Carmen Talk: My Caribbean Adventure with New Friends and Old Connections

Imagine stranding yourself on a tropical island with 15 women you barely know – sounds like the setup to a side-splitting sitcom, right? Well, I'm here to spill the beans about all the tea that has unfolded in Aruba. Amidst the clinking of cocktail glasses and the rustling palm trees, I discovered the sheer hilarity that ensues when technical blunders meet live podcasting. But it wasn't all about overcoming the challenges of a rogue microphone; it was the laughter that linked us, the shared jests, and the 'nasty' t-shirt exchanges that transformed a group of strangers into a circle of friends. With Mary, Jo-ann,  and the rest of the crew, we crafted a haven of humor and heart on those sun-drenched shores.

Now, let's get personal and peel back the curtain on the intricate dance of old friendships. Ever been side-eyed by skepticism when an out-of-the-blue message from a past pal pops up? I've been there, and it led me down a rabbit hole of self-reflection. This episode is not just a recount of my Caribbean capers but also a candid look at the beauty of introspection and the thrill of embracing the unknown. Special shoutout to Cynthia, Tony D., and Rick Costa for proving that sometimes the best support comes amidst the chaos of live streaming snafus. So, buckle up, dear listener, whether you're a thrill-seeker dangling from a parasail or someone just dipping your toes into the waters of new experiences, this journey is all about the joy of personal evolution and the unexpected delights of forging new paths.

Thank you for stopping by. Please visit our website: All About The Joy and add, like and share. We'd appreciate that greatly. Also, if you want to find us anywhere on social media, please check out the link in bio page.

Music By Geovane Bruno, Moments, 3481
Editing by Team A-J
Host, Carmen Lezeth


DISCLAIMER: As always, please do your own research and understand that the opinions in this podcast and livestream are meant for entertainment purposes only. States and other areas may have different rules and regulations governing certain aspects discussed in this podcast. Nothing in our podcast or livestream is meant to be medical or legal advice. Please use common sense, and when in doubt, ask a professional for advice, assistance, help and guidance.

Transcript

Carmen Lezeth: 0:11

Hey everyone, welcome to All About the Joy the podcast. This is Carmen Talk and I'm Carmen Lissette, your host. I want to first say thank you so much for liking and sharing and just being part of the All About the Joy journey. I have to get really better about asking people to follow us and to help us out. So I'm going to do that whole call-to-action thing that I'm really bad about and I think it's really important to know what you suck at and try to overcome it anyway, so I'm going to try to do that. So, if any of you have not already liked or commented or supported our show in such a way whether it's on YouTube or LinkedIn or Facebook or on any places that you listen to your podcast we'd really appreciate you to like, comment and share. I prefer only good stuff, though, but again, any interaction is great interaction, so I appreciate you doing that for me and for us on this show. We're just trying to move forward and I'm going to do better about asking for your help and supporting the show. So I'm here in Aruba and I am excited that I've been the podcast from here.

Carmen Lezeth: 1:17

We did do the live stream this week and you know you're living in learn. You know, the studio is amazing. I wasn't really sure how I'd be able to do this internationally. I had never been to this hotel before. So, as much as I know that there are plenty of people who podcast and live stream and do things from all over the world, this was the first time for all of us, and for me especially, and even though I'm getting great at editing and this has been such a journey for me for the past year to be developing my skills and podcasting. The truth is, you know, it's still really hard and I made a huge mistake in that I didn't bring the right mic with me, and so the live stream was fun, and I want to say thank you to Cynthia and for Tony Deeper coming on the show and, of course, rick Costo, my host, who did all they could to help me get situated while we were doing the live stream, and I appreciate them so much for dealing with my kind of clumsiness. But yeah, the live stream was fun. Check it out on YouTube or on Facebook live and, you know, again, give us a comment, like or share. I appreciate you.

