Latest / The Christian Reeve Podcast / Kristina Parro | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #109 |

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Kristina Parro | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #109 | · The Christian Reeve Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to another episode of the Christian radio
• 0:02
  Podcast. A quick disclaimer.
• 0:04
  Before we begin certain words, used within this podcast do not
• 0:09
  represent the views or opinions or beliefs of the participants
• 0:13
  involved. The words are used in historical
• 0:16
  context, thank you very much and enjoy the episode.
• 0:21
  Hello and welcome to another episode of the Christian wave
• 0:24
  podcast. Today's guest is the author of
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  Lucky a novel from Um, luck it. So, not lucky and novel.
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  That is the full title. And she is all the way from
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  Chicago, Illinois in the United States.
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  Her name is Christina, pero, welcome to the show.
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  Christina Hayden. Thanks so much Christian.
• 0:43
  I'm great. How are you?
• 0:45
  Good. Good, obviously of can, we were
• 0:46
  having connectivity problems there.
• 0:49
  I've been having a lot lately, to be honest.
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  It's very hit and miss just in podcasting, in general.
• 0:54
  It's hmm, But we're here now hearing.
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  Yeah, I've been doing a lot of Instagram.
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  Lives lately too. And I've been having some
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  similar issues technology goes in con.
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  Yeah, I gotta say ever since Instagram was acquired by
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  Facebook it's just been trashed. The whole time.
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  Just awful. Never never used to have these
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  problems before. It was a quiet.
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  So me, what's that actually? It's a coincidence, I think not.
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  Yeah, but anyway, enough about that.
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  Let's go straight to you. So yeah, what can you tell us
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  about your novel? What's it about?
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  Like I know, but in your words, please tell us what it's about,
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  for sure. So lucky is inspired by Taylor
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  Swift album folklore and the incredible true story of
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  Standard Oil heiress, Rebecca Harkness.
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  So it depicts the inner tangled, web of stories.
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  It's I part of the book half of the book is about a pop star
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  named real harmonia, and the Other half tells the story of
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  Rebecca, Harkness, starting from her grandfather, who was a
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  confederate soldier in the Civil War and then all the way through
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  the tragic demise of her children.
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  And for those of you who don't know Rebecca Harkness married
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  into the Standard Oil family, which was Rockefellers company.
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  And she a few years after she married into the family, her
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  husband passed away, And she inherited all of his money and
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  at one time was the richest American woman.
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  And so she was able to live her life.
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  However, she wanted. And she did, she was she
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  sponsored, Geoffrey's original ballet.
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  She was great friends and, you know, sponsored a lot of the art
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  of Salvador Dali. She just lived a fascinating
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  life and a life that a lot of people.
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  Wish that they could live like and I think that her story is
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  just a beautiful picture because it ends in tragedy and I think
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  the opposite side of the coin for greatness, oftentimes is
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  tragedy. And so I was kind of exploring
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  that in my novel both with the story of Rebecca and then I was
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  also telling the story, like I said, a Brea harmonia, who is a
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  pop star who Kind of gets elevated to the peak of Fame and
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  Fortune. And, you know, she's at the top
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  and she realizes that life isn't as good.
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  As she thought it would be up there.
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  She thought that, you know, if she was a good musician and got
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  Awards and you know was selling millions of albums, more people
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  would like her and that her life would be better because of it
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  and she realizes that's not the case.
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  So, she uses Rebecca's story, and little clues, that Rebecca
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  leaves behind, because real harmonia ends up buying a house
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  that Rebecca Harkness lived in. And so, she finds some clues
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  that Rebecca Left Behind to help her answer.
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  Some existential issue, she has in her life.
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  Awesome. Yeah I got a lot of questions
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  but I suppose the main one I want to kind of go with and it
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  will sound really ignorant and obvious but I think you'll know
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  where I'm going with this. What was actually your kind of
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  motivation for writing this book?
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  Yeah. So I was working in a nursing
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  home during the pandemic and I was just seeing a lot of tragedy
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  in the world around me and tragedy related to the
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  collective idea of the American dream.
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  And so, as I was dealing with that Taylor Swift album came out
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  folklore in July and I really do mean to her lyrics to try to
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  make sense of the chaos that I was felt like I was surrounded
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  by. And so I was inspired by her
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  song, Taylor has a song on the Album about Rebecca, Harkness
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  called the last great American dinosaurs, that's the
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  connection. There it is.
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  So I was interested in this character.
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  There was a biography written about her right after she passed
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  away. That's really hard to get your
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  hands on. I think you can buy it right now
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  on Amazon, for $999. I found it at a circulation only
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  library downtown Chicago. Luckily so I I had access to
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  this story that I knew a lot of people were interested in, but
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  not many people had access to so that sounds legit was actually
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  nearly a thousand dollars to buy.
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  Yes, why. Well, well guys, there's only
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  one edition ever printed of it. It's a rare book and so when
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  books are rare Supply and demands of science ends up going
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  crazy. Yeah.
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  And it wouldn't it make sense to just make it Tool version of the
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  book and just sell the digital version.
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  Story of the book. Yeah.
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  Then we know because it exposes a lot of Secrets of a very, very
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  wealthy family and a very wealthy people and my hypothesis
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  is that there was some litigation or something that
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  happened, I'm not really sure. But I know the author of the
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  book was approached on it. On Twitter about making a
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  digital version of the book and or just getting access to the
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  book and the author on Twitter said I have one copy and it's
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  not for sale. I mean, yeah, that sounds like a
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  book. That's not supposed to be red.
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  I mean, come on, man. What's the plan?
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  You know, it's like push the red button to let me now.
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  Everyone wants to push button button.
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  Never wants to read the story, like, yeah, that sounds off and
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  it's clearly if a cover-up but okay.
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  Suppose something I really want to drive.
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  That is. Obviously, the thing that I'm
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  picking up here is, is a very kind of like inspiring book for
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  women. Obviously the staff is
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  obviously, very inspiring for women like would you say That
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  it's still as relevant. Like, I know how that question
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  was sound, but there are like a lot of like female CEOs now
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  emerging around the world, there's a lot of powerful women
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  in the world. Now, you mean, you've got like
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  the Prime Minister. I believe of New Zealand is
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  female. All of the Finnish government is
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  female so like slowly. But surely we're starting to see
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  a bit more equal representation as far as like male and female
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  representation across just Society in general, to take in
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  something like Which Once Upon a Time would have been quite a
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  rarity like something that you know maybe women would never
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  even dream of and now it's a sort of a possibility.
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  Would you would you say it's like still kind of relevant?
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  Do you think like, women have more of a chance now than they
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  did, they say, When this book was written or you know like I
• 9:02
  know how this question starts. That's like a really good.
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  Oh no. I understand.
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  I think that we are at a time where women have more
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  opportunities than ever before. I watched the Cinderella movie
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  with Camila Cabello last night and it was funny, it was a new
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  take on Cinderella, where where Cinderella wanted to be a
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  dressmaker and she wanted to work.
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  And at the beginning of the movie, Everybody was like, you
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  know, no, you can't because you're a woman and then at the
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  end, she was able to. So were you going to say
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  something? Yeah, a couple of things.
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  One, is that the one that has this?
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  I think it's on, like, Disney or something.
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  Scott, like James, Corden it. Yes.
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  Yeah, see, I was really interested in that, but I saw
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  the advert and I was like, oh, and that.
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  Normally, I wouldn't care about something like that, but I saw
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  like, the Fairy Godmother was, like, sort of, like, a game that
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  dood' and I thought that's cool. Yeah, it's fun.
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  And then, as soon as I saw James, Corden us a hard.
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  One of the mice small part even though he's a small part, he
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  somehow still manages to be I'm not going to sweat greedy,
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  aggravatingly annoying. I just can't stand him, but
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  anyway. Yeah, cool.
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  Okay, yeah. So with that particular
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  adaptation. Now that's it's an interesting
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  one because I mean, that's always been done by a million
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  times but it's still seemingly has legs on it.
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  I know this is weird as well hearing something like that like
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  or because it's so old fashioned by God, you're a woman.
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  You can't do this. Like, I haven't heard that in
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  years, but I have a lot of Princess, I got have a lot of
• 10:48
  females in my community predominantly female and you
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  know occasionally they'll share stories of just like casual
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  discrimination or harassment or these different things and it
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  was kind of blows my mind that it still happens today.
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  Do you know? I mean, because years ago it
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  used to be the sort of thing that was like our it's just
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  something that women have to put up with, you know, and like
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  Society was almost kind of like laughing at it.
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  Like, oh, it's just Just you know that he's a really good
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  example by something really. This seemingly years ago would
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  have been like very passive but now it's like stamped on.
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  So like in the UK it was always been very common.
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  Like if you're a female walking across a pasta building site and
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  there's like a group of guys, they're, they're like wolf
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  whistle or whatever and years ago, it used to be like Oh, it's
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  just banter, it's lad banter, it's this, it's that and then I
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  don't know, I want to say somewhere in the mid 2010s or
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  something like that. There's just a business, major
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  shift. Maybe it was often me too.
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  Maybe that's when it kind of happened but it did change and
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  now that kind of stuff is like destroyed.
