Transcript: A to BE Episode 1

Mimi Kwa (00:02):
People say life is a journey, not a destination. But how do you know you’re on the right path?
Jo Stanley (00:09):
If only we could see the signs when they appear.
Mimi Kwa (00:12):
Well, I’m Mimi Kwa.
Jo Stanley (00:13):
And I’m Jo Stanley.
Mimi Kwa (00:15):
And on A to B, we speak to fascinating people about how they navigated their way to be here now, having profound impact on the world.
Jo Stanley (00:25):
We hope our conversations will help you reflect on everything you’ve been through to get here, the triumphs, challenges and bumps along the road.
Mimi Kwa (00:34):
And if you haven’t already, find your own map to what matters.
Jo Stanley (00:40):
Mimi, here we are in the very first episode of A to B.
Mimi Kwa (00:44):
It’s very exciting, Jo Stanley.
Jo Stanley (00:47):
I know. A lot of planning, we got here eventually, and we’ve got a distinct lack of guests in this episode.
Mimi Kwa (00:53):
Because we are one another’s guests.
Jo Stanley (00:55):
We’re enough.
Mimi Kwa (00:56):
Welcome to the show.
Jo Stanley (00:59):
Welcome to our show. Well, I guess everyone brings their own context to a conversation, so it felt useful, we thought, to share our own context before we turn our attention to one of the many brilliant guests that we’re going to be having.
Mimi Kwa (01:13):
So Jo, how on earth did we arrive here and why did we think, why did you think that it was a good idea to start a podcast?
Jo Stanley (01:22):
Well, A to B implies a journey that brings someone to this moment now, and I just think we’re, you and I, we’re both fascinated by what goes into making a person, what makes us who we are right now, and how did we get here, I suppose. But I think we learn from others how to be who we are by understanding how other people are who they are. Does that make sense?
Mimi Kwa (01:46):
Yeah, it makes perfect sense. And I think we have to listen to other people’s stories in order to reframe our own and understand ourselves. I think it’s really helpful to hear other people’s journeys to get to their B. And don’t be fooled by the tile cover of our podcast that has us in a car, because we’re not literally driving from A to B. We are on the journey on the spiritual, psychological, career, personal, professional journey to our B.
Jo Stanley (02:18):
Are you worried people might be looking for an auto podcast here?
Mimi Kwa (02:23):
I think so.
Jo Stanley (02:24):
Well, I think also it’s really important to appreciate your own strengths and what you’ve overcome to be in this moment, and that requires a bit of an audit of what you’ve gone through in your life. So that’s an opportunity when we hear other people tell their stories. I hope that triggers, for some of us listening, to go, “what have I been through? What actually has created me, who I am?”
Mimi Kwa (02:48):
And it’s really the looking back to be able to look forward, because I think when we do, as you say, the audit of our own experiences, then we’re able to step forward into our future self and our future experiences with much more clarity about who we are and where we’re going. For me, I think the whole idea of the podcast was exciting because I think the A to B of our lives is about finding our purpose and not everybody finds their purpose early in that A to B journey. But you would hope that somewhere along the line at one of those sliding door moments or one of those points, part of that trajectory is self-exploration and finding why on earth are we here?
Jo Stanley (03:35):
I mean, it’s the ultimate question, isn’t it?
Mimi Kwa (03:37):
It is. Let’s ponder that.
Jo Stanley (03:39):
But we’re lucky enough to have access to people who have found that answer. So how great to learn from them, that’s really awesome. So that’s the why, but how we arrived, I mean, we all started somewhere and we’ve ended up here. So is there a journey that brought the two of us together?
Mimi Kwa (03:56):
Yeah. Well, what I love about when we met and as our friendship has evolved is this term that you referred to, which was that we are like whirling dervishes. We are just spinning around. And I love it because it’s even more apt because apparently whirling dervishes are only meant to be men.
Jo Stanley (04:15):
Now I didn’t know that.
Mimi Kwa (04:17):
Yeah, well, I Googled it.
Jo Stanley (04:17):
But they have such spectacular frocks.
Mimi Kwa (04:18):
Exactly.
Jo Stanley (04:19):
Why can’t women get in on that?
Mimi Kwa (04:20):
Yeah, well apparently it is opening up to women a little, but they’re still in the minority. Funny that. And I just think that’s a beautiful metaphor for life and for us. And so I think we just kind of knocked skirts or clicked heels in all sorts of environments and work circumstances, social circumstances, and then we just kind of tripped over and fell into each other.
Jo Stanley (04:47):
I know. Do you reckon some people you meet and you think, oh, we were always destined to be friends, you instantly have that connection? For us, I don’t feel like there’s been a, I’ve got to get to know me, me time. It’s like we just knew each other. Is that past life stuff or we were just destined?
Mimi Kwa (05:09):
I think destiny plays a part, but I think there is a knowing, when you meet someone and you feel that you’ve met them before, or even if you don’t feel you’ve met them before, you just have this resonance with them and this understanding that whether you’re completely bonkers, crazy and not right, or whether you are right, it just feels good. And so you just want to get to know that person more and you want to connect more. And I think that’s just been our very short journey.
Jo Stanley (05:36):
I know. I barely know you.
Mimi Kwa (05:38):
Yeah, I know. Hang on, hang on.
Jo Stanley (05:40):
I’ve had the benefit of getting-
Mimi Kwa (05:42):
Taxi.
Jo Stanley (05:43):
I’ve had the benefit of getting to read your memoir, so I’ve learned a lot about you via your book. I’ve not written a memoir.
