Episode Transcript
Hello. My name is Aziz and I'm the son of a divorced mother. She's really my superhero.
That's why it's important for me to support women to share their uniqueness, their personalities,
perspectives, and emotions about life. Too many women in this world feel alone. They
worry about the judgment of others,
and they struggle with their mental health.
But when they listen to the Rare Girls podcast
where empowered women share their voices
and tell their stories,
many women will feel inspired to live a life of freedom
and to overcome all their insecurities.
They will feel it is a safe space
to find their confidence,
to remember their unique beauty
and to feel their self-worth.
And they will connect with the sisterhood of rare girls
who encourage their success and support their dreams.
That's what this podcast is all about.
My guest today is Mané Harout-Union.
Mané is an enthusiastic, dedicated,
and ambitious economic student at NYU Abu Dhabi
with a minor in social research and public policy.
Coming originally from the mountainous Armenian South,
she is dedicated to investing her knowledge and skills
in youth development,
and she enjoys reading books and yoga.
Mani, how are you today?
Thank you so much, Aziz, for asking.
I'm doing wonderful.
This is such a lovely morning.
How are you today?
I feel blessed.
I feel so happy to talk to you today
and very curious about you as a person.
So I'll begin with this nice like opening first question, which is if your friends could
describe your personality, what would they say about you?
Most probably they would say that I'm workaholic.
But in a less serious sense, I think I'm much more extroverted.
And I love talking to people and getting to know different cultures.
Especially my experience living in the UAE taught me how interesting could living
in a diverse community be?
I love that.
I have so many questions.
Nowadays, there is almost like an endemic sense
of too many people becoming introverted,
maybe during the social isolation of the pandemic,
or they rely on being text-o-verts.
And then in real life, they're
introverts where they're good on social media,
but in real life not.
For you, the first question, what do you
love most about people?
Are people to you, like you mentioned,
a source of understanding and opening up to new cultures so that you learn new things?
Is it the energy you love that chemistry you can have with some people where it fires you up
and it gives you like an electric sense of excitement? Is it because you believe people
are like a miracle and you're amazed at spending time with them? Or what makes you enjoy being
an extrovert and being so fascinated by people? Oh, such an interesting question.
So maybe from a professional perspective, I'm a future social scientist, so my job is technically analyzing people human's behavior and just studying theories that are about human beings.
So every interaction with them makes so much professional sense for me.
But on the personal level, I think living in life, the meaning of life is finding a valuable human connection, and every single human being is on the earth to lighten his surrounding environment.
And I just feel super connected when I meet someone with whom we just can talk and share ideas and inspire others like this podcast is doing.
Also, because I lived in five different countries in the past three years, I think for me, finding
myself is also finding the people whom I can rely on, especially during the trying
times. Because when you don't have the physical place of home or your birthplace, you are
definitely helped to overcome some of the anxieties that I had while living abroad.
Regarding social media, I can totally relate that there is a sense of isolation, especially
I'm a COVID generation student. So when I graduated, it was COVID, my freshman year
was COVID. So I totally get that. And I think what is important in social media is
trying to detach from it in some periods of time, for example, taking a day off, Sunday off, and going to nature.
I still think social media has more benefits than harms, but we definitely have to find a balance, right?
I agree. Balance is very important in life, and you mentioned connection and finding people you can rely on.
What is the meaning of connection to you? Is it like you are in agreement with someone that you
have the same values? Or is it someone, even if they could be different, but they understand you?
Or is it like a metaphysical sense of being on the same vibration? What is connection? And
how does it relate to relying on? Because I can imagine some people you can have amazing
chemistry with, but maybe they're chaotic or disorganized and you cannot rely on them.
I don't know. Tell me more. So I absolutely believe that you should have similar value sets
to be good long-term friends. It doesn't have to be the same religion or the same ideology,
just has to be very general human values, such as, I don't know, empathy, love, trust.
