The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 478: Susan Cain - Using Pain To Be More Creative, Finding The Right Life Partner, & A New Way To Think About Death

Episode Date: June 26, 2022

Text Hawk to 66866 to become part of "Mindful Monday." You along with 10's of thousands of other learning leaders will receive a carefully curated email from me each Monday morning to help you start your week off right! Full show notes at www.LearningLeader.com Twitter/IG: @RyanHawk12    https://twitter.com/RyanHawk12 Susan Cain is the #1 bestselling author of Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole and Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking, which spent eight years on The New York Times best-seller list, and has been translated into 40 languages. Susan's TED talks have been viewed over 40 million times. LinkedIn named her the Top 6th Influencer in the World, just behind Richard Branson and Melinda French Gates. Susan partners with Malcolm Gladwell, Adam Grant, and Dan Pink to curate the Next Big Idea Book Club. Notes: "Compassion means to suffer together." How to use sadness? "Make the pain your creative offering." To suffer with other beings brings people together. When people are grieving the loss of a loved one, they often want to talk about that person. Aristotle wondered why the great poets, philosophers, artists, and politicians often have melancholic personalities… his question was based on the ancient belief that the human body contains 4 humors: each corresponding to a different temperament - melancholic (sad), sanguine (happy), choleric (aggressive), and phlegmatic (calm). Joseph Campbell said, "We should strive to participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world." Connecting with what matters and taking committed action—moves us from bitter to sweet, from loss to love." Everyone experiences loss. It is part of the human condition. How have you moved "from bitter to sweet, from loss to love"? Are there coping strategies you recommend? The bittersweet quiz — 1-10. If you scored between 5.8 and 10, you're a true connoisseur of bittersweetness: the place where light and dark meet. Questions: Do you tear up easily at touching TV commercials? Are you especially moved by old photographs? Do you react intensely to music, art, or nature? Have others described you as an old soul? Do you find comfort or inspiration on a rainy day? Are you moved to goosebumps several times a day? Do you feel elevated by sad music? Do you tend to see the happiness and sadness in things, all at once? Do you seek out beauty in your everyday life?" (I scored a 7.1) "The secret to life is to put yourself in the right lighting. For some, it's a Broadway spotlight; for others, a lamplit desk. Use your natural powers -- of persistence, concentration, and insight -- to do work you love and work that matters. Solve problems. make art, think deeply." "The secret to life is to put yourself in the right lighting. For some, it's a Broadway spotlight; for others, a lamplit desk. Use your natural powers -- of persistence, concentration, and insight -- to do work you love and work that matters. Solve problems. make art, think deeply." "There's zero correlation between being the best talker and having the best ideas." "If we could honor sadness a little more, maybe we could see it—rather than enforced smiles and righteous outrage—as the bridge we need to connect with each other. We could remember that no matter how distasteful we might find someone's opinions, no matter how radiant, or fierce, someone may appear, they have suffered, or they will." "The secret that our poets and philosophers have been trying to tell us for centuries, is that our longing is the great gateway to belonging." "The tragedy of life is linked inescapably with its splendor; you could tear civilization down and rebuild it from scratch, and the same dualities would rise again. Yet to fully inhabit these dualities—the dark as well as the light—is, paradoxically, the only way to transcend them. And transcending them is the ultimate point. The bittersweet is about the desire for communion, the wish to go home." "Introverts, in contrast, may have strong social skills and enjoy parties and business meetings, but after a while wish they were home in their pajamas. They prefer to devote their social energies to close friends, colleagues, and family. They listen more than they talk, think before they speak, and often feel as if they express themselves better in writing than in conversation. They tend to dislike conflict. Many have a horror of small talk, but enjoy deep discussions." Life and Career advice: You have to find a way to do it. Life can sweep you up quickly. Establish a backup plan. It frees you up to be more creative. Develop rituals for writing... Purely with pleasure.

Welcome to the Learning Leaders Show, presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Text, Hawk to 66866 to become part of Mindful Monday. You, along with tens of thousands of other learning leaders from all over the world, will receive a carefully curated email from me each Monday morning to help you start your week off right. You'll also receive details about how my book, The Pursuit of Excellence, will help you become a more effective leader. Text, Hawk to 66866. Now, on to tonight's feature

leader, the great. Susan Kane is back. Number one, bestselling author of Quiet, the power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking, which has been translated into 40 languages spent eight years on the New York Times bestseller list and was named the number one best book of the year by Fast Company magazine, which also named Susan one of the most creative people in business. Her most recent book was also an instant number one New York Times bestseller called Bitter Sweet, How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole. During this conversation, we discuss how to turn your pain and sadness into excellent creative work. Then the story of what Susan's husband emailed to her after their second date and how it changed their lives.

Then the usefulness of shared suffering and why great teams and leaders do this. Ladies and gentlemen, this one is so good. It's Susan Cain. All right, Susan. It's so great to have you back on the Learning Leader Show. Welcome. Thank you so much. It's so great to be here.

I want to start maybe at a place that's, you may not have been expecting. And this is a place of love, specifically Gonzo, aka Ken. Okay. You write about them in the acknowledgement sections of, It's a document section under your book, Bitter'sweet, which is an amazing book, and we're getting it to it. But on your second date with Ken, you shared with him the manuscript or some poems of a memoir you were writing, and later that night, he sent you an email.

