Mishma Kuma-jonson
Mish Kumar-Jonson on Migrant Healing
Mishma Kuma-jonson moved across six countries and learned that belonging is not about gratitude or assimilation, but about being believed in your wholeness.
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Kintsugi Studio
Mishma Kuma-jonson
Mishma Kuma-jonson moved across six countries and learned that belonging is not about gratitude or assimilation, but about being believed in your wholeness.
Hear this story
Mishma Kuma-jonson has lived in India, Oman, France, America, New Zealand, and Australia. Each place taught them something different about what it means to be South Indian, what it means to belong, and what gets lost when you code-switch across six countries, multiple languages, and every marginalised identity you hold: queer, neurodivergent, disabled, non-binary. In regional Victoria, daily racist jokes at work forced a choice between safety and a paycheck. Mishma chose to keep the job and swallow the hurt, learning early that migrants are asked to assimilate while rarely being asked to be believed in their wholeness.
Mishma pushes back against the mythology that surrounds migration in Australia: the pressure to be grateful for being here, the assumption that established Australians will meet newcomers halfway (they usually don't), and the idea that empathy is the answer. Empathy has limits. You cannot understand someone's experience if you have not lived it. But you can choose compassion by believing what they tell you about their life without needing to relate to it first. This shift from empathy to belief changes everything.
Healing, Mishma argues, does not mean waiting until trauma is resolved to reconnect with joy. Joy is a muscle that atrophies if you do not exercise it. The dancing, the singing, the deliberate choice to find moments of lightness even while difficulty still exists, that is what keeps you alive in the fight. Home is not a place Mishma has found yet, even in the countries they have lived in or the culture they were born into. But deep belonging exists in a marriage where all parts of themselves are welcomed and celebrated.
⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses grief & loss, which some listeners may find distressing.
If you need support, you're not alone. Help is available: • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au • GriefLine: 1300 845 745 · griefline.org.au
“code switching is a constant, are you a safe person? Can I show up authentically if there's do I have to present myself or talk or, you know, say things in a particular way so that you go, okay, you're not a threat to me”
“the onus of connection is almost always placed on the migrant person and even though both of them can't understand what the other one's experience might be and therefore coming into it with different perspectives and different ways of navigating and connecting but the onus is always placed on the migrant”
“I just believe you and just have compassion for your experience”
The hero, today
Code switching happens constantly across every marginalised identity you hold, not just when you change locations, and the exhaustion comes from constantly assessing whether it is safe to show up authentically. The onus of connection between migrants and locals is always placed on migrants to join society, when what actually builds belonging is when established Australians create spaces and put in effort to meet migrants halfway. Empathy has limits because you cannot truly understand someone's experience if you have not lived it, but you can choose compassion by believing what they tell you about their life without needing to relate to it first. Healing does not require waiting until trauma is resolved to reconnect with joy; joy is a muscle that atrophies if you do not exercise it, and intentionally moving towards it while difficulty still exists is how you stay alive in the fight. Home is not a place Mishma has found yet, even in the countries they have lived in or the culture they were born into, but deep belonging exists in a marriage where all parts of themselves are welcomed and celebrated.
Yes. Mishma Kuma-jonson 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.
Code switching happens constantly across every marginalised identity you hold, not just when you change locations, and the exhaustion comes from constantly assessing whether it is safe to show up authentically.
The onus of connection between migrants and locals is always placed on migrants to join society, when what actually builds belonging is when established Australians create spaces and put in effort to meet migrants halfway.
Empathy has limits because you cannot truly understand someone's experience if you have not lived it, but you can choose compassion by believing what they tell you about their life without needing to relate to it first.
[Music] Hello and welcome to From There to Hear, the podcast where we get real about what it takes to build a new life far from home. I'm your host Emma Bilami and today my guest is Mish Kumar Johnson, a mental health social worker, psychotherapist and advocate with over 15 years of experience in traumainformed care. In this episode, they unpack some of the most important issues migrants face. From code switching and the pressure to be grateful to the complexities of belonging and the responsibility placed upon them to integrate. As a neurodeivergent, non-binary queer bibbok immigrant, Mish brings a unique perspective to this conversation. I've learned a lot through our exchange and I hope you will too. Okay, let's dive in. [Music] Mishma Kumar Johnson, I'm delighted to have you on the show. You were recommended to me by a previous guest, Nara Ayath. She mentioned on the show that you would be a great guest to interview. So, I'm glad that we are finally making this happen. Right. Thank you so much. Haraka is a dear friend and a wonderful colleague and I want to acknowledge that I'm coming to you from the unseated lands of the Wwang Warri and Bunam peoples of the Eastern Koolen nation. Just pay my respects to elders past and present. We are obviously having this chat during reconciliation week and you know we're talking about things like cultural identity and movement and I think we have so much to learn from First Nation to community. So really wanting to pay my respects and acknowledge the deep wisdom in those cultures. I'm just really grateful for the opportunity to come and chat with you today. Yay. So, Mishma, you are an interesting migrant to get insights from because you've experienced multiple migrations. You've lived in India, Oman, France, America, New Zealand, and Australia. So, I'm curious to hear the story behind your cultural identity journey. I imagine that with each of these migrations, your sense of identity, your sense of who you are changed to some extent. Yeah, absolutely. I've had the privilege of the multiple migrations as you talked about and it's really interesting because there's, you know, forced displacement and forced migration that happens, but then there's also this thing of, oh, my family moved, so I have to move. you know there it's not so much forced but your family moves so you move and then you get older and then you might have this say economic migration because you think it'll be better for your future and stuff like that and my family at some point was forcibly displaced but I in my life was not but just the learnings that I bring from that intergenerational sense of that cultural identity because I'm a very proud South Indian person and being a south Indian person in France is very different to being a south Indian person in Melbourne different to being a South Indian person in swana you know or known as the Middle East and so it's not only that I had different pieces of the puzzle come together for my cultural identity it also meant what did those cultural identities in those different context also mean right all of that is moving and all of that is fluid and there are things in this world that you sometimes can't put words to but you can only feel and I think my biggest cultural identity that I've brought along in all this journey is that we can actually connect to each other on a human by human basis. If we can find that we have more in common than we not, you know, there's so much space for us to have community together is kind of what I've learned through all of those different cultural identities and movements. So, it's finding the parts of yourself that can connect to the personality, the collective personality that you encounter in a given country. Yeah, for sure. Because they're also coming with their own authentic experiences and their own intergenerational stories and their own versions of joy. And you know, there's a sense of well, my joy looks like this. Can I invite you into that? You know, there's such a beautiful way of you might go into people's homes or, you know, come in for a cup of coffee or a small bite to eat. And there are some ways we just connect as human beings anywhere in the world. But then you get to