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Created by Roselis Cortez • Co-host: James Stanley
Seam Notes explores luxury as behavior
How you think, how you move, and the standards you hold when no one is watching.
This isn’t about status or appearance. It’s about composure, discernment, boundaries, and self-respect. The things that quietly shape how you live.
Through lived experience, we talk about growth, outgrowing environments, and learning to move differently without losing yourself in the process.
No performance. No exaggeration. Just real conversations about what it takes to hold your own.
New episodes every Wednesday.
Speaker 1 (00:00)
This is Seam Notes. Taste, standards, and the decisions nobody sees.
Speaker 2 (00:09)
You spent time building your standards, your principles, the version of yourself that you respect. And then the pressure shows up. You know, I know this. We all do. And in about 30 seconds, you find out exactly how real that is. Because pressure does not build character, it reveals it.
Today we're gonna find out who shows up when things get hard and what it takes to make sure that person is always you. The authentic you, right, is what we're talking about, right? The luxury is having a standard solid enough that the pressure doesn't rewrite it.
Working your main standard, not scrambling for it. Right, which is huge, right? Because we all kind of, you know, even as much as we talk and we do these podcasts, right? We I I kind of lose it every now and again. You know, I did you walked in this morning and I was like, rah everything was kind of going left a little bit. And I was not centered on
Speaker 1 (01:26)
Self.
Yeah. Right. When I think of pressure and who shows up without the standard or whom I had show up before the standard was in place under pressure.
Speaker 2 (01:43)
Standard meaning the authentic self.
Speaker 1 (01:45)
Correct.
The the building of a self that's solid enough or knows oneself enough, the introspective you, the one that you have chosen to create, not the one that you have defaulted into. Correct? Yeah. So for me
always under pressure, what showed up was a version of me that was still a child. It was the three year old rebellious child that didn't want to be told what to do, how to do it, when to do it. Right. Or anything, So
I think that for a lot of us the default can be that the immature child that has not had the opportunity to heal, to grow, to find itself, to learn who one is, right?
Speaker 2 (03:02)
Or even be aware that all that work needs to be done.
Speaker 1 (03:06)
Right.
the awareness isn't there because you're coming from a reactive state. You're not acting on you are reacting.
Speaker 2 (03:11)
Yeah.
to for sure. Yeah. Yeah, for me it was fear. It wasn't for me acting as the bratty child. I don't know that I ever was a bratty child. I was a fearful child, unfortunately. Right? So for me it was really covering up all the fear, the weakness, as it were, and acting uber macho. I'm the guy.
Speaker 1 (03:41)
Yeah, you've mentioned the
Speaker 2 (03:43)
You know? So I overcompensated in that lane because that's what I thought I should do. Right? Until, you know, I I started working on awareness or or just really found out that, you know what? I need to start connecting to whoever's really all the versions that are in here. Right? Yeah. and then when I started doing that, right, through therapy and then Buddhism, etcetera, then I started connecting and loving all the versions of
Speaker 1 (04:10)
Off.
Speaker 2 (04:13)
Then realizing that the pressure that I would put myself under, the circumstances are always gonna be there. The car's gonna break down, the baby's gonna cry, the train's gonna be late, financial stuff is gonna happen, everything's gonna go like this because life is designed to do that. It's how we react to all those things. So when I realized
That I had a choice in how I react to life's shit.
Speaker 1 (04:43)
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 (04:47)
Then that was the game changer for me. I'm like, you mean I don't have to freak out and punch walls because I think I told you this. I went to anger management. No. Everybody thinks that, you know, James is always No, I don't know management. No
Speaker 1 (04:55)
no.
No, you had
No,
I knew that you had been working towards healing that part but I didn't realize that you had done anger management.
Speaker 2 (05:10)
my mother had passed away, this was 2014. And when she died, I was just not dealing with stress. I would show up in a angry way.
Speaker 1 (05:20)
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 (05:22)
And I was punching walls. I'm not exaggerating.
My therapist said you need to go in anger management, and I did. And
It was so cathartic because I realized all the versions of self that I wasn't connecting to and I was repressing. Right. And then through that, right, ⁓ eventually learned that all that anxiety and stress and fear and whatever it is that we go to.
