In this Episode I speak with Parini Shroff, author of "The Bandit Queens." The novel revolves around the life of Geeta, a woman in a tiny village in India whose husband disappeared a few years ago. Everyone in the village begins to think Geeta killed him, and some desperate housewives start approaching Geeta for help in getting rid of their own, no-good husbands. Geeta isn't sure she wants to get involved, but some leave her with no choice. With a lot of heart - and humor - Parini Shroff addresses a wide range of important issues ranging from the stigma around widowhood, caste/class politics, intimate and domestic violence, and the complexities and strength of female friendships.  Parini Shroff received her MFA from the University of Texas at Austin. She is a practicing attorney and currently lives in the Bay Area. "The Bandit Queens" is her debut novel.  Here are some sources to learn more about Phoolan Devi: "I, Phoolan Devi: The Autobiography of India's Bandit Queen" "India's Bandit Queen: The True Story of Phoolan Devi" by Mala Sen "Phoolan Devi Rebel Queen," a graphic novel, by Claire Fauvel Here's a link to Arundhati Roy's scathing critique of Sekhar Kapoor's 1994 film Phoolan Devi: http://www.rarre.org/documents/roy/Arundhati%20Roy%20on%20Shekhar%20Kapur's%20Bandit%20Queen.pdf Parini mentioned R.O. Kwon's article on parents who regret having children: https://time.com/6966914/parental-regret-children-ro-kwon-essay/

Our guest in today's episode is Soraya Chemaly, an award-winning author, journalist, and activist. We discuss Soraya's new book, "The Resilience Myth: New Thinking on Grit, Strength, and Growth after Trauma," in which she urges us to question and dismantle popular ideas around resiliency that prioritize the mind/body dichotomy, encourage a "tough-it-out" mentality, celebrates productivity, and rests on the expectation of "bouncing-back" as quickly as possible. Throughout our conversation, and as Soraya argues in her book, it is clear that this cultural script for resilience is, in fact, part of the same systems and worldviews that require us to be so resilient to begin with. And as the 2024 Paris Olympic games wind-down, one athlete's story - among many! - has already left a mark on so many of us, that of Simone Biles. Soraya believes that Simone is a wonderful role model for this new reimagining of resiliency, one in which the body's needs are acknowledged and nurtured, where the virtues of "productivity" and "soldiering-on" are questioned, and where time is taken to heal with the help and support of family, peers, and the larger community.

Dr. Mona Amin is a Board Certified General Pediatrician, a Parenting Coach, a Mom -- and a social media sensation. Through her brand @pedsdoctalk, her goal is to provide relatable and easy-to-digest education for the modern parent regarding the health, safety, and wellness of their child. In today's Episode, however, I invite Dr. Mona to put down her Doctor & Coaching hat for a moment and get personal - about her childhood, how she was raised, the kind of relationship she had - and still has - with her parents, and how it all shows up in her life, relationships, and the way she chooses to raise her own children. As a mental health advocate, Dr. Mona doesn't shy away from speaking about her own struggles, especially after the birth trauma she experienced in delivering both her children. Whether or not you follow Dr. Mona you will still be able to resonate with the underlying theme of this episode and our conversation, which is that the way you were parented mattered. You can find Dr. Mona at her website: https://pedsdoctalk.com/ and on her Podcast: https://pedsdoctalk.com/pedsdoctalk-podcast/ and on Instagram @pedsdoctalk.  Also please don't forget to follow us @letstrythatagainpodcast

In this Episode I speak with Elise Hu, author of "Flawless: Lessons in Looks and Culture from the K-Beauty Capital." When Elise moved to Seoul in 2015 as the first-ever Korea and Japan bureau chief for the American broadcaster NPR, it dawned on her that she was in fact coming "face-to-face with the future of how we might live, look, and relate to one another." South Korea is one of the world's largest exporters of cosmetic goods and is at the epicenter of beauty innovation-- creating cutting edge technologies of self-enhancement and self-modification. This, combined with powerful AI tools and social media, allows the consumer beauty industry to propose solutions for problems we never knew we had. As the window of who is deemed Beautiful becomes more and more narrow, and when appearance labor becomes conflated with self-improvement, Hu asks "what does consumer beauty culture lead to, if left unconsidered and unchecked?" To learn about Elise Hu please visit her website: https://elisehu.com/

Is there much more we can say about love? Well, according to the late and brilliant bell hooks, as a society we seem simultaneously obsessed with love and yet find it very difficult to define. And that it's perhaps "our confusion about what we mean when we use the word 'love' that is the source of our difficulty in loving." In this episode we explore what hooks defines as the "original school of love" - that of our childhoods and our families. I also sit down with Lac Su to discuss his memoir, "'I Love You's Are For White People," in which he describes the difficult and tumultuous relationship he had with his father after they settled in the US as new immigrants after having to suddenly flee post-war Vietnam. Before that I talk to Dr. Aneesa Shariff, a clinical psychologist based in the UK, who has done work on first and second generation South Asian families and on the tensions that arise when multi-generational households move from Asian countries to more Western countries. Although love might be experienced as a universal emotion it is certainly not expressed or demonstrated in the same ways, universally. To purchase Lac Su’s book, please visit: https://www.amazon.com/Love-Yous-Are-White-People/dp/0061543667 To learn more about Dr. Aneesa Shariff's work please visit her website: https://leedsanxietypsychologist.co.uk/ and you can find her on Instagram @aneesashariffphd Please follow our page on @letstrythatagainpodcast

This trailer introduces the Podcast, its themes, and the topics we will explore in upcoming episodes.