Ashly Perez, READ THIS FOR INSPIRATION
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[2:22]Ashley Perez is a writer, producer, director, and actor.
[2:26]During her five-year career at Buzzfeed, she starred in over 250 videos,
[2:31]and was one of the co-creators and a producer of Buzzfeed Violet, Buzzfeed's first scripted
[2:36]character universe. She now writes for the hit free form show Good Trouble.
[2:40]Ashley's writing has been published in Buzzfeed, Hello Giggles, the conversation,
[2:44]and darling magazine. She's also been featured on NPR's Take Two.
[2:48]Her latest book, Read This for Inspiration, Simple Sparks to Ignite Your Life,
[2:52]was reviewed by Good Morning America and Cosmopolitan Magazine.
[2:55]Her other books in the series write this and send this will release in the summer of 2021.
[3:02]Welcome, Ashley. Thank you so much for coming. I'm moms, don't have time to read books,
[3:05]to talk about read this for inspiration, or today we'll talk about this for inspiration, I guess.
[3:12]You know, it's so weird. I was seeing very many people like holding the book. So
[3:16]you were just popping it in a frame was like, oh my goodness, there it is. It's so beautiful.
[3:20]And I know this is a podcast and also on YouTube, but for the people listening,
[3:25]I am a sucker, as you can see from my bookshelves behind me, all the different rainbow colors.
[3:29]So it says read this for inspiration, all different colors on the spine with yellow in the back,
[3:33]and all the illustrations are just so happy and awesome. So in addition to the actual content
[3:39]of the book, the container of it is so happy and something that we all really could use right now.
[3:45]So bravo on that. Sorry guys, if you hear it background noise, I'm outside and there's an airport
[3:52]near me. So that's what you're hearing. You know what, there's always something usually
[3:57]sirens in my background, but yeah, trade-offs. So Ashley, tell me about your journey from BuzzFeed
[4:05]to publication, how this book came to be and how you kind of exploded onto the scene yourself.
[4:12]So my background is BuzzFeed. I worked there for five and a half years before BuzzFeed was really
[4:17]what it was. I was a video producer making all types of different content. Now I'm a TV writer
[4:24]and then have now written this nonfiction book that in some ways is a culmination of most of my
[4:30]life experiences. Like I went to college to study international studies. I love languages.
[4:35]At one point, I lived in South Korea as an English teacher and thought I was going to be a diplomat.
[4:40]And so this book is very much a dumping of my brain. I have ADHD and it's a function of how
[4:47]my brain works that these are in short little chapters about lots and lots of different subjects.
[4:51]So it was actually really relieving for me to write the book and to see it because even now to this
[4:56]day I can open it and it still looks like the inside of my brain. And I love how you set out like
[5:03]all these rules at the beginning. You're like, you can read it like this or you can just open it
[5:07]anytime you want or you can do it like that. And it doesn't matter. It was like the most forgiving
[5:11]entrance. Like let me teach you how to use this book and how it can be a little different.
[5:17]And really the rule is just however you want to use the book, you can use it.
[5:21]And let's go back to your ADHD, which you talked about. And you said in the book,
[5:25]I'm not good at resting. In fact, I have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, emphasis on
[5:30]the hyperactivity stillness does not exist in my bones literally. And because of this, I am also not
[5:36]very patient. And then you talk about how you rush through everything and all the rest.
[5:39]Tell me about when did you know you had ADHD and how did that affect even like your education
[5:44]and growing up and things like that? You know, most women don't get diagnosed with ADHD until
[5:49]their older. And I was the same. I was in my late 20s. And when I found out and finally got the
[5:54]diagnosis, almost everything clicked backwards in my life where I was like, oh my God. One of the
[6:01]things that made me realize that I had it is that constant interrupting is a sign of ADHD.
[6:08]And my whole life, I just thought I was like to that my brain felt fast. And I was like,
[6:13]you know, rude or something. And then I realized, oh, this is just one of the symptoms of ADHD.
[6:20]And when I went back and started, you know, actually talking to my therapist,
[6:23]interest psychiatrist, I had almost all of the markers for both deficit and hyperactivity. But
[6:29]because of the way women are socialized, we often can socially get around what most little boys
[6:35]can't, which is just hyperactivity and an inability to concentrate in schoolwork.
