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BECAUSE EVERYONE HAS A STORY "BEHAS"
BECAUSE EVERYONE HAS A STORY / PORQUE TODOS TENEMOS UNA HISTORIA QUE CONTAR. My podcast connects and relates through the sharing of regular peoples' stories of courage, transformation, adventure, love, overcoming life’s challenges and career changes. It is a platform to give ordinary people’s stories from all over the world the chance to be shared and preserved. You will listen to stories of captivating people, both young and elderly, that I, your host Daniela, meet on my life journey. Communicating wisdom, knowledge and personal experience, these stories will connect, motivate, inspire and relate to your own. Our stories become the language of connections. Let's ENJOY, CONNECT AND RELATE. COMPARTE, CONECTATE Y DISFRUTA. I have shared stories of people from Asia, Europe, North America and South America. If you want to share your story on my show, please get in touch because everyone has a story.
BECAUSE EVERYONE HAS A STORY "BEHAS"
As Large as Your Spirit - Navigating Exile Refuge and Universal Humanity - Joel David Bond : 144
Joel's journey, which began in Kurdistan, Iraq, offers a unique perspective on resilience and adaptability, shedding light on the enriching experiences that come from living and working in diverse cultural landscapes.
Joel David Bond is an American educator whose unexpected five-month stay on a remote Greek island during the COVID-19 pandemic led to profound personal and professional growth.
His story draws powerful parallels to the experiences of refugees, emphasizing the universal emotions of loss, resilience, and the quest for belonging. We also discuss his memoir, "As Large as Your Spirit: A Reverse Refugee Memoir," where Joel encapsulates his journey and the lessons learned about flexibility and resourcefulness in adversity.
Finally, we delve into the broader implications of cultural understanding and globalization. Joel highlights the importance of respecting individual cultural identities while embracing our shared human values. He also shares his upcoming plans to move to the Ivory Coast for a new teaching position and reflects on how these experiences shape his writing and personal growth.
Let's enjoy Joel's story.
To connect with Joel: https://www.joeldavidbond.com/
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Thank you for listening - Hasta Pronto!
Hi, I'm Daniela. Welcome to my podcast. Because Everyone has a Story, the place to give ordinary people's stories the chance to be shared and preserved. Our stories become the language of connections. Let's enjoy it. Connect and relate because everyone has a story and relate because everyone has a story. Welcome.
Daniela SM:My guest is Joel David Bond, an American educator and author. He says that he was a man from the West, caught in Greece trying to get back to the Middle East. Joel's journey started in Kurdistan. Iraq offers a unique look at resilience and adaptability across different cultures. His unexpected stay on a remote Greek island during the pandemic led to significant personal and professional growth, embodying his belief that life becomes not easier but interesting and that learning requires challenges. I resonate with those quotes. We also discussed the importance of cultural understanding and globalization. As Joel prepares for a new teaching position in the Ivory Coast in Africa, I found it fascinating to speak not just to a traveler, but to a man who enjoys immersing himself in very different cultures. He always seeks to broaden his perspective, shifting from broad focus to more detailed one. So let's enjoy Joel's story. Welcome, joel, to the podcast. Thank you for being here.
Joel David Bond :Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.
Daniela SM:Yes, me too. So, Joel, I know you have a story to share, so tell me why you want to share your story.
Joel David Bond :You know, I think it's just one of those things we connect with other people through story and we learn so much about life through what other people have gone through, and I am just super passionate about what I've learned from this experience and hope others will learn from it as well.
Daniela SM:Yes, yes, that's right. We connect through stories. That you're right, and I love that you're here for that. So when does your story start?
Joel David Bond :So the story starts at the beginning of the pandemic 2020, in March of that year, I decided to take a spring break vacation from my life in Iraq, where I'd been living for several years and there's this rumor of this pandemic that was happening, but it didn't seem to affect me, and where I was in that part of the world and I had this intense experience living in Iraq and I was working my master's degree remotely and I said I need to disconnect from the world for a week and just downshift and take a vacation. And so that's when I booked a vacation to this lesser visited Greek island in the Aegean Sea for a week with just my carry-on bag and flew over there. And the day I arrived on the island itself, the World Health Organization used the words global pandemic and the airports closed, the borders shut and what was going to be a five-day vacation with my carry-on bag on this island extended into an interminable five months where I was stranded on this island without access to my normal resources, community work or friends. That's where the story begins.
Daniela SM:But you are original from.
