November 6, 2024 • 67 mins
Today, we're in conversation with Zainab Salbi, a remarkable humanitarian, writer, and social entrepreneur. Zainab recounts her harrowing experiences growing up under Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq, her escape to America through an arranged marriage, and the subsequent challenges she overcame, including domestic violence and financial hardship. Focusing on her healing journey, she emphasizes the importance of building a support network, embracing vulnerability, and the transformative power of telling one's truth.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm keeping the bigger story which I grew up with,
Saddam Hussane. People who don't understand that kind of thing,
because fear for me was very tangible. I could touch it.
It was all over the house. I grew up and
was bugged. Our cars were bugged, our telephone were bugged.
We are not equal as humans and our financial resources,
but we are equal in our stories. You have to
(00:22):
allow the goodness, the gardening, the beautiful places. That's the
beauty that these creativity and imagination and all of that
comes from the allowing.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
The people that are addicted right now, that are listening
to this, that are struggling, that are in despair, that
have raped there's people are very paranoid, They're afraid right
now there lacking purpose, the lack direction, they lack self love.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
What do you want to say to them?
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Right?
Speaker 3 (00:54):
All right?
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Welcome back to the SINO Show. I'm your host. Sina McFarland.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Zaidab Selby Okay is.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
A humanitarian, a writer, and a social entrepreneur has dedicated
her life to women's right and freedom. She is co
founder of Daughters for Earth, a fund and a movement
of Daughters Rising Up worldwide. With climate solutions, protect and
restore Mother Earth. She has been frequently named as one
(01:25):
of the women changing the World by leading publications ranging
from Newsweek to The Guardian. Oprah identified her as one
of the women Changing the World. And by the way,
people should definitely see that episode as Super Soul Sunday
with You, That's a must watch. People Magazine President Bill
Clinton identified her as one of the twenty first century
(01:45):
heroes most recently received the Time As one hundred Impact
Awards in twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
But this is what I love this stat This is
why I want you on the show. Well, that's so
many things.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
At the age of twenty three, not thirty three, forty three,
fifty three, you found Women for Women International, a humanitarian
organization dedicated women's Survivors Awards under your leadership nineteen ninety three,
two thousand eleven Women for Women International group from helping
thirty women upon its inception and helping more than four
(02:20):
hundred and twenty thousand women in streating more than one
hundred and forty six million dollars in aid. You're an author.
This to listeners, get this is a must read. This
is my favorite book of yours. There's so many others.
We'll talk about it.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4 (02:37):
Oh my god, No, it's fantastic.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Why you like it?
Speaker 4 (02:42):
It's so good being here. Wow, that's true. Come on
when I'm messing around, it's fantastic. I love it.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Yeah, No, thank you for making time. I know you're
so busy. This is God's time is always perfect. It
just worked out.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Who would not make the time for you. You're one
of the biggest hearted men and I know seriously, Oh wow,
that's so glad to be here.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
So, I think there's so much to talk about here,
and I think we should start with where you grew
up a little bit, had an interesting upbringing. Talk about
leaving Iraq, your marriage and then starting this organization. How
does that sound? Should we start there? I know, let's
(03:24):
gid in. We got to get into it, all right.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
You want you just to roll, you just go? Well
you probably if.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
You you probably have heard you're hearing my accent.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
I have an accent.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I grew up in Baghdad, Iraq, and my life was
defined by many things, wars very much. For I was
ten eleven years old when the first war I encountered started,
and that very much. I realized as a child that
the war the world was talking about our war from
TV as men were experienced the war, or talking about
(04:01):
the war the tanks and the missiles and the guns
and all of that. But as a child, I was like, huh,
no one is talking about what I'm experiencing of the war,
which was the women who were running the show. You know,
the schools, the teachers, the doctors, the policewomen. Everyone went
in in the back line discussion of war was was
(04:21):
a woman. And so that very much impacted how I
see the world is I always ask where are the women?
Because we're better, not because we are worse, but because
we are different, and that difference is important. So that
but that started at an eleven years old child seeing
the news covered only from men's perspective and missing out
(04:44):
what women were doing in war.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
So that one.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
The second one is I have a very I grew
up with a very strong mother, the first feminist I
have ever known in my life. This is back that Iraq.
She made me read all kinds of feminist books. She
made me read roots, She made me learn about social injustices,
about slavery, about right and I am very blessed because
(05:09):
when I was sixteen years old and I said, Mama,
when I grow up, I'm going to help all women
around the world, she looked at me and she said, honey,
you can and you will, And that made all.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
The difference in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
And from that story I came to learn that really
we only need one person to say yes, you can
do that, right, like, only one person. And of course
life threw many challenges at me, but my mother's saying, honey,
you can do it, and it upped me being able
to do it because my mama said I can't. Right.
But it doesn't have to be your mama. It could
(05:43):
be someone else, could be your friend, could be your
name mother, exactly. Anybody can says, you just need one
person believe in the dream. And then then I'm keeping
the bigger story, which I grew up was a dumb hussaying.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
I sort of forgotten these days.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
But she really forgotten, not to you, I did not.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
Well. He's also, I mean, I'm proud of all the
therapy I've done on myself to like his potency in
my consciousness or unconsciousness has dissolved over the time, and
the trauma from growing up close to him, to a
family that were his social friends, and I ended up
having to call him uncle, not because he was a relative,
(06:25):
but because he was my father's friend. And we were
not political. We were our role was non political. We
were not politically threatened. So that's his social friends. But
that very much, very much defined my life. I grew
up in fear, and it was It's always hard for
(06:47):
me to explain to people who don't understand that kind
of thing, because fear for me was very tangible. I
could touch it, you know. It was all over the house.
I grew up and was bugged. Our cars were bugged,
our you know, our telephone were bugged. You know, everything
about our lives were spied on. And we knew that.
(07:08):
You know.
Speaker 4 (07:08):
You were like, you know, wake.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Up in the middle of the night and you see
a car watching your house, you know, and you know
you're like, oh, it's.
Speaker 4 (07:15):
We're being watched. You're talking spying on you.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Because we were very close to the presidents basically and
so and he did not trust anybody, and he killed
his best friends and so a we were spied on,
but we also, yes, we called him uncle, and we
socialized with him, and I spent most of my weekends
and my teenage lives with him. We were afraid of him,
We were not We did not feel we were safe.
(07:39):
You know. He killed his best friends, he killed his
relatives if they opposed him, and we were stuck. My
memoirs called Between Two Worlds, and I fought for that title,
even though it may not be the best title, you know,
according to my agent, but it's because the people thought
we belonged to him, and so they feared us, and
(08:00):
we were not out of his people, his tribe, or
his family, and so we were stuck between two worlds,
everyone thinking that we are belonging to the other side,
except we did not belong to any of the sides.
And so it was a very fearful environment that I
grew up in, and the way I came to America
(08:22):
was to escape that fear in ways, you know, in ways,
my mom basically begged me to accept a marriage proposal
from a man I did not know, so in many
ways it was an arranged marriage. She arranged it to me.
That did not mean she forced it on me. I
(08:43):
grew up in a very secular, liberal family, but it
meant she cried and begged please accept the marriage.
Speaker 4 (08:51):
Do whatever she.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
Would tell me, Do whatever you do, just once you
arrived to America, just say yes to this marriage and
leave the country. And that's how I entered this country
as a bride in nineteen in June nineteen ninety, and
the marriage ended up being horrible.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Over the long term, I learned.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
It took me many, many years, nine years of realizing
that my mother was trying to save me from saddamfhasein cases.
She was weorried for my safety because I became a woman.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
And here's eye on you.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
He raped all the women around him, and many women
he liked or what, it doesn't matter. That's how he
divided and conquered. And so she was petrified, you know,
once I became a woman, and he would make a
comment and your daughter is beautiful or whatever it is.
And so but the irony of my life is that
(09:46):
she got me to America to help me escape from
any potential violence against me, only to be in a
marriage that's induced violence against me by by the very
man who was supposed to say me.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Over the time I escaped from the marriage.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
After three months of arriving America, Iraqan invaded kuwaits, I
could not talk to my family and the point of
the story because I mean, you can see I got
ten years ago, fifteen years ago, I could not tell
the story without sobbing. Right now I tell the story
and I'm not sobbing, and if I don't have pictures
(10:25):
to prove it to me also and then sometimes the
trauma sneak out on me between all and then. But
the point is two things. I learned to believe in
the possibilities of healing. You know, when you're intentionally about
going about your healing, it is possible to heal. It
is possible for me to tell that story with us sobbing,
(10:46):
you know, and having a distance from it. But the
second thing I also learned that, you know, sometimes misfortunes
lead to your fortunes. Have I had I not been
thrown at, you know, in this marriage got me to America.
When I left, I left with four hundred dollars in
(11:07):
my pockets from that marriage in a foreign country. But
in hindsight, I live to be grateful for every part
of that journey, the worst of it and the best
of it, because they all made me who I am today,
you know.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
And I'm okay with.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Who I am.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
I know you are, I know you are, but let's
do this a little bit. This is so good, thank
you so much. So many of the listeners on the show,
as you know, have addiction, have real trauma PTSD. We're
going to get into that more. You've obviously gone through
that and you've treated it. But you just said fifteen
years ago you've been telling that story and sobbing.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
What are you?
Speaker 2 (11:46):
How are you able to get distanced from now you?
What was the technique that you learned? What was it?
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Was it therapy? Was it time? What was the healing?
What was your process?
Speaker 1 (11:57):
I think my process was to have a team as
well of my therapist said it was a team. It was,
and I did not intend it to be that way,
you know, So let me deconstruct that. First of all,
my mother used to tell me you have to always
be strong. I have to always be independent and never
cry because that's a sign of weakness. I agree that
(12:21):
you have to be strong and independent also, although you
also should be soft and you know, allow for sustainability
and community rather than just alone independence.
Speaker 4 (12:32):
There is no such a thing, you know.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
I believe at least nature is teaching me that right,
but not to cry, and you always have to be strong.
Speaker 4 (12:41):
I think it's okay to cry.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
So step one was to tell the truth. That's the
step one to my healing. It took me and it
was a leap of faith to tell the truth, not
in a book to a group of strangers. I was
in a retreat and I decided to tell a book
of a group of strangers. Is my story that I
knew Saddam haaseying this is I called him uncle. And
(13:05):
I looked at them and I said, do you still
see me? Because I believed, and because that's how I
was treated in Iraq, people will not see me. They
see him in me. Oh, and they see me in
association with him. I was known as the daughter of
Saddam for Saint's pilots. The house I grew up in
was the house of Saddam Pha Sain's pilot. My father
(13:27):
was his pilot, commercial pilot. The car I drove was
the car of the daughter of Saddam Pha Saan's pilot.
Everything was in connections. My identity was connected to being
in relationship with him. So the first thing it took
me to for my healing journey was to tell the
truth right, right, First it was a group of strangers,
(13:48):
then to close, you know, to family and friends, then
to the world. And when I told it to the
world was a leap of faith. It was like jumping
off the cliff to tell that truth, which I was
told never tell that truth.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
This is the biggest secret.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Of my family, right, but I decided that truth heals.
So my number one lead lessons is truth hell. Because
when we keep a secret, that secret becomes like a
like a dark energy in my chest, in my like
it became a heavy stone and anxiety. I can think,
(14:28):
I can feel the fear of the anxiety coming just
describing it, right. And when I told the truth, and
it was scary to tell the truth, and you don't
know if you're gonna land on your feet or not.
But it dissolves that anxiety. It dissolved that darkness and
it made it into like transparent crystal really in my chest.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
Right.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
So first it's telling the truth. Second is allowing the grieving. Right.
So I cried in the process of telling the story,
of writing the story, and of you know, promoting the books,
so you tell the story some more. I cried for
three years, intensively that was what it is. I do
(15:13):
not judge myself or anybody else for crying. Emotions are
part of us, whether it is anger or joy, or
crying or sadness or it doesn't matter, express it. And
that's so I believe in the act expression. So I
allowed myself the pouring of crying until there were no
more tears.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
Got it.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
But then the trauma is not does not leave, right,
it's sneak on you. I had issues with the meaning
of power, with owning leadership.
Speaker 4 (15:41):
With owning my womanhood.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
I had issues because it is feared, you know, creeps
on you here and there.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Yes, it does.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
And so this is when I unintentionally created, unintentionally created
my team. Someone said you have a team, and it
was youngiin analysts. Wow, because I saw working intensely on
my dreams. I trust my dreams, I trust my subconscious.
