We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle - This is 46: Why I’m Pumped About Midlife

Episode Date: March 22, 2022

1. How Glennon is using her 46th birthday as an intermission–to slow down and decide what to bring with her into Act 2. 2. The counterculture power of knowing what is enough, and letting ourselves go. 3. The way to transition from Role Living to Soul Living–and why Glennon has Joni Mitchell on repeat. 4. The real meaning of “crisis”–and the idea that living well now means reimagining everything we learned in the first half of life.  5. Amanda’ s good news that if you don’t feel like Glennon does at this moment in life, it is very, very normal. 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

Whether you're doing a dance to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into Warrior I in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby, or counting your breaths on the subway. Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are whenever we need it, download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier, or pay subscription starting at 12.99 per month. And because I'm mine, I walk the line. I just feel kinda giggling.

Yeah. Well, Abby's gonna have fun. Okay. I just feel happy and giggly and, I'm just so glad to be home. Okay, so welcome. Do we can do hard things? We also hope that you are glad to be home. Here with us.

Hot squatters today. We're with us today. I don't know what's going to happen because Abby's being very weird. Well, we are talking about something that is my favorite thing in the whole world. Okay. What is that? It's the day you were born. Oh, I can't believe how lucky we all are.

And I can't believe I get to be in close proximity to you. So this is just like my favorite episode to talk about your birthday. Okay, so if this episode, if I was a Dell, I would name this episode 46. Okay, so maybe that's what we'll call it. We'll call it 46. This is the month that I'm my birthday.

I was born on March 20th actually. The first day of spring pisses me off to no end when people say that March 21st is the first day of spring because it is not. Okay. Pisces. Nope. Nope. Oh, you don't want, you don't have that fight today. I'm on the cuss. I might be a Astrologically fluid

Just like I'm sexually fluid But I are you sexually fluid? I don't know what the hell I am Can we talk about my birthday and not my sexuality? I know what they brought it up. I'm just saying, like, if you're going to talk about it. OK, you're 46. You should know by now. 26. Yeah, so I mean, that's interesting because when

we talked about what to do for a birthday episode, I think my sister was like, maybe you could talk about some things you know, like some things you've learned or lessons. And I tried. I really did. I tried to think hard. I thought hard and long about what do I know? And blankness, okay?

It's like we spend our whole lives trying to know things. And then when we get to our 40s, we're like, I don't know, shit. Yes, the longer I live, the less I know. Right. And it's like, God help those people who think they do know, because they don't know shit. They know less than people who admit they don't know. So anyway, I am not in a place of knowing right now. I have decided that I am in a place of feeling. And so what I'm going to share today is how I'm feeling at 46 at this particular moment in my life. Okay. Okay, I'm 46. That's amazing. Like I'm close. That is amazing. Like, I'm close. That is amazing. Close job.

Thank you. Closer to 50 than I am to 40. That's wild. And also, I am not if you're looking for any sort of like, what was me? I'm getting older. Like, I don't have any of that. I keep getting awesomer and awesomer every year. I can attest.

Like, that is, I wouldn't give, if you offered me all the twizzlers in the world, if you offered me all the coffee, if I, if you said, you can be in charge of all the coffee forever. I would not go back to 20s, 30s, hell no. It is so funny when people are like, like, ah, I, now I'm 43, now I'm 44, I'm like, the alternative to aging is not aging.

It's not dead. Like, it's dead. That's, it's so odd. It's so odd. It's like everyone should be pro-aging because if you're not pro-aging, you're pro-dead. You're pro-dead, there's two options. That's so funny.

There's two freaking options. That's right. So here's how I feel. We live by the ocean now, okay? And by the Pacific Ocean. That's correct. That took us a while from now. Took us a few months to get one down. It is for sure the Pacific Ocean.

And I remember that by telling myself, Glenan, it's a specific ocean and Pacific Island's with specific. Oh my God. That's how I get there. That's so good. So I have this moment each day where I can stand and look at the ocean. And I see the shore, and I see the waves coming on to the shore.

And I see the ocean as far as I can see. And I have this feeling that makes me peaceful, which is I have gone as far as I can go. I love living here because that's it. I've gone as far as I can go. Unless I'm going to walk in to the specific ocean. I have gone as far as I can go. At 46, I feel that way about a lot of parts of my life. I feel like I know my capacity. So I'm not saying that no one else could do better at these things or do differently. I'm just saying, I know myself, I know my capacity, I know where I came from, I know what I started with.

I know my own particular battles and my own particular challenges and fears and all of that. And given the package of life that I've been given, I've gone as far as I can go. Interesting. With love, with romantic love. Like there's nowhere better or bigger or further or different than I want to go. I, my children are still growing but they're baked. You know, the oldest one is off to college. The middle one is herself, Tis herself, and always has been. The youngest one is, she's baked. Now we're more dealing with her dealing with the world

rather than helping shape her. I have poured into them what I wanted to. It's interesting. With work, there's no dreams that I have that haven't. In terms of who I've gotten to work with, my family, my Allison and Dina, like my, what we've gotten to do in the world together, rising, I'm not like, now I'm just like, what do I do next? What?

