Lilly Bright: I'm the middle of three girls. We were encouraged to dream to have big dreams but well how do you have big dreams in a place where there's no opportunity? How do you get from that A to C? Well, you'll just be whoever you want, do whatever you want. That was just sort of very vague.
Jennifer Tracy: You're listening to the MILF Podcast. This is the show where we talk about motherhood and sexuality with amazing women with fascinating stories to share on the joys of being a MILF. Now here's your host, the milfiest MILF I know, Jennifer Tracy.
Jennifer Tracy: Hey guys, welcome back to the show. This is MILF Podcast, the show where we talk about motherhood, entrepreneurship, sexuality and everything in between. I'm Jennifer Tracy, your host. Oh my gosh you guys, we're already entering the second half of September. I feel I need to get some new material because I say that every week but it is real for me like just the shock of how quickly time passes, juxtaposed with how slowly my son feels that it goes. To him Christmas and winter break feel so far away. And I remember that but that was a long time ago.
Jennifer Tracy: Today on the show I have Lilly Bright. Lilly is one of my dearest friends. She is so talented, multi-talented and just fiercely creative and deeply beautiful. She's physically beautiful. Yes. But she's just beautiful on a deep level and her soul work is just evident in the way that she lives her life. And so you'll get to hear all about her in a moment.
Jennifer Tracy: First a couple things. Just to remind you that the give initiative is Amnesty International this month. Their website is amnesty.org. They are all about human rights. What they do is truly magnificent and they have people and stations all over the world working to help those that don't have a voice and help those that need defense and protecting and basic things like food and clothing and shelter. Anyway, they say it way more eloquently on their website, give them a checkout. You can also click to that through my website MILF Podcast.
Jennifer Tracy: And today's episode is sponsored by Flirty Girl Guide, flirtygirlguide.com sells curated sex toys. She has a little bouquet of sex toys together, a little gift basket. She has a blog on there too, so you can read about it. And Brooke Christian is my friend who owns this company and she started this out to empower women to feel sexy again and to enjoy sex and to integrate that with their partners because it really ends up happening after you've been married for a while. And especially if you have kids it just sort of poof, it just evaporates. That was my experience as well.
Jennifer Tracy: So she's all about this, just really empowering women to take control of their sexuality and find their kink. That's something that is so fascinating to me, in fact I'm writing a book about it. Anyway, so flirtygirlguide.com. Check it out. All MILF listeners get an exclusive 10% discount with the code MILF 10. Use that code at checkout and you'll get it 10% discount.
Jennifer Tracy: Lilly bright my guest today and I met when our kids were six months old, five months old. We went to a baby class called RIE. I've talked about it on the show before. It's called Resources for Infant Educarers and that will be in the show notes as well. The link to that if you want to know more about that. But that's how we met and she quickly became the huge lifeline for me because we were in the same boat at the same exact time. It was hard. It was really hard.
Jennifer Tracy: And she's such an incredible mother. She's an incredible woman, incredible mother and I learned so much from her and she and a couple of other women in that class held me up even when they didn't know it. Even just knowing that they were out there and knowing I could call them, knowing I could text them, knowing that their kids were at the exact same developmental stage as mine. They were struggling with many of the same things. There was so much comfort in that.
Jennifer Tracy: And those were the first moms that I followed and I really followed everything they did. And you'll hear me talk about like, I would call Lilly and be like, what do I feed him? Because he wouldn't eat stuff, when he started eating solid foods he was fine at first and then he got really picky, you know, like three or four. And you don't know if you don't know. And I don't have family members that I can ask that stuff. And so I asked this group of mothers and that meant the world to me having that kind of community.
Jennifer Tracy: And so it's a huge part of the impetus of why I started the podcast is because I wanted to create, even if it's just for an hour in somebody's ear that feeling of community and of like you are not alone. You feel so alone. It's so lonely, but you're not alone. And you can do this and you will keep going and get through this and you're going to be so much stronger and fiercer because of it. That's my experience and the experience of many of my friends and the women who've been on the show. So without further ado the beautiful and talented Lilly Bright. So thrilled to have you on the show. This is like a dream come true and to be in your beautiful sun filled office just feel's so nice. You are one of the most fascinating women I've ever met truly, you're holding in a laugh.
Lilly Bright: My husband says the same thing?
Jennifer Tracy: Does he?
Lilly Bright: Yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: In what context, when you're fighting?
Lilly Bright: No, whenever I'm acting very weird or strange or what he thinks is very weird or strange. Or what he thinks is very weird and strange-
Jennifer Tracy: I can hear him say that.
Lilly Bright: Hopping between setting the table and making dinner or something.
Jennifer Tracy: He's just watching you like whiz around and work your magic because you have lots of magic.
Lilly Bright: Something like that.
Jennifer Tracy: That's so funny. I can hear him saying that. I remember when the kids were in the toddler school and we're doing a field trip going to the strawberry fields and it was really far. We drove and drove and drove. And you and your husband showed up and he said, "This was close."
Jennifer Tracy: I want to start from kind of the beginning. Where did you grow up?
Lilly Bright: I was born and raised in West Virginia.
Jennifer Tracy: And what was that like growing up as you, as a fascinating little girl?
Lilly Bright: It was the worst place for me and it was the best place for me. It's certainly a place I can't imagine ever growing up anywhere different, because West Virginia is one of these places that, you know, it lives in your bones, it lives in the smells there. It's such a unique piece of geography. It's very landlocked so it's hard to get in, it's hard to get out. Literally with the mountains, the roads, the lack of airports, public transportation and yet there's something so central about the place like I can smell it here, you know, when I sit here and talk about it, I can feel the humidity. I can feel the dampness of the earth.
Lilly Bright: And it also felt very suffocating growing up in a place where there was one option of where I would go to school, public school, one in the county, well two in the whole county. But now one because one got flooded a few years ago in this floods in West Virginia. Very few choices. For someone like you, me, I think big dreamers. There was a felt really suffocating, limiting and at the same time to have dreams is a really precious thing to have. To have longing of something you can't get it's amazing motivator. I think about raising children here and I never imagined one, I would raise children but that's another story.
Jennifer Tracy: Wait. Let's go into that for a second. We'll come back to... You didn't think you were going to have kids?
Lilly Bright: I sort of felt not even less than ambivalent. It wasn't on my to do list in my life. Which seems crazy now because I love being a mom and I'm really good mom.
Jennifer Tracy: You really are.
Lilly Bright: I can feel that myself. It's a natural thing for me to mother, to parent but prior to meeting my husband because he brought that out of me, the desire to have a family. Prior to that it was just like maybe, I don't. I got all this other things I want to do with my life.
Jennifer Tracy: And that you are doing. So back to Virginia, that's interesting.
Lilly Bright: West Virginia.
Jennifer Tracy: West Virginia, excuse me.
Lilly Bright: I have to correct that.
Jennifer Tracy: Yes. I'm sure that happens all the time.
Lilly Bright: All the time.
Jennifer Tracy: Because people don't think of it.
Lilly Bright: It's really interesting.
Jennifer Tracy: They don't realize it's a separate entity.
Lilly Bright: It's fascinating to me.
Jennifer Tracy: Growing up in West Virginia... You were just talking about and articulating so beautifully having a dream is this precious thing. Was that nurtured or understood by your family?
Lilly Bright: We were encouraged. I'm the middle of three girls. We were encouraged to dream to have big dreams but how do you have big dreams in a place where there's no opportunity? How do you get from that A to C? Well, you'll just be whoever you want, do whatever you want. That was just sort of very vague.
Jennifer Tracy: And what did your parents do?
Lilly Bright: My mom was, her background is in teaching and guidance counseling but she was a stay at home mom and volunteered in the community. My dad is an entrepreneur he was in the coal business for many years and in manufacturing. Had a big plant in the town I grew up in.