What did the email say on the second date that you went out with him? Yeah, I actually have it printed out in my office. Yeah, so I literally can read it. It's like over there. In fact, you know what? I'm going to get up and so I can read it exactly to you and I'll show it to you. Hold on one sec. Wow.

So you print it out and frame the email. Yeah, yeah. I have to say, I love it. And I love it that you're starting with this. Yeah. It's really great. Yeah. Okay.

So this is what it looks like. So you see how it's like all these letters are gigantic and in red? Like that's what the email looked like. It actually looked like. that? I thought you changed that during the TED talk. No, no, no, no, no. It totally looked like that. Okay, can you read it? Okay. So what it says is, I want to get a little bit closer to the mic. Sorry, I just want to make sure we can hear it. Yeah, absolutely. I got distracted by trying to read it. I know, I know. I'm sorry. It says, I want more. Give me more. I know you hate to be told what to do,

but fuck you. Keep writing. And now we're getting into really big letters. Keep writing. Drop everything. right. And now the letters get even bigger and read. And it says right woman right. Second date? Second date. Yeah. So how did you guys get close fast to you could you could say something like that to a woman you obviously want to impress? Like how did this go so fast? Yeah. We had a connection right away. I mean, yeah, we met each other at this party that was being thrown for him. He was going off to. Iraq, the Times was sending him there to report a story. And there was a going away party that was made for him. And I happened to just be at the party with friends. And he asked me then, could we get together when I got back? And he says he said to a friend of his at that time that he knew he was going to marry me, like that moment. And all we had done was like exchanged a couple of sentences. And then he came back like six weeks later. And yeah, from our first date, we were just

we just had an incredible click. So this email was after the second date. What did that email, how did it make you feel to have that type of encouragement? And I would say beyond encouragement, it was a push to say basically, you've got it, right? This makes me think of Henry Ford and Edison when he's, hey, that's it. You've got it. Keep going, right? That's what it feels like to me.

Is that what it did for you? Yeah, it was like that. And especially because at that time, he was on the verge of publishing a book himself about his experiences. He had been a UN peacekeeper and he was on the verge of publishing this best-selling book. And from my point of view back then, like, I had left my career as a lawyer. I was like dreaming of being a writer, but I never thought in a million years that was really going to happen. So, you know, the encouragement was coming from someone I was falling in love with who had the kind of career that

I was dreaming of, you know, it was like everything together. And yeah, yeah, it was just an incredible thing. There's a reason that it's printed up in my office all these years later. I love it. And it's just cool to see the belief and the power. When I think about this is still Gonzo can being a leader in a way. And I think leaders can draw a lot from this. Believing in somebody else sometimes before they believe in themselves fully is so powerful and that is the power that leaders have and I love the thought of using that power for good and this is one of those examples it happens to be in a romantic relationship where you then would go on to to get married and to have a family but there's still a leadership learning here is understanding that the weight of

your words maybe even more than you realize. So when you see something in somebody, tell them, tell them, let the note, write it in big red letters, make sure they know it. You could be changing the trajectory of their life and how cool is that? Yeah, and you know what's so amazing. I mean, I've shared, well, I shared that email in my book, Bitter Sweet. And so now since then, I can't tell you how many readers have written to me saying, I'm so grateful that Ken sent you that email. You know what I mean? So it's like all these years later, it has that reverberation effect. And then lots of people are also saying, I wish I had a Ken. Like, where can I find one? Because people really need that kind of encouragement. We do. We all do. Okay. You dedicated

Bitter Sweet, your new book, to your all-time favorite musician, Leonard Cohen. How do you feel when you listen to his music? So I have felt a kind of mystery all my life listening to his music. Like, I knew that I loved it. I knew that he was expressing something for me that needed to be expressed, but I could not figure out for the life of me what it was. And I was trying to figure that. out. That's part of why I wrote this book in the first place because, I mean, so Leonard Codes

music, it's like famously kind of gloomy. And you might think, well, why does anyone want to listen to sad music? It kind of raises that question. But I would listen and what I would feel was not gloom at all. I would feel like a kind of love and a sense of him expressing some deep truth that doesn't get expressed in everyday life. a sense of like a turning of pain into beauty and most of all a kind of sense of transcendence you know a sense of being connected with with something from a higher plane than what we get in everyday life that that's the real thing I mentioned to you before we started recording that when I saw the title of your you know I love I am in the introverted scale when we when I take

those tests of introversion to extroversion like your first. first, but quiet, which just blew up the world when it comes to introversion. I saw Bittersweet, and then I saw the subtitle was, how sorrow and longing make us whole. You know, here's what it looks like. And I was like, I don't know if that's for me. I'm not sure. I mean, I love Susan. Obviously, I'll take every opportunity I can to talk to her, but I'm not sure.

