Resilience & Love

Dr. Stephanie:                   You’re listening to In Times Like These, a production of CLU Live at Claremont Lincoln University. In Times Like These explores the difficult spaces we humans navigate in culture and religion, in dialogue and doubt.

Dr. Emad Rahim, a genocide survivor and refugee of The Khmer Rouge killing fields of Cambodia developed the SALT Model of surviving, adapting, loving, and transforming as a means of helping him overcome the struggles of his youth including prejudice, abuse, childhood violence, and dyslexia.

In this episode of In Times Like These we talk to Dr. Rahim about turning tragedy into triumph, and using resilience, mindfulness, and love to transform ourselves and communities.

Emad, I’m so happy to have you here in person and thank you so much for the copy of one of your recent books.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You’re welcome.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Talk to me about this title, there’s a lot in the title ‘Resilience From Killing Fields to Boardroom The SALT Effect.’ Break this down for us, first, what’s the SALT Effect?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     It’s a play on words. I come from Syracuse, Syracuse is known as the Salt City because they have salt mines, they’re known for salt mines back in the day, so it’s called the Salt City. If you ever search Salt City on Google Syracuse comes up. It’s a play on words, but also SALT is an acronym, it stands for survival, adapting, love, and transformation. That’s the tools I use to transform my life from what it was before to what it is today. Also, salt is a preservative before there was refrigerators people put salt on everything, so it’s to heal your wounds and also to preserve life. Deep, right?

Dr. Stephanie:                   Yes.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     It’s a play on words. Resilience is something that we all have, it’s a powerful tool that we don’t use as much.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Do you think we either have it or we don’t, or is it a skill that we can learn and practice and get better at?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     It’s a skill we can learn, it’s a skill that we can continue to grow, develop, and get better. When we think about resilience we have this image of this person that struggled through life, but they keep on going and we’re saying, “How does this person do it? Like, all these bad things keep on happening to this person, but they get up in the morning, and they keep fighting the fight.” We all do that technically we just don’t think about it, but in order to really improve on our resilience we need to have that plan to move forward beyond the surviving. Instead of just going day-to-day fighting let’s create a plan, so the next day it’s going to be different, so the outcome’s going to be different.

Dr. Stephanie:                   SALT: surviving, A is?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Adapting.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Adapting.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Love.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Love and then transformation. These go in this order?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Many of us, if we see someone who’s experiencing trauma or recovering from trauma surviving is where they’re at.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yes, that’s exactly it.

Dr. Stephanie:                   I’ve seen students in a public school classroom, we can’t teach a child who is in a state of survival, they’re hungry, they’re angry, they’ve been hurt, so the next piece some of us get it on our own, and some of us have communities to help us adapt, is that what you’re talking about?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yes, you read the book already.

Dr. Stephanie:                   These are tools maybe we’re not flourishing yet, but we’re adapting.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. I think that’s the key here, many of us go through life on survival mode, so if we are just living day to day, check to check that’s survival. We are trying to figure out what to eat that day, we’re trying to figure out how do we pay the rent that day, how do we go to school today, how do I take care of my kids that day?

Dr. Stephanie:                   Is it safe to fall asleep?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. This is a survival mode, but in order for us to really transform our life to something better we have to go beyond survival mode and in order to do that we first have to adapt, we have to adapt to our surrounding, adapt to the potential of where I life should be. It’s only when you can adapt, where you can feel comfortable in your space, when you have full … When you’re consciously aware of your situation is when you can move to the next level.

Dr. Stephanie:                   This is mindfulness, right?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, exactly. That is, it is.

Dr. Stephanie:                   If you’re working with someone, if you were talking to a young person, or to a family, or to a parent that they’re in adapting mode, but it feels awful, it feels unsteady, and sometimes it feels okay, and then sometimes it feels bad again what are the tools and ingredients that they can lean on to grow that adapting?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     I use the example that’s something that we can all connect with. Let’s say, we go to a new school, like we’re a kid, and we go to a new school for the first time. We don’t have any friends, we’re out of place, we feel uncomfortable, we feel insecure, we’re in survival mode now. We’re just trying to get through that day, we want to avoid the mean girls, we want to avoid the mean teacher, we don’t want to be looked at, we don’t have the fanciest clothes, and stuff like that, so we’re in survival mode. We’re trying to adapt, we’re trying to figure out how can I make myself look like everybody else? What can I do to not stick out? Those adaptive tools start kicking in automatically. You start sitting in the back of the room when you first come in.