Speaker 1 (05:33)
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 (05:45)
didn't actually exist. They were feelings that I created that I was grasping onto and holding on to instead of relating to the real self and then handling the situation from that moment. right?
Speaker 1 (05:57)
Yeah, you know, when I talk about that child of three, she turned into an incredibly fearful and insecure child by four. Mm, right? So the bratty three year old, is the one that rejects everything, And then the other reaction that could take place,
was the I would be so afraid that I would become completely agreeable to things, Because it was better to go along in order to get along. Right. Right? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:38)
So I which I think so many of us do, right? Sure.
Speaker 1 (06:41)
Yeah, yeah. and what I mean by bratty is why, why, why, I wanted to know the reason behind everything. I wanted to get every little detail. And I was tiny little thing and I would be like, why? Why?
Speaker 2 (06:56)
So I must be bratty because I still ask why about everything. But I still do.
Speaker 1 (06:59)
But I still do
because I wanna get to the bottom line of things so that I can internalize them and absorb them in a way that they become a part of of me.
Speaker 2 (07:12)
Yeah.
Really understanding them. Exactly.
Speaker 1 (07:16)
So that it's not a card within a file in my memory. It is a full file with chapters and a story that I can refer back to, So the curious part of me is the part that
Taps into intelligence is the part of me that always wants to learn something new every day. It's it's that part, But she was squashed and she then became this very fearful insecure kid until I, went off to boarding school that I was able to kind of reconnect to the earlier child, But no matter which way you look at it.
That reactive self is a very unconscious being that's a part of you, And so it's about how do we get to the person that we need to bring out? How do we nurture that child to grow into the adult that
Taking the time to be introspective, we can nurture into who we are. Because when we were discussing doing this topic, one of the things that came up for me and that I firmly believe, is
Speaker 2 (08:34)
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (08:46)
whatever that reactive person is that shows up is a true essence of who you are, but it is not the you that you connect to.
Speaker 2 (08:59)
I mean it's a part of you, but it's not the essence of who you are. Right. There's separate things.
Speaker 1 (09:02)
Correct, correct. So
here's the thing. When as I've said before, I've been in recovery for quite a long time and you know, one of the things that we do is we take inventory and we take a look at things and one of the big keys or philosophies within those circles is pause before you respond to anything.
When you wanna be reactive, take a moment, take a pause, count to three, take a breath before you respond, because you're responding from a reactive space versus
Speaker 2 (09:38)
Take a breath, yeah.
totally. Agreed.
Speaker 1 (09:52)
you that you strive to be or that you are connected to.
Speaker 2 (09:58)
Your nature in and so very similar to Buddhism, right? So in Buddhism, you know, we believe that the agitated mind is delusional, So usually when we are responding to something and we are reactive, we are in an agitated state of mind. And we need to calm the mind. So you take a breath and just calm the mind,
Speaker 1 (10:21)
So fight or flight, chill it out, take a breath. Correct. That's what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (10:26)
Have to right? Turn turn the mind a trick for me is i and I said this once and you you thought it was kinda cool, turn the mind to stone. No thought in or out.
Speaker 1 (10:36)
Right. Shut it down. Correct. For a second.
Speaker 2 (10:39)
That will immediately switch my mind from an agitation to a calmness, which then my nature, not just me or you, right, the human nature comes out that is kind and compassionate and unstressed. Not saying that we don't have issues that we must deal with, These things in life are gonna come up. I'm not saying we repress it, we don't deal with it, everything's rose colored glasses.
Speaker 1 (11:06)
Well, you know, part of the experience of living life. I mean, all of those things are a part of it. Absolutely. You know, we can't avoid them. We can you know face them with the best attitude that we can, but we can't avoid them. Correct.
Speaker 2 (11:20)
Yeah,
because the stressed out mind
Does us no good. The stressed out mind is is taking these glasses that I wear and changing the lens to one that is no longer clear and I put them on and everything's out of focus. Right. It's exaggerated. And it's 1000%.
Speaker 1 (11:36)
confusing and it's agitating
you know, puzzling and it's all of those things.
Speaker 2 (11:44)
Debilitating
Stressing does us no good at all, and it's not necessary. We can truly tap into the being that's inside in a calm way and a clear moment and say, yeah, now I can see this clearly and make decisions.
Speaker 1 (11:56)
So composure in a way. Yeah. Right? Okay. but there is also a really big difference. where
That act of composure
unless you are in touch with that authentic self, composure could also be suppression.
