The Craziest Little Question Of All: What Should I Do With My Life?

Hi, welcome everybody, to the Becoming you podcast. I'm Susie Welch. And that noise you hear in the background because we're so professional around here is my dog Pierre, biting on his bone and oops, hope it doesn't gross you out. So, hi, welcome to this podcast. It's about becoming you, which is a methodology by which you figure out what to do with your frickin life. And I am your cruise director for this journey that we're going on. Everybody, all aboard. This is the first of our podcasts. I hope you're listening to this cause you're here to binge all of the podcasts. It's unreal how unprofessional we are. There's a dog chewing on a bone. We have a beautiful studio, but we've got a dachshund. Hey, Pierre, do we make it stop. It's okay. Okay. It's all good. It's all good. All right, look, the whole idea of this podcast is just I'm gonna rant and rave and also take questions and do some other things with it. But I have a great rant that I'd like to start out with because I just got back from the New York City Hat Luncheon, the ladies Hat Luncheon for Central Park Conservancy. And this is like the ultimate New York event for the spectacular New York women. We all don our unbelievable hats. If you're near a phone or computer, just Google New York City Hat lunch in Central park and just blow your mind. Because the unbelievably smart, sardonic, ironic women of New York come out in their unbelievable hats and they have a lunch and give money to Central park, which is a great public institution. There is no New York without Central park, just FYI. And so I go every year. But there's. It's just so much bigger than that. Because this. This podcast is about becoming you. And this is so woven into me becoming me. Because I have a hat luncheon that is just about life goals. I have a hat luncheon story that's about life goals. So when I was a young, impressionable girl of like 31, 32, total striver, like, moving around the country, My dad was an archite, my mom was an artist. And we were just this artsy, fartsy family business and success. And what happened in buildings downtown was just not part of our vernacular. And I was hopeful. I wanted to be a writer. I was like a really try hardy kind of girl. Cause I wanted to fit into the world and society, even though I didn't really Know what the world and society were. And I came on a business trip to New York on a beautiful May day, and I was walking down fifth Avenue, like after a meeting, and suddenly in front of me opened up this gigantic kind of pilgrimage of these spectacular, put together, beautiful, sophisticated New York women, like, of all aflutter in these unbelievable hats. And they all looked so happy and self confident and on top of the world, like these were the women of New York. And all I remember thinking is, I'm going to go to that party someday. I mean, I was like the kid with their nose up against the glass. And I wanted to go to that hat luncheon. I didn't even know what it was. I actually stopped and I asked a cop, where are they all going? And he looked at me like I had two heads, because everyone in New York knows about the hat luncheon. And he said, they're going to the hat luncheon at Central Park. And I was like, there's a hat luncheon? And there was no Google in those days, so I had to sort of find out what it was. And I did. And I remember, you know, like, lifegood goals, even though there were no hashtags when I was 32 and the term life goals did not exist. And frankly, I was so clueless. I had at that point, three out of my four children. I was in a marriage that fell apart. And I just knew that I wanted to be one of those women. It was like a beacon to me. Then eventually I showed up in New York and I showed up as pretty much a fancy person by those. That time in my life, my life had really, really changed. I'd married my second. Second husband. I was. I was doing stuff and kind of making waves. And one year a good friend of mine said, hey, you want to go to the hat luncheon with me this year? And it was like. Oh, like I felt like I had maybe arrived. And the first year I went, it was this incredible to be there and all these women. And I was like, I want to be in this world. And last year I chaired the dang thing last year I was one of the chairwomen of it. And I went to all the events where we picked the wine and the set, the table and picked the tablecloth, and it was really fun. It took me 63 years or whatever, 30 years from when I first saw it. So today I went. And it was kind of amazing because I brought my team with me and, you know, they're in their, like 20s and they were seeing the hat luncheon. So, like, I don't know what you guys think. What do you think? They're here.

Lots of hats.

