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Identity, Empathy, and Power with JD Valadares Williams #56
38 Plays19 days ago
Description:
JD Valadares Williams joins the hosts to explore how emotional intelligence shapes the way we connect, lead, and advocate for change. Drawing from their upbringing in Peru and experiences with migration, JD shares how empathy is built through lived experience rather than logic alone. The conversation highlights how emotional storytelling—rather than debate—can shift hearts and minds, especially in movements for LGBTQ+ rights. JD also reflects on their work with queer youth and the importance of helping people feel seen, valued, and historically grounded. Listeners walk away with a deeper understanding of how emotions drive both personal growth and collective change.
Guest descriptors:
Insightful, Empathetic, Challenging
Episode tags:
#SexWorkAdvocacy #HarmReduction #queeridentity #communitybuilding #Carcerality #socialjustice #mutualaid #DEI #equity #activism
Tags again:
#SexWorkAdvocacy #HarmReduction #queeridentity #communitybuilding #Carceralit #socialjustice #mutualaid #DEI #equity #activism
Tags again:
#SexWorkAdvocacy #HarmReduction #queeridentity #communitybuilding #Carcerality #socialjustice #mutualaid #DEI #equity #activism
Recommended
Transcript
Emotional vs Rational: The Human Connection
00:00:00
Speaker
What I've learned from all of the work I've done is that humans are not rational beings. Humans are emotional beings. And so when we try to reason our way to acceptance with people, it doesn't necessarily work. Where someone is able to see, wow, you cared for your partner when they were sick the same way I cared for my partner when they were sick. It completely removes the rational part and it connects to the emotional. Rather than this logic of, of course everybody should have the same rights because there's no there's nothing tying that person to that at the root.
Podcast Introduction & Guest Excitement
00:00:35
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Power Beyond Pride, a weekly queer change-making podcast bringing you voices and ideas from across our fierce and fabulous spectrum to transform our world.
00:00:47
Speaker
I'm Kenyon Farrell, writer, activist, communications nerd, and super happy to be here with our guest and my co-host. ah I'm super happy to be here with you too, Kenyon, all the way from California. So very excited, very excited.
Meet J.D. Valadares-Williams: Emotional Intelligence Coach
00:01:04
Speaker
I'm Shane Lucas, he, him, his, and I am a harm reduction activist, owner of a great idea, and lately been dancing to random obscure pieces of vinyl like 1970s Egyptian disco.
00:01:15
Speaker
So i'm I'm really like living into the, just the absolute amazing sounds of this world. And I'm excited about today's conversation very much. Kedin and I are your hosts on today's QueerCast journey. and We'll be talking with emotional intelligence and awareness coach, J.D. Valadares-Williams.
00:01:31
Speaker
And they are an instructional designer, content writer, and my favorite beautiful storyteller. and Their expertise lies in enabling individuals to gain awareness of their emotions, evaluate how emotions influence their actions, and to understand the impact they have on others.
00:01:45
Speaker
So a lot of great conversation today. So please join me in welcoming the wonderful J.D. Valadares-Williams. Hello, hello, everyone. Thank you. Happy to be here. We are very thankful to have you here with us on this episode of Power Beyond Pride. So to get us started, i just want to say I'm really intrigued.
00:02:01
Speaker
How does one become an emotional intelligence trainer?
Coping Mechanisms & Daily Emotional Intelligence Practice
00:02:05
Speaker
And how did life equip you into getting into that space to begin with? Yeah, oof, loaded questions already right from the start.
00:02:13
Speaker
we we We don't hold back. We don't hold back. We can get right to it. Yeah. I would say first, for me, the emotional intelligence training or becoming an expert in this field, researching it. And I even hate using the word expert because I'm really just trying to practice it every day. And some days it works, some days it doesn't.
00:02:33
Speaker
But it really came out of a necessity of a lot of the I would say ways in which I was coping when I was younger weren't necessarily helping me succeed.
00:02:45
Speaker
Sometimes they were holding me back. Things like not being able to receive feedback and really understand what it's about or not being...
00:02:56
Speaker
able to control my emotions under a moment of stress and really be able to think clearly. So to me, it was, I grew up with a lot of just repress your emotions or the way that you solve problems is through just brawling it out with somebody.
00:03:15
Speaker
So I really had to shift the way I was navigating the world because I wasn't going to get to where I want to get to. if I kept using the same old coping methods.
