Sol Vargas' Journey to Justice: An Immigrant's Story of Resilience and Hope

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Sol [00:00:03] These are growing pains when you workout and you tear your muscles. They grow back stronger. But before they do, they hurt. So at the end of the day, those are growing pains and something hurts. That's when you learn the most. 

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Brian [00:00:22] It's all gives us a great introduction of herself at the start of this episode, so I'll let her take care of that. Today's episode covers racism and many issues around DOCA and the 11 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the United States. We also talk about Sol's recent presentation to the U.S. Supreme Court. Pretty impressive for a 22 year old. Along the way, we take detours into topics of eating disorders, veganism, mental health, body image, bodybuilding, and the importance of great friends in overcoming personal crises. You are going to enjoy today's conversation, but you are going to love getting to know Sol. 

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Brian [00:00:51] So thanks for joining me. 

Sol [00:00:59] For having me. 

Brian [00:01:00] So I know so little about you, except for Gabby has said she is amazing. You need to talk with her. I'm like, okay, we can do that. So I do know a little bit. But tell me a little bit about yourself. 

Sol [00:01:12] All right. Okay. So where to start? My name is Sol Vargas. I am originally from Mexico City. I was born and raised in Mexico City, actually. I moved here to the to the U.S., to Utah specifically when I was 13. So 2013. I've been here ever since. Initially, we were only going to be here for three years. But, you know, I ended up studying here, ended up getting married and just stayed here. And unfortunately, that marriage didn't work out. But, you. Know, I still think things happen when they need to and how they need to happen. So I'm here. And I. Mean, at this point, Utah is my home. 

Brian [00:01:50] Awesome. So what are the big topics you want to talk about today? 

Sol [00:01:53] Oh, my gosh. 

Brian [00:01:54] It's a wide open thing. 

Sol [00:01:55] That's a good question. Well, I mean, there's a. Lot of things, really. I mean, I'm a community organizer. I work. For. A nonprofit organization called Communities There, and I work with the Latin Mex undocumented and immigrant population here in Utah. More specifically, I oversee the community engagement and organizing sector. So anything that includes immigrant rights, anything that's leadership academies, electoral programs, anything like that, I oversee. So I guess I recently got the chance to go to Washington, D.C., to a convention down there, and I got the chance to meet with Senator Mitt Romney's team and Senator Mike Lee as well. I also got the chance to give a little speech in front of the Supreme Court of the United States. And we. Had yeah, we had some representatives from. The House of Representatives show up. It was it was a very, very unique. Very exciting experience. 

Brian [00:02:58] So, so many questions. And take these whatever direction you want to go. How did you get involved in that? What are the big issues? What did you talk to the Supreme Court about and how was it received? And whatever order you want, say now those are done. So yeah, if I ask a question that's dumb or you know, our topic you want to talk about say that's stupid. A better question would. 

Sol [00:03:15] Be to tell you it's stupid. No. 

Brian [00:03:17] Please do. It's a. 

Sol [00:03:19] Stupid thought. Okay. 

Brian [00:03:20] But if, like I said, if you want to take the conversation in a different way, take whatever way you want. This is your story. I'm not driving anything here. I'm just here to listen. 

Sol [00:03:27] All right? Sure. Okay. So how did I get into this? So I think it's kind of a long story, really. But when I was. 15 years old, right, just a couple of years after we moved here to the US, my father was treated and he was given a volunteer leave of absence, which basically means, you know, the deportation can come off your record, but you have to leave voluntarily and then you can renew your visa in X amount of time. The only problem is that after that happened, a few months later, he went missing. And so when the Mexican police was contacted because my my grandfather worked police for many, many years down there. So he tried to pull some strings. And the only thing that he was told was that nothing could be done. They weren't going to look because the area where he went missing is an area where usually immigrants get abducted by the cartels. They're often used as mules to, you know, transport drugs in and out of the United States. And usually they're given the condition that if they do it, they will be let go. But oftentimes that is not true. They're either not let go or they're simply killed. So essentially, the police just said, we're not going to do anything about it. This is too dangerous. And so, I mean, even up until today, we really don't know if that's exactly what happened. We only know that he was never found. We received calls for more. Quite often received images to try and identify the bodies. But there were bodies that were way too torn apart, couldn't be identified at all. And others that we simply knew were not him because of, like dental records and all that. 

Brian [00:05:13] And that is awful. 

Sol [00:05:15] And, you know, it's it's interesting because I tell this story now, but it doesn't always feel like it's my story anymore. You know, like, I don't know if it's just the product. Of the trauma. Sometimes it kind of feels like I'm retelling a story that. I heard or that I, like, watched on television. You know. Like it doesn't necessarily feel like it's mine. I think it might just be a coping mechanism at this point. It's like. I see it, but it doesn't feel true. 

Brian [00:05:40] Yeah. So we had an incident when my my grandparents were murdered when I was in sixth grade, and my family has never talked about it. So we've talked about it. We've kind of gone opposite paths on that. You've talked about it enough that it doesn't feel like yours. Yeah, I've avoided that. Conversation. Our whole family has avoided that conversation for so long that it doesn't feel like it's necessarily personally relevant anymore. And there was a long time ago. But trusting being a mechanism for trauma is different for everybody. 

Sol [00:06:08] Yeah. I mean, is what they say, right? Like every mind is a whole different world. Yeah. The way that you process things, the way that whether that be like stimuli or is simply a traumatic experience. Um, but yeah. 

Sol [00:06:20] I mean, so I don't mean. 

Brian [00:06:21] To interrupt. 

Sol [00:06:22] No, no, you're good. You're good. 

Sol [00:06:23] That was that was good insight. And I'm sorry to hear about your family as well. But, yeah, so with that, I kind of got this feeling because for the longest time, well, while that was going on, you know, trying to figure out what happened to my father, we were undocumented at that point. Right. And so I remember the day after I found out that my dad had gone missing. I had to go to school and pretend like nothing happened. I had to show up to all of my classes. I had to show up to swim practice, to show up, to track practice and pretend like absolutely nothing had happened. Cause, you know, telling people that, hey, like this is what happened or not showing up to school and having people questioned, like, why haven't you been coming to school would require me telling them. Right. And not only would that require me telling them that I was undocumented, they would require me telling them that my mom and my brother. Right. My family was undocumented. And that was just such a huge source of fear for me and for my family. So for the longest time, we didn't talk, not even at church. Like with nobody. The only people that knew were the bishop and and my grandpa. That was it. So, I mean, that was pretty rough. And I remember, yeah, for the longest time, I just kept thinking, we are so alone in this. Right. There's really nobody that we can count on. Nobody is a weak about it. And I kind of. But but it's interesting, because when you're undocumented, when you're an immigrant, sometimes it kind of feels like the way it is, right? Like for. 

Brian [00:07:53] Everybody or. 

Sol [00:07:54] Yeah, for everybody. Like, you just kind of go through your own thing and like, you don't really pay much attention to others cause you're so, like, stuck in your little bubble of, like, trying to survive, like, you with your family. The you don't realize, though, like there's a whole community out there. I mean, that there's people that are going through the same exact thing is you or things that are very, very similar, people that may be able to understand you. And I don't think I came to that realization until years later when I connected with communities who neither which is the organization that I'm working with now. 

Sol [00:08:29] And it was interesting because I was not expecting to work for them. Okay. One day I received a text from my mom because I and it was like right after the Black Lives Matter movement happened and all that, my mom sent. 

Sol [00:08:42] Me a text and she's like, Hey, like, there's this protest. 

Sol [00:08:46] It's called A. 

Sol [00:08:46] Day Without Immigrants. It's going to be at the Capitol. 

Sol [00:08:49] And I'm very like, hands on. I'm like, Yeah, let's go. So I showed up at the at the Capitol with my little sign and my two peers with their signs attached. Nice as and yeah, I saw this group of people there and they're all fighting for the same exact thing that I was hoping for. 

Sol [00:09:11] Right. Which is an immigration reform in which is justice for all of those people who have been deported. 

Sol [00:09:16] Unfairly and for all. 

Sol [00:09:18] Of the undocumented don't have a pathway to citizenship, including darker recipients. Right. And so, yeah, I was very proud to see a whole community, a whole group of people there fighting for the same exact thing and realizing finally that I was not alone, that my family wasn't alone, that even though we went through all of that, it didn't have to go through it. All right. And so after that, I connected with the organization. I was going to do a few volunteer hours. And it just so happened to be that they were looking for a senior organizer. 

Sol [00:09:49] So I was like, okay, I'm going to try this out. Maybe I'm like shooting too far, but we'll see. 

Brian [00:09:54] And how old were you at the same time? 

Sol [00:09:56] I was 21. Okay. 

