July 10, 2025 • 62 mins
Changes are a part of life, and sharing one's experiences can help others navigate their life transitions. That's what philanthropist, businesswoman, and advocate for gender equality, Melinda French Gates, is hoping to do with her new memoir, "The Next Day."
Get ready for a deeply personal conversation as Melinda joins Sophia to discuss her life, both in and out of the public eye. From her 'crisis of self' to her path to philanthropy, motherhood, and moving forward after her divorce, Melinda shares it all. Plus, she reveals her 'word of the year' and her work in progress!
Melinda's book, "The Next Day: Transitions, Change, and Moving Forward," is out now.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to Work in Progress. Welcome
back to Work in Progress friends. This week we have
a guest that encompasses the idea of being a whip
(00:23):
smart woman in the world. Today, I am so geeked
to say this to you, guys, I'm actually kind of
losing my mind. Today we are joined by none other
than Melinda French Gates. She is a philanthropist, a businesswoman,
and a global advocate for women and girls, and on
a personal note, someone who has leveraged her platform for
(00:47):
such goodness in the world. I have looked up to
her for my entire adult life. For the last twenty
five years, Melinda has led efforts to unlock a healthier,
more prosperous, and more equal future. Did that at the
Gates Foundation, and today she hads Pivotal, an organization that
she formed in twenty fifteen that works to accelerate the
(01:07):
pace of progress and advance women's power and influence, both
here in the United States and all around the world.
And not only does she have one of the most
incredible professional resumes in the world, but Melinda has also
managed to be an incredibly heartfelt and vulnerable and thoughtful
(01:27):
leader for us. She is the author of the best
selling book The Moment of Lift, out of which she
actually created. Moment of Lift Books and Imprint, publishing original
nonfiction by visionaries that are working to unlock a more
equal world, and this year she is publishing her beautiful
memoir the next day. The book is about transitions, the
(01:52):
moments that we step out of our familiar surroundings and
into new landscapes, the space where we're caught in grief
or change or success or any kind of transition really,
and she's chosen to open up and reflect about her
own life in ways that had me flipping every page
(02:14):
saying yes exactly. Her story is obviously her own, it's
incredibly unique, and yet everything she shares will also feel
so personal to you. I know because it felt so
personal to me. Because the stories that she's telling illuminate
(02:35):
universal lessons, whether they're about loosening the grip of perfectionism,
helping friends navigate crisis, embracing uncertainty, all of it. Each
and every one of us, no matter who we are
or where we are in life, can be sure that
we are headed for times of transition and with incredible
(02:56):
warmth and grace, she has given us this book in
a moment in time that I think we need some
inspiration and some heart medicine more than ever. I am
so absolutely honored to have her on the podcast today.
Let's dive in with Melinda. Melinda, thank you so much
(03:25):
for joining me today. It's such an honor to have
you on the show as an early activist and a
woman who's tried to use my relative platform to affect
some positive change in the world. I have looked up
to you for my entire adult career and yeah, I'm
just so touched by this and so excited.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Oh well, I'm really glad we could do this.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Me too, And congratulations on the book. It's just so beautiful.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Yeah, before we dive into that and where we find
you today, I'd love to go back in time. And
I know you've shared some really beautiful stories about your life,
your childhood. You know what an amazing role model your
mother was to you. But for some of our listeners
who maybe haven't read the book yet, can you take
(04:17):
us back to let's say nine or ten years old
and reflect a little bit with us on who you
were as a kid, what your childhood was like, what
you were really interested in.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
So I grew up in Dallas, Texas, in a suburb
of Dallas, Texas, very close, tight knit community. We knew
most of our neighbors on our street and on the
street behind us. The moms kind of looked out for
each other's kids and kind of knew what was, you know,
going on, who was at whose house. And as a
nine or ten year old, one of my favorite things
(04:52):
was to ride my bike, being able to ride my
bike places, you know, every year I got a little
bit more freedom to ride further farther away from from
the house, and just to be able to ride to
the creek, or ride to the park, or eventually take
my allowance and ride to my favorite store. Just that
kind of sense of freedom and discovery. I've always loved summer.
(05:13):
I mean, I liked school, but I didn't really love
it until I got honestly to high school. So in
the summers of like when I was nine or ten,
I just couldn't wait for summer, you know, for school
to be over and then just to be outside a
lot playing. And I had a really good friend in
the neighborhood. My best friend lived across the alley and
down one house, and her mom was extraordinarily outdoors and athletic,
(05:39):
which was a bit different than sort of my mom.
And so the moms would often sign us up for
activities together. And so my best friend Ellen and I
used to go to the park and take swim lessons
or go play tennis or whatever our moms could dream
up as fun as far as fun summer camps for us.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Oh, that's so great. Do you think if you could
a little wrinkle in space time and hang out with
yourself for an afternoon? You know who you are today
with your nine year old self. Do you feel like
you would see the woman that you've become in her?
Do you see the same you know, kind of curiosity
about others and excitement for community in that little girl
(06:19):
when you look back.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
I think my sense of loving to be outdoors and
loving to play and play in an athletic way, I
call it be in my body, I think. And then
this sense of discovery. In fact, my word of this
year that came kind of came to me before the
start of the year is discover. Like I love that
sense of discovery, and so I think I still have
(06:45):
a lot of those elements in me. I certainly would
never have dreamt that I would become the advocate that
I have become for women and girls around the world.
That I just never you just I couldn't imagine that
that sort of sense of wonder and discovery and play
and athletic play. I think that's just been there for
a long time.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
I love that. I was someone asked me about activism
and particularly advocating for girls and girls' education around the world,
and I was sort of reflecting, trying to figure out
where the spark was lit, and I said, you know,
maybe it was college journalism and political science. And my
dad was the one who said, oh, give me a break.
(07:27):
You were organizing walkouts at school in the eighth grade.
You have always been like this, And I was like, oh, wow,
it's so neat when your parents can sort of help
you reflect on the things you're passionate about in your adulthood.
And so I love that. I bet if we got
to hang out with your nine year old self, there'd
be kernels in there for sure.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
Yeah, I would hope. So I spent a lot of
time climbing trees, not being able to bring my tennis
shoes inside because they smelled so bad in the summer,
you know, because I was out there so much, just
slopping around. And it's funny because in Dallas there isn't
a lot of nature nearby, I mean the park and
the creek. But where I live in Seattle, we are
(08:08):
just surrounded now by nature. And so one of the
things I love to do in the summer with a
friend is to paddle board or kayak or go out
on our bikes. But yeah, and I think maybe friendship too.
I knew the importance of friendship when I was little.
I was lucky enough to have this friend across the
alley and then girlfriends in my class. But I think
(08:29):
hopefully some of those elements endure.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
I love that, and I think those are the things
when you look back, you can you can kind of
view the chapters of your life or the moments that
helped you make a leap or evolve. And I think
that's why your book strikes me so beautifully. The next
day is all about transitions, and sometimes it's the thing
(08:56):
you're not sure you can do that you you know
you've got to break through your own glass ceiling to achieve,
or after a loss, you have to reflect on what's
most important to you. I'm curious as to how sitting
down to reflect on transition in every sort of version
(09:16):
it comes in, you know, the good, the bad, the ugly,
the beautiful. What you feel like you've learned about navigating
those those moments of time that are in the in
between when something is changing. You know, do you feel
like that that reflection made you ready to write the
book or or did writing the book help you leap
(09:40):
to the next phase.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
I think it was honestly a bit of both. I
didn't when I first started thinking about transitions, I was
really I wasn't thinking about a book. I was thinking
about I've been honored and asked to do the Stanford
commencement speech. And when I talked to the class presidents
months ahead, saying, you know, what would you like me
to talk about? What should I not talk about? And
(10:02):
one of the things they talked about was that they
felt like they were kind of on one track. You know,
get this degree, go to this company, or start this thing.
And they said, if you think there are room for openings,
if you believe in leaving room for openings or new opportunities,
can you talk a bit about that? And so as
I wrote that speech, I realized, Okay, I want to
(10:26):
talk about transitions. But it was afterwards that I went, oh,
my gosh, I'm turning sixty. You know. The speech was
last June. I was turning sixty in August, and I thought,
my gosh, I have been through so many transitions, and
so wow, maybe I have more to say on this.
My mom says that by the time you get to sixty,
(10:46):
you have a lot of things to say on a
lot of topics, maybe more than you should. But as
I started reflecting on the transitions, as I wrote the book,
I realized that in those in between spaces is where
the growth comes and where and even if their transitions
maybe you didn't expect or you didn't want to go through.
If you take the time, you grow a lot, and
(11:09):
there's a lot of resilience that is formed. And even
the transitions you expect or you want to come, they
still require sometimes like going to transition to college, you know,
transitioning to your first job. It takes a leap of
faith and some courage, right, And so I realized, oh,
that's actually where the magic is in life.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
Absolutely, And there was something that struck me really early
in the book when you were reflecting on being pregnant
with your first daughter, Jen, and you talked about retiring
from Microsoft at the time. And what really struck me
is I realized you were talking about this retirement in
(11:52):
a way that felt almost like reflecting on a calling.
You knew that motherhood was a calling of sorts, and
you also knew that you had the privilege in your
marriage at the time to be able to do this,
and knowing that you wanted to be the kind of
parent that your mother was for you, And I wrote
(12:15):
a note to myself and I said, this seems so beautiful,
and I wonder if it felt that way, and I
wonder if it also irked you that it always almost
always has to be the woman who makes that choice.
And then the thing that really knocked me over was,
as you reflected further in that early chapter, you talked
(12:35):
about how that pregnancy gave you freedom, you know, and
you wrote freedom from perfectionism, from the crushing, relentless societal pressure,
et cetera, et cetera. I won't, you know, read you
to you the whole way through, but it really shook
me because the way you talk about it and you
(12:57):
reflect on calling on freedom, on and essentially writing your
own permission slip to live the way you want to.
You write about it like a craving. And I don't
mean a pregnancy craving, a food craving. I mean like
a like a soulful craving to own yourself. It's such
a cool way to open a book because I see
(13:20):
so many versions of myself in these versions of you.
Is it sort of surreal to shepherd your own story
and the story of your daughter and the stories of
so many other women in that way?
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Yeah? And I think until you really, at least for me,
until I sat and reflected even more on it, it
was just a calling. I would just say, a knowing.
I just knew I could not have the career that
I had at Microsoft, which I loved. It is hard
(13:54):
charging nine year career that I had always wanted, you know,
I went from computer science to business school to that.
But I knew I couldn't be the kind of mother
I wanted to be unless I stopped doing that. And look,
it is an enormous privilege, enormous And I even knew
(14:15):
that at the time that I had enough resources that
I could stay home, right, And it's funny because I
also always knew I would go back and do something.
