Grand Slam Journey

44. Cultural Immersion: Appreciating the World Beyond Your Comfort Zone

• Klara Jagosova • Season 2

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Have you ever stood alone in a place so unfamiliar that even the air feels different? This episode is all about embracing that exact sensation! I'll tell you about my personal experiences of stepping away from my comfort zone and hiking to places untouched by the clutter of internet signals. There's profound beauty in such journeys, and I'll tell you all about the culture shocks, the newfound appreciation for everyday comforts, and how a game of tennis can open your eyes to the world's diverse cultures.

Unfamiliarity doesn't always equal discomfort; sometimes, it's the beginning of a beautiful learning curve. Together, we'll explore how these unique life experiences and cultural immersions have shaped my worldview. Inspired by the master of innovation, Steve Jobs, I'll share words of wisdom from his book, Make Something Wonderful. Just as I've learned, I hope my stories inspire you to step onto the path less traveled to appreciate the world we live in and the differences that make us unique. To all my listeners, your unwavering support is deeply cherished. Now, let's embark on this journey of discovery and growth together!

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Klara:

Welcome to Grand Slam Journey podcast, where I, together with my guests, discuss various topics related to finding our passion and purpose, maximizing our potential sports, life after sports, and transitioning from one chapter of our lives to the next, growing our skills and leadership in whatever we decide to put our minds into For me personally, areas of business and technology. Thank you for your patience and waiting for my next podcast episode. I had to drop out for a while and take a break. The older I get, the more I realize that disconnecting from the world that we know and taking a break or exploring something new is much needed, at least for me. I typically come back with a fresh perspective and I start seeing the reality around me through a different lens. I appreciate things way more, I see it more from a new person's perspective, and I typically regain energy for all of the things that I do after a few weeks of disconnecting, and so the past few weeks, I really took a deliberate effort to tune out of my projects and social media and try to be just me. One of the things that is perhaps even more powerful for me is when I go to nature Every now and then. We do these hikes to unknown parts of the world, or perhaps known parts, but without any internet connectivity. You are not tied to responding to emails, text messages, phone calls or notifications that really, in the big scheme of things, are most of the time important. And when I come back from these types of trips that typically include cultural immersion and some sort of cultural shock, I always appreciate the things I have much more. Typically, these types of trips are combined with not being able to take showers, because you're hiking in nature for days, sometimes weeks, and even having your own toilet seems like a luxury. So some of the things, surprisingly, when I come back, I appreciate is the running water, being able to stand in a shower for as long as I want, any time of the day, and having my own toilet. I can sit on even for half an hour if I want to.

Klara:

Today I wanted to discuss just that cultural immersion and the new eyes that we look at the world around us when we come back. In the past couple weeks I took a trip back home to Czech Republic and going back home to see the family always reminds me what I appreciate about them how different cultures are and the differences of languages, how the language shapes the culture of the country and the understanding of the world, and so sometimes I have the feeling that I'm almost two different people in one body. I become a different person when I go back to Czech Republic and speak my language and am around my family. They know me more in the context of who I was, not as much of who I am now because I've lived my adult life mostly here in the America, and when I come back to America I become the American Clara. But I always gain some sort of groundedness coming back from the trip, a bigger grasp of who I actually am and really reconnecting to where I come from. And so traveling and exploring different cultures and seeing how different people solve things differently and how some things are normal in some countries versus not normal in others, it's always something that has fascinated me. Tennis enabled it because you travel all over the world, although you don't have that much time to sightsee. Most of the time you see different tennis courts in different cities and countries, but in these tournaments there are many people from all over the world, from many different countries and cultures, speaking different languages, and so that immersion being in different country as well as competing against players from all sorts of different countries that all meet in that spot was something that I really embraced and I appreciated about the sport. I do think that tennis helped hone the understanding of cultures and appreciation of the differences that we have in the world. I truly believe that is what makes us unique, and I love exploring the differences and learning from them.

Klara:

I wanted to read a short excerpt from a book that I am currently reading. The book is called Make Something Wonderful Steve Jobs and His Unwords. It is introduced by Lauren Powell Jobs, steve Jobs' daughter, and edited by Leslie Berlin. It's a collection of Steve's writing from the past, and at the beginning of the book there's a short passage that talks about just that Steve's cultural immersion and how great of an observer he had become. It talks about his trip to India and then coming back to California and the different lengths that he started seeing the world around him, the world that we typically take for granted. This is about Steve Jobs working to get a job, but he also wanted to travel, and so one of the stipulations under which he took the job is that they would let him travel to Europe and see the world, because at that time. He really wanted to travel, but he didn't have the funds to do so, and so the company agreed and they allowed him to take unpaid leave of absence and go see different parts of the world, in Europe and Asia. Well, they asked me if I would go, and I said I definitely would love to, but I would like to take a leaf of absence when I was there. So they let me do that, and I ended up in Switzerland and flew from Zurich to New Delhi and I spent some time in India.

Klara:

Anyone would have a hard time summarizing a meaningful experience of their life in a page, and if I was William Faulkner I might be able to do it for you, but I'm not. Coming back was more of a cultural shock than going. All I really wanted to do after returning to California was to go find a grassy meadow and just sit. I didn't want to drive a car, I didn't want to go to San Francisco or do all these things. I didn't want to do it, so I didn't for about three months. I just read and sat.

