A Bit of Optimism - Service with Maria Shriver

Episode Date: June 22, 2020

I wanted to talk about Service. Given how she lives her life, Maria Shriver was the perfect person to talk to. We went for a socially distanced walk together in LA and talked about how we can leave this world in better shape than we found it. This is... A Bit of Optimism.YouTube: http://youtube.com/simonsinekFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/simonsinekLinkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/simonsinek/Instagram: https://instagram.com/simonsinek/Twitter: https://twitter.com/simonsinekPinterest:  https://www.pinterest.com/officialsimonsinek/ 

What does it mean to live a life of service? These words are thrown about pretty easily, being a servant leader, being in the service industry. But what does it actually mean to live a life of service? There's one person who knows a lot more about this than the rest of us. Maria Shriver has grown up in a family completely devoted to service, and she and all of her siblings have also devoted their lives to service. So we decided to go for a socially distant walk together.

Please excuse the noise from the traffic and the wind. This is a bit of optimism. Test, test. Okay, I'm recording. So the thing that I thought I wanted to talk to you about was service. What does service mean in the 21st century? Because I think it's changed. So I think that service can be really small actions. As a woman wrote today, an-american woman wrote that she was scared of the police so she sent out a facebook message in her neighborhood and invited the

police to her house i love that for cookies and coffee to talk to talk and to her to listen and i thought to myself that's so big but But in her mind, it was so small. And I think we're so focused on we have to change the world. We have to topple the Catholic Church. We have to defund the police, as opposed to these singular actions that we can each take, whether it's making a placard and go standing in a black lab. But has it always been that way? Like I went from just living my life every day to now I want to have a revolution and topple all the establishments. First of all, the good thing is,

is that all the establishments are in need of reform. That's the good news and the bad news. Right. The second question is, well, who's going to do that? Right. The third question is all of us, right? Each and every one of us. But I think we each have to pick a lane. We each have to find what is it that speaks to you, because what speaks to you is different than what speaks to me. So you can either educate yourself about what's already being done and join in that and be of service to something that's already underway or do your act like this woman did that's small but big in your neighborhood because being of service right actually ends up being of service to you and I think that's the biggest thing.

People go into service thinking it's about the other. Yeah. And it really pays off to you. Yeah. But the thing that I think is interesting about this modern day, and it absolutely is because of our ultra-connected, fast media, 24-hour news cycle, that we seem to go from, so everybody was angry about you know fixing

something helping something doing something you know everybody gave money everybody did a challenge on instagram and then we forgot that thing never got never got fixed or reformed but i think the key is we can't forget right right i was quoting my uncle the other day on health care reform, his entire career, and it didn't even, he died before it was passed. Right? My mother, her entire 88 years on the planet on behalf of people with intellectual disabilities, in one way, shape, or form. Staying the course. So what we seem to have in this modern day and age is everybody screaming about one thing for a short period of time, and then the vast majority of that, and the vast majority then moves on to the next noisy thing,

demanding change until the next noisy thing. And look, I hope this is different. I hope the time we're living in now is different. But to your point, to be truly of service, it has to be passionate, first of all, which means it has to be personal. You have to have some sort of connection to that thing. And you devote your life to it, just like a passionate job, a passionate career. You don't just bounce from industry to industry to industry. You have passion for something.

You don't just bounce from industry to industry to industry. You have passion for something. Well, I think the challenge is in a time where everything is immediate and fleeting, how do each of us dig in? How do each of us find a way to step back and say, am I still on my path? Am I still involved in what I said I was in? And for some people, especially I think a lot of young people will say like, well, I did this when I was 20, but then I found that I was interested in this when I was 30. And that's okay. Everybody doesn't have to stay the course on an issue.

But more than a few months and more than a year. Well, more than a minute, right? And I think what's important to know also or to remember is that people, you know, spend lifetimes and move the needle like this. Right, a tiny bit. And it's really up to us to decide, is that good enough? You know, a lot of people are screaming now, oh my God, nothing has changed in America. That's not true. That's just not true. nothing has changed in America. That's not true. That's just not true. It may not have changed as quickly or as rapidly or as deeply as people wanted it to when Martin Luther King died, expressing his dream. Has that been realized? No, not to the full extent, but people are still talking today about his dream. People have amended it. The question I think for each of us is, we still invoke it as a rallying cry. They do, absolutely.

