Latest / Age Like a Badass Mother / Ep. 81: Why Is Kindness Important For Aging Powerfully? She Did 1,000 Good Deeds and Changed Her Life
Transcript
- 0:00Hi, friend.
- 0:01I've always wondered why people who age well swear by kindness.
- 0:05Turns out it's science.
- 0:08Up to 40% of our happiness comes from just this one thing.
- 0:12Listen today to find out what that is.
- 0:15Today I am chatting with Linda Cohen about why being kind might just be the ultimate tool for aging.
- 0:22Like a badass mother.
- 0:24Please continue to subscribe and to share the podcast.
- 0:28You're helping us reach new people every week all over the world.
- 0:31It's incredible.
- 0:32Together, we're helping others rethink what it means to be healthy and to live an amazing life right up until the end.
- 0:39So thank you from the bottom of my heart.
- 0:42You mean the world to me.
- 0:45Hi friend, are you looking to age healthfully, confidently and vibrantly?
- 0:49Then this podcast is for you.
- 0:51Smart, slightly salty, irreverent, and thought provoking.
- 0:55I'm Lauren Bernick and this is age.
- 0:58Like a badass mother.
- 1:01Linda Cohen is an expert on kindness, a sought after keynote speaker, and the author of two books, The Economy of Kindness How Kindness Transforms Your Bottom Line, and A Thousand Mitzvahs.
- 1:13How Small Acts of Kindness Can Heal, inspire, and Change Your Life.
- 1:17I want to talk to her today because after interviewing so many people about why they're aging well, one thing comes up over and over and that's being kind.
- 1:26So I want to learn more about kindness and its connection to aging well.
- 1:30So please welcome Linda Cohen.
- 1:32Laura, I'm so glad you reached out to me.
- 1:34I'm happy to be here.
- 1:36I'm really glad to talk to you.
- 1:40I, I was googling experts in kindness, and you came up and then, one thing that caught my eye was that you were a waitress in the Catskills, and we used to go to the Catskills when I was a kid.
- 1:53Yeah, I know, right. And that's.
- 1:54That was right after Dirty Dancing thing.
- 1:56You know, it was a timely time to be in the Catskills.
- 2:01I know, and I always like when I give talks, I always talk about my family.
- 2:06And I say we were, you know, like the just like the family from Dirty Dancing, except without all the hotness and ability to dance.
- 2:13So my dad was a good dancer.
- 2:15Actually, the only time I ever dance well is when he was the leader. So.
- 2:20Oh, that's so cute.
- 2:22So for for those who don't know.
- 2:27Well, we'll get to the mitzvahs in a minute, but I want to go back to maybe, like, some of the things that, you know, you did.
- 2:34Waitress.
- 2:34You were, a housekeeper at a hotel, right?
- 2:38And then you were also, you worked at, a facility for aged people.
- 2:43And so I want to know, like, what life skills you picked up from all of those things or what lessons?
- 2:49Oh, I think it's just, you know, meeting people where they're at. I'm.
- 2:53I'm with such an extrovert, though, Lauren.
- 2:55So I feel like my superpower is just curiosity and connecting with people.
- 3:00I want to know human beings.
- 3:02So, you know, if you sit next to me on an airplane, probably we're going to have a conversation.
- 3:07You know, when I was waitressing and I didn't just waitressed in the Catskills, I put myself through college kosher deli in Los Angeles, you know, a home base, a home kind of style cooking in Massachusetts my first year of college.
- 3:19So waitressing was always just this great place to meet people.
- 3:23And I feel like that's a skill, honestly, I think could be really beneficial for everybody to learn is service, you know, serving someone else in whatever capacity that is.
- 3:32In the senior living organization, I was an activities an assistant activities director, which was super fun in my 20s, you know, to be able to have a relationship with women and men in their 90s and their 80s and just the wisdom they bestowed on me absolutely impacted me.
- 3:47In fact, one of the women, Rose Brown.
- 3:49I had broken up with somebody in Los Angeles where I had gone to college, I had moved back to Boston, and I had met Aaron, a software engineer, a young other, another young fellow, and I didn't know if I was making the right decision.
- 4:01And Rose Brown actually gave me some counsel, and Aaron and I ended up getting married.
- 4:03We've been married.
- 4:05It'll be 33 years in February.
- 4:05So, you know.
- 4:08Yeah.
- 4:09What did Rose Brown say to me?
- 4:11I think she told me.
- 4:12And I have to say, like, I kind of went back and I was like, what would she have asked me?
- 4:16You know, what values does he have?
- 4:17What does he want to do with his life?
- 4:20And also to meet his family?
- 4:22And I do remember meeting his family in Detroit soon after.
- 4:25We, you know, we were dating maybe for a year, and he could not have fallen very far from the tree because he had such an amazing family.
- 4:32So that's what I took away from what she advised.
- 4:36Oh that's good.
- 4:37What a.
- 4:38Do you remember any of the other things that you learned?
- 4:40Did you learn just like from talking to them or observing?
- 4:43I will say two things.
- 4:43I mean, probably seniors.
- 4:46I still work with seniors.
- 4:48It's a lot of the work I'm doing currently is with, you know, leaders who lead organizations that take care of seniors, at different times in their lives.
- 4:55And I will say, a senior brings so much wisdom, so much lived experience, around life and loss and, you know, and the importance of things.
- 5:06And so I feel like that's what I got in my 20s in that first job experience.
- 5:11What was hard for me was that there was mortality.
- 5:15And I had residents that I befriended who died.
- 5:18And I just remember I was only in that job for a couple of years because at 23, I said, oh my gosh, I'm just I wasn't ready for mortality, you know?
- 5:27And I think now I'm in my 50s.
- 5:29And of course, I've had many of my own losses in my life.
- 5:32And it's like you begin to realize that life is going to have loss.
- 5:36It's just part of what happens with this little life we're given. So, yeah.
- 5:43And, you know, did you did you have any takeaways from, like, the, the way people aged like, you know, there's always like the curmudgeonly people who usually have a Gucci inside or, you know, like they're hard on the outside and soft on the inside or like, what were some of the things that you observed and learned just from seeing them?
