Latest / WHAT I'VE LEARNT / What I've Learnt - Summer Series Gems (January 2024)

Transcript

What I've Learnt - Summer Series Gems (January 2024) · WHAT I'VE LEARNT

• 0:05
  SPEAKER_05: Well, in the habit revolution, there's a touch of love, betrayal, struggle, triumph, humor, and warmth.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_05: It's like a dear friend, a pocket-sized habit coach, ready to guide the reader on their journey to a better life.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_05: And on that note, I'd like to welcome Dr.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_05: Gina Cleo to the What I've Learned podcast.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_05: I'm so thrilled to have you join us.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, thanks for having me.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: It's so good to be here.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_05: Pleasure.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_05: Well, there's so much to talk about.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know where to begin, but let's talk about obviously the thing on everyone's mind is the way that you talk about very openly the infidelity that you were confronted with and how that has shaped your journey.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_05: Because tell our tell our listeners, three years ago you discovered your husband, who you thought was one of the good guys, as often we do, was actually cheating on you.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_05: Um as a behavioral scientist, you were very aware of subtle change, just subtle changes in connection or behavior, but and you wondered how you missed it.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_05: Talk to me a little bit about that, that incredible.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_05: I think we all have a heave when we hear those stories because we know lots of people that have been, I suppose it's sort of like being a victim of a trauma, really.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: For sure.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_02: And it was a trauma, absolutely.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_02: So my ex and I were together for six years, and I was crazy about this guy.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, his friends would say to me, Oh, Gina, he just worships the ground you walk on.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_02: We were that couple that, you know, people would say, I want a relationship like yours.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_02: And it wasn't just from the outside.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_02: We truly had such a beautiful connection.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_02: And we worked on our relationship, we'd go to couples therapy, we we had the same love language, which was quality time, and we just did all that stuff together.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_02: And it was COVID time, and things started to feel different.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_02: And I noticed that things felt different.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: But he would say to me, I think I'm suffering from depression.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_02: And so whenever there was behavior that was a little bit odd or, you know, something I'd want to question, it would be put under this, you know, this rug of, I have depression.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: So of course I don't want to sleep with you, or of course I am really distant when I come home, or of course I'm being crabby.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_02: And so I learned to just sort of just sit back and support him and do whatever we needed to do to keep the relationship, you know, steady and together and to get his mental health better.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_02: And then, yeah, when I realized that he was actually living this whole double life and this had gone on for at least a year, we'd only been married for six months at the time.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember sitting him down a couple of weeks before our wedding.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, if there's anything you need to let me know, do it now because I don't want to marry someone and then find out all this stuff later.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_02: Whatever you say to me, we'll work through it.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_02: What literally, whatever you say, we will work through it.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_02: But I just want to know I'm going into this with a person I think you are.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_02: And he just looked at me straight in the face and said, You know everything about me.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: This, oh, like we're fine.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_05: And um that's extraordinary.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_05: It's just blatant lying to your face.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_05: And totally how pathetic of you, though, to ask that question.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_05: Like it's almost like you unconsciously or intuitively, maybe.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_05: It's just interesting.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, yeah.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_05: So, yeah, so so then so he looked at you quite bluntly and made it clear that or implied there was no issue and that it was He's like, you know, everything about me, you know, I can't wait to marry you.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_02: And he was really the one pushing for the marriage.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_02: I was very like, you know, our friends and family can't even be here because of restrictions.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_02: Why don't we wait?
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: And he was like, No, I want to make you my wife, blah, blah.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: So he was really pushing for it.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so when I found out that he was, you know, he was into brothels and prostitutes and living this complete double life, it actually shook me.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_02: I was I hyperventilated, I fainted, I had a proper shell shock traumatic moment where the poor thing, it's just horrific.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_05: It's the worst possible feeling when you feel like you've let somebody into your intimate space and they've betrayed you.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_05: Absolutely, Deb.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, how did you discover this?
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_05: How did you find out?
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_02: I was, yeah, I was in the kitchen and I was having a particularly lonely Saturday.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_02: You know, he was having a really sort of distant day.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_02: He was out in the yard and he said, Oh, I'm just gonna go down to Bunnings.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: And I was in the kitchen doing some baking, and his computer was on the bench.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_02: And I just flicked it open to look at a recipe.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: And as I flicked it open, his eye messages were coming through, and there was a live text exchange happening between him and a prostitute that he was just about to meet with.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_02: And she had sent images of herself.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_02: He responded like, mm, yum, and then they discussed money.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: He said to her that he was five minutes away.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_02: And this is all happening live in front of me.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: And hence why I hyperventilated and fainted.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: I couldn't believe it.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_02: And then when I came back to, I looked through the rest of his messages and found hundreds more.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: I found that he was on Tinder, that so he was dating, or at least on a dating site.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_02: He was watching a lot of pornography, just a lot of things that I he would say to me, how against it he was.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And also I volunteered from a very young age with women who were stuck in the sex trade.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_02: It's something I'm extremely passionate about.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: I was the head of student well-being at Bond University, and part of my role was to work with victims of sexual misconduct.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_02: And for him to be going to these particular places, establishments that were specifically hiring women who were trafficked into Australia with it felt like a personal attack because I would donate to these companies that rescue these women.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_02: And in the same week, from the same bank account, he would be funding the industry.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_05: Oh my, and that's what's your joint account.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_05: It is literally like fact is stranger than fiction.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_05: No one, I mean, you know, there is nothing that you could have done yourself to know or protect yourself from this insidious behavior.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_02: There's really nothing because he was excellent at gaslighting and had a had a reason for everything.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_02: You know, he would often stop in these places on the way home from work and or on his lunch breaks, and he'd say something like, Oh, the traffic was really bad, or I had to get fuel, or and I wouldn't question why you 15 minutes late, you know.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, why would you?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I mean, exactly.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_05: At some point you have to trust, yes.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_02: And I wouldn't have married him if I didn't trust him.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_02: So, and also because he was so affirming of the relationship, the love bombing, like every day, like I can't wait to come home to you.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_02: I love you so much, constantly telling me how beautiful I was.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_02: I had no reason to doubt that anything, I could never have imagined this would happen.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_02: So, what happened?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_02: It sort of took it to a next level where I thought my brain just said to me, if you're wrong about this, what else are you wrong about?
