Curious Chats & Kind Acts

Lori was my long covid rehab person, and we have sincebecome friends, she is a proper good egg. We discuss long covid, how debilitating it can be, and how we can help ourselves by making changes to our lifestyle to help combat the dreaded fatigue.

Lori is such a positive human, she shares her lovely ideasaround giving and receiving light, and how she is happy with being content - a good 7/10 suits her!

She is a busy mum with 5 kids, and we talk honestly abouthow to remain positive, and the importance of self-kindness when your child has severe depression.

Her top tip is “just don’t be a dickhead” and inproducer Jonah’s words “Lori may be my favourite person” high praise indeed, let me know if you agree!

Dionne is a black, female and married to a woman. She hasworked in Equality Diversity and Inclusion (or EDI) for the police and currently Liverpool football club. She also volunteers for Ocean Cheshire a Charity who support Cheshire's Ethnically Diverse communities, sharing her life lessons and she is always selflessly trying to improve things for others. So, as you can imagine, we have a lot to discuss, I learnt loads about unconscious bias, micro-aggression's and code switching (all of which, I discovered I am guiltyoff!!)

I loved chatting to Dionne, and I’m so grateful for hersharing her perspective of the world through the lens of a black woman, about her culture, why she has a love for KFC (it’s all about meat on the bone!), and the hours it takes to get her lovely braids done. It was a real insight, and doyou know what, being black isn’t about the colour of her skin, but the beautiful differences her culture brings. So have a listen and I hope you enjoy it!

For more info about Ocean, here is a link to the website

https://www.oceancheshireltd.com/

I'm speaking with Josh today, he is the owner of Prohibition, a secret cocktail bar in Chester. He shares his story of falling in love with hospitality, and his incredible journey of opening his first bar at 22!

We hear how people have given him kindness and self-belief to make the bravest decision, quit his job and just go for it. And 10 years on, another bar and soon to be a boutique hotel, it certainly paid off.

I love how people have helped him along the way - decorating, interior designing, and even advice on where you can get the cheapest wholesale booze from! 

What I love most though is how he is now repaying that kindness, now he is in a position to do so, and giving people opportunities like he was once given.

So grab yourself a cocktail, he invented the Black Forest, have a listen, be inspired, and have a smile at Josh's extraordinary life!

Oh and there is a reference to Martha in this episode, just so you know, she is one of our kids, and it's how we first met Josh.

Happy Pride Month, and because it's pride month, we have another cheeky episode for you. (Edit note: Pride month was officially in June, but it is Chester Pride this month, August). A person called Archie.  I say a person because Archie is gender fluid, and if you want to know what this is, you will have to listen! We chat about them growing up as gay in a private school in posh England, which by all accounts seemed a bit tricky. But then Archie hit Brighton, and what an episode it became!

I think Archie’s world is so far apart from mine, I was absolutely fascinated about their hook up lifestyle, grinder and how they had sex with 5 people in one day!!  We also touch on the other side of hook- up culture, and some harsh lessons they have had to learn. I do need to say we cover sexual content, rape and some pretty tricky topics, so I’m not quite sure how we also laughed quite as much as we did.  Maybe it was our special guest host’s 1 liners!

Proper love this episode though, and a massive thanks to Archie and Jonah for giving up their time on a sunny morning in Brighton, battling a bad hangover!! I really hope you enjoy it… let your minds be blown!

Happy Chester Pride month! Today I'm chatting to Dave. We met after work in a council building in Ellesmere Port, and we spent that long in there, the security guard came and kicked us out!!

Here's me thinking I’m going along to chat social work, and it turns out Dave was part of the team who started Chester Pride.  We chat about his journey as a gay man in the 90’s, he shares his lovely love story of him and his partner, and we chat about discrimination and what we fellow humans can do in our little world to enable people to be who they want to be.

And yes as a consequence of this, Acts is marching in Chester Pride on August 17th, so get in touch if you want to come and join us share our love of difference.

Well well well we have made it guys! Series one is a wrap! And we have a little treat in store for you today! Producer Jonah and I sit down with a cocktail and have a chat about our favorite episodes. We discuss what we have learnt, what others have learnt and what's next, so please have a listen and get in touch letting us know your highlights.

Massive thanks to Vic at Mic Media for training us, and doing so much more, and Laura at Kindness Community UK who has made  our kindness clothing a reality, and most importantly each and everyone of you, our lovely kindness community who have taken the time to listen to us… All 1078 of you… yes we have hit 1000 listens! We are so humbled and grateful, please do keep getting in touch with your feedback, and if you are brave enough, we are looking for people to have a chat for series 2, it could be you!!

Anyway, grab yourself a drink of your choice, ours was an old fashioned, sit back, and listen to Jonah say like far too often, whilst I do my usual waffling (Jonah's words not mine, thanks Jonah).

Today I chat with Clair. Clair started her career in restaurants and cafes, then moved into the corporate world, living in luxury and the posh lifestyle to go with it. She is now trying to live off grid, she would love to live off the land, she homeschools, and her happy place is in the garden in her wellies!

We chat about Clair’s life, and the common theme is her pure determination, which is now allowing her to live an authentic life, being fully present for her family and community.

And then at the end… it always is, she mentions how she has been healed from a trauma her 8 year old ancestor suffered… yes there will be a follow up interview with the Mr Quantum healer!!

So here we go, I start by asking her how she met her first love.

Kirsty talks about her difficult journey of being pregnant at 15, and living through 2 coercive and abusive relationships. What I love about this chat though is how Kirsty learnt to be kind to herself, like herself, and grow into the person she has become, mother of 3 wonderful children, a thriving career, and some beautiful long lasting friendships.

Just a warning, we do discuss domestic violence, and it is a difficult listen at times, however, surprisingly, we do still manage to laugh a lot.  When I listen back, I do wonder if I am a bit flippant about such  a serious subject, I hope not, and I apologize if I come across as that. Anyway, have a listen, and you will see how the power of self kindness can turn someone's life around.

This week we're talking to Heather about her passion for walking, mountain rescue, dog training, and her extremely varied career from working for the police to working on top of Snowdon! We talk about how she has experienced ageism, and how she views it positively.

We discuss many different topics but it's fair to say Heather's story is an inspiring one. Walking the 500 km Cambrian Way and integrating self kindness and resilience into her life.

I found Heather really articulate and considerate as she reflected on her life, and I'm very thankful that she has shared some of her lessons with us.

Heather now works for a Community Catalysts, check out the link below to see what is available in your community: https://www.communitycatalysts.co.uk/

Welcome to curious chats, how are you? I say curious chats as I got a little carried away with all the drama today and only mention kindness at the end, so sorry about that, but what a great chat! We hear from Ian about joining the police force in the 90’s so that he could play more rugby! Through to him becoming an inspector in CID. He shares stories about drugs coming up the Thames in a submarine, his near death experiences and the risk a police officer takes when they pick up their firearm - not only that they may need to shoot and kill someone, but dealing with the aftermath of being suspended and investigated. I certainly see the police in a different light now.  

So I hope you enjoy this one, and a massive thanks to all of our serving officers across the country, I will certainly be trying to be kinder to police officers in future (not that I come across them that often!)