- 6:05I don't actually remember someone who was curmudgeonly.
- 6:08I do know people like that have known people like that since that job experience.
- 6:12But I feel like, sometimes the and even in my kindness work, I feel like sometimes the curmudgeonly person has has, is really dealt with a lot in their life, and they haven't had a way to move through that.
- 6:23And that's what they're holding on to, is that those harnesses are sort of difficult for them.
- 6:28And if they're ever given the opportunity to be gushy or to share that, sometimes that loosens them up.
- 6:33So I say kill them with kindness if you can.
- 6:36If somebody who is, you know, mean or isn't acting in the kindest way, maybe that's something that just if you love on them, maybe you'll be able to break through that hard exterior for them.
- 6:46Yeah.
- 6:48Okay, so I know you weren't born a kindness expert, but you became one because I guess, so you were living with your dad, right?
- 6:58When you were a teenager.
- 7:00And so that's kind of odd in itself, right?
- 7:05Your parents got divorced, and then you lived with your dad.
- 7:07That's a little mom actually had many different challenges, which does play out later on in her life.
- 7:12And she was hospitalized.
- 7:13And so we went to live with my dad.
- 7:15And my brother was in fifth grade.
- 7:17I was in seventh grade, and it was only supposed to be for maybe the year.
- 7:20But there was kind of a battle, over who would have our guardianship.
- 7:25And my dad wanted to have us till we graduated high school.
- 7:29So we had we left suburban Massachusetts and moved to rural Vermont, where my dad had, you know, left the big city and in the 70s moved to the to the Vermont Rural area.
- 7:39And, it was very hard as a seventh grader to do that, to have my whole life uprooted.
- 7:45And, and my relationship with my dad was was difficult because of that.
- 7:49I think I didn't have the ability to process in seventh grade who I was upset with, but I took it out on my stepmother, and my dad was in the middle of that.
- 7:57And it was it was a challenging teenage years, I will say.
- 8:02Right.
- 8:03But, you know, as as it is, I mean, I could kind of say the same thing.
- 8:07Like, I really have a similar, very similar situation, actually, where I didn't live with my dad, but we had a difficult relationship, and a lot of it was with his wife.
- 8:17And I took it out on him and he took things out on me and we but now we have repaired our relationship, which is nice.
- 8:25I think when you are older and you soften and you can see them as a human and not just a parent, yeah, well, you're lucky if you take time to do that because that does not always happen.
- 8:35And actually, my story is that I didn't do that until I found out my dad was dying.
- 8:40You know, it was when he told me he was dying of lung cancer.
- 8:42And I was 38 and married and had my two kids already.
- 8:46I knew that our relationship was still stuck, like 16 year old and a parent, and I and I knew and we were living across the country from each other.
- 8:53I live out on the West Coast at that point, and he was still in Vermont, and I thought, If I'm going to make any amends, it has to happen right now.
- 8:59In the last eight months of his life, were those months to, you know, to to spend.
- 9:04I was back in Vermont three times in that period of time, one of which was a four day weekend where we just watched old movies and, you know, and laughed and cried and said, Will you forgive me?
- 9:14So I have always felt like that was a really important piece of the part to get to the other side of the healing.
- 9:21After he was gone.
- 9:25I mean, it's it's really smart that you did that.
- 9:27Did you actually did you say those words to him?
- 9:30Will you forgive me?
- 9:31My dad was a therapist, so.
- 9:33Yeah.
- 9:34Oh, he was easy to, you know, I think my dad always.
- 9:37He always loved me.
- 9:39It was like, you know, now, like you said, when you get older, you realize, what it would have been like to parent a child, you know, with with the skills you had at that time.
- 9:49I mean, my dad came over from Germany as a four year old.
- 9:53He was raised by two parents who were German in New York City, very, you know, like Jewish sort of Orthodox upbringing, which did not fit my father.
- 10:03And he always rebelled against that.
- 10:04And then in my teenage years, I kind of went back to that.
- 10:07So we have this whole like cycle of all the different things that, you know, were problematic, I think, for, for our relationship.
- 10:14So, yeah, he got mad at me when I, in my 16 years old, decided I wanted to keep kosher, you know, the kosher dietary laws.
- 10:21And that was like the worst thing I could ever ask for.
- 10:24You know, that was the worst thing I was doing as a rebellious teenager, so.
- 10:29Oh, my God, that's so okay. That's opposite.
- 10:34I was like a real rebellious teenager.
- 10:36And I think in my head I was like, oh my God, this is ridiculous.
- 10:39You like, I'm going back to my roots.
- 10:40But, you know, we all take our own journey.
- 10:43And I think if life teaches us anything, it's like, oh, well, that was problematic for him because of his own challenges with his mother, with the way he was observing his religion, you know?
- 10:53And so, yeah, lots of healing, lots of healing has happened both before he passed away and of course, in the 19 years since. So.
- 11:01Right, okay.
- 11:02And so which brings us to a thousand mitzvahs.
- 11:05And for those who don't know what amidst fear is, it's an act of kindness, right?
- 11:11Yeah. A good deed and commandments.
- 11:12The Ten Commandments are actually mitzvahs.
- 11:16Did you know that in the 630.
- 11:18Yeah.
- 11:20Well, you know what, I didn't.
- 11:21I heard you say that when I was researching you, but I, that I, I'm not a very observant, religious Jew, and so I don't know that, but, I mean, we're obviously that was thrown around at my house, you know, to do mitzvahs and things like that, but I didn't realize that there was.
- 11:40What did you do?
- 11:41Several.
- 11:42Many of which we can't do because they're related to agriculture or, or other things.
- 11:48But there are many of them we can do.
- 11:50There are positive mitzvahs and negative mitzvahs, and my category was really to look at loving kindness, anything that really promotes loving kindness as a way to do something in your day to day life.
- 12:03What, are there any are there any mitzvahs that are listed that stand out to you that you can that's so interesting.
- 12:10You know, I have a friend and I study with her now, weekly.
