In Wisdom said we don't talk about that. You talk about knowledge, but we're in a world where I think with Ai becoming much more prevalent in our life, meaning that knowledge has become comm that what's gonna balance out all this Ai stuff is human wisdom, Welcome, everybody. My name is Drew Horn, and this podcast is called Lu everyday radius. It's brought to you by the Hoffman Institute and its stories and anecdotes and people we interview about their life post process.
And how it lives in the world radiating love. Please be aware that this episode references suicide Please use your discretion. Everybody welcome to the Hoffman podcast. Chip Conley is with us today. Chip. Welcome. Thank you, Drew. You have a voice for radio. I wasn't gonna say a face for r. We have a voice for radio of my friend. Thank you. Thank you. I'm I'm really excited for this conversation. Will you... Share a little bit about who you are and how you got to be Chip Conley.
Yeah. Well, I am Steven Townsend Conley junior, I chip off the old block and, or the oldest of 3 kids. I won't go deep into my childhood in history, although I know that is a half. Month thing for sure. But I will say that I came up to Northern California for college and graduate school. I started a boutique hotel company called When I was 26 years old and ran that for 24 years. And it's sort of a dark night of the ego or dark neck of the soul between 45 and 50 when everything that could
go wrong, did go wrong. I called it a midlife crisis because that's what you do at that age if something is working. And I got to the other side of it. Thankfully, and lost a few friends to suicide during that time though too. It was during the great recession. After having had a really bad laugh last half of my forties, I had the best decade of my life in my fifties.
I became the in house mentor to the 3 founders of Air airbnb, young founders, and they started calling me the modern elder, didn't like that at first, but they said, Chip, you're as curious as you are wise, so you're a modern elder. And I was, okay. And long story short as I spent, 7 and a half years, 4 years full time and 3 and a half years very actively part time helping them take the company to to where it is today. During that time, I started thinking about, like, wow,
We don't really... As a society do a very good job of helping people in midlife, we reimagine and repurpose themselves, and that's when the modern elder, Academy, Me came up as an idea. And we opened about, you know, gosh, almost 6 years ago, in Baja, on a beach front with a campus. Now have a campus that we'll be opening in Santa Fe, new Mexico and we have online programs. And
I write books about this. I have a new book coming out in January called Learning to love Midlife. 12 reasons why life gets better with age. Chip, is there any connection between those suicides during that economic. Crisis and Modern Altered Academy in terms of if they had had the skills to repurpose man. Yep. Yeah. Drew. I mean, 1 of the 5 friends I mine they're all men between age 42 and 52. 1 of them had has exactly the same name I have. His name was Chip.
Chip hank can see as my insurance broker, and 1 of my best friends, and it shocked all of us. 1 of the things I took from that period in my life where I was going through struggling I was struggling, I had some suicide idea aviation myself. And when I lost all those friends was, you know My god. What are we doing as a society to help people with midlife? Because there's a lot of transitions that we go through in midlife? And some of us think that somehow, we're getting the game of life wrong
because we're not doing them, right? And and yet many of them are normal, whether it's changing your career or empty nest or sandwich generation or divorce or the stirring of something inside of you. That little spiritual stirring inside of you that you're soul that is screaming at you saying, you know, it's time for the soul term. Let's retire the ego for a little while. So all of this led me to creating because I felt such a sense of commitment to these 5 men, who took their own
lives. I, we're not a place where people come necessarily when they're doing suicide idea aviation, We we definitely interview people before they come and and they apply, But we have a lot of people who come who are really confused by where they are in mid midlife. So what we try to do is help create a place where people can have a a safe place, have deep and life changing conversations to help them to look at the second half of
their adult life. That is beautiful. That safe place to have deep and meaningful conversations and to have wisdom holders who provide lots of guidance I imagine as well. Exactly. So all of our facilitator maybe similarly to, hoffman.
