Here we are. In Episode 52, on just about the one year anniversary of Ink Medicine Podcast, when I get the chance to interview one of my spiritual mentors about gender as fruit, spicy food and
how it relates to being kinky, wearing strap-ons, being cerebral vs. being embodied, identity labels and various perspectives on them, being a beautiful bouquet of identities, a bit on polyamory
and a bit on sex work, and seriously.... did I think we would have a conversation this rich? I did actually.
But did I think it would be appropriate for the public platform that a podcast generally is? Well sure. But there were questions.
This episode is as honest as can be. James-Olivia answers all of my straight forward questions with absolute presence, thoughtfulness, depth and humor.
And this is only Part I.
To find James-Olivia Chu Hillman online, go to
https://inquisitivehuman.com/
or to instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/inquisitive_human/
You can connect with me, Micah Riot, as well as see my tattoo art on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/micahriot/
Micah's website is www.micahriot.com
The podcast is hosted on Buzzsprout but truly lives in the heart of Micah's website at:
https://www.micahriot.com/ink-medicine-podcast/
Episode Transcript:
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I was trying so hard to be slutty. I was like I'm on Tinder, I haven't, like I had never dated online before in my life. So I'm 47 years old on Tinder going. How do you do this Like? How do you become slutty?
Micah Riot:
Hello, my darlings. Hello, this is Micah Riot and you are listening to another episode of what I Hope is quickly becoming your favorite podcast, ink Medicine. Today, I am really excited to present this episode it's actually part one of a two-parter because we ended up talking for so long and if you know this person, you will be. You're already excited, you're already delighted, and if you don't know, well, you should, because James Olivia Chu Hillman is really one of the most interesting humans I've ever met. I came upon their work on Instagram some years ago it's been a few years and I looked at it and I wanted it. I wanted to be in containers with them and at the time I did not feel like I could afford the pleasure. And some years later, namely the summer, I saw them come around again. My feed and was looked at their website again and again was like this human is. I'm just, I'm fascinated. I'm interested in who this human is, what kind of what, what? What is being in a container with them like I really wanted to experience it. And I looked closer and, lo and behold, there was a program that would fit into my life and my budget. So I signed up. I actually did two programs with them. First I did a two-week part series on jealousy, which was fascinating, and then this last few months and on for the next six months I'll be in their container called regard. Regard is exploration of right relationship, and the work James Olivia does is around relational skills and creating more of right relationship in our lives, meaning relationship that nourishes and is sustainable, as opposed to relationships full of rifts and navigational difficulties. And the way they do that is by teaching relational skills. Being with James Olivia is just so easy. It's a delight to be in the presence of somebody who is fully there and has their whole heart open to whatever type of connection that both of you are creating. In that room, james Olivia identifies as an asker of rude questions and a lover of difficult conversations, and also nurture of disobedience and just an inquisitive human. That's actually their Instagram handle inquisitive underscore human. I have learned a lot from being around James Olivia and their containers, but more importantly, I feel like I've added another gem to my collection of amazing, sparkly, fascinating, beautiful, lovely humans, which is really the work of my life is to collect as many of those people into my life as I can. In this conversation, I got one of my spiritual mentors to talk about their gender, their sexuality, dating. We talked about so many things and I vowed to myself I would ask them questions that I'm interested in knowing answers to, as opposed to questions about their work. If you want to know more about their work, you go online and you find that information. It's amazing and there's a lot of information out there about that, but I just really wanted to know more about who they were as a human.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Fantastic. Oh, you're recording already, aren't you?
Micah Riot:
Yeah, because you know what happens is I start chatting and then I'm like but you're saying some good shit and I'm losing it. So some preparation. I listened to a bunch of episodes that you've done before with other people. Oh my God, it is from like 2020, 2021. It's been a couple years, yeah.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I don't think I have. I will do better with the last one I did and this one I'll get them up. I actually think there's a handful that I have just not kept up with putting on my website.
Micah Riot:
So, okay, I'm not worried about it. I was just letting you know, in case you wanted to know, that I stalked you on Apple podcasts.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Oh, that's fine. I just figure that once I record something and it's out there, that it is bound to be listened to and laughed at on some level, because who the fuck knows what comes out of my mouth on any of these things.
Micah Riot:
So I mean, there was nothing laughable, I mean maybe smileable.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Just talking to somebody about an episode that I did. I don't know how many years ago. It was when my dog, lucy, was alive. It was like one of the only huge fights I've ever gotten into with Ben, and we were fighting over putting little dog booties on her in the snow. So it's like a massive blowout fight about dog booties.
Micah Riot:
And you were. You had talked to somebody else on a podcast about it.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Oh yeah, all of my life experiences are subject to, like, public scrutiny on podcasts, so awesome.
Micah Riot:
I have so many rude questions. Speaking of my first question, what do you think is the difference between a rude question and an invasive question?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I actually don't know that rudeness really exists. It is kind of a hilarious construct to me. I think when people say that's rude, they just mean I prefer that. And a lot of people are like I prefer something other than what you did, and society's standards are typically on my side. But I don't know that, like I don't have. I don't, I don't know what rudeness is. I don't, I don't know how to define it so invasive. I just think that's a question you don't want to answer. Like I don't think there's an inherently invasive question, I think it's oh, I prefer not to answer that question. That's not something I want to share with you. So how often have you done?