Mimi Kwa (05:51):
You should.
Jo Stanley (05:52):
So I’m a mystery.
Mimi Kwa (05:53):
You should.
Jo Stanley (05:54):
Not really. I’ve spent 15 years on commercial radio telling everybody every single thing about myself pretty much.
Mimi Kwa (05:59):
Yeah, so in that way, that vulnerability of being an open book in the media, which you have been, that must make some people feel as though they know you. But who you are is not necessarily what you put out there. And it’s the same as who I am. I mean, we still control the narrative to an extent. And as vulnerable as you can be with actual events or things or feelings that you’ve had, the true you, I think, and the true stories behind ourselves and our guests and what got us to be in our … and speaking of the meaning of be as well, I feel like to be is to just be in our purpose.
Jo Stanley (06:49):
Yes. And I guess, I would say that’s relatively new for me to feel as though I’m in my purpose, but then I kind of go back to me when I was 30, I probably thought I was in my purpose then. So generationally, as the decades go by, I suppose our purposes change.
Mimi Kwa (07:05):
Yeah. Our perception of what our purpose is change, but does our true life purpose ever change? Are we always just on that path, even if blindly?
Jo Stanley (07:17):
Oh, well see, that is the trippiest part and why I fully came to you and said, “I want to do this thing about A to B because I’m fascinated by the fact that I feel like every single thing in my life has led me to now create Broad Radio, radio for women by women.” But I didn’t know that when I was 20. But at what point do you go, “Oh, this is the purpose?”
Mimi Kwa (07:41):
Yeah, this is a specific life purpose. I don’t know, I think you can have, did you have a yearning when you were a child or when you were a young adult that you wanted to impact the world, you wanted to change the world? Did you ever have that feeling?
Jo Stanley (08:00):
I think that’s a pretty enormous thing for a child to think, so I don’t know that I felt that, but I certainly felt like I knew that it was rewarding to do things for others. So that’s something I was raised with, I guess, social conscience in our family. I knew that I really enjoyed performing. The interesting thing, I have spent a lot of time since starting Broad Radio going, “This is really, really, really hard and I didn’t want to be a startup founder, and who am I to think that I can create something out of nothing that’s really, really massive.” And I didn’t think I could be a leader of a team and all this. And then I look back at my life, so whether it was being the president of the Monash Players at Monash University, whether it was being house drama captain at high school, whether it was creating The Wizard of Oz play when I was in year six, right through to being the-
Mimi Kwa (08:57):
Hello, high achiever.
Jo Stanley (08:58):
… president of the Parents Association and making the massive Twilight Fair. I’m like, “Oh, I’ve kind of done that all my life.”
Mimi Kwa (09:06):
Yeah. So you had some little voice in your head that said to you, “I want to make a difference.”
Jo Stanley (09:11):
And for you?
Mimi Kwa (09:12):
Yeah, for me too, ever since I was little. I mean, I feel like this is a universal thing. Maybe it’s more a case of when does it get knocked out of you that you don’t want to make a difference? When does it stop? Because I think, and this is just a small straw poll of two people sitting in a studio, but I feel like we all have that desire to want to make a difference, to want to help others, and then life gets in the way, all of the conditioning, all of the experiences that we have, and then we kind of adapt our behaviors, our belief systems accordingly, and then we might not fulfill that original dream that we had when we were a little girl or a little boy, way back when.
Jo Stanley (09:58):
That is so true, Mimi. And it’s that thing, that beautiful, it was probably Deepak Chopra, I mean, you’ve quoted Eckhart Tolle, I’m quoting Deepak, we’re so spiritual. But for me it was really profound when I read, he said, “We are not born small.” We’re born big, with infinite possibilities in us, but it is completely removed, beaten out of us, we are shrunken by our experiences in society and people around us. So in this conversation and when we interview all of the wonderful guests that will be joining us, I look forward to hearing about the people that actually encourages them to be big, because they’re the parts of our A to B, where you go, “I wouldn’t be here without that moment when someone said, I see in you the incredible potential.” Did you have someone like that?
Mimi Kwa (10:54):
I had my auntie Theresa. I mean, I had lots of lovely moments in my life where people saw potential in me. My year, I’m going to say, year four, year five teacher, Mr. May, like he used to come into the classroom with his guitar strumming away, and he would just really, he saw the potential in everyone. But I just felt that as a child, you kind of feel like a teacher who is really supportive of you, is showing a special interest in you and your needs. And I think he did that for all of us and definitely for me. And that’s like that one teacher. I think if you have that one teacher who can see that you’re just really shocking at maths, but you’re great at creative writing and so they just nurture that and they’re not kind of reprimanding you for the things you’re not good at. And so that was me with him.
(11:40):
And then my auntie Theresa who lived in Hong Kong, and I spent a lot of time with her when things were going pear shaped at home in my life here in Australia. She would just kind of lift me up into this completely new dimension to me, this other world, this universe that she lived in, in Hong Kong, just rubbing shoulders with incredibly accomplished and interesting people who were doing amazing things for other people and who were just so inspiring in and of themselves. And I saw people with purpose and auntie Theresa wanted me to have purpose and I didn’t actually end up doing what it was that she dreamed I would do. She wanted me to be a diplomat and fly around the world,
Jo Stanley (12:22):
Wow.
Mimi Kwa (12:22):
And broker big negotiations between countries, which I had to think that that was a bit beyond me. I’ll leave that to other people. But what she did was she inspired me to do better and do more.