Jennifer Tracy: And did they have big dreams that they pursued and then went a different way or?
Lilly Bright: My dad had political ambitions.
Jennifer Tracy: Interesting.
Lilly Bright: Which he didn't get too far away from because when you're in coal business and when you're in tourism, you're in politics in West Virginia. It's political. And when you're in a state as small as West Virginia, under 2 million people population wise, it's not, you know, after you have a certain amount of success, you can have a certain amount of influence. It's not hard to be influential I think. But he was a big dreamer. Hard worker and a big dreamer.
Jennifer Tracy: But you are a child or teenager coming of age and seeing this and you're trying to figure out, sounds like you're trying to figure out, like you said, how do I get to see. What happened, what was the next move for Lilly?
Lilly Bright: To get out.
Jennifer Tracy: And when did you get out?
Lilly Bright: When I went to college.
Jennifer Tracy: We make it sound like you got out of prison.
Lilly Bright: I know, it is kind of really though. It is remarkable. Those who know who have grown up in West Virginia, there's like a tribe of people who are like, you got out. But are you going back? Yeah, of course I have to. You got to go back.
Jennifer Tracy: It's almost like, I don't know if you watched The Handmaid's Tale.
Lilly Bright: Oh yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: It's that whole day, that's how they talk. Are you getting out? Did he get out? Did she get out?
Lilly Bright: Canada.
Jennifer Tracy: When did you leave?
Lilly Bright: When I went to Northwestern University. It was after graduating high school. My younger sister went to boarding school, so that was interesting.
Jennifer Tracy: So she got out early.
Lilly Bright: She got out early. She was self-motivated by the fact that there were four years between us. In no way was she staying home alone for 4 years [crosstalk 00:13:17]
Jennifer Tracy: I've seen the way this is and I'm not participating. So you get to Northwestern's in Chicago?
Lilly Bright: Yeah. North of Chicago, it's North of Chicago.
Jennifer Tracy: And so that was a whole new world.
Lilly Bright: It was a big change but it wasn't that I had never left my state before or traveled. We had. I had been exposed to that through my parents.
Jennifer Tracy: But by yourself?
Lilly Bright: Yeah. And being a bulimic. Let's just say it I have struggled. At the time it was severe. It was really a severe issue for me at that time. Debilitating, you know, be it, I don't know, some people would call it a disease or an addiction. I don't ever know what camp put it in. But it was something that was struggling with on a very extreme level at the time. That made college really hard. A place of with a lot of challenges. I thought those challenges would disappear, it wasn't that it developed in college, no, it happened way before. I thought college would be something it wasn't.
Jennifer Tracy: And I know for myself I've struggled with food issues. I was never bulimic but I had other food addiction issues and some anorexia like bingeing and starving and bingeing and starving. And did you feel like you had, because I know I felt like this until I didn't and I started talking about it with other women who struggled with it at the time. But did you feel at that time going into college like you had this secret, this giant secret that nobody could find out?
Lilly Bright: I always thought I've had a secret. I've always felt that this has been a secret. And it certainly was at the time and there was all the shame around it. All the shame. Of course it was a secret. I wouldn't have even admitted it. I was admitting it to myself. I was in therapy, had already gone to a hospital, inpatient to try to get help but it was a big secret.
Jennifer Tracy: And you continued in Northwestern or did you move? I can't remember.
Lilly Bright: I stayed there for two years and then I moved to New York city.
Jennifer Tracy: Yes. That's right. You moved to New York city. What precipitated that move?
Lilly Bright: Well, the fact that I felt I couldn't manage the pressures I was feeling at school. The pressures I was putting my on myself but that I felt also in college. And again I think for many years I followed this idea that if only I moved to another location or if only I do something x, y or z differently, then this thing that is tormenting me, making me do this, self-harming actions to myself, then that will go away. So part of it was like, oh God, I just need to move to New York. I need to be in the real world. I don't like this college thing. And then who I won't have anymore. I won't have all this pain I was experiencing in my life.
Jennifer Tracy: And so you moved to the city and what was your dream then and what was your plan? Did you still have the big dreams that were cultivating and fighting?
Lilly Bright: Yeah. I still had drive. I've always had sort of a no shortage of ambition or appetite. I got an internship at VH1 Studios. I wanted to work at MTV for since a child. We are the generation, come on.
Jennifer Tracy: Who didn't want to work at MTV, it was the shit back then.
Lilly Bright: Yeah, absolutely. And this is 1997, early 97 everything was happening.
Jennifer Tracy: Everything was happening. They were dated as the first reality show.
Lilly Bright: That's right.
Jennifer Tracy: Real world.
Lilly Bright: Yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: Riveting.
Lilly Bright: Oh my God. Just music videos.
Jennifer Tracy: Music videos.
Lilly Bright: VJ's. And so that's where I-
Jennifer Tracy: Didn't you want to be a VJ?
Lilly Bright: Of course. I wanted to be a VJ. I wanted to be a news commentator before that. And then when I found out there was a VJ option.
Jennifer Tracy: Sign me up.
Lilly Bright: I got an internship at VH1 Studios. And other than being there every day, I was the intern that got promoted to a paid position. And then after about a year of doing that, I really got disillusioned with that world and I was still heavily struggling with the eating disorder which wasn't making any of this easy, having any kind of regular job, going in to work it was like being hung over all the time.
Jennifer Tracy: It's hard to function.
Lilly Bright: Hard to function. I decided to get back to school and finish up my degree and I was studying dance and yoga at the time, something called Feldenkrais method. I'm trying to heal-
Jennifer Tracy: In New York?
Lilly Bright: Yeah, in New York. It was a good move on an overall moving there was a good move. But it was still that early 20s trying to find myself. That was the theme. Looking for my, searching, trying to find myself, trying to find what I cared about, what I was good at in the world. I had a lot of dreams but I don't think I had an accurate reflection of who I was. So then-
Jennifer Tracy: Of course not.
Lilly Bright: How do you know what tree to climb or how do you know what-
Jennifer Tracy: Well and in my experience with my own addiction which I've shared about many times on the show, my alcoholism and I've shared about my food stuff too. But is that when that kind of like you said, what camp do you put it in, is it addiction, is it a disease? Because for me it filters into all of the things. It is a spiritual malady. I don't know. Yes.
Jennifer Tracy: But like you said, I just didn't have, I mean even now at 44, I was just saying this to my friend Elaine this morning. I look back on those years and I just want to hold that girl and just say, oh honey, you can not see yourself. You're amazing. I just couldn't see myself and I too at that time in my life was struggling with, I had dreams, I didn't know how to get from a to c even though I had moved to New York, even though I had opportunities, I couldn't, because I was participating in my own self sabotage with the addiction and couldn't stop. It just was an impossible, it was like coming up against a brick wall again and again and again. I relate to that.
Jennifer Tracy: And at some point, didn't you go to somewhere upstate New York to study cooking?
Lilly Bright: It was actually the Western Massachusetts.
Jennifer Tracy: Western Massachusets.
Lilly Bright: Close. The Berkshires-
Jennifer Tracy: The Berkshires of course, so beautiful.
Lilly Bright: I did, I went to study how to cook. I went to a macrobiotic cooking school in the middle of the Berkshires near the Lenox, near, I mean, it's a beautiful area.
Jennifer Tracy: So gorgeous.
Lilly Bright: And what drew me there. I'm a seeker and I'm trying to heal myself at the time. Anything and everything from psychiatrists and medications to I need a new relationship with food, who doesn't need a new relationship with food. And I wanted to learn how to cook. I just thought that's a skill I need to have. We didn't live in a place where we could go out. It wasn't a going out to eat culture. It's not like today's world. You didn't have all these options. But I also didn't know how to make anything from scratch-
Jennifer Tracy: Which is amazing to hear you say because since the moment I've known you and we became friends, I was always just blown away by it. I would come over and you'd be like, oh, those are beans that have been slow cooking on the stove top all day. And I'm making this. And I'm like, and you gave me some recipes and I didn't know how to cook at all. I learnt how to cook from you and from Katie. I didn't know. And you are one of the moms, this show is called Moms I'd Like to Follow.