And I think the question for each of us is, do you have any vision at all? And what is your vision? My vision, I always characterize my vision as the open field because it works for me. It comes off of a Rumi, a Persian mystic poem, which is out beyond ideas of right doing and wrongdoing. He wrote, there is a field, I'll meet you there. And I many years ago wrote on to that, out beyond ideas of right doing and wrongdoing, out beyond fear, shame, judgment, and labels. There's a field. I'll meet you there. And that's my vision for the country I live in, that we will get beyond skin color, race, labels, judgment, fear, pain, and we'll meet there. That's

my vision. You raise an interesting point, which is the difference between revolution and evolution, right? Which is both accomplish change. And it seems now, and I don't know if this is a current thing, that all the change that people are demanding is revolutionary, which is sudden. And it's about overturning versus evolution, which is obviously slower, sometimes frustratingly slow, but it's about overturning versus evolution, which is obviously slower, sometimes frustratingly slow, but it's much more stable. Because if there's a revolution, there's almost always a counter-revolution. There's almost always a group of people that dig in because they feel threatened.

And arguably revolutionary change isn't necessarily stable. There has to be vision. The whole idea is not to simply stop something, but to start something. Not to end something, but to begin something. Not to break something down, but to build something anew. And that's the part that I think to truly be of service, you have to, to invoke Dr. King again, you have to know the dream, you have to know the thing you're going towards. So that you know the revolutionary elements, the tactics, the steps that you have to take to get there. Otherwise, it seems to me everything is reactive. Well, sometimes I don't argue.

I mean, I was going to say I don't want to argue with you, but I do love arguing with you or pushing up against you. But I don't think that some people, they get in and they don't know the steps. They get in because their heart has been impacted. They've been moved by a story or someone's life or someone else, and they just get in because their heart has been impacted. They've been moved by a story or someone's life or someone else, and they just get in. I don't think everybody knows every step. It's like starting a relationship. You don't know where it's going to go, but you have the courage to get in. But there are people like Fidel Castro, Che Guevara. There are people like Martin Luther King. There are people like Eunice Kennedy Shriver, there are people like Robert Kennedy, but even like in Robert Kennedy, he evolved into

his voice. But you would, I would say that about every great leader. So I think it's sometimes we keep people saying, if you don't know the tactics, if you don't have the vision, if you don't have the steps, don't get in. I think people put too much pressure, especially young people in this day and age, because they're constantly being asked. What's your vision? What's your purpose? What's your what's well? That's what you're doing. No, I'm not No, I'm not

Let me finish my thought. No, you're not you're pushing listen. I don't think I don't think you have to have your own vision You can find the vision that someone else has articulated and you say that I'm interested in that Well, what about if you're not you don't have maybe you're just interested in being a part of the process that's learning but there are many people who knew that change was needed and when they heard dr. King's vision they said that's the thing I want to be a part of when when when they heard your uncle Jack's inaugural they said that's what I've been trying to say. And this is why we need leaders,

because leaders are able to capture in words and vision the thing that we feel that we know emotionally drives us, but I struggle to put into words. We have to have a vision. It doesn't have to be uniquely ours. The question I'm trying to raise is, what is it that gives our lives meaning and how do we commit ourselves to a life

of service and if we truly want to see systemic change in any in any part of our society right yeah what is the way that each individual can contribute some will do it at a big level at a policy level and some will do it at a small level at home like the story you told before of the african-american woman who invited police over to her house for tea because she was afraid of police. Correct. And she chose to be of service by doing the thing that she's asking others to do, to listen. Right. Which is magical. And she confronted her own fear, right? Right. So how do we create systemic change that requires a long time of pushing, repushing, long time of pushing, repushing, reimagining, compromises, pushing again. So you know I think that's one thing. How do we be of service? It's to look outside of

ourselves, find something that makes us mad as hell or that takes off our indignation button and there are plenty of things there, and say, I want to be part of that, because that angers me. That is unjust to me. I was having a conversation this week with Lisa Leslie, the most decorated female basketball player of all time, and she wrote this really incredible letter called Dear America.

