Joan Lunden on "Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water" || Books That Changed My Life

I'm an old man who has known a great many problems, most of which never happened. And there's another one. That's like paying dues on a debt not yet incurred. Mm. I love that one.

That one hits hard.

And sometimes my kids will say things. I'm saying, uh-uh-uh. They'll say, I know I'm paying dues on a debt not yet incurred. I said, you are. Like, you're worrying about something that's probably not going to happen.

You do a great impression of your kids, and I've never met them. Okay, so the big question.

Yeah.

How did Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water by Brian Luke Seaward, a hippie from Colorado, change your life?

Uh, he made me—

Hi, I'm Chris Collins, and you're watching Books That Changed My Life. This week, we're joined by superstar journalist and author Joan Lunden. She's here to talk about the book that changed her life, Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water by Brian Luke Seaward. If you want to learn everything there is to know about the incredible Joan London, you are in luck. We're giving away 75 signed copies of Joan, Her Definitive Memoir. Now here's how you claim yours. Just like, comment, and subscribe, then hit the link in the description below. That's it, and we'll get the book right out to you. Now sit back and enjoy the conversation. So we're here today to talk about the book that changed your life, which is Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water by Brian Luke Seaward. I'm curious what other books, when you were asked about the book that changed your life, came to mind that made the list. I think one of them is Wherever You Go, There You Are.

So Jon Kabat-Zinn, and he also wrote one called You can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf. Like, you're gonna hear a theme here. Emotional resilience. He died, who wrote Emotional Resilience. That was another one that came to mind. You know, when I was at Good Morning America, I had to read research all the time. And I didn't really have a lot of time to really get into reading books. And then it was kind of as I was turning 40, that was a big change in my life. And part of it was that I knew I was in an unhappy marriage. I knew I was gonna be getting out of it. Therefore, I knew I needed to get myself in shape. I'd had 3 kids. And so I got a fitness trainer and a nutritionist, and I really took charge of my health. And interestingly, something happened when I peeled off those physical layers. It occurred to me that if I could change myself physically so much, how much now could I maybe change myself inside? And it was like a light bulb went off in my head that I hadn't really— it's interesting, I think Brian Luc Seaward calls them your soul muscles. He says, you know, you can work your regular muscles and learn to be strong, but that's not going to necessarily help you get through a divorce or through a tough time or a job loss or breaking up with a friend, those require those soul muscles. And that's something I decided I wanted to work on. It was a conscious decision that if I had pushed myself that far physically, I could push myself farther in more of a mindful, soulful way. And I kind of made a decision not to be so shallow, to be perfectly honest. And I just started reading and I started reading people like this. And I don't even know who recommended the book, but when I think I might've started with Brian. Now I started doing speaking engagements also. And that was a big change in my life 'cause I'd always been, believe it or not, afraid of public speaking. People like, "Wait, how can you be afraid of speaking in front of an audience of 200 people? Like millions of people see you every day." I was like, "Yeah, but I don't see any of them." So when I was kind of at that point in my life, I decided to get over that. And I went on the road with Tony Robbins for 2 years. I did 2 big events a month. And when I say big events, Tony goes into like a stadium with 24,000 people and it was like baptism by fire. But I literally got over that fear of public speaking. Like I'm a living, walking example of someone who can turn a total fear into a total passion. 'Cause I do it all the time now.

Through repetition or what helped you get over it?

Probably repetition. You know, sometimes there's just things that the only way you can learn how to do them is to do them. Quite frankly, being on television is one of those. You know, I kind of learned that the only way you can learn to be good on TV is to be on TV. But there's a lesson there that I've always tried to impart in my books, which is that you have to be willing to not be good in order to get the opportunity to learn how to be good. And it's not something that people like, but I have learned it to be absolutely true. And I was not good when I started on TV and I got criticized. And you know what? All those criticisms made me better. So, you know, I've just kind of found that through my life, I've kind of opened up a little bit to these other ideas. But that turning 40, turning point is what opened me up to kind of the, the inside, the, the soulful side of me.

Well, I mean, it's such that— yeah, I've never thought of it that way, but it's so great that— so you intentionally went to work on yourself.

Yes.

And you saw your body change, you saw your health change through nutrition.

Yep.

And that gave you confidence to then think, hey, I could change my inside.

Yes. 100%. 100%. And I started—

Success kind of makes you think more is possible, right? Yeah, yeah.

You've, when, I remember I would, did a mountain climb when I was doing all my getting myself healthy. I went with a group from my gym. We climbed the Grand Tetons. And, you know, afterwards someone said, what was the point of that? And I said, because I pushed myself so far beyond a point that I ever thought I could do, that it leaves you at the bottom of that mountain saying, "Hmm, I wonder what other things I could actually do if I just pushed myself." And this was one of them. And it was a little, I will say it was a little bit of a push to go for that mindfulness meditation.

Yeah, it kind of feels weird, right?

Yeah, a little squishy.

What did you mean by shallow?

I just think that I was racing through life at 180 miles an hour. You know, when I went to write my memoir, it's like sometimes I had a hard time. I had to go to YouTube to see a spot that I did to remember that I did it, that I was there, because my life just went at such an unbelievably rapid pace. And particularly those 20 years at GMA. Sometimes I feel I have to go back to a country to actually see it, even though I was there. Yeah. You know, it's that, like, yeah, I was there, but—

You were working.