And then I started reading it. And first of all, I mean, just the writer's envy off out of this world, because you're just, you're prose is so beautiful and it's so it just constructed as good as it gets but the reason I didn't think it was for me is because I thought I don't know like I've been kind of lucky I feel like there are a lot of good things have happened but then when you actually step back and you start reading the stories and I realize like we all have our stuff we all have our things we all have our moments and I actually started thinking about the times when I did feel sad upset uh like along the spectrum of like why don't I feel good I should a lot of things are going well as as well as

then maybe using some of that or taking from that to have that inspire my work and be more creative and and do things that are useful for other people and that's when I just became a massive fan of this book it probably took me five or ten minutes to get into it and then before that I just it's one of those books where I was on the elliptical reading it and I just didn't stop so would actually help me physically. Oh, awesome. I couldn't stop. I just wanted to keep reading, and that's just a tribute to your book.

So I'm curious, can you, this is high level, and we're going to zoom in. Sorrow and longing, what first interested you in this topic to then try to figure out how this can make us whole, as the subtitle says? Yeah, I guess, you know, it's actually, it's really interesting to me to hear your experience of like first encountering the title of the book because I know what you're talking about. I, you know, I've been lucky, knock on wood, I've had my stuff in life, but I've been lucky to have a pretty good life. So I can actually imagine in a way reacting to the book's title just the way that that you did. And yet there is this sense that I've always had, you know, like you look around the world, right?

and there's so much beauty side by side with so much tragedy. And that's really what I was trying to get out with this book, like that joy and sorrow are forever paired in this world. And that's really the only way that there is to understand the world. And it is a reality for all of us that the people who we love most, the things that we love most are not going to be here forever. But that somehow the more, the more, you become attuned to that reality, it's like the more access you have to joy and to creativity

and to human connection and transcendence. And it just struck me that there's this way of being in the world. I mean, that's what this book really is about. It's about a way of being in the world that recognizes these states deeply and gives a kind of hidden superpower because the more the more we recognize this stuff, the more we can actually connect with each other, and the more we can tune into our most creative selves. And yet we're living in this culture that's telling us all the time, you know, you have to put on a face that's like incredibly, almost unrealistically, cheerful and optimistic and can do.

And like all of those are wonderful aspects. I'm not saying they're not. I'm just saying they're not all that humanity is about. And we're basically told not. to tell the truth of what we and our fellow people are all about. And that means we're losing out on some of our greatest powers. How, what are some of the, I get tactical probably too fast at times. What are some of the ways that people can use sadness for fuel to do great work, to impact people in a positive way.

What are some ideas, some thoughts, some action people could take when they are feeling sad, they're feeling down. Maybe they don't even know why, or maybe they do. But a lot of musicians and artists and athletes, they use this as fuel, and it makes them better. Some of the greatest creations of art of music were from people who would rate high on this assessment,

which, again, we're going to talk about in a second because I took it. I'm excited to talk you about. What are some ways that we can do that? Yeah. So, I mean, there's like study after study, right, showing all the ways in which creative people are often, they've often had painful experiences that they're turning into something else. And that's really what I say to people. Like fundamentally, the mindset to understand is whatever pain you can't get rid of, make that your creative offering. Make it your creative offering. And I want to be really clear here. I'm not talking about clinical depression, which is a whole other thing, which I don't

wish on anybody. And it's also not good for creativity. It's actually been documented that it's extremely difficult, if not impossible, to be creative in a state of outright depression, which is more about hopelessness and a kind of emotional numbness. So I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about a state where you are, you're like alive to all the experiences of the world. So you're alive to the beauty of the sunsets and you're alive to your pain and to other people's pain. You're alive to it all. And that's the state from which you can be most creative.

And so it's actually when you're in your moments, when you're actually in your moments of whatever the emotion is that you're feeling most intensely, that's when you should go and do the part of your creative project that requires the most, you know, kind of heart and soul to it. And I'll give you just an example for my life when I was writing this book, which is like, so I started writing this book long before the pandemic. I had no idea that was coming, but it came. And it was like halfway through the book or something by then. And I lost my brother and I lost my father in the pandemic to COVID. And I remember feeling like, you know, I remember going through like the whole vortex of emotion that you feel in the wake of losing people so unexpectedly.

And I remember a moment I was like sitting right there on the couch and thinking, do I want to write right now or don't I I don't know and I just like sat down and made myself right and I remember the feeling of like oh my gosh you know what's coming out right now I don't think this could come out at any other time and I actually posted something on Facebook that day and a friend said to me this is the most beautiful writing you've ever written and yeah and I think it came from a kind of like emotional cauldron state, you know. Yeah. So there's a moment of, there's a question of like tuning into that.

And it's like what creativity is, is it's, it's taking X and transforming it into Y. Yeah. And very often X is something painful. Yeah. It's finding a way to use that for good. I don't know why I think of some funerals. I think of death. and some of the most beautiful moments I've had with people where we've gotten very close

were maybe right after a funeral or when I just had one this a couple of days ago. I met somebody, he's become a fast friend, he's a leader, and his dad died, had a heart attack suddenly, and I just started asking about it. I'm like, how did it change you? How did it impact you? How does it now he is a husband and a dad? What did you do differently since then? And it went to such depth really quickly.