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_02: And it must be everything.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_02: Because if you had said to me, I would say, I'll give you a million dollars, the fact that he is not playing up.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_02: There's no way I'd give you a billion dollars.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_05: You were completely that that's isn't that the that's the inverted, commas sort of gift of these people, the the capacity to complete and utter duplicity.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, yes.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_05: And I mean, you're so intelligent and beautiful.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_05: And I'm like, how could anyone do this to another person?
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, totally.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I grew up in a very sheltered home, and in my family, there was always honesty, always high levels of integrity where you know we have faith and we believe in a God that, you know, like we just wouldn't do things.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_02: A part of me actually believed that some people are just simply not capable of doing such heinous acts.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that was part of my naivety.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: But it it really shook me in a way of what else am I wrong about?
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_02: And it became a point where I doubted that my parents were my parents, that the sky was blue, that we should really drive on, you know, left side of the road in Australia.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: I struggled with everything to the point where leaving my own house was terrifying because I couldn't be sure about anything.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: Nothing felt safe anymore.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_05: I a hundred percent understand why you would feel that.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_05: And I had a similar experience, slightly different context, but I had a very similar experience in a relationship, and I really understand the idea of how agrophobia and that idea that, well, if I just stay inside safe because everything that you believe is, isn't, you you become it's literally like the rugs pulled out from under you.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_05: So I think there are many listeners who could relate to this notion that when you're betrayed by somebody or when you think you're betrayed by somebody, it's like I call it shadow boxing, because you don't actually know what you're you know, there's a shadow of something that you can't put your finger on and you can't understand, and you can't fight it, but you know.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_05: Exactly.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_05: And so therefore, you feel this constant sense, which you're describing so beautifully, that sense of my world is not what I thought it was.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_02: Completely.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I had actually written a whole chapter on this story in my book originally, which um was pulled just due to risk of defamation because there aren't many people with his particular profession that live in a particular place.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_02: So it was pulled.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_02: But how I described it in that chapter the first time was it's like I woke up in a war zone.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_02: I was asleep and I woke up, and now I'm in the middle of a war and I'm in the front line, and there's all these attacks coming at me.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I I've just woken up, right?
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_02: Like I don't, I can't fight back.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_02: You're not equipped.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_02: You yeah, I can't surrender.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_02: I have no idea what to do.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_02: And so you just feel like entirely lost in this space.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the hardest part of this journey was actually feeling estranged from myself, was no longer trusting myself, no longer being able to trust my own judge of character, which we put so much faith on in our day-to-day life, and therefore being terrified about talking or meeting anybody who wasn't in my inner circle.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_05: Well, I think just it's it's really as we've described, it's a trauma.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_05: And it's like a trauma as if you've been in a war.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_05: And also that person's been inside inside a very private, trusted space and betrayed it so dramatically.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_05: So it's interesting your chapter was pulled and it wasn't allowed to.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_05: Is there any way that they could have hidden who it was?
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_05: Because really it's quite an important story to tell because it it actually is the foundation of much of your growth and your development and your book and the way that you've developed this whole extraordinary, I suppose, skill set that I know is very important to you.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_05: So it's interesting that they did that.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_05: Is it was that something that you challenged, or did you explain absolutely?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: No, I I did challenge it.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_02: You know, they wanted the story in the book.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_02: And I wrote it with so much vulnerability.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: It took me a really long time to get the words on paper because it was really traumatic reliving it and cathartic at the same time.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_02: Like it was actually wonderful to be able to put such detail into the description because it helped me heal from it as well.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_02: But I know that every day I would write, you know, I'd end up in tears and it was really difficult.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: But I did think it was important.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_02: And why they I guess there's lawyers and then there's publishers and there's authors, and we all have different agendas.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: And so I can appreciate why they pulled it.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the details would completely destroy someone's life if they were, if someone was to find out the truth, all the detail, they would never get married again.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, they would never have a family.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_02: But at the same time, I was like, I'm really tired of protecting perpetrators and their reputation.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_05: Absolutely.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_05: And you know what?
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_05: Telling your story, as you say, and I this is what we do on this podcast, is really, really important from a cathartic perspective, as you've outlined.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_05: But it's also about the universality of that experience and people going, wait, that happened to me too.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_05: Or, you know, oh, I'm not alone in that experience.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_05: And we know how critical that is in helping others, I suppose, go on the journey themselves and know that there is some light at the end of the tunnel.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_05: That's very much what you did.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_05: How long did this take for you to?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_05: First of all, I have to ask, did you confront him and how did that story go?
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_05: So tell us that.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_02: So after I saw everything, I took screenshots of everything so I can hold on to it.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: And I sent it all to my mum in case, you know, he took my phone or something.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I um messaged him.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_02: I gave him, you know, he booked in for 15 minutes.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_02: So after that time, I messaged him and I said, Can you please come home?
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: There's something I need to talk to you about.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_02: And he's he just said, Yep, I'm on my way.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_02: He came home and I was very calmly just sat on the kitchen bench and I just said to him, Is there something you need to tell me?