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  So it's really interesting to hear that, it still happens to
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  this day in workplaces and various other different places.
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  Yeah. So I guess this is good.
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  I've never Like, well, at least not that I'm consciously aware
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  of. I don't know of any time that
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  I've been discriminated against for being a woman in my
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  workplace or anything like that, but I think that just like
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  racism there are some subconscious cycles that we are
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  still working through as a collective regarding, you know,
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  truly Seeing everyone on the same or an equal playing field,
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  at least to like start, you know.
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  But as far as my book goes it's not really necessarily like a
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  woman empowerment story. As far as the story of Rebecca
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  Harkness or really Rhea. It's in more, it more looks at
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  the tragedy of well, And the fact that for women and men that
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  wealth doesn't typically last more than three generations and
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  there's like, just all of these stories of people throughout the
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  ages from. I mean, the most ancient people
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  that we know of of how well on individual scales and larger
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  scales gets squandered by the generations that come after you.
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  The original people, that Acquire the wealth.
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  And so that was more the direction that I was like, kind
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  of taking with it because I was thinking about these things on a
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  grander scale. As far as, like I said, the
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  American dream, but how that relates to climate change?
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  How that relates to, you know, our kids future like the pursuit
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  of Limitless wealth. Cannot be a good thing for us
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  all long-term. And so working in for-profit,
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  health care where I felt like, I was kind of under valued and
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  like not. And even though I was the one
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  who liked got the degree the advanced degrees, like I have my
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  Master's Degree, specifically for Speech, Pathology and the
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  speech pathologist by background.
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  Oh, well, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I found myself in a position
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  where I just had really no room for for improvement.
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  I was making like 15% of what I need for my building every day
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  and I just had no like my co-workers, hadn't gotten a
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  raise and like five years. And so, I was like, grappling,
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  with that idea juxtaposed against a stock market, that was
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  rising to all-time highs, despite us being in the middle
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  of the pandemic. And despite You know.
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  Objectively no growth or little growth in our economy.
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  And so I was just struggling with those ideas and so while I
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  think that, you know, the women empowerment angle is, is cool
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  and that is definitely a part of my book.
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  I suppose it wasn't necessarily in my motivations for writing
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  it. not get that sucks up product of it, I guess I was
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  just more interested because What a is not common.
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  Just people in general to become the heir to like millions or
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  billions or where that's just, not something that happens every
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  day and also you know, from a female perspective of you know
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  like three. Here's a good example when Jeff
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  besos got his divorce. Obviously there was a lot to
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  talk about, what his wife was taken away from that which was
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  still a crazy amount of money. Like I think if he's worth a
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  hundred billion then she got like two Alien, which was just
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  crazy to think about. But yeah, these things happen
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  and it's like you said, like you used the word wealth and, you
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  know, that's a very important distinction as well because
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  obviously people always get that confused.
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  Rich is, yeah, I have a lot of money in the bank account.
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  I flash it, whatever. I got a nice holidays, but
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  wealth is like more like power and influence.
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  And you know, I'm going to buy this land.
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  Land or this island or Lobby, and change these laws in this
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  country or whatever the case may be bored by this newspaper or by
• 16:53
  this politician. Yeah, the power is even more
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  substantial because these people have an impact on our day-to-day
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  life in ways that we don't even think about.
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  I mean, Jeff besos Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post.
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  This is yeah. Yes and when there was a recent,
• 17:19
  I don't know how recent it was but something about a
• 17:23
  billionaire tax and the Washington Post put out an
• 17:27
  article about how the billionaire tax should not be a
• 17:30
  thing but you don't know that. Jeff besos owns the Washington
• 17:35
  Post, then that's like missing information that you know, is
• 17:40
  important to understanding the context of that news.
• 17:43
  Article. Yeah, I know.
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  So the fact that he owns Amazon or did so, like right, you know,
• 17:49
  if he gets bad pressed, he can literally print good press about
• 17:52
  himself and himself to, but about his, he can put pretty
• 17:59
  negative press about his competitors.
• 18:01
  Yeah, that's messed up. Yeah.
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  But that is, that is how the world Works, to be fun.
• 18:07
  It has. And it has since.
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  So, my character, Rebecca Harkness, she was all How do you
• 18:13
  kind of in a wealthy family? Her, her father was a tycoon, a
• 18:19
  business tycoon in St. Louis during the Industrial
• 18:22
  Revolution, and he got together with some of his buddies and
• 18:25
  bought a paper, and I talked about this in my book, but back
• 18:31
  at that time, there were, you know, labor unions and strikes
• 18:36
  happening. And then, they started these
• 18:40
  businesses started hiring, you know, African-Americans.
• 18:43
  People to fill the spots that were previously, not given to
• 18:50
  them because they were African American but now because, you
• 18:53
  know, the white workers Were Striking.
• 18:57
  So then news article went out about how Negroes were taking
• 19:04
  people's jobs and that caused this massive race riot
• 19:08
  throughout the United States. That is barely talked about like
• 19:12
  I had never heard about it before.
• 19:13
  And it was like The Purge like people I've seen pictures and
• 19:18
  I've heard or I've read first hand accounts but like people
• 19:21
  were dressed in street clothes, roaming the streets of
• 19:26
  predominantly black neighborhoods.
• 19:29
  Terrorizing people burning their houses throwing throwing babies
• 19:34
  into burning houses in broad daylight and it was kind of
• 19:40
  sparked by this news article are Our various news articles that
• 19:46
  were happening at that time and so it's like the impact is life
• 19:50
  or death. Sometimes it's pretty crazy.
• 19:57
  Do you think you're going to have like a follow-up to this
• 19:59
  book or anything or any other sort of future books either in
• 20:03
  the world or planned? Cool?
• 20:06
  Tell tell tell he's now I'm working on one right now.
• 20:10
  That is it is like not even the same universe is my first book,
• 20:17
  and my first book, it was difficult to write a fiction
• 20:23
  book about a real person and my character of Brea harmonia was
• 20:30
  inspired by Taylor Swift as well as other pop stars and you know
• 20:35
  social media figures and this age but it was difficult to kind
• 20:41
  of figure out like a Very fiction where I'm keeping true
• 20:46
  to some details, but it's not a true book.
• 20:51
  So anyway, I'm doing the same thing with my next book.
• 20:54
  It had, there's going to be five points of view in this book, and
• 20:59
  one of the points of view is a character who's in Lucky, which
• 21:04
  is Abby. And Abby, you find out in lucky
• 21:09
  is an investor in GameStop. And so, I have been following
• 21:15
  the GameStop situation since January, and I think that, It
• 21:23
  helps paint a really interesting picture of our financial markets
• 21:27
  and some just some Society issues.
• 21:32
  So my next book is going to be exploring the GameStop Saga in a
• 21:37
  contemporary fiction form and with multiple points of view,
• 21:44
  writing process or approach to writing a book actually look
• 21:47
  like I start by with ideas broad ideas and write like essay type
• 21:55
  things about those ideas and then As I'm writing those, I
• 22:03
  start getting other ideas for like the book and the
• 22:08
  characters. And so then you start writing
• 22:12
  those and then puzzle them together and you say s a time.
• 22:16
  So what you like your sort of pose yourself a question answer,
• 22:19
  the question. And then in that you're sort of
• 22:22
  develop bigger ideas from that. I don't know what you mean.
• 22:26
  Yeah. And the great thing about that
• 22:27
  too is that it helps me understand, you know, part of
• 22:31
  why I write is to help myself get a better.
• 22:34
  Hold of something that I am struggling with, or that I'm
• 22:39
  trying to understand more fully or come to terms with and so
• 22:46
  that, that's exactly it. I have either a question or
• 22:50
  something that just is burning on my mind and then I explore it
• 22:54
  further. Yes, you'll book whenever you
• 22:57
  thinking of writing a book, Essentially, what you're trying
• 23:01
  to do is answer all of those questions within that book, but
• 23:05
  you need to, obviously answer them beforehand via doing these,
• 23:08
  like sort of mini essay things and then you sort of, once
• 23:11
  you've got enough to kind of work with a basic story or
• 23:14
  structure, then you take it to the next stage, sort of thing.
• 23:18
  Yes, cool. Cool.
• 23:20
  Is it? Nice interesting.
• 23:21
  I like to ask different authors that because I think the writing
• 23:24
  process is always interesting. Everyone has a different style
• 23:28
  for sure. The rights for different
• 23:30
  reasons. You know, I never set out to be
• 23:33
  a writer to write this book. Really, it just kind of happens.
• 23:39
  I was working as a speech pathologist, I never considered
• 23:43
  myself a writer. I've always journaled but I've
• 23:46
  never liked written anything really.
• 23:50
  So I know I can so briefly ask you about the motivation before.
• 23:53
  But was it more kind of like I need to just put this out
• 23:55
  because I have some ideas on it because obviously that's a big
• 23:58
  transition is You could have obviously just set up a Blog
• 24:02
  about this or set up some sort of you know like a book is a big
• 24:06
  commitment and obviously you would have known that going into
• 24:08
  that's also where did that kind of shift happen where you will?
• 24:11
  Okay, I need to do this. I need to put this data up.