Sol [00:09:59] Yeah, I was 21 was no, I was 22. I was 22. That was like very, very beginning of this year. 

Sol [00:10:05] Oh, of this. 

Sol [00:10:05] Year, yeah. So I'm 22 right now. 

Sol [00:10:07] Okay. All right. But yeah. And I mean with that. 

Sol [00:10:11] Like I also found it very helpful there. I mean, I studied political science. 

Brian [00:10:15] So you're leaning that direction anyway? 

Sol [00:10:17] Exactly. Yeah, exactly. So I was already in. I was I was about I was about to, like, graduate with my degree in political science. I super excited. I did some work. 

Sol [00:10:28] On. 

Sol [00:10:29] Like globalism and immigration codes and. 

Sol [00:10:32] All that stuff. So I was like, okay, I'm prepared, let's do this. And yeah, I ended up getting the job. 

Sol [00:10:38] Which is amazing. I honestly am super thankful. I want to say it is my dream job. 

Sol [00:10:43] I love it. I love every second of it. So it's. 

Brian [00:10:45] Awesome. That is so. 

Sol [00:10:46] Good, so intense. It gets exhausting. It's a it's a heavy and very busy job, but it's it's something very rewarding. 

Sol [00:10:53] But so that's how that got started. 

Sol [00:10:55] It was my own experience. 

Sol [00:10:56] That kind of just really fired up my passion for making sure that the immigrant community can feel just that which is a community, right? That people don't feel alone, that people know that they have resources and that they have more people. They know that they're not in this fight alone and that if they're struggling, they don't have to struggle by themselves. Because, I mean, unfortunately, as much as I would like to take away all the struggles of people, I can't. But I can at least tell them, like, hey, you know, we're here with you. Hmm. Yeah. You don't have to pick yourself up by. 

Sol [00:11:29] Your bootstraps, right? Like I'm for. 

Brian [00:11:31] Struggle alone, feeling like there's no one you can talk to about it or. 

Sol [00:11:34] Exactly. For you. An entire community of people. We're all here for you. 

Brian [00:11:39] And that means a lot. Exactly right. Because at least even though we if whether we can move it or move the needle a lot or a little bit, at least I know a bunch of other people that can commiserate and can understand my situation. 

Sol [00:11:51] Exactly. 

Brian [00:11:51] And that just speaks volumes. 

Sol [00:11:53] You know, it really does. And I mean, honestly, just looking back in my own experience, I wish I would have you know, I wish I would have had at that moment someone who told me, like, hey, maybe I can't fix this for you, but I see you. I hear you. And. Right. Mean. So, yeah. That's kind of what we try to do for people. We try to be there for them, not just when things are hard in that way, but also, you know, just basic things like eating access to food, housing. Yeah, we have legal clinics. We try to make sure that our community is healthy. Like we have mobile clinics where we do mammograms, where we do vaccinations or we do eye exams, glucose. 

Sol [00:12:30] Checks, anything. 

Brian [00:12:31] We are literally here for you. What do you mean, exactly? 

Sol [00:12:33] Exactly. 

Sol [00:12:34] Like making them know that. 

Sol [00:12:36] Hey, you just came here from a different country. Maybe you don't completely understand how the systems work here, but we got to. We're doing what we can to make sure that you can settle down and that you can not just be okay, but that you can excel here, that you can also be a part of a bigger community, that you can contribute to a bigger community and benefit from it as well. And so, yeah, that was yeah, that's pretty exciting. 

Sol [00:13:02] That's a little bit about me. I don't remember what the other questions were to be on that. 

Brian [00:13:07] So what did you say to the Supreme Court and how was it received or what message did you deliver? 

Sol [00:13:12] Oh, yeah. So when it came to the Supreme Court, we actually I was asked to talk about DOCA, which is the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. Right. It's a program essentially that protects a right now nationally over 500,000 individuals from deportation. It also gives them the right to work in the United States. The problem right now with the DOCA program is that it is under threat. It is essentially under threat of. And if it is terminated, that would ultimately mean that 500,000 plus people would be also in danger of becoming undocumented, no longer having that protection against deportation and no longer having that right to work. And so I was talking I went with with another organization, pretty much just a big coalition for an organization. But the one overseeing everything is called Community Change Action. And they asked me to go up there and talk about my experience, not qualifying for DOCA more than anything, because we wanted to ask our senators, especially in the state of Iowa, we wanted to ask Senator Mitt Romney to help us to help stand Santa darker program, not just to protect it, but to expand it and create a pathway to citizenship. And so I kind of just shared a little bit about how right along the time right right around the time that my dad went missing, I also came to find out that I was not eligible for DOCA. And that was really hard for me at the time because that meant finding out that I might never get to go to college, I might never get to have higher education again. I couldn't work. I could like there were so many different barriers, right? And that was really difficult. So I really just went up there and I shared my side of the story, just what it was like for me and to ask them to not just protect the program, but to help expand it and again, to create a pathway to citizenship for documented members of the community. Along with that, I did also. 

Sol [00:15:17] Kind of squeeze in my own little ask. 

Sol [00:15:20] Which was to not just provide a pathway to citizenship for those 500,000 individuals, but also to the more than 11 million undocumented community members currently living in the US more than anything, because one thing that we learned from the DOCA program that when we accepted that program, we had to start our parents and our. 

Sol [00:15:43] Neighbors and our friends in the. 

Sol [00:15:45] Back who didn't qualify for it. We really meaning to we kind of accepted bread crumbs, right? Yeah. Because we didn't even accept a pathway to. Citizenship. We just accepted nothing. 

Brian [00:15:56] I mean, you take what's on the table. 

Sol [00:15:58] Exactly. And that's it. But that's the point. I feel like we. We really should offer more. Okay? We really should have fought for more to be offered. Because I feel like sometimes, especially right now, there is a there's a proposal. It's called the Senate Matilda's bill, which essentially says that about 2 million undocumented Americans could win citizenship. But again, 2 million out of more than 11 million, that's not even a quarter. Right. That's really it would really mean that if we were to accept that we would be picking and choosing who in our community deserves. Yeah. Deserves that. Right. 

Brian [00:16:35] And we were talking about this earlier. Right. If it isn't good for all of us, it's not good for anybody. 

Sol [00:16:39] Exactly. Exactly. And it's like, imagine that. Just trying to figure out who is more deserving of humanity, who is more deserving of living, of being treated like human. 

Sol [00:16:51] Yeah. I don't like. 

Sol [00:16:52] I genuinely something that we did fail a lot of people with Docker. Yeah we really at that time we, we said we did just that we did the whole picking and choosing who deserves this more. But in reality, we all deserve this. 

Brian [00:17:07] Yeah. Yeah. I have a hard time understanding that because it's so far removed from me right now. I'm not personally affected by it. I know. 

Sol [00:17:14] For sure. 

Brian [00:17:15] I'm just trying to understand that it's like thing over nothing. At some point you're like, This is so close to nothing. If we lost it, it. What have we really losing? We need to hold on and get something where it's actually a solution. And until then, we're not going to accept anything less then. 

Sol [00:17:27] Exactly. And it's really just very problematic, too, because I know that there are a lot of people that are saying, oh, well, but like at least you're getting something, so why not accept it? Okay. But we've also seen in the past how any time that they give us something, no matter how, no matter how little, then for the next, what, 27. 

Sol [00:17:45] Years, they're like, Oh, we already did that for you. So our problem was solved. 

Brian [00:17:50] Yeah, exactly. 

Sol [00:17:51] Exactly. And at that point, it's. 

Sol [00:17:53] Really it really is just a way of stalling an actual immigration. 

Brian [00:17:56] Process and getting reelected. Exactly. Because I was for this one bill, even though it did essentially nothing. Exactly. I helped make that happen. And the only way we made that happen was making sure that it was so watered down that it wasn't doing anything. Exactly. And that's how we got people to vote for it. I have I had another friend of mine that we interviewed earlier on the show from Argentina, and he is very interested in international politics. And he says for and so incremental change or just wait forever for nothing I don't know that's. 

Sol [00:18:25] You know and that is that is true it really does take forever. And actually in the book I was saying about earlier, this bridge called to my back. There is a portion of that book that I absolutely love, says, how arrogant of us to believe that change would happen in our lifetimes. And the more that I think about it, the more that I realize that as a community organizer, that is the key organizing. You're not organizing to create change for you. You're organizing to create change for every generation to come. And I just think about it in the sense that today, as a woman, as a woman of color, not only do I have the right to have credit, the right to own property, I have the right to, you know, I don't know, not be segregated or have like racial. 

Sol [00:19:13] Like like. 

