We recently connected with Kyle Anderson and have shared our conversation below.

Kyle, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

Thank you for having me here. Yes I do earn a full time living from my creative work, but I don’t think it’s a worthy goal. Certainly, I don’t think it’s important to speed up the process. Even if you’re broke or you feel stuck. I do what I do to enjoy whatever time I have in this life. It will feel counterintuitive to follow your curiosities when you’re struggling to meet your survival needs but if you’re not enjoying yourself, your decisions will tend to lead to a downward spiral. Changing professions will not cure you. Poverty is painful, but riches do not heal. What value does life have if there is no joy? I learned that one the hard way like so many others so I wish for these words to inspire you to follow a different path.

Since those times, I’ve learned that in devoting myself to finding appreciation, no matter what it is that I’m doing, I could enjoy myself while doing anything. There’s wonder in every detail of life. I shed the notion of goal setting, or work-life balance, or anything like this, in pursuit of a beautiful life, by my personal definition of what that means. The side effect was better health, wealth and relationships.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Absolutely. My name is Kyle Franklin Anderson. I’ve been the lead animator on a video game called Adventures of Chris, a film called Porcelain, a series of music videos with Lion With a Mic and many other projects. I also teach Tai Chi and Qigong on a weekly basis at the Dharma Health Institute in Playa del Rey and at Yoga Loft in Manhattan Beach.

I am the kind of person who could never just go along with stuff because of the expectations of others. I always found myself asking “why?”. That led me to wish to live in a world where each and every one of us can experience ourselves fully. In other words, I wish to inspire others to die without regrets. Today, for many people, that requires a process of healing and reintegration of parts of our psyche that have long been hidden, repressed or lost as a result of some kind of wound. It’s a challenging process, but the truth will set us free. It all starts with “why?”

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

We can all shift our focus from the question “what about me?” and begin to view all life on Earth, and beyond, as part of ourselves. If you’re feeling down, giving yourself gifts will only uplift you for a brief moment, but generally you will feel empty inside. Offering gifts to others will prove more satisfying in the long run.

So, in my view, creating an ecosystem where all human beings have their basic survival needs met while doing as little harm as possible to the animal and plant life around us would be best not only for creatives but for everyone. If it’s your dog, or your cat, you tend to take care of it just as you would take care of yourself. It starts as a way of thinking, then becomes a change in our everyday actions, then becomes the quality of our character, and then the culture of our society.

We are capable of seeing everything in the cosmos as a work of art.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

One day when I was walking home from my office job in Chicago I conceived an idea for a story that I wanted to see come to life so badly that I felt I couldn’t do anything else with my life except for that. I’d had many ideas before it, and many ideas since, but in one fell swoop I made the decision to pursue that kind of life no matter what obstacles came in my way. That dedicated focus to do this one thing brought me to where I am today and yet, I have not yet found the opportunity to create this story I conceived. But I did learn a valuable lesson that led me to unlearn a particular point of view.

Life is not a destination.

When we’re kids we’re always told that one day we’ll enter the real world, a place where we get a job and a house and a spouse, etc. At every stage of school I thought in the next stage maybe then I could finally do the things I wanted to do and live the life I wanted to live. A life where I made cartoons or mastered swordsmanship or explored the boundaries of reality as we know it. Making magic.

Instead, I would graduate, or switch schools, or switch majors, and continue to be instructed to memorize mathematical equations or historical events that had no significance to me in my day to day life. In some cases, I later found that these lessons weren’t even true. Remember when we used to celebrate Christopher Columbus?

Needless to say, none of this ever helped me to feel better about myself. It’s obvious to me that I’m not alone in this struggle. It wasn’t until I stepped away from society’s expectations and decided to live how I wanted that life became rich for me.

But I’ve recognized that those moments helped me to conceive the story and led me down this path to begin with.

So I’ve let go of the need to get to any particular place in life. Instead of asking our children what they want to be when they grow up, I would ask them about what excites them today. You can ask yourself this same question. Why are you spending your time the way you spend it?

Contact Info:

• Website: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/699525024
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/khannelfreeman
• Other: https://www.dharmahealthinstitute.com/ https://www.yogaloftmanhattanbeach.com/