Trying is Winning: with Sara Haines

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
No one has all the answers, but when we ask
the right questions, we get a little closer, closer to truths,
closer to each other, even closer to ourselves. I'm journalist
Danielle Robe, and each week, my guests and I come
together to challenge the status quo and our own ways
of thinking by daring to ask what if, why not?

Speaker 2 (00:28):
And who says?

Speaker 1 (00:30):
So? Come curious, dig deep, and join the conversation. It's
time to question everything. I am coming off such a
fulfilling day or week. I have to tell you about
it before we jump into today's episode. I went to
New York for thirty six hours basically for one reason.

(00:54):
And those of you who have been listening to the
pod know that I went to Glorius Dynam's Brownstone her
to sit in her living room at the end of
last year, I think it was, and I was kind
of nervous because it was my first time there and
I just have so much reverence for her. And this
week I went back, and I'm so grateful I got

(01:17):
to go back because my nerves subsided. I wasn't jittery,
I was just present and taking it all in and
I got like forty minutes alone with her on the
couch just to talk, and you know, I asked a
million questions, but she's just such a special person and
I left thinking like this is the pinnacle of my

(01:43):
career because I can't, like, I just can't believe that
all of the like hard work and all the things
right led me to Glorious Steinem's couch. I've literally read
every word she's at written that I could get my
hands on.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
You know, I don't have her journals, but.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
I just I don't know if I've ever like admired
a person more. I'm not like a big admirer. I
have a lot of reverence and respect and love like
complimenting people and recognizing what's special in them, But the

(02:26):
word admire feels I don't know. I just I don't
say it a lot. And I really deeply admire her.
I admire how she's lived. And one of the things
that stood out to me I want to share with you.
So we were there for a talking circle and the
topic was AI. So there were two experts and a

(02:48):
few other people in the space, tangentially in the space,
and she was like really into it. I think, because
you know it, we're all sort of like learning about
AI at the same time in a lot of ways.
So anyways, we went around the circle. We introduce ourselves
and then talked about what AI means to us, how

(03:10):
we're using it in our life, the positives, the negatives,
et cetera. And everybody talked about how they use it
in their life, so mostly chat GPT at this point,
right like, the future of AI probably looks more like robotics,
but right now we're using chat GPT, which is basically
a language tool. Because I don't know if you've ever

(03:31):
tried to have chat GPT do math, it's not so good.
It's also like mediocre at planning a trip because AI
doesn't have taste, right, humans have taste. But it is
really good with language because AI is only as good
as the data set that you input, and the data
sets they have is a lot of words, a lot

(03:52):
of language, a lot of writing from the internet. So anyways,
we go around the circle. I share how I've been
using it, which is I've found for myself the best
way is to create on my own, like write on
my own and then put my writing through chat GPT
to edit it to see if there's anything that I

(04:12):
could word better, say better, be more concise with et cetera,
and I found it to be really great. So we
go around the circle and everybody's explaining how they use
it and what they're thinking about, and we were all
pretty self focused. It was about how we were using
AI and Gloria was the last person to speak, and

(04:33):
she said, you know, all I keep thinking about is
what this means for people that live in developing countries
who don't even have access to it. What does that
mean for the division that that causes, for the class divide,

(04:53):
the racial divide, all of that. And I just looked
at her in awe because that is part of what
makes her so special. She always thinks about the least
privileged person, not just in the group we're sitting in,
but in the world. And it totally changed the conversation.

(05:17):
It turned everything into a much more robust, inclusive conversation.
And I just wanted to share that because, you know,
as much as I try to look outward all the
time and I try to think about others first. I
don't know if it's age or I don't know, Like
we all were talking about ourselves, and then Gloria spoke

(05:40):
about what it means for the least privileged person, and
it just really shifted my mindset. I really want to
try to think like that more so before we jump
into today's episode, which is a really fun episode, mostly
because our guest today is awesome, but also she happens
to be a friend of mine, and so I feel
like when I know people before I interview them, it just,

(06:02):
you know, like changes the dynamic. But I was looking
at the numbers of podcast listens and it's been really
interesting to see what you guys are interested in. And
I feel like there's been a lot of new people
that came to the pod from listening to the Bosomas
Saint John episode, which Wow, she was one of my

(06:23):
favorites for sure this year, maybe even in the last
few years, Like she's just a remarkable person. But if
you're new here, there's a few things I want to share. One,
I zoom with a listener every single week, so all
you have to do is write a review or send
a screenshot of you sending the episode to two friends.
Any episode to two friends, and you're entered in the

(06:47):
lottery for the week, and you can enter as many
times as you want. It is the highlight of my
week for sure. But yeah, if anybody out there wants
to chat or your friends want to chat, that's always available.
So I was looking at the most popular episodes this
year in case you need to go back and listen
to a few, and it was interesting.

Speaker 2 (07:07):
The twenty twenty five My New.

Speaker 1 (07:09):
Year's episode about five life changing moves to get ahead
for the year, is our second highest rated episode, and
the highest rated episode of the year was the first
one in January. Actually, it was with doctor Ellen Langer,
who is Harvard's Mother of Mindfulness, and it's about reversing

(07:29):
aging and rethinking health.

Speaker 2 (07:32):
That one is such a must listen.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
If you need to go back and haven't listened to
that one, please do. Not only is she a great storyteller,
but it's one of those episodes that will literally change
your mindset, particularly about illness, mindfulness, the way you approach friendship.
It's pretty unbelievable. Okay, let's get into today's episode. There's

(07:59):
a video I saw in twenty nineteen that rewired my
brain and I'm not exaggerating.

Speaker 2 (08:05):
Jamila Jamil posted this, I.

Speaker 3 (08:08):
See tremendous value and honor in trying stuff and I
don't believe in. I think trying is winning, and this
is something that I talk about a lot, and I
really genuinely believe it, and I've proven that by how
many ridiculous things I've put myself up for that would
result in global humiliation, even just my Twitter every day.

Speaker 2 (08:27):
What am I doing? What am I saying?

Speaker 3 (08:30):
But it's because I'm willing to put myself out there,
and because of that, via my periphery, the most incredible
opportunities have come up, and women in particular are told
not even to try. We are dictated to us to
what our lanes are from as soon as we can understand.
And that's so toxic because there are so many things
that you are all capable of that you have no
idea about because you've never even been encouraged to try,

(08:51):
because you've been fearmongered around failure.

Speaker 2 (08:53):
Failure does not exist.

Speaker 3 (08:55):
The only thing that I think failure exists in is
not ever trying. That's the biggest failure that you can commit.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
And in the caption of that video, she wrote, trying
is winning. You're a hero for taking a chance on
yourself for whatever happens, and most people will be forever
haunted by the words, what if don't be that person?
Please just go for whatever it is that you love.
If you have the slightest opportunity to rejection still means

(09:22):
you are a legend for risking your pride, being hurt
to put yourself out there. That takes so much character.
I've failed a million times that I consider those as
noble as my few big wins. Do not apologize for
being ambitious and thinking outside the box that you have
been forced into by the people around you. You know,
I just mentioned that I zoom with one listener a

(09:43):
week right. People ask me about creative endeavors, about their businesses,
about public speaking, about career transitions. Sometimes we talk about
things that I am not an expert in. And you
know what, I realized, people are asking for permission most
of them time, permission to begin, permission to be seen,

(10:04):
permission to risk, permission to want more than they've been
told they're allowed to want, Permission to just freaking go
for it, to go for whatever it is they want.
And that idea that trying is winning is at the
center of today's episode. Sarah Haynes is warm and sharp

(10:25):
and so funny. She can disarm a room in seconds.
You may know her as one of the co hosts
of the View, but today we get to go behind
the camera, ready polish, and into the story that you
don't often hear, the story of someone who's tried again
and again, often without certainty, often without applause, and always

(10:47):
with a whole lot of heart.

Speaker 2 (10:49):
Sarah opens up about.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
What it took to become the woman that we see
on screen, from her childhood dreams of SNL to one
of her lowest moments where she narrowly walked away from
TV altogether. It was pretty shocked to hear about it.
It's something she doesn't talk about that often, and to
hear her honest reflections on that time as well as
some of the invisibility that she felt when she became
a mom, it was pretty cool to hear someone speak

(11:14):
that candidly. I also love when she talks about her
big ambition, and woven through all of it is this
her philosophy on trying.

Speaker 4 (11:25):
I don't want to sit here and tell my daughter
I once thought I would do something.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
The fear was never having tried.

Speaker 1 (11:31):
You know, I'm a Chicago girl, So I love hearing
her talk about her Midwestern upbringing and how she got
her first job as an NBC page. There's so much
determination that she had that I feel in her to
this day, and yet she talks about being told that
she didn't have it. Can you imagine that She talks
about watching others rise while she felt stuck, about the

(11:52):
pivots that almost broke her, and the quiet, radical decisions
that brought her back. And you know, I'm obsessed with
daytime television, Okay, especially the view. So we also peeled
back the curtain on what it really means to sit
at that iconic table and what happens when your inner
critics shows up uninvited.

Speaker 4 (12:10):
There are days I still walk away from that table.
The inner voice says, that was dumb. You didn't offer anything.

Speaker 1 (12:16):
We chatted about dating, what it means to find love
later on in your life, on your own timeline. Sarah
met her now husband at thirty four, she got married
at thirty seven, and had kids in her late thirties,
And as somebody navigating that chapter myself, it felt both
comforting and expansive to hear her say this.

Speaker 4 (12:35):
I never lost sight of what I wanted and never
would I have categorized myself as someone who's a professional
woman choosing her job.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
She also got pretty real about how becoming a mom
didn't just change her, it changed how people saw her.

Speaker 4 (12:49):
From the moment you say you're pregnant, you don't realize
how quickly you fade.

Speaker 1 (12:53):
And underneath Sarah's story is this question of trying that
echoes again and again, not just does a motivational phrase,
but as a way of living, because I don't think
trying is just about effort.

Speaker 2 (13:06):
It's about identity.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
It's about who you become when you risk failure, when
you listen to that inner voice over all the noise,
and when you keep showing up, especially when no one
is clapping.

Speaker 2 (13:18):
Sarah's story is full.

Speaker 1 (13:20):
Of answers, like she gives really good advice, but I
think even more importantly, it's full of proof that trying
is winning. Trying is the point. So the question I
think we're really circling today is what does it mean
to try? It's time to question everything with Sarah Haines.

