0:00

You and Me Both is a production of

0:02

I Heart Radio. I want

0:04

to fail. I'd rather choose

0:07

very very difficult things and

0:09

have to be resilient. If I don't make

0:11

it right, then choose mediocre goals.

0:14

So it wasn't always about swimming. It

0:16

was about living the biggest life

0:18

I can live. I'm

0:21

Hillary Clinton, and this is You and

0:23

Me Both, where I get into some

0:26

of today's biggest questions with people

0:28

that I admire. You

0:30

know, I'm always interested in where

0:32

people get their resilience, because

0:34

look, everybody gets knocked down in life.

0:36

You know, some get knocked down more than once.

0:39

And the question really is, as

0:41

my mother used to tell me on a regular

0:43

basis, it's not whether you get knocked

0:45

down, is whether you get back up. Today,

0:51

I'm talking to three resilient

0:53

guests, Diana and Naiad,

0:55

who you just heard, you know, in she

0:59

became the first person ever to swim

1:01

from Cuba to Florida without

1:04

a shark cage. She swam

1:06

for fifty three hours. She

1:08

faced incredible dangers

1:10

like lethal box jellyfish

1:12

attacks, gulf stream currents,

1:14

exhaustion, delirium,

1:17

and she did it all when she was sixty

1:19

four years old. I'm

1:22

also going to be talking to Angela

1:24

Duckworth. Angela is a psychologist

1:27

and the writer of a terrific

1:29

book, a New York Times bestseller called

1:31

Grit, The Power of Passion

1:34

and Perseverance. And she's going

1:36

to explain to us where she got her passion

1:39

for studying grit and resilience.

1:42

But first, writer and comedian

1:45

Sarah Cooper. Now, if this were

1:47

any other comedian, I'd want to play a

1:49

clip of their work for you, But I

1:51

don't think that's going to help us

1:53

here, because Sarah Cooper is famous

1:56

not for what she does with her own words,

1:58

but what she does with the words of

2:00

Donald Trump. She appears

2:03

in videos where she is

2:05

lip sinking the exact

2:07

words that came out of Donald Trump's

2:10

mouse in his public statements.

2:13

She became an Internet sensation, and

2:16

I was just totally blown away

2:18

by how in her words

2:21

his words could be understood

2:24

as even more incoherent

2:26

and frankly unbelievable.

2:29

Now, before she started doing

2:31

that, she wrote two books based

2:34

on her time working in corporate

2:36

America. In she

2:38

wrote one Hundred Tricks

2:41

to Appear Smart in Meetings

2:43

and two years later, How to Be

2:45

Successful Without Hurting Men's feelings,

2:48

non threatening leadership strategies

2:50

for women, and you know, obviously

2:52

I wish that had come out sooner. She

2:54

has a Netflix comedy special that

2:56

will be out later this fall, and she's

2:58

working on a television

3:01

series for CBS. Why

3:03

include Sarah Cooper in an episode

3:05

about resilience? Well, for starters,

3:08

it takes a lot of resilience to

3:11

listen to Donald Trump over and

3:13

over and over, and more importantly,

3:15

her videos make us laugh and

3:18

help us all to stay resilient

3:21

during an incredibly tough

3:23

time. I am delighted

3:25

to have her on the podcast. I

3:27

have to say, Sarah that you

3:31

and your humor has

3:34

gotten me through some tough days. So I

3:37

have to start by thinking you.

3:39

You know, you came to my attention, as

3:42

you did I think to the rest of the world initially

3:45

by your videos that

3:47

were lip sinking art President,

3:51

and it was so

3:53

brilliant, so extraordinarily

3:57

on point, and I'm interested,

3:59

how did you get started doing that? I

4:01

mean, where did that idea even come from? Sarah?

4:04

You know, it really came from

4:06

a combination of being on TikTok

4:09

and seeing people doing lip sinking, and then

4:11

also just watching our president

4:13

sort of fumble his way through all of

4:15

these press briefings and

4:17

these Coronavirus Task Force

4:20

meetings, and I

4:22

was immediately reminded of being in

4:24

corporate America and just watching

4:27

usually men kind of you know, talk

4:30

their way through situations when they

4:32

actually haven't said anything at all. And

4:34

so I was just really fascinated

4:36

by the words because the words

4:38

meant nothing, and yet

4:40

people were nodding and agreeing.

4:43

And so it was really out of

4:45

a little bit of jealousy because I

4:48

would love to be able to get away with

4:50

just saying nothing and having people think that I'm

4:53

brilliant. You know, that would just be amazing.

4:56

Um. And so I really

4:58

didn't set out to to be at an

5:00

impersonator of this guy. I didn't.

5:03

I was really more like, could I get

5:05

away with that? In One way to figure out

5:07

if I could get away with it is to

5:09

just take exactly what he's

5:11

saying, the exact audio clip hasn't been changed

5:13

at all, and see what

5:15

it feels like to have those words come

5:18

out of my mouth. How would

5:20

Sarah Cooper act if she could just be

5:22

in a meeting and uh,

5:24

saying absolutely nothing? And um?

5:27

It really I think for a lot of

5:29

people brought to the forefront what

5:31

everyone's been feeling. But we've been gaslighted

5:33

into thinking that we're the crazy ones because

5:36

everyone thinks this is fine. And

5:38

once you take away that suit and the podium

5:41

and the presidential seal and all the people agreeing

5:43

with him, and you're just left with me in my

5:45

sweatshirt being, you know, saying

5:48

I'm going to form a committee and the committee is going to be

5:50

really great. Um you realize

5:53

okay, yeah, no, he's not saying anything.

5:56

And that's really where it started.

5:58

I am curious. Did you expect

6:01

the overwhelming tsunami

6:04

of a response once you got started?

