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Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, Sophia Bush here. Welcome to Work in Progress,

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Speaker 1: where I talked to people who inspire me about how

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Speaker 1: they got to where they are and where they think

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Speaker 1: they're still going. I think we can all agree that

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Speaker 1: there's just something about the mother child relationship that is complicated.

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Speaker 1: It can be loving, but also tumultuous, and is generally complex.

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Speaker 1: When I saw the cover of the book What My

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Speaker 1: Mother and I Don't Talk About, I knew I had

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Speaker 1: to read it, And once I started reading it, I

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Speaker 1: knew I had to interview its editor, Michelle Philgate for

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Speaker 1: this podcast. In this collection of essays based on her

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Speaker 1: essay What My Mother and I Don't Talk About, Michelle

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Speaker 1: shares the stories of fifteen different writers who reflect on

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Speaker 1: their complicate aided relationships with their mothers for many different reasons.

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Speaker 1: Some of them are beautiful, some of them are painful,

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Speaker 1: some of them are close, and some of them are not.

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Speaker 1: And on today's episode, we talk about why the mother

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Speaker 1: child bond is so confusing, the maternal figures that have

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Speaker 1: influenced us in our lives, the importance of reading, and

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Speaker 1: how writing can be so cathartic both for the author

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Speaker 1: and for the reader. I cannot wait for you guys

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Speaker 1: to hear this. I have to thank you so much

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Speaker 1: for coming. I think maybe because I was a journalism student,

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Speaker 1: or maybe because I was an only child who lost

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Speaker 1: herself in books all of the time. I when when

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Speaker 1: a book really hits me, I don't put it down.

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Speaker 1: And in the case of your book, I picked it

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Speaker 1: up and I think I was done with it in

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Speaker 1: thirty hours or something. I just I was like, the

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Speaker 1: day is can't I'm not leaving. I need to read this.

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Speaker 1: And it was very interesting because from the moment that

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Speaker 1: I opened it, I didn't know what to expect, but

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Speaker 1: I had this strange feeling that I needed to read it.

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Speaker 1: I saw it and and it was like when you

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Speaker 1: get that drum beat in your chest, and I thought,

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Speaker 1: I have to read that book. I have to understand

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Speaker 1: because as as a as an adult woman analyzing my

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Speaker 1: own relationship with my mother and seeing all of my

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Speaker 1: friends analyze their relationships with their mothers, and also in

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Speaker 1: our closeness and yet complication because everyone's complicated, I get

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Speaker 1: to see so much of what my mother's relationship with

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Speaker 1: her mother was as we unpack sort of matrilineal inheritance

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Speaker 1: and from the moment I opened the book, I I

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Speaker 1: strangely felt very exposed and also very safe. And your

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Speaker 1: essay opens this collection of fifteen beautiful essays, and in

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Speaker 1: the last line of it says, I love you past

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Speaker 1: the sun and the moon and the stars. My mother

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Speaker 1: would always say to me when I was little, but

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Speaker 1: I just want her to love me here now on earth.

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Speaker 1: I was like, Oh, God, And and even if that

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Speaker 1: isn't your truth, you understand that that's so true. And

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Speaker 1: and there's so many stories in the book you explore

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Speaker 1: these themes of violence and silence and this intimacy that

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Speaker 1: we as women and or as children either desperately yearned

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Speaker 1: for or given very uniquely by our mothers. And I'm

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Speaker 1: just so in awe of this space that these essays

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Speaker 1: open for all of us. And strangely, when I finished

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Speaker 1: the book, I called my mom and I said, you know,

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Speaker 1: I know that we're learning to communicate differently as adults

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Speaker 1: than we did when you know, I was a kid,

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Speaker 1: And sometimes I know, I get really annoyed with you.

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Speaker 1: And I also I owe you such a huge amount

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Speaker 1: of gratitude. And it was strange because it made me

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Speaker 1: realize that I also needed to just tell her that.

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Speaker 1: And so this is a very long winded way of

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Speaker 1: saying that I'm in awe of the project and of

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Speaker 1: hopefully inviting listeners in UM who haven't read it, and

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Speaker 1: I hope after this will and for the ones of

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Speaker 1: you who have read it, you know what I'm talking about.

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Speaker 1: So in this real space of honesty about how love

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Speaker 1: itself is very hard one for all of us, I'm

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Speaker 1: I'm just so curious about what prompted you to finally

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Speaker 1: publish this essay, because your essays It's tough. It is,

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Speaker 1: it really is. Yeah. I spent well over a decade

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Speaker 1: writing that essay for several reasons. One is because when

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Speaker 1: I first started writing it, UM, when I was an undergrad,

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Speaker 1: I had just come out of the situation that I

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Speaker 1: write about in that essay, which is that my stepfather

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Speaker 1: or was abusing me and I was living with him

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Speaker 1: and with my mother and it was really difficult. And

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Speaker 1: so when I started writing that essay, I hadn't really

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Speaker 1: found my voice as a writer yet, and my piece

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Speaker 1: was really coming from a place of anger and resentment,

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Speaker 1: rather than the years I've had since then to to

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Speaker 1: think about this and think about what the real story is.

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Speaker 1: I think it took me many years of therapy. I

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Speaker 1: think my therapist in the back of the book, because

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Speaker 1: I swear that every everyone should go to therapy to

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Speaker 1: figure out, especially to figure out their relationships with their mothers.

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Speaker 1: But um, it took me many years to realize that

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Speaker 1: what what I was really trying to write about was

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Speaker 1: a daughter longing for a closer connection with her mother.

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Speaker 1: And also I was trying to write about the what

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Speaker 1: silence can do to a relationship, the toxicity of silence,

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Speaker 1: and so I I couldn't have asked for a better

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Speaker 1: timing for when this essay was published. Long Reads published

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Speaker 1: it in October of right when the Weinstein story broke

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Speaker 1: and the me Too movement took off, and so the

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Speaker 1: essay quickly went viral, shared by a lot of people,

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Speaker 1: including some of my favorite authors like um, Rebecca soul

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Speaker 1: Knit and Lydia Yukanovich. I love Rebecca Solnit so much. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and Lydia, They're amazing, They're two heroes of mine. And

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Speaker 1: Lament as well. She shared it, so um they Yeah.

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Speaker 1: All of a sudden, like the essay just kind of

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Speaker 1: blew up, And I think part of the reason people

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Speaker 1: responded to it is because, uh, not just the topic

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Speaker 1: of my essay, but the title of my essay, which

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Speaker 1: is the title of the book, what my mother and

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Speaker 1: I don't talk about. I heard from so many people

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Speaker 1: right away who were saying to me, I have something

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Speaker 1: I can't talk about with my mom, and their relationship

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Speaker 1: might be completely different than the relationship I have with

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Speaker 1: my mother, but there was a connection there and that

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Speaker 1: everyone had something that they couldn't articulate and that they

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Speaker 1: wanted to share and wished they could share. The title

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Speaker 1: is universally true, exactly, and I thank god I picked

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Speaker 1: that title because originally my editor, Sara bought in it

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Speaker 1: long Reads. I told her that I wanted to publish

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Speaker 1: it as Lacuna as the title, and lacuna means gaps

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Speaker 1: and spaces that can't be filled, and so that to

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Speaker 1: me was a really great way of poetically describing my

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Speaker 1: relationship with my mom. And Sarah was like, it's a

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Speaker 1: beautiful word. No one knows what it means, no one

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Speaker 1: will ever click on it. So I came up with

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Speaker 1: a list of alternate headlines and she was like, okay,

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Speaker 1: that one, And so you never know if a headline

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Speaker 1: will lead to a book deal, but in my case

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Speaker 1: it did. That's the mark of a good editor to

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Speaker 1: exactly yeah, she's great. So I'm curious because while I

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Speaker 1: don't want to harp on the unpleasantries, I think that

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Speaker 1: one of the things that, to your point in Me

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Speaker 1: to Move It, has highlighted for so many of us

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Speaker 1: is that, for some reason, to be taken seriously, women

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Speaker 1: are meant to just share their stories over and over again,

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Speaker 1: which really just means we have to re traumatize ourselves

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Speaker 1: over and over again, which I find a bit confounding.

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Speaker 1: And and while if there's anything you want to share,

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Speaker 1: I'm here to discuss it. I'm I'm certainly not kind

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Speaker 1: of press. But what's interesting to me in looking at

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Speaker 1: the topic and in you talking about the ten years

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Speaker 1: that it took to really get to the root of

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Speaker 1: what that experience meant for you. You know, the source

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Speaker 1: of the pain is is the gap between you and

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Speaker 1: your mother that allows all the other business to fall

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Speaker 1: into that space. You know, it's it's what goes into

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Speaker 1: a chasm that can make it so devastating. I felt

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Speaker 1: so completely flayed open as I read your words, and

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Speaker 1: I've not been in your position, Shin, but the words

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Speaker 1: about silence and about what we need versus what we say,

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Speaker 1: and then that kind of being stuck that makes you

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Speaker 1: feel like you're drowning. I felt recognition in that, And

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Speaker 1: I'm curious why you think that is now that you

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Speaker 1: have um some time in perspective on the essay and

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Speaker 1: on the book under your Belt, that that so many

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Speaker 1: people have read this, both the essay and the book,

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Speaker 1: and whispered, oh you too, because most people don't share

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Speaker 1: the exact same circumstances as one another. But there's some

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Speaker 1: kind of recognition when when in the right way, we

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Speaker 1: do get to share our stories and offer them to

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Speaker 1: other people has permission to share their own, And there

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Speaker 1: are these spaces like this book to me feels like

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Speaker 1: a talking circle. It feels like a safe space to

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Speaker 1: share and to feel recognized. And I'm curious how you

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Speaker 1: delineate That's that's a great question, because I think that

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Speaker 1: you You are absolutely right that, especially with women's personal stories,

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Speaker 1: there's this it's almost this pressure to sensationalize them. Some

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Speaker 1: bad publications, will you know, like have terrible click baby

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Speaker 1: headlines to get people to to read them, and really

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Speaker 1: tapping into trauma in a because trauma cells or some

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Speaker 1: other disgusting viewpoint. UM. For me, I did want to

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Speaker 1: create a safe space, and not just for women, because

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Speaker 1: this book also has men in it. Um, it has

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Speaker 1: Son's perspectives as well. I wanted to create a safe

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Speaker 1: space in general. I saw it as something that um

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Speaker 1: is a continuation of the work that I do already

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Speaker 1: in in my life. UM. I have a reading series

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Speaker 1: that I created in Brooklyn called red Ink that is

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Speaker 1: dedicated to women writers past in present, and it's a

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Speaker 1: panel I curate with writers of different ages and stages

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Speaker 1: in their career in genres and so UM, that is

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Speaker 1: something I was I was already thinking about, is like

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Speaker 1: putting voices together and the idea of community, because I

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Speaker 1: really think a lot about community and how um I

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Speaker 1: say this in the introduction to the book, but it's

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Speaker 1: easier to break silences together on a rather than being

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Speaker 1: alone on a stage. Um. And so for me, I

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Speaker 1: always saw this book from the very beginning as an anthology,

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Speaker 1: a collective of many different voices. And the fascinating thing

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Speaker 1: to me is that unintentionally, these different voices gathered in

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Speaker 1: the book speak to each other, right there's a lot

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Speaker 1: of overlap, there's and people do see themselves, like what

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Speaker 1: you were just saying about people seeing themselves in stories

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Speaker 1: that are very different from their own, but they still

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Speaker 1: relate to it. And I think that's so true. I

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Speaker 1: think that we all are looking for human connection, right

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Speaker 1: and a lot of times we can find that in

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Speaker 1: beautiful writing, especially in person essays. I think there's really

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Speaker 1: a need right now. There's kind of a golden age

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Speaker 1: of especially like women essays, and I feel that seeing

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Speaker 1: it as art rather than just tell all sensationalized stories

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Speaker 1: is the difference. Like we are looking at people creating

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Speaker 1: art out of their pain or out of any kind

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Speaker 1: of complication they've had. And in this particular collection my

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Speaker 1: goal was to have I wanted not just you know,

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Speaker 1: a diverse lineup of authors, but a diversity in the

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Speaker 1: types of relationships between the mother and child, because I

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Speaker 1: wanted anyone to be able to pick up this book

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Speaker 1: and find something that speaks to them somehow, And that's

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Speaker 1: the beauty of what personal essays can do. I love

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Speaker 1: that you write in the essay about your writing while

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Speaker 1: you were still at home, and that that image of

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Speaker 1: you sitting against your dresser with the dresser knobs pressing

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Speaker 1: into your back is so vivid to me. And I

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Speaker 1: think about that that version of like just needing to

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Speaker 1: be in a little bit of pain so you know

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Speaker 1: you're alive when you're struggling. And I'm curious if you

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Speaker 1: weren't writing about any of these experiences while living at

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Speaker 1: home when you when you moved out and started at

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Speaker 1: the University of New Hampshire. What's it like to make

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Speaker 1: the first crack at writing a story like this. It's

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Speaker 1: very very rough. Um, it's hard because you are re

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Speaker 1: entering that traumatic moment um so and I think at

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Speaker 1: that time I was too close to it. I was

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Speaker 1: still very much processing what had just happened to me,

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Speaker 1: but not even fully processing it. I was still it

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Speaker 1: was still such like I couldn't I didn't have any

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Speaker 1: distance from it. I couldn't see it clearly. So I

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Speaker 1: think it was it led to some bad writing right

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Speaker 1: where it's just about the emotions and not about seeing

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Speaker 1: yourself as a character, almost right. And I so I

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Speaker 1: needed that removal and I needed years to kind of

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Speaker 1: process those emotions because I mean, I think back to

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Speaker 1: that moment you mentioned in the essay where I talked

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Speaker 1: about writing in my room, leaning up against the hard

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Speaker 1: knobs of the dresser. I mean, I'd write a lot

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Speaker 1: of really bad poetry, as many teen girls do, right

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Speaker 1: about my boyfriend at the time and love and you

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Speaker 1: know I um and inkst. I mean I talked about

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Speaker 1: how I had this collection of pros and poetry that

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Speaker 1: I called Summer's Snow, and I thought that was very clever.