Jennifer Tracy: You are one of the moms I followed in the early days that I just was so bleary-eyed and hanging on by a thread. And I would call you or text you and be like, what-
Lilly Bright: I remember you asking me what are some breakfast options for this? Which is interesting because with my daughter I think about you and that question all the time because my son was so much easier to, he and I like we have the same palette, my son who is 10 now. And so whatever I like pretty much he's likes and Emily my daughter and I share some of the same lengths but we don't have the exact same palette like where my son and I really do.
Lilly Bright: I have struggled with like what am I making up for breakfast because she didn't like the things I like for breakfast. I think about you when that question and you were like, what? Can you give me some ideas?
Jennifer Tracy: I still struggle with it. I've shared about it on this show. His eating is, it's really hard to get him to eat healthy foods but that's a whole other rabbit hole. You left to New York for a short period of time to go to the Berkshires and study cooking and you had dreadlocks, which is one of my favorite parts of the story.
Lilly Bright: Wait, how do you know I had dreadlocks?
Jennifer Tracy: Because I love you and adore you and worship you and I listen to you intently when you're talking. I also remember you saying you were a valedictorian?
Lilly Bright: I was.
Jennifer Tracy: Which I knew you wouldn't mention on the show because you're humble but you're really, really smart. So you had dreadlocks?
Lilly Bright: I did. I grew dreadlocks. I don't know what this is in 99, 98, 99? I used [inaudible 00:24:17] as soap.
Jennifer Tracy: I love you so much, oh my God.
Lilly Bright: I remember I went and I drove home in my Volvo that I had just bought with my own money and I was like, it didn't have airbags. And my dad was like. Which I get it now.
Jennifer Tracy: Of course, because you are a parent.
Lilly Bright: I totally get it. I would have been like, over my dead body. You're not driving a car. But I was all like I'm invincible.
Jennifer Tracy: And you still struggled with the eating disorder, the bulimia?
Lilly Bright: The bulimia, yeah. That was a long road to recovery, I would think. It was two steps forward, one step back type of thing for a long time.
Jennifer Tracy: And I love that you as you shared you tried everything. It wasn't for lack of not trying and I think that's so important just for people to hear who are themselves struggling with it. And then people who have loved ones who struggle with it that it is a torturous existence.
Lilly Bright: It can be a long time. And because it's food, because it's not like alcohol where you could-
Jennifer Tracy: It's not like alcohol where you just leave it. You have to eat.
Lilly Bright: You really got to eat. So you got to face it like all the time so it can take a long time. And I think I was very hard on myself to be perfect about the recovery. How ironic.
Jennifer Tracy: You can't win for losing.
Lilly Bright: It's a disease of perfection and then you're trying to heal it with this perfection kind of standard. And then, yeah, so it was back and forth between New York city and Western Massachusetts. And I got involved in a couple of dance companies at the time. I was teaching some yoga was doing some work in some retail stores still very much trying to find myself, trying to heal myself, really still feeling that unless I could get a handle on this compulsion, this addiction, how am I going to have make a life? How I'm going to make a career? I don't know if I can stop this. Am I going to binge in part, I probably will today. Not today but I'm thinking and this is back then.
Lilly Bright: And it was just that all around any corner there could be and then there goes my day, there goes my job, how could you hold down a job when you're like, it's like you're consumed, you're just all consumed. I can understand if you had this and any kind of addiction. You just struggled to get through the day. I was trying to find my way out of that struggle to get through the day to where I could actually feel I could function. And then someone told me to move to L.A. but I was looking for a way to move out of New York. I was getting done with it. I could feel myself right for a new chapter.
Jennifer Tracy: Were you at this time yet involved in producing?
Lilly Bright: No.
Jennifer Tracy: Not yet. That came in L.A.?
Lilly Bright: It came in L.A.
Jennifer Tracy: You moved to L.A. just kind of, let's do this now. Like how most people move to L.A.
Lilly Bright: It's in my show that I always-
Jennifer Tracy: I got to hear a reading. I was very privileged to hear an early reading of your show and I can't wait to come see it live. I'm bringing a friend.
Lilly Bright: I can't wait for you to see it live because you had such an earlier stage of the draft. And so it's really, yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: So I'm sorry.
Lilly Bright: I was traveling already I had left New York and knew I was headed West California. I mean, come on. I already always had California in my mind for a long time. And I met a woman on my travels, barely knew me, I barely knew her and she said, "You'd make a great producer." And I'm so, not susceptible-
Jennifer Tracy: Suggestible.
Lilly Bright: Suggestible that it just went into me. I just thought, oh God. And I needed maybe someone to give me permission. That little part of me that or part of all of us that feels just someone tell me what to do and make it feel and be it, make it like it's the right thing, it feels good too. The thing that you're like, tell me what to do and then-
Jennifer Tracy: And then you be good at it.
Lilly Bright: You'd make a great producer. You should go, you should move to LA. And I just thought, okay, all right, I'll do that.
Jennifer Tracy: That's just amazing because that's just... I always say you have ovaries instead of you have balls to just say, okay, I'll do that. And then you did it. And you didn't just do it like you did it and can still do it exceedingly well. But how did you begin?
Jennifer Tracy: Again, we've come back to this sort of theme of big dreams and self worth. You had a new dream or what was marinating and cultivating into a new dream. How did you then go from a to b to c? How did you and your moving to LA., new place, you're young, you're still struggling with this thing.
Lilly Bright: 26.
Jennifer Tracy: How did you do it?
Lilly Bright: Felt like I was running out of options meaning and in a good way, it was like, I got to make this work. I think I just harnessed a lot of courage and grit which I totally credit with being raised in West Virginia. Because we were just really raised outside, outdoors and just had this kind of fearlessness. My sister's and I. I thought L.A. as always a kind of fortuitous place. Sometimes I think we just we land in a place that supports us. I took a lot of lunches. I ate a lot of lunches. I stopped throwing up as much and I met a therapist that really worked for me. I felt really aligned with this place, with L.A. And I don't know, does that sound kind of weird?
Jennifer Tracy: Not at all.
Lilly Bright: But I think sometimes we just end up in a place where our stars sort of match. And it felt like that place to me in 2003. And I just stayed really open, met lots of people through, I don't know what I did and there was no, you know, I didn't even have a smartphone. I was just kept following some kind of intuition at the time. It was like all I felt like I had to go on. And instinct, I think I have a good instinct. I don't know. I know we all have-
Jennifer Tracy: And what was your first like break in as a producer? Your first break?
Lilly Bright: I met these producers in Venice, a community of producers and they had a project that I got involved, do you want me to talk about specifics? You do?
Jennifer Tracy: If you want to. It's interesting to me.
Lilly Bright: I got involved in a project that actually supposedly based in West Virginia. It all turned out to be a hoax. If anyone's heard of the JT LeRoy hoax.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh, I don't know about that.
Lilly Bright: All of this author who was supposedly this young boy transgendered author from San Francisco was actually a woman writing the books but pretending to be someone else. Big literary hoax. Many films have been made on this on JT LeRoy. And I got involved in that project. It came to me just through I didn't know anyone here except one woman who I had met at a dinner party in New York city and I had knew her for two hours. That's the only person I knew in L.A. when I moved here. Which honestly in retrospect I was like, that was bonkers.
Jennifer Tracy: That's insane.
Lilly Bright: I don't think I would even do that today.