Joel David Bond :Originally from here in the United States, but I've lived abroad for 20 years, the last seven of which have been in northern Iraq, in the Kurdistan region.
Daniela SM:And that's because of work or preference.
Joel David Bond :Well, both I work in international education, and so I teach in different places around the world, for varying lengths of time, different contracts, but my most recent position had been in northern Iraq for quite some number of years, and so that was my home. That was where I lived. My community, all my personal possessions, my life, everything was there in Iraq, and I got stranded, quarantined, away from a third country that I'd never been to you know, I'd never been to Greece. And so here I'm, stuck there.
Daniela SM:Yes, and how do you choose?
Joel David Bond :Iraq.
Daniela SM:It's not a place that everybody goes.
Joel David Bond :I think part of it is just I have this drive for adventure. I have just insatiable curiosity, and so I'm always looking to go someplace new and different. When I had the opportunity to pursue this position in Kurdistan, truth be told, I didn't realize I was moving to Iraq straight away. I thought I was moving to the Kurdish areas of Turkey, until I got some more information about the school and where I was situation, and so then I realized I was moving to Iraq. So that was a bit of a learning curve, but I really enjoyed the cultures in and around the Middle East. I'd spent a number of years prior to moving there dipping my toe in and out of the waters in and around Turkey and Azerbaijan and Kuwait and Israel, and really enjoyed that part of the world. And so when the opportunity came up for me to work there, I thought well, why not, let's just give it a try.
Joel David Bond :Millions of people that live in this country and survive and go to school and visit grandma and buy milk at the supermarket, and it's no different than any place else in the world. Really, it's just it has bad news headlines and I figured if I was going to move anywhere in the world based just on the news. By that same logic, I would never move back to America because of gun violence and protests and political unrest etc. I had to sort of tell myself that every place in the world has people and these people live their lives, have to know how to live in different environments and adapt to the place where you're at. That's what I did.
Daniela SM:Yes, exactly, I feel like that too, that we shouldn't listen to the news, we should just explore ourselves, because everybody has a different experience as well. But what about the culture? How was it very different? Or because you've been dipping your toes in different cultures from the Middle East? It wasn't that different.
Joel David Bond :You know, the culture was unique. The Kurdish culture in particular is its own thing. It does sort of borrow and blend very closely with a lot of Turkish culture, a lot of Arabic culture, a lot of Iranian and Farsi culture, and yet it is its own unique, distinct thing, its own language. They have their own military forces in the Kurdistan region, their own political systems. It does have its own unique culture to it.
Joel David Bond :Although I found it was, it was fairly easy to integrate one because the people were so hospitable, people were genuinely welcoming and really, you know, glad to have foreigners there, because they'd been close to the outside world for so long and so now there's know this external influence can come in and they're very open to that.
Joel David Bond :And then also because it just had similarities with some of the neighboring cultures that I'd spent some time with that, I didn't feel like it was a steep learning curve. There was definitely a lot to learn, but in terms of cultural adaptation I found I was like, oh, this is a little bit like Turkey. Oh, this food's like what I've had in other places in the middle east. Oh, this is feels like it might be iranian influence, and so you were able to sort of tease apart some of that but at the same time all of that put together a kaleidoscope image that was unique to just the kurdish culture there funny how we always tend to compare, to kind of make it understand to our brain, and yet some culture says no, it doesn't look like anything else, it is unique from our country.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, I mean, I feel on some level depends on how macro a view you want to take on things. You know, if you want to pull all the way out, every culture has some food that they wrap in another food, you know. And how microscopic do you want to pick this part? Is it beef versus chicken? Is it this spices of that spice, Is it these vegetables or those? Again, depending on your lens and your sort of altitude that you're looking at things, it'll be very similar. It'll feel very different the closer inspection that you give to these sorts of things. Yes, the more unique it does really seem. But if just to sort of create that framework to work with to begin with, I think that sort of high level, 30,000 foot overview is kind of a good starting point. Yes, thank you, I appreciate that explanation Very, very to the point.
Daniela SM:Very good. Okay, so then you are stranded in Greece. Only have a backpack. I hope you'll have a laptop.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, so I had my laptop and I had a backpack. The downside was I had intentionally chosen a place that was somewhat disconnected and so I had very poor internet connection. And I remember I would wander around the courtyard of the villa that I had rented for that week trying to, you know, grab reception on my phone. You know I'm holding it up in the air and I'm trying to grab this reception. And as the pandemic and the quarantine stretched out, you know I ended up doing some work online remotely, but I was never able to join any meetings live in person. I had pre-record myself and then set them to upload overnight. It would take 12 hours for a five minute video to upload Very slow, laborious internet speeds, and so I ended up sort of just doing very piecemeal work and spending a lot of time really just in meditation and in quiet reflection and just being by myself, because I was the only guest in the hotel where I was at for four out of the five months that I was quarantined.
