Fausto’s Room

Fausto's Room | Ruben Palomares
Ruben Palomares has a story most people wouldn't believe if it weren't true. In his early twenties he was one of the LAPD's best — recruited straight out of the academy into the undercover "21 Jump Street" program, posing as a high schooler to buy drugs and weapons. Then he got shot at a payphone, survived, and shot back — and something in him changed. The adrenaline of the violence became a high he chased into the Rampart CRASH gang unit, where he became a feared "gunslinger" in the middle of the 90s gang wars.
When the Rampart corruption scandal blew the unit apart, Ruben turned all the way. He recruited a crew, used his badge and his training to rob drug dealers, and spiraled into paranoia, addiction, and a darkness he now calls being a "monster." It ended in a federal sting and 16 years behind bars.
But prison is where the real story begins. Three months in, a stranger preached to him — and Ruben was saved. He spent years in solitary preaching through the bars to lifers from every rival set, bringing light into one of the darkest places on earth. Today he's out, married, a father again, and a pastor, using everything he survived to reach the people no one else can.
What you'll take away:✅ How chasing adrenaline and respect can quietly turn into addiction✅ What redemption actually looks like when you've hit the very bottom✅ Why knowing and valuing yourself is the foundation of a second chance✅ Real advice for anyone coming home from prison — and staying out
For anyone who's been written off, done things they can't take back, or needs to believe that no one is too far gone to change.
(His full 16-year prison story is coming in a future episode.)
Chapters:00:00 "If you're not a monster yourself": the cold open02:19 What "21 Jump Street" really was07:23 Learning the craft: buying dope on the boardwalk09:13 Inside the school: befriending and buying from students13:44 Losing yourself in the role16:46 Robbed at gunpoint at a payphone22:05 The first shooting: shot twice, firing back23:41 When violence becomes a high28:44 Becoming a "gunslinger"30:09 Rampart CRASH and the 90s gang wars50:33 The Rampart scandal breaks54:04 Turning on the badge: robbing the dealers56:12 Spiraling: suicidal, paranoid, out of control1:03:46 Caught in a San Diego sting1:06:26 Getting saved in prison1:12:24 Preaching in solitary: light in a dark place1:16:34 What broke these men: the common thread1:19:09 Sixteen years, and who Ruben is today1:24:06 Advice for coming home and staying out
🎥 Watch on YouTube🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts & Spotify
Get Ruben's book:Available on Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/-/he/Redemption-Rogue-Rayford-Lorenz-Johnson/dp/1548249599
Follow Fausto:Instagram: https://instagram.com/hopedealerfaustoFacebook: https://facebook.com/hopedealerfaustoTikTok: https://tiktok.com/@hopedealerfaustoYouTube: https://youtube.com/@hopedealerfausto
🎧 Create. Belong. Heal.
"Be All Things To All People"

Fausto's Room | Michael Ketterer
Michael Ketterer's voice has reached tens of millions — his song "Spirit Lead Me" alone has passed 45 million streams — but the story underneath the music is one of repression, rock bottom, and slow, hard-won healing. Raised a minister's son, he learned to bury every feeling after his parents' divorce got the family cast out of their own church. Music became his escape, his identity, and the only place he felt seen.
He turned down a record deal after a dream told him he was "already famous in heaven," helped build United Pursuit into a worship movement that blew up on Facebook, and then said yes to fostering and adopting five kids from deeply traumatic beginnings. That yes cracked him wide open. The wounds he'd hidden for decades surfaced, he leaned on alcohol to cope, and it nearly cost him everything — his marriage, his freedom, a very public high and a very private low.
This episode is the comeback: getting sober, years of therapy, learning to feel again, and finally being able to sing the songs he wrote long before he had the freedom to mean them. It's about faith, fatherhood, creativity, and why doing the inner work is the most important thing any artist can do.
What you'll take away:✅ Why doing the internal work is what makes an artist's voice authentic✅ How the hardest "yes" of his life became the thing that set him free✅ What real recovery looks like — therapy, humility, and radical vulnerability✅ Why resting instead of striving can grow your impact, not shrink it
For anyone carrying wounds they've learned to hide, chasing a calling through the long quiet years, or trying to believe their pain might one day become purpose.
(His full America's Got Talent story is coming in a future episode.)
Chapters:00:00 Doing less to impact more: resting in God's love02:07 The day they got their boys: raising five from foster care05:26 "A blessing in disguise" — and the wounds it exposed08:46 Music as his first coping tool, and a childhood of repression19:27 "If I lost my voice, who would I be?"23:32 Chasing the dream in a pre-internet world26:35 The record deal and the dream that changed everything32:36 United Pursuit: raw worship that blew up on Facebook44:37 Fifteen years of grinding before the "overnight" success47:27 Spiritual manipulation, compromise, and walking away1:00:28 The divorce, the shame, and being cast out1:07:54 "You're not cleaning for your boss, you're cleaning for God"1:09:36 Top of the world and bottom of the world1:10:13 Getting sober and becoming radically vulnerable1:15:32 "Grateful": singing the songs he couldn't sing before1:20:01 Fame for a day and the weight it carries1:23:22 The America's Got Talent & lyrics guessing game1:37:04 Advice for artists, and where to find Michael
🎥 Watch on YouTube🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts & Spotify
Connect with Michael:Instagram: https://instagram.com/michaelkettererSpotify: search "Michael Ketterer"
Follow Fausto:Instagram: https://instagram.com/hopedealerfaustoFacebook: https://facebook.com/hopedealerfaustoTikTok: https://tiktok.com/@hopedealerfaustoYouTube: https://youtube.com/@hopedealerfausto
🎧 Create. Belong. Heal.
"Be All Things To All People"