Jo Stanley (12:34):
So important to have those people in our lives.
Mimi Kwa (12:36):
And who was your person or people?
Jo Stanley (12:39):
Yeah. I mean, I guess you made me remember when we’re talking about teachers, and this is one of the things that I really love about A to Be stories and those moments. Some of those moments can be really tiny that stay with you and I remember a year five teacher whose name I don’t even remember. That’s terrible.
Mimi Kwa (12:58):
Shout out to that year five teacher. Thanks for making Jo’s career.
Jo Stanley (13:02):
Isn’t that terrible? Anyway, no, but the thing was,
Mimi Kwa (13:05):
It’ll come to you though.
Jo Stanley (13:06):
He singled me out as being a really good writer, and I didn’t know if I was good at anything. I’d never forget that he read out a story that we wrote about Ash Wednesday. So I’m a child of the 80s. Ash Wednesday, you were in Perth, but in Melbourne, Ash Wednesday was horrific bushfires. And our school was in [inaudible 00:13:27], which is sort of out. You could smell the smoke and see it in the sky. And we got evacuated. It was a really scary time. And we wrote these creative stories about Ash Wednesday, the bushfires afterwards, and he singled me out. And I’ll never forget that he said, he read a passage and I described whatever and escaping it, whatever, and that I was hiding from the flames or I can’t even recall. But there was one sentence that was just, it was cooler there.
(13:53):
And he singled this sentence out, and I will never forget the feeling of him reading that out in the classroom and hearing him read it was cooler there. And identifying that I had actually intentionally made it a shorter sentence and that he saw that in my writing and I was like, oh gosh, that I had that intention. He saw it and now he recognizes it and he’s telling the other students. I have never walked so tall in my life and set me on a path of going, yes, I’m going to be a writer.
Mimi Kwa (14:25):
We have to find out who this teacher is.
Jo Stanley (14:27):
I know, I remember he had a,
Mimi Kwa (14:28):
Maybe we should have a show where we invite all of the teachers who’ve changed our lives onto the show.
Jo Stanley (14:33):
I wonder if that should be a standard question we ask because most people have a teacher of some kind. He had a big bushy mustache. I remember that. But here’s something I wanted to share with you, which I’ve not shared. And you say that what we share with the world, we share our narratives. Right. So your memoir starts in China. Great-grandfather?
Mimi Kwa (14:54):
Great, great-grandfather. Hang on. Great-great-grandfather. Yeah, great. Let’s just say one great. So there’s a lot of [inaudible 00:15:06] out there and there’s a lot of lineage.
Jo Stanley (15:08):
I understand.
Mimi Kwa (15:09):
It starts in the courtroom, I think.
Jo Stanley (15:11):
Yes.
Mimi Kwa (15:11):
But then yes, and then we fly back to great-grandfather.
Jo Stanley (15:16):
At the same time my great-grandfather was in China.
Mimi Kwa (15:24):
What?
Jo Stanley (15:24):
I know.
Mimi Kwa (15:24):
Are we sisters?
Jo Stanley (15:27):
So my great-grandfather,
Mimi Kwa (15:28):
That’s amazing.
Jo Stanley (15:29):
And isn’t it. My great-grandfather was a missionary in China. His name was Gladstone Porteous. And there’s a plaque for him in the village where they lived.
Mimi Kwa (15:37):
What a distinguished missionary name.
Jo Stanley (15:40):
I know. Gladstone Porteous.
Mimi Kwa (15:40):
Gladstone Porteous.
Jo Stanley (15:41):
It’s lovely. I have a little briefcase which has GP written on it there.
Mimi Kwa (15:44):
Oh, beautiful.
Jo Stanley (15:45):
Yeah. So isn’t that interesting?
Mimi Kwa (15:48):
That’s amazing. And so have you traced his journey through China as a missionary and what that adventure was?
Jo Stanley (15:56):
Well he,
Mimi Kwa (15:57):
This is the memoir writer in me coming out.
Jo Stanley (15:58):
Yes. He was there. I believe he came back to Australia and had children. And then my grandmother and grandfather were missionaries in China as well. So my father was actually born in China.
Mimi Kwa (16:11):
That’s amazing. So technically you could get a Chinese passport.
Jo Stanley (16:17):
I don’t think so. He did not have a Chinese passport.
Mimi Kwa (16:21):
Oh, okay.
Jo Stanley (16:21):
No.
Mimi Kwa (16:21):
But he was born in China. Oh.
Jo Stanley (16:23):
Yes.
Mimi Kwa (16:23):
But you’d still have to apply. Anyway, that’s all,
Jo Stanley (16:25):
Yeah. No.
Mimi Kwa (16:26):
Technicality, but essentially you’re Chinese. So,
Jo Stanley (16:29):
What is our connection? Isn’t that,
Mimi Kwa (16:29):
Amazing.
Jo Stanley (16:29):
Really interesting?
Mimi Kwa (16:35):
Yeah. So now that I know that you are actually Chinese and essentially,
Jo Stanley (16:40):
Sure.
Mimi Kwa (16:40):
We are related, I can trust you with this information that I have been dying to share with you Jo Stanley.
Jo Stanley (16:47):
What is that?
Mimi Kwa (16:48):
I found out this week, very recently, that House of Kwa, my memoir, my book,
Jo Stanley (16:54):
Yes.
Mimi Kwa (16:55):
Is going to be released in the US with Harper Collins and in the UK next year, 2024.
