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Speaker 1: Family Secrets is a production of I Heart Radio High

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Speaker 1: Family Secret Listeners. It's Danny again. Here's part two of

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Speaker 1: my live conversation with Liz Phair. The audience at the

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Speaker 1: Fine Arts Theater in Los Angeles had some questions for us. Hi. Um,

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Speaker 1: this is a question for Danny. First of all, so

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Speaker 1: lovely to see you both up there and to hear

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Speaker 1: we have to say thank you. Um, Danny, here's a

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Speaker 1: question I had, and I think you're sort of have

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Speaker 1: sort of answered it with this term the how can

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Speaker 1: we keep all confusing it? The the unthought unthought known.

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Speaker 1: And I think that if that was in the book,

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Speaker 1: I maybe didn't absorb it enough because as I was

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Speaker 1: reading your book, I was swinging from side to side,

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Speaker 1: or I was feeling like you were swinging from side

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Speaker 1: side saying, on the one hand, everyone's told you your

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Speaker 1: whole life you're not Jewish. On the other hand, you say,

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Speaker 1: how can that be? And Um, On the one hand,

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Speaker 1: I felt sure that in your life you had talked

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Speaker 1: to folks or had friends who were adoptees, or had

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Speaker 1: used sperm donors, or had experienced some of those things,

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Speaker 1: and yet when it was about you, you seemed um,

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Speaker 1: it almost seemed like you hadn't thought about it before,

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Speaker 1: like it was so mind blowing to you, the complexities

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Speaker 1: of it, and so I couldn't really I guess my

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Speaker 1: question is, can you help me understand kind of where

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Speaker 1: the path was between those dramatic swings of I was

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Speaker 1: so certain about this, and yet at the same time

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Speaker 1: I always had doubts and and maybe the answer is

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Speaker 1: this the unthought known. I never consciously entertained a doubt.

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Speaker 1: And also I didn't I in the world that I

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Speaker 1: grew up in, I didn't know anything about sperm donation

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Speaker 1: or um. Really, adoption was hardly talked about it all.

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Speaker 1: I mean, even even I think in in our you know,

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Speaker 1: it was it was kind of a quiet thing. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I think, um, you know, Lizz's parents told her from

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Speaker 1: the time that it was like woven into your identity

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Speaker 1: from the time you're very small. They were psychologically astute

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Speaker 1: enough to do that. There were a lot of parents

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Speaker 1: who didn't, and even if they did, everything was often

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Speaker 1: just very very silent, you know, And so there was

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Speaker 1: no sense of I mean, we again, we are who

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Speaker 1: were told we are as small children. I also adored

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Speaker 1: my father and the and I and I didn't adore

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Speaker 1: my mother, and so the it would have been something

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Speaker 1: that would have been just devastating and dangerous for me

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Speaker 1: to entertain. So there never was. I mean, when I

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Speaker 1: write about it in the book, there it is from

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Speaker 1: the place of now piecing it together, you know, the

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Speaker 1: collapsing of time. There's a moment in my book where

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Speaker 1: so I was when I was three years old, the

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Speaker 1: Kodak Christmas poster child. It falls under the category of

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Speaker 1: you can't make this ship up, right, you know. I

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Speaker 1: was like what And there was a story that my

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Speaker 1: mother always told about how that happened, and it was

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Speaker 1: just an accepted story by absolutely everybody. She took me

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Speaker 1: into the city for a portrait at the holidays, and

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Speaker 1: and then the Kodak people were in the photography studio

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Speaker 1: and they saw that, they saw the portrait and they said,

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Speaker 1: wouldn't it be wonderful to use this for the Christmas card.

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Speaker 1: So it's all these years later, and this was everybody

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Speaker 1: who saw the Christmas card knew in my family knew

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Speaker 1: that story. It's completely accepted. It confirmation bias. It's all

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Speaker 1: these years later, my husband and I are home one

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Speaker 1: day the the poster has a place of honor in

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Speaker 1: my son's bathroom. I mean, it's like really, it's just

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Speaker 1: kind of like And my husband is looking at the

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Speaker 1: at the poster one day and he says, this was

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Speaker 1: shot as a Christmas card. I was like, what are

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Speaker 1: you talking about. You're wearing a black and red dress.