Fausto's Room | Skinny Vinny
Skinny Vinny has lit himself on fire, jumped off cliffs, and put his body through hell for the shot — but the real stunt was surviving long enough to do any of it. He grew up worshipping Jackass, copying every bit in his backyard, until drugs took over and swallowed fifteen years of his life. Fifteen overdoses. Homelessness. An acceptance that he'd die alone as a heroin addict.
Then a free flight to LA — one he only took for the weather — cracked the door open. He got sober, moved into a sober living, and picked up a camera he hadn't touched in fifteen years. One viral video later, he was standing in Bam Margera's castle hearing people call him by name, realizing the attention was better than any drug he'd ever chased.
This is the full arc: addiction and accountability, working for free for years to build a career, learning to create for the love and not the numbers, and turning it all into something bigger — The Comeback Sober Living, a community he built so others could get the shot he got.
What you'll take away:✅ Why accountability is the real foundation of long-term recovery✅ How chasing the work you love can be the thing that keeps you alive✅ Why "do it for the love, not the money" is a survival skill, not a cliché✅ How to build a career and a life from scratch, no matter how late you start
For anyone who's ever felt too far gone, too far behind, or too broken to come back — and anyone chasing a dream everyone told them was impossible.
Chapters:00:00 Lighting himself on fire: the stunts that nearly cost him03:31 The Jackass generation: fear, attention, and comedy08:20 Copying Jackass as a kid — the first stunts09:29 Fifteen years lost to addiction and identity crises11:28 What the drugs were really masking14:34 When it stopped being fun: party drugs to narcotics16:27 College, overdoses, and rock bottom20:17 Accountability: cleaning up the wreckage23:38 Eight years sober and the childhood dream24:35 Meeting Zach and picking up the camera again26:31 The viral video and becoming "Skinny Vinny"28:20 Bam's castle: attention better than any drug31:36 Steve-O's advice: staying in sober living35:26 Working for free, doing it for love not money41:20 The scariest and most painful stunts50:21 When a video flops, and why you keep going54:31 Income streams and staying grounded57:00 Opening The Comeback Sober Living1:00:19 The Jackass stunt-guessing game1:11:05 Advice for creators and where to find Vinny
🎥 Watch on YouTube🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts & Spotify
Connect with Vinny:Instagram: https://instagram.com/skinnyvinnyThe Comeback Sober Living: https://thecomebacksoberliving.com
Follow Fausto:Instagram: https://instagram.com/hopedealerfaustoFacebook: https://facebook.com/hopedealerfaustoTikTok: https://tiktok.com/@hopedealerfaustoYouTube: https://youtube.com/@hopedealerfausto
🎧 Create. Belong. Heal.
"Be All Things To All People"

Fausto's Room | Gremlin
Gremlin grew up feeling like he wasn't the smart kid or the strong kid — so he chased the one thing that made him feel seen: creativity. Gaming, art, skateboarding, and finally music. He started writing raps young and was too nervous to share them with anyone for years, wrestling the same anxiety that can still make a trip to the grocery store feel like a mountain. Then he bet everything on it. A hundred-dollar camera from Best Buy.
A first music video he was almost too embarrassed to post. Online rap battles. A talent show where he was shaking in front of the whole school. He kept going — through years where nothing hit — until his Uber Raps took off, and one morning he woke up to a million subscribers and a plaque on the wall. But the real story is what happened after: when the thing that worked stopped working, and he had to pivot, fight imposter syndrome, stay financially disciplined, and prove he was more than one viral idea.
This one's about identity, anxiety, mentorship, and building a real career out of pure creativity.
What you'll take away:
✅ How to build a following and a career from your creativity — with no blueprint
✅ Why the people around you can make or break your dream ("get new voices")
✅ How to keep going when what once worked suddenly stops
✅ Real talk on anxiety, imposter syndrome, and betting on yourself anyway
For anyone who's ever felt unseen, too anxious, or not "good enough" at the normal stuff — and anyone ready to turn a creative gift into a life.
🎥 Watch on YouTube
🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts & Spotify
Follow Gremlin
https://www.instagram.com/gremlinraps/
https://www.youtube.com/@Gremlinmusic24/featured
Follow Fausto:
Instagram: https://instagram.com/hopedealerfausto
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TikTok: https://tiktok.com/@hopedealerfausto
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@hopedealerfausto
🎧 Create. Belong. Heal.
"Be All Things To All People"

Fausto's Room | Dane Carter
Dane Carter started using as a kid — and lost over 13 years to prison, addiction, and the streets. Weed turned to coke, meth, heroin, and finally fentanyl. Multiple prison terms. A case where he was staring down 70 years. He'll tell you straight — he never got high to die. He liked the feeling. Then the feeling ran his life.
At the end, he was using around the clock in a motel room he hadn't left in three weeks. Then a blocked number rang at 9:30 at night — a detox center offering to scholarship his way in if he showed up in 24 hours. He still doesn't know how they got his number. He left everything and went.
Today Dane is sober and built Dane Carter Fit — a thriving online fitness coaching brand and community — from the last money he had and no blueprint, just a story he knew could change lives.
What you'll take away:✅ How to build a fitness coaching brand using your testimony✅ Why your story is your greatest asset — in recovery AND in business✅ How to bet on yourself with no experience and no blueprint
This one's for anyone who's ever felt too young, too far gone, or too deep to come back — and anyone ready to turn pain into purpose and a real career.
🎥 Watch on YouTube🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts & Spotify
Follow Fausto:Instagram: https://instagram.com/hopedealerfaustoFacebook: https://facebook.com/hopedealerfaustoTikTok: https://tiktok.com/@hopedealerfaustoYouTube: https://youtube.com/@hopedealerfausto
🎧 Create. Belong. Heal.
"Be All Things To All People"