share, hey, there are these other parts of me that are really cool, you know, um I prepared food like this or my music that I've learned sounds like this or the art or culture, whatever that is. And just being able to see that through different lenses and through different stories has been really magical and really hard as well. you know, it's not it's not all kind of rainbows and unicorns. People have some really difficult stories. However, what I've been able to do with my own cultural identity and my own multiple migrations is just see that the world is bigger than our own little lives. But sometimes we forget that and we think we're in the middle of the universe and just forget that there's a whole world out there that's still happening. And yeah, I've just had the privilege of being able to see different people's story. So there is a challenge that I find particularly interesting as a migrant to navigate is code switching and I know that you've experienced this. So can you talk a bit more about how it was like for you to have the pressure to code switch depending on the context that you navigate? Yeah, for sure. And I still code switch. You know, when I was speaking to my mom, I have quite a thick Indian accent. And you know when I was in France I had quite a thick French accent and you know code switching kind of comes in all sorts of way but also I think sometimes we forget that cultural identity is not just talking about race it's also talking about other cultures. So as a queer person, the LGBTIQA plus communities has such a rich, beautiful culture and such a rich, beautiful stories, right? Historical and intergenerational stories and code switching from those cultures is also a thing that happens. Um, I'm also a neurody divergent person and then having to code switch to be, you know, more accepted or understood in a neurotypical world. I'm also a disabled person. I'm a non-binary person. So when we're talking about code switching, it's almost constant, if that makes sense. It's not just, oh, now I'm talking to someone different or I'm in a different place, so I'm code switching. It's a constant, are you a safe person? Can I show up authentically if there's do I have to present myself or talk or, you know, say things in a particular way so that you go, okay, you're not a threat to me that you understand that we can have an authentic connection outside of those biases. is exhausting. It's frankly, you know, exhausting and at the same time is really necessary for people to find safety and connection and to navigate a world that can be deeply biased or easy to, you know, sort people into categories of you sound like this, you look like this, therefore you believe this, when we know that's not true. I like what you say. I think it's a smart thing to be able to do because society requires it of you, but at the same time there is a loss that comes from it. It's a loss of parts of who you are that you cannot express that are not safe to claim in a context. So I don't know whether it's a good or a bad thing, but I guess it's like both at the same time. Yeah, 100%. And you know there's there's this thing around there are some people who talk about attachment versus authenticity and you know as human beings we have two needs. We have a need to attach and form societies and connections and families and communities. But there's also another need which is around authenticity and around authentic connections but also expressions of being able to show up authentically and know what you feel because like anything it's a muscle. And if the muscle that you're constantly exercising or practicing is the attachment muscle, sometimes you forget how to practice that authenticity muscle and it can atrophy a little bit, right? And that's why sometimes you get the us versus them because there's a sense of well I can't be authentic in these and I have to choose attachment because without attachments I won't can't do anything. I can't live in a society. So you know in some ways yes a loss of paths but also this sense of it prioritizes attachment and means I always have to self-abandon or always have to self-sacrifice authenticity in order to prioritize attachment. with my mental health hat on sometimes. I think we talk a lot about attachment wounding but don't always talk about authenticity wounding and it's something that you know I support people to explore a lot and it's in my own cultural identity there was a lot of authenticity wounding due to racism and all of that in Australia and different parts of the world not all of you is accepted and celebrated if that makes sense. Give me an example of your life. Oh, of my life. Perhaps in Australia could be a nice one to discuss. Yeah. Um, it's really interesting because I spent about five or six years in Bellarat, which is a regional town on Cooler Nation land. And it was really interesting when I moved there. There weren't that many people of the global majority. So, people of color especially, not that many Indian people. And the only time I would ever see Indian people would be when they were working. So whether that be working in Indian restaurants or you know very specific context of the only time I saw Indian people. And so when I was going to university in Balorat, there was this sense of oh you're going to go get a job as a taxi driver or you're going to go work at an Indian restaurant. And every time I would walk into work, I used to have a job at a pub or a bar and there'd be a racist comment that was said as a joke every single day. So, you know, I'd walk into work and they'd be like, "There's the register. Don't hurt us. Just take the till." You know, and I was like, "What is happening?" You know, and for the longest time, I would play into that because for me, it had to be a code switch of, "Oh, it's not safe to be a person of the global majority. I almost have to I can't be authentic here. I need this job. I'm you know trying to go to university here. There's not many opportunities in Balora for me to have that. And it's it's really interesting around the racism because it's this thing of oh you're laughing along so it's fine. And it's like no I'm choosing safety. I'm choosing to keep my job. I think that's where there's that sense of you can't always be authentic. And that really hurts, you know, because you're like, I can't actually change this about myself. I can't change being Indian. And I love being Indian. I love being South Indian, you know, as a person because there's so many stories and traditions that are really beautiful that I've been able to now engage with and now connect with. And so that was one example. And there were so many in in regional Victoria around how you have to choose attachment over authenticity. Does that kind of make sense to you or It does. I really like what you shared. There is another point that I think is really important to talk about. It's the gratefulness, the pressure that many migrants feel to, you know, show up with a positive facade and sometimes at the expense of their true feelings, their true struggles. Is it something that you have experienced that that you see other migrants experiencing? When you migrate to this country, there is such a deep sense of Australia so much better than where you came from and therefore you should be super grateful for being here, you know. And I've actually had people say, "Oh, isn't it so much better here than in India?" And I'm like, "No, actually there are some parts of India where it's actually so much better in India. There are so many things in India I wish I had here you know and just this constant oh you must be so grateful I'm like actually not grateful to be here or there's also a sense of you can't be critical of society or the way things are done here because the sense of well then just leave go back to where you came from if you don't like how things are done here and there's this real protection of what is Australian or what you know our culture and there was a quote the other day by a minister that says you know they were quoting a specific value and I think it was that Australian values and Australians seem to have forgotten that and again it's this thing of we live in a time capsule and we want to live in a time capsule and we don't want to move away from that and you need to be grateful that we accepted you through a beautiful little time capsule, you know, and you're like, there's a whole other world out there that is moving on, but also I don't need to be grateful to be here. Like, yes, okay, I'm here and all of that, but there are inherent things that I bring and so many other migrants bring that that gratitude doesn't go the other way. You know it always feels like the migrant has to be really grateful and thank you but Australia itself or the country or communities don't have to be grateful for the migrants and we saw it in co when so many people had to leave and did leave there was such a loss there was such a crater of identity that was lost and but I don't think it's shifted anything it was still like migrants