And I felt like he appreciated it. I felt like he actually really wanted to talk. I could have been wrong, but I felt like he wanted to talk about it. And it led to this beautiful conversation about the experiences we were trying to create for our families, because that's what it's all about. And to me, it stemmed from a really sad thing, right? Like the worst, as you just happened to you. unfortunate, you know. And, but it led to something really beautiful of that. And now I feel like

we got really close faster than most because we just went there. And that's, that's, that's why I encourage people as maybe as weird as it sounds like, that's a good thing to do. Yeah, you know what you're making me think of. There's actually, there's someone who I quote in the book. Let me see if I can find it quickly for you. Okay. Let's see. Yeah, here we go. I went right to it. So, There's someone who talks about the experience she had at her grandfather's funeral, and she calls it the union between souls that she found there. And what she says is, I'm just going to read what she wrote. She said, my grandfather's barbershop chorus sang him a tribute,

and for the first time in my 14 years, I witnessed tears cascading down my father's face. That moment with a lelting sound of men's voices, the hushed audience and my father's sadness is permanently etched on my heart. She says, you see, when I think of it, it's not the sadness that I most remember. It's the union between souls. When we experience sadness, we share in a common suffering. It's one of the few times people allow themselves to be truly vulnerable.

It's a time when our culture allows us to be completely honest about how we feel. And I think this is a huge thing from a leadership point of view, the union between souls that comes only when we are sharing what we truly, truly experience. And humans are designed this way. Like there's all kinds of evolutionary reasons for it. We could get into if you want. But we are actually built to unite around shared sorrow. It doesn't mean we have to go there all the time.

It doesn't mean we don't also want to bond around, you know, like dancing and celebration because we do. That's a different type of bonding. It's just that this is one type of like really profound, a profound outpouring of the heart that joins us together that we just need to know about. You also write in the book, what does sadness do? Sadness triggers compassion. It brings people together. The word compassion literally means to suffer together.

And I don't want this to feel dark. I know there's the opposing views here. I think this is beautiful. Like I think thinking of this and sadness and compassion and people coming together is awesome. And so that's why I was excited to talk to you about this because I think if you, if everyone pauses for a second and think about times when you've come together, there's a lot of times it's because of something was really tough and you may have been sad or maybe to get collectively you were and I think that aspect of compassion means to suffer together I didn't realize that that that blew my

mind you share more about that yeah so I mean maybe we should talk about Darwin for a second because everybody thinks of the lesson of Darwinism as being survival of the fittest right and there's a lot to that. But what Darwin had actually noticed, and by the way, Darwin was actually like this incredibly gentle, melancholic type of personality. He couldn't stay on the sight of blood. His dad had wanted him to be a doctor, but he just couldn't stand blood. So he went to the Galapagos instead. And anyway, Darwin, he completely noticed all the cruelty and the violence and the competition among animals. But, excuse me, what he wrote about in the descent of man is that the most, the most fundamental, he said, the strongest impulse that mammals and humans seem to have is,

is this drive that causes us to suffer with other beings. So like you see another being suffering and you feel it yourself. And it's something that's just happening automatically. You have no control over it. And so, 100, 50 years later, there are now researchers who are looking into this, and one of them, Dacker Keltner at Berkeley, he calls this the compassionate instinct. And basically what they're discovering is that because the only way the species survives is by being able to respond to the cries of our infants, we were therefore designed to react to the cries. The cries. are the distress signals of other beings in general.

And you see this throughout our bodies. Like we have a vagus nerve which runs from the spine into our torsos. It's like the biggest collection of nerves in our bodies. It regulates our breathing and our digestion. And also when we see a being in distress, our vagus nerve reacts to it. And it's happening in an involuntary way, a very fundamental, part of our physiognomy. So, so this is telling us that this, this compassionate instinct, it's not like, it's not something that's coming to us from like a Sunday school teaching.

It's, this is just part of who we are. Joseph Campbell said we should strive to participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world. What does that mean to you? Yeah, God. I've been thinking about that phrase, that idea for decades. I could not understand what the heck it could possibly mean because I thought, you know, how could you look at the sorrowful aspect of life and be joyful about it? But I think what it's saying is that it's all of a peace, that it's all of a piece,

you know, that the joys and the sorrows, they go together. and we have to kind of take them all in and we have to embrace them all and they're all part of us and that's where we get like the truest sense of joy and beauty and connection is by embracing it all I think of two again I shift to being a leader a couple things one when somebody is is going through something really tough perhaps a death or something along the lines that that really has them sad. They will remember for a long time who showed up for them in those moments.

Yeah. I was listening to Michael Lewis, another amazing writer, tell the story on a podcast about, he tragically had a child die in a car accident. And one of his friends showed up. He brought food. He said, I don't know if you're ready to hang out with me right now, but I will be sitting in my car.

And I'm just gonna stay there. I'm just there. I'm here. And Michael said, like, it was the kindest thing that someone's ever done. And the way he told the story was just beautiful. And it just, like, people remember. They remember how you show up when they're at a moment like that. And I think that, again, not to, like, make this a mechanical leadership thing, but leadership is not a title. Leadership is not a position at a company. Leadership is a choice. And so we get to choose how to show. show up and who to show up for and people remember that and it's really important. I think as I mature a little bit and this stuff happens more, that is something that's top of mind that I feel