Daniela SM:Yeah, and Greece had it hard.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, it was very hard. Nobody came or left from the islands for the first two months or so. All transportation was cut off. It was just incredibly isolating and I didn't speak Greek. I didn't know anybody. I was just there with my carry-on bag no-transcript for me, because everybody was quarantined. Everybody had this situation where they felt isolated and removed from their community.
Joel David Bond :But I think what made it particularly unique is, part way through, as local restrictions started to ease, I discovered that there was a refugee camp on the island full of asylum seekers from the Middle East who were caught in Greece trying to get to the West. And here I was, a man from the West caught in Greece trying to get back to my home in the Middle East, and so I ended up volunteering in the refugee camp to teach English. Our paths intersected and I ended up really learning an incredible amount about the world migration situation and the global refugee crisis, just connecting and changing our lives forever. There's their lives and mine, and the whole experience was absolutely incredible to see what was happening behind the veil of mass migration and political unrest and movement to Europe from these places and what motivated a lot of that, and it was just the stories that I heard from these people were heartbreaking and just so moving.
Daniela SM:I can imagine, and how long were you there in total, then? In five months you did all this.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, so the first two months was pretty isolating and then local restrictions started to ease and the last two and a half months or so I was connected a little bit more with the refugee camp on the opposite side of the island.
Daniela SM:And so then, what happened?
Joel David Bond :So finally the restrictions eased globally and global travel started to reopen, and so that was, I believe, the 1st of August was the first flight that returned to my town in Iraq where I had been living, and I was on the flight on the 2nd of August. In the middle of all this, had lost my home in Iraq. It was sold out from underneath me and I had friends that had to move everything out of my house for me. I packed my entire house by FaceTime with my friends and they would take the phone around the room and say do you want this, do you want this, do you want this? And pack things up because my house had been sold while I was away. I'd lost it, and so that all got moved in my absence, and so when the borders opened, I was able to fly home.
Joel David Bond :I immediately went to take care of all my personal possessions, personal business back home, but really, really was sad to leave because by that point I'd developed a little community and lots of friendships and relationships in Greece and really left an indelible mark on my spirit, made me think a lot about what it means to be globally migrant.
Joel David Bond :So my book that I ended up writing my memoir about the entire experience is called as Large as your Spirit a reverse refugee memoir. I named that subtitle because I found that my experience on the island it really mirrored that of refugees, and while I was coming from a place of privilege, really, and a place of means, I was able to support myself narrowly for five months on the island. I also, like these refugees, was stuck away from home with no prospect of being able to return and in an isolated environment where I didn't know the language, I didn't know the people and wasn't sure what my future would be. And so it was through that sort of shared common experience, that shared common emotion, that I was really able to connect with a lot of my refugee friends and students and identify so much more strongly with what it means to be a refugee in today's modern world.
Daniela SM:So many things the book, the experience, the going back to your hometown and not having a place anymore. There's a lot of situations that you have to adapt and deal with. I mean very adaptable, that you are.
Joel David Bond :I pride myself at this point in my adaptability. I have spent a lot of time in a lot of places around the world, but in some ways it gets easier with life experience. In other ways it just never does. I mean, life just throws curveballs at you all the time and one of the greatest things about being human is our ability to grow. It's wired into our very DNA. We are meant to change and grow and develop and if you're able to embrace that aspect of your life, not just physically but emotionally and spiritually and relationally, I think you'll find life becomes much more interesting. Not necessarily easier, but it definitely. I think you find those resources within yourself to adapt with new situations over time. So I'm grateful that I've had those experiences even prior to the quarantine in Greece, to help me sort of handle those new, harder challenges when they came along.
Daniela SM:Yes, well, even traveling to places like that that don't have the same access or internet or anything that the North America, you learn how to be resourceful, something that me, growing up in Venezuela, I am so grateful because we were always trying to find a solution. There was never really dwelling on the problem, it's just like, okay, what's the solution? And I think that you don't have that opportunity when you grew up in North.
