Jetha Devapura · 45 min
A boy who arrived in Australia at 12 with a Sri Lankan accent and a quick wit grew up to build the country's largest cancer transit home and bring Lifeline to a nation in crisis, driven by courage, compassion, and a personal battle with OCD.
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At 12, Jetha Devapura arrived in Australia from Sri Lanka with a broad accent and quick wit. Two Australian kids mocked him in grade 7; he shot back with a riposte that surprised even himself. That instinct for justice would shape everything that followed.
Jetha's early years in Melbourne were marked by struggle. Placed in the lower academic stream at high school, he found his place with kids who weren't focused on study, until he failed two consecutive years. When a school officer asked what he wanted to do with his life, he said he wanted to be a doctor. Told that doctors are A students, he was moved to advanced maths. He studied hard, topped the class, and discovered something that would anchor his life: put a person in the right environment and they can thrive.
Decades later, as a corporate expat in Malaysia, Jetha burned out from rushing and loneliness. He returned to Australia, saw a psychiatrist, and was diagnosed with OCD. His father's words came back to him: hemming hemming, slowly, slowly. Through that mental health crisis, Jetha developed three character strengths: courage to stop the checking, compassion to be kind to himself, and commitment to keep going. When he visited a cancer hospital in Colombo and saw families sleeping on floors between outpatient treatments, he couldn't walk away. He raised funds and built a 194-bed transit home, the largest in Sri Lanka. He brought Lifeline to Sri Lanka nearly 15 years ago, and it became the largest crisis support centre there. Now he's dedicating the next 20 years to school-based work in Australia through the Let's Talk program, teaching young people and teachers how to have the conversations that keep people connected before they reach crisis point.
“My mom is a superstar. She's the one that reminds me of courage when she came by herself first.”
“Well, same place you park your kangaroo.”
“You put the person in the right environment and they can thrive, but if you put them into a different environment they also can thrive but maybe in a different way.”
The hero, today
Environment makes an enormous difference to how a person can thrive; put someone in the right setting and they flourish, and they can flourish differently in another. Jetha developed courage, compassion, and commitment through his experience with OCD, which he now uses to support others: courage to stop the checking, compassion to be kind to himself, and commitment to keep going. The real crisis in schools and workplaces is not mental health as a symptom, but a crisis in self-worth caused by people not feeling seen, heard, and valued. Psychological safety depends on the leader or the person in front of you being willing to be vulnerable first; you cannot expect people to share if the person with power does not model openness. If you cannot change an environment that does not make you feel valued, build your own self-worth internally by clarifying your values and boundaries, being kind to yourself, and developing the discipline to sit with discomfort. Jetha has spent 20 years on projects in Sri Lanka after his breaking point in Malaysia taught him his father's saying, hemming hemming, which means slowly, slowly, and he is now dedicating the next 20 years to school-based work in Australia.
Yes. Jetha Devapura is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Environment makes an enormous difference to how a person can thrive; put someone in the right setting and they flourish, and they can flourish differently in another.
Jetha developed courage, compassion, and commitment through his experience with OCD, which he now uses to support others: courage to stop the checking, compassion to be kind to himself, and commitment to keep going.
The real crisis in schools and workplaces is not mental health as a symptom, but a crisis in self-worth caused by people not feeling seen, heard, and valued.
Psychological safety depends on the leader or the person in front of you being willing to be vulnerable first; you cannot expect people to share if the person with power does not model openness.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 00:15
Hello and welcome to the podcast From There to Here, a podcast brought to life with Kintsugi Heroes. I'm your host, Emma Bellamy, and each week I get to interview guests who know what it's like to rebuild a home away from home. Today, my guest is Jetta Devapura. Jetta is originally from Sri Lanka and has achieved remarkable things as a CEO and philanthropist. In this episode, he shares the memory of his life back in Colombo and the cultural adjustments he's made once arriving in Australia. He opens up about his academic struggles, his diagnosis of OCD, and what got him inspired to embark on philanthropy epic endeavors that are changing lives, both in Sri Lanka and Australia. I'm excited to share this episode with you, so let's dive right in. Jetta de Vapura, it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today and share a cup of tea with you.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 01:27
Cheers, and thank you, Emma, for having me.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 01:29
I'm particularly excited, I must say, to hear your story and insights as an Australia-based immigrant, because I know that as a CEO and philanthropist, you've made a difference in the life of so many people, whether that is in your home country or in Australia. So I'm very excited to hear more about that. But before we go into your work, I'd love us to begin by your context pre-migration. So I know that you were only 12 when you and your family left from Sri Lanka to Australia, but do you have any memories about life for you over there?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 02:07
Sure. Gosh, that's a long time ago. I had hair. I did have hair. I remember that. Yeah, I was 12 when I came here. So life in Sri Lanka was fantastic. We lived in Colombo. We lived in quite a large house and we used to play cricket in the garden. So it was quite a large garden, you know, so we had room to run up, bowl and a proper wicket. We had neighbors, so they'll join us. It was a lot of fun times, great time with family and friends. And yeah, I just loved it.
