EVERY SPOKEN WORD
130 min read · 25,844 words- 0:00 – 0:19
Intro
- SCSusan Cain
... the goosebumps and the chills that we get from music, it comes from sad music. It doesn't come from the happy and upbeat tunes. It's like there's something that that music is conveying to us about the nature of reality that makes us feel kind of electric and alive because it's speaking some deep truth. (wind blows)
- CWChris Williamson
I watched your
- 0:19 – 3:34
Is the World More Introvert-Friendly?
- CWChris Williamson
very famous TED Talk, uh, a few years ago, and in it, you hoped that the world was going to become a more introvert-
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... friendly place. Uh, doing a, a sort of analysis of what's happened over the last few years, how do you feel that's gone? What's the postmortem?
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs) I think it's gone amazingly well, and also that we still have a long way to go. And I think, you know, that's true of any social shift. Uh, you can sometimes see changes, but still know that there's still a distance to travel. But yeah, when I compare things to the way they were 10 years ago, I think it's been a pretty seismic shift just in terms of the, the degree to which people are aware of the fact that we are introverts or extroverts or maybe somewhere in between and that that shapes so much of who we are and, uh, and the willingness of companies and schools and organizations to talk about it. Um, but I would say most of all, the biggest shift I've seen is in individual humans. You know, all the letters that I get from people telling me that they once had felt like they didn't have permission to be their true selves, and that now they do and they embrace it. And there's this amazing paradox at the heart of so many of these letters, which is that the more people embrace their true quiet nature, the more successful they become in the outer-facing world. I, I see this over and over again.
- CWChris Williamson
It's very difficult to compete with somebody that's being themself, right? No one can beat you at being you.
- SCSusan Cain
Exactly. Exactly, exactly. And, um, and I think humans really like truth, uh, most of all. And when you feel like somebody is telling the truth about who they are and living that truth, we like it, you know, and we wanna be with them.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, I did a TEDx Talk, um, the start of last year, and this was the entire topic of it. It was about embracing your weirdness and about the fact that-
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... Dali was this, uh, Salvador Dali was this unbelievably unique human. Uh, but if he hadn't embraced everything that he was, we weren't gonna-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... get Dali out of da Vinci and we weren't gonna get Dali out of Michelangelo.
- SCSusan Cain
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
It was important for him to embrace all of the elements of him, the ones that got him locked in a deep sea diving suit that he had to be-
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... wrenched out of in the middle of a talk, and the one where he was throwing himself down the stairs at nine years old 'cause he just liked pain. Like, you know, he was a bizarre guy-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, beyond the facial hair. And yeah, it, i- i- it's, it's very, very right. There is a, a resonance that you get when you can see somebody just being themselves and just being truthful. And, um, it's very alluring, which is bizarre because a lot of the time, especially with introverts, that's exactly not what they want. Uh, they want, like, the allure to kind of come and go as they please, and some of the people that are the most engaging are the ones who are, um, not necessarily looking for it.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I, I, I, I do think introverts want to be able to... Yeah, they, they may just not always wanna talk about who they are. (laughs) I think they want different ways of expressing it or to be able to just take time off. I think that's the thing, we're, uh... It's, uh, in a tw- in a 24/7 on society, they want time off.
- 3:34 – 9:48
The Need to Embrace Joy & Sorrow
- SCSusan Cain
- CWChris Williamson
I agree. Uh, how do you go from talking about introverts to thinking about feelings of sorrow and longing then?
- SCSusan Cain
Well, it's very interesting in that I thought that talking about sorrow and longing in this book, Bittersweet, I, I thought when I started this project that it was a pretty big departure from what I had done in the past, you know, just like a completely new topic. And it is, but what I'm finding is that so much of the way people are reacting to it is, it's very similar to what I heard with Quiet in that so many people saying, "Oh yeah, you know, this is who I really am. This is speaking to a deep truth about myself or about the way I perceive the world, but not one I had put into words before or not one that I felt like I could put into words before." Because you're supposed to be so upbeat and so positive, you're not supposed to talk about these kinds of things. Um, so in that way, there, there was this, uh, this real parallel that I (laughs) had completely not been aware of when I first started.
- CWChris Williamson
What are the emotions that you're talking about in Bittersweet?
- SCSusan Cain
Um, well, I am talking about sorrow and longing. I'm, I'm talking about... I'm really talking about just joy and sorrow, though. Uh, like, I'm talking about the way in which the nature of reality is that joy and sorrow are forever paired and light and dark are forever paired. And, and so we have to embrace both of them and accept both of them and look at both of them in a clear-eyed kind of way. Um, and to understand that everyone and everything that we love most is impermanent, not gonna live forever, but that there's something about really living deeply in that perception, in that apprehension, um, that is a kind of gateway to creativity, to connection, to transcendence. And you can feel this, you know, when, when, I mean, what, what, what got me down this whole (laughs) garden path in the first place is, um, is just my lifelong love of sad music and what sad music unleashes in us. I mean, certainly in me, but I, but then I cer- then I started to realize that there are all these studies that find, um, you know, the, the goosebumps and the chills that we get from music, it comes from sad music. It doesn't come from the happy and upbeat tunes. It's like there's something that that music is conveying to us about the nature of reality that makes us feel kind of electric and alive because it's speaking some deep truth.
- CWChris Williamson
What do you think is going on there? How is it that music can evoke an emotional response in that sort of way?
