Myriah Marquez – Uncomfortably Comfortable

Mariah Marquez – Interview

[00:00:00] Jeff: Hello listeners, a spoiler country today on the show. We had the fantastic Mariah Marquez. How are you doing Ms. Marquez?

Myriah Marquez: Hi, I’m doing wonderful. How about yourself?

Jeff: I’m doing quite well. I must have been, I was reading a little bit about you and you’ve lived a very incredible life.

I mean there’s been difficult. Parts has been parts that work, you know, obviously you’ve grown very successful, but your, your life has definitely sounded like an incredible story.

Myriah Marquez: Thank you. Yes, definitely. As you know, you say thank you, but that that’s a low, it can be loaded because they are the hardships and this and that more.

I’ve always thought, dang, like good and bad. My life is truly feels like a movie sometimes. And so, yeah. That’s why I decided to make uncomfortably comfortable.

Jeff: So, so would you say that you’re stronger from the difficulties or the successes?

Myriah Marquez: I think both of them key to strength and weakness, [00:01:00] honestly.

And it’s just about your mindset coming out of it, what you take from it. And I’m not really sure how to measure success, honestly, either because if you know me, I probably say too much that we’re going to die. Like Just aware of that. So everything still kind of feels like it just is.

Jeff: Hmm. Well, definitely what it seems like a success, or what has proven successful is your short film, uncomfortably comfortable, which is a film like basically it’s almost like a short biography of you.

That’d be a good description of it.

Myriah Marquez: Yeah, pretty much as short experimental, a little biography of myself.

Jeff: So what inspired you to to make

Myriah Marquez: it, or like you said Everything that’s happened to me. Good and bad has really saved myself like a movie. I’m like, what is happening? So it’s like played with this [00:02:00] idea and just for myself to just really have been intrigued by film and have always fought around and yeah.

Just with no budget, you kind of just have yourself as your subject, you know, so I’ve just become in tune with myself and then through serendipitous events and meeting the right people like nail it just aligned and he really allowed me to take it into my hands and be creative and gave that motivation and support behind it.

Jeff: So the near that you’re referring to is a guest that we’ve had a few times on our show. Neil Cohen, he. Came on the show to discuss chief  and also American gargoyles. So how did you introduce, how, how, how did you become introduced to him?

Myriah Marquez: So I actually met him by working with him for his children’s book, American gargoyles.

We met through some mutual friends out and then it’s at the skate park BC before COVID and actually for a while. Almost two years. And I started [00:03:00] doing videos and little photos and stuff for just to get some content and get it moving and helped out. And we quickly became friends. As you know, from talking to him, he’s super nice, super quirky and great for conversation.

And really just like optimistic, you know? And then you meet his wife April. I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to talk with her, but just a Ray of sunshine. And so we became closer and just got to know each other and he found out. More about me through that and like my experience with making videos and then my experience just in life.

And he actually asked me, he was like, all right, you’re going to think I’m crazy, but just think about it. How do you feel about making a film about yourself? And I was just like, well, I think you’re crazy. It’s something that I’ve kind of always wanted to do. So why not? And you know, whenever you have those thoughts, you don’t really, I didn’t really do it to see it going anywhere.

I just did it for the chance of the expression, you know, and if it did go somewhere, I was like, [00:04:00] well, now that it has been going places, I’m just honestly blown away and there’s things that you share or that you do visually that you don’t fully realize, Oh my gosh, everybody’s about to see this.

Jeff: By the way I thought it was really kind of funny that you referred to COVID before COVID is BC, I guess that’s a separate world, doesn’t it?

Myriah Marquez: Yeah. I’ve been trying to coin that. Actually. I thought that was pretty funny and I don’t know if I haven’t heard anybody else say it, but BC before COVID

Jeff: Oh,

Myriah Marquez: go ahead. No, that’s it.

Jeff: Well, like I said, it sounds like we could all agree that th the world before COVID is something that is now way more of a memory that we ever wished it would

Myriah Marquez: be.