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This conversation includes cricket in the garden, his parents' leap at midlife, same place you park your kangaroo, the b-class larrikin, topping the maths exam and hemming hemming.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 02:45
So you remember it well. It sounds like you were only 12, but you have vivid memories of it.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 02:50
Yeah, I mean, it's good times and coming to Australia, I guess, was also a good opportunity and we were excited to come here. You know, when you're that young, you have connections, but the bonds are different when you're that age, you know, compared to late teens and early 20s. So I was fine to leave and look at the next chapter in life.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 03:13
How was it like for your parents? Because I assume that for them it was a little bit harder, right? Because they were adults.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 03:20
My dad was, uh, 56. Mum was about 49 when they came here. So it's that midlife where everything settled. They had very good jobs, but my mum is a superstar. She, she's the one that reminds me of courage when she came by herself first. She, she was a nurse, so she pretty much walked into a job here, worked for a few months, found us a unit and found us schools. And then dad and the 4 kids came, you know, I think it was about 3 or 4 months later. And she managed to also find a job for my dad because my dad was quite a senior person in the Ministry of Agriculture in Sri Lanka. He got this perfect job at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He had his own office, so, you know, he just came from one office to another office. And I could say the good outweighed the challenge.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 04:21
Did they speak English when they arrived?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 04:24
Yes. In fact, they probably spoke better English than us because during that time when they were studying, when they were in Sri Lanka, it was, the system was in English. It's later that they turned to Sinhalese. The kids studied in the Sinhalese medium, but they studied in the English medium. So their English was much better than us. The four of us, we knew English, but we weren't that confident. It's a new country. So initially I remember being a very shy little boy. I had to learn how to maneuver the system. But I do remember a story. I was in grade 6 in Colombo, in Sri Lanka. When I came here, I was in grade 7. So I actually gained a year. I remember two Australian kids, two Aussie kids come up to me in grade 7 and said, hey, where'd you park your elephant? You know, with my broad Sri Lankan accent, with my head nod and said, well, same place you park your kangaroo, you know? So straight off the bat, I just, you know, and it just reminds me that passion that, you know, passion for justice. And how proud I was to be coming from this beautiful island called Sri Lanka.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 05:35
That's amazing that as a kid you had the guts to respond that, and also such a quick comment that really put them back in place.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 05:44
It was a quick comment, and don't get me wrong, I think I was scared. I think I was scared. So it wasn't this, you know, total fearless sort of expression, but it is something reflecting back that I was blessed with, which I'm definitely using today.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 06:02
Was it easy for you to make friends at school and integrate and feel like you belonged?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 06:10
Look, I, I, I probably had some of my best times in high school. So what happened, Emma, was the school I went to, I won't mention it, but I actually do some work with that school right now. It's funny after 35 years of leaving that school. They had 3 levels, a B-level, an A-level, and you call them the special kids or the gifted kids. Okay. These are the kids who were grade 6s who did year 10 work. You know what I mean? They were just gifted kids. The A-class was, you could call it, you know, relatively smart. And the B-class was relatively not so smart. For some reason, unknown reason, I was put into the B class and it was the best time I've ever had in school. We hardly did much work. We were just mucking around. And funny enough, I just fit into that sort of larrikin lifestyle. But it all came crashing down when I failed 2 years in high school. You know, I went up to Year 10 and I failed Year 10. And then I repeated Year 10 and went to Year 11, and I failed Year 11, and I repeated Year 11. And I remember towards the beginning of repeating Year 11, I got called into the office. Uh-oh, you know, I'm in trouble now. One of the officers there said, Jai Tha, you know, what do you wanna do? You know, what, what do you wanna do with your life? You failed 2 years. And such a naive kid I was. When I was growing up, Emma, your typical, you know, Sri Lankan or Asian mentality is you're going to be a doctor, lawyer, or an engineer. And I jokingly say you're going to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, or a loser, right? So I wanted to be a doctor, not because of the prestige or anything like that. I wanted to be a doctor to make a difference, to help people, genuinely help people. And I naively said, oh, I want to be a doctor. They sort of came back really quickly to tell me that students who become doctors are A students, you know, all the way. And asked me, what else do I want to do? And I basically said, hmm, well, I don't know much about law, but I said, ah, maybe engineering because I think my brother got into engineering. And then they said, look, if you want to do engineering, we'll have to move you to one of the A-level maths. Into the A class. So