have to be really grateful but Australia doesn't have to be grateful to migrants you know that's I find Isn't that a really interesting Yeah, interesting piece. And also Australians have the privilege of not being grateful about their own country when we don't. Right. I think that they can criticize their country and be completely fine with it. There isn't the come back to where you are from, right? Even though they are migrants from generations ago. Absolutely. And I actually had a man come up to me once. I was swimming at a beach with a friend and we were in the water and it was for once it was warm and you know enough to go in the water and it was quite late at night and I remember him coming up and already we were a bit weary because you know we were two people and this man was coming over and then he was trying to make conversation he said so where are you from which is not a question I enjoy because I feel like the question is not so much where are you from but asking what kind of brown are you know that's what That's what I really feel like they're asking. And anyway, so me very cheekily, I said, "Oh, I'm just from Melbourne." And he was like, "No, no, no. Where are you really from?" I was like, "Oh, from Glenroy." And you know, go and he was like, "No, no, no." Like, "Where you really from?" I was like, "Oh, I don't feel comfortable giving you my address." And you know, at this point, I thought he'd just leave it. And he said, "No, you see, my family are true blue Aussies. We have been here for six generations. So where were you born? You you know and I was like oh in a hospital probably same as you. It's just such a ridiculous thing to ask right but this thing of like no I belong here whereas you are just welcome here you know and even that thing of like well six generation still doesn't mean you're from here. It just means that you migrated a little bit before me. That's that's all that means right? And but this sense of like, oh, but now I am Australian and you're not yet there. But when you become a true blue Aussie and six generations are here, then you're good enough to be here. Which is such rubbish because since when did we start hooding in this hierarchy of two years means not good enough, three years not good enough, you know, or like this generation. And it's just really interesting how embedded that is within the society here. It raises the question as to what constitutes Australianness. At which point can we consider someone to be Australian? Is it the citizenship or is it a set of values or and what are those values? Because I feel that there is as well so much diversity in Australia. And I find that when people don't experience migrants as being Australian, it's weird because I I'm not sure whether they know what Australian mean either. No, absolutely. And I actually have a really good example of that. When I was living in the United States, it was just a person that I was talking to one day and they said, "Oh, again, favorite question. Where are you from?" And I said, "Oh, I'm Australian." And I was quite young then, but nonetheless still a shit stirer. And they were like, "Australia? You can't be." And I said, "Oh, why?" You know, I have the accent. I have I call everyone mate. What more do you want? You know, and I shorten everything and add an O in it. I'll say Arbo and Serbo and or Botto. And and they were like, "No, no, no, because there are only white people in Australia." And I was like, "Oh, okay. Well, one, no, because you know, um, First Nation folk, not quite white." I thought that was and it was just so interesting that how many other people whoever I would say to you I was Australian there would just be this real puzzle look of oh but you can't be and so many people would say are you sure you're not Mexican like no I'm pretty confident actually you know and just that sense of not only is there a sense of what is Australian and we might not know but also the global perception of what an Australian is is very much this surfer, blonde, blueeyed, tall, um, you know, loves the sun, kind of larkin, drinks a lot, says whatever. And it's really hard because so many of us are not that, right? And even Australian values of matesship or whatever it is, I don't actually think it's that because I think so many migrants are so incredibly invested in community and mhship and have been doing that for eons and a half. But as soon as you do that here, it's seen as, oh, that's a weird thing. Why are you trying to get to know me deeply? There'll be a lot of superficial relationships, but not deep relationships. So even in that in those values that are touted or are put to the rest of the world where these happy golucky easy lar you know get to know us like well not really because we will actually yeah I just find it's really hard to make deep relationships here you know this it makes me think of a metaphor that Erin Mayer uses she's a cultural expert and she distinguishes between coconut cultures and and peach cultures. And so coconut cultures are more like in France where there is a harder shell to break in. But once you do, it's soft embracing. You get to really know who people are. Peach cultures are soft and super friendly. Hey, how are you? But then there is this hard seed that is unpenetrable that you can never really fully grasp because yeah there there isn't this um I don't know if it's sense of authenticity perhap there is a bit of shyness around sharing feelings or your authentic self but yeah it's an interesting distinction how some cultures that don't necessarily appear friendly can actually be more friendly than other cultures that appear at third value very friendly. Absolutely. And I think it also comes back to intentionality. I wonder if the to use the metaphor that you were just saying, the peach is there. So it's like don't touch the seed. You know, it's like don't go anywhere near the seed, have the peach, have the fruit, but you know, this is this is me or this is my whatever. And then in other cultures, it's like you got to work a little bit, but when you work and you prove whatever, you'll be embraced. And I just find here as a country or a colonial, you know, project because I think as a society we haven't really grappled with what we continue to do to First Nation folk, how we continue to colonize and how that continues to show up. There's also a sense of we don't want to go too deep because when you get too deep, Australians don't like talking about shit, right? We've employed a couple of counselors and psychologists and social workers from overseas and when I'm doing the orientation with them, I'll say this is not Europe. People won't just say things to you. You know, I grew up in Europe for a long time and if people thought something, they just say something, right? In Europe, a lot of people just say what they're thinking. Whereas here, you have to bloody It's like playing chess or checkers. if I say this, then they might say this, and then I say this, and you know, and you're like both trying to do this thing just to get to it. And it can be such a culture shock because it's like you're having three simultaneous conversations and you have to like read between the lines to understand what they're saying. And you know it's it's really interesting here that but I don't think we've actually grappled with what is truthtelling what is holding space for different perspectives what just as a as a society I think so it's hard on an individual level to do that when you don't really know who you are as a society as well. M yeah it's a good point empathy and perhaps more accurately the lack of empathy towards migrants. You drew an interesting parallel with the double empathy problem which is basically something that originated from the autistic literature if I understand it well. So, we challenged the assumption that only autistic people were unable to have empathy towards non-aututistic people. But this is a two-way difficulty where non-aututistic people also struggle to empathize with autistic people because empathy is selective. It's a lot easier to empathize with someone that you can identify with, that you relate to. So yeah, please share a bit more about that because I think it's an interesting point. I think the interesting thing also about the autistic community and I'm an autistic person is that you meet an one autistic person, you've met one autistic person. Every single autistic person is different. And even in that that sense of not only is it a birectional misunderstanding or lack of empathy that happens because I actually don't know what it's like to be a neurotypical person and I have such a good example of this is the other day Nihara actually and I were in a meeting and I was talking to the person he was online and the person who Nihara and I were meeting with that joined a little bit early maybe like a minute or two earlier and then Nihara joined and we said the hello and I said okay let's go so um this is what I'm thinking blah blah blah blah blah and after the phone call the was like um you know we should