Grounds For Success
A Caffeinated Conversation On Succeeding In Music
Grounds For Success
Kira Kosarin: Balancing Success, Time Management, and Mental Health
Hey Coffee Drinkers, Welcome to the first episode of Grounds For Success! Get ready to be inspired by the incredible Kira Kosarin, a talented actor and artist/singer-songwriter who has achieved amazing success in her career, but is a wealth of knowledge in so many aspects of the entertainment industry. In this episode, we chat about her unique background, her journey in the entertainment industry, and her strategies for maintaining balance in her life. Kira shares her love-hate relationship with caffeine, her brand new single "Before the Sad Sets In," her dedication to healthy sleep habits, and of course her newly filmed movie "The Thundermans Return," which she's taken on an Executive Producer role in. Kira's self-awareness, confidence, and unique perspective on success are truly inspiring and offer valuable lessons for anyone looking to achieve their own goals.
In addition, we explore Kira's dedication to continuous learning, self-care, time management, and preparation for her performances. From her regimen of stretching and breathing exercises to her focus on self-study and self-knowledge. Listen in as we uncover the tools and strategies that have helped her achieve her dreams and continue to drive her forward in her career. This episode is jam-packed with valuable insights and entertaining stories you won't want to miss!
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GROUNDS FOR SUCCESS LINKS
All Links Here: https://linktr.ee/groundsforsuccess
AUSTIN SELTZER LINKS
All Links Here: https://linktr.ee/Austinseltzer
KIRA KOSARIN LINKS
YouTube @kirakosarin
The Thundermans: https://www.netflix.com/title/81186615
Spotify: https://rb.gy/vz9l7
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kirakosarin/
TikTok: https://shorturl.at/jpEF2
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4114500/
Welcome to the Grounds for Success podcast. I'm your host, austin Siltzer. Together we'll unveil the keys to success in the music industry. Join me as I explore my guest's life stories and experiences to uncover practical insights to help you align with your goals more effectively. Hey coffee drinkers, today I have Kira Kosteren on the podcast. After this episode you'll see why I love her so much. She is wickily funny, incredibly intelligent. She's just an all-around awesome person with great knowledge.
Austin Seltzer:Although most of you probably know Kira from her lead role as Phoebe in the Nickelodeon TV show The Thundermen's, she's also an incredible singer-songwriter artist and I got the privilege of mixing her next single called Before the Sad Sets In And we'll talk about that some on this podcast An incredible song produced by my friend, dallas Katen, and I was just stoked to be able to be on it. Through that process, me and Kira became friends and I was lucky enough to have her on this podcast to discuss so much more than just that single. But what really makes her successful? While on her TV show The Thundermen's, phoebe is known for having to not allow people to know that she has superpowers. On this podcast we dive pretty deep into what I think you'll find some incredible superpowers and what makes her so special.
Austin Seltzer:In this episode we're going to talk about Kira's hilarious relationship with Kofi and Kaffeine. We're going to talk about Before the Sad Sets In. Of course, we're going to talk about how important her sleep schedule and routine are just for anybody, but she's going to dive into that. We're also going to talk about how her parents were in theater and how she grew up as an only child, which you know. You'll see how that can really play into someone being incredibly successful in being an actor or an artist. I'm sure that you'll find why she's successful in those through this podcast. Also, kira's time management skills and how ridiculously cool they are and how useful they are. We'll also talk about how Kira found out she wanted to act It's a cool little story with her and her father and how they pursued that by moving to LA. And we'll also talk about how Kira deals with a condition PMDD and how she still performs at the highest level. I'll let her explain that, as I think that she'll do it much better than me. Alright, let's get caffeinated.
Kira Kosarin:Hi, everybody, are we recording?
Austin Seltzer:We are.
Kira Kosarin:Are we live? We're live. Did you tell the people what's happened? Tell them what's occurred.
Austin Seltzer:I'll fall on my sword.
Kira Kosarin:Technology did not agree with Austin this week. No, we filmed for three hours, maybe three and a half, maybe four, filmed a beautiful podcast and the Internet. I mean the universe just said, no, that one's just for you guys. So we're back.
Austin Seltzer:We're back.
Kira Kosarin:Gonna try to be back and even better this time. Yes, in all capacity, One way to find out, And if this gets wiped again, then we just know something out. there is like this is not the time.
Austin Seltzer:It's too good to be out there right now.
Kira Kosarin:It could change too many lives.
Austin Seltzer:Since we are doing this the second time, I feel like there are certain things that I just must do again.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah.
Austin Seltzer:Like shit on you about not liking coffee.
Kira Kosarin:You're wrong. That's not a true statement.
Austin Seltzer:That is a gross over simplification, classes over coffee.
Kira Kosarin:Of a complicated physiological state of being.
Austin Seltzer:Please explain.
Kira Kosarin:I have a tenuous relationship with caffeine. I'm very sensitive to it, which can be a wonderful thing and a terrible thing. It is genetic runs on my family. If I drink caffeine beyond like genuinely 9 am, it will impede my ability to go to sleep that night. I try to go periods of time without drinking caffeine in my life in order to avoid that, but then there are also periods of time where I simply do drink caffeine, because I do love it, because it has such an effect on me. I feel like a superhero when I drink caffeine. My workouts are fabulous and I feel so much more clear. If I'm depressed, it helps me feel. That's depressed, like it's great, but then I just simply won't sleep and it gets into a bad cycle. So I will be fully transparent with you. I am actually drinking caffeine right now, which?
Kira Kosarin:I was not when we met in the mornings. In the mornings, because I keep getting PR boxes from energy drink companies And I can't say no when they taste so good and they make me feel so strong about workouts, but I genuinely can't drink it. It's three in the afternoon right now. If I were to have a cup of coffee, i would go to bed tonight at my regular time And 1 am, 2 am, 3 am would pass and be like why am I still awake?
Kira Kosarin:Oh, it's from that cup of coffee. I had it too.
Austin Seltzer:But I am curious actually if your sleep schedule has come back to where we were on the last podcast.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, you were just like sleeping for like 15 hours.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, oh, that's right, Okay, so yeah. so on the, I'll call it the ghost episode.
Austin Seltzer:The ghost episode.
Kira Kosarin:On the ghost podcast that nobody ever saw. I had just finished filming the Thunderman's movie And then subsequently, for the following two and a half weeks, i was sleeping 15 hours a night, which is super weird. I tend to sleep more than your average bear, but more than your average person too. Sorry, but I was really bad. But yes, it has come back in the past like week. Finally I'm sleeping, you know, eight hours a night like a normal person again.
Austin Seltzer:Damn. You're actually going to be like coherent and care about this podcast.
Kira Kosarin:I know I was in dude. I was a grumpy, grumpy grumper last time I was here I hit it pretty well, but I was, i was struggling and I'm feeling a little bit more like myself now.
Austin Seltzer:Well, actually, i mean really just sleep schedules, everything.
Kira Kosarin:It really is absolutely everything. That is my biggest. I'm talking about grounds for success. Man, get enough fucking sleep, that's it. That's it. All of those things that are like get up at four and dooba-dooda. Maybe that works for you Everybody's got a different circadian rhythm but like get some sleep.
Austin Seltzer:I'm glad you know what that is.
Kira Kosarin:What Circadian rhythm? Oh yeah, of course.
Austin Seltzer:I mean, yeah, you're into health. Do you work out every day?
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i do, and sometimes twice a day. But I have also learned that discipline is not only working out all the time, discipline is also taking rest days when your body needs them, and so I am trying to get better. I am somebody for whom working out is really good for my mental health, and so doing it every day tends to be really healthy for me. But it does get your body, does get to a point where, like if all your major muscle groups are fatigued, your, your joints start taking on load and you can injure yourself and you're not giving your muscles time to recover and like, uh yeah, so I've had to learn how to get better at taking rest days. But my rest days usually look like, you know, walking around the hunting and gardens, like looking at flowers or walking around the farmers market, or like I'm still trying to move, usually Unless I just need to sit on the couch for a day, which I also try to let myself do.
Austin Seltzer:Wait, what do you do whenever you sit on the couch?
Kira Kosarin:Um play video games.
Austin Seltzer:What are you on right?
Kira Kosarin:now I'm just gonna play, consume content, watch you to videos, listen to music. all the above, what?
Austin Seltzer:just wait, what? what game are you on? You are a gamer.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i just finished my second playthrough of God of War, ragnarok, um, which is like my favorite, probably my favorite game of all time, um, on PS five. And then I'm now on. I'm now doing a second playthrough of Assassin's Creed, valhalla, which I played like a year and a half ago, and sometimes I'll I'll just go on like missions or walk around and do things that I can do mindlessly with it on mute and sing just to like use my voice, cause otherwise, really, the only time I'm singing is like when I'm in the car driving. Um, it's nice to have something to do with your hands while you're singing.
Austin Seltzer:Totally. I mean, i actually think that video games are very important to music. I can tell you like my entire life I've been deep into video games, of different consoles, different games, whatever. But I feel like the music and games completely inspired what I would listen to throughout my life.
Kira Kosarin:That's cool. Yeah, it's very cinematic.
Austin Seltzer:Cinematic.
Kira Kosarin:it's storytelling, it's um, it's also just like the neural plasticity required to like learn new controls or combat or timing or whatever like it's valuable.
Kira Kosarin:You can definitely play your life away. You can get addicted to the like achievement the false achievement that you get within a video game and like. Stop looking for that in your outside world. I wouldn't recommend anybody to sit in a dungeon and play video games all day, every day, unless it brings you endless joy, in which case go for it. Or you're a streamer. You're making money from it, in which case go for it.
Austin Seltzer:We can go into um. You know, deja vu here. Let's do it. I would love to go all the way back um to your childhood and kind of figure out family life from you know who your parents are and kind of just what like early life looked like that shaped little Kira and little Kira.
Kira Kosarin:She was a handful man. Well, deja vu it. I was an only child, super tight with my parents, um, they were Broadway performers, so I grew up in and around music and performing and just lively, huggy theater people, just loud New Yorkers, um. So any of my kind of, you know, liquidiousness or annoyingness as a kid came from that. I talked a lot, i had to hang out with the grownups. I loved making the adults laugh, um, and I was very good at being alone because I was an only kid, an only child, um, which I think is still often the case. I, i, i am my own friend, which is which is a nice thing to be able to say Um.