Come from our community, they're are people who have actually gone through our programs, and they're, you know, well trained to to address this question of navigating transitions, cultivating wisdom, looking at your mindset and shifting those from a fix to a growth mindset. And then actually, how do we help develop our purpose in life. We've had a lot of, Hoffman grads come to Me. And as as you know, we've had Blake Mc and men twist, both of whom are at Hoffman grads who have either taught or
have been students of Mba. And I think a lot of people say, well, Gosh hoffman been addresses how do you make sense of all of your life up to this point in order to have a great change in your future. And Me sort links well with it because, well, we do not do the deep dive psychologically I'm going through a family of virgin work. That you do. So well, we really look at the psychological mindset that influence how we show up in life today, and some of those come from
childhood for sure. And then we look at what we do at that moving forward. I love that the 2 programs are so sim. Yeah. Thanks for bringing it up because part of why we're doing this now is that you will be hosting probably the fourth of these shared conversations between Hof and Me. Will you talk a little bit about those? Sure. You know, because we had so many Hoffman grads come to And say, what are you doing to collaborate with Hoffman I reached out to Liza. And we had that liza, and I had
a conversation before Covid even. And we started talking about what we're were learning and then during Covid as retreat centers focusing on personal growth, and knowing that no one's gonna be coming to our retreat centers at that time, we sort of shared best practices of how we were getting through Covid. But it was more recently in the last year where people like Lynn, people like Blake said we've gotta figure out a collaboration here.
And So the idea was let's start by having our alumni come together and have conversations and and bring leaders who are are... Aligned with both the Hoffman and the Me, ethos and point of view so that we can have interesting conversations and then do breakout groups that allow for people that go deeper on the topic of the day. And I'm really excited that Liza and Ras, and I will be we'll be talking amongst ourselves So the first 3 we had sort of thought leaders out there
in the world. And this one's gonna be just the 3 of us talking about what we've learned what they've learned... In being leaders in Hoffman as long as they have and what I've learned in my first 6 years here at Me. I was a on the board of the S Institute for 10 years. And a teacher there. So the idea of retreat centers is not a new thing for me even though I've been mostly a businessman business person an entrepreneur, But I... I'm looking forward to learning from
from Liza and Ras on this conversation. You know, tip as the representative from Hoffman, facilitated that with your people and and I love these conversations and what we get so much, what's happened is that people are writing in the chat. Oh my god, Me and Hoffman of perfect pairing, we get a lot of offers to collaborate. And you're probably the... 1 of the very few that we've said yes to and you've said yes to us. It is a good
pairing, isn't it? Let me just emphasize how honored I am personally and we are as an organization because Hoffman is... You know, you have waiting list for for months for people to get into your programs, almost 60 years of history, and we're the the new kid on the block. So we're really proud and honored that we have built this relationship, and and we've built the credibility that we have so many... Hoffman grads come to Me and loved it enough to say, gosh, we we should collaborate more.
And I... There's nothing wrong with the idea of letting people know both in our community about Hoffman, because we've got a lot of Mba grads now go to Hoffman because we've been talking about Hoffman and vice Versa because we're all in this together. I mean, the the the truth is that the more we can support emotional and mental health in a way that allows people to find their narrative and to find their voice. And I think both Hoffman and Em do that very well in a skilled way
it's not too woo woo. I mean, sometimes it's like, oh, it's all too woo this stuff. Well, yeah. Sometimes at the Es and suit, yes. Sometimes stuff is too woo. And then there's some really great social scientists who go to to S do great stuff as well. But I know that 1 of the things that's different between us and Hoffman versus say S 1, which I love. I love. Is we have... We both have a curriculum
and a program. So we're not so reliant on just the faculty members to come in and do their thing Which is what happens at Omega or Ess or blue spirit or a lot of other places. We have a program. There's a curriculum. We are not just the facility where the facilitator, And I think that's really important because that means there's a a high level of quality that is gonna be consistent.
