Welcome to Mindshift Power podcast, a show for teenagers and the adults who work with them, where we have raw and honest conversations. I'm your host, Fatima Bey, the mind shifter. And welcome, everyone. Today, we have with us Professor Lyrical. He is from the Washington DC area.

He is a professor of mathematics at a local university there. He is a PhD, an inspirational speaker, and a rap artist. His entire career has been centered around youth and young adults, which is why he is here today. So how are you doing today, professor Lyrical? What's up, Fatima?

Thanks for having me. I'm doing great. Good. I like to dive right into it. So you have all this PhDs.

你有博士學位。你真的熱愛教育。你還有很多我沒提到的事。為什麼是說唱？其實我一直很喜歡這個問題，學術和嘻哈都連結在一起。

So I was doing rap well before academics. So the the real question for a lot of people that know me is why education. You know what I'm saying? Because that that definitely came later in life. But to flip it, I mean, so the the hip hop has always just been a part of my life since I was a kid.

喜歡創意寫作，從一年級開始就喜歡上了所有與詩相關的事物。對吧？我小時候參加過詩歌比賽，還有名字和標題比賽。我很小的時候贏了一場，這讓我有點相信老師的讚美了。她說，『哦，你真有創意。 ’

You know? And I stuck with that and really kind of you know? Thanks to a teacher. Right? Like, that I believe that I was, like, creative and always kinda remember the power of, that I would get to feel a piece of when you'd be in a classroom talking to other kids as a performer and then seeing the attention that came and the the captive audience that the kids would have.

Because you need cool mentors in society, whatever. And all too often, it's hard to get those guests to come through the class. And I just it hit me. I was just like, this would be a really dope path for me to blend in with just the performing instead of just coming and doing some, you know, look at me, jump around, and do my rap thing. Like, what substance are you then gonna share with the captive audience?

所以教育這件事完全說得通。所以我非常欣賞你，帶著你的熱情，決定用它做一些除了娛樂之外的有意義的事情。這其實是我經常教的原則，尤其是在高中的時候。但即使是和老年人交談，也是如此。好的。

你知道，II，你聽我私下說過，但我看過一些藝人，感覺沒什麼特別的印象。你很有錢，很有名，可以在舞台上扭動臀部，可以勁爆說唱，可以勁爆搖滾，不管是什麼類型的音樂。但那又怎樣？你拿這些來做什麼？對吧。

I mean That's what I look at. I I I do give credit to artists who do that well. You know? Like, I mean, we all need the respite and the the break from reality kind of thing that entertainment affords, but it is really nice. I mean, that's what I gravitate to when they're when you feel like it's not just junk food.

Right? You feel like there's some substance in the meal and, you know, you feel it makes you you know, eat look look at marketing with food, really, to to continue it. It's like, if something sounds a little healthy, we, like, feel better about it. We're like, this tastes good and it's healthy. Right?

That's, like, the ideal. And And I I don't think it's much different with the way that we consume any entertainment. It's like we wanna feel like the mind is getting to be as much of a part of it, as possible. So, I I I always love it when it's that way, but I get it when it's not. Because sometimes you just want a chocolate bar.

You know what I mean? Right? Yeah. Well, the thing is doing something with it, that can come in many different ways. Mhmm.

So music can be used to uplift. Music can also be used politically and and has a big history of that. It could be used to make people aware, to get people to stand up and fight or whatever. That's still a usage. It doesn't all have to be butterflies and cotton candy, but it's still a usage.

所以，我仍然印象深刻。即使我們的政治觀點不同，我也喜歡看到人們運用自己的技能去做他們認為有幫助的事情。對。對。幫助動物，無論什麼。當然。

So I love that you that you did that. I appreciate it. So right now, I'm gonna let the I'll play a tiny little snippet, just a few seconds, of one of your, more recent songs. So let's just here we go. You sound good down right here, baby.

Follow me for a minute. My skill level is still better than most of y'all. Posterize your poses, you're still posting, but most of y'all. Hit your subject matter, this lack and still have me mad at y'all. Hocus pocus, rabbies lack focus, go take it at a raw.

My catalogs evolve, lyrics are classical, from the pad Alright. Now that you heard that, you guys heard a little bit of what his music is about. So let me ask you, professor lyrical. What would you consider yourself to be most passionate about? I mean, I default to my son.

是的。我剛和他一起待了一天，所以有點偏心。不過，這通常是我的第一個答案。我知道很多人想要的是，嗯。我們都知道。

Like, we know, but, nah, it's like more than that. It's like, I wanna make the music that my son would have for a blueprint. I wanna make the music that he can be proud of. I was just eating with him on the way home from this this school activity, and I said to him, we're we're actually talking about Elf on the Shelf. And, and I was like, you know, it's always a good idea to act like somebody's watching or somebody's listening.