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Speaker 1: So a lot of my writing was really overly earnest

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Speaker 1: and pretty terrible at the time. But the writing saved

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Speaker 1: me in many ways too, because it was an outlet.

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Speaker 1: It was it was a place where I could express myself.

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Speaker 1: And so writing has always been what has saved me,

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Speaker 1: whether through my own writing or the words of others. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, books have always been my escape as well

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Speaker 1: as where I find myself time. How do you think,

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Speaker 1: because I do think it's it's such a wise observation

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Speaker 1: that when you're still too close to an experience, it's

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Speaker 1: so difficult to clearly articulate it. And for example, in

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Speaker 1: this you know Me two conversation, people will say, well,

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Speaker 1: why didn't they report sooner? Why didn't they And you

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Speaker 1: can't get the words out when you're underwater. It's very hard,

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Speaker 1: I think, to make sense of any kind of trauma

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Speaker 1: until you've finally gotten enough distance from it that that

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Speaker 1: things can settle in your body and you can figure

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Speaker 1: out how to speak without being back in it. Yes,

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Speaker 1: And I'm curious about the transformation as you got some

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Speaker 1: distance to going from the experience itself to the realization

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Speaker 1: that this core truth was really about the fracturing you've

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Speaker 1: felt in your relationship with your mom. Yeah, if that's

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Speaker 1: not too heavy a question, No, it's not. I just

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Speaker 1: I think I honestly, I think I was kind of

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Speaker 1: blinded by my anger a lot, and also by fear.

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Speaker 1: You talked about like people, you know, not reporting things

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Speaker 1: or you know. I talked in my essay about going

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Speaker 1: to the school cop. We had a cop in our

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Speaker 1: school who was assigned to to be there and as

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Speaker 1: a resource, and I went to him and would tell

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Speaker 1: him about my stepdad, and then I would stop him

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Speaker 1: from talking to him and to my mother because I

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Speaker 1: was too afraid. And I think that's all that's that

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Speaker 1: happened so often in these cases where a woman is

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Speaker 1: abused and is afraid that speaking out will make the

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Speaker 1: situation worse. So when you would tell the police officer

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Speaker 1: what was happening, but beg him not to confront your parents. Yes,

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Speaker 1: that came from the fear that once he'd to the house,

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Speaker 1: it would be worse with your stepdad. Yeah, exactly, I was.

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Speaker 1: I was terrified that and I also didn't want to

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Speaker 1: I was terrified of what my stepfather would do, but

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Speaker 1: I also didn't want to hurt my mom. You know,

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Speaker 1: I can't. I mean, I I blamed myself at that

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Speaker 1: point for a lot of what was going on, because

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Speaker 1: that's what abuse victims often do. You always you often think,

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Speaker 1: you know, if I was a different person, maybe this

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Speaker 1: person wouldn't treat me this way. You know. Um, he

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Speaker 1: would constantly tell me that I was the cause of

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Speaker 1: problems in their marriage. You know. Some so stuff he

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Speaker 1: said reinforced to the fears that I felt. And so

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Speaker 1: I think it took me a long time to realize,

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Speaker 1: to realize the longing that I had to have a

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Speaker 1: better relationship with my mom. And I think the reason

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Speaker 1: it took so long is because I couldn't really admit

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Speaker 1: it to myself, this deep pain that I had for

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Speaker 1: so long. I could easily be angry about my stepdad.

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Speaker 1: But I wasn't really thinking, and this is what came

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Speaker 1: out of therapy. I wasn't really thinking about the absence

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Speaker 1: of my mother and my life and and how sad

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Speaker 1: that made me. And you know, my mom still did

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Speaker 1: remain in my life, but we just There's a line

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Speaker 1: in my essay where I talked about how we eventually

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Speaker 1: do talk about it, but it's it's not enough. Sometimes

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Speaker 1: when you talk about something, if the person, if there's

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Speaker 1: denial involved, the person isn't really listening. It's it's the

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Speaker 1: same as almost not having the conversation. Right. There are

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Speaker 1: all kinds of ways we can be silenced, so that

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Speaker 1: silence is really something that has lived inside me for

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Speaker 1: so long. And I felt like, even though I was

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Speaker 1: afraid of publishing this essay of what it would do

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Speaker 1: to my relationship with my mother, I also felt like

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Speaker 1: I had to publish this. I had to because I

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Speaker 1: knew it would help other women who are afraid of

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Speaker 1: speaking their truth for whatever reason that might be. And

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Speaker 1: there's a real reality I think too, that whether it's

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Speaker 1: an issue with your mother or something you've been through

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Speaker 1: in the past, when you're ready to get it out

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Speaker 1: of your body, you have to get it out of

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Speaker 1: yourself somehow, you do you really? Do you know? It's

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Speaker 1: it's kind of an exorcism, it is. Yeah, absolutely, that

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Speaker 1: is exactly how it feels. Because I think about this

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Speaker 1: all in terms of really your relationship with yourself, and

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Speaker 1: and perhaps it's because I'm projecting my own experience and

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Speaker 1: having to get to a point where I could talk

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Speaker 1: about certain things and own certain things and not worry

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Speaker 1: about other people's feelings in regards to certain experiences of

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Speaker 1: my own. So I think about your relationship with yourself

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Speaker 1: and what kind of permission someone has to give themselves

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Speaker 1: to have these sort of great revelations about their experiences,

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Speaker 1: and especially when those revelations include someone else, because women

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Speaker 1: have historically and culturally been so afraid to say this

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Speaker 1: happened to me or this was sucked up, because somehow

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Speaker 1: we've been taught that that's us saying, well, you fucked

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Speaker 1: me up, you did this thing, and the irony is

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Speaker 1: that that's often the truth. So going from you know,

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Speaker 1: this undergrad student to ten years later, the woman who

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Speaker 1: publishes this essay in hindsight, do you see how you

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Speaker 1: mustered up the courage to say it was was it

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Speaker 1: getting was it just getting ready to get it out

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Speaker 1: of your body? It? I mean it was. And it

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Speaker 1: was actually way more than ten years until I published

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Speaker 1: this essay, so it took well over a decade. I

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Speaker 1: think it might have been. Let's see, I graduated college

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Speaker 1: in two thousand and six and this came out in

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Speaker 1: twenty um seventeen. So but I I'm really glad you

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Speaker 1: brought up the idea of permission and women giving themselves

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Speaker 1: permission to tell these kinds of stories, because I was

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Speaker 1: at a writing conference this past year in Portland, Oregon,

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Speaker 1: and I was on this really incredible writing panel called

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Speaker 1: Writing the Mother Wound. This writer Van SMR. Tear, who

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Speaker 1: I really admire, actually teaches this class called writing the

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Speaker 1: Mother Wound. And I was on a panel with a

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Speaker 1: bunch of incredible writers and you could hear a pin

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Speaker 1: drop in the room. It was standing room only, and

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Speaker 1: so so many people showed up because everyone there had

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Speaker 1: their own kind of mother wound somehow. And I after

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Speaker 1: the panel was over, a bunch of strangers these women

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Speaker 1: came up to me asking me for permission to write

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Speaker 1: about their own stories, and I had to tell them

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Speaker 1: I can't give you permission. That's something you have to

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Speaker 1: give yourself, and that's easier said than done. And I

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Speaker 1: think that sometimes you just have to force yourself to

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Speaker 1: give yourself permission, even if it feels difficult or if

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Speaker 1: you're afraid. Often the things were doing come with a

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Speaker 1: lot of fear, right And so I I've found that

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Speaker 1: in my life at least, that often the things that

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Speaker 1: have been the most rewarding and the most significant and

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Speaker 1: most important to me have come with a tremendous amount

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Speaker 1: of fear at the same time. And so I think that,

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Speaker 1: you know, one of the things I was thinking about

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Speaker 1: in publishing this essay and this book is I've taught

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Speaker 1: creative nonfiction, including like personal essay and memoir writing, for

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Speaker 1: years now, and one of the things I always teach

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Speaker 1: my students is to, like one of the very first

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Speaker 1: exercises I give them is to write from a place

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Speaker 1: of shame or vulnerability. To make a list of things

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Speaker 1: that they feel shame or feel vulnerable about, and to

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Speaker 1: pick one of them to write an essay about. And

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Speaker 1: I wasn't following my own advice. So I was teaching this,

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Speaker 1: but I was avoiding myself on the page, you know,

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Speaker 1: And I think a lot of women do that. I

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Speaker 1: think a lot of us do because we're because we

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Speaker 1: shy away from the stuff that has kind of set

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Speaker 1: us on fire again to be back. And you know,

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00:23:03,720 --> 00:23:06,119
Speaker 1: wonder because in this moment, while you're talking about this,

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Speaker 1: a my chest is burning be I'm like, oh, right,

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Speaker 1: We've also, for generations been told that our role is

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Speaker 1: to nurture others. And no one's ever taught women how

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Speaker 1: to nurture themselves, how to soothe themselves, how to love themselves.

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Speaker 1: Were meant to put it all out and hope that

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Speaker 1: someone else gives it back, exactly, And it's this really

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Speaker 1: kind of warped exchange. It's not like when a battery charges,

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Speaker 1: it's like plugging into something else. Right, And hearing you

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Speaker 1: say that, I'm just thinking, Oh, of course, we make

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Speaker 1: space for everyone else's pain, but never for our own.

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Speaker 1: And if we don't really make space for our own pain,

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Speaker 1: are we really making all that much space for our

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Speaker 1: own joy? Right? Right? Because we need to? We are, right.

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Speaker 1: That's an excellent question. And I I'm really glad you

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Speaker 1: just brought up like nurturing yourself because I'm working on

401
00:23:53,520 --> 00:23:56,240
Speaker 1: an essay right now actually about learning to be a

402
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Speaker 1: mother to yourself, because that's something I've really realized in

403
00:23:59,320 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 1: putting this action together especially, is that no matter how

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00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:06,600
Speaker 1: close someone is with their mother, or if they never

405
00:24:06,680 --> 00:24:08,920
Speaker 1: knew their mother, or if they're estranged from their mother,

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00:24:09,480 --> 00:24:14,080
Speaker 1: no matter what their relationship is, you can't depend on

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00:24:14,080 --> 00:24:19,200
Speaker 1: one other person to be everything you need for nurturing, right,

408
00:24:19,280 --> 00:24:22,280
Speaker 1: And so so much of being an adult is about

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00:24:22,400 --> 00:24:26,880
Speaker 1: learning how to navigate that and to be good to yourself,

410
00:24:27,440 --> 00:24:31,600
Speaker 1: whatever that might mean for you, and to allow yourself

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00:24:32,200 --> 00:24:35,320
Speaker 1: to be good to yourself, right. Giving their going back

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00:24:35,320 --> 00:24:38,159
Speaker 1: to like giving permission. We need to give permission to

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Speaker 1: ourselves to to be the mother's are the ideal mother

414
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Speaker 1: to ourselves, right, whatever that might mean. And in some

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00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:51,760
Speaker 1: ways I feel like we have that conversation finally more

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Speaker 1: about partnership, that idea. You know, you you're never going

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Speaker 1: to be able to love someone else until you love

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Speaker 1: yourself or accept love from someone else until you love yourself.

419
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Speaker 1: But you haven't crossed the threshold of you have to

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Speaker 1: be your own nurture. You have to learn how to

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00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:07,760
Speaker 1: be your own mother, even if you love your mother,

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00:25:08,040 --> 00:25:11,840
Speaker 1: yeah you know, yeah, yeah, Because I think even if

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Speaker 1: a mother is great. A mother can't possibly check all

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Speaker 1: of the boxes of what we need. I talked about

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Speaker 1: this in the intrup of my book. You know, we

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00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:23,120
Speaker 1: mothers are set up to fail in our society in

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00:25:23,200 --> 00:25:26,920
Speaker 1: so many ways, and as women are, just as women

428
00:25:26,960 --> 00:25:30,399
Speaker 1: are exactly like you know, I personally don't want to

429
00:25:30,440 --> 00:25:34,160
Speaker 1: have kids. I'm child free, and I've always felt kind

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00:25:34,200 --> 00:25:37,239
Speaker 1: of judged by that. But I have friends who are

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00:25:37,240 --> 00:25:40,440
Speaker 1: amazing moms, who who might feel judged because of how

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Speaker 1: many kids they have. You know, so even no matter what,

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00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:47,000
Speaker 1: whether we have kids, whether we don't, whether we get married,

434
00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:50,800
Speaker 1: whether or not, whatever choices we make that involve our

435
00:25:50,840 --> 00:25:56,000
Speaker 1: bodies and our relationships, it's just like society is just

436
00:25:56,359 --> 00:26:01,760
Speaker 1: there to judge and it's ridiculous me. So, yeah, it's

437
00:26:01,840 --> 00:26:05,920
Speaker 1: really strange. And I do think that it is an

438
00:26:05,960 --> 00:26:09,520
Speaker 1: act of revolution to learn to love yourself. It really is.

