Hello You: I just wanted you to see this ...

A reminder, an explainer, keeping in touch ... and a video I'd love you to watch

This is an edited version of a post I first published about six months ago, although it seems longer. I have around double the Substack subscribers now that I had then, so you’ve probably not seen it before. I hope you find it interesting. If so, share it?

---

Hello you …

I’ve been on Substack for a while now. I signed up because I read a very wise article that said, in essence, ‘Your social media could self-combust at any moment, so to avoid losing all your useful contacts and connections, start an email list even if you never send anything out’.

This seemed a bit doom-mongery to me, and then Elon Musk bought Twitter, and Meta started tinkering with Facebook, at which point it suddenly made a whole lot more sense. So I had a Substack, but no idea what to do with it.

After a few tentative posts that went more or less unnoticed, I left it pretty much alone. Then something happened that led to me recording Hello You 1. Take a listen if you want to know what that was.

If you’ve joined the Hello You family at some point in the last six months, you might still be wondering who I am and what this is all about. Let me fill you in.

I’m Jim. I’m 62, I’m a heart attack survivor, a musician, a photographer, an events host, panel chair and festival MC, a long-term mental health patient … and I’ve worked in radio and audio since 1980. I was last on the radio on November 21, 2022, which was the day before my first heart attack (I’ve had two). There’s a lot more to tell you around all this, but I can’t at the moment. I will when I can.

Forty years of talking - no, listening - to people for a living means I’m attentive, thoughtful and empathetic. I know how to put people at their ease, and they feel comfortable sharing their stories and thoughts with me. I want to make the world a better place, and one way I can do that is by enabling you to hear the voices and understand the experiences of other people. I’m just the intermediary.

What you hear may or may not change your mind, inspire you to action, provoke a powerful emotion, make you laugh, make you cry, make you think. But it’ll probably help you feel more connected to the person you’re listening to, or to the place (geographical or otherwise) that they’re coming from.

On the subject of connection: There’s a video I’d like you to watch. I think it’s lovely.

It was made to promote a public-service TV channel in Denmark - TV2. TV promos are often noisy and vivid with quick cuts and flashy graphics. Not this. Take a look:

This video resonated with me, because this is what I think, feel and believe that public-service broadcasting and media should be about - connections, and the fostering of those connections - and it’s such a beautiful way of communicating that idea.

There’s nothing corporate, there’s nothing focus-groupy, there’s nothing ‘business’ about it … and it’s universal. It encompasses everyone. Everyone, not just one demographic or another, is enfolded within the embrace of the idea.

The clip really connected with me, and after watching it five or six times, tears in my eyes on every occasion, I shared it with my friend Georgy Jamieson who said:

Oh my god, that is incredible. I’m in tears. So beautiful. You know what the spirit of this reminded me of? Not the BBC. But Hello You. That embodies everything you are striving for and doing … Connection, bringing people together, sharing stories, chatting to people you may not know, finding what binds us as a community rather than what divides us. This is everything Hello You is.

And you know what? She’s right.

This is what I do, not just because I enjoy it and I’m good at it, but because I feel like I must do it.

Thank you for supporting what I do. Thank you for being there for me, and for this. I appreciate it very, very much indeed.

Please share this post with others. If they ‘get it’, like I think you do, you’ll be doing them a favour as well as me. And if you or they want to subscribe, or to follow me on Bluesky or wherever (links in the footer of this email), that’ll be lovely.

The buttons below will help you do all sorts of fun things. Click them and see what happens. And click the hell out of the ‘Like’ or ‘heart’ buttons? I’d love to hear from you, too, about anything: suggestions for topics to talk about or places I can go to record conversations or soundscapes, or just saying hello.

I’ve now introduced paid subscriptions, but don’t worry, the Hello You podcast and the Sunday Supplement will remain free. If you want to access a few extra rewards, or support me so I can keep doing this, it would be wonderful if you joined the ranks of paid subscribers.

If that’s beyond your reach, and in times like these I can totally understand that, you could always buy me a coffee instead?

Thank you again. Hello You 82 will be with you on Friday morning.

Take care of yourself, and take care of the people around you. For Hello You, I’m your friend, Jim Hawkins.