對吧？對我來說，他就是那樣的人。對吧？所以我對我說的話和不說的話都非常謹慎。所以除了這一點，我很難說什麼。

And I think if we don't have that person in life, it's almost like fake it. Like, pretend your grandmother's listening. Like, what would you say? You know? And I realized that sometimes sounds like it could be boring, but I'm like, no.

I wanna say something that's gonna grab my grandmother, but it'll still grab my son, and it'll grab whoever, my my friend in the corner or you or the person in the boardroom. Right? Because if it's if it's true, it should resonate. And so that true resonate part for me is important. Like, just reading a book report and trying to call it a rap probably isn't gonna be the greatest thing in the world.

But to the previous question too, it's like you can get the substance in there. So trying to blend those paths for me, I also extend to other people. So I'm really excited when I meet someone in a whether it's a seminar or conference, education, performing, and you find someone who's who they talk to you. They're like, yo. You got this career that you do, this passion where you blend them together.

Like, you know, how did you come up with that or whatever? And I always flip it, and I'm like, what two things do you really like that don't necessarily appear like they go together? And if you had to, how would you force them together? You know what I mean? And Mhmm.

It it might feel a little, like, life coach or whatever, but I don't think it's too far away from education. You know? So I'm always trying to learn something, try to be a lifelong learner. But when someone's working for you, you wanna share it. You wanna be like, hey.

Look. Look at look at this. You can do this too, but you have to feel emboldened to be able to do something that maybe somebody has told you. Yeah. No one's gonna wanna hear that.

No one's gonna wanna see that. No one's done that before. You know? And so I guess the the the long and short of the answer is is, like, you know, trying to take my viewpoint, being able to share it with somebody else in a way that doesn't just sound like, oh, look at me. Look what I'm doing.

不。你也可以做這種事，並且加入自己的想法。對我來說，這能帶給我很多回報。所以這是一種啟發。明白嗎？

Finding that inspiration in music, inspiring others to kinda do something like that. Every every time I go out, I'm kinda leading with that, you know, if I can. And if I'm just up on a stage saying a song, I hope they like it enough that they're gonna find find something else. So if I can, you know, stay centered on those things too outside of just my son, that's probably what does it for me. Okay.

I like I like that. You've taken bits and pieces of your personal life and gave them a purpose that fuels you for what you do. Mhmm. That's what I'm hearing. Yeah.

毫無疑問。沒錯。現在告訴我們為什麼，因為你知道，很多年輕人覺得教育不重要。教育很無聊，是強加在我們身上的。

我們這麼做只是因為我們必須這麼做。沒錯。但教育為什麼真的很重要呢？我的意思是，這是一個價值百萬美元的問題。當你投入其中卻看不到回報時，例如你在籃球場上練習運球動作，卻沒人付錢讓你打球。

對吧？沒人付錢讓你上學。沒人給你獎學金。也沒人給你NBA薪水。是什麼讓你繼續堅持下去，對吧，讓你達到那種水平，獲得那樣的機會？

And there's a part of that answer in school other than just the altruistic, oh, you're gonna better your mind and learn things about the world. Right? It's like, let's face it. Most students, most kids wanna hear about how am I gonna better my life. Well, it's the only pathway I know that, like, pays dividends well after the time you get that piece of paper.

Right? It'll pay that dividend. No one could take it away, and it's the kind of thing that gives you opportunity. You might be studying something that has nothing to do with what you're gonna do for a career, but it's like if you learn how to think critically about a topic, and let's say your reward for that is some university bestows upon you some piece of paper that says, I got my credential in this area. Just the process of doing it is like the process of being on the court when no one's watching, and you're out there and you're dribbling.

Right? You're just working on your handle, working on your handle, and you're getting better and you're getting better. Someday, there may be a payoff. But even if it doesn't come, you've benefited from the process of watching self betterment happen in real time. Right?

Mhmm. I I go to court and I shoot every day and I record it. And I remind myself when I watch the videos, I'm like, you sucked, like, not too long ago. Right? And you're looking at this video here, and you just hit 10 straight.

And sometimes we need that visual. Just like I got records behind me on the wall, sometimes you need that visual to say, hey. I went and did that. Right? And how did I get it done?

I was practicing in the lab when no one was looking. It wasn't when the records came out or when the video came out. I was in the lab when no one was looking. I was skipping the the party. I was skipping the fun stuff.

For me, this is fun, but I was I was sacrificing something to get it done when no one was looking and there was no reward. You know what I mean? Education can is is really literally that. It feels crappy. Like, why am I doing this?