Yeah, that's as good as it gets, Halle. It's lots of hats. You can't do better than that Super Bowl. It's a woman's Super Bowl. It's so true. We'll say all those women had their hats. I think that, you know, this show is so much about life goals because everybody has a dream of a life, and then we spend our entire life editing that dream of a life. There's just so many ways. So I teach a class at NYU Stern School of Business. Super proud to be on the faculty there. I'm a professor of management practice, and I teach this class called Becoming you, Crafting the authentic life you want and need. And every semester, I take groups of students on this journey towards figuring out what their values are, what their aptitudes are and what their interests are. What part of the economy calls them intellectually or emotionally. And then we synthesize all that data and we figure out what is their area of transcendence. What's at the center of what you really want to do. Those are your values, what you really can do because you're especially good at it, and what you should do, because it's a part of the economy that's growing, that calls you either on an intellectual level or an emotional level. And if you figure out what's in each one of those three spheres and then you synthesize it and you say, what would be the overlap? What's in the center? That's your area of transcendence. Or you could just say, that's your hashtag life goals. Right. Okay, so transcendence is a funny word. It sounds really woo, woo. But here's where it comes from. Maslov had the hierarchy of needs, which we all are so familiar with because we all went to high school, or most of us did. And for a long time at the top of that hierarchy of needs was self actualization. That is, you know, living your best life. That's sort of Oprah territory, just doing what you're really good at and being really happy. And that's fantastic. But then the world kind of changed, and part of it was the pandemic, and part of it was just increased awareness. So many societal events and people decided that self actualization just was not enough. And they wanted to be living their best lives, but somehow have lives of meaning. Be giving back, be part of the cosmos, make the world a better place. And Maslov also changed his hierarchy of needs to above self actualization to have this area called transcendence, which is self actualization plus giving back. And so when I teach the becoming you methodology at nyu, we go on this journey where we spend a couple of weeks doing an excavation to figure out what your values are. That's hard. I don't know you, whoever is listening to this, I don't know you, but I can tell you you probably don't know your values as well as you could. And we'll talk a lot about that. Your aptitudes, everybody is told what they're good at. And then you sort of by hook or crook and by accident, you find out what you're good at. But there's ways to test for it and there's ways to really figure out your aptitudes. We do a lot of testing around it, but there's other ways to figure it out that are not testing. And then you know, in terms of what interests you, what areas of the economy you should go into, like, we just take the worst advice from people. You know, o such and such a company is hiring and this part of the industry is growing, but that's actually sort of a backwards way to do it. You got to figure out what really interests you and then be ready to pivot. Because nothing stays the same anymore. But this process, you know, it's a. It's a journey. It doesn't happen overnight. The becoming you methodology, it could take you. I mean, I could sit and do it with somebody in a couple hours, or you could just make it sort of part of your toolkit for what you do. So the hat luncheon was like really insanely exciting today to see it through the eyes of people who had never been to it before. Because for me, it was, it represented something for me, I mean, it represented a piece of my area of transcendence, which was to be a part of a group of people, and in this case, women, who lived in New York. New York was a huge part of my dream and who had exciting, interesting, important lives. I hope that doesn't sound terrible, but that's really what I wanted. I wanted an exciting, interesting, important life. And I knew that that life existed. I didn't know how to get there. I. I didn't know what my values were for a really long time. I certainly didn't know what my aptitudes were. I knew what I loved. I. I knew what kind of stuff work I wanted to do. And I kind of finally figured it out. That's about the hat luncheon, I think online we'll put up a whole bunch of pictures of it. I think I was wearing a pretty splend first hat today. It was sort of. Would you say it was sort of steampunk? I mean, it was kind of.

It was a little Mad Hatter.

Mad Hatter, okay. There's so many fantastic hats. But to me, the hat lunch, which is great, it's about Central park, it is about so much more for me. And it's about becoming you, which is what this podcast is about. We're going to do some cool things and help people figure out what they should be doing with their lives. And you know what? That's a crazy thing, that question. What should I do with my life? What should I do with my life? Is a crazy question because we start asking it when we're really young. Okay. I mean, they almost sort of. You almost start asking kids that, like when they're for, what do you want to be when you grow up? And we never stop answering it. I mean, I occasionally meet somebody who's like, I'm absolutely in my area of transcendence. Maybe they don't use those words, but if they know me, they do. And some people get there. But it's our lifelong journey, struggle, challenge. And I have met people who are in their 40s and 50s and 60s and 70s who are still saying, am I doing what I was born to do? And I'm doing what I was meant to do and. And they're not there yet, but you can get closer and closer and when you're there, it's great. I wanna say one thing about this. This is not a podcast about happiness. I'm nothing against happiness. Nothing. I think happiness is great. I want everyone to have it. But the area of transcendence that I'm talking about, that's about living a productive, meaningful, fulfilling life. And one of the great byproducts of that is usually happiness. But a lot of other things go into happiness, like your health and relationships and things like that. So I'm not part of the military industrial happiness complex, but I want everyone to be happy. What I'm all about is living a really meaningful life. And I hope that the byproduct of that is like, not just happiness, but like sheer on joy. That would be fantastic. Wouldn't it be an incredible world if people were feeling that in their hearts? So.