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_02: And he denied.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, Have you had any special treatments lately or met any special people lately?
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_02: And he's like, I don't know what you're talking about.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_02: Then I proceeded to show him the images that I had discovered and the text message exchanges.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I had gone through our bank accounts and he'd taken cash out.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_02: And he would always say it was for work and he was going to be reimbursed in his wage and it didn't.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_02: And I'd chase it up and just all these sorts, everything started falling into place.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, the the images and the text message would align with the dates that these transactions were happening, and so everything was falling into place, and he denied, denied, denied.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_05: Still denied, still denied.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_05: The hubris of that man.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_05: I'm sorry, but I could feel myself anxious listening to you because I'm on this story with you, as I'm sure our listeners are, because the hubris of him denying this still.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_02: And it's wild because the man I knew was the most gentle, kind, soft, loving, innocent.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_02: You know, his friends would call him vanilla because he was so predictable.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_02: He just he would eat the same thing, do the same thing.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_02: He was just so calm and kind.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: He oozed kindness.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_02: And there was so a part of me believed him.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: I but also I wanted to believe him.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_05: And why wouldn't you?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I wouldn't.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_02: I couldn't handle not believe, I couldn't handle the fact that my world was torn apart like this, that that this betrayal was real.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: And so that really messed with my mind.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's like I have all this hard evidence, but here's my husband looking me in the eye and saying, I love you way too much to do this.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_02: What happened was I messaged them, I had the intention to go, and then I stood outside and I was like, no way, I loved you know way too much.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_02: I'd never go in.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_02: That's what he said to me.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_02: So I there was I was oscillating in and out of believing him and in and out of, you know, I already started the PTSD, these the flashbacks of the photos that I would see.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_02: And my brain was fact-finding intensely, like going back into every interaction, questioning every moment that we had had together.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_02: And then the next day, we slept in separate rooms that night.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't sleep.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: I wailed.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_02: I wasn't even crying.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: I was on my hands and knees wailing all night.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: Then the next day he packed his bag and he said, I'm not worthy of being in the same room as you.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_02: And he left, and that was it.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_02: That is just beyond appalling.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_05: He didn't even stand up and show the honor of apologizing or explaining, or you'd caught him being as despicable as he obviously was, but not having the courage, like at least if he'd had the courage to say, you know what, you're right.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_05: I I stuffed up, or I mean, I thought it was interesting what you described because we all know the good guys, right?
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_05: And many people know the good guys which you refer to.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_05: Do you think there's something, there's some alignment in your, I suppose, reflection and your um, you know, processing of this, that in his attempt to meet all the requirements and standards and expectations.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_05: Well, I'm about to interview somebody who's very cool.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_05: In fact, Jason Kimberley is an adventurer, photographer, author, and the founder of Cool, an education organization dedicated to inspiring students to learn for life.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_05: Jason is an altruistic realist.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_05: His uncompromising focus is on equitable access to quality education for all students.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_05: That's a massive issue and one that we could talk about endlessly.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_05: In the meantime, you've you've really morphed and adapted and gone as almost a full circle in terms of what you're doing now at cool.org, which is a phenomenal organization, which um you and I have spoken about reasonably extensively.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_05: Tell our listeners a little bit about cool.org, how you got there, because you've obviously done lots of things and you're multifaceted, but this is your real passion.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_05: And I'm really interested to hear um how you arrived at this destination.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, one I prepared earlier, I was um uh went on a trip to Antarctica with a couple of mates of mine in 2005, a school mate of mine, uh Jay Speel, and uh the mountaineer um Pete Hillary, who's scooched up Everest a couple of times and been to the South Pole, and uh he agreed to take me and uh my mate on an expedition to Antarctica, and the result of that was um this book here, Antarctica, A Different Adventure.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I was um struggling.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_05: What a great cover.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's not me, but um uh I'm a little shorter through the quads than that.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: But the traveling companion, Mr.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: Veal, and I thought I was gonna have a big debate as to how to get him onto the cover, and he just said, where do you want me to stand?
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: And please do not highlight any of the inevitable shrinkage that will no doubt occur.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh that was of the book.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: And when I was researching that book, I was reading about um fishermen who are coming down to the Southern Ocean and netting krill by the boatload, and krill is the basis of all um life in the uh Southern Ocean.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, everything depends on that.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: And um uh this krill was being used as an additive to put into pellets that were being used to feed cattle that were grazing on cleared Amazonian rainforests to grow burgers for uh North America, who I thought possibly didn't need another burger at that stage.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: But out of sight, out of mind, people are making money and it goes on.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I was sort of quite horrified.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: I thought I knew about this stuff, but it turns out I didn't have much of a clue at all.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: And there's hundreds, if not thousands, of these things going on around the world.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I uh asked my teacher mates and said, what's going on in the classroom?
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: How are you dealing with you know these um uh environmental challenges, but also the social and economic challenges of our day, you know, what are we doing?
