Josh and Sav Talk Interracial Marriage | The Naked Marriage Podcast | Dave & Ashely Willis

Hello and welcome back to the Naked Marriage Podcast. We are Dave and Ashley Willis, and on this podcast, we address the truth about sex, intimacy, and lifelong love. And you guys, we have a very special couple that we're going to interview today, and Dave is going to tell you all about them.

Yeah, they're. They're way cooler than me, first off. Like, they're just. Sometimes you hang out with people and you're like, I'm not cool enough for friends like these, but they're gracious enough to hang with us.

That's right.

Josh and Savannah Alexander, better known online as Josh and Sav. They. They're changing the world. I mean, if you. If you've ever been on YouTube or Instagram or Tik Tok or just the Internet, you probably come across them. They're wise beyond their years. Super fun. The parents of two beautiful little daughters. And. And, yeah, we're excited to have you guys here. So welcome to the Naked Marriage Podcast.

Thank you so much. We're super, super excited. Yeah, just us talking over each other. That's what we do all the time.

I love it. I love it. Means you're in sync.

That's it.

First question. How can I be cooler? Because you guys, you do cool stuff. You live in a cool town.

I was going to say knock 10 years off. Like, go back 10 years.

Does this mean I can't shop for my clothes at Costco anymore?

Costco? No, Costco has some cool dope hoodies. I will say I've like, yeah, Costco is great. Just the hoodies. But no, no, there's like, there's Costco's. Perfect.

They do have some good hoodies.

I hang out there because it's one of the few places left I can go where I'm on the younger end.

Yeah, this.

Most places I go in and I'm like, older end. But at Costco, I'm like, I'm young.

We have our whole lives ahead of us here.

Good.

Well, hey, we want to hear all about you guys, but whenever we're interviewing a couple, we always love to start with this question. Tell us how you met. Tell us the origin story of this great love.

Yeah, Well, I was just walking on the sidewalk and she found me and said, I want to marry you. That was it. No. Do you want to tell them? No, you tell it. Okay, I'll start it and then we'll go. So my wife is a professional dancer, and I used to do. I still do now in our creative space, but freelance videography. So I would shoot a Lot of dancers shoot a lot of artists, musical artists and things like that. And one day, a dance choreographer hired me to shoot a dance class. And usually you just go in there, you get B roll footage, and then you shoot, like, you know, the dancers, like, groups of dances dancing at you. And Savannah was in that class. I noticed her maybe probably like, 20 minutes into the class. Out of, like, how many girls?

150 girls.

There's a lot of girls in the classroom, and I.

But only one Savannah.

But only one Savannah. I saw her and she did, like, this dance move, and it was like, one of these moves, and I was like, wow, okay, that's. That's great. That was awesome. And I saw her, and I literally could not focus the entire class. It was also creepy because I was the guy with the camera and the guy with a hat on, and it was just kind of weird. So I didn't want to be too weird. But, yeah, she says that she noticed me in the class, and to this day, I do not believe it.

Well, I did, because for me, he's the only. Like, he said he's the guy in the room with the camera, so of course I'm going to notice you. But I actually did think you were cute as well.

I did.

I really did.

So I did not have the guts to go up to her after the class. I just couldn't do it. I was like, there's no way I'm gonna be that guy trying to get her number or whatever. So I did. What we all do nowadays is go to Instagram, right? And I will slid in the DMs. I slid in the DMs. And I will admit that I did a little Instagram stalking. I had to, like, find this girl that I saw, and I went to different dancers and dance choreographers to try to find her, and I found her slid in the DMs. What did I say? I said, like, you said that you.

Saw me in the class the other day.

Yes, I said I saw you in the class and that you're, like, a really good dancer. Just try to be a little smooth with it. She responded, and then, I'm taking this to the grave. She gave me her phone number without me asking for her phone number.

See? So she noticed.

She did. She was like, I just. I'm not on here. Really? Yeah.

I was like, I don't check my Instagram that often. So, like, here's my number.

Gave her the number, and then first thing she did was FaceTime me. And I'm not a FaceTime guy.

That's. That's a high pressure.

Super high pressure first. Okay.

We texted, like, a few times before that.

Yeah. But I wasn't ready for a FaceTime. I was not ready for. For a face to face. And. But ever since then, it was like we broke down a lot of barriers and opened a lot of doors with our conversations and stuff, and that was that. And our first date was at a. At a Shake Shack. And I. It was. It's so funny. The church that I was at, we were breaking a fast, and we all said, let's go out to Shake Shack and let's break the fast here. And I said, well, I think that's a perfect place to bring this girl that I'm starting to see or whatever. And now I know, years later, she's told me. She was like. I was actually super nervous.