have maybe spent some time just introducing us to each other and I was like I don't give a fuck what I just want to get to the point what's really great is having people like me around me who's like no that was great like thanks because I also sometimes you know don't do well with the fluff Where the birectional lack of empathy becomes a problem is when the onus of something going well or something being safe or that interaction being quote unquote successful is wholly placed on the made marginalized community. So within the example of where you said that the autistic community, the holistic which is people who are not autistic, the holistic community also has an empathy problem right on both sides. But the onus of communication or a situation or relationship going well is wholly placed on the autistic person because it is seen that theistic person's way of navigating the world, way of approaching anything is correct and the autistic person's way of doing everything is wrong. Right? And when you look at that double empathy problem, I think it's very similar for migrants and people who migrate here because there's a sense of your migration journey. I can't understand as someone who's not a migrant to say like right and perhaps people who are migrants might not be able to understand someone who's not left Australia and not migrated elsewhere and you know that double empathy problem that however the onus of safety in or relationship or whatever is solely placed on migrants and you see that so much in the way that Australians interact. Um, I found in many other cultures you can go out and meet people in social settings where in Australia it's really hard to because everyone goes out and they clicks. So in order for a migrant to join a group, it is solely placed on them that responsibility to join society. But I find a lot of Australians will not actually create spaces where they call in you know migrants and say hey I will put in the effort to meet you halfway so that we can both create that relationship. Does that make sense? The onus of connection is almost always placed on the migrant person and even though both of them can't understand what the other one's experience might be and therefore coming into it with different perspectives and different ways of navigating and connecting but the onus is always placed on the migrant or almost always. Yeah. the adaptation needs to come from the migrant, but there isn't really a willingness from the locals to adapt to the migrant experience as well. And that's such a good point. And you know, there are some beautiful, really, really beautiful organizations. One's called the welcome dinners. The founder of the welcome dinners was this woman who was working with the migrant community. And the people she was working with had said, "Oh, I didn't know about that." or you know whatever. And she said, "Wow, you've been there for so long and how come you knew?" And this person goes, "Because I've never been inside an Australian person's home before." And this person said, "How what do you mean you've never been inside an Australian person's home before?" And they said, "Well, who's who's inviting us? You know, where where are we getting these invites?" And so she created this welcome dinners or lunches or community dinners where it would be say x amount of people who are newly arrived Australians and x amount of people who are established Australians and they come together for a lunch or dinner and everyone brings a meal and shares something about their culture. And because research has shown the more people are connected, the more that migration journey and experience is not only not traumatic, but is held and you know beautiful and quote unquote successful, but again the onus is always placed on the migrant. And so she created this project and I have the privilege and just the joy of being part of that for a while and facilitating those dinners and just seeing people come together and going we're actually far more alike than I thought you know there are actually people in my neighborhood who think similarly to me just in little different ways you know and the onus of that or the responsibility of that happening or going well was not placed on migrants and so if that pressure was taken In a way, we just saw such beautiful connections happening. And so, I do think it's possible, but not if we only ever place the responsibility on migrants to join society or join community and also do the work of being welcomed and also doing the work of, you know, being a migrant itself. I love it. I wish that some initiatives like that existed when I arrived here because it was it took me so many years to have friends here. It was so hard because it's really hard to penetrate a click, to penetrate a group that is already established and you know, you're a bit different. You're funny. It's it's it's fun at a superficial level, but they don't really follow up with you, you know, when you're right. Mm- Yeah. Yeah. 100%. And especially so if if there's multi- kind of multiaceted cultural identity. So within say if you're someone who's part of the LGBTIQA plus community, it's like, okay, there's a thriving LGBTIQA plus community here. Great. But I'm also a person of the global majority as a person of color. And it's like, oh, okay. Um, all right. Well, you can either have the queer communities or you can have the people of color communities kind of choose one. and that you know it's kind of like those intersectional communities sometimes can be not only hard to find but can also feel othering or otherred in those and say you're someone who has a religious and cultural identity tied to religion and also a queer person that intersectionality is really hard to find and really hard to navigate if you're and all of these things of okay we have the big it's kind of like we've ticked the box do we have the queer community? Do we have the people of the global majority? Do we have this community? Do we have that? Okay, you're all good. Great. Off you go. And it's like, hang on. People are actually not silos. You know, we don't insist in these perfect little boxes. I am a little bit of this community and a little bit of this one and a little bit of this one and a little bit of this one. Where do I go? And it's like, well, can you just split yourself? And when you're in this community, just ignore all these others and then go to this one and ignore all the others and all parts of yourself. M that can be really disheartening because often people want to find a space where they can go where all of them is seen right and where they don't have to leave parts of themselves at the door where it's like all of me is welcome here and celebrated and held and appreciated and I think there's work to be done in that and we can do better in that. That makes me think of the point you made when we first met, which is that lack of empathy can also exist within migrant communities. And that's perhaps because there is so much diversity within the migrant community and even migrants that come from the same country because your take on the culture might be completely different. And I often find it really interesting and I don't know how controversial this take is going to be, but I often find that migrants are often more conservative in the country they've migrated to than the people of that culture outside of know that migrant community or that migrant country. I have found some Indians and I can only speak because of that culture because that's my culture right being a South Indian are often more conservative here in Australia than they are in South India you know back home because there's almost this sense of say parents came here in the '9s or you know early 2000s it's like their idea of India that they have is almost fixed and so it's like in order to be an Indian or a good Indian, you have to do all of these things and that's how you're a good Indian. But India has moved on, right? You like India has kind of moved on doesn't do that's not what a good Indian is anymore. And so I often find that people who are migrants us can sometimes be more conservative and hold on even more so to that culture or that cultural values or identity more than actually in the country. And at the same time because you're in a country where you are not the majority, you know, you are the minority in that you are still fighting for space and your culture is still seen as one that is exotic or one that is people can take as costumes and play around with and all of this. And I have a good example for this. So when you know people are here and they wear saris or salvaries or wear bindi or you know Bengals or whatever that is people here might say hang on that's cultural appropriation especially not if it's done in a really respectful way or people might say hey I got this from Bangalore and it's actually giving credit and all of that obviously that's totally fine but when people wear salvaries or like dupata and they're like oh this scarf like it's it's not a scarf it's clearly a data you know