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Episode Transcript
The transcript is computer generated. There may be errors.
Sharad: Hi, everyone. Welcome to how to live a podcast that explores ways to live a good life. I'm your host, Sharad Lal. This is episode 73. Today we have an incredible guest. Emmy nominated Netflix, host entrepreneur and etiquette expert. Sara Jane Ho. Many of you will recognize Sarah from the Netflix show, mind your manners. She's also a pioneer entrepreneur, founding a high-end finishing school in China, which is a fast growing company recognized among the world's top 50 innovative companies. Sarah holds an MBA from Harvard business school. And has been included in Forbes 30, under 30, BBC stops a hundred women. And a global shaper for the world economic forum.
She left her job at an investment bank in New York to start her finishing school in Beijing in our conversation. We explore what etiquettes really mean. How it builds confidence and transforms lives. Cultural differences in manners and Sarah's experience in building the Netflix show.
We'll also get Sarah to share some fun stuff.
Like how to tell a friend politely that they've got food stuck in between their teeth. Talking to Sarah made me realise that beneath manners lies a combination of emotional intelligence, psychology, spirituality, and coaching that can truly transform people's lives. But before we dive in, thank you for your support.
We're in the top 3% of all podcasts globally. Listen to over one in 40 countries. If you haven't already, please do follow us. Now let's welcome. The incredible Sarah Jane Hall.
Sharad: Hi, Sarah. Welcome to the How to Live podcast. How are you doing this afternoon?
Sara Jane Ho: Hey Sharad, it is great to see you and thanks for having me.
Sharad: Thank you for making time. Where do we find you?
Sara Jane Ho: That is a great question. Today I'm in Shanghai but I basically split my time between Shanghai, Hong Kong, LA and New York.
So cool. I'm so glad you could make time for Singapore last week. It was so good seeing you and hearing you speak about your new book. Thank you. Singapore is near and dear to my heart. my Netflix showed did very well there
Sharad: So good. And congratulations, Sarah, on all the good work. But before all that, I'd love to understand where this interest in manners and dignity came from. Where did this start? Is there a personal story which you could share with us?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah,you know I grew up in Hong Kong with my mother being an incredible role model and She was an incredible hostess and an incredible entertainer. She knew how to put people at ease.
She was also very much a tiger mother. So if anybody's teacup was empty, she would be swiftly giving me a kick under the table as a reminder for me to pour tea for somebody. But then sadly, when I was 21 years old, I lost her to cancer and my life completely changed. What was previously a warm and lively home suddenly felt very cold and very empty.
My father didn't entertain in the same way.but then I realised later on, as I was graduating from Harvard Business School and thinking about what career to pursue, I identified an opportunity in China where, you have a lot of people who have newfound status wealth and resources, but they want to know how to move through the world a bit more confidently and gracefully.
What if I combine that need with continuing my mother's legacy?
And so in 2012 I moved to Beijing and opened up my etiquette school.
Sharad: What a powerful story. Thank you for sharing that. And it seems like there was a deeper purpose there. There was a personal story, there was also a business opportunity and that came together in 2012 when you started it. Now it's good to have this inspiration, but when you actually get to it and start setting it up, what was it like?
What were some early challenges, some early wins? What was the process like?
Sara Jane Ho: Maybe I should backtrack a little bit and give some history of China. I often say there's no other country like China that's gone through so much change in such a short amount of time. When you think about the industrial revolution that Europe or the US went through, that took a hundred years, 150 years to play out.
Then we had the services revolution, and then the technological revolution. in China, all those played out in 30 years. So that creates a huge amount of pressure, not just on the government in terms of overpopulation, congestion, pollution, but also on the individual human psyche you have people who grew up very poor, where on their birthday, their parents would give them an egg to eat, that's how poor they were, who suddenly now have all the resources in the world,
So when I moved to China in 2012, it was already an economic power. And all eyes were on China, Chinese people were travelling the world, emigrating, studying abroad, so when I moved over there, I had three tough, big, main challenges.
Firstly, the idea of etiquette in everybody's mind was unclear. If you say the word etiquette to a westerner, they think, oh, rich girls walking around with books on their heads, right? So it's something that's very elevated. Princess Diana went to Swiss finishing school. It was a place where women who back in the day couldn't go to university, where they go to finish, complete their education to become a hostess.
Now in China, when you say the word etiquette, which is li yi, it actually has a very inelegant connotation. People think of, oh, servers at restaurants or one guy told me he thought of car models and string bikinis. so I had to redefine what etiquette was to Chinese people.
And the way I did that was, firstly, I opened my school in the Park Hyatt residences in Beijing, which. in 2012 was the most expensive address in Beijing.secondly, I had the sous chef away from the French embassy, so he came over with his full on top hat and everything. Every day he was making exquisite foods for our ladies.
Thirdly, I worked with really incredible sponsors for furniture and porcelain, so that I was using really top of the line, top quality items. And my school was decked out in a very elegant way, at actually very low cost to me. Now, that was one thing. The second thing was my Mandarin. My mandarin was at best, barely conversational.
I grew up in Hong Kong. We speak Cantonese and when I grew up, I went to an international school and studied in the states where English was my main language. I could barely describe what I was trying to do. one of my old tutors, cause my mom arranged for tutors for me in Mandarin at a young age.
I was trying to explain to her what I was trying to do. And she said, Your Chinese is not where it is for you to do what you're trying to do. How about this? I will send students from Tsinghua university, which is like the MIT of China, to your house. You give them free etiquette lessons and they will help you correct your teaching notes and your PowerPoint.
So for three weeks, I had these students traipsing in and out. They were brilliant.I was teaching them modules from my class. For example, when you're having British afternoon tea, when it comes to eating the scone, you do not cut the scone open with your butter knife, but rather you break the scone open with your hands.
I was teaching that if you eat a piece of pan fried foie gras, When you slice it open with a knife, if there's something runny and gooey coming out, it means that it's actually a very poor quality piece of foie gras and it's poor skill by the chef. Instead, when you eat a piece of pan fried foie gras, it should be cut clean as pudding.
I was teaching them that the proper way to pronounce The name of a particular brand was Versace, not Versas, and not Versa chee. And you can imagine these brilliant PhD engineering kids, just looking at me completely bewildered. And I just looked back at them thinking, Gosh, am I doing the right thing here?
Is there a market here? But they helped me correct my teaching notes, and after that, I did what the best way to learn any foreign language is, rote memorization. I had 30 modules, you could say British afternoon tea, slide six, and I would have just jumped in there like a tape recorder.
So those are my two biggest challenges. Of course, I had a bunch of other challenges too, for example, what should I price it at? There were no comparables. and it was like the wild west. I was Forging my own path, and I was figuring it out as I went along.
As you were speaking, Sarah, I was wondering, you started teaching people the really high end manners, which even many people in Singapore who've grown up well, may not be aware of. but there was also a lot of low hanging fruit. So how did you bring them from where they were?
Sharad: To where they needed to be. Was there a process? Did you have to change your course, the way you taught it? What did you need to do?
Sara Jane Ho: a certain type of person wants to study etiquette. I wasn't taking rogues from the forest. When people come to observe my students, when they see my students, they say, wow, do they even need etiquette? They're already so elegant and beautiful. A type of person that wants to have good manners is already a very good mannered person, is very sensitive to other people, is very meticulous about their appearance and wants to be the best version of themselves.
no one's really forced to come to my school. It's not mandatory education. people who came, It was of their own accord, they were very open minded and open to being malleable.
