TRANSCRIPT

Gissele: [00:00:00]

Gissele: hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today we’re talking about extraordinary acts of forgiveness and love. Today’s guest is Abdul Munin.

Gissele: Sombat Jitmoud, an educator faith leader and father whose response to unimaginable loss stunned the world in a courtroom in Lexington, Kentucky. After his son was murdered, Dr. Jitmoud publicly forgave the man responsible, embracing him. In choosing mercy over vengeance, what could have been a moment of rage became a living testament to faith, courage, and radical compassion.

Gissele: Abdul Munin.

Gissele: Sombat Jitmoud, Was featured in the National Geographic documentary, the series, the Story of God with Morgan Freeman. Since then, he has traveled internationally speaking [00:01:00] across faith and cultures about forgiveness, healing, and the transformative power of love in the face of violence. Please join me in welcoming Sombat.

Gissele: Hello.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: Good morning from Thailand Gissele.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: my make-believe daughter of the century, 21st century. Thank you. Thank God so much, Allah Almighty, to give us a daughter that have been waiting for 75 years.

Gissele: thank you so much. Thank you for being on the show and for the incredible message that your act has done.

Gissele: I was wondering if you could tell the audience a little bit about the loss of your son and how you came to be in the courtroom that day.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: Yes. I like to go back to, when I marry righteous wife, her name Linda.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: her father from Greece and her mother [00:02:00] are from Germany, so she born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. I came from Thailand from further of my higher education and I earned all of my degree, bachelor degree, master degree, EDS degree and doctorate degree in one of the university. I met this young lady, she’s also the minister of the Christian Church and she feel sorry for me for, she said Sombat, you are so nice person.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: And you, talk so much about God because, at that time I was reading the Holy Quran is my friend, because as a foreign student, you don’t have many friend quickly. So the friend I have on my life is I, I read the holy [00:03:00] Quran, the word of God Almighty. And then she said that I feel sorry for you, that you are such a nice person.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: You are very kind and you’re very helpful to me as a college friend. But, I’m sorry to tell you that you will go to hell fire. She said, I said, Linda, why you said that? We just met and become good friend, college friend because you don’t believe in Jesus Christ our Savior. So as a Muslim from Thailand, Buddhist society, I start to share my faith for a few words because we just first met, we just met a few days.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: She said, Linda, actually as a Muslim, I believe in Jesus Christ, but not as God or Son of God. I believe Jesus Christ is one of the great prophet of Allah who came before Muhammad over [00:04:00] five, 500 years. She was stunned that I believe in Jesus Christ.

Abdul-Munin Sombat Jitmoud: After that, we didn’t see each other. for some time she went to the bookstore and start, reading the Holy, holy Book of Islam, quran in English. She, because she tried to find a mistake in holy, to come and convince me that you see

Ep. 91 – Would you forgive your son’s killer? How one man got beyond revenge.

TRANSCRIPT

Gissele: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. And if you’d like to support this podcast, don’t forget to buy us a coffee at, buymeacoffee.com/loveandcompassion

Gissele: Today we’re talking about relationships and my guests today are

Gissele: Zeke and Terry Mead, who are empty nesters, midlife adventure travelers from the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021. After 25 years of marriage and nearly getting divorced, they accidentally rebooted their relationship and embarked on a new set of adventures.

Gissele: Embracing their differences in challenging themselves to grow individually and as a couple on a daily basis. They couldn’t be more different, but they have a long history, a solid foundation, and a steadfast commitment to making it work as they travel and explore the world mostly together. Please join me in [00:01:00] welcoming Zeke and Terry Mead.

Gissele: Hi.

Terry: Hi.

Gissele: Hello. Welcome to the show. I was wondering if you wanted to tell the listeners a little bit about how you actually met.

Zeke: Terry is the one who usually does it so . Go ahead.

Terry: Yeah, usually I do. we’ve known each other for 45 years. We, yeah, we both grew up in the San Francisco Bay area and when we were in elementary school, there was the gifted and talented education program gate.

Terry: And all of the kids who are part of gate converged at the same school once a month, twice a month for enrichment activities. And I have an identical twin sister. And one month we showed up at a school. Zeke remembers meeting us. I don’t really remember meeting him. But a couple years later, we all went to the same junior high school.