that kind of cultural appropriation it's really interesting because here there's a sense of don't do that that's shit you know don't reduce us down to a costume whatever but if a white person goes to India and wears those Indians are like yeah this is great they're embracing our culture look at that because Indians in India are the majority and the white person is the minority there so when they come in it's this thing of like oh yeah let them it's fine but here white people are the majority and South Indians or Indians are the minority. So they have to really fight to not be reduced down to a costume and not be reduced down to a food group or whatever. Even that nuance of having to hold on to your culture when other people see it as a costume or whatever is also a really interesting place to be and how people then react to that and how they have to find their own way in that because there's a sense of I'll never be brown enough for the Indian community and I'll never be white enough for the Australian community but at the same time my cultural identity is reduced down to these things like food and costumes and dressups and big weddings and stuff like There's so much more nuance within that depending also on where you live in terms of your cultural identity. Yeah. So there are two thing what you said. There is the fact that culture is not static. It evolves. So when you migrate your culture may evolve without you and you arrive with this this ancient way of conceiving and perceiving your culture and then when you arrive here you have to assert your cultural identity as a way to reclaim who you are. I often find that you know you realize you are South Indian or French in my case when you arrive in another country and you're like oh and being French becomes more important than it would have been if I had not migrated right it's the fight for the self or for some cultural aspects of your identity that you hold on to absolutely and if you say are in relationship with someone who doesn't speak the language or doesn't understand the culture. It's this thing of again you're not being fully seen in that and you have to carve out space. And so I'm married to a very very very beautiful woman called Michelle who you know it's very funny cuz I'm mission she's Michelle and it's just like mission Michelle M squared. It's a very cute thing and she has just embraced South Indianness and often people will say she's just like an Indian as well just she'll she's trying to like learn the language and you know all of this thing and one day I said to her until you learn kind of my language you won't even understand parts of me because the way we even think is so different because I think through that language and through that lens and stuff like that and you know I read once someone and I I can't remember unfortunately who it is, but I read and they said if you are in long-term relationship and you want to spend the rest of your life with a person and they speak a different language, learn that language because if not, you will never fully know them. You know, you will only ever know half of them. And I think that's so true and that comes back to that internal lack of empathy thing you were talking about before that we touched on because even say people who are here I no longer unfortunately speak Malalam and Canada which are in my mother and father tongue but even that of people going oh you don't speak that oh okay so you're not you know it's like you're not Indian or you didn't keep that and I'm like you know again you have to just like have to find yourself in the nuance of that and say it is the Indian communities. There's not always a celebration of the LGBTIQA plus communities. Of course, there is in some places for sure. And I'm very privileged to have a parent who has always celebrated that identity and has always been very open with her own family and friends who have often been quite homophobic or transphobic. And for her to go, we're not doing that. Not my child. you know, been incredibly protective and incredibly just really beautiful. So, I've had that privilege, but not everyone has that. And so, you kind of have to choose, you know, am I choosing this community or this community? Am I choosing this relationship or this relationship? Am I like constantly? And so yes, within communities there's a internal lack of empathy, but also sometimes can happen like internally within yourself as well of like I wish I wasn't queer. You know, some people will say that I wish I wasn't queer because then it'll be easier. And I was like, I wish I'd rather wish that society wasn't like this than wish I wasn't queer, you know? But can you see what I mean? Like that lack of empathy can happen in so many ways. We internalize the lack of acceptance. I think that we get from outside. I often I often feel like, oh, I wish I didn't have an accent, you know, because it would be so much more clear what I say. I would sound smarter, you know. So, I often have as well those internal talks about things that made me who I am are part of my story, but I wish I just could live at the door for specific situations. Sure. And sometimes I say back to people if someone say they can't like I had to learn how to say because you can't say without saying the you know but also in Arabic there are so many ways like your mouth just has to move and do that and when someone can't understand an accent or things like that and you know there are so many people who come to therapy or just friends and you say, "I wish I didn't have this accent." And I'll remind them, someone else not understanding your accent is probably a reflection that they haven't learned and understood the way that sounds more than you should be less. Right? It's such an interesting thing how much we put responsibility on ourselves. But I'm like, hang on, they're like, you know, auditory pallet is not that wide. So why are you then taking responsibility for their lack of having that in their circle? Because if they had say I don't know a French person in their circle and they just heard that all the time it wouldn't even be an issue you know we but we place responsibility I think this is that lack of empathy thing of like or sorry the double empathy problem thing of like even we start doing that the onus of a communication or you know conversation going well we place ourselves in I wish I didn't have the accent rather than I wish you could just understand different accents. Yeah, it's so true. You you think about what's wrong with me, how can I be better, how can I adapt better, how can I speak better, but you never think about how can they understand me better, do they make an effort to understand me better, um are they interested in the fact that I speak more than two languages? So, yeah, it's so on point with the conversation, the double empathy. Something that I want to talk about with you is that because of the limitations of empathy in your practice, you encourage people to prioritize compassion over empathy. Can you share a bit more about that? 100%. Um we at the Iceberg Foundation which is a mental health charity for the queers of the LGBTIQ A+ and the neurody divergent communities our core value is compassion over empathy because there's a sense of I believe in your experience rather than my interpretation of your experience. I can actually just believe you and just have compassion for your experience. So, for example, there's a beautiful meme of an eagle. There are two eagles having breakfast, right? So, I'm going to enact it for you. Two eagles having breakfast. Eagle one is saying, they're reading the paper, right? These are human eagles at this point. Reading the paper, having their coffee, and eagle one goes, "Do you are you ever bothered by Mr. Owl?" And these are both predators, right? Owls and eagles. And eagle 2 goes, "No, Mr. Owl has never bothered me. And then there's this pause for comedic effect. And then eagle one goes, I don't know what Mr. Mouse is on about. And it's like because owls will never bother eagles, but of course they'll bother mice because they eat mice. So when mice go and say to an eagle, actually Mr. Owl is a bloody bully, eagles go, no, I've never had an issue with him. You know, because in that there's a lack of empathy. I cannot understand, say if I was an eagle, I cannot understand a mouse's point of view because I just can't. We're different lives. Right? In the same way, there are some things that white people will never be able to understand my experience as a person of the global majority or a straight person might never be able to understand. This goes back to that double empathy issue we were talking about. they're just not able to because the world looks different and acts different and is different when you have different cultural identity and so if empathy is around I can connect with that and I can really you know have that and understand you can never do that so part of what we say is I just believe you that it sucks or it's really great or it's whatever it is I just believe what it is for