(13:47):
It was hard for me to figure out where to start,
but I always try and think of like a theme
for the episode, And as I got deeper into your story,
I realize for me looking in it was hitting a
wall and then running, either jamming a Sarah Haynes size
hole through the wall or finding a way to climb over,
Like every single time you were hit with something, you

(14:09):
find a way forward. I read that you attribute that
resilience to your parents. They never signed a form, came.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
To a game.

Speaker 4 (14:18):
Well, they loved coming to my sports, but like they
with four kids, I don't feel it they never took
the lead. There's this whole generation of parents where people
will call or my kids doing this, and they were
great parents in the nineties standards, you know, But looking back,
I'm like, they never don't forget to take that, don't

(14:39):
do you know it was?

Speaker 2 (14:42):
You're going to be left out if you don't remember that.

Speaker 1 (14:44):
Then you look back now that you're a parent, are
you ever like, why didn't my parents step in anymore?

Speaker 2 (14:49):
No? I love it.

Speaker 4 (14:50):
I love it because I just read a quote the
other day that said, it won't be what we teach
our kids to do, it will be what we empower
them to do for themselves that will lea the greatest mark.
That's not exactly how it was, but that's the sentiment,
and I thought, yes, yes, that's the point. You can't
always be there for them. I want them to be resilient.

(15:10):
I want them to handle everything coming at them and
know that I'll be there as long as I can
for whatever they need.

Speaker 2 (15:16):
But I need them to be okay. And that's what
I want for them.

Speaker 1 (15:20):
You said it so beautifully. My mother says starve them out.
She always says, I need to starve you out, like
I trapped my whole life. I tried to not give
you things so that you could give yourself things.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
And it's actually harder than I thought.

Speaker 4 (15:34):
Coming my oldest sister had kids young, and she was
my oldest sister, so I grew up judging way out
of like I was way out of my lane, judging
my sister at times with my nephew and niece, who
are great, but I was constantly like, why would.

Speaker 2 (15:49):
You do this? Why would you do that?

Speaker 4 (15:51):
And I realized, and my beliefs in what the vision
is have actually remained pretty sturdy. The execution is much
harder than I thought. So it is much easier at
times out of pure exhaustion or just the glee of
seeing your kids joyful in a moment. That means that
starving out means you have to really comprehend delayed gratification

(16:13):
and love them more than a moment, and that's I
do my best and Max is on the same page.

Speaker 2 (16:20):
But it's hard. It's really hard.

Speaker 1 (16:22):
Because you want to make their lives easier.

Speaker 2 (16:24):
I just want to watch them laugh.

Speaker 4 (16:25):
I want to watch them laugh and I want to
know that in that moment, with how hard parenting is,
those little moments, you can really solve those things. Yeah,
but if I do, what will prepare them for the
next challenge in the bigger hurdle.

Speaker 2 (16:38):
So I'm kind of starving them out. I like your mom.
I hate that. I will get so mad I tell
you for starving her out. That's why she's sitting here
right now.

Speaker 1 (16:49):
Okay, So high achiever Sarah. You went to Smith College
and you studied government. Why government?

Speaker 4 (16:56):
So my mom said, pick a major based on what
you want to study.

Speaker 2 (17:00):
It's a liberal arts education.

Speaker 4 (17:02):
You're going to spend the majority of your time in
those classes and reading that topic.

Speaker 2 (17:06):
What interests you.

Speaker 4 (17:08):
I had always loved social studies in history, and so
to see all the classes from comparative government to political theory,
I mean, oh my god, philosophers, I was like, ooh,
this is my homework. So that ended up being kind
of the topic. When I looked through the catalog that
I was like, this is kind of an easy decision.

Speaker 1 (17:25):
It's wild to me that none of the sort of
points in your life could have added up until they
were in hindsight, like now being on the view that
that degree in government is so valuable and useful and
probably taught you how to think and how to perceive issues.

(17:45):
But like at the time, you hadn't even thought of broadcasts.

Speaker 4 (17:49):
No, no, no, In fact, broadcast, my sister had wanted
to be in broadcast, so she was a communications major,
had all the internships, and then a really sad story
of a missing TV anchor who she never was found,
Like that day my sister pivoted to behind the scenes production,
but she actually was on the local station, you know,
her college station and stuff, So broadcast I thought, definitely

(18:13):
not that, Like I'm not a newsperson like I was
all I was a little more nerdy in my pursuits,
like I wanted nerdier things that got me more excited.

Speaker 2 (18:22):
But I did love to make people laugh.

Speaker 4 (18:24):
So the personality of a third child in a big
family was probably more pivotal than my studies.

Speaker 1 (18:33):
Well speaking, of laughing, you have a dirty little secret.
You wanted to be on SNL.

Speaker 4 (18:38):
I still want to be on SNL. I still am
putting this out. My dream was Saturday Night Live?

Speaker 2 (18:44):
Have they ever spoofed you? They did? They did. That's
kind of amazing.

Speaker 4 (18:48):
Okay, thank you, Hota Kappy and Kathy Lee Gifford. Because
there was a time and Zach Gallifanakis was on the
episode and I heard that in the because I knew
so many people in thirty Rock the building, so many
people said, you're lucky they made that choice for the
live because they had a crazier version of me.

Speaker 2 (19:06):
Yeah, but I think.

Speaker 4 (19:07):
They probably went for the laugh by not making us
all crazy, so I got to be not totally insane,
but like it was when I was reading side comments
and there's a point where it's Abby Elliott and she's like,
watching you too, Like I'm reading a fan comment, Watching
you too is like watching two chickens fight over something.
It was like the dumbest thing. And my nephew, who's
now twenty six, called me. He's like, did you know

(19:30):
they played you on Saturday Night Live? And it was
like he had not seen one thing I'd done before
and I haven't done that again since. So that was
my pinnacle moment and honestly for me too, I was like,
this sketch comedy was what I wanted.

Speaker 1 (19:42):
Because you wanted to be an actor.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
I wanted to be.

Speaker 4 (19:45):
In comedic acting, so I wanted to do not stand up.
Some people are like, oh, you wanted to be a comic.

Speaker 2 (19:51):
I'm like, oh wah, that makes my stomach, like that
makes me nervous thinking about not that.

Speaker 4 (19:55):
I wanted to play over the top characters and be ridiculous,
and I think in SNL sketches, So sometimes when i'm
there's a moment the most awkward thing goes through my
head and my husband's always like, are you doing it
right now?

Speaker 2 (20:08):
I'm like, I'm doing it. I'm writing the sketch, Like
it's just stupid stuff. Are you doing the thing? I'm
doing the thing.

Speaker 4 (20:13):
And that's how I experienced the world, so I always,
you know, I thought what a trip that would be.
And SNL was really the main show we all grew
up on where that was like, oh my gosh, that's
a job.

Speaker 2 (20:26):
Those people are paid.

Speaker 1 (20:27):
Yeah, I think you have to really love comedy and
improv to feel that way. Because I look at SNL
and I'm like, I'm running the other way. That looks
so scary. It's really brave.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
It's brave, it's over the top, and it's I mean.

Speaker 4 (20:39):
Now, I've also watched those behind the scenes of how
much writing and leading up to it what they do,
so I eat in a way you're seeing Iceberg product. Yeah,
but oh my god, like it's still everything. Comedians are
some of my favorite people I get a meet.

Speaker 2 (20:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (20:53):
So you mentioned knowing so many people in thirty rocks. Yeah,
I want to rewind a little bit and share your
story to thirty because it's kind of unbelievable. You're in
New York, you're pursuing acting, you're going on auditions. Yeah,
and you see this guy on the train you run
the same route yep, and he has an NBC backpack.

Speaker 2 (21:13):
Yeah, and you decide to go up to him.

Speaker 4 (21:15):
Well, so at that time, I'd come to New York
to do all that, but I hadn't even I had
to find a job to pay rent because I had
no help. So I was like, I'd saved money up
from like being a nanny and waiting tables. So I
wanted to get into the page program, because the page
program I thought would teach me everything I didn't learn
in school, you know, because I want to be in
this world, but I don't know anything but what I

(21:38):
watch on TV.

Speaker 2 (21:39):
Yes, So I stopped a guy on a train.

Speaker 4 (21:41):
His name was Gary Quinn, and that was a time
where they'd pass your resume along.

Speaker 2 (21:47):
And I still am in touch.

Speaker 4 (21:48):
With Gary Quinn, like I because I am fiercely loyal
and he always jokes. He's like, you can stop thanking
me at this point. You barged through that door and
been there ever since. And I'm like, but I believe
that it often takes one person, one moment, and so
but he passed it along, and I knew I could
sell my work ethic and my enthusiasm. So once I
got the interview, I thought, now if I don't get it,

(22:09):
it's on me. But I just had to get someone
I knew, no one. Yeah, And once I was in
the program at the time, I learned so many people
had an inn and it didn't have to be a
big in It could be I have an aunt who's
works on the crew, or you had to know someone otherwise.
It was just thousands of resumes that were faceless people.

Speaker 1 (22:30):
And when you do, you remember what you said when
you went up to him.

Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yeah, I was like, I'm so sorry.

Speaker 4 (22:36):
I don't want to scare it. I'm from Iowa. Because
in my mind, I look back and I'm like, why
did my mom prep me for New York City living?
The woman had never left Kansas, but she had me
so prepared that, like, I wouldn't want to approach a
man as a twenty three year old with a suit
during commuting hours because I might scare them.

Speaker 1 (22:56):
You would scare them.

Speaker 2 (22:57):
Yeah. She was like in New York.

Speaker 4 (22:59):
Like you don't want to wear your jewelry. I was like,
what jewelry? I'm twenty one. I have no jewelry. Like
my Clare's boutique is not going to lure anyone in,
like I was. So I looked back and I'm like,
I'm so mortified.

Speaker 1 (23:11):
It's my mom said the same thing to me in La.
It's such a Midwest thing.

Speaker 2 (23:15):
It is, right. I was like, I have no jewelry.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
Yeah, these are from Zara, Yes, And.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
I was like, what do you want me to take off? Like?

