I Choose ... MORE with Amy Robach

You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Girl. Hi everyone, exciting news. Okay, my second annual I Choose Me Live Summit Women's empowerment event is coming to Los Angeles on Saturday, April twenty fifth, and I want you to be there. The I Choose Me movement began as three little words on Beverly Hills nine two one oh in nineteen ninety five, but it has evolved into something so much more than that. A revolution, you guys. It's a message I feel so

That is such a good question everywhere, And I'm telling you right now it's so interesting. So TJ and I, when you're in it and you're at ABC News and you know what you're responsible for, and you know your colleagues and you're watching everyone, it's one thing having now taken a step back and now, Actually, because I never had time to watch other networks or.

Right programs, I wasn't. I was.

We were just immersed in our news collecting. But now that we're responsible our podcast now, I mean DJ, Like I said, we basically put up this little mini news network and part of what we do from three am in the morning until honestly about five pm at night, we have three TVs on and we are watching all the news.

And it is remarkable when you have Fox News.

CNN, local affiliates, different types of news organizations, and you see how they write stories, what their headlines are clickbait, because now we're going through, you know, from the Washington Post to the New York Times, to the Wall Street Journal to local papers and in a way that I feel like I haven't done since I was on cable news, and I'm telling you it's hard and you can't. I just would say this, I don't care who the sources or how reputable the organization is. Never ever, just like

I would just challenge.

Folks, watch the enemy, watch or read what you think is fake news, and just take it in and let trust yourself enough to be smart enough to see maybe where the truth lies somewhere in between. But I will tell you it's tough, and that TJ and I really try not to. We offer our perspective, and I think with this administration it can be tough for journalists because sometimes I would argue, for us, it's not about politics.

But I think it's fair.

I think we have to be able to talk about yeah, definitely to each other and words now, yeah, Dave does that.

I'll walk in one minute, he's watching you know, CNN, And the next minute I'll walk in and he'll be watching Fox News and I'm like.

What's going on here?

Where are you settling? But he's like, yeah, I want to see both people's opinions.

And that is that you got day will we know, Dave of David?

That is I got chills because if more people would do that, right, just be like that. And I know that takes work. That takes it's almost taking on a responsibility of acknowledging that. Yes, I mean, I think we all know you're gonna get very different even if you just.

Look at the lower third. That's what we call that, Like the banner is below.

Yeah, the thing that's arousing.

See, so they'll be both becovering.

Christy Nome, which is a big story, uh this week when we're recording this, Christine Gnome has been fired by President Trump.

If you see what the CNN banner says versus what the Fox News banner says, it's actually fun. DJ and I actually enjoy We laugh. Oh my god.

Look at the difference the same story, two completely different ways of looking at it.

I find it fast.

It is kind of fun but also kind of aggravating.

Well, yes, because you know that most people aren't going back and forth and aren't taking both sides. In they look my My grandma, but before she passed was an avid Fox News fan, and I have worked for MSNBC ABC News and she she when.

I think when I was at MSNBC, she would say, do you ever watch Fox News? Amy?

And I said, I absolutely do, Grandma, because I always like to see what everyone's saying. And I said, do you ever watch watch CNN, Grandma? No, I do not, And I was like, well, I would challenge you to do so, Grandma, So no, I do not. No, I do not.

But that is That's that's most people. I get it.

You want to feel like what you think is right is also what the folks on TV are telling you is right.

It feels safe, I get.

It, feels like good advice. I love what you're saying. How can we, as you know, views, shield ourselves from the doom scroll and the constant flood of bad news that we're seeing everywhere and preserve some sort of will to live?

Like quite honestly, it's overwhelming, and even TJ and I like, as we're like in the thick of it, He'll be kim me please just like not have any That's why, honestly, I think that's why we like horror movies a lot. It's a palate cleanser, if that makes any sense that sounds I know. But we'll either watch Ninety Day Fiance or Final Destination. You know, it's like something that is completely outrageous.

Just and takes you out of it different.

Yes, my brother is a he was an emergency room doctor for a long time. He's a position.

But he used to come home and his sons would make fun of him and watch the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

He's like, I have to I have to, like.

Just get all this stuff out of my head and just depressed. So I would suggest everyone have your fun guilty pleasure, but maybe just put a time limit on it, you know, say I'm I'm gonna look at the news from you know, from this time to this time. But it is so tempting because yes, we get news alerts on our phone what's happening, And my goodness, this isn't an exaggeration. Having been in the business now for almost three decades, I have never seen a news cycle ever.