Dr. Stephanie:                   How do people line up here? What’s the sing-song chant for jump rope here?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You start going through all of those survival tools, but in order to truly adapt we have to evolve in that situation. The first day we were trying to avoid, the first day we’re trying to sit at the lunch table towards the back so no one sees us.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Flying under the radar.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly, flying under the radar, but then we start noticing thing things. It’s like okay, oh that person has a comic book that I really like to read, and we have similar styles, so I make a friend, and I make a new friend. Then, after a few days, I’m more comfortable introducing myself. Then, it’s okay for me to stick out. Now, we’re going beyond the survival, we’re truly adapting, and flourishing.

In order to truly flourish, in order to truly be who you are we have to create a network of people that love us.

Dr. Stephanie:                   With the L for love is that my love for others? Is it my ability to accept love?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     It’s all those things. Especially with men, young boys, older men we don’t talk about love and the power of love. I always explain that you can name any leader that you love, any leader that you admire you always see they surround themselves with people that love them. When you read these bios these people always mention their wife, they mention their husband, they mention their mother, their kids, so they always say, “I could not do this if it wasn’t for these people that love me,” but we often take that for granted.

I did a powerful exercise in a town in upstate New York and these are kids that lived in some of the worst neighborhoods, there’s a huge opioid epidemic in this town, and we did this exercise where I asked them to write down people that love them. There were kids there that could not write anything. I said, “Well, what about your mom and dad,” and they said, “No,” and they gave me a straight face like, “No, can’t do it. I don’t think they love me. I don’t think they care for me. I think they tolerate me.” Then, we had kids that said, “I don’t have a mom and dad, I think my grandma is tolerating me,” or, “I’m in a foster home, they’re tolerating me.” They sat there and you could tell that that they were hurt, they were confused, and they hated this exercise because it took them outside of their comfort zone, it made them vulnerable.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Totally vulnerable.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Very vulnerable.

Dr. Stephanie:                   In their little shell …

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. Then I said, “Well, who do you admire? Who do you enjoy? Who do you like here?” They mentioned a teacher’s name, they mentioned the vice principal, and so I called these people in, and they came in. I said, “Hey, can Mark,” pout a name out there,” Can Mark put you on this love list?” He’s like, “Heck yeah!” You see they smile, like, “Really?””Of course.” Then, they started creating this list, and I said, “That’s the first start. Here’s my email, here’s my address, put me on that list.” You could see their self esteem, their posture changes, so even that idea of people loving you is a strong thing.

When you surround yourself with people that truly love you they’re going to push you, they’re going to support you, they’re going to open doors for you, they’re going to move obstacles away from you. When you feel love you’re more likely to show love to other people. I think outside of all of those elements in order to truly go beyond survival, in order to truly embrace adaptation you need to be love, feel love, embrace love.

Dr. Stephanie:                   That is so powerful and that’s so resonant. I’m raising a 12-year-old and he has had a hard past, and this particular year at school sometimes he would just sit and, “I can’t do it.” My husband came up with the idea of making a list for Team Caleb and they would make a list, and this is exactly what you’re talking about. Everyone hates me.” No baby, who’s on Team Caleb,” and slowly, “Mom, Dad, Lorena, Jana,” these people and he would carry it into the classroom with him, and have it on his desk. We use that to talk about because if you have a history where you have evidence that the world is not a safe place, you have evidence that there are people who don’t just not love you but may be actively are working against you to harm you, you need equal and more evidence that there are people who love you, who will keep you so keep you safe, who will remove obstacles.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You know the great thing about this list it’s going to grow.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Say more about that because it feels hard to grow.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, that’s the thing. As we get older we shrink our lists, we do it with a lot of things. We lose friendships, so the list shrinks, our job opportunities shrink. Hopefully, for the better like our career becomes more focused. Girlfriends, boyfriends that shrinks yeah so, things shrink and you’re okay with it, and it’s normal, but the love list should grow because that should always grow. You don’t want that to shrink, and it’s okay for it to grow, and for you to feel a certain way when you look at the list. When things feel bad, when life is not going your way, and you may want to switch back to that survival mode because that’s easy, I’m used to survival mode, this when you look at that list and you make phone calls.