Speaker 4 (23:22):
You know, so the culture shot and that's what's underestimated
when you moved to a big place. It's not just
like you hit the ground running. I didn't know the
first thing about how to get a head shot. I
knew I needed one, but I was like, those costs
a lot of money. Like, so my first headshot was
an assistant photographer at Saturday Night Live because through a

(23:42):
friend of a friend in the program, and they said,
if you call this person, it's for their portfolio. So
it was like two hundred dollars and I thought, oh,
I think I can say you know, I got that.
So every learning curve set me way back. I wasn't
even to the place where I was considered in the business.

Speaker 2 (23:57):
Yeah. I didn't know what the heck the business was.

Speaker 1 (24:00):
So you get this internship right, and you're a page
and you're actually paid.

Speaker 2 (24:04):
It's like right out of.

Speaker 1 (24:05):
College, and is this the page program? Yes, okay, and
you were obsessed with being a page.

Speaker 4 (24:11):
I loved being a page when I got a job,
which is the whole point. I did a plus's and
minus column about why I should not take this program
because I had two full months left in the program.

Speaker 1 (24:20):
Oh, because when you talk I heard another interview that
you talked about the page program, and other people are
like yeah, it was like an internship.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
And then I moved on.

Speaker 1 (24:30):
You were like, I love being a page.

Speaker 2 (24:32):
Every tour was a stage for me. Yes, I had
the most fun. Most pages hated their tours. But you're
going with a friend.

Speaker 4 (24:41):
So if we're in the page program, Daniel, you've come
in for your schedule and that day you and I
are partners, so all five of our tours will be together.
We had the most fun. These are all people that
are like minded. Yeah, they're writers, their comedians there, some
of them are into marketing sales. You get a play
all day with a friend, and every tour it's a
new life audience. I had the best time. We also

(25:03):
would this is probably not things we should admit, but
we play like.

Speaker 2 (25:06):
Word games where.

Speaker 4 (25:08):
You'd say, like I remember doing the tour in rose
O'Donnell's studio in my page friend who most of us
are still friends.

Speaker 2 (25:14):
Anyway, it was.

Speaker 4 (25:15):
Like halatosis and I was like, how the hell am
I going to plant halatosis in a tour?

Speaker 2 (25:20):
And we talked about how prizes drop down.

Speaker 4 (25:22):
I say, you don't know, you know, like maybe you'd
get mouth washed for your halotosis, and the guy said, yeah,
you would make up anything. Then we'd give each other
a word you couldn't say a word that starts with
an S, and we're like, that's not fair. We're in studios,
you know, like you can't. But then if you did it,
your partner would raise their hand in the back and
you'd have to find a way to give your tour

(25:42):
while literally going like this. So we're here in the set,
right over here, and you'd have to turn every time
you did it. So we were also a little area
like it.

Speaker 1 (25:52):
Was so fun, so fun. You have great memories from
that time, the.

Speaker 4 (25:55):
Best memories and hard because that was also nine to
eleven and then Anthrax the next month.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
Oh wow. So there was a lot of history playing out.
But the job itself was just it was amazing.

Speaker 1 (26:08):
And did you get hired by NBC right after the
Page program?

Speaker 4 (26:12):
Yes, So that the debate was I got offered a
job in operations, so you know, as a creative person,
I knew the majority of things I could learn from
more and more producing writing things.

Speaker 2 (26:24):
This was going to be all logistics, but it bought.

Speaker 4 (26:28):
Me a year in the building because you know, you're
all freelance, so I thought, but I'd get a year
in the building.

Speaker 2 (26:32):
That's a plus.

Speaker 4 (26:33):
That was my columns, today's show operations versus my assignment,
which is not even a job. On last call with
Carson Daily Go and I had like a whole list
of what it would mean to stay or go, but I.

Speaker 2 (26:44):
Took the job. It's interesting, So you mentioned creative.

Speaker 1 (26:47):
I could not believe that you said you don't consider
yourself a creative person.

Speaker 4 (26:52):
I'm really logistically oriented as a virgo, as a type
a person.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
It's funny.

Speaker 4 (26:57):
I feel creative when I'm going for a joke, like
when I'm saying, you know, what would be funny if
like when we do little things on Instagram or something.
I love being creative in those spaces. But I feel
I've always colored within the lines. I've always, you know,
kind of spent my life on programming or deprogramming so
many things that are kind of boxed in.

Speaker 1 (27:20):
It's so interesting that you see yourself that way, because
I'm like, you have lived such a creative life.

Speaker 4 (27:25):
That makes me feel so good because it's sometimes that
you don't see what other people see.

Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah, like you got married at thirty seven.

Speaker 2 (27:33):
Yep, I think creative. That's creative.

Speaker 4 (27:37):
And also one hundred percent a choice I made to
wait until I was thirty seven.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
But that's a creative life.

Speaker 1 (27:43):
But that's not yet, You're right, And then I think
you had to get really creative to get to all
of these different positions like we're going to go through.

Speaker 2 (27:51):
Yeah, I think all of this took so much creativity.

Speaker 4 (27:55):
You know what, though, it only looks creative when you
look back. It's kind of like the picture you're life
life draws when you look back at it. Because my
mom would tell people how determined I was, and I
stopped and I said, Mom, you're giving me false credit.
It wasn't just determined. It was a deep fear of regret.
So it was more of a negative drive, not a

(28:15):
positive drive. It wasn't like she has such a great attitude,
she'll figure it out. It only looks that way when
it works out and you tell the story.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
But how do you know what regret is?

Speaker 4 (28:24):
At twenty well, twenty, all I kept thinking about is
when you channel when I'm hopefully with a partner, when
I have kids, when i'm my parents' age, Am I
going to look back and say I never tried? Because
my mom when like a lot of pivotal decisions I made.
My mom said, you know, one time, and I'd never
heard this story. After college, I was going to at

(28:45):
this point now I have my government major, but I'm
thinking maybe I'm going to do teaching.

Speaker 2 (28:49):
That's my safer also a dream. I'm going to teach.

Speaker 4 (28:52):
So I had applied to grad school at my undergrad
so I'd gotten into the Smith program. My mom tells
me a story the week of graduation. These moments are
the big like road maps, you know. She said, I
once wanted to go to New York and be an actor.
And I thought, what, Like, she is a nurse, she's
a person of science. She's I'd never heard that, and

(29:14):
in that moment, I thought, well, there we go. I
gotta go because I don't want to sit here and
tell my daughter I once thought I would do something.

Speaker 1 (29:20):
Wow, So she's it's her fault. That's interesting that such
like it was probably an aside comment.

Speaker 4 (29:28):
For you, And it was quick. I remember I was
standing in my dorm room. Essentially it's our houses on Smith.
Finals were done, graduation was in a few days. I
was like telling everyone the kitchen. Could you live in
a house so you get really close with like your
kitchen staff, and they'd always saved me boxes of cereal
on the side. I went down and like, you, guys,
I hope you're not sick of me because I'm coming

(29:48):
back next year. And they were all excited and then
that and I thought, well, no, gray area, I've done.

Speaker 2 (29:55):
We're going.

Speaker 1 (29:57):
There's in one of Gloria Steinem's books, like the the
dedication talks about how she's living out the dreams that
died with her mother, and it's like, how we anytime
anything good happens in my life, I think about the
generations of women that have sacrificed that didn't get to.

Speaker 2 (30:15):
Live those out.

Speaker 1 (30:16):
Yeah, but I'm thinking about that with you.

Speaker 2 (30:18):
How does she feel about what you're doing.

Speaker 4 (30:21):
So it's funny because she, in addition to being pivotal
in a lot of crucial ways for me, picking to
go to school in the Northeast. Oh, Sarah, if I
had been able to go to college and had the grades,
I would go in the Northeast. That's a heart of education.
That's the only place I looked every decision.

Speaker 2 (30:37):
My mom did.

Speaker 4 (30:38):
But she also was the person that could have been
a blockade. When I got into the page program. She said,
you can't survive in New York on ten dollars an hour,
and I was like, I guess we'll see and I did.
And then she also said when I got offered a
job for that Today Show job, where I thought, part
of my fear is I'm going to get stuck there
because I knew I'd do a good job for me staff.

(31:00):
That's benefits that my mom asked me every time, will
this job pay benefits? I didn't want to tell her
till i'd made it the decision inside myself, because if
I heard my mom and dad endorse that it would
have been harder.

Speaker 2 (31:11):
I ended up taking it.

Speaker 4 (31:13):
I got stuck for about five years. But it's also
when that transition happened to being on air. Every decision
along the way, my mom was the yes and the no.

Speaker 1 (31:22):
I don't want to make this about me. No, But
I've never heard anybody talk about this. I had a
very similar experience, and I found it incredibly confusing. It is,
how did you learn to listen to your own voice
over your mother?

Speaker 2 (31:38):
She needed to be volume up.

Speaker 4 (31:39):
And I've taken a lot of time therapy things to
kind of realize how squished that little girl was, yeah,
and how much I reveled in making my parents proud
doing the things like when I was moving to New York,
which I made that decision that day, that one day
in my dorm room before graduating, and I went home.

(32:01):
I hustled for money on the side, and I remember
the day I told my dad, like, I'm definitely going
to be moving to New York City with my niece
on and like the few things, I have to live
on my brother's couch. My dad didn't even look up,
I remember, and he was slicing a tomato for a
salad and he's like, I didn't send you to Smith
College to be an actress. And it hit me, but

(32:22):
I actually am grateful. I wouldn't want him to light
to he that's how he felt. And so it hit
me like a punch in the chest because I was
the play it's safe. Look at my grades, look at
my athletics, look at how much I will work at
things like aren't you proud?

Speaker 2 (32:36):
Aren't you proud? Like record scratch, there she goes.

Speaker 4 (32:40):
And that was the first time I broke with things
my parents would be really proud of. I mean, it's
a little embarrassing. My older sister went into media communications successful.
My next sister went into finance successful. My brother went
into real estate and sales successful. Oh, Sarah, she's a
production coordinator in New York City. Like I stayed a
production coordinator that's an entry level job for years because

(33:02):
as they offered me promotions, I didn't feel I could
keep the dream a lot and like this handtakes and
this handtakes, and that was like an unspoken agreement. So
my boss would say, I know your answer, but we
need to offer it to you. Would you like to
become a production manager? I said, nope, I'm sticking with the.

Speaker 1 (33:18):
Plan because the other hand was acting.