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Speaker 1: You're playing with a wooden train that is containing red

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Speaker 1: and green elves with you know, little elf elf hats um.

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Speaker 1: What orthodox Jewish mother would have dressed her child in

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Speaker 1: such a manner for the holiday portrait? And and he

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Speaker 1: and he said that, and it was like the veil lifted.

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Speaker 1: And I was like, ah, that's true. She was not

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Speaker 1: telling the truth about that, And she made up a

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Speaker 1: story about how that came to be. So that's just

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Speaker 1: an example of the unthought known. It large. Like everyone

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Speaker 1: in my family, it was a big joke. It was

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Speaker 1: a source of hilarity that an Orthodox Jewish girl was

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Speaker 1: wishing the whole world Americ merry Christmas. Isn't that funny?

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Speaker 1: But not so funny when you actually understand the backstory, right?

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Speaker 1: Thank you, Hello, Hi danny Um. When reading your book

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Speaker 1: and you sharing your journey, I felt that you were

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Speaker 1: very nurturing with your words and what you were sharing.

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Speaker 1: And I'm curious to know it felt that you were

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Speaker 1: making it very more nurturing for the reader as we

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Speaker 1: all learned of your story. And it felt even though

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Speaker 1: it had a rapid pace and it was a very

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Speaker 1: quick read, um, it was a page turner. UM, it

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Speaker 1: felt like you did it in a very very careful,

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Speaker 1: caring way for the reader to find out all the information.

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Speaker 1: And it felt that it was kind of a tool

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Speaker 1: of self care for yourself, perhaps speaking to yourself through

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Speaker 1: this book. And curious to know if that, um, you

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Speaker 1: see it as a self care tool as you as well,

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Speaker 1: is um in your book? Um? And what are your

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Speaker 1: self care? What is your self care therapist that you

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Speaker 1: do for yourself? What an interesting question. So the first part,

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Speaker 1: and I actually wonder for you, Liz about this, because

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Speaker 1: to write a good book, to write a book that's

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Speaker 1: gonna resonate connect with readers, um, at some point, the

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Speaker 1: writer does need to think about how that connection happens. UM.

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Speaker 1: Or I mean I was aware in writing Inheritance that

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Speaker 1: I was writing a story that was, in its details

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Speaker 1: not going to be relatable to a lot of people. UM.

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Speaker 1: And on All of my other books had relatable um

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Speaker 1: storylines in some way. And this is where I think.

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Speaker 1: It's like, you know, it's not relatable to people. Um.

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Speaker 1: Not Not everybody's a rock star, right, um, and not

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Speaker 1: everybody knows what it's like to wake up one day

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Speaker 1: and find out that your you know, your father isn't

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Speaker 1: your biological father, and that apparently your biological father is

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Speaker 1: a sperm donor you every It's such a bonkers kind

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Speaker 1: of thing, um that I had to think about, and

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Speaker 1: I always said to my students, UM, I sort of

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Speaker 1: had to go against my own advice. I would say,

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Speaker 1: don't think about what's universal about your story. Be it

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Speaker 1: drilled down into what's so utterly specific, and that is

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Speaker 1: what will become universal. But in the case of writing Inheritance,

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Speaker 1: I did have to think about it. And the way

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Speaker 1: I had to think about it is what am I learning?

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Speaker 1: Because I didn't ask for this story. I wanted to

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Speaker 1: send it back to the story store, you know, just

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Speaker 1: it was so shocking and so painful, and and I

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Speaker 1: was like, you know, just in the thick of it.