My nutrition is because I believe also my body is
(16:13):
definitely a reflection of my trauma or my health. Right,
And the nutritionist was got was telling me as similar
things to my therapist. Right. You know, I did my
own spiritual, my meditation, my own whether it is with
indigenous people or whether it's with Tichnatania monks or whether
(16:37):
it is with other Shamas. But I did that route
of exploring spirituality and all its meanings outside of my
own traditions and that and when and then I realized,
when they're all giving me the same feedback, then I'm
trusting that feedback. When my nutrition is is telling me
the same as the my you know, my indigenous shaman
(16:59):
friends you know, and the same as my youngin.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
I was like this, this is the truth, right, this
is the truth right.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
And so I started also noticing my body, my spirit,
my soul and giving them all equal attention and importance right,
and that it's an organic team. I didn't do it intentionally.
I was in pain and I needed to release myself.
And because my trauma was getting in my way of
living my life of thriving. I don't mean thriving career.
(17:28):
I was actually thriving in my career, but I wasn't
allowing myself to enjoy it. I would reject the thriving moments,
I would reject the success, you know, because I couldn't
allow goodness to happen. Right, So I had to like
work on it because it was getting in my way
for every award you mentioned, and the many more. I
would go back home and torture myself. Wow, you know,
(17:51):
because I was like, I don't deserve it. I don't
do that. Like there was a torturing process, so I
needed to. It got to a stage where it was
getting in my way, and I remember my therapist was
telling me, you either going to accept who you are
and work on healing that and enjoying who you are,
or you're going to continue to torture yourself in the process.
(18:15):
It's your choice. And that's when it's like, Okay, I'm
gonna work on it intentionally to heal because I was
getting in my way in my path basically and ultimately, honestly, listen,
is there such a thing as complete healing?
Speaker 4 (18:30):
I don't think so. It's a work in progress.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Every time you only you unravel a layer, there gums
another layer.
Speaker 4 (18:36):
But it gets softer.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
The edges pain get softer and softer over them, and
that I trust, and the the heaviness as story carries on,
my heart dissolves and maybe it becomes a small pedal,
you know. You know, I don't want to deny that
their pedal may may creep in between now and then.
But but I believe, I honestly believe and the possibilities
(19:02):
of healing, but it takes intention, showing up, trying, trying again,
expressing yourself right on.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Yeah, we're going to talk a little bit later about
your commitment to self love. Okay, But I want to
back up a little bit. I want to know what
was the moment when you said I can no longer
be in this marriage. You're in Chicago, you got four
hundred bucks, your name, walk me through when you said
I have to leave, I can't do this anymore.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
So, in fairness to my second husband and also form
a husband, there's two marriages. One is that marriage, and
then I end up falling in love and also got divorced.
And they are two different reasons for that for these divorces.
But I'll answer your question. There was he was touching
me in a way I knew it was not right.
Hm hmm right, and talking to me in a way
(19:51):
that is not right. And here's something about women we
are yea with all our progress and our f minism
and our there is something we are wired, especially as
an I just turned fifty five, you know, as a
maybe from a different joation there's something that you do
not rebel and it's like no against your oppression.
Speaker 4 (20:16):
It takes out long, I mean, you know, a long time.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
Thank god from my mother who told me never allows
someone to touch you or talk to you in the
wrong way. Thank God, she told me that before anybody
touched me or talked to me in the wrong way.
And that guy was doing that. And so I remember,
you know, first time, the first month, he's sort of
(20:39):
trying to figure what's going on. Is this is not
feeling wrong, it's not feeling right, but you're trying to adjust.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
You doubt yourself.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Maybe I need to do something, you know, first month,
second month, she's not feeling right, you know, third month,
and he did something very particular. He raped me. And
a lot of people doubt marital rape. It's rape and
someone is touching you wrong way. It doesn't matter if
he's your husband or whatever, your boyfriend or I don't care.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Is this is rape.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
Rape is about you allowing an act or not allowing.
It's like if you're saying no, I don't care, who
the heck is he right?
Speaker 4 (21:23):
Right? So it was so so I remember going in
the shower.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
I was like, I he just there's a redline that
is being crossed, and it is my responsibility to say
no to like walk up, right, I don't like And
I had no money, no family. I mean I I
grew up in a very I couldn't go back home.
I couldn't go back home.
Speaker 4 (21:46):
I was there.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
There was there was embargo in sections America was about
to go to warway with Iraq. That's before the first
gold for months before the first gol w and so
so it is remember that I am not too allow
like it is my responsibility to walk out when someone
is talking to me and touching me in the wrong way.
(22:10):
And honestly, I'm proud of myself that I walked out
after three months in a foreign country and without having
resources or family, and I walked out. And that's a
miracle story because I also have learned to watch the
science right, to look at the science, and I feel
like God comes in different signs, right, So I walked up.
(22:32):
This was a long time ago, but I went to
the Immigration services because I was My visa was through him, basically,
and I walked out and I went to the immigration
without a lawyer, without anybody, and I just I remember
it was a black woman short tights, you know, had
pulled her hair back all the way in the back,
(22:54):
and I just remember saying, here's my passport, here's my
return ticket.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
This is what just happened to me. I just escaped
this man.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
I can't go back to my country and I need
money to earn a living.
Speaker 4 (23:07):
Here, you tell me what to do.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
You are I'm coming to the beast's mouth, right, because
you know, there's so many people who are afraid.
Speaker 4 (23:15):
It's like, you tell me what to do.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
I and this woman, and this is first miracle in
my life. This woman said come. Two hours later she
gave me a work permit, and that's how I really did.
And I wish I know if she's hearing thank you right,
you know, thank you all the time in my heart
(23:39):
because then you know, there are lots of bad peoples
in the world, but they are also wonderful people in
the world, and which one we give more attention to
is also our choice.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Thank you, that's right on. Thank you for that. That's
exactly right. So wow, how do you what made you
like I'm going to start this organization? How did you think?
Where did that come from? Was? Did you get tapped
from above? Let's talk about that.
Speaker 4 (24:09):
I grew up in fear, right, I told you I
was scared, but not.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
I was not ambivalent about the injustice I was living in. Remember,
we were my family was Adam Hussein's friends, which meant
like friends of any president of any country. You were
like the top of the crame de la crame, de
la cram of getting out of the material aspects of society. Right,
(24:40):
And so I was you know, I knew we were whatever.
That affluence was part of the package. But I was
going to school where classmates were talking about public executions
for someone who opposed the president, where they were talking
about bodies coming from the front lines, where they were
(25:03):
talking about the Kurds being gassed, where they were talking
about women being raped by Saddam's sons. So imagine in
school I would go and hear these horror stories. At night,
I would be hanging out with him and his family. Right.
Speaker 4 (25:23):
So I knew I was.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Living in an injustice, and I knew I could not
do anything about it because if I spoke, my family
would be punished. Not my immediate family only, but my
excelled family. That's how he kept us all in fear.
So if you say something, your cousins and uncles and
(25:47):
aunt everyone will be punished. It's like the massive family anyway.
So when I came back to America, when I came
to America rather and there's something about America that is
so precious, and I worry for it because for me,
it's the most important aspect of America, which is freedom
(26:07):
and the freedom of expression, the freedom of movements, the
freedom to be who you are. And I worry for
that right now thirty four years after living in America.
But at that time and it still is, that freedom
was so delicious for me. I was like, Wow, I
(26:27):
live in a country where I can say anything and
I don't get killed or in prison or wow. And
I felt I had the responsibility to use that freedom
for good.
Speaker 4 (26:43):
Do you see what I mean?
Speaker 1 (26:44):
Like for me in my very simple way of thinking,
I knew that there was injustice before, but I lived
in a country where it did not have freedom, so
I could not do anything about it. Now I live
in a country that gives me freedom. So when I
see injustice, I have the responsibility to do something.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
And the injustice that I know first in justice I
noticed was in a war at that time towards Posy
and Herzegovina, there were rape cams, consentration camps. I've never
heard of that country before. I have no idea which
who are these people, what language they speak, what religion
they believe in, and nothing, But they were concentration camps
and rape cams happening to humans. And I was living
(27:29):
in the land of freedom that allowed me and gave
me permission to do whatever I wanted to do about it.
So I felt that responsibility, and so it came, honestly
from that very basic way of thinking. And over time
I have come to believe when we see injustice and
do not do anything about it and ignore it and
(27:51):
turn our face, we legitimize it and allow for the
corruption of our own values. Right because and usually everyone
gets the when we legitimize it. You know, when you
see something wrong and you walk, then you're saying it's okay.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
But I also think, and then I am.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Then we allow for the corruption of our own values,
meaning we each think we are good humans, right, but
that being good feeling good is not about me feeling good.
I need to be in alignment with my values every day,
and if I am not in alignment with my values,
and I'm corrupting my values, right, And so if I
(28:37):
see injustice, look at the other direction, I am corrupting
myself my values.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
Right.
Speaker 4 (28:43):
So that's how I started.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Started from that very basic, simplistic childlike I always say,
in a stance of saying, oh there's something wrong, I
responsibility to something. And it started by going to Bossy
and Herzegovina. It was besiege, it was a war zone
at the time. My mom discovered that and was very
angry at me. She said, I risk my life to
(29:07):
get you out of i Rack, only for you to
go to another war on your own. That's trauma being
re enacted. Unconsciously, I would say, I don't know. Some
people told me that, but it ended up and I
just was passionate about it. And you know, I did
not have money. So I invited every woman to support
one woman at a time by sending her only thirty
(29:29):
dollars at the time, and I could afford thirty Are.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
You still listening this money? From? How are you getting people?
Speaker 1 (29:34):
I was speaking everywhere, temples, churches, mosk schools, high schools.
Speaker 4 (29:39):
The universites.
Speaker 1 (29:40):
Then I was twenty three, actually just turned twenty three,
not only twenty three, I had like twenty. I was like, yeah,
just turned twenty three, like and four months basically, And
I was so passionate about it, and I would like
I would go to demonstrations, but I realized these demonstrations
are not doing anything because we're like going and shutting
(30:00):
and we go home and have a nice dinner, you know.
And I was like, no, we need we need people
are there to feel like. They need money, they need practicalities,
they need something in their hands. Anyway, and I started
with helping thirty three women. This women just called and
they's like, oh, we want to join you. And it
(30:21):
was mom and pop organization. And after you know, a
couple of after a couple of years only I got
President Clinton invited me to the White House at the
Oval Office.
Speaker 4 (30:31):
I had no idea what the Oval Office.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
I you know, it was like yeah, I was like,
oh my gosh, you know, it's like you know, but
they were like, oh, you are one of the young
Americans who are doing something for posies.
Speaker 4 (30:43):
I was like, apparently what I was doing was unique,
you know, I did not know.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
And then there was mass media coverage and then a
few years later Opera I got a call from the
opera winfree show. But the simple act of it was
asking every woman to be part of the story, to
be part of the solution and the humanization of what
women are going through. It's one thing you say they
are in rape coms or in concentration coms or whatever
(31:12):
they've gone through. It's another thing to know one woman
and no one person to write them a letter to
say I see you, this is who I am, and
to make them feel that the world is safe, because
when you are in war, you lose hope in humanity.
You think humanity has forgotten about you, and there was
(31:33):
something for me. We are not equal as humans in
our financial resources, but we are equal in our stories.
And I say equal, I dare to say equal. I
mean a lot of people ask someone from Iraq and
I've gone through what I've gone through, is like, oh
my god, you have such a nice story. I was like,
oh please, don't compete on the stories. The trauma is
that trauma. No matter what the trauma is, in my opinion,
(31:56):
it lands on your heart in the same intensity, whether
it's you are someone in Iraq or Afghanistan or you
are somewhere in la in my opinion, right, like how
it's laughing, how your body is processing it's so painful.
So don't compare traumas in my you know, in my experience.
So to be seen to not only be given, you know,
(32:19):
some cash, go and do whatever you want to do,
but to also be seen in the process to say
I care about you, I'm here for you, it makes
all the difference.
Speaker 4 (32:28):
And that's how Women for a Woman was built.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
It's on that idea that we have to give not
only money, but we have to give part of our
story because my biggest gift for you is to give
me you my story. And our equality is when you
share your story with me. Rather, that's that when you
change me from an object exotic person to an equal
relationship here. So that's what the premise of Women for
(32:52):
Woman is, the equality of the relationship, and it ended
up working in sixteen countries.