I also got from bittersweet of a takeaway just to be mindful and to think of that. Yeah, yeah. And what I would say goes along with that as well is understanding that when people are grieving, the loss of a loved one, often they actually really do want to keep on talking about that person. And I think that what we instinctively do is shy away from talking about the lost person because we're afraid of reminding them of something that's upsetting. But of course, they don't need any reminding. They know it already. And what they really want is for the person still to be part of their lives in an ongoing way,

even if it's in the form of a memory. And one of the best formulations that I've heard for this, it comes from the work of Nora McInnerney, who has a great podcast called Terrible Thanks for Asking. And she had this experience where she lost her husband, her first husband, a very beloved husband. And then she went, later on, she became, became remarried and blended family and everything. But she distinguishes between the idea of

moving on and moving forward. And moving on is the message that we so often get from our culture. You know, it's like we say things like let it go. And that ends up being a polite way of saying get over it. And there's a feeling that you're getting that you're supposed to get over it. But she distinguishes moving on from moving forward, which is where you do carry on with your life. you know, you do get remarried, you know, the family continues. But what she says is she's carrying her lost husband with her all the time. He's part of her life still, and he always will be. Because the person she is who's now married to another man is the person she is because of who she became with him.

And I really like that idea that there is a way always to move forward without leaving behind everybody, been and everybody we've loved in the past. I love that. You created a quiz, the bittersweet quiz, which I took. And I'll reveal my score. I want to share some of the questions first. I'm going to encourage people to take this at Susan's website. But the bittersweet quiz has questions like, it's one to ten scale. Do you tear up easily at touching TV commercials? Are you especially moved by old photographs? Do you? you react intensely to music art or nature? How have others describe you as an old soul? Do you find comfort or inspiration in a rainy day? I'm a 10 on that one. Are you moved to goosebumps several

times a day? Yes. Do you feel elevated by sad music? Do you tend to see the happiness and sadness and things all at once? So one to 10 and you rate your score. I scored a 7.1 on your assessment, Susan. So that's the top end of it. And it said, if you scored between 5.8 and 10, you are a true connoisseur of bitter sweetness, the place where light and dark meet. Can you talk more about this assessment? You can comment on my score as well and the usefulness of this assessment for all people. Yeah, absolutely. Excuse me. So I developed this assessment with two friends, Scott Barry Kaufman and David Yaden, who's a research scientist at Johns Hopkins. And it was really interesting. We not only came up with the assessment, but we tried to figure out for people like

you who score high on it, you know, what does that mean? And we found that people who score high on this bittersweet scale also score high on states of awe and wonder and spirituality. So I wonder if that resonates for you, like if you feel like you easily access states where you're just in a state of like wonder at the world. Yeah. Yeah. And then also, Also, people who score high in it also tend to score high in absorption, which predicts creativity. And you're obviously a very creative person, so that's not surprising. What's interesting also about the scale is that I think there's two ways of coming to it,

or two ways of coming to a high score on this scale. One is that it seems to, it's also correlated with people who have a highly sensitive temperament, which is the temperament that was identified. by Elaine Aaron of people who just react really intensely to everything that life offers, right? So, like, you react intensely to the beautiful sunset. You react intensely also to the, you know, the obnoxious construction sounds outside your window, whatever it is, like, you're a reactor. I think of at home, like, when I regret it, why didn't you clean up your dish?

Because they're 12 years old, that's why. Like, it happens. Chill out, dude. Yeah. So, so some people are born into this bittersweet state, I would say, by virtue of having been born with a sensitive temperament. And that's about 15 to 20 percent of people. But then there's also a lot of people who come to it via life experience, which is something

I think you alluded to. You alluded to, well, as you get older, you're starting to notice all of this more. So there really are two ways of coming to it. But it's also worth saying, you know, I'm always like. amazed by the variety of human experience. So if you're someone like me or maybe like you who scores high on this quiz, it's hard to imagine being any other way. I think I read a footnote in the book that though this is introversion, extroversion, there wasn't really any correlation. Did I read that right? You did read that right. And I had the same surprise that I think you're expressing with your

question. I did expect there to be more of a correlation. But the correlation turned out to be more with sensitivity, as I say, than with introversion itself, which I guess isn't so surprising. And like, there is a huge overlap in that about 80% of highly sensitive people are introverts. So I guess what what it is is that bitter sweetness overlaps with the subset of introverts who are highly sensitive. But there are plenty of introverts who aren't highly sensitive. They're just introverted. The word vulnerability is talked about a lot now. In fact, maybe it's gone too far where people share too much. I don't know, exactly.

What do you think about using vulnerability? Because now it's like, are people using it as a tool to try to, like, go faster? I wonder, before, five, ten years ago, leaders wouldn't do that. They wouldn't cry. They wouldn't do that. Now it's like it seems very common. And what do you think about vulnerability and how that plays a role, especially when it comes to leadership? Yeah, it's very related to all of this.