Kira Kosarin:But I feel like probably the most interesting formative thing about like my, my childhood was that I skipped several grades. Um, my, i just come from a family that just likes, you know, academia and whatever, just values that, and so when I was little, like my dad would do vocabulary flashcards with me or like it was fun, it was games. The games in my household were always like somewhat educational, whether it be music or or math or whatever else. So once I got into the school system, things were kind of tricky for me because I wasn't as engaged as the other kids, because I had already learned a lot of it just by virtue of my dad teaching me things, um, and that I was just kind of a precocious kid, like I picked. I picked up on things like that.
Kira Kosarin:So my, my teachers in my early years thought that I had like a learning disability or like something was wrong because I was acting out so much and I also just had so much energy. I just couldn't focus. And my parents, luckily, fought back and they were like no, i think that I think she's just not engaged. All's to say, for a good bit of my formative years, i was much younger than the people around me and, um, there are some things that were good about that. You know, i was very driven and motivated because I had that constant encouragement of feeling like I was a good, smart kid. But I also, like, emotionally, was always way behind everybody around me and I didn't like consciously really know why, and a lot of the effects of that, i think, like manifested subconsciously. So things like being not feeling liked, being bullied, not like why doesn't so? and so how come the person I have a crush on doesn't like me back Cause they're 15 and I'm 12 and no 15 year olds like 12 year olds.
Austin Seltzer:You know what I?
Kira Kosarin:mean, or I would hope not, but yeah that's, i don't know as much as I can like. summarize here's my entire early life and why I am the way that I am now. That's probably a good, a good bit of it.
Kira Kosarin:The only other thing I'll say is that there was a point in my early childhood, when I was like you know, five or six, where my dad came to me and he was like Hey, we speak music in this family. It's like our other language and you don't have to do it. You don't have to pursue music, you don't have to have a career in it, you don't even have to like it, but you have to speak it. You have to speak this language because it's part of our family.
Kira Kosarin:I'm very grateful for that. I learned how to harmonize when my parents would perform at you know, friend parties and I used to sing. I had a song I would sing with my dad and a song I would sing with my mom, or my mom and dad would do a you know a number together from a show she had been in and I would be doing all the dance moves and like singing it in the background. So yeah, i never stood a chance. I was always going to end up in some something creative.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, have you read the book? outliers.
Kira Kosarin:No.
Austin Seltzer:Basically what the book is about is it? it talks about and it drills into why certain people become so incredibly good at whatever it is that they do Interesting. And the whole book really just outlines it's how early in life you get in those repetitions, those hours, those whatever. It has things about Bill Gates, it has things about hockey players, it has things about, like, great music artists, and it really just comes down to how much time you're able to put into a craft before life really matters. Yeah.
Kira Kosarin:Well, and also the way that you learn. that's really interesting. It's also, i'm realizing it's the way you learn discipline. because I think the other thing is that when I was young, like I said, i had so much energy that, you know, like I could have been medicated. I was like I was out there. but my parents because my mom was a dancer knew what like intense physical activity could do for a kid who had as much energy as I did. So she put me in ballet and gymnastics And for a long time in those sports I just kind of flew by natural talent.
Kira Kosarin:I flew by the fact that I happened to be flexible and I happened to have, you know, strong Russian legs, whatever, like, until I got to a point where that wasn't carrying me anymore and I wasn't trying as hard as I needed to be. And I had two separate experiences, one in gymnastics and one in ballet. One where a gymnastics coach came to me and she was like hey, you're way more talented than so and so, and you're never even going to come close to how far she's going to go because you're not working hard. It means nothing, you need to be working. And I was like what? And then in ballet. there was like one teacher that I had at a workshop who was like you're not trying, and every single day that your classmates who are trying are coming, they're growing and developing and you're not because you're not trying. And I started to realize like, oh, there's a direct correlation between how hard I work and how good I get.
Kira Kosarin:And from then on it was just like boom set me on the path of being almost workaholic, something else I'm trying to like dial back on now, but it makes sense, it was a perfect age.
Austin Seltzer:So on that, i'd like to drill a little bit deeper.
Kira Kosarin:Get in there.
Austin Seltzer:Where I know I've told you this that out of everybody that I work with legitimately, and today again, of course, you're not just on time, you're early, very communicative, like I know what's going on in your world with the things that we've worked on together. You're just like very on top of things professionally time-wise, and I know that that came from early in life and I'd like to hear some about that.
Kira Kosarin:My time management is definitely probably the thing that it makes me the most me And then I would say the most proud of, or that has served me the best in my life.
Kira Kosarin:I feel like it is almost the answer to most things, or at least a super helpful thing.
Kira Kosarin:But yeah, again, we chatted about this the first time around but I think, as far as I can figure out, I think that it was just a really healthy coping mechanism for anxiety as a kid And then it was something that worked so well to set me up to not be in anxious situations. Being late, running late, super stressful for me If I'm supposed to get out the door and it's five minutes past when I was supposed to leave and I can't figure out what I'm supposed to wear. Like once I get frazzled, I'm frazzled And I hate that feeling and I'm not making good choices And, like you know, I don't like going into a class before I've had time for my brain to wake up or going into a meeting before I've had time to wake up my like articulation skills and I flummoxed the whole time. So I think I just learned over the years like, oh, if I can schedule my life out better, I can be more prepared and therefore I have to endure those uncomfortable situations less frequently.
Austin Seltzer:We started this process?
Kira Kosarin:Why was I early today?
Austin Seltzer:Yes, like. can you tell me what went through your head, like counting backwards?
Kira Kosarin:Sure, sure, sure. So I mean, in short, the reason that I was early was that I was going to wash my hair after my workout and I just didn't have it in me to deal with it. So I just blow dried it from sweaty. Sorry, i know that's gross, but I know I was going to wash it properly. But I just dry shampooed it, so that's. But yeah, so, like I'll tell you when we were planning today out like what time we can be there, it's like okay, i'll run through this quick. I've got to work out 11 to 12. I know that by the time I've showered and got ready, blah, blah, blah, i'm home by 12, 15. Okay, cool. So I know it takes me 45 minutes to get ready with, you know, no makeup, about an hour to get ready with makeup and eating food, and about an hour and 15 if I'm going to wash my hair. Great, that's what I want. I also know I need to stop in downtown to drop something off first. So then I did.
Kira Kosarin:All of the ways is to see how long everything's going to take. But, for example, like a, like a work backwards would be like okay, i need to be here at three. It's 20 minute drive. I need to leave the other place at 240. I need to get there at 230, leave myself five minutes for parking. 225. It takes me 45 minutes to get there, so I want to leave my place at 140. I want to blow dry my hair. I want it 25 minutes to do it, so 115,.
Kira Kosarin:I'm going to do my makeup at 105, do my skincare at one, cause I keep forgetting sunscreen. I'm going to eat a snack at 1250. I want to leave myself five minutes to do emails and social media, so let's say 1240. Great, i need to be home at 1230. I need to leave the place at 1215. I need to end my workout at 12. I need to start my workout at 11. Need to leave to go to the workout at 1030. Need to get up and hydrate and do all of my morning things around 10, alarm at 945. You know that kind of stuff.
Austin Seltzer:That's amazing.
Kira Kosarin:So I was just early cause I got home from my class at 1215 and was going to wash and blow dry my hair and then didn't.
Austin Seltzer:I love how you just nonchalantly like that is the most rapid fire thing.
Kira Kosarin:Cause it's cause. It's what I do in my head before I go to sleep every night for the next day.
Austin Seltzer:How do you go to sleep That? sounds like caffeine brain to me, but it's not.
Kira Kosarin:It's just my brain. Now you see why I can't drink caffeine. You know what's funny? I I can't fall asleep unless I am actively thinking about something.
Austin Seltzer:Like if.
Kira Kosarin:I'm just laying there, My head feels like painfully empty. But if I can think about like all brainstorm, like oh, I have this event, what do I wanna wear, And in my head I'll go through my closet, It can be like mundane, it doesn't have to be interesting, but I'll just go through and kind of figure out what I wanna be wearing And then eventually that'll give way to more creative thinking. That then give way into dreaming. Like I have to get a transition from conscious brain into dream brain to fall asleep.
Austin Seltzer:That's nuts. Whenever I go to sleep, I have to say that I think that's my superpower. You really get it falling asleep, Yes.
Kira Kosarin:That is maybe one of the most practical superpowers to have. I'm envious. Can you sleep on like planes and trains and buses and stuff?
Austin Seltzer:I can, but in my bed, like I have a routine that if I do this certain thing, so it's basically you know, i'll just brush my teeth, wash my face, blah, blah, blah, but I put on thunderstorm sounds.
Kira Kosarin:I love a white noise.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, so I got that. And then I get this thing called a bed jet that blows air into the bed.
Kira Kosarin:Oh my gosh, I keep seeing videos of those with dogs inside the covers being cooled down in the summer. Very cute.
Austin Seltzer:That's cute Well. So when you tell me that, you use that My little feeder dogs?
Kira Kosarin:Picturing a sheepadoodle.
Austin Seltzer:I could be that And yeah, so what it does? is it like pipes? really hot air for a moment that helps your blood rise to the surface, and then cold air that cools you down quicker Crazy. But as soon as the hot air is blowing over me, i am out.
Kira Kosarin:I am done.
Kira Kosarin:Well, there's like a Pavlovian response there too. Like, once you get the things of your evening up and running, i feel like whenever people ask me like oh, what are your like keys to success? blah, blah, blah, i find myself reminding people often of the fact that, like you know, when there's a toddler right And they need their nap at the same time every day and they need their bedtime routine to start 45 minutes early, no screens, then a bath, then this and that, like that doesn't change. We just stop doing it. Because when you're a kid, the consequence is a tantrum And when you're an adult, the consequence is maybe you're a little anxious or whatever. But like, we need routine as adults just as much as we did as kids. My Spotify wrapped every year a mess. It's like you were listening to airplane brown noise sounds and 1940s jazz while you cooked dinner And I'm like I listened to pop music. Where is it? I just spilled on myself.
Austin Seltzer:Wow, i got hella stains today. That didn't happen the first time around.
