Patricia Tallman – Bablyon 5! Army of Darkness! Night of the Living Dead!

Pat Tallman – Interview

[00:00:00] Melissa: this is spoiler country and I’m Alyssa searcher. You may know my next guests from things like Babylon five and night of the living dead, the lovely and talented actress. Patricia Tolman. Welcome to the

Patricia Tallman: show. Thanks Melissa. That’s very sweet.

Melissa: Thanks for being here tonight. My

Patricia Tallman: pleasure.

Melissa: How are things going for you right

Patricia Tallman: now?

Oh, I, I have been very frustrated challenged technologically and I think I’m a little fed up with With, you know, being stuck in this pandemic, like just like everybody else. We’re all kind of dealing with that, I think. But I am also really grateful for the things like just some of the basics that we have now, like computers and being able to get on and, and do a show like this.

That’s that’s

Melissa: pretty awesome. Yeah. That’s great. We were, yeah, we were talking about that just a minute ago. And I thought that was such a cool You know, interesting point that I never really thought about. And you, you said, [00:01:00] you know, what, if this had happened, you know, 10, 15 years ago, and when we didn’t have all this technology, right.

I mean, I would just be, I can’t even imagine.

Patricia Tallman: I know, I mean, 10, I’m not sure how long zoom has been in business. I’ve been using zoom for a very long time, but yeah. Still, even back then 10, even 10 years ago, there wouldn’t have been this capability. And we would have really felt very isolated, very isolated.

We wouldn’t have had the, the entertainment online that we have now.  And a lot of ability just to connect and see each other. So I think it would have been a lot harder on folks when you look back and they were talking about, sometimes this is being compared to the pandemic just before world war one, right?

The Spanish flu and and how, how people reacted similarly. Like they didn’t want to wear masks and they didn’t want to socially isolate, but can, you know, part of that was because they didn’t have a way to communicate,

Melissa: you know,

Patricia Tallman: physically. So, I mean, I looked at [00:02:00] that as there is no excuse for us to not stay safe and to keep each other safe because we do have other tools, but, you know, I completely also understand how frustrating these times are.

However, I, I think I know that I would be so devastated if I gave somebody else. COVID. Yeah. I, I just don’t want to live with that deep of a heartbreak regret, you know, to cause somebody else

Melissa: serious. I mean, I think that’s why that that’s been my main concern too, is it’s not obviously protecting myself and my family, but also, you know, not wanting to you know, give it to someone else because we know that there are people that have a, some asymptomatic.

So you just. You don’t know. And I would, yeah, I would be devastated if, if I thought that that would have happened. And then when you have elderly parents and you know, people in your community that are elderly or with pre-existing conditions, you know, you just put it on like, it’s, it’s not that hard.

I don’t think, but. Right.

Patricia Tallman: I agree. I agree. And when you [00:03:00] consider how other people have to wear masks on a regular basis, like doctors and nurses and, you know, they, they muddle through somehow you know, every day always. So my brother’s a doctor and, you know, I think it’s it is a small price to play. I, I, it is very uncomfortable for some folks, but I honestly think that it’s It’s it’s become more than that.

It’s it became sort of some sort of a political statement for some reason. And that’s unfortunate because it really isn’t. Politically motivated it really, and truly is devastating for people who get sick and then these secondary infections and problems that show up that you just can’t predict either.

So yeah, stay safe out there. Kids, please stay safe, be good, safe, and healthy. And then we can get together. So we can go to

Melissa: conventions again. Yay. Oh my gosh. I miss conventions.

Patricia Tallman: Oh no, I miss my people. I miss traveling. It’s it’s really frustrating. And and because I’m so [00:04:00] heavily dependent as, as are many of us now on technology, when it starts to go South, Holy crap, my mind.

Melissa: And it’s like, what do you do now? Before COVID, were you doing any like comic cons? The comic con circuit as far as like from Avalon five or star Trek?

Patricia Tallman: Yeah, that’s a good question. I made it a regular practice to get to like two conventions a year. I don’t do a ton. I don’t do like, you know, like some of my friends are, wow, I’m really impressed, but I, I do value my My community, you know I happen to have this really odd career that is so scifi and horror centric.

It’s rather odd. And, and so I, I, I ended up starting and conventions back at 1990 because of night of living dead and, you know, the heart people hardly even talked about them then. So I, you know, I walked into that world just [00:05:00] going whoosh. Right. It was a horror con, which Melissa, I don’t know if you’ve been to horror cons there they’re very different than, than Saifai based conventions.

And it was, it was quite an eye opener. I loved it. It was called Magnum Opus con. It’s not an existence anymore. It was out in Georgia and kind of the Backwoods in this big resort area. It was very beautiful. But the convention itself was kind of like this massive party convention. And I, one of the things I loved about it and I got guys, I’m not trying to, I’m not judging.

I’m, I’m completely celebrating this there. It didn’t matter what you look like that weekend. You got laid. So I thought that was great,

but he had so much fun and, and I’d get into an elevator. And I, when I started and I still [00:06:00] do, when I do go to conventions, I kind of dress up because I feel like, well, you’re paying me to, to see me and I better show up and put my best foot forward here. So I, I would bring nice outfits and I’m in the elevator.

And I, these, this couple would get on one. Guy’s wearing all chain mail and nothing else. You know, soup like meal C is see-through by the way, ladies dressed similarly, maybe with some free bits added, you know, and I’m just like, Oh, hello

Melissa: work. Now that sounds a lot different than comic con right.

Patricia Tallman: Comic con is a very special animal. The San Diego Comic-Con is a very special experience that I recommend everybody should do

Melissa: comic con at least once. Yeah, that is my goal to get to San Diego. I’ve done the Seattle comic con Emerald city, which I also highly recommend.

I think it’s ranked number two actually after San Diego. Yeah, no,

Patricia Tallman: it is huge. It is San Diego is a, yeah, it is kind of one of those things. You, [00:07:00] you should try it just to say you’ve been, and then you can decide if it’s your cup of tea or not. It is. Unusual in that the entire city of San Diego becomes Comicon.

