AI Summary:
The discussion centered on the establishment and vision of Dharma House, initiated by Tanur Badgley, who shared his inspiration from travels and the need for authentic connections in combating loneliness among entrepreneurs. He outlined the origins of the house, including the property purchase on May 5, 2021, and the clear vision he developed through journaling, which included specific desires for the space. Tanur described the evolution of community workshops in Kansas City, highlighting the transition from chaos to a supportive environment that fosters personal growth and connection, with a notable reduction in substance use among participants. He articulated a broader vision for addressing societal issues through community transformation, emphasizing the importance of a dedicated leadership team, partnerships with nonprofits, and financial sustainability to support artists and initiatives, including an upcoming music festival.
AI Chapters & Topics:
Origins of the Dharma House Experience
Tanur Badgley discussed his experiences traveling to over 30 countries and the common thread of authentic community he observed. He aimed to establish the Dharma House as a place where people can be themselves, share resources, and foster deep connections, countering the isolation often felt in entrepreneurial endeavors. James Prieto resonated with this vision, noting the significance of radical inclusion and self-expression.
* Community engagement and inclusivity
Early Days of Dharma House
Tanur Badgley recounted the establishment of Dharma House, highlighting that they acquired the property on May 5, 2021. He emphasized the importance of having a clear vision for the house, which he articulated through a journaling exercise that outlined specific desires such as seclusion, ample space, and facilities for various activities. Remarkably, he noted that all his aspirations were realized within 40 days of writing them down.
* Origins and establishment of Dharma House
Community Workshops and Event Evolution
Tanur Badgley shared insights into the evolution of community workshops in Kansas City, highlighting the initial chaotic experiences and the shift towards a more organized and inclusive environment. The events, which began with a diverse range of participants, have transformed into a space where individuals contribute their skills and connect meaningfully. This change has led to a more aligned community, reducing previous issues with substance use and fostering a culture of sharing and support.
* Evolution of the community vibe and culture
Addressing Division and Community Growth
Tanur Badgley shared insights on how personal transformation and community involvement can address societal division and violence. He described initiatives like sound healing ceremonies and life coaching that promote individual growth and collective harmony. Badgley also mentioned the development of a committed leadership circle and plans for future events, including a music festival and retreats.
* Financial sustainability and support for artists
Full Transcript
0:01 - James Prieto: And cool. So recording right now. Do you remember how we met at our at least my first Dharma house gathering?
0:24 - Tanur Badgley: Yeah, we were doing the I exercise doing a lot of eye gazing and then I think it was like several minutes straight of talking like a dyad style and I was telling you about my vision for creating a community on the land where we like raise our kids together and transform how education works and share our food and kind of like live off the grid of society in certain ways living and abundance and connection with one another.
0:57 - James: Yes, it was something like that. I can't remember if you shared first or I shared first, but I remember talking about my vision for the world and it was like so resonant with yours. I'm like, who is this human being that's sitting in front of you?
1:13 - Tanur: I remember we were like right in right up beside my house here in the backyard.
1:20 - James: yeah yeah that um that was a interplay thing right yeah yeah that was an amazing experience of like connecting and playing and community so that was actually one of my highlights but I I figured I'd invite you here because dharma house has been going on for a while you know and uh I'd like to hear um yeah like why did this thing start? Like, what are the origins of this Dharma house experience?
1:52 - Tanur: Yeah, I started Dharma house because I had at that point, been kind of all over the world, I spent a significant time in maybe 30 different countries. And I kept finding a thing about communities that was common despite the country I was in, that that resonated with me. And it was a there was a sense of like co connection where people could be authentically themselves. They could express what was on their heart, what was on their mind. They could lean on people in the community to supply and give and take resources together with in a way that created synergy, where everyone was rising up together. I'd also been doing business and entrepreneurship and found that there was a lot of isolating elements of that, where I was cutting away friendships and stuff to get really busy at trying to build something. And I think a lot of people that go out and try to strike out on their own path and do something that kind of cuts against the grain and getting out of the safety and security of corporate W-2 salaried jobs or whatever it may be, that there's a sense of loneliness and isolation that can kind of come from that. And I'm definitely someone that thrives off of social stuff. I thrive off of a community. I get bored of conversations that are surface level, that don't have intention or purpose, where people are maybe like expressing like limiting beliefs or complaints or judgments that they have about society and are actively engaging in doing anything about it.