Kira Kosarin:No, I'm using my hair to cover a sunscreen stain on this straight that I'm very sad about.
Austin Seltzer:Wear sunscreen kids.
Kira Kosarin:I'm trying to be better about sunscreen.
Austin Seltzer:I have mine on. It's really bright in here.
Kira Kosarin:Well, the sun finally came out today.
Austin Seltzer:It did actually.
Kira Kosarin:I've not been a good sunscreen user because I'm not someone who burns, so like the consequences are usually feel pretty low. But I'm like you know I'm 25. Now I'm seeing my seeing cute little wrinkles in the mirror that I'm like I should probably be protecting myself from UV damage.
Austin Seltzer:Let's have a podcast in 10 years and see where we're at.
Kira Kosarin:Oh gosh, where do you think you're going to be at in 10 years? Just tangent, or five years?
Austin Seltzer:Five years This podcast. So the goal. I do have a five year goal.
Kira Kosarin:Of course you do, i love it.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, my five year goal is grounds for success will be a coffee and breakfast spot.
Kira Kosarin:I love that And I'll be a regular and I'll come in and I'll say, hey, get me my regular.
Austin Seltzer:I would. I would love that so much. We'll have a table for you.
Kira Kosarin:Thank you. Can I come and like put my hand print in the concrete when it's wet?
Austin Seltzer:Sure, we'll see if the city allows that, but if they don't, we'll. We'll designate an area inside. But basically, the podcast that we're having will be live at the coffee shop.
Kira Kosarin:Love.
Austin Seltzer:It'll be, you know, either once a week or we'll do like batches of taping, but I think it would be so awesome to like have an intimate conversation in front of a couple of people that maybe want to be in that zone, and you'd buy a ticket and it'll come with coffee and breakfast. Wow.
Kira Kosarin:Sorry, I'm dying you.
Austin Seltzer:My dreams are so boring to you.
Kira Kosarin:I was trying to yawn on such the low key because I knew you were going to give me shit for it.
Austin Seltzer:Phil, do not edit that out.
Kira Kosarin:I just needed air. I forget to breathe. I like live eternally in a state of exhalation. And then sometimes I'm like, oh yeah, interesting, but I'm not like steadily breathing in and out kind of ever, and maybe I'm a vampire. I'm just kind of like here until I'm like, oh yeah, oxygen, i need to breathe.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, you're so close to death all the time I really am.
Kira Kosarin:You have no idea.
Austin Seltzer:And the other thing I want to be one of the biggest mixers in the world.
Kira Kosarin:Love that.
Austin Seltzer:I really do, And what that means to me is just like I want to work on things that touch as many lives as humanly possible.
Kira Kosarin:That's cool Impact.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, that would be really cool. What's your five year goal?
Kira Kosarin:I don't know about goal per se, because my goals are kind of constantly changing, because I kind of oscillate between music and TV and film every few years. it's hard to ever know which one will really seriously hit and sweep me up for a few years. You know what I mean.
Austin Seltzer:Kira.
Kira Kosarin:What.
Austin Seltzer:You have a humongous TV show.
Kira Kosarin:No, that's not what I mean though, but I mean in five years, i think that there is as much of a chance that I'm on a world tour as there is a chance that I'm executive producing and directing and starring in a multicam for Nickelodeon or Netflix or something. I also have music coming out, and you never know when something's. I haven't really had a song hit big yet. I've been building, so I'll just say in five years I could be running a show or on a show I could be touring. I don't have goals necessarily, but I feel like predictions, like I definitely will. I mean, let's see, five years I'll be 30. Probably be married and maybe moving into my first home, potentially in five years, been in my current apartment for five years, i think another five, and we'll be ready to live in a house. I think I want to shave my head when I'm 30, because I want to do that once in my life. I just cut my hair the shortest I've ever done it And I was like even that was liberating.
Kira Kosarin:I want to have a proper short haircut at 30. Yeah, i don't know, i'll be in LA still, probably.
Austin Seltzer:Is the dream, one day to get out?
Kira Kosarin:No, i love it here. I'm going to move to here intentionally And I still am here for the same reasons that I came in the first place. It's interesting, i feel like when I think about where I want to be in a few years. It's not really circumstantial things as much as, like, i want to be a better decision maker. I want to be less stressed about decision. I want to hear my gut more strongly and be less afraid to follow it. I want to be less afraid to book a vacation, in case I book it wrong or I book a bad one.
Kira Kosarin:I want to be less addicted to my phone. I want to have the same close friends that I have right now, plus some more wonderful people who I haven't met yet, and I want more acquaintances And I want to have a better relationship every day with food and my body, things like that. I want to just continue to be a happier and happier person if possible. That's it. I don't really care what that looks like. I don't care if that means being the biggest star in the world or having completely left the internet and just living a quiet little domestic life. I could be happy either way.
Austin Seltzer:I've realized pretty much everybody that have obtained success where most the world would be like that's success. Everybody just wants to be happy.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, if we're trying to pull things out from our first attempt to this podcast, now might be a good time to bring back the Sims bars.
Austin Seltzer:Oh, I did like that analogy.
Kira Kosarin:Because that's thank you. That is, i think, kind of a good way to describe success outside of the traditional money power, whatever that people think of as success. I feel like I think of myself as a Sims, with all these different Sims bars, and it's like excitement versus peace, friendship versus solitude, indulgence versus health, exploration versus stability, whatever, fitness versus sloth and hanging out and doing whatever. There are all these different kind of parameters And I feel like all I ever want is for things to be pretty balanced And whatever one of the bars just drops way below what it needs to be. I feel it really intensely And I feel like that tends to then be a catalyst for poor mental health or whatever else. And it's funny, once you start thinking of it that way, how much it changes your perspective on everything.
Kira Kosarin:There will be times where I'm like, oh, things are really good, but I need more of a work fulfillment bar. I need more discipline, i need more fun, i need more quiet, i need more like my social bar. It needs to be filled up, i need to see people. Or my solo bar needs to be filled up, i need to spend time with myself, whatever. So that's really my. Whenever someone's like what's your goal ever? I'm like I just want to get to a point where all of my bars are even Because they'll never all be full. There's not enough hours in the day for that And some of them are mutually exclusive. But if they can all be kind of balanced, i feel like that success.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, i want to be financially secure enough And also socially secure enough meaning I have great friends and a great network that any fucking idea that I have that comes to mind I can execute. I can jump off that cliff because I know that financially I'm doing.
Kira Kosarin:OK, such a block cliff.
Austin Seltzer:I almost did when I lost the footage.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, that's good.
Austin Seltzer:And then I also have the network that can help me make these dreams a reality.
Kira Kosarin:Totally. Yeah. It's funny that you say that, because even that kind of shows the individualistic definitions of success, which is that I want to make enough money that I can travel as much as I want, as comfortably as I want. That's what I'll spend it on. Yeah, it'd be nice to have a home eventually. Yeah, I want a wedding with 150 people and serve them nice food. There's other things that I want to. I like my fancy gym and I like spending money on food and ordering Fancy gym.
Kira Kosarin:Thai food four nights a week from my favorite restaurant. I literally am in the top 0, 0, 0, 1% of orders from my favorite Thai restaurant. They send me thank you notes. It's very funny.
Austin Seltzer:Oh my gosh.
Kira Kosarin:But I just want to be able to travel and not worry about upgrading to business on a 17 hour flight, because my back will hurt if I don't. That's the goal for me. Whenever I have to do a piece of work that I just absolutely hate, and I'm just really doing it for the paycheck that's what I'm doing it for.
Austin Seltzer:Let's move on a little bit from childhood.
Kira Kosarin:OK.
Austin Seltzer:And just you know, we infant here. Moving into first of all, where did you, where were you born?
Kira Kosarin:Yeah.
Austin Seltzer:And then because you said your parents are in New York.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, so my family's from New York. I was born in New Jersey and lived there until I was like six or seven, at which point my dad stopped working in Broadway so that my mom could retire. He wanted to like go just find a way to make some money. He was like I'm going to just spend a few years doing something I'm not passionate about and just try to make money for my family, and ended up getting a job that took us to Florida and lived in South Florida from like eight to 12. And then we moved out to LA for me to pursue the entertainment industry.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, we got to pause that.
Kira Kosarin:Which was in because of a couple of things, and I can kind of tell you the story of how that happened.
Kira Kosarin:But one of the reasons that we were able to even consider that was that when I was 10, my dad had this crazy, freak accident literally like dove into the ocean during a hurricane to like save a drowning child that he saw out of the corner of his eye and got picked up by a tidal wave and slammed into the ground and shattered his shoulder and like was paralyzed and was on disability and had to stop work.
Kira Kosarin:Like just a life-changing thing when I was 10. And he also has an autoimmune disease, so, like my dad just had some really horrible health things. But what that meant was that he stopped working and there was nothing tying us down to Florida anymore And my mom loved the weather. But I can now kind of tell you the story of what brought us to LA, which is that when I was probably like 11, 10 or 11, my dad got an email about like an open casting for Nickelodeon in Florida And he was like, hey, would you be interested in this? And I was like, are you kidding me? All I do is watch Nickelodeon in Disney, like I love. Yes, of course, and I couldn't go because I had a rehearsal for the Nutcracker at my ballet school that I already committed to.
Kira Kosarin:I know. And my parents were like, leigh, you have a commitment, you gotta honor it. And I was like, yeah, yeah, so I did. And I was really beat up about it. And my dad was like, interesting, I didn't realize that was something that you were interested in, because at the time I just assumed I was going to be on Broadway like my parents. I was a singer, i was a dancer, i was a gymnast, i was an actor, i did school plays, i played instruments. I was like, yeah, i'm gonna do Broadway like my parents And you know, Costa Run's a good name to have in the Broadway world, my uncle is a big Broadway guy. I was like, great, this will be easy, like I've got my whole life planned out for me.
Kira Kosarin:Not that Broadway would have been easy to get into, but as an eight year old, I was like, yeah, that's what I'm gonna do, obviously, But I had never considered the possibility of television. And later on my dad ended up finding something about like an acting teacher who had been on Disney Channel who was coming to Florida because he was going around the country teaching workshops about like kids sitcom, multi-cam acting. And I took it and I loved it And I never wanted to leave. I just felt so instantly at home And I just it was like I found my thing And I loved it.