Joel David Bond :America. Yeah, we have a little bit too easy here, to be honest. We're not challenged, and I think it's part of the reason why I'm in education is because I understand that learning requires challenge. You don't learn unless you have to overcome a challenge, a problem of some sort, in some ways fear for the future of North American culture, because we aren't challenged enough in many ways, which means we're probably not growing or learning in the ways that we probably should or could, you know, and so I think there's definitely room for emotional resilience to be developed over time, and I think that's a big.
Joel David Bond :Resilience is a key word for me really in this day and age now, as I've been around the world and been many places and had these sorts of challenges, I've been given the image of a palm tree. Palm trees will sway in the wind, the hurricanes will come through, but they never break, they never snap. When the storm passes, they sort of return to their normal upright position because they've got that flexibility that's built into them, and I think resilience is like that. Resilience is this idea of being able to adapt, to bend, to sway with the storms of life that come your way, but never bend, but never break all the way. When the storm's passed, you'll find yourself stronger and more resilient, more upright for it. That's an image, a metaphor someone gave me a long time ago and it sort of stuck with me as this idea to help with adapting to new situations around the world.
Daniela SM:Yes, it's a good metaphor, and as I say that in North America you don't have that opportunity to be so resourceful, I take it back a little bit, thinking that maybe there is a high percentage of poverty there. Now People probably have to be resourceful. So you wrote this book. This book comes from that, so I don't want you to tell the story that is in the book. I know that you have more to say. You went back and so what?
Joel David Bond :You know, what I found I'm going to give people a message that I hope they take away from reading the book is that resilience is definitely a strong characteristic of the human spirit. I want the story really to be one about finding a place to call home, not just geographically, but emotionally and relationally. What does it mean? To find a space where you're comfortable being yourself in and around the people that you know in your life, in those communities? And what I found working with these refugees is, you know, was this sense of belonging. You know, we were all caught away from home and we were all caught in this unfamiliar situation, and so that sort of trauma bonding experience really helped us grow together and understand each other's situations a lot better. And even though we didn't speak the same language or come from the same backgrounds or cultures, necessarily there was this universal shared emotion that we could connect with.
Joel David Bond :And I think that's what I really want people to understand through reading this book and through just moving through around the world is the idea that there are shared universals. And if you're able to identify what's common, what is shared emotionally between people, then a lot of the differences, a lot of the oh, it's not a taco, it's a burrito or it's. This sort of conversation kind of falls to the side, because you recognize that there's a lot more that is similar than there is different. And it's not to say that differences are important. It's just that when we dwell on the differences they create tension. And if we can dwell on the shared common experiences, we'll start from a place of trust and start from a place of love.
Daniela SM:For me, I feel like ignorance is put as in a box. If you learn about cultures and you can tell the difference of people, how they look, people, how they speak, people, how they what they eat.
Daniela SM:It gives you that knowledge that we are different. Not everybody who looks Latin is from the same country, or everybody who has Asian eyes is Chinese. You bring a point that I also noticed, that we are all very the same, point that I also noticed that we are all very the same, like, feel like. To respect people's culture is important, but to respect the humans that we all the same is also very important yeah, it's.
Joel David Bond :You know, some people you know in various religions, backgrounds and circles will talk about the light, the divine light in each and every human being, and I think that's for me that's a nice esoteric way to kind of look at it. But even if you're not from a spiritual background, just to recognize that we all, you know, we're all alive, we all want to eat and have relationships and experience joy and, to you know, be with family. And you know, we have these longings and these relationships that are inbuilt to our very lives and the fabric of who we are. And I remember several years ago my mother and stepfather came to visit me in Iraqi Kurdistan and at that point in his life my stepfather had really not ever really been out of the country. I think he'd been to the UK possibly, and maybe Mexico, but never any places as exotic or different as Iraq. And so I was really nervous to bring him over there because this was going to be quite the culture shock, and at the time I didn't know him quite as well. He'd newly married into the family, and so I remember one evening we went to some friends of mine and they invited us to his parents' house for dinner. And so it's on this farm outside of the city and they made this phenomenal Kurdish dinner with this food that just spread across the entire floor and we sat on the floor and ate with our hands and had all this. You know plastic cutlery and plates and shared communal dishes. You know everybody reaching out of the same shared bowls in the middle, and the mother of the family, partway through, sort of paused her work with the dinner and turned on the television and sat in her chair and watched Mecca and did her prayers.