Jennifer Tracy: I did that too. I didn't know anyone when I moved here I was 23 and I didn't know anybody and it didn't matter. I don't know. There was a piece of me that was fearless as when I moved to New York when I was 18 same thing. There was a piece of me that was fearless but also vastly insecure it's so interesting that they coexisted but so and then from there you just, you took off really.
Lilly Bright: I just ran with it, I really ran with it and I was getting so much confidence. I think that's where I was getting, oh I'm not, I was going to say addicted but it wasn't, it was being filled with a good feeling about myself. That I had looked for in every nook and cranny and it was coming from a place where I really wasn't expecting it. To find self worth in running my own production company and being busy. I have a lot of energy. You just struck me as one of these [inaudible 00:34:14] I like to be busy-
Jennifer Tracy: I need to be doing stuff.
Lilly Bright: And not as like, oh, I need to be distracted-
Jennifer Tracy: No, not just busy work.
Lilly Bright: I feel like a lot of energy inside-
Jennifer Tracy: You need to make stuff. You need to create that is just in your being. And that's with since the moment I've met you, it's just like even when we were in the class with our little babies, they was what five, six months old. You just had this creative spark and when I come into your home, you make your home beautiful, you make your food beautiful, there's an artistry about your life and the way you live your life that's so compelling and inspiring and I can't wait. We're about to get to your show that you've just created, which is so epic. Can you tell me the story of how you met Evan? Because that's sort of I know in that realm of time.
Lilly Bright: Yes. That was in 2007. And like so many things in my life. It was a serendipitous encounter that happened through a chain of events that, so kind of unbelievable and that I couldn't have written anything even better than that because I had met him through, I met him in 2007 at a house party. It was his house ended up being our house and I was invited to that party by a guy that I met at The Viceroy, I know, a bar. Not even by myself. I had met up with a girlfriend there and not just any old girlfriend, the twin sister of my first boyfriend from New York city.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh my gosh. Wow.
Lilly Bright: And I had just run into her in Aspen, Colorado and found out no, in the ski lodge at the top of the mountain. It's going to continue to be more convoluted like no, really? Yeah really. After 10 years, turn around took our ski hats off and we were like, what? And I'd always remember we maintained a good relationship. I was 20, he worked at MTV. He was an editor and awesome guy. And he was seven years older, we dated for a while, seriously dated for a while and then we parted ways and I ran into his twin sister on the top of Aspen Mountain in 2000, early 2007. She was living in LA. I said, okay, when we get back to L.A. let's go have a drink. She said, great.
Lilly Bright: Met her at The Viceroy for a drink was on my way home. Said goodbye to her. She's staying in the bar to meet up with a guy, have a date date. And I'm on my way home driving home to my apartment in Venice. Oh, those were the days. That was 2007 in Venice. I turned around midway. I had forgotten my sunglasses.
Jennifer Tracy: Stop it right now.
Lilly Bright: I'm kidding. I am not kidding. My sunglasses. I don't know if you're one of these, I'm one of these people.
Jennifer Tracy: My sunglasses, my phone, it's usually my sunglasses.
Lilly Bright: Oh God. I don't want to go back but I got to go back. God, leaving these everywhere. I go back because the man, her date wasn't there when I left. I go back, there they are. They're chatting at a table, having drinks. I go grab my sunglasses. He turns to me he's like, hey what's your name? Come to his party. He's from Long Island. Come to this party, you got to come to this party. His name is Michael.
Jennifer Tracy: He was friends with Evan from back East?
Lilly Bright: He was friends with Evan. No, actually from L.A. But he's from long Island, so yes, they party. So he'd got my info that night. I was there. I didn't even sit down. I grabbed my sunglasses, he got my info. I said goodbye. Went home and then I keep getting emails from him. Invites, remember the invites it was the new thing. I'm telling you in over a course of two weeks, three or four times not just one invite.
Jennifer Tracy: He really wanted you to go to that party.
Lilly Bright: [inaudible 00:38:26] people to go to this party. And I really believe the only reason I went to the party is that I had friends from New York city staying with me that weekend in L.A. in my apartment and they wanted to go out and I had the biggest zit. I am serious. The biggest zit of my entire life-
Jennifer Tracy: Where on your face?
Lilly Bright: Between my eyebrows, directly between my eyebrows. No, it was like a mountain. It was a mountain and I had made it scabby.
Jennifer Tracy: Like you do.
Lilly Bright: Because I'm fucked up. Because you got to get in there, you got to make that imperfect thing all better. But of course you just make it worse, much worse. Set so much makeup on.
Jennifer Tracy: You should have put a bindi right there on top of like a little sticker.
Lilly Bright: Yeah, I know, right? Or one of those like, it was still wet and scat. It was awful. I mean, it was really, it was awful. It wouldn't even hold makeup. So who am I joking? But I promised my friends, I said, okay, we'll go out. I hadn't heard about this party and I went to the party and I saw Evan who of course, I didn't know who it was. And we're both into something called gyrotonic. I can say that. I can talk about this movement system of movement fitness, mindful movement work. In the scheme of things not many people are into gyrotonics, certainly back in 2007. It's more popular now-
Jennifer Tracy: It was very niche.
Lilly Bright: Very niche. So in the corner of this house that we're is the stool and there's a special stool that said gyrotonic. And I thought to myself, who the heck is [inaudible 00:40:21]
Jennifer Tracy: Is that the same stool that's in your bedroom now?
Lilly Bright: Same stool. Yes you just saw it. The same stool. He was into gyrotonic because he had gotten into it after he had this L4-L5 discectomy. He had discovered that's what kept him out of pain or something. And I've been into gyrotonic as background in dance. And it was big in New York when I was in New York. I got into it. But I thought it was so peculiar and I really wanted to figure out who is this person that has a gyrotonic stool.
Lilly Bright: I was ever sort of giddy because he was very cute and approached him and he ended up being the owner of the house and then that guy Michael was there, we connected over this gyrotonic stool. We had been going to the same studio for years, sliding doors, honestly sliding doors.
Jennifer Tracy: And then that was it, you guys were together?
Lilly Bright: That was pretty much it. It was one of those and I've dated a lot. It was a real serial dater, let's be honest. Commitment was super scary to me. Intimacy, commitment, vulnerability. I hadn't addressed those issues yet. But they were underlying all lot of other symptoms. What we're running from. And but so this was unusual that we went so and it was unusual that we recognized in each other something big. And more than just attraction. It was something big. And it was mutual and it took a few months. He actually was still dating someone in New York but living here and it was good to have some obstacles that slowed things down. I'm grateful for that. We didn't rush into anything.
Jennifer Tracy: And how long have you guys been together now?
Lilly Bright: We just had our 11th anniversary.
Jennifer Tracy: Congratulations. That's epic.
Lilly Bright: It is.
Jennifer Tracy: That's a feat.
Lilly Bright: It is. I didn't even have other relationship longer than a year and a half before.
Jennifer Tracy: And then just to, I'm going to fast forward a little bit but just to, well, I have two questions. The first is, within that timeframe, were you in recovery from bulimia yet?
Lilly Bright: For me it was a gradual process. It was over the course of almost two decades from the inception of the behavior to the peak which was I can't do anything else all day. This is going on like six times, six, seven times a day. I don't even understand but okay to just less and less and less. As I'm growing my container. To be with my feelings, to not run from every fucking discomfort. That was the test or that was the muscle I had to develop. How to be with stuff that wasn't, because I had trained myself honestly out of ever feeling discomfort. Because you just take that drink or you just take that food or you just-
Jennifer Tracy: Smoke that cigarette.
Lilly Bright: Smoke that cigarette. But what's under that? What are under those compulsions? You're uncomfortable or something and you don't want to be uncomfortable. Then your weak muscles get really weak but you don't know how to just be with something and trust it will pass and trust that that changes and takes time to change and develop, get stronger in other places which you've weakened because of choices. Coping mechanisms that weren't so healthy.
