My name's Nan. I'm a storyteller on Fine and Tell. I'm Australian born Korean and I'm currently living on Gadigle Country. I'd like to recognize the traditional custodians of this continent whose land was stolen nearly two hundred and fifty years ago, in particular the Camaragle and Warneri people, whose Land Is podcast was recorded on and we extended our respect to
all Aboriginal and torrest Right islander peoples. The rich storytelling history of the world's oldest living culture is what we pay homage to when we tell stories on Fine and Tell.
Hello, I'm Jimilla Risby and this is Find and Tell, the search for the next generation of Australian storytellers, and here we are. We started with hundreds of applications from wannabe podcasters from all around Australia. We narrowed it down to just four storytellers who you have gotten to know and fall in love with on the show over the last few weeks, and now now we're down to the
final two, Ben and Mark. All that's standing between them and being crowned our first ever Find and Tell Champion is one last story whoever tells it best will win the crown and they'll take home best in Class podcasting goodies and gear from the team at Rhade Australia and a range of short courses from the Australian Film, Television and Radio School, so our winner can continue to find
and tell stories well into their future. Both Ben and Mark's final theme is lost in translation, and today we're going to hear from Mark. Since his very first story, Mark has been willing to be totally vulnerable with me, with you, our audience. He's shared his experiences as a gay man growing up in the Mormon Church and the
everyday challenges faced by people who are plus size. He's even tickled our nostalgia by bringing up memories of Cosma DeVito's dramatic exit from Australian idol what feels like one hundred years ago. Mark has this natural talent for bringing us the audience into his world. He weaves his humor and his warmth into everything he does, even when he's tackling some really serious subjects. So for the very last time, Mark, welcome back to find and tell Hi.
Oh my goodness, that was a bitter sweet This really is the last time right, it's.
So exciting to see you again. But yeah, knowing this is it, I am so psyched to hear your final story. Tell me, have you developed your storytelling style over that time? Do you feel like you know a bit more about the kind of storyteller you are?
Well, you know, I guess it just depends on the story as well. Some will require a lot of me, some won't. I may just be a platform or I may just be like a conduit. So I think the biggest thing that I've learned really is just to be flexible, to be agile, to take things with grace, and to problem solve in ways that I never thought i'd have to problem solve, like even from a logistical perspective sometimes, particularly with this episode. So yeah, just to be flexible and love the whole process.
In the meantime, the theme for this final episode is lost in translation. When I first told you and Ben the theme where did your Where did your mind go? Did you have a story that came about quickly? Or did you have to go hunting?
Actually, this was the first time that I was stumped. From the very beginning. I think I had I had stories that I wanted to tell, even going into this competition that I was able to work into the incredible themes we've been given before. But this was the first time I was like, oh my goodness, I don't have anything that come immediately to mind, and so I had to work through that freak out first and then eventually like, really back in, have a good solid think to really
just like dig deep and look inwards. And I hope people enjoy listening to me.
Yep, they definitely will. I know that for sure, So let's do it. The theme is lost in translation and Mark this is your fourth and final contribution to Find and Tell.
So I hate being ghosted. I hate being left in the dark. When you're left with gaps of information, you fill it with your own. Is it because I'm fat? I do something wrong and I say something wrong?
Go?
I don't I deserve an explanation. Ghosting can sometimes feel like a stab in the heart. It's so much worse than regular rejection. It's like a rug has been pulled out from under your feet, which really fucking sucks. I remember the very first time I was ghosted. I was twenty one and super fresh to the dating scene. Into that apps, I matched with this cute Filipino guy in
my area and we hit it off. We spoke day night, punding over our love for K pop, and I remember messaging chat tomorrow one evening, but by the next morning his profile was gone. So why do we keep putting ourselves out there? Well, I guess we're all looking for that spark, right, I'm talking Anne Hathaway early two thousands y two k cheesy rum coom spark. To some, it's a kiss that has you kicking your feet up, like in the Princess Diaries.
In old films, whenever a girl get seriously kissed, her foot would just.
Kind of popped, or a sloppy passion the rain like in the Notebook. To others, it's enemies to lovers, cliche like and you've got male or friends to lovers in suddenly thirty, I'm.
Just crying because I'm happy.
I want you to be so so happy. I love you, mad, You're my best friend.
Cheesy, cheesy, I know, but I want that so bad. I want to stroll hand in hand with someone in Central Park. I want to spend hours yapping and explaining and venting. I want that Gilmore Girl's conversation speed where the connection is undeniable and almost unspoken. It's a little sad to admit at twenty eight, but I don't think I've ever felt that spark, at least not in full. I've come really close, but they would all just eventually
fizzle out. But one aspect of dating in twenty twenty four that Renee Zelger and Colin Firth didn't prepare me for was ghosting and fair Bridget Jones's Diary would have been a completely different movie. The ending was Bridget blocking mister Darcy on Tinder. So why do people ghost? And how do we move on? Sometimes I wish I could go back in time, break all the rules and revisit some of my almost not to beg but to just I don't know, find out why why didn't it work out?