That'S what we're gonna talk about. And after the break, we're gonna take one of, one of my listener questions and one of my Somebody who wrote me on. On one of my platforms, and we'll answer that question.

All right, welcome back. Welcome back. All right, so this is the part of the podcast which I so excited to do, which is when I answer a question that's been sent to me either on Instagram or any other place that people find me. And I loved a question, actually, that I got in person the other day. I was giving a speech at Stern alumni event. Stern is really active with its alumni, and there's a group called Stern 10. These are all the Stern graduates who have graduated in the past 10 years, thus the name Stern 10. That's very clever, wouldn't you say? And we had an event at the Chelsea Hotel in New York, which is very chic. When I go into a place like the Chelsea Hotel and I see all these people, like, having drinks and fabulous lives, I think I've just kind of completely missed the boat on it, because typically, I'm just home with my dogs. But anyway, they all look like they were having fun. And we had this fabulous event there. For five minutes, I felt cool. And so I gave a talk. I was interviewed by a Stern alumni, a great guy who's in business. And then afterwards, I talked to a lot of people who waited in line to have sort of personal questions with me. I dig that so much. And one of the people came up to me and said, you know, you talk a lot about how important it is to stay relevant. And I actually have a line about this. It's your currency. Is your currency. Let me unpack it. Your currency. How much you're worth is your currency. Little play on words. Kind of like how current you are. Your currency is your currency. This is so true. And actually, a boss taught this to my daughter really early on in her career. And I thought, that boss is so smart and looking out for you so much. Because what they were saying is, stay in the conversation. Know what's going on in the industry, know what's going on in the company. Don't drop out. Be really curious about everything going on so that you're making other people smarter. So that when they say, x company is buying Y company, you're not, like, really? What does that mean for us? You're already ahead of the conversation. And for some people, this kind of curiosity and desire to stay relevant is incredibly natural. Like my husband Jack, when he would wake up in the morning, he would read eight newspapers. He would devour them. He's had a hunger for new ideas and information. He would read all the columnists, and it's proven strongly by social science, your level of curiosity is a pretty inborn trait, but that doesn't mean you can't hone it or you can't increase it. But, you know, we sort of fall to type. And I've definitely seen, you know, I'm about to say something. Thank God my children won't listen to this podcast because they'd kill me if I heard this. But between my. I have four children, and there's so much difference in their curiosity levels. If a bomb dropped in the backyard, one of them would, like, go out immediately and, like, try to find out what the bomb was made of and wonder where it came from. And it would, like, obsess him for years to come. And literally, I have another child who would, like, not even ask, what was that noise? Okay. She would just be onto her own thing. And this is just inborn levels of curio. They're both spectacular people. Hey, I really, really love you. I'm sorry for everything I did wrong when you were children. Please forgive me. But they're just different levels of curiosity. And so after I gave the speech at Stern and I went on and on in my usual diatribe about, like, you know, your currency is your currency. Don't let your boss tell you something. Always be ahead telling your boss something. Make your team smarter. Read everything. Read things that you disagree with. Watch everything. Figure out what the zeitgeist is. Be fully aware. It's exhausting. I know what I'm describing is utterly exhausting, but not, not for everybody. So somebody came up to me in line, he said, look, you talk a lot about it, but what if you're not naturally curious? I thought this was like such a fantastic self aware question. Like, how awesome was it that this person was able to identify that this was not one of his natural traits? And then on top of that, utterly fantastic to be able to say, okay, how do I get better at it? Do you know how superhuman this is? Like, I just wanted to, like, give him massive props for that and to know what you're not good at and then to inquire and try to figure out how to get better at it. I mean, you are so far ahead of the game with those kind of behaviors. Yay, person who asked me this question. So he asked, all right, look.

