← Everything Is Energy with Cathy Heller
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- [00:00]
Kathy Heller
Let me ask you something. What would shift if you actually trusted how supported you are this week? Only you can join this Abundant Life, my private membership, for just $1. And truly, this is one of the most generous things I offer. This is where we slow down, tune in and start living from alignment instead of pressure. It's where we take everything we talk about intuition, abundance, purpose and actually integrate it into your everyday life. You remember who you really are, you start creating from that place, you change your energy and your life completely shifts inside. I'll be going live, teaching, welcoming new members on a special call and we're celebrating in really beautiful ways. You'll also get instant access to my recent Aquarius Energy masterclass about vision, planting seeds and setting the frequency for what you want to grow this spring. This $1 trial is only available this week and it's such a powerful way to step in and feel it for yourself. Just, just go to kathy heller.com gift I would absolutely love to be in this space with you.
- [01:02]
Hey guys, it's Kathy Heller.
- [01:04]
Podcast Host (Kathy Heller)
Welcome back to the podcast which we have just rebranded. Thank you for everyone who voted, we have a new logo and a new name After a thousand episodes, we are calling this podcast everything is Energy. I say that all the time. Everything is Energy. And I appreciate how many of you voted and I love this. I'm so excited and I will talk more about this name and what you can be expecting. But all the good things that you love about this show are just going to continue to grow and I'm so grateful to be on this journey with you today. I'm really happy because we have such a beautiful conversation. Mitch Albom is back. He has a new book. It's called Twice. If you don't know him, he is just one of the most remarkable people. He wrote the book Tuesdays with Morrie. He wrote so many other iconic books like the five people you meet in heaven, the stranger in the Lifeboat. He is an Emmy winning screenwriter, philanthropist, journalist and broadcaster. And this time he's here talking about this new book Twice. It's about a boy named Alfie who discovers the magical ability to get a second chance at everything, except when it comes to love. We start with the story behind the book, but honestly, it turns out that this really beautiful real conversation is one of the deepest conversations we've had on this show about love, relationships, regret and those moments in life we wish we could go back and do differently and why maybe we don't need to. Mitch has so much humility and so much wisdom. And it's always an honor to have him here. Without further ado, please welcome the one and only Mitch Albom.
- [02:38]
Kathy Heller
So, first of all, Mitch, thank you so much for taking the time. You've been on my show. I love having you on my show. And then you come back on. It's really such an honor to have such a conscientious, smart mensch of a person here. Thank you for coming back on.
- [02:53]
Mitch Albom
Well, you're welcome for coming back on. I'm not sure about all that other stuff. I think you're laying it on a little thick.
- [02:58]
Kathy Heller
But everyone happy.
- [03:00]
Mitch Albom
Happy to be here with you.
- [03:02]
Kathy Heller
Everyone knows this about you. I find it truly awesome, really, that you can just keep doing it. It's like lightning strikes again and again. You just come up with such beautiful, deep content and tell these stories that really, like, crack our hearts open. It's such a gift to all of us that you are willing to just keep writing through all of this beauty. So tell us about this book. I know that you had to do probably so many of these, but you love doing it because you want people to read it. Tell us about Twice.
- [03:37]
Mitch Albom
I'm happy to tell you about this book right here so that your viewers are seeing it. So Twice is the story of a guy named Alfie who finds out when he's a little boy that he has the magical ability to do anything in his life again. And only caveat is he has to live with the consequences of the second try. He can't go back to the first one and say, I liked it better the first time around. So he goes through his childhood and his adolescence doing what you would probably do with that power. You know, fixing his little mistakes, his little embarrassments, making the basketball shot at the end of the game that he missed the first time around, avoiding the embarrassing thing that he said to some girl he had a crush on or whatever. But then when he becomes a man, he finds out that there's one caveat to the power. It doesn't work with love. In fact, it kind of works the opposite. If somebody loves you in this life and you decide you want to go back and try somebody else, see if they're better or whatever, then that first person can never love you again. They'll be in the world, you can talk to them, but they will never feel the same way about you. You surrender that. And so, of course, at some point, he finds the woman that he thinks is perfect, they get married, and then a temptation comes along and a fight and something. And he has to Make a very fateful decision. So it's a story at its heart about the grass always being greener on the other side and regrets and, oh, if I had that to do over again, and sort of looks at, well, what if you did have the power to do it over again? Would it necessarily be better?
- [05:11]
Kathy Heller
I mean, it's just so cool that all of that comes out of your head and your heart. Like, that's. It's so powerful that you can come up with such messages and such fun, cool ways of telling those messages through stories. What is it about your own personal journey that led you to that thought? Like, did you have a situation where you wish that you could do it differently, or was there something else that led you to thinking about all this? It's.