Regarding relying on someone, I think that we create human connections when we overcome
difficulties together. And knowing, at least in your heart, that somebody will show up in
case you're not doing great in life is such a release and such an external power that
helps you to achieve more. So just knowing that someone out there would care. When people
are asking, how are you? And they care about the answer, I think it's super powerful.
So saying I want to rely on something, it does not mean that I want to be dependent on someone.
I'm not neither financially nor academically, I'm pretty much self-achieving person.
It just means on a psychological level, they can rely on someone.
And I think that helping as a people, like I'm also out there for my friends.
So being a reliable person actually means, is actually the extension of self-love
because you start to respect yourself more.
And I don't know what else can be more definitional
for the love than a respect towards yourself.
I love this.
I want more because nowadays,
and especially a lot of people don't know
how much many women struggle with worry, anxiety,
sometimes not feeling their self worth,
even though sometimes they will fake it
till they make it
where they would pretend the opposite.
So to you, what was your journey of that growing,
that self-love, how does it relate to respect?
How would you define it?
If there is not, let's say you speak into your younger self
and you want to explain, look, this is what self-love is.
This is how it relates to respect.
And this should be the journey
or what is the journey to grow it?
What would you say?
So I think on social media nowadays,
there are lots of definitions
of what self-love means, right? And there's not right or wrong answer. It's just like what works
for you. So when I was younger, like three or four years ago, I was very much self-structurizing
person. So I could do something for other people and it gives me energy. So and for me,
the concept of like, you know, love yourself, do everything for you. It sounded so odd for me
because I was very skeptical if this is going to work for me
because I wouldn't get the energy that I'm getting
from helping people.
But then I realized I can create my own definition
of self-love, helping some people or communities
not sacrificing your time for nothing.
It just extension of yourself into the other being
or as a society.
So for me, self-respect became the definition
self-love. It's something that I reformulated. And anytime, for example, if I want to do something
extremely hard, I'm saying, you know, you respect yourself as you can do it. And I think love is
such an amazing concept. So you don't have to extremely love your body or your surrounding
or your relatives, but there should be some feeling, some sense of respect towards yourself,
again, your community. So in terms of self-love, I would advise everyone to create their own
definition instead of following some some concepts that are on social media or on
internet or in the books, because culturally it also differs, right? Especially where in the
UAE it's such an interesting mix of West and the East and Muslim culture. So again, if you
more into a religious side, and you think that Western conception of self-love is more, it's not for you, just create your own. And make sure that it is aligned with your spiritual goals, with your personal goals, and everything would be fine. So I'm a huge fan of cultural relativism. So I feel that values are not extremely universal, and they can differ from one culture to another. So yeah.
Thank you. And you spoke about something important, which is related to going out of your comfort
zone and the ability to dive into the unknown in order to grow as a person and to become
a self-reliant, self-independent, including you have lived in five different countries.
So I will ask you this. Let's say there are some women or girls who have been living
their family for a long time and it's time for them to move to Dubai or Abu Dhabi or to go to
university somewhere far and they worry how would I dare to talk to new people? Would I make friends?
Would I find my people? So what's your advice about this but related to the bigger picture of
finding the courage to go out of your comfort zone even if by definition what is out of your
zone is the unknown and therefore it's risky and therefore it triggers some anxiety.
Sure. So I moved outside of Armenia when I was 16. Now I'm 20. So it was four years ago. And back
then, I think I was much more excited to leave because I knew less about what other cultures
or what being away from home actually means. But when I'm looking at my self-growth, I would
in my personal growth because it helped me to be self-reliant. So what I would say is that no
matter what, you're going to find your people. And in case you're worried that you will come
back home and your friends wouldn't be with you, it means that they might not be the real ones.
And the people who are really with you, they would appreciate your self-growth.
This is the first advice. The second advice would be actually working quite hard for them.
And I'm doing a lot of self-exploration job, like journaling, understanding yourself, not being exposed to other people's opinions and validation.