I didn't know what, but I knew it wasn't going
to be the same pace as what I was doing
at Microsoft. And then I did. I got into it,
(14:35):
and it just felt so good. It felt exactly like
what I wanted to do. I had summers back, like
one of the things I lamented when I went to
Microsoft was it wasn't like college or high school where
you had the summer off or your nine or ten
year old self. And so all of a sudden, I
had the summers back, and I have this little baby
I can play with like, you know, I could take
her when there's sandtoys to a beach nearby, or a
(14:57):
picnic with other moms, or bicycle with her. But yes,
I didn't realize at the time that I was chartering
a course for myself of who I wanted to be
in life. And I will say that as much as
I absolutely loved it in the beginning, I did have
a crisis of self about eighteen months or two years
(15:20):
into it, because we moved from this beautiful kind of
idyllic family house that I had picked out during our
engagement down the Street into this enormous mansion, and I
really had a crisis of self then because I was
no longer a working a working woman. I have this baby,
but here I am living in a house with a
(15:44):
gate way up the hill and more security and much
larger than I had wanted. So I really had to
find myself in that period, and in a way, eventually
philanthropy found me, or I found myself in it. And
that is something I never ever would have predicted in
(16:04):
life ever well.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
And that through line, because what I'm hearing you reflect
on is having the courage to listen to your own
inner voice. You call it a knowing. You knew that
you needed to make this shift for this moment in
your life. You knew that it wouldn't be permanent, but
whatever came after wouldn't be the same necessarily, And it
(16:29):
strikes such a knowing in me. I think my inner
voice reading your words went, I know that I know
what that is. And as I was reflecting on it
and on this idea of craving and this idea of calling,
it really struck me that you were talking about this
(16:50):
this immense craving or knowing, however you define it, of
our primal selves. You know that wildness of women are
wizys that is so special in our circles. And I
was thinking about how what it really is is your voice.
Your inner voice can become the voice you use in
(17:11):
the world. It's certainly a voice that, as someone looking
in on your life, I have admired of yours. And
I started to wonder, you know, is trusting the knowing
to finding the voice which came with philanthropy. As you
talk about what found you, I wonder if that's our
(17:33):
gendered knowing that we deserve truly equal footing both in
our home and out in the world, because we have
all of these ambitions and all of these things even
before we become parents. And then you become a parent
and you look at a little girl, and how could
you not want her to have everything, everything that was
denied to you, and everything that was given to you,
(17:55):
everything you know was denied to our grandmothers. You know,
you want these little girls to have everything and more.
And I don't know, I just couldn't help but see
all this extra stuff in what you're talking about, even
as you so beautifully shared about what a life altering moment,
(18:16):
this pregnancy and her birth and this whole journey was for.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
You, definitely. And I think you know so often as women,
like as I say to all three of my now
adult children, I have a daughter, a son, and a
daughter in that order, you are enough. You're enough on
the day you're born. You're enough. And yet I think
(18:39):
as we go out into society, especially as women, we're told, well,
that position's not for you, or maybe you're not quite
ready for that promotion, or you don't see somebody. Maybe
if you aspire, let's say, to be a governor of
a state, you don't see very many others of them, right,
and you so you wonder, what could I if that's
(19:00):
my aspiration, could I get there? Or if you a
young girl wants to be president, she's never seen a
female president in the United States ever, And so I
think we get all these messages from society maybe somehow
you're not quite enough to get that role or that position,
or do that thing or start that business. And that
has that really has animated my life, and that I
(19:25):
think is what I learned through philanthropy as I started
to go out and be out in these low income
countries and realize because it's so obvious there the start
contrast between men and women and what women are literally
not allowed to do what men can do. And so
I kept thinking, oh, if we can as a philanthropy community,
(19:48):
make the world more equal for them. But it wasn't
until I turned the question back on myself and said, well,
how far are we really here in our country? And
I wanted to say, oh, my god, there's so much
more work to be done in the United States, which
is the highest income country in the world. And yet yes,
we are enough on the day we are born. And
(20:10):
yet women and men don't have equality in our own country,
and that to me just it shouldn't be. And that
calling of meeting other women who were asking me for
things as they just knew I was a US citizen
coming to listen you know in some way that philanthropy
might help. That calling from those women really started to
animate my life, both in terms of my foundation work,
(20:33):
but also the work I wanted to do here in
the United States.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yes, and now a word from our sponsors who make
this show possible. It's interesting you talk about that eventual
moment of having to look back at where you live.
(20:58):
I feel like I've I've had so many of the
in my own way, which is not nearly as large
and global as yours, But in using this career and
platform as I can so many of the same journeys,
traveling all around the world, wanting to fix what appear
to be the greatest disparities, and then realizing how great
(21:23):
the disparities are in our own backyard, and how they're
just a little bit better masked, but they're everywhere. And
when you realize that it's just the United States and
Papa New Guinea that don't have any guaranteed paid leave,
and you start to realize, well, that's part of the
reason the women don't become the CEO or the president,
(21:44):
because we're told if we do start a family, it'll
take us out of work. But it shouldn't. Men and
women both deserve the opportunity to be at home with
their new, expanding families and then to return to the workplace,
and other countries and other systems have designed for that,
and we simply haven't invested in certainly in women, but
(22:08):
we actually haven't invested in families well at all. And
so when did that light bulb occur for you? You know,
when eventually you decided to start the foundation. You had
these young kids, and it came quicker than you wanted
it to, which I love that you talk about in
the book being like, I don't mean to be ungrateful,
(22:30):
but does this have to happen now? Because I think,
no matter what, we worry that we're we're doing the
wrong thing. We always want to do all the things,
but you can only, you know, spend so many plates
at once. When did the paid leave issue really strike
you as, oh, this has to be one of the
drums we beat consistently and talk about everywhere we go.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Well, as I was traveling on behalf of the foundation,
I would also go to many other high income countries
because we were trying to get their governments to you know,
some of the work that we were doing as a foundation.
It's really up to governments to scale it up. And
so as I would be out in the UK, or
in France or in Germany, and women would talk about
(23:14):
their work and their child rearing, and I was seeing
how they would talk about gender. But then when I
would also go to the Nordic countries, to Norway and Sweden,
and I started talking to men and they're like, we
can't believe you all don't have paid family medical leave.
And I would interview them and I'd say, well, well, okay,
(23:37):
do you take time off? And they're like, well, of
course we take time off. Why wouldn't we want to
be with our new child, our son, or our daughter.
And it had and as I started to study and
learn and realize, Okay, what are the two the two
biggest barriers that hold women back. It's harassment and abuse
on a continuum and paid family medical leave. And when
(23:59):
you look when you talk to people in Sweden and
Norway and you realize they've had their policy for so long,
it's a given that it changed the norm in society,
Like norms are hard to change. But men literally say no, no, no,
I'm not taking it because I don't want to leave
money on the table, Like that might have been why
men's first started to take it, but now it's because
(24:20):
I want to be part of the child rearing.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
It just became the norm.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
And so that's when I started to realize, wow, And
that was somewhere around maybe twenty fourteen, that this needed
to change. In the United States, this makes absolutely no sense.
We have these gendered roles that we just expect somehow
women will work and take care of the kids, right,
and it doesn't work. I've talked to women all over
(24:47):
the US, you know, in the South, in the North,
in the East, and the West, and women will say, like,
I don't know where to leave my child, like if
I don't have a parent to leave them with, and
I need to work, if it's a single mom, or
when it comes down to my child is sick, Who's
going to take them to the pediatrician? I'm the one
that's expected to And yet there's a penalty at work
(25:07):
for doing that. You just realize, we just we haven't
advanced like some of these other societies have, particularly in
the Nordic region, but all over the world that people
are doing paid family medical.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Leave, absolutely and what that does is it actually it's
not just a disservice to these new families, it's a
disservice to our society because you see, and I so
appreciate that you talk about these truths so often when
you're working around the world, because I think everybody needs
(25:41):
to hear them, and they need to hear them regularly.
To your point, so we can change habits or norms
when women, but families are supported countries do better economically, right,
they become not only do their GDPs increase, they become
more technologically innovative. They become places where new ideas are
(26:02):
born and where leaps in terms of human growth happen.
And so really, when you invest in taking care of families,
you build a better world. It's not just a moral issue,
it's also a mathematical one. It's an economic one. And
I think where the math and the morals meet should
(26:23):
always be the zone we're aiming for.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Right, definitely, and because we do have to realize that
women are, by and large around the world, the center
of the family, and if she does well, her children
have a better chance and the family has a better
chance of thriving. If she's not doing well, the converse
is true, the children are less likely to thrive, right.
(26:48):
And so that's why I always say we need to
lift women up, just remove the barriers that hold them
down and do what we can to lift them up,
because they lift up everybody else. And you're absolutely right,
and it comes down to economics. It has a ripple
effect throughout society.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
Absolutely and has has learning so much of this because
I'll tell you anytime I get a nugget of information
like that, you know, there's some white paper or some
great new piece of research from a Nordic country, as
you say, comes out. It makes me feel so gleeful
because because it reinforces the knowing, the knowing that we deserve,
(27:28):
the support can now also be proven. And I guess
I wonder, as someone who holds such great knowing, does
that kind of make you reflect on where some of
that expectation around women and even personally for you, that
guilt spiral that you talked about in trying to balance
(27:51):
launching the foundation and having three young kids, how that
spiral kind of you know, becomes like a ninja star
if you will, Because every woman I know who has
a family, or runs a company, or has a busy
life or is working two jobs, you know, any fill
in the blank feels like no matter what choice they're making,
(28:14):
it might be the wrong one. And you said something
in your book about this guilt spiral that is so
common for us. I wrote it in all caps in
my notebook that guilt is an indulgence and that realizing
that changed everything for you because it made you realize
(28:36):
guilt is focused on me, on us and you're trying
to focus out around you. I would imagine it feels doubly, triply,
quadruply true with all this data. But when you look
back at when you realize that that aha moment, can
you talk a little bit about that, where it came
(28:56):
from and how it had a ripple effect for you
personally in your life.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
Sure. I finally, when my kids were about middle school age,
learned this concept that had been come forward by a
psychologist in the UK about good enough parenting and the
concept of good enough parenting. They've gone out and collected
a lot of data over time that one good enough
(29:22):
parents and kids thrive. They just need one good enough adult.
And sometimes it's not even the parents. Let's say both
parents are struggling with something right and balancing a lot.
If they can have a coach who believes in them,
they can have a teacher who believes in them, but
that consistent nurturing of the child, then the child has
(29:44):
the ability to thrive. And once I could ask myself,
I was so caught up in this indulgence, as you say,
of the perfect parent. Whatever the notion of the perfect
parent is, it was some form. I think of my
mom who didn't work when I was younger. She worked
more when I was older. But you know, the be
there all the time. You know that that notion just
(30:07):
isn't isn't right, Like there is no such thing. There's
all kinds of parenting in the world, right, and kids
thrive in different ways. And so it was more saying
to myself, you know, going to my journal and saying, hmm,
am I a good enough parent? Am I good enough?
And I could start to answer the question. I wrote
down a few things I was doing, like, by gosh,
(30:28):
I am a good enough parent, So guess what my
kids are going to thrive? And so I could let
down the pressure on myself of perfectionism and on them.
It just kind of took the whole pressure level down
in the household and I could be like, yeah, they're
gonna turn out okay, Like I'm everything right, you know,
(30:50):
And but that's okay too. My mom didn't get everything
right right, but she got enough of it right that
you know, we for thrived as children.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Yeah, And to your point, what a great thing to
teach your children that they have a village, that their
coach is someone they can look up to, that their
auntie is someone they can always call with a problem
that their mentor at their internship or their summer job
is worth listening to. What it strikes me as is
(31:21):
a wonderful way to build an emotionally intelligent, communicative, and
resilient child.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Definitely, And I think you can also teach them. What
I learned later was also when they were more in
the high school ages, could you're also teaching them rupture
and repair? Like maybe you had intended to get to
that activity after school, you know, and they're on the field,
but oops, you got stuck in traffic, or you got
stuck on a phone call and you arrived late and
(31:50):
you missed the goal, or you missed the thing that
they were you know, there to do, okay, or maybe
there's a day. I certainly had days where I lost
my temper and I I hadn't sure, but going back
and apologizing, like taking responsibility and then changing your actions
in the future, you can teach your kids rupture and repair.