Or not, you know? I keep doing this. Yeah, I mean, I feel like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like keep doing this. Yeah, I mean, I feel like, and this is not an acceptable thing for women to say. So I understand that this might feel hard to hear for a woman to say it. If you're not sharing the same things, I feel like I'm proud of myself. Cool. Like with what I've given, been given, and what I've done, and all the privilege that I have

and all of it, I feel like I've done my best. I did my best. That's I think a better way of saying than maybe like I've gone as far. Because like feels like such an ending. I've gone as far as I could go. But like doing your best. Yeah, I mean, I want to talk about that part too about it feeling like the ending but I remember I and the sentence I've done my best might sound not too revolutionary

to people but for me it's really revolutionary because I was drinking for so long and I was not. It is an awful feeling to look at your life and think, I can do better than this but I'm not doing it. I could do better than this at love. I could be doing better than this at sharing my particular talents. I could do. For me to be able able to say I'm doing my best now. It's good. I've done my best. I'm doing my best is like a huge moment for me. And the flip side is true.

I mean, if you know you're not doing your best and and something is stopping you from doing that, that is a grief. But the same is true on the flip side. If you're doing your best, but you're still telling yourself, it should be better. It should be better. You can do a work harder and be better than this.

That is a different kind of English. So saying, so being able to say, I did my best, and it's good, is a beautiful thing on either side of the spectrum that you're on. Yeah, because it implies, I think, an idea of enoughness to and enoughness is culturally not even, we don't even understand what is enough. Like, I think that is also something that I'm feeling strongly, Abbie and I've been talking about what that means, what is enough mean over and over again for the last, really the last year. And it's, there's a lot of people who are exactly where I am in work, or exactly where I am, and don't feel like it's enough.

They wouldn't say, I've done my best, and I work with people like that. I work with that idea all the time. If you're where I am, you've just begun. You have so many other things to do. Imagine what else you can do. Imagine what it's not because it's not because of what I've done that I feel. It's because it's an approach that I want to bring into the second half of my life, which is the idea that like, I feel like this

is an intermission time. Okay. That's how I feel about 45. Two halves. Two halves. Two halves, right? Right now we're in the middle half time. The first half was like, I lived hard, man. I haven't breathed for decades, right? In terms of being very sick for a very long time and then recovering and then starting,

the second I recovered from, or began recovering from alcoholism and food addiction, starting life, like becoming the mother of three children and becoming a wife and then having the career and then the divorce and the remarry. And it's been fast and hard and a lot. And I feel like all of us spend the first half of our lives just like kind of building, we're just like striving and we're

trying so hard and we're building things and then we're feeling like, oh wait, this wasn't exactly right this isn't what I wanted. This is what somebody else wanted me for me. So then we're unbuilding and we're unlearning and we're deconstructing and we're like fighting to make this outer life that matches us. That's why it's so important to have the conversations that we've been having. Like what really is enough because had we not started those conversations, the only thing that we were considering is what's next and that what next piece always had to be more than what we just did. And that is a real fast way to misery. That's the carrot that you can chase your whole life.

If you do not believe in an enoughness, there will never be enough. Like if enoughness isn't a spiritual practice, like really figuring out what is enough contentment, what is enough ambition, like what is enough accomplishment, what is enough money, what is enough relevancy, like all of it, right? Then you just had to be hamster willing forever and ever amen.

It's like if all of life is anything as possible, right? Like that's like through all of life is anything as possible, right? Like that's like through all of life and Your happiness really depends on your precise posture Toward anything as possible. So like I feel like it's like the first half is like anything as possible Here we go. What can we be? What can we build? What kind of life can we have? And then that seems like a really positive attitude, but it makes us the unhappiest. And then, and this is research back, but then this the second half of our life, it's like anything's possible. You really know the

impermanence of things and that you could lose these things and these people and everything you cherish, but it's precise. That is the paradox that that is the time that you are happiest. Like it's facing and accepting the inevitability of loss, that makes us happy. It's good. It's so interesting. It's like, I see the way of like a person's life as like a bell curve. So like, physically speaking, it's like, and it can apply to this. Like, you're attaining all of these like, whether it's labels or things or roles or goals or whatever,

and you're always building and you get to a point. And I feel like maybe we're here. It's like, we need to like enjoy. And so maybe we're ready for that bell curve to kind of go down. But I also think about it spiritually speaking. And then I think that that bell curve is inverted spiritually. It is. It is what I think is a high-density curve. I think that the curve, the hill you're talking about is inverted spiritually. It is. That's what I think is a happy and secure curve.

I think that the curve, the hill you're talking about is the bullshit. Yes. The hill is like, okay, because here's what I think. What, where we get over the hill and all of that, is that is a visual for life. If you really only believe in the first half bullshit. If you believe that our joy and

our peace and our power comes from accumulating things and roles and power and relevance and all of that, then it is a curve. Because that stuff, you gain, gain, gain, gain in the first half of life, and then it starts to go away. When you think think about when I'm looking past 46 and I'm looking at like literally got looked at my neck the other day. And I was like, what is happening? Like, oh, like the like the wrinkles are coming in the neck or like I see a picture of myself without a bra. And I'm like, oh my God.

Like, is that what you're self without a bra? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I did. I took when I picked up those pictures in our in our living room the other day, with a little back. Oh, with a shirt on. Okay. I got a shirt on, forgot to say. I mean, look, you said I was just excited that this is possible. I didn't know where to go now.