439
00:26:09,720 --> 00:26:13,040
Speaker 1: And I mean, look, we're all working on it, right.

440
00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:15,080
Speaker 1: It's like that's I don't think it's a place that

441
00:26:15,119 --> 00:26:17,200
Speaker 1: you arrive and then you go, oh my god, look

442
00:26:17,240 --> 00:26:20,520
Speaker 1: I solved it, and forever all feel great. But it's

443
00:26:21,200 --> 00:26:25,440
Speaker 1: it's about creating a kind of new practice and reparenting

444
00:26:25,680 --> 00:26:30,080
Speaker 1: and re partnering with yourself to create a new way

445
00:26:30,080 --> 00:26:33,959
Speaker 1: of relating to yourself in the world. And I've been

446
00:26:33,960 --> 00:26:36,680
Speaker 1: looking around lately going like, nobody told us about this ship?

447
00:26:37,400 --> 00:26:41,200
Speaker 1: Where where? Why have we not been having this conversation?

448
00:26:41,680 --> 00:26:44,159
Speaker 1: Because everyone I know who's in their thirties and in

449
00:26:44,200 --> 00:26:46,920
Speaker 1: their forties is in the throes of this right now,

450
00:26:47,560 --> 00:26:51,320
Speaker 1: And I'm going, huh, okay, we there there's some some

451
00:26:51,520 --> 00:26:54,760
Speaker 1: version of, you know, an empathy curriculum or an intimacy

452
00:26:54,880 --> 00:26:58,240
Speaker 1: education that we need to start in schools so that

453
00:26:58,320 --> 00:27:12,640
Speaker 1: this stuff can change. Seriously, I know, when we talk

454
00:27:12,680 --> 00:27:16,240
Speaker 1: about school, I'm curious because I do love to know.

455
00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:19,280
Speaker 1: I get to meet so many people and and invite

456
00:27:19,320 --> 00:27:21,840
Speaker 1: so many friends into the space when I'm already so

457
00:27:22,000 --> 00:27:24,240
Speaker 1: impressed with the adult that they are. And you know,

458
00:27:24,320 --> 00:27:27,040
Speaker 1: I'm clearly so in love with your work, and I

459
00:27:27,119 --> 00:27:30,680
Speaker 1: know you to be this beautifully eloquent and thoughtful writer.

460
00:27:31,400 --> 00:27:34,119
Speaker 1: But I'm always curious when I look at really impressive

461
00:27:34,160 --> 00:27:35,600
Speaker 1: people and I go like, what were you like when

462
00:27:35,640 --> 00:27:39,159
Speaker 1: you were a little were you always were you always

463
00:27:39,160 --> 00:27:42,080
Speaker 1: so observational? Were you very wordy? Were you quiet? Were

464
00:27:42,080 --> 00:27:47,440
Speaker 1: you rampunctious? Like? Who who is Michelle. As a kid,

465
00:27:47,440 --> 00:27:49,880
Speaker 1: you always have your head in a book. Okay. Yeah.

466
00:27:49,880 --> 00:27:52,600
Speaker 1: In fact, in some of the family home videos you

467
00:27:52,640 --> 00:27:56,480
Speaker 1: can see me walking around like reading aloud to myself

468
00:27:56,960 --> 00:27:59,720
Speaker 1: in the background, I would always have my head and

469
00:27:59,800 --> 00:28:03,280
Speaker 1: like a babysitters Club or Sweet Valley High or you know.

470
00:28:03,359 --> 00:28:05,800
Speaker 1: Matilda was my favorite book when I was a kid.

471
00:28:06,040 --> 00:28:10,880
Speaker 1: I loved Matilda good right movie. It was so good, amazing.

472
00:28:11,119 --> 00:28:14,159
Speaker 1: I know, I know, I still watch it sometimes I

473
00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:16,960
Speaker 1: do too. I loved it, um but that you know,

474
00:28:17,080 --> 00:28:18,840
Speaker 1: I I just that was like one of the first

475
00:28:18,840 --> 00:28:22,320
Speaker 1: books where I found myself on the page in Matilda's

476
00:28:22,400 --> 00:28:24,680
Speaker 1: character and I was like, oh, a bookworm who has

477
00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:28,240
Speaker 1: superpowers to that's so cool. I want superpowers, no stuff

478
00:28:28,240 --> 00:28:30,160
Speaker 1: and is smart no matter what the grown up sat

479
00:28:30,240 --> 00:28:34,720
Speaker 1: exactly and defends the me mean headmistress or I'm sorry,

480
00:28:34,760 --> 00:28:38,680
Speaker 1: defeats the mean head mistress. But yeah, as a kid,

481
00:28:38,800 --> 00:28:42,840
Speaker 1: I was I was a bookworm. I was nerdy. I

482
00:28:42,920 --> 00:28:46,680
Speaker 1: was definitely picked on a lot because I was a nerd.

483
00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:50,720
Speaker 1: I but I spent a lot of time imagining things.

484
00:28:51,120 --> 00:28:54,600
Speaker 1: I grew up on a lake in Connecticut, a beautiful lake,

485
00:28:54,840 --> 00:28:59,240
Speaker 1: and so I feel very fortunate about my upbringing and

486
00:28:59,320 --> 00:29:01,880
Speaker 1: that for my parents got divorced, we lived with my

487
00:29:01,920 --> 00:29:05,400
Speaker 1: grandmother and so I would spend a lot of time

488
00:29:06,160 --> 00:29:09,880
Speaker 1: actually like in the woods around the house, playing there

489
00:29:10,560 --> 00:29:14,200
Speaker 1: and um, taking walks there. And so a lot of

490
00:29:14,240 --> 00:29:18,080
Speaker 1: my early short stories have to do with that landscape,

491
00:29:18,080 --> 00:29:21,280
Speaker 1: and that landscape really like looms large in my imagination. Still.

492
00:29:21,400 --> 00:29:24,120
Speaker 1: She's actually the one who turned me into a bookworm,

493
00:29:24,200 --> 00:29:28,480
Speaker 1: because she would take me to the library book sales

494
00:29:28,520 --> 00:29:30,440
Speaker 1: and we'd fill up, like you could get a bag

495
00:29:30,480 --> 00:29:32,760
Speaker 1: of books for a dollar. So I would love that.

496
00:29:32,960 --> 00:29:37,120
Speaker 1: And she played organ at the local church, and she

497
00:29:37,160 --> 00:29:39,320
Speaker 1: would take me with her when she was playing organ

498
00:29:39,560 --> 00:29:42,600
Speaker 1: at funerals and weddings and mass, and we would stop

499
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:44,479
Speaker 1: at the library or the bookstore on the way and

500
00:29:44,480 --> 00:29:47,000
Speaker 1: I'd read while I was in the loft with her,

501
00:29:47,960 --> 00:29:52,360
Speaker 1: sometimes during these stranger's funerals, which was really weird. And

502
00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:56,200
Speaker 1: so yeah, she and but she herself, this is memo,

503
00:29:56,360 --> 00:29:59,800
Speaker 1: that's what I call her memo. She she was fired

504
00:29:59,840 --> 00:30:02,320
Speaker 1: for one of her first jobs because she was caught

505
00:30:02,360 --> 00:30:05,760
Speaker 1: reading behind the clothing racks at this close store. So

506
00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:09,280
Speaker 1: and she's kind of your spirit, Oh yeah, she totally is.

507
00:30:09,640 --> 00:30:12,440
Speaker 1: So so yeah, from a very early age. I always

508
00:30:12,520 --> 00:30:15,920
Speaker 1: knew I wanted to be a writer. Um, I got

509
00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:18,880
Speaker 1: sidetracked for a little while and was a journalist and

510
00:30:19,120 --> 00:30:22,600
Speaker 1: worked at the CBS Evenings with Katie Kirk, which was great.

511
00:30:23,160 --> 00:30:26,320
Speaker 1: But I always knew I wanted to be a you know,

512
00:30:26,400 --> 00:30:29,600
Speaker 1: a writer. And so that's that's where I've landed. And

513
00:30:29,600 --> 00:30:33,160
Speaker 1: how old were you, um, when when the dynamic and

514
00:30:33,200 --> 00:30:35,640
Speaker 1: your family changed, when you were no longer living on

515
00:30:35,680 --> 00:30:39,840
Speaker 1: the lake. So my parents got divorced when I was

516
00:30:40,560 --> 00:30:43,920
Speaker 1: I think nine or ten, and so that's when things

517
00:30:44,040 --> 00:30:47,120
Speaker 1: kind of changed. And then when I was like entering

518
00:30:47,160 --> 00:30:50,080
Speaker 1: my preteens and my teens is when stuff got bad

519
00:30:50,080 --> 00:30:52,720
Speaker 1: with my stepdad. So my stepdad was in the picture

520
00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:54,800
Speaker 1: pretty much right away when he was in the picture

521
00:30:54,880 --> 00:30:59,600
Speaker 1: right away when my parents separated, and so yeah, and

522
00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:05,960
Speaker 1: that was really hard, I can imagine. And you say

523
00:31:06,000 --> 00:31:07,800
Speaker 1: that you always knew that you wanted to be a writer,

524
00:31:09,240 --> 00:31:12,600
Speaker 1: and we talk about you know, angsty teen poetry, but

525
00:31:13,240 --> 00:31:15,920
Speaker 1: were you also writing in the sort of more idyllic

526
00:31:16,000 --> 00:31:18,280
Speaker 1: years of your childhood when you were playing in the

527
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:20,000
Speaker 1: woods and living on the lake, where you were you

528
00:31:20,040 --> 00:31:21,800
Speaker 1: also writing poetry? Were you like trying to be a

529
00:31:21,800 --> 00:31:26,360
Speaker 1: little Mary Oliver. Oh man, I love Mary Oliver. Have

530
00:31:26,480 --> 00:31:30,080
Speaker 1: you listened to her be interviewed by Krista Tippett being

531
00:31:30,640 --> 00:31:32,680
Speaker 1: I've got to because I love guys. I mean, I

532
00:31:32,720 --> 00:31:35,480
Speaker 1: think she's ninety two when they do the interview. It's

533
00:31:35,520 --> 00:31:37,880
Speaker 1: one of the most fascinating conversations I've ever heard in

534
00:31:37,880 --> 00:31:39,240
Speaker 1: my life. I'm going to go listen to that, like

535
00:31:39,560 --> 00:31:41,200
Speaker 1: I will look up the link before you leave in

536
00:31:41,240 --> 00:31:44,600
Speaker 1: something it's so good. Yeah, but I do. It's weird

537
00:31:44,640 --> 00:31:46,600
Speaker 1: because the way you're explaining it and also talking about

538
00:31:46,600 --> 00:31:50,239
Speaker 1: your grandmother, I'm literally picturing her like Mary Oliver and

539
00:31:50,280 --> 00:31:52,560
Speaker 1: you like a mini me of her in the woods,

540
00:31:52,600 --> 00:31:55,080
Speaker 1: and it's like I'm directing a movie about your life

541
00:31:55,080 --> 00:31:59,520
Speaker 1: in my head. Now, I love it. No, I would

542
00:31:59,560 --> 00:32:02,680
Speaker 1: saying the idea of years of my childhood. Actually, what

543
00:32:02,800 --> 00:32:06,240
Speaker 1: I was obsessed with writing were ghost stories and mysteries.

544
00:32:06,320 --> 00:32:09,120
Speaker 1: Mystery stories. But I like, like, I loved sending ghost

545
00:32:09,200 --> 00:32:12,120
Speaker 1: stories on the bottom of the lake because the lake

546
00:32:12,200 --> 00:32:15,000
Speaker 1: I grew up on is supposedly built over an Indian

547
00:32:15,040 --> 00:32:18,920
Speaker 1: burial ground and it's a man made lake, and so

548
00:32:18,920 --> 00:32:22,000
Speaker 1: so I loved I don't know, I was obsessed with ghosts.