Micah Riot:
that Asked an invasive question. No, I've said no to a question.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I don't very often say no to answering a question. That's not. I'm like huh, that's uncomfortable. Let me think about that and then I'll probably answer it.
Micah Riot:
So you'll go around in some other way. Nobody will notice that you didn't actually answer it.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Do I try and avoid questions like that. Sometimes I'll answer a question with a question, but it's less of a strategy now. I think now I'm just more open to answering questions. You know there are very few people that once I start talking to them I'm like, ooh, I don't want to be known by you, like it doesn't threaten me to be known by people. But I think if somebody's asking questions and it doesn't feel like they're curious, it feels more like I'm couching my judgment as a question and I'm going to present you with my judgment and I don't want to be perceived as judgmental, so I'm going to put a question mark at the end of it. I will normally probably just be like wow, that sounds like a judgment framed as a question. Is that what's going on here?
Micah Riot:
What is your relationship with privacy? So the reason why I'm curious about that, I'll tell you is because something that Maestro says, right, our common friend, I would say that when you find something you really like online, what do you do? You budget, and so in the way of finding someone you really like online who is a position as a teacher, a mentor of sorts, right, people binge your content and then when it's just to you, they probably assume some people want to binge you like know everything they can about you, and I imagine that can get invasive Because you have so many people wanting a piece of you.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
So I don't this is gonna sound. Actually I don't know how it's gonna sound. I'm not gonna make that up. I think a lot of people who binge my content and then have access to me don't necessarily want to know. I'm not gonna say people don't want to know about me, but I think that I have something that people find useful and they want to know about them. I think I tell enough personal story in my teaching that if people want to know about me, they get a lot of me in conversation or in my teaching. Because I'm talking about myself a lot. I use myself as an example. I talk about relational fuckery a lot and I have a lot of it. So I don't, I'm not like, oh, I'm up here on this mountaintop and let me tell you about what other people do. I'm like here, let me tell you about this stupid shit I just did and like this is how relational fuckery shows up for me in my personal life as I wade through the muck and try and cultivate right relationship myself. But I don't find people. Typically it doesn't feel invasive for me. I've actually only had, I think, one, one or two people who have. It has felt creepy, but it's more like a non consensual kind of like wow, we're not vibing at all on the same level. It's not like, hey, I want to get to know you. I think one person was like, before we talk, I just want to, I just want to ground into our bodies and I just want to know how you feel in your body right now. And I was like I don't know you well enough to talk about how I feel in my body right now, like this is not, that's not for you, so it's not a matter of privacy, so much as like we're not with each other and I don't want to have that kind of intimacy with somebody who's not actually present to where I am.
Micah Riot:
Yeah, beautiful, how are you today?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Besides being hot from running up the stairs and kind of like pitting out a little bit and I'm always nervous at the start of podcasts I will forget we're recording at some point and be super silly. But I think I'm always nervous at the start. I'm like, oh, people are going to hear how silly I am. This is going to be weird.
Micah Riot:
I mean, I think that's a huge part of the chart, you know.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
How silly I am, or podcast in general, how much you are you. Yeah, I've tried other things. It doesn't work out as well Like being being somebody else.
Micah Riot:
Yeah, everybody else is already taken, so just be here.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, it's too much work. It's very exhausting, not to be me.
Micah Riot:
When do you? How can you kind of pinpoint a time of how old you were when you became the you that you are now, like the version of you that feels the truest to you now, like today? No, I hear that. But was there? Was there a period or an experience you had where you were like this is a turning point? Was there anything like that in your life?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I think there are multiple turning points. I think that there are experiences that sort of illuminate like, ooh, I could actually be more me, or I'm safer, like this moment is showing me that I have safety. A lot of those moments are with Ben, my husband, like meeting somebody who it is 100% safe all the time to be myself in front of somebody who has no judgment of me and is just like constantly celebrating Wow, you're such a weirdo. It's amazing, I love this. That's a huge, it's all you know when I think about it. It's all relationships, it's all people who have shown up with just unconditional love or celebration. And and it's not specific to me it's just like these people who hold other people in love and are like, yeah, I just don't have judgment for people being themselves. Every time I encounter somebody like that, I'm like holy shit, the world is a safer place because you exist and I and I become more myself in front of you. I'm going to cry. That feels so good.