Kira Kosarin:And he, the acting teacher, invited me out to LA that summer to do like a summer camp class acting workshop And I did. And when I was out here I met my agent doing like a showcase and my then agent and she sent me on a few auditions and I got callbacks for all of them. It was like Aunt Farm on Disney Channel and like Diary of a Wimpy Kid. This is like 2010. And I just had the best time ever And my parents were like, do you wanna try this for real? Like it's? you know we don't want you to be a performer Like my parents had seen too many kids play Annie and go crazy and have horrible lives. But I really wanted it. And they were like, if you really really are gonna work hard and do this, like we'll give it a try, We'll come out to LA for a few months.
Kira Kosarin:And so we came out to LA and I started auditioning and I started going to this high school I was 12 at the time And I started taking dance classes at a new dance studio and guitar lessons, and I just dove into it And I just I even loved the training, and the training that LA had to offer was so far and beyond what I could get in Florida, And so it was pretty clear that it was working and I was happy and, luckily for me, my parents like best friends from childhood also happened to live just right down the street, So they had some community here, and my dad liked the weather more than Florida, you know. And so, yeah, after a few months, my mom went back to Florida, sold the house. I never saw it again. We bought a house here and, yeah, here we are, 13 years later.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, that's so cool And it was just all off of one email, that kind of set that trajectory.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i mean it was also off of. You know, my dad has always really advocated for me and he was looking for opportunities and I think, always for me, especially, you know, given what had happened.
Austin Seltzer:More of that outlier.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i mean luck is such a huge part of any amount of success ever. You got to be prepared, you got to work hard, but at the end of the day, i mean just the luck to be born into a family with any amount of money, the luck to be born. You know the fact that I was a white girl in a period in time where it was probably a much easier, much easier, to get a job as a leading role as a white girl than anything else. That is changing now, thank goodness. But you know there's a lot of privilege involved in success a lot of the time. So I'm very aware of my privilege and luck that I've had over the years because it's obviously a huge part of what's gotten me to where I am but, yeah, i'm lucky and I'm grateful And I got me here.
Kira Kosarin:so here we are.
Austin Seltzer:Wait, did you finish out high school or did you do home school? I?
Kira Kosarin:did so. I went to a real school I'm using that term loosely for ninth and 10th grade. I was auditioning. It was like a school for kids who were professionals in any capacity. So there were a lot of actors who were auditioning or busy on set. There were a lot of kids in bands who were like touring. There were some kids who were athletes, like training for the Olympics, or some like siblings of celebrities who just needed to be somewhere where the other kids were not gonna like fangirl whatever.
Kira Kosarin:So it was core curriculum, pretty short days. All of your extracurriculars had to be signed off by other people in other areas of your life, but it meant that I was allowed to go audition. If I ever booked a job, i could miss three weeks of school or six months or whatever. So I went to that school for ninth and 10th grade and then in 11th grade, i guess right beginning yeah, beginning first month of 11th grade, i booked the Thundermen's at 14.
Kira Kosarin:And most of the kids who I was in contact with at that time when they booked a show, they would switch to online school so you could go at your own rate. Because of the child labor laws, the schooling is very specific of when you can and when you are required to do school on set. So being able to go at your own pace is advantageous, but I really didn't wanna leave a real school. So for 11th and 12th grade I had a tutor on set for the three weeks a month that I was working and then for the one week a month that I was on hiatus I would go to school in person.
Austin Seltzer:But back to that. Is that the most crazy networking of all time? It's only people who are doing shit. You know it's funny.
Kira Kosarin:I know I'm like I think about it all the time. I'm like my high school yearbook is probably gonna be worth so much in a few years. I mean already there are a few other kids kind of crushing it in the industry who? Sidney Sweeney I was in class with Miley Cyrus' little sister, noah Cyrus and her brother Bryson were there. And Frankie Jonas he held the end of school year party at the end of my ninth grade year. There were a lot of really cool kids there doing really cool stuff And yeah.
Austin Seltzer:Okay, so wait for people who are not born into a family of creatives or entertainment people You touched on this earlier a little bit. I would love to know, and for the people listening, kind of, what are some of the things that make people successful if they're not given? Or what are some things that you think make you successful as a person, like bullet points?
Kira Kosarin:Hmm, okay, i mean I'm going to take this on as a couple part question. I guess the first part is like what would I say to somebody who doesn't live in a creative family and wants to have a creative career? I would say, like, take advantage of the fact that we live in a time where the entire world's information is at your fingertips on your phone. You can really learn a lot from the internet. Granted, there's a lot of really great information and a lot of really terrible information, and none of it's labeled, which is the nightmare that is the internet. But, like, you really can learn a lot just on the internet or taking a course here and there. What do I think makes me successful as a person?
Austin Seltzer:Geez, Your time management skills.
Kira Kosarin:Time management, sure, i mean. What's funny is I don't, i don't know. Sometimes I feel very successful as a person and sometimes I don't feel successful as a person at all. I'm sitting here being like why should I be someone to tell you how to be successful, like I don't know? But you know, i think, be communicative, be kind, know how to apologize and take apologies. God, i don't know. You know, work hard and just you know, i don't know Have a hobby that keeps you in shape and makes you happy and listen to good music. How the fuck am I? I'm talking on my ass.
Kira Kosarin:Let me think Making some best, No really, i think the things that make me successful for whatever amount that I am successful is time management, a desire to do everything that I do to the best of my ability, whether it matters or not. Like, even if it's a small, stupid job, i'm going to do it the best that I can Because it's not really worth doing. I don't know being a little neurotic, like caring about details, caring about, like, do you sweat the small stuff? Because otherwise, if you only sweat the big stuff, the small stuff all builds up and explodes. Like you do have to sweat the small stuff. To an extent I'm a good talker. I think that's probably my biggest skill.
Kira Kosarin:Which can get me in trouble sometimes too, because sometimes I fear that I'm a really good salesperson for myself And then I feel like I raise expectations really high and then have to like live up to them.
Austin Seltzer:No, I've noticed that With people who have obtained a certain level of success, they're incredibly good at articulating things.
Kira Kosarin:It got me in a lot of trouble when I was a kid, but it served me well in my career.
Austin Seltzer:Isn't it funny how those things happen. All the things that you're told not to do or you're getting in trouble for as a kid are absolutely your greatest assets.
Kira Kosarin:They are. They are, although there's a lot of things that I used to get made fun of for as a kid And they ended up contributing to my success as an adult And for a while I really resented all of the people who made me feel terrible about them. But then I also realized, the older I got, like no, those were annoying, you do need to also temper things. It was probably really annoying when I was 12 years old saying look at me, look at me, look at me. Yeah, that confidence and freedom and comfort on stage served me really well in booking the lead in the TV show at 14 years old. But probably was also good that I had a few people in my life to be like hey, it's not all about you, turn it down a little bit. Unfortunately, i think I really internalized those voices and it led to a lot of self-hate for many years that I'm now working through. But it's all a balance.
Austin Seltzer:I'm curious of all of the skills that you've honed in.
Kira Kosarin:Mad skills bro.
Austin Seltzer:Mad skills, all the skills, all the bars. It is one of them that you just wish you could throw away and forget and not be good at Tough question.
Kira Kosarin:But Yeah, i mean, i often find myself wishing that I didn't care so much about absolutely everything. Actually, you know what's funny? I think that one of my greatest assets as a human is like self-knowledge Self-study in Hindi I think it is. I don't know how to remember how to pronounce it, i'm embarrassing myself trying, but I have spent many years of self-study in my life through movement, through meditation, through psychology, through studying, through psychedelics, through whatever it is.
Kira Kosarin:I know a lot about myself through nutrition. I know exactly what kind of sleep or food makes my body feel a certain way. I know about how my hormonal cycle affects my emotions. I know how any amount of sleep I know myself so well and I'm so hyper-aware of my state at any given moment which can be a really wonderful tool, but it can also be crushing.
Kira Kosarin:I remember saying once how come there are these people who are able to just not get enough sleep and function totally fine, or drink and look totally the same the next day and not be bloated and this, this or that? I think it was my boyfriend. He was like. I don't think that that's the case. I think you're just more aware of the minute differences in your being. I think you're more aware if you got a little less sleep and you're a little less sharp the next day, whereas other people might just be like, oh, i'm just a little, i don't know, a little foggy or whatever, which is not to. That sounds like I'm like, oh, i know more than everyone else, which is not what I mean. But I do think that I have a very intense awareness of my own state of being, or where I am on the scale of my best, how I feel at my best and my worst at any given moment.
Kira Kosarin:Maybe that's one I might like to be a little less aware. Sometimes I have to just be like think less, bitch, just think less. Some people like the best advice they could get is like you need to feel your feelings, you need to sit and think through things. For me, a lot of the times it's like you need to just be okay with the fact that you don't feel great and just keep living your life anyway.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, so tell me some about sad, sad sin. We're just going to call it that, because that's what you call it.
Kira Kosarin:I know it's called before the sad, sad sin and I only ever call it sad, sad sin. At one point my boyfriend was like you realize you only ever call it sad, sad sin. You should just call it sad, sad sin. I was like I can't do that because the last several songs that I put out and EPs have been called something new songbird. They all start with S's for some reason. I was like I don't want another S song. I don't know why that keeps happening. Yeah, so before the sad, sad sin is probably my. out of all of the songs that I have made, it is probably the closest in style to the music that I listen to or like I'm listening to now, which is a really nice and be a really weird coincidence, because this song sounds like the music I listen to now, but I made it before I started listening to this music. It's almost like I was like accidentally inspired by the music I was about to find rather than like.
Kira Kosarin:I also was directly inspired by like songs that I had heard It definitely pulls from like the one Moona song I liked at the time and the one Caroline Polo Trek song I liked at the time and the one 1975 song I liked at the time and now it's all I listened to. But at the time I didn't know that that's where my music taste was heading. But yeah, it's a fun song It is about. I mean, i feel like it's pretty clear what it's about when you listen to it.