(32:14):
Yes I ruptured, I raised my voice at you because
I was stressed about something else, but that's no excuse,
Like I take responsibility, and so what it teaches them
because the truth is in any healthy relationship a friendship,
an intimate partner relationship, a work colleague. There will be
rupture and repair, but it's really how you do the repair.
(32:38):
And that was another concept. I was like, Oh, it's okay,
Like it's okay, and I'll teach them something just by
being me and being real about the relationship and my
faults and my mistakes exactly.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
And I think it's such a healthier modality and maybe
strikes me, as you know, such a person point of excitement,
because I too, am a recovering perfectionist. And the thing
that undid it for me, you know, in the way
that you talk about this idea that guilt is an
(33:11):
indulgence being so revelatory. The thing that was the big
sort of thought bomb for me was when a friend said,
don't you understand how toxic perfectionism is. Perfect doesn't exist.
So if you've been raised or cultured to be a perfectionist,
you've actually been raised to believe you're a failure. And
(33:33):
I was like, oh my god, this thing rather than
just being a human who does great on some days
and not so great on others, and who tries to
be a good sum total of their parts, this idea
that if you're not perfect, you're failing. Really just sets
us up for failure. So what a gorgeous, more just
(33:57):
more human way to live. To be a real person
trying their best.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
That's right, a real person in the world. And you're
gonna stumble and fall some days, you're gonna be tired,
you might be a little grouchy, but you know, on
the next day you get up, you might be kind
of another version of your best self. And it's okay
because it also gives other people permission to be their
full self. Like as I've said to my kids many times,
(34:24):
my mother said it to me, which is all emotions
are okay, all of them, mear anger, you know, even
all the ones you would think of as negative emotions
and all the positive emotions. All emotions are okay. It's
what you do with them, and so you know, and
it's also that okay. So maybe you were in anxious
(34:46):
one day and so you weren't your nicest self. Again,
you can go back and repair with that person or
just say I'm so sorry I was having a bad day,
and it gives them permission later to have a bad day, right.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
Yeah, and to not have it feel so f Yeah,
nothing has to be such a catastrophe. Even your worst
day is something that you know, a year from now
you're going to reflect on and realize it taught you
something and it's just kind of a blip on the radar.
And I think that's that's that that resiliency. And on
(35:21):
the subject of resilience, and let me preface the question
by saying, listen, if anybody yets not wanting, you know,
a divorce or a man to be your identity as
an individual or a woman, it is me. I guess
I'm curious because you've You've spoken about this, I think,
really eloquently and beautifully for someone who I'm sure has
(35:44):
been bombarded with less than eloquent and beautiful questions on
the subject of that sort of rip and then a
personal repair, if you will. What has struck me? Having
gone through it a little more recently than you, and
I've decided to look up all the women I admire
been through it and say, like, what have you said
(36:06):
that will give me some guidance here that I can
read it to in the morning. You've spoken really beautifully
about how you wanted to thoughtfully reflect on this. Because
you are a public figure, there's just no way not to.
I feel that. For me, what it came down to was, oh,
(36:30):
I have to admit I think I've made a mistake.
There are certain things I don't want a model for
the children. I know I want to be a mother too,
And I know that can be a very shattering experience
for women who go through it in the same kind
of time period that I did. And I really I
(36:51):
thought so much about your story and about other women
I know who have experienced that kind of shift or
transition in that later stage, you know. And for you,
you were married for twenty seven years, you did raise
all these babies together. Obviously, you did some gorgeous things together.
You launched one of the world's most beautiful and accomplished
(37:13):
philanthropic foundations that you ran, and you advocated as this
sort of superwoman in my eyes, and all my friends
who you know, when we got started, were like, yeah,
we'll go to that conference, Yeah we'll get on that plane.
Sure we'll show up at this place. Yeah you want
to go bug everybody in Congress. Let's go, let's stage
(37:34):
a protest in Washington. Like we didn't know what we
were doing, but we looked at people like you and said, well, look,
it's possible. And I guess I just wonder and it
doesn't have to be a long answer. I realize I've
been rambling about this for a long time because I've
thought a lot about it, clearly, but for you knowing
(37:54):
that your story and your example can actually be a
gift in terms of resiliency. And I don't mean about
even the kids, or your ex or anyone, but you,
the woman Melinda, who if you'd gone through this privately
in another life, you wouldn't have to talk about it
out in the world. Is there like, is there a
(38:15):
nugget of wisdom or an aha moment you had that
made you know that even though the world would be watching,
which is why so many people stay, that made you
know that you deserved to choose yourself, that you deserved
to carve a new path, that you deserved, especially as
the mother of girls, to say I want something different, deeper,
(38:39):
better for this next phase in my life. Because I
know there's a lot of women that would give anything
for that knowing to come to them when they're in
the moment of do I stay or do I go?
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Yeah, And one thing I would say to anybody going
through this look, it's just painful, and the knowing comes,
and you might push it way for a while, like
so I will tell you the knowing came that I'm like, no, no, no,
I can't make this work. Knowing came, No, I can
make this work. Knowing came make So that is, at
least for me, that was a normal part of the process.
(39:11):
But at least for me in the end, I had
to look. You know, when you point your finger at
somebody else, they say you have to look at the
three fingers pointing back at yourself, right, yes, you know, yes,
And I realized there had been some problems it. But ultimately,
if I was pointing the finger at that person saying
(39:32):
you betrayed me, I had to look at my three
fingers pointing back at myself and saying, I'm betraying myself
and who I am. If I stay I have certain
values and if I cannot live those values out in
this relationship of who I am and what I believe,
that I'm betraying myself. And I thought, how horrible is that?
(39:56):
Do I want to betray myself?
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (40:00):
No, And so that helped me have the courage to
eventually do what I did. And the other thing I
say to people who you know. Some people will come
and talk to me, who are you know contemplating at
a divorce, And I'll say, look, it is not easy,
and you know, I wouldn't wish it on any family,
(40:21):
but I will tell you when it's over, and you know,
you go through a period of healing. You don't know
what it is. I don't know what it is, but
something beautiful will grow on the other side. So by
letting go of something, you may not know what you're
going to and you may not even know it for
a few years, but something beautiful will come on the
other side, and you will know yourself even better and
(40:43):
you'll be more resilient for whatever the next big change
in life is that comes. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
Yeah, I think if you can get over the fear
of the unknown, you can actually wind up discovering the
joy of the unexpected. That's on the other side of it.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Definitely, most definitely, And you just have to have the
courage to say, uh, I may not know what's coming next,
but okay, out there somewhere is something. And then but
you learn from that courage. It's just like when we
teach our kids. Let's say they have to step into
a new friendship or a new classroom or a new situation.
(41:26):
Where is their self esteem built and where's the resilience built?
By actually taking that step, that's how they come to
know what they're capable of and what's inside of them.
And so it's the same way for us as women
or men, no matter what age we are, we still
have to have the courage to take that heart or
(41:47):
that uncomfortable step, no matter what.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Yeah, I just think it's really beautiful. Thank you, And
now a word from our sponsors. Did you have certain
self care practices because you knew the world would be
(42:10):
paying attention? Like did you just delete everything off your phone?
Did you just lock your phone in a safe? Like
I had a couple of days where I was like
I need to leave the house and I need to
leave any electronic tether here and I need to just
be outside, you know. And then the next day I
was like, maybe I need to just power the thing off,
but have the music because the music helps on the walk.
(42:32):
Like I really was, it was sort of like doing
a paint by numbers when the numbers have been erased.
What were your sort of tools for your own self care?
Speaker 2 (42:42):
I had developed a lot of tools for self care
in that in between space, you know, where once you
have made the decision that you need to leave, but
then there's you know, a time before it can be
actually happen and be executed right.
Speaker 1 (42:58):
I'd imagine, also, especially at the echelon of Life Global Foundation,
I can't even imagine the complexity. The paperwork nearly killed me.
Speaker 2 (43:08):
I can't.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
I can't fathom it for you. So just hats off
that you've made it to the other side, and you
haven't you're not in the corner like eating your own hair.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
I'm amazed. There are a few days I could have
done that, but I was lucky enough to be surrounded
by an amazing tiny team of people helping me write.
But I had to learn self care during that in
between time where I didn't know when the divorce would
get announced, how it would all get split up, what
was to come. That's when I developed all my self
(43:39):
care techniques. And that was included, you know, walking with
a friend at a moment's notice, walking with a friends,
some friends on a routine basis. I talk about therapy
in the book, which I never expected to write about,
and I was a skeptical of therapy, but talking to
my therapist. Sometimes I just needed to reach out to
friends who had no idea that I was separated, just
(44:01):
to go have some fun. Or other times I was
saying to somebody, this morning, I would just listen to
a book, a piece of fiction, and that would just
take me away. But a lot being out in nature
helped kind of just get me away from a very
tense situation. So I had all those self care tools.
(44:21):
Then when it went public, and so to be honest,
I had already gone through the hardest part behind the scenes,
and so then it was just kind of like, Okay,
finally it's out there, right, Yeah, And I didn't go
look at my phone. My youngest daughter would show me
a few things and I'd be like, okay, that's enough.
You know. I go outside and you know, sit by
the lake, listen to some birds. I like to swing.
(44:43):
We had a swing set in our yard back then,
so I go swing.
Speaker 1 (44:47):
Yeah, it is interesting, the little things, you know, as
time would have it. My my best friend in the world.
Who is I mean, she's my everything, She's my business partner,
you know, my my sister. For all intents and purposes.
We went through this at exactly the same time, in
(45:07):
exactly the same summer. It was, you know, a wild time,
and out of the woodwork came so many other friends.
Interestingly enough, best friend from college, one of my dearest
friends from my activist space, one of my friends, you know,
dealing with a spouse with addiction. Like, we had this
sort of cocoon of women. And I remember on the
(45:28):
day that I knew my news would go public and
I was like, oh God, my best friend FaceTime from Detroit,
one of my other friends came over and we walked
around the house. We saged my whole house together. Knowing
we were on a countdown, I was like, Okay, six
more minutes. And we did this whole little ceremony together.
And then we had a girlfriend who was refreshing the internet,
(45:50):
and the minute it hit she was like, it's up.
We popped a bottle of champagne because they were like,
we're just going to reframe this for you. This doesn't
have to be a sad thing. We're so proud out
of you. And after that, I turned my phone on
airplane mode and I literally put it away for three days.
It was a Friday. I was like I'll turn it
back on on Monday.
Speaker 2 (46:10):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (46:11):
Anybody who really needs to talk to me, you can
call my landline from nineteen ninety six and that'll be that.
And it was this sort of gorgeous thing, and it
was to your point. The community of women, that village,
that sisterhood. They helped me take something that in the
in between had been so difficult and painful and scary,
(46:31):
and they turned it into a moment where I got
to celebrate my own courage. And it was so simple
and so sweet. And that is the thing I come
back to again and again for people like yourself or
myself who can't go through private things privately. And I
just think, well, if we can set that little example,
(46:52):
if we can encourage another group of friends to pop
a bottle of champagne for somebody I'm in.