Micah Riot:
When did you know that that's how you felt around him and about with him, and when did you know that you were going to be partners?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I did not know that he and I were going to be partners. I was pretty sure that we weren't, that there was no chance of being partners, because I was married when I met him and the first we worked to do. We met at work and the first text he ever sent me was a was an article on the way, the differences between the ways Many indigenous cultures Understand what pathologizing Western psychology would call madness or mental illness. And he and the article was about how sacred many indigenous cultures, how sacredly they hold what what we would call mental illness, and how these, how there are ways of being that we pathologize, that in some cultures are celebrated and revered as portals, like, as I hear here, somebody who's who's a bridge between this world and other worlds, who carries so much wisdom and so much information. And and I wasn't sure why he sent it to me I was like, do you know that I feel a little bit crazy a lot of the time? This is, this is a bizarre article to send to a co worker like just hey, I'm reading about craziness and I'm thinking about you and I'm like this is a little bit uncomfortable, but also I feel seen and this person has a, obviously has a way of being in the world that doesn't rely on, you know, hr style professionalism and I was like I already wanted to know him. I met him and I was like, oh wow, I really really like this person and want to know him and that sort of cracked the door to. But we're going to have really amazing conversations that aren't all about work and the weather.
Micah Riot:
So, and then what happened?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
And then, slowly, we began spending lots of time together and falling in love. And then we ran away from our lives and drove around the country for three or four months in a 66 Ford pickup truck and landed in Tucson and lived there for three years and then and got married somewhere in between landing there and leaving, and then moved to New York State and live there for five years and then, and then, and then. Now I'm in Chicago.
Micah Riot:
And you, you love, you live with him.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I don't. I live in Chicago and he still lives in upstate New York, so a lot has happened. Like you know that I am that. I think you know that I'm in an open marriage with Ben and so I have a sweetie in Chicago and I was trying really hard the first year I moved here in summer of 2022. I was trying so hard to be slutty. I was like I'm on Tinder. I haven't, like I had never dated online before in my life. So I'm 47 years old on Tinder going how do you do this? Like how do you become slutty in the modern times of digital dating? Like what is this? And I was terrible at it. I was I was really really bad at it. But I met somebody last winter and I was like this is this is not terrible. Like the way that people say dating online is really fucking terrible. I didn't have that experience. I had, like I had a really good experience dating online, but I only did it for six months.
Micah Riot:
How gay are you on a scale from one through 10?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
It depends on who you ask. I know you're asking me, so let's see. If you ask any long-term ex-girlfriend, they would probably say six and they'd be like definitely more than 50% gay, but not super gay. I have a weird sort of emerging tendency that I'm only finding out now over time, that when I'm with men, they tend to come out as like queer, trans, whatever, and so I'm like anybody that I'm with, I'm like clock's ticking.
Micah Riot:
You're queer. I find the world one, one at a time.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
So how gay am I on a scale of one to 10? Oh, I don't think I'm qualified to answer that because I'm not embedded in. I'm just I don't feel like I'm embedded in any particular culture and I feel like you'd have to ask the people who live in a particular culture, like, does this person fit in with your culture? So I mean, how gay are you on a scale of one to 10? And then could you answer that from, like, a perspective of authority.
Micah Riot:
I mean on myself. You know, in that, like, with the knowledge of history that I've had and such and that's, you know the word gay is so like ta-da, you know it's like it's a flag. You know, like, like you said, the culture and I've really identified as queer. But I think and that will be my next question for you is, when you identify as a non-binary person, you're automatically queer. I think, like I mean I guess you could be asexual or aromantic, and then that would not necessarily be a part of it. But if you are aromantic and sexual, which I am, then if you're non-binary, like you can't be straight or gay. Ha ha, ha, ha ha. Neither man or woman, right. And then my history is that I've dated mostly trans folks and non-binary folks for most of my life. And then my current partner is Femme and Cis identified, with women identified. So you know she'll be like, but I enjoy calling you my girlfriend, like is that okay? Like, yeah, that's totally fine. Like for her, I could be her girlfriend, I would be her like butch girlfriend, I'll be her butch daddy. But for me, as myself, like I'm neither and I'm both and I like so many different kinds of people, I'm just queer. But if you had to, if I had to answer that question, I'd be like 12 out of 10.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Ha ha ha ha, okay, I'm glad to hear that, because I was like, if I only answer for myself, I was like probably an 11, because I it doesn't. I don't care about the labels. Like there's no identity that I'm so attached to, that I'm like, oh, I couldn't love that person because they don't have this identity and I have this identity and, like I, labels and identities don't particularly interest me, like, yeah, almost not at all.
Micah Riot:
And I got that from you. But I also was like there's a lot of people who don't identify with a lot of labels but they're still more attached to certain body parts, you know, and their lover and like I guess it was a way of seeing you that question without being Body parts okay, that's a different thing.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Ha ha ha. Like, yeah, I'm trying to think, does the perfect gender for me exist? And it would be totally sci-fi Like there's. I don't know if there's an existing person with a gender that I have encountered that I'm like, yes, that's the one. That's the gender for me. The body parts bit I like Dick. I mean, I think Dick is fun. Ha ha ha ha. But I don't know if that's conditioning in terms of I know what to do with it. My sex work. I did like a year and a half of sex work in my 30s. That was really wonderful and for the most part it was with men. Like my clients were men. I know what to do with a penis for the most part, and that's. It's fun to feel competent. But in terms of just my own pleasure and enjoyment, I'm a total pillow princess. So I don't care what gender is doing things to me, like I don't care what their parts are. I like hands. That's the parts I like. I like hands. Hands are my favorite parts. Okay, we went all the way there. Huh, no.