3:23 - James: Yeah, whining is kind of a cultural pattern, isn't it? Like, yeah, about stuff.
3:27 - Tanur: And we glorify like being busy and like not showing up for our relationships. And then like we cope with that with like wild nights out of drinking and stuff. And I just I don't know, I had been in Thailand for like half of the previous 10 years or so, and I felt a lot slower pace there. I felt a sense of like people look each other in the eyes, actually care about how they're doing. And I wasn't feeling to the degree that I wanted to in America, especially like the kind of subcultures I had been spending time in in America. And so I wanted to create a community where people could be themselves and it was inclusive of jobs and passions and hobbies and interests and political party affiliations. It wasn't like getting so niche into any of those things. It was people could really bring all of who they are to this place, be seen, respected, heard, valued for who they are. And then you're going to find like best friendships. You're going to find key relationships. You're going to find partnerships. And when you're following your heart again, you're living in your soul's purpose. You're living by the design of how you are as a human, you're going to be able to rise and elevate and navigate life with greater agency, greater confidence, more faith and trust in yourself and your creator to guide you. And you're going to be able to go through life more joyfully, like climbing the mountain together with other people.
4:57 - James: Totally. That sounds like radical inclusion and radical self-expression. If you know, you know, borrowing from some of the Yeah.
5:05 - Tanur: And we've been able to attract people like you that have been deep in this kind of work in their own veins. And it's really interesting to bring these like expert practitioners of 15, 20 plus years into these places. And you basically have like these parties that are full of workshop people and personal development experts, wellness coaches. And it's amazing to have these new perspectives offered to me. Like I don't have to go travel to some distant faraway place and pay tens of thousands of dollars. To have my paradigm altered or my perspective shifted. It's happening right here in my backyard in my house. Yeah, pretty convenient. A place in Kansas City for us to have that.
5:45 - James: Yeah, and I had just moved to Kansas City when I found you guys. So lucky me, I got to get plugged in like so early. Yeah, I'd love to get a feel for like the early days of Dharma House, you know, because sort of like I'm the new kid on the block. And, you know, I've seen a limited, like the limited vibe. I haven't been here that long. You want to talk about, like, when did you guys start and what were things like back then?
6:14 - Tanur: Yeah, so we started Dharma House when we got the house. We moved in, like, I think we closed on the house Cinco de Mayo, so May 5th of 2021. And immediately we went into summertime pool parties. I had been brewing for a long time, but we didn't have the space. And then I, uh, I would say it started by getting the house, which started with getting clear on why I wanted a house and what I wanted in that house. And I had Darma in mind with the house. So I basically journaled. I followed a Brian Tracy journaling exercise of like going into very deep, distinct detail about what I want in a house. And I said, I want multiple acres. I want it to be large square footage. I want it to be secluded. I want to have a pool. I want it to have a place where we can have. Concerts, where we can have campouts, where we can have bonfires, where we can, yeah, do retreats at our place. I kind of wrote all this stuff down as well as like, I would get owner finance without the banks needing to be involved. I would get in for no down payment. It would be full and ready, wouldn't have to do renovations. And like literally all of that came true. And 40 days after I wrote that down, I owned this house. And so we found ourselves moving in. Suddenly had the place. And then from there, it was just like inviting a ton of people to see what we could make. So my business partner and co-housemate Phil and I kind of had this idea. He had ran this college house. He named it Dharma something, I can't remember what. And then I wanted the word Dharma because I'd been doing these Vipassana meditation experiences. I'd done a couple of silent 10 days and a five day meditation. In Thailand. And I saw that this Dharma was about like kind of unfolding people's path, living by true and right principles, honoring your distinct, unique individual path in life. And so we wanted a place with our house and our land that could achieve that. And we'd been to several kind of communities in Kansas City and found bits and pieces and pockets of it. And we just kind of invited all the leaders of those communities to come to run the workshops and to invite their community And so we got the DJs, the fire spinners, the yogis, the breath work, the meditation facilitators, people like that to go to do workshops. And that summer we were already full for workshops and we were full with DJs. And I think a little interesting thing that we did to this was rather than make this exclusive and like high ticket and like charge people for it, we said, if you come and share and donate your gift, you will get to experience gifts of all the other people and so it was like half the people here were like extremely qualified to charge ticket prices for their event but because they weren't the other person wasn't and we made this highly accessible thing where we suddenly had 200 plus people showing up to the I think the second pool party we had over 200 the first one we had like over 100 and it's been consistently above 200 if like usually above 300 now and it's still the same essence of people are sharing their gift and their craft and I wanted that because I wanted a place where the person that is kind of like maybe lost or going to a transition or going to a change and finances and like fitting in are like maybe a barrier to entry for them. I wanted Dharma to be an entryway into you can just bring yourself and experience this stuff and that giving culture is going to come to into them also and they're going to want to give and that's basically what we have in We have a committee of volunteers on a vision board that are curating these events for people, and we're taking feedback from the community. And yeah, it's just this amazing ecosystem of resources continuing to pour in, where we're getting the best of everyone to show up here and make it together. So yeah, I think we've accomplished a lot of it. But the early days were that mixed with me trying to be the project manager for everything, trying to be the sales and marketing guy, getting it going. Me paying for our company, paying for a lot of the initial costs of getting it started. It was pretty wild and chaotic, and then eventually I found people that would help. We started just like, you're in charge of the DJs, you're a DJ, go talk to the other DJs. You're in charge of the workshops.