Carmen Lezeth: 2:18

I was going to try to fix the audio so that I could just place the audio of the live stream onto the podcast, as I usually do. So any of you who are just driving to work or you know we'll sing, you know want to just check out the live stream. You always have that option with the podcast. But look it, we're just going with the flow here, right? That's what's so cool about all about the joy. There are no rules and we learn and we get better and we do better.

Carmen Lezeth: 2:40

But today's topic, what I really want to talk about in Carmen Talk is a thing that is so amazingly important to me, especially right now friendships. And let me tell you why I'm so intrigued by this. I am here in Aruba with 16 friends and 15, I should say 15 friends because I'm the 16th one, but these are 15 women and they range in all ages, all different circumstances. All of them are from the East Coast I believe I think I'm the only one who's coming who came in from California, but most of them live in New England and everybody is just pretty cool. I did not know most of them.

Carmen Lezeth: 3:15

Of course, I grew up with Mary and Joanne, who I love with all my heart, and they invited me last October, when I went back home, to go to Patty Ann's funeral, which is their older sister, who we love and miss with all our heart, and they just said, hey, do you want to come? We go every year, we do this thing and we hang out and we leave our husbands and our kids at home and we go on vacation and we have a blast. Come with us. And I said Okay. And so I'm here and let me tell you I was a little nervous about getting here because I don't know most of the people, right, and you know how friendships are. You have these relationships with people and then you meet other people and it may not click. But you know what I realized about friendships and about connections? Because Mary and Joanne are the people. They are the people that they know are cool and awesome and friendly and nice. So it stems from them, right. So I'm not saying everybody's perfect and great. I don't know everyone that well, but let me tell you I've made some instant friendships, like immediately, and there's a comfort level when you're around people, especially when the people who leave the group, in a way, you just feel settled in, like we all met at the airport and we all hugged each other and it was just kind of this cool thing.

Carmen Lezeth: 4:26

And then they had all these little things to kind of be icebreakers, which was really a smart thing to do. We all had to buy t-shirts for somebody we were partnered with, and let me tell you, the t-shirts are so nasty like the nastier the better. I'm not going to say what the t-shirts are they're on my Facebook page if you want to see them, and they are public. But it was just a fun way to kind of be open to the possibility of a t-shirt that somebody would give you right, and so I didn't know the person I had to give my t-shirt to, but she took it with grace and funniness and she happened to be my partner too. So she gave me a really bad, nasty t-shirt. I would say it's as bad as the one I gave her, but I loved it and I was laughing so hard and it was a great icebreaker. And what was even funnier is that we did this all on the beach the first night we got here or first morning we got here I can't remember now, but it was morning or early afternoon and everybody else who was on the beach was cracking up laughing because all of us were just like you opened up the t-shirt and you put it up to your chest and everybody had to read it and it was just, they're so nasty and gross and funny and it just made everyone laugh and everybody was such a good sport about it because we knew what this was about. This is about trying to have connections and trying to be okay with each other and really just a fun time, and I've learned so much about people. Just, you know, we talked a lot about relationships and men and love and I don't know it's. It's been a really good fun time so far, and we're not even halfway there yet.

Carmen Lezeth: 5:49

I went power sailing today with my very good friend Connie and I say that because I kept calling her Colleen, because anybody who knows me knows I'm horrible with nicknames, especially if I don't know you. But I asked everybody that grew because it's something I really want to do. I wanted to go power sailing. A few people had already done it because they've been here so many times, but Connie and I had not done it. We didn't really know each other, but we're like, yeah, we did it this morning. Let me tell you we did it together. It was so funny crying, laughing the whole time. It was a great adventure. I had been skydiving before. I thought it would be scarier than skydiving, but I was wrong. It's actually, I think, easier than skydiving by far in a long way, but it was really fun. I encourage anyone who ever thought about power sailing to do it. We did it together, which I didn't even know you could do it together. I thought you could only do it one at a time, but I guess it's based on weight, because they asked us how much we weighed, and so we were able to do it together and it was so much fun.