You know, once you do have some of those credentials and you start to stack them, they're permanently in the treasure chest. Right? And you can whip them out whenever time requires. It stinks who have to do that sometimes, but it isn't, just a it's a door opener, and it's an opportunity if nothing else. And they they pay dividends when you least expect it.

So I think that's an excellent point. I like the way you you phrase that. You know? It's something that the imagery that you give us there keeps giving, once you got it. And it's not just a one time thing because sometimes people require for certain jobs that you have a bachelor's degree, and they don't really care what the topic is.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I can't do it. Paper.

I mean, don't get it twisted. In some cases. In some cases. There there's the other side of that coin. I mean, I know I'm being sarcastic, but it's like, there's a lot of stuff you're gonna do in school that has no relevance to your life whatsoever.

Right. And sometimes it is in math. Sometimes it isn't the subject I teach. Right? It could be in your math class.

You might be have a job with your accountant for the rest of your life. Do you really need calculus? The answer is probably no. You know what I'm saying? You don't.

You need to sign it. Though. Right? Yeah. I also wanna point out another, another what I see as a major, major, major benefit to education of any kind, discipline.

Everything in life that works, anything anytime anybody has success in anything, doesn't matter what the topic is, doesn't matter what the subject, doesn't matter what the career is. 100% of the time, you need some form of discipline. Absolutely. And what I like about education of any kind on any level, it requires some form of discipline. That's right.

And that alone can prepare you for life in ways that'll pay you more than just money. Yep. And people don't even think about it that way, but it's true. I I am inspired by that message always. I rap about that message.

如果有人說，嘿，吐出16，通常16會這樣。這對我們來說可能是個吸引人的地方，我的第一個主要個人單曲廣告叫做《焦點》，當時我主要靠抒情。這很有趣。我兒子剛才在聽車裡的聲音，所以，這件事我又一次記憶猶新。

Came out in, the the album it was almost called Infinity. It came out in 02/2005, and the single came out in 02/2006 on vinyl. Right? And the hook of the song is from The Locks, and they say the determination, the dedication, and discipline. And just the dope way that they said that with all those d's in there.

Right? It was like, I was using it like my determination, the dedication, and discipline. The focus is back. And so literally talking about staying focused, having determination, dedication, and discipline, it is a secret formula. There's no shortcuts.

If you get a shortcut, you're just fortunate. Something fell in your lap. Don't be don't be patting yourself on the back too hard. If you didn't put in the dedication like you said, you know, it was probably all a house of cards. You know?

我想快速插播捷徑。有時候捷徑就像微波爐加熱食物和烤箱加熱食物的比較。微波爐加熱的食物，雖然有熱量，但不會持續很長時間，幾分鐘就涼了。沒錯。如果你用烤箱加熱食物，就能得到酥脆的邊緣。

Mhmm. It's the heat lasts for, like, twenty to thirty minutes. Mhmm. It's not the same quality. Just something to think about.

這就像重新加熱披薩和把披薩放進烤箱一樣。我的意思是，哦，是的。完全不同。遷移。就像那個比喻。

You gotta you got some verses. You might have some verses in there. For sure. It's all about the metaphors. So let me ask you this.

我們談論教育及其重要性，但如果我們得不到所需的教育，會是什麼樣子？所以我對此有很深的理解，我知道我有偏見。我本人也抱持偏見。我見過很多朋友，他們一開始的路和我一樣，甚至可能略有不同。有很多例子表明，他們中的一些人比我做得好得多。

Those are the outliers is what I wanna say out there. It's not the one offs to pay attention to. We can all say, oh, I have a friend who's a blah blah blah and has done unbelievably well. On average, that's not what's gonna happen. On average, the higher your education level typically is going to turn into longer term wealth.

We know that statistically. There's countless studies on it. Right? So the fact that there are great jobs out there that you can do with your hands or you can do with a certain talent that don't require formal schooling or the traditional academy way of schooling, that's great if you find one of those pathways. But, traditionally, doing something that requires no education or no skill is usually a pathway to no employment, no income, and no sustainability.

Right? Unless you turn to something that's probably fringe, illegal, or probably not that moral ethical. Right? Right. The the tried and true pathways have been tried by somebody usually smarter than us.

Right? And the the alternative ones have been tried by somebody smarter than us. But we can watch with the results of the empirical evidence of what usually happens when people take those tributaries. Right? So it's like we all wanna outsmart the system.

我們都想找到天才的做事方法，這有點像是買彩券。例如，你可能有個計劃。你可能比我聰明，而且有個很棒的計畫。你可能有一套技巧來實現它。但我不確定我是否具備這套技巧來實現它。

So for me, what has what has worked is doing what somebody else has done and trying to put my own spin on it a little bit. Like Right. Right. Being being educated is not a unique thing. Right?

