203: Re-Opening: What's Next? When and How Will You Leave the House? With Dr. MJC

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What's next? This is a question we're all having to ask and answer more frequently. I'm Jenny Blake, your host of the Pivot Podcast and author of Pivot. The only move that matters is your next.

Notes from this episode. Visit pivotmethod.com podcast if Change is the only constant, then let's get better at it. Here we go.

Welcome back to the Pivot Podcast, everybody. I'm here again today with Dr. MJC. We did our last episode that was focusing on the pandemic and where things are in episode 186 on Apocalypsis, Improv and Light. That was on April 11th. We are recording this one today on Thursday, April 30th and I actually wanted to start us off with a recording of the 7pm soundscape here in New York City and start this conversation with a note of gratitude to all of the workers, everybody who's working in the hospitals, working in public transportation, delivery services, the restaurants that are still operational, every single business that has found a way to stay in service during this time. And so I'm going to play you this clip. I hope you enjoy.

Isn't that so beautiful?

Jenny, thanks. Thanks for asking me on and starting off the podcast with that. I'm speechless. So again, I think we've mentioned the past. I live in the middle sort of nowhere and that doesn't really that, you know, we're sort of so isolated but we see this on TV and hearing it in the moment is different.

Yeah, isn't it just this beautiful cacophony? It happens every night at 7pm for about a couple minutes. Definitely no more than five minutes. And sometimes the sounds even change. Last night there was a car alarm that added to the mix and someone was sliding some big metal thing. It's pretty cool and it's so cool to hear people do it day after day as well.

I think just recently didn't like the Thunderbirds and the Blue Angels flew over a bunch of cities and I think we're seeing this huge expression of gratitude. And yesterday I finally caught the UPS driver usually comes in and I was like, hey, thanks a lot, and how are you doing? And you could tell he was just stressed just because I'm sure his days are really long. And so that was my little. I think I should bring a little pot and pan maybe every time one of those guys drives by or. It's interesting to hear all those sounds and to think behind each of those sounds is a person or a family just expressing their gratitude.

Yes.

Uh, yeah.

It's amazing in such a makeshift, improvisational way, which is what we talked about last time. The focus for today. Michael and I were touching base. We were thinking, what can we talk about? You know, it's been a couple weeks since the last one, and I'm always very wary of just adding to the noise. And so part of what I was saying to Michael is that I want to make sure we stay in our lane. We're not just trying to give news or offer advice. That's really not what I think we can uniquely offer at this time. Even if in the beginning we were early to having some of these conversations, what I think is going to be on many people's minds sooner than later is this notion of reopening the economy and leaving the house again. What I would love for this conversation to focus on is not what we think you should do. Not us trying to be experts on some high horse about that, but how are we going to think about it and offering some frameworks, some information. Again, nothing set in stone but how each person is going to individually assess risk and think about getting back out there. Before we jump into that, just to catch us all up a little bit, we are now a hundred days in and a million cases in the US of the coronavirus. So it was February 11 that the World Health Organization proposed the official name COVID 19. We are now seeing economic contraction of 30% on par with the Great Depression. And states and countries are handling this in different ways. So when we look at what's next, we see, you know, in New York, they're talking about a nightly plan for Subway Scrub Downs Europe. They're urging people to stay in their country of origin this summer, at least until mid June. They're not recommending anyone really travel internationally unless you have to, but certainly not to go anywhere until mid June. In San Francisco, Governor Gavin Newsom is talking about four stages that businesses will fall into. And I think these are quite interesting to frame our thinking as individuals of what businesses we might want to engage in or what activities we might want to engage in. So those four stages are essential Businesses as we have now, then moving on to lower risk workplaces that can't work from home. So that's weeks, not months away. As well as that would include schools, childcare facilities and public spaces like parks and trails. The third stage would be higher risk workplaces like movie theaters, gyms, salons, religious services and sports without live audiences. And Governor Newsom said that's months, not weeks away. And then the fourth stage would be reopening things like concert venues, conventions and sports stadiums. The Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai told employees that they could expect to work from home until at least June 1st. So that's interesting of just looking at no matter what the national guidelines are, that's what Google slash Alphabet is going to be doing and that even when they do return, it will be staggered and incremental all the way. On the other side of the spectrum, we have the Sweden Experiment of actually letting people be out and about even now to develop, quote, herd immunity. So that's a lot of like, kind of the range of, of some of what we're seeing and hearing in terms of opening things back up. Michael, is there anything that you would add to what you're seeing and hearing?