No, but I was like, oh my God, look at my boobs. They're like at my belt. Like, that's so interesting. What I'm saying is, if I continued to believe what the first half of life tries to teach women in particular, so it's just one version of first half philosophy that like your beauty and your youth are your power in your peace.

Mm. Right? Your cultural idea of beauty. Yeah. And the way your body looks youthful are your, if I still believe that, then yes, the second half of my life will be a down-and-spiral. If I believe what culture tells me that all of my relevancy as a woman comes from the roles that I play, right? Comes from mom name, comes from my status in the neighborhood, in the community,

comes from what, then as my children grow and don't need me as much in the same ways, it will be a bell curve down. It relevance in terms of work. I mean, we all know how that goes. Like the amount of energy and like, just blood sweat tears and almost manicamps are willing, you have to do to maintain what your work will tell you keeps you relevant. Sure. If I continue to do that, it'll be a bell curve, right?

So there's this other way of doing it that I really am wanting to do. And I feel like the intermission right now is a time where the Selah, the Holy Paz, we love that word, this is a Holy Paz in life. The Selah is the symbol in Holy Scripture that appears between Scripture when it's a signal to the reader to stop and really take a moment to let the music or the scripture from the previous part sink in. So a holy sala in our lives we consider those moments where things slow

down for a minute and you're allowed to actually take a breath and be intentional about what you just learned and how it's going to change you for the next part. And that's what this is. And I think there's a way to make your life not the up and then the down, not the over the hill, but a continued up. But in order to do the continued up, you have to let go of believing what the first half of your life taught you. You have to actually believe that your power and peace does not come from the power of the first half The accumulation of roles you have to move into soul territory like from role from believing in your roles to believing in the soul Right, right? Which is like actually we know none of that's true If all of that words to make a person happy I'd be the happiest damn person on earth, right?

I've got a lot of roles. I've got... There's this way that I see people doing the second half that I worship so much this way, which is just like the power and stillness, and the power in like actually allowing yourself to become irrelevant in the ways of the world. It's like that Rob Doss idea, like the first half of your life is becoming somebody and the second half of your life is becoming nobody. And when you can finally become nobody, that's when you actually find peace and power.

Yes. And God, it feels so hard. I'm Jonathan M. Hevar. I'm a podcast producer and someone who likes fancy things. But I grew up working class. My parents were immigrants with factory jobs. And because of that, I think about class a lot. And I want to talk about it. That's what we're doing on my new podcast, Classy. And what did you all eat? You know, trailer food. I was like,

girl, we're not doing that anymore. You'll hear from people who told me awkward, embarrassing, and strangely intimate things about what class means to them. She said, you know, for the house cleaner, I hide the tag on the $6 bread. And I just thought, don't you think she knows that you're wealthy? You're hiding the tags from yourself. Classy, a new podcast from Pineapple Street Studios. Available now, wherever you get your podcasts. I'm not ring true to everybody listening, but it kind of rings true to me because I do think that there are some things in my first half

that I Know have been and it's a lot spiritual. It's a lot like internal. It's like like the sole part of me that I've been trying to curate I think that the build of that is giving me kind of confidence in I think that the build of that is giving me kind of confidence in the exploration of the second half, because I think so many of us get stuck in the belief system that there is going to be an over the hill, and now everything is just going to be hard. My body is going to hurt all the time, and it's going to start sagging in places, and I'm going to lose all the roles that I've built my life on. But part of me knows that the roles that I have attached myself to was building a kind of soul to be able to do that next half.

So the way that I think about it is our women's national team. I know that this is weird to bring a sports metaphor, analogy, or story into it. But we always said the last 20 minutes of every game of the second half is where we will thrive. And it had nothing to do with that specific game. It had everything to do with all the stuff that we did mentally to prep for those last 20 minutes.

And wouldn't you know, a lot of the biggest games we ever played were one in the last moments of the game, because we were mentally preparing ourselves for the inevitable things that happened in the second half. Like you're more tired. You're, you're, you're, you're, you're exhausted. It's like the mental fortitude. That's it. Yeah. That's it. Of the last, I mean, because when you think about it and another way I think about this intermission is it's a beautiful time to take a breath and sort of fortify and get ready because I think the second half of life,

what the way I watch it and other people, it is more challenging in many ways. You do lose Yeah, we're gonna lose parents We're gonna walk each other through unbelievably difficult things our children are gonna grow and have real adult problems We're gonna get sick. We're gonna have friends that get sick like it requires You know how it feels like in parenting the first half is so physically exhausted Exhausting that you can't even see straight.

And then the second half is like completely mentally exhausting. It feels like it's going to be like that. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that if we can kind of get outside of what the world tells us the second half is going to be like, and oh, we're going through a midlife crisis, like, no, like we're in a, we're in a sailor right now. Like, we're in an intermission.