But sometimes we feel like we wanna have that secret sauce, you know, and do it different. But it's like, well, if you just look on average, people who do it that way tend to do pretty better over the long haul. So I'm not knocking any other way to do it. I'm just saying in my life and the people that I'm around, again, it's from my own bias. When I look at the people in my world, whether it's academia or whatnot, people that are usually very, diligent, again, that determination, dedication, discipline comes into it, and that have achieved something worth being proud of.

這通常並非偶然。如果你要從事科學或其他領域的工作，通常都會有條不紊，其中一部分已經融入科學研究的體系中。所以，即使你不把它當作職業，你也能在生活中獲得額外的好處。所以在我看來，這真是雙贏。明白嗎？

我還想指出一點，因為當我們使用「教育」這個詞時，人們會以為我們只談論大學。對，大學教育，但事實並非如此。對。所以對於聽眾，我們和同意我觀點的教授來說，教育只是代表你學到了一些東西。

Absolutely. It doesn't mean that you went to college. You education for you might be trade school. It could have been, stuff that you learned on your own. There are people who are successful in careers because they'd studied themselves.

Like, for example, I'm a professional seamstress. I've been doing wedding gowns for over twenty years. There's no school that I can go to to get a piece of paper to officially get a PhD in sewing. If there was, I would have it. I've taught I'm serious.

我教過縫紉。沒有什麼比婚紗更複雜了。絕對沒有什麼比婚紗更複雜了。沒錯。婚紗。沒錯。

Yeah. And and I make and design them, and I've sewn them, and I've taught other people how to do it. It's taken me years Yeah. Of practice, of working in the field. My education was being the alteration manager over at David's Bridal.

對。我在那裡待了十年。這就是我的教育。就是這樣。我在那裡學習。

I learned while I got paid to learn. Even though that wasn't the goal at the time, that's what it became. Yeah. And, you know, for those of you listening, I want you to know that when we say education, if traditional school is not set up for your brain and doesn't work for you, it doesn't mean that you don't get the education. If you gotta go out there and get it yourself, do it.

If you gotta go online to learn whatever it is you wanna learn, do it. And I'm talking about a principle right now. So the details of what you wanna learn, I don't know what that is. You could you can figure that out, but there's always a way for you to learn what you need to learn to get into the field that you wanna get into. Absolutely.

我有點兒不著邊際了。現在你比以往任何時候都更常看到這種情況。我的意思是，有了生成式人工智慧以及我們現在觸手可及的所有東西，你就能像基努·李維一樣，做些類似《駭客任務》的事情。我知道功夫，那種你幾乎可以瞬間獲得資訊的東西。不過，這又回到你之前用女裁縫師做比喻的時候了。

有人可能聽過這個故事。如果他們沒聽過你說的幕後工作，他們只會說，哦，太棒了。這工作真不錯。我可能做完之後就能發大財了。對吧？

但他們沒有聽到工作本身。他們沒有聽到工作如何完成並不重要。換句話說，所有的教育都會為你提供幫助，它會給你一些事實、數據，希望還有一些體驗的機會，還有一些人作為你的導師，希望他們只是在旁邊引導你，而不是總是試圖在舞台上扮演聖人。對吧？但它會給你所需要的鼓勵，對吧，也許電腦現在還不能那麼有效率地做到這一點，對吧，它會指引你正確的方向，讓你接觸到該領域的所有專家。

Mhmm. That's maybe what the formalized process does, but it's not any different than whether you take in martial arts. You're gonna go down, you're gonna learn a system, and they're gonna say, here's your belt or whatever the thing is they're gonna do is you've been led down a path with somebody else who's done it before and has just made more mistakes than you. It's all it really is. Somebody's made more mistakes than you and is trying to maybe help you avoid a couple of them to save you a little bit of time.

But still, it's not taking shortcuts. It's just saying, I don't wanna send you into a pothole. That's a little different. Right? So I wanna point out, you just made me think of this.

對於聽眾朋友來說，你們大多數人可能都沒意識到，但我肯定知道，因為當時我負責改衣部門，不得不僱用當時全美規模最大、客流量最大的婚紗店之一的裁縫。這意味著我必須僱用不少裁縫師。對吧？所以我採訪了很多人，做了很多縫紉測試。我僱傭了很多人。

And I can tell you some of the best in Emmy Do Me the absolute best sewers that you're gonna find in this country. 98% of them learned on their own. They did not officially go to school. Take that in for a moment. Right.

And that's that's in my field. I can talk about my field. I don't know about all the other fields. You can't do that in medical or law, and, obviously, you you need formal education for those things. And, and certain types of engineering, most of it.

You need do need formal education for those things. But there are a lot of other fields that you can learn on your own. The some of the teachers did that I would trust to sell my own stuff learned on their own. Right. They learned on their own, and then they took in whatever they could, wherever they worked.