Terry: And so we were in the same classes. And in the eighth grade we went together. For about six weeks. I dumped him. That makes for a better [00:02:00] story if I say that. And then we were friends through high school and if you want the full origin story, we went to different colleges. We dated when we were 21.

Terry: I dumped him again. We dated again when we were 24. I dumped him again and then we were 25. I made a list of everything that I wanted in a man for the rest of my life. And Zeke met all the criteria, except he was essentially the boy next door that I dumped three times. So then we were skiing when we were about 25 and had a little bit too much wine that night.

Terry: And I just said this needs to be the last time and either we’re going to get married or friendship has to be over ’cause we just can’t keep doing this. And 14 months later, we were married.

Gissele: what kept you holding on there? Zeke?

Terry: Insanity.

Zeke: Yeah. When you are 10, 12, 13 years old and you start to develop these relationships with people, you are [00:03:00] your conscious, gloms onto just interesting, specific, different characteristics.

Zeke: And Terry was always someone that was just this person that I was always drawn to. And so whenever our planets would circle back around and come in alignment, it would all be like, okay, so I’m attracted to this person, and let’s see what this is all about this time.

Zeke: And then the counter to that, the joke is Terry’s ability to evaluate things at 25 obviously wasn’t very good.

Terry: I was playing the long game. Really? I was playing

Gissele:

Ep. 90 – A Second Chance at Love: Compassion, Separation, and Reuniting as Partners and Parents with Zeke and Terry

TRANSCRIPT

Robertson: [00:00:00]

Gissele: Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world.

Gissele: Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. And if you’d like to support the podcast, please go to buy me a coffee.com/love and compassion. Today we’re talking about how to become a more compassionate civilization in light of the world’s most recent events. Robertson Work is a nonfiction author, social ecological activist, and former UNDP policy advisor on decentralized government, NYU Wagner, graduate School of Public Service, professor of Innovative Leadership and Institute of Cultural Affairs, country Director, conducting community organizational and leadership initiatives.

Gissele: He has worked in over 50 countries for over 50 years and is founder of the Compassionate Civilization Collaborative. He has five published books and has [00:01:00] contributed to another 13. His most well-known book is a Compassionate Civilization. Every week he publishes an essay on Compassionate Conversations on Substack.

Gissele: Please join me in welcoming Robertson work. Hi Robertson.

Robertson: Hi Giselle. How are you?

Gissele: I’m good. How about yourself?

Robertson: I’m good, thank you. I here in the Southern United States. I’m glad you’re in wonderful Canada.

Robertson: great admiration for your country.

Gissele: Ah, thank you. Thank you.

Gissele: I wanted to talk about your book. I got a copy of it and it was written in 2017, but as I was reading it, I really found myself listening to things that were almost prophetic that seemed to be happening right now. What compelled you to write Compassionate Civilizations at this moment in history.

Robertson: Yes. Thank You you so much, and thank you for inviting me to talk with you today.

Robertson: And I wanna say I’m so touched by the wonderful work of the Matri Center for Love [00:02:00] and Compassion. I have enjoyed looking at your website and listening to your podcast and hearing Pema Chodron speak about self-love. If it’s okay, I’d like to start with a few moments of mindful breathing

Gissele: Yes, definitely.

Robertson: okay. I invite everyone to become aware of your breathing, being aware of breathing in and breathing out. Breathing in the here and in the now. Breathing in love. Breathing in gratitude. I have arrived. I am home. I’m solid. I am free breathing in, breathing out here now.

Robertson: Love [00:03:00] gratitude. Arrived home solid free. Okay. And to your question, after working in local communities and organizations around the world with the Institute of Cultural Affairs and doing program and policy work with UNDP and teaching grad school at NYU Wagner, I felt called to articulate a motivating vision for how to embody and catalyze a compassionate civilization.

Robertson: So each of us can embody, even now, even here, we can embody and catalyze a compassionate civilization in this very present moment. We don’t have to wait, you know, 50 years, a hundred years, a thousand years. we can embody it in the here and the now. So I was increasingly aware of climate change, climate disasters, [00:04:00] the rise of oligarchic, fascism, and of course the UN’s sustainable development goals.