Speaker 2 (46:58):
And I think you said one other important thing, which
is to name internally what we are good at. And
I think sometimes we don't see it, like maybe you
didn't see the courage, but your friends saw the courage.
And so for your friends to name that attribute in
you and celebrate that attribute, I think as women, that's
(47:20):
another really healthy thing that we can.
Speaker 1 (47:22):
Get I do too, I really do too, and it's
it is the sort of thing that builds resiliency so
that you can have touch points where you really connect
to yourself in moments of joy or sorrow. You know,
you you talk in the third chapter of your book
about such a heavy experience that sadly, I think when
(47:45):
you get to a certain age we can all expect.
And you lost a dear friend.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
I mean who was young, you.
Speaker 1 (47:51):
Know, thirty seven or thirty eight, I believe you said,
your friend John. And going through cancer and going through
loss with someone very surreal thing when a friend your
age passes away and you write about how you learned
to grieve and how you were grieving in community and
(48:12):
in friendship with you know, his wife, and it's so devastating,
but it's so uplifting at the same time. You know,
as a reader who's now been through this sort of
shock in my own life, I just thought, Wow, this
is such a beautiful handbook in a way for how
(48:35):
to experience something like this and come out of it
both having held your own grief authentically, not you know,
turning your back on yourself or your experience, and realizing
how you can still claim the joy of what it
was out of it is the lesson that you had
(48:57):
at that time. Now, in hindsight, do you think that
John has kind of continued to be a teacher for
you in your life?
Speaker 2 (49:06):
For sure, both in how he lived his life. You know,
we were in a very rough and tumble tech industry,
in a pretty rough and tumble culture at Microsoft, right,
a lot of sharp elbows creating amazing things, and we were, Uh.
It was energetic and fun in a certain way, but
(49:26):
it was tough. And so to see him live his
life as himself, I mean, there wasn't a person that
you'd go around and you just knew who the good
people were in the company, and he was one of them.
He was celebrated for that and was himself. And so
by getting to write about him in this book, I
think I've gotten to keep alive a bit who he was.
(49:51):
And one of his three he left, as I say
in the book, three very young children behind, who who
I still know. And one of his daughters came to
one of my book events and I talked to her
for a while afterwards, and she said, you know, Melinda,
this has been so helpful. It's been cathartic for me.
To see how you saw my dad. Because I didn't
(50:11):
get to know him I was little. I read about him.
You know, my mom's told me stories my aunts and uncles,
but she said, to hear how he was as a
friend and then be able to share that with my friends,
she said, or my therapist, or my community. They get
to see my father in a different way than even
(50:31):
as I've described him. And so that's been a gift
that I think still comes like he he comes through
those stories. But as I talk about in the book,
what I learned was these concentric circles around the person
who's in the center, who is going through let's say,
a tough illness or potentially a death. You have to
(50:54):
really understand which ring you are on relative to that person.
Are you in that innermost ring, are you family? Are
you in the next ring of friendship? Are you two
or three rings or four rings out? And what you
do is you always provide comfort towards the center of
those rings, everybody who's the closest and that person, and
(51:15):
you dump your grief to people who are on the
outside of those rings further out right wow, so that
you don't take your issues. And because of course I
was grieving as I knew we were going to lose him.
But I'm not going to take that to him or
to his wife, Emmy. Right, that's completely putting my issue
on them. I just want to be support to them.
But I could grieve to my other friends who knew
(51:37):
him but weren't as close to him. Right.
Speaker 1 (51:39):
Yeah, it's something you can model reading about it. It's
a lesson you can take with you, and I think
that that is one of the marks of a beautiful book.
And now a word from our wonderful sponsors, I want
(52:03):
to pivot, which is a word I know you love
because I did this with Michelle Obama and you guys
have really amazing like mentor but also wonderful, approachable woman energy,
and I loved reading about her in your book. And
I want to just ask you like a quick fun
(52:23):
round of questions and then I'll ask you my last
and most excited or most most precious. But when you
talk about your friends, who like, who's your girl crew,
who do you call, who are your people, who do
you go on walks with? What does that world look
like for you in your village?
Speaker 2 (52:41):
Well, I talk about these three women that I call
my truth counsel. One of them is Charlotte Geimon. I
met her within the first three weeks of starting at Microsoft.
Another one is Emmy Nielson, who's the white was the
wife of the friend John who I met at Microsoft
who passed away. And another one is Killian No And
she moved move to Seattle when her husband took a
(53:02):
job in Seattle, and she literally left an entire organization
that she started in Washington, d C. And restarted here
in Seattle. And so they are my Monday morning walking group.
We text many, many, many times a week. I still
am very very close to my high school friend Mary Lehman.
(53:23):
We met on the first day of high school, literally
the first day. And she's somebody that you know, I've
reached out to in an emergency when I need something,
or she's reached out when I'm really joyful or vice versa.
She'll actually see my parents this weekend moraal day weekend
when she's down near where they live as she goes
to her nephew's graduation. So, yeah, those are some of
(53:45):
my community. Yeah, I think.
Speaker 1 (53:47):
About my high school girl text thread and you know,
my best girlfriends like Nia, who I was telling you
about it is these little crews of women I think
really become some of our built box of self when
you're not walking with them, when you're maybe going out
for like a nice a nice girls dinner. What's your
(54:08):
drink of choice?
Speaker 2 (54:09):
Oh gosh it. For years it was a lemon drop,
and now I would say it's a Manhattan. Pretty much
wherever I go, I order Manhattan.
Speaker 1 (54:18):
Very chic. I went through an old fashioned phase and
I loved when I'd order that at a bar and
a bartender would kind of raise his eyebrows at me,
and I'd be like, Yeah, I've really done it. Look
at me. What do you think is your dream meal?
Speaker 2 (54:33):
Oh? My dream meal is Mexican food. I grew up
in Dallas, and anything with guacamolean chips, be it a taco,
be it enchiladas. Just sign me up.
Speaker 1 (54:44):
I have a literal little parking lot hut taco place
in La. Next time you're on the West Coast, I'm going.
Speaker 2 (54:51):
To take you. Okay, great, What is a place that
you would.
Speaker 1 (54:54):
Love to visit if you could visit completely anonymously, just
to wander around for a day.
Speaker 2 (55:02):
Oh well, first of all, I can still go many
places anonymously. It's wonderful. Yes, it's wonderful.
Speaker 1 (55:08):
That shocks me.
Speaker 2 (55:09):
And oh gosh, Sydney, Australia, it's just it's a city
I love to walk in. I love the nature there,
I love the architecture. I like the people and the beaches.
Speaker 1 (55:18):
Yeah, that's so cool.
Speaker 2 (55:21):
Oh I just love that.
Speaker 1 (55:22):
Okay, So I have another pivot for you, And this
is a question about finance. What you're doing at Pivotal Ventures.
The way that you are upending some of the venture
capital world and investing in women really inspires me. Nia
and I have been on a very similar journey, you know,
doing a lot of philanthropic work together and petitioning for
(55:45):
a lot of corporate social responsibility checks. We eventually came
to a realization and in the words of you know,
the late great Desmond too too, you can only pull
people out of the river for long enough before you
walk upstream and figure out who's pushing them in. And
the push seems to come from inequity in the world, right,
(56:05):
And if you want to change equality, you have to
change the way money moves. Yes, and so we also
work in venture now and you are a north star
for us. The way that you work and what you
all do. And I guess I just wonder for any
young women who want to get into investing, or who
(56:27):
maybe are early in their careers in finance, what have
you learned since you shifted your sole focus from being
philanthropic into encompassing finance, And what advice would you give
to women who really want to do well and do good.
Speaker 2 (56:45):
What I say to women who choose to do investing
is invest in the things that are closest to you
and that are proximal and that you feel like you
can get your hands around and know. So one of
the things as I do and I believe you do,
is I invest in, for instance, limited partners who invest
(57:07):
in more women led companies. Why do I do that?
Because so often women's businesses don't get capitalized, and yet
they have an incredible lens, not a better lens, not
a worse lens than men, just a different lens on society.
And so some of the limited partners that I've invested
in who've invested in others, are you know some of
(57:30):
the businesses are turn out to be around women's healthcare,
like statewide in a whole state, holistic health for women,
or have to do with mental health, for people in
the postpartum phase, or maybe young people teens going through
mental health crisis or eating disorders. Like, it's just they
have a different lens even on caregiving, because more of
(57:52):
them have now caregived for not just kids, but elderly parents.
So I just say, you know, invest in people who
are going to and everybody else and who have a
different lens.
Speaker 1 (58:03):
Yes, And you're what I'm hearing you say goes back
to that point about the math and the morals, because
they meet. Because if you are not investing in fifty
one percent of the economy, I always say you're missing
out on fifty one percent of their returns, definitely, And
so it feels really exciting to see people waking up
(58:25):
to this and having this sort of aha moment out
in that space.
Speaker 2 (58:29):
And I think it takes a bit of courage to
invest in a different way. I mean, why do you
see a lot of vcs investing in the same types
of businesses. It's because it's what they know or they've
gotten used to. But so we're using some courage to
invest in things we haven't seen get capitalized before. But
one thing I do know about finance is people don't
(58:49):
like to leave money on the table. So when you're
investment thesis is played out, give us you know takes
eight ten years. Fine. I have a feeling you'll see
a lot of other people crowding in because I agree,
why did I leave? You know, why didn't I look
at that sector?
Speaker 1 (59:04):
I agree. It's the same way I feel about what
we do at our fund. We do a lot of
work in Michigan because we're very passionate about the Midwest,
and a lot of people don't get it, and I'm like,
do you really want to miss it out? I don't
think so, And so it feels exciting to remind people
of that. And gosh, I just I think the whole
(59:25):
lens of your world is exciting. All of it is motivating,
I know for me and for so many you know
of my friends who were all absolutely geeked that I
was going to get to talk to you today. I'm
going to ask you my favorite question to end an
interview with, and someday I'll ask you the rest. When
you look out at the rest of the year, your
(59:47):
summer which is about to hit, thankfully, and the way
that you think about these next chapters that are coming
after having reflected on so many chapters in your life
in your book so beautifully, when you look forward, what
feels like your work in progress?
Speaker 2 (01:00:04):
My work in progress on myself or in my company.
Speaker 1 (01:00:08):
Either both, whatever strikes you.
Speaker 2 (01:00:10):
I think I'm always a work in progress. I hope
I always am. But for me, I feel like I've
learned to have courage and to trust other people a lot.
So as my team brings forward ideas or as I
see something new, I feel like I have much more
the courage these days last ten years to go explore
(01:00:30):
whole new areas. And so for me, that's just exciting.
It goes back to that word discover. What else can
I discover? You know? What else should we be funding
that we're not seeing right now? What is somebody else
seeing that I'm not seeing? So for me, it's all
about finding partners who have good ideas and making sure
we fund them, because to me, those are the force
(01:00:52):
multipliers in life, and that just excites me. The sort
of undiscovered yet both in work and in inside of
myself of who I am. To me, that's always exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:01:04):
You're an explorer, yeah, I guess so. I love it.
I love it being a modern day Explorer feels right.
Thank you, yeah, thank you so much. Thank you for
sharing you know, your thoughts reflections, not only in the
book but on the show today. It's just been an
absolute joy.
Speaker 2 (01:01:24):
Well, thank you so much for having me and for
all you're doing through your activism and you're investing. I
just really admire it too, so back at you.