Kira Kosarin:But as somebody who loves to like, like I was saying, get deep and talk about life and think about things I am very good at thinking myself into a hole until I've convinced myself that things are bad, especially if my mental health is not in a good place. I am such a happy, bubbly person but there's a real deep sadness that like lives within me and especially at different periods of my life that sadness can really take over. And so Sunday best and before the sets. It's in a both kind of about that weird dichotomy of being somebody who's happy and fun and bubbly and outgoing, but also like deeply sad and kind of dark on the inside, behind the scenes and in different periods of my life.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah that's kind of it's represented in there. I just love the song though. I love it feels like it gives you a hug. I just I like it. It feels warm and rich and full in the middle and soft and airy and like it's got movement and energy and sparkle and just like all the things I like in the song.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, i remember whenever Dallas, kate and the producer just sent it over to me like his rough, and he was like Hey man, i'd love for you to mix this track, and the first time I heard it, that's exactly what I felt. Thank, you. I think you guys really nailed it. How was the experience writing and producing with Dallas?
Kira Kosarin:It was great. I was with Dallas and then my another co-writer, who I absolutely love working with, named all, all all, nahoth Meyer. She's also one of the co-writers on my song, parachute. We've written a bunch of other songs together. We wrote a bunch of songs together on an EP that didn't come out because I missed a year's release cycle because of COVID and signing to Republic, though those between those two things, i didn't end up putting out the 2021 project, so I called the ghost project and one day I would love to put it out Like an in the vault track. But all in the rope, Most of those songs, and I just love her. But yeah, it was, it was great It was. it was one of those sessions where it was just kind of like you know, i don't know, i don't remember, i think it was. Probably we just started making sounds and then eventually words form and eventually I go Oh, i know what this is about, and then they came together pretty quick. I think it was like a four hour session or something.
Austin Seltzer:I love that. Dallas is incredibly good as a producer. I don't, I don't know the writer. He's great.
Kira Kosarin:And then Alton and I usually write a song together in 45 minutes. Usually, once we stumble upon it, it's like and then we finish it And yeah, dallas is great. He, he just like started. I remember he had all the the synths and they were all really pretty, and then I was like kind of vocalizing what I wanted the drums to be like as he was programming them, and we were just totally on the same page of like what we wanted that sound to feel like. So, yeah, he's great. I love this song. I'm excited It's going to be out, cause it's been a while since we've made it.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, it has been. I'm so excited for people to hear it And I really love it.
Kira Kosarin:June 23rd. It's also one of my favorite cover arts, not that that super matters, but Oh yeah, i was just like do whatever in the chair. Oh yes, Sit in the chair. that way Hearts your back. I don't recommend it.
Austin Seltzer:Funny enough in that photo.
Kira Kosarin:You can't tell, but the way that we got that shot was that I, like, posed, and then Max, my boyfriend, like, spun the chair and then Zach, the photographer, like, took the picture as the chair strings to get like get different angles of it. But it meant I had to like really engage my core, because centrifugal force is no joke.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, I want to dive in on two things with that One. I know that you have like a strong girl group of artists out here, that you're all friends right.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i've got a group of friends, most of whom I met through, like one of my closest friends, emlyn. She introduced me to a few other artists It's me, emlyn, m by Hold, King, mala and MA. So MA, emlyn and M we call the empire, but we all went to dinner one night and we like we're talking about just kind of what it means to be an artist in the TikTok age and kind of all of the ups and downs of that, and we're all artists who have kind of gotten somewhere. You know, we've used social media as a tool in that And we kind of bonded and we formed a group chat and it's like tech support for like TikTok changes. It's like emotional support when the internet just makes us want to drop off a cliff. It's very cute. We're all kind of in slightly different genres but similar and at slightly different points of our careers but similar, and I'm very grateful for that little group of humans. They're just absolutely wonderful and it's really nice to have.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, I brought that up because I really, really think that for anybody listening, you should always have a support group, especially in LA. This place is very, very tough if you don't have close people who understand what you're going through.
Kira Kosarin:LA is like 15 different cities all layered on top of each other and they're just different networks of people. And if you get in with the right people it can be the most supportive, inspiring, magical, creative landscape. And if you get in with the wrong people it can be at best kind of shitty and at worst an absolute nightmare. You gotta get in with the right people And it takes time sometimes to like find your crowd. Absolutely, i know it took me some time, but it also is because I was moving through different industries.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, that does present a different curveball, but I moved out here in 2016 and my first time out here was just so dark and depressing And I'm just like you like super happy, go lucky. I'm always cheery and this and that And that time of my life was fucking brutal. But I went back to Dallas for a period of time and then I moved back out here in early 2018. And all of my friends are great, Sport group great.
Kira Kosarin:Love that.
Austin Seltzer:And it's just a world of difference whenever you have that, and so I just like strongly urge people to find your little crew.
Kira Kosarin:Best advice I ever got when I was like seven years old is like surround yourself with people who make you a version of you that you like make you the best version of you, and everything else kind of falls into place. It's really all about who you spend your time with.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, it's so true. no-transcript, That's slightly happier. I would like to dive into the sad, deep despair that sometimes you feel.
Kira Kosarin:Sure, why the hell not?
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, i mean, it's incredibly relatable, i'm sure, for so many people, and I need them to hear that, even somebody who it seems like has so many amazing things going on, you're a human.
Kira Kosarin:I mean? first of all, i think it's impossible not to have some sort of anxiety, depression, dissociation, something living in the world that we live in, like we live in a very weird. We live in the future, right. We have constant like dopamine overload and stimulation from devices That makes it really hard for us to live in the real world and do tasks. It lowers our you know, it lowers our tolerance for boredom or pain or discomfort. So there's that whole side of things. We have less community than ever. We have fewer tactile things that you can do in the real world. I was reading something the other day about, like, how there are no more third spaces. So like there is your home and there are places that you go, but there used to be more places where people would just be out and about existing and socializing them all the coffee shop And now the third space is the internet and that's where we all connect And no can be wrong.
Austin Seltzer:I love the internet sometimes.
Kira Kosarin:I like that. My brain moves more quickly than older generations because I'm taking in more stuff constantly. But it's also not what we were. We were not meant to see other people's lives and all of the lives that will never live, and be comparing, and we weren't meant to live that way. So that is one thing that I am just as susceptible to as everybody else.
Kira Kosarin:I also have dealt with, you know, i don't know how to, i never know how to describe it but kind of mental health, hormonal cyclical disorder called PMD, since I was like 19,. That's basically like what you think of as PMS, of like, oh, there's a week where the girls feel bad, like is that, but on steroids It's basically, you know, mood and emotions really are hormones at the end of the day, and when your hormones are off, your mood changes and people think of mood as like, oh you're happy, oh you're sad, but don't realize that it acts as like a filter on all of your thoughts. So you know, when your brain stops making, serotonin stops making, like it leads to, like you know the web MD is like hopelessness, self thoughts of failure, like self hatred, and you're just like what, what does that mean? But it really kind of is that is this filter that makes you feel like just empty and like everything is bad and will always be bad, and it makes you at least for me it'll make I won't sleep, i'll be nauseous, like the physical effects are the craziest part, because when you think of mental health you don't usually think of like physical health, but they really are the same thing. So I you know, right now things are good, it's my good week, i'm going to feel good for the next 10 or 12 days, but then the rug gets pulled out for me every single month and it has for the last 10 years. It's the biggest struggle I've dealt with in my entire life And like, on one hand, i think there's probably some good things about the fact that sometimes I'm really kind of sad and melancholy And you know there's like music that I relate to more in those periods And I I think that I have a kind of a more solemn understanding of the world because I know what it feels like to be in a really bad place.
Kira Kosarin:But it also sucks, because I feel wonderful right now And sometimes I do and I feel confident and strong, like I can take on the world. And you know it sucks And anybody who deals with any sort of mental health thing like this you know bipolar, two, similar. I have a close friend who goes through that same thing. We're like everything's great And then it just it is just simply not kind of just being at the mercy of your body, fucking with you And it sucks. So that that is kind of the the core of where most of any of my music about like mental health or struggles or anything all comes from that. And I think that if you're somebody who deals with that, i'm sorry. I know how much it sucks. I never know what the right answer is. Therapy works for some people. Medication works for some people. Just living with it works for some people. It's what I've done so far and it's it's been fine-ish, except for when it's not, you know, but yeah that's that, yeah, i mean.
Austin Seltzer:Obviously, that's incredibly difficult to deal with, but you are. You're kicking ass. Thank you At the top level. The thing that you talked about last time is that one thing that I know for sure is that it will come and it will pass.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah Well, so that is. that is the interesting thing about having having a mental health issue that is so like cyclical and predictable. Is that? one of the things that made it so devastating in the first couple of years was that every time I would hit, i believed it would last forever And I would say that I will always feel like this and I will always feel like this, which is truly with every fiber of my being, like I will always feel like this and I have always felt like this and I will always feel like this, which were, of course, not true, but it it lies to you. That's, that's how it feels. And so once I got that diagnosis and realized like oh, this is consistent, plus or minus four or five days every single month, and it's better some months and it's worth some other months There are various factors that can influence it. Also, interesting to note It also does have like comorbidities I guess it's called or like.
Kira Kosarin:It has a like an enhancing effect on any other mental illnesses you have. So if you have ADD, adhd, anything else, like obviously I'm not a doctor, but this is from my own extensive research of my own diagnosis is like it can worsen those, and that's so unfair. It just sucks, but yes, the knowledge that it is temporary like the deep knowledge that it has happened before and it will go away And it always does is what gets me through. I know, now I have the healthy coping mechanisms, i know how to just like go to the gym, even though I hate it and it sucks, because I know it will make me feel better And just sometimes distract myself until I know I'm, until I get better, or like, let myself just like yeah, i'm eating a shit ton of junk food because it's the only thing that makes me feel okay right now. But it's okay because it's four days and I'm allowed to eat junk food for a couple of days and it'll be fine.
Austin Seltzer:Out of curiosity, because the Thunderman's filmed for a while. It clearly came up while you're on set. How do you deal with whenever you are? best again, you are having to be on the ball.
Kira Kosarin:All right, i'm going to give you the funny, whimsical answer first, so that this doesn't get too serious And it's so stupid. And the answer is hot chocolate. Let hear me out on those days where I wake up and I'm just like there is no joy in my body. Everything that I do feels like a chore, it's like major depressive disorder, like everything feels like painful to do. I make myself a big ass hot chocolate and I just sip on it all day. It's just that little hit of like something that brings me back to childhood, something that tastes really yummy, something that's joyful, but it's, you know, still good enough for me.
