Here's Where It Gets Interesting - Creating Change Through Radical Optimism with Dr. Paul Zeitz

Episode Date: February 16, 2022

In this episode, Sharon talks with Dr. Paul Zeitz, author of Waging Optimism, about how to identify our complacency and make a move toward impacting the world around us. Together, the pair discusses how optimism leads to courage, and how courage leads to action. Oftentimes, making change requires experimentation; Plan A doesn’t always work out, so it’s good to have more than one Plan B in place. While it can be easy to feel discouraged that our actions don’t lead to revolutionary change, we can bolster our optimism by remembering that every action ripples outward and carries an impact. Two foundational ways to be a catalyst for change? Always be ready to act and continue to learn new things about how the system works so you can generate ideas on how to improve it. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, hello. You're here again. Yay. I am so excited. And today I'm chatting with Dr. Paul Zeitz, just a world changer and a movement maker. And I really think if you have ever felt like, I wish I could change blank about the world, he is going to offer you some incredible insight, wisdom, practical steps about how to change things that you're unhappy with. I had many takeaways from this conversation, so let's dive in. I'm Sharon McMahon, and welcome to the Sharon Says So podcast. Thank you so much for joining me today. I am really so excited to hear more about what you can share with us about a huge variety of topics. So Dr. Paul Zaitz, thank you so much for being

here. It's an honor to be here with you and your audience. Thank you. Tell everybody a little bit more about your background and what you do just for some context. Yes, I'm a physician by training and I left the practice of clinical medicine and started doing political advocacy nearly 30 years ago now. And really what it is, is looking at the health of the population and the health of our society, the social determinants of health, if you will. And I found that I could serve the interests of more people by dealing with the underlying causes of ill health or poverty and things like that. And I've been part of very successful movements like the movement to end global AIDS. And we were able to create a movement environment that led to political commitments that were bold and

transformative. It's really great and fun work. It has to be incredibly gratifying to feel like what I am doing on a daily basis is actually impacting the world for good. Well, I used to feel really alone and I've been through a journey of like figuring out how I as an individual have a vision of what I want the world to be like. And then walking out the front door and there's a great dissonance between what I think is possible, what I would like to see happen and what is actually happening. And I struggled for many years of my life. Like, how do I deal with that kind of conflict? my life. Like, how do I deal with that kind of conflict? And it's about experimenting and it's about being entrepreneurial in seeking justice and seeking the change that we want to see in the world. So I call myself a justice entrepreneur. So one of the things that I'm really curious to

speak to you about is how people go about making change, regardless of what that is. It could be something as simple as saving an owl habitat from development. It could be as huge as tackling the global AIDS crisis and anything in between. I hear from people regularly that they feel discouraged by their lack of ability to impact an issue that they feel passionately about. Can you talk more about how do people make change? How do we create a movement? How do we impact the world for good? I myself have also struggled at times with that challenge of how to have an impact and feeling like sometimes I'm spinning my wheels or what I might be doing is like going nowhere fast. I certainly know those experiences and have lived that myself. So I really, I believe that what I've learned from my own journey is that

it's about me. It's about how I create myself. So I had to do some work on myself because I had to understand that there are times where I act confused and that confusion would stop me from taking action. There are times where I'm complicit, so I don't do anything about it. And then I kind of self-identified that I was being complicit or complacent with the status quo or with my inability to do anything. And so that is like a pattern within me that I had to identify. And I started experimenting with how do I transform that? So one of the things that I identified is that I should have said this earlier.

I am affected by a syndrome that I identified is that I should have said this earlier. I am affected by a syndrome that I have identified. Now, the syndrome, as a physician, I have a responsibility and an opportunity to identify new syndromes. So I identified that I have something called SIPO, self-imposed, persistent optimism. And when I realized that I have this syndrome, SIPO, then I actually have the power to choose every day to be optimistic. And when I'm optimistic, I can be courageous and I can be committed to taking on a challenge. As long as you have a commitment to what you want to see change and you generate yourself as courageous, then you're not going to be satisfied with writing one letter to a senator. You're going to get 50 letters to the senator. And I can tell you, if a senator gets 50 letters from their constituents about an issue, it automatically goes to the chief of staff.

Don't underestimate what a few people could do and what every little action can build towards. I've said that many times when people have asked me, like, well, what can I do? It's easy to ignore one letter. You need to get some friends. You need to get some friends to write some letters and some of their friends to write some letters. And again, not that writing letters is the only method we can seek change. And we'll talk more about that in a minute, but there is, it is much harder to ignore a group of people than it is to ignore a person. How does somebody build a movement? Did you just decide one day, like, you know what,

I'm going to build myself a movement. How does one actually do that? What I've learned for myself is that one of my main jobs is always to stand for possibility. So if I see something I want to see happen in the world, like I want to address the climate emergency, I have to stand for the possibility that it's possible that we could fix all the problems with the climate emergency. And so I generate myself with possibilities. And when you do that, you'll find very quickly there's a lot of people saying it's not possible. It's not going to happen.