Jennifer Tracy: It is a long process. It doesn't just happen overnight and it's ongoing.
Lilly Bright: Some people seem to, I feel like some people say it happens overnight and it doesn't happen. I don't know if those are, maybe those are stories I've-
Jennifer Tracy: That's not my experience. Like you said, with alcohol it's different. You're either drinking or you're not drinking. But with the food it's, yeah. And then my second question in that moment was at what points are you, then you're with Evan, you guys are together, you ultimately decide to get married. When was the shift where you started thinking about kids and you had said earlier in the interview that he brought that out in you?
Lilly Bright: To have a family. It was pretty early, honestly. And it surprised both of us because he was married before. He has a daughter from that first marriage. When we met she was 12 at the time and living on the East Coast with her mom. And like I said, having children wasn't on my list. Having a family, even getting married wasn't on my list of to do things. I should be careful what I put on the list, what I don't put on the list rather. I think I let him bring this out. I surprised myself. That relationship it's been really transformative. He was a good mirror and I needed a mirror.
Jennifer Tracy: In what sense?
Lilly Bright: I've always liked to live by myself. And moving in with him I had then, you know, he's 15 years older and he has lots of life experience and he's traveled the world, he's met lots of different types of people and I really trusted his judgment, I still trust his judgment. He reads people really well. I think you know this about him. And so when he would give me reflections about me, positive qualities, I really put them to heart, why wouldn't I? I still do. I thought he was really qualified to have his opinions.
Jennifer Tracy: He really saw you.
Lilly Bright: I really respected, I think his-
Jennifer Tracy: He really saw you on a deep level.
Lilly Bright: Yeah. I think. And I could take it in. And then children just, it was actually I got pregnant, we got married in 2008 and I got pregnant. We had been dating for a year, no over a year. And then we got married in 2008 and I got pregnant I guess November of 2008. Because we had our children very close. In 2009.
Jennifer Tracy: Bloom's July 12th.
Lilly Bright: And William's 12 days after.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh yeah, that's right. July 24th. Oh my God. Yeah, they are so close.
Lilly Bright: I got pregnant and it was intentional. We were like, okay, we'll try it and then boom. And I was so happy pregnant, really happy pregnant person, woman. Then I have the baby. And that was postpartum was a whole other ball of wax. Really challenge for me. That's another challenge. Big challenge. Emotionally. Just chemically, hormonally.
Jennifer Tracy: We've talked about this before. I can't remember but did you have, you had postpartum depression after William?
Lilly Bright: I did.
Jennifer Tracy: But you didn't know it at the time?
Lilly Bright: I think I'm so, I've been so-
Jennifer Tracy: I didn't know until like two years in. You guys probably all knew.
Lilly Bright: I think you're right. I was in shock. I was probably in denial of it. I've always been in therapy for years. I was very aware of the darkness that was settling over in me and the daily crying. And I think I don't like labels. I don't feel like that now. I think then I was still little, I was young still. I mean that was 10 years ago. A lot can happen in 10 years.
Jennifer Tracy: Back then postpartum depression in my mind having not known anything about it but I think one of the reasons I was denying that label for myself was, oh, that's that one thing. And now since then all this research has come out and all these unfoldings of like, oh, postpartum depression isn't just postpartum depression. It's postpartum of a zillion different things, anxiety and anger and rage and indifference.
Jennifer Tracy: And it's like there's a whole, it's something I'm actually really passionate about talking about. And at some point I'd like to do something in a bigger way, more concrete way to contribute to that for women because I think it's so layered and deep and it's not talked about like they sent me from the hospital, I was like, bye. I had third degree tearing. I had to sit on a donut for two weeks, a cushion donut cushion. I was on Vicodin, which I hate Vicodin. I remember taking it and going, how do people who are addicted to Vicodin like this? You're not shitting, number one. You don't shit. And I just feel there's not a lot of aftercare or not any, there's not a lot. There's not any, in terms of that.
Lilly Bright: And I was never engaged. I wasn't involved in any mother community. I had no friends who were mothers-
Jennifer Tracy: Me neither. I had some but they all had kids that were a little older so I didn't have like new but so thank God-
Lilly Bright: Or much older, maybe decades older than me. And we weren't talking about this. And I think I was under this assumption, I think we are given that. This assumption like, oh, you're going to get your baby and then everything's going to be wonderful.
Jennifer Tracy: And it's just going to be bliss. Yes.
Lilly Bright: And I was like-
Jennifer Tracy: And it's not.
Lilly Bright: No, it wasn't for me. It was such a huge-
Jennifer Tracy: For some rare people it is.
Lilly Bright: It was such a huge shift of everything that you've ever known, a consciousness of who you are. I was not preparing for like the moment I would become a mother my whole life. I had no idea what that would mean. I had no idea. And bye. Enjoy your baby.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh, your car seat's installed great? Take off
Lilly Bright: Great. You're good.
Jennifer Tracy: Yeah. You're good.
Lilly Bright: And I couldn't exhale. The anxiety, the sleeplessness, the dark feelings.
Jennifer Tracy: Me too. I couldn't sleep. And people say, oh, so you have to sleep when the baby sleeps. I'm like, no, that's exactly when I don't sleep.
Lilly Bright: Yeah, same. I get a burst of energy as soon as the baby is sleeping. I'm like me time.
Jennifer Tracy: Me time.
Lilly Bright: And then I have a great time and then all of sudden the baby's up and I'm exhausted and then you can't sleep and then. And that keeps happening over and over.
Jennifer Tracy: And it's lonely. And we had our baby group, which we came to six months in, which was so helpful. And I've formed lifelong friendships from that. I'm so grateful for. And yet it was one and a half hours once a week, it just wasn't enough. I wanted to live with you guys.
Lilly Bright: Same. I remember taking my time to drive. I was like, no problem. I'll drive the half hour, 40 minutes to get to class and then home because you know it was okay which I had that. It was about, I don't know what it was about. I don't remember a lot of that first year.
Jennifer Tracy: I don't either.
Lilly Bright: It was [inaudible 00:52:22]
Jennifer Tracy: I don't either, there's a lot of blocking out.
Lilly Bright: Yeah. Black dark space-
Jennifer Tracy: Which is how you get to be able to have another child. I think that's the only way. So then you had your second child and you were already well versed. And was that easier?
Lilly Bright: It was so different. It was so different the way I felt. I didn't have all the extreme highs and lows afterwards. I had a caesarian with my first and I did the VBAC with my second. She was two pounds smaller, which made it better. I had four years in between. So there had really felt like there was ample healing and I didn't let myself tire out. With that labor of my first child I just again I thought I was just going to squat in the yard or in the woods better yet if I could just be barefoot in the woods. I was going to squat and have this baby out and then I was going to pick that baby up and we were just going to go on our way. Just like nothing really happened. I just slap him on the boob and off we'd go to Whole Foods and I would just not miss a beat of anything.
Jennifer Tracy: No. Because you'd even clean up after yourself.
Lilly Bright: I'd be cleaning up after myself. Absolutely. I'd cut my own cord and have an orgasm on top of it. I was like, I'm going to have the orgasmic birth, I'm going to have the self labor because these are the perils of being such a perfectionist. Of course I will.
Jennifer Tracy: But can we talk about the orgasm thing, that is a thing, right?
Lilly Bright: That is a thing. It didn't happen for me.
Jennifer Tracy: It didn't happen for me either.
Lilly Bright: Either time. I'm zero for two and I'm happy to be that. It's okay it can be a struggle.