Sharad: I remember you speaking about a point, which I found very fascinating. It wasn't really the class of people that determined who wanted to have better etiquette, but it was the person themselves. Some people wanted to, some people didn't. If you could talk a little bit more about this.
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah,certainly, I got a lot of criticism opening my school. people saying, Oh, look, she's opening a school teaching French royal manners to Chinese people. What? If anybody even cared to look at my curriculum, they would have seen that we had Chinese etiquette there as well.
I think that it's important to know etiquette for everybody. No matter where you're from in the world, what age you are, what your education etiquette is, it is a tool that we can all use to improve our family lives, our love lives, workplace self, and our best selves when we're travelling or when we're eating.
Sharad: So my response to people's criticism is that they don't actually really understand what I'm doing a lot of the time. Even though my school is high end, a lot of my books and social media content are very accessible and free, So maybe we double click into that, Sarah. What exactly are etiquettes to you? How have you seen that maybe make a difference in self worth and confidence for people?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, sometimes some people will come up to me and say, Sarah Jane, I have really bad etiquette because I'm too honest. this person doesn't quite understand what the spirit of etiquette is. People think that it's restricting, that it's limiting, that it's one big don't. people think, oh, it means that I can't say what I really mean.
But actually, it's the opposite. Etiquette is empowering. It's one big thing. Etiquette lets you, in a room, identify somebody who's interesting or important to you and that you want to go over and initiate conversation with. It gives you the tools and confidence to do that. Etiquette also is able to give you the tools to know when you should end a conversation with that person instead of hanging on to their ear going on and on with them.
until they're sick of you by knowing when to elegantly end that conversation and how to end that conversation so that person's still interested in you and does want to follow up and meet you again. Etiquette lets you set boundaries, say no to things that you don't want to do
I always try to say I'm not teaching ethics. Ethics should not be confused with etiquette. I'm not trying to be holier than thou and tell you how to be a better person. I'm not interested in that. How you want to live your life is up to you. But what I am giving you by etiquette is a skill set, to be more popular, to be well liked, to have more satisfying human connections and interactions, and ultimately achieve a sense of belonging.
Now when you ask how it has empowered some people's lives, I have a case study. I like to talk about it, and it's a student of mine. Her name is Jingjing.she was actually sent to me by her father. Her father is a very successful businessman. In China, she was very shy.
She was so shy that she would only speak in a whisper. She could barely be heard, and she signed up for private one on one classes with me. When she spoke to me, I would keep asking her to repeat what she said, but louder. I'd say, I can't hear you, say it again louder. And I said, yell.
Just yell it at me. Her yell was my normal. What's interesting is that people who are incredibly shy, or people who don't like to speak to other people, it's either because of two things. One is fear, so they're really afraid. The other one is They're afraid of offending the other person by something that they'll say.
Both of them come from insecurity. When I took Jingjing to a restaurant for lunch, we were already eating and she said, Oh, the food's good. I said, look this over in the eye and smile and tell him, the food is very good.
She didn't quite make it the first time around and then he left. I said it's okay when he comes back to try it again. Second time around she did it and when she saw how his face lit up, how happy he was to hear that she enjoyed the food, you could see her face light up too. Then when we left I said go to the maitre d and tell her that you really like the restaurant here and you plan on coming back again soon.
And she did it. again same positive response. I said, I'm going to give you 30 days of homework. Every day, I want you to initiate conversation with a stranger. I don't care if it's a cleaning lady in your building, or if it's Person sitting next to you on the plane. Do it daily and report to me weekly.
Now, when she flew back to her hometown after taking the class. She sat next to someone on the plane and ended up chatting with them the whole time and even added WeChat and became friends. And now when she gets into cars, cabs, she chooses to opt to sit in the front row so that she can speak to the cabbie.
And I was like, that's interesting. By the end of the month, she told me that she went for a haircut. And the hairdresser told her she was an outgoing and friendly girl. She said that she cried because nobody had ever called her outgoing and friendly or lovely in her whole life.
Sharad: What a beautiful story. When you see this change happening in the front seat, what does it do to you?
Sara Jane Ho: It makes my work very meaningful. My classes are not very big. they're either one on ones or they're under 10 people per class. so I form very strong bonds with each of my students and their struggles become my struggles, their joys become my joys. Actually, it emotionally does take a lot out of me when I teach because there's so much energy being exchanged.
And usually off the day of teaching, I just can't even speak. I just sit on the sofa and lie down. But just the joy of knowing that I helped effect change in one person's life makes. Everything I do, all the more worth it. It makes me want to help the next person, and the next person, and the next person.
so beautiful. It's a little bit like coaching where you want other people to succeed, but there's self management, you let them do it on their own versus kind of telling them the path. But at the same time, you clear your energy and go on the next day.
Sharad: Is it that kind of a thing? Have you seen your skills and energy improving as you've done this over a longer period of time?
Sara Jane Ho: That's exactly how it is. People come for etiquette, but they really come for so much more, and they get so much more, I'm thinking about what you said about energy. It does take up a lot of energy, and I think that's why it's also important for me Especially when I teach, let's say, a couple days in a row to have a day off and do nothing.
And actually what I do is I do a lot of reflection. I reflect on, huh, when that student responded that way, what is really going on in her life? Or, when she told me an issue of hers or a goal of hers, like, how can I help her?They say that service is solutions oriented. I am always trying to help my students find solutions to their problems.
or help them achieve their dreams. One of my students was a yoga teacher, and after she took the course, she actually broke out and started her own yoga studio. She said that taking the course gave her the strength and inspiration to start her own yoga studio. She ended up using my designer. She used my interior designer that I used for my school.
I helped her think of the name, then, a year later, she was running a small team of 10 people and then having some management issues. So I told her to go sign up for an executive MBA. so she did. she was also very unhappy in this sort of dead end relationship where she was growing and self improving, but her partner was not.
when she went to the EMBA, she actually broke up with him and met a new boyfriend and then got married and had a child. So a lot of them say that taking my class is just a small spark that leads to great change in their lives.
Sharad: That's so wonderful. etiquette has so many things in the background. There's EQ, like you said, being able to see who you want to talk to and how to have a good conversation. There's. Therapy there where you need to do work on yourself.
There's coaching there to move forward and take the next step. There's so many of these disciplines. Did it come to you naturally as when you observed your mother do these things? Did you have to learn some part of it? How did all these things come to you?
Sara Jane Ho: That's a great question. And I think it really is a result of living my life. I do believe upbringing is very important. My mom always said, live like a local. And her answer to any question I had, whether we were travelling, Oh, what restaurant do we go to? What would this actually live like a local, what would a local do? Then my father always said, the world is your playground, go explore. He was my role model in terms of treating everybody he came across, no matter if it was the cleaning lady, or if it was Margaret Thatcher, who he'd met, treating everybody with the same courtesy and respect.
I just feel very lucky that I had two such parents. That's also why I decided not to teach kids, But to start with adults. A lot of our customers are young mothers. I think that a mother is the single most influential person in a child's life. you can teach a kid something, but if they go home and it's just done differently, then There's no point, but if you begin with a parent the home is like that and Chinese women are some of the most resilient
They're always learning something new, always trying to become better versions of themselves. That's a Chinese woman for you So I would say each and every one of my students is extremely inspiring.