I'm not naturally good at it. How do I get better at curiosity? So we talked about it. I of course, said to him what I said earlier, which is, a lot of this is inborn, but I have a bunch of hacks for it. So the first hack is to figure out what your natural curiosity level is. You probably kind of get it. You've seen yourself compared to other people and you think, gee, like my sister's really curious, but I am less so. And so one thing is kind of pinpoint where you are. And if you don't know and you're unsure, why don't you ask five or six people who really know you and just say, no judgment here. This is not a gotcha question. On a scale from 1 to 10, where would you put my curiosity compared to the most curious person you know? Okay, we all know somebody who's so curious they're annoying. Really annoying, okay? And I'm not saying that's a good thing, but I'm saying compare yourself to that person. So after you have self awareness and say, you find out, okay, you're kind of a three or you're four, this is when I would say you're kind of in the danger zone professionally if advancement matters to you, okay? Because several things really matter when it comes to advancement. One is luck. Okay? Let's put that aside because you can't control it. But then there's iq. Guess what still matters. How smart you are, how good your ideas are. Just no working around it. Hard work and cover up for a lot of it, but not all of it. And then your eq, your emotional intelligence really matters at the end of the day, if you're, if you're a pompous asshat or just a jerk in general, it's going to catch up with you eventually. And then curiosity is right up there with those two. And I mean, there's research studies. I'm not gonna bore you with them, but they exist. Believe me, I've read them and seen them and written about them and so forth. So anyway, all right, once you know how curious you are or not, the next step is to build a discipline around becoming more curious. And that's a little like weightlifting. It's a little like developing the muscles. So one thing I suggest is creating a watch list, like what you are doing to expand your knowledge of the world. And if you're not naturally chasing that information, you have to create a discipline around it. So that would be like developing a watch list. This week I'm adding three things to my watch list, okay? Because everybody looks at something, say you read the skim every day or you read the Daily Beast every day. Each week, add three things that are going to give you new information. You're going to start reading X column, you're Going to start following so and so on Twitter. You're going to start looking at this Instagram feed, this TikTok feed that just starts filling your head with new knowledge. Okay, so that's one thing. Get a watch list and each week add three things to it. And this is a discipline only you can make you do it. Okay. The second thing is I would actually. This, I think, is unbelievably good hack in this front. And that's like, each week, choose a country to learn about. There are so many cool countries. And if you just pick random countries and you just sort of do a deep dive, just spend a half an hour and do a deep dive on a country, you will learn so much about the economy and social movements and things going on in the Zeitgeist. I, like, I still do this. I have some natural curiosity. I really go deep into, like, countries in Africa, and I suddenly will know a huge amount about them. And it just expands my mind about what's going on in the world. And I learn all sorts of things about, oh, like this mineral is getting really big. And, okay, it's just a hack, but do it by country. It's a really organized way to do it. And then the third one to do is to choose something that's in the news, a social, a critical issue that's out there, that every time people talk about it, you turn off, like, fracking or like, something around, like, electric cars and just say, like, I never listen to anything about it. I never talk about it, I never know about it. And I'm just going to figure out what it means. I'm just going to become an amateur expert in it. 15 minutes is all it takes, really, because of the beauty of the vast interweb. So, person who asked me that question, I answered this for you when I saw you, but I just put that out there, like curiosity. It just actually is a really, really important tool for success in life and in work. And curious people generally tend to be more interesting, which really helps just even in relationships. I understand, though, that there's sort of an undercurrent to this question, which is that the world right now is like a fire hose of information and data and images and videos and noise coming at you right in your face. And it's a lot. And then the idea that somebody is sitting here on a podcast telling you to add more to that fire hose is kind of like, ugh, I don't want to do it. And I get it. I totally get it. But if you're a person who has, as part of your hashtag, life goals, Maybe sort of like what I did with the hat luncheon, which is to have an interesting, exciting, meaningful life, then you can't ignore the fact that curiosity is a huge part of that. And I would just put that out there. I have one more small hack on this front, and then I'll stop talking about it. But a lot of times when we're talking to people, this is how it goes. La da da da da da da da da Person says, and then you go back, la da da da da da da and you sort of match their story with a story, and you can actually change the game in terms of curiosities. When you're talking to somebody and it goes, la da da da da da da da da. And then you go question, and you ask them a question about what they were talking about instead of just trying to match their story. It's game changing. It's game changing. If you watch really successful people and you see them in conversation. I'm about to drop, like, a really big name. Now, this is sort of obnoxious. Should I do it? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Long ago, I was moderating the Microsoft conference out in Seattle. And this was before Jeff Bezos was Jeff Bezos. Before, he was like this huge, gigantic person. And I was seated next to him at dinner. And after dinner, I realized that the entire time I talked and he asked questions of me and I was like, holy cow. That guy just asked me questions about myself the entire time. Every time I said something, he asked a question. And, you know, he has a voraciously curious mind. You can hate him and Amazon and all sorts of other things. I happen to really admire him. And I'm kind of stunned by what Amazon was, because I remember the early days, as many people might, when Amazon was hemorrhaging money and the shareholders would go to the annual meeting and they would yell at Jeff Bezos, when are you gonna make money? And he said, if you wanna make money right now, don't invest in my company. I have a plan. And I remember watching that with Jack, and Jack saying, that guy has kahunas. He was like that guy talking back to the shareholders like that. And they were yelling at him like, we've given money. And he was like, I know what I'm doing here. Anyway, people who invested with him those many years ago are all in their mega yachts right now. So anyway, he had. And he is a voraciously curious mind. I'll never forget, because I'm a curious person. I mean, I was a newspaper reporter. It's my business to ask questions. And anybody would tell you. Let's ask the team here. I'm curious, aren't I? Very. Oh, they're all agreeing, but they're.