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: And it was very much, oh, don't do this, don't do that.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: By the way, 10 easy tips to save the planet.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I couldn't think anything more disheartening as a kid at school being told that.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I thought there was an opportunity to speak in plain English with a sense of humor and not talk down to teachers, but talk up to teachers to uh um uh give them a really positive message about what can be done as opposed to what can't be done and how kids can have success at school, whether it's around their water waste, energy, biodiversity in their uh schools, and have some successes that they can build on through their education and be able to take that uh into their lives.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: And the first bit of research we did on the program in schools, we um spoke to about 20 different schools, and they said there was demonstrable behavior change with their students around water, waste, energy, and biodiversity, our four key subjects we were working on when we first started.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: And uh they said they'd take the time to their parents and they were um uh having noticeable behavior change both at home and at school.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: So we thought we're onto something here.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Then we expanded the program out to include the social and economic um issues that kids are really concerned about, and the things that keep coming up in the uh surveys done by um Mission Australia and the Smith family and various other organizations, kids are concerned about um uh climate, their future, equality, um, and inclusion, and also their future and mental health.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: I think I might have mentioned that twice.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so those four things in rotating order are the top four by a good distance.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: So, what we want to do is help educate kids to understand more about those areas and into entwine those key issues into a maths lesson, a science lesson, an English lesson.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: So all the learning is real world.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: We bring the real world into the classroom and kids love it rather than rocking up to school.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: Term two, week three, page seven, eight of the textbook, the same old thing we've done before.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: So we really add the spicy source to the education, get the teachers engaged to teach things they otherwise wouldn't have thought they would taught, and also get the kids engaged in their learning, keep them at school um longer, help get them uh on a career path, help them understand who they are.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_05: I think it's just so to me, it's revolutionary.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_05: And, you know, I work with the World Literacy Foundation, as you know, which I've touched on.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_05: And really, I just find it astounding that we have an education system that was developed, you know, back in the industrial age.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_05: And it's so anachronistic.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_05: It seems to be, while it has its role, there, you know, I would say if you, you know, 70% of kids would be disengaged, honestly, a lot of the time.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_05: Even if they're smart, this is not about smart or not smart.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_05: And that's what I find extraordinary is what you're doing, which is something that I would have thought was a no-brainer, excuse the pun, but you know, but to me, it makes so much sense to engage kids in something they care about, in issues that they care about, things that are going to affect them, as you say, bringing the real world into the classroom.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_05: Why has it taken so long?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_05: And how difficult has it been for you to develop some interesting?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_05: I know you're in how many schools are you in now, your program?
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: We've got there's 175,000 teachers.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: In Australia, using our program across 92% of uh of Aussie's schools.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_01: And we we started in 2008 with uh this idea and a book I showed you before.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: I sent that a copy of that to every school um librarian in uh the state of Victoria because we were just operating, we were cool Melbourne back then, with another book I'd had published about some adventures around Australia, and uh with a letter to the librarian saying, Hey, I think we can help your teachers include um all these uh uh interesting and at the time, you know, quite controversial um subjects.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: At the time the Victorian government, you weren't allowed to use the word climate change.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, there was all this sort of you know, um 1984 double speak, and it was quite an incredible time, and some of the uh the political environment sort of got quite hot um around there.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, we've been mentioned in parliament, you know, plenty of people that crank at us, um, which um from both both ends of the spectrum, which tells me we're doing a great job, you know, not green enough, not right enough, not this enough.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: So uh I'm I'm happily we happily get criticized by everyone.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I think we're doing a pretty good job.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, no, I take your point.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_05: What you're saying is you're trying to ruffle the feathers and make sure that people think and they just don't, you know, exist.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_05: And that includes in the classroom and making sure that you get because, you know, I know with my own kids and you know with your kids, obviously they're much more animated and engaged when you actually push buttons and get them to think about decisions and change and all of the things that your your program activates.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_05: So, do you was it how long has it been running now?
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: 15 years.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: We we started in 2008, so we have 15 years we've been uh we've been running.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: And the thing we've done quite differently from uh lots of other organizations, we've approached teachers directly.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: No one's ever mandated you you must use cool.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's been a word of mouth program to the point where I think 175,000 educators, 25,000 parents, and about 15,000 overseas educators, um, all in our database, um, all of them coming into the site and um, you know, downloading lessons and uh taking them off.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: And interestingly, when we ask what they do, they add it to their portfolio and teach it um year on year on an ongoing basis.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: So um that's just uh you know so rewarding.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: And when we do our research and ask teachers, how does this impact your kids?
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: And unsurprising, they say my kids are now much more likely to work in a team.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um, sort of like eight, eight out of eight out of ten more likely to work in a team.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um their understanding of the issue has changed.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, their ability to um communicate this uh lesson has also uh jumped up.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: But the interesting thing was we asked teachers, um, nine out of ten said, I've changed my view on this issue.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_01: So be able to change a teacher's view on that issue to me is a really powerful thing.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because first thing, well, where were they getting their information?
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: Was it just the loudest noises in the media?
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because um up until a few years ago, 40% of secondary teachers were teaching outside their area of expertise.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: And while that number has come down to about 26%, there's still a fair chunk of secondary teachers who are not trained to teach in their areas.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: So what we do is we assume zero knowledge on the teacher's behalf.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: So Deb, you or I could pick up a cool uh lesson, read it through the night before, and go bang and deliver it to the class the next day.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: So it's all about step one, step two, step three.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's a uh an instruction list.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: And according to a teacher's ability, they're free.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: Feel free to edit, drop stuff in, localize it for their own scenario, add bits in that they know will work well for their kids because teachers have a really great understanding of what their class needs.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, we never take the teacher away from the center of what we do.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: And um, there's a lot of platforms that just teach the kids and chop the teacher out of the equation.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: We never want to do that.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: We want to keep the teacher central and upskill the teacher to be the best educated they can possibly be.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_05: It's very interesting to me because, first of all, obviously, and I think I've raised this with you before, who's curating the content?
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_05: Who's ensure so obviously if I've got a kid at school and I love this idea and it opens doors, right?
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_05: But I'm like, okay, who's curating that lens?