Speaker 4 (33:21):
The other hand was my boss, and I had said,
he goes. I know after they decided to keep me,
because I didn't even want them to know what my
dream was, because I wanted them to take me seriously.
And you know this, it's the name of your pretty
smart people judge people that want to do certain things.
It's always like she wants to be on air, as
if in being on air is only one version.

Speaker 2 (33:41):
I mean, Diane Sawyer's on air, so is Amy Poehler.

Speaker 4 (33:44):
Like there's versions, but I didn't want people saying, oh,
she's one of the people that wants to be on air,
so I never told them. When I accepted the job,
I said, I'm going to be straight with you and
this is what I want to do. And he said, Deil,
you tell me whenever you have something you need to
go for and.

Speaker 2 (33:59):
I'll let you, but don't lie. No, doctor's a point,
I said. Deal.

Speaker 4 (34:04):
He never said that deal would be expired if I
took the promotions, but I felt that was my insights
felt wrong for that. I'm not going to climb up
and keep getting opportunities if we have a deal here,
and so I just stayed. But it was so hard
as a type a overachiever to have my friends who
never met shade.

Speaker 2 (34:23):
Oh my god, you're still at the Today Show. You're
still there.

Speaker 4 (34:26):
They all climbed by the time I went on air.
My friend who paged next to me was the publicist
for the show. She had climbed from page program to publicists.

Speaker 2 (34:34):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (34:34):
She makes the phone call to me and we cried,
we're still friends this day. But all my friends were
climbing the ranks live in their dreams.

Speaker 2 (34:42):
What a phone call did she make? She needed the.

Speaker 4 (34:44):
Phone call to tell me that they wanted to make
an announcement on air because I had grown up at
the show. Because normally I'm a random correspondent. It's a
one year deal. No one's doing it. But I had
been there for years and they wanted one of their
own to get that. And she cried when she told
me so, And in that moment, I thought all of them,

(35:05):
all these birds had flown from the nest. They never
meant it, but every time, oh my god, you're still
at the Today Show. Yeah, I'm still at the Today Show.

Speaker 2 (35:13):
How old were you? I would have been thirty thirty two.

Speaker 1 (35:17):
And what was your personal life like at the time?
Are you seeing feeling.

Speaker 4 (35:21):
Really unhealthy relationship that I had been obsessed with this
guy for years, always like we're going to be serious,
We're not, you know, And he was in the building
and we were on getting to that point where I
had to listen to that voice even when I didn't
like the answer. So she was getting louder and she

(35:42):
was like, girl, you know too much to stay.

Speaker 2 (35:44):
And I know her so well. Yep.

Speaker 1 (35:46):
That must have been I don't want to project, but
that must have been really challenging to feel like your
personal life wasn't quote unquote moving forward. Your professional life
was a bit stagnant.

Speaker 2 (35:56):
What made you stay? Each time?

Speaker 4 (35:59):
I'd like stay, And I mean there were some dark
tunnels i'd go down of, like the fear was never
having tried. So I'd go down to get coffee with
my friends, climbing the ranks, my page friends, they all
have two promotions. They're up and I'm sitting there and
I'm like, I'm not doing it. I'm not going after it.
I'm not hustling. I worked twelve hours a day. If
in three months I write into one or get one audition,

(36:22):
the pace at this dream is a never And I'm
going to be forty and I'm going to be pretending
I'm a character at a kid's birthday?

Speaker 2 (36:29):
Like was it enough?

Speaker 4 (36:30):
Was it worth it? When I had so much other
love and passion in my heart?

Speaker 2 (36:34):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (36:34):
And I remember stopping and every time thinking but did
I really try? I've got Now I'm going to sprint
because then I can quit and say I tried? But
have I really tried yet? And that kept like driving me.

Speaker 2 (36:45):
You wanted to be a person who tried.

Speaker 1 (36:47):
Yeah, So you're there as a PA yep, and how
do you move up? You're pitching your boss's digital content, right,
this is when Facebook exists.

Speaker 4 (36:57):
Well no, so I wasn't even pitching my bosses. Digital
blows up and they need content. And I thought, if
I'm sending reels out to try to now go on air,
think if it says Today's show dot com on it
like that.

Speaker 2 (37:11):
Yeah, they didn't pay me for it. They don't know
who cares. They put me on.

Speaker 4 (37:15):
They were desperate, No one needed to know. And I
would just pitch segments and I was doing all kinds
of fun. That's when I felt creative because it was
like confession booth where you're asking things that like I
remember asking like Jamie Fox. I think it was like
who was your first kiss and you remember it and
like innocent.

Speaker 2 (37:33):
Just cute things that are perfect for digital.

Speaker 4 (37:36):
They're not going to ask that in a mount Blower
interview or a Katie Kirk or Meredith Fiera.

Speaker 2 (37:40):
But Sarah can ask. So we just it was so simple,
and I was creating a real, full, full stop just
for myself.

Speaker 4 (37:49):
This is where you go in the end of your careers,
Like this is the goal. I am not that dumb
like I or as brave as some people make me sound.
I wasn't looking yet the two show. I wasn't in news.
I wasn't but I was ready to be paid full time,
not to be ordering the cars because I would sit
on the couch with like Maria Minuno's and be like,

(38:10):
while you're here, what time do you want your car tomorrow?

Speaker 2 (38:13):
Because like I was, just the lives were converging.

Speaker 4 (38:16):
I was ordering cars and catering and VIP lists and
making an appearance and ordering the cars and the people
around me.

Speaker 2 (38:23):
So that's hard.

Speaker 4 (38:26):
Yet well it was hard because I thought eventually, like
I got my shot.

Speaker 2 (38:30):
Don't overstay.

Speaker 4 (38:31):
You're working for free, Like take what you need, but
go live it. Don't be so swooned by how long
it took you or what you you know, like.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
Yeah, you got to leave, and did you think about leaving?

Speaker 4 (38:44):
I was fully leaving. I had gotten to the third
round of an interview for Teach for America. Oh my god,
Well I was on the show every day and my
mom's like, well, why would you leave? They put you
on every day? I said, because Mom, they put me
on every day and do not pay me. I want
to go do a dream that wait.

Speaker 1 (38:59):
Are you to have talking about on the show with
Hoda and Kathy Lee because we skipped a step.

Speaker 2 (39:03):
You have to talk about the Yeah, before we go there.

Speaker 1 (39:06):
You're in the hallway and you're doing behind the scenes
interviews for Today dot Com.

Speaker 4 (39:11):
Like when we couldn't get all the main guests, we
always had our anchors. Our anchors would always play okay,
so when you want to know about the first kiss,
I'd drag Kathy Lee, Hoda, mat anyone that would come down.
I'm like, oh, please come down and tell you. It's
like whatever you know, and they'd come down.

Speaker 5 (39:26):
And so I didn't realize that, Yeah, so we could
dangle the talent because even if I can't get the celebrity,
which sometimes they walk in their people nix it before
they even ask.

Speaker 4 (39:35):
But if we need some star power, we have built
in stars. So Natalie Natalie always humored us. She would
do it and they'd all come. They're like for me
because they hear about me. They're like, I'll do it
for you, Sarah. And that made the content and so
they were coming in and out. It was one of
the times KATHYI and Hoa were leaving. They're like, why
is she not on our hour? She's so fun? And

(39:58):
I thought what am I going to do interview on?
You know, like I do what you do. I'm not
a health expert. I'm not a chef, I'm not an author.

Speaker 2 (40:05):
I just chat. I chat. You want to just chat,
you can shoot the shit all you want, but like,
I do what you do.

Speaker 4 (40:10):
And so I remember they said it once and I thought,
what a phenomenal thing, But that was just it was
a compliment that they said it. By the third time,
Hoda said why is she not coming on? It was like,
oh my god, channel something.

Speaker 2 (40:21):
What do I pitch? And they said, do young people things?

Speaker 4 (40:24):
And I'm thinking, I'm not even young, Like in the
scheme of things that's for me, I'm not even young
compared to you guys, Like what can I do? When
I thought of things my mom couldn't do, and it
was like a digital photocard, like how do.

Speaker 2 (40:37):
What you can do with all your photos? Save them?

Speaker 4 (40:39):
How to back them up? And I thought, to young people,
they're gonna be like, she ain't young. But I was
like to my mom and a lot of the people,
I had a skip in my step. Once I started
doing my passion project, I ordered catering with a vengeance.
I was like, yes, with my hair back.

Speaker 2 (40:53):
I got it.

Speaker 4 (40:54):
I felt so good just doing my job. That gave
me access to this dream.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
And then crush And if you're on Hoda and Kathy Lee,
do you start having sort of like starry eyes about
broadcasts at this point.

Speaker 4 (41:09):
Still not about broadcast hosting, because now this fourth hour
was a total change in the TV landscape. You now
had Hoda who had been dateline Hoda, as Kathy Lee
called her, but now they were drinking wine and they
could get comedy.

Speaker 2 (41:22):
They could throw on things like that. Now now you're
talking the first three hours.

Speaker 4 (41:26):
Fine, I can deliver the lines, but this one I
can get my hands like, this is going to be fun.

Speaker 2 (41:31):
You can have fun.

Speaker 5 (41:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
So then I started to you.

Speaker 1 (41:35):
Know, so many people in gen Z talk about healthy
boundaries with work, and I'm so curious your take on this,
because I'm not sure that you get to be Sarah
Haynes on the View with healthy boundaries at work.

Speaker 4 (41:49):
There was definitely no balance or boundaries. And I say
it straight in the sense that I did not have
a personal life, but I was so fueled. I had
down days. I felt lonely. I watched all my friends
get married in the mid twenties. I didn't even get
married by the mid thirties. We were you know, so
I was watching. I never lost sight of what I wanted,

(42:09):
and never would I have categorized myself as someone who's
a professional woman choosing her job. It wasn't a conscious
deliberate It was incidental in a way that that was happening.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
But I was so fired.

Speaker 4 (42:22):
And that doesn't mean I didn't spend a lot of
night stuffing my face, miserable, going through breakups, bad dates,
all the things.

Speaker 2 (42:29):
But nothing stopped me.

Speaker 4 (42:32):
And that's when you also then trigger and you treat
that part like a job because there was a button
that flipped.

Speaker 2 (42:39):
I think I'm almost there.

Speaker 4 (42:40):
Yep, where you stop and you say, I know I
can do all these things.