I think it's generally a good thing except to the extent, and I felt maybe this was embedded in your question to the extent that it feels not authentic and just like leaders have learned nowadays, I must, I must, you know, like kind of mechanically show something about myself that's vulnerable. And people can sense that. My feeling in general is that we are, we're so deeply designed to be reading each other's social cues that whatever we truly feel and believe is going to come out one way or another, no matter how slick we are at our body language and our choice of language. So if a leader is being truly authentically vulnerable, you're going to know it. And if they're, you know, kind of using it, you're going to know that. So maybe vulnerability isn't even really the, the,

goal. The end goal is true expression and true, true connection. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know what I, when I keep coming back to you, there's that phrase from E.M. Forster, the 19th century writer, only connect. And you can like boil down his entire body of work into those two words, only connect. And that's what this is all really about. Only connect. So it's not like vulnerability is the is the end goal. The end goal is the connection. When you meet somebody for the first time, like how it depends, obviously,

but how quickly will you go deep with your questions? I'm curious because I am one to usually go speed through the small talk and go straight, especially if it seemed like a curious, thoughtful person. If not, then you kind of move on or whatever. But how are you when you meet somebody for the first time? Oh my gosh, I'm totally like you. I'm totally like you. And I'm going to ask you the question of like, one of the greatest things that has happened to my social life is writing that book about introversion because now everywhere I go, people feel like, like they know that I'm somebody who's comfortable

going to those places and they feel like I'm a safe person to talk to about whatever is truly on their minds. So like we just cut through all the small talk right away. The minute I meet someone, they're telling me about all the real things. I just love it. So my whole experience of going to conferences and things has been completely uplifted by this. No more small talk. Yeah, I love that.

Wow. Good, good tip. Just write a book that sells a billion copies about introversion and your life will be better. No, I love it. Okay, no, but I think we should extrapolate what the tip is. In general, like maybe the question is, How do you get to that deep place right away?

How do you do it? I think it stems from genuine curiosity. And people can sense, I think you can tell a lot about a person by the questions they ask and how genuine they are, genuinely curious they are about. I am fascinated by people and by specifically the stories of people and their life experiences because they're different than mine. And I think the best questions are follow-up questions. So I may get it started, but there was a number of questions just it's on the top of my mind because I spoke with my wife about it on our walk this morning about my new friend's dad who died and the the number of questions that it led to after he

I think he wanted to talk about him and he wanted and I said well you know what did you learn what do you do differently How does it how does it impact you as a dad? How does it impact you with your wife? I mean all these questions and I learned a lot and because I was genuinely curious about, I feel grateful. My parents are here. I'm very close to them. That thought scares me. So, but I also just want to learn from people who have gone through it. And especially a guy that I find to be curious and thoughtful and interesting and a person like that. So I'm just, I just go. I just ask. And I think they can sense it comes from a place that, no, he just wants to, he's, he's just really curious about it. And people can, like you said, they can sense when it's authentic versus when they when maybe someone feels like they're just

supposed to do that because they're the leader right right and and and and and and and to me that's how you connect pretty fast and then I certainly share too about about whatever they're curious about so I think to me it's just being willing to go deep being a really good listener asking asking thoughtful follow-up questions and before you know it it's been 25 minutes and we're in a we're in a place, a really cool place. That's how I do. How about, how about you? I would say it's very, very similar to that. Yeah, and I always think the tricky part is like, how do you get into the conversation in the first place? But I think, however the conversation starts, excuse me, there's almost always questions that come into my mind that I just really want to know about the

person and then we're off to the races. And for me, sometimes the tricky thing is, is not asking so many questions that it feels like an interview. Yes, I messed that up. Yeah, and especially I'm guessing for you because you do podcasts, you're probably in the habit, right, of always asking the next question. But that's also an introvert thing too. Introverts tend to want to take the attention away from ourselves and ask questions of other people. So that's something I've had to learn, you know, to make it much more of a give and take.

I have to like override my curiosity that way. Yeah. If you go out to lunch with somebody and you notice that your food is completely gone and they have not eaten yet, that's because you've asked too many questions. They have not had a chance to ask them questions. This happens all the time where my food is completely gone and they have not had one bite of food. And I'm like, wait, I'm kind of, I mean, I'm genuinely curious. That's why I'm asking the questions, but they haven't had time to even take a bite of food because I'm just asking. So I guess it's better if the food consumption goes at a similar pace maybe. That's probably a better lunch. That's a really good meter, but... Yep, I screw it up all the time. Anyway, this may be a left field question, but we talked about sadness and we talked about, you know, how to use it as fuel.

What, Susan, what do you do for fun? Like, what are the most fun aspects of your days? I'm really curious about that. Oh, gosh. I mean, so I, like, love, love, love hanging out with my family, like my husband and two kids. I don't even care what we're doing. I just really love it.

And in fact, my son was just saying to me the other day, he was like, you know, I used to be traveling all the time, like speaking about quiet. And I would like give a speed, like fly somewhere, give a talk and then like go right back to the airport because I didn't want to be gone too long. And he was like, you know, we would have been okay if you had like given yourself a little. little bit more time. And he was saying when we were little, we would have been okay. I was like, well, yeah, I just, I truly feel like I don't want to miss a minute of it. So that's sort of my biggest thing. But yeah, I love playing tennis.

I love doing yoga. I love like taking my dog for a walk. But I really, can I just say one thing like what I really, really love. I love sitting down with my laptop. and a latte and writing. So I love it so much that even when we go in family vacation, I have to do that for two or three hours a day because I realize if I don't,

I actually feel cheated of my favorite time of the day. And then it's like I'm resenting the vacation. What are you writing? Journaling, a next book, an article, all of the above. When you do that, what are you writing? I'm always working on some type of project. And, you know, my books take me a really long time. So you're already working on the next one, I assume?