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_05: Okay, so yeah, that's important because we need to know where it's coming from.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so a lot of our work, probably 90% of the work we do, or at least 80%, will be done with industry experts.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: So we will include, we will have um uh the expert from their film from their field, and uh they will give us and share with us all their information, their data, their research, their infographics, their videos, and we will take that as the expert educators and distill that into a year-level specific, subject-specific classroom lesson.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: And we employ uh psychologists, um particularly around sensitive areas, so that we're not um uh potentially triggering any kids or having your kids feel left out.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: And we are really explicit with the teachers on uh how they need to prepare for the lesson.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because you know, we do look at some uh uh some things.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, we did a um uh a professional learning course last year on on how to teach um consent.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: And uh over 2,000 teachers downloaded it and uh and did that PL course because it's something they're interested in because they know their kids are passionate about it and want to learn about it.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: It is, and it's really important to not just you know um uh go out and have uh an idea.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: But you know what, the ultimate judge is um Deb, the the the final arbitrator on is it good, is it bad, is it appropriate, is that teacher.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: If the if it's no good, if it's um, you know, if if it's not well researched, if it hasn't got the psychologist involved, particularly if it's um some First Nations material, we always engage some some uh Indigenous educators in that as well.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: So that we know it's not just us, we feed in from the industry experts, from the mental health experts, from the subject matter experts, and that's how we come up with the really top-class educational material.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, the teacher um will vote with their click and decide whether it's going to be any good for them.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: So the teacher.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_05: They're the curator.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, they're they're the ones that distill and ensure.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, clearly there's a lot of power and a lot of potency in what you offer because you're dealing with, as you said, social issues, often sometimes controversial issues, which you know, anything in the real world is can be controversial to either side, as we know.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_05: So the question is also, I suppose, how do you navigate government and politics and all of that, which obviously, in a way, you're sort of come in the back, you know, you can come round this way.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_05: And so you're not don't have to go through the government, I suppose, uh, gateway.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_05: But in doing that, do you find they make life difficult?
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_05: And also, are you conscious and have you had challenges um in terms of controversy or or issues that may prove to be not so straightforward?
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_05: That's just one thing.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_05: Climate change can be political and indigenous issues, and then you've got, you know, uh the complexity around um Middle East or whatever it is that is on slate.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so I'll go back to the start.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: So governments when when I first started out on this um Odyssey, um uh, you know, we're gonna have 15 years, but it was a couple of years to get a game, so let's call it 17 years ago.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: I was absolutely shocked that there wasn't a um uh a vetting process or a place where you had to get registered to have you know your um lessons or curriculum um uh approved.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: So that was my first big surprise.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: What anyone can just make a lesson and send it to a teacher and if they like it, they'll teach it.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: So no one Unbelievable.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I thought, okay, well, let's go.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um, let's get our stuff together.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: And hopefully the way we're looking at and the way we're preparing it and presenting it is appealing and is useful.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: And as it turned out, it has been.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I think one of the secret sources in that is um uh not losing your sense of humor, um, being able to um to talk in a really um uh a really open and engaging way that can be readily understood.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: So words like anthropogenic are banned.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you've got to learn, you gotta look that up in a dictionary.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: We don't, you know, we don't want to use words that 4% of the population know the meaning of.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: We really want to have things open and engaging.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: So there's that side of it.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: So on the government side, we have actually uh avoided all government um uh support uh because once you do work with the government, you're essentially doing their bidding for them.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: You're writing the lessons they want you to write, um, you're doing it a certain way.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: There's a documentation, you know, sort of two inches thick that you need to adhere to.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not who we are.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: We're a nimble um uh, you know, organization who can really do what we think is going to be um most useful for our teachers and the kids that they teach.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: And we know that by doing a significant piece of research every two or three years.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: And we ask them, surprise, surprise, what is it that you want to learn more about?
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and and we respond to that and we we give teachers what they ask for.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's a really respectful relationship and communication that we have with teachers.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, you ask, uh you'd let us know, and we will um provide that to the best of our ability.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that also keeps you um really relevant in the uh in the marketplace.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: And as for uh you know people getting met, some people just like to politicize everything.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_01: They're perpetually angry and shouty, and we all know who they are.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: They uh come on the tele after it gets dark, and um uh, you know, they uh like to, you know, we're all for free speech as long as you agree with us, which I find hilarious.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_01: So uh, you know, I think we all do.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's you know I haven't got a voice, mate.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'm watching you on TV.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_05: And you're yelling at me and you're screaming at me, and I can't still I can't hear you.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: You don't spend too much time worrying about others, we just focus on our work and uh leave all the um all the all the fighting to uh to others.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: We don't get involved in any of that sort of bollocks.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_05: But it's interesting because I think the notion you refer to as odyssey, and I think it really is quite odyssey.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_05: Well, life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it's about learning to dance in the rain.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_05: Well, I love this quote from my next guest, Jacob Klein, because it seems to go to the character of the man, and I'm very interested to hear about his perspective on the crazy world that we're in right now, but the importance for peace, mediation, negotiation, and finding resolution, and this is what Jacob specializes in.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_05: And I think, as we all would agree on all sides, people are floundering and there's a sense of vulnerability and people feeling that they're not sure where to turn next.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_05: As a mediator and someone who has navigated the psyche of complex conflicting parties before, what are some of your thoughts around what you're seeing globally?
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_05: Um, and then we'll talk about specifically Australia in in more detail, but but obviously you're really at the coal face seeing this, and you've seen it before, or have you?
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_05: Is this something that you have grave concerns for, or you can see that there may be some hope for resolution?