At three o'clock in the morning. We basically we're finished taping.

We put together several podcasts to day news of today, and we were like, cool, we got this, and we always say boring breaking news.

We got our podcast done.

We had to come back and record two unforeseen podcasts later because just the news, it's this isn't just small stuff.

This is big.

We're at war, people are being fired, people are dying in the streets of our country. I mean, this is just this is not little silly, gossipy stuff. This is major, serious, life altering events that are happening. It feels like hourly. So yes, it is overwhelming. And I don't know what the answer is except for that to just enjoy those guilty pleasures, make sure you got some palate cleansers up your sleeve, and just know how to.

How to just get away from it for a while. You can't be in it NonStop.

You can't. It's so damaging.

It truly is.

And I used to always say this too, because I think a lot of people, especially when you're hustling and you're I used to brag about about not taking my vacation days. It's ridiculous and I one of my big takeaways.

From all of this is take the vacation days and ask for more.

Like, instead of asking for a raise, ask for an extra week of vacation. Just find a way to make sure you take care of yourself and you protect your peace, and you don't forget to have fun, don't forget to to feel carefree and careless. It's okay not to constantly be worried about things you actually can't control.

That's good advice. Yes, you're full of it. I mean good advice.

Now you know you've lived enough life right at that point where yes, hard earned, I still have to remind.

Myself of I know when you left ABC, I was waiting because I was a fan. I was waiting to see where you would land on television. Yeah, and I'm sure you had opportunities along the way, but you really chose to pivot like you did, an intentional pivot at some point. And I just, you know, I think that that's such an important message for women, and to be inspired by other women who have pivoted and had, you know, another round of success in their lives.

You you know what I am? I did.

I did have actually a very tempting offer, but I will.

Say this that.

I remember feeling it in my chest like tightness, and feel like I didn't want to put myself back out there in that way. And I think after feeling like I was twisting in the wind and people were taking their shots, I didn't want to give them another chance. I didn't want to have people rooting for my failure because and maybe that was just in my head, but I just I didn't. I just wasn't ready to put

Right, I mean, I see you traveling, you're you know, working remotely from beautiful destinations. What I mean, geez, that sounds nice.

We did the podcast from Stockholm, Sweden and ran a half marathon and worked every day, but it was like not, It's like we call them workations. We go down to Tricks and caicos. We're just in Mexico, worked every single day. Haven't missed a day of work since we started these podcasts.

But we get to do them.

We can just have bureaus all around the world wherever we are, and we've got a system.

Now we're figuring it out. We're learning so many skills.

TJ is like, now become like this masterful like editor with videos he's putting up. We're learning all of these incredibles because we've had to. And that's kind of cool that we're you know, you can teach an old dog nutricks.

Apparently, you know you have settled down now things have settled down, You're in a groove with your career, with your relationship. That's got to feel amazing. I know it took me a long time to get back into my groove, and you know it's there's something nice about seeing your significant your ex significant others find their groove too. Do you think that that's given you some peace because I felt that way.

I'm never rooting for anyone to fail. I really am not. I've never been that. I've never felt vengeful or wanting someone to suffer. I just look, I'm not saying I'm a perfect person, but I've just never had that in me. So I always would root for. We root for ABC, we root for Good Morning America, we root for all of our colleagues. We root for I'll root for everybody.

Even people who've hurt me. I hope that they because I know I've hurt people inadvertently.

Like we all are responsible for our own actions, and we're responsible for how we feel about others, and I just I do. I believe in karma and all of that, So I wish everyone the best.

That's all you can do. Otherwise it just eats you up, and.

You're the one who suffers.

Yeah, if you hold on to that hatred, you're the one who suffers, and I look, I think, look, our kids are watching us.

Our kids are watching us go through tough times.

Especially now you have young adult kids like I do. They're watching us closer than ever.

Absolutely, And you know, saw me go through one of the toughest, well the toughest time of my life.

And my oldest ava is twenty three.

She's an aspiring actress, and I was like this, you know, just to see the spotlight cut both ways.

That's an important lesson to learn.

You know, you can't, they say, if you if you get caught up in all the good press, you also then are going to get caught up in all the bad press.

Like you can't.

You have to be able to insulate yourself from that spotlight and the way you feel when it's warm and fuzzy and everyone loves you and thinks you're great. You can't make that be your worth. If that is your worth man the moment the spotlight turns against you, and it will eventually at some point, some way, somehow, maybe not as spectacularly as it did.