That is, like, this isn't Omega. This isn't K apollo where, although you're going to the same site, it really depends on which teacher which facilitator is there. There is a format. There's a structure, and the teachers come in just to augment and support within that structure. That's exactly right. And we are moving more and more in the direction of Hoffman in the sense that we know over time that there are 3 key... Pillars of our curriculum, navigating transitions,
cultivating purpose and owning wisdom. Navigating transitions, cultivating purpose, and owning wisdom fantastic. And the wisdom wisdom said we don't talk about. You talk about knowledge, but we're in a... We're in a world where I think with Ai becoming so much more prevalent in our life, meaning that knowledge has become comm that what's gonna balance out all this Ai stuff
is human wisdom. So how do we help people to cultivate and harvest their wisdom and accelerate it, And that is why people of the New York Times call us the world's first midlife wisdom school. And what are you hearing from grads as you've gone through these? Early years. What are you noticing? Well, I think what especially post Covid is that just the deep desire to connect. And connecting in person to have a sense of
belonging and a sense of sharing stories. 1 of the things we say at Me is that Wisdom is not taught, it's shared, And I think that's really true. I think that we don't have a guru at the top in the front of the room. We we have a curriculum for sure, but we don't have a guru in the front of the room who's... Saying, I'm gonna teach you how to be wise. We actually use appreciative inquiry, a method of asking questions, to help unlock and unleash the wisdom that's
inside people. You know, it's a little bit of a magical approach that we take that allows people to get clearer on what gift they have inside of them. There's a beautiful quote, which is the purpose of life is to find your gift, the work of life is to develop it. And the meaning of life is to give it away. And that really describes our program. So our our real intent is to help people to see their and find their gift
so that they can share it. We're a midlife was in school and yes, Elders is in our name, Modern Elder Academy also known as Me. We've had people as young as 28 and as old as 88 come to the program. And the average age of the people who's 54, and we've had people come from 42 countries to our Baja campus. It is fantastic. I imagine it's been a lot of work and inspiring at the same time. This is my gift. Back to that quote. The meaning out of my life
today is to give this gift. And because I lost my friends 15 years ago. And because I I didn't say it, but I had a flat line experience at that time. Allergic reaction to an antibiotic, I really take every day as a as a gift to me. And as a bonus, and so the idea of giving back and being in service and and watching the transformation the people.
Rest of 26 regional chapters around the world and to see Me grads you know, in Sydney Australia or in Tel aviv, Israel or in Mexico City, Have a sense of connection with other grads is really beautiful because it allows them to feel like they can continue this process of self discovery with others who understand the language. You know, Chip when I have been a part of these conversations of witnessing you interview these guests and facilitate conversation.
You just have a natural gift for being curious and engaging. Where did you get that? You know, as a businessman, Not every businessman has that kind of gift, but I just love listening to you as you interview guests. Thank you, Drew. I'm caucasian, and I grew up in a family that was very conservative.
Very, very conservative. And interestingly enough if my parents wanted me to go to junior high school and high school in the inner city because our our home was in a district where I would go to a a predominantly non white school, a place called Long beach Poly high school, which is the number 1 feeder school for the Nfl and the Nba, and it's a really interesting place, and I
loved it. But I also learned what it was like to be the other, to be the curious white boy as they called me in my school that was predominantly non white. And I loved it, but it gave me my first experience of what does it mean to be the other and to and to be culturally curious. And then I went to Stanford it went to Stanford business school, and played water pull on the Stanford team wasn't enough attorney, but I was gay, and I was
not out yet. And it wasn't until I was 22 that I came out, and this is in 19 83 was a terrible time to come out. It those aids and it was, like, everything going on and and a Stanford business school coming out, was a big deal. You, like, really big deal back then. It And so I knew what it was like to be the other again because I was not, you know, Thought I was straight, but I... Had had girlfriends, but I... I knew that I had
to be true to myself. And that's when I started spending a lot time at Ess going to workshops and doing my own exploration. And then when I joined Airbnb, once again, I was the other because I was 52 when I joined in the average age in the company is 26. So I was the old guy, and I was the boomer amongst the millennials. So as If you looked at me in at face value, you'd say, this is a straight white guy who's done well for himself in his life. You know, he's privileged. And
that is all true. Except I'm not straight. And I've have also not always been in the dominant demographic. So that has meant that I've had to be curious, and I've had to really try to understand other to people really well. And so, yeah, I've been a Ceo and a business leader and an entrepreneur and all this stuff. So, like, it's very surprising to people to see like, oh, you have a gift to be a facilitator chip. And I love it. It's the thing I'm supposed to be doing
at almost 63 years old. For those of you who haven't read Arthur Brooks book from strength to strength. Number 1 New earth through his best seller, and he's on our online faculty. He basically talks about the fact that as you get older, your ability to think with crystallize intelligence gets better. Which crystallize criticized intelligence is the the ability to connect the dots.