Speaker 2 (42:45):
I love these things.

Speaker 4 (42:46):
My life doesn't look like the things I still want,
and those are the north star for me. That family.
I want a partner. I didn't even know if kids
would be in my cards. I didn't I was older starting,
but I said, I need a best friend. Best friend
because every time I hit one of these poop storms,
which is like lost grief. I can't do this by myself.

Speaker 2 (43:07):
It's not fun.

Speaker 1 (43:08):
You love fun, it's not fun by yourself, it's not fun.

Speaker 2 (43:10):
I need someone to laugh at my jokes, and I.

Speaker 4 (43:12):
Might pick poorly because Max only laughs like every fifteenth joke,
and he's like, hm, that's funny.

Speaker 2 (43:17):
This is so funny. Why why did I pick out
all Russian?

Speaker 1 (43:21):
Like? Do you think you were funny when you first met?

Speaker 4 (43:24):
No, he always says you're silly, and I'm like, well,
I am silly, but and thank you because he once
said in a Sexy Time moment, He's like, you are
really hot, and then you turn into an SNL character.
He said, excuse me, what can you say that again?
Did you just say a Saturday Night Love character?

Speaker 2 (43:38):
He doesn't turned on more for me. It's turning him
off and turning me so on. That's unbelievable. You were
saying that that is so funny. I'm going through my
twenty cards.

Speaker 1 (43:53):
So okay, you get Tahoda and Kathy Lee. You have
an amazing experience. But then the executives at NBC say
something to you that I wouldn't even call this a wall.

Speaker 2 (44:07):
This is like debilitating to me. It's a roof. It's
a roof. Yeah, what did they say? So? I had
approached them.

Speaker 4 (44:14):
It was the end of a contract and I had
approached them about more of the hosting roles because I
loved being in the field. But again at the expense
of never having tried, I wanted a shot in the
hosting chairs and I had been put in the third
hour hosting. Jeff Zucker, who I was a big fan of,
had put me in a few times. He said I'll

(44:35):
let you swing, and he was known for taking chances.
But he left the company and then I was no
longer asked, and I asked the same people that knew
me for years and were being honest like my dad
with the tomato, They said, we don't see you doing that.
It was one pivotal person was the head of the
fourth Hour, and she was like, love you. I love you,
and I again appreciated her honesty, I don't see you

(44:57):
doing that. And again the easiest and hardest decision I
had ever made. ABC had already been approaching me about
we want to do bigger things with you. And even
though I didn't know if they would bench me like
I didn't know if they'd bring me over and nothing
would happen, I was absolutely told what would happen at
NBC and it was we will love you, we will
keep you, you will keep doing this, and you're awesome,
and this is it and hearing it was the end

(45:21):
of the road when I had so many things I
needed to prove to myself.

Speaker 2 (45:24):
Still, I had dreams of being on the View. I
had dreams of.

Speaker 4 (45:27):
Being on a talk show like at the time it
would have been Kelly and Michael. Yeah, all these things,
this is it. I'm not done yet, and maybe I am.
Maybe I do it and I fail, but I tried.
I needed my shot. I could not stop by choice,
and so I.

Speaker 2 (45:45):
Had to go. Were you sad when you left? I
was a mess for a good year.

Speaker 4 (45:49):
In fact, I just ran into someone that jumped companies
and she was saying she was struggling, and I said,
girl like I cried for a year.

Speaker 2 (45:58):
I was in it.

Speaker 4 (45:58):
I was absolutely depression. Why because the transition from I
had won, I still would do it again. In the
heart of those tiers, I even Max and I would
discuss this. I never regretted the decision to leave, But
what I didn't couldn't have gotten through smoothly, was the
things that make your day are the people around you.
Every friend, I had I worked side by side with

(46:21):
I loved the respect I got having run around the
hallways of people that I'd watched their kids. I'd watched
them go from single to married to babies. I had
grown up at this building. And Jeff Zucker said again
in a meeting before he left, I sat down with
him and we weren't super close. He wasn't at the
Today Show when I came, but he looked at me
and he said, sometimes you have to leave home to

(46:42):
grow up. And that sat really hard. So as I'm
leaving home, knowing I had to leave home, I was
in a dark hallway. I wasn't on a staff, I
didn't know anyone, I didn't know where the bathroom was.
For three months, like the building was old, I thought,
what have I done? And yet that same voice was like, Nope,
you couldn't have done it any other way.

Speaker 2 (47:03):
But how this sucks?

Speaker 4 (47:05):
And so I would count the months with Max because
I said, when can I quit where it's not embarrassing
that I insult them? And he's like six months minimum.
We celebrated at six months and then he goes to you,
I think you have another six months in you and
I was like, well, year would probably be better, right, We
celebrated at a year, Max laughed, He goes, we celebrated
your six month anniversary every chunk of that first contract,

(47:28):
thinking I was going to leave.

Speaker 2 (47:29):
When did it get better?

Speaker 4 (47:31):
Probably only when the View had asked me to come,
I went once. I'm so glad I nailed that. But
I was going to leave at the end of my contract.
It was a three year contract, because I was going
to be offered more of the same correspondent. But what
I didn't know was the View had already approached Because
it's the network saying we want her, we want her

(47:51):
at the show.

Speaker 2 (47:51):
They already had asked for me.

Speaker 4 (47:53):
But I was being presented with they're probably going to
sign you again for two or three years, and I
thought visiting wasn't enough.

Speaker 2 (48:00):
I already proved I can do it.

Speaker 4 (48:01):
Yeah, I get that the chairs aren't always open, but
I'm not going to do more of this now.

Speaker 2 (48:06):
I'm going to go teach.

Speaker 4 (48:07):
Now I'm going to go do And they said, what
if they were offering you a View contract, because that's
also on the table, And I said, that changes everything.

Speaker 2 (48:16):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (48:16):
That really was a pivotal moment when it went from
a very dark time too, after every dark time and
Valley there's light. Yeah, but it was a long one
and I came out the other side.

Speaker 1 (48:27):
When I went to college, I didn't want to join
a sorority, and my mom was like, you got to
join a sorority because it makes a big school.

Speaker 2 (48:36):
I was at Wisconsin, it was huge.

Speaker 1 (48:37):
I was going to say it makes a big school
smaller and she was like yeah. She was like, you
don't have to stay in it, but just try it.
You got to make your life smaller and connect with people.
And sophomore year, I moved into the house and I
was like, I hate living with this many people.

Speaker 2 (48:53):
Like I'm a loner.

Speaker 1 (48:54):
You know I'm a loner, yeah, because I think when
you're an extrovert, you're actually sometimes secretly an introvert.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
You're it's one in the other you're introvert at home extrovert.

Speaker 1 (49:02):
Yep. So I called her one day and I was like,
I hate living in this sorority house. I I gained
fifteen pounds. I was miserable. And she was like, here's
the thing about sororities. There's a lot of weird people
because you didn't choose them yet. But eventually they become
your weirdos. Oh and by the end of the year.
She was right, it's like a cruise ship, like and

(49:23):
then you get on You're like, who are all these
weird people?

Speaker 2 (49:25):
By the end and then you're like jamming at go
with them? Yes, And that's how I'm imagining. I'm sorry
for the aside, but that's how I'm imagining.

Speaker 1 (49:32):
I love the experience at ABC. It was like so
tough at the beginning because they weren't your weirdos Nope.

Speaker 2 (49:38):
But all of a sudden they become you are weird.

Speaker 4 (49:40):
But they were all my weirdos, and I didn't feel
like an imposture on the view. So my whole time
in news, when I came over at Today's show, I
did a job that made sense.

Speaker 2 (49:50):
I could perform.

Speaker 4 (49:51):
I was a psych it was self created, it matched me.
I got recruited over and with all these opportunities comes
You're now going to be working on morning news shows
as a correspondent. Wow, And I thought, I feel so
bad standing next to real journalists and pretending I'm just
like them. I can't do this, Like if I'm nothing,
I'm authentic. And that was also eating away at me.

(50:14):
So getting the opportunity at the view, I thought, I'm
not faking this, like, I'm not pretending to hang here.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
This is what I love doing.

Speaker 1 (50:22):
So you got like over the imposter syndrome because you
felt like it was aligned.

Speaker 4 (50:27):
Yet, well it got I don't think you ever get
over it, because there are days I still walk away
from that table and I'm like, the inner voice says,
that was dumb. You didn't offer anything, you know, And
that's those moments where you're like, I don't think you.

Speaker 2 (50:40):
I don't think you truly ever get over that.

Speaker 4 (50:42):
I've never met a recovered imposter syndrome person. Yeah, we're
all just one day away from another episode.

Speaker 1 (50:50):
I actually interviewed an expert and it kind of stems
from perfectionism's which, yeah, your successes and your curses, it's
all they're all tied. Yeah, okay, so if we stay
with this story, well, can.

Speaker 2 (51:05):
You tell me do you have imposture syndrome?

Speaker 1 (51:07):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (51:07):
Yeah, huge?

Speaker 1 (51:08):
Okay. I didn't even realize it. I thought that's just
how everybody felt all the time.

Speaker 4 (51:12):
The worst is when you sit in a room and
I'm not joking. I was in a room a few
months ago when we're going to talk about imposter syndrome.
And I said, oh, everyone doesn't. But one person I
work with racering goes, I've never felt that.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
Is it a man? Nope? And I was like, oh.

Speaker 1 (51:26):
Damn, Like that's amazing.

Speaker 4 (51:28):
I can't decide if it was true or not. I mean,
I don't know, but it was aggressive. I was like, well,
thank you for sharing.

Speaker 2 (51:36):
When I just took off all my arm room, I'm like,
I'm vulnerable, and she was like, I'm not. Like that's amazing.
I laugh at it because I don't know if I
believe anyone who says they haven't.

Speaker 1 (51:48):
I agree with you at least in some rooms.

Speaker 4 (51:51):
Yes, yeah, because you've had to have felt it. In fact,
you're probably not taking enough risks if you haven't.

Speaker 2 (51:58):
Oh that's interesting. That's going to stay with me. Okay,
keep that right over there.

Speaker 1 (52:02):
So if we stay on this storybook theme. This was
kind of the dream because you said your dream basically
was Kelly and Michael, which you got to guest host on, yes,
or The View YEP, which you got to guest host on,
and then you get this contract which is like, there
are five women at that table.