[6:41]So for me, ADHD, it was very much a cycle of like feeling relieved and then feeling upset
[6:49]and then feeling confused about what that meant and ashamed. And now I really feel like I've embraced
[6:54]what that does to my brain and how, you know, this book wouldn't exist if my brain
[7:00]wasn't didn't have ADHD because ADHD has an ability to like grasp different concepts from
[7:08]all over the place and put them together in kind of a weird and interesting mashup. And I think
[7:13]that's what I tried to do with this book is just let my brain be free and bring the together
[7:18]concepts that might not normally make sense. Well, you know, it's so funny because I've talked to
[7:22]other like big deal editors of memoir or narrative fiction or whatever. And they're always saying
[7:29]things like, you know, try to play with time, try to like bring in this and mix it up here and
[7:34]don't make it like too straightforward, make it more interesting. And that's exactly what you're
[7:37]saying is like how your brain is like de facto state of operation, right? Yes, it's non-linear and
[7:44]just kind of hops around. That's so interesting that editors are like looking for that.
[7:48]Yeah, because it keeps, because the rest of us, even if you don't have ADHD, which I don't know,
[7:54]I feel like I have, I feel like I have situational ADHD like I am constantly interrupted. And so
[8:01]I can't actually like think in a normal way anymore. No, I know it's so much more. I know a lot
[8:06]about it. And I don't actually have it. But I do feel like, you know, sleep deprivation and other
[8:12]things can really affect your ability to focus not in terms of a underlying condition. But,
[8:17]you know, situational condition. I also think that, you know, in some ways, the way that we use
[8:24]social media now has affected all of our attention spans, whether or not you have a diagnosis of
[8:29]ADHD. We all have so much less attention because of the way we're constantly consuming content in
[8:35]little bites. Yes. And so I think that's has its translation into fiction, where you know, keep
[8:42]keep people on their toes, don't just like sit and tell them a story and expect them to and not all,
[8:46]you know, maybe it was just a handful of, I don't want to totally say that now people are going to
[8:51]be like, we'd have to like change my novel and mix it up a little bit. No, no, no, but just in some
[8:57]instances, it can help keep the pacing or whatever. But anyway, I also say you do that naturally.
[9:03]And I love how you interweave. As you said, like all your personal stories, like tell me a little
[9:07]bit about your abuela, his love of books and your special relationship with him. And then how
[9:13]you ended up dedicating the book to him. And yeah, you know, his great saying that he put,
[9:18]and I love how you or someone not going to find that they're at time, but was this one? There's
[9:22]always more to learn. Yeah. Yes. You have it here, which I'm showing on YouTube, but nobody can see
[9:27]and I won't even try to, you know, massacre the Spanish. But anyway, tell me more about him.
[9:32]Yeah. So the book is dedicated to my abuelo. And he is the entire reason that I love books. He was
[9:40]like, he died in in 2019, but he was like known as kind of a walking encyclopedia, anything that
[9:46]he read. And he read in all sorts of languages. He wrote, he read in French. He read in English. He
[9:51]read in Spanish. Anything that he read was like committed to memory, even all the way up until he died
[9:57]when he was 89. And he always used to be.
[10:00]to write me letters in Spanish,
[10:01]and I would write back to him.
[10:02]And the page, the entry that you're talking about
[10:06]is from a letter that he wrote to me at the end of it.
[10:09]It's Nungkakre, Savero, Tolo, Siampere,
[10:11]and Necessi, Thamos, Upnded, Mass.
[10:13]I'll never think that you know everything.
[10:15]There's always more to learn.
[10:17]And I really think that that's how he lived his life,
[10:20]always in the pursuit of knowledge,
[10:22]in the pursuit of new facts.
[10:25]He, in fact, very much enjoyed,
[10:27]like he enjoyed discovering new things
[10:30]that would change his perspective.
[10:32]And I always, like, very much appreciated that about him.
[10:35]And I think my sense of curiosity and appreciation,
[10:39]specifically for words,
[10:40]you'll notice that a lot of the book
[10:42]has to do with etymology and the origin of language,
[10:45]and what words really mean.
[10:47]I think that came solely from my grandfather,
[10:49]because he was so precise with all of the words
[10:52]that he chose, and he often corrected my Spanish,
[10:54]and often, like, made sure that I was using
[10:57]the correct words, the correct interpretations.
[10:59]I would go over to his house in order to learn Spanish,
[11:02]and he would pull out old letters that my dad had written him,
[11:05]and we would correct my dad's letters in Spanish,
[11:08]which is very fun.
[11:09]And we would correct my dad's letter in Spanish
[11:11]with Spanish English dictionary next to us
[11:15]to, like, be learning and always learning.
[11:17]And so I wanted to dedicate the book to him,
[11:20]because it's very much an expression of love,
[11:24]of learning, and of always being curious,
[11:27]and always discovering new things,
[11:28]and not being precious about where you discover new things,
[11:32]because you can find things everywhere,
[11:34]and you can find inspiration everywhere.