• 24:16
  What was the reason for that? I would say that was Taylor like
• 24:21
  finding out about the story of Rebecca Harkness, seeing the
• 24:25
  parallels between her and end her life and the things that
• 24:30
  we're going on in her life and the parallels to some of the
• 24:34
  things that I was experiencing and some of the things that we
• 24:37
  are experiencing as a collective and then it just like kind of
• 24:44
  happened. I originally thought about
• 24:47
  potentially writing a musical because I have a background in
• 24:49
  musical theater, um, but I have no background in writing music.
• 24:54
  So I just when I started writing, I don't know it just it
• 24:59
  all came together so fast. I had been writing those essay
• 25:03
  type things though, before Taylor Swift album came out in
• 25:07
  July of last year and then I started writing this book and
• 25:13
  September. Well, I guess what I want to
• 25:16
  know is like we're you kind of just writing Being, that is a
• 25:20
  things for fun and then you kind of said, you know what, I want
• 25:25
  to turn this into something or I can because what you kind of
• 25:29
  said before was like, you know, you'd experiment with journalism
• 25:32
  or journaling. Sorry, you done it a little bit,
• 25:34
  so it sounded like in the context of your overall life, it
• 25:37
  was like a small little hobby on the side and then there's this
• 25:39
  transition where, as you said, you'd sort of these different
• 25:42
  things you made all these different connections.
• 25:44
  You're not. Okay.
• 25:45
  I want to do something with this.
• 25:49
  But I guess what I'm trying to provide.
• 25:51
  Is that where that turns from kind of Doing these that sa
• 25:55
  things to, okay, I'm going to write a book about this.
• 25:57
  Like is it was that kind of just like I need to put this out.
• 26:02
  I need to get this out there. I need to have my kind of
• 26:05
  opinion on this or was it like this is my idea for a book and I
• 26:11
  want to become an author and this is going to be my first
• 26:13
  thing and then we're going to build from there like just so I
• 26:16
  mean like because obviously as you spoke about before you
• 26:19
  wanted to move away from from health care what and we'll get
• 26:22
  together that a bit later but Now that shift is kind of like
• 26:27
  well I'm an orphan now. So I guess what I want to know?
• 26:29
  Like what wet. How did that decision kind of
• 26:31
  come up? Okay, and I'll become an author.
• 26:34
  Yeah, so I just found myself with a lot to say it, but yet
• 26:40
  feeling increasingly not relatable with everybody around
• 26:45
  me. I felt like nobody.
• 26:47
  I felt like I was complaining about the same things over and
• 26:50
  over to my family, especially but never being able to
• 26:55
  articulate. What I wanted to say in the way
• 26:59
  that I wanted to say it. And so I think that that's what
• 27:03
  My original essays. And then what led to the book is
• 27:08
  that like I wanted the people that I love to read it because I
• 27:12
  wanted them to understand me a little bit more.
• 27:15
  And while I was working in the nursing home, like I think that
• 27:20
  the word that best describes how I was feeling is undervalued and
• 27:27
  undervalued in every that ended up manifesting itself in in
• 27:33
  other. It's of my life as well.
• 27:35
  And I felt that my words really didn't have value anymore and so
• 27:44
  I think that that was more. My motivation was just too.
• 27:50
  Have my voice have value and to use my voice.
• 27:57
  To change or, or maybe start to change some of the things that I
• 28:04
  see that are wrong about the world.
• 28:10
  And I think that being an author gives me a really interesting
• 28:16
  opportunity to do that. Both through my writing and then
• 28:20
  crew, you know, my platform and being able to come on two
• 28:23
  different podcasts and have different, you know, Instagram
• 28:26
  lives with different authors or different experts and just, you
• 28:32
  know, put that value back in my voice.
• 28:35
  Anything I sleep and I was reading one of my favorite books
• 28:39
  of the day. It's called the heart of a dog
• 28:41
  by Mikhail bulgakov and basically written around.
• 28:48
  I think Russian Revolution time as they sort of transitioned
• 28:51
  into early communism and A lot of the books that bundle of
• 28:57
  wrote were just about his life, just about things, his
• 29:01
  experiences thoughts fit, you know, feelings opinions, and the
• 29:04
  more and more I kind of read into authors behind books.
• 29:07
  The more I realized, like, you know, it's just, it's just
• 29:10
  people, I don't know. I think there's, it's, it's not
• 29:13
  common, but I don't know how common it is.
• 29:16
  The people sort of just wake up and go.
• 29:18
  I want to be an author like that just happened.
• 29:19
  I think what a lot of people just live a life.
• 29:22
  Find, they have some stuff to say that they feel compelled to
• 29:26
  put out into the world, in some shape or form and then you know,
• 29:29
  writing a book is the natural kind of progression.
• 29:32
  Like, okay, well, I need to get this stuff out.
• 29:34
  This is how I'm going to do it. Obviously other people do it
• 29:36
  different mediums. Like I use Ricky Gervais has an
• 29:39
  example lot of time, like he turns his experiences into TV
• 29:44
  shows or whatever you know. It's I think it's a brilliant
• 29:47
  way to kind of take Lessons you've learned from life and
• 29:52
  then convert them into stories with messages that people can
• 29:55
  kind of pick up on and relate to in some shape or four and it's
• 29:58
  entertainment as well, right? Yes, I think that stories are
• 30:04
  how we even make sense of our own life.
• 30:08
  Yeah. So I think that storytelling is
• 30:11
  a natural progression for humans as a species because like even
• 30:17
  even like just our thoughts, our He's if you really think about
• 30:21
  it, our memories are just the story that our brain is telling
• 30:25
  us of what happened at that time, but we all know that our
• 30:29
  memory is not, you know, 100% accurate all the time foolproof.
• 30:35
  And so, so that's just really interesting.
• 30:38
  I think that stories have so much power.
• 30:40
  Hmm, absolutely. I completely agree that worries
• 30:44
  is as well because I, I remember such as I remember things better
• 30:47
  than they actually really happened.
• 30:49
  And I have a friend. Correctly.
• 30:50
  Oh actually it was more like this and I'm like it was the
• 30:54
  most of those stories were drinking stories.
• 30:56
  So that's different. I do have a couple more
• 31:03
  questions about your writing but I just want to focus on
• 31:05
  something that you grow up a few times.
• 31:08
  So I think it's important in the overarching, kind of story of
• 31:11
  you becoming an author. So obviously you mentioned that
• 31:13
  you're an essential healthcare worker during that the pandemic
• 31:17
  you working in a nursing home I guess I want to know about your
• 31:21
  experiences. I want to kind of press on why
• 31:24
  you felt undervalued, because I do feel like there are a lot of
• 31:28
  commonalities similarities between the u.s. and the UK
• 31:31
  Health Care Systems. Obviously they are very
• 31:33
  different as we all know, but the UK is one is slowly but
• 31:38
  surely becoming more privatized obviously, it's very well-known,
• 31:42
  how the Health Care system in the u.s. works but from your
• 31:45
  perspective you know, being on the front lines being within
• 31:49
  that That tell us your experiences, okay?
• 31:53
  So let me start by just kind of telling the story of me in the
• 31:57
  nursing home during the pandemic and actually a little bit before
• 32:01
  to nursing homes. If you're familiar, are just
• 32:05
  kind of a sad place in general, but I was originally drawn to
• 32:12
  work there because I went to a medical specific grad school for
• 32:18
  Speech, Pathology And I found that I would make more money in
• 32:23
  a nursing home than in a hospital to be perfectly honest.
• 32:28
  So, I decided to work in a nursing home, and I think that
• 32:34
  part of the reason is to that, that is the case is to draw
• 32:38
  people in. And I think that there's pretty
• 32:40
  high turnover in nursing homes, because of that, and the
• 32:44
  benefits aren't really that great.
• 32:46
  And like I said, my co-workers, hadn't gotten a raise, and I
• 32:49
  think Five years, which is just ridiculous.
• 32:55
  And, and then right before the pandemic, the government changed
• 33:01
  their reimbursement policies for for therapy in a, nursing home
• 33:07
  and Inpatient Rehab setting, and we just kind of got shipped on
• 33:11
  it, and So that I was already feeling undervalued and then the
• 33:20
  pandemic started and my nursing home got hit with covid.
• 33:25
  Honestly, I think in January but it might lie, it wasn't like
• 33:29
  official until February March, but by the time lockdown started
• 33:35
  over ninety percent of my patients had covid and it was it
• 33:42
  was really just a sad time for multiple reasons.
• 33:47
  First of all, the the nursing home wasn't allowed to have
• 33:52
  visitors for obvious reasons but you know, visitors really helped
• 33:58
  the staff and everyone make sure that people's needs are getting
• 34:03
  met. Oh, that's interesting.
• 34:04
  Yeah. People's needs were often not
• 34:08
  getting met. And I, I'm the type of person
• 34:12
  who takes on people's problems and makes them my own.
• 34:18
  And so I found myself always, you know, doing what I could to
• 34:24
  make sure that that my patients were, you know, having the best
• 34:30
  life that they could making shirt like.