Sharad: Recently, I think three years back, the Netflix series Mind Your Manners started. How did that come about?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, it came out two years ago so the Netflix show Mind Your Manners came out at the end of 2022. People always ask, how did you get a Netflix show? I wasn't really looking for it. I was just doing my etiquette school day in, day out, working my butt off. then a production house based in Singapore called Beach House Productions, they called me up.
They actually emailed my info email, cold emailed me, we had some calls, they said, we think what you're doing is really interesting, do you mind if we pitch you an idea to some streaming platforms? I said sure, and Netflix bought the show so it's a Netflix original. I feel very lucky and very grateful to Netflix.
Netflix is very good at finding new ways of telling stories. I think that if, You pitch it to any other streaming platform, they probably would have said, Oh, it's etiquette. So old fashioned, so restricting, so limiting. Netflix was able to see what I do on a deeper level, which is etiquette as the utmost form of wellness.
It's a way to promote genuine and healthy individual growth. For anybody who's seen my show, which is a makeover reality show, it's a very positive feel good show. People always say that they laugh And learn a lot. The proudest thing I can say is that all my students, they say, Sarah Jane's classes are, I learned a lot and I laugh a lot.
That's the best when you have fun while you're learning.
Sharad: I loved how this articulation of etiquette related to wellness and becoming a better version of yourself. I'm really interested to know how this came about. How did this evolve to this sentence? How did you get there?
Sara Jane Ho: What's fun is that I didn't even realise it myself until after the show came out. And a freshman, an 18 year old girl at my alma mater, she was studying at Georgetown university. She cold emailed me she said, it's fascinating to see your portrayal of etiquette is the utmost form of wellness.
I wrote back to her and I said, you hit the nail on the head. You, like, elucidated it for me better than myself. I said, can I use this phrase going forwards? And she said, I'm flattered. So. Some things, it's like I'm doing them, I'm doing, I'm doing them, but then I need that aha moment from maybe an independent observer, or maybe it's just a lull in my day, or I'm sitting in a car, and I just think of something, and it's just that aha moment, like this is what I've been doing.
Sharad: That is so cool. such a wonderful experience. One of the things that I also find fascinating about your journey was purpose. As I understand it, let me know if that's right or wrong. One part of your purpose was helping people elevate themselves exactly the way you described it.
And then another purpose came about bringing Chinese culture out to the world. So I'd love to hear your thoughts and purpose and how it's evolved over time.
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, when I think about my career for the past decade, it's really been across two realms. One realm is bridging East and West, which you can see in my school, in my show, in my content, in my book. And that's because I'm a product of East and West. I was raised between both. I spent most of my education in the West and then I spent a lot of my adult life in the East.
The other realm of my career is empowering women to move through the world more confidently and again with my etiquette school with my content and With now my new brand called Anti Voter Laboratories.
So in my Netflix show, as part of my makeover for my students, I took them to go experience traditional Chinese medicine. That included acupuncture, drinking Chinese herbs, I would feng shui their home, And I didn't anticipate that a lot of my Western audience really leaned into that, and I was getting all these DMs from them saying, Your show opened my eyes to Chinese culture.
Please recommend a TCM doctor, just like the one you have in the show. I live in Orlando, Florida. I would get that from people in Poland, in Mexico, all over the world. So then as I was thinking, what is really meaningful to me and traditional Chinese medicine is something that makes me happy and healthy. if only I could find a way to bring that to women from all over the world.
So I got together with my friend, Annie, who is the co-founder.
Her family business is traditional Chinese medicine, her grandpa. Open TCM clinics in Taiwan in the 1940s that are still operational to this day. we actually bonded over our love for TCM. We were always swapping TCM info. I go to her acupuncture class.
She goes to my bone setter. we thought,what can we do that's really meaningful for us as international Chinese women, that brings the best of Chinese culture out. So we launched Antevorta, which is a feminine care wellness brand inspired by traditional Chinese medicine.
We have intimate cleansing gel, intimate spray and intimate wipes, which are great because summer is just around the corner. All our products help fight odour, dryness, and irritation of a woman's vulva, which is something that women across all ages and all ethnicities experience at some point in their lives.
It could be something as simple as just drinking too much alcohol, or travelling and being stressed out, or taking Western medications, or antidepressants, those really dry you out, or hitting, Menopause which every woman is bound to hit at some point, but a lot of women are going to early menopause now we wanted to say something that was formerly taboo, especially in Asian culture and put it front and centre and Think about how we can better understand and care for women's bodies.
Sharad: That's such a great initiative. We will have links to where people can get the products. I know it's available online. Is it available all over the world? People listening to it? Will they be able to click the link and buy those products?
Sara Jane Ho: Yes, it's available to most countries around the world.
Sharad: I'm always interested in people who've grown up in multiple cultures. I don't know whether it's right to say, but you seem to be leaning into the Chinese part of your heritage and bringing it out to the world.
Is that true? Has that been conscious? How's identity and where are you leaning right now? How does that work?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, I grew up on herbal remedies, because I grew up in Hong Kong,
so ever since I can remember, I think maybe I was five years old when I first drank my first herbal Chinese soup, mainly because I'm an only child, and my parents were always on the hunt for the next best TCM doctor, and since they were getting it, and I would be with them, They'd be, let's get our daughter checked out too.
Feel her pulse, give her some herbs. so it's second nature to me. when I go into someone's home, if I see something, for example, a mirror that's not placed well, or a cactus or something I'm very sensitive to the feng shui of that. Every time I go to my friend's home, I'll always point out some things or they'll ask me.
And, I find it quite fun. so it's second nature to me. I didn't even notice that it was that Chinese of me until I went to the West and began doing that. But what is interesting is that the West has really leaned into eastern healing practices, especially these couple of years.
There's a great mistrust of big pharma, You have the whole Purdue Sackler crisis going on. The amount of medication people take is crazy in the States. So there's starting to be a trend towards holistic and finding other alternatives. I think the success of Korean beauty has made the American consumer receptive to Asian beauty. I'd say like more than half of my girlfriends in the States. Even those who haven't ever set foot in China, we're all going to acupuncture for fertility.
Sharad: Hmm.
Sara Jane Ho: So if you're trying to have a kid acupuncture is like one of the top things that you have to do.
When I go to my girlfriend's homes in the States, girls from Texas who went to Harvard Business School or work in the art field, and they're really good girlfriends of mine. they're like, do you want some of my Chinese tea?
Sharad: It's from my Chinese doctor. And I'm like, what? This is amazing. Or they're saying, I'm going to my acupuncturist now. It's amazing. That is so cool. And you're talking about Feng Shui and changing people's houses. I got your book home. It's a funny story. My wife started reading it and suddenly my house has changed. Things have been moved around and She's already started doing some things. I haven't gone into the details and we haven't had a conversation because it's quite recent, but really cool stuff.
Sara Jane Ho: I love that. What did she move?
Sharad: So she's moved the desk. One very visible thing, we had a little room where the desk was facing the wall. She's moved it and now there's such a beautiful view. We face a little bit of the greenery, It's not facing the wall. I think there's a lot more space and air that flows through it.
I feel it. So yeah, that's one big thing that I've noticed. There are a lot of subtle things which I haven't really noticed, but which I know have been done.
Sara Jane Ho: That makes me so happy to hear that. See you just telling me that about your wife and how she's already affected change and you can feel it in your house. That to me makes writing a book worthwhile.