Wow. It’s certainly is indeed. It’s all been such a double-edged sword, you know, a lot of necessary has come out of this and a lot of [00:05:00] unnecessary as well as for the film with it being during you know, in this pandemic globally. So for myself, it’s. Being shown online, allowed such a broader audience than if it would have just only been in festivals, you know, and people that only went to those festivals saw it and maybe it got passed around, but it really has allowed so much more range.

And so I’m thankful for that fortunate to say,

Jeff: So for awhile, you were, you were traveling to other countries. I, I, especially in your video, you mentioned I haven’t gone to Mexico and a few other places, and I think you also went to some places for the festival, is that

Myriah Marquez: correct? No, so I didn’t. Well, yes and no.

So within girls world, which I’m sure we’ll get to we got to go to Mexico to a migrant shelter and It’s hard to talk on it without going fully into that there, but for the film, how saying how it’s online, it made it to the [00:06:00] pair of surf skate film festival. And that was during a time actually, where they did get to get together.

Yeah. Get to get together shown in Paris. And now it’s been accepted for the Milan 20, 21 film festival. So I’m hoping to get to go there. We’ll see how it goes. Yeah, well, well,

Jeff: your film uncomfortably comfortable has done extremely well. It w it has won awards such as the best first time director at the Venice film festival.

It won the best skate, short, the Paris surfing skateboard festival. What do these awards mean to you?

Myriah Marquez: It’s honestly humbling. Just. At the fact of like the other films and the other talent to be aside, first of all, in general, and like, to even be recognized and then to, because for my whole, and sure, this is a true story for a lot of people, but you never really fully believe in yourself and others don’t ever really fully believe in [00:07:00] yourself.

So whenever you have those moments of, Oh, no, like you’re doing pretty good, you know, it feels great. And then, I mean, it’s an absolute honor. Yeah, it’s mindblowing.

Jeff: Yeah. And like I said, it’s, the film has been, like I said, so popular. It has had so much success. Has the film proven more successful than you anticipated or that, or more than expectations you’ve had for it?

And why do you think has been so successful?

Myriah Marquez: Yes, it definitely has. And not like to boast by any means, but I would have never imagined. So in the parish, surf skate since film festival last year spoons and mid nineties. Oh, see, my mind goes blank at this point, but so many Oh made in Venice and the Tony Alva story, just so many like legendary.

Films that I personally look up to and really dig from just my love for skateboarding that I got to be alongside. And that in [00:08:00] itself, I think I might’ve missed that question. I started daydreaming. Oh

Jeff: no, no worries. No, I think you answered it extremely well. I mean, considering that this is really, this is your first ever directorial effort is not correct.

You never directed anything before.

Myriah Marquez: Not, yes, not officially. I mean, I’ve always, like I said, I’m a photo around with film and making little videos for myself. So I guess on an amateur level, you’d call that directing, you know, but officially official uncomfortably comfortable as my first time shooting, editing and directing the film.

Jeff: It’s, it’s a beautifully shot film. How did you know what to do as a director? Because I mean, there’s a lot of people who probably spend their entire life to, to, to direct a film at the same level that you just knew how to do. Where does that knowledge come from? Oh, you’re very welcome. Where did that knowledge come from?

How did he know how to make your shots and what would work.

Myriah Marquez: I think I just went [00:09:00] based off of stealing. Always anytime I’ve ever created anything, it was whenever I was in such a moment of either down or high or just all over the place. It just express myself through that. So what was really important to me is just, if I’m going to get to tell my story, to try to have that feeling behind it and.

I I’ve been really inspired by a lot of people, a few important people being my, a dragon and David Lynch and just their transitions and their eyes for things that’s like totally unusual. And everybody has the different perspectives. You know, it’s just about realizing that it’s a unique one and honing in on it.

But. And I, and I had to go with what I went with. We use a lot of old footage and so I wanted to be able to tie the new footage in with the old, without it looking too drastically different. And the old footage was just shot on my phone. [00:10:00] So I decided to shoot the rest of it just on my phone as well.

And I also edited it on my phone and did the voice recording just straight to my phone. So. I feel like that and itself too. There’s such this this feeling that does come from nostalgia with people, you know, that the imagery and the rawness to it, I feel like.