I have a question.

Yes.

What happens when you're too curious?

Okay, that's. So Hallie, who's getting married in September, is asking, what happens when you're too curious? That's awful. I can't stand that. That's when somebody who can't shut up with the questions, it almost becomes annoying. It's annoying. Why are you too curious? You're not too curious? How am I too curious?

But I think that we're exposed to a lot of curiosity in just. In your role as a professor.

Yes.

Everybody always wants to know what you're thinking.

Yes. Where. Yes.

Does the line get.

Okay, great question. We do get exposed to this. And actually, there is a line that you can't cross with the constant peppering of questions. It is annoying. And so it's true. I want to just say as a disclaimer before I go forward, NYU students, I love every last one of you. You're all perfect, and I'd give you all A's if I could. Okay with that disclaimer. Let's now move forward. I definitely have had students who cannot stop asking questions. And, you know, they get very specific. Like, I literally could sit there and answer questions to them for two hours, and it wears you out. So this is, like, just socially inappropriate behavior. I do have this one thing that I do where people say something, and I'll say, why is that? And I know that that's annoying that I do that, but I'm curious, but I have to. Even I. At a certain point, you have to stop it. All right? So that's the scoop with curiosity. Let me know in. You know, write me if you disagree with me. I'd love to hear from you me about this. And that's the spiel. That's the question of the week, and that's the answer of the week from moi.

