Ask Jim Anything #2

Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of Ask Jim Anything. I was calling it Ask Me Anything, but it's really, I'm Jim. Today I'm going to answer another 10 questions from people and some of them are questions from you, some of them are questions from me because just starting this out, not getting all the questions from everyone. So if you listen to the episode and you think of any questions you want to ask, whether they're related to emotions or conflict or leadership or Africa or culture or sports or politics or whatever comes to mind, any current event or anything that really comes to mind, then please ask. I would love to answer. This is a way for me to almost be in conversation with you, to be in interview with you without having to coordinate times and being on the same time zone and location. So I'm going to get started in a few seconds here. I realized two and a half minutes for the intro is a bit too much, but I just don't want to screw around with too many different clocks. So I want to make sure this is less than 30 minutes. So we're going to go into the next one now. Voila. Question one of 10. How has it been dating outside your culture? Any tips? Anonymous.

My first answer is that every time we are dating, we are dating outside of our culture. We don't just have one culture. We have so many different cultures. If a way to look at culture is the collection of beliefs and behaviors and habits of individuals, then we are constantly dating people who are mixed from different cultures, myself as well. So that would be the first answer is that everyone has a mix of cultures, so we're always engaged in dating with people from different cultures. But then the second part would be to realize that I didn't start the clock. And so we'll do a little bit shorter on this one. Hey! So then I'll answer another part of it is that, I think dating outside of our culture, like our main culture, one of the hard parts is...

One of the best parts is recognizing that we're really different and there's so much opportunity to learn and see the world from a different perspective and that's also one of the hardest parts because some things that people that we do are so deeply embedded that we don't even realize we're doing them and so interacting with someone from a different culture they may be behaving in a way that frustrates me like crazy. And it takes a lot of work to realize that it's just because they have a different situation. Like in Kenya, you know, dating a girl and her foot got, she had surgery on her foot and we wanted to go get a bandage from the pharmacy. And we were in the pharmacy and there were no bandages. I was like, what do you, like no, what do you call them? Gauze, like gauze pads. I was like, there's no gauze pads? And certain things can just be so fundamentally conflicting with our own expectations on the world that it can be really hard. But at the same time it can be really nice finding the common humanity with someone that we often think is so different. That'll be the answer for this one, because I know I've gone over time. I can always talk about those things more. Let's see if I can get better at this software. There we go. How do you navigate emotionally from a heartbreak or betrayal to a healed version of yourself? Because for some people, it's not easy moving on. Hey, for most people, it's not easy moving on. And what I would say is that it's actually not about moving on. Moving on is a language of apathy, indifference, disconnection, distancing. And I don't think that helps us heal or move on. And I think both of them, language of like, moving away.

And I think how we heal or how we get better is to realize that we're always going to love the person. The person's always going to love us. Even if they really hurt us, it's probably because they loved us so much. Even if we hurt them, it's probably because we love them so much. So just recognizing, yeah, recognizing that. The thing that has helped me the most, even recently, is when I frame it as emotional combat, because I think it switches the focus from, I wish they were better at this skill, to, oh my gosh, they are in a terrifying situation, a really complex, intense situation. And I'm not, I don't frame it that way for them so much, I frame it that way for myself, because I think it's the same skill.

I think it's easy for me to blame myself and get so hard on myself that I have this ideal state where I want to be and I'm only here. And I forget that, yeah, it's really hard to be in this ideal state when, wow, there's a lot of chaos and turmoil in my life. And so I think focusing on that chaos and turmoil more than my state or the other person's state helps me get to that level.

Of recognizing that we are both trying our best and we are always both trying our best no matter what happened or will happen, and to come at it from that place of compassion, I think it's one of the fastest ways is just to, recognize all the conflicts in my life, just be aware of the fact that I am, blocking, dodging, grabbing like there's so much happening in my life there's also so much happening in their lives and we're just privy to a very small percentage of what's happening in their present and especially what happened in their past.

So I'd say thinking about the numerous conflicts that are in their life can really help. All right, I got the timing down. Good, that's the end of that one. Oh, it doesn't flash. Next one. Question number three. What is something you think people don't understand about what you do? This is from Caleb, my good friend Caleb. That it's.

It's for me as much as it's for somebody else. I think we often think, okay, yeah, I think we often think that love is very sacrificial.