549
00:32:22,000 --> 00:32:24,880
Speaker 1: And remember those Scary Stories books that we had, the

550
00:32:24,920 --> 00:32:28,080
Speaker 1: really creepy illustrations. It's now being turned into a TV show,

551
00:32:28,120 --> 00:32:31,240
Speaker 1: which I'm so excited about. But I loved those books

552
00:32:31,400 --> 00:32:34,960
Speaker 1: and scary stories and fear Streets. Yes ruined me. Oh

553
00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:37,240
Speaker 1: my gosh, I read fear Street all the time or

554
00:32:37,280 --> 00:32:41,959
Speaker 1: else Snein was amazing. Yeah, So I I loved being scared,

555
00:32:42,000 --> 00:32:44,520
Speaker 1: even though I was terrified being scared too, like I

556
00:32:44,560 --> 00:32:47,280
Speaker 1: was a very scaredy cat kid, but I loved ghost

557
00:32:47,320 --> 00:32:49,120
Speaker 1: stories at the same time. So I wrote a lot

558
00:32:49,120 --> 00:32:54,280
Speaker 1: of stuff about ghosts. So I know that you you

559
00:32:54,400 --> 00:32:59,400
Speaker 1: studied English and college, right, Yeah, I studied English journalism. Yeah, okay,

560
00:32:59,480 --> 00:33:01,320
Speaker 1: and that was sort of as you say, how you

561
00:33:01,360 --> 00:33:04,280
Speaker 1: got sidetracked and wound up at the evening news. What

562
00:33:04,320 --> 00:33:08,840
Speaker 1: did that feel like? I'm curious not only what the

563
00:33:08,840 --> 00:33:11,760
Speaker 1: side track looks like into journalism, but I also wonder now,

564
00:33:11,760 --> 00:33:16,320
Speaker 1: in hindsight, what you were watching or observing. You know,

565
00:33:16,360 --> 00:33:18,160
Speaker 1: when you were watching Katie. You know, she's the first

566
00:33:18,160 --> 00:33:22,440
Speaker 1: solo female news anchor ever. That's such a moment for America.

567
00:33:22,560 --> 00:33:26,200
Speaker 1: And and in a way, when I think back to

568
00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:29,560
Speaker 1: watching her, I think, as I'm contemplating this idea of

569
00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:33,600
Speaker 1: nurturing and intellect and all of the things that women are,

570
00:33:33,640 --> 00:33:35,320
Speaker 1: but for some reason we're told to be one or

571
00:33:35,320 --> 00:33:37,800
Speaker 1: the other. I think about the way she was able

572
00:33:37,840 --> 00:33:42,280
Speaker 1: to really nurture and hand hold us as viewers, but

573
00:33:42,400 --> 00:33:45,440
Speaker 1: also really cut to the core of issues, and I

574
00:33:45,480 --> 00:33:49,080
Speaker 1: wonder what was it like to watch that and to

575
00:33:49,200 --> 00:33:52,280
Speaker 1: be there. It was incredible. I actually started there the

576
00:33:52,440 --> 00:33:56,160
Speaker 1: first week she started, So yeah, my first very first

577
00:33:56,240 --> 00:34:00,440
Speaker 1: day at the job was when Bob shei for they

578
00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:03,120
Speaker 1: were throwing like a thank you party because Katie was

579
00:34:03,160 --> 00:34:06,960
Speaker 1: taking over, and my my very first job was to

580
00:34:07,040 --> 00:34:09,960
Speaker 1: be that evening. I was stationed at the front door

581
00:34:10,080 --> 00:34:12,239
Speaker 1: and my boss was like, do not let anyone in

582
00:34:12,520 --> 00:34:15,239
Speaker 1: who is not on the guest list. So here I am,

583
00:34:15,440 --> 00:34:17,879
Speaker 1: right out of college, right, so excited to be there,

584
00:34:18,920 --> 00:34:21,799
Speaker 1: and I'm monitoring the guest list and I'm I'm doing

585
00:34:21,840 --> 00:34:25,040
Speaker 1: my job, and then I turned someone away and I

586
00:34:25,080 --> 00:34:28,120
Speaker 1: just hear dead silence and the person next to her says,

587
00:34:28,239 --> 00:34:31,280
Speaker 1: you do not turn Maureen Doubt away from a party.

588
00:34:33,160 --> 00:34:35,680
Speaker 1: Oh my god. I became a joke in the news

589
00:34:35,680 --> 00:34:38,560
Speaker 1: from people put moreen doubts. Picture above my desk. I

590
00:34:38,640 --> 00:34:40,200
Speaker 1: was my first day on the job. Is that I

591
00:34:40,280 --> 00:34:43,880
Speaker 1: accidentally tried to turn Maureen down away. You're like, I

592
00:34:43,880 --> 00:34:45,799
Speaker 1: don't know what, I don't know, leave me off. I

593
00:34:45,840 --> 00:34:47,600
Speaker 1: wasn't even looking, you know, if I had looked up

594
00:34:47,640 --> 00:34:49,600
Speaker 1: and seen her. But I was just like head on

595
00:34:49,840 --> 00:34:53,239
Speaker 1: down on the list, waking at the list. But she

596
00:34:53,360 --> 00:34:56,640
Speaker 1: had like a Leslie Man moment and go doorman, Doorman, Doorman, Doorman.

597
00:34:59,239 --> 00:35:03,640
Speaker 1: I'm sure, but but yeah, Katie. I mean, it was

598
00:35:03,719 --> 00:35:06,800
Speaker 1: incredible to be there in that historic moment with Katie

599
00:35:06,840 --> 00:35:09,160
Speaker 1: taking over. There was a lot of excitement in the

600
00:35:09,200 --> 00:35:12,480
Speaker 1: news room. So that really inspired me. I mean. The

601
00:35:12,480 --> 00:35:16,680
Speaker 1: reason that I mean when I said that, like I

602
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:19,719
Speaker 1: side tracked with journalism, I actually still see myself as

603
00:35:19,760 --> 00:35:22,400
Speaker 1: a journalist and love journalism, you know, in addition to

604
00:35:22,480 --> 00:35:24,480
Speaker 1: many of the things I write. So it wasn't really

605
00:35:24,520 --> 00:35:27,360
Speaker 1: a sidetrack in just that like it fed who I

606
00:35:27,400 --> 00:35:31,160
Speaker 1: am now. It absolutely did. And the reason I worked

607
00:35:31,239 --> 00:35:34,960
Speaker 1: there is because when I was a kid, my dad

608
00:35:35,400 --> 00:35:38,200
Speaker 1: he took me to subway at a ka the sandwich

609
00:35:38,239 --> 00:35:41,440
Speaker 1: shop in Ridgefield, Connecticut, where I grew up, and my

610
00:35:41,520 --> 00:35:46,000
Speaker 1: dad loves TV news and we would watch NBC and

611
00:35:46,239 --> 00:35:50,040
Speaker 1: we would always watch the local New York NBC news

612
00:35:50,160 --> 00:35:52,760
Speaker 1: and one day we were there and he said, that's

613
00:35:53,120 --> 00:35:56,839
Speaker 1: Carol Jenkins whose NBC. And I was so excited. So

614
00:35:56,880 --> 00:35:59,880
Speaker 1: he brought me over and introduced me, and she invited

615
00:36:00,040 --> 00:36:03,799
Speaker 1: us to shadow her at the evening news. So we went.

616
00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:06,520
Speaker 1: I went a couple of times, and so Carol was

617
00:36:06,560 --> 00:36:10,560
Speaker 1: a mentor to me. She's amazing. She's no longer at NBC.

618
00:36:10,760 --> 00:36:14,160
Speaker 1: She left and became head of the Women's Media Center

619
00:36:14,200 --> 00:36:17,440
Speaker 1: for a while, and now she does I believe the

620
00:36:17,440 --> 00:36:20,840
Speaker 1: show is called Black America on Cunei TV. She's the

621
00:36:20,920 --> 00:36:26,760
Speaker 1: host of that. She's incredible. So Carol was already somebody

622
00:36:26,760 --> 00:36:29,320
Speaker 1: who I admired. And then when I was in college,

623
00:36:29,360 --> 00:36:33,480
Speaker 1: I interned for Ed Bradley at sixty Minutes and that

624
00:36:33,640 --> 00:36:37,080
Speaker 1: was amazing. I interned for a couple of his producers

625
00:36:37,239 --> 00:36:41,000
Speaker 1: and I spent the summer working on a story about

626
00:36:41,200 --> 00:36:45,719
Speaker 1: the Emmett till civil rights case. It was an incredibly

627
00:36:45,760 --> 00:36:49,280
Speaker 1: inspiring summer to work on such an important story. So

628
00:36:50,440 --> 00:36:55,040
Speaker 1: that gave me the thirst for for journalism. Um. And

629
00:36:55,120 --> 00:36:58,600
Speaker 1: so when I graduated, I got this job working with Katie,

630
00:36:58,600 --> 00:37:02,719
Speaker 1: and Katie is amazing. She's are inspiring. I feel like

631
00:37:02,760 --> 00:37:05,360
Speaker 1: she's really great at taking other young women in the

632
00:37:05,360 --> 00:37:08,080
Speaker 1: newsroom kind of under her wing. You know. She definitely

633
00:37:08,320 --> 00:37:10,920
Speaker 1: like encouraged me with my own writing, and I wrote

634
00:37:10,920 --> 00:37:13,160
Speaker 1: for her blog a few times and that was great.

635
00:37:13,280 --> 00:37:17,560
Speaker 1: So yeah, that's so cool. And from there, I know,

636
00:37:17,680 --> 00:37:20,960
Speaker 1: you went back to New Hampshire, you worked at River Run,

637
00:37:21,880 --> 00:37:24,279
Speaker 1: and and then you ended up back in New York

638
00:37:24,880 --> 00:37:28,040
Speaker 1: and you were you were working for a scientist like

639
00:37:28,080 --> 00:37:30,680
Speaker 1: you you have this these crazy couple of years where

640
00:37:31,520 --> 00:37:34,120
Speaker 1: you're all over the place and what happens and how

641
00:37:34,160 --> 00:37:36,600
Speaker 1: do you wind up back here? And and beginning to

642
00:37:36,960 --> 00:37:39,640
Speaker 1: I think prepare for all of this. Well, while I

643
00:37:39,680 --> 00:37:41,840
Speaker 1: was still in college, I worked for River Run bookstore

644
00:37:41,880 --> 00:37:44,640
Speaker 1: in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and I loved it. And then

645
00:37:44,680 --> 00:37:46,480
Speaker 1: when I was working for Katie, I worked there for

646
00:37:46,520 --> 00:37:50,040
Speaker 1: a year for that show and ended up producing a

647
00:37:50,040 --> 00:37:52,520
Speaker 1: segment on the show called Assignment America where I would

648
00:37:52,520 --> 00:37:55,200
Speaker 1: find the feel good story of the week, which I loved.

649
00:37:55,239 --> 00:37:57,879
Speaker 1: And Steve Hartman, the reporter, was wonderful to work with,

650
00:37:58,000 --> 00:38:02,040
Speaker 1: so I really really loved and I was torn about leaving,

651
00:38:02,400 --> 00:38:05,239
Speaker 1: but you know, I was definitely like on the rise

652
00:38:05,280 --> 00:38:07,839
Speaker 1: there and already producing a segment within my first year,

653
00:38:08,120 --> 00:38:11,439
Speaker 1: which was great, But my heart was still so set

654
00:38:11,520 --> 00:38:15,080
Speaker 1: on books and on print and that, and I felt

655
00:38:15,120 --> 00:38:19,000
Speaker 1: like I had to give that a chance. So I

656
00:38:19,080 --> 00:38:23,200
Speaker 1: quit a job at a national TV show to move

657
00:38:23,239 --> 00:38:26,279
Speaker 1: back to New Hampshire to run events at River Run

658
00:38:26,280 --> 00:38:31,200
Speaker 1: Bookstore because my former boss there said, hey, come, you know,

659
00:38:31,320 --> 00:38:34,800
Speaker 1: come run events here. And I'm I do not regret

660
00:38:34,800 --> 00:38:37,239
Speaker 1: that move at all because I learned so much and

661
00:38:37,280 --> 00:38:41,280
Speaker 1: being able to curate the events series and meet writers

662
00:38:41,320 --> 00:38:44,240
Speaker 1: and hear how they wrote their books and get inspired

663
00:38:44,280 --> 00:38:46,040
Speaker 1: by them. It was like a little mini m f

664
00:38:46,040 --> 00:38:49,000
Speaker 1: A program And I learned so much about the industry

665
00:38:49,480 --> 00:38:52,759
Speaker 1: and started writing really in earnest at that point. And

666
00:38:52,800 --> 00:38:55,880
Speaker 1: I moved back to New York City because Sarah McNally,

667
00:38:55,880 --> 00:38:58,840
Speaker 1: the owner of McNally Jackson Um, had heard about me

668
00:38:58,960 --> 00:39:03,120
Speaker 1: because I like was really involved in the bookselling world,

669
00:39:03,200 --> 00:39:06,520
Speaker 1: and she recruited me to come run events at her store.

670
00:39:06,680 --> 00:39:08,960
Speaker 1: So that was what got me to come back here.

671
00:39:09,000 --> 00:39:10,520
Speaker 1: I didn't think I was going to come back here.

