Speaker 1: I'll get a team. Welcome to another installment, the new Project,
Speaker 1: Craig Anthony Harper. I hope you bloody terrific, all you
Speaker 1: guys and girls getting into our Typick typ kickstart program.
Speaker 1: Seven days of getting some momentum and getting focused and
Speaker 1: creating a few results.
Speaker 2: I hope you're doing that and having some fun with it.
Speaker 1: Today I've got I don't know if I'm allowed to
Speaker 1: say a fellow Bogan. I don't know how as she
Speaker 1: identifies as a Bogan, but I'm definitely a Bogain she
Speaker 1: did grow up. Have you ever seen yourself as a
Speaker 1: Bogan at all?
Speaker 2: Leela? Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, even when I was doing some training, like with
Speaker 3: accent training, when I was doing some acting training. I've
Speaker 3: even labeled my accent vintage Australian Nice.
Speaker 2: I like it. I like it. How hard was it?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: What was because? To me? Because acting is essentially high
Speaker 2: level pretending, right, yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's the opposite of authenticity. Although once you get
Speaker 1: really really good at acting, it doesn't seem like you're
Speaker 1: acting not it just seems like that's just you on
Speaker 1: a screen. What was what was the revelation the learning
Speaker 1: in becoming an acting student?
Speaker 3: It's a being in acting schools like a massive self
Speaker 3: discovery journey. Really like it's so like, I'm fascinated by psychology.
Speaker 3: So the psychology behind you trying to access emotions and
Speaker 3: feelings and you say, like you're acting is high level pretending,
Speaker 3: but it's not. It's the total opposite. You have to
Speaker 3: be so real, right and authentic. And that's what makes
Speaker 3: the really good actors good because they're able to just
Speaker 3: become and really feel and be those characters, whereas ones
Speaker 3: where you watch it and you go, that's shit acting.
Speaker 3: They're pretending, yes, And you've got to got revert back
Speaker 3: to a kid and being a kid. Like you know,
Speaker 3: when a kid's running around and there they're the fairy
Speaker 3: tale princess and you know they're running it. They fully
Speaker 3: believe they're a princess when they're playing, and you've got
Speaker 3: to be able to do that. So it was this
Speaker 3: this tapping into just letting go of any self conscious
Speaker 3: or any abilities of what has created you and made
Speaker 3: you the way you are and just being a kid again.
Speaker 3: It was a really good experience.
Speaker 1: I make a really valid point, so I stand corrected.
Speaker 1: Fucking five minutes into the show. You corrected me. No,
Speaker 1: you do make a good point, because when I'm watching
Speaker 1: someone who's awesome, I lose I mean on a level,
Speaker 1: on a subconscious or an unconscious level.
Speaker 2: Of course, you know you're watching a film even on
Speaker 2: unconscious level.
Speaker 1: But when they're really good, you get lost in it, right,
Speaker 1: and so all your emotions and your psychology and your
Speaker 1: physiology is all wrapped up. That's why when you're watching
Speaker 1: something that's a film that's not real, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: not that bloke's not really getting shot. Yeah, my nervous
Speaker 1: system doesn't know that because it's so well done that,
Speaker 1: you know, my body is now starting to believe what
Speaker 1: my eyes are seeing, and I lose context. That is,
Speaker 1: this is a work of fiction, and now I'm I
Speaker 1: guess that's the Yeah, maybe that's the high water mark
Speaker 1: of creating something good.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. So you want people to have an emotional
Speaker 3: response to what you're doing and feel invested and empathized
Speaker 3: with what that character is going through. And if you
Speaker 3: can make an audience cry or laugh or something, then
Speaker 3: you've the audience believes you.
Speaker 2: Do you think that because you are.
Speaker 1: I'm going to be honest, I'd heard of your name,
Speaker 1: but I didn't know anything really, and so yes saying
Speaker 1: today I've done a little bit of a deep dive.
Speaker 1: So I've done a I don't have a PhD in Leila,
Speaker 1: or I have a Cert three right, I'm.
Speaker 2: A SERT three.
Speaker 1: Oh how funny, Yeah, I have a Cert three in
Speaker 1: Leila McDougall. But do you think because you are like
Speaker 1: all the stuff that I've watched, there's no set of
Speaker 1: persona like with you know, some people, there's welcome back,
Speaker 1: it's five past yeh, well coming up next, we've got
Speaker 1: there's this whole fucking voice and energy. I forgot to
Speaker 1: tell you, Leila, we're very swear at the project.
Speaker 3: That's okay, this whole kind of.
Speaker 1: Vibe that's like, you're not really like that, So don't
Speaker 1: don't like, why are you doing the news with that
Speaker 1: weird voice? Just use your voice, you know, and everything
Speaker 1: that I've seen you on it, like I get the
Speaker 1: sense that if you're talking to a camera like you
Speaker 1: are right now or you know or you're not, I
Speaker 1: get the sense it's exactly the same.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm very I guess it was just being brought
Speaker 3: up in a country town and you are who you are,
Speaker 3: like you can't. I was never brought up with in
Speaker 3: a fake environment, if that makes sense. Like, I think
Speaker 3: I'm a reflection of the environment that I was raised in. Like,
Speaker 3: and I did go away to a fancy boarding school
Speaker 3: in year nine, and I was exposed to that fake world.
