Michelle Obama: The Light Podcast - "Decoding Fear" with Ellen DeGeneres

Episode Date: April 11, 2023

Ellen DeGeneres and Michelle discuss the role fear plays in their lives—why it’s important, the people who would weaponize it, and ways to turn the things that terrify you into rocket fuel. Michelle also tells the story of being forced to decide whether her husband would run for president and the time that inviting a Star Wars character to the White House ended up scarring one of her daughters. Plus, a special lesson on “starting kind.” Find the episode transcript here: audible.com/tlp/episode4 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Light Podcast is presented by Starbucks and Intuit. Thank you so much. Hi. Hello. I'm very excited to be here. I have to be honest. It stopped filming my show in May, and I haven't really spoken to anyone or done anything for however many months that is.

It's been a while since I've spoken to anyone. And my portion wants to know how. And but mostly I'm talking to my dogs all day long. So this could get weird. Yes, it could. Who's going to be a good audience? Who's going to be a good audience? I'm sorry, I haven't spoken to people.

I love this woman so much and the book is amazing. You're going to love it. If you read, I don't know who reads anymore, but if you read, you're going to love this book. Please welcome my friend Michelle Obama. I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a of us have to wrestle with, maybe you're afraid of public speaking, or conflict, or what people think of you. It can be anything really, but we've all got them. And if we don't take the time to understand them, they can really hold us back. And then all of a sudden, a fear is not just a fear. A fear becomes a limit.

Fear might mean that we start shying away from opportunities or risks or adventures. It might mean that we eliminate whole categories of activities or passions or people that might expand our life experience. And then we have to ask ourselves, is this really how I want to live? That's one of the things that I dive into with my good friend, Ellen DeGeneres, in this episode. Now Ellen is someone I met when my husband was first running for president, and I've been so thankful that over the years, we've built a real, durable friendship that

goes beyond our day jobs. It's not always easy to sort out who you can genuinely connect with when you're first lady of the United States. But with Ellen, there was never a question. We text each other, meet up for dinner, visit each other's homes, and to that point, I fully recognize how much she loves her home time, so it meant a lot to have her travel across the country to join me for this conversation. Of course, one of the things I know for certain any time I'm with Ellen is that I'm in for a good laugh. And that's exactly how our conversation started. With her struggling to sit on that big beautiful chair

I selected for the stage. Yes, yes, I heard the chairs were too big for you. Listen, Michelle, I came out here to, they said, see if the chairs is comfortable to you. Well, you, she's done. But it's my show, my chair size. So, so then I had to bring this out. You got a little booster.

There you go. She's tall, you guys. She's very tall. Up, see Daisy. Yeah, here I am. We have taller moderators later on in the tour. Okay. These are like lifeguard chairs.

They're like a huge. I mean, this is like, woo. All right. If I still had my show the next time you'd be on, I'd have a tiny, low-low-chairp. Oh, nursery school chairs. I have to say before I start asking you questions about the book, it's so good. It's so beautifully written.

It's got so many wonderful tools for what we all are needing to have right now. No, it's a beautiful, beautiful book. Thank you, babe. Thank you. You talk about in the book being comfortably afraid, which is I think such a great way to put it. And it's a way that I think everybody can understand, so talk about comfortably afraid. Yeah, I spend a lot of time talking about fear because when you look over what's been happening

over the course of, you know, not even just the last years, we have gotten so, oh, used to being engaged by our fear. It feels like our fear is being used against us. You look at the headlines every day, every year, every decade, each year is worse and worse. If you just look at the news, you know, if you listen to some of our leaders, we can't trust each other, we can't trust anything, you should be afraid.

When I think about how fear affects the choices that we make and the choices of how we treat each other. A lot of times that's usually grounded in some fear, the fear of your new, your different. So I started thinking about fear and the fact that we struggle to properly decode fear. Fear is an important emotion. It protects us, it saves us. I write about my first memories of being afraid. You're afraid of the dark, you're afraid of scary movies, you're afraid of people who look dangerous. I was afraid of a stuffed turtle in my aunt Robbie's recital

when I was four. The whole notion of a stuffed animal frighten me, I wouldn't get on stage. But I remember clearly overcoming that fear because I wanted to wear this red velvet dress. Because I thought I was cute. I remember telling myself, it's just a turtle. It's just a turtle girl, going over there, just pet it. And then you can be, you can just wear all your little butt off.