Jeff: So when you were preparing, create this film, like I said, you’re using old videos. And the saw that you used, did you write, did you write down, did you outline it, did it, this is something that pure instinct or inspiration.

Myriah Marquez: I went through every single video that I owned and I put them all into a folder.

And then I went through all of them a million times more and then tried to upload just what I had into a little segment. And then I did the voice recording before actually shot the video. And I had an idea of what I wanted to do because I have a projector. And that’s what I [00:11:00] used to do. The, the part with the white sheet.

So I was like, I want to use the projector at one of the girls for parties. We had, I was, had to go up to the projector and like, look inside the cap to fix something. And I realized the way that it was reflecting back was super cool. And so I was like, Oh, that’s a cool, that’s a cool way to show the phone footage without it looking like, you know, just your phone footage.

So I. Edited it all together. And then I played it back through the projector that way. And so it was really honestly a journey. It was piece by piece. I, I wrote out well, first I drank some whiskey, went out on the left and talked to my phone for a few hours and then went back and just listened to it and wrote down and really like tried to clean up what I wanted to say.

And then layered that with in one shot, the rest of the video, and then forever just saying, Oh my gosh, I’m not a sound engineer.

[00:12:00] Jeff: I mean, it’s amazing. How did you know how to do all that? I mean, that, that’s

Myriah Marquez: incredible. Just playing around with it as. Aye. You can surprise yourself with the amount, you know, it’s like a good song or old song you haven’t heard in forever. And then all of a sudden, you know, all the lyrics and you’re like, how do I remember all these lyrics?

Just from enough talking and friends and watching and just playing around with it. I guess I, I did enough to do something.

Jeff: Well, I mean, like I said, I was really impressed by it. There’s a, there’s a great line that you have. I might butcher it in the make any of the exactly correct. But in the film you discussed how you have previously left things, letting told you back that you had no control over, is the film a way for you to gain control over that part of you, or at least a way to tell your story as a way of getting control over it?

Myriah Marquez: Definitely. And yes, definitely.

Jeff: So, what, what kind of things did you feel that you previously had led [00:13:00] control you that you, or didn’t that you didn’t have control over?

Myriah Marquez: Well, a lot of things. I mean the biggest one of course my illness, I got really sick whenever I was 11 and from 11 till now. But really my major surgery, like 18, I guess, is the pivotal moment.

That whole situation. You really don’t have any say, you know, until you’re 18. And so it’s kind of going through a lot of medications and procedures and doctors and not being able to go do this or do that, or be involved here without like me necessarily wanting to, for those to be the options. You know, it’s made for yourself as a lot of people can say and Then as far as other things in Seattle.

So I lived in Seattle Washington for a few years. Once I was 18, I left home and just started moving around. And I was there for a little while and matter. Safety-wise just kind [00:14:00] of arose it. And health wise there it’s really, you know, Can beat dark and Misty, and that’s not good for your bones.

And then well I’ve mentioned at one time before, it’s not something I’m too, and I didn’t mention it in the film, what exactly it was because it’s, it’s a whole nother thing in itself. Yeah.

Jeff: Yeah. I mean it, my understanding that the issues, the health issue that you had, did you, are you recovered from them or are you still struggling with

Myriah Marquez: them?

Well, it’s definitely a day-to-day thing. I’ve got myself off of all pharmaceuticals now for. Almost five years used to be hospitalized every year, at least once. And now I haven’t been hospitalized in almost the five years as well. So I mean, I feel like that goes to say something and I’m able to be a bit more active, but I still struggle with sativa and nausea.

And I think I’ve just become better at. Being [00:15:00] uncomfortable and just like making it your norm. And that’s one thing I’m thankful for having gotten this illness whenever I was younger. And not now, because you think about a lot of people just start dealing with something at a later age and you have to adjust your whole life, you know, and I’ve gotten the chance to at least grow with it and learn how to be with it.

Jeff: Well, I thought it was a really brave thing to do to reveal this much of you and your health issues and everything in this film that you created. I also, there’s a couple of scenes that you literally bare all for the camera. And first those teams go. What I thought was where you figured really stating that you are literally bearing yourself or your soul to the audience in, in those moments, is that, and also how does it feel to kind of expose your soul as it were to yard in such an honest way?