Yeah, you know, I think we are. I think the statistics show us we're on either side of the peak. So now it's the reality is hitting us of what are we going to do next. And Jenny, I think your summary was great. We have to, I think, continue to look long term. And the conversations that I'm having with my clients, just to let you know, we're talking about 12 to 18 months coming up with a plan for their businesses now that we're basically over the peak and have gotten a little bit of a handle on what's happening. And again, 12 to 18 months is sort of the, nobody's thinking anything about past that really. I do want to talk a little bit about the Sweden Experiment, which is I find very interesting. And if folks haven't had a chance to look at that, I think that was a New York Times article, an opinion piece that was published by Thomas Friedman back on the 28th of this month. So fairly new and it's got some good data on it. And just to clarify a little bit what they're doing, if I can, they are really cocooning or really protecting all those over the age of 65 and other individuals with healthcare conditions that make them more susceptible to Covid and at the same time not really having a lockdown, as you mentioned, Jenny, but rather having social distancing. They're basically allowing somewhat normal traffic. In fact, their schools, I think under grade nine are still open, including daycare centers. So they're taking kind of a risk that they're saying that the healthy people are more likely to do well. We're gonna be with us for a while and we're gonna try to have, as you mentioned, herd immunity. If you compare them in the article, I'm just quoting what's in the article. If you compare them to their Scandinavian neighbors, have their death rates are significantly higher, as you would expect. And so they've at some level have made some sort of calculated risk that this will get them to the other side of this a little more quickly. One of the things I want to mention because of the work I've done in the past around population health and when we talk a little bit about health disparities, Sweden is very different than the United States. And I think it's been on news quite a bit about the impact on those in lower socioeconomic parts of America, especially in the New York City, the five boroughs, really getting hit really hard with the disease and deaths. And unlike a lot of America, Sweden has a very strong public health system, has a lot of social services, and it's a pretty sort of, you know, the variability in their socioeconomic status isn't as great as the United States. So that being said, there may be a somewhat of a protective effect to their population because of what they've done on that side of the coin. So they're heavily invested in public health and social services for their citizens, which then obviously that water raises all boats. And so you tend to have a little bit of more healthy population. And if you look at the data and survival all across the board, Sweden is doing significantly better than the United states even before COVID 19. So I think it's interesting experiment and I think it speaks to us to some degree about the investment that we'll need to have in the future around public health. Because I think if we are a little bit more like Sweden, you know, this might be a little bit easier.

Trip, I'm so glad you brought up the public health aspect of this included when we talk about the Sweden experiment, because I will say this, there are days where I return to quote the new normal that everyone's talking about, and I'm not that scared. When I leave the house, I have a mask, I'm doing all the right things, and I'm just not that concerned. There have been other days where I think, okay, herd immunity. Yeah, at some point we're all gonna assess our own risk and think, should I leave the house? Should I go to this next thing, whatever it is, whether it's a beauty appointment, a medical appointment, a social picnic in the park, or even a restaurant. Gasp. And then there are days where we actually encountered a neighbor who is a nurse, and she had coronavirus. She had COVID 19. And she said she thought she was gonna die. She was literally on the verge just. It was absolutely as miserable, as horrible as the media that they barely don't, you know, don't even really cover just how bad it is. I had another friend who thinks that she had it, and she also said she thought she was gonna die, like she was making her peace. Basically. I. There's another person who I encountered who said, yeah, it wasn't that bad. And when we inquired further, it was that literally this person could not move, couldn't get out of bed for two weeks, could not get out of bed. I mean, and then that was his version of it. It was not that bad. So what's crazy, I'm not saying any of this to scare people, but these are all younger people. These aren't the ones that we directly think of as the most at risk. And it's just. It's such a gnarly thing that we're all going to have to confront. And here in the States, without, you know, stellar public health and safety net, it is this question of once you've known people who've had it, it is. It is frightening to think of that, and not just frightening from a standpoint of will I die? Certainly we don't want any of our loved ones to pass away. And I know that's already happened. Many people do know people who've passed from coronavirus, but there's also like, at what point am I willing to take the risk of getting that sick? And not everyone does. Of course. We know there are people who are asymptomatic and where they're just fine. But I think that's part of the cloud of uncertainty that's. That's going to hang over all of us as we contemplate how much are we willing to engage, no matter what the government says of what, whatever the guidelines are, how much are each of us individually willing to take on and willing to risk, and what is going to be worth that risk as we even think about when we're allowed to leave the house again?