Jo Stanley (17:02):
Oh my God.
Mimi Kwa (17:07):
I know. So I’m very emotional and very excited because I can’t believe it came out two years ago and now it’s finally going to be read and consume.
Jo Stanley (17:16):
A worldwide audience.
Mimi Kwa (17:19):
Yeah.
Jo Stanley (17:20):
Oh my God.
Mimi Kwa (17:20):
Very exciting.
Jo Stanley (17:20):
You’re sharing your story with the world Mimi Kwa.
Mimi Kwa (17:24):
It’s very exciting. Thank you. And just one more little bit of news that I’ve been saving up for you,
Jo Stanley (17:29):
Yes.
Mimi Kwa (17:30):
Is that Screen Australia just announced funding for House of Kwa, going to screen.
Jo Stanley (17:36):
For a movie.
Mimi Kwa (17:37):
I know, I know. So anyway.
Jo Stanley (17:39):
Oh my God, Mimi, congratulations. That is amazing. What an achievement.
Mimi Kwa (17:44):
Thank you. Thank you. Now enough about that. Back to grandfathers.
Jo Stanley (17:47):
No. Well, I think that your grandfather would be very pleased and wouldn’t he? I know having read your book, that he was quite a man, a proud man. He would be pretty pleased that his story is getting out there.
Mimi Kwa (17:58):
Well, hopefully both our great-grandfathers would be pleased about this.
Jo Stanley (18:01):
Oh, do you think? Imagine if our grandfathers knew each other.
Mimi Kwa (18:04):
Imagine in all of the, I don’t know what the population of China would’ve been then, but the odds would’ve been greater than now.
Jo Stanley (18:12):
Oh, true.
Mimi Kwa (18:13):
Yes.
Jo Stanley (18:13):
That is true. But it’s such an interesting thing where you go, okay, so again, were we destined to be here? In actual fact, if people are interested, we met because we were, well, Broad Radio brought us together for me anyway, because I was at an afternoon tea for the ladies,
Mimi Kwa (18:31):
Yes.
Jo Stanley (18:31):
When Zoe Daniel was running as an independent,
Mimi Kwa (18:34):
That’s right.
Jo Stanley (18:34):
For Federal Parliament.
Mimi Kwa (18:35):
And Rachel Griffith, just to name-drop popped in.
Jo Stanley (18:38):
That’s true.
Mimi Kwa (18:39):
To have a chat with the,
Jo Stanley (18:40):
And so did Mimi Kwa and Jo Stanley.
Mimi Kwa (18:42):
Yes. Yeah.
Jo Stanley (18:42):
We all popped in.
Mimi Kwa (18:43):
We all popped in.
Jo Stanley (18:45):
And we met there. And I would not have been there if it wasn’t for Broad Radio because I met Zoe Daniel because she came on Broad Radio because I just cold called her and said, would you be a part of Broad Radio?
Mimi Kwa (18:55):
Is that how you met her?
Jo Stanley (18:56):
Yeah, just literally said, I was like, oh, Zoe’s come back from Washington. She’s left the ABC. She’s available.
Mimi Kwa (19:04):
I love you. That you just approached all of us basically, all of us orphans, and you’ve just sort of brought us into this Broad Radio family. It’s amazing.
Jo Stanley (19:15):
Well, why not? What’s the worst can happen? You say, no.
Mimi Kwa (19:18):
This.
Jo Stanley (19:18):
That’s right. So how were you at that afternoon tea?
Mimi Kwa (19:23):
So I was there because Angela Pipos,
Jo Stanley (19:26):
Ah.
Mimi Kwa (19:27):
I think Ange invited me and because I used to work with the ABC, with Ange at the ABC way back when. So the ABC just has tentacles that just,
Jo Stanley (19:36):
It’s true.
Mimi Kwa (19:37):
Stay with you, wrapped around you forever. And yeah, I think that that was why I was there. And then we met and then I emailed you and then you didn’t get back to me for like,
Jo Stanley (19:48):
Months.
Mimi Kwa (19:49):
Months.
Jo Stanley (19:49):
Years, maybe.
Mimi Kwa (19:52):
And I thought, oh, well.
Jo Stanley (19:54):
I have since explained to you that that’s standard.
Mimi Kwa (19:58):
Yeah.
Jo Stanley (20:00):
And don’t take it personally.
Mimi Kwa (20:00):
And we’ve worked out, we’ve worked out because I’m sure that this is fascinating to everybody, how we’ve worked out our rules of engagement about text or message anytime might not get back to you. Yeah. Text or email anytime.
Jo Stanley (20:14):
Well, but I don’t know, I just am someone who I find I like to be on my own a lot.
Mimi Kwa (20:22):
Is that because you’re in your be now because you’re not kind of out hustling for your kind of perceived hopes and dreams at the time because you actually know this is it, like this is the thing, and you are
Jo Stanley (20:38):
No, it’s because I’m working.
Mimi Kwa (20:41):
Kind of retreating a bit to get it done.
Jo Stanley (20:41):
It’s because I’m working so hard on the purpose and I’m really, really tired.
Mimi Kwa (20:47):
All right. You’re just tired. I was trying to find some really deep meaning in all of it.
Jo Stanley (20:54):
No, but I am a true introvert, so I need to sort of reenergize myself by being on my own. Aren’t you an introvert? You seem like one. We’re getting to know each other literally in the podcast.
Mimi Kwa (21:04):
Yeah.
Jo Stanley (21:04):
Are you an introvert?