Myriah Marquez: Well, I think honestly, and I just got done getting tattooed all day because [00:16:00] of this reason, too, with my illness at so when I was 11, when I was hospitalized, I was put on IB steroids and I went from weighing 80 pounds to 120 pounds back down to 90 pounds. In the matter of a weekend, it left me with gnarly stretch marks and scars and such, and I’ve never.

Been comfortable in my body and people can be really surprised by that. And it’s, it was a way of me more saying, you know, fuck it. And like becoming a, into your woman and I’m 28 now. So it’s like, it starts messing with your mental and the scars and what society says is beautiful and such a different way.

And I was just. I guess for myself again, cause I said, I didn’t really think too many people would see this for myself. It was more of like, okay, it’s pitch dark outside. I’m going to have something projected on me, just like, have your body out there, you know, be comfortable [00:17:00] and your telling your story.

And yeah. So I guess it was more a symbol of that way. And. To just the thought of, you know, being naked. It’s a vulnerable statement for a lot of people. And it was a thrill to go out there and I was like, okay, I want to hold the sheet up and project the image on the sheet. But I know if I’m like wearing clothes, it’s gonna distract from the image.

So that was kind of a conscious move to that it won’t whatever I was wearing to distract from what was being shown.

Jeff: Was the filming of this movie therapeutic for you in that sense?

Myriah Marquez: Oh yes. Definitely. Because you go through, you have to go through every little pocket and even have conversations with people just to make sure you have the facts straight on, like, is that what I experienced?

Because I just associated so much as a way of dealing that has definitely caused me to re associate to a lot of things.

Jeff: So, I mean, it sounds like you literally discovered things about yourself by [00:18:00] filming this. I mean, things that you may not have been pre that you may not have considered otherwise,

Myriah Marquez: I’d say so, but my dad always said you learn one thing new every day.

So hopefully there’s something you’re doing every day. That’s bringing you knowledge about yourself or about others.

Jeff: Well, that’s interesting. You mentioned your father, like you said, you left home at at the age of 18 and you hit the road. Do you still stay in touch with your parents?

Myriah Marquez: So my when I said my dad, I was talking about my stepdad.

My real dad is actually From Mexico. And he hasn’t really been around since I was really young. We talked to each other here and there, and that’s part of those things that are already, that are out of your control too. But I have a wonderful stepdad that came into the picture when I was about eight years old and my family is really, really great.

They raise me on way too much love and worry and kind of held the reins too strongly. So [00:19:00] that’s the only thing there. I only hit the road cause I needed some freedom.

Jeff: Did your, did your parents support the decision to leave?

Myriah Marquez: Oh, definitely not.

Jeff: But what did they say?

Myriah Marquez: Well, it was probably one of the most.

One of the experiences. I wish I didn’t have to go through, bro. My mom has heart and everything’s okay. Now, now they say Mariah, there’s nothing you can do that won’t that will surprise us. So, and they were ready. I had just had a massive surgery and had my colon, my appendix, and most of my rectum removed, not even like right at a year prior, just had the reversal surgery.

And so I wasn’t ready. Physically and health wise to be out. Actually, when I came to California the first time when I was 18, I got hospitalized with [00:20:00] dehydration and had to get all these fluids and such again. And I lasted for about a year and then had to go back home briefly and then hit the road again.

Jeff: So are there any regrets for our starting off on your own? So young, do you wish you had waited.

Myriah Marquez: No, definitely not. I love it.

Jeff: Well, sorry. Your signals going in and out just a little bit.

Myriah Marquez: Oh, sorry. Here. Let me check on that.

How’s it sound now. Okay, good. And I would say I definitely don’t regret it and I would do it all over again. And it’s so funny. Cause this is my 10 year from 18 to 28. Looking back on the things that I’d done and the places that I’ve put myself are absolutely ridiculous sometimes, but it’s all fun and it makes you who you are and you can, [00:21:00] the mind is powerful.