• 34:32
  So if they hadn't eaten or hadn't gotten changed, like I
• 34:35
  was the one who I'd go talk to their CNA or write the report
• 34:39
  or, you know, even just like FaceTiming people's families at
• 34:43
  the beginning, the the facility wasn't having any type of face
• 34:49
  time or any type of communication for the families
• 34:52
  and the patient's. And so in my sessions like I
• 34:56
  would do, I would do facetimes with their families and it
• 35:00
  turned out that like every single patient that I was doing
• 35:04
  that way. Passed away during that time and
• 35:07
  then I would like have their families calling me after and
• 35:11
  like trying to get me to tell them information or like it was
• 35:15
  just it was just really crazy. So sad I never got Hazard pay.
• 35:20
  I didn't get sick time at Baseline.
• 35:22
  My boss got covid. They made her work from home.
• 35:25
  She was pregnant. They made her work from home.
• 35:27
  Otherwise she would have had to take workers comp and get like
• 35:30
  60% of her pay. They're like so I was Is doing
• 35:36
  more than ever. I was pouring my heart and soul
• 35:39
  into these patients and just I, I wasn't being valued for that.
• 35:45
  People didn't care at the end of the day, like that is not their
• 35:50
  first priority, the money from the government or the patients
• 35:55
  families or whatever is and so Like that just really was hard
• 36:03
  for me to wrap my head around because like I kind of live my
• 36:07
  life up until this past year thinking that like it was the
• 36:13
  good thing for me to do to help people.
• 36:16
  I was being I was doing the right thing like but then I saw
• 36:22
  no one else around me doing what I thought was the right thing
• 36:27
  and like just It's kind of like getting, I don't know.
• 36:32
  They were having a better life and better a better situation
• 36:37
  than I was in. And, and I was looking at my
• 36:39
  friends around me who were then working from home.
• 36:42
  When I had to continue to go into work every day and they
• 36:46
  were getting, you know, stipends from their company for work at
• 36:49
  home stuff or they were getting bonuses and I'm like what's a
• 36:53
  bonus? We haven't had a raise in 5
• 36:55
  years. Say see this is interesting
• 36:59
  because there's a there's a lot of again, I mentioned this
• 37:02
  before. There's a lot of similarities
• 37:04
  between our nation's as far as this is concerned.
• 37:07
  Obviously, we do have a public health care System the NHS, but
• 37:12
  the same time when it comes to things like Care Homes and the
• 37:16
  NHS. I do remember that there was a
• 37:21
  brief pay-rise Maybe Mmm, once a four, five six months into the
• 37:27
  pandemic but as I recall it was really, it was a substantial pay
• 37:34
  rise for doctors, but not the nurses.
• 37:38
  And of course, everyone even to this day have been working like
• 37:43
  crazy hours trying to keep up and stuff.
• 37:46
  Well, and the funny thing is is like the nurses and the CNA is
• 37:51
  and the therapists are the ones who are Actually spending the
• 37:56
  time with the patients, like actually having to give the
• 37:59
  patient's Direct Care when the doctors like they have of course
• 38:03
  the schooling and you know, there they are paid the big
• 38:08
  bucks for a reason but they're not spending the same time with
• 38:14
  the patients that other professions in the healthcare
• 38:18
  field are. And it's funny that they're
• 38:21
  always the ones that end up getting the raises and And the
• 38:25
  special parking spots and etc, etc.
• 38:29
  Yeah. It's just, I'm story in the UK.
• 38:31
  I mean, he's even the UK Parliament.
• 38:34
  We have conservatives in at the moment and they're very famous
• 38:39
  for kind of always taxing, very high, kind benefits, that kind
• 38:43
  of stuff, but obviously it hits a lot harder, right?
• 38:48
  Now, during a pandemic that they're doing these sorts of
• 38:50
  things because we're not out of it, I mean, things might be back
• 38:52
  to normal, I know in the states. You're pretty much back to
• 38:56
  normal. And in the UK we kind of are
• 38:58
  because we sort of Follow Your template and vice versa
• 39:01
  followers, but I don't know that that's necessarily the right I
• 39:05
  did. Like, I was stunned when I
• 39:07
  started seeing that in the states.
• 39:08
  Like, remember there was like a smaller version of the Super
• 39:12
  Bowl that instead of having 130,000 it was like, 60,000, I
• 39:16
  still can't believe what I was seeing and then obviously, you
• 39:19
  know, I mentioned performer, I'm a wrestling fan.
• 39:23
  Wrestling was really hit hard. Just the same as Box without
• 39:26
  fans, but when fans came back, still thinking about it.
• 39:31
  I don't know. I feel like this is too early.
• 39:33
  I know everyone's vaccinated. But you know what, people still
• 39:36
  get the virus with or without covid?
• 39:40
  You know, I mean, I go out of my house every day and I just kind
• 39:45
  of take the risk, I don't go out, often judge, trying to
• 39:48
  limit the amount of times I go out and stuff but like I kind of
• 39:52
  just go along with whatever the current advice is and just work
• 39:55
  with that. So I when I do my volunteer work
• 39:58
  for instance, that we just wear masks the whole time but they're
• 40:02
  not, if I go to the store, maybe I don't wear it, but it's I
• 40:07
  don't know. It's very if he here because
• 40:09
  like, the government have kind of said, like, will review this.
• 40:13
  And that right now, as of recording this, it's now we're
• 40:17
  in September and they're talking about their Maybe Will be
• 40:21
  another lockdown in October. I don't think there will be, but
• 40:25
  it could happen and our government at least is very kind
• 40:28
  of, they do. It's really obvious what they
• 40:32
  do. It's like if there's news that
• 40:34
  something is going to happen, it probably will happen but they'll
• 40:37
  keep telling you that no no, no, we're going to review this time
• 40:41
  go to review this time and then they'll do everything that
• 40:43
  everyone was worried about but they just won't tell you that
• 40:47
  you know and I understand it's not like freak people out and
• 40:49
  worried people but it's like I don't know, it's just like I had
• 40:55
  a really bad feeling that we might, we enter a lockdown
• 40:57
  because last year and okay, fair enough, we didn't have the
• 41:01
  vaccine last year, so that's the different Factor, but last year
• 41:04
  it was like we lock down too late, the gov.
• 41:08
  The it was like end of March or something, when they decided to
• 41:12
  person to lockdown and by summer time of last year, We will all
• 41:19
  but back to normal voice, why, at least in the sense that bike,
• 41:22
  you know, pubs and clubs 10 clubs, but pubs and outdoor
• 41:26
  spaces, and all these things were open again.
• 41:28
  And people were frightened izing and going out and everything,
• 41:31
  which is fine because obviously the government told them, that,
• 41:33
  that was okay to do that and there was even a scheme in
• 41:35
  place. I think it's like 50% off dining
• 41:41
  on whatever to to encourage people to go out and do these
• 41:43
  things. And then obviously the case is
• 41:45
  Rose and then they just sent this back.
• 41:48
  To lock down and blamed the public for for that even though
• 41:52
  they told us to do that. And I kind of feel like the same
• 41:55
  thing might happen again. This year, I'm trying to be
• 41:58
  positive. It was a mistake because
• 42:00
  optimistic that's the word but it's hard.
• 42:03
  It's hard to know, you know, and especially in the states.
• 42:05
  I mean it's even crazier because you know, You're essentially
• 42:10
  like 50 cut, 50, 51 countries in one space journey like every
• 42:14
  everywhere operates differently. So obviously, you're in Chicago
• 42:17
  but like Texas or New York, or like operating in a different
• 42:20
  way. Maybe they're similar.
• 42:22
  Maybe not. You know, people have had on the
• 42:24
  podcast, for instance, from places like Alabama, pretty much
• 42:28
  just didn't even acknowledge that, there was a pandemic going
• 42:31
  on, they just did their thing. And then there was other states
• 42:34
  where they were really strict. So since resting You know, and
• 42:39
  just going back to the point about whether government.
• 42:45
  Kind of, but they do do things to help people.
• 42:47
  But like the people on the front lines, always have a very
• 42:50
  different kind of perspective, did I mean?
• 42:53
  Like they were, there was a lot of like, support initially
• 42:57
  coming from our government for the NHS and things like that
• 43:00
  Frontline workers. But when you look at, like, the
• 43:03
  Baseline of what that actually means, like, you know, people
• 43:06
  maybe getting paralyzed stuff like that, it didn't really
• 43:09
  happen but yet the government was happy to give themselves pay
• 43:12
  roses, right? Yeah.
• 43:16
  Yeah. Just like our Congress who,
• 43:19
  right in the thick of the pandemic last year, took a
• 43:21
  month-long vacation. Cool guys.
• 43:24
  Thanks. If that is though, that was
• 43:26
  Trump's government. So, yeah, well, that's so true,
• 43:32
  I think part of and I think that part of the reason that you see,
• 43:35
  you know, the people in The More Southern States, not take it as
• 43:38
  seriously as because, you know, those states were bigger Trump
• 43:43
  supporters and Response to the pandemic was subpar at best, but
• 43:51
  I think that part of the problem, with all of this is how
• 43:54
  it has been so politicized. And people look at wearing masks
• 43:59
  as a political statement in their wet, and it's just like,
• 44:02
  that's not what it is. I will say this as like, I'm not
• 44:05
  really a political guy, but Any government, any government
• 44:11
  regardless of affiliation right? Would struggle with a pandemic
• 44:16
  you know like because we have Labour and conservative here
• 44:18
  which is basically laborer I guess is like Democrats and then
• 44:23
  conservatives is like Republicans sort of that, not
• 44:27
  quite, but sort of and on that basis it's like it wouldn't
• 44:33
  matter. If the Democrats have been in
• 44:35
  America, there would have been similar problems, maybe Certain
• 44:38
  things would have been dealt with differently but it would
• 44:39
  have been similar problems. You know, and same here, I'm
• 44:43
  convinced if they ever were in same problems because at the end
• 44:47
  of the day you still just have a group of people who are trying
• 44:50
  to decide what the best things are to do.