6:06

I didn't. I mean I made a few of

6:08

them, really short clips at first, and

6:11

people thought they were fine and good,

6:13

but really, I mean when I made the first one

6:15

that went viral, I didn't realize

6:18

that it would go so viral. But

6:20

then beyond that, I just kept getting

6:22

good material and I just kept making

6:24

more videos and it just became

6:27

this sort of unstoppable

6:29

thing that changed my life and changed my career.

6:31

And you know, I'm literally in

6:34

l A right now, sitting in Maya Rudolph's office

6:36

because I'm on the set basically

6:39

of my Netflix special. Because of all of this, it

6:42

really just took off in a way that I had

6:44

no idea. I had sort of given up my entertainment

6:47

dreams, to be honest with you, because I wrote

6:49

these books, they didn't really do that well.

6:52

I would I would say, you know, The Hunt, my

6:54

first book, came out a month before the election,

6:57

and you know, any chance

6:59

for any press that I was ever going to get was just

7:01

completely overshadowed. But you know, I

7:04

would say it was probably a hard election

7:06

for your

7:08

election for me because

7:11

in my book, I

7:13

mean for many reasons. But yeah,

7:15

So just just to have this resurgence

7:17

of interest in the books and this idea

7:20

that oh wow, maybe I actually will have an entertainment

7:22

career has just been amazing. Does this identification

7:26

that you now have with lip

7:28

syncing Trump, does it

7:30

make you feel different at

7:32

all when you're speaking in your own voice?

7:35

Are you still, you know, in your worst nightmares,

7:37

still hearing his voice? In some way?

7:39

I get this asked us a lot because I do

7:42

have to listen to him over and over again, so you would

7:44

think his voice would get stuck in my head, but it just

7:46

doesn't. Images get stuck in my head.

7:48

Images and feelings. You

7:50

know, those things will bring me back and they

7:52

will get stuck. But audio sound

7:55

goes in one ear and out the other. So thankfully

7:57

that doesn't happen to me. My husband, on the other

7:59

hand, gets very very very annoyed

8:01

having to hear this over and over again. So I

8:04

don't blame him. I mean I

8:06

don't either. The only thing that worries

8:08

me sometimes is is people will send me clips

8:10

and they're like, you have to do this, when you have to do this

8:12

when, And sometimes I'll listen

8:14

and I'll be like, oh, I see what he was trying to say.

8:19

So I'm like, wait, wait now,

8:21

now I understand you know

8:23

what wait stop,

8:26

you know you can't do this anymore. This is

8:28

infecting you. But

8:30

I want to go back to before you

8:32

started lip syncing Trump, before

8:35

you put that on TikTok. You

8:37

know you were using your comedy

8:39

even before that to talk

8:42

about social issues. Give our listeners

8:44

a little bit of a bio here.

8:47

I mean, what, as you said earlier, made

8:49

you feel passionate about entertaining

8:51

and acting and comedy and

8:54

what is it you wanted to do with that? Well?

8:57

I always just love making people laugh, and

8:59

I think that just comes from I'm the youngest

9:01

child. I kind of was

9:04

the one who, you know, if there was ever any tension

9:06

in our family, I was the one who sort of diffused

9:08

it with some humor or jokes or whatever. And

9:10

it was just like, if I could

9:12

make people feel calm again and feel happy,

9:15

it just made me feel I think useful,

9:17

you know, I think it just made me. It just gave me a

9:19

purpose, like I can make people feel comfortable,

9:22

and for better or worse, I will say that.

9:24

You know, it can backfire in terms of if your

9:26

goal is always just to make people feel comfortable,

9:29

you can forget about yourself and you can forget

9:31

about hey, well maybe you're not happy right now,

9:33

you know, and maybe that's not your role right now. And

9:36

so it's I think making people laugh has sort

9:38

of been the number one thing. And then just realizing

9:40

I have a lot of things I want to share my opinion

9:43

on is kind of the second thing

9:46

that is exciting about entertainment

9:48

and satire in particular. I love just

9:50

because you can have a

9:53

message without feeling preachy,

9:55

you know, like with non threatening leadership strategies

9:58

for women, I wasn't telling women, hey,

10:00

you're doing something wrong, or you're

10:02

saying something wrong, or you should do this or do

10:04

this. I was simply holding up

10:06

a mirror and saying, this is what happens,

10:09

this is what I do. Sometimes I minimize myself

10:11

in rooms. Sometimes I add way too many

10:13

exclamation points in my emails just because I

10:15

want to feel, you know, like I'm being real nice um

10:19

And and it's just like holding a mirror up

10:21

and and people write me and they'll say, you

10:23

know what, I realized I do that. I

10:25

kind of ask a question when I want to make a statement,

10:28

you know, I do that, and I realized I don't

10:30

want to do that anymore. And they were able to realize

10:32

that on their own without me saying, hey, don't do

10:34

this anymore. And so that's what That's

10:36

kind of the position that I enjoy being

10:39

in, is that I can make people laugh.

10:41

I can make them think if they'd like to think. I can

10:43

make them learn something and change if they would like to do

10:45

that. But other than that, I've given them a moment

10:48

of levity that, you know, maybe they wouldn't

10:50

have had before. You know, when I think

10:52

about humor, I often think about

10:54

it as being one of the best tools

10:57

we have for resilience, I mean, define

10:59

the human in even the worst situation.

11:02

To try to, you know, connect

11:04

on that level with people. It must

11:07

be part of the motivation

11:09

that you had and still have that. You

11:12

know, Look, we're going through a hard time in our

11:14

country right now, and what

11:16

keeps you laughing despite everything

11:19

that is, you know, happening around us.

11:22

I think I just go through waves where

11:25

you know, after the election, I was just

11:27

so distraught for months. I couldn't

11:29

even write this book because my publisher

11:31

wanted me to write something about women, but

11:34

I was so angry that I was

11:36

just like, no, there's nothing funny about

11:38

this. There's nothing funny about this.