Speaker 2 (12:24)
Totally. A mask. Facade. One thousand percent. And that's great distinction because we must be distinct about that, right?
Speaker 1 (12:33)
Right?
Because you could take that pause, you could do all those things, but suppress instead of checking with that authentic self in order to investigate or feel or sense or of what your next action is going.
Speaker 2 (12:56)
Yeah.
Totally be, right, exactly. Yeah, that breath in time is going to all of that's gonna happen, and we it's not like this is revolutionary. We do this all the time. We have all had instances where we've connected with authentic self. We've taken a breath and say, is this necessary? Because we're reactive, and then when we take a step back, we're like, whoa, maybe I heard that wrong. Maybe I read the text wrong. Maybe the email was
all the stuff we built up in our mind didn't exist, But we don't want to have this facade, this composure, and say, nothing's really bothering me. I'm just gonna repress. No, it's fine. And then we explode, I used to punch the walls. That was me being composed and not dealing, And I and in those days
I was a lot younger and not as experienced, so I didn't realize that I wasn't connecting with self. But now I do know the difference. And hopefully through this conversation, some of you out there will will be able to tap into what am I authentically feeling? And taking the moment and the breath out of time to say, Hey, am I reacting or is this really what's happening? Right?
can I just take a moment and step back and say, okay, what's really going on with a clear state of mind?
Speaker 1 (14:16)
Because look, when I when I see it in the way that you are expressing it right now, ⁓ and I know that we differ in points of views about this, I believe that every feeling is valid within within its you know, it's it's
Speaker 2 (14:34)
And I'm not saying that they're not valid. Of course you need to respect them and
Speaker 1 (14:38)
But in my understanding of what you believe through the Buddhist philosophy, they're a figment of our imagination. versus an actual thing we need to acknowledge, respect, process and work through. Yes, of course.
Speaker 2 (14:57)
And then let it go. Of course.
Right. But see that's that so that's so so let me let me back the truck up. In no way am I or the Buddhist way of teaching or Buddha saying that feelings are not valid.
Speaker 1 (15:12)
Well that they don't exist.
Speaker 2 (15:14)
What's what you said. But what we're pointing out is, That we are grasping at this feeling. I am hurt. I am this thing. We are grasping at them and giving them power, which they do not have. We are creating the importance of these things,
So then Buddha taught because they are not intrinsic, they do not exist in the way we perceive them. We give them more power, is what he's saying.
Than necessary. Acknowledge, work through, do put the work in, but do not base your worth on this thing. Because that's what's happened. Let's just be clear. In the moment of any one of these feelings, we become that feeling. We have attached to it. Right? I'm angry. I'm an angry person. No, you have an angry feeling. You're not an angry person. I can feel
Anxiety, but I am not a I do not have anxiety. Do you see what I'm saying? Yes. Etc. Yeah. That's the clarity. Right.
Speaker 1 (16:11)
In that way I fully agree. So that's right because
I think that we all have all these feelings and we either acknowledge them, view them and review them, become them or repress them. Rather in a way that then all they're doing is boiling under the surface. Right. I mean look at what's happening in our society today. Right. The United States I'm referring to right now, right?
Speaker 2 (16:23)
Or repress them.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, always.
Speaker 1 (16:40)
I mean there were so many actions that were so suppressed for so many years and now everybody is reacting on them instead of looking at them, assessing them, seeing what their real perspective, their authentic perspective is on all of these things. They're just taking on whatever is there.
And if they don't want to look at it, they're suppressing it or rejecting it or doing all of these things, right? And so Exactly. Right. Exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:14)
And st the stress comes in. The
next evolution of all of that is okay, I'm gonna stress out about it, right? About the thing,
And I was feeling it this morning when this lovely lady walked in. But then I was able to let it go. I just like, what am I what am I stressing about? think about the things. This is happening, And that's it. Like any of these feelings.
Speaker 1 (17:36)
Yeah. I think
one of the things that I said to you is talk about it. talk it through because a lot of times we take it and then we're like and then we internalize it and then we suppress it and then we'd sit in there and it's like no no no no. it's okay. Right? But it's not Exactly. It's not
Speaker 2 (17:55)
I'm fine! Not
okay!