- 12:14We're actually like a Jewish study partner.
- 12:17And we actually wrote down mitzvahs that out of the 613, that really resonated for us.
- 12:22Returning something that's lost was a mitzvah.
- 12:26I remember writing on that list.
- 12:28Oh, that really good one.
- 12:30I mean, they're simple.
- 12:31That's so interesting.
- 12:32They're a little ones and they're a big ones, and each one is just as important.
- 12:36So don't you know, and, and and there were things like smiling, letting someone in in traffic, you know, and I was like, living a modern life, thinking, okay, well, does that count as a mitzvah?
- 12:46Oh, actually, one of my mitzvahs replacing a roll of toilet paper.
- 12:50It ended up being the silly one that I could talk about.
- 12:53And, you know, people would ask me about, but but that's not enlisted, as a mitzvah, letting someone in in traffic and, replacing a roll of toilet.
- 13:03So what are ones that were lists of acknowledging someone else and doing something for another person?
- 13:09And I'm sure if we just had a broader category, it would certainly fit into those categories, you know?
- 13:15So how did you get this idea?
- 13:18Okay, in my dad's honor, I'm going to do a thousand mitzvahs.
- 13:21Where did this come from?
- 13:21I really don't know.
- 13:22It was five weeks after my dad had passed away.
- 13:25My dad died December 1st, so it was like the middle of the winter.
- 13:27So dark, you know, really long nights.
- 13:30And I woke up in the middle of the night with just this idea.
- 13:32And I remember playing it out in my head.
- 13:35And I woke my husband, Aaron, up the next day, and I was like, I want to do something to honor my dad.
- 13:39And luckily he's like the computer guy, the science guy, and goes, well, how are you going to know you've done a thousand mitzvahs?
- 13:44And he said, let's start a blog for you.
- 13:46And this was January 2007.
- 13:48So blogs were kind of newish then.
- 13:51And yeah, let me start my blog and I just, I never set out to do anything bigger than just kind of grieve for my dad.
- 13:59And it was it transformed my life, this opportunity to write.
- 14:04I mean, writing is really therapeutic to go out every day, to look for ways I could do little acts of kindness.
- 14:10And there is.
- 14:11And you I know we're going to talk about a little bit the science of kindness.
- 14:15But I that actually was incredibly helpful in my healing, to be doing that, to be outwardly, actively looking for ways to do kindness.
- 14:24So I had stepped into something kind of without thinking about it.
- 14:27That would really change my life forever.
- 14:29And it has an amazing, amazing grace. So yeah, and it's interesting that you say that you were just trying to grieve, but in being kind to others, it really healed you.
- 14:43It so that that's kind of what I'm interested in is like, why is that?
- 14:49What why is it when we do something for somebody else, it feels so good to us?
- 14:55Yeah. All right.
- 14:56I'll tell you a little bit of science and I will tell for your listeners if you want to follow an amazing place where they do tons of research about this, the Greater Good Science Center is in Berkeley, at Berkeley, University of Berkeley, California.
- 15:09They have a whole department that studies so many of these.
- 15:12So pro-social, different things you can do.
- 15:15And so much of their research has been impactful for me.
- 15:19So a couple of things.
- 15:20First is, doing acts of kindness, sets off your serotonin and that oxytocin, those feel good hormones.
- 15:28That's why when you volunteer and I was a volunteer a lot when my kids were little at the school or their art camp, you know, you have, like, a high, a helper's high from volunteering.
- 15:37And I know when I talk to people about that, you know, if you're having a bad day and you go volunteer, chances are you will leave that situation feeling better because of that oxytocin, serotonin that gets released.
- 15:48So that's one thing.
- 15:49There's research by psychology professor at UC Riverside, doctor Sonia Mirsky, and she studied happiness like our own internal happiness.
- 16:00And her research showed that 40% of your happiness comes from your genetics.
- 16:05So I'm sorry, 50% is comes from your genetics.
- 16:07So you can't control that.
- 16:08And it is why sometimes you'll meet somebody who feels a little happier than the average person.
- 16:13Probably they have great genes.
- 16:1510% comes from your living circumstances, or your work circumstances.
- 16:19I would add that too, but it left 40% of the pie.
- 16:23So what else impacts your internal happiness?
- 16:26And I often will say when I'm in an audience, you know, people have said, you know, oh, how much money I make or don't make or whether I'm married or not or whether I have children or not, but her research actually showed that your intentional actions impact your own happiness.
- 16:42So I didn't know that research when I stepped into that thousand mitzvahs project.
- 16:46But when I learned that research, what I realized was I had discovered that I had discovered that by going out and doing acts of kindness, I was impacting my own internal happiness.
- 16:56And I love sharing that research, because I think, especially now, we're living in a world where people feel really hopeless.
- 17:03I feel like more and more people feel overwhelmed and hopeless than ever in the last, you know, ten, 15 years that I've been speaking about kindness.
- 17:11So I want to invite you to think about that.
- 17:14I want people to realize you have a choice how you act or react, what actions you take in any situation, even the ones you don't feel like you have a lot of control over.
- 17:28I know that's really that's so we have a lot of control over what we can say, what we can do.
- 17:37And okay, so you're saying that in a situation where we feel helpless, hopeless, the best thing to do is to just do somebody, do something for somebody else.
- 17:48For someone else, or.
- 17:50I mean, let's say you have somebody.
- 17:52I mean, perfect example.
- 17:53I remember we were coming out of Covid and we started going back out, you know, we're at a restaurant.
- 17:58And I remember running into this waitress and we were, you know, we were on the road and she was bawling when she first came up to service.
- 18:04She was a little slow to come greet us.
- 18:06And she said, somebody just threw silverware at me, you know, and, and, and oh, my husband like a thing, but like, don't go back on the road after Covid if you cannot control yourself and you cannot be kind to the waitress who's clearly understaffed.
- 18:19Right, right.
- 18:19And so what, people forgot how to do.
- 18:22So I remember I just remember my husband, I going, oh sweetheart, we will not do anything like that.