00:03:27
Speaker
I mean, I think that's powerful because, again, i I think my favorite, I was not a big fighter in in school, but I always imagined like Footloose fighting or get a little West Side Story, like Dance It Out. But that always, but I love the idea you're talking about, like, hey, this is a way we can respond to violence. This is a way by not, by finding other challenges, by other ways or other other strategies to to to respond to trauma. When your video series, Fearless Communicators, you reference your childhood, just like you shared now. And it's in Peru, right? Can you share a little bit about growing up in Peru and kind of that influence it's had on you?
Growing Up in Peru: Empathy & Global Conflicts
00:03:59
Speaker
Yeah. So I moved to the States when i was 11. And so before that, I lived in Lima, Peru with my family. And one of the reasons why we migrated to the U.S. was because this was a very unstable time in Peru. There was a lot of civil unrest.
00:04:18
Speaker
It was during the terrorism era of The Shining Path. So not only was it uncertain in economic ways, but it was also uncertain as far as your safety.
00:04:30
Speaker
Two blocks away from where I lived was a police station right across the street from where I went to school. And, and one night it was just like, there was just this big boom. And then all of you see, all of you see is just like this cloud, this red cloud in the sky. And like the, the apartment windows have shattered and everybody's waking up and i have no idea what's going on because I'm like seven, eight years old.
00:04:57
Speaker
But what has happened at the time was that the terrorist group set up set up a car bomb right outside of the police station. And so that's the explosion that we heard at night.
00:05:10
Speaker
And then the next day, going to school was such a surreal experience because it was seeing like the police station no longer there.
00:05:21
Speaker
The tennis courts that were next door completely gone as well. And parts of my school sectioned off because remains and things had blown and kind of landed in parts of the school as well.
00:05:37
Speaker
So I say this to say that sometimes we are really removed from experiences around the world and conflict, but having experienced something like that, and even though it was just that one time for me, that discomfort, that pain, that whatever you want to call it, has made me connect to people in other parts of the world that are experiencing things specifically right now.
00:06:04
Speaker
So I think my upbringing in Peru was very important for who I am today because it taught me a lot of empathy for those that I don't know their conditions or their resources. And I can hold back judgment and instead think of how can I just empathize with these people.
00:06:22
Speaker
Thank you for sharing that. I think just hearing your experience with that kind of of really kind of traumatic experience brought about by kind of political instability or that that kind of that level of violence. And we obviously know that that is happening in many parts of the world. And and even in our current U.S. context, one could certainly talk about school shootings and shootings.
00:06:47
Speaker
And these sort of dynamics or or even what ICE is trying to do in schools in terms of pulling kids out of classes and and whatnot is producing that level of of violence. So I'm just curious to know also, what is your experience um doing this work, particularly with LGBTQ youth and how your work around kind of emotional intelligence is also kind of working within the context of our community and youth?
A Non-linear Career Path: From Biology to LGBTQ Advocacy
00:07:13
Speaker
Yeah, it's funny because the way I've gotten to work in an emotional intelligence hasn't been linear at all. It all, it's all connected by learning and being really interested in behavior.
00:07:25
Speaker
Like my first job out of college, I, I studied biology because I wanted to be a doctor and then realized that I did not want to be a doctor, but I started doing human behavior research at Columbia University's medical center.
00:07:39
Speaker
And i I just really wanted a job out of college, but I started working at the HIV center and I started working with LGBT folks, particularly we were focusing on gay man sex workers and the transgender population to reduce their incidence of HIV.
00:07:57
Speaker
So it was a lot of behavioral work and that made me actually have to go out there and interact with my community. and learn about them, specifically those that are maybe sometimes is a franchise from the rest of the community.
00:08:12
Speaker
ah So I realized that there was a lot of work to be done there. But I also at the time found that there was, there's always a lot of ah bureaucracy that gets involved in research and grants and investments. And so I saw that sometimes if somebody's election was coming up, they would not want their name attached to something that was funding research for sex workers, right? Even though that's the population that really needed help So I decided to kind of disillusioned with research. I kind of went off to Madrid and said, I'm going to teach English in Spain and just travel the world.
00:08:50
Speaker
And I fell in love with teaching, but eventually i had to move back home. And when I moved back home, I realized I want to work with the LGBT youth population in schools. And so that's really how my work started.
00:09:03
Speaker
with LGBT youth because it was we are all feeling pretty lost sometimes alone confused as adults when we're more just thrust into the world and it's what if we were able to connect with each other before we get there or what if we equip these kids with some of the tools that would help them feel better about themselves, feel worthy of things. And to me, that is part of emotional intelligence, the self-awareness to know that you are worth a lot, that you contribute lot to society. But somebody has to help you figure that out and also teach you your history, teach you what your community has done before you were even here and the things that
00:09:46
Speaker
They won't teach you in school, but are definitely part of your culture and your history that are going to make you feel worthy of things. Are there ways that communities can respond? Because we're seeing, whether it's censorship in the schools, preventing young people from having access to just queer narratives, right? To just be able to see themselves.