672
00:39:11,520 --> 00:39:13,760
Speaker 1: The funny thing is part of why I ran away

673
00:39:14,239 --> 00:39:17,080
Speaker 1: was like the first time around, New York really overwhelmed me,

674
00:39:18,000 --> 00:39:19,839
Speaker 1: even though I grew up an hour outside of New

675
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:22,200
Speaker 1: York and I loved coming here. But I moved to

676
00:39:22,320 --> 00:39:27,520
Speaker 1: Bushwick in two thousands, six or seven. I can't remember

677
00:39:27,520 --> 00:39:29,759
Speaker 1: the exact year. Um when I was working at the

678
00:39:29,800 --> 00:39:33,560
Speaker 1: Evening News and I lived in this really not nice

679
00:39:33,560 --> 00:39:37,319
Speaker 1: apartment and as a lot of people did that year,

680
00:39:37,440 --> 00:39:42,680
Speaker 1: I got bed bugs and it was awful. I'll never

681
00:39:42,719 --> 00:39:45,239
Speaker 1: forget the third time the exterminator came. I was like

682
00:39:45,360 --> 00:39:49,120
Speaker 1: out and in Union Square, actually at a cafe, and

683
00:39:49,160 --> 00:39:51,680
Speaker 1: the guy next to me was scratching his arms furiously

684
00:39:51,680 --> 00:39:53,759
Speaker 1: and it turned out he had bed bugs too. It

685
00:39:53,840 --> 00:39:56,880
Speaker 1: was just very common that year, especially, a lot of

686
00:39:56,880 --> 00:39:59,920
Speaker 1: people had them, and uh, I ended up but it

687
00:40:00,320 --> 00:40:03,440
Speaker 1: that experience ended up turning into an essay that I

688
00:40:03,440 --> 00:40:07,320
Speaker 1: published on the Paris Reviews website because because bed bugs

689
00:40:07,320 --> 00:40:10,600
Speaker 1: turned you into an accidental book Yes, tell me, how

690
00:40:10,600 --> 00:40:13,239
Speaker 1: do you accidentally set a book on fire? Well, it's

691
00:40:13,239 --> 00:40:17,520
Speaker 1: really hilarious. So I had to microwave every single book

692
00:40:17,600 --> 00:40:19,799
Speaker 1: I owned, which was a lot of books, because the

693
00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:23,399
Speaker 1: externator told me that the bed bug like eggs can

694
00:40:23,480 --> 00:40:26,600
Speaker 1: live inside of the books, so I wasn't thinking it

695
00:40:26,680 --> 00:40:29,080
Speaker 1: was just microwaving, and of all books to put in

696
00:40:29,080 --> 00:40:33,560
Speaker 1: the microwave. I had Insomnia by Stephen King. So it's

697
00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:36,799
Speaker 1: like the poetic justice that this is hilarious because I'm

698
00:40:36,800 --> 00:40:39,160
Speaker 1: not sleeping well because of bed bugs. And then I

699
00:40:39,239 --> 00:40:41,399
Speaker 1: put this book in and it had a metallic cover

700
00:40:41,800 --> 00:40:46,239
Speaker 1: and it's set it on fire in microwave. So I

701
00:40:46,320 --> 00:40:50,120
Speaker 1: ended up writing this essay years later about that experience. Yeah,

702
00:40:50,239 --> 00:40:55,400
Speaker 1: but so I had the Paris Review in the Paris

703
00:40:55,400 --> 00:40:57,680
Speaker 1: Review Daily their website, Yeah, they have a blog, and

704
00:40:57,719 --> 00:41:00,520
Speaker 1: I wrote that essay for them. So I, I mean,

705
00:41:00,680 --> 00:41:04,239
Speaker 1: so everything happens for a reason, I feel like, and

706
00:41:04,320 --> 00:41:05,960
Speaker 1: you know, I didn't think i'd end up back in

707
00:41:05,960 --> 00:41:09,200
Speaker 1: New York, and second time around has been amazing. I've

708
00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:13,239
Speaker 1: been back here since eleven and I ran events at

709
00:41:13,280 --> 00:41:17,600
Speaker 1: McNally Jackson for a year, and then I left there

710
00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:20,720
Speaker 1: and ran events at Community Bookstore in Park Slope in Brooklyn,

711
00:41:20,760 --> 00:41:23,680
Speaker 1: and also got a job for working for a scientist

712
00:41:23,719 --> 00:41:28,319
Speaker 1: at Rockefeller University. And so, just as most writers do,

713
00:41:28,440 --> 00:41:30,919
Speaker 1: you have to kind of cobble together a career, right

714
00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:33,680
Speaker 1: because writing does not pay enough to pay the bills.

715
00:41:33,760 --> 00:41:37,080
Speaker 1: So I would do whatever I could to be around

716
00:41:37,120 --> 00:41:39,839
Speaker 1: writers and to soak up the information and learn as

717
00:41:39,880 --> 00:41:42,000
Speaker 1: much as I could. And is that what got you

718
00:41:42,040 --> 00:41:45,720
Speaker 1: to start writing? Yeah? Yeah, because because of my time

719
00:41:46,080 --> 00:41:49,960
Speaker 1: running events at all these different bookstores, I had really wanted,

720
00:41:50,040 --> 00:41:52,720
Speaker 1: always wanted to have my very own series with complete

721
00:41:52,719 --> 00:41:55,080
Speaker 1: control over it, even though I could do that when

722
00:41:55,080 --> 00:41:56,880
Speaker 1: I was running events at the other places, I just

723
00:41:56,920 --> 00:41:59,239
Speaker 1: wanted to be able to have my own thing and

724
00:41:59,320 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 1: not being responsible for all the other events at the stores.

725
00:42:02,719 --> 00:42:05,520
Speaker 1: So it's a quarterly series because it is a lot

726
00:42:05,560 --> 00:42:07,960
Speaker 1: of work. I read every single author's book that's on

727
00:42:08,000 --> 00:42:11,120
Speaker 1: the panel and write questions directed towards them. I mean,

728
00:42:11,160 --> 00:42:14,880
Speaker 1: you know, I know as you look at my nerdy

729
00:42:14,920 --> 00:42:19,920
Speaker 1: prep docs, I'm like, I get it. Yeah. So you

730
00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:23,640
Speaker 1: do this quarterly series. You interview these writers about their work,

731
00:42:23,760 --> 00:42:28,359
Speaker 1: their life. Do you think that there's some piece of

732
00:42:28,400 --> 00:42:31,959
Speaker 1: that that started informing this idea of turning the essay

733
00:42:32,000 --> 00:42:35,720
Speaker 1: into a book of finding and sourcing other writers asking

734
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:38,120
Speaker 1: them all this question, what what do you and your

735
00:42:38,160 --> 00:42:42,080
Speaker 1: mother not talk about? Yeah? Absolutely so. I you know,

736
00:42:42,160 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 1: I didn't have open submissions. Once I sold the book,

737
00:42:44,560 --> 00:42:47,319
Speaker 1: I knew the authors I wanted to approach. I was

738
00:42:47,360 --> 00:42:50,799
Speaker 1: so curious how you connected with them because it's such

739
00:42:50,800 --> 00:42:53,080
Speaker 1: an incredible group. So so you found them all ahead

740
00:42:53,120 --> 00:42:55,600
Speaker 1: of time, not all of them, um, but I got

741
00:42:55,640 --> 00:42:57,600
Speaker 1: a bunch of them to agree before I sold the book,

742
00:42:57,760 --> 00:43:00,480
Speaker 1: and then I approached some mothers after the book was sold.

743
00:43:00,680 --> 00:43:02,719
Speaker 1: How did you start picking people? How? How do you

744
00:43:02,719 --> 00:43:06,440
Speaker 1: go about that? I mean, it's oh, man, well, a

745
00:43:06,480 --> 00:43:09,880
Speaker 1: big thing is that, I it's kind of hard to

746
00:43:09,880 --> 00:43:11,880
Speaker 1: approach people and be like, so, what's your relationship like

747
00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:16,760
Speaker 1: with your mom? But but you have to and so

748
00:43:17,320 --> 00:43:19,480
Speaker 1: you know, some people signed up to do it and

749
00:43:19,560 --> 00:43:22,000
Speaker 1: dropped out because they realized they weren't ready to write

750
00:43:22,000 --> 00:43:27,920
Speaker 1: about their mom um. And some people, um were signed

751
00:43:27,960 --> 00:43:30,000
Speaker 1: up with the project right away. Like I knew I

752
00:43:30,040 --> 00:43:32,759
Speaker 1: wanted to have Leslie Jamison, who closes the book with

753
00:43:32,760 --> 00:43:36,479
Speaker 1: her incredible essay about trying to understand who her mom

754
00:43:36,520 --> 00:43:39,759
Speaker 1: was before she became her mom by reading an unpublished

755
00:43:39,840 --> 00:43:43,720
Speaker 1: manuscript by her mom's first husband that's based on their marriage.

756
00:43:43,719 --> 00:43:47,600
Speaker 1: He wrote a novel based on them. Is so fascinating.

757
00:43:47,640 --> 00:43:50,160
Speaker 1: It's really really fast, especially because her mom and her

758
00:43:50,200 --> 00:43:54,600
Speaker 1: mom's first husband are still so close exactly, yeah that

759
00:43:54,719 --> 00:43:57,799
Speaker 1: was mine. Yeah, and she's very close with her mom.

760
00:43:58,000 --> 00:44:00,759
Speaker 1: And I find that essay to be extremely hopeful, which

761
00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:02,600
Speaker 1: is why I wanted to end on that on that

762
00:44:02,640 --> 00:44:05,120
Speaker 1: piece for the book. But so when you right away,

763
00:44:05,160 --> 00:44:07,720
Speaker 1: I mean Leslie Jamison is one of the best essayists

764
00:44:07,760 --> 00:44:09,840
Speaker 1: of our time. She wrote this incredible book called The

765
00:44:09,840 --> 00:44:12,479
Speaker 1: Empathy Exams. I don't know if you've read that, but

766
00:44:12,600 --> 00:44:16,560
Speaker 1: what how do I know? Oh, it's amazing, quite literally

767
00:44:16,600 --> 00:44:19,839
Speaker 1: writing it down. Yeah, And and everything she writes is great.

768
00:44:19,880 --> 00:44:22,799
Speaker 1: She has a new essay collection coming out this fall

769
00:44:22,840 --> 00:44:26,840
Speaker 1: actually called Make It Screen, Make It Burn, And so

770
00:44:27,239 --> 00:44:30,800
Speaker 1: she was signed on from the get go. Same with Alexandrici,

771
00:44:31,080 --> 00:44:34,160
Speaker 1: who wrote a really beautiful essay for this book about

772
00:44:34,800 --> 00:44:37,520
Speaker 1: being abused when he was a kid in hiding it

773
00:44:37,560 --> 00:44:42,080
Speaker 1: from his mom to protect her. And Alex has this

774
00:44:42,320 --> 00:44:45,200
Speaker 1: stunning essay collection that came out recently called How to

775
00:44:45,200 --> 00:44:48,880
Speaker 1: Write an Autobiographical Novel, and he's he's one of my

776
00:44:48,920 --> 00:44:52,160
Speaker 1: favorite essays. So there were people who automatically came to

777
00:44:52,200 --> 00:44:54,520
Speaker 1: mind like, oh, I love the writing, I need this.

778
00:44:54,960 --> 00:44:57,120
Speaker 1: Then there were a few people in the book who

779
00:44:57,200 --> 00:44:59,520
Speaker 1: whose essays had already been published elsewhere, and I read

780
00:44:59,520 --> 00:45:01,680
Speaker 1: them and thought, immediately, I need this in the book.

781
00:45:01,719 --> 00:45:05,200
Speaker 1: And and that for those two that was Brandon Taylor,

782
00:45:05,760 --> 00:45:09,560
Speaker 1: who wrote a piece for Literary Hub about his mom,

783
00:45:09,600 --> 00:45:13,080
Speaker 1: who was very abusive and she is no longer alive,

784
00:45:13,239 --> 00:45:16,759
Speaker 1: and he wrote about he wrote just like with tremendous

785
00:45:16,800 --> 00:45:20,400
Speaker 1: tenderness about her despite what she did to him, and

786
00:45:20,440 --> 00:45:22,480
Speaker 1: it's one of the most beautiful essays I've ever in

787
00:45:22,560 --> 00:45:26,360
Speaker 1: devastating essays I've ever read. And then Andrea Asimum is

788
00:45:26,400 --> 00:45:28,200
Speaker 1: in the book and his piece was originally in The

789
00:45:28,239 --> 00:45:31,359
Speaker 1: New Yorker about growing up with a deaf mother, and

790
00:45:31,400 --> 00:45:35,120
Speaker 1: I thought that was a fascinating angle to have in

791
00:45:35,160 --> 00:45:37,040
Speaker 1: this book. And also I love him because he wrote

792
00:45:37,080 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 1: Call Me by Your Name, which is one of my

793
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:41,160
Speaker 1: favorite movies, and I love his book too, but the

794
00:45:41,200 --> 00:45:45,080
Speaker 1: movie isn't eazy, So yeah, so the right away I

795
00:45:45,120 --> 00:45:46,920
Speaker 1: knew they would be in there. But yeah, I mean,

796
00:45:46,960 --> 00:45:50,080
Speaker 1: I the main thing when putting this anthology together was

797
00:45:50,120 --> 00:45:54,600
Speaker 1: that I didn't want to have too much overlap. Although

798
00:45:54,600 --> 00:45:57,520
Speaker 1: the irony is there is a lot of overlap, even

799
00:45:57,560 --> 00:45:59,840
Speaker 1: with the stories being very different. There's a lot to

800
00:46:00,120 --> 00:46:01,919
Speaker 1: a lot of common themes that emerge. But I didn't

801
00:46:01,960 --> 00:46:05,239
Speaker 1: want the essays to be exactly the same as what

802
00:46:05,280 --> 00:46:08,239
Speaker 1: I'm saying, Like my especially my editor at Simon and

803
00:46:08,239 --> 00:46:10,840
Speaker 1: Schuster was like, we cannot have every single essay be

804
00:46:10,880 --> 00:46:13,120
Speaker 1: an abuse story, and I agreed with her. You know,

805
00:46:13,200 --> 00:46:15,680
Speaker 1: I wanted to have a wide array. I love the

806
00:46:15,719 --> 00:46:18,920
Speaker 1: diversity of perspective. I love that that it's so many

807
00:46:19,000 --> 00:46:22,480
Speaker 1: women and so many men. I love that it's so multicultural.