Because it's not going to hurt you. It's like I remember at a young age decoding my fear to get to someplace I wanted to go. But then there's the fear that keeps us stuck, the fear of other, the fear of somebody who's not like you, the fear of somebody who's got a different, the fear of somebody who's got a different skin color than you, that's an irrational fear, you know? And when, if we don't learn to decode it, and to know when our fear is, is keeping us safe from when it's keeping

us limited and narrow and small, you know, if we, we don't start thinking about how we process fear, I know I do. I've had to learn how to determine when my fear is rational and when it's just me not wanting to do something that makes me uncomfortable. And I think the biggest example is when Barack approached me about running for president of the United States. Yeah. I'd say, yeah. That happened.

But he played a, you know, I wouldn't say play to dirty trick. But it was sort of like he said, you know, a lot of people want me to do this. You know, it's going to be hard. And I know this is going to be a lot of our family. And if you don't want me to do this, then we just won't. And I'm like, really? You gonna put this on me? It's like, no, really, really.

So I had to sit with that choice. And think about it. And for weeks, I walked around, and I described walking around with the notion of that in my head. And my first gut instinct was no, no way, no heck, no. But then I had to say, well, what is that coming from? And if I'm honest with myself, as I said here, it's coming from the fact that I didn't want change. I didn't want discomfort.

It was all about me. It was all about not wanting to do something that would put me in an uncomfortable place. And then I had to ask myself, was that a reason to impact what could be a historic thing? What I want to live in the legacy of many of my ancestors, I talk about our grandparents who had legitimate fears because they grew up in Jim Crow and desegregation

and men like our grandfather's at limited worlds because they would be in danger if they stepped too far outside of their comfort zone. So I saw in my own time my grandfather's world to get smaller and smaller. One of my grandfather's died of lung cancer because he just didn't trust doctors. He didn't trust anybody. He didn't trust white people. So he didn't go to the dentist because that's all there were. And our community, white dentist, he didn't have a tooth in his mouth.

You know, fear, the legacy of some of our grandparents was small lives because of fear. Fear that their kids would be harmed. Don't try this. Don't go away from home because we don't know what's going to happen to you. Real legitimate fears, but my mother and father didn't want us to live with that legacy

of fear and let our worlds be narrowed. And so those thoughts came into my head and I said, well, if I say no only because of my fear, then what am I teaching my girls? What am I saying to them? How am I going to look back as an old lady and my kids say, we here at Grandpa could have been president. And it's like, yeah, girl, he could have been, but I don't want to be bothered with that.

So we still here. So learning to be comfortably afraid is learning to rationally deal with your fear so that you can get to the other side. And when you get to the other side, nine times out of ten, there's a lot of growth and opportunity and possibility if you can decode it properly. So I grew up with a father that was afraid of everything. He literally lived in fear of everything. He wouldn't let me.

I never learned to roll escape because I could have fallen down and hurt myself. We didn't go to doctors because we were Christian science. I would have a split open knee and bone would be exposed. You'd be fine, baby. He gave me some cherries and just prayed. I had a bowl of cherries. And then he tied a rag around my knee and with a markslead, a smiley face,

which seems like ink could go into the bloodstream. But anyway, yeah, he was just, he was scared of everything. And I just grew up with that kind of, and I didn't realize at the time how much OCD he had. He was a very fearful person. And so I really worked hard to try to grow out. I didn't want to become that person. I didn't want to be that fearful.

He was fearful of not having enough money, so we didn't have enough money because he made that come true. He thought about it enough that we didn't have. So, so fear to me, and so I've pushed myself, the comfortable fear for me is, you know, I want to host the Oscars. I want to do something really dangerous so that I can like feel good about myself, you know.

Do it. So, and it's hard. It's hard to push yourself to do something that's really scary. And another thing is that I explore how much fear affects bigotry and racism and isolation from each other. And that's what people try to feed on. Be afraid of the other person. Be afraid of them.