- 18:27We are so happy to have you as our waitress.
- 18:29You know, what we could do in that moment was assure her that there was still kind people in the world.
- 18:34And, you know, daily there are possibilities of actions like that that you could take.
- 18:40I'm, I'm even thinking somebody does some somebody yells at you, you know, maybe you're at work and somebody else that you do, you immediately yell back, or do you pause and they go, wow, something's probably going on for that person.
- 18:49This isn't like them.
- 18:51What's going on?
- 18:52And you pause and you take a minute to like, be kind back to them, even though they weren't kind to you.
- 18:58So I think when you know this as a possibility, it's like you can pause and you can choose how you want to act or react.
- 19:07Yeah.
- 19:08You know, when you said, returning lost things to somebody, it made me think of I was on the trail, you know, walking one day, and I lost my keyfob.
- 19:21Well, it that's it.
- 19:23I wasn't going to be able to get in my car when I got back and, you know, and so I got back to my car and I was like, checking the car, and I'm looking around and somebody came up to me and they're like, are you looking for your keyfob?
- 19:34And they go, what are you looking for?
- 19:37And I said, my key.
- 19:39And she goes, is this it? And you get.
- 19:40And she realized it was the same kind of, you know, matched the car that I was looking at.
- 19:45And I was like, oh my gosh, I just almost started sobbing.
- 19:50And she said, we knew we knew that somebody was going to be looking for this.
- 19:54And so she's like, we've been hanging out for like 30 minutes.
- 19:56I was like, I, I mean, that was like the kindest thing somebody could have done.
- 20:02And then recently I was at Whole Foods and I was trying to park my car, and I don't know why, like I was trying to get in this tight space or other space, but I nick this guy's car and I was like, oh God.
- 20:16And he was sitting in the car and I got out and I was like, I just can't even believe I, I don't know what I was thinking, trying to get in this spot.
- 20:23And he got out and he was like, this old farmer dude in this old truck.
- 20:28And he goes, you know what?
- 20:30Just don't worry about it.
- 20:31He's like, it's a little Nick and I have an old truck, and I'm not going to make you go through hoops to whatever.
- 20:38And I just, I started crying, like, I literally just started crying because in my mind I was like, oh, now I got to deal with the insurance and I got to do this now.
- 20:47And the relief I felt from that and I said, you know what?
- 20:51I want to tell you something.
- 20:52I'm going to pay this forward today in in several ways and I, I did I found ways, you know, the lady had all her kids out on the street with a sign and, you know, needed rent.
- 21:08I mean, that was the easiest one, obviously the easiest one to pay forward.
- 21:12But yeah, I did a couple other things that day, and it made me feel so good and so connected to that man, to the people I did a little kindness for, you know, really does boost.
- 21:25So you're reminding me there there's a gentleman named Steve Hartman, and I don't usually tell people to watch TV, the news especially.
- 21:33But Steve Hartman is a journalist who is on CBS and every he's on the road with Steve Hartman.
- 21:39Listeners of his stories are amazing.
- 21:42People always send them to me.
- 21:43Is that the one with his little during the pandemic with these kids at home, he does kindness 101 series.
- 21:50Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 21:50But a few years ago he did, a special on kindness.
- 21:55It was like an hour long special, and he had a, an MIT professor.
- 22:00Talk about the ripple effect.
- 22:02That's kind of what you're sharing right there, which is when somebody does a kindness for you and you feel that relief, you're just like, I want to go do kindness for other people.
- 22:10And she showed that if everybody who gets one act of kindness did one more act of kindness, like just the amount of kindness that would spread through the universe, and it was amazing because it was all just, you know, mathematics.
- 22:22But of course, if you are and I.
- 22:24And by the way, I'll tell you, I'm not the only one in this space like when I started speaking about kindness in 2000 and, you know, 11 or whatever, it's been quite a long time.
- 22:34I felt like a lone wolf.
- 22:35People would often say like, oh, that's so sweet.
- 22:37I'm you're so, you know, we really need that message now.
- 22:41There are men and women around the globe also wanting a different paradigm in the world.
- 22:49And so people are speaking about it.
- 22:51People are teaching about it, people are writing about it.
- 22:53It's been so amazing to me to be connected with so many other people who they want this, you know, we're not living in a world that we all want, and what can we do to make it better?
- 23:05And, so that's been kind of exciting, actually, to be collaborating.
- 23:09I'm actually part of I'll just make a little pitch for the human Summit, World Kindness Day, November 13th.
- 23:15We're having a virtual program which people can join a five hour virtual program talking about kindness that you can do personally, that you can do, in your workplaces, in your communities.
- 23:24And I'm going to be the closing keynote speaker for that.
- 23:27I'm really excited.
- 23:28So, yeah, maybe I'll send you the link.
- 23:31You can include that if any of your listeners want to.
- 23:33And it's only $50.
- 23:35I mean, we've kept it price so reasonably as a virtual event that hopefully everybody who would want to can join is this more like, for work?
- 23:44It's it's both for it's personal and professional.
- 23:47We expect that there will be people whose workplaces have maybe embraced the idea of kindness in the workplace, but also if people personally just don't like what's happening in the world and want to do something, that's what they can do.
- 24:01Yeah.
- 24:01I mean, I do feel like our world is, you know, it's funny.
- 24:07It's like a kind of a paradox because the world seems very divided.
- 24:12But that's on purpose.
- 24:14And when you are, you know, out now with the real world, with real people.
- 24:20It's not like that.
- 24:20Like I said, this farmer guy, I mean, he probably could not be any more different than than me.
- 24:26He's exactly.
- 24:28I feel like the media has done us no services in the last couple of years.
- 24:32They have made us more divided.
- 24:34And you're right, it's purposeful and I don't like that.
- 24:37I actually was I was sitting with someone yesterday, and we were talking about the fact that if we could demand if we could demand that the media stop leading with the negativity.
- 24:48I mean, because unfortunately, most of the, you know, 17 I, I heard a number 117 bad news stories every half an hour for the one good news story, they'll show us.