I'm actually not because right now I'm just so focused on like talking about bittersweet and all that. But, you know, but pretty soon I'm going to switch into my next project, which I don't know. I have a couple of book ideas in mind and I'm also getting a podcast together. So it's kind of like whatever my creative project is, I want to be, I want to be like sitting down with my laptop and getting into that state of flow where time is just going back. and I'm not even aware of it. It's just the best feeling in the world. Are you consulting with companies? I know at times I was reading about doing your kind of one-day workshops on Quiet.

Are you consulting or are you just kind of get in there for a day? Do you advise? What do you do business-wise? I do a lot of giving talks to companies, organizations, and schools. But I do advisory work also. Like sometimes people just want, you know, help in thinking through how to manage their executive team and the introverts and the extroverts and how do you harness everyone's strengths. So I'll come in and help with that kind of thing too.

Speaking of one of your kids, Eli, I believe, gave you a post-it note when you were really struggling during the writing process. Yeah. And it said, I know it's hard, but just say to yourself, I can do it. So the apple does not fall far from the tree. I sense this. But what a cool thing. Like what a cool, cool moment from your son. Can you talk about that moment?

Yeah, I actually just teared up just as you as he reminded me of that. Yeah, I don't know how old he was at the time. He's 12 now, so he was probably like eight or so. You know, I just remember I was like sitting at the kitchen table like tearing my hair out over how to structure a chapter. I couldn't figure it out. And yeah, and he just like wrote that down on a post-it and put it on top of my computer, you know, where I could see it. And it was so amazing. it was like the empathy of it, but also the fact that that was what we had been trying to teach him, you know, all his life.

Like things are sometimes hard to master, but you can do it and you can keep going. You know, we would say to our kids, you know, just, you know, I'm Sam, I'm Eli, and I can do this. And they really do live that way, you know. So to know that they had absorbed the lesson for their own selves and had the empathy to to then pass it on to the next person. I felt like that was like a pinnacle of parenting moment. Speaking of that, this is a selfish question, but there are other parents. What are, you don't, this isn't like your sweet spot, but I sense you're really good at this. Like general philosophies on having a great marriage and being a great mom and dad as you guys partner together.

Wait, the marriage or the, is the question about the marriage or the parenting? Both. take the marriage first. Yeah. I think it's about really that sounds like such a cliche, but you know, like supporting each other

through all your different projects, everything that matters most to you. Trying to figure out, well, I don't know, when my husband and I first met, I remember we had, there was a, we had a neighbor and she commented on how we took so much mutual delight in each other. And that phrase has never left me, the phrase of mutual delight.

Because we really loved you. We're very, very different personalities. And I think because of that, we take a lot of delight in each other's company. And so preserving that, especially as, you know, life sometimes gets overwhelming, especially once you have kids and you have work and you have everything. So figuring out ways to still have the mutual delight. And I don't mean through things like now we will go on date night. I don't mean that at all. I mean more like the little interstitial moments where you just enjoy the other person's sense of humor or the other person's take on a situation that could

have only come from that singular person. I think those are the amazing moments. Mutual delight is a great phrase. I'm going to use that. I love it. And then how about when it goes to parenting, philosophy and mindset, obviously, it sounds like these kids are amazing. Oh, we all have flaws, but I'd love to hear your take on that. Yeah, no, they are really amazing. I don't know. I guess I feel like, you know, love and respect and all the rest is commentary. Like, kind of nothing else matters. They know, like kids, kids know, Humans know when you love them. But it's also respect. They know when you respect them, you know, and respect is like you're setting limits, you're, you know, setting, quote, discipline or whatever.

So they have the limits, but you're not doing it in a way of like, I'm here and you're there. And therefore, therefore you'll follow this rule. It's more like, here's the rule and here's why. This is a good way to become a good human, you know, or this is going to serve you well if you do it this way. And that's why we're going to insist that you do. But you're saying it from a position of total respect. Like I happen to have lived longer than they have, so I know some things that they don't know. So I'm just going to explain those things.

And that's why we have these rules. It's like that. And I sense they must, I think kids learn so much through observing their parents' behavior. And they don't always want to listen to what you say, but they're always watching. And I always notice how do you treat your partner and how do you treat others. And that's why they may walk up to you with this post-it note that says, I know it's hard, mom, but just say to yourself, I can do it. I think that's where that comes from because they probably see it. And then that's what they think is normal.

I remember growing up in a house like that. It just became the normal thing to be kind and giving to others because that's just all I knew from watching my. my parents, you know. And I think that's, that's what inspires me to try so hard to do that and then to get back up when you mess up because you know that that's the most powerful position. And man, we're going to use that power for good. Yeah, exactly. And I don't want to say we're perfect because we're far from perfect. I actually think part of it is also admitting when you're not perfect. Yeah. You know, like I remember one time, I don't really have a temper that's not one of my things.

that I have to work on, but I, you know, like everybody, sometimes I lose my temper. And I, and I remember one time, like, yelling at my kids about something and then feeling really badly a minute later that I had expressed myself that way. I remember I went down to the basement where they were playing and I was like, you know, the thing you did, it wasn't, you shouldn't have done that. It wasn't cool, but I shouldn't have reacted the way that I did. So I just want you to know, I'm sorry for that. And they were like, oh, it's okay, mom. We get it. But what was so cool is that I noticed them doing the same thing later, you know, that they would apologize when they needed to for something or other. So those moments of parenting are the best.