For me, But it's a good lesson to learn.

Yeah, that's I mean. I love that you're close with your daughters and It's just, you know, I feel very similar yours are.

You're right around the same age, right.

You have a twenty eight year old and then a twenty three and twenty year old.

Okay, I have a twenty three and she's turning twenty next.

Month, so yes, I almost twenty.

How do you have a twenty eight year old that I don't know? That is incredible?

I hang out with her and I'm like, who's the mom? Like how did this happen?

I know, I know, and that feels like, you know what's so funny? Though, I just want to say to you too.

Because I like, we're the same age. But man, I was obsessed, obsessed with nine o two one zero, and I was so like I always think about maybe even my high school friends listening to this podcast and thinking, oh.

My god, you're Jenny Cart.

But it's just I have to say, like, you were someone that I certainly looked up to, and all of your success happened so young. I mean, to be able to be where you are and have the beautiful children and family and success that you've had, because you know, so when you were you were thrust into the spotlight. So I can't even imagine I had to deal with my stuff, and I was a grown as adult. You know, you were dealing with all of that paparazzi and all of that pressure and all of that when you were

It's been a learning curve my whole life. It's been a learning curve. But I feel like now I'm catching up, you know. But that's what you do at this beautiful age of ours, and thank you for that. That means a lot to me.

Oh my god, I was obsessed with you. So she's so beautiful. I wanted to see you.

Oh my gosh.

I had nine or two posters in my dorm room, like that is it one hundred percent of Dylan Brendan Well. I had Brendan and my roommate had Dylan, and we both had we had I.

We had like competing posters.

So it was yeah, it was very We were really into the show. You.

I have to ask you. I just did an interview with Joan London. We have people that you're obsessed with. After my interview with Well, I read her book and then I did the interview and she so magical, this woman and such a legend in her field. And I know you didn't work with her directly, right or did you?

I didn't work with her directly, but I know her pretty well. We've spent yuess. I mean, obviously she also went through breast cancer, and so we have many many times been at the same event, at the same table, and so we shared stories and she is a met her daughters. I think I did I give her an award? Maybe she gave me an award. Yes, breast cancer community here in New York too. We all know each other

Yes, did she ever give you advice? Because her book is full of like nuggets, Did she ever give you advice that you were like, I'm going to take that, I'm going.

To keep that.

I'm trying to she.

I mean, she is, she is a she's been through it, and she was man. She was in a newsroom and look, I went through enough coming up in newsrooms and getting into network news when I was twenty nine years old and going through.

All of that.

But she was, you know, a generation before and I just hearing her talk about how women were treated, what she went through, and I know she writes about it in her book, but she was you had to you had to not emasculate the men but still hold your own. And she just had this perfect balance of maybe and it was hard earned, but learning how to navigate all of that, and she did it with grace, with class as a mom. I mean, I loved hearing her talk about bringing her daughters to work with her and all.

But I could like travel the world and do all this stuff. I was like, I want to go to war.

I never I signed up to do some more correspondent work, but I thought I'll wait till my kids are I was like, well, I guess all of that just wasn't meant to be, but.

It meant to be.

No, But that's where I really drew inspiration from Joan was just how she balanced motherhood and such a demanding career.

It is hard to do.

And I will say, it's funny young women when they do ask me a question, it is almost always about that, how did you have daughters? How did you have children and do the job you did? And it isn't easy, And Joan made it look easy.

Yeah she did. She was a pioneer, that's for sure.

He really was.

I have two more questions for you. I know you love to run, like you you love to run, You run far. It's very inspiring. Also, I just don't I don't get it, like I don't run to the mailbox.

How do you do that? You know? It's I always say when people say they can't run or they don't like it, and I get that because I don't like it a lot of the times too. What happens is I always say, goes slower than you. I think people run too fast and they get out of breath too quickly, and then they just get overwhelmed and they're like, this

And once you start doing that, you will never feel.

Like a bigger badass than when you run your first ten k or you hit three miles five miles. I love setting goals for myself, and I used to say I could never run a marathon ever, ever, ever, ever, And then I ran my first half marathon, and then I started running.

More half marathons.

Now I've run seven marathons, and now TG and I are running another half marathon in a week, but we just I like to stay in half marathon shape because I'm like, there's nothing better than that, and it's just about it's discipline, and it teaches you when you want to quit and your body says stop, And this is why am I doing this. It is a mental exercise

And I always I told my.