- SCSusan Cain
Um, I think that the musician is saying to us in a pre-verbal way, or in a, you know, supra verbal way maybe, um ... they're saying to us, "Everything that you've ever felt and maybe not wanted to say, I'm telling you, I've felt it too. I'm telling you, everyone's felt it too. And I'm gonna take the further step of turning this thing that you've felt into something unbelievably beautiful." Um, so there's a kind of, yeah, there's a transformation in it and a kind of union in it. And-
- CWChris Williamson
It is interesting to think about the sort of impact that, that music has on us. I, I wonder, I would love to speak to an evolutionary psychologist about it and think about how, how is this adaptive? You know, how is it that music can cause us to ... it, it can induce this emotional state? Is that a byproduct of something else? You know, is it that there is something else that we need to be attuned to, and it happens to be that music can tap into that as well? Or is there a specific pathway that's causing us to be able to be made crying, weeping messes on the floor-
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, by the right song at the right time?
- SCSusan Cain
I know. It's a very interesting question, and psychologists and neuroscience have looked at what it is about sad music that induces all these feelings of, you know, pleasure is too, like, simple a word for it, but all, all these great feelings in us. And I, I don't know that anyone's ever come up with a really great explanation for it. Um, you know, they talk about how it brings our bodies to a state of physical equilibrium. Um, but, but what I found more ... although it was my kind of bias going into this whole question, to be looking at things more from a scientific and evolutionary point of view, and, and, and I do that in certain ways that we can talk about. Um, the question about music specifically, I ended up finding it was more interesting to think about it in religious terms than anything else, which I hadn't expected because I didn't really go in as a religious person. Like, I think of myself as a, an agnostic, and I still am. But, um, but I think that what ... when you listen to music, what you start to realize is that, like, a huge majority of the songs that touch us the most are tuning into a sense of longing, like an existential yearning for something. That's what the music is expressing. And so it's this, it's expressing the exact same thing that religion expresses in its longing for, you know, the Garden of Eden and its longing for, uh, Zion and its longing for Mecca and its longing for the beloved of the soul. Um, that's one of the deepest aspects of human DNA, and for those of us who aren't used to thinking in religious terms, we're kind of cut off from that, for, we're cut off from that side of our nature, but that's what music is doing. Um, w- when you listen to it, you can hear it. And then, and, and w- and there are other manifestations of that that we have in our art, like, you know, Dorothy is longing for somewhere over the rainbow. Um, Odysseus in, in the Odyssey, he's longing for, for home, he's longing for Ithaca, and that's what sets him off on, on his adventure. So you see this, like, embedded into our deepest works of art, and I think we're not (laughs) , um, in conscious enough relationship to that longing even though it's, uh, e- even though it taps our deepest nature.
- 9:48 – 17:00
Experiences of Awe & Dread
- CWChris Williamson
How is joy and sorrow different from something like awe and dread?
- SCSusan Cain
Uh, well, I think of awe and dread as being very different. And I know people talk about awe as being somehow in relation to fear, which I, I don't fully buy, so I'm gonna separate those out. I, I will say that, um, we have in the quiz, i- in the book, A Bittersweet Quiz, um, that I developed with this psychologist, David Yaden at Johns Hopkins, and Scott Barry Kaufman, um, and, and it's also on the website for people who wanna just kind of take it quickly. It's, uh, susancain.net if you wanna just do it in a minute or two. Um, but we did preliminary studies with the quiz. The quiz basically measures how prone you are to this experience of bitter sweetness, this kind of, like, intense awareness of joy and sorrow. And what we found is that people who are high in their proneness to these states, you know, they, they spend a lot of time in that bittersweet state of being, they also are prone to states of awe and wonder and spirituality. So there seems to be some kind of connection there. Um, I don't know that we know exactly what it is, but I will say that there's also a high correlation between bitter sweetness and what the psychologist Elaine Aron calls high sensitivity, which is a kind of like, it's a, it describes 15 to 20% of people who are just intensely reactive to everything about life, you know, the good and the bad. You, you feel it all very deeply. Um, so there's something about feeling it all, the joy and the sorrow, and therefore being able to take in, um, states that put us into that place of awe.
- CWChris Williamson
Do you find when you've been speaking to people about this that some people kind of just don't get what you're talking about? I'm thinking about some of the friends that I know, my history is as a club promoter, so I stood on-
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... the front door of nightclubs, and I can think about a big group of people, a bunch of them are athletes as well, where if I started talking to them about this sort of gorgeous feeling of, of bleak melancholy-
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... um, that I had when I was going through the, um, hills of Iceland on a bus, for instance-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... and it's just endless, endless landscapes of rocks, moss-covered rocks, nothing, nothing living there-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... that I can see.... and the fact that whenever there's a Planet Earth documentary, uh, that gets released...
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... immediately I always go to the most bleak landscape.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
I always want the snow or the ice one. I want the Antarctica one. And there's something about that that I find sort of beautiful and terrifying at the same time.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And I know that as I was, as I say that to some of my friends, they're just gonna look at me and go, "Yeah, but why?"
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
"That sounds like it sucks." And have you found this? Have you found that there are some people that kind of just don't seem to get it, or at least don't feel it?