- 24:57And we know that that's not what's happening in the world.
- 25:00We know that, you know, because if you do dig into this, you'll find that there is a lot of good, there's a lot of good happening everywhere.
- 25:08It's just not what gets amplified always when.
- 25:10Right when you see, you know, an emergency or you see a flood, and then people are coming with their own personal little boats to rescue people.
- 25:22It's always for the helpers.
- 25:23They don't ask Mister Rogers. Yes, right.
- 25:26Look for the helpers.
- 25:27Right. You know, nobody asks like, what's your politics when they're about to rescue you?
- 25:32They're just.
- 25:33I mean, it's just we're we're not as we're not divided.
- 25:37It's just, you know, a made up thing to divide us.
- 25:40So. Right.
- 25:41And so I think that that's something that we really, really have to keep front of mind right now and that, well, that's went back to each of us has a choice to choose how we would like to act or react when we see something.
- 25:54We can fan the flames of the negativity, or we can say, I'm not going to go there.
- 25:58I'm not going to share that. I'm going to share something good.
- 26:00You know, I'm going to share what's happening in my world.
- 26:03It's actually one of the things I talk about with organizations, share the good stories that I know are happening in your organizations, put those out into the newspaper, put those on to the local television show.
- 26:13Let those be the things that the coverage gets picked up, you know?
- 26:18Yeah, I'm.
- 26:21Yes, that's very good advice.
- 26:24So as this relates to aging, what do you think it is about kindness that helps us age?
- 26:33Well, I just have I think you have a different mindset if you have decided, you know, I was 38 when I took on that mitzvah project, but I feel younger than I think my age is, because for 20 years I have been spending time thinking about kindness.
- 26:50You know, it's hard to be.
- 26:51I don't know if I can swear on your podcast, but it's hard to be.
- 26:54Yes, absolutely.
- 26:55When you're called the Kindness Catalyst.
- 26:57So, you know, roll it back in window.
- 26:59You know, the day I go to the dentist and they're late or something happens and I'm like, angry.
- 27:04And then I have to take a breath and be like, oh, no, I can't do that, you know?
- 27:08And so it it helps you, think back about how you can be kinder.
- 27:14And it's not to say that I haven't had difficult people in my life or difficult situations.
- 27:19It's really, I think kindness has to start with yourself.
- 27:23So your own self-talk, what you're listening to, what you're watching, you know, how you are walking through the world.
- 27:30All of those things, I think, play into choosing, to be kinder in this world as it is right now.
- 27:38So so you think it's more of like, it's like a mental thing.
- 27:42You just have a different mindset.
- 27:44If you're if you're focusing on you worry and you're you're bucking the norm a little bit, you are.
- 27:49But these days, I would say there's more and more people who are trying to buck that norm, whatever that norm is that's being told to us, you know, I think so.
- 27:58I think you're right.
- 27:59And, you know, I think that you do, you you do.
- 28:04But we just talked about this before.
- 28:05We're the same age and we're both, 57 or you're going to be 57 any day.
- 28:09Yeah.
- 28:10But you do have like, a little glow about you, you know, and you come across as a younger type person just because of that, because of that.
- 28:20And so what are what do you have?
- 28:23Like, do you catch yourself saying negative things to yourself and then correct you or oh my god, correct.
- 28:29Or something like what's what's laughing?
- 28:29Yes. Let me give you this one.
- 28:32As long as I can be a little bit authentic and sort of you okay. Yes.
- 28:37You could be all authentic.
- 28:37That's what this is about.
- 28:40Okay. Well, whenever this will air, it'll probably be within.
- 28:44Okay, fine. So.
- 28:46So hopefully I'll try and get it out before you're, Okay.
- 28:49Perfect.
- 28:49Recently, I, I was speaking to a health care organization.
- 28:54They had actually hired me to speak for a 3.5 hour morning session and a 2.5 hour afternoon session, and when I looked at my data, that was longer than I have ever presented.
- 29:04I do a lot of wait, they wanted you to present for 3.5 hours and then two.
- 29:09So that's a lot for me.
- 29:10My my keynotes are often 90 minutes.
- 29:13You know, I've done 2.5 hours and I don't have anything that afternoon.
- 29:16So I was kind of stressed about this.
- 29:18I will be honest.
- 29:19And I and I it's in my wheelhouse of senior living.
- 29:22I speak a lot in senior living, but I was definitely in the weeks leading up to it.
- 29:26I reached out to speakers who I know speak longer, trainers, whatever, what, what advice they had for me, and they gave me great advice.
- 29:33Some were like, you know, in the middle of your time, go upstairs, take a shower, change your clothes, change your shoes, have your lunch, take a nap, you have time for a 15 minute reset and then walk down to your afternoon session. You'll feel much better.
- 29:45And it was fabulous advice.
- 29:46But here's what happened the night before.
- 29:48So the night before, I'm at the hotel at the, at the conference center and in the middle of the night, as I'm bitching about this, 5 hours or 6 hours of I'm going to be on stage.
- 29:59This is what my inner voice said.
- 30:01Linda, shut the f up.
- 30:04Stop complaining about the work you love doing, the people you are going to get to touch.
- 30:09They think about the firefighters you've talked to, the nurses you know, who do 12 hour shifts, the, you know, the senior living professionals that you're going to be talking to, whose days are filled with so much work, stop complaining.
- 30:22And that was literally what my and I was like, you're right.
- 30:25So, Linda, you're right. I couldn't do it.
- 30:28I was like, okay, okay, inner voice, you know?
- 30:30So so that's I guess part of what it is, is do you catch yourself in, do you say, stop it?
- 30:35You know, this is what I love doing.
- 30:38I feel so called to do this work that I need to stop bitching about it.
- 30:42So, yeah, that was kind of the inner talk.
- 30:48I think that that's, you know, we all do that.
- 30:51Right?
- 30:52And I think that part of I think I have that DNA that when you were talking about like, happiness or kindness, a lot of it, you know, a lot of happiness or a lot of kindness is in your DNA.