And we want to, the way we want to approach this is not with the crisis, mindset. Well, let's talk about that. I mean, the, when you, when you guys are talking about the curves and the crisis, like, the good news is, I have two sets of good news for the good people. The first of all, you don't necessarily have to be thinking through all of these things and as like deep in it and prepared as you are glenin. I mean,

the life does this for you. Happiness is a you curve, as you said. Happiness reaches its peak at the end of life. And so there's high happiness at the beginning, but the highest is at the end. So women are happiest between the ages of 65 and 79. That's just, and one survey even found that women are most likely to reach their peak happiness at 85 years old. Oh my God. So what is happening is that you're going to get there, right? Like life is going to do it for you because it's going to teach you that the impermanence

of things and you're going to treasure those moments because you have let go of all the striving you're talking about. Right. So do we call that running in culture in our culture? We call that women running out of fucks to give, right? That's what that's what we call it, right? That's that's when we stop trying to please everybody when we get outside of being defined and controlled by our roles of care taking of all of that when we finally get to stop and live and and notice our own life. That's probably that time. Right.

Yeah, we become less dependent. We become less self critical, more confident and more decisive as we age. That is true of women. Like on the average woman becomes more of those things as she gets older. And so you're coming into yourself at that time. becomes more of those things as she gets older. And so you're coming into yourself at that time. But I have another piece of good news, which is that if you are not feeling in this moment of life, the way Glennon feels about this moment in her life, that is normal. But in fact, midlife is the hardest.

That is where you get a drop in life. So you have the highest at the end, highest at the beginning, and then midlife is generally the most stressful period in people's lives because they have the work performance demands, they have caregiving demands of their kids and their parents, they're still striving so freaking hard. And that is when dissatisfaction peaks, it's during the 40s and it's actually at its worst at 45. if I just want to, and I am in a period like that right now. So I just want to shout out to the people

that if you're not, if you're not feeling the steep sense of peace and preparedness, that's totally normal. You're doing it right and you will be happier. Literally the best is yet to come for sure. Yeah. That's amazing. It's interesting to bring up the crisis word. That's what we used to always call it, right? This is a midlife crisis.

And I was thinking about that in my walk this morning. And I was thinking about, um, first of all, what we see as a midlife crisis. I mean, of course, when you think of midlife crisis, of course, we only get to think of men right away, right? That's our first. That's my, that's what comes, it's a man with a red Ferrari, like a man with like trading in his wife for younger versions or whatever. It's like a midlife crisis. What I think of it is, it's a approaching the second half and doubling down on the first half's values. Yeah.

It's instead of what, like to me, I'm just, this is how I'm seeing it right now. Wise midlife is a look at what's coming, inevitably coming, which is that we are going to, maybe lose isn't the best word, but it's the best word I have right now. We're going to lose a lot of the things that we cherished in the first half. We're going to have to stop worshipping a lot of things that we worshipped in the first half. We're going to have to find our identity and our groundedness and other things, other than the things that we did in the first half. You can either look at that inevitability and figure out how to jive with it, like figure out how to turn that way directionally

or you can use your intermission to turn back towards the first half and go kicking and screaming and doubling down on all of those things, right? Like being bound and determined to keep yourself young. Right? Keep yourself looking young, thinking young, you can buy a bunch of cars. That's the crisis that our culture shows us. It's a doubling down on the first half's life of values. But also, this is an interesting thing about the word crisis. I wrote about this in Love Warrior. I remember learning from Kathleen Norris in one of her books

that the root of the word crisis is a Latin word that means to sift. OK, so a crisis is, if you want to think about one of those kids who goes to the beach with one of those kids who goes to the beach, right, with one of those saves and digs up the sand and holds it out in front of them and just watches all of the sand fall away hoping that there's treasure left over. That is what crisis is. Midlife crisis is the time where we scoop up the sand of our lives

and we let everything fall away, except for the treasure that's left over, which is the truth. It's good. We don't try to keep the sand in the sieve. We let it all fall away, that which actually never mattered. And by the way, that which never brought us

the piece of promised. That's the other thing to remember. Like, if you are buying more Ferraris or whatever people do, you're doubling down on something that never worked because don't tell me that anybody ever got a car and was like, now I am the man I always, now you can never have you can never have enough of what you don't really need. No, trying to get more of it to see if that's enough is not a wise plan. But now I love that vision of the that being the crisis like crisis meaning like meaning like a re an evaluation of being willing to to morph and change into the next thing. Like you have by the way 17 times before. We act like it's midlife is the first time we have this transformation. Not even close to true. I mean, remember adolescence, remember like your

early adulthood. I mean, we've done this a thousand times. Why is this different? I think because we attached, in part, we attached this idea of a midlife crisis to it, which is a myth. Like that is not even a real thing. Very few people report having some kind of definable crisis that's related to their age at all. It was actually, that term wasn't even a thing until 1957. And it was this guy who studied composers and thought they got less creative in their 30s, by the way, that was the midlife crisis in the 30s. And so he decided that people had years long depressive periods in their 30s. And that is where we got my life crisis.

So it's not a thing for you don't have to like wait for it to spring on you. You're just you can just you're just changing and evolving. There might be a moment though. It like there might be a moment where you get to catch your breath and you look at the thing you've built and you say, I think I've done my best and you might think, I'm finally at a point where I don't want things to be different. I just want more of the same.

Let's talk about the other way it could go because I think about what if you get to your intermission or your sailor and you don't like what you've built. Yeah. That's a good question. Well, that's why you don't take a say-la. Or you don't. If you don't like what you've built, you don't stop to assess it.