And in our conversation, she said, what I try to say to people is this. If you're in a family and you have a brother or sister that's constantly being abused, your parents don't give that kid the same educational opportunities as the two or three other kids. If that kid gets only hand-me-down clothes, if that kid, and she went through a litany of things, she goes, that's what the Black community feels, and we are a family. So think about it like that, which I thought was so beautifully articulated. And she said, my husband was a graduate of the Air Force Academy, fought in two wars, and when he walks into a room in his uniform, people give him so much respect and adoration

and they thank him for his service. When he walks in a room with his sweatshirt on and his flip flops, people recoil. They're scared. So how do we get to a place where when people walk in the room right and that's going to take systemic change that's going to take education that's going to take unlearning that's going to take pushing into your uncomfortable self i mean so i think in all of these things some things will topple much quicker. I try to say to my children, let's find an area that you feel passionate about. Find an area that speaks to you that you think you can make a difference in, that you want to make a difference in, and that brings you joy and passion and purpose in making a difference in.

I think the challenge to each of us is how are we here? How are we spending our time here? And are we being of service to something that speaks to us? So it goes back to the idea of what does it mean to serve? What does it mean to live a life of service? And, you know, if we look at these two young generations, you have the millennials and then this newest generation, Gen Z. We talked about this at our table last night.

And they're very different. And millennials, as a generation, of course, not all of them, but they were labeled slacktivists, which is everything was to drive a conversation and you would tweet your discontent and you would do all the challenges and all the things on Instagram that you were required to do. And then two months later, you're on to the next. Or you felt that you were doing good because you bought a pair of shoes that that company gave a pair of shoes to someone who needed them.

And it made you feel good because you were, quote unquote, in service. This younger generation, this Gen Z, what I love about them is they're an activist generation. They don't tweet their discontent. They organize rallies. They strike from school. Whatever it is they're trying to do, they're much more engaged and show up. They seem to be willing to sacrifice something more than 140 characters. Well, I have kids in both.

And I think that's a judgment and generalization. Of course. And they would say, like, you baby boomers, you left us this mess. I'm a boomer, right? I would concur. And so, yet, I think we did a lot to push the envelope as boomers. And continue, by the way. So let me ask you a question.

Does service require sacrifice? I think everything requires choice and sacrifice. Depends how you define sacrifice. If you're enjoying it, no. So you know those who volunteer to be in the military they're willing to make the ultimate sacrifice. That's what they call it. They're putting their lives on the line for something they believe in the greater good. Right. There are people who work in four impact organizations for charities who have sacrificed income because they don't get paid a lot of money.

There are people who are out protesting. They've sacrificed potentially their health in this day and age, taking time away from family or work or whatever it is. Can you be of service if all you do is send a little bit of money and do an Instagram challenge? Is that service? Well, once again, I think you're asking me to comment on those people and shame them. I'm trying to understand. No, no. I'm not looking for shame. I'm genuinely trying to understand. If someone says, I want to live a life of service. Right. So if you're a nun and you want to live a life of service, that means you're going to take a vow of poverty,

chastity, and you're going to live in community. So for somebody who loves that and believes in that, it's not a sacrifice, it's a joy. To me, that would be a sacrifice, right? But it's considered a sacrifice. You're going against a human instinct. But it depends on the person. If you talk to people, nuns who have been in it for 40 years or 50 years. When I was in India, I talked to all these young women who had joined Mother Teresa's Mothers of Calcutta, young girls. It's like, it's a joy. It's a calling.

It's not a sacrifice, right? So I think it's really so individual. I think if you look at your service as a hardship, what you're losing, all this sort of stuff, then you're not in the right place. I concur. No, I agree with that. But that's different though. You're not blind to the sacrifice. The difference is you feel the sacrifice is worth it. Yes. Let's climb the hill since we're talking about sacrifice, right? There's this gut feeling that I have that service comes with some sort of sacrifice or struggle. But doesn't life come with that?

But I guess what I'm getting at is if we want to effect change, that there is no easy solution. change that there is no easy solution and if we want to affect change correct we have to give up something time energy correct in order to have the feeling that i'm contributing to change okay you have to know your thing right do you think a woman who for example is devoting her life to motherhood is being of service hundred percent okay hundred percent yes so many women and did that come with sacrifice based on your definition no what no that's not true so sacrifice only if she wanted to be a lawyer what she really wanted to do was be a lawyer and she decided to settle and just be a mom. If somebody wants to build a huge company and make tons of money,

and as a result of that choice, because we're talking about making choices, they have weak relationships with their children, and when the children become adults, feel they don't have a deep relationship, a deep love relationship with that parent. Now, in our modern day and age, we'd say that person sacrificed their family to make money or fame or whatever the thing is, right? Right. Prioritize. So if that person is lying on their deathbed with no one around them,

there can be no regret. You'd have to talk to them. Although I hear all the time when I read nurses who write about regrets of the dying that's always number one so people when they slow down enough they look at their choices differently so now this goes back to the idea of service which is bring us home so I'm gonna I'm gonna title in right which is try which is service has to benefit another so the people who choose to sacrifice quote unquote

for themselves fame and fortune right as you said from these nurses reports that the big regrets in other words that wasn't worth it they they discover on their death they had a regret about it they have a regret about it yes but people who live a life of service, meaning that the sacrifices they made, you sacrifice, I sacrifice my interests. I chose to give up the things that would directly benefit me in order to benefit others. That is what it means to live a life of service.