So they made it a point to learn. You but I wanna go back to the fact that you gotta be disciplined because if you're not gonna be disciplined, don't expect to be successful in anything. I mean, even even the it's a great point. Even the younger kids who are, you know, let's say, coming up in their gaming. Right?

There's a reason that those kids become elite at gaming on why kids like it. First of all, the gaming industry is made off it's in the name, gamification. Right? They have a reward and payout system that keeps you going along for the next carrot. And so that's even hard baked into the system.

這正是孩子們如此沉迷的原因之一。首先，它具有社交性。他們會聊天。現在他們大多時候和朋友一起玩，但最後也大多靠自己掌握了。不過，現在他們不會忘記了。

They're probably looking up YouTube videos. That's what they weren't doing twenty years ago when people just playing with Europeans. Right? They're so what they're they're watching somebody else do it who's also kind of been through more mistakes than them. Right?

So it doesn't the certification stuff is just the the extra benefit that, industry will use. Right? And and let's face it. Education is an industry as well. Right?

It's to say, here's our value. It's on paper. We stamped it, and we've kind of given you this certification. But you don't need that if you have the skill in an industry that doesn't require the certification. You're actually lucky in some cases if you're in an industry that doesn't require the certification.

Right. But but at least it is worth noting that when credentials become important and they are in a lot of industries, it is certainly nice to have one. And if you don't have one in your industry, you should try to find out a way maybe where you can get it validated so that you can show improve later and say, yo, I did this. I did put in this work. Don't try to pretend like I didn't.

You know? So it's it's catch 22 sometimes about, like, needing the certification because it props up the accreditation board sometimes that that kind of appear in different industries when maybe it didn't need to be there. But then there's other times where you're like, man, I wish there was some accreditation board who would come in and sanctify all this work that I'm doing so that other people could say, oh, it isn't just me telling you I did this. Like, somebody else is the witness. Right?

嗯。是的。我覺得我喜歡這種對話，也喜歡指出市面上不同類型的教育。當然。我只是想確保大家能夠理解，因為有太多人，尤其是我們的年輕人和一些老年人經歷過這種事情，他們已經因此做出了人生選擇。

他們覺得自己笨，是因為他們不適合我們所謂的「教育體系」。坦白說，這個體系只適合一類學習者。沒錯。最終，他們只能在加油站、沃爾瑪或其他一些拿著最低工資、遠低於他們智力水平的地方打工，因為他們認為自己不得不這麼做。我想讓你們知道，你們不必如此。你們可以學任何你想學的東西。

You just have to might be creative in the way you learn depending on what it is, but you can. Yeah. It's understandable. Let's talk about the rap industry. You said a few things to me that really prompted much of this conversation.

一個人是如何讓自己的饒舌音樂走向大眾並取得成功的？哇。嗯，走向大眾很容易，成功才很難。對吧。

It's easier than ever to get your music out if you want you when people say, you know, my material is out, it's available on all platforms. Literally, anybody can have their music out on all platforms now. Right. If you go back to when I was talking about that record, the focus is back. One of the re that was I was signed to a record label called Blaze the World who at the time had Caroline EMI Distribution.

EMI was one of the biggest distributors in the world. Okay. They lost the distribution, but what the gentleman had at that time, dating it back to, you know, 02/1956, is he had the ability to put the stuff on iTunes. Right? And you had to go through a label at that point.

So you had to have a label that was at iTunes. You couldn't just say, hey. I wish my stuff was on iTunes. Today, there's middlemen who've come and kinda filled in the void in the industry where there's many companies out there that anybody can just pay a fee and your stuff is instantly uploaded. Right?

So not everybody knows that, but that's how it works these days. So there's somebody who will take your money and will get it to all of the distribution channels that that need be out there. So your stuff's on Spotify and YouTube, blah blah blah. Right? So that's the easy part.

You can just pay for it. It's getting close to the point where it's very similar in terms of actually getting your stuff promoted. Right? You there are then middlemen out there who will take your money to also promote your stuff. So there's over about 200,000 songs a day uploaded to Spotify.

Wow. We just do some basic probability. Right? If you have no budget, what is the probability that somebody's gonna find your song by accident when you're competing against the top level songs that have massive campaign, pushes behind them. Right?

Mhmm. That are pushed out by major labels still. Right? The Sonys of the world and the Universals, and they they're just it's automatic. Those songs are gonna rise to the cream because they're coming with a marketing budget.

Now they've also made it so that you can pay middlemen to do something similar. Right? Whether it's the illegal kind of stuff or the quasi nonethical stuff where you're paying a bot to watch your video and make it look like someone's watching your video, which a lot of the shady overnight companies have done. And now there's a little bit more of a crackdown on that. And by the way, people in the industry can tell the difference immediately.