808
00:46:23,520 --> 00:46:28,040
Speaker 1: Every essay really surprised me. And yet you're right, you

809
00:46:28,120 --> 00:46:31,640
Speaker 1: do feel the through line in all of it, and

810
00:46:31,680 --> 00:46:33,920
Speaker 1: I guess that that makes me curious. Why do you

811
00:46:34,040 --> 00:46:39,560
Speaker 1: think that the mother child bond is so unique yet

812
00:46:39,640 --> 00:46:45,799
Speaker 1: so universal? Oh that's a great question. Oh, I mean

813
00:46:45,800 --> 00:46:49,560
Speaker 1: it's universal because everyone comes from a mother. Everyone has

814
00:46:49,600 --> 00:46:52,080
Speaker 1: a mother for even like just a brief amount of time,

815
00:46:52,320 --> 00:46:57,160
Speaker 1: So there's always this idea of I mean, in my essay,

816
00:46:57,160 --> 00:46:59,279
Speaker 1: I open it with our mothers, our first homes, and

817
00:46:59,280 --> 00:47:01,480
Speaker 1: that's why we're is trying to return to them to

818
00:47:01,600 --> 00:47:04,680
Speaker 1: have some sense of where we belong or where we fit.

819
00:47:05,320 --> 00:47:07,640
Speaker 1: And I think that's true, is that like, as we

820
00:47:07,719 --> 00:47:10,000
Speaker 1: live our lives, even if our moms are no longer

821
00:47:10,040 --> 00:47:13,000
Speaker 1: in it, we're trying to understand who we are in

822
00:47:13,080 --> 00:47:16,719
Speaker 1: relation to where we come from. So even though our

823
00:47:16,800 --> 00:47:21,640
Speaker 1: stories with our mothers might be very different there. You know,

824
00:47:21,760 --> 00:47:26,080
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, the stories of relationships

825
00:47:26,120 --> 00:47:28,839
Speaker 1: are universal in general, Like there there are so many

826
00:47:28,880 --> 00:47:32,000
Speaker 1: common threads we can see in somebody who might have

827
00:47:32,040 --> 00:47:35,960
Speaker 1: had a completely different upbringing, completely different relationship with their mom,

828
00:47:36,040 --> 00:47:39,360
Speaker 1: there's still there's That's the same way you might feel

829
00:47:39,360 --> 00:47:42,200
Speaker 1: in watching a movie where you connect with a character

830
00:47:42,280 --> 00:47:44,840
Speaker 1: who grows up in a completely different place than you

831
00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:47,839
Speaker 1: did and has a completely different story, but they come

832
00:47:47,880 --> 00:47:53,239
Speaker 1: to some realization about life that speaks to you, right, Yeah,

833
00:47:53,400 --> 00:47:56,880
Speaker 1: and you mentioned it. You know that mothers really are

834
00:47:56,960 --> 00:48:00,640
Speaker 1: set up to fail. Yeah, the the expectations are unrealistic.

835
00:48:01,280 --> 00:48:03,520
Speaker 1: Not one person can be all things to all people

836
00:48:03,600 --> 00:48:06,719
Speaker 1: at all times. And obviously that means that the mother

837
00:48:06,800 --> 00:48:10,919
Speaker 1: child connection is a complicated one. So there's this great

838
00:48:10,960 --> 00:48:14,160
Speaker 1: disparity between the greeting card family and most people's reality.

839
00:48:14,360 --> 00:48:18,480
Speaker 1: Yet we still make the greeting cards. We still live

840
00:48:18,480 --> 00:48:21,239
Speaker 1: in a society where we have holidays that assume a

841
00:48:21,280 --> 00:48:23,440
Speaker 1: happy relationship with your mother or with your father. And

842
00:48:24,360 --> 00:48:27,399
Speaker 1: I'm curious why you think that is. And and and as

843
00:48:27,400 --> 00:48:30,480
Speaker 1: a person who exists on the not happy end of

844
00:48:30,520 --> 00:48:34,360
Speaker 1: the spectrum in your in your maternal relationship, what advice

845
00:48:34,400 --> 00:48:40,000
Speaker 1: do you have for people who are experiencing that dissonance? Similarly,

846
00:48:40,440 --> 00:48:42,359
Speaker 1: what do you what do people do with Mother's Day?

847
00:48:43,840 --> 00:48:46,480
Speaker 1: I myself have a very difficult time on that day,

848
00:48:46,640 --> 00:48:50,480
Speaker 1: especially on Facebook. You know, people tend to use that

849
00:48:50,560 --> 00:48:53,800
Speaker 1: day to post photos of their moms and celebrate their mothers.

850
00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:57,879
Speaker 1: And that's wonderful and I'm really happy for everyone who

851
00:48:57,880 --> 00:49:00,200
Speaker 1: do who does have a great relationship with them mom.

852
00:49:00,239 --> 00:49:03,719
Speaker 1: But for those people who who have some pain around that,

853
00:49:04,960 --> 00:49:07,640
Speaker 1: I think that you really need to practice self care

854
00:49:07,680 --> 00:49:09,719
Speaker 1: on that day, of all days, whatever that might mean

855
00:49:09,800 --> 00:49:12,640
Speaker 1: for you. And that might mean avoiding social media and

856
00:49:12,680 --> 00:49:16,600
Speaker 1: the parade endless parade in your feed of people celebrating

857
00:49:16,640 --> 00:49:21,759
Speaker 1: their moms and buying into Mother's Day. I think that

858
00:49:21,760 --> 00:49:23,640
Speaker 1: that could be a great day to practice being a

859
00:49:23,640 --> 00:49:26,319
Speaker 1: mother to yourself, right. But I also think it might

860
00:49:26,360 --> 00:49:30,399
Speaker 1: be an interesting exercise to to write down your own

861
00:49:30,400 --> 00:49:32,399
Speaker 1: thoughts about what you would say to your mother if

862
00:49:32,440 --> 00:49:36,520
Speaker 1: you could. Um. Actually, the Smarter Living section of the

863
00:49:36,520 --> 00:49:39,480
Speaker 1: New York Times someone just recommended that exercise from my

864
00:49:39,560 --> 00:49:41,840
Speaker 1: book in the New York Times last week, and I

865
00:49:41,880 --> 00:49:44,120
Speaker 1: was like, Yeah, I love that somebody did that, because

866
00:49:44,320 --> 00:49:46,840
Speaker 1: it is a good prompt right, what would you not?

867
00:49:47,040 --> 00:49:50,040
Speaker 1: What would you talk about with your mom if you could,

868
00:49:50,440 --> 00:49:52,400
Speaker 1: even if your mother is no longer around, maybe that

869
00:49:52,480 --> 00:49:54,480
Speaker 1: might be something that helps you feel better if you

870
00:49:54,520 --> 00:49:58,560
Speaker 1: can't actually say it to her face to face, And

871
00:49:58,640 --> 00:50:00,160
Speaker 1: so that might be a good thing to do that

872
00:50:00,239 --> 00:50:02,000
Speaker 1: day if you can't get your mom out of your head.

873
00:50:02,360 --> 00:50:07,480
Speaker 1: And I'm very curious what what your thoughts are also

874
00:50:07,880 --> 00:50:10,320
Speaker 1: for those people out there who might just be starting

875
00:50:10,320 --> 00:50:14,400
Speaker 1: to figure out what they're complicated relationships have been or

876
00:50:14,760 --> 00:50:17,480
Speaker 1: or or who are coming to terms with whatever trauma

877
00:50:17,520 --> 00:50:21,960
Speaker 1: they've been through. Because again, in this world where we

878
00:50:21,960 --> 00:50:24,040
Speaker 1: are not really taught to nurture ourselves and we are

879
00:50:24,080 --> 00:50:27,879
Speaker 1: often taught to deny our experiences, I had to to

880
00:50:28,000 --> 00:50:34,080
Speaker 1: learn that doctors, psychologists classified trauma as any environment that

881
00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:37,759
Speaker 1: is not nurturing. That's where trauma begins. And then on

882
00:50:37,800 --> 00:50:43,680
Speaker 1: the sliding scale, you can go from you know, an unsupportive, dangerous,

883
00:50:43,719 --> 00:50:47,480
Speaker 1: manipulative home all the way up to what I think

884
00:50:47,520 --> 00:50:50,280
Speaker 1: so many of us think is the definition of trauma

885
00:50:50,320 --> 00:50:52,840
Speaker 1: being you know, veterans who come back from war with PTSD,

886
00:50:53,719 --> 00:50:57,880
Speaker 1: But yes, that's trauma. But doctors have also now shown

887
00:50:57,880 --> 00:51:00,760
Speaker 1: in tests you know, psychological and brain tests and everything

888
00:51:00,760 --> 00:51:03,880
Speaker 1: that you know, women have been sexually assaulted experience and

889
00:51:03,920 --> 00:51:07,240
Speaker 1: carry the same levels of PTSD as war veterans. And

890
00:51:07,560 --> 00:51:10,080
Speaker 1: so that's a far end of trauma. And then there's

891
00:51:10,200 --> 00:51:14,200
Speaker 1: there's sliding into it from any non nurturing environment. And

892
00:51:15,040 --> 00:51:21,320
Speaker 1: I am just so curious about how we help people

893
00:51:22,080 --> 00:51:26,360
Speaker 1: recognize what might be traumatic in their lives so that

894
00:51:26,480 --> 00:51:30,719
Speaker 1: they don't have to carry it, how we help them

895
00:51:30,800 --> 00:51:32,840
Speaker 1: recognize it. I mean, I think your book is helpful.

896
00:51:32,880 --> 00:51:34,919
Speaker 1: I was going to say, I think that people might

897
00:51:34,960 --> 00:51:38,120
Speaker 1: find themselves in one of the essays in this book.

898
00:51:38,680 --> 00:51:42,839
Speaker 1: I absolutely recommend meant, I recommend that they read it

899
00:51:42,960 --> 00:51:49,319
Speaker 1: in that case. Um, I mean, I think what we

900
00:51:49,400 --> 00:51:52,239
Speaker 1: need to do, especially for people we care about, is

901
00:51:52,280 --> 00:51:56,520
Speaker 1: help them recognize trauma, right like, because sometimes, like you said,

902
00:51:56,520 --> 00:52:01,120
Speaker 1: you can be blinded to yourself and not really understand it. Um.

903
00:52:01,160 --> 00:52:03,760
Speaker 1: And there's so much stigma. There is so much stigma,

904
00:52:04,160 --> 00:52:07,120
Speaker 1: and not everyone has access to a therapist, right like,

905
00:52:07,200 --> 00:52:09,960
Speaker 1: having a therapist's privilege, having the money to afford to

906
00:52:09,960 --> 00:52:13,879
Speaker 1: go to a therapy as privilege. And so for me,

907
00:52:14,080 --> 00:52:17,000
Speaker 1: I often, like I talked about earlier, I found myself

908
00:52:17,000 --> 00:52:19,880
Speaker 1: in books and books were really what helps me to

909
00:52:20,360 --> 00:52:24,080
Speaker 1: to come to an understanding of what I had been through.

910
00:52:24,760 --> 00:52:27,160
Speaker 1: And I'm hoping that that's what this book can do

911
00:52:27,320 --> 00:52:30,440
Speaker 1: for for people, is break these silences, break these stigmas.

912
00:52:30,440 --> 00:52:33,040
Speaker 1: I mean, I even know some like as I've toured

913
00:52:33,080 --> 00:52:35,719
Speaker 1: around the country, there have been some moms who have

914
00:52:35,760 --> 00:52:40,359
Speaker 1: bought copies of this book for their daughters. Um even

915
00:52:40,360 --> 00:52:42,560
Speaker 1: though they at least they tell me they have good

916
00:52:42,560 --> 00:52:45,920
Speaker 1: relationships with their daughters, but they want their daughter to

917
00:52:46,040 --> 00:52:49,240
Speaker 1: feel like they can talk about anything, Like there's no topic.

918
00:52:49,360 --> 00:52:54,480
Speaker 1: That's even if a relationship is good, it's not all good. No,

919
00:52:54,719 --> 00:52:58,040
Speaker 1: it's not possible, no, exactly, that's not a relationship. That's

920
00:52:58,040 --> 00:53:02,920
Speaker 1: a cartoon. Every relationship is laud and complex exactly. So,

921
00:53:02,920 --> 00:53:05,480
Speaker 1: so I think we need to break the stigma of

922
00:53:06,640 --> 00:53:09,880
Speaker 1: there are certain things we should tiptoe around or or

923
00:53:10,000 --> 00:53:14,120
Speaker 1: or keep to ourselves, because I think I think it's

924
00:53:14,239 --> 00:53:18,520
Speaker 1: really important to be able to articulate what we carry

925
00:53:18,520 --> 00:53:21,359
Speaker 1: in our bodies, whatever that might be, and to give

926
00:53:21,400 --> 00:53:24,879
Speaker 1: yourself permission to recognize it and carry it and also

927
00:53:24,920 --> 00:53:27,720
Speaker 1: still carry joy, also still have a really good time.