And they think systemically and holistically as opposed to being fast and focused, which is what we are when we're younger, So long story short is, I am just using the gift that I have to help other people, find their gift. I think you just described why privilege is so problematic in our society. You know, I think we have a tendency to judge everybody by their cover of their book. Sometimes it doesn't... It's not accurate.
But when people sort of come at me sometimes and say, like, with Me, for example, they'll say, like, well, that's just for privilege people? I was like, well, have you done a little bit of research over half the people who've come to Baja campus? Have been on some form of scholarship or financial aid. We've given them. It's like, oh, I didn't know that. But because they look at me and they'll say, oh, you know, white guy looks straight, They'll say, okay. It's just for
people who look like him. 1 of the things Think it's beautiful about Hoffman and about Me is no 1 knows each to his last name. Nobody knows each to this Nobody has seen each other's Linkedin profile. So you get to know each other from the inside out. And that is really unusual in our society. We need more of that. What's fascinating is late in a workshop. We don't usually get into politics and workshops. But sometimes later in the week, our workshops are about a week
wrong. And later in the week, people might start talking your politics and like all of a sudden you realize that the person you've become closest within in the workshop. Is someone who's the the exact opposite political end of the spectrum from you, and you realize I wanna listen to this person now. But if you just met them on the street, based upon, you know, their politics, you'd say, like, I'm not even gonna talk to that person.
So we we desperately need more hoffman and Mba in the world, to help with the polarity that we have in society. That's fantastic. Tip chip I wanna ask also about what something you haven't mentioned is... Your work in supporting and leading burning man. And as a guy who has never been to burning man and yet is burning man curious tell us a little bit about your role there and why people should go to burning man.
So I was asked many, many years ago by the 6 founders of bringing men to be, the first member of their nonprofit board. And so Burning is owned by a non nonprofit. And so I joined the board became the first member became a big donor. And partly because what I loved about Burning man is as Brian C, the founder of Airbnb once said when I took him there for the first time. Burning man is what the world would be like if artists rule the world. And I think there's something too to that.
Yes. Burning man gets a lot of a lot of myths around And some of them are true. So I guess, I don't know if they're are myths or not. But people run around naked sometimes. And, yes, there's a lot of a drug taking and things like that going on. But at the heart of what Burning mann is, it's a Utopian community of what would it be like to have a a gift society, we're everything is gifted. You the only thing you can buy it burning then is coffee
or ice. And so everything else you you can walk, you know from camp to camp and meet people and people will serve you drinks, feed you a meal. You'll listen to some music. It's a it's quite a beautiful way of creating a world where we're not distracted by our devices. So I loved it, and I wanted to to give back, and that's part of the reason why I joined the board and got so actively involved in the organization. So I've been on the board of Ess and Burning. At the
same time. And actually brought those 2 organizations together such that burning men used to do their leadership retreats at Ess, which was which was a lot of fun. You are embody your essence your spiritual self as we say at Hoffman and letting everything else all the ripples, of what that means to influence the world around you. Yeah. If I think I moved from, you know, back in the business world, we used just talk about Roi. Return on investment.
I now consider Roi ripples of impact. I do think that's the Roi that we need to be very considerate of, as we get older. It frankly, we should be a concern that our whole life because we can have an impact at any age. And when I say impact, I'm not necessarily saying, and You have to go out and write a book or raise money or doing that. The ripple of impact is just how you treat other people. And frankly how, you treat yourself. So that's my new form of Roi.
Chip speaking of how you treat yourself. There was a moment in a conversation you were facilitating between Hoffman and e a, were you acknowledged prostate cancer. And then you said the following question, I'm really wrestling with his idea of Have I abandoned my body or is my body abandoning me? Yeah. I I found out about 5 years ago that I... Had intermediate stage prostate cancer.