Speaker 2 (52:18):
The chances in the whole.

Speaker 1 (52:19):
I don't know math, but the probability of that is
so unbelievable.

Speaker 2 (52:23):
So it was so meant for you. It must have
felt so exciting.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
But then I heard that you did feel imposter syndrome
when you got to that table.

Speaker 4 (52:32):
Initially, well, I definitely felt it, so that the job
itself wasn't imposter Now the task fit me, okay, But
that table had Meredith Fierra. I mean, it has will
be Goldberg as Joy Behar, it has Lisa Ling, it
has you name the people that have sat at that table,
and I thought, out of all these people, yeah, that could.

Speaker 2 (52:51):
Sit here, Daniel Rober, like you could sit there. When
you look at it, it is a lot of timing,
it's a lot of luck.

Speaker 4 (52:57):
You know that you got to be prepared when that
moment lines up, but it rarely lines up, if we're
being honest.

Speaker 1 (53:03):
But it's lined up for you in a way that
is so it's almost like a miracle because it lined
up twice. And to me, that's like it's so it
was you were meant to be there.

Speaker 4 (53:14):
I have to remind myself that on certain days, like
when I'm feeling that insecurity. But I'd like to think
that because I felt all the things I missed from
NBC and that family. I had the best compliment I
gave the View when I just visited, was you remind me.
After a few visits, I said, this staff, this crew,
this reminds me of the Today Show. And that was

(53:34):
like saying, it's the epitome for me. So that's where
I liked that. It lined up for me.

Speaker 1 (53:42):
Everyone knew that you had so much love for the
Today Show.

Speaker 2 (53:45):
Everyone.

Speaker 4 (53:46):
My husband said, like a year into going to ABC,
stop lecturing people about NBC.

Speaker 2 (53:51):
It's not a good look for you. I'm just being honest,
too much honesty, Sarah. It's a Midwest thing. We can't
help her some O.

Speaker 1 (53:58):
Yeah, okay, then you decide to leave the View?

Speaker 2 (54:02):
Yes, because.

Speaker 1 (54:05):
The only other dream job that could exist was a
Kelly and Michael type of show, and now it was
going to be Sarah and Michael.

Speaker 2 (54:13):
Yeah, which is kind of unbelievable.

Speaker 4 (54:15):
Unbelievable and literally the only thing you could have offered
me other than.

Speaker 5 (54:18):
Esenl which we're still holding out for is we were
waiting for that phone call because literally that is the
one thing.

Speaker 2 (54:25):
And I love the View. I loved the View.

Speaker 4 (54:27):
Yeah, and that's why I always laugh because I'm like,
it's not like I left out of anything. I mean,
I really was emotional leaving because that was a place
I'd found after years of feeling misplaced, displaced, like I
just didn't feel good, and then I felt good, and
I thought, do I want to leave good again?

Speaker 1 (54:45):
And you had this like really emotional, tearful goodbye that
I'll never forget.

Speaker 2 (54:48):
I literally you would have thought someone died. It was
kind of it was a funeral. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (54:53):
And right before I walked on stage, Joy looked because
I had spent the whole morning hugging everyone and saying
goodbye and little cards and this, Joy go, are you
gonna fucking cry again?

Speaker 2 (55:01):
And I was like, you were so mean to me?

Speaker 4 (55:04):
She laugh She was trying to make me laugh. She goes,
are you gonna fucking cry again? Right as we're walking out,
and I was like, well there it goes.

Speaker 2 (55:09):
Here we go, I'm gonna busy being means you punch
me in the face.

Speaker 1 (55:15):
So you joined the third hour, it's called GMA Day
and then it's rebranded Straighthan and Sarah and you said
it was not good from the beginning.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
Well, one thing is the name.

Speaker 4 (55:26):
So, first of all, I love Michael Strahan and I
loved when he called me. I thought, are you kidding me?
Like I already have my dream, You're really going to
dangle this. I should have known the foreshadowing of this, though.
So I joined the show and they say, we've got
three ideas for names. Okay, Gma Day start something like
two other names, and I said, oh gosh, the only

(55:48):
one that sounds kind of is GMA Day. The next
day they're like, so we're going with Gma Day and
I thought, oh wow, so that's where you know, Like
I still laughed at this moment. That was the first
thing I ext. They asked about a title, I expressed
it and they went that way. So I thought that
should have told me everything I needed to know. But
I think the problem was it was a failed experiment

(56:09):
from the beginning. You cannot put a Kelly and Michael
show at that hour. They needed to keep it branded
to make it that it needed to if it was
going to be a standalone, it couldn't be a replication.
I wasn't the only one thinking it was like a
Michael and Kelly. I'm sure Michael was thinking that that's
why I.

Speaker 2 (56:26):
Loved the dream.

Speaker 4 (56:28):
But Kelly Rippa is amazing, and she works in a
place where she has this established audience. This is like
a lunchtime crowd. No one's everything about. It was like TV.

Speaker 2 (56:39):
One oh one. But I still don't regret making the decision.

Speaker 4 (56:43):
But that took me back into some really dark places
as well, because the pressure, like, yeah, Michael's a name,
Keiky Palmer was a name, but your name is in
the title. My name's in the title, So it feels
like it's all on you regardless of It's like TV's
a team sport, but nobody knows that because you're just
watching Strahan and.

Speaker 2 (57:01):
Sarah right and Michael had been on Mike w and Kell.
He chose to leave. He's already proven he can do that.

Speaker 4 (57:07):
Everything I had wanted to prove in my mind was
riding on that.

Speaker 2 (57:12):
Yeah. So and then I find out I'm pregnant. So
I was thoroughly Caleb, that Caleb had a little bit
the stinker. So I told my husband.

Speaker 4 (57:22):
I said, as a thirty seven year old bride, I
never would have uttered the words it's.

Speaker 2 (57:28):
Not a good time.

Speaker 4 (57:29):
Because I had dreamt my whole life of having kids
and I wouldn't mess with the powers that be. But
we had a boy and we had a girl, and
we'd always wanted a third But now knowing what two
looked like, I thought. I remember turning to Max and saying,
there's I feel so much pressure that if I were
to get pregnant right now, I could have a mental breakdown.

(57:51):
And I wasn't joking, and I said, so, we have
to be careful. What I didn't know is I was
already pregnant. It just wouldn't have showed up. Like a
week later was when I found out I was pregnant.
So I was already sitting in the midst of a breakdown.

Speaker 2 (58:03):
And that was the.

Speaker 4 (58:05):
Beginning of all the falling dominoes because I knew the
appearance I would never I knew the north Star was family,
but I also know, girl, you were just given a
show and you are Sarah and not Michael, and you
get pregnant like every bad female storyline started flying at
my face.

Speaker 2 (58:22):
What have I done?

Speaker 4 (58:24):
And that was a lot of me putting that on me.
But then as it went on, I could see when
I was due and Michael was on vacation, and our
names were in the title and they're like, we've got
to fix this, and I felt it was all on me.
So I remember telling them I'll come back at six
weeks and I'll come back the next week, and they
were like, legally, we can't let you because I thought,
you can't have Michael and Sarah gone on a show

(58:45):
called Michael and Sarah.

Speaker 2 (58:47):
Oh my god. So it was like and then literally
the depths of how low I got.

Speaker 4 (58:53):
The best part was and the pivotal moment on the
other end of this dark like it always felt like
it was my No one made me think that, so
I'm not blaming anyone. It was me, but the depths
I fell. And then Max said the most beautiful thing.
He said, stop holding onto this show like it was
the dream you had, because.

Speaker 2 (59:13):
It never was. It just sounded like it.

Speaker 4 (59:17):
Well that was when like, I was so low. I
never lose weight when I'm stressed or I go the
other way. It was the first time in my life
I was losing weight.

Speaker 2 (59:26):
I was depressed.

Speaker 4 (59:26):
The show had been suspended and eventually it was going
to be canceled, and Max said, you are fighting like
it's everything you thought it was.

Speaker 2 (59:32):
You know it's not.

Speaker 4 (59:34):
You've known that let go, and it was like, oh
my god, and then I could recover because I could
handle and deal if I just stopped running and fighting
and clinging.

Speaker 1 (59:46):
And it was like like you still tried. Yeah, you're
still a person who tried.

Speaker 4 (59:52):
I tried, and a lot of the things were out
of my hands and I needed to let go of.
This wasn't like the other pivots where up being my shot,
my shot, my child. This was something I was projecting
that wasn't that, and I needed to stop.

Speaker 1 (01:00:06):
Well, something you've talked about in terms of those female
storylines that I think is really I'd actually never thought
about it until you said this. But you said you
went from like the young woman on the show. You
were the hot young Sarah, and then you came back
as a mom, and all of a sudden, Kiki had
the young sort of segments or things that were attributed

(01:00:28):
to her, and mom became your identity. Yeah, which is
so hard when you are just had given birth and
are freaked out about your identity.

Speaker 4 (01:00:37):
Well, it wasn't even like when I was doing all
the fun things, I was super young. Now looking back
your thirties, you're very young. Yeah, But in my mind
because I'm at the time, I was in my thirties.
The twenties were young. I wasn't in my young, vibrant
hot self, but they would let me do anything I wanted.
I literally scaled down the tallest building in Jersey City
to fight breast cancer for hotocopy.

Speaker 2 (01:00:58):
I jumped out of a plane.

Speaker 4 (01:00:59):
I learned how to child, I learned how to stand up,
paddle board, I bleue glass and Canada. Anything I wanted
to not because I was young, because I wasn't a mom,
I could still be Sarah.

Speaker 2 (01:01:10):
It was like night and day.

Speaker 4 (01:01:12):
Now Kiki, who I adore and I literally love her
so much and admire her.

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
It was not her or either of us doing this.

Speaker 4 (01:01:20):
But now these producers would come to me and they're like,
we've got a mom segment, We've got a parenting segment.
And I thought it was like a build off postpartum depression,
which I now look back and realize from the moment
you say you're pregnant, you don't realize how quickly you fade.
Like the back of the Future photo when the brothers
and sisters fade. Anyone understand that reference, you know it right?

Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
Thank you? The picture fades as they die and ememorated
when you told me that, like he's so young.