Speaker 1 (17:58)
Right? It's like God, this rub me the wrong way and da da da and then dump it. Let it go.
Speaker 2 (18:04)
You really can. I'm telling you, it's
Speaker 1 (18:07)
Let it go. It has no significance.
Speaker 2 (18:11)
It has no strength or power, we give it power. You know how they say you know how the the the old adage is words have power? Well, they have power when we give them power.
Yeah, I used to get upset when somebody said this thing to me. But why does it have power over me now? I don't truly believe that. And we let it go. And I moved on.
Speaker 1 (18:25)
Mm.
Right.
Because that part of you that heard that took it from that file of forty years ago or forty five years ago. That file that has never been rewritten. That file that was written all those years ago and you've not taken the time to update it.
Mm-hmm. To give it new data. Right. To give it new information. Correct So until you do that, and this goes back to, episode three where we talked about building the foundation.
Speaker 2 (19:06)
Totally. This is all about building that new foundation. That's exactly what we're saying. Exactly. Go back to that file. Update it.
Speaker 1 (19:12)
Go
back to that file and you go, ⁓ no, this doesn't necessarily mean that. It could mean A B C D E E F G depending on the situation, where I am, what I'm
Speaker 2 (19:25)
It's all about the way the mind is proceeding. Correct, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (19:28)
What is my life like today? And
then you go from there. Yeah. Correct. So the pause that we're talking about and that moment that we're talking about is that moment that you take to check with with the you within, with the quiet.
Speaker 2 (19:34)
So
So
Speaker 1 (19:52)
mind that that we talk about all the time. Yeah. Because the luxury lies here, In being able to not be reactive, being able to look at things from a perspective that all of life happens, all of the colors happen, To all of us in this human experience. How we deal with and how we work through it.
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (20:23)
we're reacting to all of left turns, you know. I was asked to be on a panel a couple of days ago out in New Jersey, and an interesting experience happened. So after the talk, I said a bunch of stuff building and renovation and et cetera. And and I weave in this fabric of our discussion into everything I do constantly. So these two lovely
People were in a hallway, we were talking about their renovation, one of the persons was really upset about a tile work that she had in her home. And she was really stressed about it. And the other woman was trying to calm her down and I gave her some suggestions on physically what to do to resolve the tile issue. And the other one was going, my goodness, my renovation, but I pointed this out exactly what we're talking about here. You are fooling yourself if you think.
That this renovation is gonna go perfect. I said, What so far in your life, has gone perfect? Have you not had an experience where the car turns left all of a sudden and life dumps you out? And she said, Of course. I said, So why should your renovation be any different? expect those things to happen. What must change is the way you see them and deal with it.
Perceive it. That is what must change. Because we're all fooling ourselves if we don't think that the opportunity for stress is going to arise because it will. It is in the nature of the world we live in. Especially in today's world. But we must see it differently. We re must react differently. Because if we're gonna get stressed out when every time the world does something forget about it. We're never gonna get out of bed.
Speaker 1 (21:50)
Right. Right. Right.
Here's the other thing, Okay, so I'm gonna share a quick experience that I had recently You know, you'll notice
that I have a lot of different glasses, I've been wearing now for a little bit over a decade recently I bought a pair of glasses
And we kept getting them adjusted and for some reason they just weren't sitting correctly on my face,
So I go in and it wasn't the usual people. it was Sunday. I mean, brand new glasses, I've had maybe a couple of weeks, and and he starts to adjust them and the whole piece breaks right off of the glass, And I just looked at him and I was like, okay.
He doesn't know what to do with himself because of what happened. And I said, Well, you know, your colleague ordered another pair for me because we wanted to try another color. So you have the other color in case that nothing happens. And he's still all frazzled And I'm like,
Don't worry about it. He's like I'm gonna I do I do and I you know said
Speaker 2 (23:05)
And and having compassion for him, which you did totally.
Speaker 1 (23:08)
walk
away, my husband and I leave and I looked at him and I said, Wow, he really got rattled by this thing happening.
Speaker 2 (23:19)
Yeah. He's in front of a customer in a store, it's his work. I mean I know we can all relate
Speaker 1 (23:24)
And Mario says because most people wouldn't have reacted the way you did
Speaker 2 (23:29)
Of course. No, you ha that's why I said she handled it with compassion, right off the bat. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:32)
exhausted.