Joel David Bond :At that time I remember thinking for me this was an everyday experience because I'd lived in the country for quite some time, I was very familiar and very comfortable with Islamic culture and Middle Eastern food and dining practices etc. And I remember thinking that my stepdad was going to be so terribly uncomfortable, from a North American Christian background and used to North American dining rules and tables and forks and knives and chairs and having your own individual dish. I remember feeling very nervous during that whole meal and afterwards we were driving back to the hotel we were staying and I asked my stepdad about that experience and he said you know what that was? Just that just showed me something. I was like, okay, and he said that just showed me that everyone around the world values family.
Joel David Bond :Everybody got together to share that meal and they just and they loved being together. And you know, the mother had her role in that and the kids had their role in this and the father was doing this thing and they all wanted to talk about these things. And, even though I didn't understand everything that was happening, I just recognized that this was a family that wanted to be together on their day off. And I remember sort of driving slack-jawed in the car thinking, oh is like that's what my stepdad took away from this, like that's a, that's a really emotionally resilient person to be able to go through an experience that's so vastly different from what he had known, ever known before and to walk away from it having recognized, oh, it's a shared value, it's like a family dinner, it's like a Sunday family dinner, only this is the Islamic version in Kurdistan.
Joel David Bond :And I felt really proud of him at that point, to be honest, because I was afraid that he would have this sort of judgment or this fear or this misunderstanding or would confess to being incredibly uncomfortable. But no, he walked away from it having really seen the universal value of it, and for me that's the sort of thing that I really wish everybody could do. Um, that's sort of what's my life's mission, I suppose, is to help people navigate those cross-cultural environments and understand that, hey, we're all in this thing called life and doing it together might look a little different, but at its core, at its fundamental base, we're seeking the same things here yes, that's true.
Daniela SM:We all at the end is true family and love and belonging and community. Yes, I mean that's why they talk about the centenarians, that that's what keep them alive, having community, having a purpose, having people that they care about. So, yeah, it has to be true yeah, so, so important get. You get distracted with the silly things.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, having purpose really is so key I joke sometimes. I grew up in a very conservative evangelical Christian background, which I've since come in different directions from that upbringing, but a lot of those values I think I still hold and I remember growing up thinking surrounded by this what's the meaning of life? Question what is the meaning of life? As I've grown older, I think the meaning of life is to make meaning, to make purpose, to create meaning. We are created to create. We are creators who want to make things and do things in this world. I think that's really the meaning. Our purpose, it's our purpose. Our meaning in life is to actually go out there and make meaning of the things that we feel might be so nonsensical. And once you sort of have that drive and you've created that structure to live within, you've got a purpose and a story that helps motivate and propel you to the next adventure. To me, the meaning of life is to make more meaning.
Daniela SM:Yes, that's beautiful said. Thank you so much. You're a philosopher. I've got a lot of time to think, which is also very important and necessary. Instead of being bombarded with garbage, putting less unnecessary things in our brain and clean them up. Of being bombarded with garbage, putting less unnecessary things in our brain and clean them up. I think it's not just being minimalistic on your way of living, but on the things that you have in your brain as well.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, I think that's really one of the beauties of the pandemic and part of what you'll see come through in the book is the volume on all that external noise that was bombarding us all. The time got turned way down and all of a sudden all of us were forced to spend time with our own thoughts and to introspect and to spend more time in isolation and some of us, I think, were more adept at diving into that and pressing into that than others. But regardless of where you were on that sort of self-awareness spectrum, I think we all had that opportunity to just sit and be like okay, who am I and what do I want? And for a short, brief period, I feel, during the pandemic and shortly after, I felt that we had a much stronger sense of community and connection with people. And I think as we've turned that volume back up on all the noise and the radio sounds that kind of bombard us every day, I think we've lost a little sight of that in the recent years.
Daniela SM:I know I was very disappointed. I thought we were going to continue better.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, I was hoping for longer lasting change, but you know there's still hope, I suppose.
Daniela SM:But so the book is about the refugees that you met in Greece. But I know you have another part of your story.
Joel David Bond :Like you were back in Iraq and then you couldn't be back in Iraq anymore. Is that also part in the book, or can we talk about it? That is going to be my second book, which I'm currently working on, between Iraq and a hard place. That story takes place after the end of as Large as your Spirit and the book about the refugees on the Greek island. I returned to Iraq and I spent another two years there this last two, three years, actually, and this last October.