- 31:04I think that I have, kind of happy DNA, you know, it's just part of me.
- 31:11But I'm also a real person.
- 31:14And I also like, you know, start saying crappy things to myself.
- 31:18But I do catch myself.
- 31:21I do catch myself.
- 31:22And that's the thing.
- 31:23Like, I don't let myself talk to myself.
- 31:27Yeah, the in that crappy way, I don't.
- 31:30I'm always like, stop that now.
- 31:32I'll say something nice, you know, like what you used to do with your kids when they were little.
- 31:36Don't talk to each other that way.
- 31:38Now say something nice to your brother.
- 31:40Well, and it's always like, think of how you would talk to a friend in that situation.
- 31:44If you can take yourself out of the equation, you can say, if a friend was coming to me with what I'm struggling with, how would I talk to them?
- 31:50You know, and that's how you can revisit what the inner dialog is.
- 31:54I mean, of course we're all going to have inner dialog that isn't as kind, but when we get aware of it and at least catch it, we can we can improve it I think.
- 32:05Yeah I agree.
- 32:06So I want to go back to the mitzvahs.
- 32:09I want to talk more.
- 32:10Will you give me some examples of mitzvahs that you did.
- 32:13I wish I had thought to grab my book.
- 32:16It's down on my bookshelf, mitzvahs that I did, you know, or just ideas volunteered in a lot of different ways in those years.
- 32:26I would, you know, find little ways that I could do what's in my wheelhouse.
- 32:31And I always will encourage people, if you want to add kindness to your world, do what comes naturally to you.
- 32:37If you're a singer, write a song for someone.
- 32:39If you're a poet, write a poem for some of you.
- 32:41Bake.
- 32:41Bake for people like do whatever it is that gives you joy and spread that and share that with other people.
- 32:48Definitely do what's it's called.
- 32:50I'm trying to think of, you know, smiling.
- 32:54I remember I wrote a lot about these little simple things, you know, putting change in a coin canister.
- 32:59And I remember one time, like, does that matter?
- 33:02Like how much change my, my $0.25.
- 33:04And I actually looked it up and for it was like for a meals on wheels kind of program, our quarters added up to, you know, $20,000.
- 33:12I think it was a day of of serving their senior population by those little quarters that people were donating.
- 33:17So, you know, don't underestimate the quarter.
- 33:21What else?
- 33:22Calling someone when you think about them.
- 33:24I'm really intentional.
- 33:25When I think about someone, I assume that's a hit from sort of the universe for me to check in with someone and I'll try to like, but check in with them then if I find out at somebody's birthday.
- 33:35I love making a little video or sending a quick text, you know, just making sure they know.
- 33:41I'm thinking about them.
- 33:42And I've been the recipient of pretty much all these same things, you know.
- 33:46Oh, sending sending a note.
- 33:48You know, I have had so many stories in my audiences.
- 33:51And heard just amazing things.
- 33:53You know, a teacher who gets a note 20 years later from their fifth grade student saying, you know, my parents were getting divorced when I was in fifth grade, and you were the only steady adult in my life and thanking them 20 years later, you know, so there's no time limit on going back and letting a coach or a mentor or somebody know how they impacted you.
- 34:11And I think now, actually those would be received even more than ever before.
- 34:15Because you don't know where that's catching that person in this time of their life.
- 34:21I love that one.
- 34:22Yeah, I, I actually did that.
- 34:24I, I reached out, I wasn't able to find this teacher online, but I found her son and I've.
- 34:32I haven't heard back from him, but I have sent him several notes because my mother, there was a math teacher who lived in our street and nobody in my family can do math.
- 34:41And my mother would send me down to this poor lady's house.
- 34:44I can't tell you how many nights a week for me to get help with my homework.
- 34:48This poor woman, you know, I mean, she's in the middle of.
- 34:52She's a baby and she's making dinner, and I'm there with my homework.
- 34:55And she never turned me away.
- 34:56Never.
- 34:58And I so I was like, you know, as a kid, you don't know if your parents sends you down the street, you just go.
- 35:04And I'm like this poor lady.
- 35:05And so I really wanted her son.
- 35:08Who was that baby?
- 35:09You know, I wrote him and hopefully he would.
- 35:12He got that to her if she's still alive, even.
- 35:15But yeah, I think that I like, that there's no time limit.
- 35:20I'll add some other ones because, you know, now I do a lot of work with organizations.
- 35:23So I created a Kindness Bingo card, which was sort of a fun way to bring kindness to the workplace, especially senior living.
- 35:30Bingo was sort of a big thing in senior living.
- 35:32But on the different squares, it was like, you know, smile at a coworker you struggle with, invite someone to sit with you at lunch who you don't know you know.
- 35:40Let someone know how they impacted you in your workplace.
- 35:43So trying to create different ways that we could elevate kindness in the workplace, and get the kind of behavior we would like to, you know, exemplify.
- 35:53So, so I try to gamify all my work on kindness when I'm in a workplace because, you know, I think everybody knows what kindness is.
- 36:00But if we can really dive deeper into what what does this look like in real lived life in a work setting?
- 36:07That's something that I've tried to do a lot in the last five years.
- 36:13So what, what's your best piece of advice, then?
- 36:18It doesn't have to be about aging, but any just.
- 36:20Do you have a best piece of advice?
- 36:22Advice?
- 36:22Well, I'm still a napper that Lauren.
- 36:25So I would say, Oh, yeah.
- 36:27A little break if you can, in the middle of the day, even if you are working in an office building, lay under your desk if you have to.
- 36:35I think the 3:00 lull, 2: 00 lull is pretty real, especially, you know, I wake up early, I go to bed kind of early, and I wake up pretty early.
- 36:43So by 3: 00, I'm pretty much.
- 36:44So by 3: I need something to refresh me.
- 36:46So by 3: So how long do you like 15 minutes?
- 36:49So by 3: 15. 20 minutes? That's really.
- 36:51So by 3: You just set your time?
- 36:52So by 3: Actually, I fall asleep because I've been doing this so long, I have, like, a little guided meditation.