Like, that's why people go, go, go, go, go. That's because you know in the back of your mind, it's easier to keep sprinting no matter how hard it is than to stop, rest, turn around, and acknowledge that it isn't good enough. Because Abby and I were talking this morning about how five years ago. Yeah. It wasn't good enough for me. Like five years ago, had I, I mean, I guess I sort of did, but like I did not even have close to the life

that I wanted and you did. You had just turned 40 and I was in a marriage that I didn't. And same with me, I was, you know, 35, 36. And I was fucking miserable. Like I was at the worst point in my life. I'm almost six years sober. I have had the best six years of my life

because of that one day at a time approach. I think that sobriety does help, actually, because I think that sometimes whatever you do to take the edge off, the edge is what makes you change things. Like, I think it's good to you. When you at six o'clock each night start to check out, it's like you don't sit in the misery of the life you don't want long enough to actually freaking get to the point where you can't

take it anymore and you have to change something. Yes. It's like so you can live your whole life and just take the edge off every single night. And that, it's that. That keeps you from the misery that demands change. Like if you are numbing your misery, you are putting out the fire in you that is your fuel. It's good. It's so good. It's like if you can stand a little bit of that misery, it will point you directly to changing the things in your life that you want to change that are making you miserable. Yeah, you must sit in the misery. you have to. Like that's where you get your fire. I think it's just hopeful.

It's just exciting to think about that there's a whole different part of life that we haven't started. There's a whole different way to think about it. It's just funny how, you know how there's like insults we say about people as they get old, like, oh, they're really starting to slow down. Like that's an like that's an insult.

Like I am desperate to learn how to slow down. Well, you know, it's like what we talked about that the first half is over-simplified, but it does feel a little bit like the first half is for for building a house. And then the second half is for living in it. I do not want to be building a house until I die. Like I want to learn how to be. Yes, especially knowing how much you want to keep

changing things in our house. Like can we just be in our house? I think a lot about that song, all I do is listen to Joni Mitchell for Abby. It's over. It's all we listen to in the house, literally the same songs over there. I know you did. But there's this song that talks about Midway.

She says, a midway down the midway and I'm slowing down. And then she talks about the other way of life. I think she's talking about looking back at the first half people or the first half or the people who bring the first half into the second half. And she says always playing one more hand for one more dice. And she says, I envy you, the valley that you found, was it hard to fold a hand you could win? And I feel like that's the lore of bringing the second half into the first half into the second half, because it's like, when do you fold? Like when do you say enough?

I'm good. Because you can keep saying just one more year, just one more, just whatever that is, just one more promotion, just one more just whatever that is just one more promotion just whatever it is. But like I envy you the valley that you found the idea of like sitting down in the valley and just your name is Gwinnon. Yes my name does actually mean girl from the valley. So anyway I'm just Joni right now. I'm midway down the midway, slowing down. I just think that, you know, looking forward and being intentional. There's a lot of things that I'm thinking about in this intermission that I know are going to fade and shift and all a lot of the things that I've built

are going to fade and crumble and shift. And it's like that time where you realize that you are not the sand castles in the sand that you've built. You are the builder of them. are not the sand castles in the sand that you've built. You are the builder of them. Ooh. Right, you do not change. The you that is the youest you that has been you since you were born and will be you on your deathbed, changes not at all.

It doesn't change through passage of time. It doesn't change through what you lose or gain. It is exactly the same, nothing lost from the moment you're born to the moment you die, that you are the builder, you are not the castle. So how do you spend this intermission finding that treasure that reminds you constantly that all of those things you're going to lose weren't you anyway.

And so you can just stand there and watch the tide with like deep dignity. And you can show your people how that's done because that's what's really important to me too. I've done my best to show my kids how you keep learning and unlearning and building and unbuilding and building and trying to get true and true and true and true and true to who you are. And now it's time for me to show my kids how to do the second half. Like, I have to, with how I face losing, show them how to lose me. Oh, God. I'm not ready. You know, it just, I think that the second half is going to require a grace and a dignity

and a power and a fortitude and a philosophy and a real perspective, right, to like do it with the peace that I want to do it with. And I want to be completely prepared and celebratory about losing the things that the first half promised me I couldn't live without. Career, relevancy, beauty, all of that. So beautiful. That's why I have the freaking tattoo on my wrist. Be still. Like, the only reason why I allowed myself to get that

is that I knew that it would be as true on my deathbed as it was true the day I got it. That is one thing, be still and know because it's like, the stillness is the opposite of the striving. Right? And it's time now to find some peace in the stillness. Even the opportunity for striving goes away. Right? Mm. [♪ Music playing in background, talk about slowing down, you know, not

doing too much or putting too much on your plate or really prioritizing the things that, you know, you need to do. And I'm wondering if you could speak to those of us who have the opposite problem. Those of us who would rather just lay on the couch all day and watch TV and who struggled to get the motivation up to really do anything or do it really, really well. So I don't know if any of you struggle with that. How do we push through to do the things that we need to do, let alone, you know, all the things in life. Thanks, guys.