If only I had a platform where I talked to people, and if only iHeart was the same company that an old flame now has his own radio show and podcast with, I could reach out and ask the questions I've been wanting to ask.
Oh wait, hang on a minute, Oh god, Oh, I don't know. I feel bad. I feel guilty. I feel bad, Okay, cool, I.
Don't feel guilty. No, that wasn't the intention of this chat at all.
You can grill me.
I'm an open book if you want to grill me. He grilled me, absolutely not. Look so that's Mitch true. He's the night show host on Kiss in Sydney and we matched on Tinder back in twenty seventeen, and from the jump I felt a connection. We would chat for hours and hours and hours, and he got all of my pop culture references. We were right on the cusp of that spark, but that soon dropped off. We'll come back to him later. It's juicy, I know, I know. But before we get there, we got to do some work.
We're going to therapy. I have so many questions about ghosting as a phenomena, and I want to understand why people do it, or if people feel the same way I do. In the aftermath, I first reached out to my mates and ask for their ghost stories.
I've been ghosting so many times I don't know.
Usually it's not like dates with people, and then I think that maybe they're a friend of confrontation or don't want to spend the energy on it. Maybe the same reason I goost people. The sheer number of friends who have been ghosted did not surprise me, But what was surprising was how many had been the ghoste.
So I have ghosted myself just once.
It wasn't fair.
He didn't deserve it, but he was just a nice guy and I was a bit young and a bit silly.
Yeah, I just never messaged again.
I think most people would agree that ghosting isn't the most mature way to end things, but I learned that sometimes ghosting is necessary to keep yourself safe.
On the third day, he invited me to his place. The apartment creeped me out. Basically, I was not feeling it. I was really anxious. My intuition was like, get out of here. He took my phone and wouldn't let me book the obar and I had to like pam my way out of there. And I managed to get out of there. And then he sent me a few messages wanting to meet up again, and I didn't respond.
So is ghosting as black and white, as right or wrong? Some stats on mind found that most people actually think ghosting is appropriate in certain situations, and nearly two and three have ghosted someone else. Almost everyone will experience it at some stage. I guess people just ghosts and that's a reality. But why what are the reasons?
I think you know that I'm about to say this. There is no single answer and there is no simple answer as to why people ghost others.
As promised, here is relational psychologist Smoothly there who practically gave me a free therapy session answering all of my big ticket questions about ghosting. Smoothly helps people who've been impacted by relationships and the trauma that can come with personal displacement. For the Darwin based psych ghosting is so much more complex than we could ever.
Think, and for so many people who ghost, it is about being too overwhelmed to own up and say they don't want to see the other person again. And I want to be clear, this is not an excuse. This is usually the reason they do this. Sometimes it can be too stressful or too uncomfortable to say no. Some people ghost others because they're insecure themselves. They might not be emotionally mature or empathetic, or they might refuse to
take accountability for how their behavior impacts other people. Regardless of intent, this kind of behavior is extremely poor communication. It's hurtful to the other person. Usually, ghosting says more about the person doing the ghosting than the ghosting.
Yeah, that makes sense. I don't need a therapist to tell me that when I get ghosted, I automatically blame myself. And maybe that's why it hurts so much when someone leaves me with no answers. I'm not to find that closure on my own. It brings my deepest insecurities to the surface, and I become my harshest. In our critic for Smithie, this pattern of thinking is what ghosting really taps into.
Someone who gets ghosted, if they already struggle with loneliness or rejection, sensitivity, or self esteem, ghosting can then perpetuate that thinking, and they might internalize the rejection and they might be convinced that somehow they miss the mark or they're not good enough to date. They might start building this narrative in their head, built on confirmation bias, that dating is never going to work out for them, or that they need to change who they are, they need
to change their personality in order to be likable. If somebody tends to have this experience multiple times, and if they are not encouraged to self reflect and think about this from a mental health lens, it just drives them further down a really negative paths.
Those anxious and irrational thought cycles are hard to predict and control, and we may not always have someone else to help us out of them. So then, how do we change that? How do we not internalize the external data we've been given? How do we feel empowered to break these cycles on our own? Look, I think it's time to face the inevitable. We need to look inwards, confront the dark stuff, and work our way to the light.
Except that our feelings may not always be reciprocated, and accept that ghosting is unavoidable, whether that be from a lack of chemistry or a loser with no empathy. So what now? What should we do when we're ghosted? Scream into our pillows, close the curtains and blast olivery of Rodrigo, Cry into a drive through speaker box, Oh just me, Oh my bad. Smoothie suggests that we focus on what's in our control. The way that someone acts on Tinder is not in our control.
