#88: How His Darkest Moment Sparked a Culinary Empire 10 Million Strong - Andrew Rea | The Food, Conflict, and Unity Series

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Episode Description

In this episode of Finding Founders, we hear from Andrew Rea, the creative mastermind behind the Babish Culinary Universe. He’s amassed over 9 million subscribers on YouTube alone, but the scale of his community is far from what’s most interesting about this interview. With his humor and piercing honesty, Andrew shares a story of continuous self-improvement. Losing his mother at just age 11 and enduring secondary school with no friends, he was dealt a handful of painful challenges early on in life. Upon graduating film school with flying colors and a crew of good friends, early adulthood slammed him with another set of roadblocks. Grinding endlessly to make a living, broken to his core by an emotionally abusive director and stuck in a failing marriage, Andrew spiraled into his darkest days of depression. Through every overwhelming bout of failure, loss, pain, and doubt, we learn how Andrew is able to pick himself up, grow into a better person and discover a more fulfilling life.

Show Notes

Childhood: Andrew’s Mom creates a loving and normal childhood for him while battling with cancer, until one day he’s completely blindsided.
Adolescence: Dead mom jokes were not always funny to Andrew… Picking fights and plummeting his grades, Andrew doesn’t process his mother’s death until his senior year of high school.
Film and Cooking: Confident he’s the absolute best at both, Andrew is torn between culinary and film school.
College: Andrew finds happiness for one of the first times in his life, but will he find success as a filmmaker?
The Workforce: Juggling 3 jobs to just barely make rent, Andrew’s reminded that the film industry is no walk in the park.
Switch FX: Andrew gets his first job as an assistant smoke artist. Only problem is he’s never touched smoke software. Will he figure it out before his employers notice?
Working with Dad: Meaningful work, father-son bonding, and a room full of dead bodies.
Breaking Point: When hours of his dedication and hard work get thrown out and criticized, Andrew hits a breaking point.
Depressive Episode: How will Andrew climb his way out of debilitating depression?
Healing: As Andrew puts it, going to therapy is like going to the gym and here Andrew finds the creative exercises he needs to heal.
Bingeing with Babish: Andrew takes some cooking advice from Parks and Rec and goes viral.
Shrooms Trip: Andrew does a therapy session while on mushrooms and discovers a truth he wasn’t expecting.
First Windfall: A Nebraskan romance and the video that put Bingeing with Babish on the map.
Monetizing: Andrew’s Youtube channel becomes more profitable than his day job, a lot more.
Bed and Babish: Andrew’s exuberant creativity spreads to the world of Airbnb.
Advice: Andrew drops wisdom on facing your mistakes and confronting challenges.