Daughters when I had them climbing Killiman Jarrow and doing all of this crazy stuff with me, I said, I want you to know what it feels like when you get past the pain, because nothing worth actually achieving you have to go through pain in life and in physical exertion. And so when you learn how to just push through the pain, the euphoria on the other side.

That's what people say. Every runner I've ever talked to say that says, there's a certain thing that happens at a certain point. Yes, and it's like euphoric, and it's what keeps you going. What does that feel like? And how do I get that?

It's almost like you're high.

I mean, it really is a feeling of being high. Runners high, but it's like you know, I do like a marijuana gummy every now and then. And I would say, there are those runs where I'll have the right music on.

I do when i'm training, Like right now, I listen to books.

I'm listening to another I'm listening actually, I'm listening to The Housemaid right now, So I'm like reading a book while I'm running, so I get into a meditative state. But when I'm running a race or getting that euphoric high, you got your playlist on.

Sometimes like maybe it's.

Like Frozens on whatever, some dorky Broadway and I am just like my Sometimes when I run, I like extend my arms like I'm a bird, and I'll just feel.

Like a five year old kid and just it's amazing.

Okay, at what mile should I expect that to happen? You know what?

I usually hits me like mile eight.

Oh God, I don't think I'm ever gonna feel it.

I got a ten miler this weekend. I'm excited about it.

I get excited about it because I know I get nervous because I'm a little I'm still challenged. I mean, it's not like riding a bike. You have to keep pushing yourself. It doesn't you don't have muscle memory. You have to keep building the endurance. So every long run is a challenge for me. I get excited about it.

You're doing a marathon with teaj Oh, yeah, we're doing a half marathon.

We're doing the United Half Marathon here in New York City, and then we've already signed up for the New York City Marathon.

So this, Yeah, that is couplehood at its best right there.

You know what, cross a finish line with your significant other and you can kind of do almost anything, and we're talking like he's had catastrophic injuries. I've been vomiting along the way stop.

You help each other.

And I remember the first time he saw me vomiting when we were running, like I think mile twenty two.

He goes, God, you're sexy.

And I, oh my god.

There's nothing quite like bonding over puke and sweat and pain and all of that. But then you get those metals around your neck and you never felt better. It's like bragging rights forever.

I kind of want to try it. You're inspiring.

You know, what have you ever?

What?

What race have you ever run?

The race is staying alive?

Okay, so stort out.

Stort out with a five k and that's three point one miles and then say all right, I could do that, and then then do a ten k. Just just slowly do it. And it's telling you setting goal. You know how fun that is when you set a goal for yourself. Oh yeah, cannot do Like I'm telling you, I swore I couldn't do the half marathon.

My friend Sarah Haynes, I don't know if you know she's on the view a lot of your view.

Yah, she is, but she's just one of my best friends, and she and I were splitting the half marathon because I didn't think I could run a full half marathon, so we were running. I ran the first six that we ran mile seven together, and then I was just supposed to let her go on, but I had and the longest I had ever run in my entire life, with seven miles. I was. This is when I was in my early forties, and I just like, I called the race people, I go, can I just keep going?

I was like, okay, and so I.

Hyperventilated over like hyperventilated.

Oh it was two circles around Central Park.

That is not easy, and I almost vomited. I couldn't breathe and I but I finished and I made it, and I said, all right, I just did that. Now I'm going to train, and now I'm going to start working on like actually enjoying it.

And that's what got me going.

I've done an app called Couch Couch what was it called couch two K or something, I don't know what it like it amps you up on you know, it starts you walking and then you run for a certain matter of minutes and then you walk again. It kind of starts to condition you. Maybe I'll hit that back up once.

Also, Hal Higden is also a great like if you say you want to run whatever race it is, and you have this much time, it tells you exactly like I we printed out I have it printed out right here on this bullet award and looking at our training schedule and we just follow it to a t.

And so you just you have a.

Recipe, you have a formula and you follow it and it's incremental and it's doable. And I'm telling you it is such an amazing feeling to accomplish.

Next time you see me, Amy, Hey run I choose on.

I love it. I love it. We love our Nike Alpla flies.

Oh okay, good idea. Such a treat to have you with me today. Thanks so much for taking the time. Everybody listening, I encourage you all to jump into Amy and TJ's podcast feed for their news perspective. It's fresh. So thank you so much for joining me. Amy, Thanks Jenny, you guys. I'm very excited to share that My book I Choose Me Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose and Embracing reinvention is coming April fourteenth, and it would mean the world to me if you would pre order a copy or