I was working and we were just—

It wasn't about you, it was about what went on for you.

Yeah, you're going 100 miles an hour. And some of these books kind of helped me understand that there's a value in slowing down. And I never really thought there was a value in slowing down until I got to kind of this point in my life. In fact, I actually considered slowing down being lazy.

Yeah, that makes sense.

And then all of a sudden when I started reading more, and reading these kind of books got me then to start researching, 'cause I'm an information junkie, started researching actual scientific research on slowing down and stress management and how it affects your health. Then I started learning the real health benefits of rest, that rest is not this lazy concept, that it's actually a health concept. But this was revelatory to me in my 40s, you know, at a time where I was at peak of my career, raising 3 kids, but, you know, leaving a marriage. And that was incredibly stressful because I was in the public eye. So the tabloids had great interest in my marriage's demise, which is like putting fuel on a fire. So it was at that point where I desperately needed this addition to my life.

What did you read pre-this? Would you read books or—

Research for my show.

So just work.

I mean, it was just work.

So if we went to a day, like say when you were 35, your average— let's not even say day, let's say week. And then now, with what you know about rest and taking care of yourself and being present, is it recognized? Like, you almost wouldn't recognize it.

Unrecognizable. I mean, let's face it, I mean, I was working a show that required that I get up at 3:30 in the morning and leave my house at 4. I had to be there at 5. I had reams of research to read. For the 6 or 8 people that I'd interviewed that morning. I'd often get off the show, run to LaGuardia to fly to Washington to interview someone there. I mean, my life was just kind of bananas. And it went on for 20 years. So, and you know, it's funny 'cause people say, "How are you enjoying retirement?" And I actually have never retired. I've done 10 shows since GMA. They were just never that big morning show. But I did refocus myself. And that's why I called my book "Life Beyond the Script," because I didn't do what everybody thought I would do, or maybe even what I thought I was supposed to do, like pop up on the "Today Show" or pop up on a talk show. And I had those opportunities and I didn't do it. I didn't lean into them. So part of writing my legacy memoir was to ask myself why. Why didn't I lean into them? And by not leaning into them, the 25, next 25 years actually became really interesting. You know, full of a ton of advocacy, a much more focused, career in health and wellness and women's health and healthy aging. And, you know, it led me to Congress to, you know, testify before the House Ways and Means Committee to expand the Family and Medical Leave Act to cover senior care as well as newborn care. I mean, those things were, like really fulfilling and like let me feel like I was kind of making a mark on the world. They weren't the big shiny career that I had at GMA. And I don't think I could have written my memoir until now where I could kind of look back and say, you know, and I think this is the takeaway that I wanted to impart, which was that be open and understand that You don't just have to keep doing what you were always doing and what everybody expects you to keep doing. Sometimes if you kind of leave your mind and your heart open to other things that you might really be good at, that that's kind of the secret to reinvention. And we're living in a world where people are gonna have to be reinventing themselves a lot.

Yeah, but you were doing it when nobody else, like you've kind of in your career have always, been challenging or breaking the norms. One thing I love about your book is this picture. And then—

Yeah, I mean, that's the picture.

Such a great cover.

A little newbie, a little 23-year-old breaking into an all-mans business.

But I mean, what a badass you were as a journalist.

Like, thank you.

I mean, it's so cool. And then the kind of the way this book is, it is a little bit of an experience. And then you have these QR codes that then take you— so you're kind of transcending the book in a way.

So once again, Chris doing something that no one's done before.

Yeah, your publisher was probably like, you can't do that.

I would listen. I called my lawyer and I said, can I put video in the book? He said, well, what do you mean? How would you do that? I said, I could put QR codes in the book and then people could like open them up to the video. He said, do you own all that video? I said, it's all on YouTube. I don't even know how it all got on YouTube. I didn't put it there. He said, it's public domain if it's on YouTube. YouTube. So then I just started putting all those, and I love it because, I mean, it's so much fun to share. I've had this unusually extraordinary life, and to be able to share that is just plain fun.

Well, and also an inspiration to everyone else.

Yeah, yeah. And I understand that it's motivational, it's inspirational. I talk about all the challenges through my life, 'cause you know, just because you're like, you know, the star of a show and all that, you still face all the same challenging moments. And I think sometimes just the fact that people can read that we go through the same challenges, it kind of gives them hope and they just don't feel so alone because they're going through it too. I think there's just value in that alone.

Yeah, you've always been, uh, different in that way where you'll challenge the norms. I'm just curious, in your childhood, like, how how Joan was created and developed. Where did you grow up?

I grew up in Fair Oaks, California, a suburb of Sacramento. My dad was a surgeon, a cancer surgeon. My mom was pretty much a stay-at-home mom, but my dad was also a very avid private pilot and got a big piece of property with some other men, built a private airport, and our house was at one end, built around a hangar. So I grew up, like, walk down the hall, my room, my brother's room, airplane hangar. And he would come home from the rounds at the hospital and say, "Let's fly to Reno for dinner." So it was an interesting upbringing.

Does that make you think anything's possible?

Yes, 100%. And my dad told me constantly that anything was possible.

So you are a product of good parenting.

Yes, and I'll tell you, This is in the '50s and '60s that he's telling me this. That was like ahead of its time to be telling a little girl.