Kira Kosarin:I'm not, you know, doing major drugs, whatever. It just raises the baseline a little bit, so I'm just not sobbing all day. And there was one day where I woke up and I was like, okay, here it is, i'm freezing. I didn't sleep last night, my clothes don't fit, i'm nauseous, i feel ugly, whatever. But I got to go to work and I got to go to set. It was rehearsal day. I'm going to make myself a big ass hot cocoa and I put it in a different mug than usual and it exploded on me.
Austin Seltzer:Oh fuck, I saw that posted.
Kira Kosarin:And I got to work and I was like what happened? And I was like my hot cocoa spilled and I was like you're drinking hot cocoa and I didn't have it in me to be like you'd never guess. This is a coping mechanism for fucking mental illness in it, like it was just a silly thing to just be like yes, i'm drinking hot cocoa, don't worry about it. But I got. I really needed that. I cried in my trailer for two minutes and I called my boyfriend and I was like the cocoa exploded. He was like I'm sorry And I was like it's fine, i love you. I just had to complain.
Austin Seltzer:And you know, fuck, i saw that post and I had no idea that that was. But who would?
Kira Kosarin:who would. but you know, comfy clothes and then, and you know you, just you get through it. You do what you can. I got up.
Kira Kosarin:There were certain days where I was like, okay, i'm going to get less sleep than I need, because I know that if I can go to the gym in the morning and get some endorphins it'll push me through the rest of the day, or I'm going to skip my workout because I know I need more sleep. And you know, there were a couple of days where I went to the makeup trailer and just started crying and my makeup artist was really lovely and would distract me with other questions until I felt better and then say, do you want to talk about it? And I would just say, yeah, i'm just having a really hard day right now. You know, i would vent to the people that I felt safe to, but then you know, just get on with my day. If I filmed my scenes, i went to my meetings with the network and the marketing teams and whatever else had to be done And I just like you know you do it like anything else, you know, yeah.
Kira Kosarin:I'm sure that so many people, or I hope that so many people that listen and watch this have something similar in any way, shape or form and they can just hear Yeah, well, we'll say if you are somebody who you feel like you're making progress, you're making progress in any way, and then it just all gets ripped out from under you or like you feel like two different people and or like appear everyone's in a while something hits you where everything feels bad and you can't stop eating and blah, blah, blah, blah, like Track it.
Kira Kosarin:If you're a person who has a cycle like, track it to your cycle, because there's a chance that it is. I mean, another one of my closest friends, like, was dealing with things like this, where they kept having this awful thing. And one day I was just like, could you do me a favor? and just like track it against your hormonal cycle for like six months and like get back to me. And they were like yeah, it's super consistent. And I was like, yeah, you should see somebody about that. And they were like no, there's no way. There's no way I have this. And then they stopped there. But then they were like so guess what? I got diagnosed and I was like congratulations, because there's nothing better than knowing you're not just crazy, there's a reason.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah.
Kira Kosarin:And it's not your fault. It is a physical issue And now you know, with temporary and every time it happens, you can get better at your coping mechanisms and you know it will pass. So look it up. if you're somebody who you feel like you resonate with this.
Austin Seltzer:Boom, helpful advice. Boom. Can you tell me what the fuck you drew on the white board, the chalkboard?
Kira Kosarin:I would like to say first of all, watch your tone, young man. Second of all, I drew this way better the first time. Third of all, I have a major sensory issue with chalk on a chalkboard. It gives me the shivers like repeatedly, So this time.
Austin Seltzer:I will post the video.
Kira Kosarin:Did it, just looking at it every time. I drew it really light this time because I couldn't put my, couldn't put myself through that feeling again. But so this is like a very bad depiction of the glitter tears I make up that I wear when I promote Sunday best and before Sadson's in and all of the current music. And I will just start off by saying I am not the first person to wear sparkly smudged mascara Shout out to Kesha in 2014,. but lots of people do it. It's very common now, all the way back from the Indie Sleaze era to whatever weird future hyper pop era we're in right now.
Kira Kosarin:But when I was making TikToks for my last single Sunday best, one of the lyrics is like my mascara running in my Sunday best again to represent the juxtaposition of being like a happy person who's not always so happy, and I smudged my mascara and did some glitter and it just felt like a really good representation like A for me as a person and B for like the new music I'm making right now, where it's sonically pretty glittery and sparkly but like lyrically pretty raw. And so, yeah, that's the glitter tears look and like I'm a very kind of have historically been a very buttoned up type A kind of person, and so even just letting myself wear like smudgy mascara or like anything even remotely alternative is very freeing and exciting and new. So that's my glitter tears.
Austin Seltzer:I love that. Thank you, and I will post the video of the first time around. Yeah, you absolutely should.
Kira Kosarin:I'm going to tell you something. I'm going to teach you. One more thing is your resident television actor, friend.
Austin Seltzer:Take notes.
Kira Kosarin:On set. Everybody communicates on radios, so there's radio code, and one of the most important codes is 10 one, which means it's time to go to the bathroom. So 10 one back. Like we never left. Successful 10 one. What's your 20. You're sitting in a chair doing a podcast.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, I forgot.
Kira Kosarin:What's your 20? or like what's so, and so 20 is like. where are they and what are they doing? So like what's awesome, 20. Oh, he's down in the basement recording podcast with curate.
Austin Seltzer:My 20 is that I'm reading my show notes.
Kira Kosarin:Yes, i feel like one of my other greatest skills is I'm the world's fastest peer.
Austin Seltzer:I did not be fast.
Kira Kosarin:I didn't mean like physically peeing, i meant like going to the bathroom and getting back. I'll be like I'm ready to the restroom and I'll come back and people like, did you go already? I'm just, i'm very efficient.
Austin Seltzer:So a cool new addition to your I don't know how busy you are Is that now you are an executive producer. I am. I'd love to hear what goes into that on. I know in music.
Kira Kosarin:Super different in TV and film.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah for TV, especially an IP that you're so close to.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, it's been amazing. I absolutely love it. A lot of work, a lot of time, a lot of responsibility, but it's really wonderful and I love, i've loved every bit of it, yeah, i mean. So basically there are kind of three phases, right of production. There's pre-production everything from getting this script to where it needs to be, hiring all of the people, blah, blah, blah and then there's production while you're on set and then post-production. So I've had different duties throughout all of those.
Kira Kosarin:So pre-production, like I said, started like a year ago. At the very beginning. It started with them coming to me and wanting to make something with the Thunderman's IP and I had a lot of very strong ideas about how I felt like it needed to be. I have so much love and respect for the show and what we made. I'm so proud of it and I love the fans and I feel very close to them. I communicate with them on social media all the time and, because I really was a fan of Nick and Disney, like, i feel very connected to their experience as a viewer and I really wanted to make sure that, if we were gonna bring the show back, that it was what they wanted, like that it paid homage to the parts of the original series that they loved and didn't just feel like a quick cash grab, like a stupid rumor.
Austin Seltzer:I mean rumor has it that you said no, oh yeah, multiple times, huh.
Kira Kosarin:I did. I said no the first time and then the second time and then they basically were like, what would we have to do? And that's when I said it needs to be multi-cam. You need to hire the specific writer, the specific director or the specific people who I think are integral to making the show what it was. And luckily they liked the ideas and they were amenable to all of that and brought me on as an executive producer. So, yeah, it started there. So yeah.
Kira Kosarin:So then pre-production was like hiring you know everybody from writers, set deck, wardrobe, you know hair and makeup, props, cameras, sound like everybody building up a you know 200, 250 person crew, which was really, really fun. You know stunts, everything casting. I've got to be in the auditions, going through the casting process, which was really, really wonderful And I love there's only a couple of new characters in the movie. Mostly we brought back a lot of characters from the original series, which is also very important to me, had a lot of you know things that I felt like we really needed to bring back and see again. But yeah, so that was. I'm sure I'm forgetting things. I think I tallyed it up at one point we had spent like 200 hours on Zoom or something stupid like that.
Kira Kosarin:But we did all pre-production and then we got into production, at which point I was juggling on camera and EP duties, which was really interesting. So, for example, i would go to rehearsal and I would be in scene rehearsal and stunt rehearsal on stage all day and then we would do our run through and then I would go into the room with the network executives and the other writers and show creator and director and go through various rounds of note sessions. So the network giving notes to the producers, being me and the show's creator and the director, the show's creator giving his own notes to the director, his director giving notes to the dialogue coach to then give to the actors all sorts of things you know, figuring out what changes to the script needed to happen, and then on shoot days it meant that if I wasn't on camera I was in video village, like watching and being there for any decisions and texting with the wardrobe team for whatever look is gonna be on set in a couple of days. That was the other thing. I'm sorry. Last time we talked about this I was much more cohesive. This time I'm kind of jumping all over.
Kira Kosarin:But one of my favorite parts of pre-production was working with the wardrobe department to upgrade all of the characters' looks in a way that felt modern but also like the characters. That's something that I felt really like. I was really glad to be able to be a part of and I'm really happy with the job that we did, and our wardrobe department is wonderful and our head of costumes, candace Tupkowski, is just fabulous and I adore her. We also redesigned the super suits for actors' comfort, especially for the younger ones. I really wanted to make sure that they felt good and felt comfortable, and the super suits were always a source of physical discomfort and emotional discomfort over the years, so we really wanted to make sure it was a better experience this time around, which I think it was.
Austin Seltzer:Just from knowing you, i have a feeling that you're very, very good with continuity as well. Oh yeah, that seems like something that you were.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, that's one of my favorite things, absolutely Definitely. And continuity was super important on this project because we basically filmed the movie backwards. We filmed everything, not only out of order, but from the end to the beginning, and we shot it as kind of a hybrid multi-cam movie structure. so each week we would have a few days of rehearsal for whatever we were shooting that week and then a couple days of shooting On a multi-cam like a usual, a traditional sitcom. You know think an episode of Friends. You would rehearse the scenes for that week, you would rehearse the whole episode. You know, say, monday, tuesday, wednesday, each day getting minute changes, and then you'd film it Thursday, friday On a traditional single-cam movie. You would it's called Block and Shoot. So you like, rehearse it and shoot it, rehearse it, shoot it, rehearse it, shoot it.