[11:36]That is such a genius idea.
[11:37]By the way, I have this giant bag of camp letters
[11:41]from summer camp, which is, like, stuffed underneath
[11:44]a bunch of, like, clothes in the corner of my closet,
[11:47]and how great, like, as my kids get better at grammar
[11:50]and learning to spell, I mean, hopefully, like, it better,
[11:53]to take those letters out, even in English,
[11:55]and have them correct them,
[11:56]and then they can learn more about me,
[11:58]and they can, like, have a bonding moment.
[12:00]That's brilliant.
[12:01]That really was such a fun way for me to learn about my dad
[12:05]with my grandfather there, and learn about their relationship,
[12:09]and then also learn Spanish.
[12:10]It was, like, it was just so fun and so personal,
[12:13]and I'm sure your kids would love that,
[12:14]because I think any time, as children,
[12:16]we get a glimpse into who our parents really are,
[12:19]and who they are when they were our age,
[12:20]it's mind-blowing, and it humanizes them.
[12:24]Totally.
[12:24]And the people, even who wrote me letters,
[12:26]because I saved a lot of those.
[12:28]Now, with the emails, I'm always like, oh,
[12:30]I'm sure I'll be able to find this later.
[12:31]I'm just going to stuff it in this little folder
[12:33]on the side here.
[12:33]I'm never going to see that email again, but my letters,
[12:36]I have, and I know where they are.
[12:38]And, you know, I think a lot of writers
[12:40]are very attached to words, obviously,
[12:41]but I, the only thing that I will ever keep,
[12:44]and I always think, like, if there was a fire,
[12:46]what would I grab?
[12:47]I keep everything anyone has ever written to me.
[12:49]Like, if I was at a bar with a friend,
[12:52]and we wrote something on a coaster,
[12:53]I have that coaster, I have post-its
[12:55]that my roommate used to write me in college,
[12:57]I have, like, anything that has words on it.
[13:00]And when my grandfather died,
[13:02]or right before he died, he showed me in his office,
[13:05]all, there's, like, this, his whole desk
[13:07]was filled with every single letter,
[13:09]anyone has ever written him,
[13:10]and the ones marked from his family were marked
[13:13]the sodas, which means treasures.
[13:15]And I was like, oh, that is, at the end,
[13:18]like, all we have are these, like, treasures
[13:20]from each other, and what we said to each other,
[13:22]and how we made each other feel.
[13:24]So, Jo.
[13:25]And I'll tell you the first thing that I always do,
[13:27]because I've lost a lot of people,
[13:29]as I know, so many people have, whenever,
[13:31]I mean, I don't do this consciously,
[13:33]but I have found that one of the first things I do
[13:35]is, like, an inventory of, yes, what letters?
[13:38]Where is their handwriting?
[13:40]What can I hold in my hand?
[13:41]What pictures do I have?
[13:42]What videos do I have?
[13:43]And I kind of, like, assemble it all together.
[13:45]And those become talismans, like,
[13:48]the note from my friend in college
[13:50]that I still have, like, the birthday card
[13:52]from my grandmother, all of it.
[13:54]It's so, it ends up having so much more importance.
[13:57]So, I don't know.
[13:58]I've, like, memorized every voicemail
[14:00]my grandpa ever sent me,
[14:01]and it's so funny, because voicemails are always so casual,
[14:04]and it just feels like, how did I not know this was so important,
[14:10]and now my mailbox is always full,
[14:12]because I refuse to delete any voicemails
[14:14]from anyone.
[14:16]The only voicemail I refuse to delete
[14:17]is from Andre Agassi, who was, like,
[14:19]the second guest on this podcast.
[14:21]And I just thought it was the coolest thing
[14:23]that he ever called me, so I keep, like,
[14:25]deleting all the, you know, annoying school emails
[14:27]or my parents or whatever, but, like,
[14:29]Andre Agassi all caps is in my voicemail box anyway.
[14:34]So, tell me now about your TV writing
[14:36]and what you're doing,
[14:37]aside from writing great inspirational books.
[14:41]Like, yeah, you know, my TV writing,
[14:44]I work on a show called Good Trouble,
[14:45]which is on free form.
[14:47]It's been off of a show called The Fosters,
[14:49]and it's been such a fun exercise.
[14:51]You know, I started in digital writing
[14:52]and writing short form content for the internet,
[14:55]and then moved into TV writing,
[14:56]which is group writing, essentially, like,
[14:59]a lot of people, I didn't know, even as a writer,
[15:01]that what really the function of a writer's room is,
[15:04]and it's just a bunch of writers sitting
[15:06]with each other, discussing their lives and stories
[15:09]and seeing how it translates to other characters.