Yeah. So I know that Atlanta can get taken over by dragon con, et cetera, but this is, this is very special. It’s very

Melissa: different. Yeah. Well, I’ll definitely have to go to a horror con now. Cause that’s. Sounds like quiet experience.

Patricia Tallman: I mean, I can tell you stories, but I, I don’t know. I mean that one no longer is we’re going sadly, but I, yeah, I don’t know.

I call them kind of party cons and then you. Add in the kind of party you want to.

Melissa: Yeah. Right.

Patricia Tallman: Pretty fabulous.

Melissa: And I know there’s a lot of specialized cons now, too, where like, for example, I went to H it was like a specific walking dead convention. Right. And then randomly, they had half the cast of sons of anarchy there, which I thought was interesting.

Cause they more different [00:08:00] was fine.

Patricia Tallman: Have you been to a convention where they all of a sudden have like a bunch of professional wrestlers and PayPal Playboy bunnies. You’re like, Oh, okay, cool. Just like, kind of again, unrelated, but also cool. So that’s pretty fun.

Melissa: It’s like, they just throw stuff in. Cause they’re like, okay, we need to attract this type of audience as well.

So let’s just add this in and see what happens.

Patricia Tallman: That’s right. That’s right. Exactly. And that is a good idea. It’s a great idea. I, I met people because after a while, you know, Doing your table and doing your thing, you start to meet the other folks, sitting at their table, signing autographs. Like it’s like, what are you doing?

Who are you by the way, this is kind of fun. And we get to know each other and hang out a little bit. And yeah, I love

Melissa: that. Yeah. That is the best part. Getting to meet new friends. Essentially, I did a book con a few years ago and it was the romance, but con and I was the [00:09:00] only fantasy author there. And it was so great and so different, you know, because you have these diehard romance sands that are there and they’re just, you know, they’ve got their goodie bags and they’re literally just, you know, buying up every book, they can get their hands on, but I met a lot of really cool authors that I’m still friends with.

That

Patricia Tallman: is so sweet. I love hearing that. I did. Let me just, I’m going to name drop because I thought this was hilarious at San Diego. Comic-Con up in the sales pavilion is where you sign autographs and you don’t get it table for the whole weekend. At San Diego comic, you, you get a table for four hours.

Wow. You can, you can request a table for each day of the convention and you may or may not get it, but, and they give you your time slots and you don’t Oh, you can request. But they don’t always, they’re not always able to accommodate that. Anyway, I ended up with my table and my chair was back to back with George RR, Martin, who, and I thought I have no idea how I got this lucky because of course his line is [00:10:00] massive and hours long and they just.

People would just happen to kind of wander by my table and got loud. Who are you?

Oh, okay, cool. That’s cool. You know, it’s really fun.

Melissa: Very lucky, bud, did you chat with him at all? I did.

Patricia Tallman: And he gave me a book, actually. He was really sweet. I thought you were so nice compared to how it mean your characters

Melissa: are. Right? I mean,

Patricia Tallman: he’s very sweet. I felt the same way. Yes. I met Stephen King back in the day and he was another one, you know, writing these, these.

Oh my God, these intensely gross and scary books. And Oh, he’s so fucking talented. And, and the nicest man, the nicest guy, like couldn’t have been kinder it’s I just cracked up. Wow. You are so not. The profile here,

Melissa: we store all [00:11:00] this dark stuff in our brains, but then we’re actually just very nice.

There

Patricia Tallman: you go. You get it out one way or the other George Romero is the same way. Just the big Teddy, Teddy, Teddy bear of a guy. How I met Stephen King. He’s he’s really good friends with Stephen King.

Melissa: Oh, wow. Yeah. And I am going to ask you about George Romero because I am a super fan of his, all of his films.

Yes. But I definitely want to ask you, so, because you know, most of your roles have been in the horror scifi genre, as you mentioned. Is that something that just happened coincidentally, or were you just drawn to those types of roles?

Patricia Tallman: Well I’m going to tell you my story. Story of this because I have a certain belief as to why it happened and and people can make their own judgements.

I, I started off as a young kid, young girl. I played, I had Barbie dolls as, as we mostly did back in those sixties, in the seventies. And I used to play with my cousin star Trek and dark [00:12:00] shadows. So we would dress our Barbies up in our, I had fancy with the twist and turn. Waist and bendable arms and legs.

And she would be like the heroin. And then the Barbie would always, almost always be the bad guy. And I made the Barbie, the clang on, you know, I’d make the Barbie, the bad witch. And we just had the, we just lived in our imaginations and used our dolls to act out these intense storylines. We didn’t follow the storylines from the shows we made up our own.

We could take the characters and then make them up. And then we also then gave up on the dolls and just. Would play act ourselves, you know? So I kind of, when I started to really look at that, I thought, I don’t think there’s any mistake here. First of all, I became an actor and second, I ended up in scifi and horror.

I mean, that was such a focal point of my childhood. So that’s that’s I think it was the universe going, Oh, you, you love this. Okay, cool. [00:13:00] You know, we’ll just

Melissa: go in it. Yeah, that’s right. That’s awesome. Well, those are two of my favorite genres, you know, and there’s just so many possibilities and things that you can explore with it, you know what you know, since we, we were mentioning Georgia marrow, what was that like, you know, working with him and and working, you know, with his, you know, scripts and his direction.

Patricia Tallman: Oh, yeah. Good question. I started in 1980, I was fresh out of college, 21 years old. First time I was ever in front of a camera. And this was a George Romero’s movie called night writers, which was a departure for him. It was a more fantasy. It was. It was following a Renaissance fair where the Knights Joe’s job posted on motorcycles rather than horses.

And they were led by ed Harris’s character, King, Billy and King, Billy. Kimberly was a very spiritual guy. And a lot of mystical things kind of happened. There was [00:14:00] a Merlin character and Lancelot type character. It was really an interesting. Script. I was thrilled to get the part. I couldn’t believe I got the part.