Not you're gonna get married and—

No, no, no, no. I wanted to be a doctor just like him. And he said, and you will be, you can be a doctor. And it was only 'cause I went and worked in a hospital that he had helped to found and build right before college that I found out, nah, stitches and scalpels are probably not gonna be part of my career.

But, You know, but you still believe that you could do anything?

100%. And that's what my parents always told me. And I was just— I wasn't your average bear. I was a— I was going 180 miles an hour by the time I was about 9 or 10.

So you had pretty high self-esteem?

Uh, really high esteem, very high expectations of myself.

And self-imposed?

They're just there. My I just had very high expectations of what I could do in the world and very few limitations. I didn't feel boundaries.

Competitive?

Very competitive.

So in high school, what were you like?

Skipped my junior year, graduated when I was 16.

Of course you did.

Started college when I was 16.

Wow. And where'd you go to college?

Well, it was 1967. If you'll remember, that summer was the Summer of Love, the height of like hippie and flower children. And I had applied to Berkeley, Stanford, and UCLA. And my mom's like, "You're jailbait and you're not going to any of those schools." And she heard about this school called World Campus Afloat, which is today it's called Semester at Sea. And she, unbeknownst to me, sent away an application And I was accepted. And she said, "This is what you're gonna do. I'm gonna take you to San Francisco, put you on a plane. You're gonna get off in New York and you're gonna get on a ship and go around the world." We visited 15 countries in 4 months. And that just, talk about, my mom said, "I want you to broaden your horizon." Wow. And that absolutely was achieved. And you know, that just showed me the world was so much bigger than my little, you know, high school, and that I needed to figure out how I was gonna go out and make my mark in that world. So that just made my expectations that much bigger and my limitations that much smaller.

So you're experiencing the world, but you're experiencing different cultures.

Yeah. Right? Yeah, yeah.

And so then how does journalism become the focus?

So while I was on that ship, one of the girls on the ship said, "What are you gonna do next semester? I'm gonna go to Mexico. There's a school down there." "and it's in Mexico City, go with me." And so I said, "Okay." So I applied and I went to Mexico, supposedly for 3 months. I stayed 3 years. I loved it. Went to school there. Didn't come back to the United States until I was 21, until I was legal. And when I came back, I went back to school locally to finish up. And a guy who worked at a local television station, in Sacramento was a friend of the family and said, "You should consider going into TV news." I was like, "To do what?" And he said, "No, no, no, they're going to start hiring women." This was 1973. And that now National Organization of Women was really pushing all forms of media to start hiring women. And local stations around the country were really being pressured. By the FCC to hire women. And he said, go and talk to them. And he gave me the name and number of the news director. So I called and got an appointment and went in and was asking him a million questions. And he looked at me and said, well, clearly you know how to write an interview. And he said, there's something about you. I think I wanna audition you. He fired up a camera and put me on the set and auditioned me. And he was very flattering. He didn't have a job 'cause I didn't like, go in there answering an ad. I kind of went in just fact-finding, but the weatherman was back behind the set and he saw the audition and followed me out into the parking lot and said, "I saw you and some stations around the country are putting on weather girls. I'd like to make you Sacramento's first weather girl," which sounded absolutely uninteresting to me. I didn't know anything about the weather, I knew an opportunity when I heard it. So I said, "Okay." And I started under his tutelage and he kind of forced his way getting me on the air by calling in sick one day. And then they had no choice. They had to let me.

Oh, he did that on purpose?

He did it on purpose.

Oh.

He wasn't sick. And, you know, because it was that time, it was an incredible trajectory. To become, you know, the weather person, 6 months later, consumer reporter, a few months later, an anchor person. And, you know, it wouldn't have probably happened at any other time in history. And then, you know, the word got out. I was one of the only anchors around the country that was a female. So I got asked to go to New York City. I mean, after not being in the business for 2 years, and they hired me, but, They hired me as a street reporter and I'd never actually been a street reporter. I just have a lot of audacity. I said, "Sure, I can do that." And I kind of learned from my camera crews. And you know, my husband always says, "If there's a page out of the Joan Lindam playbook, it's this. Whenever anyone asks you if you can do something, just say yes and then go find out how to do it." And that's kind of how I've lived my life. And it's made for an incredibly extraordinary life, I must say.

Do you remember that first time on camera when he set up the camera and had— were you reading a teleprompter?

There was no teleprompter yet.

Was it cue cards?

They had not invented teleprompter yet. It was 1973.

So cue cards?

Yeah. There was just a paper script in front of me. You had—

Oh, so you—

No, you had to look down. So I looked down.

What did they have you reading? Do you remember?

A copy about the Vietnam War, 'cause that's what was going on. Had all these like strange names of cities in Vietnam. I was like, I have to read this. So like they just put some copy in front of me and the cameraman like stuck his head around and said, "Hi, you look great," which is really nice of him to say. And just, I'm gonna count to 3 and say your name and read the copy. So like I read the first line and I was like, and my name was actually Blunden back then. ABC in New York changed it to London. I said, hi, I'm Joan Blunden. And then I just started reading the copy. I mean, I'd, you know, I was sitting on a news set that I saw every night on television. That was just crazy that that was happening.

And so was it energizing? Like, did you, Was it exciting?

You know, it was almost like it happened so fast that you almost don't have time to get too nervous, which is kind of—

Good?