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Speaker 1: But in the thick of it, there's Um. I remember

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Speaker 1: I had a meeting and it's it's some of it

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Speaker 1: is actually in the book. I met with. It was

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Speaker 1: Rabbi David Wolpe. Um. I asked him if he would

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Speaker 1: meet with me, because um, I have a lot of

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Speaker 1: respect for him. And I was just on this search

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Speaker 1: for um you know what what what kind of meaning

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Speaker 1: I was going to make and and and Rabbi Wolpe

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Speaker 1: said to me, everyone feels other And I said this

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Speaker 1: part I didn't put in the book. I said, really everyone.

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Speaker 1: And he said smart people. And he said, you have

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Speaker 1: gone to the front of otherness and you're coming back

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Speaker 1: with something to teach us. And I really took that

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Speaker 1: to heart. I thought, well, what am I? This is?

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Speaker 1: This is my lot in life, this is this is

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Speaker 1: my I'm someone who's written about family and identity all

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Speaker 1: my life, who now has you know, just experienced, you know,

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Speaker 1: the the biggest sort of pardon the expression, but the

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Speaker 1: biggest mind fuck you know when it comes to um,

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Speaker 1: you know, identity and just the sort of profound sort

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Speaker 1: of identity crisis, existential crisis. How do I translate that?

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Speaker 1: And by translating it for the reader, I was also

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Speaker 1: translating it for myself. It didn't feel like self care.

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Speaker 1: While I was writing this book, it felt like pure torture.

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Speaker 1: I sat in a chair. My body went to complete,

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Speaker 1: you know, like I stopped moving, I stopped exercising, I

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Speaker 1: stopped doing anything other than sitting in this chair and

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Speaker 1: writing this book, um and researching and reporting and calling.

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Speaker 1: But ultimately it was I mean, I bye, bye, peace

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Speaker 1: seeing together the philosophical and moral, you know, sort of bye.

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Speaker 1: And Liz, you were talking about this. By being forced

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Speaker 1: by the endeavor to think of my parents as people

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Speaker 1: like what you're talking about with your birth mother and

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Speaker 1: holding that and holding that birth certificate, she was She

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Speaker 1: was a person to you in that moment. She wasn't

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Speaker 1: only your mother who wasn't able to She wasn't just

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Speaker 1: part of my story. She wasn't just part of your story.

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Speaker 1: Which is such a gift when that happens, because we

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Speaker 1: never really do that, we never really forced to do

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Speaker 1: that as as children, as as children or the grown

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Speaker 1: children of our parents. We don't ever have to think

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Speaker 1: of them really as anything other than our parents in

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Speaker 1: one way or another. And I had to do that,

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Speaker 1: and you know, it's self care. It's interesting. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I've been on the road for this book since last January,

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Speaker 1: and we need some self care. I meditate every morning

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Speaker 1: for twenty minutes. I bring my I haven't. I can't

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Speaker 1: do a carry on because my self care ways about

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Speaker 1: like fifteen pounds, like just the crystals and Mark Nepo's

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Speaker 1: Book of Awakening that I actually have to carry with

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Speaker 1: me and I can't read it on a kindle, and um,

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Speaker 1: and my all my essential oils that are you know,

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Speaker 1: just I mean I I wherever we go, there we are,

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Speaker 1: and I need to bring a lot to kind of

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Speaker 1: like settle myself wherever I am. Um, what do you

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Speaker 1: do for self care? I don't know that. I mean

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Speaker 1: I make art for self care. And I often find

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Speaker 1: that the friction between me and other people increases if

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Speaker 1: I'm not making art, and if I am making art,

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Speaker 1: I'm a lovely person. And it's really it's vital to

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Speaker 1: me and vital to those around me that I continue

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Speaker 1: to do. So it's how I process. So even though

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Speaker 1: as you said, it's excruciating to write, and I totally

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Speaker 1: understand why no one ever finishes their book because it's brutal,

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Speaker 1: you wouldn't think that it seems like the most cushy

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Speaker 1: job you could have, and it's brutal, but but the

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Speaker 1: feeling of joy, completeness and wholeness that I feel, even

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Speaker 1: for a difficult story is it's physical. It's a very

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Speaker 1: physical realignment for me, and so I do lots of

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Speaker 1: other stupid stuff, but like I do think that art

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Speaker 1: is the most self caring thing and and it's selfish.