Speaker 3: So I kind of lived in two worlds, you know,
Speaker 3: from that age. I was exposed to this high end,
Speaker 3: you know, parents earning a lot of money, kids having everything,
Speaker 3: Like I was the only person in my whole year
Speaker 3: level that couldn't afford a computer for school, Like I
Speaker 3: didn't have one, or I was the only person that
Speaker 3: didn't get braces. But then when I'd go, like I
Speaker 3: was at home in my hometown, I kind of didn't
Speaker 3: fit in again because they all thought I was a
Speaker 3: bit too fancy because I was going away to a
Speaker 3: fancy school. So I was kind of like, Okay, I
Speaker 3: don't want to be fake like these people, and I
Speaker 3: don't want to be one of those, so I've just
Speaker 3: got to be me. And I guess my dad's just
Speaker 3: a bit of Alarican and you know, having all of
Speaker 3: his antics growing up and things. I just, yeah, but
Speaker 3: I think I was. It took me a long time
Speaker 3: to really embrace who I was as well, because you
Speaker 3: kind of think I'm not good enough, I don't fit
Speaker 3: in blah blah blah. And it took me until I
Speaker 3: was probably twenty eight to just be totally comfortable in
Speaker 3: my own skin.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But I think if you can be that authentic you,
Speaker 1: which is not to say, by the way, everyone that
Speaker 1: everyone who goes to boarding schools.
Speaker 3: No, no, definitely no, no.
Speaker 1: There are some lovely people at boarding school, very authentic
Speaker 1: and gorgeous, and a few fakey shmaky's, but that's in
Speaker 1: every group in society.
Speaker 2: But I think if you can like this thing, this.
Speaker 1: Imposter syndrome vibe right, nearly everyone I talked to has
Speaker 1: it or has had it, and I like you. I
Speaker 1: know that you didn't feel like you were the sharpest
Speaker 1: tool in the shed, or maybe you got pigeonholed because
Speaker 1: you had dyslex here and you had some learning issues
Speaker 1: which wasn't really you didn't get clarity around until later,
Speaker 1: which kind of change your life.
Speaker 2: We'll talk about that.
Speaker 1: But I grew up also feeling dumb or not smart
Speaker 1: or not this hole, not good enough, not I.
Speaker 2: I was a morbidly obese kid, so I was the fattest.
Speaker 1: Kid in my school, right, so that you're right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that brought Yeah, so my name at school was Jumbo,
Speaker 1: Like people didn't call me Craig, they call me Jumbo
Speaker 1: because But anyway, but that that environment and that where
Speaker 1: you grow up and you're like, oh, I'm not but
Speaker 1: I think I was one of many. I think many
Speaker 1: people feel not worthy, not good enough, not pretty enough,
Speaker 1: handsome enough, lean enough, smart enough, talented enough.
Speaker 2: I think that's just consistent with the human condition.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, and learning. I think a lot of people
Speaker 3: say that to me, like how how do you take
Speaker 3: the knockbacks all the time, because you know, I might
Speaker 3: have had one success, but there's been probably one hundred
Speaker 3: failures to get to that point, and constantly being knocked
Speaker 3: down as a kid in getting back up, it's built
Speaker 3: that resilience, I think, to not be afraid to fail
Speaker 3: because I know, like if I fail at something, it's
Speaker 3: not really that big a deal, Like you just get
Speaker 3: back up and try the next thing. So you know,
Speaker 3: like I remember being at school and everyone in beginning
Speaker 3: like no, and you know, on their exams and I'd
Speaker 3: be like forty two. I'm like getting closer to a
Speaker 3: pass like, so I think just that learning to fail,
Speaker 3: not winning everything. Like you know, if you're a kid
Speaker 3: that grows up winning everything and you get to being
Speaker 3: an adult and you lose for the first time, it's hard.
Speaker 2: It's so true. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, We've got to know how to lose and fail
Speaker 3: in life because it's you know, we don't win all
Speaker 3: the time.
Speaker 1: I think sometimes mediocrity is a superpower because I think
Speaker 1: when you grow up as the kid who isn't the
Speaker 1: best or the fastest, or the smartest or the whateverest, right,
Speaker 1: when you're that kid, and I was definitely that kid,
Speaker 1: and you were probably a version of that kid, you
Speaker 1: have to be adaptable. You have to fucking figure out
Speaker 1: Like in your case, I can't read and I can't
Speaker 1: do maths, but I don't want everyone to know. And
Speaker 1: it wasn't that you were dumb, it was that you
Speaker 1: had an undiagnosed issue, condition, whatever. But you're trying to
Speaker 1: navigate the world without something that most people have.
Speaker 2: So you have to become adaptable, right yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like even now, I'm just starting to figure out
Speaker 3: that everyone's brain doesn't work at the pace mind does,
Speaker 3: and I expect people to keep up with my brain
Speaker 3: and I'm like, oh, hang on, maybe maybe not everyone's
Speaker 3: brain goes at my speed. Shit like, and I'm still
Speaker 3: learning it now. I'm thinking wow and tapping into all
Speaker 3: these different things that I was like, Oh, I thought
Speaker 3: this was a bad thing growing up. They told me
Speaker 3: I was to you know, all over the place. But
Speaker 3: really it's just learning how to use it to your advantage.
Speaker 1: I saw in your by the way, Lela's got a
Speaker 1: really good Australian story did a piece on you and
Speaker 1: it's fucking amazing. It's so good, So congrats on that.
Speaker 1: But in that you said, essentially you said I'm a lot.
Speaker 1: I think you said I'm quite full on, I'm quite alon.
Speaker 1: How do people go with that? Some people would really resonate,
Speaker 1: and some people would be a bit overwhelmed.
Speaker 3: Maybe yeah, and they are. And you know, my husband's
Speaker 3: probably the most laid back person in the world, and
Speaker 3: he just is amazing and just is like, yeah, right, oh,
Speaker 3: she's on this tangent, this idea this week and not
Speaker 3: this week. And then some people just find me a
Speaker 3: lot because I just I'm not someone who talks about
Speaker 3: I know, little things like I love chatting about ideas
Speaker 3: and what we're going to do next and how we
Speaker 3: can work as a team. And then if someone wants
Speaker 3: to come on the team, I get really excited because
Speaker 3: I'm like, yay, how are we going to And I
Speaker 3: start bringing them in and some people love it and
Speaker 3: they jump on board and they come with me, and
Speaker 3: then other people are like, whoa wa, this is too much,
Speaker 3: like I can't do this. So I guess, yeah, like
Speaker 3: if you've got the pace to keep up and jump on,
Speaker 3: Like I've got Kelly Wendell who's on my team at
Speaker 3: the moment, and she's just as crazy as I am.