Speaker 4 (01:01:47):
No, but it's a famous scene in this picture, and
they slowly die away from the moment you say that,
how's the baby?

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
How is it?

Speaker 4 (01:01:55):
And it's not that you don't want to love that baby,
but you don't know what you're doing.

Speaker 2 (01:01:59):
You don't.

Speaker 4 (01:02:00):
I don't believe that all the instincts kick in. I'm
still waiting and my child's eight. Now you know that
stuff doesn't just turn on. I was still Sarah, but
I was no longer Sarah. Did anyone see me anymore?
It's like an invisibility that you're like, how do I
do this? And then it was playing out at work.

Speaker 1 (01:02:17):
Alicia Menandez on NBC Love Her she wrote the likability Trap.
And I wrote this quote down years ago because it
always stuck with me, She said, I was anxious about
people who would know me for the first time as
a mom. It's such a powerful identifier. All of a sudden,
you become this one dimensional person that used to be multidimensional.
All of my markers of motherhood predated my actual birthing

(01:02:39):
a child, and it exacerbates gender norms.

Speaker 2 (01:02:42):
If a woman's warm and kind.

Speaker 1 (01:02:44):
She must be a mom, and then she must not
be competitive or dominant because she would need to be
the person in the leadership position, which is exactly what
you just said.

Speaker 4 (01:02:53):
Yeah, and it also showed me how the world saw me.
And by the way, I do not at all any
bad feelings towards the many women. But it was mostly
a female staff, and they were young, and they weren't
at that point in their lives yet, so I don't
think they understood how that was received. As they pitched
that way, like I could still jump out of planes now,

(01:03:15):
they were like, oh, we can't have a mom.

Speaker 2 (01:03:17):
Well guess what.

Speaker 4 (01:03:18):
Moms do A lot of stuff and I hadn't changed,
everyone else projected a change.

Speaker 2 (01:03:25):
It must have sucked walking into work every day. I
cried every day.

Speaker 4 (01:03:30):
And funny enough, there were a lot of great moments
because the staff was amazing. Yeah, I loved Keky and Michael.
I mean, talk about laughing until you hurt at all
the things. It wasn't anyone's fault, that's the problem. But
as it played out, it felt like I was being
dragged behind a car, and for the first time I
couldn't wait to leave. So I was one of those

(01:03:51):
moms that felt better going to work. Now, work was
not a safe haven. And even though I felt like
I clutched around as a mom, I would rather do
that with all my heart than what was happening at work.

Speaker 2 (01:04:02):
I just couldn't do it. And so that was a
really low point.

Speaker 1 (01:04:07):
There's this element to it, like when you would hit
a wall when you were younger and starting out in
your career. There was nothing to lose, Like of course
you could go pitch executives. You didn't have a quote
unquote name and broadcast Yeah, like you were Sarah Haynes
from the View and it was this at like the
industry was watching and people were watching, And so I

(01:04:31):
understand why it felt like so much pressure.

Speaker 2 (01:04:35):
There was so much pressure. Yeah, I still to this
day take a lot.

Speaker 4 (01:04:39):
When I look back, you'd think with years I could
have fresh growth on that because it offered me so
many strengths and practices that I came back with a
new confidence, more fearless. Because again, when you've seen dark
moments in your life, whether anyone else thinks it's a
dark moment or not, when you've survived that, the strength
you get never goes away.

Speaker 2 (01:04:57):
So you take that with each tra ever, refall you have,
you take something with you.

Speaker 4 (01:05:02):
And I came back with a louder voice I heard myself,
because anything was better than the dark spot.

Speaker 2 (01:05:10):
So all that stuff came with me.

Speaker 4 (01:05:12):
But still to this day, I can so quickly channel
how delicate and vulnerable I was, and how grateful I
am that the view said if you're not busy, we
want you back, and I thought I felt even a
double gratitude that there was a chance.

Speaker 1 (01:05:32):
Again, Well, what's amazing is that timing because Abby Huntsman
was leaving the show yep, and you could have your
seat back.

Speaker 4 (01:05:40):
Well I don't even know if this is possible to say,
but Brian or Boss had when Abby decided to leave.
He didn't want to rush to fill it because the
writing was on the wall for our show.

Speaker 2 (01:05:51):
So I think a part of him was like any
minute now. That's so nice of him.

Speaker 4 (01:05:57):
Though it was because he said, you know, Sarah, he goes,
we always loved you here, you know, And it was
the same table you left. Yeah, because Abby, and she's
so kind Roise ships in the night. But Abby, for
her own life, had made that decision. But that was
literally my seat before and Brian was like.

Speaker 2 (01:06:13):
I don't know how much longer this show has led.
I'm sorry, and I was like, thank you, thank.

Speaker 1 (01:06:21):
You, Like, but that's incredible timing. That's how I know
that was meant to be your seat.

Speaker 2 (01:06:26):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:06:27):
Okay, So online comments because during this time, I can
imagine you get with the view, you get negativity all
the time because it's a polarizing show where you're sharing opinions,
but with Strahan and Sarah it I can imagine it
just hurts more.

Speaker 2 (01:06:46):
Oh.

Speaker 4 (01:06:47):
The problem and the reason it hurts is when the
troll in your own brain is the loudest.

Speaker 1 (01:06:53):
Yes, it doesn't hurt if you don't believe it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:06:56):
And the problem is when they endorsed the troll in
your own mind, that critical voice. That voice can offend
you on any other person. And when someone else says yeah,
I see that too, you're like, oh, she's right, Like.

Speaker 2 (01:07:08):
That voice is right.

Speaker 4 (01:07:09):
And so I had to make very deliberate steps. I'd
check in with myself, what am I looking for?

Speaker 2 (01:07:16):
Here?

Speaker 4 (01:07:17):
Am I looking for external endorsement? Because I'm probably not
going to find it, and I'll probably fall further than
I feel right now by reading it. Do I want
to check in. I was pretty disciplined about it because
I was not in a good place. And the problem
was because I was believing it. Now it was affecting
me on air in a way it never had done.

Speaker 1 (01:07:35):
Because it doesn't now, you know the comment, Well, in.

Speaker 4 (01:07:38):
That moment, I now realized I was going through postpartum again.
But you don't often know it until you're out of
it and looking back because you're so busy surviving it
that you're.

Speaker 2 (01:07:48):
Like, it's not so bad. No, I got this, it's
just work.

Speaker 4 (01:07:50):
It's this, And then when time clears and you come up,
you're like, that was bad.

Speaker 2 (01:07:55):
That was bad.

Speaker 4 (01:07:56):
And so I remember that during those times, I would
blank and I'd never this far, nothing had ever rattled me.
I mean, I'd have my own moments where I forget
what I was saying, but really not an anxiety driven problem.
I would sit and I'd go to ask a question
and I'd blank. And I then had to tell my boss.
I pulled him aside and I thought, something's not right here,

(01:08:16):
and I need him to know in case this is
to affect the product so much, and I said, I
am struggling right now. I need you to know because
I'm having a hard time sometimes in interviews, and so.

Speaker 2 (01:08:28):
That sucked.

Speaker 1 (01:08:30):
It's one of the worst feelings in the world. Yeah,
I've had it. Oh it's horrible. You feel like a loser.

Speaker 4 (01:08:37):
You feel like a loser, and you're like, externally, no
one knows. So you're hurting, you're struggling, you're crying, you're
fighting back tears. You're like, this is awful. No one
needs to tell me, yea, and yet you can't. You
also aren't feeling like you need to share all those
vulnerable things. So I'm not going to come out and
pour it on the table for you. I'm not even
through it yet.

Speaker 1 (01:08:55):
Yeah, you really dealt with a lot, Sarah in a
public way.

Speaker 4 (01:09:03):
Yeah, and that part was probably the worst so far.
That's the lowest sit and I know life is long,
so they'll probably be more. But that was dark, and
I don't think I couldn't have fully grasped it while
I was going through it, or it would have killed me.

Speaker 1 (01:09:19):
I want to talk about happy things because you give
really good dating advice.

Speaker 2 (01:09:23):
I love some dating advice.

Speaker 1 (01:09:26):
So you were thirty seven when you met and married Max.

Speaker 2 (01:09:30):
Met Max thirty four, Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:09:31):
Married Max at thirty seven and he's five years younger
than you. Yes, So I want to ask you about
age gap relationships.

Speaker 2 (01:09:37):
Yep. I know men and women are different.

Speaker 1 (01:09:40):
But I was in a relationship when I was twenty
with a thirty one year old Yeah, and I look
back on that with I was a volunteer. I wasn't
a victim, but I kind of feel like I was.

Speaker 2 (01:09:55):
A little bit of a victim. Like I'm like, I'm
not sure I knew what I signed up for.

Speaker 4 (01:10:02):
So I dated a man that was eighteen years older
than me when I was twenty two.

Speaker 1 (01:10:06):
Oh my god, And were you a volunteer.

Speaker 4 (01:10:09):
Oh yeah, I was a volunteer and we were together
for four years.

Speaker 2 (01:10:13):
We were wow.

Speaker 4 (01:10:14):
And then the next one, the next serious one, the
really toxic one nine.

Speaker 2 (01:10:18):
Years older than me. Okay.

Speaker 4 (01:10:20):
I had turned away guys that were even a year
younger because I said, I don't date younger, and then
I did and I married him.

Speaker 2 (01:10:29):
I feel like this is what always happens. What I
realized is you should aim hide.

Speaker 4 (01:10:34):
But the privilege of describing what your type is, what
you want is just that it's a privilege.

Speaker 2 (01:10:39):
It's an imaginary concept. Put it all out there.

Speaker 4 (01:10:42):
But be ready when you want six to one and
he comes in at five ten. Be ready when you
thought that.

Speaker 2 (01:10:47):
He would be older or at least your age, and
he's five years younger.

Speaker 4 (01:10:51):
Be ready when you thought you were going to have
someone that saw your whole spiritual world the way you did,
and he's an agnostic ethnic Jewish man, like, be ready
for whatever will be thrown at you, because that's what
life does. It doesn't serve it up, because it wants
to make sure you're paying attention and listening.

Speaker 2 (01:11:08):
How do you know he was it?

Speaker 4 (01:11:10):
So I always see There wasn't a moment I actually
really I was just an efficient at a dear friend's wedding,
and I laid into this in my remarks.

Speaker 2 (01:11:19):
The way we describe love in this.

