Bringing Curiosity to The Conversation

Heather Hester: 00:00:11

Welcome to Just breathe parenting your LGBTQ team, the podcast, transforming the conversation around loving and raising an LGBTQ child. My name is Heather Hester and I am so grateful you are here. I want you to take a deep breath. And know that for the time we are together, you are in the safety of the just breathe nets. Whether today's show is an amazing guest, or me sharing stories, resources, strategies or lessons I've learned along our journey, I want you to feel like we're just hanging out at a coffee shop having a cozy chat. Most of all, I want you to remember that wherever you are on this journey, right now, in this moment in time, you are not alone. Welcome to Just breathe, I am so happy you are here. Today, I am doing a really short solo episode today, I have some things that I've been thinking about that I just wanted to share with everyone. And I thought that this would be a good time to do it. They're kind of timely, and I felt like oh my goodness, it's been a long time since I've done a solo episode. I've been really grateful to have so many amazing guests over the past few months, and all these wonderful people that I could share with you. But I just wanted to jump in here today and let you know some things that I've been thinking about. And I'm wondering if these are things that resonate with you, or things that have kind of caught your attention recently, and I'd love to know, if they have please email me reach out to me via email, or on Facebook, you can always direct message me. I would love to hear your thoughts. But this first kind of came up for me this whole question are really just concept. And this is gonna sound really funny. I, I do not watch a lot of TV. And when I do it has to be something that just really good captures my attention. Does it make me feel like I'm wasting time. And so and that's just me, I'm just weird like that. So, I have recently watched Ted lasso after my husband. And so many people have said, Oh my gosh, it's so good. You have to watch us you have to watch this feel good, makes you laugh makes you cry. And so I thought, Well, why not? This sounds like a lovely thing to just kind of decompress with. And needless to say, you know, for everyone who has watched Ted lasso, I loved it. I fell in love and just so many things about it that I love. But the reason I bring it up other than the fact that it really renews our faith and the value of kindness, and the value of really loving and appreciating people for who they are in this world and how they show up in this world. And one of the episodes, Ted uses the quote, a Walt Whitman quote, that is one of my favorite and it is it just blew me away. I loved the way he used it. And it's the quote, be curious, not judgmental. And he used it in a way in that scene. That was very literal. But I thought you know, this can really be used and so many different ways and really thought of it really, you know, made me think of a lot of different different things and different ways that it could be applied. And so your few weeks ago, I actually did a workshop on fear. And it really was kind of rolling around in my head then and I was like this is kind of perfect because when we think about fear specifically and ways to overcome it, ways to just kind of even just tips and strategies right for dealing with fear.

Heather Hester: 00:04:56

This quote was really great that the using the idea of being curious about the fear, whatever that fear is, instead of judging both the fear and yourself for feeling that emotion of fear. And I thought, My gosh, this is so great. And so, you know this, a lot of the workshop was actually based on kind of continuing to circle back to the idea of being curious, like, stopping and allowing yourself to think, why is this coming up for me? Why am I feeling fearful? What is happening either internally or externally, that's bringing that up for me. A quick interruption. I am so excited to announce that I am adding a new segment to every podcast episode going forward. You can now call me and leave a message with your amazing questions. And I will answer them at the end of every episode. So cool, right. So here's the number 847-448-1212. That's 847-448-1212. I can't wait to hear from you. Back to the episode. I just had a really, it was really fun for me to create that and to present that. And I've just been giving it a lot more thought. And really interestingly, today, and I don't know if you will get to hear this awesome interview with crystal before this drops or after but I got the had the pleasure of interviewing crystal Whittaker, who is a de IB coach diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging coach, and she, oh my goodness, I if you've already heard her, you know how great she is, if you haven't heard her yet, Oh, my You are in for a treat. But we brought this very thought up and I thought, Oh, my goodness, I I love that, once again, we're talking about this in a very different way, the idea of being curious and, and so she and I were talking about it in the context of when we are communicating, whether it is with our kids, our spouses, our partners, our friends, whomever we're communicating with, when we bring that element of curiosity, into the conversation, it immediately stops any judgment, it stops fear, it stops any knee jerk reactions that we might have to things, if we approach it with curiosity, approach the conversation approach, whatever we're, you know, our, our speech with, I'm just kind of curious, I'm curious, you know, why you're sharing this with me, or when something is being shared with you, when you are having a conversation. It is a really wonderful way to mindset to be and so that when information is being shared with you, you aren't automatically thinking of that response, I want to respond to Ron respond, and allows you to be in that space of really hearing and listening to you know, whether it's your child who's sharing something with you, or again, or your spouse, or your partner or your friend, when you're in that space of just curiosity. You can kind of just sit there and really hear what they're saying what they have to say. And and then it also allows for a moment to process and respond with it. Thoughtful, a thoughtful response instead of a knee jerk response. So whether it's a question or a comment or you know, a follow up or whatever it is, it's going to come across in a way very different

Heather Hester: 00:09:31

if you're coming with curiosity than if you're coming with judgment. So I really just wanted to kind of come to you today with that and really kind of brainstorm the ways that we can take this idea of approaching whether it's, you know, conversations, whether it's in our work We can take this anywhere from parenting, to really any relationship to how we show up in the world, and a showing up. And that can be in our communities. For those of you who love, love being online and are so good at, you know, social media, and communicating that way, and how you show up there, and and then it really we have this opportunity to take this with us. Not just in our communities, but into our country and into the world. And, and that's what really, you know, those, those are two of the bigger ones that inspired me to actually do this really quick episode because I wanted this to be more of a thought provoking episode. One that inspires conversation, one that inspires thoughts, and I want to know what you think about this, I want to hear your feedback, I want to know the ways that you would like to use curiosity in your family in your home with your kids or, you know, ways that you feel like you could use it in in your community. And then you know, on a much larger scale how being curious and not judgmental because could really change the trajectory trajectory of so many things that are happening in our country right now. So reach out to me reach out to me, you know, again, via email, on Facebook, whatever is most comfortable to you, I'd love to hear what you think. And I would love to know, you know, how can we really do something with this and and make some really good changes. So that's all I have. I know this is a really short episode, but I just felt very compelled to share this with you and connect with you in this way, and until next time, remember that you are not alone.