11:40

I'm just angry. And

11:43

I think eventually I was able to sort

11:46

of find a way to the humor, just

11:48

of like, look at all these rules, Look at all these

11:51

these these things we tell each other where

11:53

this don't wear this, smile, don't smile, wear

11:55

your hair like this, don't do this, don't It's like, you

11:57

can't follow all these rules. We can't. It's

11:59

in possible. And I mean that

12:01

was one of the things, you know, with your

12:04

campaign. I was so angry

12:06

that they said you needed to smile. I was like,

12:08

why does she need to smile? She

12:10

doesn't need to smile, Like,

12:13

let her smile if she wants to smile, and she doesn't

12:15

want to smile, she doesn't have to smile. How does that sound?

12:17

You know what I mean? I was so angry at that, because

12:20

that's how they get you. That's how they get this. Oh

12:22

she's not authentic. Well maybe it's because you told her

12:25

to smile when she didn't want to smile. Maybe that's why

12:27

she's not authentic to you, you know. And

12:29

it's like this whole idea of authenticity

12:32

and being true to yourself, and

12:34

yet there's this world set up that you have

12:36

to fit into. And so wait, how am I supposed to be

12:38

true to myself when there's this world

12:40

that I have to fit into and play their games

12:42

when I don't want to, you know. And so

12:45

I was able to find the humor and that of just thinking

12:47

about it and realizing, Okay, all of these rules

12:50

in a book, realize you can't follow them.

12:52

That's the joke, you know what, That's just

12:54

a joke. Yeah, we're taking a quick

12:56

break. Stay with us. You

13:00

know. I keep thinking Sarah about

13:02

you know, how resilience is

13:05

such a key part of anybody's

13:07

life. I mean, we all get knocked down. We all

13:09

have to figure out how to get back up. And

13:12

when you think about, you know, the work that

13:14

you've done and your commitment

13:17

despite the setbacks, what

13:19

got you up in the morning. You know, you said,

13:21

well, you tried to be in comedy,

13:23

that didn't work, But what kept you

13:26

going? You know? I

13:28

just I feel very

13:30

blessed to have a father

13:32

that just instilled in me gratefulness,

13:34

and so I just even when

13:36

things weren't going well, I'll tell you, like when how

13:38

to be successful without hurting men's feelings

13:41

came out, I went to a book signing. Two people

13:43

showed up. You know, I had situations

13:45

like that, but I had my husband there and he was still taking

13:47

pictures of me, like it was a big deal. And it wasn't

13:49

a big deal at all. No one was there, but

13:52

it was just like, no, I still have a book. I

13:54

did a book. I made a book. You know, like just looking

13:56

at the small things and just being appreciative

13:59

of those small things just help me

14:01

sort of keep going and just knowing. My

14:05

favorite quote is from Vanilla

14:07

Sky, and it's basically, every

14:09

passing minute is another chance to turn it all around.

14:13

That. I just love that every minute

14:15

you can do something different, You can choose to do something

14:17

different, you can choose to try something. And that's what I

14:19

did with these TikTok's. I was just trying something. I didn't

14:21

know if it was gonna work. And so knowing

14:23

you have that opportunity to just try something,

14:26

it helps me because I never feel

14:29

like I'm stuck and I can't do anything. I know

14:31

there's always something I can do, There's always

14:33

something I can try. You know, I really

14:35

relate to that. I think that for

14:37

many people, your TikTok videos

14:40

um were lifelines, um, you

14:42

know, the kind of hope

14:45

that things can get better and

14:47

can change. You know, you came along

14:49

and you you kind of helped to strip

14:51

it all down and explain without

14:54

doing anything other than repeating his words.

14:56

You gave people the idea like, well, I don't have

14:58

to listen to this, I don't have to leave that. And

15:01

that was a huge contribution to

15:04

resilience, the resilience of individuals,

15:07

and I hope the resilience

15:09

of our country. Not to put to find

15:11

a point on it, but I just can't

15:14

thank you enough for what you've

15:16

done, and I'm so in your corner. I can't

15:18

wait to see your program and

15:21

see what happens to you next. Well, thank

15:23

you. I'm I'm eternally grateful for you.

15:25

Just your commitment and your dedication,

15:27

and you're just unwavering focus

15:30

on what you think is important and what

15:33

you know in your heart to be true.

15:35

Has always been an inspiration

15:37

to me and will continue to be an inspiration to

15:39

me. So I just want to say

15:41

how honored I am and how appreciative I

15:44

am of you. Thank you. Since

15:51

my conversation with Sarah, President

15:53

Trump, as we all know, has tested

15:56

positive for COVID nineteen, Ben

15:58

hospitalized return earned.

16:00

Sarah hasn't put out any new

16:03

videos yet, and I wanted to

16:05

check in with her to see what she makes

16:07

of this latest plot twist. In

16:10

light of recent events, I wanted to

16:12

check in with you again. Your videos

16:14

do such an excellent job of highlighting

16:17

how absurd many of

16:19

Trump's statements are. But over

16:21

the last few weeks, his statements

16:24

and his actions around COVID nineteen

16:27

have not been so much ridiculous

16:29

as actually dangerous. He's

16:31

out there telling people he understands

16:33

the virus. Now and it's not something to

16:35

be afraid of and refusing to

16:37

participate remotely in the

16:39

next presidential debate. What

16:42

goes through your mind when you

16:44

hear him say these things, Well,

16:47

it starts to make me reconsider all

16:49

of the videos I've been making, just because at

16:51

this point it seems like there might be something really

16:53

wrong with him. You know, I've

16:56

always seen him as someone who is very sinister

16:58

and calculated, but at this point,

17:01

and I think Nancy Pelosi brought up twenty fifth Monument

17:03

today too, but it does feel like there's something

17:05

genuinely wrong with him, And so I it's

17:07

almost like, do you make fun of someone who has

17:10

some sort of problem that

17:12

you don't know what that problem is? But

17:15

it is also so dangerous that

17:17

I don't want to contribute to the propaganda

17:20

that you're spreading. So it is a weird

17:22

time for my particular kind

17:24

of satire because I want

17:26

to highlight how insane

17:29

a lot of the things he's saying. But if

17:31

he's actually insane, and he's actually

17:34

saying things that are are going to genuinely

17:36

hurt people and inspire other people to hurt other

17:38

people, and I don't want to, you know, spread

17:41

that message. I agree

17:43

with you. We're at a different point now.

