A devastating loss rocked Aaron's world... Pro Wrestling saved his life

Transcript

[0:05] Welcome back to Between the Before and After, a podcast about the stories that shape us.
I'm your host, Coach Jon McLernon. Each episode, I bring you an inspiring guest with a moving story that shines a light on the power of the human spirit. I'm excited to share this story with you. So let's dive in.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's very hard for me not to want to slip into my announcer's voice because I have the special pleasure today of chatting with Aaron Mashbitz, who, amongst other things in his story, has been a professional wrestler. And so, Aaron, welcome to the show. Hey, Jon, thanks for having me. Yeah, that seems to be always the, I guess, the coolest part. And it is pretty cool. Yeah, it was a dream of mine for a long time to be a pro wrestler. And, I got to do it. So yeah, it's a it's an important, very, very important part of my story.
And it basically intertwines with almost everything that's now happening in my life.
So yeah, thanks for having me. Yeah.
Has anybody done like a pro wrestling style introduction for you on their podcast?
They have not. They have not.
I mean, maybe when I was like actually going by my name, Jackson Stone, and I did some WWE tryouts, maybe 2017, 2018, I did a bunch of podcasts after that.
And so they may have done them then, but you know, that's a long time ago. So, but yeah.

[1:25] Well, unfortunately I have just a little bit of a horse throat today, so I'm not quite in full gear for doing that. Otherwise I would absolutely love to do that.
But before we dive into your story, which has many, many twists and turns that I'm excited to explore, to let people know what are you up to presently.
Oh, that's that's a good question. And when I always have trouble answering, but I'll give you I'll try to give it. Yeah, that's the tight version. One, I have a podcast. It's called something for everybody. We're about 180 episodes into that. I love baseball. So I coach youth baseball. And I also work on the mental skills. So I'm a mental skills coach as well inside of baseball. I own and operate a mental health nonprofit called you are loved. And through Through that, I do a bunch of speaking engagements at schools and businesses talking about mental health, and intertwining that with mental skills.
And yeah, so that's pretty much it for the most part, I'd say.
Yeah, outside of that.
Just a couple of things there to keep you busy. The struggle is real trying to keep these sorts of things all organized.
I know, because I'm a podcaster, I'm an educator, as well as I run a coaching company.
So I can enter into some degree to some of those challenges.
So going back to like when you were a kid, what did you picture maybe that you were going to pursue?
What did you wanna be when you grew up?

[2:52] From about four until 13, I was gonna be a professional baseball player.
Yeah. And then at age 13, that's when I saw WWE for the very first time.
Then it was, okay, I'm going to be a professional baseball player or WWE World Champion.
So that was the goal, that was the dream.
My whole life shaped around those two things.
And I've actually been extremely lucky to be able to pursue both dreams to my full potential.
But yeah, I also wanted to be a superhero. I really like Batman and the Green Lantern.
Those are my two favorite when I was growing up. Oh, and the White Power Ranger.
That was also my favorite. So yeah, I guess being a pro wrestler was a culmination of that, but yeah, love baseball, love pro wrestling.
Yeah, pro wrestling, you get to be kind of a larger-than-life character.
I'm curious how you felt about Ryan Reynolds and his take on the Green Lantern.

[3:47] I mean, I enjoyed the movie. It wasn't awesome by any means.
He's way better as Deadpool, that's for sure. Right, right. Excellent film.
But I think they should make another Green Lantern, because that's like a cool movie.
It has a good story. Use the imagination with the ring, and there's a lot of characters you can involve.
And there's many different Green Lanterns that have happened out of history in all the comics.
I think someone can take on that role.
That'd be sweet. Yeah, yeah. I think it's really sort of untapped potential there.
But it is hard to commute to Deadpool.
Deadpool was like made for Ryan Reynolds. So speaking of acting and performing.
So when you saw your first WWE show, was this on TV or did you go to a live event?

[4:30] It was on TV. It was the summer before I went to high school.
Yeah. I just come to the realization that I was like, because in middle school I played baseball, I played football, and I played basketball.
In the summer before high school started, I came to the realization that I was like, not good at basketball and I was still very small and I didn't really like football anymore because in Texas it's like very serious and it just didn't, it didn't suit well for me.
But I knew I loved baseball. I wasn't very good at it yet, but I was gonna play in high school no matter what.
And so I'm popping on the TV, kind of like sad a little bit about that coming to an end and not knowing what else I'm gonna do or whatever. And then boom, there's John Cena, right on the TV.

[5:11] He's working with Edge for their program, going to SummerSlam and then Edge goes to John Cena's dad house.
He slaps him in the face and I'm like, what's happening?
Why is he slapping him in the face? Why is he at his dad's house?
Is this normal television?
And then keep moving forward. I saw a match and I was like, my God, this is like the superheroes that I love.
But now they're fighting and they're talking and I was like, I'm doing, I ran downstairs to my mom and dad. I said, this is what I'm going to be.
I thought you thought I was going to be a baseball player, but no, I'm going to be a professional wrestler.
And my parents are the best parents in the whole world. I might be a little biased, but I think they are.
And they were like, hey, we support you. And my dad started taking me to Raw.
They bought me t-shirts and I had all the DVDs before you could do everything on streaming.
And it was in baseball games, Monday Night Raw, baseball, Monday Night Raw, baseball, we're traveling everywhere to see this, to do that.
And yeah, so that's, and then I joined the wrestling team in high school thinking that it was WWE.
It was amateur wrestling. I think most people in that profession have made that mistake, so that's a common story, but it's still quite funny. Right, yeah.
But it helped me, it got me into the gym, which has been a cornerstone of my entire life.

[6:25] And I made friends, I found out that other people like WWE inside of wrestling, because they made the same mistake as I did.
So it was cool. So that's sort of where the journey began, in terms of my wrestling love and working out and things like that.
Right. Yeah. So were you a teenager when you first got to see a live show?
And if so, who did you get to see perform live?
Oh, I think you might have stumped me in my own history.

[6:54] I only remember the first time I saw it on TV. I don't remember who my dad and I saw when we went to raw live because I think he only went to a couple with me. And then he realized that I had friends who would rather go and he was like, cool, they can go with you.
I went to a lot. I don't remember what was the first one. I've went to a couple WrestleManias and things like that because I was working the weekends that they were had. They were going on and things like that. But yeah, you stumped me on my own history.
I maybe need to look at that. Yeah. So you're you're living in Dallas. Is that right?
At this time? Yes, I am. Yeah. And are you born and raised Texas?
I was born close to San Francisco, California, and then we moved to Dallas when I was, let's say, a 11 and 12 ish. I started, I started seventh grade in Dallas. So I was like gung ho about playing football because they didn't really, it wasn't really big in California. And then I got my ass whooped for two straight years and decided that wasn't for me. And then I guess I went into wrestling and got my ass whooped there too. But I like, I liked it better. It had a better vibe. I don't know. Right, right. Um, well, I recall my first show was, uh, before I started recording, I mentioned 1991, it was the undertaker. Um, The headline was the Undertaker versus the Ultimate Warrior.
That was incredible. There was Honky Tonk Man fought a Hooded E-Fight Greg Valentine.
I remember that because we were like right under the speakers at the Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver where the show was happening. And here I'm like nine years old and they're just blaring like so loud.
And Greg the Hammer Valentine's like music in particular had something very like clangy to it.