And George couldn’t have been more kind. He, he was very empowering and, and what I mean by that is he, he gave me the confidence. To, to try things on my own. He always made me feel like I, he respected I’m 21, right. He made me feel like I was respected. And and, and that my opinion mattered. And I would come to him with ideas, some of which he’d shoot down.

And some that he said, Let’s try that, you know? So I’m very, yeah, I am, I am very excited about the, my contribution to the film and the thing is that that did, and it does for any actor in any movie or television show, when you, when you’re empowered to use your ideas and you bring something to the script and then [00:15:00] you’re allowed to, you know, actually use it in the scene, you feel like you’re really part of the creative process as opposed to being a hired piece of meat, you know, Right.

Honestly, and I, so I made a, made a couple of little weeds suggestions that, that, that I am even now to this day, when I watched the film night writers, I get, I I’m really excited to see that. That’s a choice of mine playing out.

Melissa: That’s all. Yeah. Yeah. And especially because you know, the industry has changed so much, so especially when those films were being made you know, women weren’t taken as seriously.

So, you know, and to have that kind of respect on set, that must’ve been so refreshing for you.

Patricia Tallman: Oh my goodness. And you know, it’s so interesting that we’re talking today. I would my CoStar and I living dead William Butler. Billy B he, he just posted an article that was a pretty flattering article on the 1990 version of Nye living dead.

However, you know, and it breaks it down into [00:16:00] paragraphs. Like why not living dead in 1990 is a good movie basically. And they come to the paragraph about Barbara and me and they, they completely dismiss. My contribution to the film they’re there. They gave George credit for the writing as they should, you know, making Savini for making her into you know, a Sigourney Weaver type character.

And they talk about me being a stunt person. Now, when I was cast in that movie, I had done some stunts, but. Tom Savini met me when I was an actor. Stunt work had never crossed my mind. I was in a conservatory for acting and I had been professionally getting paid as an actress since I was 15 years old. So the idea that night of living dead now is 1990.

I was 30 years old and I’m being dismissed by this article. And so I read it today. I, I, I sent it off to my social media team and I said, do you know what let’s, let’s use this and let me riff on it. Because, yeah, let’s riff [00:17:00] because it is definitely a misogynistic article though. Everybody else gets total credit for their characters as they should, you know?

Right. They don’t mention Katie Finneran at all and they don’t mention McGee Anderson at all. And they, they, they denigrate me to being a stuntwoman Savina discovered. Wow. Yeah. I just was like, Oh fuck. You

Melissa: know, that’s appalling, especially. I mean, there’s no excuse for it any more. I mean, here’s the thing.

I was like, you were such a big part of that and the fact that they, that there’s still an article that would just dismiss, you know, your role in that that’s I think I

Patricia Tallman: know. I just like, I was so surprised now

Melissa: it’s hard to watch things to back, right. Let’s say you know, documentaries or old television clips of things.

And I don’t know if you find yourself, like I do cringing at the way, like when women were interviewed, you know, [00:18:00] let’s say by ed McMahon or Johnny Carson or whoever, you know, No, no disrespect to them by any means, but the, just the language and the questions that are asked to women versus what men are asked is just appalling.

Patricia Tallman: I someone very close to me off and says, well, that was the times, you know what I mean? And that I, I CA I’m having the hardest time explaining to him while that why that doesn’t matter, because when I was. Living in back in those times, that was the time men can get away with that stuff. It were, you know, women were supposedly not to expect more than that women, by the way, did expect more than that.

Women wanted to have more than that. Women’s felt very bad about being treated the way they were treated, but we, we didn’t have any recourse. The way we do now we can call it out now and people understand when you’re calling it out back then, if you tried to call it out, you would get fired, you know, to get put down and get made [00:19:00] fun of, and it doesn’t, it doesn’t help to hear.

Oh, well those were the times, you know? No, sorry. Yeah, but still it stuck then too, by the way, you know,

Melissa: I don’t know. And if you did speak up, you know, you were labeled as a bitch or difficult to work with men did it. And it was like, Oh, they’re just being men. You know, there’s role of being in charge and yeah, no women were just like, Oh, you know, you’re on your period or you’re, you know, whatever.

And it’s just, I mean, they still do that today. Like, yeah, but like you said, we have a way more recourse now and, and support, you know for, for speaking up, which is great, but yeah, it took too long, I think.

Patricia Tallman: Oh wait, way too long. We’re still we’re we’re still, you know, so far from. Being where we should be considering everything.

But I think now we really know it, you know, before the blinkers were on, but these past four years have opened everybody’s eyes, whether you like it or not, or you agree with it or not, the cat, the cat is out of the [00:20:00] bag. And I don’t, I don’t think there’s any putting it back in.

Melissa: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, speaking of that, I know you worked on the set of angel as an, you were stunt double on angel.

I

Patricia Tallman: wasn’t, you know, I, that is what I try. I am DB is such a crazy system because it credits me with being on angel. I was never on angel. I would have loved to have been on angel and I have told them I’ve sent in the tickets saying, you know, trying to correct the CMDB. And they, they, they also insist I was on JAG.

I was not on Jack.

And there’s so much they haven’t put on there that I have done. So I just give up, I gave up. Yeah.

Melissa: And I th I think the angel thing, it might be on your Wikipedia page as well. Oh, fuck. So they probably got that from my MTV. And that’s, you know, that’s a lesson for you know, the internet, you know, and what we were talking about earlier about technology, because it can be a good thing.

It also could be a horrible thing because there’s so much false [00:21:00] information out there. And, and when I do interview people, I’m always like, Especially if it’s something obscure, I’m like, Ooh, is this true or not? I just want to make sure before we launch into a, you know, a dialogue about it, but yeah, there a lot of that out there where there’s so much fake information,

Patricia Tallman: it’s true.

It’s true. And then it’s really hard to correct. I was somebody had Put my age down as actually bringing me down, like bringing me younger, like by 10 years. And then I said, you know, that’s actually not true. You know, at the time I was, you know, 10 years, I don’t know what it was now. I’m 63 every and I talk about it and I are not

Melissa: fixed.