Speaker 1 (01:01:32):
You paved the way for us, so thank you so
much for giving us an example. Many of us didn't
grow up with it at home, so it really has
been incredibly meaningful to you know, be out in the
world and always get to see what you're up to.
Speaker 2 (01:01:46):
Thank you, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (01:01:48):
Bye bye,
Hey, everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to Work in Progress. Welcome
back to Work in Progress friends. This week we have
a guest that encompasses the idea of being a whip
(00:23):
smart woman in the world. Today, I am so geeked
to say this to you, guys, I'm actually kind of
losing my mind. Today we are joined by none other
than Melinda French Gates. She is a philanthropist, a businesswoman,
and a global advocate for women and girls, and on
a personal note, someone who has leveraged her platform for
(00:47):
such goodness in the world. I have looked up to
her for my entire adult life. For the last twenty
five years, Melinda has led efforts to unlock a healthier,
more prosperous, and more equal future. Did that at the
Gates Foundation, and today she hads Pivotal, an organization that
she formed in twenty fifteen that works to accelerate the
(01:07):
pace of progress and advance women's power and influence, both
here in the United States and all around the world.
And not only does she have one of the most
incredible professional resumes in the world, but Melinda has also
managed to be an incredibly heartfelt and vulnerable and thoughtful
(01:27):
leader for us. She is the author of the best
selling book The Moment of Lift, out of which she
actually created. Moment of Lift Books and Imprint, publishing original
nonfiction by visionaries that are working to unlock a more
equal world, and this year she is publishing her beautiful
memoir the next day. The book is about transitions, the
(01:52):
moments that we step out of our familiar surroundings and
into new landscapes, the space where we're caught in grief
or change or success or any kind of transition really,
and she's chosen to open up and reflect about her
own life in ways that had me flipping every page
(02:14):
saying yes exactly. Her story is obviously her own, it's
incredibly unique, and yet everything she shares will also feel
so personal to you. I know because it felt so
personal to me. Because the stories that she's telling illuminate
(02:35):
universal lessons, whether they're about loosening the grip of perfectionism,
helping friends navigate crisis, embracing uncertainty, all of it. Each
and every one of us, no matter who we are
or where we are in life, can be sure that
we are headed for times of transition and with incredible
(02:56):
warmth and grace, she has given us this book in
a moment in time that I think we need some
inspiration and some heart medicine more than ever. I am
so absolutely honored to have her on the podcast today.
Let's dive in with Melinda. Melinda, thank you so much
(03:25):
for joining me today. It's such an honor to have
you on the show as an early activist and a
woman who's tried to use my relative platform to affect
some positive change in the world. I have looked up
to you for my entire adult career and yeah, I'm
just so touched by this and so excited.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Oh well, I'm really glad we could do this.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Me too, And congratulations on the book. It's just so beautiful.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Yeah, before we dive into that and where we find
you today, I'd love to go back in time. And
I know you've shared some really beautiful stories about your life,
your childhood. You know what an amazing role model your
mother was to you. But for some of our listeners
who maybe haven't read the book yet, can you take
(04:17):
us back to let's say nine or ten years old
and reflect a little bit with us on who you
were as a kid, what your childhood was like, what
you were really interested in.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
So I grew up in Dallas, Texas, in a suburb
of Dallas, Texas, very close, tight knit community. We knew
most of our neighbors on our street and on the
street behind us. The moms kind of looked out for
each other's kids and kind of knew what was, you know,
going on, who was at whose house. And as a
nine or ten year old, one of my favorite things
(04:52):
was to ride my bike, being able to ride my
bike places, you know, every year I got a little
bit more freedom to ride further farther away from from
the house, and just to be able to ride to
the creek, or ride to the park, or eventually take
my allowance and ride to my favorite store. Just that
kind of sense of freedom and discovery. I've always loved summer.
(05:13):
I mean, I liked school, but I didn't really love
it until I got honestly to high school. So in
the summers of like when I was nine or ten,
I just couldn't wait for summer, you know, for school
to be over and then just to be outside a
lot playing. And I had a really good friend in
the neighborhood. My best friend lived across the alley and
down one house, and her mom was extraordinarily outdoors and athletic,
(05:39):
which was a bit different than sort of my mom.
And so the moms would often sign us up for
activities together. And so my best friend Ellen and I
used to go to the park and take swim lessons
or go play tennis or whatever our moms could dream
up as fun as far as fun summer camps for us.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Oh, that's so great. Do you think if you could
a little wrinkle in space time and hang out with
yourself for an afternoon? You know who you are today
with your nine year old self. Do you feel like
you would see the woman that you've become in her?
Do you see the same you know, kind of curiosity
about others and excitement for community in that little girl
(06:19):
when you look back.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
I think my sense of loving to be outdoors and
loving to play and play in an athletic way, I
call it be in my body, I think. And then
this sense of discovery. In fact, my word of this
year that came kind of came to me before the
start of the year is discover. Like I love that
sense of discovery, and so I think I still have
(06:45):
a lot of those elements in me. I certainly would
never have dreamt that I would become the advocate that
I have become for women and girls around the world.
That I just never you just I couldn't imagine that
that sort of sense of wonder and discovery and play
and athletic play. I think that's just been there for
a long time.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
I love that. I was someone asked me about activism
and particularly advocating for girls and girls' education around the world,
and I was sort of reflecting, trying to figure out
where the spark was lit, and I said, you know,
maybe it was college journalism and political science. And my
dad was the one who said, oh, give me a break.
(07:27):
You were organizing walkouts at school in the eighth grade.
You have always been like this, And I was like, oh, wow,
it's so neat when your parents can sort of help
you reflect on the things you're passionate about in your adulthood.
And so I love that. I bet if we got
to hang out with your nine year old self, there'd
be kernels in there for sure.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
Yeah, I would hope. So I spent a lot of
time climbing trees, not being able to bring my tennis
shoes inside because they smelled so bad in the summer,
you know, because I was out there so much, just
slopping around. And it's funny because in Dallas there isn't
a lot of nature nearby, I mean the park and
the creek. But where I live in Seattle, we are
(08:08):
just surrounded now by nature. And so one of the
things I love to do in the summer with a
friend is to paddle board or kayak or go out
on our bikes. But yeah, and I think maybe friendship too.
I knew the importance of friendship when I was little.
I was lucky enough to have this friend across the
alley and then girlfriends in my class. But I think
(08:29):
hopefully some of those elements endure.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
I love that, and I think those are the things
when you look back, you can you can kind of
view the chapters of your life or the moments that
helped you make a leap or evolve. And I think
that's why your book strikes me so beautifully. The next
day is all about transitions, and sometimes it's the thing
(08:56):
you're not sure you can do that you you know
you've got to break through your own glass ceiling to achieve,
or after a loss, you have to reflect on what's
most important to you. I'm curious as to how sitting
down to reflect on transition in every sort of version
(09:16):
it comes in, you know, the good, the bad, the ugly,
the beautiful. What you feel like you've learned about navigating
those those moments of time that are in the in
between when something is changing. You know, do you feel
like that that reflection made you ready to write the
book or or did writing the book help you leap
(09:40):
to the next phase.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
I think it was honestly a bit of both. I
didn't when I first started thinking about transitions, I was
really I wasn't thinking about a book. I was thinking
about I've been honored and asked to do the Stanford
commencement speech. And when I talked to the class presidents
months ahead, saying, you know, what would you like me
to talk about? What should I not talk about? And
(10:02):
one of the things they talked about was that they
felt like they were kind of on one track. You know,
get this degree, go to this company, or start this thing.
And they said, if you think there are room for openings,
if you believe in leaving room for openings or new opportunities,
can you talk a bit about that? And so as
I wrote that speech, I realized, Okay, I want to
(10:26):
talk about transitions. But it was afterwards that I went, oh,
my gosh, I'm turning sixty. You know. The speech was
last June. I was turning sixty in August, and I thought,
my gosh, I have been through so many transitions, and
so wow, maybe I have more to say on this.
My mom says that by the time you get to sixty,
(10:46):
you have a lot of things to say on a
lot of topics, maybe more than you should. But as
I started reflecting on the transitions, as I wrote the book,
I realized that in those in between spaces is where
the growth comes and where and even if their transitions
maybe you didn't expect or you didn't want to go through.
If you take the time, you grow a lot, and
(11:09):
there's a lot of resilience that is formed. And even
the transitions you expect or you want to come, they
still require sometimes like going to transition to college, you know,
transitioning to your first job. It takes a leap of
faith and some courage, right, And so I realized, oh,
that's actually where the magic is in life.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
Absolutely, And there was something that struck me really early
in the book when you were reflecting on being pregnant
with your first daughter, Jen, and you talked about retiring
from Microsoft at the time. And what really struck me
is I realized you were talking about this retirement in
(11:52):
a way that felt almost like reflecting on a calling.
You knew that motherhood was a calling of sorts, and
you also knew that you had the privilege in your
marriage at the time to be able to do this,
and knowing that you wanted to be the kind of
parent that your mother was for you, And I wrote
(12:15):
a note to myself and I said, this seems so beautiful,
and I wonder if it felt that way, and I
wonder if it also irked you that it always almost
always has to be the woman who makes that choice.
And then the thing that really knocked me over was,
as you reflected further in that early chapter, you talked
(12:35):
about how that pregnancy gave you freedom, you know, and
you wrote freedom from perfectionism, from the crushing, relentless societal pressure,
et cetera, et cetera. I won't, you know, read you
to you the whole way through, but it really shook
me because the way you talk about it and you
(12:57):
reflect on calling on freedom, on and essentially writing your
own permission slip to live the way you want to.
You write about it like a craving. And I don't
mean a pregnancy craving, a food craving. I mean like
a like a soulful craving to own yourself. It's such
a cool way to open a book because I see
(13:20):
so many versions of myself in these versions of you.
Is it sort of surreal to shepherd your own story
and the story of your daughter and the stories of
so many other women in that way?
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Yeah? And I think until you really, at least for me,
until I sat and reflected even more on it, it
was just a calling. I would just say, a knowing.
I just knew I could not have the career that
I had at Microsoft, which I loved. It is hard
(13:54):
charging nine year career that I had always wanted, you know,
I went from computer science to business school to that.
But I knew I couldn't be the kind of mother
I wanted to be unless I stopped doing that. And look,
it is an enormous privilege, enormous And I even knew
(14:15):
that at the time that I had enough resources that
I could stay home, right, And it's funny because I
also always knew I would go back and do something.
I didn't know what, but I knew it wasn't going
to be the same pace as what I was doing
at Microsoft. And then I did. I got into it,
(14:35):
and it just felt so good. It felt exactly like
what I wanted to do. I had summers back, like
one of the things I lamented when I went to
Microsoft was it wasn't like college or high school where
you had the summer off or your nine or ten
year old self. And so all of a sudden, I
had the summers back, and I have this little baby
I can play with like, you know, I could take
her when there's sandtoys to a beach nearby, or a
(14:57):
picnic with other moms, or bicycle with her. But yes,
I didn't realize at the time that I was chartering
a course for myself of who I wanted to be
in life. And I will say that as much as
I absolutely loved it in the beginning, I did have
a crisis of self about eighteen months or two years
(15:20):
into it, because we moved from this beautiful kind of
idyllic family house that I had picked out during our
engagement down the Street into this enormous mansion, and I
really had a crisis of self then because I was
no longer a working a working woman. I have this baby,
but here I am living in a house with a
(15:44):
gate way up the hill and more security and much
larger than I had wanted. So I really had to
find myself in that period, and in a way, eventually
philanthropy found me, or I found myself in it. And
that is something I never ever would have predicted in
(16:04):
life ever well.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
And that through line, because what I'm hearing you reflect
on is having the courage to listen to your own
inner voice. You call it a knowing. You knew that
you needed to make this shift for this moment in
your life. You knew that it wouldn't be permanent, but
whatever came after wouldn't be the same necessarily, And it
(16:29):
strikes such a knowing in me. I think my inner
voice reading your words went, I know that I know
what that is. And as I was reflecting on it
and on this idea of craving and this idea of calling,
it really struck me that you were talking about this
(16:50):
this immense craving or knowing, however you define it, of
our primal selves. You know that wildness of women are
wizys that is so special in our circles. And I
was thinking about how what it really is is your voice.