[8:23] I remember like my ears kind of hurting. There was the Bushwhackers.
The whole reason we went to this show was because my dad has New Zealand heritage.
And so my uncle wanted us to go and see the Bushwhackers who were these guys, Luke and Butch from New Zealand, these crazy guys.
And so, and then there was demolition fought, Legion of Doom, another set of legendary like tag teams.
And clearly here I am like 30 years later, still remembering it.
So it left a huge imprint, these larger than life characters.
And I had an ultimate warrior poster on my wall, just imagining these guys.
And of course this is pre-internet day. So I had no idea that any of this was scripted.
To me, it was like larger than life, this incredible thing to watch.
And so did you, before you got into wrestling yourself, like professional wrestling is the entertainment sport.
Did you get to meet any like professional wrestlers from the WWE or any other major circuits?
Not before I entered the independent circuit myself. And then I met quite a few guys since then, but no, I never just went to shows and enjoyed as a fan, but it never went to like meet and greets and things like that until I got into it.
Yeah. So when you started sort of getting this passion for pro wrestling, what in particular like drew you to this? What was it that like sucked you in? Because I think there's a lot of outside observers who look at professional wrestling as an entertainment. It's a crossover between entertainment and sport. Like it does require a degree of athleticism as well.

[9:48] But a lot of people sort of, they don't take it seriously. They look at it as like maybe a sort of a carnival freak show. But what was it that made you like so seriously want to be a part part of it?

[10:00] Well, I mean, for me, it was just a, it was a beautiful combination of everything that I loved.
I mean, I was, I love sports.
I loved theater. I used to do plays when I was in middle school.
Couldn't do them in high school cause of baseball.
And I love superheroes. I was obsessed with all three of those things.
And I see this thing on TV of like one guy being able to do all of these things.
He's punching and kicking.
He's talking, the fans are screaming, everyone's engaged.
I'm like, what's happening? How can I be this person?
And it's like John Cena with his headband wrapped around his arm.
I'm like, can I have arms that big? Is that possible?

[10:38] And so that's the combination of all of that. And just like, I mean, for me, I thought it was the realest thing I'd ever seen.
I'm like, I sort of knew that superheroes weren't totally real, but I wasn't convinced yet at 13 because I wanted to be one so badly, but this was real. This was a real person on TV, like fighting, jumping, moving, talking, screaming, engaging.
I was like, yep, that's me. That's what I'm gonna do. If I can't be a major league baseball player, I'm gonna do that right there.
And so I wonder like going through the teen years, you know, did this ever get like, are your passion for this ever like get mocked?
Or were you ever seen as, you know, this is ridiculous because we're sitting here planning on, you know, I don't know, going to college and maybe going to law school or med school or something like that.
And you're sitting here passionate about this. Oh man, all the time, dude.
I would wear wrestling shirts to school.
And the only reason I had anyone to sit and eat lunch with is because this one dude was like, hey, you like WWE? I see your shirt, come eat with us.
And there was just like the three of us who sat lunch, seat and ate lunch like away from everyone else seemed like we were the social pariahs for whatever reason.
And we just talked WWE and wrestling and all of that stuff. And so it, it.

[11:52] For wrestling, it created a community for me even before I was even inside of the business of actually being a performer, but it creates friends.
Because it's such a niche thing, if you really love this thing.

[12:08] It's so beautiful and that's an important note for anyone.
It doesn't matter what you're interested in. You could love turtles or whatever the case is, right?
Just try to express it, try to find your community, right? because those people feel the same way about the thing that you love.
And that's such a special bond that you can never take away.
I literally would have eaten lunch by myself, like for real, if I hadn't worn a WWE shirt one day to school.
And I was like a bit nervous to wear it because you knew the, like, is this weird?
Like, why am I not just wearing like a Dallas Cowboy shirt or like whatever people, other people wear or whatever.
Right? But like, it's the only reason I had lunch. And I was very unconfident in high school and the way a lot of people feel about themselves, we're unsure who we are, and we're not sure what direction we wanna take.
But I had this thing in the back of my head that I was gonna achieve it, but I didn't outwardly look like I knew what I wanted to do with my life.
I knew I was gonna be a wrestler, I knew it.
I knew I was gonna be a baseball player or wrestler. And even my high school baseball teammates were like, if you had to choose right now to go to MLB or WWE, what would it be?
I was like, WWE, for sure, no questions asked.
But I still wanted to pursue my baseball career so that till its fullest potential.
And I believe that I did, but wrestling gave me a community and it gave me a community as an adult too.
Once I left sport, which is like a whole nother really complicated thing about not being able to play your sport anymore and that identity and how you shape yourself and things like that. So.

[13:34] Yeah. And in baseball, what position did you play? I played first base.
Okay. It seems like that's like a tricky spot to play because you're kind of like in the line of fire a lot.
And if you make a mistake there, it's going to cost you quite a bit.
Well, yeah, it's an interesting position because historically it's a position where you're supposed to be a really good hitter. But also defensively, that spot is extremely important because that person makes a lot of plays and a lot of catches.

[14:02] But normally they're not the greatest defender or they're not the most agile person.
But over time that's developed, right?
Because people are getting bigger, stronger and faster. So now you have this guy who's 6'4", who can hit a 450 foot home run and also move left and right and pick the ball and throw the ball 90 across the diamond and things like that. So it's elevated.
You know, I, I was a very good hitter. That was sort of my bread and butter, but I became a good defender later in my career, which was quite helpful, but usually right handed hitting first basemans who also field right handed aren't as needed as left handed hitting first baseman's right.
So it's just an interesting thing, but it all worked out the way it needed to.
I didn't think that then I was very resentful and bitter about how it worked out, but now I know that that's how it's supposed to go.

[14:51] Right, and I don't follow baseball a lot as an adult, but I was just thinking, like statistically speaking, first base has to see like more action than the other ones because you're gonna get more people onto first base than on the second and third and to home.
And so, yeah, it's kind of a tricky one that you have to be like more switched on than, I shouldn't say more switched on, But it's also interesting to use terms like offense and defense in baseball.
I know obviously these are realities, but I think like, you know, I'm a fan of hockey and basketball where it's much more pronounced and it's team on team, like in sort of direct confrontation and baseball is kind of different in that regard. It's like one guy versus the team, you know, one step at a time.

[15:34] It's the most individual team sport there is. It's it's it's quite interesting, right?
Because I coach a 14 year baseball team and, you know, trying to get them to understand that when you go to the plate, when you're about to hit the team is sort of out of the question, right?
And unless in certain certain situations, right? You need a bunch.
You need to get a guy over there needs to be a sacrifice, right?
You're always generally thinking about the team, but there are certain at bats where I'm trying to hit a double or I'm trying to hit a home run. And that's the sole focus is me versus the pitcher, not really the team.

[16:07] Like me getting a double helps the team. But I'm thinking about this one on one battle going to work with this pitcher. What's he throwing? Give me his best so I can give my best. And it's the same way when you're on the field, right? No one can feel the ball for you. Yeah, there's other guys around you. But if the ball comes right at me, that's an individual making an individual play for the team. And so it's an interesting dynamic, right? You want to create the sense of trust. It's very important when it comes to baseball.
Like, because if I look across to my shortstop or to my left fielder, I'm like, yeah, if the ball sits down, they're definitely going to make that play. I believe in that. So as my pitcher, I know that I can throw strikes and if they hit the ball, I have guys behind me that can make a play. Right. But if we're, if we're individual focused, we're going to play a little tighter and we're not going to make pitches because we're going to try and think that we need to strike everyone out because I can't hit it to Johnny who's in left field because he can't make any plays. And so it's an interesting dynamic to try to get that, um, that chemistry figured out that trust figured out, but also realizing what control you have over personally, your attitude, your effort, things like that, and how that can sort of bleed into everyone else on your team to create this dynamic where everyone's playing for each other, but also playing their best baseball for for themselves. Right.