• 44:53
  And they have sort of like delayed medical and scientific
• 44:56
  advice being given to them which they're unsure about that.
• 45:01
  The impression that I get here in the UK, is that They were
• 45:04
  just unsure what to do. Yeah.
• 45:07
  Now they have all this information and it was
• 45:09
  conflicted. It's conflicting with each
• 45:11
  other. Yeah, it was a novel, a novel
• 45:14
  virus, right? So, you know, most of the things
• 45:17
  that we have vaccines for that, we have treatments for you need,
• 45:22
  you know, evidence-based research to, to back your
• 45:27
  decisions up and we just didn't have that at the beginning of
• 45:31
  the pandemic, which definitely like you said, you know, Add to
• 45:35
  the paralysis almost. And I think the delay in
• 45:40
  lockdowns I think the thing that would have really helped us the
• 45:43
  most is if we would have locked down right away and yeah I'll
• 45:49
  would have just like gotten gotten it over with and like
• 45:52
  everybody would have gotten on board.
• 45:55
  But on the other side of that is shutting down the economy which
• 45:59
  has a ton of Seriously negative consequences which also needs to
• 46:05
  be taken into account. So our politicians really were
• 46:08
  put in between a rock and a hard place and this is why I'm kind
• 46:12
  of fair to them on that basis. Like for instance while I do
• 46:15
  think we are out of this a bit too early.
• 46:18
  Yeah. I mean you couldn't keep it.
• 46:20
  Yeah. You couldn't keep their
• 46:21
  specially America. I don't know about the UK I
• 46:22
  think we would. Yeah, I mean we would suffer but
• 46:25
  the you u.s. definitely couldn't survive another year of being
• 46:28
  knocked down. That would just be it.
• 46:31
  You gotta, you gotta, but here's the thing, like I think we
• 46:34
  certain things. Certain measures could have been
• 46:37
  put in place. Certain things could have been
• 46:38
  done. Like I still think for instance,
• 46:41
  sporting events could have been done at like quarter or half
• 46:44
  capacity for a bit longer before they went full blast with
• 46:47
  because I feel like with a lot of these decisions it's like
• 46:50
  naught to 60 to 90 minutes that, okay?
• 46:53
  We're just going to change it up now but if you look around in
• 46:56
  the UK now it's no longer law that you have to wear.
• 47:01
  Wear the mask, it's more like encouraged but like no one does.
• 47:06
  And why would you two be Faith? Know what if you walk outside?
• 47:09
  And no one's wearing a mask, you're probably not going to
• 47:11
  wear them. And I'd say, maybe two percent
• 47:14
  of people I see outside, they're wearing them.
• 47:15
  But even even me, I've been very cautious, very beginning.
• 47:18
  But even I don't wear it really that much anymore other than the
• 47:23
  volunteering work. I do.
• 47:26
  But that's more because I go inside people's homes, right?
• 47:30
  I'm Jenna. We didn't with people from
• 47:32
  different ages, so it makes sense to be careful in that
• 47:35
  sense. But yeah, what do you do for
• 47:37
  your volunteering? Work?
• 47:38
  Is a mixture of thing. So, sometimes it's on base,
• 47:42
  helping, you know, give food Parcels or like, food to the
• 47:46
  homeless that kind of stuff answering calls.
• 47:51
  They have like a charity shop as well, but the main stuff I tend
• 47:54
  to do is that we deliver furniture.
• 48:00
  So like people that Recently been homeless and now have a
• 48:02
  place to live or people in poor income families.
• 48:06
  And we also collect donations from places and give it back to
• 48:10
  the charity kind of thing. So, obviously, like I've been
• 48:13
  doing this since October last year nearly.
• 48:17
  Yeah. And it especially like, in the
• 48:21
  height of the plant a bit last year, was really important to
• 48:23
  wear the mask and I still wear it.
• 48:25
  Like, you know, even when I do it now, still will wear the mask
• 48:28
  going to go into people's homes and stuff, but I very much kind
• 48:32
  of go on the basis of whatever the what the vibe is.
• 48:38
  Let's do it. But then.
• 48:38
  Yeah. I've been out since then that
• 48:41
  out in the city and no one wears a mask.
• 48:44
  And at the very first time, I was really anxious to find as I
• 48:47
  don't know if this is a good idea but then I kind of thought
• 48:51
  in a way it's pointless for me to wear a mask.
• 48:54
  If everyone is not wearing a mask.
• 48:56
  If you sort. I'm saying yeah I mean I think
• 48:59
  that it still might Checked you but a little bit but it's still
• 49:05
  so unknown and like, yeah, I think, you know, it's it's hard,
• 49:11
  it's really hard. But in Chicago, right now we do
• 49:14
  have a vast mandate so we had to wear masks.
• 49:18
  Yeah. In any public place, we don't
• 49:21
  have to wear them outside but in a grocery store or you know,
• 49:25
  Starbucks or whatever you do, see this is interesting because
• 49:30
  as of Again, this podcast happening, I think a couple of
• 49:34
  days ago a couple of wrestling events happened in Chicago.
• 49:39
  Aw is all out event happened there in the city center, think
• 49:44
  or one of the one of the main I'll go kill myself for not
• 49:48
  remembering this one of the main stadiums Arenas in Chicago, it's
• 49:54
  a big capacity theater but no one was wearing masks in the
• 49:57
  audience. It's interesting that maybe
• 50:00
  maybe it's a different way. Regions in the state.
• 50:02
  I don't know. And it's a mandate but it's like
• 50:05
  not like legally enforced, its are going around and like
• 50:09
  arresting people for wearing. But that's the best key though
• 50:12
  because like your wording is so important and mandate, I kind of
• 50:16
  thought that that meant typically that mandatory that
• 50:19
  you have to do. But as you say, if it's not
• 50:21
  being policed, I mean, even during the height of the
• 50:23
  pathetic pandemic last year, people were still not wearing it
• 50:27
  and I never saw anyone get in trouble for not wearing a mask
• 50:29
  ever. Right.
• 50:30
  Never People saying if anything, someone would just ask you to
• 50:34
  put one on. Yeah.
• 50:36
  And that would be the end of it, really?
• 50:37
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 50:39
  Well, if you comply, I guess I think I have seen, like, some
• 50:43
  crazy videos of like, people getting tackled.
• 50:48
  I don't know. It's crazy.
• 50:49
  When you think about, isn't it? That people, it is people.
• 50:52
  It is like, like like as far as I do understand people getting
• 50:56
  annoyed, they haven't to wear them, but the same time.
• 51:00
  If someone just asks you to put a cloth around your face for my
• 51:03
  little bit of time dinner, even if that goes against what you
• 51:07
  believe in, like it's not really a big deal that what imagine
• 51:11
  imagine. If like I turn around said like,
• 51:13
  oh no you have to wear a space helmet but that's much more
• 51:18
  intrusive. That's much more of an issue.
• 51:20
  A mask is not really if anything.
• 51:22
  You know it's funny a lot of the people I've spoken to actually
• 51:25
  like the mosques because it's like grunts anonymity, you can
• 51:28
  silently judge Without the knowing you can just either do
• 51:33
  all manner of weird stuff that people can't see with your
• 51:36
  mouth. I don't know.
• 51:41
  Pros, definitely. But one of the major cons is the
• 51:44
  mass at mask acne. When I was working in the
• 51:48
  nursing home and had to wear my mask every day, I would get so
• 51:52
  many pimples and like, my skin was just terrible, but you gotta
• 51:57
  make sure little Fun tip for anyone who has to wear their
• 52:02
  masks at work all day or whatever.
• 52:04
  Make sure after you eat lunch, you brush your teeth or use
• 52:09
  mouthwash, because your mouth has a lot of bacteria in it.
• 52:13
  And when you're breathing, like, in and out of the Mask, your
• 52:18
  mouth has bacteria, that bacteria is getting trapped
• 52:21
  behind the mask, and it's either going back inside of you, or it
• 52:25
  ends up as pimples on your face. I make sense.
• 52:30
  Hmm, learn something new today. Okay, there you go.
• 52:34
  I don't remember that for next time.
• 52:36
  I'll probably still waiting still.
• 52:38
  Do it, do it. But at least I'll know not.
• 52:41
  Yeah. Right.
• 52:41
  Right. Main thing I have is, is that
• 52:43
  the problem with the strings on the ears?
• 52:45
  So I just ate six. Like, I had it.