No, absolutely. And I think there's also. Part of the calculus is it's not just ourselves, but the fact that if we are asymptomatic? Are we going to infect someone else in our family or our friends or even unwantedly, someone we don't know that's helping out in the grocery store or is a mail carrier or somebody else that we're interacting with on a regular basis. So, yeah, those are all questions. And you started off this conversation, Jenny, with asking how we're kind of approaching with these individually. And maybe I can kick that off a little bit. But I think by what you're saying there, that is part of the conversation we're having in my family is not just the risk to ourselves, but the unintended consequence of one of us catching COVID being asymptomatic or having a very mild disease and then being the case that then gets somebody else sick, you know, and contrast that with the potential benefit, quote unquote, that Sweden is trying to derive. Or in many cases, I think people have seen the plasma donations that are happening for people who have had, you know, convalescent, you know, basically after they've had the disease, they're donating their blood, which then gets. The plasma gets extracted and then given to patients who are very sick. So there's this weird calculus that we started these conversations we're having in our family. It's like, wow, you know, if one of us got sick, but then we did well, and then we could actually go down to the hospital and get our blood drawn and see what the levels are and then give our blood as treatment. So those are conversations we're having. And so we're still, you know, I don't think we've, in general, as a family, made up our minds on what direction we're going to go. But we're definitely taking pretty big precautions to continue to protect ourselves.

This is already projecting into a future that we don't know how things will unfold even in the next few weeks. But I'm curious to know your thought process, Michael, especially with two doctors in the family, how you will approach. The government says, okay, stage one is over. Essential services, we know those are running even now. Let's say we enter a stage two, like what Governor Gavin Newsom is proposing. And I love, of course, that we're listening to the governors now, right, the national guidance, because who could the whole.

Conversation around that, right? How.

Right, right.

The governors are taking care, but, you.

Know, okay, but we'll keep that for another conversation. So let's say we move into PH too, where it's okay. The businesses that cannot work from home are allowed to reopen so that includes. Oh by the way, our vet is still open. We had to drop Ryder at the door. We couldn't go inside with him. But they are still operational. But let's say restaurants reopen. I think that's a very interesting example because the restaurant industry has been hit so hard and they're so beloved in all of our communities. The especially the small restaurants, not the chains, those are the heart and soul. They're the, the family kitchen. You know of these cities they just mean so and so many of them are negatively impacted. And by the way, you just must listen to the daily Gabrielle, I'm forgetting her last name. The founder of Prune, it's a restaurant in the Lower east side. It was such a poignant episode and David Chang has had such poignant episodes. Founder of Momofuku and the Prune conversation where she might not be able to reopen. It's also was a written piece. So anyway, I'm going to link to both. So hypothetically speaking, restaurants reopen because they can't work from home. Would you go? How would you approach that? How would you assess the risk? How would you, how are you going to decide if and when you want to go? And what would you even advise your kids?

That's a great question. So let's start with that example. Let me get really concrete. There is a shout out to curious goods. The bake of an inn. It's a farm to table restaurant about four or five miles from our house, which is basically where we live, like literally next door. Right. So but so we're close with the owners. We eat there very often. We've made a commitment. I think I've mentioned in past shows that we are ordering. We're doing takeout at least once a week and a lot of times order enough for another day. So we're batching our. And just really quickly I think in thinking about your question, I would call up Katherine and say, hey, we're now releasing this.

Phase two. How are you guys doing? And I mean I have a conversation, I guess that's you're asking what I would do. I would feel more comfortable going with a restaurant that I know and have some sort of personal relationship with. And I would just ask them just really plain question like hey, how are you guys doing on this? What precautions are you taking? I want to make sure you feel comfortable us coming and have, I don't know, it's a 30 second conversation, a 45 second conversation that I think would.

Allay our fears to some degree but also I think.

Communicate that we're also concerned and maybe give some positive reinforcement to whatever they're doing. Right? So, like behavioral economics kind of stuff. So, like, okay, if you're getting positive reinforcement to reinforce, to do the kind of things you should be doing and having that interaction right off the cuff, that would be the first restaurant I would sit in, but I would call Catherine and just say, you know, look, we're kind of going to come over. How are things going? How are you doing this? And go from there and then slowly kind of get out of our little turtle shell of I. Social isolation. I think it's.

And would you wear masks in the restaurant? Would you have gloves?

Yeah, I'm sorry, we would wear masks.

I think I would go there only if the waiters and waitresses, the service people or folks are also wearing masks. I know they're actually doing that because we pick up curbside. They're doing that. And I've seen them pictures of the kitchen. Everybody's wearing masks and wearing gloves. And then just what is a turnover like, in the table? I would ask the questions like, okay, is this table ours for the day? Or, I mean, I'm sorry, for the night or something? Or when's the last person that came through and how are you cleaning it and what are you using to clean? And it gets kind of technical. But, yeah, we would definitely, I guess maybe answer your question. More specifically, we would definitely wear masks. Obviously, it's a little hard to wear masks and eat, right? So that becomes then the social ISO. The social distancing question. So that means tables at least six feet apart between your family and other people, because you can act, you know, you're not able to eat and wear masks. And then hand sanitizer at the door, maybe even hand sanitizer at the table, as I'm thinking out loud, things like utensils and plates. I know there's some conversations with some restaurants about using only disposables, but that gets really expensive and not the best thing for Mother Nature. So I think I'd be willing to know that if they're doing good cleaning, to use those. Using the facilities there, I guess, would be another question, right? To make sure that that's properly cleaned between people. I know there's. I saw something yesterday where they're like, I think in California, the restaurants they're going to open, they're making sure that for every other sink at the communal bathrooms are kind of taped off so you can't wash your hands right next to each other. That's a great idea.