Sol [00:19:13] Interracial marriage or, you know, like all these different things that did not happen in my lifetime. And they did not happen due to my own efforts. They happen due to the effort of organizers and activists came way before me. Right. And so I try to think about it that way, is even though we do want an immigration reform now for the people that are here now, it's also important to realize that most likely that will be for the generations to come. That will most likely be for our children, for our grandchildren. And as much as that is hard to accept, I do also think that it is the least arrogant thing that we can do is to create that change, not for us, but for those checks. So yeah, that was that was something that I read in that book that it took me. 

Sol [00:20:00] I remember reading that page and I had to reread that over and over and over again until it finally clicked. And I'm like, You know what? That is so true. That makes so much sense. 

Brian [00:20:10] But on the other hand, you think, look, this, this is just common sense. This is a solution where it's obvious where we need to get to. Yeah. Why does it take 50 years to get there? Why does it take 20 years to get there? Why can't we get there now? 

Sol [00:20:21] And I think a lot of it is because we're not just creating political change. I feel like when we create political change, what needs to happen first is we need to create social change. Right. Because I because I do think that our politics are rooted in where our society is. 

Sol [00:20:36] So I. 

Sol [00:20:38] I don't know how to explain that other thing. Like I think, uh, for example, the civil rights movement during that time, you have a lot of pushback, right? A lot of pushback from people, even just from the society itself in terms of removing like Jim Crow laws. Right. And it wasn't until that pushback came like attacked or when when they started to attack that push back and really create like societal change view equality that you then start seeing all these like more progressive policies put in place or more progressive. Yeah. So much to the point where you even see like John F Kennedy, for example, getting murdered. 

Sol [00:21:15] Right. 

Sol [00:21:16] For trying to embrace such a progressive policy or even our days. We talk about Martin Luther King Jr and we talk about how big of a hero he was. But we fail to acknowledge the fact that during his time he was one of the most hated men in America, even though he was a peaceful organizer, which is something that nowadays we romanticize. 

Sol [00:21:38] But still hated him. 

Sol [00:21:39] Yeah, right. And so all the change that he advocated for didn't actually come to be until people started to see him differently, until people started to see the movement differently. And so I feel like if we want to change the politics, we first need to change ourselves and we need to change the world around us. That's actually something that's called transformative organizing, and it's pretty much the transformation of self where we can transform anything external of ourselves. So before we can transform the people or the world around us or the systems, we need to learn how to change ourselves in the way that we view ourselves within our society. 

Brian [00:22:14] Pair that with the everybody's social media newsfeeds just become an echo chamber of what they already believe. And the algorithms push out anything that's different. And you only hear things from people that look like you, that already think like you and that act like you. Those are the only comments that you hear any when really it could be so diverse that you could look and listen to all these other things, but every like and click and comment on someone that you know that looks like you or things like you just reinforces what you're going to hear. 

Sol [00:22:43] Exactly. It just pushes some more of the same content. Yes. Yeah. And that's I that's honestly such a crappy. 

Sol [00:22:49] Thing because if you really think about it, it. 

Sol [00:22:52] Really inhibits our ability to actually connect with others, to actually take in new information, to listen to different perspectives, because we're so used to just having our own perspective reinforced over and over and over again. I don't know. I mean, I would personally just say, like, if it's such a personal decision to write, to change oneself, takes an enormous amount of. 

Sol [00:23:15] Bravery to really go through all of that. 

Sol [00:23:18] Introspection and realize like. 

Sol [00:23:19] Hey, I'm wrong. 

Brian [00:23:21] Only wrong, but part of the problem. Yeah, right. The comments and thoughts that you used to have that you were thinking about is actually the reason why we're not able to make progress in certain areas and that those beliefs are actually causing harm to real people. Exactly. That you're not even aware of. 

Sol [00:23:37] Yeah. And I think that that's a that's also another problem. Right. Like we become. So I don't know, I mean, maybe egocentric or self-centered to the point where we don't realize how our our own thoughts, our own mentality affects other people. Just look at voting, for example. A lot of people like we've been I mean, sure, we we get told to. 

Sol [00:23:57] Go, go, go, go, go, vote. Okay. And a lot of us do. 

Sol [00:24:01] But the thing is, who are we voting for? And not just in the sense of like who are we writing down when we cast our ballot? But so more so like who is our vote directed for or on behalf of? Are we voting only for our own self-interest, or are we voting for that of, say, our parents or siblings, our family say can't vote us residents, those who are receiving political asylum, those who are undocumented, those who are darker community members. Right? Like, are we only voting for ourselves or are we taking into account other people as well? And I think that that's something really, really interesting where you do see that sense of, you know, being self centered. 

Sol [00:24:41] Where and. 

Sol [00:24:42] Not to be rude, but it's I feel like a lot of people we do it even subconsciously, right? We just tend to think of our own self-interest and regard anyone and everyone else. 

Sol [00:24:52] Yeah. 

Brian [00:24:52] And especially if they look, sound, think or believe different. 

Sol [00:24:56] Exactly. 

Brian [00:24:57] If they're different, then I don't really understand that. Right. Why? Because you've never made the effort to. I mean, basically that's the only excuse is you you are comfortable hearing your own thoughts echoed back on you from people that look like you and you're not willing to say, well, wait a minute, what's the other perspective? And one of the reasons I started this podcast was specifically for that reason. I see a lot of people that get into the idea of what's wrong with those people, what are their problems? And I'm like, Those are great questions. Ask them and sit down and then listen to those responses. Instead of saying subconsciously, what you're saying is they're an idiot because they don't think like me and they're they're less than because they don't have the same situation that I have. And obviously, if they were as great as I as I am, then they'd be in the same situation. And they don't see those barriers that keep prevent that from happening and they don't see how those barriers between them need to be taken down in order. So whoever those people are, whether it's political beliefs or religious belief. Beliefs or skin color or whatever, whatever barriers are in place to prevent them, they don't even see them. Exactly. And how do you get them to say down those barriers if you can't even see them yet, or if you have some fear that taking down a barrier is going to remove something you have in your life? Yeah. How do you get past that? I remember when they first started Tike first time I heard recycling way back in the day. The idea was people are not going to pay one penny more for something that was made from recycled content. They are not going to take one extra second to separate garbage if it's better for the planet. There's a way you can just dump all of the stuff in in one bin and have somebody else take care of it without raising the taxes. That in order for the systems to build to do that, then fine. But until then, no one's willing going to be willing to do it. Yeah. And now I look at your generation and they're thrifting and they're becoming vegetarian, and they're making these life choices because they're like, well, we need to make changes. 

Sol [00:26:50] Exactly. 

Brian [00:26:51] And they're not afraid to do that. But it's taken that long to get there. 

Sol [00:26:55] Yeah, I mean, but it's beautiful, really, when you start seeing people look outside of themselves and coke. How are my actions affecting everything around me? 

Sol [00:27:03] I mean, like, it's so. 

Sol [00:27:04] Interesting, even just like mentioning the. 

Sol [00:27:06] Vegetarian diet, I went vegan like almost three years ago. Yeah, because of that. Really? Because I remember it took me watching a documentary about how the meat and dairy industries affect our environment. 

Sol [00:27:22] For me to finally realize. 

Sol [00:27:23] Like, oh, crap. Like I'm a part of the problem. Yes. Like I'm contributing to that. 

Sol [00:27:28] Yes. And I feel like sometimes you really do have to be so graphic with people for them to realize, like, this is what I'm contributing to. Like this is what I'm doing, because whether we like it or not, we're all responsible for something, right? Whether we want to see it or not. Now, the thing is, are we willing to see it? Are we willing to make ourselves uncomfortable and really ask ourselves, what can I change? 

Sol [00:27:53] I do. 

Sol [00:27:53] How can. 

Sol [00:27:54] I help? I cease to be a part of the problem. 

Brian [00:27:56] Especially if your efforts are going to be minuscule compared to the whole. Yeah, fine. But if everybody does that, then those minuscule changes add up. 

Sol [00:28:06] Exactly. 

Brian [00:28:06] But they don't add up if nobody is willing to make those minuscule changes. I mean, the amount of impact you have on the global footprint in the in the meat industry is minimal. 

Sol [00:28:15] But take that and then multiply. Exactly. 

Brian [00:28:18] Exactly. And you don't get to a million if you don't start with one. And that one always has to be yourself. 

Sol [00:28:23] Yes. And that's exactly where I'm coming from with point a transformative organizing. It always starts with oneself. If you want to create change, you create change in yourself first and then another person and then another and then another. And then enough to create changes in themselves. Collectively, you have so much power. 

Brian [00:28:41] So tell me someone who is out there who is ignorant of these issues, especially around immigration and individual rights and DOCA, tell me what they should be looking at, what they should be learning, what they should be reading, what they should be thinking about next time they go vote or what what mind, what needs to change in their mindset. You mentioned the video that you saw that you decided to be vegan. What needs to click in their brain in order for them to take responsibility for those obstacles and problems that they're not even aware of? 