Patricia Tallman: I would not lie, but I couldn’t get them to correct the page. It was just okay, fine. Well, whatever, you know, I, I, and now it’s pretty, now it has caught up. I think everything I’ve seen, but I didn’t catch that angel thing. I’ll have to go look at it anyway, but I, you know, on some level I just, I just give up and I hope that people.

You know, bother too. [00:22:00] If you’re really interested in me, then I hope people bother to actually join up on my social media page or sign up for my newsletters. And, and I try to just put a lot of value out there. I’m not someone who’s talking about myself, I’m sharing other things. And you know, I really, I really want to contribute, not just.

Suck up space. I’m really trying to give things to people. So I would hope that people would come and find me. And you can, you can ask me anything. I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you the truth, whether you want to hear it or not.

Melissa: Lovely. Yeah. And I definitely want to ask about that because you know, I.

I’ve seen your YouTube page and and your Twitter page, and it’s really well organized and easy. There’s so much good information, true information about on, on those. And I love for you to tell me and our listeners more about your, you know, magical living.

Patricia Tallman: Oh, yeah. So this, well, this is [00:23:00] really interesting to me in a, and I, I share it with my people because it’s a, it’s a work in progress.

It’s been really organic and like many people, you know, times change. And then all of a sudden you realize, Oh, I got to find another way of making a living. What am I going to do? And this, you know, obviously COVID kicked that into high gear for millions of people. Luckily in a way I’d already been on that path of trying to, I have to recreate and recreate and recreate.

And what I had done was I had started a travel business. Which I love. And my, my FA my, my love of travel has to do with transformational travel. And what I mean by that is that it going with the intention of opening up your life a little bit, having more of an adventure, bringing the magic back into your life.

And so I picked stuff. Yeah. That’s that to me is super fun. Like the stuff I nerd out on, whether it’s Harry Potter or Lord of the rings, or, you know something. Yeah. Charles Dickinson scary and spooky London is just one layer after another fantastic [00:24:00] notes. And so I think of how do I, how do I. I bring that to people and show them a good time.

And one of my mutant powers is, is is taking care of people and, and surprising folks in wonderful ways. So I had been since 2015, putting together trips, taking people on awesome journeys, helping them to push outside their comfort zone a little bit and try something new and, you know, experiment with physically, maybe trying something new, like snorkeling or something.

Scuba diving or hiking on lava, you know, I mean, I don’t mean to have hot lava obviously, but that was a Hawaii trip. And then, you know I had just run my most successful by biggest trip ever, which was to New Zealand. It was the, it was the end of 2019. And we did the entire country of New Zealand North to South and following the Lord of the rings around.

And it was so awesome. And my, my note now my fiance and I were in Scotland in 2020 in [00:25:00] March and April when the shutdown happened and we got, we got stuck in Scotland. Oh, poor us. And plants will be trapped. Right. I know it, it was, I can’t even tell you how magical it was because we actually ended up staying in There’s this castle in Scotland that had apartments in the walls of the castle, in the Highlands of Scotland.

And we stayed in one of those apartments because everybody had canceled. And so we were just like, Oh, can we stay here? They were like, sure. And they gave us a really good deal. I mean, it couldn’t have been any more insanely magical. It was just so beautiful half. But my, you know, here I’m running a travel business and I had to, we finally get home in April.

It’s like, I gotta, I gotta come up with a whole new business. This, this COVID thing is not going to be resolved for a year or two. And it takes me a year to put together a trip and market it. So people take the time off of work and plan the money and all of that. So I got to find a new, I got to make a new business in about 10 [00:26:00] days.

I created that I am answering your question. This is, this is all of this. I kind of wanted to talk about tonight. So sorry. So I created  events and I called it B five events because I thought it will be pretty instantaneously recognizable as having to do with science fiction and Babylon five, et cetera.

It will identify back to me. And I never meant for it to be like a permanent name. Okay, but I thought I need to, I need to put up something fast and that URL was available. And, and now that’s, that’s what I’ve been doing is, is having an online event every month inviting guests in and doing a big, doing a big thing.

And it’s, it’s also based around personal development and. And just, you know, how do you live your best life? What do you do? And asking those kinds of questions of folks that we, you know, that we respect. And we want to hear more from the cast of Babylon five and you know, I had an inner visitor in Alexander city gone.

I had Armand Timmerman, Tim Russ. Know, I just want to keep reaching out to the [00:27:00] Saifai community and the har community, Billy Butler. And I did it. Did something and Tony Todd showed up, you know, and things like that, just to kind of keep it, it was super fun putting it together so that we can have these online conversations and, and keep our community energized and feeling a little more sane because the, this is tough stuff right now.

And I, I love zoom because we can see each other and we can talk. I started a Patrion page just so we can hang out. I mean, I’m really trying to. To, to embrace the community and help people feel like, you know, there are alternatives and we’re okay. We’re just, we’re all in this together. And we’re going to get through it.

And maybe now, you know, you don’t have to spend a kajillion dollars traveling to a place you can actually get online and. And, and meet up with people and then take the pressure off, you know sure. Do the trips when you want to, but you also have an alternative. So anyway, the magical living magic of living, what, what I came up with [00:28:00] when I was, when I did the first event was I felt like this.

I felt like I was giving birth. It was super uncomfortable and frustrating. And, but what was, but something wanted to come through and it had to do with teaching workshops and classes, these one B five events, the event thing too, that the travel is I’m going to keep doing that. That’s going to come back.

That’s great. Community is four. So there’s these four pillars of my, my business, right. And what do I stand for? You know? And it’s really has to do with bringing the magic back in your life. So that’s why we’re calling it. I’m calling, I’m using the Royal we kids there’s no, there’s no wheat. It’s me. That’s like magical living seems to be like It seems like a more fun.

Yeah. I want it to be fun. I want to bring the ah,

Melissa: back in. Are you yeah. Are you doing so you have guests on, like you said, you know, Babylon five cast you’re talking about really cool fandoms. Are you doing [00:29:00] anything? Cause when I think of magical living, I start thinking almost you know, like bettering yourself.