Speaker 4 (32:58):
We just celebrated thirty two years.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Actually the money and then I think now at the
moment is more than one million women connected to each other. Right.
And then of course as they get the program, they
also get the tools that resources like okay, yes, war
destroyed everything, but let's get you back on your feet. Right.
So there is a program that teaches them skills, that
builds communities for them and get them back on their
(33:22):
feet within one year, you know, get a job, get
a house, get all of that. So there is the
practicalities of it, but the emotions of it as well.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
That's walk me through this. You're going to Rwanda, yeah,
which I've worked in extensively.
Speaker 3 (33:39):
What are you thinking about when you're going there? What
is the plan?
Speaker 2 (33:42):
What's the action steps when you get there? How does
that work? What are you trying to accomplish exactly?
Speaker 1 (33:48):
I know?
Speaker 3 (33:48):
Can you break it down a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
There's a technical aspect you find You're like, go, you
need to do there, but they seem let me so
I'm happy to answer the technical aspects of what you're
looking you know, who are your people you need to
meet where you're going. But this is the emotional aspect.
And I believe, whether it is Rwando, or whether it's
Afghanistan or whether Democratic Republic of Congo or Sudan.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
Or whatever, you have to go with.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
A sense of curiosity, true curiosity, true desire to learn
their history, their knowledge, their stories. B you have to
respect the people you are there to serve I once
(34:39):
I had the privilege to spend a day with the
Dalai Lama, right, and honestly, it was not easy to
understand him, you know, the way he spoke and all
of that. But the best part of what I got
out of my day with him was if you cannot
respect the people you are serving, then better don't serve them. Right.
(35:01):
And when I came back and I told my team that,
and at that time, Woman for a Woman was like,
had seven hundred staff members and you know, offices all
over the world. Some of them raised their hands and said,
we need to retire, resign because we don't respect the
people we are helping. Right on, thank you very much
(35:22):
for your carriage to actually acknowledge that I appreciate you.
Speaker 4 (35:26):
You know, let's work on that.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
You know. So, so you have to respect the people
you are going. And then the last thing I want
to say is that you have to value because it's
an arrogance in the way we go as outsiders, as expatriates.
You know, I am a Western educated woman, I have
(35:49):
a master's degree. That there's an arrogant you go with
as a humanitarian. You know, you have a plan, we're
going to do this, this, this, We're going to do
educational program, economic program, We're going to help you get
on your feet.
Speaker 4 (36:01):
Da da da da. And every time I went.
Speaker 1 (36:04):
With that assumption that I know it, I was symbolically
slapped on the hand and realizing I really don't know it.
I know, I know what's happened in other countries. I
may have access to books and read historical precedents analysis,
Da da da, But the true knowledge comes from people
(36:27):
who are experiencing it and feeling it every day. And
I cannot put more points on the knowledge that can
give it. Give you the information with charts and facts
and figures and numbers and data, and dismiss the importance
of the knowledge of a woman or a man, or
(36:48):
what or a child or in a small village for
telling you this is what we need. That knowledge is
equally important to a peace.
Speaker 3 (36:58):
That right.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
And I've had so many, many, many many experiences where
I come and I'll tell you one funny story. I
was helping a woman wanted to do a kid a
chicken farm, a small business, because we helped woman then
get some training and to get some income, right, and
that included small businesses. And I was like Okay, how
(37:21):
many chickens you want to buy? How many was the eaculation,
the coops, all of the things that you need for
the chicken? How much you sell eggs for yahd Yadia
to help her in the business. And then I said
how many? Well, how many eggs a chicken give a day?
And she looked at me and that's when she lost
(37:41):
all respect to me, and she looked as like one
a chicken gives one egg a day. Now, So you know,
I give a lot of speeches. I often use that
story in my speeches. I promised you, ninety percent of
the audience every time I ask them, do not know
that chi can give one egg a day?
Speaker 3 (38:03):
Right?
Speaker 1 (38:04):
They don't teach us that knowledge, right? And so and
that's a silly example. Maybe it's a funny example for me,
but it is. There is the basic principles of knowledge.
So you have to respect and be humble, walk on
this earth humbly, no matter who the heck you are, right,
And I have seen people.
Speaker 4 (38:27):
On top of their mountains, yes you have.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
They go nowhere and I've seen it many times, the
roller coasters of life. So you have to walk on
this earth humbly because you never know. First, you never
know where the knowledge comes, You never know where the
angels are, you never know what you're going to learn.
And most importantly, the first step to helping people is
(38:51):
to truly love them and to truly respect them. Right,
you don't have that. Please spare me the indignant, Spare
me your money. Even you cannot respect me and see
my humanity, then yeah, I think you'll appreciate this.
Speaker 4 (39:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
When I was working in northern Uganda with the children
soldiers and I was trying to learn, I had.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
No idea what I was going to do to help
these kids. I have no ideas I'm.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
Learning about, and it kind of I was trying to realize, Oh,
they're they're trying to.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
Preach to them, they're trying to convert them. They have
their ideas. And what worked was James Brown in a frisbee. Yeah,
that's what works.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
And I and I say that because the thing that
these women trust you because you see them, you talk
about that, your heart is open to them. You make
them feel safe, there's no judgment, there's such dignity and
respect to these women, and they feel that otherwise it
will never work. Talk about that process. I know it's
(39:57):
real in you. But that's I mean, that's a art.
Speaker 4 (40:01):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (40:02):
I mean, it's a very good question, you know, And
I really don't know if I'm conscious about it, right
because same same organization, other staff members could have this
or could not have this.
Speaker 4 (40:16):
This is what I mean.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
I don't know if you can teach that skill, you know,
I feel, I really don't.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
I mean, I know I dance with them, I know
I hug them. I know I'm there for them.
Speaker 3 (40:32):
You let them.
Speaker 4 (40:33):
I truly do, I really, really really do.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
I've dedicated my life for them and I will die trying, right.
But I don't know if you can teach that or not.
There is no process, you know. I don't, so I
don't know.
Speaker 4 (40:53):
If there is.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
I do it intuitively. I'm not conscious of it. But
I can tell you when I hire people over the time,
is I look at their hearts, not their skill sets.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
Right on, Because skill sets can be taught.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Hearts intelligence, emotional intelligence cannot be taught. Maybe it can,
but I'm not going to be in the Maybe it
can for a child as you're raising them, but if
the person is sincere, you can't teach sincerity. You either
have it or you don't have it, right, So I'm
(41:31):
not sure I'm able to answer your question because I
don't know how to answer it.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
Yeah, I'm probably just applauding you more for how your gift.
Speaker 3 (41:40):
I'm probably applauding for you.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
But something that's really important that I also think is
one of your gifts that I really think is important,
especially in recovery, is the art of active listening. Yes,
you really care when you listen. You have to really care,
you know. Now, let me ask you this.
Speaker 3 (42:04):
People are like, okay, I mean, how do you You've
seen so much horror stories? How did you stay persistent?
How do you stay hopeful? How do you keep when
your destruction destruction? Destruction? Destruction? How do you stay bright?
Speaker 1 (42:20):
Well, it's not always. There were lots of tears. I'm
in a good stage right now. But I tell you how.
Speaker 4 (42:31):
I mean.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
I remember going to Congo one day and this woman
with a militia chopped one of her legs into four
pieces and forced her kids to eat each piece. Wow, okay,
the kids are vegetarian. They refuse to eat any kind
(42:53):
of meat.
Speaker 3 (42:53):
Sense.
Speaker 4 (42:54):
I rarely tell the story.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
Actually, this first time I tell it in age because
I anyway, it's too too big. I see her a
year later, she's wearing prosthetic, right, and that woman I
was dancing fiercely. I was like, wow, you were dancing,
(43:16):
and she said, of course, that's how I say alive.
We're gonna dance and dance. And honestly, up until then,
I was like taking myself as a serious activist, you.
Speaker 4 (43:27):
Know, like for woman's rights.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
And I was like, who the heck am I to
take myself so seriously?
Speaker 4 (43:33):
I take my shoes off and we dance together.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Right. And I used to, for example, not care about
my you know look or what my friend's called uglifying myself.
You know. It's like, ah, I'm an activist and I
go to a war zone and you know, and this
woman are like, oh, can you bring us a lipstick
next time? And well, let's look at your eyebrow and
let's plug it in for you and let's shape it.
(43:57):
And I'm like, excuse me, I'm coming to women wars
to like, you know, fight for rights, and you are
looking at how do we make ourselves beautiful? And how
do we dance? And how do we plant the flower?
And I learned from them, right, This is like you
because they are working actively on bringing beauty and their
(44:18):
joy in spite of their circumstances, not because of it.
This is what If this woman is dancing after what
she's gone through, who am I not to dance? If
a woman in Afghanistan is still looking at her as
the shape of her eyebrow and lip said, who am
I not to take care of myself and appreciate the
(44:38):
importance and the value of beauty? If like, if this
woman in Rwanda is planting flowers in front of her
rough camp, who am I not to plant flowers? Do
you see what I mean? That they to see the
consciousness and that how humans put consciousness into building beauty
(44:58):
and joy and how so you decide like it's a
conscious thing, so you can again focus on how awful
what they've been through, or focus on what they are
doing to bring hope a life and enjoy and life
and beauty and all of that. So it becomes a choice.
I really I do believe in choice. A lot of
(45:19):
times people say it's not fair. Not many people have choice.
The choice is not of our circumstances. The choice for
me is what do you do? Do I become in despair.
I mean the house I grew up with in, you know,
became an execution center, a brothel, a military base, and
now it's not recognizable. Do I grow up in Do
(45:39):
I live in despair every single second of my life
because I lost everything and I worked with women who
have gone through hell? Or do I choose to live
in joy and in love? That's my choice. The awfulness
of life is not mine, right right. I think we
(46:02):
have that choice. I think we can make that choice
as individuals. And I choose to look at the joyful
aspect of it, the goodness, the goodness, the goodness. I
choose to look at the goodness of humanity rather than
only at the badness of humanity.
Speaker 3 (46:21):
Right on, I love you for that. Let's talk about Roomy.
Speaker 4 (46:25):
Mm hmmm. Why do you love boyfriend? You're not alive
right now? I mean, like, please godine and connye and
have him come here.
Speaker 2 (46:36):
Why do you talk about Roomy because it's obviously the
poet Roomy the history, Yeah, I mean it's but it's
really touched your heart though well.
Speaker 1 (46:46):
Roomy, for those who are not familiar with Roomy, is
the thirteenth century Sufi poets and Sufis are the mystics
of Islam. I'm a Muslim, and it's important for me
because Islam has been demonized. Muslims have been demonized and
continue to be demonized in this country and in the
(47:08):
Western world in the last few decades. It's heartbreaking for me,
honestly because and I am talking as a Muslim, but honestly,
I think the same feeling could be with any groups
of people who have been demonized. It doesn't matter of
whether it's race or gender or ethnic groups.
Speaker 4 (47:28):
Is because you take.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
The integrity of their humanity arts, you reduce them to
you reduce them to something that they are not right.
And I grew up in a culture and a religion
that is beautiful and elegance and graceful. And I come
here and suddenly present it to me as awful and
(47:53):
violent and mean and oppressive. And it is not how
I grew up. It is not who I am. It
is not my people. Of course, some people are like that, sure,
of course, so are Americans. Some of them are awful.
Do I say all Americans are awful?
Speaker 4 (48:09):
Nuts?
Speaker 1 (48:10):
Right? I say some, you know, And these people don't
qualify as all Americans, you know, it's like individuals, right,
So this is roomy. So this is all a rounded
way to say this. Roomy brings that beautiful essence that
I'm familiar with, you know, of the culture that I
love and cherish and respect, and of the religion and
(48:33):
the tradition that I love and cherish and respect.
Speaker 4 (48:37):
And roomy.
Speaker 1 (48:38):
Is that roomy reflected to the world in a way
that can be seen and heard. That's one thing, But
that is political answer. When I also read Roomy, I
see him and he sees me. I love him so much.
I don't know how to explain that. I think my
(49:00):
soul is a roomy as well.
Speaker 4 (49:02):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
I'm like tearing up because I read a Roomy every
single morning, a roomy poem, and he puts perspective on life.
Speaker 2 (49:12):
Is there a line or a quote that's familiar with
you that always strikes you, or when you're introducing.
Speaker 4 (49:17):
So many what comes to MI mind?