Sol [00:29:13] Well, I answer that. 

Sol [00:29:14] So give her a do the rest. Absolutely. I am so sorry I. 

Brian [00:29:18] Missed the whole thing. Oh, so can we. 

Sol [00:29:21] Yeah. 

Brian [00:29:21] Rewind and back up. Yeah. So the question was, how can someone who is not aware of the problem learn the issues are and know how they should educate themselves to become part of the change? 

Sol [00:29:34] Right. Okay. And to that, I would say initially create more empathy. Something that has always worked for me has been reading, trying to wrap my head around different experiences, trying to expose myself to different experiences. I think the more exposure that we seek to have to anything different than our own life experience is beneficial. 

Brian [00:29:55] I think that's a big key. I think a lot of people read. Read is what they're comfortable with and they think what they're reading reflects their social media echo chamber and is all by someone who looks like them about they already believe. And I think it's podcasts are great because you can listen to other people's stories, but you can also focus into people that are also yelling and shouting the same things that you already believe. Exactly. And you're reinforcing the lack of empathy. 

Sol [00:30:18] Exactly. 

Brian [00:30:19] So diversity in reading, right. Going out of your way to read from authors. Don't look like you or think like you or act like you or have the same thoughts. 

Sol [00:30:27] Yeah, exactly. 

Sol [00:30:29] No, it really can be. It can be very, very painful and beautiful. Yeah. I remember. 

Sol [00:30:34] Reading the book, Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson and the book The New Jim Crow. 

Sol [00:30:41] By. 

Sol [00:30:42] Michelle Alexander. Both of those books, I remember those two were the books that actually got me into wanting to study political science. 

Sol [00:30:50] Wow. 

Sol [00:30:51] Because they were the two books that finally exposed to. To a life different than what I know. Right? Because even though I am a person of color, even though. 

Sol [00:31:00] I am an immigrant. 

Sol [00:31:00] Woman, I don't know what it feels like to be black in America. I don't know what it feels like to, you know, be in the demographic that is the most affected by mass incarceration. Don't know what it's like to be called. I mean, because even though I am a woman of color and I am American sorry, and I am an immigrant and all these things, I do also have many advantages and many privileges that I count on. Right. Like I speak English pretty. 

Sol [00:31:28] Well, I would say. I mean, I don't want to be all hello. I wouldn't even. 

Brian [00:31:34] Even question. 

Sol [00:31:34] It exactly. But like a lot of people, when I tell them that I was born. 

Sol [00:31:37] And raised in Mexico. 

Sol [00:31:38] They don't believe me. They think that I'm a Chicano, right? That I'm like Mexican. Mexican-American, and I'm no like I'm from Mexico. Right. So a lot of people, I. 

Sol [00:31:50] Don't get the same treatment that let's say other immigrants would or that even. 

Sol [00:31:54] My mom does. Like, I know in the. 

Sol [00:31:56] Past I've gone out with her just a few weeks ago we went to we went to Costco and she was trying to get help from. 

Sol [00:32:02] Someone. And my mom has a thick accent. She speaks perfectly like she knows exactly what she's saying. She has a grammar, but she has an accent. Yeah. 

Sol [00:32:10] And the lady was so impatient with her. She was so. 

Sol [00:32:14] Impatient with my mom. 

Sol [00:32:15] She was telling her, like, I can't understand. 

Sol [00:32:17] You this and that. She's honestly, she was pretty rude. Yeah. And then the moment that I said exactly the same thing that my mom had said, but without an accent, demeanor changed. All of a sudden she was all smiles. She was so great to me. And I thought that to me I was like, Why? Yeah, change just the accent. That was the only thing that changed. 

Sol [00:32:37] We asked you the same exact thing. We were both very kind to you. 

Sol [00:32:40] What changed? 

Sol [00:32:41] Right. And so I do think everybody does have different lived experiences and it sometimes it can be just as small. 

Sol [00:32:49] As an accent or as the color of your skin or. 

Sol [00:32:52] Even your gender. 

Sol [00:32:53] Identity or your sex. 

Sol [00:32:55] Right. And so I think that that's something that for me, reading did amplify was that empathy, that what I experience is not what everybody else experiences. My experience does not speak to what everybody else, to what everybody else has to go through, to what everybody else lives. And I think that's something that sometimes we do where we do have that kind of fallacy, where we believe that because we live something that everybody else might too, or that everybody else. 

Brian [00:33:20] And you even mentioned that earlier when you were saying when you first moved here, you had that experience and you just assumed that everybody else had those same experiences because that that was normal. Yeah, it's a little bit of maturity in understanding that and also takes a little bit of effort in wanting to understand something that is different from what you're accustomed to and might even take a little bit more work. 

Sol [00:33:40] Yeah, it does. And it does take a lot of work. It really, really does. Honestly, with that and with, you know, the death of George Floyd, with the writing of the Black Lives Matter movement or like the writing in popularity, at least. 

Sol [00:33:55] I was. 

Sol [00:33:55] Forced for the first time to really look within myself and ask myself, How am I a part of the problem? 

Brian [00:34:03] Fantastic. 

Sol [00:34:04] I read a book by Abramovic's Kendi called How to Be Anti-Racist, and I find it interesting that there are so many people that are so unwilling to look within themselves and really ask themselves those difficult questions, right? Like, how am I perpetuating racism? Because maybe. 

Brian [00:34:22] My but how am I. 

Sol [00:34:23] Exactly? Because it's not a matter of like, am I or not like. 

Sol [00:34:26] We all are. Truth is, we all are. 

Sol [00:34:29] Whether we are consciously doing it or not, that's a whole nother story, but we all are. And so yeah, I had to really question myself and realize like, how am I being a problem? How am I contributing to this? And that allowed me to come to the realization that I had so many biases, there were so many things, so many thoughts that I continuously had that went either unnoticed or unchecked, right? That I didn't stop for a second to say like, no, that's wrong. 

Sol [00:34:56] Let's reroute that. 

Sol [00:34:59] Until that time. And at that. 

Sol [00:35:01] Time I remember I went through a little. 

Sol [00:35:03] Existential crisis because. 

Sol [00:35:05] I was like, No, I'm an awful person. Why is this happening? Why am I like this? Why my thinking these things? 

Sol [00:35:11] But you know, why ultimately, like, I had to be very patient with myself and give myself a whole lot of grace and realize that I know that I am contributing to this problem. But I also know that I am willing to change with the information that I'm given, that if I know that something is not wrong, I'm willing to do the work and it's not going to be a change, just like night and day, but it's going to happen and it's in the same way. Like, for example, I equate it to me going vegan the first few months were so difficult because, you know, I was born in Mexico. 

Sol [00:35:42] Mexican cuisine. There's lots of me, lots of cheese, dairy, everything. Right. It was very hard for me to make that change, but. 

Sol [00:35:50] I had to continue to tell myself, like, I'm doing this for a great. Good. I'm not just doing this for myself. I'm doing this to help, you know, like, make a little dent in the issues with the environment and whatnot. Right. So in that same way, I kept telling myself, like, if I'm changing, it's not just for me. For my friends. It's for my loved ones. I want to be a better version of myself. And for me, it's so that I can be a better contribution to society. Right. Because like, how can I look my African-American friends in the eye and tell them I love you when I have all of these biases against them or if not them, other people who look like them. Because at that point, it's almost as if I were to say, like, I love you, but not the rest. 

Sol [00:36:31] Right. Like, that's not okay. 

Brian [00:36:33] Right. Right. And I think I think part of the issue with crossing the street to a group that you're don't have a lot of you haven't grown up with a lot of interaction. It can be difficult. Yeah, it can be very uncomfortable. But I think you also learn that one person that you meet isn't anything like what you thought represented that group and you're in your head. The next thought is, Well, maybe none of the rest of them do either. Yeah. Right. And that's kind of where you can start to make change is when you realize instead of, well, yeah, I don't understand them know this person I get but the rest of. Exactly. Wait a minute. Why? Why are you differentiating? And you'll find out through a lot of these conversations that I've had. Once you meet one person of a certain group, we can't look at that group the same again. Exactly. It's open your eyes. It's changed your mind. You mentioned earlier about reading American Dirt, and even though that wasn't your same experience crossing the border, you had empathy for the people that did cross that border, that it crossed the border that way. And you understood their perspective a little bit better, and you just take a little piece of that away for every time you read somebody else's story or hear someone else's story on a podcast or you read a book of someone else's story wasn't like yours. Yeah. And eventually that piles up. Eventually you get enough guns out there. Eventually you get enough people that are recycling, and eventually you get enough people voting for others as well as themselves. You can make change. 