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um I start with the end.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it's a very, very bad, bad is even an understatement situation, but I do have hope, and I will try to explain why.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: But first of all, let me tell you, I was in this mediation or or conflict resolution both as a professional and as a person.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: I see myself, I belonged to what in Israel is called a peace camp.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I see myself as a liberal, as a humanist, as someone who believes in civil rights and in personal rights.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: I was establishing and later on participating in many dialogue groups with Palestinians.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: And everywhere we could, I did it.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: And uh there was hope.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I worked with the consultant of the general chief of staff, which means basically the commander of the Israeli army, and that was on the Oslo covenant, that was more or less in 1995, 96, 97.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: There was hope.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: And having said that, I belong really to this camp that fights for a solution that is both guaranteeing Israel's security but also guaranteeing the rights of the Palestinians.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_00: But the events of October 7th shatter, they they cracked and challenged many of my beliefs and of my actually my hopes.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because this the massacre committed was not something that that was that was terrorist, that had nothing to do with liberation or with freedom camp, or because they are poor.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: That was an orgy of murder and rape and mutilation of bodies, and uh a lot of things which I can't repeat, I don't want to repeat.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I think you did a wonderful job in talking to people who survived, or that they have the relatives in Gaza.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm uh the the the whole thing is something that uh even now they yesterday the Americans, American intelligence said they don't want to return the women because they are afraid that they will tell what they went through.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_05: I saw that actually, yes.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, this is this is only the tip of the iceberg of many things.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: We know, we know uh unfortunately, a little bit more information.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean our intelligence, not I personally, but I had that.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the confession of the Hamas people, the ones that were captive here, they say terrible things.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_00: They were really happy to kill Jews.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: One of them called.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: We have the film.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: He called his father and said, I killed Jews, Papa, be so proud of me.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't say soldiers, he didn't say people, he didn't say Israelis.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: We killed Jews, I killed 10 Jews, be proud of me, and so on.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like a badge of honor.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_05: It's so so shattering, and so the value of death over life.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_00: He took the telephone, the cellular phone of the girl he murdered, her phone, and he said very proudly, we heard it because the Israeli intelligence uh uh concepted it.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: We he says, I hear you have here the cell phone, and here I'm talking, I did kill her, and so on.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_00: But this is only one of many, many, many examples.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, and then I guess you were exposed in the the whole realm.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: There was one of my relatives, the cousin of my son-in-law.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yes, a child, I I knew him, the Yanai Zikim, uh, one of these heroes.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: He protected uh 90 kids, 18-year kids.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_00: He they were recruited, but they hadn't even uh they were not armed.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: And he he he but they were not trained, they were nothing.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: That was a basic training.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: And he and two other officers went there and they sacrificed their lives, protected and saved them.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm so sorry for your loss.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_00: His funeral, of all the funerals, his funeral devastated me.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_00: Symbolically, in the middle of the funeral, as the father, a broken father, uh, whom uh he was in Australia also.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, um, he started to speak once the alarm of rockets, and we all lay down on the on the on the ground, on the hard ground, because it was in the area of Jerusalem.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_00: I was even hurt.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_00: So that was so symbolic, I say.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: What I want to say is it's very, very hard to believe in dialogue and peace and peaceful solutions when you see these things.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because these have nothing to do with rights, human rights, with fighting for freedom.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_00: They have nothing to do with it.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_05: So the challenge, yeah.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_05: The challenge is what you're saying is the trauma is great.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_05: You've seen it before.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_05: I know that you worked also with the Rabin government and at that time, and you know, it was a long time ago, but you, you know, there is a strong, complex, overwhelming history of these sort of atrocities.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_05: Okay.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_05: We remember when there was that whole phase where all the buses were being bombed with innocent people, there was that whole horrible terrorist thing going on um back in the 90s.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_05: And this is sort of like, I think why everyone's so shocked, as you're correctly outlining, is there is something so sinister here that is next level.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_05: It's not war, it's like there's something going on on both sides.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_05: There seems this incredible um uh unrelenting hate and and disregard.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_05: And so, for someone like you who works in the peace negotiator media space, where does the anger go and how do you find a way?
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_05: This is what I'm interested in.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_05: As you said, you're devastated, you're traumatized.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_05: So, as is all the community, as is Israel, as is the globe.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_05: And then you have these people responding globally with hate and celebration.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: I I want to tell you something about hate, which is unfortunately exactly as you said, it's it's flourishing now in both sides.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: But before that, I want to relate to a very small thing.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: You said it actually unnoticed.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_00: You said hate of the both sides.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: That's true.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm very, very much concerned that the word makes such a clear cut, it's very, very almost self-understood that it's a symmetry.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: There is no symmetry.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm very I'm I belong to those people who criticize the Israeli government very harshly.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: I was demonstrating week after week, week after week, more than a dozens of weeks.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: So no one can blame me that I'm a very blind, ardent, or someone who hangs on.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_00: But there is no symmetry.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: The speed with which the word shifted from seeing Israel as the victim on the Thursday, on Saturday, or Sunday, and immediately after that, or some in some places, even at the same day, we are the aggressive ones, we are the the ones who does it.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_00: There is no symmetry.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: You even if we do me do mistakes, if such a murderous attack, if it happens, and Israel goes to defend its own people so that the the settlements can go back.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_00: I had a discussion with my uh daughter, she's also in the pig skin.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, I don't know what the solution is, I don't think war is the is the best solution.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_00: So she said, okay, but if I'm living there in one of these set uh one of these villages, so kibbutzim, how can I really come back if the Hamas is still there?