the B class, I think, I hate to say it, but probably thought we were the dumb kids. You know, we weren't even allowed to do the engineering type maths. We were just allowed to do general maths, which I called veggie maths, right? So they moved me to the A class just for that. And I remember walking into this class and, you know, everyone was studying. I sat right at the back waiting for somebody to chuck something at me. And muck around, but nobody did. Everyone took it seriously. They were studying. So I had to put my head down and study. And I remember doing a test, a maths exam, and the day they gave us the results, I wagged school. And the next day I was coming back to school. Everyone was going, oh, Jay, you know, well done, well done. I said, what's this all about? What's this big fuss? I walked into class, to that maths class, and the teacher handed me my exam results and I topped the class in maths. That kind of told me this story that, you know, you put the person in the right environment and they can thrive. But if you put them into a different environment, they also can thrive, but maybe in a different way.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 09:44
Do you know that the expectations you have of the students determine their performance? So it's actually been proven by multiple studies. So it's, it's a thing. The way you see the student and their capabilities is going to inform the way they think of themselves and their performance.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 10:02
Absolutely. Absolutely. I think environment makes a huge difference and we see that. I work in schools at the moment and I see that working in programs I do. But I finally passed, it fell, and got into engineering and uni life was fantastic.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 10:19
Yes. So you become an engineer. And by doing that, you, you kind of like semi-follow the path that, you know, your parents had in mind, I guess, for you. But I know that you shared with me that there was deep down a feeling that there was more to life than that. And you still wanted to make a difference in people's life in a different way than through engineering. Can you share with us what was the turning point for you?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 10:48
Firstly, I've gotta say my parents really supported me. They, they weren't your typical parents who sort of forced me to do anything particularly. Obviously they wanted me to study, obviously they wanted me to do something, and they were very proud for me to get into engineering. And for me, anything I do tend to be in the extreme. And I remember my dad saying, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that, I'm gonna do this. And he said to me, Hemming Hemming. Hemming Hemming is a Sinhalese saying, Hemming Hemming. If I convert that to English, it means slowly, slowly. It's a profound statement that I always remember him for. My dad passed away at, he was 94 when he passed away almost 8 years ago. And I was always in a rush and I remember trying to climb the corporate ladder I took on a role as an expat in Malaysia, based in Malaysia, looking after a whole lot of Southeast Asia for a company I was working for. And I think that was the turning point. I'm a person who loves people around me, especially people I care about. I've really had this feeling of loneliness when I was there. And I think finally I broke, I broke mentally with obviously the job stress and also coupled with not having my friends and family, feeling lonely. And I remember coming back to Australia and going to see a doctor and just some, you know, I feel really anxious, really sad. And I went to see a psychiatric doctor and they diagnosed me as having OCD, obsessive compulsive disorder. It's an anxiety disorder. I think that was the turning point. And I think my dad was so right to say, himing, himing. I was going at 100 miles per hour, and that was a turning point for me to slow down. Well, sort of slow down. That was probably the turning point for me to, you know, have that trip to Sri Lanka and really open my eyes to the needs over there. One of the important things I should mention here is that through that journey with mental illness, I developed 3 character virtues that helped me. The 3 character virtues was courage, compassion, and commitment. One of the things that OCD drives you to do is to keep checking something compulsively, check something, obsessive compulsive disorder. And I needed courage. I needed something to say, stop, Jetha, stop. It's okay. You've checked it and it's good. You don't have to keep checking it. So I needed courage. One of my favorite words is compassion, and I needed compassion to be kind to myself, you know, not to be hard on myself, and commitment to just keep going. So I always say courage to get up, compassion to understand the journey, and commitment to finish the journey. So I had these three virtues. When I went to Sri Lanka on a holiday, one of the people I knew invited me, a couple actually invited me to the cancer hospital over there in Colombo. So went there, I just saw a mother and a daughter on the floor in the corridor. There were several and some old people as well. And I said to them, what are these people doing on the corridors, sleeping on the corridors? Oh, they're, they're floor patients. I said, what do you mean floor patients? They come from far away places. They come here for cancer. Once they get discharged as outpatients, there's nowhere to go. Because they have to keep coming back as outpatients for their chemo or radiation. They don't have a place to stay and they sleep on the floor until their next appointment. I, I, I could never imagine that at the Royal Children's Hospital, you know, walking in there and looking at people that come from a tukka that's sleeping for their next appointment. So I had to do something and, you know, after a couple of years of supporting and helping I decided to do a fundraiser and we raised enough funds to build a transit home. In fact, 194 beds. Today it's the largest cancer transit home in Sri Lanka. We raised $1.6 million and today no kid or mother or father sleeps on the floor in that hospital.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 15:11