Mimi Kwa (21:05):
Well, I’m not sure that I like the label either way, because I love being out at a party or in amongst people. So I mean this, for example, it’s just two of us in a room. If there were 20 people here, that would be fine. But I guess that doesn’t define introvert or extrovert does it because that would just be work.
Jo Stanley (21:26):
Yeah, no. Isn’t it about, I see,
Mimi Kwa (21:28):
Yeah, what is it about?
Jo Stanley (21:30):
Well, it’s about how you reenergize yourself. So some people, like I think technically extroverts get energy from others,
Mimi Kwa (21:36):
Oh.
Jo Stanley (21:37):
And I get energy from being on my own.
Mimi Kwa (21:41):
Oh yeah. Then I’m an introvert.
Jo Stanley (21:44):
Yeah, I figured that.
Mimi Kwa (21:45):
Did you?
Jo Stanley (21:46):
What do you do on your own?
Mimi Kwa (21:47):
Well, to me that’s saying what star sign are you? I don’t know how that, I guess it’s interesting to know. And then when you get a really accurate one, you go, oh my gosh, that is really good. I’m going to follow it from now on. Back to in terms of our purpose state of being. Do you know ever arrive? Do you feel like you’ve arrived?
Jo Stanley (22:14):
Well, I do feel like this is me now. Yes.
Mimi Kwa (22:18):
So it’s an arrival of sorts. It’s a continued journey. It’s not like I’ve arrived and I’m here.
Jo Stanley (22:24):
Yeah and most definitely I see a version of myself I will be in 10 years. I kind of am more intentional about how I wish to grow as a person, as opposed to, I think in my 30s. I didn’t know that I needed growing, perhaps. I suppose I was busy. I’ve just worked so much that you don’t stop and thank God, literally I got sacked and was forced to stop because otherwise I would still be on that same treadmill of working really hard and being in a really surface level relationships, friendships, not my personal friendships, but professional friendships, partying, putting too much emphasis and value in things like the way you look and the way you dress and the parties you’re invited to and the events. It was just a really, I guess an Instagram version of life, which I didn’t think I was doing, but now I look back and see that I was because all I did was work. Now I realize that I needed to be sacked. It was devastating, but I needed it to actually have that moment to sit still and look out a window for 12 months and work out what the hell was that about and who will I be now.
Mimi Kwa (23:41):
That’s life forcing your hand. You could have had every sign and this is what we talk about in A to B as well, it’s like those signposts along the way, but we miss so many of those signs. It’s like now, okay, we’re lucky enough in real terms to have a sat nav that’ll say turn left, turn right, but do you remember the days when we just had the Melways and this is what I used to do in Perth with our equivalent there. I’d literally open the page, we’d have to go to the back of the book, find the address, then find the page, then find the correlating coordinates yes and know where you’ve got to go. You’ve got to go back a few pages in the book. You’ve got to link it all together. I’d get a pencil and go, okay, this is going to be the way and then I’d get a piece of paper and write down the streets where I’d have to turn left and right and all of that. Yes, especially if you’re going on a trip that you’ve never taken before, but because you’re not actually aware of how many streets are before that turn or how many after, it’s very easy to miss the sign. That is a very long way of explaining that in life we have these signs from the universe, I believe or from whatever higher power or force greater than us that exists and whether they’re coincidences or not, there are signs that we miss, but then they just keep coming back until we get them and so that was your sign. You probably can’t even talk about the signs that you missed because you missed them.
Jo Stanley (25:13):
Yeah, but don’t you think in your heart that you’re not living your true self?
Mimi Kwa (25:20):
You have a yearning. I think you have a dissatisfaction with your life, but you cannot put your finger on what it is and all of the signals from outside are saying, this is what you’re supposed to be doing, this is how you’re supposed to behave, this is correct. We’ve got society’s general consensus of what is right and what is not, what is normal, what is abnormal. If you want to fit into what is normal and what that general consensus with society is, then you keep doing what you’re doing, even though it doesn’t feel quite right. There’s something that’s just sitting awkwardly inside you, but unless you can put your finger on it’s very difficult to break out of that and I think that is where, as a culture and society, that’s where a lot of people are. They’re stuck in that expectation of being what they’re expected to be, rather than being what they are inherently meant to be or being what they are capable of achieving.
Jo Stanley (26:20):
Yeah. I don’t know if I would ever have worked out what the signs were if I hadn’t been sacked. I knew that I was fatigued, but that was breakfast radio. I knew that I had spent a long time not being really connected with my husband, but I didn’t know that there was a better way to be. I knew that I was probably drinking too much and just putting too much value in the way I looked and torturing myself with exercise and really not connecting with my body in a healthy way, but I didn’t know that there was a different way of being. I didn’t know there was another-
Mimi Kwa (27:01):
When you don’t know, you don’t know. It’s like when you’ve got blind spots, that’s why it’s called a blind spot because you don’t know it’s there.
Jo Stanley (27:08):
Yeah. I just think, oh gosh, the sacking was devastating and I still don’t know why that happened because the man never spoke to us ever to explain, but you just go, oh well.
Mimi Kwa (27:19):
Let’s get him on. We’ll make it, this is your life. As we trawl through the deaths and the history of Jo and Mimi’s lives, we’ll just get him on the program and then we’ll just resolve it.
Jo Stanley (27:33):
I don’t like that person.
Mimi Kwa (27:35):
All right. We won’t get him on the program.
Jo Stanley (27:38):
To the point around that moment where you are forced to change directions, have you experienced that?