So I really think it's like a practice that you have to build your capability that always stand for possibility in the face of all circumstances, in the face of all negativity, still stay true to whatever you want to see done. I love the idea though, that you have to go into advocating for change, knowing that you are going to face some stiff pushback from people who don't want the kind of change that you're advocating for, for whatever reason, you are going to face the naysayers and it requires courage. It requires courage to step out and be the person. Courage is a practice. Some people maybe have a personality trait that makes them more prone to bravado, but we can all practice the skill of courage and get better at it. Absolutely. I couldn't agree more.

I do think courage is a practice. And when I'm optimistic, I can be courageous and I can be committed to a cause. And when I'm committed, then all kinds of magical things can happen and all kinds of opportunities that were unforeseen can occur. There's also another dynamic here, I would say, is like, I have always decided to pick my work and focus my energy and my work on bold and transformational change, not incrementalism. It's when you try to really bring forward bold and transformational change then the naysayers kind of amp up their energy so i think it's about protecting yourself in the face

of naysaying and be prepared for it anticipated as you said and like you know generating yourself as courageous it can be shocking i remember one time i was working on global aids and i had come back from africa and i was living in the dying fields of Africa. Adults and people all over the place were just dropping dead. And I was like living on the front line of that. And I came back to Washington and was in some meetings with my colleagues at work. And I was saying, well, we need to go from millions to billions of dollars here because we're what we're doing now is not working. And we have the solutions, but we have to go from millions to billions of dollars here because what we're doing now is not working. And we have the solutions, but we have to go to billions. And these were from reputable

organizations and institutions, so I won't name, but they literally laughed at me. They said, there's no way that's going to happen. There's no way you're going to get billions. And then two years later, President George Bush committed to $15 billion over five years. So I have learned that in the face of naysaying, that if I stand firm, I have to listen to their feedback. I have to learn from them. But I also can understand that that might not be the actual truth or that might not be the reality of how things unfold.

truth, or that might not be the reality of how things unfold. It's a good point that you, you sometimes do have to listen to negative feedback, particularly from somebody who might be a trusted peer, but maybe who doesn't understand the full scope that you do, or might have a different perspective. Listening to that negative feedback though, can sometimes be very useful because then it gives you useful information that you can use to combat their objections. And for me, it's like about excavating and understanding where is the fault line. So understanding where people are landing in comparison to the stand that I'm taking. And then it helps me to understand where their stand is and where I call that a fault line. And then once you understand a fault line and you have to really

do like these dialogues that you're describing, you know, with the, with people that don't agree, and then you can understand the fault line. And then it's, you're more able to navigate solutions and generate solutions and generate possibilities for understanding where, where the, where the issues lie. Maybe somebody who is struggling with this idea of like, I really want to create change. I want to be an advocate for my cause. Can you give us a small number of very practical ideas for how somebody could go about either creating transformational change or creating that sort of incremental change? I think if someone makes a commitment to a cause or to an issue or to whatever they want to see transformed. It's that commitment that can fuel one's effort to find a pathway where they can affect change. So make a commitment,

like commit yourself to doing it. Yes. Commit yourself to doing it. That's step one. Then explore and explore what else is going on in that ecosystem, in that space. See what other potential allies there are and talk to people, connect with people and see if you find like-minded or like-hearted people that you want to relate to. And then start joining forces and doing things together with other people. doing things together with other people. That could be with an organization, a church group, a family network. It really can be any way that you choose to do that. And then I would say it's about experimentation. Like I explore this thing, I pursue that, and then it works or it doesn't work. And then I go to the next thing. I experiment again. I experiment again. And I never give up. And when all the nsolidify, and recalibrate my commitments. So I think it's that kind of attitude and that approach.