I've seen some public transportation. They're going to put stickers of how far apart to stand.

I mean, there's a whole industry now in taping off floors, I think.

Right. Cuomo in New York was saying that, you know, this whole thing about sanitizing the subways every night out of respect for the essential workers who are traveling on them. And I was thinking to myself, at what point would I be willing to get back on the subway? I don't know. You know, and I was thinking the subway or even in an Uber, you don't know who was just in there before you. And I think in the beginning, we're all gonna be more hesitant than not. Probably. Maybe there are gonna be some people that just bolt out the door, no, Hallelujah, let me outta here. You know, and they don't care and they, they just go for it. And some people, I think depending on your personality type, for some people, the, the worrying about getting sick, to them, they're like, they will reach a point where they're so sick of it, they don't care if they get sick. They don't even care if, as the people who have told me where they said, I felt that I was on the verge of death, maybe they're not going to care. They're there. Let's just say there will be a category of people that don't give a shit. They're like, staying home is worse or not working is worse. Um, and this is not to have any insensitivity to the people who feel right now, currently that they have to go to work or they'll, you know, I, I feel, I feel for the people who are saying, don't call me a hero. I'm not working by choice. I don't have a choice. I can't feed my family if I don't go to work right now. And I'm not really doing this by choice. I'm not really putting myself in danger by choice, but it's the only way to feed my family. So I think barring that and of those essential workers, there are going to be some people that, and I guess I'm talking more from the perspective of each individual, let's call them patrons or members of society. So even less from the business of when should you reopen and how. I'm more curious of how each person is going to decide. And for me, I thought, okay, what if a friend who lives in lower Manhattan, So like a 30 minute subway ride invites me to something even if it was A socially distanced walk in the park, would I go? At what point would I be ready and willing to go? Especially knowing that public transportation and even things like Ubers, more people have gotten sick. Like subway drivers, conductors have gotten sick. And so for me, it's going to be a really interesting calculus. And there are services that I might have done before. Like, I know it's so silly, Michael, but the lady listeners can understand. But like a mani pedi, okay? This used to happen once a month. It was just like a part of personal grooming. And once a month was really at a minimum. And now I even have myself thinking, let's say the nail salons reopen. Am I willing to go or am I going to just. This is talk about the new normal. And I know this is very superficial, okay. But it's just one example of you're in direct contact with another person. And like you said, for me not to get sick, but also me not to get someone sick, I've thought about, if I get invited to speak somewhere, not only if that organization is willing to host the event, should I, in good faith, out of integrity, should I get on a plane and track germs through New York City, this hub of infection, out to wherever I'm speaking. Like, even that doesn't seem like a good idea.

Yeah. So here's what comes to my mind as you're saying this and as we talk about this more is personal responsibility and personal accountability. I think in hearing what you're saying, Jenny, and how I'm thinking about this, it's what is my responsibility. And that's, again, I'm not telling folks what to do. I'm reflecting on what you're saying and how you're saying it and how I'm approaching this is I'm gonna try to do the best thing I can do. Just like when I drive my car, I drive at a relatively safe speed, right? Observe traffic rules, wear my seatbelt, which protects me. I mean, if I get in a car wreck and I hit something else, whether or not I wear seatbelts doesn't affect the other car, but affects me and my passengers and I. So I'm going to run with this analogy for a second. There are things that I do to get in the car, and there's experiences and tests and those kinds of things that happened before I got in the car and will do as I drive because it is potentially a lethal thing that I'm doing. And maybe just the mind shift is this is sort of like the same sort of thing what precautions am I taking? Am I wearing my seatbelt or in this case a mask? Am I observing social distancing? Am I doing all the things I can do to reduce the risk to myself and other people otherwise? Because I guess as I think about it, it's an interesting analogy because every time you leave the house that you could die in a car, right? It's not 100% guarantee that something bad isn't going to happen to you or you're going to strike someone else by accident. But you do everything to reduce that risk. You mitigate those risks. And as you're what I'm hearing you say, it's like, you know, if I want to get a mani pedi, what am I going to do? I'm going to walk there the rest of my life? No, I have to get in a car and go get those services. So there's always a risk.

Well, in New York, I might legitimately walk there. I might say, oh yes, I will walk the hour and back a to get exercise, but also to minimize risk.