Like I'm super, like I have this good girls complex, which is can be explained because I mean, culturally, it's much more accepted in Ermia to be, you know, to do, to always meet people's expectations from outside of the world, especially if you're a girl.
So for me, I still do that. I'm not saying that I'm perfect, or I achieved all of my self-growth worse, but living abroad definitely helped me to decrease the validation that I need from the society.
And obviously make sure, I mean, for me, it was nice because the first countries they lived in, which was Georgia and the UAE, they were quite safe from outside.
So, I would say, think a lot before just jumping to New York or going to the States.
However, you can always rely on yourself and just be careful.
So, again, do that, especially in the same country.
Moving cities is an amazing idea.
Moving cultures, I would say, depend if you're ready or not.
But I would still recommend, but again, super personal.
I still would recommend moving.
This is great. I will ask you because cultural relativism and you thinking in a pragmatic
way that truth is what works for each person rather than in a utilitarian way that truth
is what society should say is true or whatever it is. Well, according to Nietzsche, he
would argue that that makes people have existential angst because there is a loss
of one unique truth, and therefore, you have full responsibility in a chaotic world to create
your demeaning, which is very scary to human beings because they realize they're a speck
of dust within the universe, rather than feeling that they are part of a huge big
culture because if it's up to you, then you are your own decider rather than
given an outside authority decision making that allows you to not take responsibility
and therefore feel safe.
How do you deal with that? Just for your own personal thing, because some people might become nihilistic in the sense that they say if everything is meaningless and I can choose the meaning, well, I choose no meaning, and therefore I'm depressed because life is meaningless. How does it work for you?
So I'm guessing, so Nisha, his writing in 19th century was during the time when the Christianity
in Europe was actually not as strong as it was before.
And people were losing the meaning of life.
And Nisha said, the god is dead and we killed him, right?
So I would say that I could completely relate to it because I was born in a country
that was post-Soviet. So we didn't necessarily have a religion in a spiritual sense, but we had a
religion in a cultural sense. So I have a cross with me because I was born as Christian, however,
I never practiced it. So on that sense, I grew up to be completely self-reliant and people around
me, they were finding a meaning in other senses. So my community, they usually relied on their
families. So it's still a meaning you're providing with your family or helping them
rather than a God or something, and you're being responsible for your family, which
is again, good. It's not nihilism. It's just finding other meaning in life. So for
me, very recently I discovered that I want to kind of go back to the church in the
sense that I really love the values that they are providing. And the interesting
thing is that a lot of religions are very similar when it comes to values. Like lots
religions have universal values. They just have like different stories that they tell to people.
And if we agree that values are the things that connect people, we could say that the meaning of
life is actually connection, because otherwise we could become really nihilists. And I'm a huge fan
of Albert Camus, like he's a French philosopher writer. And the way he actually describes the
existentialism is really fascinating in the sense that he actually shows that the life
can be meaningless, but we still have the power to find a meaning. So although commute
can be pretty depressing at the end, but I still find a hope in his writing that yes,
human society has been in a sense of losing its meaning, but the meaning can be found
in other places than religion. So that's why I'm a huge believer of diversity and like liberalism
and the story that liberalism tells us because it basically means open borders. It means that
Muslims and Christians can be okay with each other. So I would say I find meaning in family,
in friendships, and in human connections. And maybe because of my cultural background,
But also, I think at some point I will go back to the church,
but I'm not still sure that I have any spiritual connection
to God at this point.
Thank you.
And you mentioned that connection between people
is based on values, and that value for you
is connection, and humans, and family, et cetera.
When you meet new people, is that
what you're screening for, that you're speaking to them
and then paying attention?