And that's why we have to be really careful when people try to lead us by our fear. We should be suspicious of that. because I live in this country, I've traveled around it. And let me tell you, people disagree with one another, you know, but the fear is coming from other places, noises and people's heads, things coming from folks' phones. And I think that's one of the reasons why I encourage us all to be mindful of getting out of our comfort zones,

of reaching out to people who are not like us, because we will not see the truth of each other if we just sit in our fear and isolation and assume that what people are telling us about them is true, because they're telling them about us, and that's not true. So it can't just be one way. So I think decoding fear is a part of us being able to drop our guard and really learn each other and not be manipulated by power

that's trying to gain more power because of our fear. Yeah, I think also, I think we have the noise, the loudest noise is from extremes. So we're hearing extreme, extreme right voices and extreme, extreme left. And that's just noise. Most of us aren't feeling or thinking that, but it just looks like that.

And so the middle part of us, the all the smart ones have to go, we're as loud as you people on each side. Right. It's just, it's really hard to quiet that noise. And it's a really horrible thing. Your daughter was scared of Chubaka, and yet you brought it to the White House.

I did. That was a big mommy fail. We thought we were doing something great. We invited all the Star Wars characters. And I forgot that Sasha hates all things big and furry where you can't see the face. That poor child had on the cutest little costume. You don't see her here because she's crying in her room upstairs. But I eventually got over my fear of stuffed

turtles and she is now no longer afraid of big hairy things. So we are now comfortably afraid together and moving through life normally. She's gotten over that. She's good. That's good. I'm a physician and being a black woman is not always easy. So there have been many times where my voice just seemed very muted. If I made a suggestion or something like that, it wasn't heard, whereas maybe it's one of my counterparts

who then look like me, it's hurt. And so there have been many times where I've had to bite my tongue or kind of pretend like the microaggressions weren't there, you know, and just keep moving, keep my head down and keep doing what I know that I need to do. At the end of the day, it's about patient care. And if I can't take a breath and kind of let that roll off a little bit, then it comes

back on them. And the other thing is, as a black woman, I always had to be very cognizant of how I'm handling my black patients because they don't get to see us all the time. And so it's really good that they see somebody that they're like, oh my God, she looks like me. And she sounds like me. And her hair is like mine and things like that. If I get bogged down with that other stuff

that I don't get to show up like I need to for them. We'll be right back with more of my discussion with Ellen. We'll be right back with more of my discussion with Ellen. The Light Podcast is brought to you by Intuit, the technology platform that helps build your financial confidence. If you're like most people, you know what it's like to worry about money. We've all been hit with an unexpected expense or a state of late wondering how to pay the bills. We are here to change that. all been hit with an unexpected expense or stayed up late wondering how to pay the bills.

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This is a real story shared by Kelsey, a barista. When Robert walks into Kelsey's store, she greets him like she does every customer. But rather than saying hello, she taps him on the shoulder, puts her hand under his, and waves before leading him to the counter. Robert is deafblind, and Kelsey communicates with him using a combination of American Sign Language and tactile Sign Language, that she learned from another barista who is deaf. Today, Kelsey is passing on that knowledge to others at her Starbucks store. It's very life-giving to be able to have that moment or be able to connect with someone.

That is something I don't want a customer to miss out on. A wonderful reminder that a little kindness is never really little. You talk about in the book, meeting yourself and others with gladness. And this is your friend Ron who does this. And I think it's a really beautiful thing to do that. It's a short chapter in the book called Starting Kind. As one of the tools that I learned, I describe a friend of mine, Ron Kirk. Some of you may know him.

He used to be the former mayor of Dallas and was in Baroque's administration, handsome, charismatic, funny, southern dude who is confident and poised. He's a good friend, his wife is one of my dear friends, and she would tell me about a habit that Ron would have in the morning. She's lying in bed, and she hear him getting up, he gets up early, start his day, and she'd hear him talking to himself in the mirror, and he would say, hey, buddy. You know, I was like, he'd say that out loud.

He's like, no, no, no, she's talking, hey, buddy, how you doing? You're going to have a great day. So she tells me, and we're just cracking up because imagining Ron Kirk, giving himself that little morning pep talk. Now I asked him before I told him, I said I'm about to write about you in this book. And he said go ahead, he just wants the percentage of the muck sales when it's like the hay buddy mugs that are going to come out of this. But I share that story because

while we tease him, you know, because he can stand teasing, is that it is a simple thing that we do not do, particularly women, for ourselves. We do not send ourselves simple kind messages, not even, especially not in the morning. And it is such a simple tool. It's a tool that I know I have to practice more and more because those negative thoughts, I don't care what they are sitting comfortably in my head. You know, even if I can play it off, that negative thing is like, oh girl, you're hair didn't look good

or this didn't have no, did you gain weight and what's wrong with that? Wrinkle come from and, oh, why does your face look like that? You know, we all just get used to these negative messages and we practice that over anything else. When Michelle told me I was gonna be in the book, I was at first flattered, surprised, and then a little anxious to have a story about somebody who talks to themselves.