So I think that that’s the most important is every day you have the ability to change things and to do something new or to be. What have you, I don’t know, you know, just to be,

Jeff: would you say that those struggles that you dealt with at an, as an adolescent and obviously throughout your life, you think that made you a more compassionate adult?

Myriah Marquez: Oh, most certainly. Yes. And I do have to remind myself I mean, everybody has their struggles and like what they go through. You know, some people, they just haven’t experienced certain things.

It’s not that they’re, they just haven’t gotten that. And the day, that sense of awareness of others, they haven’t had those experiences. So I definitely feel, and two, from those experiences, you can go one way or the other. But it. [00:22:00] For sure. And it’s a cursing too. I’m like sometimes I wish I just didn’t care so much.

Jeff: Yeah. I mean, th the one interesting, another interesting about your film because of how you present it, and it’s a look through your eyes. Barbie was wondering if it’s part of the reason that you made the film is it’s that you want it to give people an opportunity. You kind of live vicariously through you and what you’ve experienced in a way.

So they would themselves maybe learn some level of compassion through somebody else.

Myriah Marquez: Yes, totally. And it actually didn’t. Wasn’t really going to go that direction and tool. So while I was in the works of making this girls world went to Mexico, to the migrant shelter, to the middle school, and I came back from that experience and told Neil, I wasn’t going to make it anymore.

I was like, I’m not going to sit here and talk about myself when all of these things are [00:23:00] actually really happening out there. And there’s more important things to talk about than me. And so he accepted that and like, talk to me a bit and time went on a little bit and I was like, okay, if I’m going to do this, I’m going to do it in a way that incorporates what’s happening to other people.

And just the fact that it’s like, wait, With my story. I am so fortunate and it’s not to boast, but it’s. Like I said, your mind is powerful and there are people that can take what you’ve been through and it can help in that in turns helps you too. It’s so rewarding when you have a conversation with somebody that thinks they’re going through something completely alone and they realize they’re not alone and can talk openly about something, something that they’ve never even spoken out loud, you know?

And so I think that that’s powerful and I hope people took it that way. I didn’t want to so much be about the self, but.

Jeff: Well, it does, it feels like your video help a lot of people. Cause like I said, I do [00:24:00] think it means a DeVry, definitely a deep examination of an individual, but I think it’s also very inspirational as a story of someone who’s overcoming things and also not only overcoming things, but has taken the opportunities that they have to really give back.

And I think that’s extraordinary.

Myriah Marquez: Thank you so much. I got it from my mama. Yeah, is she, I would say they’re the best. They raised me really well that she could, she was voted most kinds in high school all four years is so loving and giving. And I definitely had a good example there.

Jeff: Well, another great moment in the film is that you described skateboarding as being your security blanket and a means of feeling empowered.

How does skateboarding accomplish this for you?

Myriah Marquez: So [00:25:00] when I was 11, I before I got sick, I went to. A school. And when I went back to school after I hadn’t been on the different medications, my cheeks got really big and I had gained weight and bullying just got really, really bad. And so my parents had decided to switch me schools.

And when I switched schools, I didn’t want others to, I want it to seem tough and where I’m from. No one skates, except for people that are just were scary. And I was watching at the time On MTV, jackass and VH1 with BMR, Jared. And I was like, Oh, that’d be, I was obsessed with it. I’ve always been kind of different, more like roughing out.

And so yeah, I got a board that year, but being weak and such and Always like I didn’t too much skate around. It was more the streetwear and have my board close by and carrying it, you know, and just like being tough and fill in tough. And knowing that I had [00:26:00] something beside me and they would still make fun of me for skateboarding, but at least they were making fun of me for the skateboard, which I thought was.

Really sick or, and not me, you know, so that started and from there, it’s always been with me more progressively whenever I was 18. And I started traveling, I had it with me and it, it was a way of meeting people. I would start off at different skateparks. So it was a way of getting around quicker through different towns and saving gas and Yeah.

And then from there, just that you learn and, and I’m just like in a lot of different communities, it really is a community. It really is a family skateboarding. And so yeah, I found community with it as well as a form of strength.