00:10:04
Speaker
Are there things that people can do to to shift in their in their local communities these conversations so that there is more of a conversation about queer youth and how they can how they can come into community, come into their own, be seen? Is there something that you've experienced in your work that you think are like, hey, if more people knew this,
00:10:22
Speaker
it would be so much easier for us to get some of this some of this accomplished.
Changing Perceptions Through Emotional Connections
00:10:25
Speaker
Yes, I think that what I've learned from all of the work I've done and just even studying human behavior is that Humans are not rational beings. Humans are emotional beings.
00:10:38
Speaker
And so when we try to reason our way to acceptance with people, it doesn't necessarily work. And there's research that has been done about this. the Before same-sex marriage was legal at the federal level in the U.S.,
00:10:54
Speaker
There was, i remember, four states were voting on the same day to see if they were going to pass this bill. And the l LA LGBT Center, ahead of this vote, decided to do this canvassing, but they called it deep canvassing, where they sent out LGBT folks from door to door to talk to people, but just talk to people about their experiences, their life, their connection to their partner.
00:11:22
Speaker
And so what they found was that once you get to that emotional connection with someone, where someone is able to see, wow, you cared for your partner when they were sick the same way I cared for my partner when they were sick.
00:11:36
Speaker
It completely removes the rational part and it connects to the emotional. And they found that when they would follow up with these people 90 days later, those sentiments were still there. They didn't go away because they were tied to this emotional connection rather than this logic of, of course, everybody should have the same rights because there's no there's nothing tying that person to that at the root.
00:12:00
Speaker
can i Can I ask a question? i want to I'd like to follow it up with question just because in the current state where there's so much attacks on immigrant refugee communities, and as somebody who immigrated to the United States as ah as a young person, do you feel like that's a place that that queer people have dropped the ball because queer people haven't necessarily been invested in that movement and that there there may be opportunities there to for for queer people to develop a stronger empathy when it comes to conversations around immigrant refugee rights?
00:12:28
Speaker
Oof, that's a lot. I would say though, i would say we can always do better. What I mean by that is specifically thinking about the US.
00:12:40
Speaker
Yes, we have same sex marriage, but trans people still don't have rights in many states. So it's what is a priority here? So to me, it's is the priority helping people of this community knowing that there is this huge intersection between immigration, refugees, and LGBT people, and that a lot of times you are escaping anti-LGBT violence. So I think there's always more that could be done, but I think people have to be really intentional in calling that out within our community.
00:13:15
Speaker
i think a lot of times it's just kind of, well, maybe we'll support it from afar, or yes, we're kind of worried about that, but since it's not us, then it's not really a priority. Yet, that's what we always tell other people. One day it'll be you. So we need to be to do the priority, but we don't necessarily act the way we're preaching what we're saying. Yeah. Yeah, I wonder, a lot of your work, or I would imagine around sort of emotional intelligence, partially involves helping people to be more empathetic, right, to people that they are different from or situations that they may be different and how you really develop that ah deeper deeper level of of compassion and empathy.
00:13:56
Speaker
and You've worked with LGBTQ youth, you've worked in kind of nonprofit settings, but you've also worked in corporate settings, right?
Teaching Empathy in Capitalist Systems: Leadership Success
00:14:03
Speaker
And I i would venture to say that corporate CEOs or the C-suite of corporations aren't necessarily viewed as the most empathetic people um to sometimes their workers and and corporations or to the larger public, etc.
00:14:20
Speaker
How do you see that work, I think, with folks in sort of the business or for profit sort of or or in corporate spaces and the being able to sort of do the development of empathy, et cetera, with with folks who, again, are are usually looking at very hardcore bottom lines around profits?
00:14:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's always going to be an uphill uphill battle to try to teach people practice empathy in a capitalist system where profit is the ultimate outcome and not necessarily other people.
00:14:59
Speaker
So what I found, and I learned this during my time in working in the diversity inclusion field, because before emotional intelligence, I was doing diversity inclusion work because I did want to see our workplaces change.
00:15:12
Speaker
But I realized that, um, maybe the way we' we're going about it wasn't as, wasn't reaching the people that I personally wanted to reach, which are these leaders, these executives, or maybe the people that as soon as they see a training about bias, or I'm not going to that, I don't care about that. It's, I'm looking to reach those people. So how do I reach those people in a capitalist system?