Joel David Bond :In the wake of the Israel-Gaza conflict, I just had a ripple effect throughout the Middle East, and even though I wasn't in Israel and I wasn't anywhere connected to Israel, there was just this repercussion that went across the Middle East. As an American citizen in Iraq, somehow or another, I got singled out as a target for kidnapping by terrorist organizations that were still operating in the country. I was given a phone call on a Friday night from the US State Department informing me of the situation and telling me that I should depart as soon as possible, and so that was Friday night. On Saturday night, I was on the airplane with two suitcases worth of my stuff that I could pack, the rest left behind and evacuated back to the US, where I've been since.
Joel David Bond :It was a very traumatic and dramatic departure from a place that I'd called home for seven years that I loved very much. So I'm working on that narrative, that memoir and the direction, the things that I've learned from that. That's still a bit of a process and I don't know that I can speak intelligently or as philosophically about it as I can, about the first experience that we have spoken about. There's a lot that goes into that. I'm looking forward to getting this next one out to the world in the next year or so.
Daniela SM:But do you think this happens? If I understand, you went to visit Israel and then you went back to Iraq.
Joel David Bond :I mean I had been to Israel, but it'd been, you know, 10 years ago or more, so nothing that was, you know, any of immediate relevance.
Joel David Bond :The State Department and the FBI, the phone calls, the information I've had from government organizations haven't been able to tell me a complete story. So anything I say at this point is conjecture, is just a guess, and my guess is because I have Jewish friends and have had some visibility in the Jewish world, even though I'm not Jewish. I think that was enough to trigger a few things from these groups that were there being a Westerner, being American, being Christian, being connected to the Jewish world, just having a visibility, with a book that had been published, some TEDx talks that were given in and around Iraq, social media presence that was just that one step above, kind of your normal expat that was over there. I had a visibility and a notoriety just in general to the general public. I'd met with ministers of education and the government and I think all of those things combined were enough to raise my profile above, just enough to be a tripping point for groups that didn't want people there.
Daniela SM:So you had a TEDx talk.
Joel David Bond :So, yes, I gave a talk in Baghdad. It wasn't TEDx, but it was very similar. It was the same demographic, same size audience for a large organization that, an NGO that was operating there in Baghdad. And then I attended the TEDx conferences both in Baghdad and Erbil, so I had lots of connections within that speaking world at the same time as I released my book.
Daniela SM:And when do you think the second one will be ready?
Joel David Bond :Hopefully I'll have that out within a year. I am in a very, very big transition period right now. I've obviously had the traumatic transition back to the US and in another week and a half I'm actually moving out of the country to West Africa where I'll be taking up a new teaching position. I'm in a sort of big tumultuous life change here, so I'm trying to juggle lots of projects at the same time, but hopefully we'll be able to get something out and published at least self-published on Amazon in the next 12 months here.
Daniela SM:You couldn't stay put. You had to go somewhere.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, I had to go someplace new. I was never going to stay here for too long.
Daniela SM:And the other thing is that. So if you say that you still have a lot to process from that traumatic experience of having to leave in such a rush, are you ready to continue the book or is this going to take you more time?
Joel David Bond :So I do have an entire rough draft, an outline, a skeletal structure of the book that I'd like to publish. It does need a lot of work and some filling out. There needs to be a lot of detail that's put into it to sort of round out the length and to make it a little bit more of a palatable read. But I have the general structures that are there and I think as I continue to talk about the experience and as I transition to a new overseas experience, it'll help me with, I think, just perspective. It'll give me that 30,000 foot view that I need Because at the moment, up until the last couple of months, I've been very too close to the experience to really see the universal truths that need to be, pulled from it.
Joel David Bond :So I think, as some time and distance come from it, I'll be able to go to that 30,000 foot altitude view and see what really came from that experience to help you grow.
Daniela SM:I like that analogy that you keep mentioning for you traveling or going to a different culture, because you're not just going from one place to another, you're just changing cultures and staying, kind of finding other homes to stay for a while. So you know what is that? That's not traveling, that's just what that's me. Yes, I. What is that?
Joel David Bond :that's not traveling, that's just what. That's me, yes, I know, but you have met other people like you, you know, I think it's. I think it's community building, I think it's that search for connection, it's that curiosity, it's that desire for growth and change. People who I've come across who live like me, I think, are never really satisfied with stability. They always like to have a little bit of insecurity. They always like to have a little bit of like, not quite sure what the next thing is going to be, and I think that's just that curiosity of what's around the next corner. I don't really know how to describe that one so much. You know.