You are going to feel some sort of faith if you get ghosted. Let's accept that feelings of feelings and fighting and invalidating your feelings is not going to help. What is going to help is understanding why you feel, how do you feel, and starting to process them. This can include things like self reflection, understanding your triggers, understanding your past experiences how do these shape your current feelings. This might involve not immediately believing your just because someone
did not text you back. It's very easy for us to fall into feeling shame when we perceive ourselves as not being good enough or being unworthy of being responded to, being replied to. I would really encourage people to replace that with what you would tell a friend who got ghosted. It sucks. It's really hard, so remember to be self compassionate.
Being self compassionate will not fix the problem, no, but you know what, it'll give you enough time and space to start feeling like yourself again so that you can then reflect and problem solve and re energize and talk about it.
I'm a big believer in rejection being redirection. If I'm going to be a loyal subscriber to faith and that everything happens for a reason, I must also believe that some connections aren't meant to be. It's not the end of the world, and he it may just not be that into me This might be hard to hear, but surviving a ghosting may require some tough self reflection. I've always struggled with confronting rejection head on. I lose myself in those inner conversations so easily, but to ground myself
I must push through. Smoothie says that self care is a vital part of the process, so I asked her, how can we take better care of ourselves when we're grieving and processing a rejection.
I agree that sometimes it is about having those difficult conversations or honest conversations with yourself, and self care is definitely not about massages and candles date They can be great, but self care has to be sustainable. It is about putting yourself first, about valuing yourself and making a habit out of it.
After chatting with Smithie, I took her advice and started to self reflect. I paused my sixteen three watch of The Devil Wares Prada, opened the curtains, fluffed and reshaped my pillows, and I looked back on my almosts, on the ghosters and on the fizzlers. Some were short lived, some a bit longer. I can forgive most of them and still hurt with the rest. But I can't think
my way through that pain. I have to feel it and then eventually let it go as I work through the self deprecation and the confusion to then eventually find my own approaches to self care. There is one situationship in particular that keeps making a recurring guest appearance in the Rolling rom com in my mind. So let's get back to Mitch, the radio host that I almost felt that spark with, the one I've always wanted to look in the eye and have a conversation with.
This will be fun, fun, I'm say.
Okay, So I'll read the script narration that I have planned for this and then we'll go straight into a chat. Okay, I'm so excited. Okay. So, like I said, things with Mitch started as most modern love stories do, on Tinder in twenty seventeen. This was before he was kiss a Fem's night show host and before he was voted Australia's most relatable media personality. Whatever he was though, the cashcock running errands for Kyle and Jackie. Oh oh god, our
banter was electric. This was the chemistry I'd been waiting for. We both adored sushi and spent so many late nights laughing about musical theater. We shared our dreams and aspirations of living in New York, and we were so hopeful for our features. This went on for a couple of months, and we promised to meet, but things just never worked out and our timing never aligned. Then I started to feel him pull away. Was that accurate? Is that how you remember?
Okay?
Why am I pining for this relationship that never happened.
I'm moaning the loss of the love that I didn't even know existed.
I've got a half erection. I didn't even know it's possible.
I am in love with you all over again, and I do remember it in that way.
There, it is that mixtruy charm. We just bounced off each other so easily. But it was only seven years later, on the other side of that fizzle, that I was comfortable and secure enough to reach out and speak to him again.
I'll be honest, that part of my life was very weird at that point. I was like, send me in the closet. I was using dating and the apps to enter that world. Right. I was just nervous, But I'm a nervous person in general. I don't like letting people down.
Like I still had a minute where I was like, Oh, is it because I'm this or is it because that person is this?
But then like, if you want the answer, how many years later has it been seven years six or seven six or sevenays later? That's not the reason, it's not your beautiful. The connection was really strong and I remember it and it was like I genuinely thought, like, Wow, I'm really enjoying this conversation with this person.
And.
Okay, I need to come clean. I need to come clean. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I can't keep painting sweet Mitchell this way as some dreadful Ghoster because he wasn't one. No Mitch came to the top of my mind because he didn't ghost me. He instead just told me straight up that things were getting serious with another person and that he would just like to be friends.
I remember writing how I actually felt I just want I owed you, I really liked you, and I owed you a genuine reason as to why I wasn't gonna work. It was getting very serious with my then partner, who I stayed with for five years.
So I do remember that.
Yes, well, you know, like the original and immediate reaction was oh my god, this is shitty. But then that only lasted for like two months, less than a month, okay, like forty five minutes.
I'm worth maybe three months.