Speaker 1 (49:19):
For the longest time, people when I gave speeches, they're like,
here she goes, She's gonna give us that poem. You know. Now,
I have many other poems, but the one that one
is out beyond the out beyond the world of right
doing and wrongdoing. There is a field. I shall meet
you there when the soul lies down in that grass.
(49:44):
The world is too small to talk about ideas language.
Even the phrase each other no longer makes any sense. Now,
I think we're living in a world where it's so
hard to be in that field.
Speaker 4 (49:59):
People.
Speaker 1 (50:00):
I want you to be right or wrong, you're good
or bad, you're for those people or against these people.
That I miss the field. I am in the fields. Well,
when you are in the field, the world is too
Is it too small or tubic to talk about a
can ideas language? Even the phrase each other no longer
(50:23):
makes any sense. This is what we need today in
such a divisive world. This is why we talked the
beginning about freedom and how it tastes it for me
in America thirty four years later, I worry for that
freedom safe right, and I want to enjoy this field
where you know, even the phrase each other no longer
(50:46):
makes any sense. So that's for me is so true,
It is so alive. The meaning is so applicable today,
and romy wrote it in the thirteenth century.
Speaker 3 (50:59):
Okay, wow, I think we should talk about this because
I think it's really important. You had a health scare.
Speaker 4 (51:09):
Uh huh can we do that?
Speaker 3 (51:12):
Yeah, let's talk about that.
Speaker 1 (51:14):
So I leave women for women, I go into journalism,
and I go into I reach a stage which I
am another top of my mountain. Right. You have a
checklist of I'm sure most people have checklist. I have checklists.
I had a checklist of what it made me happy? Check,
you know whatever, career was very important. Check how many people,
(51:39):
in my opinion, I helped check you know, love life,
check vacations, nice clothes, whatever, check check, check, check check.
It was a moment where all the boxes were checked,
and suddenly I am rushed to the er, to the
operating room, to the ambulance, to the operating room, where
(51:59):
they so a quarter of a gallon of liquid pressing
on the soft part of my heart. And that night
I believed I was grabbing my last breath. My body
was moving on, it's on, I was struggling to breathe,
and there was a moment in which this was it.
Speaker 4 (52:18):
And in that most.
Speaker 1 (52:20):
Intimate moment, which I believe we will all experience that
on our deathbed, if not before. But it's a very
intimate moment. It does not matter who was around you.
In my case, it was my brother, and a lot
of doctors were around me, and nurses and all of that.
It is a very intimate discussion between you and your heart,
(52:42):
you know. And up until that moment, I measured my
purpose and my value in life by how many women
I have helped, And no matter how many I have helped,
I would say it's not enough, right, you know, people say, oh,
but you're a humanitarian. I was like no, but I
(53:04):
was still measuring, right on. Yeah, someone measure how many
houses they have, how much money they have, how many
cars they have. I'm measuring how many people I'm helping.
Still measuring that's the problem, right, Okay, people is better
than cars, but you know, by measuring, that's my problem.
And in that most intimate moment, I surprised myself that
(53:27):
the question did not come did I help enough people?
Before I was dying? It was did I live my
life in kindness to myself? Did I live my life
in love to myself and to others? And I had not.
I had lived it in kindness and in love to
(53:50):
the far away others. As a humanitarian. Of course, you
feel good you're helping so many people, But ask me, then,
are you living in your life and your kindness and
kindness to yourself. I was like, yeah, I get a
massage every week, I do manicure, petticure. That was what
I thought is kindness to myself, right, And I was
(54:13):
shocked that I did not know the meaning of that.
And I was embarrassed even that that's what came out
as the most important thing in that last moment, in
my last breath.
Speaker 4 (54:26):
Right, I stay alive. I am alive.
Speaker 1 (54:31):
But it took a year and a half of recovery.
I was very sick for a year and a half
and in that time I isolated myself and twas overlapping
with COVID I happened this was eight months before COVID.
But and I ended up spending a year and a
half alone in nature exclusively.
Speaker 4 (54:50):
And I have come to.
Speaker 1 (54:52):
Learn I came from that year and a half with
app lute joy and love and kindness to myself and
to others. And I tell you what, And itwas a
most important year now because I could not work, and
I could not think, and I could not write, and
(55:13):
I could not walk, and so at an existential crisis of.
Speaker 4 (55:17):
Who am I if I am not? This if I'm
you know.
Speaker 1 (55:22):
And after a year and a half of meditating, spending
time in nature, walking, cooking, playing the piano, painting, doing
all things in the art, basically because that's the only
part of my brain that was functioning, I came out saying,
how dare you? I ask? Who am I? I am?
Speaker 4 (55:46):
I am?
Speaker 1 (55:49):
And that was the most profound experience of my life,
you know, to not measure my self worth and value
by what I'm doing and what awards I got and
whatever it is it is I am. And I came
out with a new list of what it makes me,
what I call what it makes a happy day, not
(56:11):
a happy life. There is no such a thing as
a happy life, because that's the biggest life they sell
us in these self help books. Life is ups and downs.
By definition. We cannot control the downs.
Speaker 4 (56:27):
Right, It just it's going down.
Speaker 1 (56:30):
You never know, you never know, so please, there is
there is such a thing as a content life. Your
attitude about life is content. But it's impossible to maintain
a happy life. You know, you have to have a
moment of sorrow and joy. This is another my favorite
poem of Romi. It says a guest house, let all
(56:52):
these pain and sorrow and joy and the shame and
the malice. Enter into your house, let them sweep it
empty of all the things in it, you know, and
welcome them.
Speaker 4 (57:04):
Welcome them exactly right, and so you know. So that's lives.
Speaker 1 (57:09):
But I have a list of what makes a happy
day or teaches me how to experience happiness from my self.
And that's very basic list that list. Just drink a
lot of water, eat healthy food, show gratitude on the
simple things.
Speaker 4 (57:27):
I have a red scarf phone. Wow, how gorgeous right.
Speaker 1 (57:33):
Be in nature? In the presence of nature. I believe
nature is our biggest teacher, and we are the worst
friends for her. You know, experience art, connect with family
and friends, and live your purpose. And most importantly, and
appointment with my heart. So I don't call my meditation meditation.
(57:56):
I call it an appointment with my heart because I
literally during that time when it says kindness, I had
an image in my meditation. Soon after that, my heart
held my hands and said, don't leave me again. So
I called an appointment with my heart where every day
I visit the temple of my heart and I'll say
(58:19):
I'm here. And the process taught me that there is
a heart intelligence that we have to learn what heart
intelligence means, and that means the discipline. Just like you're
learning French or Spanish, it's or any language you want
to learn, or Arabic if you want to learn that.
You know it's said you have to have a discipline
(58:39):
to learn a language, and that includes your heart language.
And so you know, it goes back. You know, I'm
back in my full energy and fierceness. Do I have
bad days, of course I do, but I go to
my appointment to my heart, and the minute I enter
that temple, I like giggling. I promise you, it's like
(59:02):
my safe place, my happy place, and I know I'm
safe and I'm okay and rewiring and go back again.
Speaker 2 (59:10):
One of the reasons why I love you, and it's
a long list, because a lot of people that come
from you, where you came from the world you're in,
they're heavy, m.
Speaker 3 (59:21):
They're heavy.
Speaker 4 (59:22):
Well we've sort of suffered a lot.
Speaker 2 (59:24):
No, no, I know, I know, But that's what I
love about you. Because you're bright, and you're fun, and
you love to fucking dance and you love to sing,
and you love good food and you love people. There's
such a generosity of your spirit. I mean you really,
it's really powerful. You know, what's your podcast calleded okay this?
(59:49):
You have some incredible guests, and I know a lot
of them are your friends. Okay, the Alice Walker is
really powerful.
Speaker 3 (59:58):
What did you learn from her? WALKI what's gems that
you could throw us from her? Well?
Speaker 1 (01:00:04):
Alice is a very dear friend and she is a
motherlike for me, and I'm truly blessed with that. And
I learned so many things from her. I think one
of the most important thing is not to take myself
as an activist too seriously, right, I mean, I'm not
(01:00:28):
sure if she would approve that lesson.
Speaker 4 (01:00:30):
I mean yes, she would say. Yes.
Speaker 1 (01:00:31):
She taught me the importance of gardening and a lot
because you know, there is an intensity about being activists,
not only from my part of the world. Any activist
you're trying to change the world and make the world
a better place. And it's hard to allow the goodness.
And she taught me you actually have to. You have
to allow the goodness, the gardening, the beautiful places, that's
(01:00:56):
the beauty that these carew creativity and imagination and all
of that comes from the allowing that to happen for us,
and that for us to accept that. And over time
I came to believe that ultimately all what God wants
(01:01:22):
out of us is to give the best out of
us to this life, to our lives, and to the
world we live in. And the only way we can
give the best out of us is to actually live
in that allowing of beauty and safety and freedom.
Speaker 3 (01:01:48):
Beautiful.
Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
And I used to think of freedom and beauty and
safety as this country or that country, because remember I
lived in lack of freedom. I think freedom is what
we allow inside our hearts. Yeah, because I see so
many people in this country. They have the freedom, you know,
on a day to day basis, but they still don't
(01:02:11):
allow themselves the freedom. Right, it's a freedom from our hearts.
It's freedom as an inside job. As my last book
you know, titled you know, So, it's that we have
to allow this goodness, which Alice has been a teacher
and allowing goodness and in order for us to give
(01:02:32):
the best out of us to the world.
Speaker 3 (01:02:34):
Oh that's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (01:02:35):
She's a powerful force, that mean, yeah, right on, Because
if you can't garden, then if you can't enjoy these things,
you're not free.
Speaker 4 (01:02:43):
Yes, you're not freeing your creativity, You're just juice.
Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
You're you're stuck in your identity as an activists, as
this powerful person you're not allowed.
Speaker 1 (01:02:53):
To do as a technologist, as a boxer, as it
doesn't matter. You know, it's like you're stuck with your
identity of soul. Well, this is who am I? Right,
but if you allow that's and there's something like you know,
I work a lot of my energy now is on
the protection of our There is something I have come
(01:03:16):
to believe that nature is not only a healer, but
nature is our teacher in our values. We need to
learn for us as humans. Right, So that's gardening or
(01:03:37):
that whatever it is. Honestly, the more I learned how
to garden, the more I learned to I become a
better human, right. And so Alice was a teacher for
that for me. Yeah, because you don't expect you know,
she's an activist and a poet and she's very courageous.
I have to give her credit. She has been incredibly
(01:04:00):
us and we'd get attacked through that process by even
people she loved. And the integrity of staying I mean,
the integrity is staying in your values, even when you're
attacked by people you love. Yeah, right on, It's so important,
(01:04:25):
so lonely, so hard, and so needed. And she has
been a teacher in staying an integrity to your values
no matter what people's responses are.
Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
Okay, parting words.
Speaker 2 (01:04:44):
To people that are addicted right now, that are listening
to this, that are struggling, that are in despair, that
have raged. There's people are very paranoid, they're afraid right now.
They lacking purpose, they lack direction, they lack self love.
What do you want to say to them?
Speaker 3 (01:05:01):
Right now?
Speaker 1 (01:05:03):
What's coming to me is that the world we live
in is a product of our imagination. So we might
as well reclaim our imagination, right like, change the imagination,
change it. And it's hard. I don't want to sugarcoat
(01:05:24):
anybody's journey, because God knows, I've gone through my ups
and downs and hills and mountains, and you know it's hard.
But and the journey towards freedom is hard. But when
you arrive there because you had the carriage to reimagine
your life and reshape it, and we would despite of
(01:05:47):
the alls and the ups and the downs, The taste
of that freedom is so delicious. It is worth it,
my friends. It is worth it, and it is possible
to do it. It is possible to taste that deliciousness
in your mouth.
Speaker 3 (01:06:08):
Amen. I think we had it right there. Hey, all right,
thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (01:06:11):
Oh my gosh, I love you. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:06:13):
I love not only I love you. I'm so grateful
for all the light and joy you bring into this world.
And ap reate well your I'm just behind you.
Speaker 4 (01:06:22):
No, God knows, we're all.
Speaker 1 (01:06:24):
As the prayer says, I dedicate myself to awareness and
the path of awareness. My family and friends, we are
suffering and awakening together. Both we are in the path,
my friend.
Speaker 3 (01:06:40):
Good night, and thank you all.