Sharad: People should read the book and we are also going to have the links to the show notes. Everyone's heard of Feng Shui, but for people who do not know the depth of it, is there a simple way of understanding what Feng Shui really is? What's the underlying concept?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, feng shui. Feng means wind. Shui means water. So it's wind water. When it comes to feng shui, there are actually five elements. jing mu shui huo tu, metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. It's about things being in balance.
It's about how you place objects in your home that just make the energy of your home feel good. What feng shui can also do is to minimise the downsides in your life and maximise the upsides.
Because each cycle is 12 years. And that's why when you think of Chinese astrology, there are 12 animals and everyone in all their lives will go through ups and downs. Your life is your destiny. You can't actually change your life, your destiny that much. Some people say you can, but that gets a bit complicated.
But what you can do with Feng Shui is that you can minimise downsides and maximise upsides. That's how I like to think of it. The best way is there are standard things that work for everybody. For example, In your bedroom, do not have a mirror that reflects onto the bed.
Because that means that a third party will always be trying to interfere in your relationship. In the States, a lot of bedrooms have sliding closet doors that are mirrors that reflect onto the bed. And in fact, when I shot my Netflix show, I stayed in an exquisite service apartment, but it had that.
So what I did was I spent six weeks sleeping on one sliver of the bed that was the only sliver that was not reflected on by the mirror. So that stuff applies to all people. if you put dead or dried flowers, or cactuses in your home, that brings dead and dried energy.
So like chi cannot flow, It's like stagnant. if above your bed you have a fan or a decorative object or a light. so it's right over your body when you lie down. That'll bring illness because it creates pressure. But then there's a lot of feng shui around the home that should be customised.
In the later episodes of my Mind Your Manor show, notably episode six, we invite a feng shui master to do over one of my students' homes and he needs her ba zi. Ba means eight, zi is character. So the eight characters that are the year, month, day, and time of birth. Time of birth is extremely important for feng shui to be able to calculate all this stuff accurately.
usually you have to get it from the whole household, whoever lives in the home. then based on that, they'll say, so and so's bedroom should be in the east corner, or your table should be facing whatever, or you should put water here or there, et cetera. So there's part of it that is standardised, And the other part of it, this should be customised.
Sharad: We're starting our journey based on your book, and I'm sure we'll get there. So very fascinating. As you develop your business, Sarah, I was wondering, how do you balance the purpose that's behind the business and ambition? You've gone to Harvard Business School, you're an ambitious person.
How do those two things come together? And is there a balance?
Sara Jane Ho: I'm probably the only graduate of Harvard Business School that has a career in etiquette. And vice versa! probably the only etiquette expert in the world that went to Harvard Business School. And, I enjoy pursuing my passions. And I don't really care what other people think of me.
I enjoy doing the unexpected, actually. So I enjoy being the Harvard Business School grad who moved to China and opened Etiquette School. I enjoy being the etiquette expert that has founded a product for your vulva. Again, it's so unexpected. I just want to keep doing that in my life because that pushes me to do new things and learn new things.
I'm the kind of person where if I'm not learning anything new, I get bored because there's no personal growth. And that's why, even though I still stay within the realm of etiquette. I've come out, I've gone from just training to publishing to media to all these other things still around etiquette, which I love, but also learning and exploring different industries and expanding my reach through those.
Sharad: very exciting. Maybe we have some fun questions for you, before we end, What's the most awkward etiquette mistake you've personally made?
Sara Jane Ho: Oh, I make so many, Shirad. It's really hard to pinpoint one. I probably make one a day.
I have plenty of weaknesses and plenty of faults, I by no means think of myself as a perfect person. I just don't dwell on my mistakes.
So when they occur, I'm the first one to see it, know that I did wrong, take accountability, apologise where needed, and provide solutions where needed. then put in things or framework that will make sure it won't happen again, or be more mindful.
But then I don't dwell on it. So I don't really remember them. Like I'm somebody who's very forward looking.
Sharad: That's the learning mindset. You're learning, but you're not getting caught up with failure. So yes. What's the lesson? What do I learn? I move forward. What a wonderful trait. I have this other question because I asked some friends that I'm going to be interviewing Sarah Jane Ho. What's one etiquette question you should throw to them? And this could be common, but I'll just put it out there. When you see someone eating food in front of you with food stuck in their teeth, how do you politely tell them?
Sara Jane Ho: That's a great question. let's say it's just one on one, then I like to say, yes, and this movie we watched was so good. Oh, by the way, you just have something in your tooth here. Anyway, so this movie that I was saying, Angelina Jolie was a maid, right? So that way you're sandwiching it and you're not putting the focus.
If you just say, Oh, you have something in your tooth. the conversation doesn't move on. All the attention, everybody's basking in that embarrassment.Now, if it's in a group setting and you're sitting maybe across the table and you don't want to, say it in front of other people, what you can do is catch that person's eye, just point.
Sharad: And immediately that person will know. That's cool. I love both of them. I love the first one. Like, by the way, it's not a big deal. and just keep going on. So that the attention is not on that person.
I have one more that, Claude, I like Claude, more than chatting on GPT. The AI system recommended that I ask you, you've gone out for dinner.
you're sitting with the host. Who's made a special dish for you and he's eating it. But it's smelling yucky and you can't get yourself to eat it. You're sitting next to that person. The person's really enjoying it. What do you do?
Sara Jane Ho: That's a great question. I will usually not blame it on the food. I'll blame it on myself. I'll say, Oh, I just had such a big lunch today. I wish I could finish this, but I'm just really struggling. Or I'll say, yeah, I had some food poisoning the other day and I'm still recovering. I wish I could finish this.
It's so delicious.
Sharad: Thank you for that. I have two last questions, just as we wrap up. Bottom line, what's the one piece of advice you'd like to leave people with?
Sara Jane Ho: I would say, don't take things too seriously, because in the grand scheme of things, nothing is really life or death. Even when people say, when you have meals with other people, are you really offended by their bad etiquette? Not at all. I completely turn it off, because to me it's in the grand scheme of things,
Unless they ask me, or they pay me, I'm not going to be sitting there judging and being offended by things. So I think the most important thing in life is just to not take things too seriously. You have to have fun in life. It's really all about your mindset and how you think about the world and surrounding yourself with other people who are positive, who are inspiring, and who aren't taking things too seriously.
Because if you aren't having fun in life, then how are you ever going to learn?
Sharad: What a wonderful point. The last question, Sarah, I ask everyone, a serious question. like at the end of your life, how would you know you've lived a good life?
Sara Jane Ho: Being surrounded by just a handful of good friends and good family.that's all I know to have lived a good life, and to not have to think when I want to do something. to be able to make a trip, or take a nap, or take a break, or see somebody without any hesitation or anything holding me back. the freedom to enjoy life as I want to enjoy it.
Sharad: Thank you very much, Sarah, for making time with us. What a wonderful conversation. Congratulations again on All the wonderful work you're doing, getting people to be more confident and creating new products for everyone. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Sharad. Thank you for having me. Thank you, Sarah, for such a fun and insightful conversation. For more on Sarah to order her book.
Or order her wellness products, Please check out the show notes. Here's something we could all reflect on. I see a link between etiquettes and empathy.
How can we use etiquettes to add more empathy to our life? Let's say we have to have a difficult conversation with someone. How can we use manners to do it better to do it with empathy?
Are there any other areas in life where etiquettes can add to a life to make it a little more meaningful? Let's think about this. Best of luck. I hope you enjoyed the episode. The next one will drop two weeks from now on August 30th. Do join us for that.
Till next time, have a wonderful day ahead. Bye bye.