In the morning might be received most of my life, I'm up at 530 in the morning. My wife is very much not a morning person and I just like to think through what I'm going to say. And so it got to be on Wednesdays. I like to just remind myself you got this then it sort of evolved I would call and leave myself a voice message if I could So I called and I was like hey buddy, it's me. You know, she's gonna have a good day But I didn't know she was listed my wife never gets up So at some point I could think doing one of their

So at some point, I could think doing one of their trips she would take her girlfriends and she shared this story with Michelle and the group. And then the next thing I know when we're all together in Marters' Vignette a couple of years ago, Michelle, Barack, get buddies. Hey, buddy, how you doing? I'm saying. So I can't believe she remembered that story. I didn't know that it resonated like that. It speaks to her unique talent to take everyday life stories and find something of value of them.

I just never dreamed I'd be, you know, one of those stories. that be, you know, one of those stories. You have been attacked in so many ways and people have tried to turn off your light. And I just, the strength that you have, and it really is, I think, a big part, like you said to your parents, because they were amazing parents, and really gave you the tools. But to go through what you've gone through, and how do you keep that light strong when you have people saying such horrible negative things? And a lot of people is really interesting. Young people now who know me on this side of it, don't even remember how bad the attacks were on me

when Barack was running and the country didn't fully know me. I mean, these are major magazines. They took the image of a smart, articulate, outspoken black woman, and they turned it into a threat. And so yes, it definitely hurt. It was stunning at first because it's like when you see yourself in a way that is not you, you wonder, well, wow, how easily your whole persona can be manipulated when you're in the public eye. Ellen, you've experienced as a public figure. Unfortunately, we often treat it like,

well, that's the cost of being a public figure. And it is sad, but sadly, social media and the press, again, praying on negativity, praying on fear, praying on anger, it's become the easy go to. What pain and anger and fear must you behold onto that you would do that to anybody, let alone a woman, a mother, what prevents you from seeing my humanity, something is broken. And when you're the first lady, your job isn't to worry about it. Your job is to figure out how to fix it because people are in pain, people are afraid, people are

afraid of people who aren't like them because they don't have enough. And that's the problem with living in a country where people don't have enough. You know, they take their anger and their bitterness and their loss out on each other, you know, which is why we should all be promoting more taxes and more support systems and better schools for everyone of all races because it makes people feel like they have a stake. And then we don't have to go after each other. So I get through it because it's an armor that I built. Another tool is that you learn how to not let that stuff in and to grasp on to the truth of who you know

and to rise above it, to see your own light and to hopefully help them see theirs so that they're not in that place. I overcame the fear of animals by getting an animal. I was afraid of dogs and cats. As a child, dogs especially were seen as something scary, not necessarily as pets, but as things that chased you down the street. And we never had pets in my family.

And so someone said a cat might be an easier thing. So I got a cat. Prince the 23 pound cat. That started off as a cute little kitten and became a 23 pound cat. My biggest fear was for a long time of saying no. I felt like a lot of the time I would say yes to everything because if I said no, then I maybe lose the person that I'm saying no to. But I've figured I found out as you know I got older that it's important to say no sometimes because you have to refuel yourself. Like you can't say yes to everything because

you're giving more than you're receiving when you say yes to everything. So you have to learn how to say no, you know, just to kind of keep your own sanity. We'll be right back with Ellen in just a moment. You're listening to the Audible original Michelle Obama The Light podcast. Like what you're hearing? Listen to more from Michelle Obama between episodes on Audible. Sign up for a free Audible trial and get your copy of the Light We Carry audiobook. For now, enjoy listening to the Light Podcast.