Jennifer Tracy: Well and that's the whole thing. It's like every birth story is different. Every birth is so different. And it's all beautiful and perfect. Exactly as it's supposed to be. But you do or I did think they're like do a birth plan and do this and you take these classes and it's like, no, none of that helped at all.
Lilly Bright: I'm out to change the phrasing. It's really a pet peeve of mine when people ask, did you have a natural birth?
Jennifer Tracy: What does that mean?
Lilly Bright: To me I say al birth is natural. Birth is natural. I don't care what you had [inaudible 00:55:01]
Jennifer Tracy: I have not had people ask me that.
Lilly Bright: I've had. Was it natural? And I'm like, well yeah, it came out of my body. It's real natural.
Jennifer Tracy: Yeah that's very old fashioned.
Lilly Bright: Well, I don't know people still use that language but the gift of my first labor, 53 hours and caeserian hospital, all things I didn't want and thought I would never ever have the gift of that is now I see the error of my ways of like, oh my God, I had really boxed myself in and I didn't even like they meet their child once it has a different plan. Because that thinking like again, it's the control issues that surround all my past struggles of like, oh, I'm in control. Maybe-
Jennifer Tracy: Not really.
Lilly Bright: Not really. And also there's another human being now in the picture and you're not in control. And if you can't learn it any other way, maybe you're going to learn it this time. I'm kind of giving a voice to the universe. And I did learn it because it was a big cataclysmic change and hit over the head of like, oh my God, my body was ripped, the ceasarean and I healed very poorly and that was everything I didn't expect and I felt like a failure. And I thought, well, that's really shitty because here I have this healthy, beautiful son, how am i a failure?
Jennifer Tracy: You birthed a gorgeous human being and yet because we're somehow programmed to think-
Lilly Bright: And all of a sudden then, oh, I didn't have a natural birth? Hell no. It just came from my body and this is natural. I don't care what you used as supplement that process. As long as you don't harm that the baby. It was a big growth. It was a huge growth in some ways. And the second time was night and day difference. And I credit to, I really I wanted a different experience.
Jennifer Tracy: And well you were a different person by then. Look at the growth. I always say having a child and I should clarify, I do believe this happens whether you adopt a child or whether you actually give birth to the child or not. But when you mother a child and when you have a child, it does rip you apart. It rips you apart in the best possible way.
Jennifer Tracy: And everything you just described is what parenthood has been for me. It's just smashed my old ideas of what you know. And my son now he's not confrontive but he really calls me on my shit because I taught him to do that. It's so great because I know he's doing that out in the world for himself. And that's something I didn't learn until I was in my 30s.
Jennifer Tracy: So anyway, I'm digressing but so you have these two incredible human beings that you're raising and you're still, I'm kind of going back to Emily was born and have these two children and you're raising them and you're still working as I recall during that whole time. I remember you were doing different projects and things and you got certified in the Feldenkrais Method. And tons of other things. You guys moved and then you moved back and you built two different houses. You're doing a lot and then you got inspired to tell this story.
Lilly Bright: The idea for my solo show came in 2012, it was before I was pregnant with Emily and at that time I was shifting gears from producing and distributing films into my own work. And motherhood birthed my creativity, birthed me like re-evaluating how I was spending my time and realizing I have all these creative ideas and impulses and now that's where I'm going to put my attention. So that did happen over a period of time. It wasn't-
Jennifer Tracy: Just one day.
Lilly Bright: One day but it was a period of. I was in that process end of 2012 and I was taking writing workshops or generative support. I was resourcing to generate ideas and to kind of start unpacking already ideas I had and I took a writing and movement workshop and the writing and the voice that came out felt like a solo show. And not just to my ears which I thought, oh I think this could be a solo show. But to the other women in the group. Which was in fact one woman said it before I even, she said, you ever thought of doing a one person's show? And I was like, actually, yeah, I mean very sort of from a distant place. Like to think, oh yeah, that would be, because my background's in theater and dance and college as theater major.
Lilly Bright: Growing up plays after play after play. And when I moved to L.A. it wasn't just to get into producing. Yes I was also doing acting classes. And voice lessons, which I'd always done. And at any rate it was birthed in this workshop and I have always felt the last piece of my healing process would be to share my story in a more public way. Because thinking about one of the first things we talked about today, the secret, hiding the secret of my struggle. My secret with what I did with food. I mean it's very secretive food especially bulimia, food issues are often very secret. And with the secret, the bigger the secret, the bigger the shame. They just go hand in hand. And I thought, well, I'm not passing this on to another generation, not passing this to my daughter.
Lilly Bright: I was never satisfied with and you can probably tell, I'm not satisfied with doing things half-ass. Yeah, there's a perfectionist thing perhaps in there but it's also, no, I really, I want a full healing for myself. I don't want to be haunted by this all the time. I can't have that in my life.
Jennifer Tracy: And I think it's, you're right. It's not always perfectionism. I think there's a healthy pride in a solid completion to your best ability. And you know, Lilly, you know your best ability is your bar is high for yourself and that's great.
Lilly Bright: So then I thought, okay, this show and this voice. And then I got pregnant and then the work on the show shifted for a good year. No, maybe a year and almost two years to a back burner. And I'd feed it every so often with writing or this but it was in the back burner for sure. And I knew I would get back into it. I wanted my daughter, I wanted to get out of the postpartum phase. I wanted to get out of breastfeeding, I wanted her to be more than it was in 2016 so yeah, she was two and a half when I kind of really dove back, really recommitted or committed myself back to creating this project to manifesting the project.
Jennifer Tracy: And how did you do it? From that moment on? How did you-
Lilly Bright: I started resourcing for women who were solo show performers, solo show coaches. It was a very particular and specific genre. And there are actually more today than back in 2012 honestly. It's very interesting. I think this genre has had a real growth spurt but so I researched who could help me in this process because I didn't know, I've written before but I had not written a show before. It's like a solo show. I found a woman in New Mexico. And then I went to work with her for a weekend and started getting the process going and then I went off on my own and wrote the show [inaudible 01:04:00] The first draft was done in less than three days, which felt like a real download. I think it actually was 36 hours or something.
Jennifer Tracy: That's amazing. At that point did you just lock yourself in a room and do it?
Lilly Bright: I kind of did, yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: I love doing that for my own writing and I just have a friend who just did that. She had her husband take her kids for two weeks to the East Coast during the summer. And she stopped her work for two weeks and she finished her memoir. She had already been working on it. But for me there's something about that immersion writing that really works because you can just stay in it. So then you had the reading, which I got to be a part of. I was so grateful when you asked me. Oh my God. It was so amazing, it blew me away.
Lilly Bright: [inaudible 01:04:47] reading couple years ago, more than two years ago. Amazing. Wow.
Jennifer Tracy: And now you're about to debut here in Los Angeles?
Lilly Bright: Yeah, I premiered it in Santa Fe last March 2018 and then I wanted to get a couple of few shows under my belt before I worked at the show in LA. And so here I am.
Jennifer Tracy: Here you are. And you have your director Valerie is another solo show artist.
Lilly Bright: Yeah. Who you know.
Jennifer Tracy: Who I know.
Lilly Bright: I love when the world gets all connected like this.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh my gosh. The show is coming up in a couple of weeks and I already have my tickets and obviously this week on MILF Podcast we're going to be telling everyone how to get their tickets and where to go. And but so you're doing it for, how many nights are you doing it?
Lilly Bright: It's seven shows total between September 19th and September 28th. Seven shows.
Jennifer Tracy: That's intense. Are you so excited? Are you nervous?
Lilly Bright: I'm excited, I am. It is a shamanic process. And I realized this on my... This came to me the other week when the fear was tremendous and the shame and the oh-
Jennifer Tracy: What am I doing?