In this segment of the show, I reveal my secret mentor crush. All right? So I have this theory that I talk about with my students all the time. I actually wrote a piece about it for LinkedIn. It was like, I think, was it my most popular LinkedIn post ever in the history of humankind? Like, thousands of people liked it, where I basically said, sorry, Gen Z. And by the way, Gen Z, I love you. I'm not apologizing because I love you so Much. I said, sorry, Gen Z, Mentors are not the way you think. And here's the problem with mentors, absolutely. Is that people have this model in their mind that you're gonna get to work, and then a knight in shining armor, a mentor, is gonna come along on their stallion and they're gonna sweep you up and you're gonna have a spectacular career because of this mentor who comes in with connections and wisdom, and they just sort of like, part the Red Sea for you. I've now mixed many metaphors. Please don't hold it against me. My tax filings say I'm a writer, but I just mixed a lot of metaphors. But I would just say that you have this idea of the mentor. Oh, mentor. And they. And people who are in college are told, go get a mentor. Well, it just doesn't work that way. Okay. There's two different reasons. One is, and this is a really big one, first of all, people are too busy to be your mentor. And you have to kind of get in front of them and dance and prove yourself and be amazing and bring something to the table. And then some wise, wonderful person will say, hey, I'd like to be in a kind of business relationship with you and bring you along. It's not going to be initiated by this wise, wonderful person who goes and seeks you out and says, you look like a diamond in the rough. I'm going to polish you up. Does not happen. Never seen it. Okay. Usually what happens is, when it happens this way is that a person has a great deal of promise. They sort of blow the barn doors off with their performance when they arrive at an organization. And somebody who's an older wiser says, you kind of remind me of the young me. I mean, that's what happens. You remind me of me, and I'm going to mentor you. I'm interested in what happens to you. That's the way it goes. But much more importantly, everybody is a mentor. Like, why would you have one mentor when there's so many spectacular people out there and you don't have to love every single thing about them? You look at somebody at work and you think, you know, that person has a great deal of poise in meetings. I'm going to let them mentor me. They're going to mentor me from afar. I'm going to just mimic them. They're a mentor to me. They don't even have to know they're one of your mentors. And in your career, you'll have a lot of mentors, some who are the Same age as you, some who are younger. I mean, I, my whole team are mentors to me. They teach me so much. My students teach me so much. They really do. And even when I'm grading and I'm feeling like I'm homicidal, I'm not. I love you very much and I would never harm any of you. Oh my God. I would just say I feel like they teach me so much about how the way the world works today. Everybody, everybody is a mentor to you. You got to have that mindset. You just do. So I actually, in my dotage here, I am constantly looking for mentors. Every time I meet somebody, I think what is spectacular about them. I kind of tend to be a very sunny, optimistic person. It can be annoying. I understand. And I want to say that yesterday or two days ago I went out to lunch with a friend of mine and, and I mean, you would have thought I was madly in love with her. She happens to be a married person and I was just staring at her with goo goo eyes because she's a mentor to me. Her name is Betsy Smith. She is the president of the Central Park Conservancy. The CEO, actually. The Central Park Conservancy. She's a spectacular person. She's a friend of mine and she's such a mentor to me. She's maybe five, six years older than I am. She's been on the board of the Central Park Conservancy for a long time. And then she was made the CEO. Why? Because there was no one in the world who could do it better than she could do it. And she's raised a huge amount of money for the park. She's made the park a better, more democratic place. She's had incredible future for the park. And I described to her what area of transcendence was, how it's the intersection of your values, what you really want to do, what really motivates you in this world, what you, what you're uniquely good at, your superpowers and what you, the world needs you to be doing. That's what that should, that opportunity is about. And I said to her, I think you're in your area of transcendence. And she said, I am, I am. I love what I do. And, and she's done. I mean her success is spectacular. She's beloved by all. She's a, she has, she can execute, she has edge, she's a passionate leader. And she's also really like the most level headed person I've ever met. I think she's flawless. I do. Sometimes I think she's just the perfect person. I love her and I admire her, and if I was a different person with a different set of kind of views on this, I would just consider her a friend. I would just say, I'm so lucky. Betsy Smith is my friend. She's my friend, and she probably. Hey, Betsy, if you're listening to this, and I don't know why you would be, but if you were, I, just by surprise, you're my mentor, and I watch you and I observe you, and I see how you move in the world and how you inspire people with your quiet elegance. And I'm like, man, she's the greatest. Anyway, she was at the hat luncheon because she runs the Central Park Conservancy. It all goes back to the hat luncheon, doesn't it? And I think, actually, to be honest with you, when I was that young woman and I was seeing that flock of beautiful New York, sophisticated, exciting, interesting New York women walking down Fifth Avenue, and I was just. If you could just picture this young, feral girl, kind of like I was. I was a journalist at the time, looking at these women, I thinking, I want in. I want to be like them. Those are my life goals. If you could have described Betsy Smith to me in those days, I would have said, that's who I want to be. And now she's a friend of mine, but I can touch the hem of her skirt for what she's done for the city of New York. And I admire her so much. And so I wonder how many of your friends are actually mentors and how many people who could be mentors that are just sort of hanging around you and just. Absolutely. If you look at it in that way, then you suddenly start learning from them. And I just. I think that she's just the embodiment of those life goals. And so that's my secret mentor crush. I just have generally a girl crush on her entirely, and she's fantastic. I hope you go find your crushes, your mentor crushes. If you've got them right, send them to me. I want to talk about them and think about them and know about them. All right, that's my secret mentor crush part. And now after the break, we'll come back and we'll have the lightning round where my team asks me questions that they're going to try to stump me with. Okay, see you soon.

All right, we've entered the segment of the show the peer cam is running, and we've entered the segment of the show where my team Tries to ask me difficult questions to see if I, if I can answer them all. All right, over there, you look like, like three kind of the, the three Furies. Okay. Which I think was a painting that I studied in college. All right, all right, I'm ready. Go ahead. What's one of the questions? Go ahead, let's hear it.

I mean, like, favorite vegan protein.

Oh, my favorite vegan protein. Vegans of the world, unite. Huh?