- SCSusan Cain
Definitely. Definitely. Yeah, and I've had, um, some funny interviews, uh, a couple with friends of mine where (laughs) they would say, "You know, I just took your bittersweet quiz, and I scored a zero, like, on every single one of the questions, zero, zero, zero." So yeah, there definitely are some people like that. Um, and I- I- I- I do... This is what I think. I think there are some people who come into this world with a temperament, like, of high sensitivity that sort of predisposes them to getting into this state. Um, I think there's some people who come to it via life experience, you know, maybe they've experienced enough of life's mix of trials and triumphs that they get to this state, and some people really don't. Um, and the way I think of it all is that if you think of the lesson of all the myths and the fairy tales and the Marvel movies and all of it, you know, it's basically telling us there is a whole array of different superpowers on offer, right? There's like lightsabers. There's wizard hats. There's, um, you know, some people can climb up buildings and stick to the walls, and it's really easy for them. And, and I just think of this as one kind of power with which to relate to other people and to the world, um, and it doesn't have to be for everyone.
- CWChris Williamson
It's strange thinking about the, uh, double-sided nature of a lot of the things that we not necessarily might not like about ourselves but sometimes are, uh, not super proud of it, right? It's very easy to wear, uh, the badge on your sleeve of being a super outgoing, charismatic-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, extroverted person-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... or the sort of person who can watch a scary movie and not get scared or watch a sad movie and not get sad.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Th- th- th- there is kind of something sort of cool and stoic and heroic about that.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
That's not me in the slightest. And it does seem a little bit like on the face of it you could perhaps take those, those insights that you get about the world and see them as a weakness, uh, and yet when you look at them very, very closely, you realize that they're probably just the other side of something that you really care about.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- 17:00 – 26:48
Where Creativity Comes From
- SCSusan Cain
- CWChris Williamson
Does sorrow and longing come about from pain in your experience?
- SCSusan Cain
(clears throat) I think they're related to each other. Um, sure, I mean, you have... I guess it could be physical pain but certainly emotional pain. I mean, you have... Maybe that's the definition of sorrow, that you're experiencing a kind of emotional pain. I think longing is a slightly different state 'cause longing has more of a sweetness in it, you know? It's more of like a, an orientation towards that which you would want to have that you may not have right now, but, but there's something about the orientation and that direction that brings you closer, um, to the thing that you think is most perfect or beautiful or good or true. Um, so... Yeah, so longing, it, it... In our culture, the word longing sounds like it's very... like you might be mired in longing, you know? It sounds like it's something very negative. But literally the word, the etymology of the word longing, it literally means like to grow longer and to reach for something, so I think of that as a quite positive state of being.
- CWChris Williamson
How can this be transformed into something more like creativity or love? You've got somebody that's listening now and thinking-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... "Yeah, me. That's me."
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs) Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
"I love Antarctica when it comes on planet Earth."
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs) .
- CWChris Williamson
"And bleak landscapes and sad music." How can they transmute that into something more useful?
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. Well, so for, when it comes to create ... There, there's a lot of answers to that. On the creativity side of the question, um, when you look at what many creative artists are doing, what they're really doing is they're taking pain and turning it into something beautiful. So it's a kind of transforming process. Um, so I, I say to people, you know, "Whatever pain you find, you feel you can't get rid of, make that your creative offering." Like that, that is your wellspring. Um, that's so much of what people go to art looking for. You know, they're, they're looking for someone to express for them in some kind of, like, beautiful or otherwise transcendent form. Um, to express for them something they felt that they can't really talk about at the grocery store or, you know, like chatting with their colleague at work. It's just not right to talk about it there but, but art is gonna do it for you. So, it's the source of our great creative impulses. It's not, it's not an accident that there are study after study that I talk about in the book finding that so many of our great artists, um, have been orphaned, uh, when, when they were children. Um, (laughs) and there was one study that, that took a bunch of unsuspecting people and had them give speeches to an audience of, of people who the researchers had planted there. And half of the audiences, um, smiled upon the people as they gave their talks and, and applauded very enthusiastically, and then the other half, uh, looked very disapproving. And so- (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SCSusan Cain
... the people who gave the talks to the disapproving audiences were pretty bummed afterwards. Well, they all had to do collages when they were done, and it turned out that the, the collages done by the people who were in a bad mood, 'cause they had given the, the talks to the unhappy audiences, um, those people made collages that were rated much higher for creativity by a panel of artists than the others did. And that, that was especially true, that effect was especially pronounced for people who had a hormonal profile going in that suggested emotional vulnerability. So there's something about tuning into what we can call your Antarctica state, um, that is connected with a creative impulse. And it's not to say ... I, I really want to say this. Again, I'm not advocating for depression. In fact, I think it's really difficult to be creative when you're depressed, if not impossible. It's more just, about just tapping into some sort of state of imperfection and doing everything you can to transform it in the direction of perfection. That's like the great human undertaking.
- CWChris Williamson
What about love?
- SCSusan Cain
Love. Um, so with love, part of the lesson here ... There's a reason ... I- in the book, I, I, I tell at some length the story of The Bridges of Madison County, um, which was this blockbuster book and movie about this, um, about a, a woman kind of trapped in a pretty mediocre marriage, let's say, um, in a Midwestern farm town. And one day, her family goes away for a week, and there knocks on the door, um, this handsome photographer from (laughs) National Geographic magazine. And they fall into a passionate four-day affair, and he tries to convince her to leave her family and go off with him. And at first, she's actually packing here bags, ready to do that, until she decides to unpack them. And she unpacks her bags partly because she doesn't wanna, you know, she doesn't want to abandon her family, but it's also deeper than that. It's because she understands that they, she and this photographer, have already together kind of gone to Eden, and that even if they were to s- going to stay together, they wouldn't get to stay there. And you start to realize that this is a story not really about marriage and adultery and that kind of thing. It's, it's really a story about longing itself and that that's what the photographer represented. And in our own love lives, I think it's incredibly helpful to understand this about ourselves that, that we have this kind of emotional make-up as humans, because otherwise what you end up doing is, you know, you enter a new love affair and basically you and your partner take each other to Eden for some period of time, and then eventually ... And then you don't get to stay there, because you find out that they're imperfect, and you remember that you're imperfect and, and ... Yeah. And it, and it, and if you don't understand this whole dynamic, you might feel like, "Okay, that's a sign that that relationship was all wrong, and now I've gotta go to the next person who might be able to bring me to Eden, and then we can stay there for good." But if you understand this dynamic about human nature, I think you a- approach your relationships with much more forgiveness, and your own self with much more forgiveness, um, and you can experience love in its human forms and appreciate the moments of Eden when they come and appreciate imperfect love the rest of the time, and, and really derive the benefits and the satisfactions of that.