Robertson: I also had been studying the engaged Buddhism of Thich Nhat Hahn for many years, and practicing mindfulness and compassionate action. As you know, compassion is act

Ep. 89 – Creating a more compassionate civilization from our current state of fear with Robertson Work

TRANSCRIPT

Gissele: [00:00:00] was Luther King jr. right? Does love have the power to turn an enemy into a friend. We’re creating an inspiring documentary called Courage to Love The Power of Compassion, which explores extraordinary stories of those who have chosen to do the unthinkable, love and forgive even those who are deeply hurtful.

Gissele: Through their journeys, we will uncover the profound impact of forgiveness and love, not only on those offering it, but also receiving it. In addition, we’ll hear from experts who will explore where the love and compassion are part of our human nature, and how we can bridge divides with those we disagree with.

Gissele: If you’d like to support our film, please go to www M-A-I-T-R-E-C-E-N-T-R e.com/documentary. It’s mitre center.com/documentary Hello and welcome to The Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. [00:01:00] Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today we’re talking about self-compassion in teenagers. And my guest is Dr.

Gissele: Karen Bluth, who’s an associate professor emerita at the University of North Carolina, where she studies how mindful self-compassion improves the mental health of teens and young adults. She’s the author of five books for teens and caregivers, including The Self-Compassion Workbook for Teens and Mindful Self-Compassion for Teens in Schools.

Gissele: In addition, she’s a 2022 recipient of the Inaugural Mind and Life Foundation Award for Public Communication of Contemplative Research. Yay. As a mindfulness practitioner for over 45 years, a mindfulness teacher and an educator with over 18 years of classroom teaching experience, Dr. Bluth frequently gives, talks conducts workshops, and teaches classes in self-compassion in educational and community settings and trains [00:02:00] teachers in mindful self-compassion for teens internationally.

Gissele: Please join me in welcoming Dr. Karen Bluth. Hi, Karen.

Karen: Hi. It’s well. It’s my pleasure to be here. Thank you so much for inviting me.

Gissele: Oh, thank you so much for coming. I think this is a topic that it’s definitely needs to be discussed, and as a mother of two teens, I know the need for self-compassion. I was wondering if you could tell the audience a little bit about how you got started in this work.

Karen: Sure. Well it really takes me back to my teen years. I was in high school, it, I was a senior in high school. It was 1975 and I needed. A topic for an independent study project that I had to do for my English class. and it was due the next day. I was driving down the road. I didn’t have my topic of course.

Karen: I was driving down the road and outta the corner of my eye, I saw a sign that said something about meditation. Tm at that ti at that time it was transcendental meditation. It still [00:03:00] is actually, but I remembered hearing something about meditation in a different class in my social studies class. And there was something about it when we talked about it in that social studies class that resonated with me.

Karen: And I remember thinking, Hmm, that makes sense. So when I saw that sign out of the corner of my eye, I thought, oh, well, let me check this out. So I pulled in. It was this old house I remember, and I went in and I picked up some brochures about transcendental meditation. And talked to the people there and they said, well if you want to be initiated, and I think that was the word they used, come back Saturday at 10 o’clock, I think they said, bring flowers and a piece of fruit.

Karen: So it s

Ep. 88 – Helping Teens Be Kinder to Themselves: Support That Actually Works with Karen Bluth

Gissele: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to The Loving Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today

Gissele: we’re talking about coming back together after estrangement, and I have my good friend, Iona Sky, who is a globally recognized social worker, consultant, and educator whose work is rooted in compassion and systemic change. For over two decades, they’ve helped organizations transform policies and cultures through equity, inclusion and accessibility strategies.

Gissele: Iona inspires leaders and students alike to see compassion, not just as a value, but as a powerful tool for justice. Please join me in welcoming my good friend. Hi Iona.

Iona: Hi Gissele. Thank you for having me here.

Gissele: Oh, you to be a part

Iona: of this.

Gissele: Thank you for being on the show and I’m so grateful to be able to chat with you.

Gissele: I mean, you and I have worked together for many years in the field of child welfare and [00:01:00] we did as we were talking off camera, we did some transformative work around the voices of children and the voices of families and how to work in more empathetic and compassionate ways. You were talking a little bit in your story about estrangement that happened between yourself and your parents, ’cause you’re part of the LBTQ community .