[17:22] You I like that framing of it, like the most individual team sport that there is.
And yeah, the battle of like pitcher, pitcher versus batter and thinking maybe I'm off the mark here, but I feel like fans of baseball are more stats driven than fans of other sports.
Like every sport keeps statistics, but I think baseball keeps more statistics.
Would that be accurate?
I think so. I mean, if you're a baseball fanatic, right, you the game is slow, right?
They're trying to speed up the game. So if you love baseball, you love sort of the art of baseball and you love looking at the metrics and the averages and where he might hit the baseball or things like that. So you're definitely looking at, you know, on base percentage and slugging percentage and batting average a little, bit more than you would if you're a huge basketball fan and you may or may not know, like LeBron James is field goal percentage. It's not important. You want to see him dunk, right? But there's not that many exciting things that happen in the game of baseball unless you really love it.
And then you get the intricacies of it. Like, okay, why are they doing this? There's a game of chess always happening. Why are they trying to sort of steal the signs here? Why are they shifting to two inches to the right or two inches to the left? Why are they moving that guy back all based on sort of angles and things like that. And so that's where the game becomes very fun.
If you actually can study it a little bit and see the art for what it is. Cause I mean, I think personally hitting a baseball is the hardest thing to do in any sport period.

[18:48] That's why, you know, if you if you get a hit three out of 10 times, you're the best player in the league in any other sport like that number is like you're on the bench or you cut from the team.

[18:58] Right. Yeah, that's something to think about. And I agree, there's an element of sort of chess.
I came across a stat recently, like the smallest baseball, professional baseball stadium in the US holds something like thirty five thousand fans.

[19:11] And so to me, that that kind of blows my mind to think about, like, you know, especially if a team routinely gets sellouts.
And so I think maybe baseball is not just about the game, but it's about the stadium experience. And because there's they play one hundred and sixty two, They've had double the amount of games of like really any other professional major league.
Um, you know how they managed to, I guess, keep drawing fans in, you know, game after game and build like a passionate fan base. It has to be more than maybe even the game itself, but like a state stadium experience.
Oh yeah. Yeah. Stadium experience, fan experience. What are you going to do at the game?
The food they have, um, you know, how they market the players.
Are you getting to know them a little bit better?
Like, do I feel like I know the starting center fielder like a little bit better than just like a guy with a number 17 on his back, right?
So trying to create that a little bit and then, yeah, it's a long season though.
So some games there's 12,000 people there, some games there's 40,000.
And also in certain cities, baseball fans can be a little fickle.
So if the team is doing well, they show up.
If they don't, they don't show up. But there's some really good baseball cities like St. Louis and Chicago and Boston. Those are some really good baseball cities.
Right, right. So between the two, so you've been juggling or were juggling at this point in your life, you know, the world of baseball and the world of professional wrestling.

[20:31] How did you, how did you get into the independent circuit? People might hear this like and think like how, how does someone, you know, break into the wrestling game as, hey, I would actually like to do this.
Yeah, so I stopped playing baseball in 2014 after my college career.
And I had some tryouts with the Atlanta Braves to play professional baseball and decided to.

[20:57] Sort of move away from that and go back home to Dallas and start my professional wrestling career and didn't really know how to start. So I googled how to become a professional wrestler.
As you do.
Yes, you do. Yes. Thank you to the Internet. And basically, a bunch of just schools came up. I was like, oh, I guess you go to a school and you get trained. And OK, so I look for some that are local to me. And I found one in a city that's called Bedford, Texas, which is 45 minutes away from Dallas. I emailed the guy, went out to like a training session, saw what it was about, saw that it actually was professional wrestling. And yes, I said I'd like to get trained and I'd like to go go to WWE.
Uh, little did I know that it takes a lot more work to get to WWE.
I didn't even know that independent professional wrestling existed.
So I got open my eyes to a whole new world and a whole new career that I could potentially have outside of WWE still doing the thing I loved.

[21:56] So I started training in 2015 maybe and had my first match in 2016 or 2015.
I can't remember now.
Um, yeah, I donned my name, uh, Jackson stone and I, uh, started traveling from there and things, you know, went in a pretty good direction for a long time.
Right, right. So you go to this wrestling school and say, Hey, I want to be a pro wrestler.
And in fact, I want to make the WWE and maybe this, the, the, the trainer or trainers, they're just kind of smiling and go, yeah, you and thousands and thousands of other people who want to make the roster, right, right.
You and every, you and every other person who gave their pillow an elbow drop.
Right, right. So prior to going to like wrestling, like training school, had you like on your own looked at YouTube videos or anything or tried to practice or learn any moves or any anything about that?
Or were you like totally green walking to the school? No, no sort of wrestling moves per se outside of just doing amateur wrestling in high school.
But I took an eight week theater class. And I took an eight week improv class at Dallas comedy house.
So I think both of those things helped me sort of get in tune with how to speak in front of people because I'd hadn't done public speaking at all at this point, didn't need it in my baseball career.

[23:08] Um, so the interviews I did in my baseball career atrocious, if you'd like to go back and look at those, they're really, they're really quite funny at this point.
But yeah, so I wanted to be able to learn how to speak and emote and use my, my face to express emotions and things that I knew that I was going to need, how to cut promos and engage an audience. So I was working on that stuff sort of in the midst of joining the professional wrestling school.

[23:32] And that helped me a lot in terms of being able to just be one step ahead of everyone else that was just doing sort of the bare minimum.
And I also happen to be in really good shape. I'm 6'2", 230 pounds.
And so that also helped my sort of get noticed quickly by whoever was there, whatever the case may be.
But yeah, so a combination of those two things helped me have an early, you know, high trajectory for my career.
Right, right. Now, is Dallas itself like kind of a hotbed for professional wrestling or are there any like any particular areas in the in the US that are like wrestling kind of hotbeds?
Um, the East Coast is quite good. Sort of in that Philly, New York, New England sphere.
And Texas is all right. It's just so big and so spread out that like it's hard to like leave the state itself.
So you sort of might get stuck in the state doing the same shows because you can travel eight hours and you're still in the same state, you know, but they do put on really good shows out here, and that Ohio sort of Midwest region has also some really good wrestling itself, but each state is fairly got a fairly good run of indie wrestling.

[24:50] Some obviously much better than others as you as you know, and witnessed yourself, but yeah, yes.
Yeah. How many, like how many, or I guess what would be like the minor league?
So if WWE is like the major league and they used to have the competitor WCW, and I don't know if there is any current competitor to WWE, but what are like the minor leagues of the circuit that are like one step below WWE.

[25:12] Yeah, so there's WWE, there's AEW, which is basically WWE's competitor now.
And then the whole basically independent professional wrestling circuit is sort of quote unquote the minor leagues.
Nowadays, guys are making full time livings being on the independent circuit because they can charge their own rate, they can do anything outside that they want.
There's no someone controlling their name or their likeness.
So people are making a lot more money now on the independent circuit outside of WWE.
A lot of WWE guys have left to join the indy circuits.
They can have sort of full control and full autonomy over their name and where they go and how they wrestle and who they wrestle and things like that.
And so I mean what I was it was really hard to make a bit of money.
But as I progressed a couple of years into my career, it got a lot better to make a decent amount of money on the independent circuit.
And nowadays, from little that I know, I'm not fully entrenched in it as much.
But guys and gals are making quite a bit of money on the indie circuit, and they're not as likely to get bought by WWE with a really shitty deal, because they're making their own money.
So they can bargain for themselves, and they can have agency over their lives, and that's much better just for everyone involved. So people are getting the best deals possible.