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: And this is something under the border is yeah, if it's it's I I always I compare it if someone comes to you, not to you, but to someone's house comes and slaughters your family and rapes your daughter and kidnaps your wife and kills your brothers and all the whole family, and then you go and and try to seek him and release your kidnapped.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: But he and his whole band are hiding in a village, and in this village, there are part of them are his band and part of them innocent, but you're going after him, and once you are fighting because he's hiding himself, then the world calls him he is the aggressor.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_00: I I think it's very a known fact.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_00: We found it in the last uh 50 days.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: We found bombs and rockets and munition and the whole thing of the rocket infrastructure under under mosques, hospitals, under schools, under uh under kindergarten, and under uh under the hospital, it was not only Shifa.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_00: We are now discovered another hospital where they have the tunnels with the munition under it because they were sure we will not touch it.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I I'm very, very sensitive to this symmetry to say yes, they have hate and we are.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_00: It is not.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_00: And and and if we do miss uh do mistakes, and we do, it is still not a reason to say yes, it's on both sides, both sides are criminals.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_05: And I think that's a big debate.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, you're right.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: I promised you uh a word about hate.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: I think this uh the one of the one of the tragedies of the so-called collateral damages of this whole thing is it took away the hope of some of people like me who were really hoping for a dialogue, for a for a kind of a solution that will include both.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_00: I remember after 9-11, where there was a lot of agitation and anger, um, I called for some kind of thinking, of reflecting, and not only angel.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_00: And there was also a Zen Buddhist person, uh Tech Nathan, a Vietnamese one, and he said, embracing the anger.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: I think that what we have to do is on both sides, I can't take responsibility for the other side, but of our side, to say we do what we do to free our hostages and to be sure that there is no danger for the settlements and the villages.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: The kibbutzim that are on the border.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_00: But no rage out of uh revenge, no things that come out of just purely punishing.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not I don't believe in punishing.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: I don't believe in even if we are very uh bad or a band of murderers, not punishment is is certainly not as a state, but but simply make sure that these people will not risk our our citizens again.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_05: Well, Nikki has interviewed hundreds of celebrities about touchy topics and even took the now infamous video of an agast Anna Winter being asked for her ID at an event.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_05: Nikki attended college in Melbourne, Australia, and has worked for many newspapers over the years.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_05: When she's not stalking celebs on the red carpet, Nikki loves to watch the great British British bake-off and true crime murder mysteries and nag her children.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_05: You can follow her red carpet escapades on Instagram at Nikki Goston.
• 45:13
  SPEAKER_05: So Nikki, welcome to the What I've Learned podcast.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_05: So good to have a fellow journo on board and we can talk about all things uh journalism.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_05: Great, thank you.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you for having me.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_05: So you're uh based in New York and have been there for a long time.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_05: Tell us a little bit about how your journey started and what it is that drives you to interview and engage in the celebrity world, but not just celebrities, but predominantly celebrities.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_05: Talk to me about that.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_05: I love I love your story.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_03: I came to New York with friends on a holiday and just stayed, so it wasn't really a very thought-out plan.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and I kind of fell into it.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_03: I was working at Newsweek, and uh they used to have a page at the back, which was kind of like a fun celebrity page, and they used to have a column that was for an interview, and they never could get anyone to do it, and no one on staff, no one wanted to do it.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_03: And I was like, I'll do it.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_03: And um, it was Newsweek at the time was a really big deal.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_03: We could get anyone on the phone.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_03: I started, I just I didn't care interview.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_03: I just thought it was funny to annoy people and not be.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_03: I there's nothing that's more boring to me when an actor will talk about what it was like working with a director because of course they're gonna rave and say something nice.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_03: I'd much rather hear what they had for breakfast.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_03: That to me is infinitely more interesting.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_03: I'm with you on that.
• 46:39
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, we love, yeah.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_05: So, in other words, I mean, Newsweek was pretty hard-hitting and certainly not where you wouldn't associate it with sort of celebrities and that's you know, it was very predominantly news.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_05: And so it's interesting that you grab that column.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I had a column in the age called What I've Learned, which is where this podcast really was born from.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_05: So I relate to that idea of wanting to do a bit of a deep dive and get an insight into how that person ticks.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_05: It's really just a fascination with humanity, isn't it?
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_05: That's what drives.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_03: I think that there's nothing.
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_03: The best advice I ever got in the beginning, I was trying to be funny and quippy.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_03: And I remember my editor saying to me, You're not listening.
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_03: And I was like, Oh, a penny dropped.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_03: I was like, he's right, I wasn't listening.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_03: I was just like rat a tat tat tat tac.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_03: And um, and I am interested in hearing about, but like it doesn't matter, famous or not, I love hearing about people's stories and where they came from and what motivates them.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_03: And it's all just so interesting to me.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_03: So I love hearing people talk.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_05: Me too.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_05: I'm and that's why I do this, because there's nothing, it fills you cup, doesn't it?
• 47:46
  SPEAKER_05: Because also you learn a lot.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_05: Like I've learned so much from all these interviews, like I'm learning from you now.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_05: And I think I actually consider it a privilege, and I'm sure you're the same, that somebody's prepared to trust me with their story and to give their version of the world and their lens on the world.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_05: That's actually quite a privilege to share that with someone and for someone to trust us and to trust you.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_05: So, in the in the sense of your your, I suppose, journey, who's some of the people that have really rocked you or moved you or challenged you?
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_05: Any any just a few that come to mind?
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I've had some, I've got some favorites that I like speaking to.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_03: Um, you know, I've been told off by people, so that has stayed in my mind too.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_03: Like what?
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_03: Like, who's told you off?
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_03: Like, but it's Jerry Lewis, who was famously just a grump and a nasty person, and he screamed at me on the phone, and I literally screamed with laughter.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_03: I was just like, I loved it that Jerry Lewis was telling me off.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_03: I just loved it.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_03: Why was he telling you off?
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_03: Why did you do it?