There's all sorts of algorithms to know if you've gained the system and tried to make it look like you're more popular than you are. Right? Okay. So there's that. But if you have the right budget and you wanna do it the correct way, you could, for about a hundred thousand dollars, market a decent song that let's just say is, let's use, an academic term grammatically correct.

Right? Like, if it's if it's not awful and it's like it's like that essay, if it's a c paper, right, and it's grammatically correct, it may not it might be pretty blah, but you might get the c or maybe the b minus. You can take that equivalent of a musical song, and with a hundred grand, your song's gonna pretty much be a hit in whatever genre it is. Meaning a hit on, like, Spotify and YouTube. It's gonna have a lot of views.

Right? Mhmm. If If you have the right marketing campaign, you can find even the wrong marketing campaign with that kind of money. Now if you magnify that by times 10, well, you're gonna probably find yourself, with the again, a decent song. Right?

A decent song with a million dollar campaign, you're probably gonna crack major charts like billboard and so forth. That's the amount of money that you're playing within, hundred thousand to a million. So if you don't have that, it's more of a pipe dream, for an artist to say someone's gonna find and hear my song just because I'm good. Right? So we're we're now in an era where anybody can get out, but any good artist might not get discovered unless there's a lot of constant repetition, planning, thoughtfulness, frugalness.

Right? Trial and error, making a lot of mistakes along the way, but it's not for the faint of heart, and it's not for the people who have small budgets. If you do have a small budget, you just gotta be incredibly diligent and really think hard about what you're doing. And, again, like we're talking about in education, find somebody else who's kind of done it and gone through it to save yourself a lot of the hassle. That's just to get heard.

對吧？但這並不代表你演出的時候會很出色，或是你會被邀請演出，或是人們會買你的作品或週邊。對吧？這些都是不同的策略，有些人會用一兩種。這有點像打籃球。

Some people can shoot, but some people can shoot and they can dribble the rock. And they can play defense and they can pass. Those people end up in the league. Right? Yeah.

The the rest of us will, like, play it on the weekends. Right? You know what I'm saying? So it's it's that kind of thing. So So Hope that helps a little.

What I hear is not just putting it out there, but the marketing of it. Yeah. And so can a can a person become successful without a a lot of a big budget for marketing? Yeah. But you gotta do it a different way, and it does take longer.

Yeah. Yeah. It does. And you have to know, like any industry. Right?

你得知道你的目標是什麼。我來快速說一下我的公式。它並不適合所有人，而且在某些方面也有點不傳統。雖然我很想擁有數百萬點擊量的歌曲，但我的典型歌曲可能只有幾千甚至幾十萬點擊量。對吧？

And they don't come with large massive marketing campaigns. Right? It's just not the lifestyle that I'm living, and it's not really where my bread is buttered. I do mostly college shows. I do a lot of corporate stuff.

I write for songs, movies, television, that kind of stuff as well. And I perform and I speak. So for me, what's important is when I come to your school, that that person at that school is recommending me to somebody else to book me. Right? And so for all the artists out there that aren't aware, if you, you know, if you wonder, hey.

What's that artist getting paid to do that college show? They're probably getting paid very well, maybe 10 times more than they would play in your local club. Right? So the average college that nobody knows about, nobody's even hearing you about doing the show, and you might have done a show for a hundred or a thousand or more, could pay you 10 times more than the local club could pay. Because most times, local clubs aren't paying you anything.

但如果你夠幸運，能從俱樂部拿到3500美元，甚至更誇張地說是1000美元，那麼你的音樂水平可能相當不錯，而且在當地擁有龐大的粉絲群。大學會毫不猶豫地付給你10倍的報酬。如果你的作品能引起大學市場的興趣，例如我們一開始提到的那種，那麼隨著時間的推移，這些數字即使不是指數級增長，也會逐漸增長。所以對我來說，這就是我的世界，它不一定要追求數以百萬計的點擊量。我願意每次出專輯都能獲得數以百萬計的點擊量嗎？

確實如此。但有時，那種能達到我剛才所說的效果的音樂，並不一定能帶來數百萬的點擊量。沒錯。幾萬甚至幾十萬的點擊量就能讓我感到開心，然後說，哇。這首歌我的確做到了。

你懂我的意思嗎？所以，我有點兒像「那是什麼？算了吧，但聽起來你賺的錢比99%還多」。是啊。它更……更……更……更……更像那種即使你回頭看看15年後仍然可能仍然適用的東西。

Right? Yeah. Because you're not trying to do what's to today. Like, I pay attention to what everything sounds like in every era, and I've been around for a long time. It's like, I never think my music has stuck out as, gee, that's, like, incredibly old or, gee, that's incredibly in the future.