[26:33] I love that you mentioned improv and drama and things like that, because character development is central to the art of professional wrestling.
Without a character, you don't have a reason for why these guys are fighting.
If we think about any other prize fighting, like boxing or MMA or things like that, there's.

[26:50] The biggest draws are not necessarily the most talented fighters.
No reason for them to be fighting. I think that's a really good point.
I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point.
They're the ones with a story.
You know, I'm not going to name any names, but there's a couple that come to mind that are, you know, they're a draw because they tell a story and they've created a character.
When you when you trained as a pro wrestler, did you have sort of a character idea in mind or how does that emerge?
Like, how does Jackson Stone emerge?
I didn't have, per se, a character in mind, but there were a few people that I really liked, One being the Miz, the other being the model, Rick Martel.

[27:25] And that's old school. Yeah, yeah, he was awesome. And so Jackson Stone sort of came out of, I mean, The Rock was one of my favorite wrestlers and in college, my teammates used to call me the pebble.
Okay, right, right, right. I love that. And so I couldn't be that as a professional wrestler a professional wrestler unless I was playing a joke of a character, which would have been cool for a funny show.
But so I just changed that to Stone.
And then I really liked the show Sons of Anarchy and the main character, his name was Jax Teller.
So I created my name as Jackson, J-A-X-O-N.
And then sort of for the first part of my career, like maybe the first six months to a year, I didn't really have a character. I was just like being a wrestler.

[28:09] And then one night I wake up in the middle of the night and I'm like, I got it.
I got the million dollar idea. It's lights, camera, Jackson.
That's it. I'm done, finished. That's great.
That's the best. That's fantastic. And so you go to do kind of like your first show as a pro wrestler and you make your entrance. What did you have as entrance music?
My very first wrestling match, I had no entrance music. I just had to walk out there.
Wow. Yes, cause I was like trying out for this feud thing and sort of, I just had to like show up and walked out there.
I wrestled for about five minutes against this guy.

[28:50] And my sister was there to film it, which is, you know, quite powerful and important.
It's actually on YouTube, available to watch right now on my YouTube channel.
I'm still going and checking that out after this interview. Yes, it's not bad.
It's not bad. It's not bad. And so, yeah, that was my very first match.
It's just like a guy with some blue trunks named Jackson Stone.
Yeah. Super cool. probably the second most nervous I've ever been.
The first is when I proposed to my fiance like two months ago.
Right. Yes. Yeah. Other than that, that was it probably.
Yeah. And so you go out there and you have a match. Now, was this because there was no entrance music?
Like was this a show in front of a crowd like where where you interrupt something happening and that's how you make your entrance?
Yeah. Like it was. Yeah, there was maybe 150 people there. And like this guy was talking like, if anyone wants to challenge me, yada, yada, yada yada. And then so I was like, I'll do it. So my entrance music was like me coming out saying I'll challenge you because I was a nobody with.
No one knew who I was, so you don't need music, just go out there and prove yourself, and then ended up doing pretty good.
So more stuff kept coming from that, and then I had some entrance music, and created a character for myself and all of that.
But yeah, that was quite nervous. He was like, yeah, you're just gonna walk out there. I was like, hmm?
So, and for those who are kind of curious about the behind the scenes.

[30:12] And I don't wanna know the outcome of the match because I actually wanna watch it and watch it develop.
So I'm totally gonna go, I don't wanna spoil that. And so we're not going to put any spoilers in here because I think there is a genuine enjoyment that comes for those who are passionate about this art.
And again, for those who might not know, I spent a year as a pro wrestling ring announcer.
So I got a little bit of an inside look into this, into this way of living as well.
And it's a fascinating subculture, I have to say.
But how much sort of time did you have with this guy talking about here's what we're going to do kind of thing?
Like, had you ever met him before? Or is it literally like you meet in the locker room and like, hey kid, you're going to come out and do this thing?
I had met him a bunch of times before because at the place that I trained, we had to set the ring up for every show.

[30:52] So for like the last eight months, I was there every other Saturday night, setting up the ring, cleaning up the ring, doing all this stuff.
So I met all the guys and everyone was pretty cool and everyone seems to help out.
And then I got booked on the show and this guy was more of an old school guy, which means they don't like to talk much before the matches.
They just like to go out there and work on the fly.
But man, was I nervous. So I needed a little bit of like, what do I do? How do I do it?
Like, what's the structure? So man, maybe we talked for 20, 30 minutes and then, you know, three hours later we wrestled.
So, it was pretty good. Yeah, he led me well and he was able to communicate to me what I needed to do and all of that stuff.
But yeah, it was quite cool.
Yeah, there's something about the term like helping someone get over.
In other words, helping someone be believable.
And so you think of like big names in wrestling, what they do is they do a favor like a younger guy coming up if they let them get over even if they don't actually win the match that they let them, you know, have their moments of shine and things like that.

[31:53] Yes, exactly. Much like podcasters can do by having someone they like on their podcast that hasn't reached as many viewers and they share their audience with them, right? It's very similar to someone helping you out, someone saying, I see something good in you. Let's let me see what I can do, like help you in a match or have you get over here, share my audience with you or whatever the case may be is right. It's all it's all a beautiful thing. Yeah. So your wrestling career kind of it takes off from here.
Are you able to make enough money to make a living like what's your outside living arrangement?
Are you like living as a bachelor in an apartment, you know, living off of canned tuna and instant noodles here? What's going on outside of this? Like my first two years of wrestling, I was I was local in Dallas.
I wasn't traveling very much. So I was working as a personal trainer, which is going quite well.
And then things started to take off and I started to travel internationally.
So I couldn't be a personal trainer anymore.
I was traveling internationally, mostly into Germany, the UK and over in Europe.
So then, you know, about three or four years in, I was, I was full time and then I moved out to Philadelphia and was a full time professional wrestler out there.
And then, um, yeah, so, uh, it took me a little bit, but before that, you know, I was trying.

[33:07] To make it work, uh, you know, in between sort of coming back from traveling overseas to not be having a personal training job anymore to being still on the road and sort of having to sleep in my car and bring my own sheets to hotels because they were not nice and figuring out what food I was going to eat and things like that.
You know, I, I.
My parents were very supportive, and I knew that I could fall back on them if I really needed help.
But I wanted to try and really go forward with this thing and give it my best effort, and I really did. I wanted to feel what it's like to have to go through that, to want something so bad and not have it handed to you.
How can you keep working and keep working and keep working?
It proves off to be very good. So it paid itself out.
When was the moment when you realized like there is something here, like there's more than just this is a hobby?
You know, when did it kind of go click?

[34:00] Oh, very early, very early. Yeah, that's why I decided to go overseas earlier than most people, you know, leave their small town.
Right. Cause I knew that I could get out there. I could make a name for myself.
I was, you know, two or three years in the business.
You know, I was confident in my abilities And I was going to go out there.
I was going to sink or swim. You know, I was going to go out there.
If I was going to be horrible, they were never going to have me back.
I ended up being pretty good. So I did a bunch of tours and all of that stuff.
But yeah, I had a lot of confidence in myself early on about my professional wrestling career.
I think that carried over from how I carried myself as a baseball player and things like that.
But I was lucky.
Yeah. And you came up with Lights, Camera, Jackson. Did that come before you were overseas and you'd kind of settle on a character and like an entrance music?
Who did Lance Cameron Jackson like become?
Movie star, baby. Yeah, okay.