Bye. Who could possibly answer this? What could be? They, if you're up, you're up. Maybe you were made for such a time as this. Oh, I mean, I giggled right as she started talking because, listen, people might not know this about me, but if I had it my way, without my best life mindset on,

my shit would be on a couch all day long. That's right. And I feel no shame about it. Like I love sitting. I love laying down. I love laying even more than sitting. Much more. Laying down and watching shows and just like hanging out

with the dogs. And I think part of it was because I lived of such a weird life that I would like, I'd basically just be sprinting or laying. Like that was the whole life that I lived. Now I'm between. I'd be playing soccer and then part of my job was to rest and recover. So I actually was forced.

It was part of my job description to lay. You told me once you were recovering, a year into our marriage, while you were laying on a couch watching another freaking vampire movie and I was like, what has happening? And you said, I'm recovering, I'm in recovery. And I was like, from what? Because also,

From 30 years of playing soccer, God damn it. Also, we're watching vampire movies. So what are we recovering from? I was recovering from 30 years of torture. Right. So what do we say to sweet Brittany? Like how do we, what do people who don't need, they don't feel that their greatest need is to slow down?

They actually feel like their greatest need is to speed up. Speed up. First of all, I love them. They're my favorite. It's not like I do too much. It's like, I really do too little. I feel like Brittany is comparing herself to the people that are like, go, go, go, go, go. And she is feeling like she's a very different type of person than that kind of person.

But to me, continuing to go and not be able to stop is the exact same thing as not going and not being able to start. That's right. It's not like one is better than the other. I mean, socially acceptable, yes, but that's Newton's first law of motion, right? An object at rest tends to stay at rest. An object in motion tends to stay in motion. Sweet Britney. Sweet Britney at rest tends to stay at rest. Sweet, sister in motion tends to stay in motion. Sweet Britney. Sweet Britney at rest tends to stay at rest.

Sweet sister in motion tends to stay in motion. So what do we do with Britney and sister who are two sides of the same beloved coin? First of all, stop beating yourself up because it's literally a law of motion. Science, so, Brittany, science. You can't, wait, you're gonna go tell Newton, but he's wrong about that. So I just think, stop beating yourself up and I just think it's going, it takes a big change. It's a big change. You're not gonna just like get a new planner

and watch a new inspirational video and suddenly you're gonna start like getting your shit done, Brittany, just like, I'm not going to like do a morning meditation and start like being very present in my life and letting go of the things I have to do. It's just it's going to be a big fucking change, Brittany, okay? Check back in in a couple of months. Brittany is going to Brittany and sister is going to sister. I mean, I would just say one thing since everyone asked me. I do feel like there's an element of should in all of this. Yeah.

Like, Brittany feels like she should do something different than what she is, than what her natural self is telling her to do. Sister, you're feeling like you should do a morning meditation or whatever. I don't know, maybe you're probably not even. But you know what I'm saying? If we just remove should completely, because neither of those things have anything to do with desire. Like what, if Brittany desires to do some stuff and she's not doing them, that's one question. If busy body people desire to rest and they're not doing it, that's one thing. But let's start with desire instead of just should or momentum, right? What do you want? Yeah. And then go there because I mean, I don't know.

Brittany, while you're while you're sitting there in the couch, download or or whatever, the notebook come to the scene. What do you want? Come to the scene. Come to the scene. What do you want? She loves the notebook. Okay, let's hear from Libby. Hi, Glenin, sister and Abby. My name is Libby, and I am wondering

how is there a way to be too honest? Can you be, sorry, like my heart is beating really fast. Can you be too honest with your kids? I'm talking like age is 13 and above about your past, about things in your relationship. Where do you draw the line? Or you just lay it all on the table and hope that it makes them bigger, better people than you

that won't make the same mistakes. Or if they do, we'll know how to deal with them. Thanks. I have thoughts about this, Sweet Libby. Yeah. Libby, Libby, Libby. When she said hope that it makes them better people than you, that makes my heart hurt. Cause I just don't think anybody's better.

It's right. Anybody else at all. They're just going to keep it. Can't imagine anyone being better than Libby. Um, maybe Brittany, except Brittany, but I like them both. So it goes Brittany, then Libby. Let me just tell you my thoughts about this because I think about it all, all the time as someone who's set my life up in such a way that I don't have a choice that my kids know all my shit, right?

And I'm not talking right now about little, little ones. I know that's different and things have to be developmentally and age-appropriate in the way they're shared. But Libby asked specifically about ages 13 and above. And what I just want to say is that what I found over and over again is that what our culture teaches us about what makes a good parent is that we are perfect. Whatever the hell that means, right, that we present a version of ourselves that is robotic and plastic and has no pain and has no regret and has no shame and has no regret and has no shame and has no

anger and has no fear and has no way and that we present this plastic version of ourselves to our children. And that somehow that will protect them from something I don't know. It is such a disservice. We show this version with this plastic version of ourselves, this non-human version of ourselves to our children, who are human, who are fully fucking human, who have all of the angst and terror and rage and all of it, they have all of the sorely stuff inside of them that we have. And then we show them no model for how to navigate that in any way, because

we hide all of ours from them. We are the only ones who can make them feel less alone by showing them that we are exactly as human as they are. And even if we let them see all of our mistakes, they're still going to make their own. They're just going to make different ones. It's just, you know, and I think, I think a lot about, I saw this tweet the other day about how mothers with eating issues, that like their kids notice everything and see everything and like no matter what you do, they always, and then I'm whole at that all the time. Yeah, my whole heart just like, clenched, but then I thought, no, it's okay.