Sol [00:37:49] Yeah. And I mean, just one last point. I just now, I was just reminded I had an experience last year around the 4th of July with my ex-spouse and one of his one of his close friends. So his friend's wife was asking me about my schooling and all of that. I explained to her what I was doing. She asked me, Why. 

Sol [00:38:12] Are you doing that? And so I told her a little bit about my background. 

Sol [00:38:15] And I told her I really want to help my community. And it was really interesting because her response to me was along the lines of If she did not want to welcome illegals, she calls them. Personally, I don't agree with the term illegal. 

Sol [00:38:30] I rather the term undocumented be used. 

Sol [00:38:33] I think it's more humane. But aside from that, what really got to me during that conversation was the fact that she was saying she did not want illegals over for dinner, that she didn't want to welcome them as if we were going to have a. 

Sol [00:38:47] Picnic in the United States with them, you know, open borders and all. And so I asked her. 

Sol [00:38:53] Okay, if that's how you feel about. She also mentioned something along the lines of family separation at the border. I told her like, that is the most inhumane thing that could have been done. And she told me that she actually agreed with it, that she actually didn't believe that illegals or undocumented folks should be able to keep their children. And that was really hurtful because I told her, okay, so you're saying that you agree with my family being separated as we were? And her response was, oh, no, but you're different. Right? But how so? 

Sol [00:39:26] Right. 

Sol [00:39:26] I was in documents. There's nothing about me that makes me different than the rest of my community. If you think that way about my community. But you just don't think that way about me. Guess what? You do still think that way about me? 

Sol [00:39:38] Yeah. We're a package, like, you know what I mean? 

Brian [00:39:41] So it sounds like there's a different issue at work there because it's not empathy towards that group or those people. They've learned a little bit. They've met one of them, and then they're still like, No, but those people are. And you're like, I am. Those people. Those people are me. They're they're all us. Can they take a little step and not be aware of the next step? I have a hard time understanding that. It seems like if you know this problem exists for one person, chances are it exists for more than one person. 

Sol [00:40:07] Yeah. And I mean. Yeah, and to be honest, I was something that was really hard for me to wrap my head around. Just number one, realizing that somebody who I thought was a friend think that way about our community. And the number two, knowing that I somehow was considered different when in reality my own experience is something that other people experience as well. Right. The fact that, you know, like there are 11 million people. 

Sol [00:40:33] Out there other than me who are also living undocumented or there are thousands. 

Sol [00:40:39] Of families out there other than my own who are being separated. My story may be unique, but it's not the only one. Right. And so with that, I did have a hard time. I did have such a hard time. I remember I kept. Going over that conversation in my head for weeks. 

Sol [00:40:57] It really did mess with my head. I just kept going over it and over it. 

Sol [00:41:01] And over it. And I was like, How can she not understand? Especially because, I mean. 

Sol [00:41:05] I'm a member. 

Sol [00:41:06] Of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. I may not be the most active. 

Sol [00:41:10] Nor by standing member, I mean, I'll just be honest. I'm not. But, you know, I still go to church from time to time. I still believe in God, all these things, right? 

Sol [00:41:21] So I'm not always like that. I always appreciate it. From the churches, they've always pushed for a humane immigration reform, put out statements pushing for an immigration reform, or know challenging, inhumane policies such as a zero tolerance policy or the termination of DOCA. They've taken that stance. Right. And so one of the biggest reasons why this couple or why this person was against immigration, like illegal immigration, was because of her stance with the church, because you're breaking the law. But something that I never understood is like, okay, but if the church can see past that, if the church can understand that people are not just coming here because we want to come here out of necessity, do you really think somebody would risk their life and. 

Sol [00:42:12] Their child's life crossing a border for nothing? No, we don't. We don't put we don't. 

Sol [00:42:18] Leave our. 

Sol [00:42:18] Families behind. We don't leave our heritage and heritage. 

Sol [00:42:22] We don't leave everything that we know. 

Sol [00:42:23] Behind for nothing. 

Sol [00:42:25] We do it because we see virtually no other option, because we have to, because we know that this is the better alternative than staying. And, you know, whether that be facing facing economic struggle, facing violence, facing. 

Sol [00:42:41] Crime, organized crime. 

Sol [00:42:43] You know, like all these different things, like even like, for example, like we see lots of gender violence. 

Sol [00:42:49] Down in Latin. 

Sol [00:42:50] America, right? I mean, with Mexico, there's 11 women killed every single day just from Femicides. And that's just what gets reported. 

Sol [00:42:58] Right? 

Sol [00:42:59] Thousands and thousands of people that go missing in Mexico from cartel activity. And again, that's just what gets reported. Right. And so for me, it's it's difficult to know that people don't want to understand. 

Brian [00:43:11] Well or even if they do understand and they meet you and they know you and they know your story, they're still against what could have prevented that or made that a little more tolerable. Yeah. Refusing, it seems. It seems easier to me to say to have someone just so stuck in their mind that says, Oh, no, that's all wrong. But to take a half a step and then not take a full step to me just seems a little. I don't understand what's going on in their mind to do that. And we could sit here and and talk about. 

Sol [00:43:37] Try to figure. 

Brian [00:43:38] Out how to figure out what's going on in someone else's mind. But I can't feel it's in mine half the time, so. 

Sol [00:43:42] No. Yeah, that's a tough one to tackle. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, humans were such we're such complex beings and really dictating why. 

Sol [00:43:52] Somebody thinks the way they. 

Sol [00:43:53] Think. Like it's difficult, even ourselves. We have so many things that we need to learn about ourselves. I'm still learning something new every single day. I'm like, Oh, wait, that's why I do that, right? So for me, trying to decipher someone else though, and not going to happen. 

Brian [00:44:09] So what is what is something that you've learned recently about yourself that was most impactful in the last year or two or whatever? 

Sol [00:44:16] Ooh, that is such a good question. 

Sol [00:44:19] I mean, I've learned a lot of things, honestly. 

Sol [00:44:23] I think one of the biggest. 

Sol [00:44:24] Things that I've learned. 

Sol [00:44:26] Is. 

Sol [00:44:26] I. 

Sol [00:44:27] Am a lot stronger than I give myself credit for. I mean, of course I know that I've been through a lot of difficult things in my life, but for the most part, I have always felt like I've gone through them with someone, right? Like with my, let's say, my mind the last. 

Sol [00:44:41] Day, like I went that I went through that with my mom. 

Sol [00:44:44] We were together. We went through it together. But recently going through a divorce and everything, like that's something that I very much had to go through by myself and not just going through a divorce, but going through the financial hardship that follows it. Yeah, I mean, of course, like I've had the support of friends and family who love me and who have made sure to known that I can count on them. And I really do appreciate that. I love them a lot, but for the most part, keeping myself. 

Sol [00:45:12] Out of the gutter for say yeah, like that's been all on. 

Sol [00:45:16] Me. Yeah. And I think I've come to realize that, you know, that you can't really I don't know how to explain this other than I. I've learned a lot of self-love, self appreciation. I've learned that when you learn to love yourself, you learn to take yourself out of negative situations. You learn how to create your own boundaries and not just create them, but uphold them, respect them. And I think those boundaries are sometimes even thin. 

Sol [00:45:43] Yourself, right? 

Sol [00:45:44] Yeah. So you're creating boundaries for myself in terms of how I speak to myself, how I think about myself. I used to be a very. I used to be very careful towards my self-image. Um, I, I mean, I just. On social media a while ago, I posted this, this comparison photo. 

Sol [00:46:04] How? A year ago? Well, a little bit over a year now, I was doing. 

Sol [00:46:09] £115. I was eating virtually nothing. I was so afraid of eating. I felt like I was ugly. And like, in order for me to be. 

Sol [00:46:20] Like, beautiful, I had to, like, be in this category. Like, I had to be super skinny and I had to look this way and do this and do that. And I hated myself. I really did. I remember the way that I used to talk to myself. 

Sol [00:46:35] And, you know, way I don't know if it's the fact that I changed my entire life in the sense of changing, like the situation that I was in. But within the last few months I've seen so much growth within myself. 

Sol [00:46:48] I am no longer scared of eating. In fact, I decided to do bodybuilding and I got to the point where I was eating like 2400 calories a day. During my booking season, I loved every second of that. I had started to rise over so long, but I'm like, This is amazing. Food tastes great. And yeah, it's. 

Sol [00:47:10] Just really understanding that that relationship. 

Sol [00:47:12] With food was different, you know, that it. 

Sol [00:47:14] Wasn't something to be scared. 

Sol [00:47:16] Of, but rather is something to honor your body and everything that it does for you. Um, and along with that. 

Sol [00:47:22] I started seeing a lot of changes within my own mind, right? Like, I started becoming more appreciative of what my. 

Sol [00:47:28] Body does for me. And rather. 