Jeff: I mean, that’s really, I mean, skateboarding in some level is open to a lot of danger, in my opinion.

I mean, when I was younger, I, I did want a skateboard, me and my sister [00:27:00] and I would try skateboarding and I only made it ever to the going up and down the driveway could that became in my head too steep for me. And I, you know, I think I fell off a few times at the hand, just had had enough of it.

Cause I have no zero coordination. I’m very bad at that. I’m

Myriah Marquez: saying that’s how it is.

Jeff: So, but my question is, I mean, for someone who asks had some health issues, does, was it at all concerning the potential of getting hurt, doing skateboarding?

Myriah Marquez: For my parents, for me, and this is something that I’m starting to like piece the pieces together now that I’m older and can like look back at things.

But I would have suicidal tendencies and thoughts and. Self-inflict pain. And this turned out to be a way to self-inflict pain without self-inflicting pain [00:28:00] and actually make me afraid of pain, you know? And I feel like I’ve kind of gone through it. And as far as the surgeries and procedures and needles, that.

That stuff. Doesn’t really, it didn’t really bother me or scare me now. I’m starting to see how precious life is again. And like, Oh my gosh, we get old. And I like to do other things. I’m getting scared of it again. But at that point, not just felt like, felt really? Yeah. Like my security blanket, like a a safety tool.

Jeff: Well, it’s interesting. I mean, I don’t recall you ever mentioning in the video that you at times were suicidal growing up? Is that something you purposely left out or that’s something that on reflection you’re being to realize more?

Myriah Marquez: I think it’s something that I’ve always realized. But. I think that I feel like I did an intentionally or unintentionally it out as I was [00:29:00] going through it and edit it and such, there was just, I had said a lot, a lot more that’s in it now they had to hone in on specific things and to make sure that it was, I just didn’t want to say too much.

I didn’t want to go, you know, but I don’t think it would’ve purchased that. I don’t think it would have been too much. So maybe I didn’t have the thought initially. It has. Yeah. Maybe we have to make a sequel, maybe.

Jeff: So skateboarding led you to being introduced or to introduce the people who would later become girls swirl. Can you tell our listeners what girls, girls swirl is?

Myriah Marquez: Yeah. Sure. So girls world is a group of women slash folk that live here in Venice, California. There was none of us that founded it. We skate, but we are running chapter style.

So we have a chapter in New York and a chapter in San Diego. [00:30:00] And what we do is we host skate meets and we throw parties to raise money for other nonprofits. And our community and help teach the other chapters, how to hone in on their community as well, and get involved in just like make direct connections and basically just like community building tools.

And beyond that, we have started doing skate mentorships and afterschool programs, and we went out of the country and passed out boards. So just empowerment there, skateboarding, you know, It’s a tool to be used in a way to play and a way to meet other people. So we decided to use it as an icebreaker and yeah, we just we’re good.

Those people killing it, having fun. I liked it, but yeah, the best thing that’s literally ever happened to me and I’m so thankful for the others and

Jeff: it’s wild. Is it, is it [00:31:00] hard to find like-minded individuals like that or, I mean, did it, or did you just, did they just kind of gravitate towards you?

Myriah Marquez: This was very serendipitous.

Usually I would say it is really hard to find like minded individuals and for so long, I only had skating to myself and really, truly you would go to the skate parks and you would be the only. I would be the only girl there I’d be. I would just be with all the guys, you know? And so, so to then be placed here all the sudden and not have a community, not have a job, not have friends and meet them.

Literally my six day in, it was very serendipitous and it definitely gravitated towards me. I don’t know how they divine and. The thing is though my thoughts on that have changed over time from it being very rare to be in an actual occurrence. If you put yourself out there and you, and the law of attraction, whatever you put out, hopefully, and [00:32:00] we’ll come back to you.

And girls role has. Caught in some negative and this and that. And that’s what I tell people too, when you come to escape, you’re not going to get along with everybody, but there’s going to be one person there that you’ll hit it off with. I promise. And if it’s not any of them, it’ll be me. I’m like, totally, we’ll be stuck to your hip the whole time.