Even though I am still fucked up with food and my kids see a million things a day that, you know, they see me like eat a bite of cookie and then put the rest in the pantry. They see me like do all of this, but they also see me saying, I have eating issues and this is not normal and I'm working on it. And I'm gonna be working on it till the day I die.

I talk about it overtly, right? They know mom's got, this is an issue. They don't think my mom's trying to show me this is normal. They think that, they think that's her struggle when they see it. I just think when we hide ourselves, we might make our kids feel like my mom's perfect, but they're going to feel inversely bad about themselves as they feel shiny and admiration

about us, because they know in their bones that they are fully human. It's kind of about like the whole conversation about first half of life and second half of life. It's almost as if in the second half of our life. We just We stop suspending reality You know it's like the first half we're pretending as if we're immortal and we could keep going forever and go go go And the second half we let it go with our kids It's kind of like we're so afraid of their own humaneness that we pretend that they're not human. Like she said, so that they will become better people than me. Like that isn't putting yourself down, that's pretending that your kids are not going to be

human. Right. They're not going to be. They're not going to be better than you. They are not going to be human. Right, they're not gonna be. That's gonna be better than you. They are not gonna be better than you. No, exactly. They're gonna be exactly like you. And so it's just odd the way we do that. I mean, I recently, even with little kids, she asked about big kids, but very recently, Bobby brought home something. One of his friends, parents got divorced

and he doesn't see a lot of that. And so he was like, so and so his friends got divorced. And he was like a little bit worried and scandalized. And I was like, that's, I'm so sorry for them. And also like, that's real normal, real normal. And I was like, I'm divorced. And he was like, what? It was, and I just like, I'm divorced. And he was like, what? It was.

And I just like sat the both down and told them everything. Because and they asked all kinds of questions. So why did so why did you break up and did you love him? And what happened and all that. And then and it was a way of saying like this. We're all normal. We're all the same. So like that those parents you're normal. We're all the same.

So like that, those parents you're worried about, same as me. Yeah. Like they aren't bad parents unless you think I'm a bad parent. And this is, and they can handle all of it. They can. They can handle all of it. Except it was so amazing because we talked about it for like one hour and they asked all of their questions.

And then they were, we were done. They were like, I'm good now. I'm good. I have all the questions. And Bob got a music. Oh, one more. When you were married before, did you have any kids? Ah! Ah!

Ah! And I was like, I probably would have led with that, Bob. Yeah. OK. Come in, little Kaylee. I knew that. You're new, simply. I feel like. Glenn and I, we've had this conversation a lot. You're new simply. I feel like.

Gluten and I, we've had this conversation a lot. You live your life out loud, Gluten, and so the kids know a lot of this stuff. But there's also stuff that they don't know that you, and through that conversation of you telling them who you are, you give them the space to tell you who they are. And I think that that is a really, that's a dynamic,

that's hard, I think, for parents, because it's like parents put themselves on this pedestal, and the expectation is to either become exactly like me or don't be like me at all, because I had such a horrible, like, adult childhood, whatever. And at the end of the day, it's like, actually, we just want our kids to know everything so that they're equipped when they start feeling

these hard feelings, like, oh, I had this big breakup. Oh yeah, remember that time? Whatever it is. So, I don't know, I've always age appropriate for sure, but like, completely honest. Mm-hmm, you know? And not in hopes that they're gonna become anything other than as fully human as you are like. That's right. And that's beautiful.

Okay, let's hear from DJ. Hi, Glennon. Hi, Mr. Hi, Abby. This is DJ. I'm wondering if you all might talk about how you are dealing with the existential dread, like big picture dread, you know, with climate change, reality, then whatever the next pandemic is, the direction that feels like we're all plummeting. I mean, how are you avoiding just like daily paralysis?

From at all, how are you avoiding complete? Hopefully, how are you keeping the light in? And believing just any of this, any of this matter is, it just feels harder and harder. Every day, doesn't it? Anyway, downer.

Anyway, thank you. Okay, so it goes DJ. Britney, Britney, you're bombed. Then livy. Okay, can I take this one Britney, you're bumped, then Libby. Okay, can I take this one because it's about extension dread? Yes, yes. Okay, so because I just feel like this is my time to shine. Okay, this is the album cover for 46.

Yes, extension dread. Yes, okay. I know that there are many experts who tell us not to dress rehearse tragedy. Okay, I think that's a lovely thought. I am going to for the rest of my life because that is how it helps me to do that. I need to think through what is worst case scenario all the time every day, every minute, and that's when I can relax. Okay, I have a plan for when the thing

inevitably goes to shit. Okay, and everybody, he's not gonna go to shit, it's not gonna go to shit. That's fine, I hear you and your toxic positivity. What I'm saying is, we can both relax now. You because you're delusional happy, and me because I have a plan right so I do Jay Have actually my life. Yes literally. Yes. I have actually thought this all the way through to the end. Okay, DJ. So I

Have thought about what would I do if the world were actually ending, like tomorrow. Like what? Okay, because existential dread is, does it matter, climate change, all the things are coming, the world's gonna end. Okay, great, like let's take it to its, what if next week we find out that the world's ending.