Self-care are you like Bert Bernay Brown type of stuff, you know, are you doing things like that where you’re you know, not like a Ted talk, but you know, just sort of. Helping people reach out to, to get more self care in their life, whether that’s

Patricia Tallman: absolutely self care is a huge part of it, but it’s self-awareness too, you know, I talk a lot about mindfulness with my group.

We have my Patrion group, we have we have a weekly morning meditation on Mondays. It’s actually evening in the UK. We have a book club and that’s all it’s personal development books. And it, yeah, cause to me that’s the key to life. And then I use techniques that, to me feel like magic. I had a, I had a really bad episode in, in 2011, 2012.

I, and, and I ended up now, what do you call that? Like a. Not a psychotic break, but it kind of was okay. I had a nervous breakdown or the old terms and it just lost. I lost my shit for, for a while [00:30:00] and I was, I couldn’t do anything. And I had to really rebuild my life. So w. All of that was actually good news.

I think there is, there is a real benefit to hitting bottom really hard because you have to be humble and to rebuild from there. You just go, okay. I obviously don’t know anything because my best effort got me here. He’s down in the mud at the bottom of a pit. So. I was willing to listen. I was willing to take the coaching.

I was willing to learn, you know, I, I was really, really baby, baby, baby steps, wobbly trying to figure it out. And so I’ve taken, I’ve taken all the things that I’ve tried since that time and, and distilled it down to the shit that actually worked for me. I mean, I take it, you know, other people have other things, but I, I, I.

I am. I’m really open to anybody doing whatever they feel they need, but I’m, I’m sharing what I think works. And I start [00:31:00] with the basics, which is starting to, to, to get out of your brain and to really listen to your instincts. And how do you do that? How do you listen to your higher self speaking to you?

I’m not, I I’m not at all religious, but I feel like I’m spiritual, you know, I believe. Yeah, we’re a, tardus, you know, we’re much bigger on the inside. So how do you connect to all that inner wisdom? That’s my thing now, how do you listen to those? And then how do you know what the next right step is?

Melissa: Absolutely. And like you said, everybody has to find that. Sort of path, you know, for what works for them. And I think, I think a lot of people, whether they you know, have come to terms with it or not struggle with some form of, you know, either mental illness or anxiety or just, you know, high levels of stress.

And I think that, you know, social media unfortunately has added a bunch more. You know, illnesses to the, to the mix because of the long long-term effects. Yeah. So, you know, I think it’s important [00:32:00] to, to meditate and, you know, I’ll do like taro cards, you know, or whatever, to, to kind of clear my mind and, and things like that.

But yeah. How do you, you know, do you have people that come to you and say like, you know, social media is just, you know, cause cause like me good for one thing, obviously if you’re trying to build a brand and you’re trying to get your message out there, it’s great. But for marketing, it’s very toxic. You know, with cancel culture and and politics and all that, you know, Yeti stuff.

So, you know, do you have people come to you? And they’re like, how do I, you know, how do I deal

Patricia Tallman: with this? Yeah, I think what, what my approach is at first is, is to learn to Now, some people can’t even start meditating right away. So there’s, there’s ways that you can actively, if you will, still your mind.

So we try to, we try to do that kind of thing together and news visualization towards what you really. Want in your life. And then we talk about habits. And one of the most important habit is what are you [00:33:00] doing? First thing in the morning or the first part of your day. And this has to be adjustable for everybody and everybody’s lifestyle, but there’s, there are certain things.

That you can control and, and obviously not picking up your phone. First thing, when you wake up, get out of bed, don’t look at your phone and, and, and change that right away. It’s, it’s there’s all kinds of ways you can change it. And I will be happy to help, you know, how do you figure out how to do that?

But I think w looking at our habits, and then you look at. Where you want to go or who you want to be. And then you need to be really honest about what habits you need to change. You know what I mean? And get support around that. I think that people for some reason, and I did it too, that, that had a lot of shame around not being able to do it myself or, you know, how many times I’ve tried to lose weight and I couldn’t do it or whatever it is.

Do you know how hard I’ve tried to change this habit? And I just fucking give up now because I can’t. Okay. I get it. And you know, we, [00:34:00] there are ways to change it, but you just, you’ve been trying to do it by yourself. You just maybe need a little community around that where people are really trying to change these habits.

And habits can take a long time to change, but it’s possible of course possible. And keeping that in front of your head and realizing that everybody is in this struggle together, you’re not alone. You’re not you’re not a loser. You’re not, you know, any in any way people put people, put themselves in boxes.

And that’s the other thing. I try to identify with somebody and get it, get it. Right away. That is something we’re going to take off the plate. That’s not on the table anymore. Get yourself out of that box. I mean, how many people do see celebrating something like being an introvert to me, that’s a very dangerous box.

Okay. Identifying yourself as, as anything like that. I, I, I celebrate. Looking at how to take care of [00:35:00] yourself. And if, if seeing that you share a lot of these introverted traits, so that means you need to have more, do I need to have some alone time to recharge? Fantastic. But I’m telling you something. So do extroverts, everybody needs a lone time.

So stop thinking that you’re special because you need a long time. You’re special in a good way because you’re you, but it’s not because you were an

Melissa: introvert. Yeah. Well, let me ask you about that then. Cause I’m curious. Do you think that, you know, the self-proclaimed introverts, do you think that they, and obviously we’re not doctors here, which just, you know, Oh, we’re just talking,

Patricia Tallman: we’re just talking about the label

Melissa: box with social anxiety.

Patricia Tallman: Okay. Absolutely. So here’s how. Social anxiety. It can look like a lot of different things, can’t it? So [00:36:00] a lot of people will abuse alcohol. That was me. I will do that. I would drink like three glasses of wine just to get through the first hour of a party. And then I would forget while I was at the party and did the rest of the party, it would be a blur.

Right? So that I changed pretty quickly once I, I got into my forties, but it took me a while to, to really understand. Stand that, that, that I wasn’t drinking because it was a party I was drinking because I was very anxious and feeling judged and all the, you know, all the things we tell ourselves is going better going on.