But, but, so that’s the thing. And Yeah,

Jeff: so, and that, and also the, the community of where girls were squirreled, I guess, started out from, it felt like you guys have been embraced pretty much pretty completely. What did that, what does that say about the community as well? That they embraced you and you embraced them so readily.

Myriah Marquez: Well, that’s everything. That’s why, when people like thank me or say this or that, I’m like, literally we would be nothing without the community, without the stoke, without everybody else showing up and being a part of it as well, without people in our community, volunteering their time and their resources and their business to help [00:33:00] out another community and our community, you know?

So it’s just like, it would be nothing without everyone. And I think that that’s why it is so powerful. Cause it’s a. Combined energy of everyone. It’s not just us putting intentions out as like gathered of intention. How do I say that? It’s like a combined force of the dungeon.

Jeff: So what, what did all this experience with girls swirl and within the community?

Like what did you learn about maybe the nature of people in yourself by being able to. Only being around those who are like you or share your interests, but finding that even those may be in the community who aren’t like you also connect with so readily and we’re so open, armed with you and you in return.

Myriah Marquez: It’s funny to say that it brought me out of this, that this state of isolation when we’re all in a state of isolation right now, but it really truly did bring me out of this [00:34:00] state of isolation. And always mum, I laugh with my mom cause I tell her I’m like, I don’t know. It’s like, I really care about.

Humans and humanity, but sometimes I just really don’t like people it’s just like, I it’s taught me to like people it’s like, okay, there are some really likable people out there. Like it’s, it’s given me a reason to care. Cause I feel like that’s where a lot of the suicidal thoughts came from is because I had this love to give that wasn’t being received, that wasn’t getting returned.

And so sorry. Yeah. When you have that love flow, it’s

Jeff: beautiful. No, I, I think, I think that’s fantastic. And I, and I do think it’s incredible. Just how. Giving of a person you get, you became, I think that’s, that’s incredible. And, and I think that connects to also what you said in the film where you state that, how fortunate that you are.

And I think people who would know [00:35:00] your story or have learned of your story would maybe not. First use a word like fortunate, obviously, cause of your illness and your struggles. But I guess in many ways you, you turn it into a fortune. Is that, would that be an accurate?

Myriah Marquez: Yeah, that’s definitely one perspective of it, certainly.

And. But I would say more my experience as like off as it was, I was always more fortunate. So growing up they didn’t have room on any of the other floors at the hospital. And so I had to go on the 12th floor, which was the cancer floor and I hadn’t been diagnosed with cancer and I wasn’t on isolation.

I can have visitors and all around me was kids that have literally lived there for six months, plus are on isolation. Couldn’t have visitors, couldn’t go out into the hallway. Doctors had to be fully suited up to go in. [00:36:00] And there I was, I got to roam the halls. I got to have visitors. I got to eat food from down the road, you know, so it’s like, I really did.

From that moment. See, and it’s kind of, it’s a messed up thing too, to be able to do, honestly, to be able to see your fortune above others. Cause that’s really down to the line what you’re doing, but just more open in my perspective of like, okay, yes, this is bad, but like it could be so much worse. And that’s what you always have to do is like, Yeah.

It’s every, your story’s valid. It can cause nightmares it’s causes PTSD and things that just like you still struggle with daily, but

continue. No, that’s it. It’s just the bottom line is I am fortunate and that’s just what I tell myself. I’m fortunate to be alive. What that experience

Jeff: is, is optimism like a state of mind, would you say.

[00:37:00] Myriah Marquez: Yeah,

Jeff: sure. Is there a way to encourage, like how would you cause someone like me, because I always lived my life as a pessimism.

I’m a wicked pessimist. I know what people who know me know I’m a pessimist. How, like, what would you say or advice would you give to make a, a pessimist into an optimist?

My wife would really appreciate that answer. My, my, my, my wife does, I don’t, she would really appreciate that answer.

Myriah Marquez: That. And of course, you know, just the whole it’s, it’s tough. You gotta read spiritual books. You gotta just like, I think for myself, it was getting so close to death so many times that I’m just thankful to be alive at this point.