By far. Like, wait, am I actually not screwing this up completely? Maybe not. No, that's good. I'm curious, Susan, when somebody is, let's say, a recent college graduate and they don't necessarily know what they want to do for a living, that's okay, it's normal. But they do, know they want to make a positive contribution to the world. They want to do good. Whatever that may be. What are some general pieces of life slash career advice you'd have for that person? I guess I'd say you have to find a way to do it. Life can sweep you up really quickly. And I say this is somebody who spent almost 10 years as a corporate lawyer before I ended up doing work that I, you know, find so intensely satisfying. What if, especially if you're somebody who's like pretty ambitious and driven and dedicated and all that stuff, like whatever path you take, you're probably going to get, you know, absorbed right into it.

And you might find that you don't have that much time. for other things. So I guess I'd say choose carefully, especially if you're that type of person. But I will also say, like, when I made the choice to stop that particular pathway and start writing, it's really important to establish a backup plan because you're actually a lot freer creatively if you know that you have a plan B to fall back on. Whereas if you feel like you're out there with no safety net whatsoever, it actually takes up a lot of mental space. So like when I started writing, I never really expected I was going to be able to make a living at it. So I had all these different sort of side hustle ways of making a living that I knew I could keep going with if I needed to.

And I think that's that's not only financially sound, it's mentally freeing. And you're going to keep getting the message that, you know, if you're truly committed to this thing that you want to contribute to the world, you know, you would be willing to risk everything for it. And I think that's a stupid message. There's no reason to risk everything. Especially when it's creative output. I'm so grateful this podcast was went on for three years as a side hustle before I was able to. Make it my full time living with everything associated that goes along with it. But that was so freeing because, I mean, I lost money for the first two years

because there's costs associated before I earned enough exposure to sell ads and to get other things that go along with it. And but it was, I didn't, I didn't care. I was getting to do this. I was going to talk to Susan Kane for an hour. I mean, there was nothing better. So to me, it was so freeing. And I think that made it a lot better.

and then the results eventually came out of a sheer love of the preparation and then the actual execution. Same way with you, I would imagine. You felt free. You feel like there's no pressure in a way. I'm just going to go hard at it for sure. But I love the thought of side hustles and backup plans. That doesn't mean you're not committed. It means that you're setting the foundation.

I think you're creating an environment for you to do your best work. because you can be more free. And I think that's that's the, that's the mentality I try to maintain. I would imagine, are you able, how are you able to maintain that now that this is, I mean, it's gone pretty sweet, but this is your full time. This is your profession. Well, I really honestly, do you feel like those first years that I had before I ever made a nickel from writing?

Yeah. Those years really set the foundation forever because I, you know, as you're saying, I thought of writing as the thing that I was doing that was purely a source of joy that I was just doing for its own sake. And I developed all these rituals around it. Like I would write in my favorite cafe, sitting at a sunny window, having my latte and some chocolate. So like all those years I was associating writing purely with pleasure. And that has stayed with me. I'm really glad I had those years because now, you know, I, I used.

do have the real life concerns of deadlines and publicity and all those kinds of things that you have to think about. But I have enough of that foundation of joy that it's all built on that that always stays with me no matter what's happening. And I think that's really important, you know, like the daily rituals that you put in place. It's like your mind is basically Pavlovian, right? So you have to train yourself to associate the thing you care about most with pleasure and So good. The book is called Bitter Sweet, How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole. Look at this. It's awesome. Amazing cover. I saw you acknowledge that person or the team in the acknowledgements, but I love the look of the book, too, and the inside's even better. I highly, highly encourage people to buy and read Bitter Sweet, How Sorrow and Longing, make us whole. Susan, thanks so much for coming back on. And I certainly love to continue our dialogue as we both progress. Oh my gosh, I would love that. I would love that. Thank you so much for having me on. Thanks.

And yeah, after we come off officially, I can't remember if we have each other's email addresses, but I want to make sure that we know how to stay in touch. For sure. For sure. All right. Thanks. I love talking with Susan Kane. She's so kind and generous, curious, really thoughtful, and just an amazing writer. This is one of those episodes which makes me so grateful to have this podcast to spend an hour plus with one of my literary heroes. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did a few takeaways from my notes. How about that email?

Her husband wrote her on their second date and the power of belief. He believed in her. He pushed her to keep writing. As leaders, we have the power to believe in people. We can help them get to levels that maybe they didn't even realize they're capable of. Let's use that power for good. Then, what does sadness do? Sadness triggers compassion.

It brings people together. The word compassion literally means to suffer together. Show up for others when they're sad. Show up for them when they need you. Show up for them all the time. that's part of what makes, I think, a great life. And then connecting with what matters and taking committed action moves us from bitter to sweet, from loss to love. Everyone experiences loss.

It's part of the human condition. And I think Susan's work, and this book, Bitter Sweet, is awesome to help you better understand that and how it can help you in all aspects of both your professional. and personal life. Once again, I want to say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling a friend or two, hey, you should listen to this episode of The Learning Leader Show with Susan Kane. I think she'll help you become a more effective leader. And because you continue to do that and you continue to write reviews and rate the show, hopefully five stars on Apple Podcast, you giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that, I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk you soon. Can't wait.