Speaker 3: So it's just finding other crazies. And we shouldn't talk
Speaker 3: to ourselves because as soon as I meet someone, I
Speaker 3: start to go to defend myself and say, oh, you know,
Speaker 3: I am a lot, I am full on, I am crazy,
Speaker 3: like kind of pre warning them about what I am.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, why do I do that?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Why do you?
Speaker 1: But I think also, and I'm not just trying to
Speaker 1: make you feel good or pissing in your metaphor or
Speaker 1: pissing in your metaphoric pocket, but I mean, like, I've
Speaker 1: known you for five minutes and I watched a couple
Speaker 1: of hours of stuff on you. But you know, to me,
Speaker 1: you're gifted to me. And again I'm truly mean this right,
Speaker 1: you're highly intelligent. Not only are you not dumb, right,
Speaker 1: you're highly intelligent, highly creative, highly motivated. Yes you're not
Speaker 1: good at everything, Yes you've fucked up, Yes you've failed
Speaker 1: at shit. Yes you're human. Welcome to the world's biggest club.
Speaker 1: We all fuck up and fail, but I think you know,
Speaker 1: the challenge is to fuck up and fail and make
Speaker 1: mistakes and look silly and be embarrassed and be humiliated,
Speaker 1: and then out of all of that go that's okay,
Speaker 1: that's okay, that's everyone, like, that's everyone, and you know,
Speaker 1: and even the kids.
Speaker 2: I need to be careful how I say this, but
Speaker 2: you know, I've.
Speaker 1: Caught up with people from school that I went to
Speaker 1: it one hundred and thirty years ago who were super
Speaker 1: I mean super smartly la super academic, super gifted, super athletic,
Speaker 1: and let's just say, for some.
Speaker 2: Of them, it really didn't work out at all.
Speaker 1: So having that running start may not be the gift
Speaker 1: that we all think.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, definitely, You've got to have a bit of grit,
Speaker 3: a bit of mongrel, I call it like you've just
Speaker 3: got to have that fire in the belly to just
Speaker 3: and I don't know, and I don't know if you
Speaker 3: can teach that to people, whether it's something you've just
Speaker 3: got or you don't, but having that bit of mongrel
Speaker 3: and fight sort of helps you just punch through the
Speaker 3: next thing. And yeah, sure I have days where I'm like,
Speaker 3: I don't want to get out of bed. Life sucks,
Speaker 3: blah blah blah. We're all going to have those days.
Speaker 3: But it's about how you wake up the next day
Speaker 3: and get out. And that's how I just look at it.
Speaker 3: And I'm just and even used to say to yourself,
Speaker 3: like I've been to a couple of third world countries
Speaker 3: on missionary trips with students when I was teaching, and
Speaker 3: you just think, Wow, how lucky was I to be
Speaker 3: born in Australia in the family. I was like, it's
Speaker 3: like a you know, zero point three percent chance that
Speaker 3: I could have been born here, like my spirit could
Speaker 3: be in this environment, yet I am, So let's get kracking.
Speaker 1: That's such a great stat I mean, you think I
Speaker 1: always think about that, you know, looking with it again
Speaker 1: sounds cheesy, but it's just true. Looking at the world
Speaker 1: through a lens or trying to look at the world
Speaker 1: through a lens of gratitude and self awareness and situational awareness.
Speaker 1: I'm the same as you. I grew up in a
Speaker 1: great family and a great place. I have great friends,
Speaker 1: And yeah, I was a fat kid, but that's that
Speaker 1: was my fault.
Speaker 2: Nobody made me fat.
Speaker 1: And even though people call me jumbo, there was no
Speaker 1: real malice in it, right, that was like because I
Speaker 1: was just Jumbo, Right, But then you think, like a
Speaker 1: friend of mine got literally blown up by gas bottles
Speaker 1: in a work in an industrial accident seven years ago,
Speaker 1: and I see him a few times a week at
Speaker 1: the gym. I train him and have helped him recover
Speaker 1: and a whole bunch of stuff. But every day of
Speaker 1: his life he has pain like he never has He
Speaker 1: never has a pain like a zero pain day. And
Speaker 1: you know, they said he would be a quadriplegic. Then
Speaker 1: they said he'd be a paraplegic. They said, you know,
Speaker 1: have a significant massive brain injury. He'd never be able
Speaker 1: to you know, and all of these things that he
Speaker 1: was meant to not be able to do he can
Speaker 1: now do. He walks with a stick, he drives himself
Speaker 1: to the gym to meet me, and but life is
Speaker 1: you know, he's done some amazing shit, but life is hard,
Speaker 1: and like compared to his life, every day of my
Speaker 1: life is like a fucking Disney movie, right, And it's
Speaker 1: like an episode of something, you know, I'm like, Wow,
Speaker 1: I don't get up in pain. I can press a
Speaker 1: button and the air conditioning comes on. I can turn
Speaker 1: on a tap and there's cold water. You know, two
Speaker 1: billion out of eight billion people in the world don't
Speaker 1: even have fresh water, but they can't. I can just go, oh,
Speaker 1: here's a tap, here's a glass, clean water boom, like
Speaker 1: a lot of people don't. And I know again, you
Speaker 1: know this seems cliche, but sometimes we don't value things
Speaker 1: until we don't have them anymore. And sometimes the things
Speaker 1: we really really want are just like, oh can I get.
Speaker 2: Out of bed?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Am I pain free? Oh? Can I? Is this person
Speaker 2: still in my life?