Jeff: No. Yeah. I mean, I mean the perspective, I guess, where I I’ve obviously never had the struggles that, that you [00:38:00] have.

And so maybe it’s a not appropriate for me to be a pessimist in, in, in, in comparison. But but I think I do appreciate the idea of optimism. I do think. Optimism. I would like to think is more spreadable than pessimism. I hopefully it is

Myriah Marquez: well, and we need the balance. That’s the thing. It’s the yin and the yang and you wouldn’t have one without the other, and I’m sure you go through the ebb and flows and be an optimistic, but I need those pessimistic people in my life to be like, all right, Mariah, you can’t do it all.

Jeff: So, so we do have purpose

Myriah Marquez: and then we die. So then, I mean, I’ll say, I mean, there’s purpose.

Jeff: And so the other thing that you say in your movie that I thought was very interesting. You said you also say that we are all the writers of our own story. So is this a way for you to present your story? [00:39:00] And as we were saying before, do you think other people, you think everyone has a story worth?

Presenting the way you have.

Myriah Marquez: I think everybody is worth presenting whatever they want to present in any way. Yes, definitely. And by that, I meant by so there’s this the scientific fact that you can literally change molecules in your brain by talking about something it shifts and moves things.

So, and like, Plants, I’m sure you’ve seen the experiments. You talk to them kindly and you talk to them negatively. They really truly remember your sin and your touch. And I just think that there’s so much power in that and what you tell yourself and what you speak to other people. And so hopefully, I mean, and I, again, I work on this every day.

This is what gets me through is that you tell you something enough, [00:40:00] you’ll start believing it, you know? So you. You are the ready restorative in that way. And I think that comes from a bit of the dissociation that I have is like, well, forget all of that. This is what’s really happening. And maybe it’s not, what’s really happening, but so what I’m going to believe to get through and.

Also another thing with kind of going back just on the scars and everything that I’ve gotten from it. I really got into tattoos because it was a way to present my body the way that I want it to be seen rather than the marks and scars that I’ve worked was given. And not that anything is wrong with those marks and scars, you know, it’s just.

I feel like your body is your temple and it’s your, your story being seen without having to say anything. And so I think it’s pretty cool. You can like change your story and get rid of that.

Jeff: So looking back at the film, uncomfortably comfortable what do you think was the best thing to come [00:41:00] out of its completion?

Myriah Marquez: All the fun conversations and connections and people that have reached out in my small group of friends and the larger social global community of people that have actually taken something from it, the way that I wanted to it to be that I like something that could be inspiring and uplifting and just take your mind off of things for a minute, you know?

So mainly that just the connections and the continued fun, it’s all just a fun experience.

Jeff: So where can our listeners find your film?

Myriah Marquez: So there is an Instagram account called doc weekly and they have it on there. IGT V I M. Not for too much longer, probably for a little while longer, we waited and set a time [00:42:00] on it.

But it’s there and right now it’s just private. Other than that besides wherever it gets picked up.

Jeff: So, what are you doing now with your time?

Myriah Marquez: Trying to stay COVID friendly. We do a lot of behind the scenes stuff with girls, we’re working on trying to become a nonprofit and just working on future initiatives and keeping the connections strong and.

We have like a merge line we’ve made skirts and boards and socks, and I do the shipping and fulfillment of that. So I’ve been busy, busy be learning how to ship and fulfill orders as well as a few exciting things for nails children’s book and the work we just made, snow Globes and new t-shirts or some other connections that’s come in and then I’ll just work on.

I had a few projects in the works, but it’s all kind of just happened in so quick when everything is on hot. So I’m trying to get it all [00:43:00] together.

Jeff: Are there any more films in your future?

Myriah Marquez: I hope so. I mean, I’m working on some Neil and I are working on something together just to play around with, and have fun for the moment and have talked about some future things together.

Nothing quite in stone yet, but. Lay in the lay, in lay in the semen.

Jeff: Well, I do hope whatever you do next. I hope you come back on the show to discuss

Myriah Marquez: it. Thank you. I would really, that would be awesome. It’s really nice talking to you. Thank

Jeff: you so much.