The transcript is computer generated. There may be errors.
Sharad: Hi, everyone. Welcome to how to live a podcast that explores ways to live a good life. I'm your host, Sharad Lal. This is episode 73. Today we have an incredible guest. Emmy nominated Netflix, host entrepreneur and etiquette expert. Sara Jane Ho. Many of you will recognize Sarah from the Netflix show, mind your manners. She's also a pioneer entrepreneur, founding a high-end finishing school in China, which is a fast growing company recognized among the world's top 50 innovative companies. Sarah holds an MBA from Harvard business school. And has been included in Forbes 30, under 30, BBC stops a hundred women. And a global shaper for the world economic forum.
She left her job at an investment bank in New York to start her finishing school in Beijing in our conversation. We explore what etiquettes really mean. How it builds confidence and transforms lives. Cultural differences in manners and Sarah's experience in building the Netflix show.
We'll also get Sarah to share some fun stuff.
Like how to tell a friend politely that they've got food stuck in between their teeth. Talking to Sarah made me realise that beneath manners lies a combination of emotional intelligence, psychology, spirituality, and coaching that can truly transform people's lives. But before we dive in, thank you for your support.
We're in the top 3% of all podcasts globally. Listen to over one in 40 countries. If you haven't already, please do follow us. Now let's welcome. The incredible Sarah Jane Hall.
Sharad: Hi, Sarah. Welcome to the How to Live podcast. How are you doing this afternoon?
Sara Jane Ho: Hey Sharad, it is great to see you and thanks for having me.
Sharad: Thank you for making time. Where do we find you?
Sara Jane Ho: That is a great question. Today I'm in Shanghai but I basically split my time between Shanghai, Hong Kong, LA and New York.
So cool. I'm so glad you could make time for Singapore last week. It was so good seeing you and hearing you speak about your new book. Thank you. Singapore is near and dear to my heart. my Netflix showed did very well there
Sharad: So good. And congratulations, Sarah, on all the good work. But before all that, I'd love to understand where this interest in manners and dignity came from. Where did this start? Is there a personal story which you could share with us?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah,you know I grew up in Hong Kong with my mother being an incredible role model and She was an incredible hostess and an incredible entertainer. She knew how to put people at ease.
She was also very much a tiger mother. So if anybody's teacup was empty, she would be swiftly giving me a kick under the table as a reminder for me to pour tea for somebody. But then sadly, when I was 21 years old, I lost her to cancer and my life completely changed. What was previously a warm and lively home suddenly felt very cold and very empty.
My father didn't entertain in the same way.but then I realised later on, as I was graduating from Harvard Business School and thinking about what career to pursue, I identified an opportunity in China where, you have a lot of people who have newfound status wealth and resources, but they want to know how to move through the world a bit more confidently and gracefully.
What if I combine that need with continuing my mother's legacy?
And so in 2012 I moved to Beijing and opened up my etiquette school.
Sharad: What a powerful story. Thank you for sharing that. And it seems like there was a deeper purpose there. There was a personal story, there was also a business opportunity and that came together in 2012 when you started it. Now it's good to have this inspiration, but when you actually get to it and start setting it up, what was it like?
What were some early challenges, some early wins? What was the process like?
Sara Jane Ho: Maybe I should backtrack a little bit and give some history of China. I often say there's no other country like China that's gone through so much change in such a short amount of time. When you think about the industrial revolution that Europe or the US went through, that took a hundred years, 150 years to play out.
Then we had the services revolution, and then the technological revolution. in China, all those played out in 30 years. So that creates a huge amount of pressure, not just on the government in terms of overpopulation, congestion, pollution, but also on the individual human psyche you have people who grew up very poor, where on their birthday, their parents would give them an egg to eat, that's how poor they were, who suddenly now have all the resources in the world,
So when I moved to China in 2012, it was already an economic power. And all eyes were on China, Chinese people were travelling the world, emigrating, studying abroad, so when I moved over there, I had three tough, big, main challenges.
Firstly, the idea of etiquette in everybody's mind was unclear. If you say the word etiquette to a westerner, they think, oh, rich girls walking around with books on their heads, right? So it's something that's very elevated. Princess Diana went to Swiss finishing school. It was a place where women who back in the day couldn't go to university, where they go to finish, complete their education to become a hostess.
Now in China, when you say the word etiquette, which is li yi, it actually has a very inelegant connotation. People think of, oh, servers at restaurants or one guy told me he thought of car models and string bikinis. so I had to redefine what etiquette was to Chinese people.
And the way I did that was, firstly, I opened my school in the Park Hyatt residences in Beijing, which. in 2012 was the most expensive address in Beijing.secondly, I had the sous chef away from the French embassy, so he came over with his full on top hat and everything. Every day he was making exquisite foods for our ladies.
Thirdly, I worked with really incredible sponsors for furniture and porcelain, so that I was using really top of the line, top quality items. And my school was decked out in a very elegant way, at actually very low cost to me. Now, that was one thing. The second thing was my Mandarin. My mandarin was at best, barely conversational.
I grew up in Hong Kong. We speak Cantonese and when I grew up, I went to an international school and studied in the states where English was my main language. I could barely describe what I was trying to do. one of my old tutors, cause my mom arranged for tutors for me in Mandarin at a young age.
I was trying to explain to her what I was trying to do. And she said, Your Chinese is not where it is for you to do what you're trying to do. How about this? I will send students from Tsinghua university, which is like the MIT of China, to your house. You give them free etiquette lessons and they will help you correct your teaching notes and your PowerPoint.
So for three weeks, I had these students traipsing in and out. They were brilliant.I was teaching them modules from my class. For example, when you're having British afternoon tea, when it comes to eating the scone, you do not cut the scone open with your butter knife, but rather you break the scone open with your hands.
I was teaching that if you eat a piece of pan fried foie gras, When you slice it open with a knife, if there's something runny and gooey coming out, it means that it's actually a very poor quality piece of foie gras and it's poor skill by the chef. Instead, when you eat a piece of pan fried foie gras, it should be cut clean as pudding.
I was teaching them that the proper way to pronounce The name of a particular brand was Versace, not Versas, and not Versa chee. And you can imagine these brilliant PhD engineering kids, just looking at me completely bewildered. And I just looked back at them thinking, Gosh, am I doing the right thing here?
Is there a market here? But they helped me correct my teaching notes, and after that, I did what the best way to learn any foreign language is, rote memorization. I had 30 modules, you could say British afternoon tea, slide six, and I would have just jumped in there like a tape recorder.
So those are my two biggest challenges. Of course, I had a bunch of other challenges too, for example, what should I price it at? There were no comparables. and it was like the wild west. I was Forging my own path, and I was figuring it out as I went along.
As you were speaking, Sarah, I was wondering, you started teaching people the really high end manners, which even many people in Singapore who've grown up well, may not be aware of. but there was also a lot of low hanging fruit. So how did you bring them from where they were?
Sharad: To where they needed to be. Was there a process? Did you have to change your course, the way you taught it? What did you need to do?
Sara Jane Ho: a certain type of person wants to study etiquette. I wasn't taking rogues from the forest. When people come to observe my students, when they see my students, they say, wow, do they even need etiquette? They're already so elegant and beautiful. A type of person that wants to have good manners is already a very good mannered person, is very sensitive to other people, is very meticulous about their appearance and wants to be the best version of themselves.
no one's really forced to come to my school. It's not mandatory education. people who came, It was of their own accord, they were very open minded and open to being malleable.