Good.

Did they play it back for you?

No.

So you didn't see it?

I don't know if playback existed. No, I didn't see it. The guy just came out and said, "There's something about you." He said, "I don't have a job, but you know, we're gonna start an early news in about 6 months or so. It's something that stations are doing around the country." 5:30 news, and I'm going to keep you in mind because there's— we're also— people are starting to do like consumer reports. Maybe you— we could have you do that. So I have your number and like I'll keep you in mind. I walked up thinking like, all right, maybe I, maybe I just opened a door. And it was then I realized somebody was following me and it was Harry the weatherman who made me the weather girl. That's how I got my foot in the door to a newsroom that was all men.

Yeah.

Who weren't very happy when they made me an anchor.

Yeah, there was probably a lot of condescending.

Oh yeah, it was not a—

And you just let it.

I didn't have a choice. And you know, I've been asked that and I've just been thinking about it lately. Like, was I oblivious? Oblivious to all of that. Like, no, I wasn't oblivious to it. I was just so focused on the need to learn fast and become as good at this new thing as I could, as fast as I could, that I think I was just so focused on that that I didn't let them, you know, kind of— You didn't let it get on you. I didn't let it get to me, I guess. But I didn't have any of these other wonderful lessons that I learned later. I didn't have any of those yet. Look, I was 23. You know, it was my, it was kind of my first real job.

Yeah. So you're in Manhattan.

Well, 2 years later I get to Manhattan. I'm 70, I'm now, it's 1975. So now I'm 25. Woo! And I'm still a newbie in a brand new newsroom that also didn't welcome me.

And so what did you think of Manhattan?

What the hell did I get myself into?

That was kind of a crazy time.

It was. Oh yeah. I mean, 1975 in New York City was kind of a crumbling building time. A lot of crime, dirty city, Times Square mess, a lot of dirty politics. It was kind of a little bit of a mess at that time. Um, but But again, Chris, I was a little bit oblivious to it because I was so focused on learning yet another new job, how to be a street reporter. I mean, they sent me out on a fire, I remember, just after the first couple days I was there. And like, you know, it was all film. Nothing— there was no videotape yet. So they were like, like, we're like making little mini movies. So your sound man, your lighting man, your cameraman, they go and they get out of the car, they're getting all the equipment. There's like all these firemen. Like, I ran up to a fireman and started talking to him. He looked at me like I was his little sister, like, "Get out of here." And the cameraman comes running over to me, "You can't talk to the fireman. You have to talk to the chief, the one with the white hat." It's like, "Okay, didn't know that." I mean, I was so new. And it was just, it was on-the-job training is what it was in its purest form.

What was 25-year-old Joan like in the dating world?

It was really nonexistent because again, first of all, when you're the new person, you're called in, you're first to come in on the 6:00 AM shift and they keep you till the 11 o'clock show because you don't get any of the good shifts like coming in at 9 or 10. And there's also this thing that exists, Chris, that when guys see that you're on television, they think you must be dating like, like 100 other fantastic men, and they're not inclined to ask you out.

Really?

Yeah. Ask any woman in show business, ask any woman in the public eye if it's easy to date, and they'll tell you the same thing.

Hmm.

It's not easy.

So then how do you navigate that?

Do you have an approach? Not easily. You know, I think, I mean, I was sent to do a story once on a guy who was building a penthouse on top of an apartment building in New York City. And he was a billionaire. A billionaire, the heir to General Motors. His name was Stewart Mott. They also own Mott's Applesauce. And like, you know, he's leading me around this place and explaining to me how he's building this garden that's going to be the biggest, I don't know, whatever. And he's obviously hitting on me. And he's saying, "How are you enjoying New York?" I was like, "Yeah, I came from California. It's like all cement." And I, you know, I left my pet and that's kind of— I got back to my apartment that night and the guy at the door, the doorman, said, "You had a few deliveries." I said, "Okay." I opened my apartment door. My apartment is filled with ficus trees and greenery and a little cat carrier with a white Persian cat. The guy gave me a cat.

And was there an invitation to dinner?

I had an invitation to dinner. And we went out a few times, but he was like in another hemisphere, you know. He was a guy who spent his days telling the staff who to give money to. And he was very political. I was 25. I was shallow, Chris. It was like I just didn't belong in his world. But I mean, those are the kinds of dating experiences I had.

Yeah, that's going to be pretty awkward.

Yeah, and it's awkward. But I mean, that kind of, that one time like kind of epitomizes what—

What did you name the cat?

I named the cat Pasha Pishu. Why? Because my best friend from childhood was a guy named Jed Johnson. He went to New York before me and got a job working for Western Union. And he went to, because back in those days, if you wanted somebody to know something, you had to send them a telegram. And he delivered a telegram to Andy Warhol and got a job with Andy and ended up being Andy's partner. So by the time I got to New York, he and Andy lived together. And so Jed was the only person I knew in New York. So now all of a sudden, my two best friends are Jed and Andy Warhol. And that's who I would go out to dinner with. That's who I'd go out with. And they used to take me to parties at the Iranian embassy back when Iran was our friend. And the Iranian ambassador in New York was like, Like he held through parties all the time. And so I got, so a friend of mine from the Iranian embassy said, "Oh, name the cat Pasha Pishu. It means King Kitty." That is how my cat became Pasha Pishu. And shortly after that, everything blew up between Iran and the United States and they closed down the embassy and no more parties.