Your inner voice can become the voice you use in
(17:11):
the world. It's certainly a voice that, as someone looking
in on your life, I have admired of yours. And
I started to wonder, you know, is trusting the knowing
to finding the voice which came with philanthropy. As you
talk about what found you, I wonder if that's our
(17:33):
gendered knowing that we deserve truly equal footing both in
our home and out in the world, because we have
all of these ambitions and all of these things even
before we become parents. And then you become a parent
and you look at a little girl, and how could
you not want her to have everything, everything that was
denied to you, and everything that was given to you,
(17:55):
everything you know was denied to our grandmothers. You know,
you want these little girls to have everything and more.
And I don't know, I just couldn't help but see
all this extra stuff in what you're talking about, even
as you so beautifully shared about what a life altering moment,
(18:16):
this pregnancy and her birth and this whole journey was for.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
You, definitely. And I think you know so often as women,
like as I say to all three of my now
adult children, I have a daughter, a son, and a
daughter in that order, you are enough. You're enough on
the day you're born. You're enough. And yet I think
(18:39):
as we go out into society, especially as women, we're told, well,
that position's not for you, or maybe you're not quite
ready for that promotion, or you don't see somebody. Maybe
if you aspire, let's say, to be a governor of
a state, you don't see very many others of them, right,
and you so you wonder, what could I if that's
(19:00):
my aspiration, could I get there? Or if you a
young girl wants to be president, she's never seen a
female president in the United States ever, And so I
think we get all these messages from society maybe somehow
you're not quite enough to get that role or that position,
or do that thing or start that business. And that
has that really has animated my life, and that I
(19:25):
think is what I learned through philanthropy as I started
to go out and be out in these low income
countries and realize because it's so obvious there the start
contrast between men and women and what women are literally
not allowed to do what men can do. And so
I kept thinking, oh, if we can as a philanthropy community,
(19:48):
make the world more equal for them. But it wasn't
until I turned the question back on myself and said, well,
how far are we really here in our country? And
I wanted to say, oh, my god, there's so much
more work to be done in the United States, which
is the highest income country in the world. And yet yes,
we are enough on the day we are born. And
(20:10):
yet women and men don't have equality in our own country,
and that to me just it shouldn't be. And that
calling of meeting other women who were asking me for
things as they just knew I was a US citizen
coming to listen you know in some way that philanthropy
might help. That calling from those women really started to
animate my life, both in terms of my foundation work,
(20:33):
but also the work I wanted to do here in
the United States.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yes, and now a word from our sponsors who make
this show possible. It's interesting you talk about that eventual
moment of having to look back at where you live.
(20:58):
I feel like I've I've had so many of the
in my own way, which is not nearly as large
and global as yours, But in using this career and
platform as I can so many of the same journeys,
traveling all around the world, wanting to fix what appear
to be the greatest disparities, and then realizing how great
(21:23):
the disparities are in our own backyard, and how they're
just a little bit better masked, but they're everywhere. And
when you realize that it's just the United States and
Papa New Guinea that don't have any guaranteed paid leave,
and you start to realize, well, that's part of the
reason the women don't become the CEO or the president,
(21:44):
because we're told if we do start a family, it'll
take us out of work. But it shouldn't. Men and
women both deserve the opportunity to be at home with
their new, expanding families and then to return to the workplace,
and other countries and other systems have designed for that,
and we simply haven't invested in certainly in women, but
(22:08):
we actually haven't invested in families well at all. And
so when did that light bulb occur for you? You know,
when eventually you decided to start the foundation. You had
these young kids, and it came quicker than you wanted
it to, which I love that you talk about in
the book being like, I don't mean to be ungrateful,
(22:30):
but does this have to happen now? Because I think,
no matter what, we worry that we're we're doing the
wrong thing. We always want to do all the things,
but you can only, you know, spend so many plates
at once. When did the paid leave issue really strike
you as, oh, this has to be one of the
drums we beat consistently and talk about everywhere we go.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Well, as I was traveling on behalf of the foundation,
I would also go to many other high income countries
because we were trying to get their governments to you know,
some of the work that we were doing as a foundation.
It's really up to governments to scale it up. And
so as I would be out in the UK, or
in France or in Germany, and women would talk about
(23:14):
their work and their child rearing, and I was seeing
how they would talk about gender. But then when I
would also go to the Nordic countries, to Norway and Sweden,
and I started talking to men and they're like, we
can't believe you all don't have paid family medical leave.
And I would interview them and I'd say, well, well, okay,
(23:37):
do you take time off? And they're like, well, of
course we take time off. Why wouldn't we want to
be with our new child, our son, or our daughter.
And it had and as I started to study and
learn and realize, Okay, what are the two the two
biggest barriers that hold women back. It's harassment and abuse
on a continuum and paid family medical leave. And when
(23:59):
you look when you talk to people in Sweden and
Norway and you realize they've had their policy for so long,
it's a given that it changed the norm in society,
Like norms are hard to change. But men literally say no, no, no,
I'm not taking it because I don't want to leave
money on the table, Like that might have been why
men's first started to take it, but now it's because
(24:20):
I want to be part of the child rearing.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
It just became the norm.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
And so that's when I started to realize, wow, And
that was somewhere around maybe twenty fourteen, that this needed
to change. In the United States, this makes absolutely no sense.
We have these gendered roles that we just expect somehow
women will work and take care of the kids, right,
and it doesn't work. I've talked to women all over
(24:47):
the US, you know, in the South, in the North,
in the East, and the West, and women will say, like,
I don't know where to leave my child, like if
I don't have a parent to leave them with, and
I need to work, if it's a single mom, or
when it comes down to my child is sick, Who's
going to take them to the pediatrician? I'm the one
that's expected to And yet there's a penalty at work
(25:07):
for doing that. You just realize, we just we haven't
advanced like some of these other societies have, particularly in
the Nordic region, but all over the world that people
are doing paid family medical.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Leave, absolutely and what that does is it actually it's
not just a disservice to these new families, it's a
disservice to our society because you see, and I so
appreciate that you talk about these truths so often when
you're working around the world, because I think everybody needs
(25:41):
to hear them, and they need to hear them regularly.
To your point, so we can change habits or norms
when women, but families are supported countries do better economically, right,
they become not only do their GDPs increase, they become
more technologically innovative. They become places where new ideas are
(26:02):
born and where leaps in terms of human growth happen.
And so really, when you invest in taking care of families,
you build a better world. It's not just a moral issue,
it's also a mathematical one. It's an economic one. And
I think where the math and the morals meet should
(26:23):
always be the zone we're aiming for.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Right, definitely, and because we do have to realize that
women are, by and large around the world, the center
of the family, and if she does well, her children
have a better chance and the family has a better
chance of thriving. If she's not doing well, the converse
is true, the children are less likely to thrive, right.
(26:48):
And so that's why I always say we need to
lift women up, just remove the barriers that hold them
down and do what we can to lift them up,
because they lift up everybody else. And you're absolutely right,
and it comes down to economics. It has a ripple
effect throughout society.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
Absolutely and has has learning so much of this because
I'll tell you anytime I get a nugget of information
like that, you know, there's some white paper or some
great new piece of research from a Nordic country, as
you say, comes out. It makes me feel so gleeful
because because it reinforces the knowing, the knowing that we deserve,
(27:28):
the support can now also be proven. And I guess
I wonder, as someone who holds such great knowing, does
that kind of make you reflect on where some of
that expectation around women and even personally for you, that
guilt spiral that you talked about in trying to balance
(27:51):
launching the foundation and having three young kids, how that
spiral kind of you know, becomes like a ninja star
if you will, Because every woman I know who has
a family, or runs a company, or has a busy
life or is working two jobs, you know, any fill
in the blank feels like no matter what choice they're making,
(28:14):
it might be the wrong one. And you said something
in your book about this guilt spiral that is so
common for us. I wrote it in all caps in
my notebook that guilt is an indulgence and that realizing
that changed everything for you because it made you realize
(28:36):
guilt is focused on me, on us and you're trying
to focus out around you. I would imagine it feels doubly, triply,
quadruply true with all this data. But when you look
back at when you realize that that aha moment, can
you talk a little bit about that, where it came
(28:56):
from and how it had a ripple effect for you
personally in your life.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
Sure. I finally, when my kids were about middle school age,
learned this concept that had been come forward by a
psychologist in the UK about good enough parenting and the
concept of good enough parenting. They've gone out and collected
a lot of data over time that one good enough
(29:22):
parents and kids thrive. They just need one good enough adult.
And sometimes it's not even the parents. Let's say both
parents are struggling with something right and balancing a lot.
If they can have a coach who believes in them,
they can have a teacher who believes in them, but
that consistent nurturing of the child, then the child has
(29:44):
the ability to thrive. And once I could ask myself,
I was so caught up in this indulgence, as you say,
of the perfect parent. Whatever the notion of the perfect
parent is, it was some form. I think of my
mom who didn't work when I was younger. She worked
more when I was older. But you know, the be
there all the time. You know that that notion just
(30:07):
isn't isn't right, Like there is no such thing. There's
all kinds of parenting in the world, right, and kids
thrive in different ways. And so it was more saying
to myself, you know, going to my journal and saying, hmm,
am I a good enough parent? Am I good enough?
And I could start to answer the question. I wrote
down a few things I was doing, like, by gosh,
(30:28):
I am a good enough parent, So guess what my
kids are going to thrive? And so I could let
down the pressure on myself of perfectionism and on them.
It just kind of took the whole pressure level down
in the household and I could be like, yeah, they're
gonna turn out okay, Like I'm everything right, you know,
(30:50):
And but that's okay too. My mom didn't get everything
right right, but she got enough of it right that
you know, we for thrived as children.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Yeah, And to your point, what a great thing to
teach your children that they have a village, that their
coach is someone they can look up to, that their
auntie is someone they can always call with a problem
that their mentor at their internship or their summer job
is worth listening to. What it strikes me as is
(31:21):
a wonderful way to build an emotionally intelligent, communicative, and
resilient child.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Definitely, And I think you can also teach them. What
I learned later was also when they were more in
the high school ages, could you're also teaching them rupture
and repair? Like maybe you had intended to get to
that activity after school, you know, and they're on the field,
but oops, you got stuck in traffic, or you got
stuck on a phone call and you arrived late and
(31:50):
you missed the goal, or you missed the thing that
they were you know, there to do, okay, or maybe
there's a day. I certainly had days where I lost
my temper and I I hadn't sure, but going back
and apologizing, like taking responsibility and then changing your actions
in the future, you can teach your kids rupture and repair.