- CWChris Williamson
When people talk about somebody completing them, it kind of ... It does make a lot of sense when you think about that. It does feel like ...... and also the stories about being fallen creatures-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... about there being a part of us which is missing, which is fallen, which is, uh, uh, sort of permanently cursed to spend its time trying to fix that which it can't. There is something embedded in our experience that does feel a little bit like there sh- i- it's a hole that requires filling, something that needs fixing, something that if only we could get it in there. There's this really interesting line from Robert Wright's book, uh, Why Buddhism is True, where he says that the original, uh, reading of life is suffering by the Buddha.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Um, the original word for suffering, dukkha-
- SCSusan Cain
Dukkha, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, yeah, is the translation's contested and some of-
- SCSusan Cain
Right.
- CWChris Williamson
... some people say that it should be unsatisfactoriness.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Life is unsatisfactoriness.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And when you look at life through that lens, you realize that the holiday you've planned for the last year to go on, when you finally arrive there, there's a bit of sand between your feet and the sun's a little bit bright in your eyes.
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs) Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
And, "Oh, I should've got this blended instead of on ice, and maybe if I'd got-"
- 26:48 – 36:38
Struggling to Accept Being Introverted
- CWChris Williamson
In your work on introverts, you were talking about how people ape the beliefs of the, those that are around them in a little bit of a way. They sort of play the role that introverts sometimes can, uh, be made to feel like that's not perhaps the role that is optimal for them to play when they go out into the world, that they should kind of act more like extroverts if they want to get ahead-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... and that can sometimes cause people to not fully embrace who they are.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Do you think that there's an equivalent here with this sort of melancholy as well? That definitely, to me, feels like a thread that's run between those two pieces of work, that you've got this sort of hidden introversion, people acting up as extroverts, and kind of this hidden melancholy with people trying to hide the fact that things affect them so deeply?
- SCSusan Cain
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. (laughs) And I know it. I mean, I knew it before, but, uh, gosh, if I didn't, if I didn't know it before, you'd know it from the letters that I'm getting now, um, from all the people who are talking about the extent to which they hide it, even from themselves, you know, because p- I, I think people are meant- are made to feel that, um, that that aspect of themselves is the one that could lead them to depression or the one that's gonna lead them away from worldly success or whatever it is, as opposed to learning to integrate it into who they are and really go deep with it, um, in a productive way. Like, I, I got one letter, um, from a filmmaker who told me that all his life, he had had this exact reaction to sad music. Um, he used to live in New York City, and he would go to a party at night and then walk home along the length of, of Manhattan listening to his music in his headphones, and he said he would be overcome by what he came to call, quote, "that holy feeling." And I love that it was like that holy feeling. But he said over time, he kind of learned to, to mistrust that feeling and to, and sort of put a lid on it because of all these social signals that he was getting. Um, but he, he was now starting to let it kind of come up for him, and, uh, I think there's a great wholeness that comes from doing that.
- CWChris Williamson
There was a guy on the show a couple of weeks ago called Tom van der Linden. He runs a stor- uh, channel called Like Stories of Old.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And if anyone went and watched some of his videos, which they definitely should, it's great, he is so bleak-
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... with his video. I mean, they're beautiful, but f- fuck me, they're bleak. And th- the, they're always... He uses dead space a lot in terms of the music and the soundscaping that he puts in there, and he's talking about the myth of h- masculine purpose or why we can't be heroes anymore. He's doing analyses usually of, of media. And I wondered why I, I, what drew myself to his work, and it really is, there's something so melancholic and, and bleak about, about what he puts out, and it speaks to something in me, and it-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... it makes me feel like, well, maybe other people have this sense as well that, that things are kind of a bit, a bit sad and a, a bit serious and a bit lonely, but a bit beautiful and a bit sort of transcendent as well. And it is this, this big melting pot. One of the things that keeps coming up when I'm thinking about this is the courage and the bravery that you need as somebody to actually embrace this, first off-
- SCSusan Cain
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... to not be able to hide it from yourself, and then secondly, to put that out into the world, right? Eh, w- whether you've got a YouTube channel or not, you know, even if it's just speaking to your kids or your friends or the person on the street or whatever, um...... I wonder why people shy away from doing that. I mean, I ha- I have a, a 34 years of examples myself, but my point being that I wonder why it is that something that makes ... I, I love Tom's work, right? It really connects with me.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And yet I still see in myself and the people around me a lack of commitment, or a lack of courage, or a lack of desire to be sufficiently brave to completely open up that area of ourself to others, even though we know that we appreciate it when others do it for us.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. Yeah. Uh, and, uh, I, I, I have a, excuse me, a theory as to why we shy away from doing it. And I believe it's because, especially over the 19th century as things ... as we became more and more organized around being a business culture, um, there was more and more a focus on were you succeeding or were you failing at business? And then if you were a success or failure, was it because ... People literally started to ask this question explicitly. They would say, "Is it because o- of good or bad luck, or is it because of something inside you?" And increasingly, people started answering the question by saying, "It's something inside the person." And they started like ... And they started, uh, categorizing people into winners or losers. And th- this word loser, literally, like the usage of it, has gone up astronomically over the 20th century and now into the 21st. Um, even in, in the, in the Great Depression, there were like newspaper headlines that would say like, "Loser commits suicide in the street," after like losing their money. Um, okay. So, the more you're dividing people into winners and losers, of course no one wants to be on the loser side of the ledger. And so what you end up doing is divorcing yourself from any of the emotions, or affects, or experiences that have anything to do with loss. Y- you know, you just don't want to admit to that. So, I mean, so just the way it's such a false dichotomy to say, "This person's a winner and this is a loser," as opposed to saying, "We all win and we all lose," the same thing is true with the emotions that are associated with those states. Um, those, all of those emotions belong to all of us, and that's like being a really truly whole self. But, but in a culture of winners and losers, we don't feel like we can be.
