred plant, this can seem like a very contradictory practice.

In fact though, that notion could not be further from the truth.

Getting high and working out is one of the least talked about and least appreciated pleasures of fitness. Lifting weights is fun when you’re under the spell, cardio is cool too, but for me, nothing compares to getting really high and hitting the heavy bag.

2 tokes of the good is usually all it takes to start the enchanted wave – 3 if I wanna go deep.

As its spirit enters my system it flows from the lungs into the bloodstream and as it passes through the body slowly every cell along the way sighs a collective “ahhhh…” and accepts the pleasure of the enchanted state.

Music is a must.  I’ve got a punching bag set up over matts in my garage, and I’ve got a speaker dock for my ipod.

“I wanna be a billionaire” starts things off as I begin to shadow box.  I’ve got a timer on the wall that fires off a loud bell every 3 minutes and lighter bells every 30 seconds to let me know when to work, sprint, and when to rest.  By the second round of shadow boxing is over The Black Keys have taken over the tunes and the sweat has started to flow.

For me the initial goal is always the balance between concentration and losing myself completely in the movements.  That’s where the love is.  When the two of them sync up perfectly together the body flows smoothly from technique to technique, never stopping to admire the work, always using the breath as a mantra to hold the frequency.

There’s two common times in my life where I always feel like I have to write my feelings down right there and then because it is a special and fragile vibe that I’m tuning into, and I want to hold onto as much of it as possible.

One is when I’m out and I’m having a great time with some friends, and I’m just catching a buzz and I go to the bathroom to take a leak.

I’ve come to some life altering revelations about friendships and what’s important in my life while pissing into a urinal and reflecting on the wonders of this temporary experience on this floating rock.  I always think that I need to step aside and write down how I feel right then and there while I’ve got a hold of this, the slipperiest of thoughts, but I never wind up doing it.

I usually wind up just hanging out and having fun, but somehow I almost always eventually lose the magic of that precious inspiration as the night goes on, and then I have to wait until a similar night in a similar urinal to recapture that fuzzy picture again.

The other time I feel that way is right after I get done getting high and working out, and that’s where I’m at right now.  I’m dripping sweat onto the keyboard wearing a soaked t shirt and sitting on a folded towel.  If I showered before I sat down to write this I’m pretty sure I would have lost some of what I’m feeling right now.

There’s a sweet wisdom that reveals itself out there in that garage.  It doesn’t give me any complete answers, but it allows the human consciousness a brief respite from the monkey body and offers a clearer view of what it really is that we’re dealing with in this life.

By the time I’ve moved from shadow boxing to putting the gloves on and bouncing in front of the bag waiting for the bell to go off I’ve settled into the favorable groove.

As every combination is fired off and feet and fists slam into the bag the lungs must be filled and exhaled.  The feet must pivot in response to the moving hands.  The hands must torque and swing with the arms to penetrate deep into the bag with the kick.  My mind juggles focus on technique with constant regulation of the breath and an appreciation of the music.  All three dance together in a beautiful storm of moving meditation, discipline and inspiration, and if my mind is true and I commit to the trance I can lose myself in the wave.

So much of our perspective is swayed and affected by the state of the body.  You don’t even realize how little independence the mind normally has from the pull of its biological vessel until you find a way to completely silence that inner chimp.

3 rounds of shadow boxing, 5 hard rounds of kicking and punching, and then finally 2 rounds of jumping rope and 5 more rounds of stretching.  The monkey shoots his fix and goes offline, leaving behind a mind free and light.

I want to smile and laugh.  I want to hug friends and loved ones.  I want to somehow tap into this feeling and extend it through my day.  My whole body is buzzing with freedom and energy – free of the stress and tension and energized with positive energy and a newfound appreciation for the wonders of the world around me.

I’m hoping that writing this down is going to help me corral some of this frequency.  I’m hoping that careful focus and reflection on how I’m feeling exactly right now will aid me in my personal evolution.  I’m hoping I can move through this life more freely with less resistance, and that I can elevate the course of my own path because of it.  I’m also hoping that the honesty and momentum of these thoughts vibrating around in my mind right now can bounce off these typed words and resonate with you as well.

I’m writing all this down with hope, for all of us.

Life can be really fucking beautiful, but man is it a tricky thing to manage.