Micah Riot:
I didn't. I did not expect you to tell me you're a pillow princess. I should tell you.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Well, okay, that depends on what I'm wearing, meaning I'm no longer a pillow princess. You're wearing what, dick?
Micah Riot:
So You're wearing dick. Okay, so you will wear dick. And oh, absolutely yeah.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
But mostly with a man.
Micah Riot:
So why mostly with a man?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
That's been mostly the opportunity that I've had and I feel most comfortable.
Micah Riot:
Like you feel more comfortable wearing a dick with a man than if you were wearing a dick with somebody who wants to receive it. Like, like.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Well, I mean, the assumption there is that a man wouldn't want to receive a dick for me, and that's the case they don't want to receive a dick from you.
Micah Riot:
I know they do. I'm how to ask and speak about these things without being reductionist to body parts. But so you'd rather fuck a man's ass than someone else's pussy.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
It's not that I would rather it, just I feel more comfortable Like there's a. There is a power dynamic where I feel more comfortable. Yeah, absolutely. The answer is yes, not that, not that I would say no to somebody who is like I have a pussy and I want you inside me. I might be like I can make that happen for you. It's just there's the power play for me is way more fun to is that true?
Micah Riot:
Are you a switch, or your Sounds like it, doesn't it? Well, it sounds like you're both the top and the bottom, but in a way that somebody is not a switch but they're either top or bottom, like depends on the person. It depends on the person.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
And and some people I'm switchy with that person like Mm-hmm, and yeah, what's? That and you're kinky also Sounds like it, doesn't it? It does sound like it. I think that probably is subjective to the kink level of the person asking. Like I'm guessing that some people would be like you are not kinky at all, you are very, very basic and vanilla, and I'd be like okay.
Micah Riot:
And some people would be like, holy shit, you're super kinky and I'd be like, okay, I'm so surprised at how you're speaking about sexuality in reference to other people's opinions or reference points, because I don't have sexuality, I guess.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, because I don't know how to label it. It doesn't. It doesn't interest me to label myself as kinky or not kinky, like I. I think it is a relational label, it's. It is only, the label is only relevant to the person, to another person, kind of measuring it against what they hold as kinky or not kinky. So like for me to say I'm kinky in relationship to what, who cares? But if I say to another person like I'm kinky, what are you into? Well then we have to figure out what does kinky mean? What does kinky mean to you? Because that's like me saying I like spicy food and somebody else is cooking with me, like we have to agree on what spicy means. So like if I go to a restaurant and they're like hey, how spicy do you want your food? And I'm like what are my options? And they're like it goes up to five stars. I've got a scale now Spicy goes up to five stars. I probably don't want five star spicy. I it'll blow my taste buds out, but it is a relative, it's a relative scale. And I if I just say, oh, I like spicy food, and I'm sitting next to somebody who eats five star spicy, like for breakfast, and they're like great, you like spicy food and I have not established what spicy means to me. We are not eating the same Like. We're probably not going to enjoy the same thing together.
Micah Riot:
So you're speaking to like negotiations with a potential sexual partner. I guess I was speaking more to like when I think of labels. If someone says I'm kinky, if they just say yes, like I'm part of that community, I understand that means you know, like that's what, that's what I get. If I start talking about power dynamics, you will not look at me like I'm in that job.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
You know right, I have no, I have no explicit like apparent relationship with a kink community. So everything that I think about and talk about is pretty much interpersonal, not communal or collective understandings. So so, yeah, we're probably talking about different things sometimes.
Micah Riot:
I think it's enough of the same. Yeah, I mean, I think that's the beauty about kink is that it's tailor made, just like queerness. It's tailor made.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, that that actually feels really like. When I hear that, there's a relief in my body because I find that a lot of times when I hear people talking about kink or queerness or like polyamory or whatever it is that they're into or want to be into, a lot of people are speaking from a like I am speaking on authority for the collective, this is what queerness is, or this is what poly means, or this is what kink means, and there's sort of a almost a gatekeeping feeling to it, like if you're not at least a seven on the gay scale, you're not queer enough, or like or if you don't do this, you're not really kinky, or like that's not poly, that's E and M, whatever it is it's. There are so many really precise distinctions and labels that I think that's my rejection of labels a lot of times is like okay, whatever you mean when you say that, until I relate to you and understand exactly what you mean when you say that I don't want to take on. I don't want to reject or take on the label because I don't even know what it means yet.