[35:02] Everything was a performance. So I started pretending to be a movie star on social media, at shows, unless I was just like in my house or with my friends or whatever the case may be.
Everything else was a pretend.
You know, I wasn't making very much money to be a movie star.
I'd never been in a movie before.
That was the whole point of the character. And I tried to play it to the best of my ability.
There's a bunch of content on YouTube, if you go watch that match, where there's some stuff I curated and made as Lights, Camera, Jackson, the performer.
But everything was Jackson Stone. That was my whole life. That's who I wanted to be, and that's who I was.

[35:43] I sort of foreclosed on everything else of my identity. I did the same thing as a baseball player.
I didn't know how harmful that could be until after the fact.
That's a lot of things that happen inside of professional wrestling that can be very dangerous.
That you start to be this character all of the time and you don't know who you are.
You never really knew who you were before that.
And now you need this sort of validation from a crowd. You need strangers to tell you how good you are, to boo you.
When you leave the arena or the ring, There's no adrenaline anymore, so you need the uppers, you need downers, you need drugs, you need alcohol, you need women, you need all of these things to try and soothe you until you have your next show where you get your next high.
I'm not saying this happens for everyone, but this is a common theme in professional wrestling. And we'll get to why I started my non-profit, I'm sure, but a lot of the work that I do with my non-profit is trying to set up mental health resources, is for professional wrestlers because there just isn't any, especially at the independent level.
There just isn't, there's nowhere for people to go.
They don't have insurance. They can't do these things.
Like they just need someone to talk to or they need support or need a guiding hand, right?
A lot of at the bigger companies now, they're building those structures in, which is fantastic.

[37:00] But for independent wrestlers, there's not a lot of structure.
So me and a team of us are trying to sort that out because, you know, because what I dealt with and how much love I have for professional wrestling.
Right, and you really led into my next question, which is the dark side of wrestling.
So we've talked about, you know, the performance art and the love of it and the joy of it and the joy that it can bring others as you entertain them.
But there, you know, and I know this from my wife being a performer as well, like if you can get really deeply immersed in a character and that itself can be really difficult when you don't have a solid sense of identity outside of this to anchor to.
And so you start morphing more and more into this character.
And as you talked about, you go and you pursue the high and then there's this low and there's this gap between shows and it becomes like a bit of a roller coaster ride.
Did you find yourself falling into that pattern And was there a wake-up call for you at some point?
I mean, the interesting part about wrestling, I'll just give you this before I talk personally, is that for the majority of people that are inside professional wrestling, they can tell you at least one story of how professional wrestling saved their life.
Right. Okay.

[38:12] Those inside the ring doing the wrestling, they can also tell you that professional wrestling is what causes them the most harm. So it's so difficult to untangle that because because this thing that I'm doing is the thing that I love the most.
And when I was a young boy or young person struggling or I'm struggling now, professional wrestling is what is saving my life.
But it's also the thing that causes me the most difficulty, the stress, anxiety, the high, all of these things.
And so it's complicated.
It's very complicated because you're trying to battle these sort of dual personalities while also maintaining relationships and other hobbies. But you can't because you're trying to be obsessed with this one thing because you want to make it your whole life.
And it's like, it's a very, very deep, but I never got super involved in terms of drinking drugs, alcohol, because I took on professional wrestling like I took on baseball, like I'm an athlete.
So I am going to do the things I need to do. I'm gonna take care of myself.
Yes, I went out and I drank alcohol and I had some good times with my friends and made some choices.
It is what it is. But for the majority of time, like I was on the straight and narrow in terms of trying to achieve this goal.
But that's not to say that I was fully consumed by Jackson Stone, that's who I was.

[39:29] And not till later on did I start to parse the two and figure out who I was outside of that and who I could be and what I was really passionate about.
But it's interesting thinking about trying to become, you know, really, really good at something, and what you have to do to get there.
What are the sacrifices you have to make?
Can you create a...
A healthy pattern or healthy patterns for yourself to still allow you to get really good at that thing.
Is there other things in your life that you can, as their balance, not really maybe an obsessive harmony is maybe a better way to say it. So there's, there's like a lot that's happening, right? And you're, you're putting an endless amount of hours and a lot of time, you know, the first maybe year or two or first 50 matches, there's, there's very little money and there's no reward and you don't, not sure how you're going to pay for gas on your way home. And so So are you gonna just use that money to buy something else?
Are you gonna keep wrestling? Are you just gonna sleep in your car?
Are you gonna, I don't know what you're gonna do. And so there's a lot of things that go through and there's a lot of professions like this where you have to hustle and grind.

[40:33] But I would really like to see a turn where we can chase our dreams in a more healthy manner.
We can chase our dreams while not giving up ourselves while becoming our best selves in service of this dream.
I think is the best way that I could put it, but it's quite complicated and not talked about a lot.
Yeah, and so as you're evolving as Jackson Stone, did you develop, like you mentioned, having a fiancee.

[41:05] Were you in a relationship with this individual as a professional wrestler?
I was not, I did not start, well, I guess the very tail end of my career, I met my fiancee, I met her two years ago.
Um, but, uh, she, she knows a little bit about it. And sometimes I show her the, the very, uh, new or the very old, but we're new pictures when I was taking them as Jackson stone, she's like, I don't know about that. I'm glad I know you as this guy.
And I'm like, I'm, I'm glad I know you as this guy too. Um, you know, timing was perfect for us and I'm blessed to be in that relationship.
But, um, in 2018, I was in a relationship with a female at that time.
When sort of my whole life changed.

[41:49] Yeah, absolutely. So before we dive into that, because we will, the span of your wrestling career, was it like 2015 to 2021, roughly? Or what was the timeline of your? Yeah, roughly it was roughly about six years, give or take 2015, 2016 till 2022 ish, give or take some time there for COVID when we didn't have a job. Right. So that was a bit slow. And then at the tail end of my career, I was only really wrestling once a week. But at the height of I was doing Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday every week. Okay. Yeah, so halfway through your wrestling career, Just as you're really starting to catch steam get momentum. You're becoming known you this is this is really you're living the dream, Your life is shattered by something probably tragic.

[42:36] Yeah Yeah, so I'm living in Philadelphia at this time With my but with my good buddy Wheeler Yuta who actually wrestles on TV now, so shout out to you, too Um, and we're living in a, an apartment in Philadelphia and I'm actually at the Jersey shore with this girl that I was dating at the time and her family.
And I get a call from a number that I don't know what it is.
Never seen this number before. And some person's on the phone and they're kept saying their name and I'm like, who are you?
And I, I did know this person. It's very, very close family friend, but apparently in this moment I didn't know who they were.
And they're telling me that my sister, my big sister, Rachel, who was a huge supporter of mine, as I said, she filmed my very first professional wrestling match.
She created Jackson Stone websites and Jackson Stone merch, and she's incredible.
That she had died. She had died by suicide, that she'd taken her own life in our home that we grew up in in Dallas.
And I think when something like that happens, you, one, you don't think it's real.

[43:42] Like, you know, but then it was real. I figured out who this person was, that they're very close friend and they were calling on behalf of my parents because my parents could not do it. They had me with them at the time.
And I was lucky enough to like be with people who drove me back to Philadelphia, drove me to the airport the next morning. You know, I flew home to my parents the next day in Dallas.