Speaker 4 (01:11:21):
World, specifically for girls and women, is it happens to you.
It's electric, you'll feel it, it's a bolt, it's all
these things. Well, that gives all the power to something
out external that happens. There's a very sober moment where
you have to eventually make a choice, and there's not
a guarantee. The people that you hear that from. I
also felt how many the ones did I meet? They

(01:11:43):
just weren't saying yes or calling back, you know, like
I met other guys, I had storylines. You know, Eventually
you have to stop and say, are we looking in
the same direction When we look at what life looks like?

Speaker 2 (01:11:56):
Do we mostly agree?

Speaker 4 (01:11:57):
You may suck at cleaning up the bathroom, which he does,
and he leaves the toothpaste lid off, and I'm about
to lose my mind? All those things can be there
when it comes to your values, the most important things
in life?

Speaker 2 (01:12:08):
Do we agree on those things?

Speaker 4 (01:12:10):
When we have children, do we agree on what type
of people we want them to be? Not necessarily what
activity or what, but like in general, if we're doing
that and I'm still attracted to you and I enjoy
your company, eventually you make a choice.

Speaker 2 (01:12:23):
And it's timing.

Speaker 4 (01:12:24):
I don't believe Max was walking towards me his whole
life and I was walking toward him. There's a lot
of luck in life, a lot of stuff happens. You've
got to be ready, and you've got to make a
deliberate choice with your head, not your heart.

Speaker 2 (01:12:37):
Heart has to be involved. Yeah, you've got to use this.
We make our best decisions not in the fog of.

Speaker 1 (01:12:43):
This but in the clarity of this, and you feel
like you and Max wanted the same things out of.

Speaker 2 (01:12:49):
Life in general.

Speaker 4 (01:12:50):
We both wanted a family, Like I think it's a
deal breaker if you disagree on kids.

Speaker 2 (01:12:56):
I don't think people change on that.

Speaker 4 (01:12:58):
Do we want a life with kids, Do we want
to have those kids together those types of things. Do
we believe in the same kind of integral values of
character doing the right thing?

Speaker 2 (01:13:09):
We're both works in progress. We both agree on that.

Speaker 4 (01:13:13):
But we're marrying each other today where we're at, But
we're gonna hope, We're definitely going to grow, or one
of us is not going to be here in the end,
you know. So all those really pivotal things, and you
just have to you do have to enjoy their company.
I think women learn to put themselves in a pretzel
to be chosen as if we weren't worth choosing, you know, like,
and we keep doing that, and then we stop, and

(01:13:34):
we don't know where our voices, We don't know what
we believe in or the amount of things I took
on that one x I became a triathlete because he
was a triathline guy. No, I was an athlete, and
I ended up loving it. But I look at like
how many times they came in. Why wasn't I offering
what I had? Why wasn't I thinking about what I felt?
Why wasn't that person saying, Hey, I want to go
explore your gave volleyball league with you.

Speaker 2 (01:13:57):
I want to wear the shorts.

Speaker 4 (01:13:58):
I want to wear the short It's like, why was
there was so much here that I knew value? Why
wasn't I asking people to lean into me? I was
so busy leaning.

Speaker 2 (01:14:06):
Out to them.

Speaker 1 (01:14:08):
There's this one question that I think nobody really asked.
You probably did, but a lot of young people don't
ask what does retirement look like for you?

Speaker 2 (01:14:16):
Okay, we actually talked about this. I wouldn't say I grew.

Speaker 4 (01:14:20):
I wouldn't say I knew so much that I asked
every right question, because there are definitely questions I would
hone in on, but retirement what I love about him
and our parents are both a different generation and version
of this. We never want to be away from our kids,
so we said, aside from traveling and definitely enjoying not
seeing the world, laying on beaches with Pina coladas, like,

(01:14:41):
not like we're going to see every chapel I can't
wait to go to Asia, beautiful places. Our mission is
to lay on our asses and laugh and drink and
read books.

Speaker 2 (01:14:49):
That's what we want to do.

Speaker 4 (01:14:51):
But in between, we never want to be away from
our children. So my parents I went away to school,
they're in another place. Max's dad is down in Florida.
His mom's up here, but he's not that close with her.
So everyone's spread out. And our kids will say to us,
do we ever have to leave you? They're at that
young age, do we have to leave you? We're like, no,
right now, Alex in the face, I want to live
with you forever. We're like, you are welcome to We

(01:15:12):
think you're going to change your minds when you are welcome.
But Max and I bond because it's mostly our dads.
As much as they love us. They're like, we raise you.
We're done, we're having fun. I said Max, I want
to compound and I want to be near one to
three children anywhere they go, and he's like, I agree.
We want to be there and show up and take
care of the grand babies. We want to let them

(01:15:33):
get away from her, and we don't want to push agendas.
We don't care what you want to feed them. We
just want to love them and love them because we
love you. So we have agreed that our life will
just contain hauling after our kids, hearing about every test,
every game.

Speaker 2 (01:15:47):
Once you meet them, you never.

Speaker 4 (01:15:50):
Want anything else, really, and it's not instant, just to
be clear, it wasn't something I felt. But when I
look at those three little people and they're very I
stop and I like, I never want to not know you,
and I want to.

Speaker 2 (01:16:04):
Know all of you.

Speaker 4 (01:16:04):
I want to know a Bland Tuesday in October. I
want to know all the things. I want to hear
your days. I want to as much as you'll talk
to me, I'm going.

Speaker 2 (01:16:13):
To be there.

Speaker 4 (01:16:13):
And Max is the exact same way, and men are
not always that way.

Speaker 2 (01:16:17):
Not to stereotype, but he is just as obsessed with
as me.

Speaker 1 (01:16:22):
And is that because you guys didn't feel that in
your childhood or because you did.

Speaker 4 (01:16:26):
We felt like his dad worships him if he literally
he's his dad's only child. His dad was forty something
when he had him, so his dad had given up
on having kids. When Max read a book in college,
he'd say, Dad, I read this cool thing. His dad
would go find it his dad's language is Russian, so
he I mean they're Russian for he's a first generation
maxis so he only speaks Russian with his parents.

Speaker 2 (01:16:46):
His dad would hunt down that book and read it.

Speaker 4 (01:16:49):
Max took an excursion after law school for three months
solo in Asia. His dad two years later repeated the
same itinerary because he wanted to see what Max had seen.
I said, my parents definitely don't love me like that.

Speaker 2 (01:16:59):
That's amazing.

Speaker 4 (01:17:00):
His dad worships him, like in the most beautiful I've
never seen someone love so much. Max feels that, and
he loves his dad back. My parents love me, but
my mom would love to be close to us, but
she's got four and were scattered.

Speaker 2 (01:17:15):
My dad is God love him.

Speaker 4 (01:17:17):
He's like, like my mom always say, should we go
move up there? Take care of the kid. My dad's like, hey,
I raised my four, love them. They can visit, but
we're done. I never want to be done.

Speaker 2 (01:17:26):
You're in it. I am in it until the very end.

Speaker 1 (01:17:30):
What's the most fun you've ever had on TV?

Speaker 2 (01:17:33):
Probably when Tiffany sang to me on my fortieth birthday.
That was amazing.

Speaker 4 (01:17:40):
I still like I can watch that video and like
my body like shakes. It was one of the coolest moments.

Speaker 2 (01:17:48):
In my life.

Speaker 4 (01:17:49):
Why, I think because it channeled, like there's so many
moments where I stop and I'm completely Sarah Hanes from
where I came from. So some of my closest friends
are childhood friends. Yeah, and I'm like, can you believe this?
Like what's going on? That moment was so pinnacle because
we used to dance. My sister a goofy not cute
to Tiffany, I think we're alone now in that moment

(01:18:10):
to realize it was like a record scratch moment where
you realize, I'm standing here, that's Tiffany, that was Debbie
Gibson on a video message. What the hell is going
on right now? And it is so jarring and magical.
And as you're looking next to your seeing your modern
friends like Paula Faris, Amy Robach was backstage, all these
friends and it's your life colliding. It's like your twelve

(01:18:31):
year old self bumping into you in the future saying
you're gonna be okay, this is fun.

Speaker 2 (01:18:37):
You got a lot of fun coming and like it
was just amazing.

Speaker 1 (01:18:41):
That's a beautiful way of describing it. That's amazing.

Speaker 2 (01:18:46):
Thank you.

Speaker 4 (01:18:46):
I don't think I thought about it that way, but
there's something raw there.

Speaker 1 (01:18:50):
The record scratch, yeah, okay, some rapid fire yep. Dream
guest panelist on the view, the most obvious question, Daniel, Okay,
how about dream guest?

Speaker 2 (01:19:05):
Dream guest? Yeah, so not host Okay, yeah, dream guest.

Speaker 4 (01:19:10):
I have still yet to meet Bill Clinton or brockelone
and just for that historical moment of that, I'm obsessed
with Hillary Clinton, but I would love to.

Speaker 2 (01:19:20):
Meet one of them.

Speaker 1 (01:19:21):
A book that changed your life? Something you think everybody
should read. She's come undone, finish the sentence. Every woman
should try this once an acting class, really scene study.
What's the most challenging part of your job right now?
Being unapologetically strong with myself? How do you talk about

(01:19:42):
money with your husband?

Speaker 2 (01:19:43):
Not? Well?

Speaker 1 (01:19:46):
What is the smartest decision you've ever made?

Speaker 2 (01:19:49):
Probably coming to New York?

Speaker 1 (01:19:51):
Okay, grab a question everything card which everyone calls you?

Speaker 4 (01:19:57):
Oh, what parts of yourself do you feel almost proud of?
I feel most proud of the way I love people.
It's from my toes and it's big.

Speaker 2 (01:20:08):
I give it freely.

Speaker 1 (01:20:11):
Everybody around you feels it, Oh, I hope so they do?

Speaker 2 (01:20:15):
You really take care.

Speaker 4 (01:20:17):
I love I love people when I connect especially It's
not like I love every person, but when I love,
it will pour out.

Speaker 1 (01:20:24):
Yeah, thank you for your time today.

Speaker 2 (01:20:27):
Thank you so much, Danielle. This was amazing, so amazing. Okay,
you know what time it is. Today's a good day.
To have a good day.

Speaker 1 (01:20:40):
I'll see you next week.

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