[15:11]And so, really, all writing is the same, I think.
[15:14]It's like human sharing stories with each other
[15:17]and then figuring out the best form for it to take.
[15:20]But ironically, like, being in a writer's room,
[15:22]you do very little solo writing.
[15:24]When you get an episode, you go off and write,
[15:26]or sometimes you'll write scenes for different episodes,
[15:28]but it was more of a function of just, like,
[15:31]being in community with each other.
[15:33]And I feel like I usually preferred solo projects
[15:36]to group projects in school,
[15:37]and I was like, and yet I kept getting, like,
[15:40]thrown together, particularly in business school,
[15:42]because they were like, you have to learn
[15:43]how to work as a group.
[15:44]And then the more I talk to people who work on
[15:46]and writers' rooms, it's the same thing.
[15:48]And I'm like, well, I guess I should have stopped.
[15:50]I have that opportunity.
[15:51]But a girlfriend of mine is going to be in a writer's room
[15:53]in January, and she's like, do you want to come in on our Zoom?
[15:56]And I was like, yes, I can't wait.
[15:57]I want to see what that's like.
[15:59]It's definitely a very cool experience.
[16:01]And I think it's fun to be able to write
[16:04]in lots of different forms,
[16:05]because the book was very much written
[16:07]at exactly where I'm sitting every day at the same time.
[16:11]I would write during the dawn and during dusk.
[16:13]I found were the best parts for me.
[16:15]So like, in the very early morning or at night
[16:17]in the magic hour, essentially, of the day and the dawn.
[16:21]And because, and the hardest part about writing this book
[16:24]was that I had to be inspired in order to write it.
[16:27]And so I was, like, constantly practicing
[16:30]how do I find inspiration and in what ways?
[16:34]And part of it is like the discipline of looking
[16:39]for inspiration.
[16:40]But then oftentimes it would be at the time
[16:43]where I was completely exhausted, couldn't think of anything.
[16:45]And we go on a walk that something would surprise me
[16:48]and give me a true burst of inspiration
[16:51]that was like, unlike just pining and looking for it.
[16:54]It's hard to say, like, OK, now I'm going to be inspired.
[16:58]Although I guess now that we have your book,
[17:02]now I have a time and a place that any time I want.
[17:04]I can just go in.
[17:05]Another thing I noticed is how often you referenced Oprah.
[17:08]I feel like she must be some sort of cult hero of yours
[17:10]because you talked about not only how
[17:12]she used to hand out free donuts on the street
[17:14]to get people into her TV studio,
[17:16]but also how few iconic moments are relative
[17:20]to how much time the show took in general, right?
[17:23]Yeah.
[17:24]How many hours?
[17:25]So tell me about you and Oprah.
[17:27]Oh, me and Oprah, I wish that that was a real thing.
[17:30]I'm like, here's my friendship with Oprah.
[17:31]But just like most of America, Oprah has just
[17:33]been like an icon in my house.
[17:35]And I think of a purveyor of wisdom and somebody
[17:39]who has I've looked to for perspective.
[17:43]Me and my editor had a lot of back and forth
[17:45]about how much Oprah could be of the book.
[17:48]Interesting.
[17:49]And I won a lot of Oprah.
[17:51]I would say I was just flipping through the book
[17:52]the other day.
[17:53]I'm like, oh, the first couple of entries
[17:55]are very Oprah-heavy or people that Oprah has talked to
[17:58]and the wisdom that she learned there.
[18:00]But I think that I really respond to Oprah
[18:03]as like what I know for sure.
[18:05]And little truth, she has a book called The Book of Happiness.
[18:08]I think Oprah is also someone who has been scouring
[18:11]the world in her lifetime for new perspectives
[18:14]and new learnings.
[18:16]And Oprah's person is Maya Angelou.
[18:19]Like if you know anything about Oprah,
[18:21]all she ever talks about is Maya Angelou
[18:23]and what Maya Angelou taught her.
[18:24]For me, it's Oprah and Brene Brown
[18:26]are the two people that I constantly
[18:28]and incessantly talk about who I feel like our women
[18:30]who have taught me a lot.
[18:32]But one of my favorite things that you're referencing
[18:34]is there's an entry about Oprah, how she had,
[18:38]I believe it's 4,561 or 4,651 episodes
[18:45]of the Oprah Winfrey show.
[18:46]4,561.
[18:48]561, I was trying to memorize it
[18:51]because this has actually come up a few times,
[18:52]but she had 4,561 episodes of the Oprah Winfrey show.