Speaker 1: You know? Like that looking through that lens of awareness
Speaker 1: and gratitude, I think that is more life changing than
Speaker 1: actually the situation.
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely. And I've been I've got in trouble for
Speaker 3: saying this before, but it's it's so true. Like my
Speaker 3: dad always said to us as kids, there's always someone
Speaker 3: worse off than you. It's so true. But then I've
Speaker 3: been I've got in trouble for saying that sometimes because
Speaker 3: they're like, oh, but you're diminishing other people's problems. But
Speaker 3: I'm like, but if we all looked at it as
Speaker 3: the way of I am lucky and genuine gratitude. Like
Speaker 3: there's a lot of ingenuine gratitude around where people are like, oh,
Speaker 3: I'm grateful for this, and you know, they do their
Speaker 3: reflection and their gratitude journal and all this sort of stuff.
Speaker 3: But I'm like, are you genuinely glateful? You know, you
Speaker 3: can say you are and you're living a life of gratitude,
Speaker 3: but are you really And there's that's that difference between
Speaker 3: it genuine gratitude and not genuine Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's like when people say I'm really spiritual, I'm like,
Speaker 1: if you were, you wouldn't say that exactly.
Speaker 3: I love that one. They're like, I live a spiritual
Speaker 3: life area if you were, I could just look at
Speaker 3: you and and yeah, yeah, I don't have to tell me.
Speaker 1: It's like I did a humility workshop on the weekend.
Speaker 1: I was the best. Yeah, but I think, you know,
Speaker 1: to your point of when you say that you diminish
Speaker 1: people's pain or whatever or problems.
Speaker 2: I'm with you in that.
Speaker 1: I think we can acknowledge people's problems of course, and go, yes,
Speaker 1: you do have it hard, or you have had it hard,
Speaker 1: or we're acknowledging that you have real issues and challenges
Speaker 1: and problems. We're acknowledging that. And here's some empathy and
Speaker 1: here's some care, and I mean that genuinely, but also
Speaker 1: at the same time, what do you have to be
Speaker 1: grateful for?
Speaker 2: Is there anything you know? Is there you know?
Speaker 1: Can you get out of bed? Can you walk? Can
Speaker 1: you walk to a fridge and there's food in there?
Speaker 1: Do you have that option? You know? And look, I
Speaker 1: mean at the same time, we've got to interweave the
Speaker 1: practical realities of living life on planet Earth. And it
Speaker 1: can be tough mentally, emotionally, physiologically, you know, socially, all
Speaker 1: of those things. But that it's like I put up
Speaker 1: a post this morning on my social media this is
Speaker 1: a bad thing to do in the middle of a podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm going to find it and I'm.
Speaker 2: Going to read it to you.
Speaker 1: So if anybody doesn't follow me on Insta it is
Speaker 1: Craig Anthony Happer. So I put up this post which
Speaker 1: you can't see, but it says the problem with the
Speaker 1: when you do this you make me feel that mindset
Speaker 1: is that you make me feel. Part of the statement
Speaker 1: is telling the world and yourself that someone else is
Speaker 1: in control of your feelings.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: It's like, when you do this, you make me feel,
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, maybe that's again. I'm not saying that
Speaker 1: you know that people aren't insensitive or nasty.
Speaker 2: Of course they are. Of course people are mean and nasty.
Speaker 2: We get that.
Speaker 1: But then at some stage we need to have some
Speaker 1: kind of for one of a better term sovereignty or
Speaker 1: responsibility for our own feelings and responses. Right, Ultimately, you
Speaker 1: need to manage you. You need to manage your mind,
Speaker 1: your emotions, your body. And of course Craig Harper might
Speaker 1: say something that's insensitive because he's a fuck right he might.
Speaker 2: He might, Right, there's a good chance today.
Speaker 1: Right. But even in the middle of that, there's still
Speaker 1: what you do with that, right, Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, And that's it. Like, as you can only control
Speaker 3: your own actions and your own thoughts, you cannot control
Speaker 3: someone else. You cannot expect them to always be thinking
Speaker 3: of everybody else and what they're how they're making people feel.
Speaker 3: Because are you also thinking about everything you say and
Speaker 3: how that affects the other person. No, So it's like
Speaker 3: this whole thing. We're all like, I'm the victim. Don't
Speaker 3: say this to me because I'll be triggered or it
Speaker 3: might do this to me. It's like, but are you
Speaker 3: also putting out what you want to get in?
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you something that my listeners will
Speaker 1: hate me telling you because they've heard it too much,
Speaker 1: but you have never heard it, right, Fuck it, So
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you. Everyone else, get yourself a chocolate,
Speaker 1: come back in two minutes. So my PhD Leila is
Speaker 1: on a thing called metaperception, which is your ability to
Speaker 1: understand the Leila experience for everyone else. So the question is,
Speaker 1: for everyone else in my life, what's it like being
Speaker 1: around me? So for me, it's like, what's the Craig
Speaker 1: experience like for Lela in this moment? What's the Craig
Speaker 1: experience like? For my audience or for my mum or
Speaker 1: dad or my business partner, what's the Craig or my friends?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: And so it's understanding us through the eyes and experiences
Speaker 1: of others, and it's kind of an interpersonal superpower. So
Speaker 1: it's where we start to think. So when we think
Speaker 1: about thinking, that's called metacognition, where we just start to think,
Speaker 1: why do I think the way that I do? Why
Speaker 1: do I react to what?
Speaker 2: You know? Why when?
Speaker 1: Why when you know, my dad does this, or my
Speaker 1: friend does that or says that, why do I think that?
Speaker 2: Why do I you know?
Speaker 1: So that's it's kind of almost doing a deep dive
Speaker 1: into understanding your own mind. And then the next level
Speaker 1: on that is understanding the mind of others, which is
Speaker 1: called theory of mind, which is your ability to just understand,
Speaker 1: not necessarily agree with, but how other people think, right yep.