10:37 - James: You want to talk about some of that wildness? I know I've heard some of stories that you share with me one-on-one, but anything you wanna share here around some of the wild, fun things that happened? Just to get a flavor.
10:55 - Tanur: Yeah, I mean, one party we didn't have any policy about what happens when it rains, and suddenly we had, between my garage, my living room, and my kitchen, we had probably like 200 people, 150 people maybe in the house, and it was like, full of mud. But it was pouring rain outside. It was like cold rain in the middle of summer. Everyone had to get indoors but no one wanted to leave yet. It was like only like 11 at night or so and it turned into this like big sleepover vibe where everyone's just sitting like crisscross applesauce with each other on the floor in these pods of people that don't really know each other well and suddenly someone's doing a magic trick and then someone else is like wanting like insight into their brand new business that they're doing. And then our DJ shows up from some other place that he was officially DJing like as a paid like person at a club He brought all this stuff here and he's like, can we go in the basement? And suddenly we had this like giant basement rave wait until 4 in the morning It was like boom boom like in the basement and It was pretty wild because I was like I didn't know what the boundaries are and it's my house And so no one else is gonna enforce any boundaries except like the ones I enforce And I enjoyed just kind of seeing what it could become. And luckily, like it was still a safe place, but the house was a total mess as a result of that with like the carpets and stuff, but it was worth it.
12:21 - James: That sounds painful. Yeah. Cleaning up after that. Yeah.
12:23 - Tanur: The cleanup was intense in the first days. There was no one to do it. And so we were bringing 12 loads of trash down and we were the guys with like, you know, a 15 yard stretch of trash bags at the bottom of our driveway for a um yeah it was chaotic yeah um have you noticed like vibe changes through the years as you know you got a little bit smarter and you know maybe you got clear with what it is that the boundaries you want to set or or the spaces that you want to offer like that you want to talk about that like how how I mean that sounds like total chaos but I mean fun but uh absolutely I I would say in the beginning we didn't quite know who this was for yet. And we started to develop this like taker energy in the community. Where I think at one point our advertisement got printed and put on the walls of like some sort of rave club. And we had this giant influx of people come at like one in the morning. And they were just like dropping their cocaine on the kitchen table and snorting. They knew nobody here. And they're all like 18 to 21 year old kids. And like, yeah, I would say we don't have that anymore. We don't have, we used to have like a drinking subculture here too, where people are kind of treated like some frat house party thing. And like, there's, you know, like chugging alcohol and playing beer games and getting pretty sloppy and guys hitting on girls and making them uncomfortable. We got a little bit of that in the beginning. When you put out this radically inclusive thing, you're going to find all the things in it. Yeah. Yeah. And so we learned how to tune our messaging and tune in our marketing and figure out who the leaders of the community are that we wanted to model more people like them to come here. And slowly, it's gotten to be just more and more aligned people where everyone is in contribution, where it's like this shared economy. Mostly sober as an event now. We haven't gone to a strict no alcohol policy yet but I don't see a lot of people like getting hammered or anything like that anymore. Maybe people have a couple drinks. It's gotten to be more of a of a tuned experience as well where it's like before people didn't know that a workshop was happening. They didn't know where it was. They didn't know what time it is. Sometimes it would start an hour and a half late. Sometimes the workshop facilitator would would bail an hour before their event. I had to come and be the sub for missing workshop people all the time and just wing some workshop for people. I was kind of a jack of all trades. I could do the yoga. I could do the meditation. I could teach journaling. So I was like, all right, I'll just do the workshop. No one's here. But now it's really good. It's on time. It's happening well. We're helping build other people's businesses. We have a little marketplace that comes in now and like selling goods and services. There's like massage tables that get put up and people get Reiki and massage. And it just feels a lot more like holistic contribution than like me and a handful of people contributing and a bunch of people taking from it and using our space for their own like little sub click party. That doesn't really exist so much anymore. It feels like one whole community where you might not know everyone, of course, but like you're going to know enough people that you feel connected to someone that you didn't know. There's not like this group on the side doing their own thing, not talking to anyone anymore, which feels awesome.