I love what you just said, this question and thank you, mjc, for pulling out this inquiry here of what is my responsibility? That's a great. Every day we could just check in with that and with whatever activity eventually as things open up, we do decide to do. It's just what's my responsibility here and how can I do what whatever activity this is most responsibly. It also occurs to me, Jeff Bezos, his regret minimization framework that I talk about even in Pivot, which is, you know, in the context that he said it, it's what would he regret more, doing this thing or not doing it. For me, there's going to be. That question is going to come into play in terms of regret minimization, as in If I contract COVID 19 from this activity, will it have been worth it? Will it have. Will it have been a good choice or will I reg having done that thing? Now, of course we cannot know this and we nor can we know exactly where it does come from if and when we do get sick. But I'm going to think of it that way. I'm going to, I'm going to really be asking myself, how would I feel if this was the thing that led to that and what is it still worth going and going and doing so responsibly or do I want to adapt? You mentioned the Thomas Friedman article. I just have to read a small excerpt for people because whether you agree with the Sweden experiment or not, and I love Thomas Friedman, as a writer, he said that this pandemic has often been described as a war with an invisible enemy and that the war metaphor is wrong and misleading. He says wars are fought and won by humans. But when you're in a struggle with one of Mother Nature's challenges, like a virus or climate change, the goal is not to defeat her. Her, no one can. She's just chemistry, biology and physics. The goal is to adapt. Mother Nature does not reward the strongest or the smartest. She rewards the species that are the most adaptive in evolving the chemistry, biology and physics that she has endowed them with to thrive, no matter what she throws at them. And that's so pivot friendly. You know, the whole notion of pivot is how do we adapt? And I love this reframe here. And I had mentioned on a previous episode, and then I was sort of feeling self conscious that I also didn't like the war metaphor. But I love this notion of our goal is to adapt now and in the future. And you mentioned these business planning that you're doing for the 12 to 18 month timeline. And I see that for us as individuals too, the goal will not be to have any answers. It's not going to be some, all or nothing, leave the house or don't. The goal is going to start to be adapting every day to every new circumstance.

Yeah, no, absolutely. And I believe, you know, someone at some point told me that the only move that matters is your next one. So I'll just take that from you, Michael.

I love that.

Exactly right. So your next move, really, That's, I mean, yeah, I mean, that's the only thing that, you know, the only thing that matters is your next move. Right. So you can't change the past. You can't change decisions that have gone forward or gone backwards. You can sort of say, okay, what's my level of accountability? What's my. How do I mitigate these risks? How do I, as individual, you know, move forward from this? And I also, you know, when I read that part about adapting naturely, nature is perfectly designed to do the thing it's designed to do, right? So, so there it would take us, I guess I should say it's taken millions of years for nature to come up with the coronavirus, basically. Right? And for whatever reason it is doing exactly what it's supposed to be doing. We, we need to do the same. We need to adapt and change going forward. Because what if there is no vaccine? What if, you know, just yesterday remdesivir got approved and it has about a 31% looks like chance of improving symptoms. But what if that's the only thing that we have? We need to continue to adapt.

You just reminded me I gotta pivot to something very tactical here. The nurse who was sick and she said what she wished she had known before she got sick. And I kept meaning to say we are. Can I fit this into the Pivot podcast And I'm sorry now that it's halfway through an episode. So this is for the. Toward the end of the podcast club listeners. She said she wishes she had Gatorade in the house. And I found on Amazon Gatorade packets where you just add water. Cuz Gatorade takes a lot of space and has a lot of sugar and an oximeter. She said that her oxygen was really low and that's one of the things that worried her the most. And you can get a pulse oximeter. Am I saying it right, Michael? You can get it on Amazon.

Exactly. Okay.

Okay. She wishes that she had that. That she would have. It would have been a big help while she was at home to have been able to monitor her oxygen levels. And she being a nurse did not want to go into the hospital. She said she knows what happens there, she wanted to avoid it. But those two things. So I'm going to pass that along to listeners. I think part of this adapting is also learning from each other. What do you wish you had known? What do you wish you had Continuing to be stocked up. And there is a site I just read about a Silicon Valley site for prepping. I think it's called the Prepared. I'll go find it.

Yes, I've seen before.

Yes, yes. They're. They're trying to separate how preparers get kind of a bad rap and it gets caught up in a lot of political or it just the whole notion of preparedness or preparing for the apocalypse gets. It does get tangled in certain communities. And this site is for rational preppers. Like actually the tips on why it's important to prepare, how to be prepared. So I'm going to put it in the notes. Is the domain the prepared?

I think so, yeah. I haven't looked at it. I looked at it many, many moons ago. Yeah, I haven't looked at it in a while, but I haven't done the.

Deep dive yet either. Yeah, the prepared.com common sense prepping guides.

What you said about the nurse and the Gatorade and those couple simple steps. I think that there are so many simple things we can do going forward and what just boom. Just forgot to mention was, I know it sounds kind of strange, but there's only a few ways not sounds strange the way I'm going to say it's going to sound strange. There's only a few ways the virus can get in your body. We've been concentrating so much on masks and so one of the things that we've talked about in our families, what are we doing is should we just start wearing glasses and sunglasses? Because the other way it gets in really through your eyes, your mucous memories and your eyes.