(32:14):
Yes I ruptured, I raised my voice at you because
I was stressed about something else, but that's no excuse,
Like I take responsibility, and so what it teaches them
because the truth is in any healthy relationship a friendship,
an intimate partner relationship, a work colleague. There will be
rupture and repair, but it's really how you do the repair.
(32:38):
And that was another concept. I was like, Oh, it's okay,
Like it's okay, and I'll teach them something just by
being me and being real about the relationship and my
faults and my mistakes exactly.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
And I think it's such a healthier modality and maybe
strikes me, as you know, such a person point of excitement,
because I too, am a recovering perfectionist. And the thing
that undid it for me, you know, in the way
that you talk about this idea that guilt is an
(33:11):
indulgence being so revelatory. The thing that was the big
sort of thought bomb for me was when a friend said,
don't you understand how toxic perfectionism is. Perfect doesn't exist.
So if you've been raised or cultured to be a perfectionist,
you've actually been raised to believe you're a failure. And
(33:33):
I was like, oh my god, this thing rather than
just being a human who does great on some days
and not so great on others, and who tries to
be a good sum total of their parts, this idea
that if you're not perfect, you're failing. Really just sets
us up for failure. So what a gorgeous, more just
(33:57):
more human way to live. To be a real person
trying their best.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
That's right, a real person in the world. And you're
gonna stumble and fall some days, you're gonna be tired,
you might be a little grouchy, but you know, on
the next day you get up, you might be kind
of another version of your best self. And it's okay
because it also gives other people permission to be their
full self. Like as I've said to my kids many times,
(34:24):
my mother said it to me, which is all emotions
are okay, all of them, mear anger, you know, even
all the ones you would think of as negative emotions
and all the positive emotions. All emotions are okay. It's
what you do with them, and so you know, and
it's also that okay. So maybe you were in anxious
(34:46):
one day and so you weren't your nicest self. Again,
you can go back and repair with that person or
just say I'm so sorry I was having a bad day,
and it gives them permission later to have a bad day, right.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
Yeah, and to not have it feel so f Yeah,
nothing has to be such a catastrophe. Even your worst
day is something that you know, a year from now
you're going to reflect on and realize it taught you
something and it's just kind of a blip on the radar.
And I think that's that's that that resiliency. And on
(35:21):
the subject of resilience, and let me preface the question
by saying, listen, if anybody yets not wanting, you know,
a divorce or a man to be your identity as
an individual or a woman, it is me. I guess
I'm curious because you've You've spoken about this, I think,
really eloquently and beautifully for someone who I'm sure has
(35:44):
been bombarded with less than eloquent and beautiful questions on
the subject of that sort of rip and then a
personal repair, if you will. What has struck me? Having
gone through it a little more recently than you, and
I've decided to look up all the women I admire
been through it and say, like, what have you said
(36:06):
that will give me some guidance here that I can
read it to in the morning. You've spoken really beautifully
about how you wanted to thoughtfully reflect on this. Because
you are a public figure, there's just no way not to.
I feel that. For me, what it came down to was, oh,
(36:30):
I have to admit I think I've made a mistake.
There are certain things I don't want a model for
the children. I know I want to be a mother too,
And I know that can be a very shattering experience
for women who go through it in the same kind
of time period that I did. And I really I
(36:51):
thought so much about your story and about other women
I know who have experienced that kind of shift or
transition in that later stage, you know. And for you,
you were married for twenty seven years, you did raise
all these babies together. Obviously, you did some gorgeous things together.
You launched one of the world's most beautiful and accomplished
(37:13):
philanthropic foundations that you ran, and you advocated as this
sort of superwoman in my eyes, and all my friends
who you know, when we got started, were like, yeah,
we'll go to that conference, Yeah we'll get on that plane.
Sure we'll show up at this place. Yeah you want
to go bug everybody in Congress. Let's go, let's stage
(37:34):
a protest in Washington. Like we didn't know what we
were doing, but we looked at people like you and said, well, look,
it's possible. And I guess I just wonder and it
doesn't have to be a long answer. I realize I've
been rambling about this for a long time because I've
thought a lot about it, clearly, but for you knowing
(37:54):
that your story and your example can actually be a
gift in terms of resiliency. And I don't mean about
even the kids, or your ex or anyone, but you,
the woman Melinda, who if you'd gone through this privately
in another life, you wouldn't have to talk about it
out in the world. Is there like, is there a
(38:15):
nugget of wisdom or an aha moment you had that
made you know that even though the world would be watching,
which is why so many people stay, that made you
know that you deserved to choose yourself, that you deserved
to carve a new path, that you deserved, especially as
the mother of girls, to say I want something different, deeper,
(38:39):
better for this next phase in my life. Because I
know there's a lot of women that would give anything
for that knowing to come to them when they're in
the moment of do I stay or do I go?
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Yeah, And one thing I would say to anybody going
through this look, it's just painful, and the knowing comes,
and you might push it way for a while, like
so I will tell you the knowing came that I'm like, no, no, no,
I can't make this work. Knowing came, No, I can
make this work. Knowing came make So that is, at
least for me, that was a normal part of the process.
(39:11):
But at least for me in the end, I had
to look. You know, when you point your finger at
somebody else, they say you have to look at the
three fingers pointing back at yourself, right, yes, you know, yes,
And I realized there had been some problems it. But ultimately,
if I was pointing the finger at that person saying
(39:32):
you betrayed me, I had to look at my three
fingers pointing back at myself and saying, I'm betraying myself
and who I am. If I stay I have certain
values and if I cannot live those values out in
this relationship of who I am and what I believe,
that I'm betraying myself. And I thought, how horrible is that?
(39:56):
Do I want to betray myself?
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (40:00):
No, And so that helped me have the courage to
eventually do what I did. And the other thing I
say to people who you know. Some people will come
and talk to me, who are you know contemplating at
a divorce, And I'll say, look, it is not easy,
and you know, I wouldn't wish it on any family,
(40:21):
but I will tell you when it's over, and you know,
you go through a period of healing. You don't know
what it is. I don't know what it is, but
something beautiful will grow on the other side. So by
letting go of something, you may not know what you're
going to and you may not even know it for
a few years, but something beautiful will come on the
other side, and you will know yourself even better and
(40:43):
you'll be more resilient for whatever the next big change
in life is that comes. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
Yeah, I think if you can get over the fear
of the unknown, you can actually wind up discovering the
joy of the unexpected. That's on the other side of it.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Definitely, most definitely, And you just have to have the
courage to say, uh, I may not know what's coming next,
but okay, out there somewhere is something. And then but
you learn from that courage. It's just like when we
teach our kids. Let's say they have to step into
a new friendship or a new classroom or a new situation.
(41:26):
Where is their self esteem built and where's the resilience built?
By actually taking that step, that's how they come to
know what they're capable of and what's inside of them.
And so it's the same way for us as women
or men, no matter what age we are, we still
have to have the courage to take that heart or
(41:47):
that uncomfortable step, no matter what.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Yeah, I just think it's really beautiful. Thank you, And
now a word from our sponsors. Did you have certain
self care practices because you knew the world would be
(42:10):
paying attention? Like did you just delete everything off your phone?
Did you just lock your phone in a safe? Like
I had a couple of days where I was like
I need to leave the house and I need to
leave any electronic tether here and I need to just
be outside, you know. And then the next day I
was like, maybe I need to just power the thing off,
but have the music because the music helps on the walk.
(42:32):
Like I really was, it was sort of like doing
a paint by numbers when the numbers have been erased.
What were your sort of tools for your own self care?
Speaker 2 (42:42):
I had developed a lot of tools for self care
in that in between space, you know, where once you
have made the decision that you need to leave, but
then there's you know, a time before it can be
actually happen and be executed right.
Speaker 1 (42:58):
I'd imagine, also, especially at the echelon of Life Global Foundation,
I can't even imagine the complexity. The paperwork nearly killed me.
Speaker 2 (43:08):
I can't.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
I can't fathom it for you. So just hats off
that you've made it to the other side, and you
haven't you're not in the corner like eating your own hair.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
I'm amazed. There are a few days I could have
done that, but I was lucky enough to be surrounded
by an amazing tiny team of people helping me write.
But I had to learn self care during that in
between time where I didn't know when the divorce would
get announced, how it would all get split up, what
was to come. That's when I developed all my self
(43:39):
care techniques. And that was included, you know, walking with
a friend at a moment's notice, walking with a friends,
some friends on a routine basis. I talk about therapy
in the book, which I never expected to write about,
and I was a skeptical of therapy, but talking to
my therapist. Sometimes I just needed to reach out to
friends who had no idea that I was separated, just
(44:01):
to go have some fun. Or other times I was
saying to somebody, this morning, I would just listen to
a book, a piece of fiction, and that would just
take me away. But a lot being out in nature
helped kind of just get me away from a very
tense situation. So I had all those self care tools.
(44:21):
Then when it went public, and so to be honest,
I had already gone through the hardest part behind the scenes,
and so then it was just kind of like, Okay,
finally it's out there, right, Yeah, And I didn't go
look at my phone. My youngest daughter would show me
a few things and I'd be like, okay, that's enough.
You know. I go outside and you know, sit by
the lake, listen to some birds. I like to swing.
(44:43):
We had a swing set in our yard back then,
so I go swing.
Speaker 1 (44:47):
Yeah, it is interesting, the little things, you know, as
time would have it. My my best friend in the world.
Who is I mean, she's my everything, She's my business partner,
you know, my my sister. For all intents and purposes.
We went through this at exactly the same time, in
(45:07):
exactly the same summer. It was, you know, a wild time,
and out of the woodwork came so many other friends.
Interestingly enough, best friend from college, one of my dearest
friends from my activist space, one of my friends, you know,
dealing with a spouse with addiction. Like, we had this
sort of cocoon of women. And I remember on the
(45:28):
day that I knew my news would go public and
I was like, oh God, my best friend FaceTime from Detroit,
one of my other friends came over and we walked
around the house. We saged my whole house together. Knowing
we were on a countdown, I was like, Okay, six
more minutes. And we did this whole little ceremony together.
And then we had a girlfriend who was refreshing the internet,
(45:50):
and the minute it hit she was like, it's up.
We popped a bottle of champagne because they were like,
we're just going to reframe this for you. This doesn't
have to be a sad thing. We're so proud out
of you. And after that, I turned my phone on
airplane mode and I literally put it away for three days.
It was a Friday. I was like I'll turn it
back on on Monday.
Speaker 2 (46:10):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (46:11):
Anybody who really needs to talk to me, you can
call my landline from nineteen ninety six and that'll be that.
And it was this sort of gorgeous thing, and it
was to your point. The community of women, that village,
that sisterhood. They helped me take something that in the
in between had been so difficult and painful and scary,
(46:31):
and they turned it into a moment where I got
to celebrate my own courage. And it was so simple
and so sweet. And that is the thing I come
back to again and again for people like yourself or
myself who can't go through private things privately. And I
just think, well, if we can set that little example,
(46:52):
if we can encourage another group of friends to pop
a bottle of champagne for somebody I'm in.
Speaker 2 (46:58):
And I think you said one other important thing, which
is to name internally what we are good at. And
I think sometimes we don't see it, like maybe you
didn't see the courage, but your friends saw the courage.
And so for your friends to name that attribute in
you and celebrate that attribute, I think as women, that's
(47:20):
another really healthy thing that we can.