Joel David Bond :I think we all like to have a certain amount of routine that we build into our lives. But we also like to take a break from routine. We like to go on vacation, right, take 10 days, go someplace else and take a break and then come back when you know, partway through vacation, we're like all right, I'm ready to go back, I'm ready to do my routine again. I think for me it's just I like those routines to stretch out and I like those breaks to stretch out as well. I'll build a routine for a couple of years with a new community in a new place, and then I want to disassemble and reassemble it someplace else and see if I can learn something else from the new experience in the new place. But yeah, it's definitely not traveling. It's living abroad and building community and doing work in the world to see how you can make things better for everyone, including yourself.
Daniela SM:Yes, and what is the first thing that you do every time you go to a new place?
Joel David Bond :First thing I try and do is learn how to say thank you in the local language. That's my number one. Everywhere I go, I need to be able to say thank you, because I think there's something about being grateful, about expressing gratitude for the help that you receive in entering a new space, the love and the connection that people will show even though you're a total stranger. A new space, the love and the connection that people will show even though you're a total stranger, and looking for ways to help build and deepen and strengthen those initial connections that you make when you first step off the airplane. So, for me, the first thing is gratitude, is to say thank you.
Daniela SM:Yes, and the second one then.
Joel David Bond :Yeah. Second thing is just just move, like go, start walking, see what there is, discover, ask questions, yeah, questions, yeah. Ask questions. Be curious. For me it's thank you and then be curious.
Daniela SM:I think that's what it is and so where are you going now?
Joel David Bond :I'm moving to the ivory coast, cote d'ivoire, in west africa wow, they speak french yeah, so french is the official language I'm.
Joel David Bond :Part of the reason why I chose this position is that is, I do speak french. I had studied it at in college, in my undergraduate. I'd lived in France 20 years ago, so I do have a fading knowledge of French. I do need to make sure that I brush up on it before I head back over to a French-speaking country. But part of the reason why I chose this is because I wanted the challenge of being someplace where I did speak the language, but maybe not 100% fluently. In Iraq I didn't speak Kurdish or Arabic, and so the grace and the privilege, I suppose, of being able to turn the background noise down a lot and be like, okay, I don't know what they're saying and just tune it out, whereas now I'm going to a place where I will understand a fair amount and it's going to constantly impede on my brain space. So I think it'll be a challenge to sort of work bilingually in a space coming up.
Daniela SM:Since you've been to so many countries or live in so many countries anyone that you that it was harder to adapt.
Joel David Bond :Harder to adapt. To be perfectly honest, one of the first places I lived overseas was France, and I did find that initially very hard to adapt to French culture and live in that space. I think that's part of why I kind of want to go back to a Francophone country is to see if I can now overcome that. With 20 years more experience under my belt. What does it mean to be able to adapt to a new place now that I've had more experience since that first time around? So I think, yeah, as I've grown, as I've learned, as I've changed, I think it's become easier every time. I will never say it's going to be easy to move to a new country. There's always challenges and things to learn. But I think I've come to a point now where some things are more predictable on what will happen and how it will unfold, and so it helps me deal with that, I think, a little easier.
Daniela SM:Yes, you stretch your mind. Every time you have these experiences, your mind becomes really gooey and very stretchable.
Joel David Bond :Elastic?
Daniela SM:yes, I don't want it to turn to mush. Gooey is not good. Elastic is Elastic. Yes, it turns into more elastic. You're right, we will delete that and put the right one Wonderful. So okay, we went through your two books. Is there anything else that you want to add? Because I know you don't want to tell the whole story.
Joel David Bond :What I'd love to have to go away with is this idea that we're faced constantly with life decisions. You know you come to a fork in the road and you're trying to decide what to do next these life junctions and so often we look at the next steps and we think what if? And we fill in the blank with a negative. What if it's terrible? What if I lose money? What if my friends abandon me or I don't meet new people that I need to? Or what if? What if? What if?
Joel David Bond :I think it's important just as much to fill in the blank with the positives. What if that next thing is amazing? What if it changes your life for the better? What if you meet the people that influence you in ways that are so beneficial that you never realized you needed to be influenced in? What if the next step brings you such wealth and joy and prosperity and happiness and love that you never dreamed possible?
Joel David Bond :And I think it's really important to think about the next adventure that you take, holding both of those in hand, not just the negative what ifs, because those are good, those are evolutionarily in place to keep us alive. Like you do need to think what if this is unsafe, but what if it's amazing? And what if you learn things from it? And the reality is, the answer is going to be somewhere in the middle. It's going to be both good and bad. You'll learn things either way and you'll have come up with great stories in the end. So if it's a great success, fantastic. Everyone loves a happy ending. If it's a terrible failure, fantastic. What did you learn Because you'll grow from that as well Is to take the next adventure, take the next step, because what if it turns out to be something really incredible?
