16. Personal Things You Wanted To Know About Me | Q&A

Welcome to the Influency Podcast. I'm Hadar and this is episode number 16. And today I answer personal questions that you asked me. Hey there. What is up? I hope all is well.

All's well.

Reductions, contractions. If you've listened to my previous episode, you know what I'm talking about. I'm talking about, have you started noticing contractions all around you? If you have no idea what I'm talking about, go listen to the previous episode, episode number 15. But you can do that after listening to this one because we already started, why stop, right? So anyway, every time I start to record a new podcast episode, I always try to imagine you, what you're doing, where are you sitting, where are you listening, where are you walking, driving, where do you live? Are you listening to this in the morning, in the afternoon? I think I've mentioned that already in one of my introductions to one of the episodes that I wonder that it's easier for me if I know who I'm speaking to. Luckily, I actually know a lot of the listeners and a lot of the community, and I can actually visualize your faces and I get your DMs and messages and comments on Facebook telling me that you've been listening to this on your run or on your way to work. And that's fantastic. That helps me because I know that I'm not just speaking to a piece of metal that is called a microphone. Anyway, what I have for you today.

Is something that I don't usually do.

In fact, I don't think I've ever done it. And that is answering personal questions about myself. And the reason why I haven't done it before is because I've always thought that why would anyone want to know anything about my personal life? Because I'm a teacher, I'm a coach, I have knowledge to share and thoughts and ideas. But in today's world, it doesn't work that way because we're so connected. And a lot of you know me anyway really well if you are a member of the Influency community on Facebook, and if not, go find it and go join it because we're waiting for you there. And it's so cool and. And fun over there. A great place to practice English. Anyway, so people know me there, but I don't feel that a lot of people know too much about my personal life. I do share stuff on Instagram, but it's also hard for me because I don't like to share too much from my personal life. Anyway, a few months ago, that was today. Now we're in February. And that was in June or July where I posted on Instagram asking people to ask me personal questions. And I thought, I'm gonna get like one or two comments. And I got about 60. It's like, okay, maybe people do wanna know some stuff about me.

So I picked the best questions. And yes, there is a question about.

My hair and an answer, so I'm.

Gonna talk about that too.

But I'm going to actually answer all of how I met my husband. And that includes a fun story about my life as an activist, because that's how we met during a social protest. And other stuff about my business and family and life and teaching style and schedule and my hair. I got a lot of questions about my hair, so I answered most of them. I hope you enjoy it. I hope you find it fun. Remember that you can always turn it into an English practice if you download the transcript and follow the text and underline new words. And if you want to practice intonation, you can mark the stressed words and cross out the unstressed words, listen to reductions and identify things that you don't usually use. But you know, that's a really good and effective exercise. Not just looking for words that you don't know, but recognizing the words that you know but you never use. So that's what I would want you to mark and practice and repeat. And of course, don't leave it on the paper. Mark it and repeat it. Whether you repeat after me or just you read it out loud, it doesn't matter. But it has to be spoken, okay? Don't leave it in your head and your eyes because that's passive English and it doesn't serve you. But you know that, right? So let's not wait any longer and listen to the audio of my YouTube video. Personal things you wanted to know about me.

Hey there, it's Hadar. And today we have a slightly different video because today I will be answering personal questions that you asked me. So a few days ago, I posted a question. What are the 10 things you'd like to know about me? 10 personal questions. And I got like a billion questions about different aspects of life and business. And I was so humbled and thrilled to talk about these things and kind of like unveil my life because I feel that I'm so connected to you. But maybe you don't know a lot of things about me and about my life. So I decided to be more open and to share more things with you. And that's it. Here we go. So let's begin with the basics. Where are you from? I was born and raised in Israel. I grew up in Petah Tikva, and now I live in Tel Aviv. I haven't lived abroad for over 15 years. How many languages do you speak? Okay, so I speak Hebrew, of course, English, and then I speak Italian, Japanese, German, French, of course Arabic, Russian, and a little bit Brazilian Portuguese. No, I'm kidding. I just speak English. A lot of you have asked me about my family, if I have a family or to tell you a little bit about it. So, yes, I have a beautiful family. I live with my partner. His name is Gil.

