Meet David Zimmerman | Hip Hop Artist, Poet, Founder of Herb & Olive

We had the good fortune of connecting with David Zimmerman and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi David, what led you to pursuing a creative path professionally?
The story of my life has come full circle -from creative and shy empath, to tech startup life in silicon beach, to corporate consultant and digital product manager, back to a creative- It’s interesting looking back at who I was as a child and how my teenage years to early-20’s were a complete 180 from that kid… and how I’m now reverting back to that child-like self, but with more real world experience. I love it. This is my origin story.

After graduating college, I went down a career path that was expected of me after graduating college. I’m fortunate to have been have given the opportunities I had. I was so financially motivated because that’s all I really knew. Most of my peers were the same way. I always had the creative child inside me, it just took a traumatic health experience to bring him back out. I was working 10-12 hour days at a consulting firm and traveling almost every week. Financially, things were good, but I was yearning for something so much bigger. I always felt this identity crisis walking into the office, like “this just isn’t me”. The universe hit me with smaller signs to pursue the entrepreneurial and creative / artist path in my past. I listened sometimes, but never went for it 100%.

It wasn’t until I ended up hospitalized from internal bleeding and experiencing a loss of about 60% of the blood in my body (pretty much overnight), for me to question everything. I had never felt depression before this experience. I was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease, and was pumped full of all kinds of medication that I didn’t know or understand. Doctors told me this was a life long thing and that I would always be on meds. I didn’t want to accept that. This experience led me down the path of seeking knowledge through books, videos and looking inward to my intuition (which had been suppressed for too long).

These times of suffering and being with myself were daunting and empowering at the same time. I had nothing to lose at this point. I experienced the lowest of the lows for countless months trying to sort my body and mind out. Once I stabilized physically, I became determined to get off medication and seek out my true purpose in this lifetime. This took me down the path of natural healing, and opened up my mind to spirituality. I didn’t realize how stressed I was before this experience. I was always in good shape physically and “healthy”, but discovered that I hadn’t been exercising and strengthening my mind the way I had my body. Over the course of a few years, I managed to get off medication and have been now for 3 years. I saved up money for two years, with plans to quit my job and pursue my own ventures. I had always been writing and making music, but never took it that seriously. Now I’m creating authentic music, true to myself, and taking it very seriously. I also launched a super high quality specialty olive oil and CBD brand. Everything is organic and sourced from the finest ingredients I could find in the states. These plant medicines helped me heal from the inside out, and it was only natural to start making them myself.

Now I embrace the bad / suffering experiences the same why I appreciate and love the good ones. This mindset has shifted everything for me. Every good experience feels good, and every “bad experience” is something you can learn from because it challenges you. I’m happy, healthy and creatively fulfilled now more than ever. It’s a beautiful thang.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
It’s taken me over a decade to find my artistic integrity as a musician. Life experience, suffering, meditation and relationships have allowed me to reach these heights. I now understand who I am as person. I feel like I’m me for the first time since childhood. It’s empowering and incredibly rewarding. When you listen to my album that’s dropping later this year, HORIZONS, I don’t think you’ll be able to compare it to any other living piece out there. To me, I feel like I’ve already succeeded. This is the album that I’ve visualized for the last decade, but didn’t have the life experiences or enough practice to create until now. Everything is starting to make sense. It’s funny looking back at all those little universal nudges, connections, deja vu, and “aha” moments. Everything you do, everyone you interact with, all the environments you engage with… they all shape and define who you are as an individual.

I’ve been spending a lot more time by myself (inspired by Covid), so I can tap into the source of who I really am. We’re constantly bombarded by the distractions of marketing, our phones and notifications and all of the media trying to grab our attention. You have to give them credit for building a beautifully intricate system to keep us distracted from ourselves. It’s not going to last though. Covid has woken people up. People are starting to question all these systems that have been built, which I believe is a really good thing. I’ve been writing about this for years, which is why I feel like the timing for the album is divine. I think it’s going to speak to people. That’s the goal at least, to plant seeds for people to open their minds and begin to question everything. We live in a world where we have to do very little work to find information. The issue though, is that we’re being shown information that other people tell us to read. That’s very different than wisdom. Wisdom is found over time, through experience and the free thinking and synthesis of information for yourself. Here are a few pieces of wisdom I’ve learned along the way.