Okay. And then I started going, why am I going to these parties?

Melissa: Why am I doing

Patricia Tallman: to myself? Why am I doing exactly. Exactly. So it really, if we just start to question it, it can get into deeper and deeper conversations about what makes you happy. Now, I don’t know any introvert. Well, who doesn’t like to sit with their best friend and have a nice meal.

Absolutely. So just to, you know, but to say here’s what, here’s, what happens this week. We have something that we [00:37:00] tell the universe we put out there, you’re telling yourself, you’re telling your inner self, or you talk to yourself, right. Who’s listening. You are, you’re always listening. What’d I say herself?

Oh my goodness. Things I discovered, I was saying to myself, I would never say that to anyone else ever. I would never have treated anyone else the way I was treating myself. And when I started to uncover that, I’m like, well, no wonder. Oh, no wonder I was a, you know, a bag of toys. It was, it was a mess in my head.

And so I don’t want to think, tell, tell introverts I’m begging on you, but I want you to, I want everybody to understand that everything you want in life comes from somebody else. What do I mean by that? If I have I have people who say they like animals better than people. I said, well, good luck with that.

Don’t get me wrong. I have a house full of animals and my animals are my babies, but. Everything that I want comes from other people, the food I buy in the grocery store. Someone’s got to put it there. Yeah. Someone had to create it. [00:38:00] Someone’s got to pay me for what I do so I can pay for the groceries. I’m going to get the store.

Somebody makes the clothes that I wear. Somebody is a bank teller. And that helps me with those transactions. You can’t do anything in modern life. Without somebody else. So let’s just admit that we, and stop saying you hate other people because that’s telling the universe, you’re listening to how you’re talking.

You’re telling yourself you hate other people. Well, yeah. How productive,

Melissa: you know, it’s also. I believe in the law of attraction. So I think that your point, yeah, whatever you’re putting out, whether it’s, whether you’re saying it to yourself, or you’re saying it out loud, it’s an energy that you’re projecting.

And then I feel like it mag, you know, magnetically comes back to you and, you know, the people that have you start out having a bad day because you know, you have a taillight out or something like that. And instead of like letting it go and [00:39:00] saying, okay, this is just one incident. People tend to feed on that.

And, and so you sort of, yeah,

Patricia Tallman: I mean, that’s a, you know, go right there and

Melissa: then the rest of your day is going to be ruined because your job is now pulling that negative energy with you for the whole day. But

Patricia Tallman: yeah, it’s a self fulfilling prophecy. I mean, we do it anyway. Yeah, yeah. I, that is such an offense.

It’s such a fantastic topic. So I, so I just want to put it out there that if, if. If, if you feel like you’re, you’re, you’re struggling with other people, there’s a deeper conversation TAF. It’s not that you’re not having trouble. It’s that there, there is a really effective conversation to have to help you unravel that.

And then, and then find a way. To be in the world. That’s joyful that, and then embraces the people you want to be close to. You know, we’re, we’re [00:40:00] social animals, none of us thrive in isolation. So, so let’s just keep that in mind. Shall we? And, and let’s not. Push all the good away you’re pushing all of humanity away, some of those big blanket statements.

And then you wonder why you can’t find the perfect lover or you’re so lonely, you know, I get it, I get it. And I, you know, I have, I have. I have a foot in a lot of different boxes, you know, I’m no one would ever say I’m an introvert, but I have introvert times. I have, I can’t answer the phone on the first ring.

I have to let it go to voicemail. And then I slowly have to approach my phone and decide when I, when I can make that phone call, I’ve got my own shit kids. I completely admit to it.

Melissa: I am the same way. I’m the same way, unless it’s my mom or my daughter or my sister. Right, right. No offense to anyone else, but that’s just that’s family and you never know if there’s something wrong or an emergency or whatever, but unless it’s those three, I literally, every [00:41:00] everybody else you know, I, I do let it go to voicemail just because I’m usually in the middle of something, whether it be a deep thought process or whatever.

And so yeah, you don’t, you

Patricia Tallman: want to, I think that’s a very wise use of your time too. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. No, no,

Melissa: no, totally. And I think it’s just important. Sometimes you have to kind of listen to. Yeah, listen to the voicemail first and decide, okay, is this something I can address right now? Or do I need more time to get back to them later because it’s going to be a longer conversation.

And I think that’s what we want to get

Patricia Tallman: that time. That is okay. I do it because I just, my nerves are shattered.

Melissa: Yeah.

Patricia Tallman: I went, went through, you know, when I did that, that nervous breakdown thing, there was a lot of elements to that. And so part of me is just, has never been the same. So. What I, what I’m doing, what I do is I kind of mitigate the anxiety.

I’ve, I’ve had two or three really super tough days. So I, I get it. I want everyone to understand that again, I’m not bagging on it. I am. I’m just. [00:42:00] Asking you to to open up a little bit around what’s going on with you, because if, when you close off other people, you’re closing off some of the best aspects of life from coming to you and that breaks my heart.

So there’s ways of managing community there’s ways of, of, of being with others. There’s ways to, to go out and celebrate in groups that will be supportive to you. And your comfort zone, if you will allow that to happen. And, and yeah, you may be somebody who comes early to a party and leaps early, but you still went to a party, you know, you still saw your friends.

So let’s, let’s just find the possibilities instead of shutting down all avenues. Yeah. That’s my point. That’s what

Melissa: kind of reminds me of that film.  With Jim Carrey, it was called yes. Yeah. Yeah. You know where, you know, it was an extreme obviously, cause it was Jim Carrey movie, but you know, that kind of a thing, you know of like, you know, it’s, it’s [00:43:00] okay to say no.

And actually I think more people don’t say no enough and we tend to let ourselves get pressured into social situations or obligations that maybe we didn’t do, but we just don’t want the person to think bad of us. Right. Cause we’re all I know. I was critical. You know, but you

Patricia Tallman: have they insight. Oh, I’m sorry.