Are they family-oriented?
are they people-oriented, are they trying to create a reciprocity within the connection,
things like that, or are you looking at them with the cultural relativism of thinking each person
has their own values and I just look at them in their unique way and I'm not looking
for a specific kind of person but I look for someone who knows and follows and lives
through their values. So I would say that every single human being has different selves
within oneself. So part of me, for example, extremely workaholic, another part loves to go
to the art museums, you know, the other part loves to read books. It's the same about like
law of attraction, you just attract different kinds of people. And I think among my friends
I call still I find a lot of people who have similar values to me, because otherwise we
wouldn't be compatible enough to do a long term friendship. However, they're quite different
to. So for me, for example, being a generous person is extremely important. So I try to
surround myself with people who are generous. It's not about money. It's about time and energy
that you want to share, right? And again, as I told before about people who are reliable.
So I have friends from different countries who speak different languages, have different
different religious, different spiritual beliefs. I wouldn't say it's like an obstacle. It's more just like more of an interesting thing. But I would still think that law of attraction means that you're going to attract people who are similar to you in a value sense, in a character sense, in a success level, because you have to still be on the same page in life, especially about the energy that you want to give from life and receive, right?
Also, finding activities that you both like is quite nice.
Thank you. You spoke about the law of attraction and at the same time you said you don't have
much connection with the concept of God. To you then, what is your metaphysical and
spiritual perspective on the world? Are you someone who chooses, let's say, to be a
girl who's reading her horoscope and thinking like that just because it adds a level of
interesting excitement and adventure to life.
How do you believe in the law of attraction?
If so, how does it work?
Is it some energetic thing?
And if so, where does it come from?
Tell me more, because how do you make sense
of the universe if you have such meanings
like the law of attraction,
which is something that is more powerful
than you that is creating this?
Or are you the goddess of your universe?
I don't know, you let me know.
So when I was referring to law of attraction,
I was meaning it from a scientific point of view,
Because psychology actually says that we tend to track people
who have the similar psychological traits
that we do have, for example, openness.
There's a scale.
So depending where you are on the scale,
your friends tend to be on the same scale.
For example, if you are extremely extroverted
and your friend is extremely introverted,
it would be hard for you to kind of be together,
just because someone will just talk,
the other one will just listen, and it's not compatible.
so I was referring to it from a scientific point of view. On a spiritual front, I would
still say I'm not that spiritual in a sense that I can read horoscope and I can do tarot
card readings or I can read Bible. However, the problem is when I do that, I become very
analytical of what I read and I just tell me on a conscious level that it's not true.
I would say that this is maybe because of my background, because I achieved lots of academic success.
I feel it taught me just to be too analytical in life, otherwise I would just go into decay and collapse.
Because my personality is pretty chaotic and if I'm not putting my life into the order, nobody will.
So, however, recently, I just realized that in life, we need something like something to rely on to believe that someone is bigger than we are. So that's why I really want to go back to religion, I'm trying to, I'm trying to be less analytical way to just have faith in life for God's sake.
So I would say that I'm not believing in horoscope, it would be wrong to say that I do, but sometimes
I go to the church and I do believe that someone is bigger than me, who is this someone
I'm not entirely sure, but I do believe that someone is bigger than me.
And I think, I mean, I still think sometimes I'm a spiritual person, I would believe
something would happen, something good would happen, I just have the feeling of God,
I don't know how to explain it, but I have very good intuition.
So sometimes reason does not make any sense and you have to rely on your emotions.
This is the way the word works, right?
I understand this.
I love it.
Some people too might call that that you are being masculine.
Have you ever been accused of being like masculine and not so feminine?
And if so, what is your definition of that your own?
I know you'll say each person, each culture will define masculinity, femininity in their
way.
But to yourself, when do you feel most masculine?
when do you feel most feminine? Which one do you enjoy being more in? Or like you said,
you have different personalities and therefore you bring your inner masculine, your inner feminine,
it's all good for you. Because there are some women who say, I am forced within this
society to take a masculine role, but it's too exhausting. I would prefer if I could
let go sometimes and be in the feminine. But to you in this world, your own definition first
to define terms. What is to you the energy of masculinity? What
is to you the energy of femininity? How much of each do
you believe you have because each person can carry multiple
charges? And how like, is this the ideal thing? Or is it
because you had to depend on yourself so much that you
fear letting go because then you become either dependent or
like a prisoner or you feel like everything is
meaningless. So if I don't take charge and make
then I'm lost in this world.