Fast forward. I no longer have a prostate, and that's relatively new news that's in the last 2 months had some surgery along the way to try to make it better, but ultimately had to have it taken out and it spread to my my lymph nodes in my pelvis. But I'm actually doing okay, and I was on hormone depletion therapy for 5 months, which is no
fun. I learned what Menopause like That's what happens when a man is on hormone depletion therapy is, like, you actually go through menopause, which is fascinating. But the question I now ask is... Cancer, what do you have to teach me? Because I I don't think I'm at war with cancer, nor am I a victim of cancer, what I am is a student of cancer. And as a student, the 4 things I that cancer has been has taught me, Number 1, I wanna slow down my life
and spread out. I tend to get very focused on the things I'm focused on and lately it's been Mba, but there's a lot of things I love doing in life. Now I wanna spend more time on those things. Number 2 Wanna slow down Me growth, which is I can do as the Ceo. Number 3 is I wanna learn how to move out of the archetype of being the hero. It's a hard 1 for me. This is 1 that I've had my whole life.
Sure drilled into me by my my marine captain father, and how do I move away from the hero identity because it has an effect on me? No. I don't want that anymore. And then fourth, what is the fourth 10I wanna love my body. I wanna actually be... I wanna think my body as my best friend. And you would treat your best friend really
well. And yet we tend to think of our bodies almost like a rental car, you know, that we were issued when we were born, and the older you are, or the more dense it has in it, and you sort of, at some point as is true at the rental car. You you drive it hard knowing that you're gonna be able to return it at the end of the rental time. So I'm more like, okay. I'm gonna I'm gonna spend some time polishing this car a little bit, and most importantly,
inhabit the interior of the car? Because that's really the most important thing as we get older is what's the interior of the car? What's the interior of our what's the interior decorating we need to do inside our ourselves when it comes to our emotions. Wow. And how's that going? I mean, I imagine you're such a spirited, positive engaged human and I imagine at times it's challenging.
It it is. I think the hardest part Drew is I'd had choreographed or curated my life in such a way that I had so much on my plate. That when 5 months ago, actually, now it's 7 months ago, we found out that it had spread from my prostate to my limbs I had to change everything, and Had to do it overnight and right, you know, I hadn't set Me or other parts of my life up in such a way that it I was ready to step away or step back a little bit
for a short period of time. And it was a bit of a shock to the system and it it woke me up. It was the hotel yours wake up call, of seeing like, okay. You know what? I've gotta figure out an alternative way of how to curate my life. I see it as a gift Yes. Are there fears about... Okay. I might die from this. Yeah. I will be on active surveillance, the rest of my life having, you know, tests quarterly. But, you know, I've had enough people come through With terminal cancer,
and other things and just... The most lovely people in the world. And I realize that life does have a death sentence attached to it. But what's most important is what do you do while you're here? And what kind of spiritual life do you build around, you know, is there something beyond this? So for me, the ultimate religion or spirituality, is 1 that actually show... Helps you to show up with the most humanity in this lifetime, and that's what I try to do. You know, I heard Oprah.
Interview David Brooks once, and she's like David Brooks you have away with words and that. Is how I'm feeling right now. Your capacity to string words together is really beautiful. Thank you, Drew. What does that look like on a regular basis are you... And do you have practices that help you navigate the daily journey, not on a theo. Level, but are you sipping tea with your dog or something. How does it work in real time? Well, I do I do something called spying on the divine. And that it...
Those are all walks. So there's a again named Dac Ke, who's from Uc Berkeley and started the greater good science center and he's on our faculty once a year comes and teaches at Me. He taught me a lot about All walk. And I'll walk is the idea of going into nature, maybe asking the question nature, what do you have to teach me? And then just observing, becoming a first class notice or of what you see. And that's what I've been doing.