928
00:53:27,880 --> 00:53:30,960
Speaker 1: Exactly before we started this interview, we were laughing about

929
00:53:31,000 --> 00:53:33,799
Speaker 1: travel and trips, and you were telling me about, you know,

930
00:53:33,880 --> 00:53:38,200
Speaker 1: backpacking with your significant other through Europe and being an

931
00:53:38,280 --> 00:53:40,759
Speaker 1: artist in residence and getting to say above the Shakespeare

932
00:53:40,760 --> 00:53:44,760
Speaker 1: and codebook story like how amazing. And so I guess

933
00:53:45,160 --> 00:53:48,360
Speaker 1: I'm also curious where where do you find joy? What

934
00:53:48,440 --> 00:53:52,080
Speaker 1: makes you happy? You know what, when you're not exercising

935
00:53:52,360 --> 00:53:55,000
Speaker 1: the profundity of words like what are you doing for fun?

936
00:53:55,960 --> 00:54:00,600
Speaker 1: Traveling definitely and spending time with friends and family really

937
00:54:00,680 --> 00:54:04,719
Speaker 1: important to me? What else gives me joy? It's like,

938
00:54:04,760 --> 00:54:07,279
Speaker 1: whenever anyone asks me what my favorite thing to eat is,

939
00:54:07,280 --> 00:54:09,360
Speaker 1: I can't think of anywhere I've ever been, And literally

940
00:54:09,400 --> 00:54:11,920
Speaker 1: I planned my entire life around where my next meal was,

941
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:15,799
Speaker 1: but I don't when someone asks, It's like my brain

942
00:54:15,840 --> 00:54:19,200
Speaker 1: just goes like white noise. Well exactly, and that same

943
00:54:19,200 --> 00:54:21,840
Speaker 1: one people are asking for my favorite books. But I'm

944
00:54:21,880 --> 00:54:24,560
Speaker 1: glad you brought up eating, because actually food is what

945
00:54:24,640 --> 00:54:27,319
Speaker 1: gives me a ton of joy. So and it's something

946
00:54:27,360 --> 00:54:29,080
Speaker 1: that connects me to my mom because my mom is

947
00:54:29,120 --> 00:54:32,880
Speaker 1: an amazing cook. So even though we have a complicated relationship,

948
00:54:32,920 --> 00:54:35,959
Speaker 1: whenever I'm cooking, I can think about how that's something

949
00:54:36,000 --> 00:54:40,480
Speaker 1: that relates to her. But yeah, I live to eat. Basically,

950
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:42,920
Speaker 1: I travel so that I can eat. Yeah, I like

951
00:54:42,960 --> 00:54:47,640
Speaker 1: I'm always looking for the best reviews. Yes, and we

952
00:54:47,719 --> 00:54:53,680
Speaker 1: have to trade less. So talking about you being being

953
00:54:53,680 --> 00:54:57,280
Speaker 1: an artist in residence, you know, you're getting your um,

954
00:54:57,360 --> 00:55:02,080
Speaker 1: your master's which is so cool, and you're teaching, yes,

955
00:55:02,320 --> 00:55:06,680
Speaker 1: And I'm curious you're teaching creative nonfiction. But I'm actually

956
00:55:06,680 --> 00:55:09,480
Speaker 1: teaching fiction and poetry all at n y U. I'll

957
00:55:09,520 --> 00:55:11,279
Speaker 1: be teaching for the first time. I mean, can I

958
00:55:11,440 --> 00:55:16,360
Speaker 1: get your syllables? Of course, I'm really proud reading it.

959
00:55:16,520 --> 00:55:19,600
Speaker 1: I would really like to see it, Like we can

960
00:55:19,680 --> 00:55:23,880
Speaker 1: learn out about this. But I am curious as a teacher,

961
00:55:24,920 --> 00:55:28,760
Speaker 1: what advice do you give to your students. You mentioned

962
00:55:28,800 --> 00:55:32,720
Speaker 1: that you take them through that exercise, and I do

963
00:55:33,200 --> 00:55:35,280
Speaker 1: having heard you say that. I think a lot of writers,

964
00:55:35,280 --> 00:55:38,040
Speaker 1: a lot of people are afraid of delving into certain topics,

965
00:55:38,719 --> 00:55:41,279
Speaker 1: you know, for what that kind of vulnerability might mean.

966
00:55:41,960 --> 00:55:44,680
Speaker 1: How do you encourage your students to put that fear

967
00:55:44,719 --> 00:55:48,600
Speaker 1: aside and and dive in. I you know, when I

968
00:55:48,640 --> 00:55:51,400
Speaker 1: was on book tour, I read and gave talks with

969
00:55:51,440 --> 00:55:53,239
Speaker 1: a lot of the contributors to the book And one

970
00:55:53,280 --> 00:55:56,600
Speaker 1: of the my favorite things someone said was Melissa Phoebos,

971
00:55:56,680 --> 00:55:59,799
Speaker 1: who's an amazing writer, gave the advice when we were

972
00:55:59,800 --> 00:56:01,759
Speaker 1: on a panel that you really need to write with

973
00:56:01,880 --> 00:56:04,719
Speaker 1: blinders on when you're writing about your own life and

974
00:56:04,760 --> 00:56:07,200
Speaker 1: I and and that is essentially what I tell my

975
00:56:07,239 --> 00:56:10,200
Speaker 1: students too, is that you have to kind of trick

976
00:56:10,239 --> 00:56:12,520
Speaker 1: yourself into thinking that no one else is ever going

977
00:56:12,560 --> 00:56:15,240
Speaker 1: to see this. It's different than writing for a diary.

978
00:56:15,320 --> 00:56:18,080
Speaker 1: Write a diary is just more stream of consciousness and

979
00:56:18,239 --> 00:56:22,359
Speaker 1: not about trying to create a narrative out of something necessarily.

980
00:56:22,880 --> 00:56:26,400
Speaker 1: But when you're writing for an essay about something that

981
00:56:26,480 --> 00:56:29,440
Speaker 1: happened to you, even if it's not traumatic, just something

982
00:56:29,480 --> 00:56:32,200
Speaker 1: in your own life where there's any kind of complication,

983
00:56:33,120 --> 00:56:35,399
Speaker 1: you do need to pretend that no one will ever

984
00:56:35,440 --> 00:56:40,359
Speaker 1: read it, because otherwise you might paralyze yourself. Um and

985
00:56:40,480 --> 00:56:44,040
Speaker 1: I think that's so important is to just worry about

986
00:56:44,120 --> 00:56:47,960
Speaker 1: getting the first draft down and thinking about it as

987
00:56:48,000 --> 00:56:51,759
Speaker 1: a conversation between you and the blank page, and not

988
00:56:51,880 --> 00:56:55,000
Speaker 1: thinking about the wide world out there and what people

989
00:56:55,040 --> 00:56:58,040
Speaker 1: will say. I love that a conversation between you and

990
00:56:58,080 --> 00:57:02,600
Speaker 1: the blank page. That believe it's so much pressure it

991
00:57:02,719 --> 00:57:07,120
Speaker 1: really does. Immediately. It does, because otherwise you're instantly thinking

992
00:57:07,120 --> 00:57:09,080
Speaker 1: about like, oh, if this is published, what are people

993
00:57:09,080 --> 00:57:11,080
Speaker 1: going to say about this? What is my family going

994
00:57:11,120 --> 00:57:13,480
Speaker 1: to think? How are people going to react? There are

995
00:57:13,480 --> 00:57:15,839
Speaker 1: a million things you can say to talk yourself out

996
00:57:15,840 --> 00:57:18,520
Speaker 1: of writing something, but there are a few things you

997
00:57:18,600 --> 00:57:21,680
Speaker 1: can say to talk yourself into writing something. And the

998
00:57:21,720 --> 00:57:23,640
Speaker 1: other thing. The other thing I have my students do

999
00:57:23,720 --> 00:57:26,080
Speaker 1: that I learned from my friend, the writer Dylan Landis,

1000
00:57:26,120 --> 00:57:29,080
Speaker 1: who also has an essay in this book. Um is

1001
00:57:29,120 --> 00:57:32,440
Speaker 1: the palmadoro technique. Do you know about this? Oh, I

1002
00:57:32,480 --> 00:57:34,880
Speaker 1: love a technique, I love a tool. Oh yeah, me too.

1003
00:57:35,000 --> 00:57:37,080
Speaker 1: So this is like something that's used in a lot

1004
00:57:37,120 --> 00:57:40,160
Speaker 1: of colleges. But it's basically, you set a timer for

1005
00:57:40,200 --> 00:57:43,400
Speaker 1: twenty five minutes, and during that twenty five minutes, you

1006
00:57:43,440 --> 00:57:46,200
Speaker 1: do not check your phone, you do not check the email.

1007
00:57:46,480 --> 00:57:49,440
Speaker 1: You know, you're not on social media, you are just writing.

1008
00:57:49,880 --> 00:57:52,760
Speaker 1: And there's something about that concentrated amount of time. Twenty

1009
00:57:52,760 --> 00:57:56,080
Speaker 1: five minutes feels like possible, even no matter how busy

1010
00:57:56,160 --> 00:57:59,560
Speaker 1: you are, right and so there's something about just being

1011
00:57:59,600 --> 00:58:03,200
Speaker 1: able to focus for twenty five minutes that it's enough

1012
00:58:03,240 --> 00:58:05,400
Speaker 1: time to get you into what you're writing, but also

1013
00:58:05,480 --> 00:58:08,520
Speaker 1: to not feel overwhelming. And then when the timer goes off,

1014
00:58:08,560 --> 00:58:10,720
Speaker 1: you said it again for five minutes to give yourself

1015
00:58:10,720 --> 00:58:12,880
Speaker 1: a break to do whatever you need to do, and

1016
00:58:12,920 --> 00:58:15,640
Speaker 1: then you set another twenty five minutes if you have time.

1017
00:58:15,800 --> 00:58:18,480
Speaker 1: But I really like breaking it into those little chunks

1018
00:58:18,520 --> 00:58:21,880
Speaker 1: because what I find is it's a lot more doable

1019
00:58:21,920 --> 00:58:24,520
Speaker 1: than just sitting down for like a four hour stretch

1020
00:58:24,560 --> 00:58:27,360
Speaker 1: and being like I need to write, which just there's

1021
00:58:27,400 --> 00:58:34,600
Speaker 1: no that's daunting. Yeah, exactly exactly. So I think that,

1022
00:58:35,040 --> 00:58:37,240
Speaker 1: you know, that makes it manageable. I think it's all

1023
00:58:37,280 --> 00:58:40,800
Speaker 1: about like that. And then another thing I one of

1024
00:58:40,840 --> 00:58:44,280
Speaker 1: my favorite writers is Elizabeth Gilbert. She's incredible. Her new

1025
00:58:44,320 --> 00:58:47,960
Speaker 1: book is so good. She is the best. Yeah, but

1026
00:58:48,120 --> 00:58:51,600
Speaker 1: her book Big Magic about Creativity and her ted talks

1027
00:58:51,640 --> 00:58:54,160
Speaker 1: on fear and creativity have really stuck with me. And

1028
00:58:54,200 --> 00:58:57,040
Speaker 1: one of the things that I've I take away from

1029
00:58:57,040 --> 00:58:59,440
Speaker 1: that that I try to remind my students of and

1030
00:58:59,840 --> 00:59:02,000
Speaker 1: I tell them I learned this from Elizabeth Gilbert is

1031
00:59:02,040 --> 00:59:06,280
Speaker 1: she talks about finding the joy and creativity, which can

1032
00:59:06,320 --> 00:59:09,120
Speaker 1: be hard, especially if you're writing about complicated things, right,

1033
00:59:09,120 --> 00:59:11,600
Speaker 1: because like, where is the joy in that. But there

1034
00:59:11,840 --> 00:59:15,439
Speaker 1: is this She talks about how we have this myth

1035
00:59:15,480 --> 00:59:19,320
Speaker 1: of the suffering, tortured artist and that there can be

1036
00:59:19,840 --> 00:59:23,600
Speaker 1: joy in the act of creating um And I think

1037
00:59:23,680 --> 00:59:26,840
Speaker 1: that's true. And I think, you know, like this this

1038
00:59:26,960 --> 00:59:29,120
Speaker 1: essay in the book that I wrote, it's the hardest

1039
00:59:29,120 --> 00:59:33,400
Speaker 1: thing I've ever written. Did I have joy while writing it? No?