We think that we are giving up and doing something for other people, and it hurts us. I think we do, I don't know, I do things for other people, and it helps me. This idea that love is soft? Man, I don't know, have you ever tried loving someone? It's not soft. Maybe falling in love makes us feel all woozy, but to truly, properly love, I think to go on a deeper level is so incredibly intense, emotional, challenging, difficult, complex, that I think we brush it off as, oh, it's just so soft. Man, I just stick to one thing. What's something people think don't understand about what you do? A lot of people don't understand the business model. a lot of the funding model, and it frustrates and even breaks a lot of the relationships in my life, where I'm like, I want to give things to people for free, and I want people to give things to me for free, freely, rather. And I think it really angers people, because I think they really don't understand. I think they really want me to just get a job, to just kind of do the normal path, But I think that's because they don't understand maybe what it's like to be at this, to have, I don't know, be at this level, maybe to, yeah, to have this skill in this particular area where I still care about a lot of people who have arguably wronged me more than people have been wronged.

And I think people just don't understand why I would want to give these services, why I would want to help people solve conflicts and not ask them to solve my conflict in the, Yeah, I mean, I can talk more about it another time, but I really think that's probably the issue. That people just think I can just go do a job and do this on the side. So maybe they don't also understand the urgency and importance of why I'm working on this. Ooh, lots. Maybe I can go on a lot of things. Next question. Voice, come back, please. Ah, what do you think? What do you think? Is the most challenging part of being more in touch with your emotions? Caleb.

I don't know, the first answer is that it's almost having like x-ray vision. I can feel it in myself, I can see it in other people. And then when I want to talk about that, people are like, no, that's not how I'm feeling. And I'm like, oh my god, you're obviously feeling that. And so this almost window into what I think is happening and confidence into what I think is happening, but feeling crazy because most people around me disagree, and sometimes strongly disagree.

And so having the endurance to pull people into more awareness of their emotions, instead of trying to like immediately push them off a cliff into it, to have the endurance to recognize that it takes time for people to learn these skills, you know, a lot of people have been in environments where they have learned almost the complete opposite, where they would feel sadness or they'd feel anything and people would say stop feeling that, shut up, leave me alone or they'd get beaten for it. So I think one of the most challenging parts is being in touch with your emotions surrounded by people who are not in touch with their emotions and not.

Disconnecting from them, distancing from them, estranging from them, not leaving them, abandoning them, but keeping them in your life and trying to maintain a relationship with them and to try to lift them up, or to lift up those behaviors rather, instead of their behaviors of suppression, of avoidance, kind of pulling me down.

That's one of the challenges I think it's so easy to just tell people to move on just go find your tribe just to be with people who get you, but then what, I'm ignoring all the other people who just because of where they were born or how they grew up that love me but don't understand me because of the distance or because of the different behaviors so I think one of the hardest parts is, being in touch with my emotions surrounded by people who are less in touch with them and not running away and giving up. Next question. Voila, I like this software. We're moving. Question 5 of 10. Is it always about understanding emotions through words or are they sometimes only physically experienced?

There is a woman named Anna Wurtzbika, who I refer to often and should probably have the courage to ask her to come on the podcast because she's up in her 80s, I think. She said the word emotion doesn't exist in all cultures. What does is to feel and to think. And she thinks that emotion is really thought applied to feeling. So using that definition, I don't think we always have to use words. I do think a lot of times our thinking is in words, but it's also in visions. It's also in sounds maybe, other stimuli.

But, so I think, yeah we can feel it physically sometimes only, but for me I tend to, that becomes more of a sensation or a feeling, this is all linguistic, wordsmithing that we're doing anyways, right? So, I would say...

I would say it becomes an emotion almost when we start to apply words or thought or some type of categorization to it. I can't remember who said it. I think it was in this book by James Pennebaker called Opening Up, but he said something about writing about feelings was like putting a digital digital system onto an analog signal. So the analog signal being this very continuous, messy, interaction we have with the body, right? So if we're feeling something in the body, it's the heart rhythm, it's the breathing pattern, it's the posture, it's the chemicals, the hormones, like there's a lot of things happening in the body. It's just a really complex mixture of things and then words coming in and kind of chunking that experience up to communicate it with others but also with ourselves so can we just physically feel the emotion i based on my definition of emotion i'd say maybe not but to certain things that are really hard to put in words and by putting them in words it actually changes the feeling yeah i think when we put things into words, it changes the experience. So sometimes just feeling it can maybe be more pure. I don't know.

Man, two and a half minutes seems very short for most of these. I really like answering. These are great podcast starters. So if you're listening to any of these and you want to come on, let me know. Question six of ten. What are your thoughts on development in Africa in general? How do you balance development and resource utilization with preservation of nature and culture, whoo, anonymous, so I was talking with a friend of mine on this, so I worked in economic development in Tanzania in 2008-2009, a consulting firm, and with everything going on with USAID and all that right now.