Gissele: I was wondering if you could share a little bit about Helped you make the decision to come back together

Iona: Mm-hmm. Thank you for that question. When people see me and my my mother now, my dad passed nine years ago you know, I think they would, they would be very surprised to hear perhaps that, we did not have any contact for seven years and that that was purely based on, who I am as a person, my sexual orientation, and what my parents’ journey in understanding and what their story was.

Iona: So seven [00:02:00] years of no contact and I got married, my partner had a son, all of these things. And it was actually at my brother’s engagement party. When I was invited, I went by myself and I saw my parents and from across the room after seven years and I looked at them and I, wow.

Iona: And I. I remember looking at them and seeing how they had aged in seven years. And in my heart, I was sad that I didn’t get to be a part of that experience. And I thought to myself, I miss them and I don’t wanna continue in this way. And so I went and gave them a hug and said Hi. And then I went and sat with my sister, and, we didn’t really talk, I don’t [00:03:00] think much that day.

Iona: And then it was a series of really slow steps my brother’s wedding. Slowly starting to communicate via email. And then because my parents they weren’t living in Canada at that time for for periods of time. And so I decided to go and see them and spend some time back home after I separated from my ex-wife because I needed to go back home and just get rooted again.

Iona: Mm. And, and I remember being very nervous. ’cause I’m like, whew, okay, how’s this gonna go? Right? Yeah. ’cause not only have I not seen them, you know, I haven’t been home for a long time. And I saw them at the airport and it was like old times. you know, my family,

Iona: We don’t talk about emotions, [00:04:00] we don’t talk about this kind of stuff, right? Mm-hmm. And, but we show, so for me it’s been learning especially with my son, talk about emotions, those kinds of things. We show us reactions, right? And s

Ep. 87 – GBTQ+ Family Estrangement: How Healing and Forgiveness Bring Us Back Together with Iona Sky

TRANSCRIPT

Gissele: Hello, and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today we’re talking with Rashi Nayar, and she’s on a mission to shift humanity from lower states of consciousness to higher states of consciousness.

Gissele: I’m so, so excited to talk to her today. We’re gonna have a great conversation and she’s gonna do a practice with me. Maybe you can tag along as well. So welcome Rashi. Hi

Gissele: Rashi.

Rashi: Hi Gissele.

Rashi: I’m so honored to be here with you.

Gissele: Oh, thank you so much for being on the show. I’m really looking forward to it.

Gissele: What led you to be on this mission to increase the consciousness of humanity?

Rashi: My own path to increasing my own consciousness, you know, to operate from higher states of consciousness, which is peace, joy, and love. You know, these are actually who we are and we explore that more as we go along.

Rashi: But I was very depressed for 18 years of my life, you know, since [00:01:00] 2007 when I lost my dog and in a car accident. And that was the first time I had experienced unconditional love that way, you know, someone loved me for who I am, not for, I had to prove myself or I had to perform. I had to be someone.

Rashi: I could just be whatever. And he loved me that way, right? And it’s very beautiful to get that type of love from someone in that way. And when I lost him, he was only two years old and he met with a car accident and he died in my arms. But that was like it was like an opening. And it was like my heart broke for the very first time.

Rashi: I had never experienced something like that before and I was grieving, but that was the first time I started asking questions like, who am I? Why am I here? What’s our true purpose? What is God? What is enlightenment? You know, all of that. Because what my soul was longing for was to connect back to that unconditional love that I had experienced from him.

Rashi: But I didn’t know, [00:02:00] I was always looking outside, you know, outside myself. And I entered toxic relationships because I thought that other people were gonna give that to me. I was very disappointed and I was very depressed. I wasn’t chronically depressed. I was depressed, but I was also living in a low, low grade anxiety for a very, like, very long time until 2025.

Rashi: This year when I lost another family member, I lost my aunt to ms. So that episode really shook me to the core and it forced me to sit in stillness with just with myself. Like no more reading books, no more going outwards, right? Because that’s what I always did. I would go to a spiritual retreat.