It's kinda right around the area without too too much trend appeal. If you do that, you can have a long career. You might never be super, super, super big at any particular moment, but you can ride out a lot of, you know, waves and gaps and mountains and peaks kind of stuff. I wanna reiterate something you said. Really, kinda you've said a few times throughout this interview.

那些為了達到事業巔峰而拼盡全力，成為眾人眼中的第一人，這些都屬於異類。你說得對。這並非不可能，但可能性很小。所以，要設定現實的期望，我會說，是的。是的。

我認為這是一個現實的問題，很多人會說，你知道，我會成為下一個比爾蓋茲。我會成為等等等等。從你的城市開始。明白嗎？而且，你知道，KRS 是因為說這話而出名的，這話沒錯。

你會成為你街區最火的傢伙，成為你鄰裡最火的傢伙，成為你鎮上最火的傢伙，然後是你的所在城市，甚至你的州。我認為，對許多藝術家來說，成為你所在城市的代表是一個現實的目標。但很多人不知道這是什麼樣子，也不知道這實際上能帶來多大的回報。有很多藝術家是他們所在城鎮最紅的藝術家，或者其中的一員，而且已經紅了很多年，他們雖然不是家喻戶曉的人物，但他們仍然有自己的事業。順便說一句，他們經常在海外演出，並因此獲得報酬。

So Yeah. I could think of a local group I'm thinking of right now. They probably do better than most of these ones that try to go national. Absolutely. It's just like we teach in other areas of business and marketing.

找到你的焦點。沒錯。找到你的利基市場，並堅持下去，因為我想說，有時候擁有一千個真正的粉絲，真正關注你、去聽你的演唱會、參加你的活動、關注你所做的一切的人，總比擁有一百萬個卻無人關注要好。天哪，你成功了。

The the one with the million numbers, you have no power at all. The one with the thousand follow followers has power because if they put something out to those followers, those followers are gonna do something with that. That's right. The math is on your side. If every time And they'll get their friends to come.

你知道嗎？沒錯。如果他們喜歡你，他們就會這麼做，你知道，這就是超級粉絲的概念。對吧？就好像你在每個城鎮都能找到幾個超級粉絲，如果你能找到幾個你認識的藝術家，你可以聯絡他們，然後你說，嘿。

I'm gonna do a show. Could you get 10 people to come to it? If you have those, you're usually set. And those are very, very hard to get, and they're very slept on. And sometimes people laugh at people like that.

他們說，啊，看看這個。人們把他們當成“粉絲”，就像埃米納姆的歌裡那樣。對吧？就像那個超級粉絲「粉絲」。就像那個狂熱粉絲。

對吧？嗯。不過，有時人們會嘲笑你的粉絲，你得尊重他們。他們有時比你本人更熱愛你的音樂。他們對你的了解，遠比你自己可能忘記的還要多。

Right? And they're invaluable people. And I see artists laugh about that kind of stuff all the time. And I'm like, give me five people like that. Like, to your analogy, give me five people over that over the thousand who just kinda like you.

You give me five super fans, they're gonna be with you for your life. Those thousand people who like what you're doing right now but can't be bothered to change their calendar around to come out and see you when you come to town, they're not paying your bills. Those fans will buy everything you tell them. They buy everything you have, and they'll change their date to be there, and they'll tell other people about you. It's like they're on payroll.

It's like so you can't you cannot find enough people like that. You gotta respect those fans. I agree. Now, tell us, for someone listening, what is what is a big no no? What should they give them some advice of what not to do in the industry.

我認為表現得比實際上更大。沒人想一直支持絕對的勝利者。對吧？我參加過，讓我用饒舌比賽來打個比方。我參加過朴茨茅斯的一場比賽。

那場比賽叫做「鐵人麥克之戰」。你知道，我身為饒舌歌手，比賽經驗可不少。對吧？我偷偷地去了那裡，和我的另外三個隊友一起。我們去了那裡。

我們就像，喲，抒情的。我們去賺錢吧。對吧？我們去戰鬥，去粉碎那些根本不知道你在場的人。對吧？

在他們意識到為時已晚之前。所以我們就這麼做了。對吧？我們參加了這場戰鬥。它被稱為朴茨茅斯的「鐵人麥克之戰」。

波特蘭。不好意思。緬因州波特蘭。緬因州波特蘭是個大城市。對吧？

Mhmm. Relatively big city in Maine. It's one of the few. We looked to Portland, and the Iron Mike has, I believe at the time, 64 rappers in it. Okay?

And I called and said, yo, I'm gonna come. I'm gonna be I was one of the last people to get in. Waited to the end, so they weren't promoting it. And and at the time, it was and this was probably, like, 2,007 or something like that. It was it was, like, a thousand dollars or something like that, which is pretty big money back then.