- [05:38]
Mitch Albom
It's more sort of. I've taken. At this point. I think this is my 12th book. I sort of approach it as, what are things that I think about that other people think about too? You know, one of the things I've learned along the way, if I've had any blueprint for success of any kind, it's that just because it's interesting to me doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be interesting to somebody else. Try to think about what things are interesting to you, but you also know are universal. I happen to love doo wop music. Okay. I think it's great. You know, I can listen to it all day long. 1950s doo wop music. Am I going to write a book about it? You know, it's going to center just on doo wop music? Probably not, because I know that while it would be interesting to me, it's a very, very small, you know, audience there. And so I try to find things that I know people are thinking about. And I always try to pick a few theme. Not a plot, not a character, but a theme that I know that people are thinking about. And then I try to construct a story about it. So if you look at some of my work, you know, the five people you meet in heaven, for example, a lot of people thought, oh, I just wanted to write about heaven. No, I never had any idea about heaven. What I wanted to write was a book about people who think they don't matter and try to show that everybody matters. Everybody touches somebody in their life, whether you realize it or not. Eventually, I came up with the idea of a guy who dies and goes to heaven and meets five people from his life who kind of show him this. But the idea behind it, the theme behind it, was people who think they don't matter, because that's something that I know a lot of people think about. The stranger in the lifeboat. You know, if you read the plot summary, it sounds like an adventure story. You know, the 10 people survive a boat explosion. They're out in the middle of the ocean. Nobody's coming to save them. They. They see a body floating in the middle of the water. They pull him out, and he says that he's God and he's come to save them. But of course, they don't believe him because he's a schlub, you know, and he doesn't behave like God. So everyone would have thought, oh, wanted to write a story about lifeboats and goes, no, I wanted to write about help. And I wanted to write about how we all cry out for help. We all say we need help, but then sometimes help is right in front of us and we ignore it. You know, we don't believe in it, or we don't think that person can help us or that thing can help us. So that's how I do my books. And in this case, it was the idea of regret and people. You know, as you get older, I think you probably find this too, when you're in your 20s. Nobody says, I should have done this, should have done that, because you just do it. You know, if you think the person that you're seeing isn't right for you, you break up and you go with somebody else. You think the job that you're doing is in the wrong path, you stop, you go back to school, try something else. You start to get a little older, and the cement starts to harden a little bit, and it's a little harder to just switch out. And eventually you get to the point where you say, well, it's too late, and I can't change it, but if I could have changed it, I should have changed it. And I know that that's a universal feeling. And so I took that idea and then ultimately came up with this character and this magical ability that he has. But it was first the idea and then the plot.
- [08:49]
Kathy Heller
It's so beautiful. And I know this is not something you necessarily. You don't have to answer this, but I feel like all of your books, but especially this one, could. Should be a movie. Like, that's just such a cool idea, this one.
- [09:00]
Mitch Albom
They beat you to the punch. This is the first time that someone ever bought one of my books before I finished it. Like, they just got the idea, and they got an early manuscript, and there was a kind of a bidding war, and Netflix won it and they already have a writer and director, Paul Weitz, who's a wonderful guy and did the movie about a boy, if you remember, many years ago, which I loved. Yeah, Great movie. And I like him very much. And he and I have already worked together. He's already written several drafts of the script.
- [09:32]
Kathy Heller
Oh, my God, I'm so excited. I was afraid to ask you because I felt like that might be secret information. And then I didn't want to put you on the spot, but I'm so happy.
- [09:40]
Mitch Albom
Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So I. Well, you know, I think any book can be a movie if you know how to make it, and any book can be a bad movie if you do it wrongly. So, you know, most of my books have been optioned for movies, and many of them are in different stages of that development thing, which is something I really don't understand. It's.
- [10:04]
Kathy Heller
I know. It's a whole thing.
- [10:05]
Mitch Albom
All I know is it takes a long time. Yeah.
- [10:08]
Kathy Heller
This is so good. And I do think that people ask this question all the time about free will versus destiny. Right. Like, would it matter if I went back? You know, like, you think about Back to the Future, and he goes back to the enchanted under the Sea dance because he wants to make sure that there's a. You know, he can fix certain outcomes. Right. And we think about mistakes, quote, unquote, that we've made. But, like, really, were they mistakes or did, you know, was it really free will? Because ultimately there's a destiny. And I think so many of your books do have this sort of higher consciousness to them. And so I'm just curious, personally, what do you think about that? Like, do you think that ultimately how it happens isn't a mistake because the detour was part of the destination?
- [10:50]
Mitch Albom
Yeah.
- [10:51]
Kathy Heller
What do you think?