- CWChris Williamson
Do you know Alain de Botton's piece about this, where he talks about Lady Fortuna?
- SCSusan Cain
Oh, gosh. Well, first of all, I love him. I, um, huge fan of Alain de Botton. And I don't know about the piece, but I've heard him talk about how, uh, I think he refers to it as cruel that we no longer think in terms of Lady Fortune. Yeah, and I-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Well, that's exactly ... He uses the exact example, the word of losers, that in the past in ancient Greece, they would be called the unfortunates, that Lady Fortuna hadn't blessed them.
- SCSusan Cain
Right. Right. Right.
- CWChris Williamson
Those are literally the people on the street, the, the, the disabled, the lame, you know, the people that weren't able to work or whatever. They were the unfortunates. Lady Fortuna ... And the whole point of this, and that's ... I'm right. L- is Lady Fortuna represented as the person that has scales? I'm pretty sure-
- SCSusan Cain
I think so. Yeah. I think that's right.
- CWChris Williamson
Like it's a, a set of balancing scales, not fish scales.
- SCSusan Cain
Y- yes.
- CWChris Williamson
And the whole point of that was that she giveth and she taketh away. And I can't remember whether it was Epictetus when he got his legs broken and they didn't heal correctly. I feel like he'd been a successful trader for a long time and had had wealth, or maybe it was somebody else. Maybe it was the guy that was the advisor to Nero. And I think it was the guy that had- was an advisor to Nero. He gets thrown away in a jail cell, and people are saying to him, you know, "This is an injustice. This is terrible." Uh, "Well, how are your family gonna exist without you?" And he says, "Well, I've lived a pretty good life. You know, Lady Fortuna, she gave and it's now her time to take away."
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Right.
- CWChris Williamson
Uh, and, and the, the changing of that language to, um, any meritocracy, where if the people that win are worthy of their successes, what does that mean the people who lose are worthy of? Well, it means that they're worthy of their losses.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- 36:38 – 41:01
The Tyranny of Positivity
- SCSusan Cain
English literature teacher passed out blank notebooks to the class, and looked Susan in the eyes and told her, "Write the truth of what you're feeling. Just write it all down." And she said, "I, the teacher, um, I'm gonna look at it. I might make a little comment or two, but this is yours to write your truth." And she was looking straight in her eyes when she said it. And Susan started finally writing what she really felt, and she refers to that as a revolution in a notebook. Um, and, you know, and, and it led to, you know, a lifelong passion for helping (laughs) people to just make peace with all the different emotions that we have as humans.
- CWChris Williamson
Do you think there's something going on here culturally? Is it culturally novel to have such a obsession with positivity and wanting everything to be okay? Uh, i- is it something outside of just the success of the individual? Is there something else going on here?
- SCSusan Cain
Well, there's definitely a cultural aspect to it. Um, an- and in fact, psychologists have compared different cultures to measure how much do they smile or not smile, you know, and you'll be shocked to know, in the US they smile way more than in many other cultures. Um, but there, there are cultures in which smiling is seen as being, um, kind of suspect. You know, like, "Why would you be smiling so much all the time?" It, it's seen as a sign of somewhere between foolishness, like as if you don't understand how serious life is, or just a sign that you're not to be trusted, 'cause clearly you're not telling the truth.
- CWChris Williamson
These suspicious, happy people-
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... we need to be, need to be very, very cautious around them.
- SCSusan Cain
Exactly.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Um, I, I, it is interesting, especially coming from the UK to America, so we're kind of-
- SCSusan Cain
Right.
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, genetically perennially a little bit miserable, right?
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
That's why satire and, and, and sort of s- that stiff upper lip thing comes from the UK. I think it's very, very heavily borne out of the weather, the fact that we're waterlogged on all sides, uh, the fact that we've got a, a, a long history, uh, spit and sawdust, salt of the earth people, you know, coal mining and working class towns and stuff like that. And, um, coming over here was very interesting to see people's-
- SCSusan Cain
I can imagine that.
- CWChris Williamson
... um, relationship to the difficult. And the kind of encouragement that I get, the kind of feedback that I get when I tell different friends about things that I've got that are coming up, it, it's... The, if it wasn't for the fact that it was in the same language, it would feel like an incredibly different culture. And perhaps it is. Perhaps th- the fact that it is in the same language makes me think that the cultures are less different than they actually are.
