Face The Dred Show

If you're a creator in web3 struggling with your mental health, where do you go to hear your heroes talking about their own problems? What is the show that holds space for that openhearted conversation?

I want to create that series.

I want to interview artists, entrepreneurs, and creators about their past struggles and how they overcame them, including their challenges and lessons learned.

Mission alignment

• Create experiences or products which directly benefit holders
• Promote the Moonbirds and Mythics brand beyond web3
• Elevate Moonbirds and Mythics within the web3 community

Community backers

@PLY (Philip) 🏛, @Teos [GFC], @pommes frites [GFC] , @milesrote.eth, @Gribbz [GFC]

What is it?

During the recent Mythics launch, Colin's vulnerable story about his art career led to a whirlwind of supportive Twitter activity. Folks across this community shared their own stories about facing the Dred, overcoming adversity, cultivating resiliency, and living more wholeheartedly. These stories were profound and inspiring, but they were also relatable. We all have our own darkness to confront.

The Proof team recognizes this collective truth and leaned into integrating the deeper layers of the human experience into the Mythics lore, e.g., Justin tweeted that the collection is "a story about what it means to come up against seemingly insurmountable odds, and to hold strong with those convictions. To look fear in the face and declare that it won't have the last word."

I propose creating more content that supports and aligns with this journey.

WHAT IS MY IDEA?

I want to record six episodes as a beta test to see if people like the angle/concept. I think we could start with artists within the community, if they're open to it. For instance:

@JustinMezzell, the originator of the Dred. Let's hear more from him, why it matters, and where he's faced it

@Derech has made a few Discord comments about his panic attacks, pressure, and burnout he feels

@grelysian has been outspoken about their mental health

@marlo.eth has touched on her chronic pain, childhood trauma, and stress management.

@phraze has briefly discussed the difficulty in balancing full-time art with full-time parenting (he's also already agreed to come on the show to jam about this)

This series perfectly complements the suite of existing media that Proof already produces. For example, The Daily Countdown focuses primarily on economic updates and current events, while Proof Signal focuses on community happenings and the broader NFT market. Although the 100 Proof show does periodically include artist spotlights, these segments are generally brief, not regularly recorded, and they focus on anecdotal descriptions of recent events, drops, and creations rather than in-depth interviews.

How does it benefit the Moonbirds and Mythics holder community?

PROOF has produced incredible content that goes wide across the art industry. I think we can go deeper. When it comes to art and the creative process, let's talk about the stuff we don't usually talk about that really unites us. Let's peek behind the curtain and dive into what it's like to be a creator, builder, and collector in this space, warts and all. The content produced is designed to be real and relatable, supporting aspiring artists along their creative journey and enabling collectors and supporters to get a more holistic understanding of what it's like to be a creative in the wild west of Web3.

Because the series will be publicly available, anyone can watch it. It'll be available on all major platforms. This easy access could help onboard people from the traditional art realm into the NFT space while concurrently promoting the Moonbirds/Proof/Mythics brand (through their association with the project via the Lunar Society funding mechanism). I'm happy to highlight that association in the Introduction to each episode - assuming the team is okay with that. Additionally, I could promote upcoming drops, community meet-ups, etc... during the introduction, providing one more place for community members to hear or be reminded of important events happening in the Proof ecosystem.

At a basic level, it will create content that lets people get to know some of their favorite artists in a more meaningful way, building a deeper connection with them and their work.

About the team

WHO AM I?

I'm a recovering scientist turned life coach, podcast host, and spoken word poet, an empathy-collecting, anti-quitting word wizard, and a connoisseur and collector of fine silver linings. I worked internationally for governments and universities for over a decade, spent five years studying how our brains influence our actions, and then wrote a Ph.D. thesis about it. I've managed teams of people and millions of dollars. My name is Dr. Jeremy Goldberg, and my mission is to make kindness cool, empathy popular, and compassion commonplace. I want to make the world better than it was yesterday. As part of that purpose, I give TEDx talks, host retreats and workshops worldwide, work as a life coach for incredible clients, write books, and host the Long Distance Love Bombs podcast.

HOW WILL I EXECUTE THIS IDEA: My podcast, The Long Distance Love Bombs Podcast, has over half a million downloads and nearly 200 episodes, making it one of the top 1% of podcasts globally. Most of my guests come from the personal development industry, including several NYT bestsellers and numerous therapists, coaches, and creators. This is all to say: I already have a podcast, know what I'm doing, and don't need much to get going. I've got a good microphone, lighting, and an audio engineer I like. Proof's media production team is likely stretched relatively thin, so I propose using online recording software such as riverside.fm to record in studio quality without a studio.