[44:07] And yeah, my whole life, as you can imagine, altered and changed.
Not to say that I re-evaluated everything within the first minute.
Just like anyone, I grieved and I was sad and I was angry and I've tried to deal with my emotions in a, I don't know, what's the right word?
Good way, in an appropriate way, or actually seeing them. The healthiest way possible, which probably, it does involve experiencing and processing and moving through them as opposed to burying them and wishing they weren't there.
Right, exactly, exactly, yeah. And so I spent the whole month of September with my parents in Dallas.
And I had this match, this professional wrestling match planned and booked, a show that I really wanted to be on against my roommate, who was a very close friend of mine at the time at the end of September.
And I was like, I don't know if I want to do this. I don't know if I can do this.

[45:01] But like I said, everyone has that story where professional wrestling saved their life.
And I knew I had this match at the end of the month.
So it got me up every day to go to the gym to do something, to like engage myself in life still, even though I was feeling horrible, feeling horrible, not coming to terms with issue really dead, all of these things that you think about when you lose someone you absolutely love.
And so I fly back to Philadelphia, I have this match with We The Yuta, very few people in the crowd knew what I had dealt with because I hadn't really posted about it yet.
But obviously my buddy We The Yuta knew, his name is Paul, so I'll just say Paul.
And then we had a very special moment after that match. You know, we went outside and we both just cried because he was the first person I told outside of the girl that was with me.
I actually couldn't verbalize it to him, so she had to tell him for me, which now thinking about that's probably it's not a very nice thing that I did to make her tell him that.

[45:58] Right. But, you know, in that moment, again, you're not really thinking about what's what's the most considerate way to navigate this.
Yeah. Your brain is just being overwhelmed by these massive emotions that, you know, kind of come out of nowhere. And, you know, I think maybe maybe there might be the question, maybe you've asked this or pondered this before, you know, was there ever any indication prior to that or that this was a potential like a possibility or this really come right out of the blue for you?
No, it wasn't. It wasn't out of the blue. My sister battled and struggled with severe depression and bipolar disorder. And she I think she was developing schizophrenic tendencies at the end of her life. And so there was over 10 years she struggled. There was hospitalizations.
There was suicide attempts. There was police phone calls. But through the midst of all that, she graduated college. She became an engineer. She started working at Raytheon. And so there there was a lot of good mixed in with a lot of the hard.

[47:05] And so, there's sort of like a looming black cloud over our family, like if we leave her, is this the day? Is this the day?
You know, and then my parents dealt with that a lot because she was living with them at the time.
And I wasn't close to home and I hadn't been close to home for a long time.
And there's some regrets and some guilt that I feel about that and things of that nature.
Yeah, the mental health conditions are very complicated and very serious, and it has to Bye.

[47:41] Be parsed out that everyone has mental health. You and I, John, have mental health, right?
It's how we think, feel, and act. It encompasses our every single day, but it's much different, much different than the very severe and pervasive mental health conditions that some people face, like I mentioned, right?
Severe depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, all of these things.
And there are treatment plans, there's things that can help you, obviously.
And if you're feeling any sort of way, you should go and seek those treatments.
I know firsthand that they can help and they can extend your life and they can make your life great.
And you can accomplish all of the things you want to accomplish, just like my sister did.
But unfortunately, she lost her battle, but leaves a beautiful legacy for me to remember.

[48:31] For me to think about how she was the most non-judgmental person that I've ever met in my life.
My mental health nonprofit is now called You Are Loved, but way before that, I used to say that I hate everyone.
I used to say that because I felt like they had to earn something from me.
Like I'm too good for that. They have to earn, I hate you before you, You have to earn, and so my sister would tell me not that. Give people a chance, you know?
There's a lot of love out there, and so I didn't learn that until after she died.
And that's come with a lot of pain and a lot of realization that I could have been better, as a person, not as a brother.
I feel like I was a really good brother and she was a really good sister to me, the best.
But just as a general person. So maybe I'm over-rotating and trying extra hard to be a good person now, even though being a good person is really hard.
It's not something that I say lightly. So I'm just trying. I feel like I'm just trying.

[49:30] And so backwards a little bit, we have this match, me and Yuda.
It's the thing that probably saved my life, kept me going, kept me moving.
And then about a month later, I break my cheekbone.
I shatter, can't wrestle for 10 weeks. So now my sister just died.
The only thing that's keeping me going is wrestling.
Now I break my cheekbone, I can't wrestle for 10 weeks.
So I got a lot of time to sit and ponder and think about who I wanna be, how I wanna be.
There was some crying, there was a lot of stuff. There was too much drinking. There was just a...
Multitude of ways that I was trying to deal with my emotions.
And I came out on top of that feeling like I wanted to do something.

[50:19] So this is when I started posting about mental health. I started talking about my feelings and about my sister and what she dealt with.
I started this YouTube series just sharing people's stories.
I created a T-shirt that just had you are loved on it based on, you know, things I was selling for my pro wrestling site.
And he's told like, you know, 500, you are love shirts and donated to a foundation called American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. And that was sort of the push to start doing the things I'm doing now.
And then my jaw healed and I came back to professional wrestling in the same manner that I was wrestling before.
So as a heel, as this bad guy, as lights Cameron Jackson, but over the last 10 months, I'd been posting about, or 10 weeks, excuse me, about mental health and things like that.
And so, and I go to my first show and I'm trying to perform as this bad guy.
And I did it for a couple of shows and I felt sick, like sick to my stomach.

[51:16] Right, yeah. Like how am I gonna be out here talking about love and empathy and support and guidance and things like that.
And I'm gonna go to a show and I know it's pretend and I know it's a script and I know I'm playing a character to tell a little girl to shut up because I'm the heel, right, instead of being nice to her and talking to her and signing her autographs and all these things.
And so, uh, I had to make a change in my professional wrestling character because up to that point, everything was curated and pretend and performative.
Um, and so I changed, I just dropped lights, Cameron Jackson.
I dropped all of that. I kept Jackson stone cause you still need a stage name.
Aaron mash bits is kind of hard to chant.
So I just kept Jackson stone and I, and I just, um, I was just me, just me and I moved back to Dallas and I got back into the sort of the Texas wrestling scene and was able to sort of develop myself outside of professional wrestling.
I took you are loved a little more seriously. I started a podcast a bit and then fast forward all the way to COVID hitting COVID hits.
We lose our job as pro wrestlers because you can't wrestle in front of no people.
And that was sort of the blessing I needed to really dive deep into everything.
I went full throttle on my podcast.
I went, I created You Are Love to be an actual 501c3.

[52:39] I got back into baseball coaching, all of these things. And so...
That's sort of the the journey in a nutshell. Right? Yeah. And so one thing I wanted to ask was, had you had opportunities to have like honest conversations with your sister and maybe moments of vicinity where she was able to express like this is what my experience is with this to try to put into words what her lived experience was. Yes. Yes. We've had had some of those conversations.

[53:10] And so it helps me have an understanding of how dark really is dark.
And what the depths of hell really fucking feel like.
And when people say that suicide is selfish, that's where I feel like they don't grasp, the full understanding of what it means to be in the darkest pit of life.
Right, and so I know it's a plausible and logical thing to say that suicide is selfish. It makes sense It does it makes sense I get it because this person that you love wasn't thinking about you your dog your life your kids your friends your family all the Great moments you have that yesterday you told them you love them They weren't thinking about that of course not all they were thinking about in the darkest moment They've ever had in their whole life was that I have to fucking half this pain to stop I actually do might want to live and I do want to see tomorrow but I can't see tomorrow because this pain that I have is insurmountable and, It's fucking taking over my whole life my whole body and my whole soul my whole being and it's hard to grasp that if you've never seen it in real life, or you've never heard it or felt it or.