Speaker 1: And then the next layer to that is understanding how
Speaker 1: people think about you. And you being a public figure
Speaker 1: now like it or not, it's in your interest not
Speaker 1: to be worried about what people think to you, but
Speaker 1: to have an awareness of, oh, what's the.
Speaker 2: Me experience like for them?
Speaker 1: And that's something I've had to deal with and navigate
Speaker 1: because you know, in the same show, I'll get feedback
Speaker 1: from people going, thank you so much, that was fucking amazing.
Speaker 2: Blah. Blah blah.
Speaker 1: I love how real you are and the swearing and
Speaker 1: the you know, the authentic and someone else will go,
Speaker 1: please stop swearing, it's offensive. Yeah, you know, and you're like,
Speaker 1: of course that's because it's the same stimulus.
Speaker 2: But there's these myriad of individual responses.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And that's something that like I've probably struggled with
Speaker 3: a lot in my life is like what is another
Speaker 3: person's experience of me? And getting used to the fact that, Like,
Speaker 3: I think I went through a point where I was
Speaker 3: like a real people pleaser. I just wanted to do
Speaker 3: everything to please everybody and make sure I was liked.
Speaker 3: And then I got to a point where I'm like,
Speaker 3: why am I changing my behavior and who I am?
Speaker 3: Like I've totally lost my creative spark. I'm not doing
Speaker 3: anything that really makes me happy anymore. How do I
Speaker 3: get back to being me? Because I am a bit
Speaker 3: eccentric and you know, like and moving to a place
Speaker 3: where you didn't grow up and everyone in the community
Speaker 3: just knows you because they watched you grow up, I
Speaker 3: think it's really hard. Like everyone in Walker just knew
Speaker 3: I was a little bit creative, you know, they knew
Speaker 3: my struggles and what i'd gone through with schooling and
Speaker 3: they were all really supportive, and to this day that
Speaker 3: little town is like my biggest fan club when I
Speaker 3: love it. But then coming to a place where I
Speaker 3: had to try and fit in and please everybody, you'll
Speaker 3: lose that and then sort of going no, I want
Speaker 3: to be me, and then the people that do like
Speaker 3: me will come to me, and I can't make everybody
Speaker 3: like me. I can try and be as pleasant to
Speaker 3: these people that I don't have the same opinions and
Speaker 3: views on life as, but I can't change myself to
Speaker 3: just make sure that they like me. Does that make
Speaker 3: any sense again?
Speaker 2: One hundred percent? Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I think it's just about, you know, being authentical.
Speaker 1: I mean, we can still be sensitive and aware to others' needs.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: It's like my mum doesn't like swearing, so I don't go,
Speaker 1: how the fuck are you merry?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Yeah, even though I normally swear.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm aware.
Speaker 1: I'm sensitive to my mum's needs and likes and dislikes,
Speaker 1: and so that's just to me, that's just respectful. But yeah,
Speaker 1: but if you and me are hanging out having a
Speaker 1: coffee and we talk for an hour, I'm probably going
Speaker 1: to say fuck twelve times, right, and I don't do
Speaker 1: it for a fact or you know, and maybe I
Speaker 1: should or maybe I shouldn't, but it reminds me when
Speaker 1: I first started. So my main job, Leila in Inverted Commas,
Speaker 1: is corporate speaking. And when I first started, you know,
Speaker 1: so I'm sixty one. I did my first corporate gig
Speaker 1: at twenty six. By the time I was twenty seven,
Speaker 1: twenty eight, thirty ish, I was, I was wearing fucking suits.
Speaker 1: I hate suits and I hate suits, right. I own
Speaker 1: one suit and if I absolutely have to drag it
Speaker 1: out for a wedding or a funeral, have to, I will,
Speaker 1: but I really don't.
Speaker 2: And that's just me, right, And I just got.
Speaker 1: To a point where I went, I mean, unless the
Speaker 1: client or the company, unless they absolutely like, unless it's
Speaker 1: a deal breaker, I'm not wearing a suit. And so
Speaker 1: when companies book me, now I go, what's the dress code?
Speaker 1: And if they go, you know whatever, I go cool,
Speaker 1: I don't wear suits, And they're like, I go, I
Speaker 1: don't wear business attire. So I'll be wearing boots, jeans
Speaker 1: and a shirt.
Speaker 2: Is that okay?
Speaker 3: And they go all right?
Speaker 1: And if I can I'm going to go black T shirt,
Speaker 1: army shorts and sneakers. They're like, all right, And I've
Speaker 1: been at many corporate dig events where yeah, I'm.
Speaker 2: The only person in the room in a pair of
Speaker 2: shorts and.
Speaker 1: That I'm I don't yeah, yeah, I mean it doesn't
Speaker 1: have but for me, I don't know.
Speaker 2: I feel like and.
Speaker 1: Again this is just completely individual, not right or wrong,
Speaker 1: but when I wear a suit, I feel like I'm
Speaker 1: pretending that I'm something that I'm not pretending to be
Speaker 1: something I'm not. But all right, speaking of fashion, there's
Speaker 1: so much to talk about with you. So you grew
Speaker 1: up thinking you're a dummy, and you're not a dummy.
Speaker 1: But at some stage, and we'll jump back and forth
Speaker 1: because I know I'm not going chronologically in your story,
Speaker 1: I realize that.
Speaker 2: Tell us about you and fashion. When did that door open?