• 52:48
  I had it the other day. I had to wear my school day
• 52:50
  indoors and obviously you change them every every once in a
• 52:56
  while. Change your gloves, every once
• 52:57
  in a while. Yes, really painful and I had
• 53:01
  like an aching Sensation that lasted at least two or three
• 53:04
  hours, afterwards oof. Well, you'll have to send me
• 53:07
  your address after. We're done with this because I
• 53:09
  have some masks that I thought made for my book and they have
• 53:12
  adjustable ear straps, and they're like the most
• 53:15
  comfortable masks ever. So I'll send you a couple cool
• 53:19
  right on, right? I like, like, that's the one,
• 53:21
  the one thing I like about the mosque's is like, customizable,
• 53:24
  and people saw it as an opportunity, a marketing
• 53:26
  opportunity. And of course, of course, of
• 53:29
  course, Of course, that is why not word-of-mouth advertising as
• 53:34
  yeah? No, it's a good point, actually.
• 53:36
  But literally literally literally.
• 53:40
  And so, you mentioned that your speech language or were speech
• 53:44
  language Pathologists can just tell us a little bit more about
• 53:48
  that job and what it entails sure.
• 53:50
  So I still technically am a speech language pathologist.
• 53:53
  I'm not working in the field right now.
• 53:56
  Three months, so freelancer. Yeah, I do.
• 53:59
  I do have like in our field, we call it P RN.
• 54:03
  So I like registry or as needed. I have a part-time job that I
• 54:09
  help out at once in a while, just to keep my skills fresh
• 54:12
  and, you know, a licensure like I had to get licensed.
• 54:16
  I had to go through a fellowship year in order to go, like, I
• 54:19
  don't want to lose the opportunity that I like to work
• 54:25
  if I would want to in the future, but Language pathology
• 54:30
  most people know about it as far as kids in schools with lists or
• 54:36
  other speech impediments. But I was working on the medical
• 54:39
  side of Speech Pathology. So the areas that I would work
• 54:45
  on patients with was cognition. So memory attention, executive,
• 54:51
  functioning speech, and language.
• 54:54
  So the actual articulation of the speech or the language, Part
• 54:59
  of speech, which happens in your brain.
• 55:01
  And then we also worked with swallowing disorders.
• 55:06
  So anyone who was having difficulties, swallowing our
• 55:11
  breathing tube, and our food to bar like right next to each
• 55:13
  other and our throat and so especially if somebody has some
• 55:17
  kind of you know, brain damage, neurological disease, any kind
• 55:23
  of weakness, things can go wrong and so we would modify people's
• 55:27
  diets who would do swallowing exercises Them just
• 55:31
  rehabilitate, the swallowing muscles to get them back to
• 55:34
  eating regular Foods. So no slightly related note.
• 55:39
  I don't know if this is some funny but just bear with me when
• 55:43
  I was like four. I think it for years old, I just
• 55:49
  got fired. I like accidentally choked on
• 55:51
  something. I don't know what it was.
• 55:53
  I think it might be hot dogs sausage or something.
• 55:56
  But from from that point onwards, I I had like a problem
• 56:01
  swallowing certain things so like pills even to this day, I'm
• 56:05
  a wuss when it comes to taking pills.
• 56:06
  I have to but took a massive Swig of water, even if it's a
• 56:09
  tiny pill after be like like that.
• 56:12
  And also, I couldn't eat normal sausages, so not hot dogs
• 56:19
  sausages. But normal sausages, that it
• 56:22
  would make me feel sick. Like I'd smell them, I'd feel
• 56:24
  sick. And then somewhere around 11, 12
• 56:29
  years old, that sensation just went away just know.
• 56:33
  I'm still, I still get the thing where I'm a bit funny about
• 56:36
  taking pills by just do it, but but that thing with a sausages
• 56:41
  went away. So and I always wondered like if
• 56:43
  that was just an irrational. Theory or if there was at some
• 56:48
  more serious problem there or something like that, my guess is
• 56:53
  that that was like a psychological thing that like
• 56:55
  you're traumatized from almost to death and because like
• 57:02
  there's no physiological reason that I can think of that an
• 57:07
  event when you were four would cause like nausea and you were
• 57:14
  older unless you had Kind of actual damage in your throat,
• 57:18
  but I think that you would have difficulties eating other things
• 57:22
  to not just one specific thing, right?
• 57:26
  Absolutely. Thanks for sharing by the way.
• 57:29
  Welcome. So bring it back to your
• 57:31
  writing. So I found this interesting.
• 57:33
  You actually publish your book under your own publishing
• 57:37
  company. So I just wanted to ask what
• 57:41
  steps did you take to actually create this company?
• 57:44
  What does it require and also why Why what why you decided to
• 57:47
  do that as opposed to just going for a regular publisher, her
• 57:51
  sure. So let's start with the why and
• 57:54
  it has to do partially with the fact that I was feeling
• 57:59
  undervalued in my job. And part of the reason I was
• 58:03
  feeling undervalued was because there was a middle man who was,
• 58:08
  you know, sucking a part of my profits but doing nothing in my
• 58:14
  opinion. And so, for my book, like, I had
• 58:20
  the cover very, very early on in the process.
• 58:25
  I already like, I had my, I had my editors, like, I had
• 58:30
  everything lined up for myself, and so I kind of looked at it as
• 58:35
  a similar situation like that a Publishing Company would have
• 58:39
  just been a middleman for me, because they don't surprisingly,
• 58:44
  they don't really do that much. Much.
• 58:46
  They get your book printed and they distribute it but like a
• 58:50
  lot of the advertising, they don't have big advertising
• 58:53
  budgets for each book. They don't care or for off each
• 58:56
  author. So like that often falls on the
• 59:01
  author themselves to do and usually with with the advanced
• 59:05
  that they had been given. So I at the beginning of the
• 59:10
  pandemic, I got really interested in the stock market
• 59:14
  before that too. But I was really Really into it
• 59:16
  at the beginning of the stock market.
• 59:18
  And I'm sorry at the beginning of the pandemic and so I I made
• 59:25
  some money and that's how I was able to, you know, ultimately
• 59:29
  quit my job, but I just kind of looked at this as an investment
• 59:34
  in myself and so I just wanted to do it myself and I wanted to
• 59:40
  have the control and I wanted to just say that I did it.
• 59:44
  So I Incorporated a company, an LLC and then I actually printed
• 59:50
  my wool, my books are on Amazon and that's like Amazon will
• 59:56
  print on demand paperback books, which is really cool.
• 1:00:01
  So like if somebody goes to buy my I'd lost you.
• 1:00:06
  Sorry if somebody goes to buy my book.
• 1:00:12
  Amazon will just print it like on demand which is great because
• 1:00:15
  I don't have to I don't have to like, you know, put up front any
• 1:00:19
  money for that but I did get hardcover books printed and I
• 1:00:23
  got thousand hardcover books printed and I had to have to
• 1:00:27
  like you know, front the cost for that, right?
• 1:00:29
  So that's how you get if you suddenly get like a massive
• 1:00:32
  demand like this. Say your book takes off like
• 1:00:34
  next month, and you, suddenly just got 10,000 orders.
• 1:00:36
  Like, that's how you'll deal with it.
• 1:00:38
  You just have to front up a certain amount of cost and
• 1:00:39
  Amazon deals with the kind of, they're essentially the
• 1:00:43
  middleman in a sense. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:46
  Yeah, okay, definitely are the middleman.
• 1:00:48
  It's like honestly, I It is kind of the same thing.
• 1:00:53
  I'm all good options for my next book to just because they do
• 1:01:00
  take quite like. I make a very, very small amount
• 1:01:03
  of money per book. So I I don't know.
• 1:01:09
  The convenience is, a definite Pro of going through an Amazon
• 1:01:15
  and not having to deal with like, you know, the like
• 1:01:20
  shipping out, the books, like housing, the books, like storing
• 1:01:24
  the books, you know what I mean? But they are definitely still a
• 1:01:28
  middleman, okay? So you're looking eventually
• 1:01:31
  thing to distance yourself from them as well, and be able to get
• 1:01:34
  like a better sort of deal for yourself.
• 1:01:36
  Kind of thing. Yeah, I would love for this,
• 1:01:38
  just to be like, you know, my, my thing.
• 1:01:41
  And that's what I was looking for.
• 1:01:44
  Really because I just found myself, despite like I said,
• 1:01:50
  despite having gotten Advanced degrees, despite having spent my
• 1:01:55
  four years at undergrad, two years and getting my masters.
• 1:01:59
  Like, I found myself very stuck and I looked at the other
• 1:02:03
  options for me in my field and other fields.
• 1:02:08
  And like I really didn't see any place where I wouldn't be stuck
• 1:02:13
  unless I was working for myself and doing my own thing.
• 1:02:19
  And so that was really what motivated me to to start my own
• 1:02:24
  Publishing Company. Awesome, I think it's a sensible
• 1:02:28
  thing to do. I just think it's a tricky one
• 1:02:31
  because obviously much in the same as the music industry, you
• 1:02:35
  know, when you are working with publishers, And companies you do
• 1:02:38
  have the machine behind you. As far as like distribution is
• 1:02:41
  concerned by hear more and more like in the music industry that
• 1:02:44
  people artists are opting to get distribution deals as opposed to
• 1:02:48
  the label deals. So that, you know, they have
• 1:02:50
  full control and ownership and such.