Go ahead. Finish

Melissa: time. I think it’s important too. When I turned I’m 41, almost 42. And when I turned 30, I decided I was going to start doing things that were kind of like off the wall. Like. You know that maybe I wouldn’t have, you know, done in my twenties because I was too embarrassed or something like that and nothing crazy, but just, just things that were outside my comfort zone, like going to a comic con that’s when I started getting into comic con and comics you know, and doing silly things, you know or taking a trip on this.

At the moment without having to like plan it down to the, to the detail. And I think that’s so important that, you know, you learn when to say no when you’re feeling like that anxiety and your God about it, but then also saying yes to things so that you can have new [00:44:00] experiences,

Patricia Tallman: you such a fine balance, you know?

And. I think that it’s really, you said is exactly right. You want to balance things out. You want to mitigate the stuff that, that is really hard for you to do, but not shut yourself off from life entirely. And that’s, that’s really my point, like a Comicon you know, there’s times you just don’t go down to the main floor cause you know, it’s going to be, it is going to be so packed with humanity that could re that would set me off, you know?

So I, I just, I go in the off hours early and late, and then, and things like that. But you, you, you find your way of, of, of, of managing it. It’s, it’s just that I have so many people in my life who want this or that, but then say, say the, the opposite to themselves. And then they’re just, it just breaks my heart.

So I think what I loved about what you were saying is that you bothered to look deeper. In yourself to say, ah, okay, what do I need to do here? I know I’m going to need to [00:45:00] mitigate this so that I can still do the fun thing or, Oh gee, why am I? And maybe it’s so it’s not about parties at all. Maybe it’s about.

The people that are in your circle and you need a new circle. Yeah. Oh my gosh, I’ve done that. I had the women’s group. I was part of for 12 years. It was quite an investment of my time, energy and friendship. And I started going through this bad time, right before the breakdown and I couldn’t figure out what was happening to me.

And instead of. Sort of surrounded like you would, I would love to be part of a community where I was surrounded with some, some understanding and compassion and kind of people holding that space for you. Instead of doing that, I was judged and criticized and they complained about me. And then, and so I left the group and and they closed rank and I’ve, I’ve never been back.

And, and I thought, Oh my God, I wasted all that time. I thought they were my friends. They were obviously not my friends. And they had caused me. I had caused [00:46:00] myself by sticking in this situation. So much stress and anxiety. I didn’t look at the quality of my relationships. I was still letting the mean girls run my life and this happened.

It was well into my fifties. It’s like, Oh my goodness, how long does it take me to learn a lesson kids? So I’m not standing here on some high high platform or perfection. I am really down in the trenches with you, but then that’s where I’m seeing the pain and I want to, I want to help. And I think it’s going to just going back to that metaphor, we got to get ourselves out of the box.

Okay. And let’s see what’s shape. You really are. Maybe you’re a starfish. Maybe you’re a unicorn. But you can’t be unicorn in a box right out of the fucking boxes

Melissa: through the box boxes.

Patricia Tallman: Yeah, we are. We’re all special snowflakes and we need our space. Absolutely.

[00:47:00] Melissa: And you do a lot. Well, I mean, so you’re, you know, you’re helping People with this, you know, magical living.

But then you also do work with penny lane and the B a Santa Claus program. Yeah. Tell me more about that. Cause I’m not familiar with, with either. Oh

Patricia Tallman: well, it’s, it’s it’s, it’s it’s, it’s a big organization and that they serve a lot of families and children, but they They’re not, you know, super famous or anything like that.

So there’s there’s a a group home foster family care system called the penny lane centers here. And when I started with them almost 30 years ago they were just penny lane. They hadn’t become centers yet it was center singular and will be my group of the kids that they were there serving was the group that was in In a group home.

I had 50 girls in the main facility, and then we had eight satellite to send 10 satellite houses at each, had [00:48:00] six kids. Some of them are boys. So I had boys and girls teenagers from 12 moving into 13 to 18. And then they’re out of, out of the system. And penny lanes is really an extraordinary place, which I quickly figured out as I, I was volunteering there.

And I saw that, that the kids really didn’t have. Christmas, the foster family kids, you know, they had a family, there were, there was a Christmas happening, but the kids in the group homes had a very Everybody penny lane was doing the best they can, but the money penny that penny lane had had to go into their care.

And it wasn’t really going into Gibson throwing parties. Although the supervisors did the best they could, they are very large hearted and the fire department would bring them by basketballs and Barbie dolls. You know, something like that. But so I just reached out to the fans, the, you know, all this community we’ve been talking about and said, Hey, what do you think you guys, I think, you know, do you want to send him some gifts?

So we, we just started doing that. They would send me gifts and I would, I would give each kid. [00:49:00] Gift bag of stuff. We would start with, you know, stocking stuffer type things, and then maybe small game gifts and then try to fulfill a couple of their wishes then that, that worked for many years. And then we morphed into by then the, the mall system around here is called the Westfield malls and there they.

They had a gift card that would be good for any store in the mall and what teenager wouldn’t love to go shopping for their own stuff. So then I just started raising money to give the kids a nice gift bag, full, you know, like a shopping bag full of goodies and not just food, but food, personal care products, art supplies, little games, and then a gift card.

Good for a hundred bucks or so. And then they could go shopping and take advantage of the sales after the holidays or whatever they want and they get to do. And I think that’s an important learning process anyways, to go handle your own money, learn how learn how far money goes and the importance [00:50:00] of money.

So that’s kind of where we’re at now. It, that has been very successful. That feedback from the kids has been super positive and we’ve we throw a party for the kids. So I just do it. We’ve been crowdsourcing this for, you know, 27 years. Before crowdsourcing was a thing and fans send me in money and it all off, every penny goes to the kids.

It doesn’t go to any kind of admin overhead, nothing just to the kids. Yeah. It’s really fun.

Melissa: And where can you know, for our listeners, for anyone that wants to contribute where can we go to, to send money?

Patricia Tallman: You’re so sweet. There is a website called BIA, sante.org. And we can take money all year round.