That's amazing. And is it just next to the hospital for cancer treatment?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 15:16
It's actually inside the premises of the hospitals. We signed an MOU with the Ministry of Health in Sri Lanka, and they gave, gave us the land. We built and we actually maintain it now. It's been running for more than 10 years. But I guess just going back to the work in Sri Lanka, my passion was mental health because of my living experience with OCD. I wanted to do something in that area, and I found that Sri Lanka had one of the highest suicide rates in the world. In the top 10. So here you've got beautiful services like Lifeline and Beyond Blue and Kids Helpline, things like that. I thought, wouldn't it be great if I took Lifeline to Sri Lanka? So I actually called Lifeline a couple of times and met with them and I said, hey, would you like to help me start a Lifeline center? 6 months later, we had 2 trainers from Lifeline fly to Sri Lanka. It's been How many years now? Almost 15 years. Today we have the largest crisis support in Sri Lanka with Lifeline. We've actually made a big difference to the suicide rate in Sri Lanka as well. Since we started, you could actually see that it's come down a fair bit. I mean, we can't take the credit for that. There's been other services as well, but it's definitely made a difference.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 16:31
Do you have the numbers about how it dropped since you have established Lifeline over there?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 16:37
I can't exactly recall the numbers, but if I look at a 20-year period from when we started looking back 10 years, the amount that dropped after we started has been almost 2.5 times.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 16:53
Wow.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 16:53
Yeah. Yeah. I stumbled on that result only recently when I Googled WHO figures for suicide in the last 20 years. And I said, there's a distinct difference. From when we started in December 2009. So it's made a huge difference.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 17:10
Was it important for you to make a difference in your home country and why was it so important for you?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 17:19
I just couldn't walk away. I just couldn't walk away from those kids on the floor. Just a bit like I couldn't stop saying the same place you parked your kangaroo. For those kids, right?
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 17:31
Yeah.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 17:32
I think it's just justice, you know, it's the justice of leaving a mother and a child on the floor when they're getting chemotherapy, when we know for a fact that the common cold can be fatal for those outpatients who are immune compromised. So I just couldn't walk away from it. I just, I don't like to take the credit for this. I always look back and think, why, you know, why, what keeps me going? There's something driving me. I think I'm just being given the energy, the passion, and the perseverance to do this, and I need to keep doing this. So I've been doing this for 20 years. This is our 21st year as a volunteer. I still have a, you know, full-time job. So this is really juggling a full-time job and a hobby that just becomes a lifestyle really.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 18:29
Yeah. It's much more than a hobby to me. How did you do to combine a full-time work with that? You're not human.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 18:39
I, I think there was a, not a planned sacrifice, but I think an unknown sacrifice. I've got a beautiful family. I've got two beautiful girls who are 5 and 6, almost going on 7. I'm not a young man anymore, you know. I got married at 49. I had my first kid at 51 and I'm 58 this year. I started late in on the family side, but I also jokingly say I had 3 sons before the 3, 2 girls, they were called CCC. I had to give them some names, you know, starting from C or something.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 19:16
I love that. It's true that it's probably it's easier to work on your projects before you become a parent, because when you become a parent, things become a lot harder.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 19:28
Oh, absolutely.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 19:28
Yeah.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 19:29
I'm, I'm glad I started early.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 19:32
And now you are involved with another project, right? The Let's Talk program. Can you tell us a bit more about that?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 19:40