Well, you're an inspiration in that way that you could take all that and still stand strong and still put yourself out there because, you know, when you had to, you had no choice. You had to just be... Well, then there was that. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that's that's really tough. I mean, I, you know, I say this all the time, but like people say, you know, we're in show business and you have to have thick skin. You just have to grow thick skin. It's like,

I don't, I don't have thick skin. I don't want thick skin. I like being sensitive. I like feeling things. And it's taught me compassion and empathy because now I know what it feels like to be attacked and to be judged and to be criticized. And I don't ever want to do that to anybody because I know what that feels like. And if I had thick skin, I wouldn't know what it felt like. So I'm happy that I feel things because I want other people to feel good, like I feel good.

Like you said. That's why people love you. Well, that's one of the reasons. It's, I think that social media, though, has exponentially just like it, I think, has created. It's because, and it seems to prey on all the negative and all the tax versus anything nice that you're saying about somebody. They love to keep sharing and spreading nasty. I mean, I don't know what we do about that.

The social media has really hurt. Well, and I don't think that it's a coincidence that we're seeing high rates of anxiety and depression, especially among our young people. There are wonderful things that social media has done. It's opened up the world in so many ways. It has connected us in ways that gives you access to information.

My children can now correct us on point by going, mom, you're stupid. This is the right answer. You don't know what you're talking about. And it's like, oh, I hate Google. I hate Google. Makes parents look stupid. They do it to my mom all the time.

It's like grandma, that science experiment didn't work that way. But we don't know where all that is coming from. And it's too much information. It's like everybody's opinion doesn't matter. It really doesn't need to be heard and shared. It really doesn't. Before you had a crazy uncle, and he just talked crazy at the kitchen table.

And now he's got followers. You know? It's like, nobody was supposed to hear from Uncle Bubba. Ever, ever, ever. We were just like like you just living up mm-hmm now he's spreading that stuff it's just we haven't yet figured out how to manage it you know so I think we have to be wary and I think in its heart is parents to you know set those boundaries for your kids. And we just just escaped it because

Malia wasn't as old enough where she wasn't hooked on it like a drug. Sasha is, you know, just writing that cusp. So I know it's easier said than done. But for the sake of our young people, our young adults, we've got to be, you know, we don't know what this is doing to them. And I think that it's just making us all way more anxious and suspicious. It is dividing us in ways that we just have to be careful of, and it's going to take us some time to really know these effects. But I am wary of social media, even though I'm on Instagram and Twitter and all that stuff. So follow her. You're right.

So follow me on where you saw my community page. So you talk about your mom a lot in the book. She's amazing, Maryann. But you talk about some pretty, her rules. Do you wanna talk about her rules? Well, the chapter is called Meet My Mom because let me tell you, you wanna know what's my source code,

what's my biggest tool is that I had Mary and Robinson as a mother. She is common sense, unique kind of wisdom, but it's called Meet My Mom. And there's a lot of little Marianisms in there just to share one this notion is you don't go to school to be liked. You come home to be liked. And this is another thing that helped me get through some of those tougher times because my mother's view was

you go to school to learn. You can't control whether the teacher likes you. What you need to do is get the math that she has from her head into yours. You come home to be liked. That's just an example of just the kind of steadiness that my mother provided to me and my brother, our family, her entire life. and that she upended her life

to come and live in the White House, which she did not want to do. And the only reason she did it is that her favorite child, my brother Craig, convinced her that it was the best thing for her to do. So she reluctantly came and lived in a couple of sweets in the White House to do me a favor. But it was a huge favor, creating a kind of stability. I talk about the fact that Grandma lit up for us all those eight years in the White House. She was there seeing us as ourselves,

Barack, the girls, me. She was that source for me to come to when that stuff would happen. I could go up to her room and just sit and let out a breath, and she would remind me who I was, who we were. If we were traveling and we wanted to keep the girls on a schedule and make sure they were doing what they were supposed to and they didn't grow spoiled or pampered or didn't take advantage of the staff there. Grandma was there to be like, you know what you're supposed to do, you know who you are, don't come in here acting new. You know, all of that kept us grounded.

So a gift that I, one of the biggest gifts in this book, is the chapter on my mom, because there's so much that she teaches us, and me, one other important thing is that you raise the child you have. I mean, you don't try to change them into another version of yourself. And it didn't make sense until not after the first child, but the second, right? Because the first one, you think, even if it works out, you think it's you, right? You think, oh, I'm such

a good parent, you know? Look how normal they are and how they think, they listen, and then the second one comes, and they're very different. And I share a story about when I was about to give up on parenting, when it was clear when my children was showing me who they were, and I shared this story about, you know, it was one of those nights, Baraka's campaigning, kids are little, it was time for bed, and they weren't listening, and I was like, go to bed.