Mimi Kwa (27:47):
Yes. Yeah. I was just thinking, just coming back to my joke about getting him on the program, I realized that I say that because I’m all about forgiveness and reconciliation and just resolving anything that doesn’t work.
Jo Stanley (27:58):
No interest. No interest in forgiveness or reconciliation with that person. Thank you.
Mimi Kwa (28:03):
I love that we’ve found a point of difference because otherwise with our potentially friends, our great-grandfathers being friends, we could actually be almost the same person. Now we know that we are not.
Jo Stanley (28:15):
Yes, that’s true.
Mimi Kwa (28:16):
Has that happened to me? Oh, so many times and actually there have been times where I didn’t read the signs, but the sign was when I was on maternity leave from Channel Nine. My son was two weeks old and I got a call from the ABC and they said, do you want to come back and read the news for us? I was like, oh my gosh, I’ve got this two week old baby and I’ve just been offered the job of my dreams. All I had wanted to do my whole life up until that point was be a news anchor. I had watched [inaudible 00:28:52] from when I was probably three, four years old. I just remember watching the news. I wanted to be a journalist first and then I wanted to be a news anchor. I’d been a journo and ABC called and it was like a dream coming true, but I was also holding my baby going, oh my gosh, I’ve got this baby. They said, “Don’t worry. You can bring him in to work.” The makeup ladies loved holding him while I was on air. I’d be able to breastfeed him and there was some very awkward looks from male news readers and presenters in the makeup department, which that was fine because it obviously wasn’t as socially accepted then, which is ridiculous, but it was just the way that it was and I just remember breastfeeding Royston sitting in the chair and looking over at Hendo and he didn’t know where to look. Then I’d get up and I’d go and read the news and I’d hand Royston over to one of the beautiful makeup artists and she’d just nurse him up and down the corridor, carry him up and down the corridor. Yeah, it was great. I made it work. Yeah, that was an amazing sign.
Jo Stanley (30:02):
That’s pretty unusual at that time.
Mimi Kwa (30:04):
It was.
Jo Stanley (30:04):
For women to be able to breastfeed in the workplace in that way.
Mimi Kwa (30:07):
It was. I guess I was one, unconsciously, for breaking barriers. I remember being the first person on television, I think, to actually show my pregnancy, in that I just said, let’s just have a wide shot. It was probably not the crew, it was probably the producers or somebody, some God higher up, who was saying, no, she’s pregnant, we need to do a tighter shot and I was like, why? I’m doing a walking shot interviewing Guy Pierce or interviewing talent as we’re walking along. We need to do a wider shot and it was at a time where it just wasn’t really something that was done and I don’t think anybody had really discussed the reasons around why it shouldn’t be.
Jo Stanley (30:55):
Remember there was that big fuss when Nicky Buckley was pregnant on Sale of the Century.
Mimi Kwa (31:00):
Oh yes.
Jo Stanley (31:03):
It’s like, oh my gosh.
Mimi Kwa (31:03):
Yeah.
Jo Stanley (31:04):
It’s a family show. There are women at home looking exactly like her.
Mimi Kwa (31:10):
Yeah. Well, I need to get my timeline right. Whether I did it before she did or whether not.
Jo Stanley (31:14):
Oh, it’s irrelevant. Doesn’t matter.
Mimi Kwa (31:16):
I got hate mail. It was just always anonymous. Like scathing pages of handwritten letters. How dare you? I was just amazed.
Jo Stanley (31:31):
It is a funny thing that back in the day hate mail came handwritten.
Mimi Kwa (31:39):
I didn’t even think of that. That is so true.
Jo Stanley (31:42):
I had a serial hate mailer who would hand write the same, the handwriting was the same. It was clearly the same person. I’m assuming it was a guy, could have been a woman, but he had a real issue with my chin and he would write pages and pages and pages about how hideous my long chin was.
Mimi Kwa (32:00):
Oh my gosh. That just makes no sense at all.
Jo Stanley (32:07):
I just had this very long face that he really was so offended by. I remember I was like, this person’s taken the time to hand write a letter about, did I take children’s eyes out when I turned my head and did my mom have sex with Jay Leno? It’s like, oh my God.
Mimi Kwa (32:28):
That is mind blowing.
Jo Stanley (32:29):
People are funny though.
Mimi Kwa (32:30):
The poor person, whoever it was. Oh gosh. Clearly projecting something. I mean, you think?
Jo Stanley (32:37):
Yeah, you think? I mean, it’s one of those things where those moments, do they make you who you are? Does every moment make you who you are?
Mimi Kwa (32:46):
Every moment makes you who you are.
Jo Stanley (32:49):
Every moment?
Mimi Kwa (32:50):
Everything’s either a lesson, I think or it’s a sign, in which case it’s a lesson as well. Maybe just everything’s a lesson. Even the most completely in what seemed to be inconsequential moments, sitting in the car driving here, there were moments where I was out of my body and thinking about something else. And you know how you can go from A to Be literally driving and then get to the Be and go, “Oh, my gosh. How did I get here?” Because I was not present. And so I was driving here and I just brought myself back to presence because there was just like a cute dog being walked by its owner on the side of the road. And that was just like my reminder, “Oh, my gosh,” this is not only to drive safely here, but to just be present in life. And so I just find myself picking myself up all the time just trying to be present, because in that presence will come the lessons. And so that’s why I think every moment is a lesson, because it’s a lesson towards those impactful lessons that are going to be those sliding door moments, are going to be those pivotal epiphanies that you have that encourage you to take action.