00:15:36
Speaker
It has to be what's in it for them. So to me, it's Do you want to be a good leader or a great leader? Because great leaders are self-aware. Great leaders are able to empathize because then they know when something's up with one of their employees and are able to catch that before it becomes a huge fire. And so it's maybe empathy is not important to you.
00:16:01
Speaker
As far as like caring about other people, but maybe empathy is important to you as far as your success in this business. And unfortunately, if you don't like it, it's going to be to your detriment because people would rather work with somebody they like than somebody they don't like. If they have the choice, they're always going to pick the other person.
00:16:22
Speaker
Very true. And with that, it's time for us to take a quick break. But please stay tuned to this emotional episode of Power Beyond Pride, where we are in conversation with J.D. Valadius Williams. And we'll be right back.
00:16:42
Speaker
Welcome back. This is Power Beyond Pride, a queer change-making podcast. And I'm Shane Lucas, here with my fantastic co-host, Kenyon Farrell. And JD, so glad you could join us today and really share about your experience as ah as an expert in emotional intelligence. Obviously, you bring a lot of lived experience, a lot of learned experience in this mix. And you stated that your role in this life is to challenge the way that people think, which is really powerful. I know it's It's it's one of the one of the things that I adore about you. It's also one of the things that secured you a We Create Space Award. So I want to acknowledge that and your incredible, you know, that incredible acknowledgement.
00:17:18
Speaker
How has your experience as a queer neurodivergent Latino shaped the role you play in that conversation around challenging the way people think? Yes, so I do say that i I like to challenge norms and that's because I i have no choice, I feel, and in this world but to challenge those norms because so many times I've gotten a resistance for something I wanted to you because of some norm.
00:17:48
Speaker
And so I say that because growing up, I wanted to both play the sports and and do the cooking and the sewing and the baking and those things. And I wasn't allowed to do both. Or when I wanted, i remember for Christmas, a hot pink bike my dad put up a lot of resistance or like suggesting maybe you want to get another color.
00:18:12
Speaker
I'm very appreciative that in the end he did get me that bike, but it ended up creating a lot of animosity around my dad for making that decision. And so from young, from early on,
00:18:26
Speaker
I knew that I wanted to challenge these s norms because they made no sense. And as I got older, I realized that, oh my God, everything in the world is made up. Like our gender is made up, right? ah but Not gender, but like our, the way in which we say like male and female, it's yes, that's great, but biology is so diverse, that there's so much variety even within that, that we can't pare it down to that.
00:18:51
Speaker
When I think of ways in which our norms just sway with the wind, depending on whoever did Dix Hastings, right? Like heels were originally designed for Persian soldiers to be able to stand up on horses and be able to shoot arrows.
Questioning Societal Norms: High Heels & Beyond
00:19:08
Speaker
And then eventually the nobility in Europe, when they were starting doing trading, saw these shoes and they thought, oh, we can be taller than everybody else. So, you know, we're going to start wearing these.
00:19:19
Speaker
And then the trend caught on and then everybody started wearing them. So then Louis the fourteenth was like, only the nobility can wear the shoes with a red sole. which is where Christian Louboutin comes from. But it's all of this to say that now we connect heels to women when originally they were designed for soldiers.
00:19:41
Speaker
And so everything that we have in our society is made up. And unless we challenge it, whenever we're put against the wall of you can wear heels, it's what do you know about heels actually?
00:19:53
Speaker
Do you know what they were for? So I think that's how I like to challenge norms through unpacking the history that's already there, but that we just forget about and then repeat it. No, it's really powerful. and And that your father, that you had this sort of conflict with with your father at at se young such a young age, sounds like it kind of formed this, hey, i I'm being told that what i what I want to experience in this world isn't isn't in alignment with what everybody else expects. Were there other people in your household who did kind of, were ah safe space for you, did provide that space of affirmation?
00:20:28
Speaker
Yeah, that person was my grandma, my my dad's mom. after After my mom passed away when I was seven, that was the I'd say that was a really difficult time for my dad. and Now as an adult, I realize that losing the partner, the love of your life in your early twenty s can do a lot of damage. You can like being in an adult, having studied psychology, understanding trauma, grief. Now I can see it.
00:20:55
Speaker
But as a kid, I was just a kid. And so I saw that this person that's supposed to lead me is kind of disengaged. And so I really tied myself to my grandma and she just so happened to be a very understanding person for me because to everyone else, like She was a little scary to other people because she was a very strong woman who didn't take crap from anybody.
00:21:22
Speaker
And so she was like kind of my greatest defender in in the household. And I would be able to bake things and also sew and things like that when she was around.