I forgot to mention that earlier, that's such a simple thing to include. And people aren't healthcare workers are doing the shields. The reason they're doing that is to protect their eyes really.

From a direct barrier, basically. And so it's just like simple things. I'm thinking.

I need to start putting make sure everybody in our car to make sure everybody has a pair of sunglasses or a pair of glasses if they wear glasses when they leave. And I don't know why that triggered that. It's like a simple thing that is just right in front of you, literally in front of your eyes. And we're not doing. I hadn't thought. And actually we sort of had that conversation. Every heading, follow up in that. Sorry, had to do like that last little promo there on using glasses.

I think it's great. I mean, that's the kind of thing that we're all building the skill of how to protect ourselves in terms of our health during a. During a pandemic. And that might seem like a very random skill. We may, everything I'm hearing says prepare for a resurgence in the fall. So even if things open back up in the summer, we may need this again sooner than later. Like you said. What's the thought experiment around if it doesn't go away, if there is no vaccine, and then, then worst case, this is the biggest pandemic of our lifetimes and we learn all these skills around personal health and safety that we don't end up using for another 10, 20, 30, 40 years. I don't know. But that seems like a good sort of asymmetric bet to place. Like let's do the small things. Have an extra pair of sunglasses around, have a mask and some gloves, have a preparedness kit. There's very little downside to learning these things and improving our preparedness and our skills around these things. Even if here's hoping we just don't have to use much of it.

You're absolutely right, it is. And I thought about the small investment asymmetric Investment, Right. So in our lives we do little tiny things that reduce our risk greatly.

But they're very, very simple. Again, I use the analogy of wearing your seatbelt when you drive. It's such a simple task, but if you don't do it, and even it's a small risk that you'll get into an accident, things are going to come out poorly for you. I'm also interested from your perspective as you are doing this back to work piece and other kind of things, what is your triggers for agreeing to going to a live event? Let's say it's relatively small. Let's say it's facilitating a dozen people or something like that. What kind of things are you thinking about out that have to happen? Because it might help me kind of reflect on that a little bit if it were okay.

The last event I attended was March 13, and I knew even then I didn't want to take the subway. So I booked a car to get to New Jersey. It was an hour ride each way, which is pretty expensive to do car service. I think I paid at least a hundred dollars each way, not including the tip. But looking back, I'm glad I did that. And that was, I just sort of baked it into the cost of the event to protect myself. So let's say if I got invited to something in New York, first of all, in all my contracts now I have a new contract for virtual only. And even the virtual only contract includes if the event cannot happen due to speaker illness or unforeseen circumstances, it can be postponed but not canceled. If I get sick, I need to. Now in every contract and every agreement, I definitely need to understand what would the backup plan be if I got sick. And at the same time, you know, if, and I'm, I'm for virtual events, I'm going to be charging up front. Not everyone will agree to that, but that's something I'm going to be doing. And I don't plan on giving deposits back because any organization that's going to engage with me, even if we postpone from my end or theirs, let's say some big news breaks out and they have to shift and go back to basics or something. That's totally understandable and it's not a problem. I'm going to experiment with a six month window stipulation. So I, I generally don't like things hovering indefinitely like, oh, okay, we canceled and who even knows when you'll reschedule. I like to keep things at least within six months or the calendar year. If I got invited to speak in New York. And this is the first time I'm thinking this through. So thanks for prompting me. I would either try not to take public transportation at all, or I would try to walk there, or I would probably book a car and I would need to talk with the organizer about if I'm going to be signing books afterward. Is it where I'm sitting at a table and one after another people are coming up again, or do I pre sign all the books? As I sometimes do something that would minimize the interactions and almost after the event, a lot of people will often come speak to me afterward. It's like, would I, would I do that or would I. I have some socially distanced, some 6ft perimeter or some different way that we handle Q and A. And if I was invited to an event out of the state, partly I'm thinking about the level of risk and is it, is it smart for me. I don't want to unintentionally bring contagion from New York. But the other thing is, and I hate to be crass, like, it's got to be the money's got to be there. I'm not going to accept smaller payments than my new 2020 rates for. I'm just not going to do it. There's too much risk for me to say yes to some of the things I might have in the past just because.

Anything that pays the rent is a good thing. And I'm generally grateful for the whole range of invitations that I receive. But moving forward, really, the money's going to have to be there and it's going to be a factor.

I think it's great that you were thinking about this book signing piece because you're right, that is a high risk event. So if you go in and you do all you said, you say, but now you expect to be signing something, what can you do to reduce everyone's potential risk? So.