- [10:52]
Mitch Albom
You know, one of the reasons I think I was able to write this book is because I have lived a twice existence. You know, my first 37 years of my life were kind of one direction. It was all work, all ambition, all personal self. Just wanted to be the biggest sports writer and best known sports writer that the country had ever had. And. And then I kind of hit this roadblock, you know, when Maury came into my life and I had to, you know, sort of hit the brakes. And I was going to visit him every Tuesday and then found out that he was, you know, dying without any money, and he. He was afraid he was going to leave his family in debt, they were going to have to sell the house. So I. First time in my Life, really. I decided to do something that was just for somebody else, which was to write that book. And nobody wanted it, by the way, Kathy. I mean, everybody turned down Tuesdays with Maury. The laundry list of people who told me it was a stupid idea, depressing. You're a sports writer, you can't write it. Nobody want to read it. It's way longer than the tiny little list of people who are interested in it. And we found one publisher. They gave us enough money to just pay Maury's medical bills. I gave it all to him, and I really wrote the book as a favor to him, and then was planning to return to my life as a sports writer. And instead, that book became something nobody could have anticipated. And it really sort of swept me up with it and turned my whole life around. And instead of people coming up and asking me who's going to win the super bowl, people will come up and say, you know, my mother died of cancer. And the last thing we did was read Tuesdays with Maury and can I talk to you about it? And I became this person that people started going to for grief counseling and. And for thoughts about, you know, what's really important in life. And I started getting asked to come, you know, speak to schools and funeral parlors and hospice organizations and places that I had never gone before as a sports writer. And my eyes became open to this whole sort of sensitivity to the world about what people really carry in their hearts. And by the time came around to write another book, I was no longer really interested in writing sports. It seemed very small as a book. I still do it in a newspaper fashion. And I wrote the five people you meet in heaven as a novel. Again, they told me that was stupid. Nobody's gonna. You're not a novelist. You don't know how to write fiction. Nobody's gonna want to read it. I said, well, that's what you said about Tuesdays with Maury, so I'm gonna try it. And I did, and thank God that became a big hit. And I've been doing that ever since. So I do think that your life is made up of a lot of turns that you can't see coming, and many of them are your mistakes. And, you know, the most common question I have gotten since Twice came out is, well, if you could go back and do something else in your life, what would it be? And I expected that question. And the answer is, there's a million things that I would correct if it was as simple as just saying, undo that time that you were mean to somebody, undo that time that you. You invested in the wrong stock, you know, and whatever it is. But if you said to me that you had to lose all the lessons that you learned from that mistake or all the ways you changed as a result of those lessons, then I would say, no, thank you, because I would never have evolved. I'd be the same dumb person that made all those mistakes, only I wouldn't have suffered the consequences of them. So what would I have learned from them? There's a moment in the book where Alfie says to his grandmother, who has the same power as him, he says, how can we only get two chances? You know, like, if we have this power, why can't we keep doing it? And she says to him, alfie, if you kept getting second chances, you'd never learn a damn thing. And that's kind of the essence of the book, you know, it's like, even the mistakes that we make, if we don't learn from them, then it doesn't really matter how many chances you get, because you're always going to do the same dumb thing. And if you have learned from them, then you do get a second chance. It's called the next minute of your life. The next minute of your life is when you get to take everything that you've learned up to this minute and apply it and not make the same mistake again. So everyone gets a second chance. Everyone has a twice power. We just don't think of it that way.
- [15:05]
Kathy Heller
I mean, everything you just said is so riveting, because as you're saying it, I'm like, that's true. If you had to lose the lessons that you've learned because all of it, right, because we want to grow. You know what happens to water when it stays stagnant? It's just poison. You know, on some level, as much as we think we want it all to be, you know, sitting on the beach and drinking a Mai Tai, it's like what you really want is to keep expanding, and you only often expand from having some contrast and then going through, hopefully, the growth, the evolution of yourself. And those are. Those are really priceless moments in our life. They're catalyst, catalyst moments. Now my next question is, but why with love, did you make it different? Like, there's something about that that you clearly feel deeply that that's something that you don't necessarily get to tinker with in the same way. So why? What's different?
- [16:00]
Mitch Albom
Well, that's not an accident. I mean, I made love the exception to the rule, because love Is not a basketball shot. You know, love is not a one time thing that you. Okay, well I gotta, I did something wrong, this thing, I just go back fix that. And it' good from that point. Love is the first day of the relationship with somebody. It's the hundredth day, it's the thousandth day. It's everything that it took to get to the thousandth day and all the days that follow. So if you suddenly were to walk away from that in the midstream on the 850th day or the 20,000th day and you say, well, I'm just going to go try something else, give my love to somebody else, see how it works out. But if it doesn't, I want to come back and pick up where I left off. Well, that would be like asking water that had run downstream to go back upstream. You know, it can't. Because love is everything that you have built with somebody. The good, the bad and everything else. And so I always liken it to, you know, my, my wife and I have been together for 37 years now.
- [17:04]
Kathy Heller
Oh my gosh, going on 38 time.
