David Kim, author of A Kids Book About Change, talks about how everyone goes through change in their own way and at their own pace.
David Kim, author of A Kids Book About Change, talks about how everyone goes through change in their own way and at their own pace.
A Kids Book About Change (view book)
Full Book Description:
Change is impossible to avoid because it happens ALL the time! In this book, the author speaks on how to cope with and embrace life’s changes by recounting personal stories and asking kids pointed questions. Empathetic and encouraging, this book emphasizes talking through life’s many changes with the people you care about and trust.
About the Author:
David Kim was born in Seoul, Korea, but is now pastoring in Silicon Valley where there is constant change! And as a husband and father of two young girls, he is still learning to navigate change with them every day! You can find him @davidjanghyunkim on instagram and davidjanghyunkim.com.
*If you want to be on a future episode of A Kids Book About: The Podcast or if you have a question you’d like us to consider, have a grownup email us at listen@akidspodcastabout.com and we’ll send you the details.
A Kids Book About: The Podcast
S1 E12, David Talks About Change
[INTRODUCTION]
Matthew: What does it mean to go through a change?
Jonah: Going through a change means something is happening. Something is different. Something is changing. Which means something is gonna be different.
Owen: Change is the process of one thing becoming another.
Kai: Everybody goes through change.
David: I think for me, what change is is when something becomes different. So for example, let's say, um, I am five years old and all of a sudden I'm becoming stronger or I'm becoming taller or weaker, whatever that may be, we call that a change: when something becomes different than where it was in the past.
Matthew: Welcome to A Kids Book About: The Podcast! I’m Matthew. I’m a teacher, a librarian, and I’m your host. The voices you heard at the top of our show were from Jonah, Owen, Kai, and David.
Each week we talk about the big things going on in your world with a different author from our A Kids Book About series.
[MEET OUR GUEST]
David: Hi, my name is David Kim and my Korean name is Jang Hyun. And, uh, I am a Korean American father. I have two young girls. They are five and three: Skylar and Zoey. I'm having the time of my life. And I'm also a pastor here in Silicon Valley, San Jose, California.
And I'm the author of A Kids Book About Change.
Matthew: Change. What a huge topic.
We all go through change. We all go through changes. We, ourselves. We, our families. We, our communities.
David: A lot of times we think that change is something that we make to happen, but a lot of times actually change is something that happens to us. It's, it's something that's done unto us. And in life, you grow older when you become five to six, six to seven, you'll see that many of the changes are actually out of our hands. And we are navigating, we're journeying to experience how to interact with various changes that come really outside our world.
Matthew: The transition you feel through change is unique to you and to the specific change you’re going through. So, talking to David, we both felt like the more specific we were in talking about change today, the more you each will be able to connect with the feelings of those specific examples we share.
So let’s start at the beginning of this book, but also at the beginning of David’s life. Or, at least, near the beginning.
David: This is the book that I wish I had navigating change. And I wrote it for my ten-year-old self, moving from Korea to New York City. And if there was a resource for me or my parents... And my parents, they wanted to help me, but they didn't have any resources during the early nineties to help me work through some of these things about feelings and about different circumstances that are changing.
And so I wrote it for my ten-year-old self.
Matthew: There’s no guidebook on change. Maybe the best guide is learning from others as they navigate change or reflecting back on the changes you’ve experienced already.
David: I’ve moved over 22 times in my life. And so that's a lot of changes. A lot of new neighbors, friends, schools,cities. And in my book, I particularly talk about moving from South Korea, Seoul to New York City. And so even change of learning a new language, eating new food, everything, it was such a fun and interesting experience.
Matthew: Moving 22 times is a lot! I was curious if that’s a kind of change you could ever get used to. So I asked David.
David: I have found that every time I move, I am both excited and sad. I am excited for a new adventure ahead, meeting new friends, coworkers, neighbors, and new restaurants and food that may come with it. I'm a big foodie. I love food. But also I've also seen that every time I moved that I'm sad because I am letting go of some of the important things, especially relationships that I may not see for a while and I don't know how long that may be.
Matthew: We put so much of ourselves into relationships, so when you move to someplace new, at least in my experience, it’s hard not to feel like you’re leaving a part of yourself behind.
But at the same time, starting someplace new can come with its own challenges. Ones that can make us question ourselves or the things we love.
David: Yeah, I remember, going back to when I was 10, the first kind of experience that I had bringing my Korean food into school is that I was ashamed of the particular smell. And here’s the interesting thing: I didn't know it smelled until I moved to New York and I saw that, “Oh, it is different. It is unique. Oh, maybe people then therefore, because it's different, it's something wrong. That there's something wrong with my food. That it's something that is something not welcomed into the school.”
And so navigating that was a little bit difficult and experiencing that change was particularly hard for me.
And so therefore I started to eat a lot of American food to almost cover and hide my Korean food. And yeah, I ended up really enjoying the pizza and I was in New York City. So “New York City bagels, New York City pizza... they're the best!” But at the same time I also missed my Korean food.
So I was trying to navigate all of that.
Matthew: Listeners, I’m thinking about where you are in that story that David just shared. Have you moved with your family before? Or have you been in a space where people were questioning the food you ate? Or the language you spoke? Or the way you dressed? Or just how you showed up in a space?
By contrast, have you ever asked these types of questions to someone new in your space?
As you sit with those thoughts, let’s connect by thinking about how going through a change made you feel. Share your response with someone who may be listening with you, and then listen as they share, too.
How does going through change make you feel?
Jonah: Going through a change makes me feel a little happy and a little sad. Sometimes changes can be good changes and sometimes changes can be bad changes.