Yeah, it's terrible what happened.

That was back in the old— the good old days when things were still fun in Iran. Yeah.

So you, you eventually end up getting married, right?

Yes.

Then you have kids.

Yes.

And so kind of, kind of tell me about that in reference to when this book—

um, I had 3 great kids, but that— but I didn't marry the right person. And, um, so I got married when I was 27, and by the time I was turning 40, I realized that I needed to get out of that marriage, which is not easy when you've been put on this pedestal by America as America's working mom. And so I had to really kind of steel myself for that, and that's where I decided you better get in shape. You better, you better be ready for this, because I, I knew it was not going to be easy, and it wasn't, because everybody had an opinion.

Did you know you were going to be getting a divorce before you started getting in shape?

Yes. Yeah, I, I had a purpose. I had a real purpose. And I spent about a year and a half Lost like 40 pounds, but it's not just losing weight. I made myself strong and healthy. Strong and healthy. That's when I climbed the Grand Tetons. All metaphors.

How old are your kids at this point?

Oh, when I got divorced, they were like, you know, 4, 7, and 10.

So you're taking on that responsibility too.

Yeah. Kind of, sort of, I had all that responsibility for myself anyway, Chris, which is part of the reason for leaving, you know? And yeah, and that was, it's a scary, scary proposition, but it's one that sometimes you come to realize you have to make. Like, you can't, if you know that you're in the wrong relationship, at some point you just have to, makes the break and, and you can't stay in it.

I'm so curious, with all of that pressure and you being on a pedestal, and you're like, you know, you're, you're mourning in America. I know, in a sense. If you went back now and you could talk to yourself in that moment that you realized that you were going to get a divorce and you were going to have to face all of this, What would you tell yourself?

You damn well better be ready for what's coming.

Wars.

I mean, I didn't realize how bad it would be. I didn't real— you know what? To be honest, I didn't think people were that interested in me, quite honestly.

People love a dramatic story.

I mean, to be really perfectly honest, I didn't think that my getting divorced would be made into that big of a deal. Big of a deal. But the tabloids went bonkers. I mean, I went one entire year that there wasn't one week that there wasn't an article in a tabloid. And I mean, you know, in trying to go through a divorce, they're like putting fuel on the fire. And, you know, you want an amicable divorce, but it's very difficult when, you know, there's just so much tabloid coverage of it. And really, you know, I worried about my career and what people were gonna think. I worried about—

And it was, divorce wasn't as acceptable as it is now. No.

And by the way, it also wasn't as acceptable for women to be taking that step. And by the way, I was also one of the first women who had to pay the alimony. Joan Collins was one of the first. I was the second. And I mean, I remember my attorney said, there are men popping champagne bottles in locker rooms that, yeah, we've been paying alimony for years. Let a woman pay. But the tide had turned, and all of a sudden I was the moneyed spouse because I was making a lot of money. And so it was, there was just so many different dynamics associated with that divorce that made it hard and that made it big news. And so, you know, I finally just made a huge settlement and got out of it. But you know why Jewish divorce is so expensive?

'Cause it's worth it.

'Cause it's worth it.

I love that joke. Even though I'm Irish, I love that joke. Yeah.

And so I just knew I had to start my new life. But you know, when you're 47, how old was I when I divorced? I was probably 44, 43, 44. But when you try to start dating again, you feel like you're 16 again. It's just as weird as when you were 16. And especially when you're in the public eye, it's even harder. And so it was a hard transition, but that was kind of the time that I was going through this metamorphosis of becoming strong and healthy and just kind of taking charge of my life. Like, I'd always been strong, obviously adventurous, and, you know, a high-powered public figure, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you feel emotionally strong.

Yeah, no, you're—

they're two different things. Yeah. And I needed to really work to get emotionally strong.

I love that, how you said like, physically, and then I realized, hey, I could, I could get mentally strong.

It was like a light bulb that went off. It really was.

You just connected that dot.

I connected the dot, and I came to understand that being emotionally strong was different than just appearing strong all the time.

Now, what that insinuates, though, is you got to put in the work.

Oh, big time.

You're accepting that you're going to work on yourself, that it is, you know, there's, there's no genie in a bottle sort of a thing. So who introduces you to the book, or how does the book come into your life?

I wish I knew how I came to know Brian, but when I started doing all the speeches with Tony Robbins, I talked about change. That was my speech, was how to deal with change. And I wrote a book about it. I wrote a book called "A Bend in the Road Is Not the End of the Road, as Long as You Make the Turn." And I kept quoting Brian. So one day I get a letter from him and he says, I'm like a grown-up hippie. I teach at the University of Colorado at Boulder. I've never owned a TV in my life, so I've never seen you, but I keep hearing that you keep quoting me, like in magazines and things. I'm so glad that my works have impacted you. So that started a little back and forth between him and me. And he subsequently wrote another book called "Stressed Is Desserts," spelled backwards.

She's a great title.

