Meet Wiley Ross

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Wiley Ross a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Wiley, thanks so much for taking the time to share your insights and lessons with us today. We’re particularly interested in hearing about how you became such a resilient person. Where do you get your resilience from?

I don’t even know if it would be resilience or if it would just be adaptability or stubbornness. Like, I think that stubbornness and resilience can be pretty closely related. Partly it’s because some of the best pep talks I’ve ever been given are from people that have been Dismissive to me. And people not believing in me. Like, I had a girl that I dated one time. I told her I was moving to… California, to pursue art and music, and she laughed in my face and said I wasn’t that good. And I still use that as motivation today. Using the negative to create positive action… that must be healthy, right?

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

Bio:

Wiley Ross was born and raised in Springfield, Missouri. Throughout most of his life, Wiley’s focus has been art. Then, while in college on an art scholarship, he decided music was the passion and next step to pursue. So he picked up a guitar, loaded up his van, and hit the road to Austin, TX.
Soon, the hard hitting rock trio, Street Light Suzie was born. After touring the country, including a packed house at LA’s Viper Room, and recording their first CD, “Red River Revival”, In September of 2011 the band’s blistering demos got the attention of Guns ‘N Roses alum Gilby Clarke. The union was a resounding success as the band traveled to LA to record in Clarke’s studio. The result is the critically acclaimed “Red Album”. Wiley has also been very successful placing songs in film and television, including credits on CSI, Nikita, Ringer, VH1 and E! shows.
Wiley is a critically acclaimed painter, muralist and musician. As his reputation has grown, so has the size of his creations. Austinites can see his murals on many walls throughout the city. For a man who truly believes “the world is a blank canvas”, this has been an exciting and fulfilling experience.
Wiley lives in Austin, TX with his daughter, Veda Moon and Partner in Crimes, Karma Montagne.
New ventures, for a man constantly evolving, are currently coming to life… #divinetiming

Guerilla Gardening ATX… exactly what one would think… Planting garden beds with food to grow in this middle of the night, wearing masks, on public property. This activity also includes “reverse graffiti”, cleaning up where needed.

Kult of Kindness- we launched a non profit to help others with the creative side of their soul. Mentorship, art supplies, or just talking and looking at things from different angles.

Puppet Confessions. Interactive Sock puppet theater driven by anonymous crowd complaints and confessions. About to have our second show in Austin.

Trainstation Junkies… new duet with Karma and I. Album just came out across all streaming platforms. Check out some of the music videos as well in our YouTube channel. #karmiccoyote #hitthatlikebutton

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

1. Generosity.
My mom, she volunteered for Special Olympics for years and I saw how good it felt to do something kind and be a positive impact on somebody’s life. And it, makes me feel truly spiritually fulfilled, it’s my favorite thing, and I love it. And it definitely helps to give to others when you’re feeling sorry for yourself.

2. Know your “why” so you can always feel the purpose behind your day.
So I always knew that I was going to do something with art, but I didn’t discover my purpose until,.. I don’t know when I did. But I know now. Yeah, my purpose is to help people. But I think art and music will be the vehicle that gets me to where I can help a larger amount of people than I could if I wasn’t doing that. And.. I just, there’s no way that I could ever have like a nine to five. Like, I mean, really like… it would…. Oh, my God. Yeah, I just cannot imagine that.

3. Be a competitive cheerleader
Funny thing about haters is, If you don’t have any haters, then you’re not doing something Right. And the way I look at it is While they’re talking about you, and they’re hating on you, You’re not even thinking about them. I mean, here’s the thing.. I was a hater at one point in time in my life because I was Very competitive and I was jealous. And it wasn’t until I figured out that by complimenting those people, and because it was well deserved, if they were better than me, they were better than me. I would complement them And then that made me feel better. And it felt so much better to be a cheerleader for something or someone than somebody that was just downing on it, you know, or. Because it’s so… well, It’s not a good look for people. And it’s so, so clear. I never openly communicated the jealousy and the hatred. I always supported them, but I always really felt it inside. Until I realized it was just projecting negativity and accumulating bad karma. I know better now. I am now cheerleading for them.

What would you advise – going all in on your strengths or investing on areas where you aren’t as strong to be more well-rounded?

What used to be important to me is not as important to me now. And things that I took for granted are much more important to me now. I think that success is defined in a lot of different ways. I think that because of my size and things like that, that helped me. But the short and skinny of it is that I just work my fucking ass off. Don’t like standing out. It makes me uncomfortable I don’t like having happy birthday sung to me. Whenever I was eight, I had my birthday party at fantastic gymnastics and. And we invited two girls, Alison Landis and Alicia Smith. And that way, whenever it was time to open up presents, everybody could just exchange presents. Like, the two girls could exchange their presents, everybody else. So there. That way there’s not no attention on me just opening the presents. Everybody was doing it. And then my mom gave me stuff when I got home, but I. That’s how much I did not want to have any attention brought to me, which is so funny now because i’ve had to find balance in learning to take a compliment. I’ve had to force myself to be socially impactful as much as my work is feverishly driven. My work can speak for itself, but I find it’s got a stronger voice when coupled with my own Missouri drawl. You know?

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Karma Montagne

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