Micah Riot:
That's super fair. That's an interesting perspective, as you know, like, yeah, I've enjoyed labels through my life. It's helped me find my people, or at least find people that could potentially be my people, not just people outside of those labels wouldn't be my people, but I've. You know, when I've come upon people who refuse to have labels, it's sort of been like a well, is it about? Is it about do you have enough belonging to mainstream community where you don't need these more niche labels because you don't need to find those people? But it's an interesting thing to hear you say that for you it's about kind of like not stepping on toes or like not wanting to take on something that somebody else would deem an appropriator, you know, et cetera, and it's I'm certainly not here to gatekeep those labels, but more like, do we have these things, this language, in common in some way? Is this a place we can connect in some way?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, I have. You know, I think it's probably me, being mixed race as well, like there are. I have lived much of my life going. Am I Chinese enough? Am I white enough? Am I an indigenous enough? Am I Jewish enough? Am I gay enough? Am I like it's? And, and especially with you, know race or ethnicity or culture without a community to say, yes, you belong here, it's a? It's a very strange thing to say, yes, I am this and it's like okay, I might have a certain blood lineage, but culturally, am I really this Like? I speak almost no Chinese and I'm the only in my generation of my of my family on my mom's side, and I'm first generation American born on my mom's side. I'm the only cousin that was raised only English speaking. And so if, if I were to ask anybody in my family like am I Chinese, you might get multiple answers from different people in my family. But if you ask somebody on my dad's side of the family, am I Chinese, somebody would probably say yes, like, of course. Or they might say you're half and I'm like oh my God, people in my own family who have indigenous lineage are using blood quantum to let me know whether I am Chinese enough, and which is a total mind fuck, like to have indigenous family members using blood quantum as a measurement, and so that's. That's for me where all of these labels are really relational and and moving targets, and I have to relate to the people using them to understand what they mean.
Micah Riot:
I find the multiplicity of identity to be such a beautiful bouquet in people and I know it's not easy to hold on your own in your own life.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
It's yeah, it can be a lot to navigate and I think the my ability to navigate it in a way that brings me joy requires me to also see it as a beautiful bouquet. So otherwise it's just a grasping it belonging, like where am I, where do I belong? Who am I, what am I? I think that the question like who am I, what am I If I'm able to answer it, I'm a brand new thing, that has never been before to me feels like the way a lot of my trans friends will say, particularly my non-binary friends are like I'm just a gender that's never existed before and I'm like. That feels so right to me.
Micah Riot:
I've said I've been saying this for my entire life is that there's as many genders, as there are humans. There's no two people who express their gender the same way.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, I love that.
Micah Riot:
I want to hear you speak more to your gender. Story Will about your gender, how you came to know your gender.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I don't, I still don't know if I know my gender, like I think, because I'm fem presenting and fem conforming enough to like just move through life. I'm going to say mostly un, un, molested by people's questions about gender and and it's, it's not that I think they wouldn't care, it's I don't think they know to ask like I don't, because I'm not parading around announcing gender in any way other than a very conforming way, like the announcement is I look, femi.
Micah Riot:
But your announcement is also that you're they. Yes.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
And forward. It is very yeah, and I think that mostly people just ignore that and forget it a lot. And I don't, and I don't have strong feelings about it's not that I don't have any feelings about it. I don't have strong feelings and I don't feel like fighting about it. I don't. I don't feel like fighting for other people's precision in language about that particular thing and I have mixed feelings about this. I haven't landed anywhere on this because when I there have been times where, when people have openly misgendered me, I'll I'll say something and normally it'll be like hey, you know, I like in private, I will often say to people you know there's, I want to know you, I want to be in right relationship with you and I'm holding on to this thing. That is getting in the way of that for me and that's when you misgender me or misracialize me or whatever. It is where I feel like you know I am unseen by you, which is really none of my business. It it puts a wall between me and you. I put up a wall where I don't want to know you as much as I would want to know you otherwise. It it feels retaliatory and that's on me. I don't like that about myself, but it feels like, oh, you don't want to know who I am, and now I kind of don't want to know who you are either, and what what's true for me is, I do want to know who people are and I want to be known by them, and so I've had that conversation with different people and it's it feels important in some ways for myself, but in other ways it feels more important to just let people know that, like, hey, the femme presenting people in your life may not be women or like the people that you assume look like what you know, to be a man or a woman or a boy or a girl. That's an assumption, and I'm like sometimes what I'm doing is saying this assumption isn't a correct assumption and it's not really about me. It's for all the people who look kind of like me and you're doing this to them too, and it doesn't feel that great. It hurts so. So I haven't landed anywhere. I don't think I just take it moment by moment and I'm like what feels? What do I have capacity for today? Does this feel like a fight I want to have? Does this feel like, you know, a conversation I want to have? My sweetie uses she her pronouns with me, and the other night we were having dinner with one of his friends and his friend used she her with me. And then my sweetie used they them and I just like almost burst into tears. I was like, oh my God, you they them to me. I'm so going to suck your dick later. Wow.
Micah Riot:
Wow. Sexual pronouns correct pronouns without any sexual favors.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
But it's it's so wild, like I don't typically, I think I, I think I make myself not think about it very much, very often, and then when, when somebody uses they them with me, I'm just like ecstatic about it.
Micah Riot:
So you're, you get gender euphoric about it.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I really do. Yeah, I really do, Even though I'm like you know, I I don't wear makeup or do my nails or anything like that, but I do like being feme, I like being kind of girly in my presentation and also I don't know if it means anything to me, I think.