- [17:06]
Mitch Albom
It's a long time. And a psychiatrist once told me that when it comes to relationships, a lot of Americans, especially men, are always looking for the new car smell. You know, they like the newness of the relationship. It's not really the person, it's the fact that it's new or it's different or the fact that this kind of person now likes me or this kind of person finds me attractive. And we have in our house here, which is where I'm downstairs now. But every room in this house over the course of. Because we've been in the same house for 34 years, every room in this house has been changed, knocked down, modified or whatever in some way, shape or form. And. Except the kitchen wall, the wall in the kitchen has never changed because this wall in the kitchen is covered with photographs from our life together. You know, from the earliest days when we met, when our marriage or wedding, you know, friends, things that we've done, people that we've loved, you know, little frames all the way over. And there are times when she's less than crazy about me, I'm sure, and once in a blue moon I might feel that way about her. But. But we go to the wall and you'll see one of us kind of standing there, you know, kind of staring at the wall and you go, well, yeah, I'm really mad at him over this. But you know, we do have this. And it's true. After 37 years, you don't have a new car smell anymore. But were I to go with somebody who had a new car smell, I wouldn't have the wall. And so you gotta make a choice. And to me, the wall is love. And that's why you don't get to just do that one all over again. There's a price to pay if you to take those pictures off the wall. You don't just get to throw them back up when you feel like it. And so, you know, that was the point of the. The book is to try to show that love is. Is a really, really unique blessing that we have to give one another and it's not to be trifled with. And Alfie has to learn that lesson the hard way. Of course, he. He makes the terrible mistake that his grandmother warns him about and everybody warns him about. And then it's what he does for all the rest of his life to try to make up for it. And it's a good love story. Actually. I never really. I haven't really written a book where the love story is the thing. There's been a love stories in all of my books. The characters have all had supportive or difficult or whatever, but relationships. But it's never been the sole focus of the book before this one. But this one, love is the. Is kind of at the core of it. So it was kind of interesting. I'm getting a lot of romantic readers that I didn't have before.
- [19:44]
Kathy Heller
Well, I mean, in a thousand episodes, I've never heard anyone say what you just said. And we've had so many cool, smart, interesting. I mean, just brilliant. But what you just said is. It's singular. I mean, I'm sure that other. Hopefully other people think it's. But it is a rare, very special, very highly conscious, highly aware thing to say. And I'm just so moved that you even think it. You know, my parents got divorced. My dad was married three times. And there was a lot of bumps, but also lessons. And when he was dying in hospice, I had a lot of love for his wife. She was an amazing caretaker and friend to him. But that. What you just said, no one's ever said that to me. You know, if anything, there's a lot of ways people sort of comment on how it's better. You know, you wind up finding the person who you're really actually meant to be with and all.
- [20:53]
Podcast Host (Kathy Heller)
But you.
- [20:53]
Kathy Heller
What you said about this wall, you know, it just. It's like a gut punch because I remember seeing that at my, in my dad's last days, I had my mom, who they didn't speak for, you know, 30 years. I said, he's gonna pass. You should come to hospice. And she came in and all of a sudden she just said to him, I love you. Like, it was like so instant, you know, like all. Everything melts away. And I said to her, she said, what should I say? I said, sing to him what was playing on the radio when you were dating. And so she sang Penny Lane from the Beatles. And my dad, like, anyway, he like grabbed her hand and my stepmom said, I'm going to give you guys a minute. It was the three of us. And he just said, I'm so sorry. And I was sitting there and I was like, this is like wild. Like the amount of mental gymnastics and pain and yuck that we all went through for that, that was it. And then we didn't leave the room, we didn't brush our teeth, we didn't shower. But the last minute of his life was me, my mom and him. And she sang Penny Lane. And I'm just like, isn't that just. It just breaks your heart. I don't even know what it means. I mean, I don't know what it means. Right? I don't understand.
- [22:09]
Mitch Albom
I think it means that there's a love that was always there and, you know, it got buried. And that happens. You know, we throw a lot of stuff on top of love and sometimes we throw enough stuff you can't see it anymore. But that's why you have to, in my mind, and I think, Kathy, I mean, inadvertently, you kind of probably explained why for me, you know, I'm able to write this and maybe somebody else isn't. I was raised in a very loving two parent home where they, my mom and dad met each other when they were 15 and 16 and never dated anybody else.
- [22:51]
Kathy Heller
That's so cute.