And the whole premise is that you eat sugar and you spiral up. And in the same way, you're stressed by something, something happens to you and you spiral downward. But if you can start to be able to identify identify that point, that moment that someone or something triggers that in you, then you can choose not to go down the rabbit hole. What a revelatory, awesome concept. And he had me write the foreword for that book, which to me was like one of the all-time amazing things that anyone has ever asked me to do because this was my new world of mindfulness. And that somebody who wrote about that and taught stress management at, you know, University of Colorado Boulder was asking me to write. I was like so bowled over by that. And we've kept in touch. He goes out, he speaks. I've gone to hear him speak many times. And so we're in contact to this day.

So did that happen before or after this book?

Oh, that happened way after. After I read this book, I started talking about him, and that's when he got in touch with me.

Yeah, because you know you're on the back of this one too.

Well, but that's only because—

I'm sure this is—

because that's not the original book. And I went hunting through my house for the original, and I probably lent it to someone. But then when he came out with the 10th He came out with the 10th anniversary edition and he sent it to me. And that's where I'm on the back of it. 'Cause by this time he knew me. And needless to say, as you can tell by this book, I reread it. Look at it, it's got writing all the way through it, little stars.

Oh, can I see?

And you know, he also loves quotes.

Oh, you're like me.

And I—

This book works for you.

Yeah, yeah. And there's—

How do you do this on a Kindle, Joan?

Oh, you don't do that on a Kindle. I only use a Kindle on trips when I'm, you know, like on a book tour right now. I love real books. I got a million of them in my house.

This one, you folded the page, you starred it, and you underlined it.

Obviously, I liked that.

The prophecy made in 1933 has come to pass, and we begin the 21st century. As we begin the 21st century.

Well, for me as a researcher, everything he's talking about in that—

You're devouring this.

Yeah, I know.

I mean, it's so great.

Yeah. I mean, and there's, you know, I mean, some of his quotes in that book are in my— are in this book, are in my latest book, because I also love quotes, these little collections of words that just impact you and stay with you. And I keep them. I have a quote collection. I have thousands of them. So when I go to write a book, I mean, I live and die over chapter titles and quotes.

How do you collect them? In a document?

In a document, yeah.

Yeah, I have a thread in my phone too, of course.

Yeah, I collect them. And at one time, my book agent at the time said, everybody asked me, 'Cause everybody's hearing about your quote collection. We should like, do a book of your quote collection. So we sold the book as a quote collection to Atria Books. And after they bought it from me, then they said, what we really want you to do is we want you to write a book and we want you to tell us how those quotes changed your life. I was like, all right, I thought this was gonna be easy, but it turned out to be a wonderful challenge. And a terrific little book that I called "Wake Up Calls." And it's wonderful 'cause I have people, I've met people who in airports who say, "You wrote that book, 'Wake Up Calls,' and it sits on my nightstand." Like, I love that. My husband says, "Why do you keep writing books? It takes so long. You could go do 4 speeches for the same amount of money." I said, "Yeah, but the book ends up on their nightstand, you know?" There's just something about that.

Yeah, and it's personal.

It's personal, yeah.

Yeah. So when you first read this book, do you remember how long it took you to read it the first time?

I don't know how long. I devoured it, I can tell you that.

Which for you means a week, 2 weeks, how long?

Maybe less. No, I'm a pretty good reader.

Like over a weekend?

Yeah, I mean, I started a book on the plane and coming from New York to San Francisco, my book tour started up north. And by the time I got on the plane to come down here, I'd finished that book and started the next one because I just love reading. But I don't, I mean, this was a long time ago. This was when I was in my early, or just turning 40.

So for somebody who hasn't read it, just kind of give a synopsis of what it is.

So Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water is, A metaphor, I guess you'd say, that basically in its simplest form says that we need to learn how to stay resilient and stand and stay in our convictions and feel powerful. But you also have to understand that when there's something in the way, like a rock is in the way of the water, the water goes around it. It finds its way to the bottom, to where it wants to be, but it finds another way to get there. And that says that we have to be flexible and we have to not just say, "No, we're gonna do it my way, damn it!" That sometimes yet there are other ways around things and that you need to be able to be resilient and have some like intuition and some insight and some understanding of situations so that you can figure out about, you know, sometimes it's better to, what's the saying, to stay even than to get even. And sometimes that means learning to flow like water as in addition to standing like the mountain. It's balance. It's learning to balance kind of the mind and the body and the soul at the same time. So yeah, I'm strong here. I have the upper hand, but oh, You have a good point. So maybe I should kind of, you know, figure out how we can compromise here and achieve the end goal. It's that kind of a thought process. And I mean, the guy teaches stress management. So this is understanding how to make your way through life, how to navigate life's changes, not just bad times, but sometimes good times, challenges, growth, kinds of change in a way that you're not all stressed out. I mean, that's his goal, really. In fact, I don't know if it's in this book or a subsequent book, but he talks about stress actually being an interesting source of personal growth, which people don't think of it that way. They think of stress as like incredibly annoying. And I remember one time, did he write the book? It might've been someone else that said that parenting is like, your kids are like your own little Buddhas. Why? Because they make you come up with compassion, understanding, patience, and that they are your little exercise. In patience and understanding, and that they help you grow in those aspects of your personality. And there's really a lot of truth to that. Do you have kids?

No.

Oh, well.

I was a kid.

But you were a kid. I have a feeling that maybe you're still a little bit of a kid.

Yeah, for sure.

I think I see that.