I was, like, meeting all of these, like, important people in his life, and I'm like, I don't even know you.

That is so funny. That's true. I didn't even think about that.

Right.

Oh, my goodness.

So. So, yeah. That's the long story short. I love it, but, yeah.

Oh, that's such a great story. And the dancing thing. This totally makes sense. I've seen some of your dancing videos, and y' all are really good. I mean, so. I mean, it makes sense. I don't know if you've been able to see them yet, but I was like, oh, my gosh. Like, have you ever seen where people will mimic, like, good dancers like yourselves and then try to pull it off? Like, we should do that. We should try to do.

We should.

We literally should try Me trying to do your dances.

That would 100% go viral.

I would.

I would break something.

Well, it's so cool how you'll come in together, because I think there was one where you started dancing and then he joined you. Like, that was a more recent one, I think.

Okay.

Yeah, it was really good.

Really good. I'm always trying to follow her footsteps. Footsteps with the dancing. I can, like, hold a beat. I have rhythm. That's what it is. Yeah.

Awesome. That's so cool that you all share that, too. That's the love of music and rhythm and dance and all that. That's so cool. And then four years married, right?

Pretty soon, October.

Y. October. And two little girls.

Two little girls. You guys have been busy. Making precious daughters, making all this video content, traveling to Texas to record. I mean, you guys are all over the place. I love it.

Yeah.

Now you just had a move and moving with small children. We've done it. It can be one of the most stressful things on earth. People don't talk about this enough, but moving is listed by itself as one of the top five stressors a human being can go through.

Oh, yeah.

But when you add small kids to the mix, even if you're going someplace you want to go, even if it's exciting, it is exhausting. So how's this transition been? Because you're fresh in this move, Like a month in.

Super fresh.

I mean, we still have boxes in our house. We're not fully settled yet, but I will say we've moved a lot, just the two of us. And so we felt like we're like, okay, yeah, we got this. But we've never moved with children, especially two under two. So it was definitely, like, eye opening for us. We were like, okay, this is. This is not for the week.

When it was just us and our dog, we would do, like, the. We would drive because we used to actually live here in Dallas, and we drove from Dallas to Michigan, where we. Where we used to live. And we were like, let's just do the drive. It's easy. We'll ship the stuff, do the drive. The first thing I said was, okay, the next time we move, there's no way I'm driving anymore. We're just gonna ship the car, ship the stuff. We're getting on a plane and. Or you're getting on the plane with the girls and I'll drive. But I ended up driving. I ended up getting on the plane with them and was like, we're not doing the full thing because it's stressful. And, like, the littles. And like, on the. We now live in Portland, and that flight is like four hours, 30 minutes with two little ones. But our oldest. She's our oldest. I sound like she's like, 20. Yeah, she's not even 2, but she's been flying since she was, like, 2 months. So she's kind of like a little pro. She's a pro at it. She is.

Yeah.

It's. It's cool. We have to buy her own seat now because, like, we used to do, like, the lap child, and she can just be the bike.

They can actually be a lap child until they're two. So she still technically can. But we learned that she's very mobile now, and I'm like, she needs her own seat.

Like, she needs her own seats.

She cannot sit on our lap.

We can't do it.

So money well spent.

Yeah, money well spent.

Money well, it's worth it. Yeah. So we. We did the move and we're enjoying it. We're getting acclimated. We're surrounded by the grandparents and stuff now, and that's that the girls aren't here because they're with the grandparents. So it allows us to do trips like these. But yeah, the house is still kind of in shambles. We still got to unpack and do a lot of stuff.

But give yourselves grace.

Yeah.

It's a process.

Yeah. That's what people have been telling us. Yeah.

That's awesome. And what would you say? Kind of. And I know you've had a lot going on, a lot of moves. You've been doing all that you're doing and having babies. What would you say, though? And if you could, like, rewind the clock Back in that time of engagement and like that first year of marriage, what were some of kind of the hardest parts of that for you guys?

What do you think?

I feel like it's funny because we. We had gotten the advice that. Or not the advice, I guess, but just letting us know that the first year marriage can sometimes be the hardest because it's just such a learning curve.

Yeah.

You've never lived together. You're learning all these things, how to live and be roommates, but also it's your spouse. Like, you love them.

Yeah.

We got married in 2019 and then Covid hit. And so honestly, our first year of marriage was, like, amazing.

I loved.