• 1:02:52
  And the only thing they have to front up is money to get it
• 1:02:55
  distributed. So if a similar thing is
• 1:02:58
  possible in the book industry, then that's, that's obviously
• 1:03:03
  more preferable because, you know, you keep retain more of
• 1:03:05
  your own money. So, Right, right?
• 1:03:08
  That's the luck with that. Thank you so much.
• 1:03:11
  It's been fun and it's been really empowering.
• 1:03:17
  Awesome on your website, you stay that a word.
• 1:03:22
  You'd use to describe the impact you intend to make on the world
• 1:03:27
  is transformative. And you aim to achieve this via
• 1:03:32
  your storytelling ability. So tell us more about your sort
• 1:03:34
  of philosophy of life and storytelling.
• 1:03:38
  Philosophy is my favorite part of life.
• 1:03:41
  I've really really delved into philosophy this year but Like,
• 1:03:46
  looking back at my life. I think that it can be
• 1:03:50
  categorized as transformative in almost every year.
• 1:03:55
  I feel like I'm constantly changing learning and growing
• 1:04:01
  and I think that a strength of mine is that I am open to
• 1:04:07
  learning new things, extremely open to learning new things,
• 1:04:11
  like I love to learn and I think that that's how we grow and its
• 1:04:16
  form is through learning and so, while I write my books and like,
• 1:04:23
  while I wrote lucky, for example, like Like, I'm a
• 1:04:27
  completely different person than I was when I started writing
• 1:04:30
  that book and I think that some at least some of that has been
• 1:04:37
  captured in in my book. And hopefully, you know, that I
• 1:04:43
  look at it kind of like the butterfly effect where one small
• 1:04:46
  change can you know, spark, hmm. Spark consequences that you
• 1:04:54
  never would have expected but I I just like one small change in
• 1:04:58
  myself, can, hopefully spark more Collective change through
• 1:05:06
  through, you know, reading my books and reading my writing, I
• 1:05:09
  totally agree with you. It's not something you
• 1:05:11
  originally think about, I think when you create art because I
• 1:05:15
  was, well, I mean, I'm gonna call myself a writer.
• 1:05:18
  I do occasional poetry and stuff, but the things that I'm
• 1:05:21
  more into our writing music or casting acting.
• 1:05:26
  And all these sort of Endeavors and I'm sort of building an
• 1:05:31
  online following, right? And some of them are following
• 1:05:34
  listens to this podcast as well. So hello.
• 1:05:37
  Hey guys, but some of them have been telling me they've been a
• 1:05:40
  bit more vocal lately. They've been saying how like
• 1:05:42
  they've been inspired but what I do to do their own things or or
• 1:05:46
  that it gave them like a positive kind of outlook on
• 1:05:50
  things which inspired them to do something or you know, they're
• 1:05:53
  just having a bad day and that turned it.
• 1:05:56
  To at least a good ending for a bad day or something like that.
• 1:05:59
  And I guess my point is that like you don't really think
• 1:06:01
  about that impact and until you start seeing it much the same as
• 1:06:05
  that when I do my volunteer work, I just do that because I
• 1:06:08
  want to help people and, you know, I love to do it every now
• 1:06:12
  and again, something will happen or someone or thank you.
• 1:06:17
  I'll give you a really good example.
• 1:06:18
  Like I it was close to Christmas and there was I was working with
• 1:06:24
  this driver and This particular driver had a bad attitude which
• 1:06:29
  was weird because everyone else at this place, I do volunteering
• 1:06:32
  eyes awesome. But this particular person
• 1:06:34
  wasn't and I was really, I was like, wow, I'm the professional
• 1:06:37
  one here like this is odd because the thing is what I
• 1:06:40
  normally do is I sort of tag along and help and everything
• 1:06:43
  and I did, you know, I take it very seriously, but I
• 1:06:45
  essentially I am a helper in that situation but they were
• 1:06:48
  sort of pushing the responsibility on to me and I
• 1:06:50
  was okay. But the scenario was that we
• 1:06:54
  were delivering Furniture to this person.
• 1:06:56
  House. And the first thing I noticed
• 1:07:01
  right away was the outside, the house, occasionally in the UK,
• 1:07:03
  you have like these like bars on the side of on the outside of
• 1:07:07
  the door. I think it's more that when
• 1:07:09
  people are disabled that or the elderly and they just need
• 1:07:11
  something to pull themselves in something to hold on to while
• 1:07:14
  they're, I don't know, grabbing their keys or whatever.
• 1:07:17
  The case may be to assist people, essentially, and I was
• 1:07:23
  like, okay, and I was thinking, Hmm.
• 1:07:25
  And basically the driver's compartment.
• 1:07:26
  Complaining because it's like, aw, no, I'm not gonna wait, I've
• 1:07:28
  got other things to do. You know, we're busy Bubba,
• 1:07:31
  Bubba. And I'm thinking, like, Jesus.
• 1:07:33
  We've been here like a minute, like, let's just did.
• 1:07:37
  I was like, what if they're elderly?
• 1:07:38
  Like maybe they're because basically, we always call them
• 1:07:41
  before till I let them know that.
• 1:07:43
  Hey, we're outside, can we come in blah blah and he was just
• 1:07:49
  really kind of in a bad mood just not being very professional
• 1:07:53
  and I was that I said, like we're gonna wait, I was assuming
• 1:07:56
  control. The situation even though I'm
• 1:07:57
  not in control of that, we gotta wait let's wait let's cool them.
• 1:08:00
  Let's wait till he speaks to them on the phone.
• 1:08:05
  And they're running late. It's a mother.
• 1:08:07
  She's running late. Okay, and I just had a feeling
• 1:08:12
  about this situation, you know. I in more recent years, I just
• 1:08:15
  tend to rely on my feelings and they always steer me in the
• 1:08:18
  right direction and I thought they're going to come here and
• 1:08:22
  even though we've sort of put all of the stuff outside the
• 1:08:25
  house of this point, he wanted to basically drive off and leave
• 1:08:27
  it. And I would just felt bad
• 1:08:29
  because then it's one thing. If you just leave a a table but
• 1:08:32
  we'd left like basically enough It's a Well, fill a house.
• 1:08:37
  So I was like, come on. This is ridiculous.
• 1:08:40
  And I just had a feeling that that's all right.
• 1:08:45
  No worries, no worries, no worries.
• 1:08:47
  I had a feeling like it was wrong.
• 1:08:49
  Like, you know, we should wait and wouldn't, you know, this
• 1:08:53
  mother eventually came five, ten minutes later and she looks
• 1:08:56
  stressed as hell. And she's got two kids.
• 1:08:59
  One of whom is a bit elderly. One is younger, but she just
• 1:09:02
  looked stressed and I just saw my mom was a single parent and I
• 1:09:09
  don't know that she was a single parent but she just had that
• 1:09:11
  look in her eyes the same look that my mum had on some days
• 1:09:15
  when she's really stressed with me just trying to you know live
• 1:09:18
  and make things happen and She? Yeah, she was it hurts.
• 1:09:26
  Her mind was all over the place. So she's clearly like got a
• 1:09:29
  million things going on in their head and I my colleague
• 1:09:33
  eventually did assume control of a situation started like
• 1:09:36
  communicating with her. And then she just asked us or
• 1:09:40
  hey would you mind also moving this thing for me downstairs
• 1:09:44
  upstairs and it was like really difficult to get up there and
• 1:09:46
  stuff like it was hard work. But you know, that's what were
• 1:09:49
  there for and I was like, yeah, sure.
• 1:09:54
  Like no problem and I lifted in it's like didn't say anything
• 1:09:57
  either, but it was awkward, you could tell on our own that would
• 1:09:59
  be a problem and so we just lift it up there.
• 1:10:01
  It took maybe like a minute or two and then I was not expecting
• 1:10:05
  this. I was ready to just be like, hey
• 1:10:07
  yeah, thank you very much. You know, have a good Christmas
• 1:10:10
  all that but she literally said, like, oh my God, thank you so
• 1:10:15
  much. Like, there's been so much.
• 1:10:17
  Like you could tell her like she just wanted to like cry which is
• 1:10:20
  like holding back tears like cause that was like meant a lot.
• 1:10:25
  But, and clearly like there's a lot of stuff going on, but you
• 1:10:27
  don't want to like, unload to a stranger, but the same time it's
• 1:10:30
  like, oh my God, thank you so much.
• 1:10:32
  And I was like, yeah, no worries.
• 1:10:33
  Have a good Christmas and Stuff like that.
• 1:10:37
  Is why? Well a I think you should people
• 1:10:40
  should do volunteering and be yeah yeah just when you see that
• 1:10:44
  impact that you have on other people, it just Spurs you on to
• 1:10:49
  keep keep creating keep doing good.
• 1:10:53
  Things, positive things in life to help.
• 1:10:55
  People, keep, trying to put positivity out into the world,
• 1:10:59
  and, and kind of impact the world in a positive way and make
• 1:11:03
  people feel better. And you know what?
• 1:11:06
  What about Place little by little.