Right off the bat it's like, okay, we know that Covid lives on texture services a lot longer than flat services. So right off the bat, this is for anybody who's signing books and sending them out, like all of our friends, right? So let's see, Mike Michalowis just had his book published, right? And other folks, so, you know, sign your books two or three, four days in advance, put them a box, seal it up and let it sit in storage for a while. And then when you show up, you say, okay, these books have been signed, whatever, how long ago, once the box is opened in a clean fashion with, you know, Whatever wash your hands. Everything that's inside of it should be fairly safe. So I know that sounds kind of a weird kind of thing, just the way we're sort of handling groceries and shipments into our house. If we're going to do something like some sort of gift or giveaway to others for like a book signing, I think that that a smart way to go. About the other thing that maybe a flash in my head is the calculus that people have to make to leave their home and what is incentive and harking back to a podcast that you did a while back with Grant Baldwin from Speaker Lab and that conversations, I think my recollection was what does it take? What are the economics behind leaving your home, time with your family and those kinds of things and doing.

In person event? I think now that calculus, Jenny, is different. Right. You've noticed added a couple other variables to that math equation. And the things that you mentioned just a little while ago about your safety, the safety of others and that expense, I think it makes complete sense to me.

Yeah. So people will be making that cost benefit calculus for themselves individually with whatever nature of work they do. And another thing we were saying in momentum just yesterday is so two, two things that we talked about in momentum. One is I think we are all going to have an eye to how do we create a recession proof or pandemic proof business, even if the entire thing isn't black swan proof. Not that some are saying the pandemic was not a black swan. We easily could have seen it coming. We just weren't prepared. But nonetheless, I think we're all going to be very creative about how we diversify our streams of income, even more so than before. And it's going to be more important now than ever to look at that queen bee role you mentioned. Mike Michalowicz, he illustrates this concept so beautifully in his book Clockwork. And I talk about it in the Free Up Founder time course, which is what is that thing that you and only you can do in your business? And I will then extend that to the world. So within how do we serve during this pandemic? And again, using this conversation as an example, I didn't want to just add to the noise. So Michael and I were saying what is it that we uniquely can offer or our unique perspective, whether it's who we are, where we are or how we say it. And I do think that as things start to open back up, people are going to be asking themselves the tough questions, do I want to go back to the way things were or do I want to pivot now? Again, so many have been pivoted without choosing that. Like, just have it knocked on their heels and have to rebuild and do that in a. It just. It's going to take time, especially even for certain jobs to come back online. But I also think there's going to be people saying, what is my unique offering to the world? And not just within this, the subject matter of a pandemic. But was I happy with my contribution, with what I was doing? I just was on a zoom call and someone was fired, you know, during this time. And she said, you know, I wasn't that happy with what I was doing. So that's what I'm getting really curious about now, too, is what choices? If someone asked in momentum, if time and money weren't an issue, what would you be doing right now? And we know it's almost funny to ask that question because time and money are such huge issues at this moment. But what if they weren't? What would this time be teaching you and inviting you to offer in a way that is your unique queen bee role within all of this? And those are big questions. I don't know if any of us have the answers yet.

It's such a big question, folks listening to this. So Jenny posed this yesterday, and I can't stop thinking about it. And I shared that before the show. It's like I was doing some yard work this morning, and I'm like, what is my queen like? What is it that I'm doing? Because I think I've gotten caught up in the noise. So we started off this podcast with that beautiful cacophony of everybody clanging their pots and pans in that gratitude. That's great. But at the end of the day.

You can't make out certain things. And maybe I'm stretching that analogy a little bit. I don't want to be beating my pot and pan into the darkness. Great. In celebration. But what is my purpose behind that? And I'd love to have more conversations around this because I think the queen bee role that we each have really starts with reflecting. I think you mentioned that sort of reflecting to ourselves. What do we bring?

What is it we are uniquely. How are we uniquely serving? And I think that sometimes we forget we think we're doing it, but I think sometimes we get a little lost. It's a very deep question.

Well, I love your parallel to the cacophony. I love that I never thought of the noise of that with. Even for you, Michael, it's like, if you just said, okay, I'm a doctor and let me serve. Okay, but there are many doctors speaking up, so what kind? Okay, I'm was a pediatrician. I worked in the US Army. I have a business background. I really sit at the intersection. So as you hone in more and more and more, it becomes clear, at least clearer at every stage of that. And that's what I think is so interesting is. And we almost need to reflect with and from the help of other people because I think even you and I don't always know until we get feedback from listeners like, what is this helpful? What you know, and. And those messages have been such important fuel for us to say, oh, okay, we're reassured. Like, we hope we're not just adding to the noise. Last thing Michael, you had said before we came to this, that that episode 200 surprised you. You were the first person to comment on it. So I'm just curious to hear before you, before we close out, what surprised you as.