And then finding my own voice, finding my own way to serve. I love the idea that it requires, many times, requires experimentation with what is going to work to make the change that you want. It's not just step three is write 82 letters. Step four is watch the laws change. You know what I mean? Like it requires experimentation to see how your message resonates, where it might fall short and expect to be required to change gears that like we

experimented on that, that did not have the desired effect. Now we're going to try this thing. Yeah. And each person like myself or yourself or all of your listeners, we're not static. We're dynamic beings, right? We're always changing. So last year I did it this way and it led to that result. And so I recalibrated my 2022 commitments. Like I learned and I'm always learning. Yes. And it requires practice. And practice. Yes. I also absolutely love the question. How can I serve? How can I serve this cause best today? And that might be different day to day, and it might change year to year. But the idea that just going into your

advocacy with that question of how can I use skills that I have with the resources available to me to serve this thing that I care passionately about today. I do a lot of work on onboarding people into advocacy and political advocacy. And one of the things that I've observed in doing this, and I call it like mentorship, you know, I see myself as I I've been through the mill. I've gone through a lot of success and a lot of failure, more failure than success. I find what I observe, what I witness in people is I see all their power. I see their articulation of issues, their passion, their caring, the tactics that they come up with as innovative and creative when they're in their own mind, doubting and questioning and confused and this and that. And I just think it's also about like going for it and, you know, having the confidence

that self-love and self-confidence that's at the root of it too, you know, that is the source for courage and for optimism. I'm Jenna Fisher. And I'm Angela Kinsey. We are best friends. And together we have the podcast office ladies where we rewatched every single episode of the office with insane behind the scenes stories, hilarious guests and lots of laughs. Every Wednesday, we'll be sharing even more exclusive stories from the office and our friendship with brand new guests. And we'll be digging into our mailbag to answer your questions and comments.

So join us for brand new Office Lady 6.0 episodes every Wednesday. Plus, on Mondays, we are taking a second drink. You can revisit all the Office Ladies rewatch episodes every Monday with new bonus tidbits before every episode. Well, we can't wait to see you there. Follow and listen to Office Ladies on the free Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts. I'd like to share a quote from Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who recently passed away.

I had the blessing and opportunity to work with him directly. He had a joy about him that was infectious. And being courageous is contagious to me. But Desmond Tutu said, a good deed doesn't just evaporate and disappear. Its consequences saturate the universe. peer, its consequences saturate the universe and the goodness that happens somewhere, anywhere helps in the transfiguration of the ugliness. So that is like a really important additional point to be made, which is every step and every action has some kind of ripple, even if you don't even know where it's going. Yes. You don't know the impact of those,

of the small thing that you did today. You can not look around and be like, well, that did nothing. You actually don't know that. You don't know how that maybe affected somebody who is like that person's kindness made it possible for me to get out of bed today. I would also on the advocacy tip, say your letter to your senator or congressperson or governor or whoever, you don't know if you're the hundredth letter saying that same thing or you're the first.

So maybe your letter is the tipping point letter. One of the things I've also found really interesting about you and your work is that you have worked with multiple presidential administrations on both sides of the aisle. You've worked with both Republican and Democratic presidential organizations on issues that you feel really passionate about. What has that been like? What's it been like to work at a really high level and how did you even get to do that? That's a good question. I think it comes with the commitment that I talked about earlier and persistence and going into learning how these systems work and

how these organizations work and realizing that they're just people, like we're all just people, and we all can access any level that you want. It's totally within anyone's reach. I have had the opportunity to work in tandem with or as part of the Bush administration, with the Obama administration. I was in the State Department even during the Trump administration. It's about understanding that people have different political ideologies, different political views. And the issues that I care about, I try to bring in common solutions that can. And I also have to have clear boundaries, too. If there's something going on within a governmental policymaking process that I'm uncomfortable with, or that's misaligned with

my core values, I'm not attached to it. I walk out. So there are people that work in the political space that live their whole life in that kind of zone. I'm more of a inside outside kind of person. I can go inside of government, or I'm very happy outside of government as well. So I don't get attached to being in one pathway. Mm-hmm. I think that is such a, you know, such an interesting point that you bring up as well, that you, in order to make change at a governmental level, you have to know how the system works. mental level, you have to know how the system works and knowing how the system works is a huge chunk of the game, right? You can't just be like, I called the 1-800 number. You know what I mean? I think that that's going to like, well, I fixed it without understanding how the system works. It is very, very difficult to change the system.

If you want to redesign a car, you need to know how cars work. If you want to change the government policy on something, you have to understand how that policy gets made to begin with. And so education on how the thing works is important. I think that's a very good point. And, you know, I've been in Washington now for, I'm in my 22nd year here. I feel like I'm trapped in the swamp and I would love to get out some year. But that being said,

I believe that there's a lot of people here in the swamp that are just like me, that are trying to do good things and help transform the world and bring health and goodwill around. And yeah, I always joke that Washington, D.C. is like a company town. You know, there are these cycles that happen. There are these kind of patterns of how people relate to each other. And, you know, when there's a Democratic administration, all the Republicans are out at the think tanks or out on K Street at

the lobbying firms. When it's a Republican administration, it flips. You know, it's a really interesting thing to watch that flip occur. And, you know, but it's interesting because it's the same people that flip in and out and they all know each other and they're all connecting and talking and relating all the time. And so when you understand how the company town works, then you understand that agenda setting and bringing new agendas forward can be, you can create that in the company town. And once you do it in the company town, then you have to build a grassroots network and a grassroots movement. And then the grassroots movement kind of reinforces what the company town actually does.