• 1:11:08
  Yeah and I think what's so amazing about this kind of thing
• 1:11:13
  is that like you never know exactly how or what you're
• 1:11:20
  doing. That makes the change and so
• 1:11:23
  that just speaks to the importance of like you know you
• 1:11:28
  live like you need to be living your best life, you need to be,
• 1:11:33
  you know And stand and have have a philosophy.
• 1:11:39
  Have a, why you you have to have all of these things or and I
• 1:11:46
  mean through volunteering and through writing, you can find
• 1:11:51
  those things if you don't already know them.
• 1:11:53
  But but I really think again, it's the change inside of you
• 1:12:00
  that then spreads into the world around you and that is just Like
• 1:12:06
  such a powerful thing. Jordan Peterson is one of my
• 1:12:11
  like, favorite intellectuals to listen to, and I think it was
• 1:12:16
  him who said, like you can't change a city unless you change
• 1:12:20
  yourself or something? And so one of his big things is
• 1:12:24
  like, you know, every day you wake up, you make your bed like
• 1:12:28
  that, starts your day off off, on a good note, where you've
• 1:12:31
  accomplished something and then that already puts you in a good
• 1:12:35
  Good State of Mind for all of your interactions during during
• 1:12:39
  that day, they great. I mean, sometimes like I'm a
• 1:12:44
  very tidy person anyway, but like, every now and again,
• 1:12:46
  inevitably when you're working, you know, you move your member
• 1:12:49
  gets messy. Your space gets messy and every
• 1:12:51
  now and again, I'll just have a day where I just clean stuff up.
• 1:12:54
  Did Hoover in washing all this stuff, you know, and it's funny
• 1:12:58
  how like once you're done, you just breathe and you just feel
• 1:13:02
  better. You like, you feel like
• 1:13:03
  refreshed, but you've hit the reset button, you like You know,
• 1:13:07
  and it's good, you need that you need that but like, yeah, it's
• 1:13:10
  like yeah some days are just, you know, the bet the best thing
• 1:13:14
  you did was, you woke up and you got yourself out of bed and that
• 1:13:18
  is an achievement in of itself because and that's okay, right.
• 1:13:22
  Right. And like, on the flipside of
• 1:13:25
  that to, like, if you are filled with negativity, if you're
• 1:13:29
  filled with insecurity, if you're filled with, you know,
• 1:13:33
  criticisms for for people around, Found you, I think that
• 1:13:38
  that ends up manifesting in the world around you to.
• 1:13:42
  So this is like really of the most important because every day
• 1:13:46
  whether you realize it or not your changing world around you.
• 1:13:50
  And so that's why it's all that much more important to make sure
• 1:13:55
  that you are you know, in the person you want to be, All
• 1:14:06
  right, my next question. Seems a bit.
• 1:14:08
  Silly know what the best, and worst things about Chicago.
• 1:14:16
  Okay, that's the worst things about Chicago best.
• 1:14:20
  Well, let's start with worst parking.
• 1:14:23
  I have gotten so many parking tickets in Chicago that my
• 1:14:26
  parents joked that when I moved to like my own apartment that I
• 1:14:30
  needed to Have a budget item for parking tickets because I would
• 1:14:35
  get them legitimately every month.
• 1:14:36
  It was brutal and it's just driving and parking kind of
• 1:14:43
  sucks. But the best thing about Chicago
• 1:14:45
  is being by the lake and I just I love being around water.
• 1:14:50
  It really is balancing for me. It's inspirational for me and
• 1:14:57
  the fact that I like I'm in a volleyball league and It's right
• 1:15:02
  on the beach. And the skyline is in like,
• 1:15:06
  right there, the background. It's so beautiful.
• 1:15:12
  And it every time I go, I'm just like, man, could I be any
• 1:15:16
  luckier? So you originally from Chicago,
• 1:15:22
  from the suburbs of Chicago and then I moved to Indianapolis
• 1:15:26
  Indiana for for college, I went to Butler University.
• 1:15:31
  And then I moved back to Chicago to the actual City for grad
• 1:15:38
  school and then I decided to continue to live here.
• 1:15:41
  Now, it's refreshing to have someone that loves weather
• 1:15:43
  originally from because you don't know.
• 1:15:45
  Yeah, I don't know. I got I grew up in London.
• 1:15:47
  I now live in Manchester for those who don't know, it's sort
• 1:15:51
  of in the middle of England. And Everyone is always like, oh,
• 1:15:56
  you you bought in London? Oh, that must have been great.
• 1:15:58
  And it's like, no, not really. It was fun when I was a teenager
• 1:16:03
  that's about it. Hmm, but the reality is like, it
• 1:16:07
  does really depends. I think if you spend time away
• 1:16:09
  from home, that's a big thing. Like, I, but I missed.
• 1:16:13
  Like, I lived in Europe for three years.
• 1:16:16
  And I came back, funnily enough as the pandemic here, and I
• 1:16:21
  still didn't want to stay in London.
• 1:16:22
  I wanted to go somewhere else but I did miss the UK that
• 1:16:26
  familiarity. And so they say, isn't it
• 1:16:30
  absence makes the heart. Perform.
• 1:16:32
  The basic school to hear that. You are a big Chicago.
• 1:16:35
  I hear a little good things about Chicago.
• 1:16:37
  Actually, it's awesome. I mean, the food is also great.
• 1:16:40
  You should really couldn't miss it.
• 1:16:41
  I would love to if I had all my God.
• 1:16:43
  Hey, we're definitely on my list of places to go.
• 1:16:45
  I'd love to see professional wrestling now, because from
• 1:16:48
  professional wrestling to Cargo is known as one of the best
• 1:16:51
  town. Certainly in America Town places
• 1:16:55
  in America to see wrestling. But yeah.
• 1:16:57
  Anyway, so funny because like I didn't even know that Yeah,
• 1:17:01
  perfect honest, huge. I'm surprised that there's a
• 1:17:05
  wrestler actually from Chicago's nice X, CM Punk, and that big in
• 1:17:10
  the wrestling world. He's also like a massive hockey
• 1:17:12
  fan and he's like, such a big deal in Chicago.
• 1:17:17
  That like, like, even a hockey games that when they've won,
• 1:17:20
  like, the World Series or whatever, like he's like,
• 1:17:22
  they're prominently and it's like, yeah, we won this together
• 1:17:25
  and it's not Fenwick totally different industry that?
• 1:17:29
  Yeah, that's cool is cool. It seems like it's Very
• 1:17:31
  passionate place that certainly comes across in sporting events
• 1:17:36
  and entertainment and stuff. Oh yeah.
• 1:17:39
  Oh yeah. I mean, no matter what sport you
• 1:17:42
  like Chicago is a great City for you because we have it all.
• 1:17:46
  Well just about What's the biggest life lesson that you've
• 1:17:50
  learned so far? That's a great question.
• 1:17:58
  I would say. That.
• 1:18:03
  Life is beautiful and it's also tragic.
• 1:18:07
  And the most important thing to think about is balance, and if
• 1:18:15
  you find balance in your life, then you are on the path towards
• 1:18:25
  a fulfilling life, at the very least and, you know, happiness
• 1:18:32
  Shouldn't be what we're aiming for.
• 1:18:33
  Because there's another side to happiness.
• 1:18:37
  There's like, you don't know, happiness, unless you also know
• 1:18:41
  sadness. And so Those things should be
• 1:18:48
  appreciated, both of those emotions.
• 1:18:51
  In my opinion, should be appreciated but balance is the
• 1:18:56
  key. Thanks for sharing as we draw
• 1:19:00
  things to a close. Do you have any upcoming
• 1:19:02
  projects or some final thoughts to give like to share with our
• 1:19:05
  business? Well, you can follow me on
• 1:19:10
  Instagram because I am always doing some interviews with
• 1:19:15
  different authors. I try to get topics that are
• 1:19:23
  Topics that can be Universal to everyone yesterday.
• 1:19:26
  I talked to a woman named Leah Grimaldi about forgiveness, and
• 1:19:32
  she took me through the Reiki healing method for forgiveness,
• 1:19:38
  which was really interesting. I talked to another author last
• 1:19:42
  week about manifestation and the Law of Attraction.
• 1:19:46
  So we've been exploring, a lot of interesting topics on my Ig.
• 1:19:50
  So give me a follow. I am Christina pero rights.
• 1:19:54
  It's Christina with the K, Maybe Christian can put this in his
• 1:19:56
  like little bio about, what about the podcast.
• 1:20:01
  But other than that just you should read my book.
• 1:20:07
  I think that it's a book that while it is about women.
• 1:20:13
  I think that it's a book that universally can be universally
• 1:20:21
  applicable. Bowl.
• 1:20:22
  And I think that, I hope that my lessons learned throughout the
• 1:20:28
  year this like, year of chaos and year of trauma, you're in a
• 1:20:33
  half during the pandemic, I think that I have package some
• 1:20:39
  of those life lessons up into lucky.
• 1:20:42
  And so, I would just highly recommend it.
• 1:20:46
  All right. Excellent.
• 1:20:47
  Thank you so much for being on the show and sharing everything
• 1:20:50
  with us and yeah all the best. Thank you Christian.
• 1:20:54
  I have a great one and to everyone listening to the
• 1:20:57
  question we podcast be safe, be well and I'll see you in the
• 1:21:00
  next one.