Jo Stanley (34:01):
You mean like it’s training you to be aware of?
Mimi Kwa (34:03):
Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Jo Stanley (34:05):
Yeah. I know I love that. Actually, it was a pivotal moment that poor old gent… I don’t know if he was old. That person.
Mimi Kwa (34:13):
So you’ve created a whole story around what happened. I love it.
Jo Stanley (34:17):
[inaudible 00:34:18] can just say this angry old guy who’s just writing about my chin, but actually-
Mimi Kwa (34:22):
And you’re probably not far wrong, but who knows?
Jo Stanley (34:24):
But what was hilarious was that I actually had had a real paranoia about my chin and my long face.
Mimi Kwa (34:30):
Wow.
Jo Stanley (34:30):
And then when I started getting those letters, it was because it was so funny to imagine this person being angry enough to write the letters that I was able to go, “Oh, my God. For fuck’s sake, get over the chin. It is who you are.”
Mimi Kwa (34:44):
That’s fantastic. See? That was [inaudible 00:34:45].
Jo Stanley (34:46):
So, yeah, it was. It was actually a lesson.
Mimi Kwa (34:48):
Thank you. Whoever you are who wrote those hate letters about Jo’s chin, we say thank you because look at her now.
Jo Stanley (34:57):
Look at me now. I just don’t care about my long face and my chin.
Mimi Kwa (35:01):
Your beautiful face and your beautiful chin. That’s so extraordinary, isn’t it? Because things just keep coming. And I was going to say, pardon the pun, but I’m just going to say it anyway, things keep coming back and just slapping you on the face.
Jo Stanley (35:18):
Yeah. [inaudible 00:35:19] do.
Mimi Kwa (35:19):
They do. When you don’t get, it’ll just come back. And if it has to be an angry person penning a letter to you about the thing that is the problem in your life that you’ve created, then that’s what it takes. Sometimes, I’m sure if the universe had a personality, the universe would be going, “Oh, for Christ’s sake, what do I have to do to let Jo know that she can be okay with every part of her? Okay. I’m going to get an angry man to pen a letter so that she gets it and she can finally let it go.”
Jo Stanley (35:54):
I do love that. I hope… There’s purpose in everything.
Mimi Kwa (35:59):
There is. And you just try to find it. It’s like my daughter cracked the windscreen this morning by doing a stretch in the car and the windscreen’s completely cracked, so I couldn’t drive my car in and borrowed my husband’s. Should have got public transport, but was running late. And I’m trying to find the reason in that. And the reason was because I figured out that I actually don’t have any car insurance, and so I need to take out car insurance.
Jo Stanley (36:23):
Imagine if you discovered that when you’d had a serious accident.
Mimi Kwa (36:26):
Exactly.
Jo Stanley (36:27):
Wow.
Mimi Kwa (36:28):
Oh. And people say, “Oh, gosh. You can find a reason in everything retrospectively, and that’s just so easy to do.” Well, you can believe that if your glass is half empty, but if it’s half full, I just feel like finding a reason in things can only help you to notice the moments and the reasons in other things and to exercise that muscle to keep that presence about you. So yeah, I think that that’s really important.
Jo Stanley (36:53):
So, Mimi, every single event on the planet had an origin. Would you agree with that?
Mimi Kwa (36:58):
Yeah. I’d agree with that. Everything starts somewhere.
Jo Stanley (37:00):
Yeah. As do the people involved in those events. They have an origin. Yeah. So in every-
Mimi Kwa (37:06):
And their origins have an origin.
Jo Stanley (37:07):
Oh, my god.
Mimi Kwa (37:07):
It’s endless.
Jo Stanley (37:08):
Okay. That’s doing my head in. It’s like those mirrors that go back and back, where you see your reflection.
Mimi Kwa (37:12):
Yes. Oh, no. When you’re in an elevator and there’s the… Yes. Is that what you mean?
Jo Stanley (37:15):
It is.
Mimi Kwa (37:15):
The two mirrors reflecting each other?
Jo Stanley (37:19):
All right. That’s done my head in.
Mimi Kwa (37:20):
That’s an ’80s film clip.
Jo Stanley (37:25):
It’s [inaudible 00:37:26]. All right. Back to the origins. So in every episode we’re going to be bringing the origin story, okay, the A to Be, of a well-known thing. I’m going first. You don’t know what this is. It’s a surprise to you, what I’m bringing today. Here we go. A to Be story of how we have Post-it notes in the world.
Mimi Kwa (37:46):
Oh, Post-it notes.
Jo Stanley (37:48):
Have you heard this story?
Mimi Kwa (37:49):
No. Heard of Post-it notes.
Jo Stanley (37:51):
Oh, my gosh. I couldn’t live.
Mimi Kwa (37:52):
I know. I couldn’t either.
Jo Stanley (37:53):
I could not live without Post-it notes. Could literally run my life.
Mimi Kwa (37:56):
Every book I read, Post-it notes on all the pages that I love. Never go back to those pages, but I liked to put a Post-it note just to mark that moment of epiphany.
Jo Stanley (38:04):
It’s kind of how I have run my life for a very long time, is the Post-it note. And I really enjoy the fact that they’ve entered into fluorescent colors and… But that’s an aside. I just like visually, it lifts me. Anyway, this is how Post-It notes came about. Okay?
Mimi Kwa (38:22):
I’m ready.
Jo Stanley (38:23):
It’s so great. Art Fry. Fantastic name. Arthur, Art for Short. Right?