16:02 - James: Yeah, that's that's great for new people that come to the city like me, like hoping to plug into some some intentional communities. Hey, you know, we're starting to run out of time here, but I'd love to hear maybe some personal experience, personal high You've been to quite a few of these. Any events that were over-the-top amazing that you want to highlight here? Any personal experiences? One of the first ones we did was awesome. We had probably 500 people.
16:35 - Tanur: It was our biggest turnout ever. It was because a big real estate guru was coming to town and we became the host site for him. We ended up getting a petting zoo in the yard. We had like goats and chickens and I even had a baby horse. And that was really cool because we ended up getting all these like business real estate people to come through that that are not usually doing this kind of more free spirited activity. But then the speaker canceled 24 hours before and so people all came and I became that stand in and it was really rewarding for me to get to get of financial advice and investing advice, because that's what I do in my business, and how to bring that into being holistic and purpose-driven and in your Dharma path. That was definitely a highlight for me, for sure, to have 25 people in the basement and me kind of doing that. And I would say on the other side, some of the early moments working with Ashley Miller were really wonderful for me. Suddenly, I went from, oh my, this is like 100 of my time to put this on to like five hours of my time and this thing is happening. That was major. Like Ashley just really sought to understood the vision and the mission and like the cultural recipe we're after here. And she just, she just really crushed it. She made it happen. She really discerned who the right people are we want to invest in. And she gave them a leeway to make their thing happen. I mean, I would say anytime I do interplay with Davey is a major highlight for me. We're like acting goofy and silly and like connecting with total strangers and people are having transformational experiences where they're expressing emotions they haven't expressed in a long time. We did like the yurt hypnosis that was a really cool one to be laying in a yurt with 30 people and everyone getting hypnotized together. We did this two-day event where we went on a canoeing trip down the river and we ended up at the river market doing a giving safari so everyone went and bought stuff. And then we gave it away, like as a parade of people giving stuff away.
18:40 - James: Ooh, that sounds fun.
18:41 - Tanur: I want to do that. That was a really cool day. We did a two-day, so it was a normal dharma party on Saturday. People slept over, and we had a group of like 35 go out Sunday together and do down the river to river market for giving things away, and then ending up at the Kansas City Museum. It's like a historical museum about Kansas City. It created a lot of bonding. That was where I felt like I truly had rich, deep, one-on-one relationships with people in the community was those early days where Ashley was allowing me to stop being the the guy doing all the things and starting to just actually go in and enjoy the party and you know the people at it.
19:20 - James: Cool I love the spirit of outreach you know it's just like randomly connecting with people that you don't know out there.
19:27 - Tanur: That was fun we had a megaphone and we were like yeah we were just yelling out affirmations to people and we were coming up to couples and like affirming like their love for each other and asking like pretty spicy questions and then gifting them like flowers.
19:43 - James: It was awesome. Wow. Almost sounds like a church.
19:47 - Tanur: Evangelical about what you're doing. Right.
19:50 - James: But yeah, before we go, I'd love to hear, you know, we've got kind of a lot of violence and polarization in our culture. And I'm wondering, how do you see, you know, addressing that division that's out there right now? Absolutely.