Lilly Bright: What are you doing? And I thought the only way to address this level of fear. When you fear I think you have to go right into it and you have to go into it with a consciousness and with a courage that I think I have to frame it as a shamanic rite of passage. Just because that I'm very visual person. I have to make a picture of me walking into fear in my head.
Jennifer Tracy: You are going to walk through fire.
Lilly Bright: You have to walk through fire, otherwise it's going to consume me.
Jennifer Tracy: In front of us and we're all going to be holding this [inaudible 01:06:50] for you.
Lilly Bright: And anxiety. I know you have.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh yes.
Lilly Bright: I know you know that.
Jennifer Tracy: Yes, I do. Well.
Lilly Bright: And so yeah, that's the way you deal with the fear.
Jennifer Tracy: It's so hot, it's so sexy. Oh my God. It's really is. To me that's the stuff that turns me, that's the stuff that gets me like, yeah, let's do this. It's because it's just. Somebody asked me the other day, why do you keep doing this work? Why do you keep doing the podcast? Or why do you keep staying sober and doing your sober recovery work? And I'm like because all the other stuff is just noise. You know what I mean? When I get anxious about this or that or material things or.
Jennifer Tracy: I was just talking with someone the other day about my aging and how I'm worried about aging. And it's like, well, I'm only worried about aging when I'm thinking about aging. The rest of the time I'm not thinking about it because I'm talking to another amazing mom who's doing a solo show or I'm, you know, it's... But those fears are what kind of percolate around. But when I get in front of people that are inspired and doing inspiring things and walking through their own fear, it provides me with this sense of relief. I don't know. I'm not articulating it well I don't think. But it's just like I can exhale. I can just exhale and go all right.
Lilly Bright: To just reflect you to you because Jen, you are completely transformed from when I met you.
Jennifer Tracy: Yes I am.
Lilly Bright: I am and you are and that's like, I really treasure that. It's really valuable and it's inspiring. You're stepped into yourself, your power, a path. Showing up at my house and having your podcast. All the things you've been doing, your event, the other end July Dynasty Typewriter. Who you've become through your, you have a transformational journey. And I'm thinking about in my show, I think about what I want people to take away from the show or how can, I think when we witness someone in a transformational path. I think that's really, it can be really inspiring.
Jennifer Tracy: So inspiring. And that's what I was trying to say. I think I was fumbling but when we're witnessing someone else's vulnerable, true raw story, it gives us relief because we're less alone. We're just that much less alone. Whether we can relate to that exact experience or not, we can relate to the humanity of it. And there's something that's just so beautiful about it. That's why there's millions of books and TV shows and music and theater and I don't think we've said it. What is the name of your show?
Lilly Bright: American Standard: A Story of Enough.
Jennifer Tracy: I just got chills everywhere. That's so amazing.
Lilly Bright: I had the name before anything.
Jennifer Tracy: You had the name before anything?
Lilly Bright: I've had the American Standard for a long time. Is it obvious why?
Jennifer Tracy: To me it is.
Lilly Bright: It doesn't have to be.
Jennifer Tracy: We can say why. Well, for those listeners that are like, why is American Standard, what does that mean?
Lilly Bright: They should come to the show.
Jennifer Tracy: They should come to the show.
Lilly Bright: Do come to the show.
Jennifer Tracy: Tell us where the show is?
Lilly Bright: Highways Performance Space, which is a black box theater in Santa Monica, 18th & Olympic.
Jennifer Tracy: Super easy to get to and it's such a great space.
Lilly Bright: It is easy to get to and it's a great space. I needed this run at least to be on the West side. Because that's really where I've made my home. Most of my community, but I'm fearless. I'm a fearless Los Angelian in terms of driving. I go anywhere.
Jennifer Tracy: Yeah, you really do. I ran into you at that Calabasas [inaudible 01:11:17] I'm like-
Lilly Bright: Oh my gosh, that's right. I do go [inaudible 01:11:19]
Jennifer Tracy: Which is also my favorite one. I know.
Lilly Bright: I love [inaudible 01:11:22] Calabasas.
Jennifer Tracy: I'm going to live there. We're going to make it happen. But that will be good. Wait, Highway Space. And by the way, all of this, if you're driving or doing your laundry or whatever, all of this is in the show notes. So if you want to buy tickets, which you should if you're in L.A. you can go to my show notes [at] milfpodcast [dot] com and you can get tickets. I will be there probably more than once. I'm bringing one friend at least one night. I have those tickets bought. But and then there will be more and we will keep you apprised of the next space. Maybe you'll travel, maybe you'll do it in many venues.
Lilly Bright: I hope so. I think with creative work you have to just listen. It's a living kind of thing. And you listen to what it wants to be. What it wants to do, how it wants to maybe change or if it's done. I think you just have to listen.
Jennifer Tracy: I love that, that you just said that because for me, what's interesting is when I get into my creative stuff, my ego can take over and try to dictate what it should be or where it should be or who should be seeing it. It's interesting and I think there's, what you just said is so nice because it lets that ego kind of take a back seat and it's like, no, you're not driving this.
Lilly Bright: Yeah. Well, honestly, all the best things that have ever happened to me have been accidents or in random, seemingly random or like, oh, because I turned around and went back for glasses.
Jennifer Tracy: Because you forgot your sunglasses.
Lilly Bright: If I had said, well I want this to go like that or all the best things have been felt like chance encounters or when I didn't have it all mapped out. That's, yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: Boy did I need to hear that today because I tend to think I need to have it all mapped out. And I'm really trying to release that at 44.
Lilly Bright: Can I just tell your listeners though something?
Jennifer Tracy: Yeah.
Lilly Bright: Jen has really great feet.
Jennifer Tracy: I do?
Lilly Bright: You all need to know this because you'll probably never ever see her bare feet. They're really great.
Jennifer Tracy: You're so sweet. I was like, you were looking at my feet-
Lilly Bright: And they're really clean but she doesn't have any color on her nails, which I love because I had a boy-
Jennifer Tracy: You [inaudible 01:13:54] bare nails.
Lilly Bright: I do. I had a boyfriend once that I was deeply, deeply in wild love infatuation with and respect. And I remember I showed up one time, he was a firefighter [inaudible 01:14:10] He was really hot. I was really young, I had showed up to where he was stationed in Southern New Mexico and I had painted my nails, got this pedicure and he was the kindest man but he also was like, eh. I thought he was going to love this pedicure I had done, he was like, I don't like polish. And I know it sounds like it could have been mean, it wasn't-
Jennifer Tracy: No, I wasn't gasping but I was just, to me that's so interesting. I've never had a man-
Lilly Bright: Comment?
Jennifer Tracy: Comment on my nails or not nails. I don't know except for like, oh, you got your nails done but like to say, oh, I don't like polish. That's just so interesting like that he knew what he liked and he was willing to say it.
Lilly Bright: He was like oh honey. Kind of like, oh honey, you don't need that. Exactly.
Jennifer Tracy: That's what I liked about it. He just wants your raw beauty.
Lilly Bright: And because it was a whole, I won't go into the story of how we ended up completely falling out and never having any contact and it's one of the biggest regret that I, it's a regretful ending. He didn't like it and I don't use polish every so often. My daughter loves it but I love the fact that you have beautiful feet.
Jennifer Tracy: Thank you.
Lilly Bright: I never say that.
Jennifer Tracy: Thank you for saying that. That's so sweet.
Lilly Bright: It's true.
Jennifer Tracy: So we've come to the time when I ask the questions and then the lightning round. What do you think about Lilly when you hear the word MILF?
Lilly Bright: Jennifer Tracy, I will join the long line of women who say Jennifer Tracy, I do, your picture.
Jennifer Tracy: Well, thank you. I'm very glad. That's good. We're redefining it.
Lilly Bright: We are.
Jennifer Tracy: What's something you've changed your mind about recently?