Gah-hah-ti-hee laughing laughing. And I was just at the end of my rope, it had a long day, and I had asked too many times, and I just went upstairs and said, okay, y'all don't listen to me. I quit. You just don't need a parent, so I'm out. You could just do this all on yourself, since you know so much. I'm just retiring. I'm standing there.

I've got Malia, the older one who's empathetic and sweet. Her reaction was, oh, no, mommy. No, we wouldn't know what to do without you. No, don't. She walked in her room, brush your teeth, hopped in the bed, and I was like, oh, OK, this works. And then the little one, Sasha, she was about five. She grabbed her blankie and was like, oh, good.

She walked. Hey, that little girl was like, I am so glad you were finally handing me my life. I mean, this is what I've been trying to tell you. You don't know what you're doing. That little girl was like, I am so glad you were finally handing me my life. I mean, this is what I've been trying to tell you. You don't know what you're doing. And I learn right then in there, two different people. And I have to approach them.

And it's been that way. Their whole lives. They are beautiful, amazing young girls, but they are separate individuals, and I have to approach in that way. Different kind of ways to show love, different ways that they hear it, and that was something my mother taught me, is like, don't turn your child into a mini-me. You have to parent the child you have. So that's just some of the wisdom.

I love that. Yeah, and that's, I think that's a, a lot of the reason that people have kids is because they think they're gonna, you know, mold them into exactly. To another. Yeah, what they want them to be. Any final thoughts, anything else you want to say before we say goodnight? What a night, what a night, what a night. I just want to say, you know, this woman is light. Ellen, I love you. I am grateful that you've taken time out of your world to share the stage with me.

Let's give Ellen DeGeneres a round of applause. I love you. I love you. Thank you, guys. Ellen, I love you. Good night! Good night! When I wake up in the morning low Throughout my life, my mom's wisdom has been the armor that helped me get through my toughest moments, not just when our girls were little, but as they grew older and especially during

the White House years. Honestly, the topics we've talked about in this episode all fit together because my mother's grasp of these smaller truths gave her a sort of fearlessness of her own. And she shaped the way I looked at fear, the way I see my place in the world, the way I interact with all of you. Because look, we'll never completely rid ourselves of fear and uncertainty. That's just a fact. But when we fixate too much on our fears, on the dangers that might be lurking around the corner whether real or perceived, or when we give too much power to what other folks think

of us or how they've mistreated us in the past. We risk letting our fears dim our light. So we've got to get comfortable with our fears. Sometimes a fear is like a hater that you just brush off and keep it moving. Other times, a fear is a true nemesis that you have to look dead in the eye and face down in order to really let your light shine. And isn't mirror and tell ourselves that we can do this. And once we do that, then we can share our light with others as well. So I want to thank Ellen for her friendship, her perspective, and for guiding us

through such a wonderful conversation. And thank you again, all of you, for listening in. I'll talk to you soon. This has been a higher ground and audible original, produced by higher ground and little everywhere, executive produced by Dan Firmann and Mukta Mohan, for higher ground and Jane Marie for Little Everywhere.

Audible Executive Producers Zola Masheriki and Nick DiAngelo. Audible co-producers Keith Booten and Glenn Pogue, produced by Mike Richter. With additional production by Joyce Sanford, Dan Galuci, Nancy Golembisky and Lisa Pollack. With production support from Andrew Epen, Gen 11, and Julia Murray. Location recording by Jody Elf. Special thanks to Melissa Winter, Jill Van Lokerin, Crystal Carson,

Alex May Ceeley, Haley Ewing, Marone Highly-Messkel, Sierra Tyler, Carl Ray, and Jerry Radway, Meredith Koop, Sarah Corbett, Tyler Lechtonberg, and Usra Najum. The theme song is unstoppable by Sia. The closing song is lovely day by Bill Witheres. Audible head of U.S. content Rachel Giazza, head of Audible Studios Zola Masha Riki. Copyright 2023 by Higher Ground Audio LLC. Sound recording copyright 2023 by Higher Ground Audio LLC Sound recording copyright 2023 by Higher Ground Audio LLC

Voice over by Novina Carmel This episode was recorded live at the Warner Theater in Washington, D.C. Always seems to know the way Then I look at you