Klara:

When you are a stranger in a place, you notice things that you rapidly stop noticing when you become familiar. I was a stranger in America for the first time in my life, and so I saw things I had never seen before, and I tried to pay attention to them for those three months because I knew that gradually, it by bit, my familiarity would be gained again. I think this excerpt is very powerful and 100% agree with it from my own perspective. At the beginning of this episode, I explained some of my experiences with it, and so I hope that many of you have decided to travel to different places this summer, perhaps even locally. They don't have to be international to different country. But I want to invite you to perhaps just go out of your normal area where you live and interact with work and people and just try to see the world from a different lens. I really think that it adds a different experience and the newness of things. The unfamiliarity is where we gain understanding and deepen our perspective.

Klara:

I briefly want to touch base on my experience of even just moving from California to Texas, and I now realize, living here for a few months, I'm losing the newness, I'm taking it more and more for granted, but I really believe that it's often the little things that make the biggest difference at the end of the day, and so here are the few things that I really appreciate about Texas, and I have nothing against California. I think it's a fantastic state and I'm grateful for all the amazing friends I have created there. I miss them greatly. What I'm realizing now is that I had chosen to go to college UTR LinkedIn for a reason, and the reason is the friendliness of the South. Before I came to college, I played tennis tournaments in the US two summers in a row and I've traveled in the US on my own for about eight to nine weeks the two previous years. There was something about Texas, in Dallas specifically, that attracted me to the place. I had a family that adopted me, allowed me to stay in their own home and drove me from their house to the tennis courts practices, and even watched me and cheered for me. I have never found that level of kindness anywhere else in the world and I am so grateful. It is undoubtedly one of the experiences that made me fall in love with America.

Klara:

Another reason was a coach, francisco Barrientos, who was equally kind. He was the director of a tennis tournament 10K that I played at the time in Waco. I ended up doing quite well before my opening match of the main draw. I ended up qualifying and then, by the lack of the draw, I ended up playing against his own student. Francisco was so kind and wanted to show me the real warmth of stuff, although he is from Chile, and so he asked local news to record a video and put us in the news about the match we were about to play. The girl he was coaching at the time, I believe, was seated and had a solid game. I was so nervous I didn't wanna show it, but obviously it showed in my game and I remember losing quite easily in the first round of the main draw, mainly because I couldn't handle my nerves and I didn't know how to perform under that pressure.

Klara:

At that point in time. I didn't know how to rise to that occasion. Nonetheless, I kept in touch with Francisco and it was definitely one of the key decisions that allowed me to go to university in Dallas. I knew that there was at least one familiar person that I knew and naively I thought perhaps if the practices at school aren't good enough, I can travel to see him and train with him and play tennis tournaments. That's how naive I was about what it means to be a college tennis player and competing for a university. Anyways, learning what that means to be a student athlete was a whole nother learning. That took me a while to grasp my head around, and I'm not planning on going through all of that in today's episode, and so I'm sharing those two stories to bring into light how warm the south is, and by warm literally it is hot outside, but I mean mainly the warmth of the people around here.

Klara:

Everyone has been super friendly, super nice, super kind, willing to open up home for you when in need and help support you with your goals. If you are a decent and kind human being as well, I find this is still true. Coming here, everybody on the street greets you, even if they don't know you. It has certain familiarity to it that I appreciate. One of the other small things that I really appreciate and this one may sound weird is the water pressure in the shower. Yeah, I know really weird, but in California most houses are built based on a newer coat and because of the water, drought and restrictions, the shower heads even if you switch them on your own in the shower cannot get enough pressure, and so one of the things that I really appreciate when I moved to Texas into our house, was the amazing pressure of the water that you can get. It really seems like you're getting a proper shower. And one more thing that I really like and appreciate and this might be a little bit of a splurge is our shower has real pebbles at the bottom, and I didn't fully understand why people do that, but it's so amazing. It almost feels like you're showering outside because you're standing on real pebbles, and so that experience of having an amazing shower with full pressure water and standing on real pebbles makes such an amazing shower experience.

Klara:

Yeah, I know weird, I really enjoy a shower and you must think that I'm crazy, but I really think sometimes it's those little things that make a big difference. At the end, it's not the big things, but it's the things that you insert into everyday life, that you do over and over, and improving the quality of those little tiny things, bit by bit, smidgen by smidgen, is what creates a big difference of our enjoyment, happiness and fulfillment on a daily basis over a period of time, because those are the things that you end up repeating and doing on everyday basis. So one of the things I'm really starting to pay attention to is improving my quality of life around the things that I do on a daily basis Sleeping, eating, taking a shower how can I optimize my environment in a way that is more fun, more enjoyable and makes me feel at home and alive? So there's one thing today I want to invite you to explore is trying to think of what is one of the things that you do every single day. It can be taking a shower, it can be going to bed, it can be drinking a coffee or your favorite tea, and how can you create even better experience from that routine.

Klara:

For example, if you enjoy listening to music, you can install one of the shower heads that has music. Or you want to improve sleep, you can purchase one of the silk pillowcases that changes the experience when you lay your head on the pillow. Or if you drink coffee every day you enjoy coffee as much as I do maybe you want to invest in a really good coffee machine or really good coffee beans. That allows you to experience the coffee in a different way, and it's something that you look forward to as soon as you step out of your bed in the morning. And if none of these things are it, I totally get it. We all are unique. Take your own and try to play with it, explore it, invest in making it just a little bit better, maybe even 1% improvement Test it out for a week or month and see how it works for you.

Klara:

Thank you for tuning in. I have a bunch more content that I'm behind on and fun, exciting conversations that I look forward to bringing you in the next coming month, so I appreciate you waiting for me for the past two weeks and allowing me to take some time off and disconnect. If you enjoyed this episode, I want to ask you to please do two things that would help me greatly. One, please consider leaving a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcasting platform that you use to listen to this episode. Two, please share this podcast with a friend who you believe might enjoy it as well. It is a great way to remind someone you care about them by sharing a conversation they might be interested in.