Was like bliss. We got a dog. Our engagement season, I will say, was a little bit tougher. We did long distance, so that was definitely different for us. Yeah, we were dating for like, the first year and then we got engaged and we're engaged for six months. Long distance. It's hard, but, yeah, that was really tough. I feel like that was probably one of the, like, tougher parts of our relationship.

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Yeah, no, definitely. I think when we. When we first got married and like, you would think, like she said, like, it would be super tough, but we were. It was covet. So we were like. And we were also living. It's gonna sound like we lived everywhere, but we lived in LA at this time. That's where we met by the. We met in Los Angeles and LA was like, fully shut down. So, like, there was a curfew. We couldn't be out past like 4 o'. Clock. And I just married my wife. We just found our place and like, everything's good. And then we're like, we gotta be together all the time and we're Doing social media full time at that, too. So working with my spouse and then also not being able to leave the house, it was. It was like. It was fun, but at the same time, it was like, okay, we have to do this for, like, months on end, People not knowing what's going on with COVID and stuff like that. So it definitely was fun. But we compare it to when we were doing long distance and doing long distance for a long time, too. Nothing compares to that. Like, we. If we can be trapped together for our first year of marriage, we're like.

We can do anything.

Yeah, we can do anything. So.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

You know, when we just backstage before we got out here, we were all talking to a friend of mine, a friend of ours, a friend of the ministry, Pastor Narup Alpha. Great guy. And he made an observation. He was talking to me about it one of the last times we talked. He said, by the year 2050, he's always got a statistic.

He always has.

Always reading something. He said, By 2050, the majority of couples in the United States will be interracial couples. And he said, and he himself is in an interracial marriage. And he said, and we face some unique challenges. We've got a great marriage, but have faced some unique challenges. And he said, and I think part of the reason why is because even though there's so many folks in this dynamic, it doesn't get talked about. Right. And so you two represent an interracial couple. Did you have any struggles at all, like, with. In any way related to that, or was that not an issue at all?

Yeah, I would definitely say it was more not an issue than an issue. But there were things that would come up where. Whether it's things that are happening in the world or things that are happening in America, especially, like these past few years, racism and things like that. To where we've had to have conversations, not like, I wouldn't say have, but to where she's been wanting more clarity on how to feel or how do I feel with certain things like that? And I've always. I've loved that with talking to just other people who aren't black or whatever, like, people who are wanting to know about, you know. Okay, Josh, well, how does that make you feel or how can I help? How can I, you know, be an advocate and things like that. So I will say that those have been, like, maybe challenging. Having tough talks about if, you know, you see something on the news about, you know, there was a lot of tough situations.

Yeah, exactly.

She sees that, and then it's kind of like if we're being real, like, we're in the living room and it's kind of quiet. It's like a little. Yeah. Awkward silence, if you will. Especially in the first few years of marriage. And I'm. I know what I'm feeling, but I don't know. Like, I know not. Not one ounce of racism is in this girl's bodies, but, like, she's never had to experience anything like that. So in my head, I'm like, okay, we're gonna have to have this talk. Cause I know she's probably feeling a certain type of way. And you. You've been willing to have that talk. So I would say that we were talking to Taiwan, who's an amazing producer with this.

He is recently.

We were talking to him back there about. Cause he's an interracial relationship as well. On certain instances where people look at us out in public a little different than, you know, you would look at a couple who is the same race or whatever. And we shared this story that we were in New York, and we were on the subway, and there was this older black lady. Sure, she was sweet, bless her heart. She was staring at us, and I think the best of people. And I was just like, maybe she's looking at her shoes. We're attractive. She's very pretty. Maybe she was just looking at us because of those reasons. And I'm starting to realize she's starting to up and down me. Mean mug me. Kind of look at Savannah kind of weird. And I was just. Didn't think nothing of it. I'm walking off the train, and Savannah walks ahead of me. She's off the train now, and she looks at me verbatim, not making this up. She says, mm, you don't like chocolate. And it was like. It was. It was funny. But at the time, I was just like, wait, hold on. Wait. What. What is that? What does that even. Okay, So I walked. Walked off, and I didn't. I never mentioned it to her. So probably, like, months later, because I don't want her to have to even think about that. But it made me really think that, you know, that is still evident in today's world. Like, she was thoroughly upset or felt a type of way that I was with a white woman and not a black woman or someone of my race. And it's so funny. We've always either cracked jokes about it or especially on social media, because it's obviously evident, because we see comments nowadays sometimes, and people are Saying, oh, you should be with a black woman, you should be with a white guy. And we poke fun at it because it's funny to us that it's still a thing. We're still having these conversations on interracial relationships and things like that.