- SCSusan Cain
Exactly.
- CWChris Williamson
That's, in fact, that's, that's probably exactly what's happening.
- SCSusan Cain
I've had that thought too when I go over to the UK. Um-
- CWChris Williamson
How do you find it?
- SCSusan Cain
Well, I mean, it's interesting, what you're talking about. Like, I think with the UK th- there isn't the same emphasis on a, a kind of manic smiliness that we have here. Uh, but I do think there's the same, or maybe a greater discomfort with negative emotions or with talking about them. Like, you're not supposed to talk about that, right? You're, you're more supposed to show a stiff upper lip and a kind of resolve and, and a kind of ironic detachment from all of that. You're never supposed to be earnest, I think.
- CWChris Williamson
That's very, very true. That's very, very... The earnestness... (sighs) If you can get it across in a, uh, sort of side-eye critical way... This is kind of like the tenor that I notice on Twitter a lot. No one actually ever points at somebody and says, "That was out of order. You're not, you, you're, you're not allowed to say that. That's something which..." It's always everybody's reply back and forth when they're having a disagreement on Twitter is some witty-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... this doesn't affect me quip that's trying-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... to sort of smartly dunk on the other person's idea. It's never actually somebody breaking the fourth wall a little bit and going, "Yo, that's out of order. You don't, you're not allowed to say that even if you're on the internet." And I, I think that that definitely gets drawn across into the UK. It's like a, a real sort of strange, malignant version of the stiff upper lip thing. It's not quite what it was-
- SCSusan Cain
On Twitter, you mean?
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, but also in the UK as well. You know, there's just-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... there, there is a little bit of a, a little bit of a difference in the way that people show their emotions. I had... I gotta tell you this
- 41:01 – 47:31
Witnessing a Lunar Eclipse
- CWChris Williamson
story. So, it was the lunar eclipse couple of... la- last ni- last week, I think, uh, middle of last week.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And the south of America, especially Texas, was one of the best places on the planet to see it. So I'm sat out on the balcony there. Someone texted me and said, "Yo, you watching this lunar eclipse?" And I was like, "Shit, I love the moon."
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
"My mom loves the moon." Mom's a Reiki master. She has been for 20 years and-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... she's always big into stuff to do with the moon. You know, I need to go outside and look at it. So I go outside. Did you look? Did you see any of the images of this?
- SCSusan Cain
I didn't.
- CWChris Williamson
So, it's like a fiery orb in the sky. The whole thing is a red hue, kind of like rust, if rust was lit from behind.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
It's a very bright sort of rust color.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Uh, and there's different stages that it goes through, and I was, uh, managed to go outside while it was in its full... And I'm sat outside and I started having to breathe heavily. Now you're going, "What's, what is going on here?" I was just sat there, s- silence, no one else around. There's a pool below in the courtyard where I'm staying. And I was starting to breathe heavily, and then I was... realized, I was like, "I'm weeping."
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
"What am I weeping at?" I was looking up... And I felt so stupid. I thought, "What a, what a pussy thing to do. What a stupid thing to do. It's the moon!"
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
"You've seen it a million ti- It's the moon, it's the moon not even lit, right? It's the moon with us in the way of the sun-"
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
"... between it..." Okay, okay. D- whatever. I'll calm down.
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
I'll chill out a little bit, this big pink sky orb. And taking some photos and sending them to my mom and stuff. And then, uh, I can't remember what it's called. It's not the apogee, it's something else. So as... There's different stages to the eclipse, and as the Earth begins to move out of the way-... s- parts of the sun start to strike one corner. So you can imagine that you have this sort of reverse crescent that starts to come in, and it starts to get brighter from the bottom corner, all the way up.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And there's this, still the same color at the top, and then this sort of line, this razor thin line of super bright yellow light at the bottom. And I just started bawling, crying. I was like, "What is going on?"
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Like, "How can I stop this from happening?" And I remember looking up at it and going, uh, really sort of questioning myself like, "Is this something that I should be ashamed of?" Like, "Should I..." And I felt shame. I was like, "Why am I, as a man of 34 years old who supposedly reaches millions of people on a podcast every month, what am I doing crying at the moon?"
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Like some sort of really sad werewolf.
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
What am I doing crying at the moon? And it was like tears streaming down my face. I was having to scrunch my face up to try and, like the way that you do when you would sob.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- 47:31 – 55:44
Being Open in Competitive Environments
- CWChris Williamson
given the fact that we've got this sort of tyranny of positivity that you're talking about-
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... especially in things like the workplace, how should someone, uh, integrate their bittersweet emotions when the world is expecting the bubbly positive Susan that doesn't like bleak landscapes? Like how, how are people supposed to navigate that space effectively, do you think?