The path I chose versus I chose to sacrifice the lives and health and whatever of others so that I may benefit. My children wanted to love me and be close to me, but I was too busy. That's such an individual thing. I would think the question really is to everybody, what is the path they choose? I cannot abide.

Okay, then don't. Hold on. That we can say that someone has lived a life of service if all the benefit went to them. I didn't say that. You didn't say that. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to say I have lived a life of service, if all the benefit went to them. I didn't say that. You didn't say that. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to say, I have lived a life of service when I sacrificed my interests for the good of others or the greater good.

Yes, that person may be sitting there going, I tried to do all this for you. Do you know what I mean? I'm not judging that person. But it's the person who built the company and didn't go to the Little Leagues or didn't show up as a father will say, gosh, I did all this for my kids and my wife and my family. Except the thing they didn't do, unlike that wonderful woman who talked to the police, was sit down with the family and listen and talk. Yes. It was an assumption that was made.

Yes. And I think that was an assumption that was made. Yes and I think that's changing. I think you know I don't see men or women at that matter I think much more conscious today of the choices, the ramification, the collateral damage of our choices in a way that I think when I was growing up was not part of the national conversation, which brings me back to how these things have raised. Men are very different today in your generation than in mine, than in my father's generation. In the sense that?

Everything, how they look at the choices. They're aware of the trade-offs. Before, it was like that was how a man was supposed to be, right? A woman was supposed to be this way. And because boomers pushed up and said, I want to be more fully seen, more fully valued women, right? There were choices that came with that. The can you have it all question, right? Men by saying, I can be more evolved, I can be sensitive, I can cry. No one told me that. So that is huge and that's in my lifetime. You know what I'm, the conclusion that I'm drawing from all of this.

Are you? Of course. Always. I've never talked to you and not learned something. Oh, good. Every time I interact with you, I'm just that little bit wiser. Thank you. The two things that I'm really appreciating from this conversation is this idea of sacrifice,

which I still have to unwrap if I'm honest, but I do like the idea of choices and that the sacrifice is really only a sacrifice from the viewer, from the viewing gallery, because for those who are in it, it feels worth it. And so it doesn't quote unquote feel like a sacrifice. It's like doing a job that you love, right? When you work with passion, you work late hours or you may turn down a better paying job and it's fine. It's totally worth it because you love the thing you're doing. Correct. And so I really appreciate this idea that we get to choose how we live our lives. And we have to remember that our choices are our own. And if it feels like a sacrifice, if it feels like this doesn't feel worth it,

then maybe change path. So life becomes this searching or dusting, looking for my path. Absolutely. The thing that I think makes being a human being so much fun, it's kind of like, you know, you sort of get a sense that God has a sense of humor. That all of the food that tastes so good is so bad for us. It's kind of like, you know, you sort of get a sense that God has a sense of humor. That all of the food that tastes so good is so bad for us. And all the food that's so good for us is so bland.

And now you have to go choose. And it seems that life has a similar paradox, which is all of the things that take away from serving some higher calling, living a quote-unquote life of service. It's Patrick. Can I answer the phone? Of course. Hi, sweetheart. I'm walking with Simon up a hill for his podcast, and he's arguing with me, but I'm taking this call to give me some reprieve. We're up. We just walked by, you know, we're up we just walked by you know we're up tiger walking up and then come down we're far up yeah but we're coming down how are

you baby are you on your way home oh oh okay great I'll be home in a little bit then. Okay sweetheart. I'll go on a bike ride with you after. Okay. Okay. So what I was saying is... I always make a choice, no matter what I'm doing, to pick up the phone when one of my children calls. No, I love it. It's one of the things I love about you. Always. No matter what. I know how devoted to your family you are. It makes me smile when you choose your child over a conversation with me. Trust me, I like that. Oh, okay.