Lilly Bright: I change my mind a lot. I'm fearless about changing my mind. And I give all women the permission to change their minds. Whether it's like you were going to go out to dinner with someone and you just at the last moment, I don't know, last moment, I'm not into standing people up but it's okay to change your mind.
Jennifer Tracy: Listen to your intuition, which you said at the very beginning.
Lilly Bright: Well, I think that's, that's really interesting. Change your mind. It may be the best thing you ever did.
Jennifer Tracy: I love that. How do you define success?
Lilly Bright: I think it's a feeling of satisfaction, success. And only each of us knows what that is. And I think that's just, it's the warm feeling in your belly. It's that warm easy feeling in your belly? That should be your success.
Jennifer Tracy: Okay. Lightning round of questions. Ocean or desert?
Lilly Bright: Desert.
Jennifer Tracy: Favorite junk food? Can't wait for this answer.
Lilly Bright: I'm thinking of anything with chocolate and almond butter. And coconut, sorry.
Jennifer Tracy: Trifecta. Now they have the Justin's with almond butter. It's so much better with almond butter.
Lilly Bright: I have a whole pantry of nut of every flavor nuts. And if I can just eat them and with some chocolate and coconut and dates.
Jennifer Tracy: I just discovered like a year ago cashews. Where have cashews been all my life. Oh my God. I've been missing out. They're like kind of creamy. And then I discovered cashew milk. I was like what?
Lilly Bright: So good.
Jennifer Tracy: It's so yummy. It's satisfying. It's successful, cashews are successful.
Lilly Bright: My son's vegetarian. I find all sorts of, so we're huge and he loves nuts. So we have gotten, we and I, yeah.
Jennifer Tracy: There's so many. Oh, and I was just in Hawaii and we had macadamia nuts and the fruit. I mean I'd forgotten how amazing the fruit is there but we had these macadamia nuts and I was like, oh my God, I forgot about macadamia. I wouldn't eat them all the time but it was like a dessert.
Lilly Bright: Apple cider donuts.
Jennifer Tracy: Wait, what do you mean? Apple cider donuts?
Lilly Bright: Sorry. I'm still thinking about your question.
Jennifer Tracy: Do you bake them?
Lilly Bright: I have a deep fried my own donuts. They're so good. I learned on the East Coast, it's a East Coast thing. It's a Pennsylvania thing.
Jennifer Tracy: So Apple cider, you mean you-
Lilly Bright: You use Apple cider in the dough when you make it then you roll it into cinnamon sugar and everything.
Jennifer Tracy: It takes like the fall in West Virginia.
Lilly Bright: Bingo. It's so beyond. I'm going to have to make it and you'll come over for coffee, Apple cider donuts. I'm sorry. You've gotten me now thinking about like my favorite, what did you ask? Junk-
Jennifer Tracy: Junk food.
Lilly Bright: I don't even know if that is junk food it is so good food though. I will just have to probably redefine it.
Jennifer Tracy: In your realm, that is junk food.
Lilly Bright: We'll have to redefine it.
Jennifer Tracy: One of my [inaudible 01:19:48] and her answer was kale chips was her junk food. It's whatever. We're so L.A. Movies or Broadway show?
Lilly Bright: Broadway show.
Jennifer Tracy: Daytime sex or nighttime sex?
Lilly Bright: Day.
Jennifer Tracy: Right on, too tired at night?
Lilly Bright: I am beat at night, I'm just trashed.
Jennifer Tracy: Unless it's four in the morning, then if but then it's morning sex. It's not really nighttime.
Lilly Bright: Morning, mid, noon.
Jennifer Tracy: Noon.
Lilly Bright: Noon sex.
Jennifer Tracy: A good nooner does me right.
Lilly Bright: Love it.
Jennifer Tracy: Texting or talking?
Lilly Bright: To you, talking, texting everybody else.
Jennifer Tracy: Cat person or dog person?
Lilly Bright: Dog.
Jennifer Tracy: Have you ever worn a unitard?
Lilly Bright: I wore a unitard last night. Not to bed.
Jennifer Tracy: Yes.
Lilly Bright: I love my unitards. I love my tards. My unitards and my leotards.
Jennifer Tracy: I love my tards?
Lilly Bright: They're my thunder suits. Have you heard about dogs and they need a thunder suit?
Jennifer Tracy: No. What's a thunder-
Lilly Bright: A thunder shirt. Sorry. It's what you put on a dog when it's lightning and thundering out to calm them. A friend of mine who has dogs who get really hyped up around loud noises. They have these thunder shorts and they're like really fitted and they make them feel secure-
Jennifer Tracy: And your unitards make you feel secure?
Lilly Bright: My unitards and my leotards make me feel secure.
Jennifer Tracy: I love that.
Lilly Bright: I love them. I wear them a lot.
Jennifer Tracy: Shower or bathtub?
Lilly Bright: I can't live without a bath but I'm very mindful too about my water usage, another thing I've had to change living in California.
Jennifer Tracy: Yes. Ice cream or chocolate?
Lilly Bright: Chocolate.
Jennifer Tracy: Dark chocolate or?
Lilly Bright: Preferably raw. The kind of has to be refrigerated.
Jennifer Tracy: I found these new things at [inaudible 01:22:03] and this is so L.A. boring but it comes in an orange package. It's basically raw cocoa, coconut I think that's it.
Lilly Bright: Maple syrup.
Jennifer Tracy: I don't even think there's, well, there must be something sweetener. It's mushy.
Lilly Bright: I don't know this one. Yesterday I had had some raw chocolate with me. But don't leave it in your purse.
Jennifer Tracy: Oh gosh. Did it melts all over everything?
Lilly Bright: It happens.
Jennifer Tracy: On a scale of one to 10, how good are you at ping pong?
Lilly Bright: A five.
Jennifer Tracy: What's your biggest pet peeve?
Lilly Bright: Was your birth natural?
Jennifer Tracy: If you could push a button, which one do I ask you, I have three choices. If you could push a button because you already have perfect skin, so that's out. If you could push a button and it would create 10 years of world peace but it would also place a hundred year ban on all beauty products, would you push it?
Lilly Bright: Yeah. Of course.
Jennifer Tracy: Super power choice, invisibility, ability to fly or super strength?
Lilly Bright: Invisibility.
Jennifer Tracy: Would you rather have a penis where your tailbone is or a third eye?
Lilly Bright: Third eye.
Jennifer Tracy: What was the name of your first pet?
Lilly Bright: Valentine.
Jennifer Tracy: What was the name of the street you grew up on?
Lilly Bright: Starbucks [inaudible 01:23:33]
Jennifer Tracy: Stop it right now. So your poor name is Valentine Starbuck. That is fantastic.
Lilly Bright: You can take the show on the road now.
Jennifer Tracy: Lilly, I love you so much.
Lilly Bright: I love you Jen.
Jennifer Tracy: Just really quickly, is there a website for your show or is there a newsletter people can sign up for? How do people get in touch with you? How do they follow you on Instagram?
Lilly Bright: Yeah. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. It's Lilly. Well Instagram, @lillybright76 I'm a centennial baby. And Facebook Lilly Bright, American Standards Show, americanstandardshow.com is the website. And you can get in contact with me there, links to the tickets there but Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, Lilly Bright 76.
Jennifer Tracy: Perfect. So we can stay updated as you bring new shows and do new things. And also you can always find all of this on the milfpodcast.com website under Lilly's show notes as well as a transcript of the show. And I'm just so grateful to know you. I love you so much.
Lilly Bright: I love you so much. Thanks Jen.
Jennifer Tracy: Thanks so much for listening guys. I really hope you enjoyed my conversation with Lilly. Please check out flirtygirlguide.com and remember to use your exclusive VIP code MILF 10 for 10% off of all your purchases. Come back next week for a fresh episode of MILF. I love you guys. Keep going.