Speaker 2 (01:06:42):
The Sino Show is a production of iHeart Podcasts, hosted
by me Cina McFarlane, produced by pod People and twenty
eighth av Our. Lead producer is Keith carlak Our, Executive
prouser is Lindsay Hoffman. Marketing lead is Ashley Weaver. Thank
you so much for listening. We'll see you next swick
Speaker 1 (01:07:03):
H
I'm keeping the bigger story which I grew up with,
Saddam Hussane. People who don't understand that kind of thing,
because fear for me was very tangible. I could touch it.
It was all over the house. I grew up and
was bugged. Our cars were bugged, our telephone were bugged.
We are not equal as humans and our financial resources,
but we are equal in our stories. You have to
(00:22):
allow the goodness, the gardening, the beautiful places. That's the
beauty that these creativity and imagination and all of that
comes from the allowing.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
The people that are addicted right now, that are listening
to this, that are struggling, that are in despair, that
have raped there's people are very paranoid, They're afraid right
now there lacking purpose, the lack direction, they lack self love.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
What do you want to say to them?
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Right?
Speaker 3 (00:54):
All right?
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Welcome back to the SINO Show. I'm your host. Sina McFarland.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Zaidab Selby Okay is.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
A humanitarian, a writer, and a social entrepreneur has dedicated
her life to women's right and freedom. She is co
founder of Daughters for Earth, a fund and a movement
of Daughters Rising Up worldwide. With climate solutions, protect and
restore Mother Earth. She has been frequently named as one
(01:25):
of the women changing the World by leading publications ranging
from Newsweek to The Guardian. Oprah identified her as one
of the women Changing the World. And by the way,
people should definitely see that episode as Super Soul Sunday
with You, That's a must watch. People Magazine President Bill
Clinton identified her as one of the twenty first century
(01:45):
heroes most recently received the Time As one hundred Impact
Awards in twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
But this is what I love this stat This is
why I want you on the show. Well, that's so
many things.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
At the age of twenty three, not thirty three, forty three,
fifty three, you found Women for Women International, a humanitarian
organization dedicated women's Survivors Awards under your leadership nineteen ninety three,
two thousand eleven Women for Women International group from helping
thirty women upon its inception and helping more than four
(02:20):
hundred and twenty thousand women in streating more than one
hundred and forty six million dollars in aid. You're an author.
This to listeners, get this is a must read. This
is my favorite book of yours. There's so many others.
We'll talk about it.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4 (02:37):
Oh my god, No, it's fantastic.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Why you like it?
Speaker 4 (02:42):
It's so good being here. Wow, that's true. Come on
when I'm messing around, it's fantastic. I love it.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Yeah, No, thank you for making time. I know you're
so busy. This is God's time is always perfect. It
just worked out.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Who would not make the time for you. You're one
of the biggest hearted men and I know seriously, Oh wow,
that's so glad to be here.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
So, I think there's so much to talk about here,
and I think we should start with where you grew
up a little bit, had an interesting upbringing. Talk about
leaving Iraq, your marriage and then starting this organization. How
does that sound? Should we start there? I know, let's
(03:24):
gid in. We got to get into it, all right.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
You want you just to roll, you just go? Well
you probably if.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
You you probably have heard you're hearing my accent.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
I have an accent.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I grew up in Baghdad, Iraq, and my life was
defined by many things, wars very much. For I was
ten eleven years old when the first war I encountered started,
and that very much. I realized as a child that
the war the world was talking about our war from
TV as men were experienced the war, or talking about
(04:01):
the war the tanks and the missiles and the guns
and all of that. But as a child, I was like, huh,
no one is talking about what I'm experiencing of the war,
which was the women who were running the show. You know,
the schools, the teachers, the doctors, the policewomen. Everyone went
in in the back line discussion of war was was
(04:21):
a woman. And so that very much impacted how I
see the world is I always ask where are the women?
Because we're better, not because we are worse, but because
we are different, and that difference is important. So that
but that started at an eleven years old child seeing
the news covered only from men's perspective and missing out
(04:44):
what women were doing in war.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
So that one.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
The second one is I have a very I grew
up with a very strong mother, the first feminist I
have ever known in my life. This is back that Iraq.
She made me read all kinds of feminist books. She
made me read roots, She made me learn about social injustices,
about slavery, about right and I am very blessed because
(05:09):
when I was sixteen years old and I said, Mama,
when I grow up, I'm going to help all women
around the world, she looked at me and she said, honey,
you can and you will, And that made all.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
The difference in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
And from that story I came to learn that really
we only need one person to say yes, you can
do that, right, like, only one person. And of course
life threw many challenges at me, but my mother's saying, honey,
you can do it, and it upped me being able
to do it because my mama said I can't. Right.
But it doesn't have to be your mama. It could
(05:43):
be someone else, could be your friend, could be your
name mother, exactly. Anybody can says, you just need one
person believe in the dream. And then then I'm keeping
the bigger story, which I grew up was a dumb hussaying.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
I sort of forgotten these days.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
But she really forgotten, not to you, I did not.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
Well. He's also, I mean, I'm proud of all the
therapy I've done on myself to like his potency in
my consciousness or unconsciousness has dissolved over the time, and
the trauma from growing up close to him, to a
family that were his social friends, and I ended up
having to call him uncle, not because he was a relative,
(06:25):
but because he was my father's friend. And we were
not political. We were our role was non political. We
were not politically threatened. So that's his social friends. But
that very much, very much defined my life. I grew
up in fear, and it was It's always hard for
(06:47):
me to explain to people who don't understand that kind
of thing, because fear for me was very tangible. I
could touch it, you know. It was all over the house.
I grew up and was bugged. Our cars were bugged,
our you know, our telephone were bugged. You know, everything
about our lives were spied on. And we knew that.
(07:08):
You know.
Speaker 4 (07:08):
You were like, you know, wake.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Up in the middle of the night and you see
a car watching your house, you know, and you know
you're like, oh, it's.
Speaker 4 (07:15):
We're being watched. You're talking spying on you.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Because we were very close to the presidents basically and
so and he did not trust anybody, and he killed
his best friends and so a we were spied on,
but we also, yes, we called him uncle, and we
socialized with him, and I spent most of my weekends
and my teenage lives with him. We were afraid of him,
We were not We did not feel we were safe.
(07:39):
You know. He killed his best friends, he killed his
relatives if they opposed him, and we were stuck. My
memoirs called Between Two Worlds, and I fought for that title,
even though it may not be the best title, you know,
according to my agent, but it's because the people thought
we belonged to him, and so they feared us, and
(08:00):
we were not out of his people, his tribe, or
his family, and so we were stuck between two worlds,
everyone thinking that we are belonging to the other side,
except we did not belong to any of the sides.
And so it was a very fearful environment that I
grew up in, and the way I came to America
(08:22):
was to escape that fear in ways, you know, in ways,
my mom basically begged me to accept a marriage proposal
from a man I did not know, so in many
ways it was an arranged marriage. She arranged it to me.
That did not mean she forced it on me. I
(08:43):
grew up in a very secular, liberal family, but it
meant she cried and begged please accept the marriage.
Speaker 4 (08:51):
Do whatever she.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
Would tell me, Do whatever you do, just once you
arrived to America, just say yes to this marriage and
leave the country. And that's how I entered this country
as a bride in nineteen in June nineteen ninety, and
the marriage ended up being horrible.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Over the long term, I learned.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
It took me many, many years, nine years of realizing
that my mother was trying to save me from saddamfhasein cases.
She was weorried for my safety because I became a woman.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
And here's eye on you.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
He raped all the women around him, and many women
he liked or what, it doesn't matter. That's how he
divided and conquered. And so she was petrified, you know,
once I became a woman, and he would make a
comment and your daughter is beautiful or whatever it is.
And so but the irony of my life is that
(09:46):
she got me to America to help me escape from
any potential violence against me, only to be in a
marriage that's induced violence against me by by the very
man who was supposed to say me.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Over the time I escaped from the marriage.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
After three months of arriving America, Iraqan invaded kuwaits, I
could not talk to my family and the point of
the story because I mean, you can see I got
ten years ago, fifteen years ago, I could not tell
the story without sobbing. Right now I tell the story
and I'm not sobbing, and if I don't have pictures
(10:25):
to prove it to me also and then sometimes the
trauma sneak out on me between all and then. But
the point is two things. I learned to believe in
the possibilities of healing. You know, when you're intentionally about
going about your healing, it is possible to heal. It
is possible for me to tell that story with us sobbing,
(10:46):
you know, and having a distance from it. But the
second thing I also learned that, you know, sometimes misfortunes
lead to your fortunes. Have I had I not been
thrown at, you know, in this marriage got me to America.
When I left, I left with four hundred dollars in
(11:07):
my pockets from that marriage in a foreign country. But
in hindsight, I live to be grateful for every part
of that journey, the worst of it and the best
of it, because they all made me who I am today,
you know.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
And I'm okay with.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Who I am.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
I know you are, I know you are, but let's
do this a little bit. This is so good, thank
you so much. So many of the listeners on the show,
as you know, have addiction, have real trauma PTSD. We're
going to get into that more. You've obviously gone through
that and you've treated it. But you just said fifteen
years ago you've been telling that story and sobbing.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
What are you?
Speaker 2 (11:46):
How are you able to get distanced from now you?
What was the technique that you learned? What was it?
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Was it therapy? Was it time? What was the healing?
What was your process?
Speaker 1 (11:57):
I think my process was to have a team as
well of my therapist said it was a team. It was,
and I did not intend it to be that way,
you know, So let me deconstruct that. First of all,
my mother used to tell me you have to always
be strong. I have to always be independent and never
cry because that's a sign of weakness. I agree that
(12:21):
you have to be strong and independent also, although you
also should be soft and you know, allow for sustainability
and community rather than just alone independence.
Speaker 4 (12:32):
There is no such a thing, you know.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
I believe at least nature is teaching me that right,
but not to cry, and you always have to be strong.
Speaker 4 (12:41):
I think it's okay to cry.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
So step one was to tell the truth. That's the
step one to my healing. It took me and it
was a leap of faith to tell the truth, not
in a book to a group of strangers. I was
in a retreat and I decided to tell a book
of a group of strangers. Is my story that I
knew Saddam haaseying this is I called him uncle. And
(13:05):
I looked at them and I said, do you still
see me? Because I believed, and because that's how I
was treated in Iraq, people will not see me. They
see him in me. Oh, and they see me in
association with him. I was known as the daughter of
Saddam for Saint's pilots. The house I grew up in
was the house of Saddam Pha Sain's pilot. My father
(13:27):
was his pilot, commercial pilot. The car I drove was
the car of the daughter of Saddam Pha Saan's pilot.
Everything was in connections. My identity was connected to being
in relationship with him. So the first thing it took
me to for my healing journey was to tell the
truth right, right, First it was a group of strangers,
(13:48):
then to close, you know, to family and friends, then
to the world. And when I told it to the
world was a leap of faith. It was like jumping
off the cliff to tell that truth, which I was
told never tell that truth.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
This is the biggest secret.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Of my family, right, but I decided that truth heals.
So my number one lead lessons is truth hell. Because
when we keep a secret, that secret becomes like a
like a dark energy in my chest, in my like
it became a heavy stone and anxiety. I can think,
(14:28):
I can feel the fear of the anxiety coming just
describing it, right. And when I told the truth, and
it was scary to tell the truth, and you don't
know if you're gonna land on your feet or not.
But it dissolves that anxiety. It dissolved that darkness and
it made it into like transparent crystal really in my chest.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
Right.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
So first it's telling the truth. Second is allowing the grieving. Right.
So I cried in the process of telling the story,
of writing the story, and of you know, promoting the books,
so you tell the story some more. I cried for
three years, intensively that was what it is. I do
(15:13):
not judge myself or anybody else for crying. Emotions are
part of us, whether it is anger or joy, or
crying or sadness or it doesn't matter, express it. And
that's so I believe in the act expression. So I
allowed myself the pouring of crying until there were no
more tears.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
Got it.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
But then the trauma is not does not leave, right,
it's sneak on you. I had issues with the meaning
of power, with owning leadership.
Speaker 4 (15:41):
With owning my womanhood.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
I had issues because it is feared, you know, creeps
on you here and there.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Yes, it does.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
And so this is when I unintentionally created, unintentionally created
my team. Someone said you have a team, and it
was youngiin analysts. Wow, because I saw working intensely on
my dreams. I trust my dreams, I trust my subconscious.