Micah Riot:
If you think of your gender out in the vacuum, not because of other people, do you have something coming up like? What is it?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Oh, passion fruit. I'm passionate fruit.
Micah Riot:
Like the texture of it, the taste of it.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
That there's wait. Passion fruit is the one with the little dots in it. Right the like. The tiny little is the little tiny seeds it's like. Does it look like maybe I'm talking about a dragon fruit? I'm either a dragon fruit or a passion fruit. This is why I can't find Jen.
Micah Riot:
You're good. Why are you cleaning mangoes or pineapple?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Oh God, yeah, mango is a little. There's too much consistency. I could never I could never be a mango. I love mangoes, I will eat mangoes all day long, but I couldn't be a mango. Too consistent Pineapple.
Micah Riot:
What's that? I love passion fruit, but actually passion fruit is just amazing.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Now I have to find out if maybe it's a dragon fruit.
Micah Riot:
Well, I'll describe it to you and you'll you'll. Okay, dragon fruit is pink, it looks like a bird. There's it's got like things coming off of it. It's a little spiny, like scales, okay, and then yellow and pink and the inside is black and white and has that dots. Dragon fruit, okay, but dragon fruit is very mild in flavor. Oh fuck, not that Um passion fruit, no, it's usually like a purple. I have one Hold on. I'll show.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Okay, I know I know.
Micah Riot:
Yes, it has these gorgeous flowers. It's like they're, like, they look like creatures, also like purple, white kind of stripey flowers. This is the fruit.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Oh, it looks almost pruney, that's, or like like it does.
Micah Riot:
It looks pruney when it's ready to eat and then inside is like yellow and purple and they have their kind of sour. I feel like your gender is more passion fruit than dragon fruit.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, I hate to say it, it's true, dang it. That's the thing I want to be all pretty like a pat, like a dragon fruit, but really it's the substance.
Micah Riot:
Has never existed before. So maybe it's passion fruit and sides and a dragon fruit outside, you know, I think.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Dragon fruit for me Is drag, like when I do myself up, when I get ready to go out and be seen, and like one of that's been that's my dragon fruit days. But I think, yeah, passion fruit. It looks unassuming but it packs a punch and I think that that might be more more accurate. Okay, same question your gender and your fruit. Your gender as a fruit? Oh no, maybe your gender's not a fruit. I don't want to be that limiting, sorry, your gender and just whatever it is, it may or may not be a fruit.
Micah Riot:
It can be a fruit. I mean gender has many sides to it. You know those heirloom tomatoes that are like green and red and they're like stripy and then you put like flaky sea salt on them.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yes, that's my gender. Okay, so you have to be left alone until you're ripe, like if you get picked too soon, it's not as full of an experience.
Micah Riot:
You definitely got to pick me at the right time.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Okay, also. Okay, there's a thing about tomato plants. I have a thing about tomato plants. I love them very much If they don't experience any adversity, like if they're just like a hot house tomato won't, won't flower and fruit as much if it doesn't experience some sort of like you kind of got to like shake it up a little bit, or like they need some adversity, they need something to something to indicate, like it's not always peachy and safe, and then they start to flower and and produce a lot more fruit. Is that true of you, fuck?
Micah Riot:
yeah, isn't it true of most humans?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I think so, I think maybe so Do I want that to be?
Micah Riot:
true of me. Well, I mean, how could it not possibly be true of you or really any human I feel like? And this I know it's, it's a generalization, but there's a reason why I find people with some experience of difference, trauma etc. Like more interesting, right, like there's more fruit because you have to get through something, right, if you have had to deal with I don't know all kinds of shit, not, I mean, there's a, there's a line I feel like people who have been really, really, really traumatized can become unsafe for other people themselves, and there's that too. But in general, the right amount of adversity creates more fruit, for sure.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, okay, have we taken the fruit metaphor as far as we can go, or are we gonna stay here for a while?
Micah Riot:
We can go on. I mean, I know that I am the one interviewing you, but, as many other people have said on the different podcasts that I've listened to with you, on them it's a conversation, so you don't. You can also. You can present a topic if you like.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I don't have a topic, I am. I had no idea where we were gonna go. I I really am delighted and a little bit terrified of our conversation so far, so I'm following you.
Micah Riot:
What I'm gonna do is I'm not releasing it like tomorrow. I'm gonna give you a few days to to think about if you want this entire conversation on on the air, so I will.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I currently have a. Yes, and I don't really want to second guess it, but I really appreciate that that's a that feels like a beautiful, like hey, you said a bunch of really personal shit. You sure you want to share this with the world. I appreciate that a lot.
Micah Riot:
Yeah, of course, yeah, absolutely. It's the least I can do I'm.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I am trying not to say really anything ever that I'm not okay having published on the internet.