It's not by happenstance. You know, I can give you many examples of how I, you know, political leader, I can tell you for sure, George Bush did not enter the presidency with the idea that he was going to end global AIDS. Yeah. It was like the company town was like, president Bush, this is an opportunity for you to lead. And it took two years of work

with his administration and Congress and the whole ecosystem. And then he actually did step up and lead. And he did assert his intellect and his heart and his soul into leading on that to great impact. So but I, you know, I think it's like, it's all in play. As far as I'm concerned, everything's possible. So you're always in this space of like, I think it's like, it's all in play as far as I'm concerned, everything's possible. So you're always in this space of like understanding how it's all working, knowing who the players are and knowing how the system works, as you said, and then, you know, always being ready. One thing I learned from the Chinese is that they have 12 plan Bs, you know, so plan A,

of course, what you want to see happen. And then you have 10 or 12 plan Bs, plan B, plan B, plan Bs, you know, so plan A, of course, what you want to see happen. And then you have 10 or 12 plan Bs, plan B, plan B, plan B. There's not a plan C, D, E, or F. It's just 10 plan Bs. That's my understanding of, and that's the philosophy that I've adopted, you know, like, and it's, it makes everything more fun because then you're always like, okay, well, plan A didn't happen. So I'm not going to get upset or be frustrated or, you know, all the negative emotions. I'm just going to deploy plan B, plan B. And then if I run out of plan Bs, I just come up with more.

I'll just get new additional plan Bs. Yeah, exactly. Because as one of those things works, then that becomes your plan A. So now you need different and new plan Bs. You need 10 more new plan Bs. Yes. I would love to hear more too about how you, so you have three movements that you are working on building and that that's a lot of movements. One movement is a lot of movements for one person. Three movements is that seems real ambitious. So you obviously have to care deeply about these topics. And I know one of them is related to violence against children. Another is related to climate change and another is related to racial justice, so to speak. Can you elaborate a little bit more on,

first of all, how did you land on those three things? And then secondly, what does movement building look like in those three different spaces? Thank you for that question. So I have a construct called Build a Movement 2022. That's like my general, that's who I am. I'm waging love and I'm building movements and I make them time bound. So I'm operating under this rubric of Build a Movement 2022. And looking at the reality of our world and our country right now, I've identified these things where I feel like there's an opportunity to bring forward bold and transformational change. And they're all interrelated in some way, too.

So they sound very separate, but they're all interrelated. We're building a movement called Brave Movement. It's a U.S. movement under the banner of Keep Kids Safe. And we're building a global movement. under the banner of Keep Kids Safe. And we're building a global movement. There's literally billions and millions of people who are survivors themselves, adult survivors of childhood sexual violence, or family members or allies. And anyone that's a parent, or most parents are allies, because they want to protect their own children. So that is exciting. We are taking a stand, we want to end sexual violence against children, It's wrong and it can be stopped. We have the solutions. So we need to generate the political

will, get our policymakers to take bold action. So that is moving forward at a steady clip. I grew up in Philadelphia and I believe in the American dream. I believe in the idea of America, that we can live together as one people. We can unify. We can stand for liberty and freedom and justice. I believe in the mantra of the Pledge of Allegiance, justice for all. And so there's an original conflict that is clear to all of us, which is that there's a hierarchy of human value based on skin color that our country was created on, our policies and our systems were built on this hierarchy, this lie that there's a hierarchy of human value based on skin color. So having worked with Desmond Tutu, he was the one that pioneered a Truth and Reconciliation