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Speaker 1: I'm not gonna lie like you're taking time away and

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Speaker 1: saying please don't call me during these hours or you

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Speaker 1: can't you know, leave me alone for a week or

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Speaker 1: whatever that is. But it's it's the most other than

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Speaker 1: you know, the usual stuff like exercise and eating well

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Speaker 1: and sleeping right. Like it's the most aligning, restorative thing

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Speaker 1: I know how to do. We'll be back in a

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Speaker 1: moment with more family secrets. Hi, uh Danny, And let's

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Speaker 1: thank you so much. Um you're speaking is melody. Really

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Speaker 1: it's inspiring. And thank you for sharing what your manager said.

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Speaker 1: I'm hoping that I'll think that on a daily basis.

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Speaker 1: I wanted to ask because it is so rich and painful,

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Speaker 1: and as you're talking about how you're writing with each

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Speaker 1: of your books and going there, it sounds really nice

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Speaker 1: when you say, oh, the sharves of glass and in

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Speaker 1: between you see the light. It sounds beautiful, but when

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Speaker 1: you're having to put it down on paper and expressing

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Speaker 1: it that way, how do you get there and make

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Speaker 1: it authentic instead of like trying to sound a certain

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Speaker 1: way or be a certain thing. Kind Um, One of

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Speaker 1: the things that really bothers me the most is I

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Speaker 1: have to do it sober. I can't. I don't have

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Speaker 1: any fun tools, Like no fun tool will give me

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Speaker 1: that stuff. So it really chaps my ask that I

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Speaker 1: have to do all this stuff sover because it would

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Speaker 1: be much more fun. You know. I read about writers

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Speaker 1: like you know, they're whiskey or whatever. I can't do that.

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Speaker 1: I have to go to a state of vulnerability. But

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Speaker 1: this may just be me. I don't know how you

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Speaker 1: would feel about this, but I have an ability, maybe

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Speaker 1: because I've been writing songs for so long to do

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Speaker 1: like an inception like dive. I don't have a lot

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Speaker 1: of memories, but the memories I have are there because

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Speaker 1: they're either really great or really terrible, and I can

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Speaker 1: walk into it. So the trick that I'm always the

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Speaker 1: way I'm gaming myself is you make sure no one's

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Speaker 1: going to interrupt you. Usually I work very late at night,

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Speaker 1: and I'm terribly dismayed to see my son has picked

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Speaker 1: up this habit. But I need the world to shut up.

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Speaker 1: I needed to be quiet, almost like a what are

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Speaker 1: those uh chambers? Those when you don't have any stimulation,

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Speaker 1: sensory depth, ovation chambers? So I can I always try

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Speaker 1: to write in the age that I was when I'm

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Speaker 1: in the memory. So if you can go into the

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Speaker 1: age that you were, and it does require vulnerability, but

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Speaker 1: there's surrender in the sense of just put it down,

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Speaker 1: what you see, what you smell, Just follow the train

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Speaker 1: of sensation, and you'll find yourself giving yourself insight. It's

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Speaker 1: almost like you do the sensation first. Where am I?

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Speaker 1: What does it feel like? What does it look like?

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Speaker 1: Go back there? Who am I? Like? You know, there's

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Speaker 1: a couple of stories, like from in my book The

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Speaker 1: New York City Blackout, which I book ended with being

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Speaker 1: in New York City during a blizzard too, but like

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Speaker 1: in the blizzard, I'm more like hard and grizzled and

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Speaker 1: older and responsible, and in the Blackout, I'm younger and

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Speaker 1: like loving the snow day of it and having romance

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Speaker 1: with someone I shouldn't have. It's just like like be

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Speaker 1: that person and don't leave. Okay, God, I want to

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Speaker 1: say something that I cannot say. I have the perfect

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Speaker 1: I'll tell you later, but there are other things that

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Speaker 1: you do where you have to take your mind out

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Speaker 1: of it and follow that. There you go, hi, uh Danny.