對吧？往上走，我做了第一個，每個人都選了64個饒舌歌手。對吧？也就是32場battle。你得想想這要持續多久。

Yeah. They're all battling each other. The crowd's listening. And at the what they did different in this battle is at the end of every round, they ranked the leaderboard. Right?

首先，我們有抒情的。然後大家都覺得，是的。抒情的打敗了那隻貓。對吧？他們下一輪又會繼續比賽，把對手打得落花流水。

Right? It just cuts the number goes from 64 to 32 to 16. Right? It just keeps getting down until you get down to two people. So they did this, and they kept saying my name, and I was doing really well, right, all night.

They're like, by the time you're in your fourth battle, people want the underdog to win. Right? So So when you come out like, yo, look at me. I'm crushing this dude. After a while, people just don't want you to win.

這只是常識。就像人性一樣。確實如此。確實如此。如果你在生活中一直取得成功，情況也是如此。

There's gonna be someone salty on the sideline. It's like, look at this dude. You may not even think you're better than you are. They just they have a whiff of it. Right?

They have a whiff that you think that you're better than you are, and that'll humble you really quick because that person is the one nipping at your ankles to try to take you down. You know? They're not like well, it doesn't have to be, you know, dramatic stuff, but they just might be like, you know, you pass in this sticker and they're, like, throw it in the trash kinda thing. Right? You know what I'm saying?

So Mhmm. Acting like you're already there. And even when you are there, remember not to act like you're already there, I think, goes a long way. So that would be my answer because you don't want those people turning on you that were loving you just a few rounds earlier. You know what I'm saying?

你說得有道理，而且很可能，我根本就不喜歡說唱，而這正是我腦子裡一直在思考的首要建議。因為我認為這是真的，所以我認為其他行業也普遍適用，不僅僅是饒舌和娛樂。不過我很喜歡你這麼說。所以，告訴觀眾你接下來會有什麼作品，以及人們如何找到你。事實上，我已經籌備了一張專輯很久了。

It's called Doc Duplored. And we originally were trying to get it out, at the February, and then we knew it turned into a 02/2025 project. So, I don't wanna date the project, but it's all produced by my man, Jay Johnson. Jay Johnson has done a few of my singles. If you look up no, which, I have a video for, Jay Johnson produced that, and he's got a low five vibe.

And so we've been working on well over a year, making this album, 15 tracks, all produced by him. It's relatively lo fi. So look for Doc De Plore. That's my actual last name. So it and it features Jay Johnson.

所以，去看看吧。我們會跟進，盡可能多地演出，以支持現場演出。即使你不能來現場觀看，也可以在任何你能聽到和找到的地方觀看。至於其他方面，我知道，很多時候人們一聽播客，就會發現有些東西已經過時了。不過，可以關注我的帳號@professorlyrical.com。

That's my website. All my socials are pro lyrical or Professor Lyrical. I'm in a duo called Pro Quo as well. My old crew, Excal, we're still putting up music as well. So, short for Excalibur.

Shout out to my man, Fee. So those are the projects that I work on. So if you see any of those, Professor Lyrical, Pro Quo, XCal, that's all me. Continue to get to the next step. Right?

Yeah. It's all on ProfessorLyrical.com. And, you know, bring me out to a college that you're at, and I'll be there. Right? I I love that you do this at colleges.

I think it's really cool. Well, professor Lyricle, thank you so so so much for coming on today. Oh, thank you. I always enjoy talking to you, and, I hope that I hope that the listeners really get a lot out of the only little bit of wisdom that you shared today because you have a lot more. But Appreciate it.

We we get into if we give too much, we can't make the mind shift happen. You know what I mean? Yeah. Good point. Good point.

你可別想翻三百六十或一百八十。你只要給他們一點點就行了。就像「是啊，沒錯」。好吧，再次感謝你。

Oh, thank you. Thanks for having me. And now for a mind shifting moment. I wanna plant this thought seed in your head. First, go back and listen to this episode again.

Professor Lyricole gave a ton of really good practical advice that applies across careers in general, not just the entertainment industry. But something I wanna point out is, what is it you wanna do? I don't care how old you are. What is it you really wanna do that you haven't done yet or you're thinking about doing? You can go for it.

You do not have to follow traditional paths to get to where you wanna go. That's like keeping you in a box. Why would you wanna imprison yourself? Find a creative way to educate yourself in the area in which you want to reign supreme and go for it. He did and he's successful.

And like he said, you can be too. Thank you for listening to mind shift power podcast. Please like and subscribe to my YouTube channel at the mind shifter. If you have any comments, topic suggestions, or would like to be a guest on the show, please visit FatimaBay.com/podcast. Remember, there's power in shifting your thinking.

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