No, maybe like a minute and a half. Okay, interesting, what you had done was given me an answer? Yeah, I had a thought that I could grasp onto. You didn't leave me in the dark. I was given an uncomfortable answer, but at least I was given one. Yeah, my time for me to move on, find someone else I have better compatibility with.
That's how you do it, guys, Yeah, it's not hard.
By saying the uncomfortable stuff out loud, Mitch had saved me from the blame, the turmoil, the confusion. I felt that with others, but he was one I didn't have to worry about, and I can't thank him enough. He could have left me on red, he could have ghosted, he could have been awful, but he wasn't. Sadly though, Mitch was the exception and not the rule. Some conversations will never be had and some things will get lost in translation, and that has to be Okay, what was
that great saying again? Yeah, rejection is redirection.
Oh well, like that you was at the Darwin Psychologist.
No, it was someone else. It was it was a thirty five year old.
Interest it got it okay and sent me the link.
Shall we call it a rap? Before we roll the final credits, here are some last bits of advice straight from the director. Cut.
Dating is tough. You can't let it get you down. That's not your person. A person's not right for you, or that's not your hook out, that's not the moment, they're not right for you.
You cannot let a little ghosting stop you from dating or going forward.
And let's also be real to the ghosters out there. Ghosting others is not going to make it easier for you to date. People don't like being treated like they're disposable. So unless it has to do with your safety, consider if you can communicate what you're feeling in ways that are clear and non blaming. So practice communicating effectively and assertively.
Everyone deserves today if that's what they want, of course, and if ghosting is an unfortunate inevitability, then we must remain open hearted to keep our peace. Maybe then it's about making sure that the firing you burns bright on its own, so that when the ghost's clear and the sparks come fireworks.
Mark, I can see you smiling. How does it feel listening to that?
That felt so Norah Efron, queen of two thousands of wrong goings?
Hey, there's nothing wrong with having a self comparison to Norah Efron. You did bring all the feelings. You brought all the feelings in that one. And I promise I'm going to get to the podcasting, but I have to ask about the personal stuff first. It would have been confronting reaching out to contact Mitch and ask him to be part of this. How did you do it and how did you kind of get yourself ready to do that?
It was so funny. I think I put off having that initial invite conversation with him, but then this was simply just a matter of like reaching out to him on Instagram like, Hey, I've got this incredible interview coming up and I want you to be part of it. Are you down? And he was so willing to help and so lovely about it. I'm so grateful for him
for his vulnerability as well. It was very healing speaking to him, and to interlace that with what Ruthie was speaking about, it was just I feel like, I've felt a lot of romantic feelings and fragments, and so to have these two conversations really helped provide like a framework to how I emote and how I should move forward and you know, feel my feelings instead of think through them. So yeah, it was such a healing experience speaking to Mitch and then to Smithie as well.
What made you want to tell a story about ghosting and explore the subject.
Well, I am very proudly a hopeless romantic.
I think I got that. I think that came through.
I also would consider myself a late bloomer. I never experienced romantic love when I was younger, which, you know, now navigating this in my twenties, I feel a little bit stumpeded, which sort of overtakes my mind sometimes. When I finally took ownership of sort of my dating life, I found I was encountering ghosters a lot and it bothered me a lot, And I was like, why does this bother me? There are people who are get ghosted and it's not a big deal, But to me, I
was like, why is this the case? And so I really really wanted to like explore this phenomena, learn so much about myself and about how ghosting works, and then take the listeners with me as well, so that it's a big overall learning experience for all of us.
What do you hope that listeners take away from this story?
Look, there are two major takeaways for me, the first being you know what I learned with Smoothie. I think to love yourself is to be uncompromising with your wants and needs. You know, in the meantime, interrogate your feelings, feel them, do your thing. The second thing really is that I am single, I am on the prowl. I'm single and ready to mingle. Yeah. So if there are any queer men who are listening and are interested and have loved my storytelling and my voice, I will happily
do the same in their ear. So if you're interested, reach out. You know, my dms are open.
Oh my god, there's a whole new spinoff podcast that I am seeing that is possible right now, Mark all the producers, they're going to have their inboxes flooded, flooded with requests from admirers of yours and your beautiful voice. I have loved what a great job you have done with all your episodes, and particularly today Thank you so much, Mark.
Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.
Well, folks. Mark has set the bar high and in our final episode we will be hearing from Ben. That's before I decide who is going to be our first ever Find and Tell Champion. It is getting really exciting now everyone, you do not want to miss it. Hit follow in your podcast app now because the epic conclusion to Find and Tell is on the way. Thank you also to Afters and Roade Australia for supporting our storytellers
with some incredible prizes. Find and Tell is a co production between iHeart Australia and the black Cast podcast network. Black Cast empowers First Nations people and people of color to reclaim their narratives, to strengthen cultural identity and contribute to a more inclusive Australia by showcasing exciting emerging talent from Australian communities.