So in the book, he's, He's kind of borrowing from Buddhism, Christianity, Native American, Taoism, Jung psychology. Uh, he's kind of like picking from, from everything.

He's a grown-up hippie.

Yeah, which I like.

He was consuming— I'm sure that he was consuming all of that that kind of manifested itself into the Brian Luke Seawood, Seawood, which now is teaching mindfulness and stress management to young people today, you know, as a college professor and writing books like this.

So he talks a lot about the different spiritual roadblocks.

Yeah.

When you were in your early 40s and experiencing this book, what were your blocks, your spiritual roadblocks, do you think?

I guess what you're asking me is figuring out how I could solve this problem before me, you know, changing my life, going through a divorce in as amicable way possible, but as not having the biggest public disaster possible. But also, in the end, I realized that that was only one aspect of it. In the end, I realized it was also to have the least emotional disturbance. And in his subsequent book, Desserts Is Stress Spelled Backwards, that book taught me something that I actually manifested one day in one phone call when my husband, ex-husband called me and started in on me And in that moment, I thought, I'm not going there anymore. In that instant, I said, you know what, I'm not having this conversation anymore. I'm not— I'm choosing not to spend any more emotional energy on this anymore. I won't have this conversation anymore. And I hung up, and I never have since. But also, it's not just the phone call. It means that you have to also end that conversation in your head.

How do you do that?

That's much harder. That's the conversation in your head. You know, I should have told him this and I should have told him that 'cause I was right. And like that conversation takes longer to extinguish. But you can put that fire out too. It takes longer. It takes reading more guys like this. But you can extinguish that. But it's kind of coming to that realization that it's possible.

Yeah.

You have to understand. You have to have that. You have to come to that concept that it is possible to be able to feel that it's worth working on.

It's good. Let's— can I trade you?

Sure.

So can we, can we just kind of go through this and let's just start with the very first tab. All right.

So your tabs here. All right.

So page 1.

Yeah.

It opens with this quote by Mark Twain. Will you read it?

So I love this quote and I have used it in a little different form in a bunch of my books. I'm an old man who has known a great many problems. Most of which never happened. Now, another way of saying— I've used it as, I've been through some terrible things in my life, some which actually happened. And whenever I use that in a speech, women are like, oh my God, I do that all the time. And there's another one that's like paying dues on a debt not yet incurred. I love that one.

That one hits hard.

That's— and sometimes my kids will say things, I'm saying, uh-uh, they'll say, I know, I know, I'm paying dues on a debt not yet incurred. I said, you are, like, you're worrying about something that's probably not going to happen.

You do a great impression of your kids and I've never met them. All right, 22, I'm gonna read this to you because I think, I think that this was written for you. Okay, even though he probably didn't know you when he wrote this, but it may come as no surprise to women to learn that they have been handicapped regarding expression of anger. To show, vent, or display frustration detracts from the feminine nature that Western culture has deemed socially acceptable. In her book The Dance of Anger, author Harriet Lerner highlights the social mores that have denied women the ability to feel and express anger. She writes, the taboos against our feeling and expressing anger are so powerful that even knowing when we are angry is not a simple matter.

So I had a very big lesson in this one the day that, um, a judge made a ruling that I— of how much alimony I was going to have to pay my husband until we went to court, $17,000 a month. I was in the back of a car on my way to a story with a producer at ABC. And somehow they called— a writer from the New York Post called ABC and said, "I'm trying to reach Joan Lunden." And that ABC operator reached the producer, and the producer handed the phone to me, and I didn't really get what was happening in the moment. And they said, can we just get your opinion on the judge's ruling? And I said, yeah, tell my husband to get a job. Well, that, that was the headline in the New York Post the next day. Big, big, big letters. Do you have that framed in your office? Get a job. Which didn't go over really big. And there's another newspaper in New York, the New York Daily News, and they're very competitive. So the headline the next day was, pay up or shut up, which meant for me, the new female editor moneyed spouse, like, it's your turn now. So, so it be— and that literally just blew up, and that's why the tabloids followed that story for the next year. So that was kind of a big lesson in that as a woman, you are not supposed to express your anger. Yeah, I kind of learned that one real— I— that was a big old lesson.

Yeah, it's funny how, uh, different the rules were.

Oh yeah, that was like— and after— and ABC came to me afterwards, said, how could you have said something like that? As a woman, you should have known better.

Yeah. And you're like, how come you handed me the phone?

Yeah.

So funny. Let's go to, uh, page 225. And I love— I love this one.

I plagiarized him a lot, but he knows that. He told me I could use anything I want. So, that the birds fly overhead, this you cannot stop. That they build a nest in your hair, this you can prevent. And that's, you know, I just love that one. You know, it's kind of, well, look, it's kind of like his book. No, it's kind of like Jon Kabat-Zinn's book, You Can't Stop the Surf, but you know, You Can't Stop the Waves. But you can learn to surf. And like, you know, that's such an inevitable in life. Like there's just, things are gonna happen. You can't stop 'em. But if you can learn how to emotionally deal with them and not let them like make you insane, then you have this ability to stay balanced and it just makes life so much nicer.

Yeah. And focus on the things you can control. 'Cause you control a lot. You control your energy. Absolutely.

Your work ethic. Yep.

Your perspective, right?

And my life, I feel like my life in the last 15, 20 years has been so much more enjoyable, not just 'cause I got a fantastic second husband, which I did, but it's because I've learned to manage stress so much better than in the previous 20 years.