The Let's Talk program was really born from the Lifeline Center in Sri Lanka. So We do a lot of fundraising here to support Sri Lanka, both the projects, the Transit Home and the Lifeline Center. Every month I get a report from the Lifeline Center in Sri Lanka on, you know, call rates and reason code, missed calls, all that stuff. I think it was 21 reason codes why people call. You know, if I did the bell curve on the most calls we get, right in the mean, which is the most calls we get. Was relationship issues, economic problems, loneliness. Then came your heavy-duty, you know, mental illness, abuse, work stress, disability, suicide, isolation. The most number of calls were relationship issues and loneliness and economic problems. And I thought to myself, we all have those issues, but we don't pick up a phone and call a total stranger. And that's what a crisis support is, to call a total stranger to talk about our stuff, especially things that are, you know, everyday problems to most people, not everyone. For me, the vision was how do we ensure that people don't have to call a crisis support line? How do we ensure that we empower people with their mindsets and skills to have those conversations with their mom, their dad, with their husband, their wife, their neighbor, their friend, before it escalates to something like a crisis call. So the Let's Talk program was born probably almost 6 years now before COVID 2019. I wrote the program, got a lot of help from, you know, psychologists who sort of ratified the program. And we trialed it in a school, just one school. Oh, by the way, while I was working, the first program was just for teachers to train teachers to see the telltale signs, acknowledge kids, listen to them, and keep in touch. So T for tell, A for acknowledge, L for listen, K for keep in touch. And they loved it so much. And they said, look, the kids are asking about Let's Talk. They want to be Let's Talk buddies. I said, okay, let's just write another program for kids, for students. And that's when it really started to get really exciting. And today we are over 10 schools. We're doing some research. 2 years ago, almost 2 years ago, I left my full-time job and I decided to dive into Let's Talk. Because last 20 years I have really focused on Sri Lanka. My vision for the next 20 years is to focus here. You know, I lived here 45 years and hopefully the Let's Talk program will be accepted and something that we can share globally.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 22:39
And there is so much to do in the school system. I haven't gone to school here, but I think it's kind of a universal thing. So many kids suffer from the school system. I know that a big concept of the Let's Talk program is psychological safety.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 22:55
Yes.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 22:56
Would you mind explaining the concept?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 22:58
Psychological safety has been there for many years, but I think it got very popular since COVID The easiest way I could explain psychological safety is to say, if I can come to work, or if I can come to school, or if I can go home, and raise my right hand and share my ideas, my new thoughts with someone without being judged or humiliated or punished. Or if I can raise my left hand in the same instant and share my mistakes and my concerns and my fears without being judged, humiliated, and punished. When we've got both hands up, what do you think I'm doing here? I am actually surrendering. You know, if we can surrender our best selves at school, at workplaces, and at home, that's when we see our best selves. That's when we can be creative. That's when we can be authentic. But there's a price to pay with that. It really depends on the person in front of me. So Emma, if I'm putting my hands up, you know, and you're holding a gun, then I am forced to surrender, right? But on the other hand, you're inviting and you're compassionate and you're kind and you don't judge. This is fantastic. You know, I can be my authentic self with you and share, which I'm actually doing at the moment. So that's psychological safety, the ability to share your ideas and mistakes without the fear of being judged.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 24:39
Something that I find interesting about that is it's a collective thing because as you say, it depends on the other person in front of you. So how do you make that part of the organizational culture? Because you can change perhaps one person, but is it much harder to change a whole class?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 25:00
Absolutely. And, and then sometimes you just can't expect everyone to be like that, but it starts with leadership. You know, in a school, it'll start with the principal and the teachers. You can't expect children to feel psychologically safe if the teachers don't feel psychologically safe. And similarly, in workplaces, you can't expect the staff to feel psychologically safe if the boss doesn't feel psychologically safe or are not creating an environment or does not share or be vulnerable with his or her staff. Vulnerability is being our authentic self, really. I can't find the difference between authenticity and vulnerability. I think they're pretty much the same thing. I like to give this example. A newborn baby is probably the most vulnerable person on the planet. They can't do anything. They can't feed by themselves, they can't change, they can't even eat by themselves, right? All it knows is to cry. It feels safe to cry because mom's there, she's smiling most of the time. When she's not sleep deprived. But the baby will cry regardless. The baby doesn't stop and think, hmm, it's really weak of me to cry. You know, what will mom think? You know, what will dad think? You know, I'll just shut up. I'll just, you know, go hungry. The baby will never do that because it is authentic for the baby to cry. Baby's not being vulnerable. Baby's just being authentic. And similarly, when we hit our teenage years, when we are 20, the vulnerabilities are different. But our authenticities are covered up with layers and layers of expectations created by the environment. So what I've learned in the years is that we need to peel off the layers, be authentic, be vulnerable, and really find out more about the village that supports you. And if the village doesn't support you, maybe you need a new village.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 27:15