Micah Riot:
You know, I think the future of the internet and our society and community as humans is that everybody will have something out the internet. You know I've done it's on the internet. You know when I started, oh yeah, is it good? Are you proud of it? I was in my 20s. I needed money. It was, you know, a queer women run like company that produced solid porn. They paid pretty okay for it. You know like I did it, because I it was something to do. I needed the money. I traumatized by it. It was a good company to support. You know, and I use the same name. I don't think you can actually find it anymore because it's so buried down deep, but this was plus 15, plus years ago. But when I began tattoo, I kept my name, like the name I've been. No, this is not my legal name, mike Orion, the name I've been going by since I was about 20 and I'm now almost 40. So it's been a minute and so I use the same name. And so I had these younger folks come to me to get tattooed and be like. I googled you and I feel like cool. What did you find? There's like old poetry from when I was in high school. There's old journals, like life journal, you know. There's porn, there's my tattoos. The internet's a deep well, and I feel like from my generation on, most people will have shit like that online. Yeah.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I hope that makes us more forgiving of ourselves and each other, because it really puts on display like this is where I was at the time. This may or may not have been a mistake at the time, or maybe it was a mistake at the time and now I recognize that it was part of my learning journey or like that we can just that we live and don't get too wrapped up in. This is that moment when I did something that I wouldn't do now and think, of course I wouldn't do that right this minute, because now I'm almost 50 and I wouldn't do the things that I was doing when I was 15, but maybe I should. But that we can recognize. It's a little counterintuitive or maybe paradoxical to look at moments in time in the past and go and and to use the documentation as just that. Like this is a documentation of a moment in the past and it doesn't define who I am right now, which is not to say that doing porn was a mistake. I didn't. I'm not trying to make that parallel, because I didn't.
Micah Riot:
I didn't know it, but in the way you know, like politicians will use sexual scandals against each other, right and somebody recording themselves doing something and now it's online and now this person's using it against them and so they get more votes, the less votes or whatever. And when time comes, when everybody has that shit online, when everybody has had naked pictures and sexual chat rooms and etc. You know everything was that then nobody will be able to use it against anybody else and I think it will make us more forgiving as a culture.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I wish I could find all the naked pictures I've done when I was younger, because I looked so good. I'm like I would love to show off those pictures. They're all buried somewhere. I don't know where they are. You don't have them yourself. I don't have a lot of the pictures that I've ever posed for, like if I do, they're buried in you know old computers or like. I have no idea where most of that stuff is and I now, as I start aging and entering my kind of croniers, I'm like that stuff is fantastic. I'm not ashamed of it at all. It's beautiful and I was fucking beautiful and I would like to see that again.
Micah Riot:
I have a book of photographs, like a professional book of photographs, one of which is from an ex-partner of mine and she's like 27 and you know she's perfect, like so gorgeous, and I showed to somebody else they'd be like, oh my god, this person is just so stunning and I dated her when she was in her mid-40s, you know 20s. She was in her mid-40s. It's one of my first like serious relationships and she's so much hotter she was so much hotter in her mid-40s, you know, to me than she was at her, you know, at 27, was like, yeah, you're beautiful, but like, just, I don't know, for me personally, I think yeah, well, also.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I mean, hotness is so subjective and in real life like there's two-dimensional conventional beauty and that's one thing, but the, the hotness of somebody being a person in real life in front of you, nothing compares to that like no, anybody can be pretty in two dimensions and physicality just has such a small part of attraction. Yeah, yeah so I definitely feel much hotter now in my late 40s than I ever have in my entire life and I know that if somebody were to just look at the physicality they'd be like I don't think so, but I don't care because I think with somebody I have no idea, like I guess me looking with a critical eye at you know, conventional visual beauty I don't know my, my ideas of beauty have changed so much in the last decade. Like what I find beautiful now is so much more vast, like the things, what beauty that's available to me now is so much more vast.
Micah Riot:
So so I keep on looking at other humans or nature or everything, all of it.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
When I look at almost anything, like I'm not, I don't have a sense of things being flawed anymore, like I have such a sense of things being so perfect as they are. And particularly with humans, I'm like you are incarnate. That's fucking beautiful. Like you have skin and you have nerves and you have a way to interface with the world. That's so hot.
Micah Riot:
Like there's that's so hot so yeah enough.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, my understanding of beauty has really really changed in the last several years.
Micah Riot:
Was your understanding of beauty prior to this time more conventional or just more physical, or?
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I think it was more, I would say, conventional, but what I mean by that is externally oriented, like very much. In the same way, our conversation started about gender, or like queerness. What would other people like? How would somebody else answer this? I think my ideas of beauty would be like well, how would photographers answer this? Or how would an architect answer this? Or, and I think, as my orientation has shifted to me and I am the subject and not the object, I'm like oh, I can have my own ideas about beauty, and they're vast and inclusive, and I don't have to hold anybody else's ideas as my own about beauty.