Owen: Change makes me feel sad because it means one thing has gone. But it sometimes makes me feel happy because maybe that one thing that’s gone is bad but the one thing it changed into is good. So it really just depends on what is changing and what it’s changing into.
Kai: Change can be good. Change can be bad. In the end it’s more or less the same.
David: I think it's different for every person in this world. But for me, I would say uncomfortable is my first feeling that I get because we talked about how change is something that becomes different. And so it's not something that I'm used to. And a lot of things that we're used to, we feel comfortable around it. And so the feeling that I get is, “Oh, I feel uncomfortable.”
Now, because I'm uncomfortable, that can lead to a little bit of fear, anxiety. I may be afraid. I may be just scared or nervous. Or that uncomfortableness may kind of lead me to be curious and see, “Ooh, I wonder what that is?” And “I want to explore that.” And maybe there's something fun or adventurous ahead.
And so those are kind of the things that I feel.
Matthew: We’ll be back in a minute with David - and the answer to a question submitted by a listener - right after this quick break.
[BREAK]
Matthew: Welcome back to A Kids Book About: The Podcast. On today’s episode we’re talking about change with David Kim.
So, here’s a funny thing. Change happens to everyone. Literally everyone. And yet, many of us or maybe even most of us resist change. We try to avoid it. That habit is actually something that connects a lot of us: our resistance to change.
David: I think we resist change because we as human beings like to be comfortable. And when things get slightly uncomfortable, we feel that we need to fight it off or try to make sure that that doesn't come into our territory. And so. by nature, in order for us to survive and be comfortable and be okay, I think we just resist change naturally.
Matthew: Resisting change can look like a lot of different things, but for David (and me, too) it sounds like distraction was a strategy he turned to a lot.
David: Growing up, I didn't know at that time, but I watched a lot of movies, played a lot of video games. I'm not saying those are bad, but I was going through a lot of change and I was using that to make myself feel better about all the changes that I was going through.
But now that I am growing and learning more about how to process it well, I look for a close friend who is a good listener. And I talk to him about some of the things that I am feeling about this particular change and the way he would respond, in care and in empathy and support, that has helped me a lot in my journey.
Matthew: So, here’s a fun fact for you: A Kids Book About Change started out being a book about moving.
David: I was sharing at my local church about all the different changes that I went through in my past and how I negatively coped with it and learning how to positively cope with it. And Jelani, our founder, he got a chance to somehow come across my clip. And he saw that and he said, “Wow, that seems like a kids book about, in the beginning, about moving.
And we started actually having a conversation and more and more that we talked, certainly even though it was centered around my moving, we realized that the bigger human experience is change. And so that's kind of, so we went from moving to talking and writing about change,
[LISTENER QUESTION]
Matthew: Kai, a listener in Montreal, Quebec in Canada, asks this question:
Kai: How many times have you gone through change during your life?
David: Wow! That's a great question. Thanks for asking that. I can answer that in a million ways. I love that and I'm not sure what your, uh, which angle you want me to answer. So I hope I'm doing my best. Here's what I'll say: I've gone through so many changes and I don't even know that I've gone through them.
The immediate thing that comes to my mind is I think I've gone through one or two. Big changes that I still remember how it impacted me.
Matthew: I want to move us, listeners, to talking about what we all can do to help others who are going through a change. But I think it’s important to remind you and to remind myself of how necessary it is that we are able to see one another through the changes others are going through, even and especially if it is not something we have gone through ourselves.
David: So as I shared, I am a Korean American and so in the last, few weeks, few months, our Asian American community have been, we've been hurting a lot due to, uh, increase of, um, just violence. And one of the ways that my friends have helped me in that journey, even now, they said, “David, we have heard about these news that's happening around the country.” And they just said, this: “What can I do to help you?”
And that question alone, even though I didn't have particular answers to that at that moment, felt the world to me. I felt seen, I felt supported and you know, down the road, I had few things that, I did say, but at that moment, even that question alone was an incredible source of encouragement and support.
Matthew: Stop for a moment and say this aloud, “What can I do to help you?”. Say it again, and this time picture someone, anyone at all, who might need to hear it. “What can I do to help you?”
Let those words become your superpower.
David: Noticing what's happening around them and just asking, what can I do? How can I help you? What's going on? I would love to talk with you. Those are things that you can do anywhere.
Matthew: No matter what change you’re going through, I hope that when you get to the other side you find there are friends there to welcome you with care, and empathy, and support, just as David said.
David: What seems like a small change to one may be a big change for another. So let's not judge anyone and let each individual work through that change on their own time, and in their own pace, because I think we all approach it differently.
[CLOSING]
Matthew: Thank you to David Kim, author of A Kids Book About Change, for joining us today. And thanks to our very special kid voices for helping make this episode what it is.
Jonah: Hi. My name is Jonah and I’m 10 years old and I live in Maryland. Some of my favorite things are to play video games.
Owen: Hi. My name is Owen and I am 9 years old and I am from Maryland. I like to draw and read.
Kai: Hi. My name is Kai. I am 8 years old. And I live in Montreal. My favorite thing is Echo VR. It’s a fun game on the Oculus Quest.
Matthew: Thank you, Jonah, Owen, and Kai! If you want to be on a future episode of A Kids Book About: The Podcast or if you have a question you’d like us to consider, have a grownup email us at listen@akidspodcastabout.com and we’ll send you the details.
A Kids Book About: the Podcast is written, edited, and produced by me, Matthew Winner, with help from Chad Michael Snavely and the team at Sound On Studios. Our executive producer is Jelani Memory. And this show was brought to you by A Kids Podcast About.
Subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and wherever podcasts are found, and if you liked this episode, consider sharing it with a friend, teacher, or grownup.
Join us next week for a conversation about Anxiety with A Kids Book About author Ross Szabo.