17:45

It is scary to think that we have

17:48

still three or four weeks something like

17:50

that. I mean, it's it's a very tense time

17:52

of just trying to get to that election and

17:55

and hopefully see the light at the end of the tunnel. I

17:57

agree with you. I mean, the tension just

18:00

seems to build. I was talking to a good friend

18:02

of mine who's a doctor, and she was saying

18:05

she sees so many people now it's

18:08

just exploded in

18:10

terms of you know, her patients

18:12

saying that they're anxious, they're agitated,

18:14

they're depressed, and they link it to this

18:17

election. They just are

18:19

literally overcome

18:22

by what they're experiencing

18:24

when they watch Trump. But

18:26

I think it is a, you

18:29

know, a real sign of resilience that

18:32

more and more people are voting early, more

18:34

and more people are speaking out,

18:36

more and more people and the press and elsewhere

18:39

are calling him out. So, you

18:42

know, maybe that's a good sign that

18:44

assuming we get through this election and

18:47

we know retire him,

18:49

we can kind of pull together again. And

18:52

I'm praying for that, me

18:54

too, Sarah, me too. Keep

19:03

an eye out for Sarah's upcoming

19:05

comedy special. It's called Sarah

19:07

Cooper Everything's Fine, and

19:10

it comes out on Netflix October.

19:16

One of the reasons I'm interested in resilience

19:19

is that it's not just something that you're

19:21

born with or you aren't. And

19:23

I've learned a lot about that from research

19:26

that is being done about how to cultivate

19:28

resilience in ourselves and others.

19:31

And you know, nothing is more important than helping

19:33

kids be more resilient, especially

19:35

right now with so much uncertainty

19:38

in their world. So that's why I'm

19:40

looking forward to talking with Angela Duckworth.

19:43

She's a psychologist, she's a MacArthur

19:45

genius. She's the writer of

19:48

Grit, the power of passion

19:50

and perseverance. Grit.

19:53

Actually, that's one of my favorite words. You

19:55

have been called gritty. I've

19:57

had a feral streep in other people, pretty

20:00

gritty moments. You know, you're very gritty.

20:02

Um, But I guess I want to start with

20:05

having you explain what grit

20:08

is. When I talk about grit,

20:10

I mean this combination

20:13

of passion and perseverance

20:15

for especially long

20:17

term and personally meaningful goals. Um.

20:20

And I say passion and perseverance because

20:22

it's not just you know, working

20:25

hard and being tenacious, I mean that is part

20:27

of grit, and I think that's where the overlap

20:29

with resilience, you know, the topic of this show.

20:31

But grit, unlike resilience, means

20:34

that you're passionate about it. It It resonates with your

20:36

values, it interests you. You feel like a kid

20:38

when you're doing it. So perseverance

20:40

and passion for long term goals turns out

20:42

to be not at all correlated with talent

20:45

or intelligence, but very predictive

20:48

of long term achievement. Tell us a little

20:50

bit about your own life and if you can

20:53

reflect on what brought you to

20:55

this particular subject.

20:58

Well, we may or may not have this in common. But I

21:00

was certainly raised in a family that was dominated

21:03

by my father's obsession with achievement.

21:05

He really was like obsessed with the

21:08

outliers in human accomplishment.

21:11

And and then in our own family,

21:13

he would make comparisons of my

21:15

sister, my brother, and me, you know, who was doing

21:17

well in the in the horse race of achievement. I

21:19

by the way, I'm not recommending this, I'm just describing

21:22

my childhood. Um. And so when I

21:24

grew up, I wondered whether there was something else

21:26

other than our our maybe our innate

21:28

talent, that that might determine, you know,

21:30

what we might achieve. And I think that's

21:32

what led me to the study of

21:34

grit um. I was also, by the way,

21:37

a teacher classroom teacher in New

21:39

York City and San Francisco public schools

21:42

for several years. And when I saw

21:44

my students at the beginning of the year, it

21:47

was clear that some of them had,

21:49

you know, more of a facility for math, which is

21:51

what I taught. But I was very surprised

21:53

at the end of the year that the students

21:55

who had really learned the most, you know,

21:57

weren't always the ones who were you know, quite

22:00

obviously bright at the beginning. And and so

22:02

much of it was a kind of dedication, a

22:04

stained interest and effort

22:06

in spite of setbacks, which is

22:08

I think the heart of resilience. Well,

22:10

I think there are similarities between

22:13

our fathers. My father was absolutely

22:17

set on making sure that I

22:19

did as well as I could in school. I

22:21

would bring home, you know, straight a's, and he'd

22:23

say, you must go to an easy school. It

22:26

was his way of, I think,

22:28

trying to motivate me. And it's the

22:30

only way he knew to express

22:33

his hopes was through this

22:36

kind of competitive comparative

22:39

approach that I believe,

22:41

you know, fathers like ours actually

22:43

thought was a way of showing love

22:46

and appreciation to keep

22:49

pushing their children and luckily

22:51

for us, their daughters, not just their

22:53

sons. Yes, and

22:56

you know when you think about those students

22:58

that you taught, because I've read about

23:01

how you began to think

23:04

through, what was it that made some

23:06

kids successful even

23:09

if they didn't start with the greatest

23:11

understanding of math or some other subject,

23:14

and other kids maybe fade who

23:16

looked like they had potential.