I love, uh, what you say about authenticity and vulnerability. I, I find though that as an adult, it's so tough to be entirely authentic, particularly because there is perhaps a part of yourself that is expected in this situation and a part of yourself in another. And we, we have to juggle between different parts of ourselves. So how do you actually reconcile? Authenticity with having so many facets that we could potentially express in many different situations. I wonder whether they can be connected or not.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 27:50
It's funny, I was, um, doing some training to some teachers, how they respond to children, teaching them about emotional intelligence from a neuroscience perspective. And they said, yeah, yeah, yeah, Jay, we do that. Yeah, we definitely do that. We diff— This is what we do. But when I go home, it goes out the window with my kids.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 28:12
Interesting.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 28:14
You know, I'm just myself, my authentic, wonderful self. So there is a level of professionalism we have to bring to our work, whether it be schools or workplaces. And there's also a level of professionalism we have to have at home in terms of respect. Being authentic doesn't mean you can get away with, uh, things. Being authentic is doing it respectfully, respect other people's boundaries.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 28:41
Yeah, I like that. I, I guess you need to be aware of the context in which you are and still being yourself within that context, but at the same time in a way that is fitted to the context, you know? And I think it's particularly hard when We are asked as professionals to be ourselves, but in a professional way. There can be some confusion because sometimes being yourself and being the professional can be two different things and they can be in conflict. How do you resolve the conflict?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 29:15
I mean, dialogue is just the thing that we have to have. We have to have those conversations. We have to have those conversations behind closed doors. We have to have conversations in a team environment. Safety is really paramount. Authenticity or psychological safety alone is not enough because you can make a place safe and assuming you and I work in the same place, then it might be totally safe for you, but it might be unsafe for me. What I'm saying here is that apart from covering everything in cotton wool, we also have to tough enough people. When I say tough enough people, need to build psychological resilience in them as well. So psychological safety and psychological resilience go hand in hand because in a workplace or in a school, even for a leader to really create psychological safety, they have to be resilient. To create safety, they have to let their guard down. The best way to create vulnerability is for the leaders to be vulnerable. And be authentic, be true, you know, honest. And you're not gonna get honesty if they're not strong enough, they're not resilient enough to actually open up themselves.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 30:32
What would you say is resilience? How do you define resilience in that context?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 30:37
If you look at the definition of resilience, it says the ability to bounce back. We teach resilience in, in 3 ways. Yes, you can bounce back. But more importantly, you need to be able to bounce with and bounce off.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 30:52
Oh, okay.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 30:53
So, um, you know, I think we all know what bounce back is, is having that stoic approach, strong, determined, perseverant approach to keep bouncing back. We can only bounce back so often, but I think what's really important and more sustainable is to bounce with. Bounce with means I have a problem, but you know what? My friend Emma over here, she's gonna help me. I'm gonna bounce with her, you know, to overcome this problem because I can't, I just can't do it alone. Bounce off is I have a problem, but really, is it in the sphere of my control or influence? Can I do anything about it? So I always say bounce off is let it go with the keeper. When somebody bowls you a ball that goes to your face, called the bouncers in cricket. You duck and go, let it go to the keeper. I think more and more letting go is the secret sauce for resilience.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 31:51
Yeah. And be able to make the difference between what you can control and things you can bounce back from and the things that you can't control and you need to bounce off.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 32:03
That's right. Ability to prioritize and let things go that you can't control. And, and that word control is a word of expectation.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 32:13
For me, it's about acceptance as well. Accepting, it's such a hard thing. Like, it's such an easy thing to say, but accepting what is is so hard.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 32:24
Acceptance, acknowledging, and that's why one of the second strategy in TALK is acknowledge. Accepting that what I feel is true to me. Even if somebody else thinks it's crazy or not warranted, acknowledging the fact that this feels like this to Emma, even if I think otherwise. So I think accepting, acknowledging, not trying to control everything and letting go is, there's something there about resilience right there.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 32:54
Yes. I love that. And I know that you're working on a research at the moment, right? So you, Yes. Can you just give us a little glimpse in simple terms of what your research is about?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 33:05