Well, yeah, you worked on yourself.

Because I learned and, And it just makes walking through life and dealing with people and dealing with stuff, sometimes bad, sometimes good, but you still have to deal with it. You still have to make decisions. You still have to make choices. And I just feel like I've been much better equipped since I had some of these revelatory, to me, revelatory lessons.

There's one part here on 295, which is the ending of the book.

I'm there.

Okay, will you read this one?

Once, once awakened, the power of love is limitless. An ancient Chinese voice of wisdom said it best this way: if there is light in the soul, there will be beauty in the person. If there is beauty in the person, there will be harmony in the house.

So it says, if there is harmony in the house, there will be order in the nation. If there is order in the nation, there will be peace in the world.

Oh, and isn't this time in the world teaching us that?

It really is. Like, it's very relevant to today.

Very relevant to our world today.

But it starts with us.

Yes. And I'll tell you, I speak a lot to women's groups, and I tell them that I went through this, like, kind of a transformation where I, took care of my health, and then I took care of my happiness. And my happiness took care of my life. Because once you're happy and you kind of exude that effervescence, that happiness, that attracts people to you. Mm-hmm. And I think that's why I ended up with this fabulous, great man that I now spend the rest of my life with. And, you know, I don't think it's just somebody— I don't think it comes from the outside. I think it comes from the inside.

Well, I think that the lesson that I take away from, from what you've shared with us today is that it all comes from intentionality.

Yeah.

You've been very intentional in taking your happiness and, you know, working on it yourself, not leaving it to chance, not leaving it for somebody else.

It's almost kind of like I learned more about it at one point in my life by studying it. And it just made a great transformation that made the rest of my life so much more enjoyable.

Yeah, there's a powerful intentionality to just the fact that you connected those two dots and you're like, no, I'm going to work on this.

Yeah.

I'm going to try to discover and figure out what this is and how I can get better. And then I'm sure you're— how you changed as a person then attracted your husband.

Yeah.

Energy was different than the first time you got married.

And we have to continue working on it. I think we have to always continue working on it. Like, I think sometimes, like, even in my wonderful marriage with kids that I— my second round of kids, you know, with my second husband, we have two sets of twins. They're now 21 and 23. But as they were like younger, and I found sometimes I was getting stressed out, and I once again employed this same theory and said, I don't wanna be that person that gets upset and like yells at my kids. Like I need to, I need to change that. And I literally chose to change it. And then you can notice a change. We have that power. I don't think everybody understands that we have that power. I feel like really lucky that I learned that we have that power. Yeah.

You have broken a lot of ground. Okay, so the big question.

Yeah.

How did Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water by Brian Luke Seaward, a hippie from Colorado, change your life?

Ah, he made me a much more resilient, compassionate, understanding, stress-free— not always stress-free, but stress-free person. Thank you, Brian.

Thank you, Brian. It's great. That's so fun. Well, thank you for picking this book and turning us on to it.

Yeah. You hadn't read it?

No.

Well, I mean, it's kind of an abstract book. There's no reason why you would have particular— and I don't really remember how I came to it. I wish I did, but it was just too long ago. But it— and I'm not sure it was the first one. I might have read— I might have read You Can't Stop the Waves, But You Can Learn to Surf. Like, I read these 3 books, like, right in a row. Um, and Emotional Resilience, David Biscott. Oh, and Wherever You Go, There You Are.

I love that title.

That was Jonathan Kabat-Zinn, right?

I don't know the author, but I know the book.

And that book basically says that we all have a lens. And that lens is created by all the experiences you've had in your life, all your biases, all the things you like, don't like, all the things you're afraid of. And that as you walk through life, that's the lens you see life through. So you and I might listen to someone and we, our takeaway is different. Because my takeaway is gonna be through my lens that's different than your lens. And that too, to me, was like revelatory to just like to realize like wherever we go, like it's how all the things we've ever experienced is kind of how we're gonna experience life. And I think that's important right now in today's world, except it's really being messed up I think, by the internet and algorithms, 'cause those algorithms are changing the way, they're changing people's lenses, and not in a good way.

Yeah, no, it's just more of the same.

Yeah, so instead of us having our own natural lenses that we used to have, that just came from living life and being with your friends in school and all just the things that happened to you, now, these kids are getting those lenses formed by what they're seeing on their phones. It's a very different kind of life.

Yeah.

Which is gonna make a different future. That's a whole other, that's a whole other podcast that I don't even know if I wanna think about.

I mean, kind of two things that came to mind too is when you were talking about how we bring our own perspective to things, is it's interesting, like, when you first read this book, your take on it would be completely different than if you read it again today because you've changed.

Yeah.

And we change over time.

Oh yeah.

Also, and then the other thing, one of the favorite parts of doing this show for me is so often people have a book come into their life and it's the book they need at that moment. There's like a magic to it that was not sure how It just appeared, or they walked into a bookstore, something happened, but the teacher met the student at the time of their highest need. And books are magical.

Yeah, books are magical. Books are so important.

So fun. Well, thank you for doing this. We appreciate it. We are so excited to announce the Books That Changed My Life website. We made a way for for you to show your book pride and that you love books. Hats, tees, hoodies— check it out, link in the description. Everybody needs a self-help hat.