So, yeah, I feel like we. We try to make, I don't know, keep it light hearted, because to us, we're like, I mean, yes, we've been affected by it, but it's not. We try to, like, not let it get to us because I feel like that's the only way to like, especially with the comments. Like you said, like, we do get a lot of, like, hate comments, if you will. And we're just like, you know, it's just crazy that someone can sit behind their phone and just say these things. And I'm like, I am curious, like, would they say that if they were actually right in front of us?

So.

But yeah, we.

I don't know.

I feel like we just keep it lighthearted.

Yeah, definitely keep it light hearted and just not make it a big deal, because to us it's not. But we do. We are aware that it's prevalent and.

People and just as public figures, you know, we've just being online at all, you know, critics come out of the woodwork about anything. And most critics are not being critical in a constructive way online. At least they're doing it kind of in a more cowardly way where they wouldn't say it to your face, but they just want to. They just want to throw a punch.

Drop it and leave. Yeah, there's no conversation here. There's no understanding.

And that can be hurtful, especially at first when you're just kind of first getting these critic. And then after a while you realize, okay, well, there are just some people that are going to criticize. But, yeah, you guys have such wisdom, such perspective. And I just love that we can have these conversations because so many people listening are in that dynamic. Like I said, By 2050, it'll be the majority of couples, and yet there's still so many backwards mentalities and there's little comments and sometimes, sadly, those comments are coming from within the family. Right. It's one thing if it's like the random lady on the subway, but when it's your mom or your dad and they're voicing their disapproval of this person, and it has nothing to do with their character, it has everything to do with their melanin. You know what I mean?

Exactly.

And that's. That's just hard.

It's Heartbreaking.

But that's a reality that a lot of people live in. And so we just, we want to, we want to platform folks who have different experiences that we've had different struggles, but that has not been one. But we have so much compassion for those who have experienced those things. But your families love each other, get.

Along well and everything.

That's been the best thing.

Yeah, it's crazy actually. When we got married, our families, that was their first time ever meeting each other.

Oh my goodness.

So it was kind of like nerve wracking, I would say it was.

They've seen like, like they've talked over.

The phone, interaction, physically meeting. That was their first time ever meeting. But it was really sweet. And our families all love each other.

They love each other. They're all.

That's a blessing.

Yes, it's a big blessing. And now like us being where both of our families are in Portland, like even that dynamic, because I've always wanted to have the, not the high school sweetheart, but like somewhere to where, you know, we're in the same city and like maybe your parents live, you know, 10 minutes that way. Parents live that. And now we actually have that. And our kids can be around their grandparents and things like that. So it's, it's definitely great that both of our families get along. No one's, you know, iffy about the other and we haven't had to deal with that.

That's a gift.

So we'll give a plug if your families don't get along.

Yeah.

We have a brand new book.

Come on.

Married into the Family.

Married into the Family not so Secret.

Guide to In Law Relationships. That's right. We will plug it every chance. Taiwan for the win. Sliding it over. That's right.

Yes. Wherever books are sold, you can get@xomarriage.com too and of course Amazon and other places.

But yeah, and we are going to. This conversation we're having with Josh and Sav is really a two parter. We want you guys to check out the second part, which is going to be all about parenting and it's going to be on our brand new Parenting Uncovered podcast. We're so excited. So check over there. And we're gonna continue this conversation all about parenting. But before we go, guys, and tell us, tell the folks who are listening where they can find you. You've got so much great content. You've got an amazing podcast, video content. Social media folks could just do a deep dive and a delightful deep dive into all. They could learn dance moves, they can learn life things.

That's true.

You can take the dance challenge.

Absolutely.

Do the dance challenge.

So tell folks where they can. Where they can get more Josh and Sav.

Honestly, you could just go to joshandsav.com we have our podcast that we are kind of, like, looking up to you guys because you guys inspire us with our podcast just to have. It's a marriage podcast, but.

And it's so good, you guys. It's so good.

Thank you. We talk about faith, marriage, life, social media, and the things that we've learned that have been teachable lessons for us that we want to share with other people. So it's called the For Us podcast, and that's where we're hanging out every single week. And same with TikTok, where we're having fun, Instagram, YouTube. So, yeah, Josh and sav.com is where you guys can hang out with us.

I love it.

I love it.

Thank you guys so much for being here, and I hope you guys tune in next time for another Naked Marriage podcast episode. But for those of you parents out there, please go join us on Parenting Uncovered, and we'll continue with Josh and Sev.