Mimi Kwa (38:31):
I was just thinking about frying art for a minute, and I was just getting very confused because I thought we were talking about the Renaissance and [inaudible 00:38:40] Bohemian…
Jo Stanley (38:39):
No. It doesn’t go back that far.
Mimi Kwa (38:40):
Okay. Go.
Jo Stanley (38:41):
It’s in the ’70s. Okay?
Mimi Kwa (38:41):
Art Fry. [inaudible 00:38:44].
Jo Stanley (38:43):
So Art Fry was working for 3M, which is the company that created Post-It notes. And he was singing in the church choir because he was a keen singer, Art Fry, and he was really frustrated about the fact that all of the little slips of paper that he had put in his choir book to mark where the songs were kept falling on the floor. And he says he’s sitting in a particularly boring sermon and he thinks to himself, “Oh, my mate, Spencer Silver,” another great name, “My mate, Spencer Silver, at work has created a super weak glue. He was trying to create…”
Mimi Kwa (39:27):
A really ineffective glue.
Jo Stanley (39:30):
He was trying to create a super strong glue, completely failed and made a super weak glue. And Art Fry as he sat there in church that day thinking, “Gosh, this minister really needs to speed it up a little,” he goes, “I reckon that glue that Spencer Silver has created…”
Mimi Kwa (39:50):
That useless glue.
Jo Stanley (39:52):
“Is going to be the solution for me and my choir book and all my pieces of paper falling on the floor.” Went back to work, put it on… He says to Spencer Silver, “Can you just give me a bit of that glue?” put it on the top of this piece of paper. Lo and behold, Post-it notes.
Mimi Kwa (40:05):
Oh, divine Intervention. That is amazing.
Jo Stanley (40:09):
Isn’t that a beautiful story? But the lesson in this is for me-
Mimi Kwa (40:11):
Yeah. What is the lesson? I thought that God just laid a hand during the sermon, gave him this epiphany.
Jo Stanley (40:19):
Perhaps God did, if you’re a God-believing person, but for me, well, there’s two lessons. One is failure can often lead to great success. Poor odd Spencer Silver with his super strong glue that happened to be super weak.
Mimi Kwa (40:34):
Well, his name’s not a fail though, is it?
Jo Stanley (40:36):
It’s a ripper.
Mimi Kwa (40:37):
Spencer Silver.
Jo Stanley (40:38):
But for me, it was the fact that it happened when Art Fry was pursuing a passion. He loved singing. He’s sitting in church. Who knows how many years he’s been a singer, long enough to be included in the church choir. Although some church choirs, they’ll take anyone, but…
Mimi Kwa (40:54):
Let’s just say he was quite good at his art. Art was good at…
Jo Stanley (41:00):
Art. But I just think that we are so often focused on a goal and we have to do it this way and so we shut out all of the joy parts of our lives, and it’s in those… Isn’t it in those sort of interim moments [inaudible 00:41:17] moments?
Mimi Kwa (41:16):
The moments where the best ideas arise. So where even are we now in this discussion?
Jo Stanley (41:26):
Well, these questions and more, I think that we’re going to have to ask our guests. There are so many different conversations around how people have reached their moment, this moment right now. And we’ll be doing that with so many amazing people.
Mimi Kwa (41:40):
So many amazing people like Amy Wang, who is going to be our first guest on the show. We are so excited about that. Aren’t we?
Jo Stanley (41:49):
We are. So she’s a screenwriter who is now writing the sequel-
Mimi Kwa (41:54):
To Crazy Rich Asians.
Jo Stanley (41:56):
Australian woman made good, over there in LA doing incredible things. But how do you get from being that person to LA screenwriter?
Mimi Kwa (42:06):
Yeah. Exactly. Superstar. So I can’t wait to hear what her A to Be is, what all of those sliding door moments, the people who have helped her along her path. I know that she’s going to be a great guest.
Jo Stanley (42:20):
One of many amazing people.
Mimi Kwa (42:22):
And I just love that we’re going to be able to hold space for people in a way that allows them to expand their actual journey of how they did get from A to Be, because we hear from a lot of people, a lot of well-known people, a lot of impactful people, about what they’re doing now. And we kind of get a summary of, “Okay. How did you get here?” But this is really about those moments that without that moment, you would not be doing what you’re doing now. Or would you be?
Jo Stanley (42:55):
Oh. You doing my head in. It’s a little like time travel, this.
Mimi Kwa (42:57):
Oh. That’s my parking’s.
Jo Stanley (42:57):
I think that’s a sign,
Mimi Kwa (42:57):
Which means… Yeah. That is a sign. [inaudible 00:43:06] saying, “Shut up, ladies. Shut up.”
Jo Stanley (43:11):
Thank you for listening. We love you joining us for our A to Be chats.
Mimi Kwa (43:15):
Yes, we do. Please see our show notes for our acknowledgement of country and all the people who help us put this podcast together, as well as interesting links to our guests’ work and other references we’ve mentioned.
Jo Stanley (43:27):
Such as your frequently unverified quotes.
Mimi Kwa (43:30):
Yes. I may still need to check a few of those. Thank you.
Jo Stanley (43:34):
We’re Jo…
Mimi Kwa (43:35):
And Mimi from A to Be. Rate, follow and get in touch on our website.
Jo Stanley (43:40):
And let us know who’s A to Be you’d like to find out about.
Mimi Kwa (43:43):
We can’t wait for you to hear our next conversation.