Okay. Two parts of this. Number one, here's the two things I can control with that. I can keep trying to make it not end. Okay. I am not going to be the person who just says, fuck it. Eat drink and be merry. That's not going to be me because that's not my main character character trait. I want my main character character trait to be the sort of person who continues

to work for the world not to end. Even if it inevitably is going to. Number one, number two, when it ends, if it does, if it's next Tuesday, I fucking know what I'm gonna do. Okay? You know that, okay, it's a little bit, a little bit closer, don't look up with spoiler alert. Okay. In the end. In the end of the movie. There's a scene.

Okay, it's the world's ending and you see what this family does. Okay. If the world ends, I am going to be amazing about it. Okay. That's one of us. I am going to sit with my family around a table. My entire family, we are gonna talk, we are gonna hug. They are gonna see nothing but love and peace in my eyes, okay? Also, I'm gonna be on Instagram live. That's true. I'm going to be on Instagram live.

That's true. I'm not going to be that old. Okay, I've thought this all the way through. I am going to have my phone on a stand at the table for anyone else who is alone the night the world ends so that they can be with my family and my family can be their family and I can look at them with my peaceful eyes because not everyone in the world is going to be as prepared and Lexa, pro-dop as I am at the end of the world.

Okay. I will not be peaceful. What I'm saying, DJ, is that I have decided that we do not get to control the plot of this freaking life in any way. So we get to control what we can control, which is the main character. What am I going to do until the world ends? And what am I going to do when it ends? Because it's going to be a problem. And nobody's going to steal my fire before that and my care. And nobody's going to steal my peace at the night of it. And my kids are going to look in my care and nobody's gonna steal my peace at the night of it. And my kids are gonna look in my eyes and see

even though nothing's okay, somehow everything's okay. I can't, if I see a spider, I will lose my shit and run out of the house, but I can handle the end of the world, DJ. So if you can't, you just get online. Instagram life. I will be losing my shit. So she thinks that this table is going to be nice and sweet,

not a chance. I want to say thank you for my birthday episode before we get to the pod's water. Happy birthday, sister. Thank you. I'm so glad you were born. It's my favorite day. Thank you. Seriously, it's more favorite than my own birthday of everything in the world, I am most grateful for you too. I love you both so much.

I sister in my wife, my best. Thanks. My best thanks. Hi, this is Pat. I have a glen and sister. I'm going to retire next week after 32 years in a very traditional environment. And people keep asking me, what are you going to do? You're not going to be able to slow down. And my response has been, do I have to do something? And it's kind of thrown me off. Yes, they've seen me as somebody who has been very structured and has training programs plans two years in advance.

But I'm ready. You know what? I am ready. You know what? I am ready. I have survived cancer three times. Last year I had a lost key sister, and so it is time. The universe is telling me it is time. I'm going to hang out with my husband's

for my kidney and grandkids, volunteer travels, get into some good trouble, which is probably gonna end up in some civil disobedience, and some strange encounters with my team to be four-and-one co-workers if you get my drift. But I'm ready. I don't have to do anything, be anything I can do.

I just redirect my pace and my journey and retirement. So thank you so much for all you do, and the heart prints that you've left on me and on the rest of the world. Love you off. That seems like somebody who knows what they're about to go do. Yeah, so it goes Pat, then DJ, then Brittany, then Libby, Libby, you're still, it's just, you know, it's just these people. I don't know what to do. You all, we just, we just need to be like Pat. Yeah. Okay. I don't have to do anything, be anything. I get to direct my pace and my journey. Hey girl. Yeah. It's not just for retirement. Yes. Let's say it again. I don't have to do anything, be anything. I just get to redirect my pace and my journey.

That's your next right thing, y'all. Okay, we love you. Thank you for being with me on my birthday. We're gonna see you next time. We're gonna see you next time on We Can Do Hard Things. Bye. I give you Tish Melton and Brandy Carlisle. I chased desire, I made sure I got once mine And I continue to believe that I'm the one for me And because I'm mine, I want the line

Cause we're adventurers in heartbreak So man, a final destination And man, we you stopped asking directions. Some places they've never been. And to be loved, we need to be known. We'll finally find our way back home. And through the joy and pain That our lives bring

We can do a heartache I hit rock bottom, it felt like a brand new star. I'm not the problem, sometimes things fall apart. And I continue to believe the best people are free. And it took some time, but I'm finally fine. Cause we're adventurous and heartbreak so mad A final destination will act We stopped asking directions So places they've never been

And to be loved we need to be known We'll finally find our way back home And through the joy and pain That our lives bring We can do a hard thing This world finished her rose and heart breaks on land. We might get lost but we're only in that. Stop that skiing directions. Some places they've never been.

And to be loved we need to be long, we'll finally find our way back home, and through the joy and pain that our lives bring. We can do hard things, yeah we can do hard things, yeah we can do hard things. We can do hard things, is produced in partnership with Cadence 13 Studios. Be sure to rate, review, and follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Odyssey, or wherever you get your podcasts, especially be sure to rate and review the podcast if you really liked it. If you didn't, don't worry about it. It's fine. you