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to say, as a woman who's also

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Speaker 1: donor conceived, I'm sure you've all of us come out

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Speaker 1: and have something to say. So, um, I found out

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Speaker 1: at twenty five, and I found my father's other daughter

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Speaker 1: two years ago and she didn't know that her mother

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Speaker 1: had lied to her and told the stories. And we

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Speaker 1: found our biological father's identity a year and a half ago,

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Speaker 1: so this is all really new for us. So anyway,

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to preface that, um to say that

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Speaker 1: we as part of the donor conceived community. I mean,

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Speaker 1: when I was twenty five, there was nobody else donor conceived.

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Speaker 1: It's just not talked about, and our mothers said our

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Speaker 1: mothers were told not to tell anybody. So anyway, what

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to say is just really appreciate to

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Speaker 1: you giving life to our story because it's really not

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Speaker 1: well known and the people in our family and our

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Speaker 1: friends who hear that we are donor conceived. They don't

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Speaker 1: really understand what this means to us, to be basically

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Speaker 1: lied to our entire lives. And then suddenly one day, poof,

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Speaker 1: you know, the man you thought youre was your father wasn't,

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Speaker 1: and I was really happy about it. You weren't, and

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Speaker 1: my my sister Jane was very confused. And now we

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Speaker 1: have our father's biological children through his wife and they're

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Speaker 1: very upset and confused the whole thing. So the fact

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Speaker 1: that you gave this story life and have been able

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Speaker 1: to educate so many people in terms of what we're

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Speaker 1: all going through, we just really app I speak for

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Speaker 1: all of us, We really do appreciate it. And UM,

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Speaker 1: my question is what's next for you in terms of

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Speaker 1: supporting the community. Are you is this the end of it?

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Speaker 1: Are you speaking to the community, are you involved? Just

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Speaker 1: really curious what you're doing next? Thanks, thanks for that,

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Speaker 1: and thanks thanks for sharing. UM. What I'm doing is

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Speaker 1: this UM. That's why I've been on the road for

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Speaker 1: the last year. That's why I've just been to five

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Speaker 1: cities in five days. UM. That's why I have an

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Speaker 1: ongoing UM tour, UH, both nationally and internationally. UM. I'm

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Speaker 1: a writer who made this discovery and you know, poured

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Speaker 1: my heart heart out into a book about it, and

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Speaker 1: I'm now out there actually really trying to UM connect

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Speaker 1: and okay, I you know, it's it's interesting because to me,

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Speaker 1: when I speak to audiences crowds, I feel like I

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Speaker 1: have a responsibility to say, million people have the trill

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Speaker 1: of hands right now? How many people in this room

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Speaker 1: have UM ordered a DNA test? See yeah, I love

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Speaker 1: doing that right. So it's um the most popular holiday

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Speaker 1: gift in America. Um Uh. Families are giving it to

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Speaker 1: each other for Hanakah and Christmas. UM. And for a

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Speaker 1: portion of these people, there is UM a shocking discovery.

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Speaker 1: It's not always doing our conception. UM. Birth parents are

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Speaker 1: finding their birth children, birth children are finding their birth parents.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes that's a all of the all of these cases.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes that's a beautiful story. Sometimes it's a painful story. UM.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes it's almost always it's a complicated story. And there

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Speaker 1: are members of families who feel differently about what they're learning.

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Speaker 1: It's just there are fathers discovering children they never knew

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Speaker 1: they had. There are people discovering half siblings that they

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Speaker 1: never knew they had it, just it's it's really kind

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Speaker 1: of epidemic UM. And what people don't really realize is

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Speaker 1: the sheer numbers. So if twelve million people uh did

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Speaker 1: this d N DNA testing last year, which was what

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Speaker 1: the number was, and if two percent of those people

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Speaker 1: are discovering what's known in that world as an MPE,

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Speaker 1: which stands stands for not parent expected, two twelve million

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Speaker 1: people is I think two forty people. That's the number