We.

We've been together for eight years. We are not officially married, but we are bound to each other. We have two beautiful daughters. The eldest one is Amalia. She's six years old. And we have Asia, who is three and a half years old. Isis wanted to know how I met my husband partner. So actually, it's a really interesting story. So we met exactly eight years ago during the social protest in Israel. It followed the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street. So here as well, we had weekly demonstrations, fighting for social justice and resenting the crazy housing situation. And what we did is we actually lived in tents in the middle of the city. And yes, I had my own tent. And we would protest and actually sit every evening. And then a bunch of us got together and we wanted to do something more, something to show the injustice that is happening in the city. And we discovered that there are a lot of apartments or buildings owned by the municipality that are completely deserted. And we wanted to raise awareness around that. So we created an action group. And in that group, I met Gil, who is now my partner. Now, it's a fun story. So I'm going to tell you about what we've done. And we actually found this incredible huge building. Like, you had to. Like, it would take you 20 minutes to just walk through the entire building in the middle of the city in one of the most expensive areas. And what we did is we found our way in, we cleaned up the house, and we, like, there was one event. We planned it out. We said, okay, there is a secret action going on. There is a secret event going on. Meet us at 8pm on this and that date. And we picked up, like, thousands of people from around the city. And we had like a few meeting points of hundreds of people from around the city. And we led them into that building. And it was like, magical. Like, at that moment, we felt like, you know, we are really taking our destiny in our Hands and people connected and we declared it as a liberated building. And the news was there and we were kind of like, we were in euphoria. And then at 4am the police came in and we said, no, we're not going to move from here. They're going to have to evacuate us. And then, you know, they just talked to one of the people and we're like, okay, so let's go. So that was kind of lame, but it was a lot of fun. And actually, a few years later, the municipality has turned it into.

A public.

Building for the people. They created a bunch of kindergartens there after school programs.

And it.

It's like, it's really beautiful. And we are very proud, I have to say. And that's how we met. So next time you're debating whether or not you should go to this or that protest, I say go, because you never know where it's going to take you. Lulu is asking, so which things make.

You crazy to the point of screaming?

People chewing gum, People being rude? Coming home to a messy house. Okay, yes, definitely coming home to a messy house, Ask Gil. And especially like dishes in the sink and like, filthy food. I'm not the cleanest and the most organized person, I have to say, but coming home after a long day like that can drive me crazy all day. Also, people being rude on the road. I mean, in Israel you'll find a lot of them. Also, I think injustice drives me crazy. I actually got into a fist fight once. I mean, you see me all cool and chill, but I have a short temper when it comes to being rude or aggressive or to injustice. And I remember when I was a bartender in New York, I was like, it was like 3am and we were at the bar and someone just walked in and started being really aggressive with one of the women. And I walked out of the bar and I actually kicked him out with my hands and I pushed him out, away from her, and I think he punched me. So a lot of you have asked me about my hair. What products do I use, what do I do with it, and how did I inherit it? So, yes, I was blessed with thickness Middle Eastern hair. My grandma is from Tripoli and she had this really thick, dark long hair, as I remember. And my grandma on my dad's side is from Iraq, and she also had this like, beautiful long hair when she was young. And that's it. Like, I got their great jeans. And the secret is that I only wash it twice a week and I rarely brush my hair. And if I do, it's Just before I go to bed, otherwise it would look like this.

And yeah, that's it.

Now a few people also asked me about the fact that I quit acting and if I miss it. So the answer is in the first few years after I stopped acting, I definitely missed it and I felt like it was a huge loss. I felt like I was not fulfilling my dream, I was not fulfilling my calling. It had been my dream for, you know, like for 10 years, between the age of 20, even before that and until I hit 30 and when I moved back to Israel. So now I don't miss it because I feel that the reason why I wanted to pursue acting is I wanted to connect and to be in front of people and to get them to feel and to think and to experience something. And I think that I was able to find this, this is my niche of doing what I love, of being passionate about what I love and still finding that space of standing in front of people and getting them to feel and to experience something with me.