I would say I definitely have both energies, right?
Because in the work context,
if you want to achieve more, you have to be
that goal-seeking,
purposeful
human being, which is technically
from the traditional point of view,
very masculine types of energy.
But I would say I have tons of feminine energy,
the way I dress, the way I talk,
I mean, I can read literature
for hours and just be
streaming about stuff and watch cartoons. I mean, I love to cook. I love to walk. I love
to receive. There are all kinds of types of feminine energy. I definitely do have some,
but because I have too much feminine energy, sometimes it's chaotic. And if you live
alone from, again, from my perspective, because I live alone, for example, now I'm
in New York City, if I will walk with extreme feminine energy, I will definitely
get robbed and lost and stolen and all of this. So I would try
to be, you know, aware of my surroundings, be responsible for
myself, which is definitely part of the masculine energy. So
I would say every single human being, regardless of the gender
has both energies. It's just, you know, we just have to find
a balance between the two. We just have to understand where
want to put our energies. So, for example, I'm a very compassionate person and I think it's part
of my female self who wants everyone to be safe and stable and nourish everyone. So I definitely
love it. Yeah, it's definitely true. Sometimes the masculine energy is too much because I have
expose it. And I wish I was in a more stable financial or economic conditions of not having
to achieve all of these things. But sometimes we don't have that much choice, especially if
you're an international student and you want to have a nice job. But obviously I wish in life I
could exercise more for feminine energy and let it go more of my masculine energy, but I'm proud
both, you know, you have to be proud of both of your energies in life, definitely. And I think at
some point in life, in my 30s, if I, I mean, I want to have kids and like have a stable family,
I would definitely try to be less, you know, I mean, again, depending, depending on a lot of
life factors. But I think I have very nice balance of both, both energies flying and you
be proud of both. It's nothing wrong with it. Of course, I love that. And it makes me wonder,
you said that because of your culture and where you grew up, you had a good girl syndrome or
whatever, where you were a people pleaser, unable to say like, no. But at the same time,
now you said, I have a lot of masculine energy, which is also associated with setting
boundaries. How did you learn to develop your ability to set boundaries? How much like,
Because even till now, you said you're still working on it,
but to some girls or women who might be too good girls
in the sense that they say yes to everything
and sacrifice everything there,
how to set boundaries without feeling too bad
or feeling, oh my God, I'm breaking another person's heart.
How can I live with that?
It hurts, they will hate me
and all those nonsensical thoughts.
Can you share your journey, your thought
and your latest understandings
when it comes to setting boundaries
and becoming comfortable with that.
So breaking someone else's heart,
it's good for that someone else because you don't
feel this person is valuable enough to spend time with.
So in a longer term perspective,
you're not breaking someone else's love.
You're freeing that someone else.
So this person can go out and find someone better
than you are, right?
So this is the way I think when I create boundaries.
So if I don't have time to that person,
I just don't want to consume that person's
I just want to free them. So I'm also setting their boundaries. I'm making sure that they live better lives than they would live with me or being, you know, I don't want someone to be my second choice or third choice in terms of relationships and friendships.
Regarding how you put boundaries, I would say there's no magical formula for that, right? You have to just learn over time.
something that's helped me that at some point your time just becomes so scarce. And you just don't have the choice to make time for everyone. And you have to say no. Otherwise, you would be late from your, you know, very important priorities and deadlines. And this is like just horrible for my, you know, purposeful self.
So I would say it was it was definitely journey over time and I didn't I knew it was a problem
that I'm people's pleaser and I still I feel I'm still very much meeting people's
expectation in a lot of senses.
But definitely I learned to say no over time.
And every time I advice would be when you're saying no to someone else, you're also
freeing up that person.