20:09 - Tanur: Yeah, I think addressing systemic change that we want to see on the outside starts with our own ways of being inside. There's all sorts of things that already are happening politically and stuff. We're not necessarily a political movement. I think what we're doing is we're embodying what it looks like to be like living in truth and doing that as a collective community that honors each other's truth. And when that happens, like people's skills, gifts, talents, visions really come to life. And those visions are not in conflict with anyone. Like someone's ideal vision, their dharma, their purpose for their life is not going to be violent to someone else's. And so when we're actually living in that, rather than fear, doubt, scarcity, ego, uncertainty, the stuff that creates separation, isolation, and violence. We're being an example of that change we want to see in the world. And then there's major ripple effects of that. Like people can come to our sound healing ceremony, sit in a meditation, get a one-on-one with a professional life coach for free here, and then dance the night away and also play with some kids while also like getting advice from a couple of 75-year-old ladies, learning how to grow a permaculture farm. Like you start to get vision for how to create a sustainable, peaceful vision for society. And then you get started with some of those things like seeds get planted in your mind and they go into your heart and then they go into your out your hands and into society.
21:45 - Tanur: And I see like this ripple effect happening.
21:47 - James: Seeds get planted in your mind. Yeah. Get taken into your heart. I like that as a vision.
21:53 - Tanur: Nice.
21:53 - James: Yeah. Yeah, this is feeling pretty rich and I appreciate your time. Is there anything else you want to add before we kind of move on to other things? No, I'm really excited for where Dharma is going.
22:09 - Tanur: This year I think we reached an important tipping point in kind of two main areas. One is like we have this inner circle of leaders right now that have committed at the same kind of level or some of them look even like greater level of commitment than I've made. Made to the project, where they're really giving time, energy, focus, bringing connections and resources. We have this vision board that's committed to making this grow and scalable. They're getting more of the legalities in place for us to scale. They're helping us to understand the ways in which we want to grow, the ways we want to expand beyond just a summertime pool party. That is turning into affinity groups. That is turning into people actually creating tangible organizations out in the world. We're pairing with nonprofits this year. We're getting a lot of safety elements involved, and we're gearing up for an October music festival here at the property. I see this turning into retreats going away. Thailand is a place that's really in my heart. It's where my family's from It's where I really found my true identity as an adult. So I would love to bring people out to Thailand. And then this is a model we can bring to other cities around the country. At almost every single event, we have someone fly in from somewhere else that's really intrigued by the project we have going on. And then I hear that how little ways in which they're making that come to life, like wherever they are, Phoenix and Denver and LA and New York and, you know, these kinds of places are getting a little bit of change because of what they experience here. We're moving away from like consumer producer thing where it's like I am paying you money to consume your art and then I leave and it doesn't really change me like this is like you're consuming and you're creating and you're like giving to the next generation and you're in synergy with someone else's gift there's just so much possibility here um and then on top of that we figured out the money part this year we are now like profitable we we now like get enough contributions from everyone that it doesn't fall on the shoulders of me or my company to finance every part of it. And that's really, really exciting, too. It feels like we went from like an I to like a we, like people are down to play team here. Yeah, I'm excited about that, too.
24:31 - James: Yeah, especially, you know, the part about like supporting artists. I'm curious if we can find a model, a way to also supporting, you know, the people that spend their life creating and their music. So anyway, but that's maybe a next chapter of our evolution.
24:48 - Tanur: Yeah, I'd like to be able to be a place for donors to want to get a tax write-off and put it into something impactful and purposeful that they care about. We're not just another thing. We're serious, and we're genuine, and we're being wholesome and holistic about it. Yeah, and we're asking a lot from people to get this thing going, including the artists who are paid performers to come and play for free, I would like to switch it to where we actually have a fund for this and we have a budget coming in. So if you're someone that's making excess money instead of giving it to state and federal taxes, like get a dollar for a dollar write-off and give it to Dharma House, which is a more like efficient, equitable, effective version of what, you know, our governments are trying to do for us.
25:37 - James: We're doing it much more like Yeah, effectively, I feel like, yeah, I, I've been in conversation with some of the artists, a good friend of mine, Julia, and, you know, she's helping me from the perspective of musician, how, how important, you know, all the years and effort and sweat that's gone into her craft. And I personally want to like help her succeed and help to cover some of her financial Yeah, just to support her work.
26:07 - Tanur: Yeah, I think we can get people that are about to pay big tax bills. I mean, I'm in real estate and there's people that flip houses and they gotta pay $500,000 in taxes at the end of the year. Why can't you shift that dollar for dollar into Dharma House instead of paying it to the federal government?
26:25 - James: You know, you support artists like her. Sounds good to me. Well, hey Tanur, thanks for your time. I know you're busy. So yeah, thank you. And hope to see you at our next Dharma Project event in Kansas City.
26:40 - Tanur: Thank you so much for the interview, James.
26:43 - James: All right. See you, man.