So.

So I think that it wasn't the need to be an actress or famous, it was the need to communicate and to feel the people that are in front of me. And I have been doing that. And also I've been coaching a lot of actors and I think working on texts with them has really fulfilled the place of working with language. And I do work with, and as an actress I loved working with language and dissecting sounds and words and understanding the emotional baggage each word has. And I think I still do that but slightly differently from a different angle. So I think that passion was accomplished to say that I don't miss it, that I don't feel like working on a role or a character. I would like to say that I don't, but I don't have time for it right now in my life. And if I had to choose between what I do now or to have a career as a successful actress, I would hands down choose what I'm doing right now. So I guess the answer is no. Vishal is asking, how do you manage your day to day tasks and increase your productivity? Actually that's a great question. I'm obsessed with productivity, methods and techniques. I read a lot of books about that. Not only because I want to improve the quality of my life, but also I incorporate that in my training and as in the way I teach English because I feel like you have to be very productive about how you learn English, especially these days. So first of all, I don't have a lot of distractions in my Life. So I don't have a tv, I don't watch television, I don't watch shows. I rarely do. I, you know, I, I only consume. I try to stay off social media, even though it's hard. I mean, that's my weakness, I guess. And it's hard because that's where my community is. That's where I work and live and create content. So. But I try to stop myself if I see that whatever I'm doing is not super productive or is not getting me somewhere. I'm just like scrolling up and down. I say no to a lot of things, even exciting things, even things that are very profitable. Because I feel like when I say yes to things that are not taking me in the direction of where I want to go, then I'm basically saying no to other things like creating more content or developing my other programs. So I really try to be careful with what I say yes to. And my task list is usually huge. But every day I try to decide on my main three things and I try to accomplish them. And actually that has worked for me. When I do it, I don't get distracted. I'm not perfect. Successful people usually go through major transformations in life. What was your biggest failure? Do you come from a place of suffering and then succeeding? Or is that not the case? So I'm guessing the transition that from being an actress to doing what I'm doing right now was very painful for me. Deciding to come here to Israel after five years in the US and it happened because my visa expired was not something that I wanted. And moving here already felt like giving up on my dream because my dream was to become a successful actress in New York. And then I moved here and no one cared about me and what I've done. And no one cared about the school that I went to and my experience in theaters in the US And I felt lost. I felt that no one wants me. I started thinking really bad things about myself. I was struggling with communicating. I barely spoke up. I was so embarrassed around other people. I felt ashamed. I felt like I had nothing interesting to say. Like I was just like a shell of a person. I was searching for myself. I started studying naturopathy. Naturopathy. And then I started managing a restaurant, like a really high end restaurant. And I was really good at it. And then I thought maybe this is what I need to do in life. And really I felt lost because I felt that I gave up on my passion. So I definitely felt like I was a failure. I did not know that it was all Leading me to do what I'm doing right now. Right. I did not know that acting and working with texts and acquiring a new accent is something that is like, I needed all of that to be doing what I'm doing right now. But at that point between those two careers or different lifetimes, then I definitely felt that I was a failure. And it was really hard to come out of it. I went to therapy. I went to a homeopath. I tried a whole bunch of things. I was depressed. So it was really, really hard. It was really, really hard. I felt like my dream is gone. And I think that through that.

When.