So, again, people who have the same syndrome, they are just afraid that they are making people hurt, but if you are keeping that person near you, you are holding that person next to you, but you don't care about that person enough to make sure it's longer term.
Just let him go, let she go, let them go. So, yes, just creating a different story to yourself.
I love that. And it makes me also link this because being a
people pleaser is also very linked to not wanting to
disappoint people and to fear judgment of others. A lot of
women struggle with that. Well, by meeting people's
expectations, they live in a narrative that is like a
narrative where they will be pleasing people even without
people asking for anything is just living up to people's
But they worry, they say, if I go for my potential, for my big dream, but then if I fail, what
if my parents hate me and say, oh, we're disappointed in you or other people laugh
at me or they tell me you wasted your life, you chose this path of craziness instead
of doing the secure path.
Even if you hate it, make your money or whatever it is.
So just in general, because it's much more empowering in this world to be on
own path, as in the Bhagavad Gita they say in that religious text of the Hindus, it's better to fail
in your own dharma or in your life path that is meant for you than to succeed in someone else's.
So for you specifically, do you have a reframe, a narrative, or just advice for women and girls
who feel they're being pushed to and driven into a life path that meets other people's
expectations, but is not really the path they want. And then what is holding them back is worrying about if they fail, some people will judge them harshly and be disappointed. Or even if they kept going, those people might judge them and think they're ungrateful and that they're not a good person.
So definitely the first part of your speech, it's completely about me, like, you know, pleasing some people who don't expect me to please them.
Definitely, I would love to say that, you know, I don't need validation about the people I do, I still do, unfortunately, but I'm working on it.
So one thing that I think would help you to live your life is figuring out what your life
you want it to be.
So sometimes we just lived for so long on the script scenario of your parents or your
friends or your society that you forgot what your life is.
So just again, self-exploration in a pragmatic sense. So you want to, I don't know, try something
new, try new hobbies, go to dancing, or go to singing, or do some, I don't know, math
to figure out if you can become an engineer, just do it for yourself. And once you try
that thing, once you reflect on that, you can realize if that is for you or not
you. So for example, picking my majors was completely my decision. My parents never said
they wanted me to become a doctor when I was a teenager. But it was my path. I changed majors.
I tried something. I'm not entirely sure if Econ is right for me, but at least it's my
decision. If it will fail, it's all on me. But again, especially starting something new,
Yeah, it can be quite daunting because especially in the world of social media, if you're starting
something, like everybody knew you are starting, but the probability that you fail is like
more than 90%. And if you do, everyone knew you failed. And it's just like, I feel
the word is becoming super interconnected, which sometimes harms people. So I think
We just live in a bit of a toxic culture regarding success.
I'm 20, so people expect me to have everything figured out.
I don't have everything figured out.
I'm working on it.
I'm trying my best.
But I cannot show you a success scenario at the age of 20.
And it's fine.
It's OK.
And some people, they have different backgrounds,
different academic skills.
might be completely on a different page and it's also okay. Like the society, especially some people
just don't have jobs other than writing comments on social media. Just don't do it. You're ruining
other people's lives. Just live your own. So regarding self-validation, again, I don't know
how people avoid or how people are being completely self-reliant or how they are
their relationships, interpersonal relationships. I'm definitely on this journey, but I'm not yet
done. I'm just starting that. But regarding the success, having everything figured out in your
20s, I think it definitely it's a pressure. And I struggle with it. I'm open with it. And lots
of people are. Just don't be toxic to your surroundings. Be gentle to yourself and the
around you and you will be fine. Thank you so much Mani. It was my privilege and my honor to share
your voice, to hear your perspective and to do this podcast episode with you. I wish you all
the success, the emotional balance, the self-healing and the strength in order to keep going and then
make all of your dreams, your own unique self-decided dreams come true. Thank you for
Thank you too, it was such an honor speaking with you, it was such a nice self-explorative
speech, thank you.