Commission as a healing pathway for the country of South Africa at a very critical time in their history. And I'm working with a large movement, a multiracial movement, a multi-partisan movement, cross-partisan movement, and stakeholders across the country to bring forward a truth, racial healing, and transformation commission in the United States so that we can heal and realize that we're all in this together. And if we work together, we can all rise together and fulfill on the American dream. The third one is the climate emergency. It's a dire situation. We have a worsening climate emergency and our policymakers, I think, are failing to bring forward the kind of solutions that we need to ensure the survival of climate change, but also

taking on the challenge of removing the trillion tons of CO2 that humanity has already pumped up into the atmosphere. We can do that, but we have to take it on very proactively. And so I'm very excited about a global partnership that I'm a part of that's mobilizing around the world to bring forward a carbon removal agenda, which I think is key for climate transformation and for ensuring the survival of our species. Just out of curiosity, how do we remove carbon from the atmosphere? Well, there are technologies that are developing now. We need to invest more to develop more technologies, but there are technologies such as direct air capture. You can create an infrastructure to use machinery, basically,

to remove carbon from the atmosphere and then transform it into useful products. That's one pathway. There's also easier pathways, maybe. There's a way of binding carbon dioxide from the atmosphere into the concrete materials. And when you pour concrete, bind carbon dioxide into it and permanently store it in concrete. These are new technologies that are available, but haven't been brought to scale yet. And the concrete industry is a trillion dollar a year industry. It is huge.

So the Pentagon pours a lot of concrete. The Chinese government pours a ton of concrete. So it's leveraging the people that pour large concrete, like this infrastructure bill that passed. like this infrastructure bill that passed, you know, with bipartisan support, you know, I hope that it will consider building infrastructure with carbon negative building materials. So that's another major pathway. That's really interesting. I have not heard of that before. And that is fascinating that as we develop, as we do things like build new buildings,

build new bridges, build roads, et cetera, that we can actually be using technology that doesn't just, it's not just carbon neutral. It is carbon negative by helping remove carbon from the atmosphere. Bingo. You got it. And carbon negativity is the name of the game. Carbon neutrality is way too. Too little, too late for that. Too little, too late for that. Well said. Yeah. It's not ambitious enough.

And the carbon neutrality goals are by 2050. I mean, it's too late. It's way too late. And that's why a bold goal of carbon removal is like the game changer that I believe we need in order to wake everyone up into, you know, full throttle action mode. You know, because right now it feels like, oh, if you do that, it's not going to matter. I think that's what's going on for many people. You know, even if I, you know, get an electric car or even if I recycle or even if I do this

or that, it's still the problem so bad, it's hopeless. So that's that hopelessness situation going on in my head. So that's that hopelessness situation going on in my head. So then I started exploring and found out, oh, my God, there's this whole new terrain. And it could become a multi-trillion dollar global industry. It will, I believe, do that. And so I'm working with folks all over the world on a global carbon removal partnership that is relatively new, that's just picking up steam. And I believe it will be an important catalyzer of bringing forward these ideas. I love that. It's kind of like the people who have developed technologies to remove

plastic from the ocean. It's that instead of just saying, well, we should cut back on the amount of plastic we put in the ocean. Like we actually need to go out and get the plastic that's in there out. We need to get the carbon that's in the atmosphere out of the atmosphere. Yeah, we need to do both. We need to stop putting plastic in and we need to remove what we already put in. So it's very similar in that regard. We have to reduce CO2 emissions. Absolutely. And we can do that and maintain our lifestyle. And we have to figure out how to remove the trillion tons that we've pumped up there. And the reality is, is that at least 50% of that has been pumped up in the last 30 years, like our lifetime. So this isn't like anyone else's responsibility. It's ours. We are the stewards

of that atmosphere. And I believe we are all responsible right now for doing whatever we can to remove that CO2. And so that our children and our grandchildren and all future generations have a plausible existence. That is such a, I love that too. Oh my goodness. This is, this has been a very, very enlightening, very interesting. Tell people, okay. So people hear what you're saying. They like what you're saying and they want more information about like, how can I get involved or how can I start a movement? Where can they find you so that they can access more of that information? Thanks, Sharon. Go to my website, drpaulzeitz.org.

And all the information about the movements that I'm involved with is there, as well as information about the books that I've written, Waging Justice, Waging Optimism. And I'm hoping to publish a third book called Waging Love at some point down the road. So I invite people to go there. You can contact me directly at that website. And I'm very responsive to people that I can support in building movements. I love the idea too, and I'll just leave it here, but I love the idea that in order to make any kind of change, you have to have enough optimism to believe that it's possible. Nothing will change if you don't believe in the possibility of change. Thank you so much. This has been really, really fantastic.

Thank you so much. I appreciate the time with you. Thank you so much for listening to the Sharon Says So podcast. I am truly grateful for you. And I'm wondering if you could do me a quick favor. Would you be willing to follow or subscribe to this podcast or maybe leave me a rating or a review? Or if you're feeling extra generous, would you share this episode on your Instagram stories or with a friend? All of those things help podcasters out so much. This podcast

was written and researched by Sharon McMahon and Heather Jackson. It was produced by Heather Jackson, edited and mixed by our audio producer Jenny Snyder, and hosted by me, Sharon McMahon. I'll see you next time.