And when we start fundraising specifically around September, October, and we start pushing out and saying, okay, it’s that time Santa is pony up

and we keep Itali going on my Facebook page and you know, everyone can see what’s going on. It’s facebook.com backslash or forward slash I can never remember what that is. [00:51:00] Patricia Tolman page. It’s on the socials, but it’s always been mainly in the Facebook page.

Melissa: Perfect. Yeah. Awesome. And can they send, is it just money or do you take any kind of like donations as far as like product

Patricia Tallman: or goods?

Right. Yeah. Good question again. Yeah. That’s I can take stuff. It’s it’s easier, you know, shipping Scott and so expensive. So a lot of people, most people prefer to send money. If you’ve got like, Oh, you’ve got all these great kid books and you, you don’t want to throw them out. We can absolutely take them.

I take use things to give to them houses, and I make sure that the kids’ gifts are brand new. So they’re not, you know, I want them to feel that some dignity behind it, but the house can take used games and books and things like that, because then it’s just there for the kids to use communal. Yeah, that’s right.

Exactly. Communal. Exactly.

Melissa: That’s awesome. And then where can we go to sign up? And learn more about magical thing. Oh,

Patricia Tallman: you’re so sweet. [00:52:00] Right now, so I’m rebranding, you guys are actually hearing, you’re hearing about magical living before anybody else. That’s been something I’m working on and it’s it.

You’ll see it a little bit out there, but we haven’t explained it at all yet because we’re waiting for the new website to get built. But you go to  events.com. B the letter B and the numeral five events.com. And you can, there’s a, you can sign up for a newsletter there. I really prefer that than the socials, because what happens is the socials for S you know, any of them can shut down.

I had, I just got some sort of flag on my Facebook page. You tell me, I have no idea why. And the thing is there’s no recourse. You know, nothing’s happened. They just said your, your page has been reported. And if it happens again, you know, they’ll suspend the page and I have no idea why, and there’s no way for me to call anyone to say, why can you fix it?

They never respond. Yeah, that’s right. So what you gotta do kids is, is if you [00:53:00] give me an email address, I don’t spam you. I just let you know what’s going on. I’m lucky if I get one email out a month, I don’t have the time to do a lot of emails, right. But you at least do know about like Gigi Emily’s coming up and the early bird ends Saturday.

So today I just sent out a newsletter to everybody saying the early bird and Saturday, I hope that’s valuable information for people and we have a free watch party coming up on, on, on on Saturday as well. So, you know, let them know about that stuff. And then that’s it. You won’t hear from me again for one, but the page that you will we’ll show you some info is, and you can get tickets there.

But I appreciate it. Yeah, I

Melissa: really do. I know that, you know, people can also follow you on Twitter cause you’re, you’re at Patricia Tolman right on Twitter. And and I saw that you were posting some of your B five events stuff on there too. So you know, for anyone listening

Patricia Tallman: on Instagram.

Melissa: Oh, good.

Awesome. Okay. [00:54:00] Have you

Patricia Tallman: asked Patricia tolman.rocks on, on Instagram,

Melissa: Instagram. Okay. And then have you dabbled into like the new, the Tik TOK stuff

Patricia Tallman: yet? I love cheetah. I love watching Tik TOK. I don’t, I don’t, I have an account, but I’ve never posted anything, but I just got into clubhouse. Anyone else in clubhouse?

That sounds really familiar.

Melissa: I feel like someone

Patricia Tallman: mentioned you have to be invited in it’s. Okay. That’s what I’ve heard, what the deal is. And you have to have an iPhone. They don’t have it out rolled out for Android yet, but my, my business coaches on clubhouse, so I had to find a way in and yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s kind of interesting.

It’s a conversation place. It’s not a. Social media posting place. So I’m really curious to delve into it. Somewhat the regular socials were on there and yeah, I appreciate

Melissa: you’re seeing that middle side. Yeah, no, absolutely. And we can post, you know, all the links, you know, in the show notes too, so people can just click on wow.

Patricia Tallman: Yeah. Yeah. So we have Gigi Italy coming up as [00:55:00] just my last little pitch and she’s on February 20th, but the early bird you’re saving 10 bucks. If you buy a ticket by Saturday. And she’s really lovely. We’re going to talk about passion. It’s a, it’s a three hour event. We have an open house for all ticket holders to hang out and then Well, she w we do a nerding out session with Gigi, where we ask her questions about her career.

But then this is my favorite part is the spotlight. We talk like you and I been talking and we talk about her passion. We talk about what passion is, how we answer questions from the guests. Like, what, what is that mean to you? What is my passion? So some of these words thrown around and it gets very confusing.

And you feel like you’re missing out on something. I don’t know. Well, we’ll help you figure that out. And then she’s going to share some, some stuff that she’s very passionate about. So and then we have a VIP party where people who want to just one-on-one time with, with Gigi in a small group that’s the VIP party.

So that’s, that’s kind of the right now would a, B five event looks like [00:56:00] I’ve got one coming up in March. That’s going to be all the behind the scenes crew members from Babylon five. Tell them their stories that you’ve never heard.

Melissa: but I actually asked you you know, before we got into the other stuff that I was going to ask you some behind the scenes stuff, but I don’t want to spoil it if you’re gonna, if you’re going to do a whole.

Patricia Tallman: Right. Well, we’ll do a whole thing. We’ll do a little

Melissa: thing. Well then we’ll talk. We have to watch that and then we can have you back on after.

So we can, I would love that.

Patricia Tallman: Yes, yes, exactly. What did I learn? That I didn’t know

Melissa: exactly. That’s what I was. Well, I mean, you are such a lovely person. I’m so happy that I got to meet you. My new

Patricia Tallman: best friend.

Melissa: Yeah. And I’m very curious. To yeah, to learn more about the magical livings. I will personally be checking into that as well.

Thank you. I hope our audience. Yeah, please come back. Anytime. This has been so much fun and yeah, like I said, we’ll link [00:57:00] everything up, so people can just, you know, find you with no issue and and just click on the

Patricia Tallman: winks. Thank you so much. And thanks everybody for listening. Really appreciate it.

Absolutely.