[18:57]But maybe I don't know, 10 of those episodes,
[19:00]but truly like three of those moments
[19:02]are iconic in American history
[19:04]and feel like part of our pop culture zeitgeist.
[19:07]And I think about the fact that, you know,
[19:09]she had a quote that said,
[19:11]do the work as an offering and then whatever happens
[19:13]happens because I think often as artists or creatives
[19:17]or people who are looking just for inspiration,
[19:20]we put a lot into whatever the next thing is
[19:23]and feel like it has to be perfect
[19:26]and it has to be the thing where actually in actuality
[19:29]with life, like even what you're talking about with camp,
[19:32]think about how many hours you spent a camp,
[19:35]how many days, how many nights
[19:36]and how many of those memories really stay exactly with you
[19:40]and how many of those are pertinent to you.
[19:43]And I think it kind of taught me that you can't hold
[19:46]everything so preciously because you just do the work
[19:49]because you want to do it because you love it
[19:51]and you live your life because you have to live your life
[19:54]and we're not really sure what's gonna resonate.
[19:57]And it's not our job to figure that out.
[19:59]It's just our job.
[20:00]to put out there what is important to us.
[20:02]I love that.
[20:03]Well, that sounded like great advice.
[20:05]I always like to ask what advice you have for aspiring authors,
[20:08]and that is fabulous.
[20:09]Would you have anything else aside from basically
[20:12]keep putting things out there and letting
[20:14]the right people find it when they need it?
[20:16]Yeah, you know, that actually,
[20:18]that pretty much sums my advice, sums up my advice
[20:21]is that you don't need permission to be a writer,
[20:24]you don't need permission to be, and that the validation
[20:28]of, I think, oftentimes for me,
[20:30]I was always looking for what is going to make me a real writer.
[20:33]What job am I going to get?
[20:35]Who's going to see it?
[20:36]Is it, do I have to have a published book in order to feel real and authentic?
[20:41]And it's actually so much more about,
[20:44]I feel like a real writer when I'm writing stuff that I like,
[20:47]and no one could see it.
[20:48]You know, it's like, if we be while our bridge is this amazing writer,
[20:51]she did free bag and killing Eve,
[20:53]she's a television writer.
[20:54]She always says that she writes for her one best friend.
[20:57]She just wants to make her one best friend laugh, and that's it.
[21:00]And she ended up making everybody laugh and is this incredible writer,
[21:04]but I think the pressure of thinking of an audience
[21:07]and people who are going to deem your work important
[21:10]can actually be the killer of creativity.
[21:12]And so it's like, just either right for your best friend or right for yourself
[21:16]and take that pressure off.
[21:18]And then whatever happens happens,
[21:20]if it goes out into the world and people like it, great.
[21:23]If it doesn't, I often think that the time of anonymity
[21:27]is the best time to be a writer,
[21:29]because you can fail in the dark by yourself with no one watching.
[21:34]So enjoy the time before the time where people are looking.
[21:40]Failure is in the dark.
[21:41]Yes.
[21:43]The next book I read is for inspiration.
[21:48]In this inspiration, in your closet, with all it's up.
[21:52]Well, Ashley, thank you.
[21:53]Thanks so much for coming on mom's no time to read books.
[21:55]Thanks for this beautiful book, which just makes me smile whenever I see it.
[22:00]And I'm going to leave out on my coffee table, even though it's tiny and adorable.
[22:04]Because it's exactly what it's for.
[22:06]Yeah, that's good.
[22:07]It's for your coffee day.
[22:08]I made it specifically when I was designing it.
[22:10]I like to carry my books with me all around and backpacks and stuff.
[22:14]And it's like, I want it to be hard enough that it didn't get bent
[22:17]and that you could fit it into your purse, into your locker,
[22:19]or right next to you by your coffee table.
[22:21]So thank you so much for having me.
[22:23]It was great talking with you.
[22:24]Great talking to you, too.
[22:26]Right.
[22:26]I actually.
[22:28]Thanks so much to be Keeper's Natural for helping me through a sick day
[22:32]with the amazing cough syrup and cough spray.
[22:36]Throw a spray that you have and thanks for helping all my listeners.
[22:39]Be keepersnaturals.com slash no time promo code no time.
[22:44]Thanks for listening to this episode of mom's don't have time to read books.
[22:48]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at zippyowens and at mom's don't have time to read books.
[22:53]Also sign up for my newsletter at zippyowens.com and sign up for my virtual book club
[22:57]and meet lots of authors on zoom every other week.
[23:00]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at texture sound for the sound editing.
[23:03]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and now
[23:07]trim music.