Even a topic that’s hot right now is mental illness, it’s depression. We’ve been talking a lot about that for the last … Obviously, people have been talking about that forever, but the last few months we lost some great people like Anthony Bourdain and stuff, and now we’re talking about these trigger words, these images, these situations that may trigger somebody’s mental illness to appear. This is where that love list comes in, make that phone call, talk to people.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Reach out.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Reach out.

Dr. Stephanie:                   I’ve seen yesterday with the Supreme Court decision upholding the Muslim ban so many of my non-Muslim friends, and loved ones, and colleagues saying specifically, “My Muslim brothers and sisters I care about you, I love you, I want you here,” and then encouraging all of us reach out to them as a neighbor, reach out to them as a colleague, call up your college roommate who’s Muslim and say, “This isn’t on behalf of my heart,” [inaudible 00:13:13]. That’s what you were saying, make concrete and tangible these threads of love that connect us.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You feel inclusive, you feel invited. The worst thing to ever feel is that you’re not invited.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Isolated.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You’re not wanted here. Having that list of people that love you and knowing that these people will call, or pick up the phone when you call is important, it’s critical.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Tell me about the image of the book, which we’ll have in the show notes. This is a little baby Emad.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, that is a little baby Emad. I was born in a concentration camp in the killing fields of Cambodia and my family, which includes at the time just my mother and I because we were the last surviving members of our family. In the middle of the night, we escaped with a group of people and made our way to Thailand, and we ended up in a Thailand refugee camp for two years.

In that picture it’s actually the picture that I took in order to come to America, that’s actually my green card picture right there. Many years I had just the top half of my face on a green card and it was not until I was 30 … No, no about 28, 29 is when I discovered this picture that my mom had kept and I was like, “Is that me,” and she was like, “yeah, that’s you,” and she told this story, and I was like, “Wow, this is something that I didn’t know about myself.”

Dr. Stephanie:                   She told the story. Do you think that’s painful for her or do you think that she’s come to a place …? Now, you’re healthy, you’re successful, you have children.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     It’s still painful for her. The reason why I discovered this picture was I had to do research on my life, I was actually invited to be a part of a play.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Say your mom’s name, we should honor her name.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     [Son-i 00:15:06] [Ku-ng 00:15:06]. I was a part of a play called Tales From the Salt City, which also plays on the book. In the play, it was directed and written by Ping Chong, a dude that won tons of awards, did stuff on Broadway, he’s an amazing guy. He wrote a script that utilized different stories, people that migrated into a city, some are Americans, some are not, and how their lives are connected without even knowing.

Dr. Stephanie:                   That’s reality.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     That’s reality.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Our lives are connected without us knowing.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly, and that’s how he did it. He did it by dates, he did it by places, he did stuff that we ate, and said, “This is how we are connected.” Through that storytelling experience I had to learn about myself, which meant that I had to ask my mom these hard questions. She was upset that I was telling my history on stage.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Making it public.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, in Asian culture really-

Dr. Stephanie:                   It’s not confessional.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly, it’s not confessional at all. It’s like you’re airing your dirty laundry, we don’t want no one to know. She didn’t understand that.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Even though she had done nothing wrong.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. She was somewhat frustrated and unsure why I was pursuing this project, why I would do it. Then, later on she got that, she saw the book, she saw that these dialogue circles that I was engaged in by way of storytelling it was actually improving community and relationships, people’s lives, and stuff like that.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Wow.

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Picturing your mother, a young woman with one child in a place of persecution, in a place of physical insecurity, in a place where people would wish her dead leaving, migrating, looking for safety. I know all of us who are listening are seeing images of children and families, and last weekend was World Refugee Day. How do we make sense of borders and the human desire, on one hand, to keep people out and yet in the better version of ourselves we know that there is enough to welcome people in?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     I will tell a story that connects all that. We came to America they didn’t just put us anywhere, they didn’t put us in the suburbs, they put us in Brooklyn in the ’80s during the height of the crack epidemic. I lived in Sunset, Brooklyn on 61st Street. 61st Street was also segregated, it was a block by block, so those are borders. One block was all the Puerto Ricans, these are all Latin kings you don’t belong there if you’re not Puerto Rican, you’re not a Latin king. Another block we had these Haitian gangs, you don’t belong there. You had Dominican, so you had all these ethnic blocks.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Demarcated, clear.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     It’s clear. I was this little Cambodian kid that just wanted to break dance, so I would go to different blocks and get chased out of blocks, but I didn’t understand these borders I just know that people look different, but everybody liked hip hop we should all be break dancing. I would just go to different blocks as a little kid and one day during a block party the YMCA used to come down on 61st Street every summer, shut down the block, and have this block party. It looked like a Spike Lee movie. The fire hydrant is letting loose, girls playing hopscotch, basketball, and everybody that had these borders all came to the same street to barbecue and have a good time. All of a sudden the Haitian guy is barbecuing, the Puerto Rican guy is playing cards, the Dominican guy’s playing basketball, so all these people that didn’t technically get along are all here together.