As I think I've discussed with, with Jenny and other folks that know me, I'm a very left brain, analytical kind of person. And even though I think I'm an empath at some level, I don't naturally gravitate to that. So when episode 200 came out, I actually was like a little frustrated about stuff. I'm like, okay, I know that it's supposed to drop sometime soon, so if you haven't listened to episode 200, I found it very emotionally stirring because I was kind of a little bit of a dark place. And I'm like, okay, let me just listen to something. And I said, oh, it's only like 12 minutes long. Oh, that's interesting. So right away that piqued my interest. And then the music. So you did the bumper at the beginning, whatever they usually get. And then the music starts and you start talking. And at first I was confused. I was like, wait, is she just reading like the podcast titles for the past however long you've been doing? No, that's not okay. What is she doing? And also I'm like, oh. And I found myself almost like a guided meditation. It was almost as if I needed to hear those words. And where I was on that day, which I think was Tuesday this week, I can't remember the exact day, but.

And then the most beautiful part, Jenny, that I wanna talk about a little bit, is that when you stop speaking, the music continued and I sat with myself and ground. Tried to. The words were grounding at some level, but also kind of like comforting, like it Was like a warm, like, you know, a brain blanket of like, oh, okay, I need to take some time to think about this. And for that two and a half, three minutes that music was going on. I was. And I do meditate regularly, but it was a different type of guided meditation because it usually, you know, you do gratitude meditations and all these other things. This was like, where, like, what am I doing? Where am I going? The questions that you posed and the queen bee thing just kept on, like, reverberating in my head.

It was very powerful. I mean, I had a very powerful experience through it. And I, you know, I feel kind of odd sharing this with you.

I love it.

But it was the right thing at the right time. It was like one of those universe again. Again, I'm a left brain person. So all this stuff like, you know, and then just to let you know. So Stephanie Houston, shout out to her, you know, I'm a Taurus and I guess there was a new Taurus moon. I don't know. I'm getting this all wrong, right? So she's giving me. She's got to give me some information I'm not used to. And I'm thinking, okay, how am I seeing the world that way differently? And it was like a nexus of a combination of the words, the music. And just because it was. Was this period that was relatively short and it was in that meditative moment that it got me into that has me just thinking about this queen B roll a lot more and the change. And I mean, I can't remember all the words that you mentioned there, but it was important and powerful for me to take a little bit of time. And I've been toying with the idea that when there's a dark place to kind of just going back to that and going, okay, what's the reset button for me on some of these things? Things. So, folks, if you haven't heard, it's less than 15 minutes of your life. Definitely worth a listen.

Thank you so much, Michael. Thanks for listening and for reflecting that I have a big smile on my face because I was thinking, how can I celebrate episode 200? But not in a way that is typically done, like 10 things I've learned in 200 episodes. That's what I did for episode 100. And Michael, my husband Michael, actually helped me brainstorm. And it was like, what if I just show, not tell. I just give you an experience. And the funny thing is that after I had uploaded and by the way, I downloaded the text itself, it just came to me in one morning with my coffee. And I didn't edit it. I didn't even reread it before I went to record. I recorded it one take all the way through, didn't edit it. And then I went to find music. I use a directory called pond5 and I found a song. The, the tune that I purchased was called Flow, had the word flow in it, which the whole point of this exercise for me was about flow. Downloading it in a way that was really connected and flowing, recording it and flowing and not overthinking, overanalyzing. And the music I had, I had cut it right when my voice stopped and I was all ready to go, ready to hit publish. And at the last minute I thought, you know what, I don't want to just jump them into the next episode and then the rest of their life. I actually am going to leave this silence. But as you know, I didn't explain it. It's just the song keeps playing. So I'm so happy to hear that it resonated. Thank you so much, Michael, for listening, for co hosting these Pandemic related podcasts with me and thanks again for another awesome conversation.

Thank you, Jenny. Be well and look forward to the next one. And again, well wishes and to the folks and hoping the folks who listen to this have taken just a little bit out of this from personal kind of thoughts about this. And if you get an opportunity, please, you know, ask us questions or you know, reflect on what was discussed today. That'd be really great.

So that would be awesome. You can submit@pivotmethod.com ask and if you also want to give feedback on the podcast overall, I'm at another inflection point where I really genuinely want to know what's on your mind. So you can also take the Listener survey@pivotmethod.com survey. Stay safe and sane, everybody. Everybody.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Pivot podcast. Make sure you don't miss an episode or my insider tips and templates by signing up for Pivot List, a curated twice monthly newsletter where I share the inside scoop on what I'm reading, watching, listening to and the latest tools I'm geeking out on. Sign up@pivotmethod.com pivotlist get show notes from this episode@pivotmethod.com podcast and connect with me on Twitter ennyblake.

Remember, build first, then your courage will follow. Hasn't it always.

Sam.