My nutrition is because I believe also my body is
(16:13):
definitely a reflection of my trauma or my health. Right,
And the nutritionist was got was telling me as similar
things to my therapist. Right. You know, I did my
own spiritual, my meditation, my own whether it is with
indigenous people or whether it's with Tichnatania monks or whether
(16:37):
it is with other Shamas. But I did that route
of exploring spirituality and all its meanings outside of my
own traditions and that and when and then I realized,
when they're all giving me the same feedback, then I'm
trusting that feedback. When my nutrition is is telling me
the same as the my you know, my indigenous shaman
(16:59):
friends you know, and the same as my youngin.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
I was like this, this is the truth, right, this
is the truth right.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
And so I started also noticing my body, my spirit,
my soul and giving them all equal attention and importance right,
and that it's an organic team. I didn't do it intentionally.
I was in pain and I needed to release myself.
And because my trauma was getting in my way of
living my life of thriving. I don't mean thriving career.
(17:28):
I was actually thriving in my career, but I wasn't
allowing myself to enjoy it. I would reject the thriving moments,
I would reject the success, you know, because I couldn't
allow goodness to happen. Right, So I had to like
work on it because it was getting in my way
for every award you mentioned, and the many more. I
would go back home and torture myself. Wow, you know,
(17:51):
because I was like, I don't deserve it. I don't
do that. Like there was a torturing process, so I
needed to. It got to a stage where it was
getting in my way, and I remember my therapist was
telling me, you either going to accept who you are
and work on healing that and enjoying who you are,
or you're going to continue to torture yourself in the process.
(18:15):
It's your choice. And that's when it's like, Okay, I'm
gonna work on it intentionally to heal because I was
getting in my way in my path basically and ultimately, honestly, listen,
is there such a thing as complete healing?
Speaker 4 (18:30):
I don't think so. It's a work in progress.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Every time you only you unravel a layer, there gums
another layer.
Speaker 4 (18:36):
But it gets softer.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
The edges pain get softer and softer over them, and
that I trust, and the the heaviness as story carries on,
my heart dissolves and maybe it becomes a small pedal,
you know. You know, I don't want to deny that
their pedal may may creep in between now and then.
But but I believe, I honestly believe and the possibilities
(19:02):
of healing, but it takes intention, showing up, trying, trying again,
expressing yourself right on.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Yeah, we're going to talk a little bit later about
your commitment to self love. Okay, But I want to
back up a little bit. I want to know what
was the moment when you said I can no longer
be in this marriage. You're in Chicago, you got four
hundred bucks, your name, walk me through when you said
I have to leave, I can't do this anymore.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
So, in fairness to my second husband and also form
a husband, there's two marriages. One is that marriage, and
then I end up falling in love and also got divorced.
And they are two different reasons for that for these divorces.
But I'll answer your question. There was he was touching
me in a way I knew it was not right.
Hm hmm right, and talking to me in a way
(19:51):
that is not right. And here's something about women we
are yea with all our progress and our f minism
and our there is something we are wired, especially as
an I just turned fifty five, you know, as a
maybe from a different joation there's something that you do
not rebel and it's like no against your oppression.
Speaker 4 (20:16):
It takes out long, I mean, you know, a long time.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
Thank god from my mother who told me never allows
someone to touch you or talk to you in the
wrong way. Thank God, she told me that before anybody
touched me or talked to me in the wrong way.
And that guy was doing that. And so I remember,
you know, first time, the first month, he's sort of
(20:39):
trying to figure what's going on. Is this is not
feeling wrong, it's not feeling right, but you're trying to adjust.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
You doubt yourself.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Maybe I need to do something, you know, first month,
second month, she's not feeling right, you know, third month,
and he did something very particular. He raped me. And
a lot of people doubt marital rape. It's rape and
someone is touching you wrong way. It doesn't matter if
he's your husband or whatever, your boyfriend or I don't care.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Is this is rape.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
Rape is about you allowing an act or not allowing.
It's like if you're saying no, I don't care, who
the heck is he right?
Speaker 4 (21:23):
Right? So it was so so I remember going in
the shower.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
I was like, I he just there's a redline that
is being crossed, and it is my responsibility to say
no to like walk up, right, I don't like And
I had no money, no family. I mean I I
grew up in a very I couldn't go back home.
I couldn't go back home.
Speaker 4 (21:46):
I was there.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
There was there was embargo in sections America was about
to go to warway with Iraq. That's before the first
gold for months before the first gol w and so
so it is remember that I am not too allow
like it is my responsibility to walk out when someone
is talking to me and touching me in the wrong way.
(22:10):
And honestly, I'm proud of myself that I walked out
after three months in a foreign country and without having
resources or family, and I walked out. And that's a
miracle story because I also have learned to watch the
science right, to look at the science, and I feel
like God comes in different signs, right, So I walked up.
(22:32):
This was a long time ago, but I went to
the Immigration services because I was My visa was through him, basically,
and I walked out and I went to the immigration
without a lawyer, without anybody, and I just I remember
it was a black woman short tights, you know, had
pulled her hair back all the way in the back,
(22:54):
and I just remember saying, here's my passport, here's my
return ticket.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
This is what just happened to me. I just escaped
this man.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
I can't go back to my country and I need
money to earn a living.
Speaker 4 (23:07):
Here, you tell me what to do.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
You are I'm coming to the beast's mouth, right, because
you know, there's so many people who are afraid.
Speaker 4 (23:15):
It's like, you tell me what to do.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
I and this woman, and this is first miracle in
my life. This woman said come. Two hours later she
gave me a work permit, and that's how I really did.
And I wish I know if she's hearing thank you right,
you know, thank you all the time in my heart
(23:39):
because then you know, there are lots of bad peoples
in the world, but they are also wonderful people in
the world, and which one we give more attention to
is also our choice.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Thank you, that's right on. Thank you for that. That's
exactly right. So wow, how do you what made you
like I'm going to start this organization? How did you think?
Where did that come from? Was? Did you get tapped
from above? Let's talk about that.
Speaker 4 (24:09):
I grew up in fear, right, I told you I
was scared, but not.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
I was not ambivalent about the injustice I was living in. Remember,
we were my family was Adam Hussein's friends, which meant
like friends of any president of any country. You were
like the top of the crame de la crame, de
la cram of getting out of the material aspects of society. Right,
(24:40):
And so I was you know, I knew we were whatever.
That affluence was part of the package. But I was
going to school where classmates were talking about public executions
for someone who opposed the president, where they were talking
about bodies coming from the front lines, where they were
(25:03):
talking about the Kurds being gassed, where they were talking
about women being raped by Saddam's sons. So imagine in
school I would go and hear these horror stories. At night,
I would be hanging out with him and his family. Right.
Speaker 4 (25:23):
So I knew I was.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Living in an injustice, and I knew I could not
do anything about it because if I spoke, my family
would be punished. Not my immediate family only, but my
excelled family. That's how he kept us all in fear.
So if you say something, your cousins and uncles and
(25:47):
aunt everyone will be punished. It's like the massive family anyway.
So when I came back to America, when I came
to America rather and there's something about America that is
so precious, and I worry for it because for me,
it's the most important aspect of America, which is freedom
(26:07):
and the freedom of expression, the freedom of movements, the
freedom to be who you are. And I worry for
that right now thirty four years after living in America.
But at that time and it still is, that freedom
was so delicious for me. I was like, Wow, I
(26:27):
live in a country where I can say anything and
I don't get killed or in prison or wow. And
I felt I had the responsibility to use that freedom
for good.
Speaker 4 (26:43):
Do you see what I mean?
Speaker 1 (26:44):
Like for me in my very simple way of thinking,
I knew that there was injustice before, but I lived
in a country where it did not have freedom, so
I could not do anything about it. Now I live
in a country that gives me freedom. So when I
see injustice, I have the responsibility to do something.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
And the injustice that I know first in justice I
noticed was in a war at that time towards Posy
and Herzegovina, there were rape cams, consentration camps. I've never
heard of that country before. I have no idea which
who are these people, what language they speak, what religion
they believe in, and nothing, But they were concentration camps
and rape cams happening to humans. And I was living
(27:29):
in the land of freedom that allowed me and gave
me permission to do whatever I wanted to do about it.
So I felt that responsibility, and so it came, honestly
from that very basic way of thinking. And over time
I have come to believe when we see injustice and
do not do anything about it and ignore it and
(27:51):
turn our face, we legitimize it and allow for the
corruption of our own values. Right because and usually everyone
gets the when we legitimize it. You know, when you
see something wrong and you walk, then you're saying it's okay.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
But I also think, and then I am.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Then we allow for the corruption of our own values,
meaning we each think we are good humans, right, but
that being good feeling good is not about me feeling good.
I need to be in alignment with my values every day,
and if I am not in alignment with my values,
and I'm corrupting my values, right, And so if I
(28:37):
see injustice, look at the other direction, I am corrupting
myself my values.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
Right.
Speaker 4 (28:43):
So that's how I started.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Started from that very basic, simplistic childlike I always say,
in a stance of saying, oh there's something wrong, I
responsibility to something. And it started by going to Bossy
and Herzegovina. It was besiege, it was a war zone
at the time. My mom discovered that and was very
angry at me. She said, I risk my life to
(29:07):
get you out of i Rack, only for you to
go to another war on your own. That's trauma being
re enacted. Unconsciously, I would say, I don't know. Some
people told me that, but it ended up and I
just was passionate about it. And you know, I did
not have money. So I invited every woman to support
one woman at a time by sending her only thirty
(29:29):
dollars at the time, and I could afford thirty Are.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
You still listening this money? From? How are you getting people?
Speaker 1 (29:34):
I was speaking everywhere, temples, churches, mosk schools, high schools.
Speaker 4 (29:39):
The universites.
Speaker 1 (29:40):
Then I was twenty three, actually just turned twenty three,
not only twenty three, I had like twenty. I was like, yeah,
just turned twenty three, like and four months basically, And
I was so passionate about it, and I would like
I would go to demonstrations, but I realized these demonstrations
are not doing anything because we're like going and shutting
(30:00):
and we go home and have a nice dinner, you know.
And I was like, no, we need we need people
are there to feel like. They need money, they need practicalities,
they need something in their hands. Anyway, and I started
with helping thirty three women. This women just called and
they's like, oh, we want to join you. And it
(30:21):
was mom and pop organization. And after you know, a
couple of after a couple of years only I got
President Clinton invited me to the White House at the
Oval Office.
Speaker 4 (30:31):
I had no idea what the Oval Office.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
I you know, it was like yeah, I was like,
oh my gosh, you know, it's like you know, but
they were like, oh, you are one of the young
Americans who are doing something for posies.
Speaker 4 (30:43):
I was like, apparently what I was doing was unique,
you know, I did not know.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
And then there was mass media coverage and then a
few years later Opera I got a call from the
opera winfree show. But the simple act of it was
asking every woman to be part of the story, to
be part of the solution and the humanization of what
women are going through. It's one thing you say they
are in rape coms or in concentration coms or whatever
(31:12):
they've gone through. It's another thing to know one woman
and no one person to write them a letter to
say I see you, this is who I am, and
to make them feel that the world is safe, because
when you are in war, you lose hope in humanity.
You think humanity has forgotten about you, and there was
(31:33):
something for me. We are not equal as humans in
our financial resources, but we are equal in our stories.
And I say equal, I dare to say equal. I
mean a lot of people ask someone from Iraq and
I've gone through what I've gone through, is like, oh
my god, you have such a nice story. I was like,
oh please, don't compete on the stories. The trauma is
that trauma. No matter what the trauma is, in my opinion,
(31:56):
it lands on your heart in the same intensity, whether
it's you are someone in Iraq or Afghanistan or you
are somewhere in la in my opinion, right, like how
it's laughing, how your body is processing it's so painful.
So don't compare traumas in my you know, in my experience.
So to be seen to not only be given, you know,
(32:19):
some cash, go and do whatever you want to do,
but to also be seen in the process to say
I care about you, I'm here for you, it makes
all the difference.
Speaker 4 (32:28):
And that's how Women for a Woman was built.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
It's on that idea that we have to give not
only money, but we have to give part of our
story because my biggest gift for you is to give
me you my story. And our equality is when you
share your story with me. Rather, that's that when you
change me from an object exotic person to an equal
relationship here. So that's what the premise of Women for
(32:52):
Woman is, the equality of the relationship, and it ended
up working in sixteen countries.
Speaker 4 (32:58):
We just celebrated thirty two years.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Actually the money and then I think now at the
moment is more than one million women connected to each other. Right.
And then of course as they get the program, they
also get the tools that resources like okay, yes, war
destroyed everything, but let's get you back on your feet. Right.