I've been doing that, with my dog for 3 hours at a time, I put it in my calendar just to make sure I I don't over schedule myself with other things. That's 1 thing I do. I love meditating. I've loved meditating for 40 years, since I first learned to do that at excellent. And every morning. I do a little meditation. I I say 3 prayers and 6 mantra as well. I do that in the shower. The 6... 3 pairs in 6 months. I... You know, as this kind of Bj dj Fog, who's a famous for his habit. How you how
do you make habits work? He's on our faculty too. You stack a habit on something else. So I do my my mantra and my prayers while I'm taking a shower. Because that way, I'll do them. And, yeah, I like to write a lot. And so I have a daily blog called wisdom well. I tend to get up early in the morning and write as well. So these things writing and being in nature and prayers and mantra and meditation. Those are sort of the the small pieces that make me be able to handle a life that's
pretty full on. It's like a fire hose sometimes. I imagine you must love. Bringing together all these people, these wisdom holders with different perspectives onto your faculty at Me, Oh my gosh. Whether it's Esther per, famous psycho or Matthew, the famous Buddhist monk or Dan But, who founded the idea of blue zones, just having these people who have a lot of wisdom come to the campus and integrate their wisdom teaching with our curriculum.
It has been beautiful and it's been 1 of the collateral benefits of founding this program is is to have those kinds of people. Michael Fran, the musician is coming next year to our Santa fe campus, Pico Ay, who's 1 of my favorite writers in the world. Is doing so as well. So it's it's it's it is quite beautiful. I feel really
lucky. And 2 campuses, the 1 in Santa face being built, but the 1 in Baja is already running Baja has open, Santa fe opens in March and it's a 2600 acre regenerative horse ranch. Just outside of San mfa, oh, the most beautiful campus I could ever imagine. What's it like to tell your story and talk about these... Things you've done. What do you notice as we have this conversation. You know, I think there's 3... 1... There's a again an Aaron Taylor who is on our faculty.
He was a green bay packer actually had 2 super Bowl rings. His career got cut short early because of injury, and then he ended up, having addiction issues, fascinating guy. 1 of the things he taught us at as a faculty member, is that when we're talking to other people, we're talking from 1 of 3 vault. The first vault is the facts of our lives, and we first get to know someone that's where you go to. The second vault is the stories of our lives.
We can get caught up in storytelling really easily and much of what I've talked about today has been story. And as the Hawaiian say, talking story is not a bad thing. Except for when you get so caught up in your story that you actually don't have a way out of it. You're sort of stuck in it. And so the third vault is where we tend to talk from Me in our workshops and... Where I've tried to go a little bit today, which is talking from essence, and it's not your story. It's actually what's
underneath the story. It's des sp mah of whatever comes up in that moment. And the revelation of things that you wouldn't necessarily talk about in normal formal company. What I try to make sure I do in a conversation like this is I don't wanna spend too much time on story on facts or story. I'd like to spend more time. On essence. Because, you know, when you actually go to that place, it's like Rot root for your soul.
It's like you've just sort of opened up a clogged artery that for so many of us, the ability to access our soul is stunt by our facts and our stories and good behavior. So being able to get there by going to the third vault is what opens this essence portal that all of a sudden starts sprout. You start to... It's like it's looks like you've you've hit a little gus of water, a natural spring deep inside yourself that starts to
actually come up through the earth. It's And that's what it feels like when you're speaking from the third vault. Wow. I got goosebumps says you're discreet. I didn't know. I didn't too. I'm a total neo fight at this stuff. I'm learning. I know this is what I'm supposed to be doing in my life right now. And at times, I feel a bit like an impostor. You know, you have a impostor syndrome where you sort of feel like, well, I don't have the credentials or I don't have this or I don't have that.
And then I just show up and I just like, you know what? When I'm in the impostor syndrome, and a lot of us have that in different parts of our lives. Then I just sort of go back to, okay? I'm just gonna speak from my truth. And when I do that, man, does it make me feel like, okay. I'm not an impostor. Yeah. And part of what your truth involves what I hear is some humility, some acknowledgment of the unknown... You mentioned Carol Du work earlier about a growth mindset that seems to have had a
big impact on you. Yes. Yeah. You know, if there's so many people who come to Mba, and there's they're really sort of stuck. They're stuck because they have a mindset, I'm too old to fill in the blank. Or I will never meet my soul night, or I will never be able to get over a childhood trauma or the... So those are fixed mindset where you you sort of stuck, and you're often feeling like, you have a limited amount of capacity and your job is to sort of, like... Do the best with it.