Sharad: I remember you speaking about a point, which I found very fascinating. It wasn't really the class of people that determined who wanted to have better etiquette, but it was the person themselves. Some people wanted to, some people didn't. If you could talk a little bit more about this.
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah,certainly, I got a lot of criticism opening my school. people saying, Oh, look, she's opening a school teaching French royal manners to Chinese people. What? If anybody even cared to look at my curriculum, they would have seen that we had Chinese etiquette there as well.
I think that it's important to know etiquette for everybody. No matter where you're from in the world, what age you are, what your education etiquette is, it is a tool that we can all use to improve our family lives, our love lives, workplace self, and our best selves when we're travelling or when we're eating.
Sharad: So my response to people's criticism is that they don't actually really understand what I'm doing a lot of the time. Even though my school is high end, a lot of my books and social media content are very accessible and free, So maybe we double click into that, Sarah. What exactly are etiquettes to you? How have you seen that maybe make a difference in self worth and confidence for people?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, sometimes some people will come up to me and say, Sarah Jane, I have really bad etiquette because I'm too honest. this person doesn't quite understand what the spirit of etiquette is. People think that it's restricting, that it's limiting, that it's one big don't. people think, oh, it means that I can't say what I really mean.
But actually, it's the opposite. Etiquette is empowering. It's one big thing. Etiquette lets you, in a room, identify somebody who's interesting or important to you and that you want to go over and initiate conversation with. It gives you the tools and confidence to do that. Etiquette also is able to give you the tools to know when you should end a conversation with that person instead of hanging on to their ear going on and on with them.
until they're sick of you by knowing when to elegantly end that conversation and how to end that conversation so that person's still interested in you and does want to follow up and meet you again. Etiquette lets you set boundaries, say no to things that you don't want to do
I always try to say I'm not teaching ethics. Ethics should not be confused with etiquette. I'm not trying to be holier than thou and tell you how to be a better person. I'm not interested in that. How you want to live your life is up to you. But what I am giving you by etiquette is a skill set, to be more popular, to be well liked, to have more satisfying human connections and interactions, and ultimately achieve a sense of belonging.
Now when you ask how it has empowered some people's lives, I have a case study. I like to talk about it, and it's a student of mine. Her name is Jingjing.she was actually sent to me by her father. Her father is a very successful businessman. In China, she was very shy.
She was so shy that she would only speak in a whisper. She could barely be heard, and she signed up for private one on one classes with me. When she spoke to me, I would keep asking her to repeat what she said, but louder. I'd say, I can't hear you, say it again louder. And I said, yell.
Just yell it at me. Her yell was my normal. What's interesting is that people who are incredibly shy, or people who don't like to speak to other people, it's either because of two things. One is fear, so they're really afraid. The other one is They're afraid of offending the other person by something that they'll say.
Both of them come from insecurity. When I took Jingjing to a restaurant for lunch, we were already eating and she said, Oh, the food's good. I said, look this over in the eye and smile and tell him, the food is very good.
She didn't quite make it the first time around and then he left. I said it's okay when he comes back to try it again. Second time around she did it and when she saw how his face lit up, how happy he was to hear that she enjoyed the food, you could see her face light up too. Then when we left I said go to the maitre d and tell her that you really like the restaurant here and you plan on coming back again soon.
And she did it. again same positive response. I said, I'm going to give you 30 days of homework. Every day, I want you to initiate conversation with a stranger. I don't care if it's a cleaning lady in your building, or if it's Person sitting next to you on the plane. Do it daily and report to me weekly.
Now, when she flew back to her hometown after taking the class. She sat next to someone on the plane and ended up chatting with them the whole time and even added WeChat and became friends. And now when she gets into cars, cabs, she chooses to opt to sit in the front row so that she can speak to the cabbie.
And I was like, that's interesting. By the end of the month, she told me that she went for a haircut. And the hairdresser told her she was an outgoing and friendly girl. She said that she cried because nobody had ever called her outgoing and friendly or lovely in her whole life.
Sharad: What a beautiful story. When you see this change happening in the front seat, what does it do to you?
Sara Jane Ho: It makes my work very meaningful. My classes are not very big. they're either one on ones or they're under 10 people per class. so I form very strong bonds with each of my students and their struggles become my struggles, their joys become my joys. Actually, it emotionally does take a lot out of me when I teach because there's so much energy being exchanged.
And usually off the day of teaching, I just can't even speak. I just sit on the sofa and lie down. But just the joy of knowing that I helped effect change in one person's life makes. Everything I do, all the more worth it. It makes me want to help the next person, and the next person, and the next person.
so beautiful. It's a little bit like coaching where you want other people to succeed, but there's self management, you let them do it on their own versus kind of telling them the path. But at the same time, you clear your energy and go on the next day.
Sharad: Is it that kind of a thing? Have you seen your skills and energy improving as you've done this over a longer period of time?
Sara Jane Ho: That's exactly how it is. People come for etiquette, but they really come for so much more, and they get so much more, I'm thinking about what you said about energy. It does take up a lot of energy, and I think that's why it's also important for me Especially when I teach, let's say, a couple days in a row to have a day off and do nothing.
And actually what I do is I do a lot of reflection. I reflect on, huh, when that student responded that way, what is really going on in her life? Or, when she told me an issue of hers or a goal of hers, like, how can I help her?They say that service is solutions oriented. I am always trying to help my students find solutions to their problems.
or help them achieve their dreams. One of my students was a yoga teacher, and after she took the course, she actually broke out and started her own yoga studio. She said that taking the course gave her the strength and inspiration to start her own yoga studio. She ended up using my designer. She used my interior designer that I used for my school.
I helped her think of the name, then, a year later, she was running a small team of 10 people and then having some management issues. So I told her to go sign up for an executive MBA. so she did. she was also very unhappy in this sort of dead end relationship where she was growing and self improving, but her partner was not.
when she went to the EMBA, she actually broke up with him and met a new boyfriend and then got married and had a child. So a lot of them say that taking my class is just a small spark that leads to great change in their lives.
Sharad: That's so wonderful. etiquette has so many things in the background. There's EQ, like you said, being able to see who you want to talk to and how to have a good conversation. There's. Therapy there where you need to do work on yourself.
There's coaching there to move forward and take the next step. There's so many of these disciplines. Did it come to you naturally as when you observed your mother do these things? Did you have to learn some part of it? How did all these things come to you?
Sara Jane Ho: That's a great question. And I think it really is a result of living my life. I do believe upbringing is very important. My mom always said, live like a local. And her answer to any question I had, whether we were travelling, Oh, what restaurant do we go to? What would this actually live like a local, what would a local do? Then my father always said, the world is your playground, go explore. He was my role model in terms of treating everybody he came across, no matter if it was the cleaning lady, or if it was Margaret Thatcher, who he'd met, treating everybody with the same courtesy and respect.
I just feel very lucky that I had two such parents. That's also why I decided not to teach kids, But to start with adults. A lot of our customers are young mothers. I think that a mother is the single most influential person in a child's life. you can teach a kid something, but if they go home and it's just done differently, then There's no point, but if you begin with a parent the home is like that and Chinese women are some of the most resilient
They're always learning something new, always trying to become better versions of themselves. That's a Chinese woman for you So I would say each and every one of my students is extremely inspiring.