I don't know what my favorite vegan. I mean, I like tempeh. Okay. I. All right. I like. We've just lost every. We've just lost the three. The three listeners that we had have just all exited. All right, do we have another question? Another question, please. If you had to rank your dogs from most to least dramatic, how would they. Okay, thank God you didn't ask me to rank my dogs just in general, but rank my dogs most to least dramatic. Without a doubt, sir. My big male German shepherd, who's supposed to be fierce, supposed to scare the living daylights out of you, is got the personality of a six year old girl who hasn't been invited to a birthday party. Okay? He is, he is like every day is the most dramatic day ever lived. He's like, he's like a little girl. And he found out that all the girls in class are going to the birthday party, but he was not invited. That's sir's personality. I'm so sorry, sir. And he's not going to bite your face off, even though he looks like he might. And then I'd say Pierre, the dachshund there is very dramatic and with absolutely checking in third, with almost no personality whatsoever is Audrey. You could just. She's. I, I love her. She's a fantastic dog. I'm sorry. Now let me issue my podcast apology to Audrey, my other German shepherd. She's a magnificent dog, but no drama. She is no drama. Okay? So, all right. That's why I call her extraordinary, ordinary. Okay, go ahead. What's the most over worn item in your closet? Oh, my clogs. Hey, you know, clogs are the greatest shoe ever invented in all time. No, clogs are the most. Look, whoever invented clogs? Some Swedish person. Lars, wherever you are, Olga, I love you. I want to say I've been wearing clogs. I've been wearing clogs since I was in ninth grade. I love them so much. And then when I had Roscoe, I had a babysitter, so this is. Okay, Roscoe's 34 years old, so I had a babysitter, she was like 11 or 12 years old, helping me with new baby. So, you know, do the math, whatever. He's 34 years old. Years and years ago, this was. Actually, I could tell you exactly when it was. I'm now going to recall the year he was born. Sorry, Roscoe, I was. Almost forgot your birthday. But he was born in May 1989, and so this is probably a year later. And I got a little babysitter. And she looks down at my feet and she says in horror, what are those? Okay, I was wearing clogs, okay? In those days, there were only one kind of clogs. Dance. Go. Hey, if you'd like to sponsor me, we're waiting. Anyway. And she asks, like, with horror about what are my shoes? I say, they're Dansko's. And she looks at me aghast. And I said to her, they will come back. And they are back, because now you can buy Chanel clogs and Prada clogs. And so there's a long answer. Clogged, people, let us unite. Okay, clogs, next question. If you could rename yourself, what name would you pick? Oh, I love that question. You know, this is sort of like when you're in Starbucks and you can give them any name on your cup. Any name. And you know which name? I really. I. I'd like some kind of exotic name. You know why? Because Susie is the worst name in the world. Honestly. Okay. The only other name they could name me would be Linda. And they. And. But they. Because there's so many of them. Suzy S, Susie R. Susie M. Oh, how do you spell it? S U, S, I, E or S U, Z, Y? And I just. I think that it's just mom and dad did not get very creative when they were coming up with these. My younger sister's name is Debbie, and she in high school, said, I'm deep six in the Debbie. And she renamed herself Della, which was a big improvement, right? Yeah, totally renamed herself. Just like my daughter Eve renamed herself. So if I have to say, if I had to give myself a name, I would go back to my third family nickname for me when I was young and they called me Suki, which is a very good name. Yeah, I was so cute. Isn't it? It was that Suki, my older sister still occasionally calls me Suki, so I would probably do that. It's adorable. And nope, not me. Susie. Okay, last question. What is it? Let's see if we can stump me. We've talked about what Clogs, dogs, My name and what have we got? I. We. I thought we were gonna get something like geopolitical, but apparently that's not happening. All right, what do we got?

If you were a professional wrestler, what would your stage name and signature move be?

Okay, as a mother.

As a mother of a former.

Okay, so I will say that when my son wrestled, he did have a signature move where he literally wrapped his arms around the person's torso, lifted them straight up, and then threw them down. And, like. And I just. Every time I saw it, I used to scream. It was just very bad. I would like to take a pass on this question entirely because it's just. I'm gonna just say I have no freaking idea. What do we got? Last question. What's the feeling that you wish there was a word for? Oh, I have so many feelings. I mean, I actually think. I mean, can I get. I have that word? Like, I love this word. Scarephoria. Okay, so this is when you're super scared but euphoric at the same time. And there's actually a really good word that somebody else made up, which is called Sephora, which is what the euphoria you feel when you walk into Sephora.