Basically, we're doing some research with, uh, some schools to collect the evidence and really review the program. So I'm very fortunate to do that randomized control study. So the outcome of this research would be to look at what I just talked about with our teleknowledge system, Keep in Touch, and how they work. And how we can apply that to not 10 schools, but thousands of schools. That's the 20-year plan, Emma, my next 20-year plan.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 33:39
Well, I really cannot wait to see how you're going to be able to impact the school system because so many kids need it. It's something that I wish was in place when I went to school. I had a very hard time at school. I hated school for many, many years and And I did not feel safe at all. And I think that many kids did not either. If the next generations could actually feel safe at school, oh my gosh, what a difference in their life it would make. What a difference it would make to their personality, their self-confidence, their future self. It would change so much. To me, what you're doing is incredible. I, I just love the project.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 34:21
Thank you. I mean, there's such a big focus on mental health, you know, especially after COVID. And there is a, there is a mental health crisis, but I think the crisis is not necessarily mental health because mental health is symptoms, the outcome. Like real crisis is in self-worth. And that's what the Let's Talk program really focuses on, to be seen, heard, and valued. People want to be seen. People want to be heard and want to be valued. Unfortunately though, in difficult situations when the environment or the, you know, the village around them has so much judgment and expectations. They hide behind being seen, and that's devastating for people because everyone wants to be seen and noticed.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 35:04
Actually, on that, um, now that we are reaching the questions of the end, I wonder whether you have an advice or a word of wisdom for those who are struggling to feel seen valued and heard. What would you say to those people?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 35:19
Are you talking about generally speaking or for migrants or?
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 35:22
A lot of migrants tend to struggle with that because the life may be quite difficult, but I guess it's for everyone, everyone who is in this situation.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 35:32
Yeah. Especially for migrants who might be watching this, uh, new migrants. Always think about this word migrant, and I think everyone here in Australia is a migrant. Except the First Nations people.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 35:45
Yeah.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 35:46
I think from a migrant lens, don't feel like you're a migrant. You're, you're just a person like everyone else. We are all migrants here. I think the challenge is the people around you and the environment around you. I think that's what the focus should be because fundamentally humans, every human wants to be loved, everyone wants to belong fundamentally, and everyone wants to be good enough or enough. When we get to be loved, when we get to feeling this belonging and feeling, oh my God, I'm good enough, I did this, we feel fantastic, you know, self-esteem, self-worth, everything goes up. But it's also the true, the opposite. When we're not loved, when we don't belong, we're not good enough, It's horrible. We don't feel valued. The way I look at it is if the environment, I'm talking about the people in the village, is not making you feel seen, heard, and valued, change environment. Okay? Just change environment. But not everyone can change their environment. People are stuck in relationships. People are stuck in jobs sometimes, or studying or whatever. Sometimes you can't change the environment, at least in the short term. You have to endure the environment. And that's probably when the real learning happens. And this is when you look internally to building your own self-worth. This is a bit like, you know, letting it go to the keeper, but really focusing, letting go and looking at yourself by building self-worth. I always look at building self-worth as 3 components of self-respect. Self-compassion, and self-discipline. So self-respect, if you look at, if you break down the elements of self-respect, fundamentally they are your values and your boundaries. What is your values? How often could you sit down with a person and say, could you write down your values? We don't think about, well, what is my values? Ah yes, honesty and truth and all that. But have you written it down? Have you thought about what your values are? —things that you respect? And what's your boundaries? What are the things that you put a fence around that you don't cross, but also make sure that people don't cross over your boundaries? So I think if people are not feeling valued, look at building their self-respect, looking at their internal values, looking at the boundaries and protecting them, and also be compassionate. You know, be kind to yourself. Don't be so hard. My gosh, I failed that exam, or I didn't make that KPI at work, or whatever that is. My wife's birthday, or, you know, husband's birthday. Just have that self-compassion that you're only human. Breathe again.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 38:40
And we all do mistakes.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 38:42