00:21:34
Speaker
And those are memories that are very vivid in my mind of I was so happy here. i was so happy in this moment. So one of the things I'll bring up something that just kind of happened in the break. us but We were kind of talking about, Shane asked you about the pronunciation of Valladere and whether we were getting it correct or not. And you said, well, it's actually not really my name. so And we could talk about it. So I'm just curious, since she you gave us permission and Being a queer podcast, we do love a little bit of tea. So, um, so if you could talk to us about that, about your, yeah about your name and, and having a different either a professional name or, or sort of how that, how that happened.
00:22:20
Speaker
Yeah, we have such different connections to our names. And I feel like sometimes we don't even maybe explore what that means. To me, my last names have always had an impact on how I've navigated life first.
00:22:38
Speaker
Because living in Peru, there is unfortunately still this bias depending on what type of last name you have. And so, you know, you're seen as lower on the totem pole. If you have an indigenous last name, you're seen as a little bit higher up if you have a Spanish last name.
00:22:56
Speaker
And if you have a British or German last name, then that's even higher up. And so for me in school, having a Spanish last name and a British last name, I was treated differently just based on last name alone, which was then a really interesting experience moving to the US where we don't use both of our last names, right? In Latin America, you use your father's last name and then your mother's last name. You use both.
00:23:23
Speaker
Here, they just cut it down to the first and the first is Spanish. And here, that meant a totally different type of treatment that wasn't that great. But the other part of the last name that also had an impact on me growing up is that my dad only has sisters.
00:23:41
Speaker
And so I felt as an only child, it was my responsibility to continue the family's last name. And for a long time, that took a toll on me. That was the pressure. Until I started researching our last name and our roots and thinking about, well, where did this come from?
00:23:58
Speaker
And then tracing it back to my dad's part of the family. My grandfather's part of the family is Afro-Peruvian. And so. It's not their last name. It was at some point they were given this last name by whoever at some point owned part of my dad's family.
00:24:18
Speaker
And so once I realized that we didn't have an actual connection to this last name that comes from Galicia, I realized this is all again made up by society and I don't actually have any obligation to this last name, but also it doesn't really mean much to me. And so when people mispronounce my last name, it doesn't have the same effect that it did before because it's to me, I just see it as it's not even mine.
00:24:50
Speaker
I don't know where it came from and it makes me feel better not to be tied to it too. I mean, that's really powerful. i know for a lot of people that they they do have expressed, I changed my last name. So I kind of understand that relationship to the the name you may have been come into from your family and then your own relationship to it and and kind of how you want to frame your relationship to it And I think for many in the queer community, there is often this conversation about what legacies I want to carry with me, how I want to approach my existence with that legacy.
Intentionality & Personal Values
00:25:20
Speaker
Like that journey that you've had now as an adult, do you do you think about the way that you approach that conversation about ownership of queerness incontin in communities where you are? It's like, hey, there's this idea about what it is to be normalized, to sort of get into these spaces as a queer person and what people expect. And because you're talking with organizations and you're talking with companies, like they're coming in with some preconceived ideas about how how this works.
00:25:46
Speaker
So are there strategies you're using to say, hey, they're like the rules that you're applying don't necessarily always apply to those of us who have come through processes where we've made choices, we've been intentional.
00:25:59
Speaker
Has that intentionality influenced your own instruction and workshop creation? That's definitely a conversation I've had with my therapist. And then whatever I've learned from those experiences, I've tried to share with others on how I've worked through it.
00:26:15
Speaker
I think every space we walk into, it's a performance, no matter where we are, whether, ah sure, there are differences in how we might code switch if a space might not be as friendly or open or safe.
00:26:31
Speaker
But we are always shifting a little bit of our behavior depending on who we are around. We're not the same around our family a lot of the time as we are around our closest friends.
00:26:42
Speaker
That's not the same as when I show up to the office and I'm supposed to do a training, right? I'm supposed to be more formal. So I think up to a degree, all ah the spaces in which we go into, we're putting up an act.
00:26:54
Speaker
So I think what matters is through that act, are you ever feeling like uncomfortable or cringe about the alignment between what you're putting outside versus inside?
00:27:09
Speaker
I think to me is what's important. It's not, I don't need to tell everybody that I'm queer and that I'm an immigrant and all of these things. But if I'm in those spaces and somebody says something negative about them, I am going to challenge it.
00:27:26
Speaker
And so it's maybe I'm not showing up super intentional about being visible, but I am sticking to my values if something in that space contradicts them.
00:27:37
Speaker
So I think that's the intentionality that I would encourage others to have that. You don't have to be the loudest or most outspoken person in the room, but you do have to speak up if something isn't aligning with your values.