So there is a program that teaches them skills, that
builds communities for them and get them back on their
(33:22):
feet within one year, you know, get a job, get
a house, get all of that. So there is the
practicalities of it, but the emotions of it as well.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
That's walk me through this. You're going to Rwanda, yeah,
which I've worked in extensively.
Speaker 3 (33:39):
What are you thinking about when you're going there? What
is the plan?
Speaker 2 (33:42):
What's the action steps when you get there? How does
that work? What are you trying to accomplish exactly?
Speaker 1 (33:48):
I know?
Speaker 3 (33:48):
Can you break it down a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
There's a technical aspect you find You're like, go, you
need to do there, but they seem let me so
I'm happy to answer the technical aspects of what you're
looking you know, who are your people you need to
meet where you're going. But this is the emotional aspect.
And I believe, whether it is Rwando, or whether it's
Afghanistan or whether Democratic Republic of Congo or Sudan.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
Or whatever, you have to go with.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
A sense of curiosity, true curiosity, true desire to learn
their history, their knowledge, their stories. B you have to
respect the people you are there to serve I once
(34:39):
I had the privilege to spend a day with the
Dalai Lama, right, and honestly, it was not easy to
understand him, you know, the way he spoke and all
of that. But the best part of what I got
out of my day with him was if you cannot
respect the people you are serving, then better don't serve them. Right.
(35:01):
And when I came back and I told my team that,
and at that time, Woman for a Woman was like,
had seven hundred staff members and you know, offices all
over the world. Some of them raised their hands and said,
we need to retire, resign because we don't respect the
people we are helping. Right on, thank you very much
(35:22):
for your carriage to actually acknowledge that I appreciate you.
Speaker 4 (35:26):
You know, let's work on that.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
You know. So, so you have to respect the people
you are going. And then the last thing I want
to say is that you have to value because it's
an arrogance in the way we go as outsiders, as expatriates.
You know, I am a Western educated woman, I have
(35:49):
a master's degree. That there's an arrogant you go with
as a humanitarian. You know, you have a plan, we're
going to do this, this, this, We're going to do
educational program, economic program, We're going to help you get
on your feet.
Speaker 4 (36:01):
Da da da da. And every time I went.
Speaker 1 (36:04):
With that assumption that I know it, I was symbolically
slapped on the hand and realizing I really don't know it.
I know, I know what's happened in other countries. I
may have access to books and read historical precedents analysis,
Da da da, But the true knowledge comes from people
(36:27):
who are experiencing it and feeling it every day. And
I cannot put more points on the knowledge that can
give it. Give you the information with charts and facts
and figures and numbers and data, and dismiss the importance
of the knowledge of a woman or a man, or
(36:48):
what or a child or in a small village for
telling you this is what we need. That knowledge is
equally important to a peace.
Speaker 3 (36:58):
That right.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
And I've had so many, many, many many experiences where
I come and I'll tell you one funny story. I
was helping a woman wanted to do a kid a
chicken farm, a small business, because we helped woman then
get some training and to get some income, right, and
that included small businesses. And I was like Okay, how
(37:21):
many chickens you want to buy? How many was the eaculation,
the coops, all of the things that you need for
the chicken? How much you sell eggs for yahd Yadia
to help her in the business. And then I said
how many? Well, how many eggs a chicken give a day?
And she looked at me and that's when she lost
(37:41):
all respect to me, and she looked as like one
a chicken gives one egg a day. Now, So you know,
I give a lot of speeches. I often use that
story in my speeches. I promised you, ninety percent of
the audience every time I ask them, do not know
that chi can give one egg a day?
Speaker 3 (38:03):
Right?
Speaker 1 (38:04):
They don't teach us that knowledge, right? And so and
that's a silly example. Maybe it's a funny example for me,
but it is. There is the basic principles of knowledge.
So you have to respect and be humble, walk on
this earth humbly, no matter who the heck you are, right,
And I have seen people.
Speaker 4 (38:27):
On top of their mountains, yes you have.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
They go nowhere and I've seen it many times, the
roller coasters of life. So you have to walk on
this earth humbly because you never know. First, you never
know where the knowledge comes, You never know where the
angels are, you never know what you're going to learn.
And most importantly, the first step to helping people is
(38:51):
to truly love them and to truly respect them. Right,
you don't have that. Please spare me the indignant, Spare
me your money. Even you cannot respect me and see
my humanity, then yeah, I think you'll appreciate this.
Speaker 4 (39:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
When I was working in northern Uganda with the children
soldiers and I was trying to learn, I had.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
No idea what I was going to do to help
these kids. I have no ideas I'm.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
Learning about, and it kind of I was trying to realize, Oh,
they're they're trying to.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
Preach to them, they're trying to convert them. They have
their ideas. And what worked was James Brown in a frisbee. Yeah,
that's what works.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
And I and I say that because the thing that
these women trust you because you see them, you talk
about that, your heart is open to them. You make
them feel safe, there's no judgment, there's such dignity and
respect to these women, and they feel that otherwise it
will never work. Talk about that process. I know it's
(39:57):
real in you. But that's I mean, that's a art.
Speaker 4 (40:01):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (40:02):
I mean, it's a very good question, you know, And
I really don't know if I'm conscious about it, right
because same same organization, other staff members could have this
or could not have this.
Speaker 4 (40:16):
This is what I mean.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
I don't know if you can teach that skill, you know,
I feel, I really don't.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
I mean, I know I dance with them, I know
I hug them. I know I'm there for them.
Speaker 3 (40:32):
You let them.
Speaker 4 (40:33):
I truly do, I really, really really do.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
I've dedicated my life for them and I will die trying, right.
But I don't know if you can teach that or not.
There is no process, you know. I don't, so I
don't know.
Speaker 4 (40:53):
If there is.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
I do it intuitively. I'm not conscious of it. But
I can tell you when I hire people over the time,
is I look at their hearts, not their skill sets.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
Right on, Because skill sets can be taught.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Hearts intelligence, emotional intelligence cannot be taught. Maybe it can,
but I'm not going to be in the Maybe it
can for a child as you're raising them, but if
the person is sincere, you can't teach sincerity. You either
have it or you don't have it, right, So I'm
(41:31):
not sure I'm able to answer your question because I
don't know how to answer it.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
Yeah, I'm probably just applauding you more for how your gift.
Speaker 3 (41:40):
I'm probably applauding for you.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
But something that's really important that I also think is
one of your gifts that I really think is important,
especially in recovery, is the art of active listening. Yes,
you really care when you listen. You have to really care,
you know. Now, let me ask you this.
Speaker 3 (42:04):
People are like, okay, I mean, how do you You've
seen so much horror stories? How did you stay persistent?
How do you stay hopeful? How do you keep when
your destruction destruction? Destruction? Destruction? How do you stay bright?
Speaker 1 (42:20):
Well, it's not always. There were lots of tears. I'm
in a good stage right now. But I tell you how.
Speaker 4 (42:31):
I mean.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
I remember going to Congo one day and this woman
with a militia chopped one of her legs into four
pieces and forced her kids to eat each piece. Wow, okay,
the kids are vegetarian. They refuse to eat any kind
(42:53):
of meat.
Speaker 3 (42:53):
Sense.
Speaker 4 (42:54):
I rarely tell the story.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
Actually, this first time I tell it in age because
I anyway, it's too too big. I see her a
year later, she's wearing prosthetic, right, and that woman I
was dancing fiercely. I was like, wow, you were dancing,
(43:16):
and she said, of course, that's how I say alive.
We're gonna dance and dance. And honestly, up until then,
I was like taking myself as a serious activist, you.
Speaker 4 (43:27):
Know, like for woman's rights.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
And I was like, who the heck am I to
take myself so seriously?
Speaker 4 (43:33):
I take my shoes off and we dance together.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Right. And I used to, for example, not care about
my you know look or what my friend's called uglifying myself.
You know. It's like, ah, I'm an activist and I
go to a war zone and you know, and this
woman are like, oh, can you bring us a lipstick
next time? And well, let's look at your eyebrow and
let's plug it in for you and let's shape it.
(43:57):
And I'm like, excuse me, I'm coming to women wars
to like, you know, fight for rights, and you are
looking at how do we make ourselves beautiful? And how
do we dance? And how do we plant the flower?
And I learned from them, right, This is like you
because they are working actively on bringing beauty and their
(44:18):
joy in spite of their circumstances, not because of it.
This is what If this woman is dancing after what
she's gone through, who am I not to dance? If
a woman in Afghanistan is still looking at her as
the shape of her eyebrow and lip said, who am
I not to take care of myself and appreciate the
(44:38):
importance and the value of beauty? If like, if this
woman in Rwanda is planting flowers in front of her
rough camp, who am I not to plant flowers? Do
you see what I mean? That they to see the
consciousness and that how humans put consciousness into building beauty
(44:58):
and joy and how so you decide like it's a
conscious thing, so you can again focus on how awful
what they've been through, or focus on what they are
doing to bring hope a life and enjoy and life
and beauty and all of that. So it becomes a choice.
I really I do believe in choice. A lot of
(45:19):
times people say it's not fair. Not many people have choice.
The choice is not of our circumstances. The choice for
me is what do you do? Do I become in despair.
I mean the house I grew up with in, you know,
became an execution center, a brothel, a military base, and
now it's not recognizable. Do I grow up in Do
(45:39):
I live in despair every single second of my life
because I lost everything and I worked with women who
have gone through hell? Or do I choose to live
in joy and in love? That's my choice. The awfulness
of life is not mine, right right. I think we
(46:02):
have that choice. I think we can make that choice
as individuals. And I choose to look at the joyful
aspect of it, the goodness, the goodness, the goodness. I
choose to look at the goodness of humanity rather than
only at the badness of humanity.
Speaker 3 (46:21):
Right on, I love you for that. Let's talk about Roomy.
Speaker 4 (46:25):
Mm hmmm. Why do you love boyfriend? You're not alive
right now? I mean, like, please godine and connye and
have him come here.
Speaker 2 (46:36):
Why do you talk about Roomy because it's obviously the
poet Roomy the history, Yeah, I mean it's but it's
really touched your heart though well.
Speaker 1 (46:46):
Roomy, for those who are not familiar with Roomy, is
the thirteenth century Sufi poets and Sufis are the mystics
of Islam. I'm a Muslim, and it's important for me
because Islam has been demonized. Muslims have been demonized and
continue to be demonized in this country and in the
(47:08):
Western world in the last few decades. It's heartbreaking for me,
honestly because and I am talking as a Muslim, but honestly,
I think the same feeling could be with any groups
of people who have been demonized. It doesn't matter of
whether it's race or gender or ethnic groups.
Speaker 4 (47:28):
Is because you take.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
The integrity of their humanity arts, you reduce them to
you reduce them to something that they are not right.
And I grew up in a culture and a religion
that is beautiful and elegance and graceful. And I come
here and suddenly present it to me as awful and
(47:53):
violent and mean and oppressive. And it is not how
I grew up. It is not who I am. It
is not my people. Of course, some people are like that, sure,
of course, so are Americans. Some of them are awful.
Do I say all Americans are awful?
Speaker 4 (48:09):
Nuts?
Speaker 1 (48:10):
Right? I say some, you know, And these people don't
qualify as all Americans, you know, it's like individuals, right,
So this is roomy. So this is all a rounded
way to say this. Roomy brings that beautiful essence that
I'm familiar with, you know, of the culture that I
love and cherish and respect, and of the religion and
(48:33):
the tradition that I love and cherish and respect.
Speaker 4 (48:37):
And roomy.
Speaker 1 (48:38):
Is that roomy reflected to the world in a way
that can be seen and heard. That's one thing, But
that is political answer. When I also read Roomy, I
see him and he sees me. I love him so much.
I don't know how to explain that. I think my
(49:00):
soul is a roomy as well.
Speaker 4 (49:02):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
I'm like tearing up because I read a Roomy every
single morning, a roomy poem, and he puts perspective on life.
Speaker 2 (49:12):
Is there a line or a quote that's familiar with
you that always strikes you, or when you're introducing.
Speaker 4 (49:17):
So many what comes to MI mind?
Speaker 1 (49:19):
For the longest time, people when I gave speeches, they're like,
here she goes, She's gonna give us that poem. You know. Now,
I have many other poems, but the one that one
is out beyond the out beyond the world of right
doing and wrongdoing. There is a field. I shall meet
you there when the soul lies down in that grass.