One day during this block party a fight broke out, and I was a little kid, and I didn’t understand what was happening, so I got curious, and I walked towards the fight. As I walked towards the fight a gun went off, and during that situation I was shot in the leg, I got almost my entire leg blown off. Now, I had no idea what is happening, I don’t know what’s going on, my mother’s not around, but everybody in that neighborhood came together to save my life. I remember a lot Spanish, I remember a lot of Creole, there was a lot different dialects, different type of languages out there. All these people got together to save my life, these people that didn’t get along-

Dr. Stephanie:                   Don’t normally work together.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Don’t normally work together, they stay behind their borders, and they came together on this day, and they worked through their problems, they worked through their situations to save this boy’s life.

Dr. Stephanie:                   It’s so interesting that you described a place of abundance. That summer festival was a place of food, and refreshment, and joy, and I think that some of what goes on right now with the political divisiveness comes from a false sense of scarcity. There aren’t enough jobs, there’s not enough healthcare, there’s not enough spots in college for my students. When we mistakenly believe that there’s not enough we clench up and say, “No, no, no you can’t come in, there’s not enough! I need to have a border,” but when we understand places of abundance we can be more generous. Two things going on there: the sense of abundance, and also the sense of looking after the most vulnerable. When you look at the landscape of Summer 2018 in the United States are still capable, as Americans, of looking after the most vulnerable?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     I think so, I think we are, I want to believe we are. I think social media’s a good thing and bad thing, we see all this negative stuff instantly and we start questioning humanity like, “Wow, look at all this stuff, this is craziness,” but it’s always been there technically. Every election this happens. It feels like it’s a lot more because it’s in your face, but technically I know racism has always been here, people face all types of hatred, prejudice, sexism, all these things exist they’ve always been here it just seems now it’s just more up in your face.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Amplified.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. News is always instant, so you just feel like you can’t stop seeing it, you can’t escape, I think that’s what you feel there’s so much more of it. At the end of the day, I have never seen this much people rally to support another that, to me, is powerful when you entire streets in New York City just full of people that look different all rallying to support this, all rallying to fight this. You go to DC and it’s packed with people, so you go all the cities, and all these towns there are people unifying to show their love and support, to show that we still are human beings, and we still support these human beings, and this is what America is about.

Dr. Stephanie:                   How could we use mindfulness as a tool to keep us from getting overwhelmed at this constant news cycle?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Sometimes we just have to shut the news cycle, we have to shut things down, we have to go back to the basics and just close the different digital devices, and then focus on ourselves.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Individual people, human people.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. Connect with people, and reflect on our lives and the lives of other people, and celebrate your life and other people’s lives. I don’t think we do enough of that. We focus on problems, we focus on solutions, we focus on money, we focus on bills, we focus on a lot of these things. What about celebrating us, celebrating our friends, celebrating our family members? I think those things are also important because it rejuvenates us. It makes us aware of where we are at, of our true surroundings not the media surroundings, but our true surroundings.

Also, it goes back to that list of love, it’s like, “Oh, look at all these people that love me. I can actually shut this down, call a few people, and have a great conversation. Or I can actually close this stuff down, go to a park, take a walk, and you know what? The birds are still chirping like it did last year, the wind is still blowing like it did last year.” Everything looks exactly the same because it technically is the same in that space we just need an opportunity to reflect and take this all in.