Sharad: Recently, I think three years back, the Netflix series Mind Your Manners started. How did that come about?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, it came out two years ago so the Netflix show Mind Your Manners came out at the end of 2022. People always ask, how did you get a Netflix show? I wasn't really looking for it. I was just doing my etiquette school day in, day out, working my butt off. then a production house based in Singapore called Beach House Productions, they called me up.
They actually emailed my info email, cold emailed me, we had some calls, they said, we think what you're doing is really interesting, do you mind if we pitch you an idea to some streaming platforms? I said sure, and Netflix bought the show so it's a Netflix original. I feel very lucky and very grateful to Netflix.
Netflix is very good at finding new ways of telling stories. I think that if, You pitch it to any other streaming platform, they probably would have said, Oh, it's etiquette. So old fashioned, so restricting, so limiting. Netflix was able to see what I do on a deeper level, which is etiquette as the utmost form of wellness.
It's a way to promote genuine and healthy individual growth. For anybody who's seen my show, which is a makeover reality show, it's a very positive feel good show. People always say that they laugh And learn a lot. The proudest thing I can say is that all my students, they say, Sarah Jane's classes are, I learned a lot and I laugh a lot.
That's the best when you have fun while you're learning.
Sharad: I loved how this articulation of etiquette related to wellness and becoming a better version of yourself. I'm really interested to know how this came about. How did this evolve to this sentence? How did you get there?
Sara Jane Ho: What's fun is that I didn't even realise it myself until after the show came out. And a freshman, an 18 year old girl at my alma mater, she was studying at Georgetown university. She cold emailed me she said, it's fascinating to see your portrayal of etiquette is the utmost form of wellness.
I wrote back to her and I said, you hit the nail on the head. You, like, elucidated it for me better than myself. I said, can I use this phrase going forwards? And she said, I'm flattered. So. Some things, it's like I'm doing them, I'm doing, I'm doing them, but then I need that aha moment from maybe an independent observer, or maybe it's just a lull in my day, or I'm sitting in a car, and I just think of something, and it's just that aha moment, like this is what I've been doing.
Sharad: That is so cool. such a wonderful experience. One of the things that I also find fascinating about your journey was purpose. As I understand it, let me know if that's right or wrong. One part of your purpose was helping people elevate themselves exactly the way you described it.
And then another purpose came about bringing Chinese culture out to the world. So I'd love to hear your thoughts and purpose and how it's evolved over time.
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, when I think about my career for the past decade, it's really been across two realms. One realm is bridging East and West, which you can see in my school, in my show, in my content, in my book. And that's because I'm a product of East and West. I was raised between both. I spent most of my education in the West and then I spent a lot of my adult life in the East.
The other realm of my career is empowering women to move through the world more confidently and again with my etiquette school with my content and With now my new brand called Anti Voter Laboratories.
So in my Netflix show, as part of my makeover for my students, I took them to go experience traditional Chinese medicine. That included acupuncture, drinking Chinese herbs, I would feng shui their home, And I didn't anticipate that a lot of my Western audience really leaned into that, and I was getting all these DMs from them saying, Your show opened my eyes to Chinese culture.
Please recommend a TCM doctor, just like the one you have in the show. I live in Orlando, Florida. I would get that from people in Poland, in Mexico, all over the world. So then as I was thinking, what is really meaningful to me and traditional Chinese medicine is something that makes me happy and healthy. if only I could find a way to bring that to women from all over the world.
So I got together with my friend, Annie, who is the co-founder.
Her family business is traditional Chinese medicine, her grandpa. Open TCM clinics in Taiwan in the 1940s that are still operational to this day. we actually bonded over our love for TCM. We were always swapping TCM info. I go to her acupuncture class.
She goes to my bone setter. we thought,what can we do that's really meaningful for us as international Chinese women, that brings the best of Chinese culture out. So we launched Antevorta, which is a feminine care wellness brand inspired by traditional Chinese medicine.
We have intimate cleansing gel, intimate spray and intimate wipes, which are great because summer is just around the corner. All our products help fight odour, dryness, and irritation of a woman's vulva, which is something that women across all ages and all ethnicities experience at some point in their lives.
It could be something as simple as just drinking too much alcohol, or travelling and being stressed out, or taking Western medications, or antidepressants, those really dry you out, or hitting, Menopause which every woman is bound to hit at some point, but a lot of women are going to early menopause now we wanted to say something that was formerly taboo, especially in Asian culture and put it front and centre and Think about how we can better understand and care for women's bodies.
Sharad: That's such a great initiative. We will have links to where people can get the products. I know it's available online. Is it available all over the world? People listening to it? Will they be able to click the link and buy those products?
Sara Jane Ho: Yes, it's available to most countries around the world.
Sharad: I'm always interested in people who've grown up in multiple cultures. I don't know whether it's right to say, but you seem to be leaning into the Chinese part of your heritage and bringing it out to the world.
Is that true? Has that been conscious? How's identity and where are you leaning right now? How does that work?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, I grew up on herbal remedies, because I grew up in Hong Kong,
so ever since I can remember, I think maybe I was five years old when I first drank my first herbal Chinese soup, mainly because I'm an only child, and my parents were always on the hunt for the next best TCM doctor, and since they were getting it, and I would be with them, They'd be, let's get our daughter checked out too.
Feel her pulse, give her some herbs. so it's second nature to me. when I go into someone's home, if I see something, for example, a mirror that's not placed well, or a cactus or something I'm very sensitive to the feng shui of that. Every time I go to my friend's home, I'll always point out some things or they'll ask me.
And, I find it quite fun. so it's second nature to me. I didn't even notice that it was that Chinese of me until I went to the West and began doing that. But what is interesting is that the West has really leaned into eastern healing practices, especially these couple of years.
There's a great mistrust of big pharma, You have the whole Purdue Sackler crisis going on. The amount of medication people take is crazy in the States. So there's starting to be a trend towards holistic and finding other alternatives. I think the success of Korean beauty has made the American consumer receptive to Asian beauty. I'd say like more than half of my girlfriends in the States. Even those who haven't ever set foot in China, we're all going to acupuncture for fertility.
Sharad: Hmm.
Sara Jane Ho: So if you're trying to have a kid acupuncture is like one of the top things that you have to do.
When I go to my girlfriend's homes in the States, girls from Texas who went to Harvard Business School or work in the art field, and they're really good girlfriends of mine. they're like, do you want some of my Chinese tea?
Sharad: It's from my Chinese doctor. And I'm like, what? This is amazing. Or they're saying, I'm going to my acupuncturist now. It's amazing. That is so cool. And you're talking about Feng Shui and changing people's houses. I got your book home. It's a funny story. My wife started reading it and suddenly my house has changed. Things have been moved around and She's already started doing some things. I haven't gone into the details and we haven't had a conversation because it's quite recent, but really cool stuff.
Sara Jane Ho: I love that. What did she move?
Sharad: So she's moved the desk. One very visible thing, we had a little room where the desk was facing the wall. She's moved it and now there's such a beautiful view. We face a little bit of the greenery, It's not facing the wall. I think there's a lot more space and air that flows through it.
I feel it. So yeah, that's one big thing that I've noticed. There are a lot of subtle things which I haven't really noticed, but which I know have been done.
Sara Jane Ho: That makes me so happy to hear that. See you just telling me that about your wife and how she's already affected change and you can feel it in your house. That to me makes writing a book worthwhile.
Sharad: People should read the book and we are also going to have the links to the show notes. Everyone's heard of Feng Shui, but for people who do not know the depth of it, is there a simple way of understanding what Feng Shui really is? What's the underlying concept?