Carmen Lezeth: 6:38

There are too many pictures. We had someone on the boat take pictures. We met a wonderful couple and their kids on the boat and they took our cell phone and took all these pictures. So I'll post some of those at some point. I'm really bad at the whole picture taking. My cousin, cynthia, has been asking me for pictures the whole time I've been here, but I'm the worst of it. So everybody else from the trip who's on my Facebook page is posting pictures and I'm kind of just like being tagged on them. But at some point I'll put some pictures up on the Facebook page as well.

Carmen Lezeth: 7:05

I think what I'm done with the trip, but I just think friendships are so cool and if you're open to meeting new people and if you're open to not making judgments right, we all make judgments. So let me just back up there for a moment, because I think that's a weird thing to say. I think it's part of human instinct to make judgments, right. I'm sure a lot of it is based on our environment, but it's a way of protecting ourselves. But if you trust people in the group like I trust Mary and DeWan with my life, I love them, they're my family and I trust them Then I'm able to be open to the possibility of all the other people they know and love. And when you can open yourself up to that, it's just such a great experience. Now, do I think I'm going to know these women for the rest of my life? I think so, maybe, but I'm just saying it's the coolest, most wonderful experience I've had in a long time and I really do love meeting people.

Carmen Lezeth: 7:54

I meet people all the time. This was just a different environment and a different way to do it and I encourage you, if you're someone who's shy or someone who doesn't really make friends easily, join a meetup group. There's meetupcom who, by the way, I'm not sponsored by them or whatever, but there are so many different places where you can go and connect with people in your community and I just know meetupcom is one of them. It's not about dating, it's about finding things that you like to do together and, like I think I had joined a hiking group I don't know back in the day I was like 2005 or something so I was still at brand new school and I just wanted to start hiking and that's how I met a lot of the people I started working out with, because I joined the meetup group and they started. You know, they were not so much hikers as they were working out people, but it was the same concept. So and I'm still friends with some of those guys today. So really great experience to meet people and strangers and to become like instant friends. Such a great fun time. But I'll also say this I had another experience where and this is during the same time while I've been here I you know, of course I'm still working. I have several clients and so, even though all of my amazing, amazing co-workers are taking over and taking care of things and I wanna say thank you to them they don't necessarily listen to my podcast, but happy and grateful that I can take the vacation because other people can step up and take care of stuff, and.

Carmen Lezeth: 9:19

But I've been checking my emails and, of course, checking my personal emails, and I had an old friend reach out to me and it was a random email, like I hadn't talked to him in a long time. I didn't understand why he was sending me the email and I'm not saying I was defensive, but I was completely suspicious, you know, like so that threw me and, of course, everyone who knows me I'm pretty bold about being like what do you really want? Like why are you emailing me this crap? You know you emailed me a link about something very political and which is fine because we're both very political people and we do have that in common but I was a little bit thrown by it because I didn't understand, like why are you reaching out to me now of all days? You know it's been such a long time. So I just asked him that and he was like dude, I was just reaching out to say hey, you know, and I thought of you and it's such an interesting thing.

Carmen Lezeth: 10:03

You know I had conversations with friends about this. It's not that he's a good person he's always been a good person but sometimes I just want people to be straight up, like do you need something? Are you gonna ask me a favor? Because if you're not in my life on a regular basis but then you act like you are, it's a little bit hard for me. But I think that's more about me and not about him, right, and not about other people. So you know, you always have the ability to grow and I think you know that's. I think that's the best part of life If you are always willing to check yourself, to ask other people if maybe you're acting real crazy or something.

Carmen Lezeth: 10:38

You know, like I reached out to another friend and said, hey, is this weird? And I asked people in the group and they were like well, you know, of course they don't know me, they don't know him, but it was really good to realize like, all right, maybe I'm overstepping, I'm overreacting, I'm being an idiot. Like it's not a big deal. People can reach out to you just to say hi, and it means nothing at all. Or it can mean something really cool and fun. It doesn't have to be a negative. And so of course, me and this other person, this man, I have a history.