I believe that the development industry has big problems. But I also believe the solution is to not run away and give up, just as I said earlier in this episode, but to dig down and go deeper and figure out what the problems are. And one of the challenges, I think, is having foreigners make all the decisions for locals. So I actually think the problem is that we are not trusting enough, not that we're too trusting. So I think people think we're giving too much money to Africa, these people can't figure it out. Well, part of the reason they can't figure it out is because we don't trust them. We have foreigners come in and make a lot of the decisions for the things. When I was there, I was the business manager, but I had three local Tanzanians who were on the board, so I didn't make the final decisions. And it's so opposite from what happens out there. And so I think that can be very helpful. I think having an outsider perspective is really helpful to switch things up a little bit, but I think having more trust of locals to make decisions.

Would empower them more. And I think one of the problems is not so much that they don't have money, they don't have food. I think they don't have trust. They don't have power. They don't feel empowered. So when it comes to preservation of nature and culture, I think it's kind of related. You know, people may have losing relationships with nature because maybe the elephant comes in and stomps your field all the time and you're like, screw this, I hate these elephants now. You know, like, I mean, or in the U.S. you get a tornado and then you hate nature because of that. So I think the challenge with culture, man, this is such a long question, but the challenge with culture is that how do we help culture there and culture here become more trusting and more empowering so that we can actually develop and solve problems ourselves. Ourselves, not just individually, but our groups, and just more oriented towards problem-solving and less towards problem-avoiding.

Oh, that is not trying to rail on Africa. It talks about here as well. Question 7 of 10. What is one TV show you'd like to be on? Ha, this question I asked myself. Jeopardy. Actually, I think celebrity Jeopardy. I thought about this the other day, and I've watched Jeopardy. If you're not familiar, it's an American TV show, a quiz show, and they ask six times, I think 30 questions per round. There's two rounds, and then there's a final question. So I think it's 61 questions in a 30 minute show with commercials. So in like 20 minutes, they wah, wah, wah, question, question, question, question. And there's what? So there's 10 categories plus the final round. So 11 categories.

And I love it. I've loved the show since I was a kid. I saw a taping when I was out there because it's almost like the Super Bowl for nerds. It's almost like the world championship for nerds. I realize how many American cultural references I'm using. And I love it. I watched it as a kid. I've been so afraid to even apply for it. And they have a version called Celebrity Jeopardy. And this is when they would bring on actors and sports stars and different people that have become famous in American society. And they have the same questions, the same format. Now it's a little different, but they would ask much easier questions. And I would love to go on regular Jeopardy, But I thought, man, if I go on Celebrity Jeopardy, I could clean up. I'm a little afraid to say this publicly because part of me is like, no, no, this is your secret. Get famous and then go on Celebrity Jeopardy. And man, just take it all. I mean, even though the winnings go to charity. But man, it's not about the money. It's about the pride. It's, oh, you won Jeopardy. I don't know if people would give me as much accolades if I won Celebrity Jeopardy. But I don't know there's a lot of serious TV shows I would like to be on but somebody suggested 40 Day Fiance the other day that would be interesting, but yeah I think I've always dreamed of being on Jeopardy and now that the show's host changed from Alex Trebek to Ken Jennings I am you know at first I was a little less excited, but and after seeing the taping it was a little kind of demystifying but man I think I would still love Ken is, Ken's a brilliant man. I would like to be in the company and say I've been on that show. Wow. So if any of you know how to make me a celebrity and get me on the show, please let me know.

All right, timing-wise. Oops, next question, next question. Okay, gotta run. What's one way in which you think the pandemic has impacted us long term?

I think so many of us are carrying so much pain, and that pain has turned into anger or hatred, hatred more so towards other people. And indifference, and that we've just continued the whole social distancing to be more emotionally distant.

And, yeah, I don't know. We spent two years basically learning how to hide, literally hide from other people so that they wouldn't breathe on us or we wouldn't breathe on them so we would get each other sick or get angry at the people who said we shouldn't do that. And I just think it was such a traumatic shift, such a dramatic shift in our lives, and we don't even talk about it. People just don't want to talk about it. It's a couple of years later and it's almost like we pretend it didn't happen.

And I think we need to talk about it, but it's tricky. It's almost like we went through a global collective trauma and everyone's pretending it didn't happen. like we collectively got robbed or we collectively got, physically or sexually assaulted and just nobody's talking about it but it shows up in so many aspects of our lives.

I've talked to people in bars occasionally one guy in a bathroom and one guy just sitting around pizza and I mentioned you know we're not talking about pandemics Both of them opened up and almost started crying in the bar within five minutes of mentioning the topic. I think years after COVID, after the pandemic ended. So it's just, it's like we're carrying so much pain. It's almost like the pain has bubbled up to here. And so when we explode, just from, you know, we're just adding 5% to the top of what's already inside of us. So I think just in general, the collective emotional experience that we've felt from that is still here and we're not talking about it.

Okay, question nine of ten. What is one physical exercise that helps you more than you imagined?