- [22:52]
Mitch Albom
Married when they were 19 and 20. Didn't have a pot to piss in. My mother's father died when she was 16. My father kind of came in and just sort of became the man of the house at 16, you know, and they were living in these rogue tenement places in the Lower east side of New York. And, you know, he just sort of assumed the role of man of the house and kind of future husband. So much so that we would beg them as kids to tell us the story about when dad asked you to marry him. And they couldn't remember it because it was like I was just. We just knew we were going to get married. Well, come on. There had to be a proposal. There had to be some ram land. No. You know, we're always kind of always together. And they were together until their dying day. And, I mean, they both had strokes at the end of their lives and at one point were in wheelchairs simultaneously holding hands in the wheelchairs, you know, so when you witness this, and. And it wasn't a perfect marriage by any means. I mean, they fought frequently and disagreed on many. Not violent fought, but, you know, disagreed on many things, and particularly on things with us as kids and whatever. But you felt like there was a united front, there was something that was unbreakable of the two of them. And, you know, my mother would say to me, if you're lucky in your life, you'll have two really true friends. Great, true friends. And if you're really lucky, you'll marry one of them. And I always kind of felt like that's what they did, you know, And I tried to do that with my wife, you know, which I think you'd have to ask her, but I think she feels the same way we sort of did. And so when you have that friendship as well as the love, you don't feel right walking away from it just because you had a spat or an argument or you're tempted or whatever things, you know, destroy marriages. But it's tough. You have to. I always say there's three parties to a marriage. There's the. Let's say it's traditional husband's, you know, wife or spouse, spouse, and the marriage itself.
- [24:58]
Kathy Heller
Right.
- [24:59]
Mitch Albom
You can be mad at the spouse or the other spouse can be mad at the other spouse, or you can want to walk away from the spouse and the spouse, but you always have to be in love with the marriage. You have to see that as bigger than just your emotions at that moment for that person at that time. You have to also love the idea being married and what you've created, the wall, you know, and if you have that, you can ride out the bumps. If you don't, you. You know, chances are that you'll get thrown off the horse, especially in a society where, you know, more than half the people who bother to get married get divorced anyhow. So it's not like there's a stigma to it. You know, a lot of people will say to you, why don't you just get divorced? Or people will go into marriages saying, well, look, if it doesn't work out, I'll just get divorced. You know, to me, every time I hear that, I always. The Second part of my. And you will, you know, because as.
- [25:50]
Kathy Heller
Long as it's an option.
- [25:51]
Mitch Albom
Yeah. If you start with that mentality, you probably are going to end up there. Yeah.
- [25:55]
Podcast Host (Kathy Heller)
Yeah.
- [25:56]
Kathy Heller
It's really so awesome and beautiful and that you had that as a role model and as an example. I feel like, what's more, often the case is people talk about, you know, they really didn't enjoy their childhood, and here's the reason why. And there's all this bitterness with the parents. It's really beautiful and rare and special that you know. And you can be honest and say they fought frequently, but there was so much that was solid in your house and so much love and that. That's the biggest takeaway. And what an answer to their prayer that their kid, you know, is sharing that. That it's like you're paying that forward and. And then so many people get to be the recipient of that love through this book, you know. But why did you think, like, you just said, like other books, there was always a supporting idea of love, but it wasn't the main one. So did something happen or did you have this, like, moment where you were taking a walk or you went to someone's funeral or you were reading something and you're like, I want to make love the essence of this book?
- [26:59]
Mitch Albom
I don't know. I guess, you know, when you really examine what goes on in your life, I'm one of those people that has way more ideas than time. Like, I have no writer's block. It's never been an issue for me. My issue is I don't have enough years left to write all the books that I want to write. I can do the math. And, you know, unless I get to live to be 150, you know, I have a long list of ideas for books, and my biggest fight I'm doing right now is choosing, okay, what's. What goes to the top of the list. What. And the other ones I have to walk away from because it's like, well, yeah, I want to do that one. Yeah. But I also want to do that one. I don't do that one. So why any particular one at any particular time? It's just sort of, you know, I think what's going on in your life has something to do with it. And I. I do think, like, I couldn't have written this book 20 years ago because I don't think I had the appreciation for love 20 years ago that I do and for its uniqueness. And also, we are as weird as it probably seems, my Age, but we are, we have a little girl now who we adopted from our orphanage in Haiti. And she came to us when she was six months old and she only weighed six pounds. She had nothing to eat in her life but sugar.
- [28:14]
Kathy Heller
Oh my God.
- [28:16]
Mitch Albom
So she really was on death.
- [28:17]
Kathy Heller
Oh my God.
- [28:19]
Mitch Albom
We brought her home and with the purpose of saving her life, which thank goodness, you know, we and the doctors were able to do, and then she just kind of never went home. And she's just, she's the joy of our lives. And so how old is she now or. And so, you know, to have a four year old, you have a whole new sort of appreciation not only for love, for a child, which is a different kind of love, and I have written a book about that, but for what you're teaching her about love between you and your wife, you know, and what you're trying to create. And you know, many is a time when I'm with her and I, or I'm with my wife and her and I'm thinking, I want her to grow up to feel, you know, like she can have a solid marriage with somebody. So I need to behave a certain way right now. And she needs to see that we're united or she needs to see that we're holding hands or she needs to see that we kiss each other or whatever. Because I want her to think that way when she grows up. So you start thinking about how you're behaving. I think that's what children, I mean, children bring so many things into your life, but it's one of the things that children bring into your life is like the second focus. Like you start examining your behavior. Especially like if you say something and then she repeats it and you go, oh my God. She just, she just repeated something that she should never think or say. And I can't say that kind of stuff out loud or I can't act that way. Or sometimes I'll say, you know, my wife and I, I'm the earlier one, she's the later one. You know, we're trying to get out the door and I'm going, come on, come on, come on. And not in. Our daughter will go, you know, guys, guys don't fight. Guys don't fight. And we're not fighting. You know, we're just talking about being late. But you realize that's how she's ingesting it and it's like, oh gosh, you know, I don't want her to ever feel like her parents are going to break up or leave or so. So you start modifying your own behavior and you start thinking about. So maybe that's what was on my mind over the last few years when I was writing it. Maybe that was it.