Speaker 3: I guess it's a family thing. Like all the women
Speaker 3: that have ever come before me have been very creative
Speaker 3: and make things like and I guess you know, I'm
Speaker 3: probably the first generation of my family where we have
Speaker 3: access to just buying stuff because we want it. So
Speaker 3: everyone else in my before me, if they wanted something,
Speaker 3: they'd make it. Themselves, So I've got that. So my mom, my, Nan,
Speaker 3: my great grandmother, they were all sewers and knitters and everything,
Speaker 3: so I just naturally had that flare. But yeah, when
Speaker 3: I went away to my second school in Armadale, they
Speaker 3: had they actually had textiles as a subject, and I
Speaker 3: just was like a duck to water. I loved it.
Speaker 3: I loved sewing, I loved making clothes. And then when
Speaker 3: I look back at it at my life as a kid,
Speaker 3: like I used to make all my dolls little clothes
Speaker 3: out of bits of scrap fabric that Mum had laying around,
Speaker 3: and yeah, so I just have always had this fascination
Speaker 3: with clothes and and fiber. I think I loved fiber
Speaker 3: more than I loved fashion. I kind of didn't want
Speaker 3: to work in the fashion industry after I'd gone and
Speaker 3: studied it because I sort of resented everything that it
Speaker 3: was like this fast fashion, manipulated people to buy your
Speaker 3: product or that sort of thing, Whereas I fell in
Speaker 3: love with wool. And I guess that's mainly because my
Speaker 3: parents were fine wool growers, and I was like, how
Speaker 3: am I going to make my dad rich? I'm going
Speaker 3: to make clothes out of wool very nice. But yeah,
Speaker 3: that's that was my plan.
Speaker 1: Didn't work well, but you did it did go on
Speaker 1: to win an award, so you must have some talent.
Speaker 2: It tell us what did you win? It was something
Speaker 2: when you're at school, wasn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So I remember going to this Woolf Fashion Awards
Speaker 3: in year nine and I just I even remember distinctly
Speaker 3: sitting in the chair. I know exactly where I was
Speaker 3: sitting in the audience, like I've got a memory like
Speaker 3: you wouldn't believe, Like it's quite it freaks people out sometimes,
Speaker 3: but I remember exactly where I was sitting. We were
Speaker 3: watching this fashion show with all these other you know,
Speaker 3: fashion things in war coming down. I remember saying to myself,
Speaker 3: I'm entering this year next year and I'm in it.
Speaker 3: And so I did, and I entered it and I
Speaker 3: didn't win anything that year. But the following year I
Speaker 3: entered and instead of entering the kids like the student section,
Speaker 3: I entered the wedding dress section because I found this
Speaker 3: really amazing fabric, white woolen fabric, and I made it
Speaker 3: into a wedding dress. And I didn't think I was
Speaker 3: going to win anything with it because I wasn't in
Speaker 3: the student category. But yeah, I ended up winning a
Speaker 3: scholarship to study fashion design.
Speaker 2: And did you do it?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yep, I went on to do It was kind
Speaker 3: of like my key to getting anywhere, because I wasn't
Speaker 3: going to get into UNI with my grades at anything,
Speaker 3: and to get into study fashion design because it's so competitive,
Speaker 3: Like you needed a it was a UAI when I
Speaker 3: was at school. You needed a ninety eight UAI. Definitely
Speaker 3: wasn't getting.
Speaker 2: That only if you added up all your subjects.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah and put them all to it. So I
Speaker 3: got forty nine point five. So I was like, way off.
Speaker 1: It Isn't it funny though, that you can be based
Speaker 1: on certain criteria, I mean you're not but on that
Speaker 1: criteria or system, you know, very very sub average, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: But in a depending on what protocol or tool or
Speaker 1: measurement we use, you might be the smartest in a
Speaker 1: group of one hundred, depending on what it is we're measuring.
Speaker 1: I mean, intelligence is such a it's such a spectrum
Speaker 1: of stuff, isn't it.
Speaker 3: And I think something the other day where they said
Speaker 3: there's a difference between intelligence and knowledge. Intelligence is we
Speaker 3: just have it or we don't but knowledge. You can
Speaker 3: give yourself knowledge, and I guess that's what school is,
Speaker 3: that they're giving us knowledge to then regurgitate it in
Speaker 3: a way. But just because someone has all the knowledge
Speaker 3: doesn't mean they're actually always intelligent in every situation.
Speaker 1: One hundred percent. That is beautifully said. I mean that
Speaker 1: is true, and there are some people that are knowledgeable
Speaker 1: and smart. There are some people that knowledgeable and not smart,
Speaker 1: some people that don't have the same academic prowess. I
Speaker 1: would say you and me. I was probably probably marginally
Speaker 1: better at school than you, but not a lot, to
Speaker 1: be honest. And I'm even though I'm doing what I'm
Speaker 1: doing now with my PhD, I'm not actually an academic.
Speaker 1: I'm more a pro academic, right, So I naturally understand stuff,
Speaker 1: then I need to almost reverse engineer it to say, oh,
Speaker 1: what does research say about this? Like I start off
Speaker 1: with something that I intuitively or instinctively or experientially know,
Speaker 1: and then I go, what is science or what is
Speaker 1: research or academia say about this is the thing that
Speaker 1: I know naturally, is it supported by any kind of evidence?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 1: And that's the that's the thing, because we could there
Speaker 1: are so many people that I need to say this carefully,
Speaker 1: but Okay, so where I study and they're great people,
Speaker 1: They're great and some of them are like, depending on
Speaker 1: the conversation, I could feel like definitely the dumbest person
Speaker 1: in the room because there's just I'm like that is
Speaker 1: I've got no idea what you're all talking about. Or
Speaker 1: there could be another conversation and I might be the
Speaker 1: smartest person in the room. It depends what we're doing
Speaker 1: and what the subject matter is. But I think that
Speaker 1: overarching kind of idea of is can I what do
Speaker 1: I know? What do I understand? And then most importantly,
Speaker 1: what am I doing with that knowledge and that understanding
Speaker 1: and that intelligence to create something good in the world
Speaker 1: or me or good for my family or good for
Speaker 1: the people I care about? Like, am I operationalizing this
Speaker 1: stuff to produce real world results?