Lesson 1: Be patient and trust the process. I got chills as I typed that, which goes into lesson two…

Lesson 2: Listen to your intuition. Those are the moments where you get a feeling or idea that seemingly comes out of nowhere. That’s the good stuff, coming straight from the source. The main difference between an ego (physical) thought and an intuitive thought is that the thought coming from ego will be tied to an outcome or a reason. An intuitive thought is a subtle nudge, almost a whisper that’s slightly guiding you in a direction. The ego is the loudest voice in your head, whereas the intuitive thought is the softest.

Lesson 3: Let go of control. This is arguably the hardest lesson to learn, but the most valuable. I’ve concluded that I have very little control over the outcomes in this world, and Covid really hit that lesson home. This is also true with relationships. You can’t control people, nor should you want to. Everyone is on their own path of learning, and will do so at their own pace. The best thing you can do for the people you care about (and yourself), is to show love and support at all times. If they ask for help, you can provide them insights. Don’t project yourself onto someone else, because this is usually met with a defensive demeanor.

Lesson 4: Listen. Listen to your intuition. Listen to your body. Listen to the trees rustling in the wind, the quiet of a snow covered mountain, the hawks calling out, echoing across the valley. You’ll learn a lot more from listening than from speaking. When you do speak, choose your words carefully and with precision.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
Coffee: BOXX – Arts District
Verve – Arts District
Bar 9 – Culver City
Ten Cafe – Playa

Food / Bars:
Sushi – Sushi Gen (Little Tokyo)
Hawaiian Breakfast – Broken Mouth (Downtown)
BBQ – Gus’s (Pasadena)
Aged Fish – The Joint Eatery (Sherman Oaks)
Indonesian Food – Simpang Asia (Culver City)
Vibey Bar + Food – The Prince (KTown) – Get the fried chicken
Japanese Fried Chicken – Pikunico (Row DTLA)
Ramen – Rakkan (Little Tokyo)
Vibey Bar – In Sheep’s Clothing (Arts District)
Meats – H & H Brazilian (Downtown) – You can get raw grass-fed meat to grill at home too
Natural Wine & Roasted Chicken – Lasita (Chinatown)

Outside:
Culver Steps (workout / stairs)- Culver City
Huntington Gardens (beautiful gardens, you can enjoy for hours) – San Marino
Surfing – Anywhere in the water
Deer Creek Road (views) – IYKYK
Eagle Rock (hiking) – Pacific Palisades
Angeles National Forest (hiking) – In less than an hour you can feel like you are VERY far from LA. Smell the pines baby

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Jordan Halpern Schwartz – We met on a birthright trip to Israel before I moved to LA officially. He is a true artist, and befriending him made me realize that it’s possible to do this for real. I recorded my first few songs with Jordan. We’ve both grown together as artists over the last 6-7 years, and it’s been amazing to experience the progress over time.

Mom – I always have to shout out mom. She’s my biggest fan, and supportive of everything I do. Even though she questioned leaving my “good job”, she supported my decision and understood why I left. Thank you mom, I love you.

Aeli – We met at a Soulection (Shout out Joe Kay) show outside the MOCA downtown. He commented on my tie-dye save the reef hoody and we got talking. He had just moved to LA from Dubai. We exchanged info, and a little over a year later, started making music. He is a master of his craft, and i love how our collaboration works so fluidly. This is something that I’ve realized is hard to find in the world of music and art. We take ego out of everything and it all just flows.

Ren Ayers – A body worker out here in LA. He literally healed me of Crohn’s over night. I have the test results to validate this experience. I went from 5x body inflammation to normal levels in 24 hours. He gave me hope that I could heal myself naturally.

Nick Levich – We’ve known each other since childhood, but became much closer friends in the last 5 years. We’re both on our own spiritual paths, and help each other ride out the rollercoaster together. He’s a ride or die friend and a professional psychedelic guide and trip sitter.

BCGDV – Working there was a wild ride. I leveled up as a business person while working at this firm. I sat at the table with executives of fortune 500 companies as a peer. Many of the people and connections that I met at this firm have become long-time friends. They are some of the most creative and talented people I know.

Books – Too many to count. I’m into all the fun stuff that I was drawn to as a kid right now: Ancient civilizations, Egypt, Atlantis, psychic / intuition, etc. DM me if you want to know what I’m reading specifically!