 I had a totally different video planned, but my girlfriend's best friend Shelby just had to tell me about this drama going on on Twitter between Jeffree Star and Thomas Halbert. So now I got to talk about it. What is up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul where we talk about the problem, but focus on the solution. And if you're new to my channel, my channel is all about helping you with your mental health. But what I like to do is pull things from the YouTube community or pop culture to try to teach you some pretty valuable lessons about improving your mental and emotional well being. So if you're into that kind of stuff, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell because yeah, I am not a drama channel. I am not here to spill any tea, but like there's so much, there's so much like if you are someone who watches the beauty community, like watch it and learn from it, please for the love of God because there's so much to learn about how to not have friendships and just how to have healthy relationships by doing the opposite of what they're doing. So anyways, yeah, my girlfriend's best friend Shelby, we have a little group text and like she said, oh my God, there's stuff going on on Twitter between Jeffree and Thomas Halbert. And I'm like, oh, I don't want to look. And then I was like, okay, I'll look. And I looked, I'm like, what is happening? That's a million tweets from Jeffree Star. So I went over and I'm like, who is this Thomas Halbert guy? And I went over to check out his video. And it's called like racism, sexism and silence. So a lot of you don't know this about me, but I'm actually half African-American and I'm not going to talk about the, that kind of stuff that Thomas Halbert was talking about. Like just real quick opinion on this. It seemed like a lot of virtue signaling and I just don't have a way to really tie that into mental health. So I'm going to stay away from that, but that's my opinion on it real quick. So anyways, there's, there's two main topics I want to talk about in this video and I hope that you can learn from it. So the first topic I'm going to talk about is kind of exploiting your own mental illness for sympathy or as a form of manipulation. So I'm going to start this video out by telling you a story and I'm going to try to shorten it as much as possible because I know I'm long-winded, but please stay for this story because there's a very valuable lesson to be learned. Like a lot of you ask me so many questions and I've done so many things throughout my life to improve who I am as a person and improve my mental health. So at the beginning of Thomas Halbert's video, he like just casually tosses in that he had an eating disorder. Like in the first couple of minutes, he just casually just kind of just tosses it in there. I'm like, okay, where's this going? And like, it had absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the video in ways that I was conditioned and raised was like a perfect example is when I would starve myself when I knew I was hungry, which led into something more serious, which is an eating disorder. And I'm like, what the heck, dude, like, why did you why did you just throw that in there? You know what I mean? Like, and if you don't know what I mean, here's what I mean with this story. So those of you who are just now meeting me, I am a recovering drug addict and alcoholic. I've been cleaning this over for six years. And in my addiction, I wrapped up three tickets in one week, right? Or two weeks, something like that. Or no insurance and no registration, because for me, it was more important to buy drugs than pay for insurance and registration. So I wrapped up all these tickets. And when I got sober, I went to California, I wasn't paying on the tickets. So I moved back. There was a warrant out for my arrest. I paid that off. And then like, I had to start paying off the tickets, which was thousands of dollars. And they wanted $200 a month for me. And like the job I was working at the time, there was absolutely no way like that I could pay that. Like I have a son. I'm living in a ghetto apartment and barely scraping by, riding on the bus. Like there's no way I could afford $200 a month. So I call him up and I'm like, yo, is there any way you can work with me on this payment? And they say, you would have to come down and talk to a judge for them to lower that monthly price. And I'm like, okay, cool. So I like took a day off work. I went down to the courthouse and I had to like wait around for a while in order to meet with the judge and ask him to lower that 200 down to something that was actually like reasonable for me to pay monthly, right? So as I'm waiting, like as somebody in recovery, as somebody who's trying to be a better person, like I had to realize that I manipulate a lot. Like I am one of the biggest manipulators on the face of the earth. And if I want to be a better person, like I need to quit doing that. But sometimes my brain doesn't really have a good judge of what's manipulating or what's not. So here's a tip, call people and ask them, all right? This is something that I was taught. So I got cleaned through a 12 step program. So I had a sponsor and I called him up and I called this dude up and I'm like, hey, I'm about to go into this, to talk to this judge and I just want to ask you if you think this is manipulative. So here's what my plan was. Okay. Like I heard so many stories of people like going in to talk to a judge and at this time I had like a year and a half sober and people always said like, yeah, I went in and I talked to the judge. I told him that I'm cleaning sober now. And you know, the judge was like, oh, I had a cousin who got clean and sober. So yeah, we're just going to get rid of all your charges. Like I heard these stories. So like, I was like, well, maybe I should do that. But if you remember, my, my tickets had nothing to do with drugs or alcohol. Really, right? So I called my sponsor up and I'm like, hey dude, like, do you think it would be manipulating the judge if I told him, I said, hey, you know, I'm really sorry about this. I'm a year and a half sober now. I was making a lot of bad decisions. Like would it be manipulative if I just casually toss that in there, right? And my sponsors like, yes, of course it would be. And I'm like, all right, you're an idiot by it and I hung up on it, right? And I, what I did was I called like 50 other people like, do you do that? Do you ever like ask a ton of people the same question and you just wait