No, no. I sit here with a smile on my face going, here's a woman with values. This is one of the reasons I like her. And it comes from a desire to make sure, and I feel blessed with my parents, but it comes from a desire

to make sure that these four people feel like they're a priority with a capital P. And that nothing else is as important as them. And they will argue with me, or they say, you run around, you're a chicken with your head cut off, why don't you stop, what are doing why do you do that you're making all these sacrifices to your health you could be out finding a boyfriend so in their eyes i'm sacrificing the life i could be living for the life i am living as opposed to recognizing that you made the choice and you love the path that you're on.

And I love the path that I'm on. So the analogy I was making was, God has the sense of humor. You know, all the things that are good for us are bland and all the things that are bad for us are so tasty. But it seems like that living our life is very similar, which is all of the things like making money, power, fame, all of the selfish stuff is so

addictive and once you have some of it you want more of it and yet the challenge in life is to live a life of purpose means actually giving some of that stuff up in order to do good for others now you can also make that stuff and do good for others but at some point the there are sacrifices to our personal lives to our personal ambitions to our personal desires to our personal joys that we do so willingly so that others may gain we cannot live entirely selfish lives that is not a life of service and well I think that's also an unhappy life. An unhappy life. Yeah. And you and I both know people who've made that choice, and there is a lot of unhappiness. Right.

But I don't know at the end of people's lives what is the life. Well, there was a wonderful TED audition by an EMT, and basically there's this belief in the medical community, amongst EMTs, that you lie to people when they're facing imminent death. He said, you know, there used to be this belief that if somebody clearly was going to die in a horrible car accident, they've lost too much blood, and they look up to the EMT and say, am I going to make it? You see this in combat, you know? And somebody would always say, you're going to be fine, you're going to be fine, you're going to be fine. There was this belief that we have to reassure them with good news, even if the news is bad. And this EMT tells the story of how he showed up, I think it was a motorcycle accident,

and the woman was not going to survive. And she says, am I going to make it? And he says, you're not. He told her the truth. And apparently the result was incredible, which there was this calm resignation and acceptance that came over her. And this is what he started doing. He went on this journey where when he would come across these cases, though he would, of course, fight tooth and nail to keep them alive, that he wouldn't lie to them anymore. And he found the pattern to be 100% consistent. That's beautiful. That they all said, please tell my family I love them.

And it's really phenomenal. And what was abundantly clear to everyone is we want to live a life of value in the lives of others. We want to have been valued in the lives of others. Not that just we served ourselves, but... And you think about it. Nobody wants on their tombstone the last title on their business card or whatever the last balance was in their checking account. We want on our tombstones the kind of person we were to others, beloved

mother, loyal father, whatever it is. It's always, the thing we want to be remembered by is how were we to others. Yes, but I also feel people come to these forks in their road in very different ways and at different times. And I think it's usually through suffering. There's that word. Not sacrifice, through suffering, through a choice that went bad, someone who lied to you and you discover it, whatever it may be. But through suffering and out of that can awaken a different human being. So it's not sacrifice that's required for service.

It's suffering. I think suffering is big. That's required for service. And I don't think we talk enough, this is going to sound crazy, about the benefits of suffering. It's going to sound crazy, about the benefits of suffering. Yeah. And how people, when they're suffering, they think there is no other side.

So I think the more people share their stories of intense, deep, personal darkness, you know, the dark night of the soul, the suffering, and the other side of that, I think that's a huge benefit to other people. And maybe the people who struggle to find their purpose, the people who struggle to find their cause, have not yet suffered in a way that would illuminate that path. Perhaps. Yeah, perhaps. And I think without the suffering, this is when people go from cause to cause to cause to cause,

where they're really into it for five minutes, but they're searching. Searching, suffering, sacrificing. We have an alliteration here. You and I both love alliteration. Suffering. And sacrifice. This is why we have movements, because no one of us can do it alone. It's a massive, massive, massive jigsaw puzzle.

Last time I talked to you, you were like, where's Martin Luther King? Where's the leader? No, I still think we need that. It's a massive, massive, massive jigsaw puzzle, but somebody has to point to the picture on the box. Otherwise, we're holding pieces to puzzles that we don't know where they go or what role they play or where they belong. There has to be someone on the ship saying, go do north. Otherwise, how do we know where to set the sail? Right. But the person on the ship is probably flawed.