Speaker 1 (47:22):
Get I do too, I really do too, and it's
it is the sort of thing that builds resiliency so
that you can have touch points where you really connect
to yourself in moments of joy or sorrow. You know,
you you talk in the third chapter of your book
about such a heavy experience that sadly, I think when
(47:45):
you get to a certain age we can all expect.
And you lost a dear friend.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
I mean who was young, you.
Speaker 1 (47:51):
Know, thirty seven or thirty eight, I believe you said,
your friend John. And going through cancer and going through
loss with someone very surreal thing when a friend your
age passes away and you write about how you learned
to grieve and how you were grieving in community and
(48:12):
in friendship with you know, his wife, and it's so devastating,
but it's so uplifting at the same time. You know,
as a reader who's now been through this sort of
shock in my own life, I just thought, Wow, this
is such a beautiful handbook in a way for how
(48:35):
to experience something like this and come out of it
both having held your own grief authentically, not you know,
turning your back on yourself or your experience, and realizing
how you can still claim the joy of what it
was out of it is the lesson that you had
(48:57):
at that time. Now, in hindsight, do you think that
John has kind of continued to be a teacher for
you in your life?
Speaker 2 (49:06):
For sure, both in how he lived his life. You know,
we were in a very rough and tumble tech industry,
in a pretty rough and tumble culture at Microsoft, right,
a lot of sharp elbows creating amazing things, and we were, Uh.
It was energetic and fun in a certain way, but
(49:26):
it was tough. And so to see him live his
life as himself, I mean, there wasn't a person that
you'd go around and you just knew who the good
people were in the company, and he was one of them.
He was celebrated for that and was himself. And so
by getting to write about him in this book, I
think I've gotten to keep alive a bit who he was.
(49:51):
And one of his three he left, as I say
in the book, three very young children behind, who who
I still know. And one of his daughters came to
one of my book events and I talked to her
for a while afterwards, and she said, you know, Melinda,
this has been so helpful. It's been cathartic for me.
To see how you saw my dad. Because I didn't
(50:11):
get to know him I was little. I read about him.
You know, my mom's told me stories my aunts and uncles,
but she said, to hear how he was as a
friend and then be able to share that with my friends,
she said, or my therapist, or my community. They get
to see my father in a different way than even
(50:31):
as I've described him. And so that's been a gift
that I think still comes like he he comes through
those stories. But as I talk about in the book,
what I learned was these concentric circles around the person
who's in the center, who is going through let's say,
a tough illness or potentially a death. You have to
(50:54):
really understand which ring you are on relative to that person.
Are you in that innermost ring, are you family? Are
you in the next ring of friendship? Are you two
or three rings or four rings out? And what you
do is you always provide comfort towards the center of
those rings, everybody who's the closest and that person, and
(51:15):
you dump your grief to people who are on the
outside of those rings further out right wow, so that
you don't take your issues. And because of course I
was grieving as I knew we were going to lose him.
But I'm not going to take that to him or
to his wife, Emmy. Right, that's completely putting my issue
on them. I just want to be support to them.
But I could grieve to my other friends who knew
(51:37):
him but weren't as close to him. Right.
Speaker 1 (51:39):
Yeah, it's something you can model reading about it. It's
a lesson you can take with you, and I think
that that is one of the marks of a beautiful book.
And now a word from our wonderful sponsors, I want
(52:03):
to pivot, which is a word I know you love
because I did this with Michelle Obama and you guys
have really amazing like mentor but also wonderful, approachable woman energy,
and I loved reading about her in your book. And
I want to just ask you like a quick fun
(52:23):
round of questions and then I'll ask you my last
and most excited or most most precious. But when you
talk about your friends, who like, who's your girl crew,
who do you call, who are your people, who do
you go on walks with? What does that world look
like for you in your village?
Speaker 2 (52:41):
Well, I talk about these three women that I call
my truth counsel. One of them is Charlotte Geimon. I
met her within the first three weeks of starting at Microsoft.
Another one is Emmy Nielson, who's the white was the
wife of the friend John who I met at Microsoft
who passed away. And another one is Killian No And
she moved move to Seattle when her husband took a
(53:02):
job in Seattle, and she literally left an entire organization
that she started in Washington, d C. And restarted here
in Seattle. And so they are my Monday morning walking group.
We text many, many, many times a week. I still
am very very close to my high school friend Mary Lehman.
(53:23):
We met on the first day of high school, literally
the first day. And she's somebody that you know, I've
reached out to in an emergency when I need something,
or she's reached out when I'm really joyful or vice versa.
She'll actually see my parents this weekend moraal day weekend
when she's down near where they live as she goes
to her nephew's graduation. So, yeah, those are some of
(53:45):
my community. Yeah, I think.
Speaker 1 (53:47):
About my high school girl text thread and you know,
my best girlfriends like Nia, who I was telling you
about it is these little crews of women I think
really become some of our built box of self when
you're not walking with them, when you're maybe going out
for like a nice a nice girls dinner. What's your
(54:08):
drink of choice?
Speaker 2 (54:09):
Oh gosh it. For years it was a lemon drop,
and now I would say it's a Manhattan. Pretty much
wherever I go, I order Manhattan.
Speaker 1 (54:18):
Very chic. I went through an old fashioned phase and
I loved when I'd order that at a bar and
a bartender would kind of raise his eyebrows at me,
and I'd be like, Yeah, I've really done it. Look
at me. What do you think is your dream meal?
Speaker 2 (54:33):
Oh? My dream meal is Mexican food. I grew up
in Dallas, and anything with guacamolean chips, be it a taco,
be it enchiladas. Just sign me up.
Speaker 1 (54:44):
I have a literal little parking lot hut taco place
in La. Next time you're on the West Coast, I'm going.
Speaker 2 (54:51):
To take you. Okay, great, What is a place that
you would.
Speaker 1 (54:54):
Love to visit if you could visit completely anonymously, just
to wander around for a day.
Speaker 2 (55:02):
Oh well, first of all, I can still go many
places anonymously. It's wonderful. Yes, it's wonderful.
Speaker 1 (55:08):
That shocks me.
Speaker 2 (55:09):
And oh gosh, Sydney, Australia, it's just it's a city
I love to walk in. I love the nature there,
I love the architecture. I like the people and the beaches.
Speaker 1 (55:18):
Yeah, that's so cool.
Speaker 2 (55:21):
Oh I just love that.
Speaker 1 (55:22):
Okay, So I have another pivot for you, And this
is a question about finance. What you're doing at Pivotal Ventures.
The way that you are upending some of the venture
capital world and investing in women really inspires me. Nia
and I have been on a very similar journey, you know,
doing a lot of philanthropic work together and petitioning for
(55:45):
a lot of corporate social responsibility checks. We eventually came
to a realization and in the words of you know,
the late great Desmond too too, you can only pull
people out of the river for long enough before you
walk upstream and figure out who's pushing them in. And
the push seems to come from inequity in the world, right,
(56:05):
And if you want to change equality, you have to
change the way money moves. Yes, and so we also
work in venture now and you are a north star
for us. The way that you work and what you
all do. And I guess I just wonder for any
young women who want to get into investing, or who
(56:27):
maybe are early in their careers in finance, what have
you learned since you shifted your sole focus from being
philanthropic into encompassing finance, And what advice would you give
to women who really want to do well and do good.
Speaker 2 (56:45):
What I say to women who choose to do investing
is invest in the things that are closest to you
and that are proximal and that you feel like you
can get your hands around and know. So one of
the things as I do and I believe you do,
is I invest in, for instance, limited partners who invest
(57:07):
in more women led companies. Why do I do that?
Because so often women's businesses don't get capitalized, and yet
they have an incredible lens, not a better lens, not
a worse lens than men, just a different lens on society.
And so some of the limited partners that I've invested
in who've invested in others, are you know some of
(57:30):
the businesses are turn out to be around women's healthcare,
like statewide in a whole state, holistic health for women,
or have to do with mental health, for people in
the postpartum phase, or maybe young people teens going through
mental health crisis or eating disorders. Like, it's just they
have a different lens even on caregiving, because more of
(57:52):
them have now caregived for not just kids, but elderly parents.
So I just say, you know, invest in people who
are going to and everybody else and who have a
different lens.
Speaker 1 (58:03):
Yes, And you're what I'm hearing you say goes back
to that point about the math and the morals, because
they meet. Because if you are not investing in fifty
one percent of the economy, I always say you're missing
out on fifty one percent of their returns, definitely, And
so it feels really exciting to see people waking up
(58:25):
to this and having this sort of aha moment out
in that space.
Speaker 2 (58:29):
And I think it takes a bit of courage to
invest in a different way. I mean, why do you
see a lot of vcs investing in the same types
of businesses. It's because it's what they know or they've
gotten used to. But so we're using some courage to
invest in things we haven't seen get capitalized before. But
one thing I do know about finance is people don't
(58:49):
like to leave money on the table. So when you're
investment thesis is played out, give us you know takes
eight ten years. Fine. I have a feeling you'll see
a lot of other people crowding in because I agree,
why did I leave? You know, why didn't I look
at that sector?
Speaker 1 (59:04):
I agree. It's the same way I feel about what
we do at our fund. We do a lot of
work in Michigan because we're very passionate about the Midwest,
and a lot of people don't get it, and I'm like,
do you really want to miss it out? I don't
think so, And so it feels exciting to remind people
of that. And gosh, I just I think the whole
(59:25):
lens of your world is exciting. All of it is motivating,
I know for me and for so many you know
of my friends who were all absolutely geeked that I
was going to get to talk to you today. I'm
going to ask you my favorite question to end an
interview with, and someday I'll ask you the rest. When
you look out at the rest of the year, your
(59:47):
summer which is about to hit, thankfully, and the way
that you think about these next chapters that are coming
after having reflected on so many chapters in your life
in your book so beautifully, when you look forward, what
feels like your work in progress?
Speaker 2 (01:00:04):
My work in progress on myself or in my company.
Speaker 1 (01:00:08):
Either both, whatever strikes you.
Speaker 2 (01:00:10):
I think I'm always a work in progress. I hope
I always am. But for me, I feel like I've
learned to have courage and to trust other people a lot.
So as my team brings forward ideas or as I
see something new, I feel like I have much more
the courage these days last ten years to go explore
(01:00:30):
whole new areas. And so for me, that's just exciting.
It goes back to that word discover. What else can
I discover? You know? What else should we be funding
that we're not seeing right now? What is somebody else
seeing that I'm not seeing? So for me, it's all
about finding partners who have good ideas and making sure
we fund them, because to me, those are the force
(01:00:52):
multipliers in life, and that just excites me. The sort
of undiscovered yet both in work and in inside of
myself of who I am. To me, that's always exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:01:04):
You're an explorer, yeah, I guess so. I love it.
I love it being a modern day Explorer feels right.
Thank you, yeah, thank you so much. Thank you for
sharing you know, your thoughts reflections, not only in the
book but on the show today. It's just been an
absolute joy.
Speaker 2 (01:01:24):
Well, thank you so much for having me and for
all you're doing through your activism and you're investing. I
just really admire it too, so back at you.
Speaker 1 (01:01:32):
You paved the way for us, so thank you so
much for giving us an example. Many of us didn't
grow up with it at home, so it really has
been incredibly meaningful to you know, be out in the
world and always get to see what you're up to.
Speaker 2 (01:01:46):
Thank you, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (01:01:48):
Bye bye,
Host
Sophia Bush
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