- 36:55So by 3: I often will do.
- 36:58So by 3: And I've done that so many times that even without hearing it, it's in my head.
- 37:02So by 3: And I put a pillow under my knees and I lay down and my body just knows, oh, this is time.
- 37:08So by 3: This is her nap.
- 37:09So by 3: You know, like, this is kindergarten stuff.
- 37:11So by 3: This is nap time.
- 37:13So by 3: Get your mat, Linda.
- 37:15So by 3: But do you you set a timer to wake up, though?
- 37:17So by 3: I mean, I never know.
- 37:19So by 3: You only sleep for 15 minutes.
- 37:19So by 3: He just wakes up.
- 37:21So by 3: I mean, I because I'm kind of told that this is what we're doing right now.
- 37:26So by 3: If you think you aren't going to wake up, of course.
- 37:27So by 3: Set a timer. You know, I think sleep.
- 37:31So by 3: I think I'll do that, too.
- 37:31So by 3: That sleep in general.
- 37:33So by 3: And as you hit a certain age for women, it gets so much harder.
- 37:37So by 3: You know, with menopause, things change in our bodies.
- 37:39So by 3: But sleep, I think, is, is something really important to protect.
- 37:43So by 3: And whatever we can do to I think that would be the advice I would give is, you know, try to protect your sleep at all costs and see if you can find ways to, to to be really regular about that, if at all possible.
- 37:57So by 3: I moved a dog out of my bed.
- 37:58So by 3: I had dogs that were in our bed and it was like, no way.
- 38:01So by 3: You know, a few years ago, this crazy and people like, you're never gonna get your dog out of your bed that they were raised with. Nope.
- 38:06So by 3: That dog was out of the bed and it's been out of the bed for a couple of years.
- 38:10So by 3: So yes, I know I have a big dog.
- 38:14So by 3: She sleeps on the floor next to us, but yeah, he can't have that in the.
- 38:17So by 3: I mean, some people sleep fine with their dog, but I feel like that wakes you up a lot.
- 38:22So by 3: Yeah, I like the idea of a nap, and I do that too.
- 38:25So by 3: Sometimes I'll be like, I just have to close my eyes for 15 minutes.
- 38:28So by 3: You don't want to do it too long now.
- 38:30So by 3: Yeah, I think that's refreshing and good.
- 38:32So by 3: I would say the other big piece of advice is monitor your media diet.
- 38:38So by 3: I talk about gulping media, which is where I think we are.
- 38:42So by 3: If you are 24 seven or it's on your watch or it's on your computer, you know you are getting way more media than you probably should mental health wise.
- 38:51So by 3: So instead of gulping it, sip it.
- 38:54So by 3: And so in the last 510 years, we have absolutely shifted how we receive media.
- 38:59So by 3: And I promise you, I don't miss anything.
- 39:01So by 3: I still hear about it.
- 39:02So by 3: You know, if you're on any kind of social media or any kind of newsletters, you still will hear the big, important things that impact your community and your world.
- 39:10So by 3: But I think you can take less of it in.
- 39:14So by 3: So, and it doesn't serve us.
- 39:16So by 3: I don't think we're wired for the amount of 24 over seven.
- 39:19So by 3: We are we are wired into these days.
- 39:21So by 3: I think it's really hurting people in a big way.
- 39:26So by 3: I think that's very, very smart.
- 39:29So by 3: You know, I know you're you touched on that your mom had some mental health issues and that your dad died of lung cancer.
- 39:38So by 3: But is there any takeaways you have from watching your parents?
- 39:41So by 3: Yeah, I know that was one of your questions.
- 39:42So by 3: And I was thinking about it.
- 39:42So by 3: My dad died at 70.
- 39:45So by 3: My mom, she actually, committed.
- 39:48So by 3: She ended her own life at 75.
- 39:51So by 3: She had mental health challenges.
- 39:52So by 3: She was hospitalized several times in my life.
- 39:54So by 3: And it finally, you know, it was what took her.
- 39:58So by 3: So what I have witnessed, I have in-laws who are 92 and 88 now, and what I have, you know, both situations of aging, they're different.
- 40:14So by 3: You know, I lost both my parents kind of young.
- 40:16So by 3: So I haven't had the aging process with them at all.
- 40:20So by 3: Or even knowing what my genes would have been had they not had those two ways that they passed away.
- 40:26So by 3: My dad was a smoker, like a huge smoker.
- 40:28So by 3: So of course lung cancer is not shocking, but that's what he died of.
- 40:33So by 3: My in-laws, you know, they're living to be much older.
- 40:37So by 3: So we're having all the conversations now about how are they going to move to the end of their life in a way that feels, dignity.
- 40:43So by 3: And they still have to make they can make choices.
- 40:47So by 3: So I think the thing I'm taking away is, you know, I think in my 70s, maybe mid 70s, if I'm still alive, I need to make the decisions about what I want with the last chapter of my life, because I don't want to put that weight on my children.
- 40:57So by 3: I don't think that feels fair.
- 41:00So by 3: And I'm sure at 70 it's going to feel really young to be making those decisions.
- 41:04So by 3: But I think that's that's the smart way to handle your own life.
- 41:07So by 3: Otherwise somebody else is going to make those decisions for you, you know, and I think it's we we probably are actually at that age where we should do that.
- 41:17So by 3: You never know what's going to happen.
- 41:19So by 3: I just had like, I haven't done it, but I had, an expert on about parenting, aging parents recently.
- 41:26So by 3: And, you know, I was thinking the same thing.
- 41:29So by 3: You are like, oh, yeah, when I'm in my 70s, he says, now 57.
- 41:33So by 3: How are we supposed to be doing it now?
- 41:34So by 3: I mean, it's not 57, but she just said, you know, sooner rather than later.
- 41:41So by 3: But I mean, that's one of those things that you probably put off.
- 41:45So by 3: But I think, well, I think that's what, we're all of you have to talk about dying.
- 41:49So by 3: It's the craziest thing. Hello.
- 41:51So by 3: There is no other alternative.
- 41:52So by 3: We know it's happening.