23:19

What did that then lead you to decide

23:21

to do well? First I was frustrated with

23:23

them, um, And then, as any halfway

23:25

decent teacher would be, you realize that you're the problem,

23:27

right, So at first I was like, why aren't they learning my

23:30

my beautiful lesson plan? Like how

23:32

come it's not turning out the way I wanted to?

23:35

And quickly my frustration my

23:37

students turned into frustration with myself because

23:39

I realized it was a limitation of me

23:41

as a teacher that I wasn't accessing, I

23:43

wasn't creating an on ramp to what we

23:45

were doing, And when I got frustrated,

23:47

I eventually decided that my tactics

23:50

were incredibly ham fested. Like I

23:52

mean, I tried to be nice, but I just like, you

23:55

know, if you could just you know, put more effort

23:57

in, you'll be successful. I mean, that doesn't work.

24:00

So what I decided to do is change my

24:02

career trajectory a little bit, um or a lot,

24:04

I guess, and become a psychological scientist. It's

24:07

not until I think we can understand

24:09

why is it that when a child gives

24:12

up like they do, like what

24:14

is going on in the millisecond

24:16

before they put their pencil down and stop

24:18

paying attention to what they're doing? Like what happens?

24:21

And I realized that we needed more science

24:23

on you know, motivation and interests

24:26

and effort in order that teachers

24:28

and parents, um, by the way, could

24:30

do more than just the kind of like well intentioned

24:33

but usually ineffectual sermonizing

24:35

UM at least that I was doing. So when

24:38

you went back to school, how did you actually

24:41

construct a program to look

24:43

at this and pursue it as

24:45

a professional academic interest. So

24:48

I was a late bloomer in the sense

24:50

of coming to graduate school. UM in

24:52

my you know whatever, fourth decorade of life. But I

24:54

knew what I wanted to study. I was like, I know exactly

24:57

what I'm here to figure out. I wanted to understand the

24:59

psychology of young people in moments

25:01

of frustration and moments of

25:03

self doubt. And then I wanted to figure

25:06

out, you know, what turns things such

25:08

that insecurity becomes confidence

25:10

when the frustration becomes bearable.

25:12

And I apprenticed to a very

25:15

famous psychological scientist,

25:17

Marty Seligman, who basically is

25:19

the leading figure um

25:21

or one of at least in resilience. And

25:24

I'll tell you maybe one insight that gives you a

25:26

sense of how scientists like figure things out like

25:28

this. You know, when you study something

25:30

scientifically, you want to make a comparison. So

25:33

if you want to study resilience, you want to find

25:35

examples of resilience, but also examples

25:37

of um, you know, non resilience right

25:39

or or giving up during difficulty.

25:42

And Marty did exactly that. When he was

25:44

in graduate school he studied animals.

25:47

He studied dogs, for example, and

25:49

he discovered that when animals

25:52

are resilient, it is in part because

25:54

they have control. Um. So, if an

25:56

animal is experiencing control over

25:58

their adversity, even if the adversity

26:01

is in the case of the dogs he

26:03

was studying, like mild electric shocks,

26:05

I mean really painful. The control

26:07

makes all the difference when animals

26:10

don't have control over adversity.

26:12

It's what he coined um as learned

26:15

helplessness. And so I think the basic

26:17

idea of the scientific method when applied to things

26:19

like resilience is you know, make systematic

26:22

comparisons, fine examples of what you're looking

26:24

for, fine examples of the opposite, and

26:26

then you know, systematically work

26:28

your way through to kind of figure out what's

26:31

going on underneath the surface. Everything

26:33

you've said obviously has

26:36

implications for parenting. How

26:39

is your research impacted your

26:42

own parenting? So, practically

26:44

speaking, I think in terms of resilience,

26:46

the most important thing I learned in my research

26:49

was that, you know, left to their own devices,

26:51

young people will shy away from

26:54

hard things, like it's way more

26:56

fun to win than to lose. Um

26:58

it's way more fun to get the right answer then

27:00

the wrong answer. And I could see my kids

27:02

like shy away from hard things. So we

27:04

made a rule in our family and we

27:07

call it the hard thing rule, UM, and

27:09

we said everybody in this family, including mom

27:11

and dad, has to do a hard thing. UM.

27:13

We instituted this when the girls are about kindergarten

27:16

age. And the hard thing world had three parts.

27:18

One is that a hard thing is something

27:21

that requires practice, UM, like really

27:23

trying to get better at something, you know, with feedback

27:25

and um, and not all the feedback is going to be positive.

27:28

The second thing about the hard thing is that you can't

27:30

quit in the middle. So if you've

27:32

made a commitment to a track coach or a

27:34

piano teacher, and you said you've done you know

27:36

you're gonna do something for two months, then then

27:39

you have to honor that commitment. And then the

27:41

third thing, and I think this is so important. You

27:43

know, I'm of Chinese heritage, my parents immigrated

27:46

UM in the fifties, and I

27:48

don't really believe in tiger parenting. I

27:50

think the third part is the most important

27:52

part, which is that, UM, you get to choose

27:55

your hard thing yourself. Nobody can tell you

27:57

what your hard thing is. And I let my five

27:59

year old we I should say my husband and

28:01

I. We let them choose even

28:03

when they were in kindergarten. I mean it was multiple choice

28:05

because like one year Lucy said she wanted

28:07

to ride horses and I was like that not on the list.

28:11

So anyway, I I think that was all informed

28:13

by science. I love that idea,

28:16

you know, giving them some control over

28:18

the hard thing they choose, but

28:20

then they have to stick with that hard

28:22

thing and they have to be willing to take

28:24

the ups and the downs that come from

28:26

trying something that's hard. And you

28:28

know, I think about hard things that I've had

28:31

to do. I mean running for office was really hard.

28:33

Looked like it the object. It was hard.