Growth mindset really believes that we're here to learn and improve and not judge. That's a really important third component. A lot times when we think of growth mindset that we think of it as we're here to learn and improve. But I think the another key piece that is to not judge ourselves because with a fixed mindset that we're off often trying to compare ourselves with others and we define success as winning. And with a growth mindset, it's not about winning. It's about learning.
And so that is my principle, that I try to live by. Now, at the same time I'll be honest with that, you know, there are times when I'm... I just am freaked out. I'm a... Don't know if you know the, but A I big believer in the and I've studied that for 40 years. I started studying it with Helen and Thomas. In Berkeley a long long time ago. And I'm a 3 with a 4 wing. And so at as a 3, man, I... You can get very much in the performance kind of mindset, and I can be very focused on, okay,
you know, what have we accomplished lately? And that is sort of at odds with the growth mindset, if you can make them work together, it's powerful powerful, powerful. But if I have the mindset that I'm only as good as my most recent success. Which is what a 3 can sometimes think and that sort of a fixed mindset mentality, that is actually really debilitating because if you're only as good as your last success, your
chest, constantly judging yourself and stressing yourself. So we'll put a bunch of what you talked about all of it in show notes with links. Including all the people you mentioned to or faculty members will have a link to their personal stuff, and also the Annie Graham in case, people are interested. But before we go, I just wanna ask about, you know, the surgeon in general came out a few months ago talking about epidemic of loneliness.
And every time I hear about that, a part of me just... I just get sad. For our increasing division, increasing isolation. And I imagine that Uc a as in part an antidote to that. Yeah. I think the number 1 surprise we've had, and this is even pre Covid was... How much people are desi connection.
We live in an era in which somehow, partly because of what Robert Putnam wrote about in Bullying alone, the idea of the the different kinds of social structures we had, churches and and civic organizations that people used to be more in... Because those have sort of evaporated a little bit we're at a stage where sometimes you feel very alone. And this is more true of men than women, although so many men, they're unconscious to it, they don't even realize how lonely they are.
They can feel not happy, but they don't necessarily know it's loneliness that may part of it. So what we need to do as a society is to look at how are we creating new social structures, Hoffman and Mba or and new social structures, You know, programs that help create connection and then keep that connection. And part of the reason we have these community conversations is it's 1 of many things that Hoffman and Me can do and to keep that connection
going within our communities. And no doubt, the more we feel connected with others, the more we have what I'd like to call emotional insurance? We have property and liability mobility insurance for our home for a Rainy day, but where's the emotional insurance for our own rainy day. When things don't go well for us. And for a lot of us, we need that because that's what actually keeps us, you, alive, go when we go through the most difficult of times.
Chip, where or are you headed to the rest of the day? Amazingly, I'm having a call in a few minutes with Ras and liza? To get prepared for our call next month. I'm may go a for a hike here in Santa Fe. And then I'm gonna go hang out with 1 of my best friends Van who lives here in Santa fe, and we do... We do something that I love. She's a coach. And she's someone who helped me through my dark. Time 15 years ago. But we do something called couch.
And couch is where we lie on the couch with each other, and we eat popcorn and we talk about the things from the third vault that we often don't Have time to talk about just on a phone call or when we see each other... So I'm we're I'm gonna go couch with her fantastic. I am grateful for this conversation and I'm looking forward to this conversation between you and Ras. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much, drew. Thank you, Chip. Thank you for listening to our podcast. My
name is Liza and Grass. I'm the Ceo and President of Hoffman Institute Foundation. And I'm Ras Rossi, Hoffman teacher and founder of the Hop institute Foundation. Our mission is to provide people greater access. To the wisdom and power of love. In themselves in each other and in the world. To find out more, please go to Hop institute. Dot org.