[54:24] Then you know experience it yourself, and if you have experience of yourself Thank you for still being here if you were hearing my words right now. I fucking love you for being here and, And, but that's a very important point because the words we say when talking about mental health, and suicide especially are extremely important.

[54:42] Because we have no idea what any person has gone through.
I don't know what you have gone through, John. We've been talking now for like over an hour, you know?
You now know what I've gone through, a small portion of it, right?
But we don't know what people's stories are.
We don't until they're expressed through these great podcasts, right?
That's why it's so important to talk about it not just talk about it in a way that's like, yeah, we should talk about mental health, but like really talk about it.
Like, what do you feel?
How do you feel? What got you to that point? How can we express more things to help people get out of that point? Where can we see the light? Where is the light?
How can we create support groups or communities of support? Things like that.
And that's what's sort of went on a tangent there, but yeah, that's what's important to me.
I think the passion is so, so, so important.
You know, and I wonder if I could maybe ask a controversial question, and this doesn't come out of nowhere.
Maybe at some point I'll explain where this question comes from.

[55:37] You know, I work with psychologists. I work in the field of neuroscience and psychology. I'm a researcher in this area as well, not just in terms of what I do with coaching. And, you know, in a conversation with a very, very experienced psychologist who has more than four decades working with like severe personality disorders, you know, we were having a conversation in and around suicide. And she made this remark, I don't know the exact quote, but it was like, people do have the right to choose to end their life.

[56:08] And I almost in that moment didn't really know what to say, because I mean, she's, she's had clients do exactly that, you know, over the course of a 40 year career, working with thousands of people, it's inevitable, she's going to have that happen. And, and so she said, like, some people do have the right to make that choice if they want to. And do you, I'm not even sure the question they really want to phrase, but it's like having almost like opening the door to this, thought here. Is it compassionate to try to have somebody continue to move forward through this immensely difficult, dark, and tortured existence for our sake and for our desire to have them a part of our lives when they don't necessarily see a way out of it, how would you respond to that?
CB. That's very interesting. I need to think about that. RL. Yeah, I didn't know either. And a little bit of context. One of the individuals I've interviewed for this podcast, her daughter committed suicide at the age of 16. And, And you know, for a mother, that's one of the most difficult things to ever go through.
But she said, and her daughter's name was Jenny. She said, but...

[57:35] On the other side of this, in one sense that Jenny kind of set her family free because, the whole family was so preoccupied with trying to help her to stay alive. And as from the age of seven, this young lady, Jenny had just wrestled with all of these things in this really quite tortured existence. And she was this beautiful, enigmatic, charismatic, highly intelligent, like wise beyond her years person. But everyone in her family, her multiple siblings and her parents and her teachers were constantly on edge around her trying to do whatever they could, to convince her to continue living because this wasn't the first time she had attempted that.
And so again, it sort of brought to light this thought that a psychologist shared with me that people do have the right to make that choice. And as much as we want them to continue living, that we feel like from our perspective it is worth continuing to live, is it our place to force that choice on them if we've done everything we can?
Yeah, I think that last part is important. But yeah, so what comes to mind for me immediately.

[58:46] Is this one emotion that I had trouble admitting to myself that I felt.
And it wasn't until I was going to these suicide loss survivor support groups, where people were sharing their experience and they were years ahead of me in their experience talking about feeling relief.
And the first time I heard relief, I was like, how could you feel relief?
Your sibling just died, what the fuck, get out of here. That's ridiculous, relief.
I would never, I'm not that person. I would never feel relief.
I want my person here right now.

[59:20] And then you start to sit with it. you start to think, you start to actually deal with your emotions and your feelings and your person that you lost their whole life and what they went through.
And then I finally admitted to myself, yeah, there is a sense of relief. There is.
Just like that family, and just like I shared, there's sort of this 10 years of struggle and this black cloud and.

[59:43] There's a breath you can take. Like, I don't have to sit here and worry every single day of my life for the rest of my life.
Now, that's not to say, that's not to get it twisted that I wouldn't have her back, right, this very second.
But that is to say that there is a sense of relief, because now I can live my life knowing that she existed in a beautiful, powerful way, being my shining light, remembering all of the good things, but knowing that she's simply at, she's at peace and she doesn't have to live in hell every single day.
And so I don't know if I would phrase it the same way that that psychologist did, but people do have, it is a choice, like, I don't know if it's a full choice. Like, I don't know if they have the full faculties of their brain that they're making this conscious choice.
I think they're simply trying to make the pain stop. I really do think that's where it goes because they're not thinking about anyone else or their family or their loved ones.
They're saying, I need to not feel this way anymore.
And if you have moved to the point where you've exhausted all resources, everything you can possibly do for this person.

[1:00:50] You know, just like cancer, you can do all of the things that the doctor recommends and that person may still lose their battle.
We're still fighting the cancer battle every single day. And it's very similar to a extremely severe and pervasive mental health condition.
And again, it's on a spectrum. There's a lot of different things that can be placed on the spectrum of mental health.
But when you have the most severe and the most pervasive, it is definitely an illness that takes over your whole life, your whole body and your whole soul.

[1:01:18] And so at some point, you may lose your battle. And if you can frame it in that regard, for me, contextually, that was helpful to understand like my sister a bit more, even though I had a lot of context of her battle.
But I think that, I mean, those few thoughts pop up after what you mentioned.
And I appreciate you sharing that.
And I felt like you might be able to kind of express some things around that, given the work that you do, it's not an easy conversation to have for anybody listening.
I don't want people to think that this is somehow just an easy, casual conversation at this point in time, but this is a crucial conversation, I think.
The willingness to go to these areas and talk about them where everyone is afraid to, because for example, you mentioned this word relief, and I imagine, and you can clarify, but I imagine you would experience in the beginning maybe some guilt at actually allowing yourself to feel relief and wrestling with this.
Like, am I allowed to feel relieved? Am I allowed to laugh again?
Am I allowed to and so on?
And so how do you go from that place of like refusing to feel relief because you feel guilty about it to permitting yourself and becoming OK with feeling relief?
And then maybe how do you move forward and maybe keep the memories of Rachel alive?
Yeah, it comes with some time.

[1:02:45] It comes with some patience, and it comes with doing the work. I've been in a support group now for five years with people who are feeling the exact same way. And after a loss is wrapped up in shame and guilt, especially from suicide, because you're like, what could I have done?
Why wasn't I there? Why weren't you home? Why were you with her? What's wrong with you? What the fuck? You're a terrible brother. You piece of shit. You're a piece of shit. You're a piece piece of shit, you know, and I can't even imagine the things my parents are thinking because it's totally different for them, right?
And so I've been trying to, you know, we have a very close relationship. We always have.
Like I said, I feel like I'm the luckiest person in the whole world with the parents that I got.
But their struggle is totally different than mine. And so I sort of mask some of my feelings at the very beginning with trying to help them. Um, but then had to, had to deal with my own shit when I was sitting on my couch, eating ice cream, drinking a bottle of whiskey with a broken jaw. Um, that's when you think about, okay, I got it. I got to figure this out. And you sit with these things, you like sit with them and you, and you feel, you feel them. Okay. I feel guilty. Why do I feel guilty? Well, I feel like I wasn't there. Well, why wasn't I there? Okay. Well, I was actually chasing my dream, doing the thing that my sister loved me, wanted me to do. She supported me all the way. Okay.
That's a rational thought. Okay, I can think about that. Yeah, there's going to be some shame. Okay.