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Speaker 1: of people who are making these discoveries right now. And

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Speaker 1: it has to do with all of this secrecy, all

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Speaker 1: of and I me also to say the secrecy which

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Speaker 1: is ending now. I mean, it's beginning to come to

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Speaker 1: an end. It's got a ways to go. We all

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Speaker 1: have ways to go, because there are still I mean,

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Speaker 1: I don't want to get on a soapbox about this tonight,

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Speaker 1: but in this country, we are one of the only

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Speaker 1: countries in the developed world that does not have any

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Speaker 1: kind of UM database, any kind of registry for a

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Speaker 1: number of donor a number of offspring that a donor

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Speaker 1: can produce, right no checks and balances. You add to

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Speaker 1: that secrecy, lack of disclosure, and you have really a

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Speaker 1: crisis UM so all of this is I mean to

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Speaker 1: answer your question. That's that's what I'm doing. What I'm

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Speaker 1: doing is using the megaphone that I currently have to

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Speaker 1: spread the word as much as I can and to

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Speaker 1: humanize and make people understand what this story is. I

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Speaker 1: was at a dinner the other day in Philadelphia with

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Speaker 1: a bunch of of UM publishing people and somebody just

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Speaker 1: turned to me and said, well, no matter what, your

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Speaker 1: father still your father, and that that is true. I

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Speaker 1: came to that my father is very much still my father.

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Speaker 1: In fact, he's more my father than he ever was.

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Speaker 1: But for someone to say that to me like that,

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Speaker 1: it's like, how about walking for a minute in my shoes,

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Speaker 1: you know? And then she said, I don't think people

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Speaker 1: should be contacting their donors. I mean I know families

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Speaker 1: that have just been completely torn apart by this, and like, okay,

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Speaker 1: I've been doing nothing but thinking about this for the

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Speaker 1: last four years, but thank you for your opinion. UM,

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Speaker 1: it's it's it's it's really complicated, and what I'm trying

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Speaker 1: to do is UM shed light on that complexity. We'll

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Speaker 1: be back in a moment. Well, since it is the

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Speaker 1: last question, let me thank you both very much for

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Speaker 1: something that was very entertaining, educational, and formative. And so

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Speaker 1: I'll just end with a question about one word shame. Um.

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Speaker 1: You ask the questions why do families lie? Why do

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Speaker 1: families keep things secret? And in the Jewish tradition in particular,

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Speaker 1: there's enormous evidence that shame is a critical motive for lying.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sure you have been through the first

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Speaker 1: chapters of Genesis, I don't know how many times. But

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Speaker 1: the patriarch Abraham, his wife Sarah, was childless, and she's shamed.

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Speaker 1: She has to give him a concubine. He tries to

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Speaker 1: pointer off the Pharaoh, lying that she's his sister, and

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Speaker 1: then later on in the Bible they make up a

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Speaker 1: story that she bears Isaac after she's passed the menopause um,

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Speaker 1: only so that they can say Abraham begat Isaac, which

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Speaker 1: is Abraham couldn't possibly be Isaac's biological father. Uh. Isn't

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Speaker 1: there a very significant Jewish tradition, or perhaps general the

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Speaker 1: shame as a critical factor in this question of secrecy.

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Speaker 1: I love that we're ending this evening with that question.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I love that because I've become a bit

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Speaker 1: of a student of secrecy in in You know, I

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Speaker 1: discovered that I was the secret after writing about secrecy

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Speaker 1: all my life. But then when I started the podcast,

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Speaker 1: when I started Family Secrets I, which happened in a

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Speaker 1: very organic way. It just came out of people started

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Speaker 1: telling me there their secrets. They would read Inheritance and

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Speaker 1: start telling me their stories. I've seen in conversation after conversation,

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Speaker 1: you know when I've had enough. Now I've had thirty conversations,

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Speaker 1: like really deep ones with p Will who have really

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Speaker 1: intense kind of unpacking of family secrets, and I've begun

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Speaker 1: to see, all right, what what do all of these