Kira Kosarin:What we did was we would rehearse whatever the scenes we were shooting that week were for a few days and then film them. But those scenes were plucked from all over throughout the movie. So every scene we did, we had to be like, okay, what came before this, what comes after this? And you're like establishing props and wardrobes and things in the later versions of them appearing. So then when you go to shoot, you know the first time you see that prop or the first time you see that outfit like it can't change. You have to establish things the first time you shoot them. Post-production is where we are now, so I'm supposed to see the first cut of the movie, I guess by the time this is airing. I have seen it and we're deep into it on editing and everything.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, 48 hours.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, and it's getting there. I'm excited.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, i think that's so cool. Also, it's your art, because I know that that takes a very specific talent set to be able to do that kind of comedy.
Kira Kosarin:It's a very specific genre, for sure, and it's a genre that I think, gets shit on sometimes, because people think like oh, you're just acting badly, but like there's a lot that goes, there's a lot of technique. There's just a different type of acting just a different genre. It's not meant to be the same as a dramatic film.
Austin Seltzer:For sure It blew back up on Netflix. Was it Netflix during the pandemic?
Kira Kosarin:Yeah it blew up on Netflix during the pandemic. It was number two worldwide.
Austin Seltzer:Crazy.
Kira Kosarin:I my theory as a kid who loved watching shows like that. I think that there is a lot of comfort and familiarity in shows like the characters in a show like that become like your family, because our show is about family. I like to think that we become kind of familial beings for the kids watching. But I also think it's just pure, unbridled silliness and joy And we all needed escapism during the pandemic. And some people find escapism in darker, heavier topics because it makes them feel like their own life isn't that bad or they can get a lot Like.
Kira Kosarin:That's my mother right. My mother wants to get lost in a horror world When her life is going badly. She wants to watch some dark stuff. I want to watch something silly. I want to watch a rom-com. I want to watch a sitcom, and I think that there were a lot of kids who escaped into our sitcom.
Austin Seltzer:I love that. Now to something totally 180,. What is the absolute worst career move that you have made?
Kira Kosarin:Why would you ask me that?
Austin Seltzer:Because I got to know the. We have to understand that not every move is a great one. There's one that you're looking at in your mind and you're like damn, do I say that? Do I say that?
Kira Kosarin:No, i can't, I genuinely can't is the answer. I mean, look, every decision that you make, you make the best decision that you can with the knowledge you have in the moment and hindsight's 20-20. So yeah, there are things that I've done that I would choose differently now, knowing how things turned out, but that's not to say that there's any world in which I could have known then.
Austin Seltzer:You know what I mean. So there weren't like bad decisions. They were just-, but I want to hear it looking back 20-20. Because there are moves that I have made.
Kira Kosarin:Then why don't you, you tell me your deepest, darkest in your senses?
Austin Seltzer:Whoa, i didn't need the mirror. Oh damn Well.
Kira Kosarin:My podcast. I don't have to get vulnerable.
Austin Seltzer:I'm just gonna say it This is my wall.
Kira Kosarin:I'm joking. You have been very, very wonderful and generous.
Austin Seltzer:I don't mean to be Damn, when somebody gonna do that for me with coffee, i'm gonna do it with my hands, but here this is my thing.
Kira Kosarin:Tell me your regret And.
Austin Seltzer:I'm gonna toss the literal mic back to you. It's not a regret per se, but one of the biggest lessons that I've learned now in hindsight is do not try and move as fast in your career as possible, and what I mean by that is jump several rungs up the ladder at a time.
Kira Kosarin:Mm-hmm.
Austin Seltzer:Slow and steady absolutely wins the race. Now there are moments where you can see that I should do X and I will progress my career forward. That makes sense. But if you think it doesn't make any logical sense to be reaching out to that person or trying to get X work, or trying to get to the top by cutting a corner, it will 10 out of 10 every fucking time, come back to bite you. It will.
Kira Kosarin:So funny, because now that you're saying that, that is absolutely my answer too.
Austin Seltzer:I took.
Kira Kosarin:No, no, i know I'm sorry, let me just copy off your paper.
Kira Kosarin:No, it's true, though I, because of the position that I was in coming off of a television series, i had access to a lot of people in the music industry that I had no business having access to at that point in my music career, and I sullied a lot of potentially really good and important relationships by going too soon.
Kira Kosarin:There was a producer who produced this artist who I was obsessed with and I messaged him on Twitter and I'd never even done a session, i didn't know what I was doing, and he came over like my parents' house to produce this song and he could tell I didn't know what I was doing and it was awkward and embarrassing and it just was weird. And I'm sure to this day, if anyone mentions my name, he's like oh, that weird 15 year old who doesn't know what she's doing, like which sucks, cause now I do know what I'm doing and I just took that opportunity too soon. But yeah, you know, there's, there's, it happens I've forgiven myself for a lot of those moves, cause I was just doing the best I could with what I had.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, i don't know what my point is there, but my point is like yeah, I know what your point is And it hilariously, almost invalidates my podcast, Which I've I've thought about for a long time that I legitimately think that some of the best advice that you could ever receive is don't listen to advice If you in your gut feel something like it's the right thing or the wrong thing. It is right so often and advice could steer you away from something that that other person is facing demons on, and they give you advice and you don't listen and things work out.
Kira Kosarin:I think that the, the the one of the biggest things, though, in life is to learn the difference between like your gut and your fear, in both directions. Like we, we've heard the story so many times of like oh like your guts telling you to pull away from it. But that's just your fear, don't listen to it. But there's also a lot of times where it's like the other direction, where, where there have been a lot of times where I've had a especially recently, like a really strong gut feeling that I need to make a change And the. I've been told so many times like no, that's just fear, your fear of failure, your fear of success, that I've shut that voice up and white knuckled my way through something before finally getting to a point where I'm like no, maybe that wasn't fear, maybe that actually was my gut telling me that I need to make a change. And that's almost harder, you know.
Austin Seltzer:Do you have a professional mentor?
Kira Kosarin:I have lots of professional mentors in different parts of my career. I mean, overall, my professional mentor is my dad and always has been. But you know, i have a director who I connected with, who I loved working with, and so he was the one who I shadowed and learned how to direct and learned how to camera block and, you know, learned everything I know about directing from. You know, i've had various people come into my life in the music space that I've learned a lot from, be it by watching and observing or by actual lessons.
Kira Kosarin:You know, my shows creator, jed Spingarn, who I worked incredibly closely with on the Thunderman's movie, has been somewhat of a mentor to me and has taught me a lot. And you know I ask a lot of questions. I take advantage of the smart people around me to learn as much as I can. So he's definitely been somewhat of a mentor. Yeah, i don't have a person who sits me down and life coaches me, but I'm not afraid to ask people who I know are, if not smarter than me, more knowledgeable than me about something, and just pick their brain.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, i am very certain that probably 90% of people who are quote unquote successful have a yearning for knowledge and just continuously Intellectual curiosity. Exactly. They just want to continue to learn about anything and everything, just want to absorb knowledge, yeah, yeah. The last thing that I drawed it down was if you are filming today or if you're on set today, if you're in the studio today, do you have something that, like, focuses you and puts you in the zone, ready to perform?
Kira Kosarin:Stretching.
Austin Seltzer:That is your free.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i have to stretch before anything I do. If I'm acting, stretch my face out like that before every take.
Austin Seltzer:Wow.
Kira Kosarin:I stretch my fat, I stretch my neck Before I perform, before I sing, stretch my pecs because it affects my lung capacity, my ability to breathe If I have to be standing all day. I stretch my hips and the outsides of my legs and certain things. So I have a lot of injuries. As an ex dancer and gymnast, I have a lot of things in my body that require a lot of maintenance to continue working well. So, yeah, I mean I work out, get a good sweat, clean up, and then I'm pretty much ready to go do whatever. But yeah, when I'm on set on long days, that's kind of the thing that keeps me going.
Austin Seltzer:Stretching.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, You'll see me walking around in a village doing arms shoulders. I'm always kind of adjusting my body.
Austin Seltzer:That's how you hone in your mind.
Kira Kosarin:Kind of. It is one of the preparations I need to do, i guess, before I do anything. I don't know, it's kind of a silly answer, but it's also kind of true. There's nothing really that I have to do to hone my mind in necessarily I go on. it's just my surroundings once I step onto set. the synapses in my brain that are ready to act just are there because I'm on set and it's around. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, once I put on the Phoebe outfit, it's pretty easy to act as Phoebe and get into character. You know what I mean? Things like that. Yeah, it's nothing really.
Kira Kosarin:breathing, deep breathing. I feel like a lot of people don't have the privilege of having been taught how to breathe. I've done yoga since I was so young. I've danced since I was so young. I've done so many. I've lifted, i've done so many physical things where you really learn how to breathe deeply and effectively. That's a great skill to have. I definitely do a lot of that if I'm nervous, if I'm about to perform or something I don't know. Sometimes, if I'm going into an important interview or a panel or something early in the morning, i'll just wake up my brain in the car on the way there by just going through the alphabet and thinking of words that match each letter, or doing tongue twisters or stuff things like that so that I can be articulate. I don't really have one thing.
Austin Seltzer:That's cool. I actually understand that. I think it's because you've been doing this for so long. I bet in the beginning you had some certain things because maybe you were slightly less confident in whenever you step on set. this is my thing.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, i was so much more confident as a kid actually.
Austin Seltzer:Oh really.
Kira Kosarin:I was so confident as a kid.
Austin Seltzer:Well, you did say that you wanted all eyes on me too, yeah, and I was like what could go wrong.
Kira Kosarin:I also feel like as a kid I got more. I had more ideas for comedy when people would look at me and were watching. I did a better job when the stakes were higher. I think the older I got and became a real person and started to understand the stakes of like if I don't get this job, i don't have to make money. Or like if I embarrass myself, i have like an ego now that can be bruised and damaged. Or like wonder if I'm pursuing the right career path. Like the stakes change as you get older, so I got a lot more. I was never nervous in my life until I was like a full adult.
Kira Kosarin:That's so interesting, isn't that weird?
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, but I get it.