- 41:52So by 3: No other doctor. Yes.
- 41:55So by 3: So why are we afraid of it?
- 41:57So by 3: Why are we so afraid of it?
- 41:58So by 3: Because it feels so, you know, so difficult to think about.
- 42:01So by 3: I don't know, and I feel like I am.
- 42:04So by 3: I mean, I'm not I'm not really afraid of it either.
- 42:06So by 3: I actually read the obituaries.
- 42:09So by 3: I love reading people's obituaries.
- 42:11So by 3: I think they're really beautiful.
- 42:12So by 3: And when I started speaking initially, funeral directors started asking me to speak.
- 42:18So by 3: And I remember my first Funeral Directors Association conference.
- 42:21So by 3: It was so cool.
- 42:22So by 3: They were like hearse hearses and, you know, vases.
- 42:26So by 3: And I was walking around the trade show like it was kind of it was kind of cool, you know?
- 42:30So by 3: I was like, okay, would you talk about kindness in the workplace, actually.
- 42:34So by 3: But I mean, what is a legacy?
- 42:36So by 3: They were having one of the organizations having some generational challenges because they have new funeral directors, younger, who are coming in.
- 42:44So by 3: And then there were funeral directors who are kind of old school, and a lot has changed in the funeral industry.
- 42:49So by 3: I mean, cremation now, where it was a very little piece of their industry, has become a huge piece of the industry now.
- 42:55So by 3: And so that, you know, that has been challenging also, technology, when we got into Covid and, you know, there were streaming of services, that was like a whole new thing.
- 43:07So by 3: And you know, plus people can choose so many different ways to do a funeral.
- 43:10So by 3: Now, it isn't like you have to go to the funeral home.
- 43:13So by 3: So it's been you know, the industry has been evolving.
- 43:15So by 3: And so kindness, kindness around it's interesting.
- 43:19So by 3: Yeah. Yeah. Wow. So.
- 43:22So by 3: Do you have a favorite health or beauty products?
- 43:24So by 3: Me that. Okay.
- 43:25So by 3: So my hair is straightened today, which is crazy only because it was, you know, a no hair wash day, but my hair looks like yours curly.
- 43:32So by 3: And I don't know if I'm saying the name of this product.
- 43:35So by 3: Right. Oh, you I ordered.
- 43:38So by 3: I think it's we.
- 43:39So by 3: Dad and a friend of mine recommended the product line a few years ago, and it has changed my life in terms of curly hair days.
- 43:48So by 3: So, they have great. Okay. Spell.
- 43:51So by 3: Oh, spell that again.
- 43:52So by 3: My dad and they have a shampoo.
- 43:55So by 3: They have a condition, okay?
- 43:56So by 3: They have all sorts of products you put in after you wash your hair.
- 43:59So by 3: And it has changed how my curls look.
- 44:02So by 3: So I don't know what you're doing.
- 44:04So by 3: So it's for curly haired women? Yeah.
- 44:06So by 3: Yeah, maybe men do. Yeah, I love it.
- 44:09So by 3: I've become a huge fan of their product line, so.
- 44:13So by 3: Yeah. Okay.
- 44:14So by 3: And then, what is your favorite concert idea?
- 44:19So by 3: Okay, so this is so cool.
- 44:20So by 3: I grew up in Vermont.
- 44:20So by 3: I was a high schooler in Vermont.
- 44:22So by 3: Guess what?
- 44:23So by 3: We don't get concerts where I lived.
- 44:25So by 3: My very first concert was James Taylor when I was married.
- 44:31So by 3: After I got married at 25 with my husband, Tanglewood, Massachusetts, and I was like, yep, that was my first concert.
- 44:39So by 3: Oh, so I know I mesh.
- 44:41So by 3: I've seen him.
- 44:42So by 3: He's a great performer, but I missed a whole chunk.
- 44:45So by 3: I love music and I married somebody who's really into music and lived in Michigan.
- 44:48So by 3: Got to see all sorts of great live, you know, musical groups, but I didn't.
- 44:53So by 3: So, now I would say I love, blues.
- 44:56So by 3: We have a blues festival every year in Portland on the 4th of July, and we go pretty much every year.
- 45:02So by 3: And I would say that's been one of my favorite cons of getting introduced to blues and, and rock kind of musicians. So.
- 45:08So by 3: But yeah, I don't have the traditional I wish I did.
- 45:11So by 3: I was like, there's so many musicians, I wish Peter, but you can still go to concerts now.
- 45:15So by 3: You do have to be a teenager.
- 45:15So by 3: You're right.
- 45:17So by 3: I actually have started roller skating. Lauren.
- 45:20So by 3: I've started doing a lot of things that I do, you know, that I either did as a kid that brought me joy or things.
- 45:26So by 3: Maybe I felt like I missed out on. So, yeah.
- 45:29So by 3: So are you roller blading or is this four wheels or your two wheels at a roller skating rink?
- 45:34So by 3: There's a skating rink in Portland that's just the one floor.
- 45:37So by 3: Just like when I was 12 back in Vermont.
- 45:39So by 3: And I've done it like five times.
- 45:42So by 3: And then it got to be summer.
- 45:43So by 3: And so I haven't been doing it much since, since the summer months.
- 45:46So by 3: But it's really fun and it's like riding a bike you do not forget.
- 45:50So by 3: Yeah. It brings me so much joy.
- 45:53So by 3: And I brought a friend who's gone a couple times.
- 45:54So by 3: Yeah. So.
- 45:57So by 3: Oh, that's good.
- 45:58So by 3: I like that, Linda.
- 46:00So by 3: All right, well, thank you for sharing all your good advice about kindness.
- 46:05So by 3: So everybody go out and do something kind and get the ripple effect going.
- 46:10So by 3: Age well.
- 46:11So by 3: Yeah. Huge. Well all right.
- 46:14So by 3: Thanks, Linda.
- 46:15So by 3: Take care. Thanks for listening, friend.
- 46:18So by 3: From my heart to yours.
- 46:20So by 3: Be well. Until we meet again.