Carmen Lezeth: 11:02

So I, you know, I reverted back to that place where I was like he wants something. I know he does, you know, but I don't want to be that person. I want to also be someone who can realize that you know what. Everybody isn't doing something to try to do something neat or trick me or whatever, like I don't want to be that person, not even to someone that I think might actually need something. So what if he needs something? Right? Maybe this was his way to just say hi and he needs to ask a favor. You know what I can say yes or no Does it make him a bad person? I also know I'm pretty intimidating. I don't know if I'd be to him.

Carmen Lezeth: 11:33

But I think as I get older and as I start reflecting back on a lot of the relationships I've had in my life, I understand that my ability to be so honest and blunt and so on, point about what I know, what I don't know, who I like, who I don't like. I know that people see that as a plus, but it's also something that I know is also a negative right, because I don't give people sometimes the ability to have grace, you know, to do things the way they need to do it, without forcing them to tell me whatever it is that they need. So what I'm self-reflecting on right now and during this whole process of me going out and meeting new friends you know, going to a Ruba place I've never been traveling with 16 women. Part of me was really scared about doing that, but I'm so excited and loving it, doing things like parasailing and not being so worried about every little thing, like I was like what are the safety things? What do you need to know? They're like dude, we do this all the time. We're just gonna hook you up to the harness, you're gonna go up. I was like freaking out, you know.

Carmen Lezeth: 12:34

So I think that as I get older, what I'm self-reflecting on is being able to let go of some of those things that I think are my protection mechanisms right, being open to new possibilities, being open to the fact that I can continue to grow and learn and be a better person. I think that is the whole purpose of life is that you continue, no matter how old you get, no matter how grown you think you be right, no matter how much you understand the world and you think you know it all, that you realize. You know what? I still have an ability to be wrong. I still have the ability to learn. I still have the ability to understand that there might be a different perspective or way of doing things, that I have the ability to make new, cool, awesome friends, even if it's just for this week.

Carmen Lezeth: 13:21

You know, for this vacation. Like every friend doesn't have to be your, you know, ride free or die person. Is that how you say that? I forget Ted Hicks and I have had this whole thing that I've never heard of, but you know what I mean. Like everybody doesn't have to be your best, best friend. So I'm just having a great time. I hope that, whatever you're thinking about right now if you're listening to this podcast, that you have a great day and that this kind of makes you think about your life as well and what you're doing to grow and be open to new possibilities and new adventures. You know, we're just not even midway into this vacation and I have to tell you it might be one of the best things I've done in the past 20 years. Just to you know, take a shot and go somewhere. I've never been with people I don't really know Well. I mean, I know Mary Joanne, really well so, but you know what I mean.

Carmen Lezeth: 14:10

Anyways, I am grateful for everyone who listens to the show. Thank you for listening to this. Carmen talk Very appreciative and I hope you will do what I asked earlier in this recording Please comment, like and share, support us in the only way I need you to. We don't need any money. I mean, we need money. I need a lot of money if somebody wants to sponsor us, but I'm just saying what I need from people who listen to us and who care about the things that I'm trying to accomplish with this show. We just need you to comment, like and share on all platforms that you possibly can. I'd really appreciate it.

Carmen Lezeth: 14:40

And, of course, please come visit us on the live stream on Thursday nights, 6pm Pacific, 9pm Eastern, or wherever we are internationally. I'll make sure to post it and also listen to the podcast that posts on Sundays at your leisure. And please listen to or watch the replays on YouTube and Facebook. We appreciate it. We appreciate the views. We appreciate even when you don't like us on YouTube, which is so funny Like I don't know why people keep watching the show on YouTube if they don't like the show, but it's still great, great interaction for us. So, but you know, if you don't like the show, you can make a comment. I prefer that you don't because it's a lot of work for me, but I'll try to answer every single comment I can. You can also send me a message. Anyway, thanks for listening. Remember it really is all about the joy and we'll see you next week. Bye from Aruba. Thanks for stopping by. All about the joy. Be better and stay beautiful folks. Have a sweet day.