Sol [00:47:29] Than tearing myself down because, oh, I wish I looked like that, or I wish. 

Sol [00:47:33] I. 

Sol [00:47:34] Could fit in these jeans or whatever. Now I was more so like. 

Sol [00:47:37] Okay, I can just find new jeans. It's not a big deal, but like at least I'm healthy. I'm doing everything that I need to do. My body is treating me right. And yeah, I really I feel kind of bad now because some days I feel like I'm getting a little, like, full of myself. My mom. Yeah, sometimes I feel a little full of myself, but maybe just because I was so used to giving myself all that self-love. Yeah. Then I'm like, okay, maybe I need to tone it down a bit. Maybe I need to start coming down. 

Brian [00:48:10] So. So what do you think? I'll ask the same question two different ways, and one be easier to answer than the other. Oh, for sure. What was the impetus that made that change in you to start feeling feelings about that self-love and taking care of yourself and and allowing yourself just to be you? Or what would you tell someone that was in that situation helped them make it out of what would you have what would you have told yourself a year and a half or whatever ago that yeah. 

Sol [00:48:35] So I mean, and I'll be honest, I. 

Sol [00:48:38] Kind of went through this just because as my marriage was ending, I went through this period where I was so continuously stressed out that I actually ended up in the hospital with seizure. And I remember that for me was the last straw when I told myself like no anymore. Even my body is telling me no. So I remember that the same week we went to therapy, and that's when I finally told them like I can't. And after that happened, I went through a little period of depression. But I have a very amazing friend. His name is Alfonzo. 

Sol [00:49:13] He he lives with me. He's my roommate. And every single morning he would come into my room, he would rip off the blankets, and he'd be like, let's go, let's get up enough crying. And, you know. 

Sol [00:49:26] At first I hated him for it. 

Brian [00:49:28] Every morning. 

Sol [00:49:28] Every morning I hated him for it. I was like, No, I don't want to do anything. I want to stay in bed. 

Sol [00:49:34] But every single morning he kept doing it and he kept doing it and he kept doing it. So I fed off so much his energy of like, let's keep going life. Keep life. 

Sol [00:49:43] Continues. 

Sol [00:49:44] Yeah, but I then started to somehow adopt that myself. 

Sol [00:49:48] I guess I became for myself. 

Sol [00:49:51] After a while I started telling myself like, you know. 

Sol [00:49:54] You've made it through a few days, even when you thought you couldn't. Yeah. 

Sol [00:49:57] So let's make it through another one. Let's make it through another one, then another one, then another one. 

Sol [00:50:02] And so I started enjoying life again. And then I realized I was pure and I was more myself than I had been for months. And I finally realized that one day when Alfonso actually. 

Sol [00:50:14] Told me, Proud. 

Sol [00:50:16] Of you. 

Sol [00:50:16] Don't remember the last time I. 

Sol [00:50:18] Heard you cry? Because for a while there I was crying every single day, every single day. And now I am like, happy to. 

Sol [00:50:25] Say it's been a few months since I've actually shed a tear. 

Sol [00:50:28] Or at least, you know, a painful tear. Yeah. Um, but, I mean. 

Sol [00:50:33] If anything, I just want to stay like something that I have learned is that in one way or another, you are in charge of your own life. You can sit around and you can allow someone else to have that power over you. Or you can say, You know what, no, my life is my own. I have that power over myself. Because truly, I feel like when you learn to love yourself. You learn to recognize your own power. You learn to recognize what you're capable of and all the strength that you have. You learn to give yourself so much more credit. You learn that you fly. Tears you down. You build yourself right up. And do it. And just think of like I started just thinking about it this way. When my dad disappeared, the longest time I thought my life was over. I felt as though my life was over. I genuinely there were days where I didn't know how I was going to make it through. Yet I did. And now I look back at it and I'm like, all those days where I question myself, where I question whether I would be able to continue living. Did I see it now? Only those days are past. So what makes me think these days aren't going to pass too? Yeah. 

Brian [00:51:39] Humans are so bad at over predicting fear fearful situations and they're so bad at realizing that they can take care of it. How strong they are. 

Sol [00:51:48] Yeah, exactly. 

Brian [00:51:49] And so when something the worst does happen, you think, oh, I'll never be able to survive. I don't know how you do that. You do it the same way anybody else does in that situation one day at a time. Alfonso, they're pulling the covers off, saying, let's go one one day, let's just get up, start today. And sometimes it can be. Well, it's often very painful and very difficult. Go take a shower. Get out the door. 

Sol [00:52:09] Yeah, exactly. And honestly, some days are going to hurt like hell. Yeah. Some days you are going to really, truly want to throw in the towel and say, I'm done. And I know I've. 

Sol [00:52:19] Been there a lot of times more than I care for. Right. But at the end of. 

Sol [00:52:25] The day, just speaks of your resilience and your mental strength when you can look back at it and say, I got through that, I did that. And I think ultimately that's even more empowering when you realize that you can that when you thought you couldn't. That's when you can the most. Right? I think and honestly, that's something really interesting about bodybuilding. It's something that I have really fallen in love with the players bodybuilding because of that, because let's say when. 

Sol [00:52:53] You're getting to the. 

Sol [00:52:54] Last of. 

Sol [00:52:55] Your reps and you think you can't move that way anymore and you think you're going to you think you're going to fail, you think you're right about to hit failure. 

Brian [00:53:03] And you're pushing yourself to failure point. You know that you're doing that. 

Sol [00:53:07] Then you do more. You push yourself past what. 

Sol [00:53:10] You thought was going to be your failure. 

Sol [00:53:11] Point, and you realize your. 

Sol [00:53:13] Mind is so much stronger than your body is. And in that same way, I think of all those days that I laid in bed crying, thinking that I wasn't going to make it past another day, and I did. And then you walk out feeling so powerful and so content with yourself, knowing that you can handle so much more than you thought. And I mean, honestly, there were days where I contemplated ending my life, and now, looking back at it, I am so thankful that I did not. Because imagine all of the things that I would have missed out on and not just I feel like it truly is just such a sense, like such a source of accomplishment. 

Sol [00:53:50] And like feeling powerful. 

Sol [00:53:52] Knowing that I pushed myself past failure, both mentally and now physically. Right. 

Brian [00:53:58] And the physiology of doing that, what happens to your muscle tissues when you push yourself past failure? What happens? 

Sol [00:54:04] They tear, but then they build back up stronger. Yes. And in the same way, it's interesting. I was having a conversation with my brother a few months ago and that's something that really stood out to me. He told me, these are growing pains. When you work out and you tear your muscles, they grow back stronger. But before they. 

Sol [00:54:22] Do, they hurt, right? They're sore. Or in the same way when you're. 

Sol [00:54:26] Growing, when you're a little kid, you're growing. 

Sol [00:54:29] Up, your bones hurt as they reconstruct themselves. Right? 

Sol [00:54:33] Then guess what? They grow back even stronger if you break a leg. I mean, yeah, sure it hurts, but it also creates a callus and then scale is is actually way stronger. So at the end of the day, those are growing pains and something hurts. That's when you learn the most. And it's not to say. 

Sol [00:54:50] Like go be a masochist and hurt yourself for no reason. But it's also it's it's. 

Sol [00:54:55] More so to say, don't be discouraged because when you're going through the hardest times. 

Sol [00:55:00] Those are the moments. 

Sol [00:55:02] When you're going to grow and learn the emotions. Those are your growing pains. 

Brian [00:55:06] I heard a brand new phrase yesterday that I'd never heard of before, that I have written down that I have to go research called trauma growth. And I've never heard of that before. 

Sol [00:55:14] I've never heard that either. 

Brian [00:55:15] But it's based off of that same idea that when you experience a trauma, if you go through all of the layers of grief and loss and come out on the other end, there's actually a growth opportunity. And by that. But it also makes me think of a comment you mentioned earlier that you're feeling too good about yourself, you're feeling too big, you're feeling too thin, you get too big. Can you get too strong? Can you get can you. 

Sol [00:55:36] I mean, boy, that's a good point. Can always get bigger. You can always get stronger. 

Brian [00:55:40] Yes. So asking that question is doing yourself a disservice right now. 

Sol [00:55:45] That is so. 

Brian [00:55:45] True. Now there are other people that will always tell you that you're too loud, you're too big, you're too too strong willed. You're too independent. You're too whatever. But. 

Sol [00:55:54] A whole nother group of people. 

Brian [00:55:55] Exactly. You find yourself a new environment. 

Sol [00:55:57] Sometimes you outgrow people. Yeah. No, it's true. Seeing that you would bring that up. 

Sol [00:56:02] Earlier we were talking about Malcolm Gladwell, and there's actually one of his books, I can't remember which one, because, again, I've read all of them. So it's kind of figure out which one it is. But in one of them he talks about. 