Ironically, moving more slowly. I say ironically because I have been speaking so quickly on this video and so now I will slow down into a much more Martin Luther King pace or Mr. Rogers pace or even, I think, Pope Francis Pace. I watched a documentary on him a few years ago and he spoke more slowly. So I notice that so often in my life, I am just physically moving fast. Even if I'm thinking fast, I think a lot of us don't realize that thinking fast, the body is still involved. We are doing this with our hands. We are, you know, scratching our head. We are moving this. Our breath is changing a lot. we are, even to think, or to, I think often thinking is sub-vocalization, so even this part is moving fast, the tongue is moving fast, so I realize that just intentionally slowing down can reset my posture, it can reset my heart rate, it can reset my diaphragm, it can help me sleep better it's hard to remember it can help my digestion it can help you know going to the toilet.

So much. It can help with the anxiety, it can help with the creativity in some ways. I'm not suggesting we should always be slow or move slowly, but there's something especially about how quickly the world is moving right now to just intentionally slow down. The challenge is when we slow down we might want to sleep, as I feel more sleepy doing this. But if we're not sleeping well, part of that is, maybe because we're using the phone, and on the phone, our thumbs are going super fast, if we're typing, we're typing really fast, or if we're reading, we're skimming, or we're watching a video, and the video is quick moving, it's TikTok, it's 30 seconds, it's five seconds, life is fast, things are moving at us very quickly, and I love that, and I find just physically slowing my body down, not so much even focused on the breath, but just like the hands and the, this can really change things for me. Last question.

I'm going to keep looking at the clock so the alarm doesn't go off. Question 10 of 10. What's one question you have for people watching? It's funny, I ask these questions myself, but I don't even remember what they are.

What's, okay, this is just the first one that came to mind. What's something that you dream about doing, but you think everyone in your life will tell you you're crazy for doing it?

Yeah.

What's one thing you dream about doing, but you think everyone in your life will tell you you're crazy for wanting to do that?

I'm not sure if I should explain this more. I think the essence is, yeah.

I think there are so many things that we want to do in our lives.

That sometimes the closest people in our lives tell us not to do it. And we stop. But we keep dreaming, but we just don't think it's possible. Even for me, like, I can answer it myself. What's one thing that I would do in my life that I think everyone would tell me I'm crazy for it? Ask people to just give me money for the work that I'm doing most people I talk to think I'm absolutely crazy, and but it's not like I'm trying to just do it out of charity or pity I just believe it's going to work I believe that, the way to a more open, loving generous, problem solving strong, powerful whatever phrase you want to use the way to that type of being, is to open up and receive as well, and to receive unconditionally, and to ask, to request unconditionally.

And it's just, I've known this for 13 years, I think, but it's just now that I'm like, screw it, I am going to hit people in the face with this until eventually they're going to realize it. But yeah yeah so I'm curious what it is for you what's one thing you dream of doing that you think everyone in your life will tell you you're crazy for doing it, or wanting to do it okay this is a reflection so I've got a few minutes I won't go the full time but how did this go with most of the questions from you huh.

I mean, I find questions from me interesting because I often don't realize the questions that I'm asking. Like, I wrote them a few days ago, and I hadn't thought about them too much. So I think there's still an element of reflection and curiosity in there. I like questions more from other people, at least at this point, because I ask myself so many questions. It's almost like, I was not telling Caleb, I was like, asking myself questions almost feels like tickling myself. And there's actually research saying that it's really hard to tickle ourselves. We can try. We can go like this. But it's really hard to make us go, ah, ooh, ah, and the laughter. Because there's an element of unpredictability that is required for tickling. They did the study and they, I think, disconnected. Not disconnected. You can try to tickle yourself. And what they would do is that they would put an unpredictable time delay in there. And by doing that because you're holding like a I don't know, a feather or something that actually allowed us to tickle ourselves so maybe me asking questions to myself a week ago, helps or if I would have randomly asked them in some ways but I really like questions from other people because then I'm in a conversation with you instead of a conversation with myself.

Because a lot of you are going through things or curious about things and are curious to hear my perspective and one, I feel grateful for that. And two, if my perspective could help you in any way, man, I'd be even more grateful. So, and like I said, it could start, be the start of a conversation. You ask me a question, I respond, and then you're like, oh, I want to ask another question. And then maybe I want to ask you a question. So in the future, maybe you're a guest on the show, or maybe it leads to other things in life. So I'm grateful that I'm able to ask myself questions. And I think that's one of the essences of why I am getting better at these skills, reflection and relationship with myself, kind of interviewing, conversing with myself. But I also think it's really fun for other people to ask me questions because it builds relationships with me and with them. And on that, the clock is going to alarm, and talk to you next time. Thank you.