you and I have compassion for that that's it, right? I don't have to have been in your shoes. I don't have to try to imagine what it would be like because you're just telling me what it's like for you. And even if we went through exactly the same experiences, doesn't mean I will still understand your point of view. And where we see, you know, for example, twins can go through the same household with the same parents and still have very vastly different experiences of life or navigating the world. We understand that that happens. And so I just find it really interesting when we put so much kind of depth or weight in this thing of if I can connect with it then I can understand you. Why can't you just believe what the person is saying and just come from a place of compassion? I was like, "Wow, I will hold this space for your experiences without me having to kind of come in with my own." I really Yeah, I really like it. And I actually looked up the differences between empathy and compassion. And something that stood out for me was that empathy is really about the ability to understand another person's perspective, their feelings, their experience. As we've discussed, it's definitely selective and limited and you know depends on your ability to identify with or relate to another person. But compassion is more about the response that arises when someone shares their experience with you and the desire to help. So it's more outward focused. It's not inward focused like empathy is and it's directed towards action like it's recognizing the limits of you being able to understand their perspective and focusing on what you can do for them. Yes. And you know sometimes the doing for them is not doing anything but just sitting in silence. Right. There are so many times where people might share a story and the other person goes, "Shit, I don't know what to say. What is the perfect thing to say?" And sometimes it's just the silence of going, "Thank you for sharing." There's actually nothing to say in this moment. I just want you to know that I'm here to support in whichever way. And if that is just sitting in silence or, you know, that's also completely fine. And it doesn't always have to be solutions focused. It can just be a hey here is someone who will listen and I will have a human response for you not a can I understand what would that be like if I was in that position you know because once we start doing that we start making these bold assumptions about what this person's life might be or what they might want or their values whereas with compassion it can be okay wow you know what that's wild or whatever that is and just be in it with them and be present in that. At the same time, if I'm trying to be the devil's advocate, can we do that without some basic empathy? Because I'm thinking that if we don't have this feeling of or this sense of what this person might have been through, isn't there a greater risk of dehumanizing them? I never know how to say it with the accent. And you said it perfectly. Yeah. Did I Okay. Yeah. So, what's your point of view on that? Because when that stops, are you dehumanizing them and their experience as well? It's a great question and I think it kind of goes back to something we've already talked about around that double empathy problem. Whose responsibility is it for that person to have compassion? It's not always one-sided. So, if for example, I share something with you and you're like, I cannot relate. I no idea what you're talking about. It seems like you're from a different planet. Right? If you have that to me and you're like, I actually don't think we both live in the same planet, what I would then say to you is go expand your horizons because clearly your point of view of the world is narrower and this person's experience sits outside that and it's not their job to educate you or expand your horizons for you. It's actually your job to recognize, oh, I don't get it means I'm missing something and so I need to put in the work to just expand my horizons so that I can learn more about it or whatever. Relate to that kind of Yeah. relate to it on human level, right? On a basic level. So, if you look at the trans community, there was someone the other day who said to me, they said, "Did you know that there are people in the trans community that die?" And I was like, like in general, because trans people are also humans and all humans die. So, you know, just from a biological point of view, that's, you know, it kind of happens and they were like, "No, no, no." Like, it can be really unsafe for them. And I was like, "Yeah, have you watched the news lately? You know, have you can you see?" And they were like, "No." Because when I watch the news, none of this comes up for me. So what I said to them, I was like, "Okay, you have noticed a gap in your own understanding of how the world works. And at this moment, you have a couple of choices. You're seeing that the way you thought the world works is being challenged. It's up to you now to go and learn more about it, listen to the voices. You know, I gave them a few people to follow, read about, listen to, look more into. Now, that's their choice if they want to do that or continue to be like, "No, that's not the world or this half half thing that some people do." Of course, there is this person might never be able to relate perhaps to the trans community. probably they might be able to relate to the fact that the world is not always safe for everyone, you know, just like basic human things come back to and I'm hoping that they go away and look and listen and unlearn and relearn and all of these things to come back to, oh my god, life sucks for trans people. But there's also incredible joy in the trans community and trans joy is euphoric. It can be really beautiful. Can you see what I'm saying? in the sense of yes on a basic level there might not be that relatability but you can change that there is a responsibility that can be placed on the person to say okay you've noticed a gap off your pop go do some research get sensitive to their experience I don't know why it makes me think of uh I saw a real the other day of a guy who dressed as a female like he was quite androgen in his features and so when dressed as a female like there there were hours and hours of makeup to make him look like a very attractive lady and he looked stunning, right? And so he was walking the street and he spend the entire day dressed as this very beautiful woman and the way the men were behaving, it made him feel very unsafe. And at the end you have an interview with the guy saying, "Look, I had no idea." And I wish more people were doing that with other different communities that they cannot relate to. 100%. And this is where I come back to using privilege to make space for and there was a great example around whiteness and how to use your privilege of whiteness to fight against racism and racist interactions where people say, "If you're a white person, use your privilege to call out stuff because you're more likely to be listened to than the person of the global majority." Right? as a black person or indigenous person or person of color. And in the same way, just say that this person dressed as a woman for one day and felt unsafe, but then can go back to his usual life. It can just be the, "Oh yeah, I remember that one day." It's very different when that has been your life before you were even born, right? But this is what I mean. This person can never understand what it's like to be a woman. But he can perhaps spend his life being curious but also acknowledging that he's not going to know and then believing and then using his privilege to create safeish and safe enough environments. Do you see what I mean? Like I don't think the goal is to be able to understand everyone because it's not possible. But I do think it is around using privilege and using power to be able to create spaces where communities can self-determined. Now women don't need this man to become a woman to you know understand them if nothing is going to change. If he's not going to hold other men accountable now he just knows that the world is unsafe for women for one day and then what does it change? Right? But if he uses his privilege to go, "No, I know how unsafe it is, how can I just be a part of creating safer places, say for women or whatever that is, it can still go a long way." It makes me think of so many people on social media when they see racism as example, they will say, "Oh, not all white people are like that." Or when they see misogynism and they're going to say, "Oh, not all men do this." you know, and it's like really denying the fact that it is a systemic issue and it's not really about the fact that not all men or not all white are like that. I I just come back to the Maltesers metaphor. Have you heard of the Maltesers metaphor? No, I don't think so. If you're eating a box of Maltesers, you know, like the little chocolate things, and you're eating away, and then someone says to you, "Oh, two of the maltesas in there are actually rabbit