28:36

It was hard the first time I tried it and never had

28:38

done it for myself before and had

28:40

to practice and practice and learn

28:42

and learn and it you know, it was

28:44

a passion and I had to persevere,

28:47

win or lose. And I assume

28:50

you've had to do hard things, like what are

28:52

you know one or two of the hard things you had to

28:54

deal with? You know, I told

28:56

you that. My dad was like, you know, how how

28:59

how smart are is this person? House? Well,

29:01

one advantage I will just say of of never

29:04

thinking of yourself as the smartest person in the

29:06

room is that like, wow, you

29:08

are, at least for me, I think the way I

29:10

interpreted that, I was like, I'm going to be the hardest working

29:12

person here, like like nobody's

29:15

going to outwork me, is going to outwork

29:17

me, right, And you know, I think that has been

29:19

a certain kind of confidence. Like,

29:22

you know, just the other day, I was in a conversation

29:24

with Danny Kneman, who's another

29:26

hero of mine. You won the Nobel Prize, and I

29:29

think he's the best living psychologist there is

29:31

today. And we're having this conversation and

29:34

I was trying to give him an idea about

29:36

like the psychology of attention, and about

29:38

twenty minutes in, he was like playing chess

29:41

with Gary casper Off. He was like checked

29:43

me, and I was just he was like, he's like this idea

29:45

is like full of holes. It isn't work. And I remember

29:47

thinking, wow, like I am

29:50

not as smart as any condoman

29:52

when it comes to psychology. Uh, And I think

29:54

I said something like that, but you know, I wasn't

29:56

so afraid. I never thought of myself

29:58

as that way. So I just said like, well,

30:00

you know, I would like to talk about this more, but I think

30:02

I gonna need a week to like on

30:05

it, to cover

30:07

gather my wits, make some more notes, read

30:09

some more. You were fierce in

30:12

your desire to you know,

30:14

keep going. Maybe take a deep breath and come

30:16

back. I have so enjoyed

30:19

talking to you, and I hope this will

30:21

be the first of many conversations because I am

30:23

fascinated what you do. Thank

30:26

you so much for talking with me, and

30:29

say a load of your family, Say a load of those two

30:31

daughters. Angela's

30:37

book is called Grit. She's a co

30:40

founder of Character Lab, which

30:42

helps classrooms across the country create

30:44

more resilient kids, and you

30:47

can learn more about her and her

30:49

research at Angela Duckworths

30:51

dot com.

30:56

I first heard about Diana and Naiad

30:59

really along time ago because she

31:01

had this amazing success

31:04

record of swimming around the island

31:06

of Manhattan across Lake Ontario.

31:09

You know, she really was somebody who

31:12

was of my vintage and was doing heroic,

31:15

difficult things in the water. She

31:18

took time out to be a sports broadcaster,

31:20

and then I would see her covering sports,

31:22

including the Olympics, and it looked

31:25

like she was, you know, done with her own

31:27

competitive swimming until she

31:30

decided to try again. She

31:32

had tried to swim from Cuba

31:34

to Florida the first time when she was twenty

31:37

eight. When she was sixty one, she

31:39

decided to try again, and

31:41

again and again, and

31:43

then at age sixty four she

31:46

wanted to try once more, and

31:49

she succeeded on her fifth

31:52

try. That should give everybody a kind

31:54

of boost about what's possible. As

31:57

you'll hear her zest for life

31:59

puts the rest of us to shame. I

32:02

think about your amazing

32:05

career and how

32:07

you really took on the

32:09

challenge of long distance swimming.

32:12

What drew you to it, because it's

32:14

such a unique sport. You

32:17

know. There are two layers

32:19

to the answer to that question. One is um

32:22

I was born in New York City, but by the time I

32:24

was in second grade, so you're seven years

32:26

old, I was in Fort Lauderdale, Florida,

32:28

with a beautiful, warm ocean right there,

32:31

and I was good at swimming. I had a way

32:33

of feeling the water and going through the water

32:35

in a strong, fast way, So of course

32:37

I wanted that. But honestly, way

32:40

above that. I don't know why,

32:42

Hillary, but I got the idea

32:45

very early before the age of ten, that

32:47

this whole thing was gonna go by very

32:50

quickly, that I better not waste

32:52

any time. I may not be the best at what I

32:54

do, but I want to live up to my potential.

32:57

I want to help people the best I can. I

32:59

want to be the best I am intellectually

33:01

physically. So I've been lucky

33:04

to have a lot of attributes of energy

33:07

that helped me get up very early and

33:09

live a gung ho pressive kind

33:11

of life all day long and go

33:13

to sleep every night saying who

33:16

I just couldn't have done anymore with that

33:19

day? But I guess I'm getting around to saying

33:21

it wasn't and it it's still is

33:24

not just about swimming. I

33:26

wasn't necessarily driven to I've got

33:28

to swim this, and I've got to be a swimmer.

33:31

I was and I am all that, But

33:33

it's more what can I do

33:35

with this one? As Mary Oliver put

33:38

it, wild and precious life

33:40

of mine? I want to fail.

33:42

I'd rather choose very very difficult

33:45

things and have to be resilient

33:47

if I don't make it, and and have to be humble

33:50

if I don't make it, then choose mediocre

33:52

goals. So it wasn't always about

33:54

swimming. It was about living the

33:57

biggest life I can live. Amen,

33:59

And you know, part of what I'm

34:01

interested in is there are a lot of

34:03

people who say to themselves, Wow, I'm gonna

34:06

do something that is really big

34:08

and it's going to fill me up and

34:10

I'm going to make a mark. But then

34:12

there are those who actually do it. And

34:14

you know, I've read your fabulous

34:16

autobiography and just

34:19

reading about the training that

34:21

you subjected yourself to was

34:24

exhausting. Describe

34:26

that training regimen because it

34:28

shows so clearly what it takes

34:30

to say, Okay, I want to do

34:32

this, but hey, here's what I have to

34:35

make sure I can do in

34:37

order to be able to achieve that. What

34:39

does that actually look like day to day? Well,

34:42

you know, it's it's tough. If you're gonna

34:44

swim for let's say, what might

34:46

be ostensibly fifty four hours

34:48

across Cuba to Florida NonStop,

34:51

never allowed to touch the boat, what are

34:53

you gonna do to get ready for that. Well, you're not gonna

34:55

go swim fifty four hours. You might as well

34:57

go do the real thing. So you start doing.