Of course. And we'll make mistakes and we'll make navigational errors. But they still have to have a sense for the forest for the trees. A sense of the forest for the trees. Yes. Otherwise, because the rest of us are down in the rocks because there is no straight path. I think this is the magical relationship Of the forest for the trees. Yes. Otherwise, because the rest of us are down in the rocks, because there is no straight path.

I think this is the magical relationship between leaders and followers, which leaders are above the trees saying, there's the promised land. I can see it. I can see it in my imagination. It's right over there. What do you see in your imagination? A world in which the vast majority of people wake up inspired, feel safe wherever they are,

and then the day is fulfilled by the work of the people. up inspired, feel safe wherever they are, and then the day fulfilled by the work they do. Beyond that, what does that actually look like? How do you get to that place? Well, I think there are many, many, many, many, many pieces to this very complicated puzzle of which there are social components, there are career components, there are government components. And we need soldiers and leaders in all those places because we need change at a social level. We need change at all those institutions that you listed at the top. In that world, right. All those institutions, the church and the police,

and all of them require change to move towards. Is there something that ties them all together? For me, it's the human condition. For me, it's about human relationships. That we are tribal animals that need each other, that have to learn to work together. And the great irony is all the things that we want in our lives selfishly are more likely to happen when we commit to helping other people get those same things. Correct. So in my fully, my imagined world, when I look at health disparities, I imagine a healthcare industry where everybody is able to be seen, able to pay for it, able to access it. And I think that goes for education education the police system yeah that's the thread

for all these institutions and if each of these institutions had that at their base right and that adding in their right that you're fully safe in a relationship in a community in our country that you don't have to worry, you're a black man, about walking down the street. If you're a woman, I worry if I walk down the street at night. When I was a young girl, I worried all the time. I have that in common. I thought maybe I'm not thinking I'm going to be pulled over and shot, but i'm thinking other things that are equally detrimental to me as a young woman so i think we all have to live it to live a life without fear but i don't like things that are written against i like things that are written for so to live a life where i feel safe

yes and i mean i mean yeah isn't that what we all want we don't wake up in the morning feel safe as we go to work and come home send home, knowing that our kids are safe on the way to school and coming home, that I go to a hospital. That's what ties gun reform to health care, to Black Lives Matter, to feminism. That everyone has the right to feel safe. But bingo. And if we're all in service to that... It'll be a good world.

It'll be the world we imagined. All of us, uniformly. Exactly. Yeah. And so great leadership is actually great followership. And what I'm learning is what followership means, what followership means is this is my path. And there may be a leader on that path who's helping direct me, but this is my path that I chose. And we're all doing different things. That's important. They're all doing different things. We're all doing different things. Your open field is my j that I chose. And we're all doing different things. That's important. They're all doing different things. But I feel...

Your open field is my jigsaw puzzle. Yes. And what I've always believed is that each of us has a responsibility to speak loudly about what our piece of the puzzle is and to hold it up high above our head so that others can see where our pieces join. Because only when we work together,

only when we share, only when we share information share lessons learned share hardships so that others don't make the same mistakes will the pieces come together to actually form that world in which every single one of us feels safe yeah it takes millions of pieces of puzzle and we need a language that people can hear and we need leaders who can point to the box so it feels feels like it brings us back to, my God, there's a lot that needs to be done. And, oh my God, that's so great. There's so much opportunity to do things that need to be done.

Thank you for listening to me. Thank you for letting me feel heard is a big part of it. Huge. So you know I would follow you anywhere. I don't have anywhere to go. But what's the... The path that you're on in the field that you're going to? Yes.

I would follow you there. The path that I'm on in the field I'm going to. I would follow you there. Thank you so much. I envision you there with your jigsaw puzzle on a pine table over there with a beautiful woman sitting next to you who likes to play jigsaw puzzles with you. I do like jigsaw puzzles. Okay there you go. That's a good vision isn't it? It's good. So you don't have to feel you made a sacrifice. She's waiting for me in the field. She is absolutely. That's what I think every day

for myself, actually. I have a vision in my field. Do you know, I have a very clear vision in my field. That was such a good conversation. Thank you. The big thing that I learned from Maria is that a life of service requires struggle, and it's the struggle that brings us together with each other. Thanks for listening. If you'd like to hear more episodes, but without the ambient sounds,

please subscribe to A Bit of Optimism wherever you like to listen to podcasts. Until then, take care of yourself and take care of others.