for the one person to give you the answer that you want? Well, thank God I hang around people again, who I always tell you to hang around with people who tell me what I need to hear and not what I want to hear. So I called like 50 people and they're all like, yeah, Chris, that's manipulative and I'm like, right? But like, think about that. It is manipulation. Like I would have been manipulating that judge if I just tossed in there that I'm a drug addict and alcoholic and recovery had nothing to do with my tickets at all, really? Like, and that would have just been a bad character action on my part. You know what I mean? So like, this is something that I'm really, really passionate about because like when I see people do that, there's a lot of conversation right now with all the better help stuff going on. Like, are YouTubers exploiting the mentally ill fans? Are YouTubers faking mental illness? Are they doing this? So like, I think it's important to have this conversation. I just want to kind of give you some context from my experience. By the way, some crazy stuff happened and the judge actually lowered my payment down to $50 a month. I actually still pay it to this day, the minimum payment. And I do it as a reminder to myself about the screw up I used to be. I need to go and make sure I paid it this month. But anyways, so going back to Thomas Hubbard, I do not like how he just casually tossed in that he had an eating disorder. Like, what was the purpose of that Thomas? It had nothing to do with the rest of the video. Stop it. Stop it, Thomas. Now, the second point that I want to make is like, if you are watching this, if you are watching this video, cut out the people in your life who are constantly involved with drama. Like, I just made my video the other day, I think yesterday, about many MUAs come back and the drama around World Mental Health Day and all that. And like, I'm upset. Like, I've just been punched into this beauty community and it's driving me nuts. Because back in my past, back when I was very mentally unstable, I hung out with all of the drama queens. I was a drama queen. I always hung out with people who constantly had chaotic stuff going on in their lives. So basically, like, you can go over on Twitter. I'm not going to dive into all this stuff. But Thomas Hubbard goes over to Jeffrey's house to kind of talk with him about Jeffrey's, like, racist past. And I'm not here to judge any of that stuff. But like, like, what happened was, Thomas was texting Laura and Manny while he was at Jeffrey's. And then like, Jeffrey outed, like, confronted Thomas about it. And then Thomas was like, oh, I'm so sorry. And then Thomas came out with this video. So anyways, go check out Twitter if you want to get all that tea. But I'm sure the other drama channels will. But like, there was just constantly drama going on. Like, you guys, I am not lying to you. Like, I cut all those people out. I cut them out. Like, I have like four really good friends who I talk to on a regular basis. Like, four, OK? Like, I have a lot of family members who I don't even talk to on a regular basis because all they do is gossip and talk drama. So I think that might actually be why I get a little like defensive when people say, like, oh, you're turning into a drama channel. Chris, like, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm trying to teach you lessons about the drama that's going on. So if you have friends that are constantly having drama in their life, cut them out of your life. Like, I'm telling you guys right now, if I would have met my girlfriend and she had this type of drama in her life, I would not have dated her. I wouldn't have dated her. I'd be like, yo, sorry, I could not handle that stuff. You know what I mean? Now, what's funny is we joke around, my girlfriend and I, that she's like my PR team, right? So I often run like ideas past her. Sometimes I even run like comments past her. Like, should I make this comment or should I make this reply? Should I tweet this? You know, by the way, that's another pro tip. If you have a problem keeping your mouth shut, run it by somebody. Okay, so her and I were talking about this video and I was telling her, I was like, yeah, this is what it's going to be about. The lesson's going to be about cutting out people who have drama in your life. And I told her this, so you probably see it on the screen right now. But I said, so FYI, when I blow up, I refuse to be friends with Jeffrey. And then I was saying, no, you'll see it's a lesson because she gets worried that I am going to go too much into the drama and I'm going to reach and not make it about mental health. So then she says, LMAO, what if he buys you a car or house or a corgi? So those of you who don't know, I freaking love corgis and I want a corgi so bad. So I'm like, ugh, then I'd have to set up healthy boundaries. And then I got the idea. This is how my ideas come. I was like, that'd be such a good video. How to be friends with Jeffrey Star. And I'm like, OMG, remind me to make that video sometime. So yeah, I think that'd be a great video. How to be friends with somebody like Jeffrey Star who constantly has drama around it. If you think that would be a good, interesting video, because like I told Tristan, it would be about setting up boundaries, constantly setting up boundaries with him. So if you think that would be an interesting video, let me know down in the comments below. But aside from that, let me know down in the comments, how do you feel about people like just casually tossing in their mental illness, like just, oh, here you go. Here you go. Here's my mental illness. Like, how do you feel about that? Like, and I wonder, like, and tell me if I'm being contradictory as somebody who tries to increase awareness, like, am I being hypocritical? Like, I don't know. Like, tell me down in the comments, I got thick skin, but I want to hear your thoughts on that. Okay. Anyways, that's all I got for you with this video. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up. And if you're new, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell because I make a ton of videos. And a huge thank you to everybody supporting the channel over on Patreon. We just got a new Patreon supporter, and now they're added to the list. So if you would like to support the channel over on Patreon, help me spread a message of hope. Make sure you click the top on that Patreon icon right there. All right. Thanks so much for watching. Get rid of the drama, and I'll see you next time.