35:00

You're not in shape yet seven and eight

35:02

hours swims, And mind you, a

35:04

swim like Manhattan Island is

35:07

under eight hours. Now later in

35:09

the year, you're gonna be up to twelve fourteen

35:12

hours swims. You're lying in

35:14

the fetal position at night. You can't

35:16

get up because you're so darn exhausted.

35:19

You can't get dinner. But you do

35:21

get up the next day and you do fifteen

35:23

hours. Then you're up to eighteen hours.

35:26

Then you're up to twenty four hours, and that's

35:28

a lot of lonely, you

35:30

know, isolated time. This sport

35:33

is a case of sensory deprivation.

35:35

You don't see much. You're turning your head fifty

35:38

five times a minute. You don't see

35:40

anything but the side of the boat over here,

35:42

and Bonnie, my intrepid you

35:45

know, handler you dig down

35:47

and get your mind disciplined

35:49

and strong enough to make it through those lonely

35:52

hours. So that's what it's

35:54

about. Yeah, it's the shoulders, it's

35:56

the body. You've got to be a good swimmer,

35:59

a strong swimmer. But more than anything is

36:01

can the mind suffer

36:04

and concentrate and refuse

36:06

to give up for all those

36:08

hours? That's what it's about. We'll

36:10

be back right after this quick break.

36:14

Do you have any insights as to

36:16

whether that resolved that incredible

36:19

resilience and grit how do

36:21

you evaluate the mix between

36:24

kind of what's deep down inside

36:26

you or just plain

36:29

hard work that it takes, you know, as it

36:31

learned. Is it something you can practice

36:33

to achieve? How would you tell

36:35

young people if there were a bunch of young people listening

36:38

and they were wondering, well, how I don't

36:41

I don't know that I could ever do anything that brave

36:43

or that big, but i'd like to.

36:45

How would you tell them to think about it?

36:48

Yeah, it's it's always, isn't it. It's the age old

36:50

nature nurture conversation.

36:53

So you know, I don't remember any

36:55

particular you know, light bulb that went off

36:57

to say that's how I want to be, that's

36:59

who I want to be. So I do think there

37:01

is a lot of a genetic component, But

37:04

I do believe that people all the world around

37:06

have resolved. Now, it could be that

37:08

they're not dreaming of you know, changing

37:11

there. They're not Nelson Mandela who

37:13

wants to you know, change the entire fabric

37:16

of the future of the world. And now we we

37:18

view equality, um. But it could

37:20

be that in their particular community,

37:23

that's the way they live and that's what they

37:25

demand of their neighbors. And their family,

37:27

And isn't that equally important. Don't

37:29

we think the world gets changed one

37:32

family and one neighborhood at a time.

37:34

So I admire, and I'm sure you do too,

37:36

all kinds of people that the world will never

37:39

hear of. You know, I have a neighbor here

37:42

in in my neighborhood in Los Angeles who

37:44

lost her husband to cancer, and

37:46

she was busy, well, um,

37:48

somebody else had trouble in the neighborhood. And this

37:50

woman who had very few resources,

37:53

no time at all, three kids on

37:55

her hands, mourning her husband. She's

37:57

the one who went around all around the ebro

38:00

to say, we got to help this

38:02

other neighbor. She needs our help. And Naiad,

38:05

you're the little star of the neighborhood. While

38:07

that's just great, but see your name here

38:10

on the clipboard. Every other Tuesday,

38:12

you're gonna get dinner on their back porch, okay,

38:14

And it's not going to be Kentucky fried chicken. It's

38:17

gonna be a vegetable and a dinner. And if

38:19

you can't do it, get somebody else to do it,

38:21

because for a year, we're gonna help

38:23

her out. So I admire that

38:25

woman as much as I admire Bill Gates,

38:27

but I think that's a really important and very

38:30

relatable point, is that not everybody's

38:32

gonna, you know, swim long distance.

38:35

Um, not everybody's going to be a star

38:37

athlete or whatever else the

38:40

comparison might be. But everybody

38:42

can do something, and everybody can

38:45

both overcome their own challenges

38:47

and then help others to overcome the

38:49

challenges that they face. And you

38:51

know, how would you describe how your experience

38:54

in long distance swimming has

38:57

actually translated to how you meet

38:59

challenge is in your life? Well?

39:02

You know, I know that you know the story

39:04

Hillary that I like. Unfortunately

39:07

millions, uh suffered sexual

39:09

abuse as a young teen. Um

39:12

My coach, the person who should have uh

39:14

you know, put me up on a pedestal and helped

39:17

send me out with character and with confidence

39:19

into the world. He was an abuser

39:21

and he really got a kick out of humiliating.