- [30:20]
Kathy Heller
It's so beautiful. You know, there's a line in the Talmud that says that the world is held up by 36 simple people, just regular people. I think you're one of those 36 people.
- [30:33]
Mitch Albom
Well, simple and regular, for sure. I'm not sure I'm one of the 36, but. No, you know, why 36?
- [30:40]
Kathy Heller
I don't know. There's something cosmic about where it says that, like, it's never the people you think it is. You know, it's not like a king. It's not like it's always like there's something kabbalistically about the number 36. But, like, these 36 regular but righteous people, people who are just. They do good to do good, you know, they're like. They're not looking for the accolades. And I don't think you realize, which is part of what it is to be good. You don't even realize how good you are because you're just being good, you know? But it's just. It's so beautiful. Whenever I have you on the show, then I, like, talk about you for. I'm like, you guys, you don't understand. And everyone's weeping. Everyone's like, who is this person? You know, it's just so moving that you're such a good person just because. Right. Like, you're not looking for the appro. You just want to. You just want to be good. But it's. It's in every area of your life, and it's so beautiful. It's such an honor to, like, just sit with such a kind, amazing human.
- [31:40]
Mitch Albom
Well, you're. You're. You're. You're being very kind. But maybe you could stop because you're embarrassing me. You know, it's. Believe me, I've seen good, and I've been in places in the world. You know, I go to Haiti every month, and I see what it takes to be good, and I have it much too good to be praised, the way that you're praising me. Because it's a lot easier to be good when you don't have to worry about what you're going to eat and where you're going to sleep and if your child's going to live or not. And so, you know, there's that old expression, you know, he's born on third base and thought he hit a triple. You Know, I don't ever want to be one of those people. I want to always recognize that I was given a stable home. You know, I wasn't raised with money or anything like that, but I had a stable home and a stable family, and I was never hungry, and I never went to sleep worrying that I might not wake up the next morning. And that's the life for every one of the kids that we have at our orphanage who have come in. And it's still the life even inside the orphanage because of all the violence that goes on in Haiti. Out in the streets, we have gunshots every night. We find bullet casings, you know, and one of our guards was. Was hit by a stray bullet. Just, oh, my God. They weren't even trying to. It wasn't like somebody came over the wall and shot at him. It's just. I don't know where the bullet came from. So I never had to grow up with that. I have to deal with it now for our kids, but. And they're good, and they have grown up good in light of all that. And so, you know, you can always look to your left or you're right, and find someone who's had it a lot harder than you have and. And has somehow managed to rise to a level equal to you or better in terms of their goodness. And that's what you want to aspire to, and that's what you want, you know, And I think that when you stop aspiring, when you stop thinking, I could do better than I am, you're not living the way that you're supposed to, you know, and so it's the reason I get a little uncomfortable with all this praise, because I appreciate it. I really do. And it's very kind of you. It's not that I understand, but my computation of life is I want to be told, you know, nice job. You could do better. You know, next time there's a little bit more you can. Not the easy word, bad, but there's still more to be done. And I look at the days that I have left in my life and whatever, and kind of measure them by that, you know, like, well, I should be doing more. What other charity can I help out? Or what other. How can I spend some time doing this? Or even with my books, you know, or what's something that, you know, I haven't written about yet that might help people? And, you know, there are times where everybody would love to sell the kind of numbers of books that, like the newest fad cells. Like, right now, it's Romantasy, you know, books and these things come out. These numbers are off the charts, you know, and. And listen, I've had in Tuesdays with Maury more success than anybody should ever have a right to have. So. So I will never, ever complain about book sales. But, you know, there's always that part of you that. The competitive industry part. It's like that book's selling so many copies and more than my book is selling. But. But I've always been able to take comfort in the fact that when I write a book, I try to write something that will help somebody. I want it to be entertaining. I want it to be a good story, and I want people to want to flip the pages and get to the end and say, oh, I love that book. But in the end, I want them to remember it. I want them to take something from it that at some point in their life, they remember something from it, and maybe it helps them. And a lot of the books that are just written for fads or to have movies made out of them, they're wonderful, they're great stories. I got no problem with them. But they're not. That's not their purpose. And when they're done, they're done. And when the story's over and the plot's over and you figured out who killed who or whatever, you're done. And I'm trying to do things that will stand the test of time and still have some resonance in a lesson, because to me, the books that I remember the most or the people that I remember the most are the people who changed me and the people who, you know, affected the way I viewed the world. And so I'm trying to be one of those people for whoever takes the time to read some of my books. And sometimes that doesn't come with the same.