Daniela SM:Yes, that's beautiful and it's true, don't you feel also this is part of personality? Some people just have these traits that they have to be negative or incapable to live with uncertainty. And then there are other people that are like you and that they're open, are curious, they're always want to explore, like of course, we don't want everybody to be the same. It will be boring. I feel like it's personality.
Joel David Bond :I think it can be a practiced trait, it may be nature, it may be nurture. I'm not quite sure In my fantasy league of doctorate degrees that I would pursue in another lifetime. I would love to see what risk-averse and risk-taking people, what their lifestyles look like over the long term, what sorts of things they get into and how their life satisfaction is. I think it'd be a fascinating doctorate study. That's for someone else, not me, but but yeah, I mean I think it's. It's a combination of nature and nurture. I think you know I've always had this, this desire to explore what's around the next corner, but at the same time I've had to learn and practice and grow from those experiences on how to be thankful and grateful and explore and ask those questions.
Daniela SM:Yes, I know, I know. And as a teacher, what is it that you like to teach, I mean, besides literature? Are you always throwing this advice and these suggestions to your students?
Joel David Bond :I would tell my students in Iraq. The cover of the book said I was teaching English, but I'm really teaching you how to be a better human being.
Daniela SM:But you were also in an international school there.
Joel David Bond :Yes.
Daniela SM:These people that go to international schools. The parents are traveling, so they are themselves travelers.
Joel David Bond :There is a degree of yes. These students come from means they come from backgrounds of privilege, the school that I had been teaching in but at the same time, a lot of them had never left Iraq or had never traveled further afield than the next town over. So it was really kind of a diverse mix and I was really surprised, actually, at the amount of travel, or lack thereof, that a lot of my students had. Their exposure to the rest of the world through media and social media and entertainment and everything, I mean it's so prolific. I mean America exposes culture so much so far. You know that it's pretty easy to connect with young students on, you know, the latest Beyonce songs or Taylor Swift or whatever's out there now. You know, because it's everywhere and so they were able, you know, you're able, to make those connections even in places that are, you know, incredibly different, that you think these people wouldn't have the same exposure, but they do.
Daniela SM:Yes, I think that's the thing about globalization. The only thing that it makes it now, I guess, is that you traveling what is no more of this things but the, the people and the culture right?
Joel David Bond :Yeah, the experiences yes, yeah, so we said at the same time clearly on the same page. I'm thinking Clearly on the same page.
Daniela SM:So wonderful. I love what I hear Like. I really appreciate all the things that you say. You have a really big message to share and I hope that you continue doing that one way or another. Yeah.
Joel David Bond :And I think in a world where it is so globalized and you can get your Snickers bars and Taylor Swift music anywhere you want to go in the world, the thing that really makes life interesting is the sharing of ideas. Now, it's those experiences and connecting mind to mind, because the physical reality of our daily lives is so similar in so many places in metropolitan areas for sure that it's lost that kind of uniqueness. And what makes things unique are the connections of the people that you make along the way, and so that sounds super cheesy, I know, but I think that's part of the reality of our modern world is we are so connected that it's the ideas that we share that really help make things interesting.
Daniela SM:Well, I mean including this podcast, right? I've been meeting people from so many places, from so many places that I'm fascinated, and so it is true we have now these opportunities.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, everyone has a story.
Daniela SM:Yes, everyone has a story, and I guess the more that we connect this way, that we can learn more about each other.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, 100%.
Daniela SM:Yes, all right, jules, thank you so much. We will put in the show notes everything about your book that is already out there and hopefully when you get your next book you can knock on my door and we can have a second episode for sure.
Joel David Bond :Yeah, I would love that. In the meanwhile, I am findable on the internet at joeldavidbondcom and I'm on Instagram, facebook and LinkedIn at joeldavidbond and my book is out there on Amazon. As Large as your Spirit.
Daniela SM:As Large as your Spirit. Wonderful title. I like it.
Joel David Bond :Thanks so much for having me.
Daniela SM:Thank you. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. I am Daniela and you are listening to, because Everyone has a Story. Please take five seconds right now and think of somebody in your life that may enjoy what you just heard, or someone that has a story to be shared and preserved. When you think of that person, shoot them a text with the link of this podcast. This will allow the ordinary magic to go further. Join me next time for another story conversation. Thank you for listening. Hasta pronto.