You know, you feel. Felt it. Okay, Jorge, you have not felt Sephora. Okay. But I want to tell you that there's this feeling that you get when you walk into Sephora. Do you know what Sephora is? Okay, he knows. He's aware. And. Okay, so, all right, your wife knows what Sephora is. Okay? So ask her if she's ever felt Sephora. So this is the feeling when you walk into Sephora. You feel like you must purchase everything there. You're overwhelmed with the number of lipsticks and. And. And mascaras that you must purchase, and you feel Sephora. So anyway, I have scare for you, which is like, I. It's. I'm not going to recommend it for people. I mean, I feel it all the time, which is like, I'm really scared, but I'm euphoric. This is actually. Now the truth comes out about what a nerd I am. But, I mean, I actually feel it about my PhD, which I'm getting at 64. Why? Don't ask. I mean, like, when I talk to my boss about it, who's the head of my department, he thinks, you know, I said to him, please don't roll your eyes. This is an identity issue. And he's like, okay. And then he tries really hard not to roll his eyes, and he's, like, staring straight at Me. But I know he's fighting, rolling his eyes back in his head because he says, you don't need to get your PhD. And I was like, it's an identity issue. Please don't ask further about it. So anyway, I'm doing that and I have scare for you about it because what am I doing? But I'm also really excited about it. And when I visualize walking across the stage and getting my PhD and then I will now force everyone on my team to call me Dr. Welch. That's coming for you. Forget Susie, Forget Suki. It's Dr. Welch. Even the dogs will have to call me Dr. Welch. Okay? So that's what's coming. Dr. Mommy. Come on, it's time for chow time.

Before we end, I want to leave you with a quote. I just take so much inspiration from quotes and I want to share this one with you. I love it. I just saw this quote. I happen to love poetry. I love Mary Oliver, one of the great poets of all time. She's the poet who asked that very famous line which I use in my class, becoming you all the time, which is, tell me, what is it that you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? That is what we do in becoming you. And that's what I will talk about incessantly on this podcast. Which is what you plan to do with your one wild and precious life. And why? Okay, we get one wild and precious life, all right? And it is ours to decide what to do with it. There will be so many things that get in the way of us deciding. There will be events, there will be good events, and there will be terrible events. There will be people who come into our life who are good and who are bad. There will be world events. And so we don't get to do all the self determination around our lives, but we have junctions and decisions that we can make that we can decide. And that is the work of becoming you. That's the work I've devoted my entire life to. That is my life's work. And I described it the other day to a very fancy surgeon and he said, I don't buy it. And I was like, buh, bye, go do brain surgery on yourself. So I would just say that it is all about discovering what we should do with our wild and precious life. So Mary Oliver wrote that poem. That poem was called A Summer's Day. And she wrote another poem called Don't Hesitate. And that's the quote I want to share with you right now. And here it is. If you Suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy. Don't hesitate. Give into it. Here's the part I love. Joy is not made to be a crumb. I mean, I think that I've got to get better at this. I've got to get better at this. I mean, I finished writing a book the other day, and then the way I celebrated was I ate a bowl of chickpeas, and I said to my daughter, I said to her, a normal person would be celebrating. I just finished writing a book. I don't even know how to experience joy that well. I. I want to get better at it. That's. That's my goal. That's. There's a life goal. I want to share this quote with you. Maybe I love it so much because I'm not so great at it, but if joy happens to find you, lean into it. My late husband was super good at this. He loved happiness, and he loved embracing joy. He loved celebrating. That's. And celebrating is why I'm forcing my team to go out to lunch with me tomorrow. You guys excited about that?

You think that it's forcing us to go?

Who wants to go out with their boss? Boss for.

Okay, okay.

All right. You know what a thought bubble over my head is, they just want a free lunch. Isn't that horrible? It's horrible. All right, so here we go. There's that quote. If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don't hesitate, give into it. Joy is not made to be a crumb. I love that quote. That's the quote of the week. I got more quotes coming at you. And also recommendations. I'm about to go see a big slew of plays, and maybe I'll suggest Play for those of you who are not in New York. It'd be a reason to come to New York, but I'm always catching watching these. Hey, here's a recommendation for you I wasn't thinking about giving you, but there's a show called Hacks that Jean Smart is in and the third season is out. If you've not watched the first and second season of Hacks, it's an amazing, amazing sort of comedy. It really is funny, it's sharp. It's got some really poignant moments about it. There's two seasons of it. I don't know what. Can you guys look up what. What channel Hacks is on?

It's Max.

It's Max. Okay? It's. It's brilliant and funny, and it's about a relationship between an older woman writer and her protege who's trying to help her have a comeback. The third season is out. That's what I'm watching during my travel this week. I'm going down to Tampa to give a speech and then I'm flying out to California to lay down a LinkedIn learning episode and I'll be watching the third episode of Hacks. That's my recommendation. Along with this beautiful poem. That was a bonus point there. Okay, we'll say goodbye and we hope you come back. Next time I will have another rant and rave and I'll tell you about another crush and we'll get together again. This is actually a show about figuring out what to do with your life. I. We didn't actually talk about that today. Oh, yes, we sort of did. We did with the hat lunch and in life goals. But we'll talk more about it. Stick with us. I love you. I don't know you but I do and hope you come around again.