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_03: Because I he he, I mean, if you read about him, if you just go to his Wikipedia page, he was like one of the nastiest people.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_03: So it wasn't even grumpy, it was like worse than that.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_03: So I it was something silly that set him up, like it wasn't even anything, and he just went off to the races and it was fabulous.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_03: I loved it.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_03: I'm trying to think.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I've just interviewed so many people and it's just been fun along the way.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_03: I love I love it when also when I do these red carpets and I'm the oldest there by decades.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I say and I act like the rabbi for the I call them the kids, and I say to them, treat it like it should be like a tennis match or any type of game.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna throw the ball to you, hit the ball to you, and you want the celebrity to hit it back to you, and then you're gonna have fun.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_03: Like they've got to realize that, and most do, that I'm coming from a place of fun and lightness, and because you've only got two minutes.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_05: So the red carpet is your focus, yeah.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_05: So you're right, that's actually quite hard, like very different to what I do, which is deep dive for an hour.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_05: You have to, in that, you have to grab that that nutshell or that nugget very quickly while they're walking on the red carpet.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_05: And that's quite a skill, I reckon, to get that.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_05: Um, and I can imagine that it would be quite challenging because you're jostling with other journalists, like I get this sort of space and I get to control and create it.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_05: You are really having to fly by the seat of your pants, make it work and engage them.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_05: How challenging is that?
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_05: And and obviously you're known because you've been doing it for years.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_05: But is it getting harder?
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_05: And also, what are some of your tips about how to ensure that you get that nugget?
• 50:31
  SPEAKER_03: Well, like I said, the to me, the number one is uh hopefully they'll realize that it's it takes two.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_03: And so I'm gonna be light and playful with you, and so hopefully you're gonna be light and playful with me, and then we'll have some fun and we'll get something quippy, and it's not gonna be any big anything that you're gonna be embarrassed about.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_03: I work for the New York Post, which uh and page six, which is kind of this infamous gossip page, which is fun to read, but uh celebrities are terrified of.
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_03: So a lot of times I I still have this now.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_03: I can't get on car, I have to beg to get on carpets, and people, publicists don't want us, they'll not, they don't want their clients to speak, and then they see it's me and they okay, we'll do it for Nikki because they know I'm not gonna, I don't want to do anything snarky, I don't like being mean, I like having fun, but I'm just not here to, especially the last couple of years, there's too much negativity in the world.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not gonna add more to it.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_05: And that that in itself is testimony to what you've, you know, you've created a bridge there for people that they know they can trust.
• 51:35
  SPEAKER_05: And it's interesting that that notion of the gossip page, the page six.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_05: Um, do you think it's changed?
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_05: Do you think it's become, especially as social media is now driving this whole other um agenda and also platform?
• 51:48
  SPEAKER_05: It's massive.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_05: Do you think it's as powerful as it was, or do you think it's it's losing some of its bite?
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_03: Well, the things have changed, like we used to do a lot of like magazine editors, that was a big deal.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_03: Like it just doesn't, that world doesn't exist anymore.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_03: Nightclubs was a big thing, which it's starting to come back, but you know, because of COVID, that just disappeared.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_03: And um, so the landscape of Manhattan has changed a lot uh in that way.
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_03: And reality stars, they just you know, they didn't exist.
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_05: So fascinating, isn't it?
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_05: It's a really different world from when you started, when you and I started.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_05: Um, but particularly in that space, you're actually right.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, New York has transformed in that sense, as has the world.
• 52:31
  SPEAKER_05: So what are you finding?
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, like nobody really cares, you know.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_05: As you, I mean, we talk about Anna Winter, and she's still got a you know, a strong power base, obviously.
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_05: But it is a it is a different time.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_05: And so who are you finding that when it goes I mean, I was just looking, I mean, Sarah Snook and Margot Robbie, seeing them.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I was so excited, as I'm sure you were, to see Australians thriving and and doing so well.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_05: Um, what what are you seeing in terms of the who people want to read about?
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_03: Um, for our audience for page six, right now it's uh Taylor Swift obsessed.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_03: They love Taylor Swift, they love housewives, big on housewives, um, and they also love reading about the royal family and particularly Meghan Markle, and it's like a love-hate thing.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_03: They a lot of the audience hates her, but they love reading about her.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_05: So, for you drawing that line in that space, first of all, that must be quite difficult because you obviously want to capture the the snapshot that you need for page six, but you also come from a base where you also don't sound like you're on the gossip trail in the in the old sense of the word.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_05: You sound like you're somebody who actually just, you know, wants to have a relationship, have a bit of banter and capture that person.
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_05: How difficult is that?
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_05: Is that hard?
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_03: When I'm if they are like I have to do a lot of write-ups.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_03: So that's just, you know, where you write from the source and you have to click, you know, link to them, and that's a whole different story.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_03: But when I'm doing original interviews, um, I, you know, obviously I want to get something newsy, but I don't want to get something that is gonna, you know, embarrass someone, or I just want it to be fun and interesting.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_03: So I have had it a couple of times where someone said something to me and I knew it was gonna get them into a heap of trouble.
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_03: And I just thought I talked about it with my boss, and I thought it's just not worth ruining their life over a day of me having a big story for one day, and I just didn't feel comfortable with it.
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_03: Having said that though, if someone, you know, confesses to murdering someone, I'm not gonna be nice about it, I'm gonna run it.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_03: But you know, it's some silly thing that they said that in this day and age when you get cancelled so quickly, it's just not worth it.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_05: Thanks so much for listening.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_05: I'm blessed to have so many wonderful guests coming on the show.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_05: So check out my What I've Learned Instagram for updates.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_05: Meanwhile, stay tuned, kind, and curious.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_05: Love dear.