00:27:51
Speaker
Well, let's take a short break here and please stay with us because we'll be back in a minute to share some fun facts, plus a speed round of questions to get to DoeJD a little bit better. so come back and join us here at Power Beyond Pride.
00:28:11
Speaker
Welcome back to Power Beyond Pride. And I am here with my amazing co-host, Kenyon Farrow. I'm Shane Lucas, and we're here with the fantastic and talented emotional awareness guru, J.D. Valladere Williams.
00:28:25
Speaker
Thank you, JD. So before the break, you were talking about emotional, not the emotional challenges, I'm sorry, but you were talking about code switching and and how to sort of how we show up in different spaces. And a lot of the work, particularly in the kind of DEI space, diversity, equity, and inclusion,
00:28:46
Speaker
is often a way to help kind of institutions understand how different people based on culture or gender or et cetera show up in workplaces and can still be valuable even if they don't kind of hold the norms of whatever the dominant kind of culture or space is, right? I'm paraphrasing. I'm not a DEI expert. I'm just spitballing here. But given that, I'm curious to know with this current, the Trump administration and just a general kind of right wing push back on DEI programs and protocols.
DEI Challenges: The Shift to Emotional Intelligence
00:29:21
Speaker
And, you know, it made a lot of companies, organizations and even schools either streamline or completely do away with all of their DEI protocols or programs. How has this impacted your work in this space?
00:29:36
Speaker
Yes. So I saw this sentiment coming for a while. i think all of the signs were leading there. And so that is one of the reasons why I switched from that the diversity inclusion work that I was doing and opened up my own consultancy and focusing on emotional intelligence.
00:29:53
Speaker
It was also the going through that experience as a facilitator and trainer to other people that I found it wasn't helpful or good for me on the training end either.
00:30:06
Speaker
Because a lot of times what happens is people of color are put into these positions of DEI work because it's kind of like, well, that's who we should have. And then it's, okay, let's have them train the other people on, know,
00:30:21
Speaker
how to spot their bias or how to avoid microaggressions and whatnot. And what we don't talk about enough is the toll that that takes on the trainer or facilitator to be exposed over and over again to invalidations, to resistance when it's connected to your identity, to your culture.
00:30:45
Speaker
And so I found the work to be very harmful to me as queer person of color. in the way that we were doing it. And so to me was, how do I continue doing this work, but from a place where I feel safer, where I feel more protected.
00:31:04
Speaker
And to me, that was going back to my roots of having studied biology and psychology. I thought, well, what if I've approached this from a scientific lens? What if I bring data? What if I talk about the human body and the hormones and the brain and all of this that impacts your human behavior?
00:31:21
Speaker
And you can't see it as an opinion because a fact. It's science. And so to me, it was a way to protect myself by still trying to get people to get to the same outcome, right? The outcome was for people to be aware of themselves and how they were maybe being judgmental of others. So I'm not calling a training spotting your bias, but I am calling a training being aware of your emotions a leader when you have to make important decisions. And so...
00:31:51
Speaker
Yes, you might not care about bias, but you care about being in control when you're making decisions. And for that, you have to be aware of your emotions and how they're dictating what you're saying about this person versus it's this other person.
00:32:03
Speaker
To me, it's I'm getting to the same outcome of you spotting that there is a difference between these two, but I'm not going to call it bias because I know I'll lose you the moment I use that word.
00:32:14
Speaker
I mean, it so it seems, again, a really great way to invite people in who, and you talked about this earlier, a little bit of discomfort and now managing that discomfort is simply by also reframing the conversation in such a way as to say, hey, like we we all share challenges in decision making and there's going to be things that impact us in that process. So I really, i think there's a lot of power in what you're sharing. So thank you for that.
Speed Round: Personal Tidbits & Favorites
00:32:37
Speaker
now Now is the time, though, that we are going to get to know you even better. So, J.D., are you ready for a speed question round where we're going to ask you some questions and you don't take a lot of time to think about it? Like, we just want the first thing that pops off top of your head.
00:32:52
Speaker
yeah Great. yeah What could go wrong? what What could go? Nothing. Nothing could go wrong. every we're we're bringing our full selves into the room. So we're were we're all here. Are you ready to do this?
00:33:06
Speaker
Ready. All right. Perfect. So first question, do you hit snooze? And if so, how many times? A good five to 10 times. Five 10?