I got the job and I felt needed, that helped me a bit. And then I started teaching privately because I just needed the extra cash. So I was like, okay, what can I do? Okay, I'll teach accent. It wasn't like my lifelong dream. I didn't think about the fact that this is what I'm going to end up doing, right? And I discovered I rediscovered my passion, and I was able to say, okay, I'm allowing it to come in. I'm accepting this change and I'm surrendering to it. And let's see where this takes me. And I'm very happy for having done that. Hansa is asking, how can you describe life in one or two words, a gift? Marilyn is asking, where do you see yourself 10 years from today, both professionally and personally? So I have big dreams and I have big plans. I want to create this worldwide community of non native speakers from around the world that meet every year and create events and empower each other. And we will have meetups around the world in different places and a community for each other, with each other. I'm also working on a training program for teachers who are non native speakers of English, so they'll get some tools on how to teach pronunciation and how to feel confident and proud of who they are, understanding their advantages. And also some tricks and tips on how to empower your students and really help them achieve fluency. And since I'm super passionate about online marketing and being an online entrepreneur, I also want to support Englishpreneurs, English teachers that want to develop their own community and their own online business because they know it's possible. And I think that if you are passionate about it, you can definitely do it. And I've been doing some business coaching to friends and people that I know because I always have something to say. So I definitely see myself combining the business part and everything that I've learned, doing what I do with teaching English and Supporting my community of teachers. So Jefferson asked me if some of my family members are also entrepreneurs. And the answer is yes. I grew up with a dad who was a hard worker, a hard working entrepreneur. He was a designer and he built a shoe factory. Like at some point it was like a big empire here in Israel. And he designs beautiful shoes. Of course I only walk with sneakers and I don't take, I don't wear any of his shoes. I mean maybe like I have a of pair, but that's just me. So he has this beautiful shoe factory and actually my sister is a designer there and my brother in law and my mom, they're all in the family business except for me. I do English stuff. So yes, I did grow up in a house of entrepreneurs, of people who. And I think this is why growing up I always felt like I could never work for someone else. Like I need to be my own boss, I need to have my own schedule. I don't want to have someone telling me what to do. I have done it and I'm an excellent employee. But at some point I felt like I'm investing all of my energy into someone else's business and that was just not okay with me. Paula de Jesus is asking a shout out to Paula, community member and a student of mine. I love you, Paula. What would you say to people who want to achieve another career after years of working on his or her own profession? People who now, after getting older, want to pursue another career but they're afraid of, afraid of what others would think and about possible failure. Oh, don't get me started on this one. First of all, I don't believe that there is such thing as starting too late. I was just listening to a podcast of a woman who has been an executive producer in the Oprah show. And at the age of 50 she decided to quit and she reinvented herself and she started a totally different business and she started a podcast and she started like, like this incredibly successful business influencing hundreds of thousands of people around the world. And she was just talking about there is no such thing as being too old to reinvent yourself. I reinvented myself at the age of 30 doing something that I had no will or I had no intention of doing. I did not want to be a teacher if you were asking me at the age of 24. So I think that if you're passionate about something, this is something that you should definitely pursue. This is something that you should like. People will always have something to say, right? But if you care so much about what Other people think, then you are putting their opinions in front of your needs and your potential and your possibilities. Right? Because once you do something that you're passionate about, the universe will help you bring it to fruition. The universe will help you succeed. I truly believe in it. I have seen it happen with me. So I think that not doing it is you are doing injustice to you and the people that you can help doing what you love doing. Right? And. And again, it doesn't matter what people have to say, because at the end of the day, you will have to face the consequences. And regretting about something that you haven't done is the worst feeling in the world. And at some point, it will be too late. You will be too tired. You will be too caught up. You'll have too much on your plate. So I really think that there is no such thing as being too old. And you can always start fresh and start something, and you can start a business, and it can start skyrocket within 18 months. Really? And then you'd be like, stupid me, why haven't I done it earlier? So my recommendation is, if you're passionate about something, do it. Okay. This was long. Thank you so much for watching and being here with me and listening to me in my living room. I feel like I'm just like, I've just invited all of you to my living room and I'm just, like, talking, telling you stories. Where's my glass of wine? Anyway, so thank you so much for being here with me, for asking all these beautiful questions. You really touched me, like, wanting to learn more about me and about what I've done. And for all the rest of the questions that I haven't gotten to answer, I promise I will maybe on social media, on Instagram, or in another video. I love you all. Thank you for being here with me.

Bye.