Sara Jane Ho: Yeah, feng shui. Feng means wind. Shui means water. So it's wind water. When it comes to feng shui, there are actually five elements. jing mu shui huo tu, metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. It's about things being in balance.
It's about how you place objects in your home that just make the energy of your home feel good. What feng shui can also do is to minimise the downsides in your life and maximise the upsides.
Because each cycle is 12 years. And that's why when you think of Chinese astrology, there are 12 animals and everyone in all their lives will go through ups and downs. Your life is your destiny. You can't actually change your life, your destiny that much. Some people say you can, but that gets a bit complicated.
But what you can do with Feng Shui is that you can minimise downsides and maximise upsides. That's how I like to think of it. The best way is there are standard things that work for everybody. For example, In your bedroom, do not have a mirror that reflects onto the bed.
Because that means that a third party will always be trying to interfere in your relationship. In the States, a lot of bedrooms have sliding closet doors that are mirrors that reflect onto the bed. And in fact, when I shot my Netflix show, I stayed in an exquisite service apartment, but it had that.
So what I did was I spent six weeks sleeping on one sliver of the bed that was the only sliver that was not reflected on by the mirror. So that stuff applies to all people. if you put dead or dried flowers, or cactuses in your home, that brings dead and dried energy.
So like chi cannot flow, It's like stagnant. if above your bed you have a fan or a decorative object or a light. so it's right over your body when you lie down. That'll bring illness because it creates pressure. But then there's a lot of feng shui around the home that should be customised.
In the later episodes of my Mind Your Manor show, notably episode six, we invite a feng shui master to do over one of my students' homes and he needs her ba zi. Ba means eight, zi is character. So the eight characters that are the year, month, day, and time of birth. Time of birth is extremely important for feng shui to be able to calculate all this stuff accurately.
usually you have to get it from the whole household, whoever lives in the home. then based on that, they'll say, so and so's bedroom should be in the east corner, or your table should be facing whatever, or you should put water here or there, et cetera. So there's part of it that is standardised, And the other part of it, this should be customised.
Sharad: We're starting our journey based on your book, and I'm sure we'll get there. So very fascinating. As you develop your business, Sarah, I was wondering, how do you balance the purpose that's behind the business and ambition? You've gone to Harvard Business School, you're an ambitious person.
How do those two things come together? And is there a balance?
Sara Jane Ho: I'm probably the only graduate of Harvard Business School that has a career in etiquette. And vice versa! probably the only etiquette expert in the world that went to Harvard Business School. And, I enjoy pursuing my passions. And I don't really care what other people think of me.
I enjoy doing the unexpected, actually. So I enjoy being the Harvard Business School grad who moved to China and opened Etiquette School. I enjoy being the etiquette expert that has founded a product for your vulva. Again, it's so unexpected. I just want to keep doing that in my life because that pushes me to do new things and learn new things.
I'm the kind of person where if I'm not learning anything new, I get bored because there's no personal growth. And that's why, even though I still stay within the realm of etiquette. I've come out, I've gone from just training to publishing to media to all these other things still around etiquette, which I love, but also learning and exploring different industries and expanding my reach through those.
Sharad: very exciting. Maybe we have some fun questions for you, before we end, What's the most awkward etiquette mistake you've personally made?
Sara Jane Ho: Oh, I make so many, Shirad. It's really hard to pinpoint one. I probably make one a day.
I have plenty of weaknesses and plenty of faults, I by no means think of myself as a perfect person. I just don't dwell on my mistakes.
So when they occur, I'm the first one to see it, know that I did wrong, take accountability, apologise where needed, and provide solutions where needed. then put in things or framework that will make sure it won't happen again, or be more mindful.
But then I don't dwell on it. So I don't really remember them. Like I'm somebody who's very forward looking.
Sharad: That's the learning mindset. You're learning, but you're not getting caught up with failure. So yes. What's the lesson? What do I learn? I move forward. What a wonderful trait. I have this other question because I asked some friends that I'm going to be interviewing Sarah Jane Ho. What's one etiquette question you should throw to them? And this could be common, but I'll just put it out there. When you see someone eating food in front of you with food stuck in their teeth, how do you politely tell them?
Sara Jane Ho: That's a great question. let's say it's just one on one, then I like to say, yes, and this movie we watched was so good. Oh, by the way, you just have something in your tooth here. Anyway, so this movie that I was saying, Angelina Jolie was a maid, right? So that way you're sandwiching it and you're not putting the focus.
If you just say, Oh, you have something in your tooth. the conversation doesn't move on. All the attention, everybody's basking in that embarrassment.Now, if it's in a group setting and you're sitting maybe across the table and you don't want to, say it in front of other people, what you can do is catch that person's eye, just point.
Sharad: And immediately that person will know. That's cool. I love both of them. I love the first one. Like, by the way, it's not a big deal. and just keep going on. So that the attention is not on that person.
I have one more that, Claude, I like Claude, more than chatting on GPT. The AI system recommended that I ask you, you've gone out for dinner.
you're sitting with the host. Who's made a special dish for you and he's eating it. But it's smelling yucky and you can't get yourself to eat it. You're sitting next to that person. The person's really enjoying it. What do you do?
Sara Jane Ho: That's a great question. I will usually not blame it on the food. I'll blame it on myself. I'll say, Oh, I just had such a big lunch today. I wish I could finish this, but I'm just really struggling. Or I'll say, yeah, I had some food poisoning the other day and I'm still recovering. I wish I could finish this.
It's so delicious.
Sharad: Thank you for that. I have two last questions, just as we wrap up. Bottom line, what's the one piece of advice you'd like to leave people with?
Sara Jane Ho: I would say, don't take things too seriously, because in the grand scheme of things, nothing is really life or death. Even when people say, when you have meals with other people, are you really offended by their bad etiquette? Not at all. I completely turn it off, because to me it's in the grand scheme of things,
Unless they ask me, or they pay me, I'm not going to be sitting there judging and being offended by things. So I think the most important thing in life is just to not take things too seriously. You have to have fun in life. It's really all about your mindset and how you think about the world and surrounding yourself with other people who are positive, who are inspiring, and who aren't taking things too seriously.
Because if you aren't having fun in life, then how are you ever going to learn?
Sharad: What a wonderful point. The last question, Sarah, I ask everyone, a serious question. like at the end of your life, how would you know you've lived a good life?
Sara Jane Ho: Being surrounded by just a handful of good friends and good family.that's all I know to have lived a good life, and to not have to think when I want to do something. to be able to make a trip, or take a nap, or take a break, or see somebody without any hesitation or anything holding me back. the freedom to enjoy life as I want to enjoy it.
Sharad: Thank you very much, Sarah, for making time with us. What a wonderful conversation. Congratulations again on All the wonderful work you're doing, getting people to be more confident and creating new products for everyone. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Sharad. Thank you for having me. Thank you, Sarah, for such a fun and insightful conversation. For more on Sarah to order her book.
Or order her wellness products, Please check out the show notes. Here's something we could all reflect on. I see a link between etiquettes and empathy.
How can we use etiquettes to add more empathy to our life? Let's say we have to have a difficult conversation with someone. How can we use manners to do it better to do it with empathy?
Are there any other areas in life where etiquettes can add to a life to make it a little more meaningful? Let's think about this. Best of luck. I hope you enjoyed the episode. The next one will drop two weeks from now on August 30th. Do join us for that.
Till next time, have a wonderful day ahead. Bye bye.