Rashi: I would, you know, go outwards, read books, do therapies, you know, do coaching. I did a lot of work, technically a lot of healing work, and maybe that was required, but. Nothing really significantly changed. You know, I was still the same. I was [00:03:00] still living with low grade anxiety and I was still the same. And but this time I went inwards and I connected with the part of myself that is infinite, that is peaceful, that is love.

Rashi: And I realized that everything that I thought about myself or the identity that was caring was actually not who I truly was or not, or not who I am. The identities or the masks that I was wearing, you know, the mom, the entrepreneur, and the aunt and the friend, all of those were really masks and identities that I was carrying.

Ep. 86 – Loving All Aspects of Ourselves with Rashi Nayar

TRANSCRIPT

Gissele: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content.

Gissele: Today we’ll be chatting with Deidre Harris, who is a national leadership in highly effective teams development trainer and coach. She supports educational programs looking to enhance their administrative staff’s leadership skills and their teaching teams levels of effectiveness.

Gissele: Please join me in welcoming Deidre.

Deidre: Hi.

Gissele: Hi. Hello. Welcome to the show. Oh,

Deidre: thank you for inviting me.

Gissele: Oh, thank you so much for being here. This is definitely a topic of interest for me. I was wondering if you could tell the audience a little bit about how you got into this work.

Deidre: Oh my gosh. To make a long story, very short that I’ve just been working in the education field for over 35 years [00:01:00] and through all of my very.

Deidre: Various different positions. You know, leadership has just been coming up over and over and over again. And, and what does that look like? As a teacher working with children or as an assistant supporting that teacher or as a director or principal supporting staff. And so no matter what position I was in or what I was doing, leadership was just always, at the foundation of everything we did. So as I stepped out to do my own work, it just kept coming up more and more, and so I said, okay, there’s a need. Let me get out there and help to address it.

Gissele: Wonderful. Wonderful. And what were some of the biggest leadership challenges you saw in the education system?

Deidre: Well, gosh, I have to start with myself, Gissele right? So how did leadership show up in me? And a lot of times we kind of think about it and put it under the category of professionalism, but leadership. Actually goes [00:02:00] beyond professionalism to to be professional, to to show up with that hat, to do the work that you are hired to do in a manner that you know, that gives great outcomes for everybody.

Deidre: That’s just one piece of it. When I go in and I talk about leadership, it’s really about mindset. And so I actually had to work on my own set. Who am I as a leader? And how do I get to show up in that leadership to, you know, to actually, again, get those outcomes that I’m looking for. And so, as I was, you know, as I started doing this work among myself, like I mentioned earlier, I started seeing it.

Deidre: Elsewhere. And what I notice is that again, well, the biggest challenge, or the thing that I notice the most is everybody attributes leadership to a title.

Gissele: Mm. Right? Mm-hmm. So yeah, you’re

Deidre: either your administrator or like I said before. You’re a director or a principal or, you know, sit [00:03:00] somewhere where leadership is part of your, your title in the sense of authority.

Deidre: And so that’s, I would say one of my, my biggest challenges and, and what I noticed and again, what’s, you know, motivated me to do this work because leadership, we’re all leaders. You know, regardless of our title, regardless of what we do, and because I have that belief, then going out there and helping people to see their leadership and then to start standing in their leadership, that’s, that’s been my ongoing challenge in work.

Gissele: Hmm.

Deidre: Yeah.

Gissele: Thank you for that. Thank you

Ep. 85 – Educating from the Inside Out: Leadership, Self-Worth, and Compassion with Deidre Harris

Gissele: [00:00:00] With Martin Luther King, Jr Wright, does love have the power to turn an enemy into a friend?

Gissele: Does it have the power to heal? we’re creating an inspiring documentary, courage to love the Power of Compassion, which explores their extraordinary stories of those who have chosen to do the unthinkable, love and forgive even those who are most hurtful. Through their journeys, we will uncover the profound impact of forgiveness and love.

Gissele: Have not only of those offering it, but also on those receiving it.

 In addition, we’ll hear from experts who will explore whether love and compassion are part of our human nature. And how we can bridge divides with those with disagree with. If you’d like to support our film, please donate a www M-A-I-T-R-I-C-E-N-T-R e.com/documentary.