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00:25:07,480 --> 00:25:13,680
Speaker 1: stories have in common? UM? And thrumming? Underneath the keeping

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Speaker 1: of the secret is I think almost inevitably shame. And

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Speaker 1: the shame UM comes in many forms, but it's some

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Speaker 1: version of no one would understand this. I'm completely alone,

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Speaker 1: uh in this experience. If I were to voice it,

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Speaker 1: I would be ridiculed or not understood, or I would

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Speaker 1: be shunned. UM. And you know, I I teach a

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Speaker 1: large retreat once a year on the East coast and

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Speaker 1: UM and a few years ago, at the end of

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Speaker 1: the retreat, I gave this exercise to everyone sitting there,

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Speaker 1: there are a couple hundred people, and I made it

401
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Speaker 1: up on the spot. I said, okay, I want all

402
00:25:55,800 --> 00:25:58,359
Speaker 1: of you just take a piece of paper. You'll have

403
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Speaker 1: three minutes. I want you two and and once you

404
00:26:01,960 --> 00:26:04,879
Speaker 1: finish what you've written, you can rip it up, you

405
00:26:04,880 --> 00:26:06,520
Speaker 1: can burn it, you can throw it away, do whatever

406
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Speaker 1: you want. No one's ever going to see it. I

407
00:26:08,760 --> 00:26:11,640
Speaker 1: want you to write the thing that if anyone knew

408
00:26:11,640 --> 00:26:15,399
Speaker 1: about you, you would die of mortification. And then I

409
00:26:15,400 --> 00:26:18,159
Speaker 1: was like, okay, start And from where I was sitting,

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Speaker 1: I watched like a couple of hundred people, no one hesitated,

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00:26:25,400 --> 00:26:29,679
Speaker 1: everyone started writing. It wasn't like shame, What is this shame?

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Speaker 1: What are you talking about? Shame? And but then later

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Speaker 1: as I was driving home, I was thinking, because to me,

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Speaker 1: the lesson was whatever is in here is rich material

415
00:26:40,840 --> 00:26:43,399
Speaker 1: for you, like think about that now that you've But

416
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Speaker 1: I was driving home and I was thinking the real lesson, um,

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Speaker 1: which I never would do, is it if I said,

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Speaker 1: actually just kidding, you'll have to read you have to.

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Speaker 1: You'll have to read it aloud now, which I would

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Speaker 1: never ever do. Um. There are teachers who would, but

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Speaker 1: I'm not one of them. Would have happened, everyone in

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00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:09,919
Speaker 1: that room would have started nodding and resonating and feeling

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00:27:09,960 --> 00:27:13,680
Speaker 1: like yeah, me too, or I understand, or the compassion,

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00:27:13,800 --> 00:27:17,400
Speaker 1: the empathy, the sense of this is, you know, this

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00:27:17,520 --> 00:27:20,639
Speaker 1: is the human catastrophe. We're all in this together, but

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Speaker 1: we don't do that. And that is why, you know,

427
00:27:25,200 --> 00:27:30,760
Speaker 1: conversations like this feels so incredibly valuable and important to me. Um.

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Speaker 1: And also why this moment in time, I think we're

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Speaker 1: we're at the start of something. I mean, there's so

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Speaker 1: much that's so messed up in the world right now,

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Speaker 1: but counteracting it in some way is this desire for

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Speaker 1: authenticity and connection and gathering and truth telling and vulnerability

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Speaker 1: and you know, just this sense of we're all more

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Speaker 1: alike than we are different and can we just kind

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Speaker 1: of Um. I think the guests that no one I've

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Speaker 1: asked to come on Families Secrets, I said, no, not

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Speaker 1: one person. And they're not doing it because they want

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Speaker 1: to confess in a kind of brilliant way. They're doing

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Speaker 1: it because there's this sense of you know what, I'm

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Speaker 1: telling this and it's liberating me. Yes, thank you for

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Speaker 1: more podcasts for my Heart Radio. Visit the I heart radio, app,

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Speaker 1: Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.