00:33:17
Speaker
Wow. Yeah. I love it. Do you have like down? There's a lot of judgment in that response. Just pointing that out. There's no judgment. There's no judgment. I just want to know if it's worn down on the button. like I want to know if you're like, have you worn it? Well, no, now it's on the phone. So now it's just. Oh, there you go. now it it's It's not so much. okay maybe it's a little bit of judgment for me, but it's because I have I have dated people who are five, 10 snooze hitters and it has drives me crazy.
00:33:47
Speaker
but I'm like, if you don't turn that damn thing off. yeah yeah Sometimes i was like because I get half thoughts in the middle of that. I kind of get my brain's kind of half awake. So I get a little bit of that dream state. So I'm i'm with you, Jiddy. I'm on board.
00:34:02
Speaker
I'm on board. Sometimes you got to do it. So TV show you're currently binging. I am rewatching all of Project Runway. The first season still the best. Yes. Although the that the language We've made some, we've made some ah evolutions in, in the language that we use and how we treat people and even the models.
00:34:22
Speaker
So it's interesting to also see that change and what as a collective we i agreed was okay. And what isn't now, I mean, even America's Next Top Model is another one that I sometimes binge and it's like, yeah, in that episode, she just shaved everyone's heads and we were all cool with it.
00:34:40
Speaker
It was, it was different times. Is there one contestant that you're like, this contestant should have made it like this contestant should have done it now in retro. Do you kind of look back and go, oh, this one?
00:34:50
Speaker
No, but I will say that ah Wendy is still my favorite villain. And she was, I think, from the third or second season. And I would watch anything that she's on because people just really dislike her. It makes for good TV.
00:35:08
Speaker
ah layers Okay, so what's a travel goal you have for the next five years? o i definitely want to, and it's on my bucket list, to go to Cambodia.
00:35:20
Speaker
I want to visit Angkor Wat. I feel like this place has been calling me all my life, weirdly. I'm not even...
00:35:30
Speaker
I don't know where i land on the spiritual part. I'm very atheist a lot of the time, but something about that place tells me that I need to go before before the world's over and who knows when that's going to happen. So in the next five years, I should definitely go.
00:35:47
Speaker
We encourage that. We encourage that. So what color crayon would you be?
Family Traditions: Cherishing Zoom Calls
00:35:51
Speaker
Ooh, fluorescent beige. No questions. Awesome. Wow. What's a guilty pleasure that you're not guilty about?
00:36:00
Speaker
that I'm not gonna feel guilty about my guilty pleasures.
00:36:06
Speaker
that That means that I'm just caring about what people in the outside think. No, if it's good for me, it's good for me. there joe What's a tradition you cherish? A tradition I cherish is Sunday Zooms. So during the pandemic, since my family is in France, in Spain and in Peru, we started Zooming just because it was, oh we're able to actually spend some time with each other as nobody can go outside.
00:36:36
Speaker
But after the the restrictions were lifted, we we kept doing them and we're doing them every weekend. And it's really no obligation. It's, hey, if you're around and you want to pop on for a few moments and talk, you can do so. But if you don't, like...
00:36:52
Speaker
Nobody will say anything. So that's how we've been able to continue it since the pandemic and that there's no obligation to show up. But it's a way to see the kids growing up and not going a year later and be like, oh, my God, I don't know you. Now I actually feel like I know my family and I always make a little bit of time to show up to those calls.
00:37:12
Speaker
What's a sound that evokes a sense of nostalgia? Oh, um, old boleros, like that old Spanish nostalgic kind of music reminds me of sitting around on Sunday afternoons with my grandfather and he had this vinyl connection and I just love just spending time with him and playing the different records. He would let me place them. He would get very frustrated with me sometimes because I broke many needles. This was back before the automated one. So you had to be very careful about how you placed it. And me being a seven, eight year old, I wasn't necessarily the most
00:37:52
Speaker
ah delicate at at doing it. But I, it always reminds me of those times. And sometimes when I cook, I just like to put those on. My heart just melts. I'm a vinyl person. So ah just all all the, all the, all the warmth there. My heart is melted. What's a community space that makes you feel safe and welcome?
00:38:12
Speaker
Nowadays in Brooklyn, it's it's a club slash space, but it is the only place I have been to so far where when you go in there's this like kind of the entrance, the ticket booth part.
00:38:27
Speaker
They give you a chat about how you're able to navigate the space. So it's You don't touch anybody without their consent. There are no phones allowed on the dance floor.
00:38:39
Speaker
And if there is some problem or somebody is bothering you or there's a safety issue, there's people around with a glow-in-the-dark bracelet. They are monitors in the space, if you need anything.
00:38:51
Speaker
And so they set the guidelines for that how they expect everybody to behave in that space before they go in. And it really sets the tone that People know what's not allowed there.