1040
00:59:34,840 --> 00:59:37,840
Speaker 1: But did I have joy in knowing that it helped

1041
00:59:37,840 --> 00:59:41,000
Speaker 1: other people? Yes? And there's other stuff I'm writing now

1042
00:59:41,040 --> 00:59:44,040
Speaker 1: where I do feel joy, right, And I think it's

1043
00:59:44,080 --> 00:59:46,160
Speaker 1: important to be able to work on the things that

1044
00:59:46,320 --> 00:59:50,000
Speaker 1: give you joy, especially if you're working on something that's hard, right,

1045
00:59:50,240 --> 00:59:53,680
Speaker 1: and maybe you had to get the icky thing out

1046
00:59:53,720 --> 00:59:56,360
Speaker 1: of the way so that you could plug into the

1047
00:59:56,440 --> 01:00:00,080
Speaker 1: joy exactly. Yeah, It's it's that duality again. Yeah. And

1048
01:00:00,120 --> 01:00:02,280
Speaker 1: I think it's so important that we give ourselves permission

1049
01:00:02,320 --> 01:00:05,600
Speaker 1: to be whole people, because it really is the sum

1050
01:00:05,600 --> 01:00:10,840
Speaker 1: total that puts us where we are. So on that note,

1051
01:00:10,920 --> 01:00:12,880
Speaker 1: I have a last question that I love to ask

1052
01:00:12,880 --> 01:00:15,160
Speaker 1: everyone because the title of the podcast is called work

1053
01:00:15,160 --> 01:00:19,280
Speaker 1: in progress, and I think from the outside, when you've

1054
01:00:19,280 --> 01:00:23,160
Speaker 1: published a book or work in media or whatever, looks

1055
01:00:23,480 --> 01:00:27,840
Speaker 1: you know, fancy people think, Oh, that person has it

1056
01:00:27,880 --> 01:00:30,560
Speaker 1: all together, but any of us who sit in a

1057
01:00:30,640 --> 01:00:32,840
Speaker 1: talking circle are talking about what we're still trying to

1058
01:00:32,880 --> 01:00:37,200
Speaker 1: figure out. So I'm I'm curious at this stage in

1059
01:00:37,280 --> 01:00:42,440
Speaker 1: your life, whether it's something personal or professional, or political

1060
01:00:42,560 --> 01:00:45,480
Speaker 1: or passion project, what feels like a work in progress

1061
01:00:45,480 --> 01:00:52,480
Speaker 1: to you myself? I mean the same I would say

1062
01:00:52,920 --> 01:00:58,080
Speaker 1: imposter syndrome, right I it's ridiculous. But the more successful

1063
01:00:58,200 --> 01:01:03,000
Speaker 1: I am, the more I haven't poster syndrome. Everything that happens,

1064
01:01:03,040 --> 01:01:05,880
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, well, this only happened because of this reason,

1065
01:01:06,120 --> 01:01:08,720
Speaker 1: or I can like justify everything, right, I can think

1066
01:01:08,720 --> 01:01:12,000
Speaker 1: of it that way. And I'm going to be thirty

1067
01:01:12,080 --> 01:01:15,760
Speaker 1: six in October. I'm a grad student right now, I'm

1068
01:01:15,840 --> 01:01:18,880
Speaker 1: like everything that happens to me, I'm always explaining a

1069
01:01:18,880 --> 01:01:20,920
Speaker 1: way of like, oh I only got this because of this,

1070
01:01:21,040 --> 01:01:24,720
Speaker 1: or this only happened because of this. And I'm really

1071
01:01:24,800 --> 01:01:27,560
Speaker 1: trying to get out of that mindset and I and

1072
01:01:27,600 --> 01:01:29,640
Speaker 1: I want my friends to get out of that mindset too,

1073
01:01:29,680 --> 01:01:31,520
Speaker 1: because I have a lot of friends who also have

1074
01:01:31,560 --> 01:01:35,640
Speaker 1: a similar feeling. I mean, I think anybody who has

1075
01:01:35,680 --> 01:01:41,400
Speaker 1: ambition has imposter syndrome, especially women. Oh yes, I'm right

1076
01:01:41,400 --> 01:01:44,040
Speaker 1: there with you, and it's interesting. Some friends and I.

1077
01:01:44,040 --> 01:01:46,040
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is helpful, but we just

1078
01:01:46,080 --> 01:01:49,760
Speaker 1: had this conversation that can you imagine if you spoke

1079
01:01:49,840 --> 01:01:53,600
Speaker 1: to one of your best friends or or your boyfriend

1080
01:01:54,400 --> 01:01:57,400
Speaker 1: the way you talk to yourself. If your boyfriend looked

1081
01:01:57,440 --> 01:01:59,920
Speaker 1: at you and was like, hey, Michelle, I love you,

1082
01:02:00,040 --> 01:02:01,320
Speaker 1: and you were like, yeah, but you only say that

1083
01:02:01,320 --> 01:02:03,000
Speaker 1: because you have to, he'd be like, the funk is

1084
01:02:03,040 --> 01:02:06,400
Speaker 1: wrong with you? You know, like like if we spoke

1085
01:02:06,480 --> 01:02:09,240
Speaker 1: to the people who we love and value in the

1086
01:02:09,280 --> 01:02:11,400
Speaker 1: way that we talk to ourselves, they would just be like,

1087
01:02:11,440 --> 01:02:15,760
Speaker 1: are you okay? And and when you think about saying

1088
01:02:15,800 --> 01:02:18,000
Speaker 1: what you say to yourself to someone else who you trust,

1089
01:02:18,080 --> 01:02:21,080
Speaker 1: you realize it's an insane thing to say yes. And

1090
01:02:21,200 --> 01:02:24,680
Speaker 1: that when my imposter syndrome is really firing. You gave

1091
01:02:24,680 --> 01:02:27,120
Speaker 1: me some exercises. This is the exercise I've been doing

1092
01:02:27,320 --> 01:02:30,440
Speaker 1: where I literally imagine saying everything I'm thinking to my

1093
01:02:30,480 --> 01:02:33,320
Speaker 1: best friend and the like smack on the back side

1094
01:02:33,320 --> 01:02:35,320
Speaker 1: of the head she would give me if I ever

1095
01:02:35,400 --> 01:02:37,360
Speaker 1: did that. Seriously, I love that. I'm going to use

1096
01:02:37,360 --> 01:02:40,040
Speaker 1: that from now on with myself because it's the worst

1097
01:02:40,840 --> 01:02:43,360
Speaker 1: we can be our own worst enemies. So awful how

1098
01:02:43,400 --> 01:02:46,120
Speaker 1: we talked to literally, I think about like saying things

1099
01:02:46,160 --> 01:02:49,920
Speaker 1: to Nia and her just going no, no, sit down,

1100
01:02:50,040 --> 01:02:52,520
Speaker 1: and I'll be like, okay in trouble. Well, this is

1101
01:02:52,560 --> 01:02:55,000
Speaker 1: also the part of learning to our mother ourselves, going

1102
01:02:55,040 --> 01:02:58,040
Speaker 1: back to that, right, like imposter syndrome, like getting over

1103
01:02:58,080 --> 01:03:01,200
Speaker 1: that that idea is part of being good to yourself

1104
01:03:02,000 --> 01:03:06,480
Speaker 1: and nurturing yourself. So I think I I at the

1105
01:03:06,520 --> 01:03:10,120
Speaker 1: same time, I think that you know, it's okay to

1106
01:03:10,200 --> 01:03:14,640
Speaker 1: be like questioning where you are at and what you

1107
01:03:14,640 --> 01:03:17,160
Speaker 1: can do to make yourself better. That's something that's different

1108
01:03:17,200 --> 01:03:19,600
Speaker 1: though than imposter syndrome of the idea of like I

1109
01:03:19,640 --> 01:03:23,080
Speaker 1: don't belong here, And when you think about how much

1110
01:03:23,200 --> 01:03:26,120
Speaker 1: energy we probably waste worrying that we're not supposed to

1111
01:03:26,160 --> 01:03:30,440
Speaker 1: be somewhere where we've been expressly invited, it's so crazy.

1112
01:03:30,520 --> 01:03:34,320
Speaker 1: It's the worst. So I'm I'm trying to get over that,

1113
01:03:34,400 --> 01:03:36,919
Speaker 1: and I think that will be something that I work

1114
01:03:36,960 --> 01:03:40,760
Speaker 1: on for a long time, because are again, I think

1115
01:03:40,760 --> 01:03:43,960
Speaker 1: our society kind of encourages women to think this way,

1116
01:03:43,960 --> 01:03:48,560
Speaker 1: and we have to actively work against that encouragement. Absolutely,

1117
01:03:48,880 --> 01:03:52,840
Speaker 1: even you know, I've I've heard several editors from magazines

1118
01:03:53,120 --> 01:03:57,080
Speaker 1: or publishers tell me how you know, whenever they give

1119
01:03:58,040 --> 01:04:03,040
Speaker 1: encouraging rejections to people, without a doubt, they'll never hear

1120
01:04:03,080 --> 01:04:05,840
Speaker 1: from a woman again, but a man will send them

1121
01:04:05,840 --> 01:04:11,040
Speaker 1: like a bunch of new ideas. So again, it's about

1122
01:04:11,160 --> 01:04:14,680
Speaker 1: like getting over this idea that we're not enough. My

1123
01:04:14,720 --> 01:04:17,080
Speaker 1: friend Jen passed alof who's another great person you could

1124
01:04:17,120 --> 01:04:19,080
Speaker 1: have on this podcast. By the way, She's amazing. She's

1125
01:04:19,120 --> 01:04:21,280
Speaker 1: based in l A. And she wrote a book that

1126
01:04:21,800 --> 01:04:25,160
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Gilbert like, raved about it on Instagram and Cheryl

1127
01:04:25,200 --> 01:04:27,880
Speaker 1: Strae blurbed at Pink, blurbed at patent oswal a bunch

1128
01:04:27,880 --> 01:04:30,680
Speaker 1: of people. So Jen used to work in a famous

1129
01:04:31,040 --> 01:04:34,360
Speaker 1: restaurant in Hollywood called the Newsroom or in l A.

1130
01:04:34,400 --> 01:04:38,400
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, yeah, and so um. Her book is about

1131
01:04:38,680 --> 01:04:40,560
Speaker 1: She's she's one of the most inspiring people I know.

1132
01:04:40,760 --> 01:04:44,160
Speaker 1: She is partially deaf, but she's one of the best

1133
01:04:44,200 --> 01:04:49,080
Speaker 1: listeners I've ever met. She leads these incredible manifestation workshops

1134
01:04:49,080 --> 01:04:52,160
Speaker 1: around the world. I mean, we have to go, yeah,

1135
01:04:52,280 --> 01:04:54,520
Speaker 1: you do. They They are life changing. You will not

1136
01:04:54,640 --> 01:04:58,120
Speaker 1: leave that room without crying. And she talks about all

1137
01:04:58,200 --> 01:05:00,880
Speaker 1: kinds of stuff like the bullshit stories we tell ourselves.

1138
01:05:00,880 --> 01:05:02,640
Speaker 1: And I think about that a lot, and that ties

1139
01:05:02,680 --> 01:05:05,360
Speaker 1: into the imposter syndrome. And the you are enough is

1140
01:05:05,400 --> 01:05:07,880
Speaker 1: one of her other phrases. I love that, And so

1141
01:05:08,440 --> 01:05:11,919
Speaker 1: that book on Being Human is a dear treasured book

1142
01:05:11,920 --> 01:05:13,840
Speaker 1: to me because so much of what Jen says in

1143
01:05:13,880 --> 01:05:17,920
Speaker 1: there speaks to this idea of questioning ourselves and thinking

1144
01:05:17,920 --> 01:05:23,040
Speaker 1: we're not good enough, and actually, you know we we

1145
01:05:23,040 --> 01:05:26,400
Speaker 1: we are good enough, right, We just have to allow

1146
01:05:26,440 --> 01:05:29,080
Speaker 1: ourselves to feel that way. Yeah, and we have down

1147
01:05:29,160 --> 01:05:32,080
Speaker 1: the anxiety backpack and we're good enough. Flaws and all.

1148
01:05:32,120 --> 01:05:34,600
Speaker 1: That's the thing that she really encourages. And I love

1149
01:05:34,680 --> 01:05:38,400
Speaker 1: that because we are all flawed. There's no person who

1150
01:05:38,640 --> 01:05:44,200
Speaker 1: is not, not a single one. Yeah, exactly. So awesome.

1151
01:05:44,480 --> 01:05:46,920
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, of course. Thank you for coming

1152
01:05:47,000 --> 01:05:50,480
Speaker 1: and sharing and for writing your beautiful book. I think

1153
01:05:50,520 --> 01:05:52,000
Speaker 1: everyone in my life is like, we get it, the

1154
01:05:52,080 --> 01:05:54,480
Speaker 1: essay book, We get it. Stop talking about it. But

1155
01:05:54,560 --> 01:05:56,640
Speaker 1: I just I feel like a broken record. I keep

1156
01:05:56,720 --> 01:06:00,320
Speaker 1: coming back to it. It's so special. Thank you, Really,

1157
01:06:00,440 --> 01:06:08,200
Speaker 1: this conversation has been wonderful. This show is executive produced

1158
01:06:08,200 --> 01:06:12,520
Speaker 1: by Me, Sophia Bush, and sim Sarna. Our supervising producer

1159
01:06:12,640 --> 01:06:16,720
Speaker 1: is Alison Bresnick, Our associate producer is Kate Linley. Our

1160
01:06:16,840 --> 01:06:19,840
Speaker 1: editor is Josh Wendish, and our music was written by

1161
01:06:19,920 --> 01:06:23,080
Speaker 1: Jack Garrett and produced by Mark Foster. This show is

1162
01:06:23,120 --> 01:06:25,200
Speaker 1: brought to you by Clarion. Anatomy asked