shit covered in chocolate." But not all malt tees. Not all malt teasers. So, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. Not all You're going to be a little bit worried. You're going to perhaps approach every single malt teaser with a healthy level of skepticism and worry because you don't want to eat shit literally. So, not all maltes, sure, but enough. It's that sense of again, why can't we just believe being unsafe is problematic and that's it? Then why can't we create spaces that is safe enough for people to exist in without having to go but I don't experience this. Yeah. Okay. That doesn't actually change anything in anyone's life if you say not all men. Great. Status quo kept. Amazing. Well done. I love this metaphor. I've never heard of it but I love it. It's such a good point and it makes me think that encountering truly encountering another person requires the ability to give up on the need to understand them to make their experience yours. It's more about accepting that they are ungraspable that you may never understand what they are going through but yeah believing them anyway. And I think that the belief part is really interesting. I never really thought of compassion about just believing, not experiencing the same things. It's interesting. Another point that I think is interesting in your practice is that you encourage people to invest in joy rather than trauma rather than the difficulties that they are facing. Why is that? This is I love talking about this. I I come back to the way so many societies have have endured and have continued and especially First Nation communities here and black communities. There is so much healing that is done in dancing and singing and being together that is outside of therapy or colonial ways of quote unquote healing right and we've done this for eons eons it's not anything new singing dancing or whatever and I think somewhere along the lines capitalism has forced us to look at things like that through the lens of profitability Human beings just need to be able to move their body and sing and cry and feel and chant and scream and, you know, stomp and dance. And that's that's needed. That's a really integral part of how we move through the world. And when we look at how we approach trauma or how we approach difficulty, there's this sense of We need to tackle it and we need to center it. Martin Luther King said, "You can't drive out darkness with darkness." You know, if you're trying to light up a room and it's really dark, you don't bring in more darkness to try to make it like it doesn't make sense, right? You bring in light. And in the same way, I'm not saying that we don't address trauma or we don't acknowledge that there's deep difficulty in our bones. That's not what I'm saying. in our muscles. What I'm saying is joy is such a way to center healing rather than only ever centering trauma. And when we center trauma, so the questions of what happened to you that shouldn't have happened to you and what didn't happen to you that should have happened for you. What about what went right? What is going right with you? What are the strengths and the stories you hold from your ancestors that have allowed you to be where you are today? You know what how do you find joy? Because joy is also a muscle and unless we exercise it to use that metaphor, it's going to atrophy. A lot of people when they're looking for healing are looking for the ability to reconnect with joy. However, it's kind of saying, I want to go to the gym and I don't know, be able to do 10 pull-ups, but I have a really weak back. And what we would say is, well, start with pull-ups. If you want to go to pull-ups, start with pull-ups. Even if you can't do it well, use all of these different aids, use the bands, use different weights, use the machines and stuff, but actually move towards the pull-up. You see what I mean? And when it's a joy, there's a sense of after I am completely healed and all my traumas are addressing, then I will start moving to joy. And it's like, well, okay, but we're still centering trauma. We're not moving towards joy. Joy just gets further and further and further away rather than that's the healing bit, right? Joy is the way we connect to each other. We connect to ourselves. That's the muscle we build in order to say I am choosing. Yes, there's the trauma, but I'm also choosing to grow this muscle. And two things can be true at the same time. It can be true that there's deep hurt and deep trauma and deep distress and difficulty navigating the world. And at the same time, I can start to grow my muscle of joy. And so when it does come around, I can learn to recognize it rather than seeing it as a red flag or something that's really scary. Because when there is trauma and distress, joy can actually be seen as a really scary thing or as something that is deeply dangerous, right? If we're trying to not get hurt. And so even when joy comes around, sometimes we see it as danger if we haven't engaged with it enough for it to not look like a danger. Give me an example. I'm struggling to understand how joy can be perceived as a danger. Great. I have a great example. Say you have a relationship in which the person was really shit, right? and you've been really impacted by this relationship and you break up and you know can be really really distressed and you start a relationship with someone else but they're a really lovely person and they start doing things that feel really uncomfortable. They say things and you're like why are you saying that? Do you not think I can do it? And they're like oh I'm just asking because I just wanted to know like what that's like for you. One of the thing that often comes up is someone go, "Oh, are you using that?" And the person goes, "Why do you not think I'm going to put it away? Because perhaps in another relationship, you know, that was seen." And they go, "No, I was just going to put it away if you weren't going to." And it's this thing of why? Just the suspicion that comes up. Why are they doing that? Why are they saying that? Because joy has not been there or kindness and care has not been given. when it does come around, it's really difficult to recognize is exactly what it is because we're still holding what happened. Again, not to say that we don't, you know, address what happened. That is absolutely something we do. However, when joy muscles are atrophied, we can see it as suspicious or something that's dangerous. It's linked as well to the trauma bond. All right? When you are trauma bonded, you tend to see other relationships through that lens of the past traumatic relationship and you are unable to see that this is a great behavior, a great person that you have here that could give you a lot of joy. Is that it or Yeah. And but it's a protection, right, of like you're trying to protect yourself from the world and you needed that. And that would have been a really really great clever way of protecting yourself by seeing the red flags. And what our brain does, our brain is geared towards protection because we don't have wings, we don't have claws, we can't run that fast, we our eyesight's not great. like as a species in itself. We're not, you know, we're pretty vulnerable as a species to the world. And so our brain is constantly looking for the threats, the dangers. And when we're in difficult situation, our brain can stop seeing the green flags in life and just start picking up on everything being a red flag. And if we don't actually practice intentionally finding green flags, everything starts looking like a red flag. and everything starts looking like I need to protect myself from this. Again, such a clever and such a wonderful protection mechanism which has kept so many people alive and so many people, you know, out from dangerous situations. It does come from at a cost though, right? It comes at a cost of now everything is painted red and we don't actually recognize the green flags unless we go and intentionally try to look for those green flags. And for me those green flags are joy because if we're looking at centering trauma that will always be the thing that we're trying to find or that'll be the thing that we talk about it's still but if we center joy and healing that is still part of it and we're saying how can we still hold both of those things is true. Yeah. How can they coexist? I love what you say about not waiting for the trauma to be healed in order to re-engage with joy. Yeah, exactly. And there's not much we do that way in life. You know, if I want to say learn a language, there's not a sense of I need to know my language perfectly before I can learn this language, right? Or I need to master every way. we just go, okay, I don't know this language, but maybe I can start small and, you know, learn a few words. If it's me, I learn all the curse words first and then I'm like, okay, now that I know all the curse words in this language, I can maybe start learning how to say hello in this language. You know, it's my priority. Learn all the curse words. It's this being a you