- SCSusan Cain
Well, I mean, there's a bunch of things. There's clearly the, the creating the spaces to just dive wholeheartedly into, you know, in- into these states of melancholy and longing. But before you even get there, there's something about just engaging with beauty for its own sake. Um, because beauty, beauty will take you everywhere, right? It'll take you to states of just joy and bliss, but it'll also take you to those states of, of melancholy and self-transcendence that you were, that you found with the moon. So, I believe we need to be integrating proactive encounters with beauty into our everyday li- lives. And preferably starting our days that way. Um, you know, so-... it could be for one person listening to music or, uh, like, what, or, or going out into nature first thing in the morning, whatever it is. Like, for me, during all the time that I was writing this book, I started following all these art accounts on Twitter, and I would begin every morning by picking a favorite piece of art and then sharing it on my social channels. And it was, it was such an amazing experience because first of all, I was, like, really attuned to the art because I was going through this process and practice, but also it was then connected with a whole community of people who valued that kind of thing in the same way that I did. And it was such a grounding way, especially to start a creative day of writing, but really to start any (laughs) kind of day. So that's one thing I would say. Um-
- CWChris Williamson
What about when it comes to dealing with other people? You know, somebody asks, "How are you doing?" And there's a response that you're expected to give, and it's not always appropriate to say, "Well, do you know what it is? My dog died last night and I cried at the moon and-"
- SCSusan Cain
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
"... a bunch of other things happened." But what we said earlier on is that there's sort of this role model bravery courage thing going forward that sets a standard for other people to feel more comfortable in this space. And if-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... as I guess that you wanted with the introvert book, to hopefully forge a path for introversion to be, um, more effective and more accepted publicly-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... what, what about bittersweet emotions? How can those be sort of integrated socially or in the workplace better?
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah, absolutely. It is the same thing here. And, and it does help when it comes, as always, as with anything, it helps when it comes from leadership or from admired people to just be, to, to just find moments to share something that's a little bit truer about the complexities of your life. And it doesn't mean you have to, like, show up at work and divulge (laughs) all you, what, whatever priva- private emotions or experience-
- CWChris Williamson
Rampant athlete's fit foot that you're dealing with at the moment or whatever-
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... other problem you've got going on.
- SCSusan Cain
Whatever it is. Whatever it is. But, but there usually are moments for those kinds of openings. Um, you know, at Google, there was that famous study called Project Aristotle where they looked at the, the top performing teams in the company and tried to figure out what set them apart from the others. And they looked at all the usual metrics, like years of experience and education and that kind of thing, but it turned out that the factor that mattered more than any other was the ability to communicate openly about whatever, um, with one's teammates. You know, to, to really kind of show up in a full way. And, um, you know, and, and gave the example of a, of a, of a team leader who opened up to his team about how he, he had been struggling with stage four cancer, which no one had known about. But when he did decide to share that information, you know, it really brought the, the team together and then other people started showing up with their own struggles. So each one of those small actions can have a real cascading effect. And I think one thing that we can be doing is creating spaces for people to do that, even anonymously. You know, at the start of a Zoom chat, just to be inviting people to, to share what they're truly feeling. Um, again, with the option to not have your name attached to it. But, like, you know, there's Zoom chats where (laughs) where the organizer will come in and ask, "How's everybody feeling today?" And you know, "Everybody's pumped and everybody's thrilled and everybody's psyched to be here," so they say, and that's not really true. So what if a few people went first and just talked about... like gave a more complex answer? It would open things right up.
- CWChris Williamson
I think that there's a, a resistance that a lot of people will feel, and, uh, I, I, I can feel it in myself about-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... about that opening up thing, that there's a sense where this isn't the place to bring my problems in. That, um, maybe you can fake it until you make it. Maybe you can lead with actions and thoughts will follow in a way that if you sort of act in a positive manner, that everything else is gonna come from that. But I also think that there's only so far that you can go away from the emotions that you're feeling until they're basically... you're, you're, you're just playing a role.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Now it's just a persona.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
This isn't you... This isn't you putting a spin on what it is that you're feeling, it's you creating something completely separate. And w- the way that you go forward into the workplace, for the most part, I don't think that's going to paper over the things that you feel. If you've got some sort of bittersweet emotions going on or if you're dealing with grief or whatever, privacy would be something that I could see as a reason why people just simply don't want to have the questions asked.
- SCSusan Cain
Sure.
- CWChris Williamson
That, to me, makes a lot of sense.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
But if it's you thinking that this is actually a road to rehabilitation and that you do want to connect with people but just not here, but just not in this situation, I'm not convinced that that's true. W- when I think about the friends that I have the best relationships with, they're the ones that have been the most vulnerable, you know?
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
What is it that they say about a friendship? Um, true friendship is telling somebody something that, in the wrong hands, could be ruinous to your reputation.
- SCSusan Cain
Oh, that's such a great way of putting that. Yes, that's exactly right. That's exactly right. Yeah, and I... Listen, I... There's a part of me that's really sympathetic to all the objections that you just raised. Um, you know, I, I used to be a corporate lawyer before I became a writer, and I remember very distinctly during those years, it was like if I was going through something at home, let's say, um, you know, you feel like, "Oh my gosh, I don't feel like going to work today," you get there, you have to put a smile on your face, and then suddenly you actually do feel better. Um, at least in the moment you feel better. But then there's the long-term thing of, like, there's a kind of burnout that comes when you're showing up day after day not as your true self. So I think it works to some degree (laughs) , works in the short term. There's a longer term question there. And there's also the fact that...... we put those faces on because we know they're expected of us. But if we were showing up in a culture where they were less expected, we would feel, in turn, somewhat less of a privacy need that way. I'm thinking of, uh, I, I looked at an, a bunch of different case studies of companies where they did this, you know, from oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico to a billing department in Michigan, where leaders created cultures where it was just sort of natural for people to show up and tell each other about things and come to each other's aid. And they created a culture where that was normal, um, and that was productive. So, uh, what we assume to be an unchangeable aspect of how work must be conducted is much, much more, uh, amenable to change than we think.