And the other thing is self-discipline. This is probably a big one because it's the age of convenience. We have places called convenience store, right? It's a convenience store because everything's convenient. We want something yesterday, you know? And I think sitting with discomfort, sitting with uncertainty, and really feeling that bit of anxiety is, it's okay. It's okay to feel a bit anxious. I went through anxiety in its extreme. OCD was extreme anxiety. Where I could be sitting down here with you and I'll be so worried about something that I'll be having sweat pouring down my leg and I haven't even done a pushup yet. Okay. Or done a squat yet, you know, or done run a marathon yet. So a little bit of anxiety, little bit of doubt, little bit of uncertainty. It's okay. You got to sit with it and really build that self-discipline to keep to your part. Because so often I find people just, oh, that's too difficult. So if you can be self-respectful, be self-compassionate, and be more self-disciplined, that is going to build your self-worth bucket where a lot of the things that happen environmentally that we can't control, you're not gonna hit rock bottom. You know, you have water in your bucket. Yeah. Mm.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 40:06
I love that. I never heard the self-compassion, self-discipline, self-respect, and how that, that are the three aspects that you can focus on to feel valued or to cultivate self-worth. Uh, that's a very, uh, interesting way to look at it. Self-discipline can appear to be a bit in conflict with self-compassion. No, probably not. I guess you can be self-disciplined with compassion as well. So they, they are complementary.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 40:33
Absolutely. A bit like, you know, pepper and salt. Or actually more like, uh, you know, lemon and chili. Lemon and chili.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 40:42
That could be, that could be a good combination. I think that's a very good answer. It's like, look for the people in the village, but also inward, the outward and inward focus. And, you know, if you can't have control over the outside, looking at the inside. Because we can always, to some extent, change the reality of our inner world. Like, I think that there are situations where it's harder than others, but—
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 41:11
I think, you know, in essence, we need to tap into our intelligence, not just focus on our intellect. And just think about where you come from to today. Look, think about progress and just don't worry about perfection. Because there's no such thing as perfection. There's no such thing. It's true.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 41:30
If you love the process of something more than your idea of what the results may be, you know that you are onto something. Because I feel like so many people don't enjoy the process. They do it because of the idea of the results they want to get. But I think it's important to find the things where you don't care about the results so much. You really care about the process and the progress. More than the ultimate outcome in its most perfect form? Absolutely.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 42:01
Well, it's enjoying the journey, learning from the journey, not just the destination. Destination is great, but you know, when you hit the destination, you go, oh, what's next? I'll do something better or higher or whatever. You don't even live in that outcome or in that space for long enough to even thank yourself for getting there.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 42:25
I have a tradition in the podcast. I like to ask two questions that are slightly weird. So one of the first question is, when I say the word migrant, what does it evoke to you?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 42:39
I think the first thing when you say migrant, and especially in Australia, and I'm thinking even globally, everyone, everyone is migrant. My dad, is a Sri Lankan, you know, Sinhalese background. And if you trace him back enough, it'd probably be in a, somewhere in India, you know. My mom is also from Sri Lanka, but she's got English-Irish background. So if you just go back, if you trace it long and back enough, we always come from somewhere.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 43:09
Yeah, that was a good answer. The second one I have for you is, what does being Australian mean to you?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 43:21
Hmm. Hmm. Being a migrant?
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 43:24
Well, I guess it's a big part of the book, isn't it?
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 43:28
Uh, look, if I look back the last 45 years and all my work in Sri Lanka, Australia has been amazing. Like, it has allowed me to do the work for Sri Lanka. It's given me the platform, given me the time, given me the opportunity and the freedom to do that. But when I look at Australia, I look at two areas fundamentally. We need to be thankful to all the migrants who came, the early Australians who made and built this country. And we also have to be thankful to the First Nations people who welcomed us. Even when we did the wrong thing by them and they still keep welcoming us. They're just amazing people. And when you say the word being Australian, I think about the opportunities and the freedom to express ourselves. Mm-hmm.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 44:28
Yeah. We are so lucky to be in this country. So many reasons, I think. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Jetta, for this interview and sharing your story with me and the work that you do. Thank you.
Jetha Devapura (Guest) · 44:40
Thank you so much, Emma. Thank you for the opportunity and making me feel comfortable and prepared. You are welcome.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 44:52
Thank you for listening to this episode. I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Jetta. If you did, Please like, follow, share, and rate the show. It really, really helps others find the podcast. Next week, I will be interviewing Mashid Babzartabi, an incredible woman who escaped her country and went through a terrifying journey to reclaim her freedom in Australia. I was your host, Emma Bellamy, and I can't We cannot wait to bring you on another journey from there to here.
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