Gissele: That’s maitricentre.com/documentary. Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion [00:01:00] Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today we’re talking about how love binds us with others, including those of crossed over.

Gissele: We’ll be talking with Rebecca Schaper about communicating with animals on the other side after the sudden and unexpected passing of Rebecca Schaper dog’s. Gus. She consulted animal communicator Sonny Mann, beginning a lengthy and revealing correspondence.

Gissele: Sonny reported her dialogue with Gus in the afterlife at various times throughout the next year. This moving story includes the transcripts of those psychic sessions, along with Rebecca’s notes from her daily journal as she responds to both the earthly and spiritual guidance from Gus. His spirit describes his life in both worlds.

Gissele: He urges her to embrace fully her life contract as a Shamaic practitioner and healer. Please join me in [00:02:00] welcoming Rebecca.

Gissele: Hi, Rebecca. Hi.

Rebecca: Thank you so much for having me. I’m looking forward to this wonderful conversation.

Gissele: Thank you so much for being on the show. Can you tell our listeners a little bit about how you started this journey of, communicating with Gus on the other side.

Rebecca: Sure. 2023. My dog Gus died unexpectedly on December 7th. Mm-hmm. he was six years old. He was my co-pilot. He was definitely my soul dog. It was as though we knew each other in the past life and we communicated to each other telepathically, and of course it broke my heart wide open. To the point where I was worse than losing my parents by suicide and.

Rebecca: I’ve never felt grief like that in my life. So in January of [00:03:00] 2024, which was a month after he had passed away, I decided to reach out to a pet communicator because I knew I needed help. and I knew I could not do this on my own. Normally, I can work through situations. I’ve had some real trauma in my life, which I’m grateful for.

Rebecca: because it’s definitely led me to a lot of love and compassion like your show. But I knew at this point I definitely needed help. So I communicated with Sonny, asked her if she’d be willing to communicate with my dog, Guss. And what she would do is she would, go into some type of trance is the correct.

Rebecca: Word to use, but she was just able to have that strong telepathic connection and she would ask him questions. And then after she was done, I mean it wore her out. She told me, she said, it’s [00:04:00] very taxing on the body. And so after she was done with that first session. I was blown away with what, with what

Ep. 84 – Love Without End: Animals, Mental Illness, and Life Beyond Death with Rebecca Schaper

Gissele: [00:00:00] was Martin Luther King, Jr. Wright, does love have the power to transform an enemy into a friend. We’re currently working on a documentary showcasing people doing extraordinary things such as loving. Those who are most hurtful in this documentary will showcase extraordinary stories of forgiveness, reconciliation, and transformation.

You’d like to find out more about our documentary, www M-A-I-T-R-I-C-E-N-T-R-E com slash documentary.

 Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. Today we’re talking with Larry Rosen about whether enemies can come together in dialogue.

Larry is the founder of a mediation law practice. Through understanding he has helped thousands craft enduring solutions to [00:01:00] crippling conflicts, millions have watched this popular TEDx talk with secret understanding humans whose insights informs the enemy’s project. From 2024, Larry completed writing the novel, the Enemy Dance, posing the question, must the society riven by tribalism descend into war or can it heal itself?

Larry is a graduate of UCLA School of Law, where he served as editor of the Law Review and received numerous academic awards. Growing up, Larry was both the bully and the bullied. The one who was cruel and the one who was kind, he was sometimes popular. And sometimes friendless. He had many fist fights with kids who became his friends.

He had his very own chair at the principal’s office. He believes that his peacemaking today is born out of the callousness and empathy that he knew as childhood. [00:02:00] Please join me in welcoming Larry.

Hi,

Larry.

Larry: Hi there. That, it’s funny because that la last piece that you read about my, you know, the, the principal’s office that’s on my website, I’ve never had someone read that back to me and it brought me a little bit to tears, like, oh, that poor kid.

Yeah, I, I don’t hear that very often. So anyway,

Gissele: yeah. Oh, I really loved it when I saw it, and I could relate to it because I’ve also been both. when we hurt other people, we wanna be forgiven, but when people hurt us, you don’t always wanna forgive, right?