Speaker 3: Yeah? And I remember just being at school and having
Speaker 3: these these thoughts, you know, where there's girls in my
Speaker 3: year level that were just so smart and they'd get
Speaker 3: like ninety eights and like be so clever, and I'd
Speaker 3: get so frustrated at them because I'm like, you have
Speaker 3: I would give anything to have what you have. In
Speaker 3: beginning those marks but you're just you're always getting in
Speaker 3: trouble and you're not really pushing yourself to your best ability.
Speaker 3: Yet you have that potential, and it used to just
Speaker 3: frustrate me so much because I would have just given
Speaker 3: anything to be able to just get the marks that
Speaker 3: they were getting and go and have the opportunity to
Speaker 3: study whatever they wanted when they left school, and I
Speaker 3: just didn't have that. They used to frustrate the shit
Speaker 3: out of me.
Speaker 2: I can imagine.
Speaker 1: What.
Speaker 2: So when did the.
Speaker 1: Dyslexia curtain get pulled back and you and your family
Speaker 1: went ah this? Yeah?
Speaker 3: Year nine? So because yeah, I went away.
Speaker 2: I went to.
Speaker 3: Away to a different school because yeah, I just wasn't
Speaker 3: getting anywhere at the current one I was at. But
Speaker 3: the one that I was at, my best friend was there,
Speaker 3: and we'd worked out a way of hiding everything. So,
Speaker 3: like you know, when you're in like, dyslexics are really
Speaker 3: good at disguising themselves because they don't want to stand out.
Speaker 3: And I wasn't doing that consciously. It was just something
Speaker 3: that I was doing because I thought I had to
Speaker 3: fit in. So my best friend was kind of like
Speaker 3: my safety blanket. And when I went away to the
Speaker 3: next school, she wasn't there sort of helped me and
Speaker 3: hide it. So what you know, when like it's the
Speaker 3: worst thing teachers do. They're like, you read out a sentence,
Speaker 3: you and you go around the room. And we'd go
Speaker 3: around the room, and so i'd like count how many
Speaker 3: people were in front of me, and then i'd count
Speaker 3: the sentences and then be where I am, and then
Speaker 3: i'd practice the sentence to make sure I had it.
Speaker 3: So I wasn't hearing anything else going on in the classroom.
Speaker 3: I'm just concentrating on making sure that when it gets
Speaker 3: to me, I can read out my sentence. But then
Speaker 3: there's always some smart ass in front of you who
Speaker 3: thinks I'm going to read too rose the whole thing,
Speaker 3: and you're like, now I've got to try and find
Speaker 3: the next one. Now, where's the next one? But my
Speaker 3: girlfriend used to sit next to me and she'd whisper
Speaker 3: the words to me, and I just repeat them so
Speaker 3: they could A great friend. I know, she's my best
Speaker 3: And then in all our mass exams, I'd sit next
Speaker 3: to her and I'd just copy her answers and wanted it.
Speaker 3: No one ever worked it out, And we were so
Speaker 3: good at it that some of them I'd make difference
Speaker 3: so that it wasn't an exact her exams and stuff.
Speaker 3: So when I went to the new school and like
Speaker 3: the teachers that said, oh, she's okay at mass and
Speaker 3: blow and my marks, like they were like, this kid
Speaker 3: can't even add up because I was didn't have her
Speaker 3: there to copy. And one of the teachers I kind
Speaker 3: of worded up another girl. I'm like, oh, can you
Speaker 3: just help me read this because I'm just a bit
Speaker 3: nervous and I don't know how to read. And she
Speaker 3: was whispering it to me and I was repeating it,
Speaker 3: but the teacher heard her doing it and was like,
Speaker 3: what's going on here? Like this isn't she's yeah, And
Speaker 3: then that's when they started testing me and yeah they
Speaker 3: were like you know there were letters back to front.
Speaker 3: My whole handwriting was tilted like the wrong way. And
Speaker 3: now even to this day, like Pete, when you read
Speaker 3: my handwriting, it's like you've put that around the wrong way,
Speaker 3: Like what are you doing?
Speaker 2: Like were they were?
Speaker 1: They?
Speaker 2: Were they good though? Were they empathetic? And oh?
Speaker 3: Like it was amazing. I had a learning support teacher,
Speaker 3: missus Ashley. To this day, like I still stay in
Speaker 3: touch with her. I used to spend an hour every
Speaker 3: day with her go back learn different ways, Like she
Speaker 3: really encouraged the creative side of me and like not
Speaker 3: concentrating on just you know. She just said, like, you're
Speaker 3: never going to be the best reader and writer, and
Speaker 3: that's fine. We're going to play to your strengths. So
Speaker 3: like I did all my creative subjects, I did really
Speaker 3: well in those and there's always writing components to those subjects.
Speaker 3: But she just was so supportive in the fact that
Speaker 3: she's like, you know, are you going to write an
Speaker 3: essay when you leave school? I was like, probably not, oh,
Speaker 3: but here I am writing things. So it was good
Speaker 3: to have that support. And then my textiles teacher in
Speaker 3: year eleven and twelve, she was just amazing. Missus Thomas
Speaker 3: definitely Thomas a stale state in touch with her and
Speaker 3: having those people that believed in your strengths, not and
Speaker 3: playing to your strengths rather than always telling you you're
Speaker 3: not good at something and trying to make you better
Speaker 3: at the thing that you're never going to be good at.
Speaker 3: They found was good at and helped me get those Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, shout out to missus Ashley and shout out to
Speaker 1: Missus Thomas, shout out to mister Ryan, who used to
Speaker 1: tell me. Mister Ryan, my year eight teacher, who used
Speaker 1: to when I was fucking round, it'd go Harper. I'll
Speaker 1: be like, yes, sir, you don't be a dickhead. I'm like, yes, sir.