Dr. Stephanie:                   These tools, the SALT, surviving, adapting, loving, and transformation they, I’m imagining, don’t just work individually, will they work at a societal level?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, this is the important piece. I truly believe, and I know there’s been a lot of research out there now, is that there’s no such thing as a self-made person.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Say more about that. That one’s counter-cultural.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. You hear people talking about I’m a self-made millionaire.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Bootstraps.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Exactly. Bootstrap, I did this all by myself, but someone gave you those boots. Someone taught you how to strap, so these are things we don’t talk about. Someone loved you, your mom and dad, or your grandparents, whoever fostered an environment so you can be the person you are today. Or you lived in a certain neighborhood that fostered your skills, your talent. Or you went to a school that provided the sports activity that some kid in Compton didn’t have, that’s a privilege, so it might’ve been hard for you, and I’m not saying it’s not difficult for you to become the person you are, but you didn’t do it all by yourself. There’s a lot of people that push you, a lot of people that love you, and also sometimes you got a lot of luck, you have luck that other people didn’t have.

I struggled through life, I faced a lot of hardship, but I can tell you there was a lot of people that loved me, there was a lot of people that pushed me, so I know I did not do this alone, I could have not. There was no way I could’ve done this alone. I’m a big fan of Malcolm Gladwell, and he wrote the book ‘The Outlier’ and it talks about that, so I didn’t create this concept. He waw the person that said, “Listen, there’s no such thing as a self-made person,” like a man is not an island, basically. You need people and people need you.

Dr. Stephanie:                   This is a prescription, and a recommendation, and a model for me to apply for myself, and then me to turn to my community and say, “Where can I impart my love? Where can I connect my love, so that it will have a multiplier effect?”

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yes. That’s where the transformation comes in.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Not just personal transformation.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, it’s your community, it’s everything because in order for you to transform yourself to the person you want to be it also means that your circle needs to reflect that. You might have to leave your community because your community is not fostering that environment you need, you might have to leave your friends, the people that you grew up with, but because of their situation, because they are not loving themselves and loving you, you might have to leave and find new friends, and that’s perfectly fine. It’s not saying you’re giving up on people-

Dr. Stephanie:                   You’re looking for growth.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You’re looking for growth. In order to transform yourself into the person you want to be you might have to find people that are in that situation, that are in that place you want to be. Looking at my situation when I started pursuing higher education I needed to find people that spoke this vernacular that I didn’t have, that have these tools that I did not have.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Just like the child on the first day of school, it’s survival.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yup, so I went looking for those people. I got new friends, it doesn’t mean I gave up my old friends, but my love pool grew. Then, I know when I need something oh, I know this person has it, or when I need this other thing oh, I know this person has it. I also had to leave the neighborhoods that I grew up in because it was no longer fostering growth for me, but it doesn’t mean I gave up on those neighborhoods. I go back, help out, volunteer, those type of things.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Before we close, I have to say how up appreciative I am that you are successful, you’re a man, you’re wearing a suit, you’re very polished, you are a Dean of a school, and you’re using the word love, you’re talking about love. In my experience, in academia and in professional settings and educational settings, love is a language that young people use, K-12 educators use, nursery school teachers use, but men and academics we don’t use that kind of language. Do you feel any dissonance or power or you’re just like, “No, it’s love we have to talk about it”?

Dr. E. Rahim:                     No, I feel just like that. I don’t think it’s a bad word, I don’t think-

Dr. Stephanie:                   You could’ve said leadership because survival, adaptation, leadership, transformation, but you named it, you named something that is not always seen as masculine.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     If I didn’t have love I would not be the person I am today. People that love themselves it’s because other people love them. I love myself because I know a lot of people showed me love, but sad thing’s that there are a lot of people walking around, just walking around right now they don’t know what love is, they can’t tell you what love is. Their description of love is often very physical, it’s not emotional.

Dr. Stephanie:                   It’s [cosumer-y 00:30:28].

Dr. E. Rahim:                     Yeah, exactly. It’s, basically, entrenched in something else, yeah.

Dr. Stephanie:                   Thank you so much. You’ve given us a lot to explore, and ponder, and apply, and it’s just delightful to talk to you.

Dr. E. Rahim:                     You’re welcome. Thank you so much for the opportunity.

Dr. Stephanie:                   My pleasure.

You’re listening to In Times Like These, a production of the CLU Live at Claremont Lincoln University. In Times Like These explores the difficult spaces we humans navigate in culture and religion, in dialogue and doubt.

Thanks for listening to In Times Like These where we explore issues of politics and faith, and learn from one another how to navigate difference for maximum flourishing. In Times Like These is a product of CLU Live at Claremont Lincoln University, for more subscribe, share, and visit us at claremontlincoln.edu.