39:25

And now I'm seventy and look at me, you

39:27

know me, I'm pretty confident, I'm pretty

39:29

happy. Uh, I'm I feel

39:31

very fortunate at this life I've gotten

39:33

to live. And on the other hand, still

39:36

deep down, if I want to get real about

39:38

it, uh, there is an imprint

39:41

from that humiliation that

39:43

is still there, that that little girl,

39:46

that young teen still can

39:48

feel, the low self esteem and the

39:50

anger, the anger at myself

39:53

for not throwing him up against a

39:55

wall and saying I'm going to my mother

39:57

and I'm going to the principle. Well, I

39:59

think that, even though I'm older

40:02

and wiser now and deal with it in a

40:04

in a more holistic way, I

40:06

think there was something of a

40:09

resilience that told

40:11

me right away, even while it was happening,

40:14

I'm going to survive this. I'm

40:16

going to thrive through it. This is not

40:18

going to ruin my life. I won't

40:20

let it. I'm not going to

40:22

go down. Boy, that's such a

40:25

message, Diana, that needs to be

40:27

heard by so many young people and

40:29

not so young people. And the fact

40:31

that you've talked about it and you've written

40:34

about it and you've made

40:36

it a part of your

40:38

overall message and mission, because

40:40

so many young people need to hear that. But

40:43

this is an important part of you

40:45

know who you are and what

40:47

you've overcome, and what the source

40:49

of your resilience is, and just

40:52

your determination, yes,

40:54

that grit to keep going and

40:57

not look back in a

40:59

way that pair lizes you but instead

41:01

mobilizes you. Yeah, those are good words,

41:03

paralyzed and mobilize. You

41:05

know, I want to switch gears to the

41:08

oceans because nobody has spent

41:10

more time in them than you have all

41:12

over the world, and it's

41:14

such a critical issue

41:17

with the environment, with climate change,

41:20

and I know that you are really going

41:22

to tackle this like you've tackled

41:24

everything else. You know. One of the things

41:26

I've heard that you're really going to focus

41:29

on is single use plastics and

41:32

what they're doing to the ocean and what they're doing

41:34

to the you know, animals that live in the ocean.

41:37

But talk a little bit about how, given your

41:40

personal immersion in the

41:42

ocean, this new

41:45

mission has arisen about what you

41:47

want to do to try to use

41:49

your voice and use your experience to

41:51

literally help save our our world

41:53

oceans. Yeah, I I guess

41:56

you could say that I

41:58

fell madly in low with

42:01

planet Earth by being immersed

42:03

in its oceans. You know. Carl

42:05

Sagan spoke about it as that little

42:08

magical blue spec that astronauts

42:10

see from way up there. So, um,

42:13

Bonnie and I when we got done with the Cuba

42:15

swim, we started a walking

42:17

initiative and I know you're a big walker, we

42:20

want you to come out walking with us. I would

42:22

love that. There you go. So ever,

42:24

Walk is all about a new vision

42:27

of lifestyle in America, and

42:29

that is that everybody walks a mile every day.

42:32

It doesn't matter what the weather is. You just do.

42:34

You walk before work, you walk during lunch,

42:36

you walk after school with your kids. But you walk

42:38

a mile every day

42:41

of the year, virtually. And

42:43

now we're going to sort of

42:45

drive all that walking towards walking

42:47

along the oceans. So

42:50

next June, we're gonna walk from Daytona

42:52

to Miami. Oh wow, that's fabulous.

42:55

It's two hundred miles. Some people will walk the

42:57

whole way, twenty miles a day for ten days.

42:59

That's great. Most people will only want

43:01

to walk a mile. They want to be part of it. But we're

43:03

gonna do a cho hundred mile crusade.

43:07

And all the way we're gonna have beach rallies

43:09

with mayors, business people, Bill

43:11

and Hillary Clinton, all kinds

43:14

of crazy characters. Are you gonna

43:16

say? I promise I am

43:18

going to reduce, if not eliminate,

43:20

single use plastics in my home, in

43:23

my business, because eight million

43:25

tons of plastic around the world

43:27

are now going into the ears oceans. They're

43:29

suffocating the lungs of the planet. I

43:32

would love to be part of that. I love

43:34

walking, I love oceans. You're bringing

43:36

them together. I am so happy

43:38

to talk to you today. I could not think

43:40

of anybody better to talk about

43:43

this subject of resilience. Stay

43:45

safe, stay healthy, and I'm

43:47

brightened down that I'm gonna see you walk on the

43:50

beach uh in Florida

43:52

next June. There we go Diana

43:59

and iyads out to buy aography is called Find

44:01

a Way a perfect title, and

44:03

you can find more about her new initiative

44:06

to protect the oceans at everwalk

44:09

dot com. You know, when

44:11

we think about resilience, I think every one

44:13

of us can reflect on our

44:15

own lives, but certainly the lives of

44:17

those near us. Think about the people

44:19

you know who have shown great resilience.

44:22

Who's your hero, who's your example?

44:25

See what you can do to help others,

44:28

especially young people. Understand

44:30

that to keep going is really

44:32

a mantra that everyone on this show,

44:34

including myself, believe in you

44:39

and me both. Is brought to you by I

44:41

Heart Radio. We're produced

44:43

by Julie Subran and Kathleen Russo.

44:46

With help from Huma Aberdeen, Nikki

44:48

e Tour, Oscar Flores, Brianna

44:51

Johnson, Nick Merrill, Lauren

44:53

Peterson, Rob Russo, and

44:56

Lona valmro Our engineer

44:59

is Zack mc niece. Original

45:01

music is by Forest Gray

45:03

and a big thanks to Riverside FM.

45:06

Just imagine we needed a recording

45:09

platform that could help us make

45:11

a podcast during a pandemic

45:13

and voided they step up. If

45:16

you like you and me both, spread the word,

45:18

don't keep it to yourself. You can subscribe

45:21

to you and me both on the I Heart Radio

45:23

app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

45:25

you get your podcasts, and while you're

45:27

there, leave us a review. It's a great

45:30

way to help other people discover us

45:32

and we'd love to hear from you, So send

45:35

us your questions, your comments, your

45:37

ideas or suggestions

45:39

for future shows to you and

45:41

me both pod at gmail

45:44

dot com. Come back

45:46

next week when I'm talking about turning

45:48

Grief into Action with comedian patent

45:50

Oswald and Sabrina Fulton, Trayvon

45:53

Martin's mom and a powerful advocate.

45:56

Hope you'll join me