- [36:15]
Kathy Heller
It's true. And there's so many numbers. I say this to people when they ask me about podcasting. Not like, I have all these answers, but if. If anyone asks me, I'm like, listen, you can start a podcast because you're trying to chase the popular vote, right? Or you can, like, I started this podcast, and I was like, I don't know if it impacts three people. It feels amazing. Like, I just wanted to do something that worked from the heart, enter the heart. I don't know, maybe somebody would find that moving. And to me, that was. I think people think we're chasing success, but I think everyone is chasing significance. And when I was growing up, my mom was really depressed, and she tried to take her own life. And as a kid, I thought, wow, I thought a lot about that. And what I realized from that was the opposite of depression. I realized it wasn't. Happiness is purpose. She wanted to feel like her life mattered. And she got to this place after everything off my dad and the cheating and the leaving and the whatever. And she was like, I don't feel like. I feel like a failure. Like, I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do. And I want worthy. It's like, but you're significant every day. Like, if you can impact one person, if you can contribute what you have to one person, it mattered. It mattered for that person. It really matters. And so I think. I mean, that completely changed my life. You know, those lessons changed my life. And so the blessing of that for me was that even though he left and I was left with this person who was, you know, in and out of treatment, I grew up quickly, maybe in a way, and really started thinking philosophically about what makes a life successful. And to me, it was about purpose. And the truth is, when you're thinking that way, you're not chasing all that other stuff. It doesn't even matter, like, on the level of your soul. You don't care about likes and sales. You care that, like you said, the thing you did, the thing you made, the move, you know? And when my dad was dying, I could just see that he wanted another day to just do more good with the day that he had. And he felt very regretful that he was off track some of the time. So. I totally hear you. Okay, last question. I was going to ask you anyway, but you just led up so beautifully to it. There's so many lessons in this book, but for you, what would be your favorite takeaway that somebody gets from this book that imprints on them?
- [38:33]
Mitch Albom
Well, so Alfie finds out that he has this power when his mother dies when he's eight years old and they're in Africa and he's. They're missionaries and he's there with them. And his mother gets sick and she's bedridden, and one morning his father goes out to get medicine and says, go sit with your mother. And his mother's sleeping. So he sits there and she's sleeping. And he's a kid, he's 8 years old. He says, well, she's sleeping. She won't know if I'm in here or not. So he goes outside to play with a Superman cape, and he runs back and forth, trying to fly, you know? And then when he comes back into the house. A couple hours later, his mother has died. And he's so upset that he. He wasn't there and he missed it. He was supposed to be there. And he just. He's so regretful and so regretful that he brings this power on. And he wishes, you know, he could just go back. And when he wakes up the next morning, the cape is around him and his mother is in the room, and his father says, go sit with your mother. And he goes, what do you mean? You know, and it's like the same day is happening again. And he goes. And he sits there, and she opens her eyes and she sees him. And she realizes in looking at him that what's taken place and she has the same power that he does. But unbeknownst to him, he never knew it. And so he says to her, you know, have you been here before? And he says, you know, he's just, like, shocked. He says, yes. And she. Did something bad happen? She says, did I die? And he says, yes, Mommy, you died. And she says, all right, you have to listen to me. She starts to tell him everything about this power. You know, don't try to change things, and don't try to make money off of it, and don't take advantage of people. It's not always going to be the best thing, and be very careful and all. Do you understand?
- [40:18]
Kathy Heller
And.
- [40:18]
Mitch Albom
And he just says, mommy, are you going to die again? And she realizes, like, okay, in the moments that she has left, and she doesn't even know what. How much time that is, he. She's not going to be able to convey everything he needs to know. So she says to him, come here. Sit on the bed. Let me tell you all the things I love about you. And that's how she spends the last seconds of her life, is telling him all the things that she loves about him. And of course, throughout the course of the book, he remembers these various things as they go on. But I guess when you're asking me, you know, like, the lessons of the book, in that moment is sort of like, what I'm trying to say is you could have this power magic and go back and change everything, but in the end, when it really, really matters, all that you need to know is, is that you're loved and that you're giving love, and that's what that moment becomes for him and for her. And so after the whole story is sort of said and done, and I would caution anybody who's watching this, who's going to read the book, do not read the Last page first. Okay. He's going to ruin it for you. You know, everything I've heard from people is, oh, the ending was my favorite part. The end. Good. It's supposed to be, but it's. It's an ending. It's not the beginning. Don't read it at the beginning. And so when it's all said and done and when you've read the last page, you know, I think people will find that that's kind of the message there, too.