start small when you want to learn something, when you want to move to a goal. If I want to, I don't know, run, God only knows why I would want to, but just say my goal was I want to run 10ks. Just know, Emma, that would never be me. But one day I wake up and I want to run 10 kilometers. I would not start by being like, okay, I need to know exactly all the ways to run and all the technique. Maybe you are that person. That's okay. But part of it is, well, then go run. Maybe start walking. Maybe walk and run a little bit. maybe you know build that over time. It's how we kind of move towards a lot of goals in life that you might have. And so healing and joy is I would say very similar. Start center it. Find ways of finding it in different things. It's such a pity because I used to speak French more fluently than I speak English. There was a time I used to dream in French and think in French and whatever and I've completely I've lost it. And I was in the French territories not that long ago and I was like, "Oh god, I can't remember anything." But when I first came back to Australia from France, I would try to keep it alive by like naming all the different things in my house in French or if I was going to order something at a restaurant in my head, I would order it in French first before trying to order it in English or whatever that was. I was trying to keep it alive. I mean that became too hard and not many people speak French here so you know that's fallen to the wayside but it's this thing we know you either use it or you lose it. We understand that as a society for a lot of things but I think we don't always understand that for joy right and sometimes there's a sense of guilt that comes when there's difficulty and this thing of oh I shouldn't feel joyful or I shouldn't feel like we are literally watching a live stream genocide at the moment right and there's so much of this sense of I can't feel joy because but there's this guilt that comes I shouldn't and I remember there's a quote by someone called Dan Savvich who says and this was the height of the HIV AIDS epidemic and he said in the morning we buried our friends in the afternoon we protested and at night we danced and it was the dancing that kept us in the fight you know and so keep dancing and I think that's the point of we need to find joy to keep us in the fight to continue to show up for each other and to continue to advocate and to to keep us in the fight and sometimes I think we we lose that. Yeah. And even more so when we are facing terrible things if you don't have that then I guess you die internally as well. You lose hope which is why ceremony and dancing and chanting and singing and weaving and art and making food together and poetry and expression is so important is so important. But I think capitalism has really robbed that from us and has really made commodified this thing of oh I don't draw well so I'm not good you know and we forget it's not about drawing well it's just about drawing it's not about singing well it's just about singing it's not about you know and if someone thinks well we go oh you should go on a show because you sing so well what about them just singing for the joy of it you know we've commodified so many things that I think it would be beautiful to go back to life is just supposed to be about finding moments of joy within moments of I need to also survive. Do you have any final words of wisdom for migrants out there who are struggling to belong or who are struggling in Australia in some ways? You're not alone. I think that is one. You're not alone. There are so many people who feel this too and who really hold your experience and can really compassionately hold your experience and if you can really connecting with people in different ways might not always be the same ways that you have connected with people but I find sport is a bloody brilliant way And you know, someone might be like, "Oh, I'm really bad at sport." I'm like, "Great, I suck at sport." You know, like, sure, you know, in one sport I was good for a little while, but there were others. I played lacrosse for a long time. I was really bad at lacrosse. I don't, you know, wasn't good, but I played lacrosse, right? And it can be or find a poetry kind of community. Find a community you're interested in and find spaces where you can authentically be yourself because the more you can learn to authentically be yourself, the more you can perhaps learn to authentically connect with others and be held compassionately. That's a beautiful advice. Is there a book or any other piece of content that particularly inspired you that you would like to recommend? I always think it's important to show First Nation voices and there's this book called Firefront and it's First Nation poetry and power today and it's different essays and I just love how much it really comes back to land and connection and I think so many migrants could find those stories of your own connection to land that you might be missing into your own communities and yeah I just find I found a lot of joy reading this book Firef and is there a guest that you would love to hear on this podcast? Yeah, I don't know if you have already had Kiroish. No. Um but I think Ki would be wonderful to have on the podcast. Great. Okay, let's chat after this. So I have two sets of questions that I ask at the end of the interview and the first one is when I say the word migrant what does it evoke in you what words come to mind? Strength, endurance, joy um and deep hope. And my last question which actually might be a set of questions is is about belonging. And as someone who's a bipok immigrant who also identify as queer, non-binary, neurode divergent, like we talked about that you had to code switch quite a bit. So is there a place where you feel like you can authentically be yourself, where you don't need to code switch? It's not a physical place, but it's my marriage, which is really beautiful because I was um talking about this today and all parts of myself are really welcomed and celebrated. And it is also a place where my joy is celebrated and protected. And so yeah, there is deep deep deep belonging, deep belonging and joy in my marriage. I love that. At a macro level, do you feel home in Australia? No. No. Um, yeah, it's an interesting one. I think I I love going back to India a lot and we've talked about maybe moving there. Yeah. But it does feel much more like home there. But even still, I haven't found it yet. I think for a long time for me home was Capoton or like you know around those areas just because I spent so much of my formative years there and but I don't actually know now. For those who don't know, Osagor is in the south of France. That's why you assume that I knew it. Yes. Yes. Sorry. No one knows about Oug is a very good. It's a very good point. So for people who would love to keep in touch with everything that you're doing, where can they follow you and contact you? Yes. So I'm on LinkedIn as Mishkuma Johnson. Not Mishma. I'm only ever called Mishma when I'm in trouble. Oh, sorry. My wife had No, no, no, no. It's so fine. So that's why I just go by Mish because I hear Mishmar and I'm like oh god I have done something. Um so Mishkumar Johnson and also on Instagram Mishkumar Johnson as well great well Mish that was amazing to have a conversation with you. Nara was right. You had so many insights that were so worth discussing and thank you so much for sharing all of these interesting views. I have so much to reflect on. No. And thank you for having me and just, you know, creating the space to yarn and yap and chat and kind of go down rabbit holes and Yeah. Thank you so much. I loved all the rabbit holes that we've had. Thank you. Great. Thanks. [Music] Thank you for listening to this episode. If the story and insights of this brilliant guest resonated with you, please share this episode with a friend, leave us a review or add stars in the ratings of the show. And don't forget to follow us. It helps the community grow. Next week I will be interviewing Nura Mehabi who's a former refugee from Afghanistan and a senior clinician at the New South Wales service for the treatment and rehabilitation of torture and trauma survivors more commonly called starts. She'll be giving plenty of mental health insights for refugee populations. So stay tuned. I was your host, Emma Bilani, and I cannot wait to bring you on another journey from there to here. [Music]
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Healing does not require waiting until trauma is resolved to reconnect with joy; joy is a muscle that atrophies if you do not exercise it, and intentionally moving towards it while difficulty still exists is how you stay alive in the fight.
This conversation includes five countries, one south indian identity, the constant arithmetic of code switching, racist jokes at the pub in ballarat, the myth of australian gratitude, the man at the beach asking where you're really from and peach cultures and coconut cultures.
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