Mm-hmm. So it gives you the different perspective. I’m so thrilled to have you on the show. And how I actually came to know about your project is, so I’m a professor at a university and I teach research and ethics. And, what I had discovered about my students is that many of them don’t come with the ability to do the critical thinking, to be able to hold both sides.

Many of them come thinking there’s gotta be a right answer, and there’s a right way of doing things. Just tell us what the answer is. [00:03:00] And so for my students, I get them to write a paper where they tell me the things they feel really strongly about.

Then they’re researching the opposing perspective using credible sources. because trolls are easy to dismiss, right? So credible sources, the opposing perspective, and then they are supposed to, so tell me what are their main points? You know, like why do they believe what they do? And and are you really that different?

Right? And then the last part of the paper is. Talk about the emotions you feel and throughout the year I prepare them in terms of being able to handle it. So I teach them mindfulness, I teach them self-compassion so that they can hold because it’s really difficult to hold posing perspective. What? It’s research and ethics.

 I do it for my, ’cause one of my research interests is compassion. And so, and I was a director of one of the departments I had was hr. And wh

Ep. 83 – The Enemies Project: How to Have More Compassion In a Divided World

TRANSCRIPT

Gissele: Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content.

Today we’re talking with Barry Adkins after losing his 18-year-old son, Kevin, to alcohol poisoning. Barry saw that he had two choices. He could curl up in the corner and allow himself to become a victim, or he could get out and tell as many people as possible about what happened to his son, Kevin.

Barry chose the latter in an effort to raise awareness of the dangers of binge drinking. Barry set out on an Epic 1400 mile journey on foot from Arizona to Montana. His son’s ashes in his backpack, stopping at numerous schools, churches in treatment facilities along the way to share his story. Larry’s presentation describes in powerful detail the night his son died.[00:01:00]

The quiet morning that he got the knock on the door and how he came up with the idea to walk from Arizona to Montana.Barry’s message is both powerful inspiration and a warning about the consequences of even one night of binge drinking.

Barry has shared his story with over 200,000 students and parents. He has been a featured speaker at numerous high schools, community events, and town hall meetings. Barry has also been featured in numerous media outlets, including Reader’s Digest, the Dr. Gina Show and the Leon Fonte Show. Please join me in welcoming Barry.

Hi Barry.

Barry: Oh, thanks for having me on. Gissele

Gissele: Ah, thank you for being on the show.

I was wondering if you could share with the audience a little bit about the story of your son’s passing and how that led you to actually decide to become this powerful messenger on the dangers of pitch drinking.

Barry: Well, Gissele, I probably should start by kind of telling you, you know, what led up to that.

[00:02:00] Yeah, let’s start with that. So he had just graduated from high school. He struggled in high school. He was actually flunking his English class in March of his senior year in high school. And he needed it for graduation, right? Mm-hmm. And I would always talk to him about it and, you know, he would tell me to quit bothering him about it.

He’d take care of it. But at the end of the day, he did graduate, and I remember at his high school graduation ceremony, he gave me a hug and whispered, thanks for not giving up on me, dad.

Gissele: Hmm.

Barry: And shortly thereafter suffice to say he saved up enough money and I agree to co-sign a loan so he could buy a new truck.

And if you have listeners that work at dealerships, I apologize, but I have a healthy dislike for that process, right? Mm-hmm. Because they’re gonna try to sell me something I don’t want or need. He found one of the dealerships, so I gotta go in and sign papers, right?

Gissele: Mm-hmm. I

Barry: sit down in the, the dealerships.

You know, in their [00:03:00] office, and the first thing this guy says to me is, how about some life insurance? And I’m like, 18-year-old boys don’t need life insurance. They don’t die. But I was wrong. They do die. He wouldn’t live long enough to make a single payment on that truck. So a few weeks later.

I remember him sitting down in our living room and talking about how he couldn’t believe his life was finally beginning and he wanted to move out, and I did my best to discourage him because we honestly never really had any problems with him. His high school principal didn’t even know who he was. I didn’t have any luck talking out of it.

So a couple weeks later, his buddy Craig came over and they sta

Ep. 82 – Transforming Grief Into Love with Barry Adkins

Love and Compassion Podcast-Where Gissele talks with everyday exceptional people
who have overcome adversities and have wisdom to share.

Gissele Taraba

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