Sol [00:56:15] He tells a story of Barack Obama, for example, and not just Barack Obama, but children in general who. 

Sol [00:56:23] Have. 

Sol [00:56:23] Lost a parent in a young age, at a young age. And how they've gone through that trauma, then they've excelled later on in life because it's gotten to the point where you lose your most valued person or the thing that you value the most. You've already been through the worst of it. So it could get worse, right? 

Sol [00:56:42] You survived it. 

Sol [00:56:43] Exactly. And you survived it. So that actually creates a sense of power, a sense of empowerment, where you think to yourself, I've already been through the worst of it. 

Sol [00:56:52] I can do anything, I can get myself through anything. And it's so interesting because I. 

Sol [00:56:57] Remember thinking that same thing. 

Sol [00:57:00] You know, during my getting better phase after after my separation. 

Sol [00:57:06] I remember thinking in a way so much in life with my, you know, with family separation, I'm being sexually assaulted as well as a teenager. Like all these different things that just kind of accumulated. 

Sol [00:57:18] Around the same time. And I went through it and I got through it. 

Sol [00:57:22] There is nothing that I can't get. There is nothing that I can't handle. I mean, I might cry. I might have a hard time. I might, you know, and it's okay. So human response we natural. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to get through it. Right. Like I was reading the other day, a friend of mine shared something along the lines of, you know, you might be scared, can still do things even through the fear, even when you're scared. Fear isn't something that can truly hold you back from achieving your goals. It can only do so if you allow it to. 

Brian [00:57:53] Doesn't truly exist. It's a construct of our own minds about something that might happen. 

Sol [00:57:59] Exactly. And it's like, are we going to allow it to. Are we going to allow that construct to keep us from attaining our goals, from achieving everything that we want to do. 

Sol [00:58:09] In this life? No. I mean, honestly. 

Sol [00:58:11] I am of the mindset now that. 

Sol [00:58:13] If you can do it, you can do it. Go do it. Don't wait until. 

Sol [00:58:17] Tomorrow to wait until next week. Honestly, that whole body building for. 

Sol [00:58:22] Me, like it's been a life changer. It really has been. One day I just walked into a gym and I was like, okay, I. 

Sol [00:58:28] Just want. 

Sol [00:58:29] To get a quote. That's all I want. I walked out of there. I was like, I guess I have a team now. I have a meeting. Meeting in April. Who cares? 

Brian [00:58:39] Really? 

Sol [00:58:39] That's how it happened. Like, it was just like from one day to like, I mean, not even one day to the next. It was just like five minute walk in the door. 

Brian [00:58:46] And walking. 

Sol [00:58:47] Out. Usually I walked in there, I walked out. I was like, okay, I guess I'm competing in April. That was it. That was it. I mean, like we it was already like a little advance of the gym and everything, but still it was unexpected. But at that time, I told myself, You know what, okay, I don't have to be afraid of this because I've been thinking about it for a while. Yeah, I've been thinking that one day I would love to do that. So why not have that day be now? Why not? Where are they going? Oh, my gosh. Oh, okay. So. Oh, my gosh. Everything comes back down to my dad. I don't know why, but, I mean, during the time I was going through a really bad depression, it was getting to the point where I. 

Sol [00:59:30] Was getting extremely suicidal. And I remember trying therapy, I tried medication and nothing seemed to help. 

Sol [00:59:38] I even had a friend give me an emotional support animal. 

Brian [00:59:43] Okay? 

Sol [00:59:43] And I love him so much. I still have him. He's my little baby. But even then, I still. 

Sol [00:59:49] It was not helping. And I remember one Sunday we came back from church and my mom went up to her room to sleep, and I locked myself in my room and I started writing down letters and those were my goodbye letters. And I remember writing one for my dad just in case he ever reappeared. And at that point I had been months. But after I wrote the letter, I laid them all down neatly on my bed, and I went to the kitchen. I grabbed a blade, I went to the bathroom. I start preparing everything in the night. Just got this feeling that, you know, maybe you should do one last prayer. So I knelt down in the bathroom and I remember praying to God. And I told him, I can't do this anymore. I can't see a way out. I don't see a way out. I don't see anything. Passive boy, if you have a different path for me and I was really so desperate because I began, I didn't see a way out. And I swear I have never, ever had a prayer answered so quickly in my life. The second I said. Three men, 2 seconds passed and the doorbell rings. And I thought like, Oh. 

Sol [01:00:57] That was weird. That was strange. God, I know. I was like, Heavenly Father, is that you? So I go out to the door. I open the door and it's the bishop. And I don't think he knows this. To this day, I don't think I've ever told him. But he saved my life day. Okay? I opened the door and he told me that he was driving by and he got the. 

Sol [01:01:21] Strong impression that he needed to. And yeah, we just talked for a while and he shared a message with me. We read the scriptures, everything, and he he was on his way. But that little interaction to me at that time were okay, even though that to. 

Sol [01:01:37] Him was just one small thing that he did. 

Sol [01:01:39] I truly felt. 

Sol [01:01:40] Like that was God speaking to me that day. And that night I grabbed all the letters and I hid them like, No, I can't let anybody see these. I still hold on to them just in case. But I was like, No, I'm not going to let anyone look at me, put everything away, clean my meds in the bathroom. 

Sol [01:01:59] And I went to bed and. 

Sol [01:02:01] The next. 

Sol [01:02:01] Morning I woke up and I told myself, okay. God did his part. I need to do mine. If I want something to change, then I need to change something, right? 

Sol [01:02:09] Nothing changes until something changes. 

Sol [01:02:11] And so that day, coming home from school, I used to walk home from school. I walked past the Herriman Rec Center and I thought, Oh. 

Sol [01:02:21] Okay, maybe I'll go in there. Maybe I'll sit with them there. And so I walk him. And then the top floor, they have like they have the gym area, though. Okay, maybe I'll check it out. I'll see what they'll see, what's going on there. And I just started seeing all these people lifting like weights and just, you know, being all gym people is all about the rise of OC. I've never been in here before, but they don't have to know that. I'll just mimic what they're doing right? And they just started to copy what people were doing. And I did the other day. I ended up so sore. So I told myself, okay, I'll go back tomorrow. But then the next day I was like, Man, I'm really sore. Maybe the next day. And initially I would only go like twice, maybe three times a week. And then I started feeling I started realizing that like on the days that I was going to the gym, I was feeling better. I was feeling way better in a way that I wasn't feeling with the medication and the way that I wasn't feeling with other other methods. Right. And so, yeah, it. 

Sol [01:03:26] Eventually just became a daily thing. I would go home from school and I would at first I would walk to the rec center and then once I. 

Sol [01:03:33] Started like feeling a little bit more full. Eric And then I started running to the rec center and. 

Sol [01:03:39] Then I would have run weights her run back and yeah, it just became an everyday thing. And honestly, yeah, both the bishop and the gym saved my life. 

Sol [01:03:48] Well, and. 

Brian [01:03:49] You, you had something to do. 

Sol [01:03:50] With. Well, yeah, I guess. I guess I did. That is true. Where? Look, that. Yeah, no, that is true. I got to give myself credit for that too. 

Sol [01:03:58] But yeah. And I don't know, once I, when I started noticing all those changes. 

Sol [01:04:03] I. 

Sol [01:04:04] Eventually in this fairly recently, probably within the last two years. 

Sol [01:04:08] You know what I want to do more like I would like to do more and I would see all these bodybuilders at the gym, especially. Herriman Yeah. I don't know why there so many bodybuilders in Herriman, but there is a ton. So I go to the gym and I would even like feel embarrassed working can next to them. I'm like they're like that person is Jack and there is such an inspiration to me. I'm like, okay, next, next time I'm, I'm going to come to a gym and I'm going to hit the weights harder. Yeah. And I'm going to go harder and harder and harder and yeah, I just I just started looking up to them so much. 

Brian [01:04:42] And then so explain the gap between doing that and then going into a gym to say, I need to just see what there is in here and then walking out on a team. And how did you stop going for a while or was this a different gym or. 

Sol [01:04:54] Oh, so so I think I think. 

Sol [01:04:57] Honestly, the same thing happened that happened like with the bishop, like the day after saying that whole, okay, like if something's got to change. 

Sol [01:05:06] I need to make the first move. Like, I need to change something after my separation. 

Sol [01:05:11] That's when I also went through my little period of depression. And then I told myself, okay, hang around, let's get up and do something. And so I told myself, All right, so what can I do to. 

Sol [01:05:21] Improve my quality of life and to. 

Sol [01:05:23] Improve myself? And so I thought to myself, okay, well, you're already going to the gym pretty consistently. 