00:39:02
Speaker
And so it always feels incredibly safe because everybody came to a space with these expectations. Thank you. And what's the common misconception about the LGBTQ community that you'd like to correct?
00:39:17
Speaker
That we are progressive. No lie.
00:39:23
Speaker
no lie okay No lie. I mean, I had been chatting with Shane the other day that I just started trying to get back into dating again and I downloaded Hinge and just the amount of conservative and moderate men on the app is the majority.
00:39:40
Speaker
So to me, it's the biggest misconception is that we are this open minded, forward thinking community when in reality we're very much a mix of all of the things.
00:39:51
Speaker
Some of us are very on the radical end, but some others are very much on the other end. There is a a ah gay Republican cruise happening that they're selling tickets for right now. So it's, it's again, a misconception that we're really anything forward thinking.
00:40:08
Speaker
It's only a few of Kenny doesn't want a ticket. Absolutely not. The look at Kenny's face was like... People listening to this didn't see my face, but look.
00:40:17
Speaker
God. Thank you for sharing that. um One question I want to, so one last question is not really a speed round question, but you know, this is called Power Beyond
Self-Pride & Community Improvement
00:40:25
Speaker
Pride. So I'm curious what Power Beyond Pride means to you.
00:40:28
Speaker
Power Beyond Pride to me is, let's see. Yes, there's something about having a sense of pride, having a sense of worth, feeling good. But then what are you doing with that?
00:40:42
Speaker
Because the people in power are always enforcing their power. So if you aren't using your worth and your self-esteem to kind of uplift your own community, then you are just another person or being in the system being crushed by that power.
00:41:04
Speaker
So to me, the pride is that my pride makes me exert that power because I love myself and expect better from the world. and demand better from the world.
00:41:16
Speaker
So I'm exerting the power through the really just feeling good about myself. Love it. Well, we feel great about you being here and so glad, so glad you could join us today. It just means a lot.
00:41:27
Speaker
And where can people follow you in your work? Yes. So, well, people can find me on LinkedIn. Of course, I have a huge name, so I just shorten it to JD Vawi, B-A-W-I.
00:41:40
Speaker
And you can also find my website, bq-me.com. That's where you'll find more information about my emotional intelligence consulting. Well, thank you so much, JD, for your time. I'm so glad you were able to join us. but We are out of time for this podcast. We do hope that you'll be able to join us again ah and have you back to talk more about any of the things, emotional intelligence and cringy hinge dates.
00:42:11
Speaker
I'm going to we're going to wear it. Kenny has a taste for the tea. So as you... and As you continue to explore those those apps, that there's invariable stories. We all have stories. We all have stories. So the Cringy Hinge episode, we need a cringy cringny episode like that. Oh, yes.
00:42:29
Speaker
Again, thank you so much, JD. It's been such a joy to be able to get to know you more. we we both were part of the We Create Space group. And so it was just such a great honor to meet so many great people. And the work that you're doing every day to influence our young people, to to speak to corporations, to to encourage them, to think about their emotional emotional intelligence capabilities is just, um it's important. So thank you for being with us today. And again, everyone can follow JD on those on LinkedIn and obviously check out your site.
00:42:56
Speaker
I'm your co-host, Shane Lucas, he, him, his, and am the harm reduction activist and owner of A Great Idea and dancer to vinyl, which, JD, you and I just need to put on some vinyl. We're just going to get some vinyl going. We're going to, we're going to, Bodearos are amazing. So I am all on board with that too. So, so good, good listening ahead.
00:43:16
Speaker
And i am your other co-host, Kenyon Farrow, activist, writer, comm strategist. And you can follow me on all socials just at my name, at Kenyon Farrow.
00:43:26
Speaker
And remember to subscribe and get your friends to subscribe to Power Beyond Pride on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And you can also check it out at our website, powerbeyondpride.com.
00:43:42
Speaker
Power Beyond Pride is a project from A Great Idea, a queer-owned design and content agency. You can learn more about them and me at agreatidea.com. This episode is produced by none other than my co-host, Shane Lucas. Matty Bynum is the project developer. love you, Matty!
00:43:58
Speaker
Our editor is Jared Redding. You too, Jared. With support from Ian Wilson. Go, Ian!
00:44:07
Speaker
Kenny and I are both part of this podcast. Awesome host team. And we invite you to send in your questions and comments for a monthly reply all episode where we take your questions as well as talk about news and and recent events. And you can submit those at powerbeyondpride.com.
00:44:20
Speaker
Check out our new episodes each week. And we look forward to queer change making with you next time. Thank you from all of us at Power Beyond Pride.