Speaker 1: But you know what I loved because I was being
Speaker 1: a dickhead. I mean shock, everyone's everyone's like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: I can't believe it.
Speaker 2: But he would go.
Speaker 1: What I loved was there was no bullshit. He's like,
Speaker 1: don't be a dickhead. I'm like, yes, sir. And that
Speaker 1: was it, and I'm being a dickhead for solid twenty minutes.
Speaker 2: And then he helped me again. But he was an
Speaker 2: ex cop who yeah, he was a policeman, and then
Speaker 2: later he became a teacher. So I bought that that
Speaker 2: kind of cop energy and that authoritive kind of and
Speaker 2: I needed it and I responded to it. So and
Speaker 2: isn't it funny? Like I mean that we're talking two
Speaker 2: thousand years ago, but isn't it funny?
Speaker 1: I mean, missus Ashley and Missus Thomas are probably for you,
Speaker 1: like twenty years ago plus, but you still you still
Speaker 1: remember them and still value them, right yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: And it's and that's when I like, cause I started
Speaker 3: teaching because you know, studied fashion design and married a
Speaker 3: farmer and needed a job, so I did my dip D.
Speaker 3: And that's what I said to myself, I want to
Speaker 3: be that teacher in a kid's life. Like, I'm not
Speaker 3: going to be that to everyone, but if there are
Speaker 3: kids that I know are like that were like me,
Speaker 3: I want to help them. And like my first two
Speaker 3: years of teaching, like I still stay in touch with
Speaker 3: some of those kids and they're great and I love
Speaker 3: seeing them grow. But my art class, my first ever
Speaker 3: art class, year eleven and twelve, they were just the
Speaker 3: coolest kids.
Speaker 2: So when did you start and stop? Oh, so you
Speaker 2: taught art.
Speaker 1: You didn't have to teach anything else though, Like I'm thinking,
Speaker 1: you don't want to be teaching bloody Australian history or
Speaker 1: something wherever you go.
Speaker 3: But I think I'm better at teaching that because I
Speaker 3: have a different way of teaching it, Like I have
Speaker 3: a different sequence that kids can understand, rather than someone
Speaker 3: who's just really good at history teaching history, someone who
Speaker 3: struggled with something and has to work out how to
Speaker 3: understand it can then explain it in a way that
Speaker 3: helps other people understand it. I think it's quite an
Speaker 3: interesting but no, I don't teach history and things. I
Speaker 3: teach art, textiles, would metal food like the fun stuff?
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely the fun start, you know. I think the
Speaker 1: thing also about I can't remember the exact stat but
Speaker 1: I think it's this, although I could fuck it up,
Speaker 1: but thirty percent of all millionaires or around thirty percent
Speaker 1: of all millionaires or not that that's necessarily a big
Speaker 1: deal these days, but a dyslexic, like there's a disproportionate
Speaker 1: number of people who are successful who have dyslexia. And
Speaker 1: when you go you google famous people who are dyslexic,
Speaker 1: it's like so many really famous, high profile people.
Speaker 2: I reckon. Part of it is exactly what you did.
Speaker 1: You have to go through life solving problems, and when
Speaker 1: you become a big person, you know, like you you
Speaker 1: have your own business, you did your film which you
Speaker 1: will talk about you like being a human. A big
Speaker 1: part of being a human is just figuring shit out
Speaker 1: in real time because life gives no fucks about your
Speaker 1: results or your feelings or your happiness, and so you know,
Speaker 1: It's like before the U Project, I did three other podcasts,
Speaker 1: three other shows. They didn't work, and then I started
Speaker 1: this one and I made no money for like, not
Speaker 1: one dollar. I lost money for two years. And you go, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you could call that a failure, or you could call
Speaker 1: that part of my apprenticeship to become a black belt
Speaker 1: instead of a white belt, you know, and so you're
Speaker 1: you're produced. Like even when you spoke about failure before,
Speaker 1: I was thinking, when we reframe failure without trying to
Speaker 1: sound too cliche again, you just go, well, there was
Speaker 1: an outcome. Yeah, I learned from that outcome. Well, next
Speaker 1: time I'll do more of that and less of that
Speaker 1: other thing. Or that was completely wrong, but I reckon,
Speaker 1: I've got more of an eight like.
Speaker 2: We're always you know.
Speaker 1: For me, I got to the point where I can
Speaker 1: talk to you, who I've never met, for maybe an
Speaker 1: hour and a half comfortably. Not because I'm a genius
Speaker 1: or you're a genius, but because I've done this so
Speaker 1: many times and I've had so many conversations, and I
Speaker 1: used to be shit at it, and now I don't
Speaker 1: think I'm brilliant at it now, but now I've got
Speaker 1: skills and knowledge and awareness and understanding and insight that
Speaker 1: I didn't have.
Speaker 2: But I couldn't get the knowledge skills, et cetera unless
Speaker 2: I went through the shit.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, And like you could have read it in
Speaker 3: a book on exactly how to do it, or watched
Speaker 3: a documentary on how to do it, but you still
Speaker 3: would never have learned what you've learned until you go, oh,
Speaker 3: that's not the way you do it. The book did
Speaker 3: say that, but I didn't understand why it wouldn't work.
Speaker 3: But now I've done it and it didn't work. I
Speaker 3: get it.
Speaker 2: Now, I get our champs.
Speaker 1: It's me just interrupting the flow of the conversation because
Speaker 1: the lovely Leela and I.
Speaker 2: Banged on for a long time. We had a very
Speaker 2: long chat, an hour and a half or thereabouts. So
Speaker 2: we're going to call this the end of part one.
Speaker 2: I hope you're enjoying it. We'll be back tomorrow with
Speaker 2: a second bit.