- 55:44 – 1:08:01
How to Accept Death
- SCSusan Cain
- CWChris Williamson
When you're talking about grief and sorrow and stuff like that, obviously one of the topics that comes to first of mind is death.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
How do you think that people should live and deal with life knowing that both them and everybody else that they care about and love is going to be gone?
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah, this is, like, the, the big question, isn't it? Um, there's so many different answers, you know? And I, I, I spent time in the book, um, with people who are radical life extension advocates, who are, who, where their response to this problem is to say, "Well, that's not gonna happen, you know? I'm gonna work on making sure that that doesn't happen." Um, but for those of us who think it probably will happen, at least in our lifetimes, I have found it to be, like, tremendously, um, sustaining to, to really immerse in the idea of, of impermanence. You know, there, there's a reason that so many different, um, religious sects and the Stoic philosophers have engaged in one practice or another of remembering that at any moment, they could die the next day, they could die that day. Um, there's something about doing that that really helps you to live in a much more engaged way in the moment, but also to accept death a little more easily when it comes. And I say this having just weathered the deaths of my father and my brother during COVID. Um, I don't know, you know? Nothing takes away from the, the sheer, like, horror and nausea of that moment when, when you lose somebody. And it is, uh ... So, I'm not meaning to say that this is like a ... this is a antidote, but it's a mind shift. It's more of a mind shift to really be immersed in the awareness of impermanence. You know, so the Tibetan monks used to, or maybe still do, I don't know, in some sects, um, they'd go to sleep at night. They would turn their water glass over before they would go to sleep as a reminder to themselves that they might not wake up in the morning, and they might not need to drink the water, so I'll turn the glass over now. Um, and, uh, and Ryan Holiday talks about how, um, the great generals ... I'm forgetting which ones this was. But in ancient Greek times, you know, they, they would have some great victory and they would be parading in front of, of their cheering people, and there would be a guy whose job was to be stationed behind them as they paraded, whispering in the general's ear, saying, "You might-"
- CWChris Williamson
"You're only mortal."
- SCSusan Cain
"... you're only mortal, you're only mortal." And whenever I remember to do that in my life, I truly do find myself living differently, you know? I put my cellphone down, focus more on my kids, focus more on the trees outside, all of it.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, the impermanence thing's an interesting one. I had, uh, David ... Very famous transhumanist, I had him on the show, uh, three and a bit years ago, and I found-
- SCSusan Cain
Is this David Sinclair, maybe?
- CWChris Williamson
No. So, uh, he's also been on the show, but, uh, not him.
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
I think he would class himself as longevity, not-
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah, yeah, that's what I thought.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. This David, this David was, uh, you know, full upload to the clouds.
- SCSusan Cain
Right, right.
- CWChris Williamson
Intravenous MDMA for the rest of time. Levels of flourishing and pleasure hereto unknown by humanity. It was like real-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... real serious stuff.
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Um, what did you find amongst that group then? You've, you've gone and spent this time at this transhumanist conference-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... speaking to people that want to extend life, so that death basically, know that, and impermanence isn't a concern. What did you learn from your time with them? What did you reflect on?
- SCSusan Cain
Oh, gosh, there are so many things. Um, well, one thing was, I, I guess I, I went into that kind of skeptical of their project and feeling, um, that it, in some ways, it was just, uh, an extreme symptom of our culture of positivity. Like, we're gonna be, we're so positive that we're not even gonna die, you know? We, we can triumph over that too. Um, I ended up feeling really quite sympathetic to their aims. But, but also, it was fascinating to me the, how little interested they were in the philosophical questions of things like, well, does, does death give a meaning to life, you know? Does the fact that we're not here for that long ... They, they would say, "That's all nonsense. That's a story that we tell ourselves because we feel we have no choice." But as soon-
- CWChris Williamson
It's just a cope, yeah.
- SCSusan Cain
It's a cope, it's a cope. But as soon as we think we have a, a choice, then we don't have to go there anymore. Um, what was also really interesting about them was so ... I noticed that so many of the scientists who would get up and make their presentations would begin by telling a story of someone beloved who they had lost, you know? Or so often, like, uh, they would begin with an image of somebody bent weeping over, uh-... o- over a person they had just lost. And it was like, they were so focused on, on sorrow and longing and trying to turn it into something else, except the thing that they were turning it into-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SCSusan Cain
... was this ra- this hope, this promise of radical life extension. So, it was very interesting. Um, I don't know. One, one of them, uh, one of them gave me the thought experiment. Well, actually, before I tell you the thought experiment, I'm curious, like, where, where do you stand on the project?
- CWChris Williamson
So, I think that transhumanism generally is interesting-
- SCSusan Cain
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... which i- it definitely is, and I think that where the line between what David Sinclair does-
- 1:08:01 – 1:08:41
Where to Find Susan
- CWChris Williamson
to date with the stuff that you do and see some of your art postings, where should they go?
- SCSusan Cain
Yeah, um, best thing, come to my website, which is susancain.net, and you can sign up for my newsletter. And then, I'm also on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram. And the book, Bittersweet, is anywhere you usually buy your books.
- CWChris Williamson
Thank you, Susan. I appreciate you.
- SCSusan Cain
Thank you so much. It was wonderful to get to know you.
- CWChris Williamson
What's happening, people? Thank you very much for tuning in. If you enjoyed that episode, then press here for a selection of the best clips from the podcast over the last few weeks. And don't forget to subscribe. Peace.
Episode duration: 1:08:42
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