And my answer to my husband was it's just a pair of glasses.
Speaker 2 (23:39)
Yes. Exactly. Not worth stressing.
Speaker 1 (23:44)
In the in the grand scheme of things, it can be repaired, it can be fixed, it can be changed. So many things, Another thing, we don't need to be reactive to all these little things. You know, there's only two things in life that are the big parts of life, right? We're born and we die.
Everything in between has a solution, a way around it, an adapttive phase, whatever it is, no matter how bad or good that is. Right? So
Speaker 2 (24:20)
But I really want to touch that you had compassion for this other living being who was stressing out. Because a client could have said all kind of nasty things or not even care or be aware that this other living being was suffering over yes over their own actions, but still that they were suffering,
Speaker 1 (24:38)
just like it's not a big deal. Like it was like it's you know it's because it isn't, and so so that's that's one thing. And the other part of this that I and and maybe you'll have something to to to share with us as well. in the recovery circles, right? And even in the non recovery, Is people using things as an excuse.
Speaker 2 (25:02)
Okay.
Speaker 1 (25:02)
Well we can't crutch on parts of life either, where is the growth in that?
Speaker 2 (25:09)
No at all.
Speaker 1 (25:10)
I mean because all of this, we go back to episode three where we're talking about building the foundation. Now we're talking about what that foundation is created out of and how having that be solid is not reactive, it's proactive and it's active.
being able to find tools to deal with it and not use it as an excuse the same way that you don't use addiction as an excuse you don't use any of these things as an excuse
They should be eye openers to discovering another way, another lens with which you can view all these things.
Speaker 2 (25:56)
Very similar to when we said we're grasping at this feeling and and now it's become us. I am exactly I am. Exactly. I am broken, I'm hurt, I'm angry, I have anxiety. I'm not saying any of those things don't exist. They do. But they do not have to become.
Just like you're saying, right? So the excuse or whatever, does not have to define who the person is and say, well, because of this, I can't do these things, We can still have growth and realize we are grasping and now we have made our identity this thing. Instead of saying it's a part of us, different, And eventually finding growth around it and ways to work with it.
Speaker 1 (26:32)
Exact
Speaker 2 (26:42)
instead of it becoming our identity. We're grasping onto the stressed and being reactive to a situation instead of having a clear mind, I didn't have a clear mind this morning. and I work on this. Right.
Speaker 1 (26:53)
You acknowledged it. You
took the time to express it, observe it, and recognize that it was what it was and that it wasn't a you. It did not
Speaker 2 (27:07)
Wasn't who
I am? No. It was a moment in time. It was where my mind was at that moment.
My mind was reacting in a negative way to stuff and agitated. And then when she walked in the door, I admitted it. I heard it out loud. And then that's when the shift came. And now at this moment my mind is very calm and actually joyous right now. So just let it go. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:33)
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:36)
Isn't that funny how we can
realize that you can go from a stressed out mind, an agitated mind, to a joyful mind. Right. Just by You really can. That's it.
Speaker 1 (27:48)
Exactly. Yeah. what a great conversation because you know there's so many ways to go with this and so much more that we can expand on about this topic, But it is that, You can convert anything into something else, into a joyous experience, positive experience, and not in the
Speaker 2 (28:07)
Because we're choosing to do that.
Speaker 1 (28:12)
Oblivion or delusion or any of that in the my god that was just a moment, a fleeting moment that just happened. That's it. No big deal. Let's move on, And get the joy laugh at yourself. We need to do that.
Speaker 2 (28:28)
Really do
Yeah, I do it all the time.
Speaker 1 (28:33)
So we've talked about standards, we've talked about principles, we've talked about, really this particular conversation was about acting versus reacting, Correct. So as our usual closing that we like to do, we'd like to leave you with a thought for the week, And this week is when something tests you.
Pause before you respond.
And then notice who shows up.
Speaker 2 (29:08)
Correct.
Speaker 1 (29:08)
during that pause.
And that is your real answer.
Speaker 2 (29:14)
Correct.
Speaker 1 (29:15)
Yeah. Thank you, James. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (29:19)
This is Seam Notes, luxury from the inside out.
Speaker 1 (29:25)
New episodes every Wednesday. We'll see you again next week. Thanks for joining us.