- [41:47]
Kathy Heller
So beautiful.
- [41:48]
Mitch Albom
Yeah.
- [41:49]
Kathy Heller
You remember that line in When Harry Met Sally where Billy Crystal says, I'm so cynical. I always read the last page of a book first, so if I die, I know how it ends.
- [41:57]
Mitch Albom
Yeah. Well, you ruined this one, so I.
- [42:01]
Kathy Heller
Also just want to tell you thank you. Because this book you wrote, the Little Liar, it just so happened. So I had the book, I read the book. And then my daughter, this past summer, her best friend Olivia, whose grandparents are Greek, Olivia, had her bat mitzvah in Salonika.
- [42:18]
Mitch Albom
Oh, wow.
- [42:19]
Kathy Heller
And my daughter went to Greece, and I gave Olivia's mom, Jenna, I was like, do you know anything about it? Because it's her husband's family that's from Greece. And she's like, no. I go read this book. She loved it. She had all the other families, like, part of their. Their family read. My daughter got to go on this trip. They went and toured, like, all the Jewish sites and this and that. And I felt so happy because she was like. She loved the book so much, and it was actually a cool story because her grandparents got married in that synagogue before the Holocaust. And then she went back, and she's the first girl that had a bat mitzvah there. They flew the Torah, like, from their Reformed synagogue, like in la. And it was just.
- [43:01]
Mitch Albom
I think I know which synagogue it is because I visited all of them when I was there doing research.
- [43:06]
Kathy Heller
It was so cool. My daughter said that there was, like, all, like, there's a lot of security and stuff because it's, like, not so safe there right now for them. But it was just so beautiful. And so everybody read your book. There's, like, a group of, like, 30 people from their family that all went, and they loved it, and they didn't know anything about the history. So thank you for writing that book.
- [43:25]
Mitch Albom
Well, thank you for sharing it that way. I'm glad they enjoyed it.
- [43:28]
Kathy Heller
It's so cool. And then she got to go, and I was like, that's so cool. And then we read all about the history, and it's amazing how many Jews used to be there and now they're not. It's insane, but so cool. Okay, so twice is obviously everywhere. People can get it anywhere they definitely want to get it. Thank you for just beautifying our day by listening to you, and thank you for everything you shared. It's just absolutely beautiful. And I don't know, I think people know how to find you, but why don't you tell them? Where's the best place to find you?
- [43:57]
Mitch Albom
Oh, you mean Internet? Mitchell is a. Yeah, that's pretty simple. My name, dot com, and everything's up there. You know, you can find out about our charities and our orphanage and all that, as well as all the books and all that, so that's so cool.
- [44:11]
Kathy Heller
Thank you. Thank you so much. What a gift. I can't wait to see it. I hope that they do justice to it because it's so good.
- [44:19]
Mitch Albom
Me, too. We'll see.
- [44:21]
Kathy Heller
Thank you for your time.
- [44:22]
Mitch Albom
Take care. Bye. Bye.
- [44:23]
Kathy Heller
Okay, bye. Okay.
- [44:26]
Podcast Host (Kathy Heller)
Well, that was phenomenal. Here are the takeaways. Number one, life is made up of lots of turns that you can't see coming. Number two, if you learn from your mistakes, then you do get a second chance. It's called the next minute of your life. We all have twice power. Number three, love is everything that you have built with somebody. The good, the bad, and everything else. Love is a really unique blessing that we have to give one another. Number four, you can always aspire to create more goodness in the world. There's always more to be done. Number five, people think we're chasing success, but everyone is actually chasing significance. Number six, you could have this power magic and go back and change everything, but in the end, when it really, really matters, all you need to know is that you're loved and that you're giving love. Thank you so much for listening. I know that you have so much on your plate, so much you could be doing. So I really appreciate that you're spending your time here, and I'm so excited for the conversations that we're going to be bringing to you with this rebrand. So make sure that you follow along on Apple podcasts or Spotify or wherever else you listen. And if anything has resonated with you, please share this show with a friend and leave us a review. Here's a review that we just got from a listener named Holly. She said, amazing, inspiring, real. I appreciate the show so much. Kathy is so sincere, empathetic, and her heart is so wide open to her contributors and listeners. The insight encouragement in this podcast is invaluable I've been listening to her podcast since she first started and I keep coming back. Start listening now. Thank you so much Holly. That's so, so sweet. These are always so fun to read, so please leave me a review if you haven't already and I may just read one on a future episode. And finally there's still time where you can join us. We're doing a celebration inside my membership. It's only a dollar. To try it out you can go to kathyheller.com gift I think you will have so much fun in there. We can take this conversation real time on Zoom. You'll be learning all these cool things and you'll be seeing the results so fast. How life starts to change when your energy is just so lit up and all of these things that you thought were so far away just start happening with synchronicity in your life. It's truly amazing. I love you so much and I'll talk to you soon.