[1:04:07] But what can I change shame into? What's shame really? Well, shame is really that I'm angry.
Okay, why am I angry? I'm angry because I'm not letting myself feel relief. And so it's all underneath all of these things that you have to get the root of. I'm not fully, I'm not like excited that I was able to accept the fact that I felt relief, but it's a weight off my shoulder that that it's something that I can express to myself that I feel this way about it.

[1:04:35] Go ahead. It can probably be said as well that those that we've lost to suicide, on the same token, if they could speak to us again, would say, keep living your life.

[1:04:49] Move forward. Those that love us, like don't stop doing this.
Like you said, Rachel, she was like your biggest supporter, your fan, she did so much for you.
Love to see you living out your dream and watching it come to fruition. And those that are left surviving, we can get trapped in the world of should have, could have, would have, what ifs, trapped in the past and trapped in the future and possible future scenarios that could have played out. But bringing yourself back to the present and say, this individual would have said to me, keep living your life.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the first time that I went like a 24 hour period without thinking about my sister, I woke up in the middle of the night like so mad. Like, how are you gonna have a good day?
You fucking again, you're a piece of shit. How are you gonna have a good day? Your sister is dead and she had no good days at the end. How are you gonna tell yourself that you can have a good a day that you can smile. Um, and that was hard, like knowing, like always internally knowing that my sister wanted me to have my best life, like knowing that full full well, but not ever believing it until I actually believed it until I started to actually do the work and think about these things and work through my emotions and go to support groups. And and now my life, you know, you know, this September, um, will be five years and my life is amazing.

[1:06:17] I have trouble thinking about gratitude. I love this life, but I don't know if it would have came if my sister was still here. I don't know any of that. I'm not God, right? Of course.
But I know that the things I have in my life currently, I am grateful for them.
And I express gratitude immensely all the time. But I don't know if I'm grateful for the situation.
Like, so I have trouble like sort of extrapolating the two about how beautiful my life is now.
And I have an amazing fiance. We're about to get married and my parents are healthy and we have an awesome relationship and my friends and my work.
And like, just sitting here at 545 talking to you is like, who would have thought, like, this is a job?
All right, sounds great.
Sign me up, right? Being able to express my sister and her love and all of that stuff.
But I like, I just, I haven't found the right words to think about the actual situation and how it turned out five years later.

[1:07:14] You know, I think it's also important to know that if you go through a tragic event, like something really, really hard and painful, you don't have to make it your life's mission.
You do not.
Right. But you don't. No matter what social media says about all of this stuff, right, you just have to be able to find some peace in it so that you can move forward with the life you are continually living.
Now, if it was a life that you hate, then you. It's great. It's a perfect time.
Pain is the greatest indicator for change. time to make a change.
Life is precious and fragile and beautiful. How can we say I love you a little bit more?
If that's the indicator you need, great.
But if you were already living a life that you wanted to live and something unpredictable and really hard and tragic happened, you don't have to turn it into your life's mission and save the whole entire planet.
You could just be the person you're being, right? Because the little communities we create have downstream effects.
I needed to make a change in my life and this is the thing that forced me to change, to force me to reevaluate, to do the thing that I'm doing.
And now I feel like I'm on a mission. I'm on a mission, a driven purpose-filled mission.
And I wake up every day feeling that way.
It started off with me trying to save the world and that doesn't work.
I can't save the world.
But I can work my hardest to do the best I can. And whoever that touches, that's fantastic.
And so, yeah.

[1:08:35] And I'm so glad that you also take the pressure off of going through a tragic event does not mean you have to turn this into like your life's mission.
You know, I think the work that I do, I would not have been be doing if I had not gone through violent trauma, right?
And gone through years of mental health struggles myself. Like, and so I have an intimate understanding of what some of these struggles look like.
Not maybe specifically like, for example, what Rachel experienced, but I do have an understanding of what severe mental health struggles can look like.
And so, but really it factored into what I was already going to do with my life, you know?
But prior to going through trauma, like I'd thought I wanted to marry my love of nutrition and exercise and things like that into some way, you know, helping people live better lives.
But I didn't recognize that it was gonna take going through a decade of serious struggles, to actually get me to a place that I'm doing this thing that I love and feel so called and compelled to do.
And I wouldn't take the experience that I went through or the experiences that I went through out of my past, but I wouldn't put up my hand and say, I'd like to go through that again.

[1:09:38] Yeah. Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Yeah, because we can't change it. We can't. Yeah.
Yeah. But we could do our best to, I don't know, manage it. I don't want to say make the best out of the situation. And those aren't adequate words, but I guess they'll work for now. But, they do, you know, and, you know, as we as we bring this to a close, I know we could we could keep talking for quite a period of time. I know there was a lot more that I would love to ask but I think this is just a wonderful reason to go and spend more time learning what Aaron Mashvitz and the wonderful work that you do, the amazing work that you're doing.
Before we get to my final question, I really, if people, if they've been touched by what you're sharing, they're touched by your mission and what you're sharing and the work that you're doing now, how do they reach you and how do they connect with you and maybe even support what it is that you're doing?
So my nonprofit is called You Are Loved. We have merchandise And we post every day on social media and there's a tab for donations if you feel so inclined.
But all of that is at youarelovedlife.com, youarelovedlife.com.
And then if you'd like listening to me talk, I talk way more on my podcast, which is called Something for Everybody. And you can find that anywhere you find John's podcast as well, so.
Yeah, that's amazing. Well, before we close out, if someone's listening to this conversation today and if they could just take one thing away from hearing these stories, what is it you would like people to take away from it?

[1:11:07] Well, it's the same thing that I needed when I was at my worst, is that you are loved.
And I don't care if it sounds cheesy or if it sounds lame.
It's true. And you may not feel it in yourself right now currently, but there's someone out there who does feel that way about you.
And there's a point in time that you can work towards where you feel a little bit better about yourself each day.
And so maybe right now you totally despise yourself, and I get that feeling.
I know that feeling.

[1:11:41] But there is, you know, there's breath in your lungs, and that means there's time for you to continue getting up every single day and making the choice to move closer towards maybe not hating yourself, to maybe being okay about yourself, to maybe liking this part about yourself, to maybe feeling like you are worthy and you are loved because you You definitely are.
It's not an easy thing, but it's a worthwhile passion. It's a worthwhile pursuit.
I've come to learn that from doing this work for a little bit over five years or just about five years now.
I think the cheesier, the better. You're deeply loved and cared for, and you have a divine spark in you that needs to be be expressed to the world and only you can express it because you're the only you and you're the best version of you there ever will be.
And so I hope you find that within you and maybe these words will give you a little bit of encouragement to go out and try and do that for yourself.
So that's what I feel.

[1:12:47] I love that. And I love that you laid it out step by step. You don't just have to jump from self-loathing to self-loving. There's a process to get there. That's so helpful to clarify that.
Well, Aaron, thank you so much for being on the show today. It has truly been a pleasure.
Thank you so much, man. I really enjoy the conversation.

[1:13:04] Thank you so much for tuning in to Between the Before and After.
If you've enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a review because that helps this podcast, to reach and inspire more people.
I love exploring the stories that take place between the before and after, the powerful experiences that shape who we become.
And I love human potential. I love the possibilities that lie within us.
So whatever you may be up against, I hope these stories inspire you because if you're still here, Our story's not done yet, so keep moving forward.