(49:44):
The world is too small to talk about ideas language.
Even the phrase each other no longer makes any sense. Now,
I think we're living in a world where it's so
hard to be in that field.
Speaker 4 (49:59):
People.
Speaker 1 (50:00):
I want you to be right or wrong, you're good
or bad, you're for those people or against these people.
That I miss the field. I am in the fields. Well,
when you are in the field, the world is too
Is it too small or tubic to talk about a
can ideas language? Even the phrase each other no longer
(50:23):
makes any sense. This is what we need today in
such a divisive world. This is why we talked the
beginning about freedom and how it tastes it for me
in America thirty four years later, I worry for that
freedom safe right, and I want to enjoy this field
where you know, even the phrase each other no longer
(50:46):
makes any sense. So that's for me is so true,
It is so alive. The meaning is so applicable today,
and romy wrote it in the thirteenth century.
Speaker 3 (50:59):
Okay, wow, I think we should talk about this because
I think it's really important. You had a health scare.
Speaker 4 (51:09):
Uh huh can we do that?
Speaker 3 (51:12):
Yeah, let's talk about that.
Speaker 1 (51:14):
So I leave women for women, I go into journalism,
and I go into I reach a stage which I
am another top of my mountain. Right. You have a
checklist of I'm sure most people have checklist. I have checklists.
I had a checklist of what it made me happy? Check,
you know whatever, career was very important. Check how many people,
(51:39):
in my opinion, I helped check you know, love life,
check vacations, nice clothes, whatever, check check, check, check check.
It was a moment where all the boxes were checked,
and suddenly I am rushed to the er, to the
operating room, to the ambulance, to the operating room, where
(51:59):
they so a quarter of a gallon of liquid pressing
on the soft part of my heart. And that night
I believed I was grabbing my last breath. My body
was moving on, it's on, I was struggling to breathe,
and there was a moment in which this was it.
Speaker 4 (52:18):
And in that most.
Speaker 1 (52:20):
Intimate moment, which I believe we will all experience that
on our deathbed, if not before. But it's a very
intimate moment. It does not matter who was around you.
In my case, it was my brother, and a lot
of doctors were around me, and nurses and all of that.
It is a very intimate discussion between you and your heart,
(52:42):
you know. And up until that moment, I measured my
purpose and my value in life by how many women
I have helped, And no matter how many I have helped,
I would say it's not enough, right, you know, people say, oh,
but you're a humanitarian. I was like no, but I
(53:04):
was still measuring, right on. Yeah, someone measure how many
houses they have, how much money they have, how many
cars they have. I'm measuring how many people I'm helping.
Still measuring that's the problem, right, Okay, people is better
than cars, but you know, by measuring, that's my problem.
And in that most intimate moment, I surprised myself that
(53:27):
the question did not come did I help enough people?
Before I was dying? It was did I live my
life in kindness to myself? Did I live my life
in love to myself and to others? And I had not.
I had lived it in kindness and in love to
(53:50):
the far away others. As a humanitarian. Of course, you
feel good you're helping so many people, But ask me, then,
are you living in your life and your kindness and
kindness to yourself. I was like, yeah, I get a
massage every week, I do manicure, petticure. That was what
I thought is kindness to myself, right, And I was
(54:13):
shocked that I did not know the meaning of that.
And I was embarrassed even that that's what came out
as the most important thing in that last moment, in
my last breath.
Speaker 4 (54:26):
Right, I stay alive. I am alive.
Speaker 1 (54:31):
But it took a year and a half of recovery.
I was very sick for a year and a half
and in that time I isolated myself and twas overlapping
with COVID I happened this was eight months before COVID.
But and I ended up spending a year and a
half alone in nature exclusively.
Speaker 4 (54:50):
And I have come to.
Speaker 1 (54:52):
Learn I came from that year and a half with
app lute joy and love and kindness to myself and
to others. And I tell you what, And itwas a
most important year now because I could not work, and
I could not think, and I could not write, and
(55:13):
I could not walk, and so at an existential crisis of.
Speaker 4 (55:17):
Who am I if I am not? This if I'm
you know.
Speaker 1 (55:22):
And after a year and a half of meditating, spending
time in nature, walking, cooking, playing the piano, painting, doing
all things in the art, basically because that's the only
part of my brain that was functioning, I came out saying,
how dare you? I ask? Who am I? I am?
Speaker 4 (55:46):
I am?
Speaker 1 (55:49):
And that was the most profound experience of my life,
you know, to not measure my self worth and value
by what I'm doing and what awards I got and
whatever it is it is I am. And I came
out with a new list of what it makes me,
what I call what it makes a happy day, not
(56:11):
a happy life. There is no such a thing as
a happy life, because that's the biggest life they sell
us in these self help books. Life is ups and downs.
By definition. We cannot control the downs.
Speaker 4 (56:27):
Right, It just it's going down.
Speaker 1 (56:30):
You never know, you never know, so please, there is
there is such a thing as a content life. Your
attitude about life is content. But it's impossible to maintain
a happy life. You know, you have to have a
moment of sorrow and joy. This is another my favorite
poem of Romi. It says a guest house, let all
(56:52):
these pain and sorrow and joy and the shame and
the malice. Enter into your house, let them sweep it
empty of all the things in it, you know, and
welcome them.
Speaker 4 (57:04):
Welcome them exactly right, and so you know. So that's lives.
Speaker 1 (57:09):
But I have a list of what makes a happy
day or teaches me how to experience happiness from my self.
And that's very basic list that list. Just drink a
lot of water, eat healthy food, show gratitude on the
simple things.
Speaker 4 (57:27):
I have a red scarf phone. Wow, how gorgeous right.
Speaker 1 (57:33):
Be in nature? In the presence of nature. I believe
nature is our biggest teacher, and we are the worst
friends for her. You know, experience art, connect with family
and friends, and live your purpose. And most importantly, and
appointment with my heart. So I don't call my meditation meditation.
(57:56):
I call it an appointment with my heart because I
literally during that time when it says kindness, I had
an image in my meditation. Soon after that, my heart
held my hands and said, don't leave me again. So
I called an appointment with my heart where every day
I visit the temple of my heart and I'll say
(58:19):
I'm here. And the process taught me that there is
a heart intelligence that we have to learn what heart
intelligence means, and that means the discipline. Just like you're
learning French or Spanish, it's or any language you want
to learn, or Arabic if you want to learn that.
You know it's said you have to have a discipline
(58:39):
to learn a language, and that includes your heart language.
And so you know, it goes back. You know, I'm
back in my full energy and fierceness. Do I have
bad days, of course I do, but I go to
my appointment to my heart, and the minute I enter
that temple, I like giggling. I promise you, it's like
(59:02):
my safe place, my happy place, and I know I'm
safe and I'm okay and rewiring and go back again.
Speaker 2 (59:10):
One of the reasons why I love you, and it's
a long list, because a lot of people that come
from you, where you came from the world you're in,
they're heavy, m.
Speaker 3 (59:21):
They're heavy.
Speaker 4 (59:22):
Well we've sort of suffered a lot.
Speaker 2 (59:24):
No, no, I know, I know, But that's what I
love about you. Because you're bright, and you're fun, and
you love to fucking dance and you love to sing,
and you love good food and you love people. There's
such a generosity of your spirit. I mean you really,
it's really powerful. You know, what's your podcast calleded okay this?
(59:49):
You have some incredible guests, and I know a lot
of them are your friends. Okay, the Alice Walker is
really powerful.
Speaker 3 (59:58):
What did you learn from her? WALKI what's gems that
you could throw us from her? Well?
Speaker 1 (01:00:04):
Alice is a very dear friend and she is a
motherlike for me, and I'm truly blessed with that. And
I learned so many things from her. I think one
of the most important thing is not to take myself
as an activist too seriously, right, I mean, I'm not
(01:00:28):
sure if she would approve that lesson.
Speaker 4 (01:00:30):
I mean yes, she would say. Yes.
Speaker 1 (01:00:31):
She taught me the importance of gardening and a lot
because you know, there is an intensity about being activists,
not only from my part of the world. Any activist
you're trying to change the world and make the world
a better place. And it's hard to allow the goodness.
And she taught me you actually have to. You have
to allow the goodness, the gardening, the beautiful places, that's
(01:00:56):
the beauty that these carew creativity and imagination and all
of that comes from the allowing that to happen for us,
and that for us to accept that. And over time
I came to believe that ultimately all what God wants
(01:01:22):
out of us is to give the best out of
us to this life, to our lives, and to the
world we live in. And the only way we can
give the best out of us is to actually live
in that allowing of beauty and safety and freedom.
Speaker 3 (01:01:48):
Beautiful.
Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
And I used to think of freedom and beauty and
safety as this country or that country, because remember I
lived in lack of freedom. I think freedom is what
we allow inside our hearts. Yeah, because I see so
many people in this country. They have the freedom, you know,
on a day to day basis, but they still don't
(01:02:11):
allow themselves the freedom. Right, it's a freedom from our hearts.
It's freedom as an inside job. As my last book
you know, titled you know, So, it's that we have
to allow this goodness, which Alice has been a teacher
and allowing goodness and in order for us to give
(01:02:32):
the best out of us to the world.
Speaker 3 (01:02:34):
Oh that's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (01:02:35):
She's a powerful force, that mean, yeah, right on, Because
if you can't garden, then if you can't enjoy these things,
you're not free.
Speaker 4 (01:02:43):
Yes, you're not freeing your creativity, You're just juice.
Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
You're you're stuck in your identity as an activists, as
this powerful person you're not allowed.
Speaker 1 (01:02:53):
To do as a technologist, as a boxer, as it
doesn't matter. You know, it's like you're stuck with your
identity of soul. Well, this is who am I? Right,
but if you allow that's and there's something like you know,
I work a lot of my energy now is on
the protection of our There is something I have come
(01:03:16):
to believe that nature is not only a healer, but
nature is our teacher in our values. We need to
learn for us as humans. Right, So that's gardening or
(01:03:37):
that whatever it is. Honestly, the more I learned how
to garden, the more I learned to I become a
better human, right. And so Alice was a teacher for
that for me. Yeah, because you don't expect you know,
she's an activist and a poet and she's very courageous.
I have to give her credit. She has been incredibly
(01:04:00):
us and we'd get attacked through that process by even
people she loved. And the integrity of staying I mean,
the integrity is staying in your values, even when you're
attacked by people you love. Yeah, right on, It's so important,
(01:04:25):
so lonely, so hard, and so needed. And she has
been a teacher in staying an integrity to your values
no matter what people's responses are.
Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
Okay, parting words.
Speaker 2 (01:04:44):
To people that are addicted right now, that are listening
to this, that are struggling, that are in despair, that
have raged. There's people are very paranoid, they're afraid right now.
They lacking purpose, they lack direction, they lack self love.
What do you want to say to them?
Speaker 3 (01:05:01):
Right now?
Speaker 1 (01:05:03):
What's coming to me is that the world we live
in is a product of our imagination. So we might
as well reclaim our imagination, right like, change the imagination,
change it. And it's hard. I don't want to sugarcoat
(01:05:24):
anybody's journey, because God knows, I've gone through my ups
and downs and hills and mountains, and you know it's hard.
But and the journey towards freedom is hard. But when
you arrive there because you had the carriage to reimagine
your life and reshape it, and we would despite of
(01:05:47):
the alls and the ups and the downs, The taste
of that freedom is so delicious. It is worth it,
my friends. It is worth it, and it is possible
to do it. It is possible to taste that deliciousness
in your mouth.
Speaker 3 (01:06:08):
Amen. I think we had it right there. Hey, all right,
thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (01:06:11):
Oh my gosh, I love you. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:06:13):
I love not only I love you. I'm so grateful
for all the light and joy you bring into this world.
And ap reate well your I'm just behind you.
Speaker 4 (01:06:22):
No, God knows, we're all.
Speaker 1 (01:06:24):
As the prayer says, I dedicate myself to awareness and
the path of awareness. My family and friends, we are
suffering and awakening together. Both we are in the path,
my friend.
Speaker 3 (01:06:40):
Good night, and thank you all.
Speaker 2 (01:06:42):
The Sino Show is a production of iHeart Podcasts, hosted
by me Cina McFarlane, produced by pod People and twenty
eighth av Our. Lead producer is Keith carlak Our, Executive
prouser is Lindsay Hoffman. Marketing lead is Ashley Weaver. Thank
you so much for listening. We'll see you next swick
Speaker 1 (01:07:03):
H
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