Micah Riot:
Is it hard for you to turn that around? Like I can find so many things beautiful in other people that are hard for me to see in myself when I look in the mirror as I am entering an age where I'm like, oh, I have like skin sagging, like that's new, you know, like the pandemic, I like started looking in the mirror more and that was like my neck looks different. Oh my God, and that's, you know, it's fresh still, cause I am 39. So, but none of those things that I'm looking at myself going like, oh, that's different, I don't know, I don't know how I feel about it. Like in somebody else is so hard to me.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Mm-hmm. That's true for me and I'm conscious of it and I think, because I was raised by both of my grandmothers at a young age, like until I was, you know, going to school, I have and I spent so much time with them, even after I had started school. I spent time with them in the summers, and also I had an older mom, so I'm almost 50, she had me when she was 33, which for people my age is much older than most Like. My mom had me about 10 years later than most of my friends, and so I got to watch her age and I got to see my grandmothers and I was surrounded by older people. And so I feel like I have a mental map of beauty that includes bodies that are subject to gravity and changes and, as I'm going through perimenopause now, my body's changing super rapidly and the things that I have a hard time with judgment like self-judgment around. It's not so much like oh, this little sag here or this creepiness there, or this like dryness there, whatever it is that I'm like oh, these lumps are new and in a different place than they used to be. What's happening, it's more about being surprised that I don't recognize myself all the time and kind of feeling like am I in my own shell? Like it feels almost like a second puberty. I very often feel for the growing up process of children because their bodies are different all the time. Like every couple of weeks they're in a different body than the one that they had, even 14 days ago, a month ago, and they're always changing. Like there's the gangliness of teenagerhood for me just being really awkward and having my limbs grow really really fast and being lanky and not knowing where I was in space. I feel like I look at myself, I look in the mirror and I'm like I'm not sure if I recognize all this and I don't know this body as my own all the time and I feel less and less attached to my body being me. It's like, oh, I'm in this skin suit and it's doing things and I am a person and I'm having an experience wearing this thing and it's changing all the time and it's doing. It's not behaving in the ways that I recognize from even like six months ago and it's a little unnerving sometimes but I feel not so attached to it now. But I did really like being young and firm. That was fun, but I wouldn't trade it. I like getting older.
Micah Riot:
I've heard you speak to living in your head and not being I'm gonna translate that into not being super embodied, and I know if that's true for you Is that I mean you're also saying that that's also you're less and less attached to the body as you get older.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I think that's also a paradox. I'm I have been becoming more embodied and also less attached to this body being any particular way or thing. I think the experience of becoming embodied for me slow. It's a slow process. The first time I heard the word embodiment I think I was like, ew, no, thank you. That sounds very uncomfortable. I would not like to have that experience. It's like you just want to thank you. I'm like so you just want to feel things. Like that's a thing people want to do. No, thanks. But as I start relating more to my own body and consciously, on purpose, having the experiences of having a body like okay, yes, I can feel my feet. Yes, I can feel the chair under my butt. Like, yes, I can feel my own pangs of hunger, or like there's a little bit of spit on the corner of my mouth because I can't stop talking right now, like there's. I'm finding so much more enjoyment in it, even in the discomfort of having a body, than I ever thought that I would, and I'm finding less and less attachment to having it, like someday I won't have this and so I want to enjoy it while I have it.
Micah Riot:
Yeah, when I asked you what do you do with your day, like with your time, you said I knit, I sleep, I have sex, I like. Everything you said had to do with being embodied. Oh yeah like eat food and drink water. And yeah, he said I believe he said those things too and I was like, wow, you're. It's such a. It feels like, in contrast to what you, what I've heard just say to other people like I live in my head. I'm not very embodied right being in the body. It's scary, it's hard, so it's interesting to there's like the thing you think about yourself and then there's something that you actually are.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Yeah, and they're saying things. Yeah, they're kind of like so funny, okay. So I'm telling you old stories. That's what's happening. I'm telling you old stories about myself.
Micah Riot:
Well, you've said things, but when I've asked you questions, you've answered them in a way that feels very embodied, and so, yeah, I feel like like that's as a body as you can get, as a person who doesn't watch TV, doesn't read books, just lives in their body, sleeps, eats, has sex, knits like, makes things like right, that's like a cat, your cat.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
I am a cat, but I'm an indoor cat and okay, so I forgot to tell you the part where I can sit for hours and play like a video game on my phone and completely zone out and be disembodied and dissociated. So, like, that also happens and I'm sitting here talking to you, knitting, having like fully experiencing temperature changes and hearing the sounds that are happening around me, and like looking at my plants and thinking did I give you enough water? Okay, like. So, yeah, I think both things are true and I probably hold on to this old story about myself that I'm very, that I'm almost exclusively cerebral and I'm not actually exclusively cerebral.
Micah Riot:
You're welcome for their reflection.
James-Olivia Chu Hillman:
Thank you.
Micah Riot:
This concludes part one of this absolutely delightful interview. I certainly hope you're just as delighted by this conversation as I was recording it. Find James Olivia Chiu Hillman on Instagram at inquisitive underscore human, and also on their website, which is inquisitivehumancom, and tune in next week for the second and last part of this conversation. Also, please, please, please, subscribe whichever platform you listen to this podcast on. It really helps Subscribe like review. I would really appreciate it. We will talk next week. So much love Peace. Bye now. Bye now. Thanks for everything. I'll see you New week. Coming the week to bring something for you better weather. Just have a wonderful weekend.