Sol [01:05:28] And you've always wanted to be a bodybuilder. You've always wanted to do something along those lines. So why not just check it out? Yeah, and there's this bodybuilder friend that I made at the hair vendor, actually, and I saw on his Instagram that he was training with this one coach. So I was like, okay, maybe I'll check that out. So I messaged the coach and immediately he answered. 

Sol [01:05:53] She's like, Yes, I have an. 

Sol [01:05:54] Opening in 2 hours. I was like, okay, I guess I'm coming over to our house. And so I got there and at first it was just a conversation. 

Sol [01:06:04] I was just telling him like, I'm just trying to. 

Sol [01:06:06] Figure this out. I'm just trying to check and check out, see if it's something I want to do. And then I don't I don't know what that dude has, but he convinced me like 2 seconds. I was like, okay, all right. Three doing this. 

Brian [01:06:17] April, is it okay? 

Sol [01:06:18] Yeah. He's like, he's like, no, you're good. He's like, he literally told me he's like, if you wanted to compete in March or April, you could. I'm like, All right, okay, let's do it. 

Brian [01:06:28] There you. 

Sol [01:06:28] Go. And that was that. That's awesome. It was yeah. It was super quick. It was. And I honestly really appreciated it because it kind of allowed myself to come to the conclusion that if it's already on my mind, if I. 

Sol [01:06:41] Already think I can do. 

Sol [01:06:42] It, then why not try? I mean, what's the. 

Sol [01:06:44] Worst thing that could. 

Sol [01:06:44] Happen? You know, I don't win the show, okay? And I still learn something. I still had a great experience. I still taught. 

Sol [01:06:53] Myself that I can be very disciplined. 

Sol [01:06:55] Like the amount of discipline that I've. 

Sol [01:06:57] Developed within the last, what, like four or five. 

Sol [01:06:59] Months. Incredible. I've never been that disciplined in my life. Like from every from the way that I trained to the way that I eat. Yeah. I haven't had candy in months. I haven't had sugar in months. 

Brian [01:07:12] So are you still vegan? 

Sol [01:07:14] Well, right now. Right now, no. 

Brian [01:07:16] I was going to say because that's hard to get protein. 

Sol [01:07:18] So actually, the protein is actually not difficult even for a bodybuilder. Okay. And it's not that difficult. 

Sol [01:07:25] Tofu and vegan. 

Sol [01:07:28] Ground beef is what I eat for protein. 

Sol [01:07:30] Okay. 

Sol [01:07:31] I'm right now, though, I did also incorporate eggs into my diet. Okay. So I'm eating eggs as of now. I think once I go back into my walking season, I'll. 

Sol [01:07:41] Stop eating eggs again. Okay. Just to go back to my roots of being vegan. 

Brian [01:07:46] But that's a lot of tofu. 

Sol [01:07:48] It's like, yeah, it's like 200 grams of tofu a day. Plus the vegan can be. Yeah, it is quite a bit of tofu. You're not going to lie. But I also enjoy tofu. I it's gotten to the point where I've learned how to cook it that it no longer taste bland and yeah, yeah, I enjoy it. 

Brian [01:08:08] That's because I have two daughters that they haven't. They weren't vegan, they were both vegetarian and one of them still is on. It struggles with their daily protein because she lives a very busy life and she walks a lot. She lives in Manhattan and she does a lot of walking. So she's just burning calories, getting to and from places and not enough time in between to eat. So it's hard. It's one of those, I believe it's just kind of you have to really plan for it. Yeah. And she doesn't have the time to plan for. And I have another daughter who's your age that was doing the same thing. She's going to school up at the U. And she just does not plan for it. And so she just doesn't have the energy and everything else. And she says, I have to start getting protein on the run and in other places because I just can't plan far enough in advance to to have the intake that I need. 

Sol [01:08:53] So yeah, no. Yeah. And I mean honestly, like I've. 

Sol [01:08:56] Had a very busy schedule and everything too. So first I would really struggle. But the one thing that I came to realize is, you know. 

Sol [01:09:03] I'm only going to struggle as long as I don't plan for it. Yeah. So now let's say my day off Sunday, I cook for the entire week. Okay, really, if you look at my fridge right now, like all my food is already prepped. 

Sol [01:09:17] Everything is already good to. 

Sol [01:09:18] Go. So during the week I can just grab like my Tupperware, eat what I need to eat, wash and get it ready for next Sunday. So, yeah, I mean, that's the only way that I can. 

Sol [01:09:29] Make it work because otherwise. 

Sol [01:09:30] I would be struggling a lot. But yeah, no, I mean, it's, it's been it's been a struggle, but it's been a good struggle. It's not one that I complain about. I'm actually very happy. I've seen a lot. 

Sol [01:09:43] Of changes. 

Sol [01:09:44] In my mind, not just in my body. I mean, yeah, the physical changes are great, you know, you start feeling better about yourself. 

Sol [01:09:52] In that way, but also it just you learn how mentally strong you are and you learn how disciplined you can be. Because at some. 

Sol [01:10:00] Point. 

Sol [01:10:00] Especially right now, I'm in a bodybuilding prep, which means I am cutting. 

Sol [01:10:05] I am in a caloric deficit, I'm eating way less carbs, working. 

Sol [01:10:09] Out just as. 

Sol [01:10:10] Intensely. I'm exhausted a lot. Yeah, but at. 

Sol [01:10:13] The same time, it's incredible because I realize. 

Sol [01:10:16] You know, why I got this. I can do this. I mean, sure, I have like 17 weeks to go, but. 

Brian [01:10:22] Yeah, well, but it's also nice to know that you've got a plan from someone who knows what they're doing. Exactly, and you're just winging it, trying things. It's like, this might be causing my body more harm than it's actually. But if you have someone that's in charge of the nutrition and and the workout and everything else, it's like, okay, now I'm going to put trust in them. Yeah. 

Sol [01:10:38] And and you just learn to trust the process. 

Sol [01:10:41] Yes. No, honestly. Yeah. That and that gives you. 

Sol [01:10:43] Such a peace of mind, too. 

Sol [01:10:44] Especially when you're like a novice, like. Like I am. I cannot imagine doing this, but. 

Brian [01:10:49] Then you start seeing the results too. It's like, this is working. Okay? I see where this is going and I can get used to this. 

Sol [01:10:55] No, it's true. It's true. And it's funny because I love talking about this. I really do. And I think you can tell, but I feel kind of bad because I think my mom, my family, they're getting kind of tired of hearing about it. They're like, Oh, change the channel. And I'm over here, like, all excited. Guess what? It's like I, it's, it's right down to 2% body fat. They're like, okay, nobody cares. 

Brian [01:11:18] So I do. That's a big deal. 

Sol [01:11:20] Like, I'm having a great time. But yeah, no, it's, it's been amazing. It's been great. 

Brian [01:11:26] Thank you so much for coming today. I do have another question. First of all, one thing is, is there anything else you want to cover? 

Sol [01:11:31] Oh, my gosh, I can't really think of anything else. Honest. I feel like I mean, I feel like I talk nonstop. 

Brian [01:11:36] No, it's fantastic. You've been great. 

Sol [01:11:38] Thank you. 

Brian [01:11:39] Yeah. No, I'm so excited. There you go. So then my last question is, do you want listeners to take away from this conversation? What are the big bullet points that you would like them to. 

Sol [01:11:49] Oh, man. Okay. I feel like there are a few, just to kind of recap on everything that we've talked about. Number one, try to look outside of yourself, try to learn different experiences, try to hear other perspectives, try to not be so focused on yourself. Number two, recognize the power that you recognize how much power over yourself, hold how much you can control, how much you can change, how much you can himself. And three be kind to yourself. It's understandable. We all go through difficult things in life. We all go through our challenges, and we all wish that we could change so many things, but have grace for yourself and realize that you're human. 

Sol [01:12:33] And that's okay. It's okay if you need to break down every now and then, just make sure to pick yourself back up. Whatever it is that you're going through. 

Sol [01:12:41] There is always going to be a way out, even if you can't see it right now. Promise. Just keep holding on and you will eventually see it. 

Brian [01:12:48] It's beautiful. 

Sol [01:12:48] Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate your time. 

Brian [01:12:54] Let's take a few minutes to talk about education and social reform. During the episode, I saw what needs to happen to take down barriers that prevent change. Her answer was simple Change in social reform always starts with oneself. So today's conversation in our online Facebook forum is threefold. One What social changes are you most passionate about? Q How have you educated yourself on the relevant issue? And three, what resources would you recommend to others who want to learn more about that social issue? In past episode, we've specifically discussed issues with racism, feminism, LGBTQ plus religion, adoption, abuse, and a variety of other topics, including populations of unsheltered and now undocumented individuals. I would love it if you'd take time to share your thoughts on these topics online at our Facebook forum. And thank you for listening to Strangers You Know.