Kira Kosarin:Yeah, because stakes are higher.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, everything's real. I just have to say, if you did not stretch, and all of that today before you came in here, i am so offended.
Kira Kosarin:I did, of course I did. I did a full workout. I had a great workout.
Austin Seltzer:But that's not stretching. Like before you came in here did you stretch your face and like your pecs.
Kira Kosarin:You'll see it. If you go to the very beginning of this footage, i bet you'll see me stretching my face Hell yeah, i think right before we started Let's go. Yeah. This is as important as Probably looks insane Fuck.
Austin Seltzer:I need, i need some TikTok reals of just that, just me going, just looping. Yeah, kira's Faces. Kira Austin, thank you so much for Did we do it.
Kira Kosarin:We did it. Take two. I mean I'm not going to celebrate until the camera tells us that we have the footage. I mean we're still recording and I can't freaking hope, so I can hear myself So-. That's good.
Austin Seltzer:You know we're still going and thank you so much for coming back and doing all of this. And I actually I think that it was actually more on track. Maybe there were times that maybe you said my thoughts are here and there, but I think that it just it flowed naturally.
Kira Kosarin:We did our. Thing.
Austin Seltzer:We did our. Thing. I'm proud I'm caffeinated. You're not.
Kira Kosarin:I am still from this morning.
Austin Seltzer:What did you drink? This is going to be my final question, but-.
Kira Kosarin:Probably the equivalent of like a cup and a half of coffee, but in energy drinks.
Austin Seltzer:Oh.
Kira Kosarin:Celsius and Alani New beverages.
Austin Seltzer:Yeah, those are good, but Celsius is like crack. Yeah, yeah, i mean I'm like Yeah, i love it.
Kira Kosarin:I love it. I am my best self when I'm jacked up on caffeine. It just I won't be my best self the next day. And I like we were talking about long-term wellness over short-term fun is often the way.
Austin Seltzer:And on that note, yeah, all right, bye, bye.
Kira Kosarin:Stream before the sad zeds in.
Austin Seltzer:All right. So I'm sure that you've listened to this podcast. I'm sure that there are plenty of takeaways that you can put into your life to make you know yourself more aligned with your goals. But I'll list out a few here that I really resonated with. I mean, she's just such a wealth of knowledge, but I wrote down a couple that I really thought stood out.
Austin Seltzer:So, first of all, kira grew up as an only child, two parents that were in theater. From an early age, kira was very into academia and you know she was able to skip several grades in school, which is just such a unique like culmination of things. Being an only child, two parents that were in theater already you know well versed in that world have friends in that world. Kira grew up going to plays and on stage and hanging out in that environment And then she also skipped several grades which put everybody you know older than her. So just a very interesting circumstance. So, yeah, it obviously led to bullying, but she had this sense of being different, just like she stood out, and I think that that really really led into wanting attention from others and her parents, because she was an only child, and that attention was perfectly put into acting and being an artist, you have to put yourself on a pedestal because you are putting yourself in a position to be an idol to others. You're in a position where all the eyes are on you And from an early age she already had that, which is just perfect for what she is now doing. Another point early on in life she had a gymnastics and a ballet teacher both tell her that she had this incredibly raw, amazing talent for movement, dance, gymnastics. But her peers around her in her classes were putting much more effort into their craft. Even if they weren't as talented as she was. They were putting much more effort. And so both of these teachers told her that these people are going to become better than her because they are working harder, and that really flipped a switch in her brain which made her much more of a workaholic. She said that her work ethic changed whenever she was told these things. So that, right there, it's about the work ethic. You may be the greatest raw, natural talent person in your craft, but without that work ethic, other people will outshine you. They will get the gigs because they will meet the people. They will do the things necessary to get the opportunity to show off their craft, where someone who's just has that raw talent may not get the same opportunities.
Austin Seltzer:Obviously, after listening to this, her time management skills are on such a different level. I was absolutely in shock whenever she just started like just rapid firing, working back through her day, just in a hypothetical day, i mean it just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. You know, with what she would do in that typical day. And having that skill, as she developed whenever she was way young, is for sure a cheat code for her being able to be on time, actually early everywhere, get more things done in a day where more hats, do more projects, just because she's able to slot all of her things into a day. Much better than I, certainly much better than me. I don't know if you're listening to this podcast, you probably feel the same way.
Austin Seltzer:She also said do sweat the small stuff, and I think that that resonates with me deeply. As a mix engineer, i mean, my job is to fine tune and sculpt something to be the best that it can possibly be, and while I think that sometimes, if everything is under a microscope, you actually never get work out there and you never really see the full picture, which people you're trying to resonate with are only going to be looking at the big picture. But everyone who I've talked to that is really great at their craft does care about the small things. So, no, do care about those. Never, ever, be afraid to ask questions from people who are smarter than you or in a position higher than you, as long as you have some kind of rapport with them. Ask questions. You're always going to learn something. There's a reason that people are further along than you. Maybe it's time, maybe it's knowledge, maybe it's just sheer opportunities that they were given, maybe they were born into it. Whatever it is, they're going to have a different perspective and information that you can probably use in your life. So do not hesitate to ask questions.
Austin Seltzer:And the last point that I want to make and I think that this is a beautiful way to wrap this episode up is you will never become incredibly great at your craft unless you're actually doing it. You need to do it every single day. And the beauty of being in a craft whether it be acting or music making or writing books, whatever it may be to get into this zone called the flow state, where time passes you by words or music or whatever just flows out of you effortlessly and you're not even thinking about it, you're just channeling whatever comes to you and letting it flow through you. The only way to achieve that, from what I can tell and what I heard from Kira and other guests that will be on this podcast, is that if you're in the act of doing whatever your craft is all the time, over and over and over and over, day in and day out you will just be able to get into the zone more quickly less distractions, more focus, because you are used to doing this craft, like your body likes the routine of doing this craft. After having done it so much, you will just start to not overthink every little move and nuance of everything. You'll just do it. And this came up whenever I talked to her about how she gets ready to perform on set And she just said that she stretches and does not worry about performing because it just comes out of her. And I think that that holds true for really any creative craft. So thank you for joining us for this episode and I can't wait for the next one.
Austin Seltzer:Since this is the first podcast that's gonna come out, i really wanted to take a moment and thank everybody who has helped me either with the room, with lighting, with the cameras, with everything. Just a special little shout out, a little time capsule for everybody to listen back to, to hear the people who have made Grounds for Success be able to be a thing. So first of all, i have to give the biggest shout out to Cass Huckabee, my rock, the person who, if anything is difficult, any little thing that I need to vent about, she's there. She has helped me not only paint and hang up things, but go pick out these chairs and the fabric and the color and the rugs and everything that I look around in this room. She was there to help, give guidance or physical help or just someone that I could vent to about if something broke in here or something went wrong. Like she would listen and she was there to help out. So this room and this podcast would not be a thing without her. So thanks, cass.
Austin Seltzer:After that, snakes of Russia made the theme song for Grounds for Success. I'd fucking love his music and I reached out to him and I had him over and he checked out the room and was stoked to do it and I could not be more happy with the way it sounds. Next is Ashley Von Helsing, an incredible photographer, and she just I gave her the vision for this place and she basically made it happen. She helped me source all of the pieces in here. She helped me with the decorating aspect of this room and without her it would definitely not look this way. I could not be more stoked with the way that it looks, and on camera it's amazing too. Thank you, ashley.
Austin Seltzer:After that, sasha Pascal, dude, thank you for helping me with the lighting and making sure that on camera, everything looks the way that I want. He came over here and just really helped me dial in the lighting, and I love the moodiness and everything about it. So thanks, dude. Phil Roder, my editor. He's editing this right now as I talk, but, dude, thank you for being a friend for so long and being along with me for this journey. I can't thank you enough. Dude, nico Fibito he is my audio editor and also helps me prep sessions. He's my secret little weapon. And, dude, thank you so much for being on board with this project.
Austin Seltzer:Then I'm gonna shout out a bunch of people who helped me physically put this room together and also as idea boards just me bouncing ideas off of them, and one night, just being honest, i smoked some and was throwing out some wild ideas and this podcast idea that I've had for years came out and my guys, cody Tarpley and Cy Huck, just sat there and listened and loved this idea and we played around with it and Grounds for Success was born, and they also physically helped me put stuff together in this room. Then my dude, boy Blue, sam Brant, helped me put things up in this room but then also, just like, came up with some very witty ideas for podcast names so many of them and Grounds for Success just stuck. It came out from a brainstorming session and I mean, without him coming up with all these witty names and helping me in this room, i wouldn't have done this either. And Larsen Dean as well. Dude, thank you so much for being a friend and being there to help with just literally like any physical anything making, breaking, building, putting up my clouds in the other room. You helped me with that as well, dude. Thank you so much. Kylie K she's gonna be doing all my social media management and this podcast will reach so many more people with her help. So I'm really excited to have you on board.
Austin Seltzer:My guy Spencer he's my manager. He has helped my career so much, since he's been managing me, and I know that this podcast would not be a thing if he wasn't killing it on the mixing front for me. Also, i'd like to give a shout out to my dear friend, brittany Danielle. Thank you so much. I know that you don't manage me we're just good friends but I turned to you for advice and you have given me all the advice that I need, continuous guidance and feedback, and I just cannot thank you enough for always being there to lend a hand. So thank you so much.
Austin Seltzer:Next, i have Stephanie Gerard for my head shots. My thumbnail is beautiful and it's because of her great photography. I thank you so much, chun, my dude who does my hair. Dude, you're incredible. You just keep me looking good on camera. Thanks so much, dude Hannah, who did my logo. Thank you so much. I found her on Upwork and she just absolutely killed it. I love the logo so much. And last but not least, i wanna thank all of my clients, my mixing and mastering clients.
Austin Seltzer:Without you guys, one would not be able to afford to live in LA, wouldn't be doing what I do for a living and loving it, i wouldn't be able to afford the place I live, with the studio I have. I wouldn't be able to have put money from those gigs into this room and make this podcast a thing without my clients and my friends. This just could not be a possibility. I don't know where I would be, but I wouldn't be here, and so I really. I wanted to end this by thanking you all. I can't wait to see what we work on in the future, but for now, you're helping me with Grounds for Success and I thank you for that. I'll see you guys next time.