Mandana Dayani: ON BEING JEWISH NOW: Two Years After 10/7

Summary

Totally Booked with Zibby

Episode: Mandana Dayani – ON BEING JEWISH NOW: Two Years After 10/7

Aired: December 10, 2025
Host: Zibby Owens (with guest interviewer Stacey Eagle)
Guest: Mandana Dayani

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Overview

This episode is part of a special “On Being Jewish Now” series in which Mandana Dayani – business leader, activist, and co-founder of I Am a Voter – reflects on Jewish identity, activism, and resilience in the two years since October 7th, 2023. Guest host Stacey Eagle (author of Finding the Calm and the Chaos) leads an intimate discussion exploring Mandana's journey from Iranian immigrant to influential advocate, her foundational work combatting antisemitism, and her hopes for building Jewish pride and unity in a polarized world.

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Key Themes & Discussion Points

1. Foundation Stories: Kalanet and One Mitzvah Day

[05:00 – 08:57]

• Origins of the Kalanet Foundation: After October 7th, Mandana felt a deep compulsion to act against antisemitism. Drawing from her background in combating misinformation and brand-building, she shifted focus from just countering negative narratives to proactively celebrating Jewish resilience.
  • “We pivoted and created the Kalanet Foundation... The idea that the flower of Israel is this red anemone. And after October 7th, all the fields where the Jews were massacred, these beautiful red anemones blossomed. And I just kept thinking like, that is who we are as a people.” [06:04]
• One Mitzvah Day: Inspired by the need for gratitude-based activism, this digital initiative encourages daily thank-you messages to individuals and organizations supporting Jewish causes.
  • “How beautiful would it be to build a movement centered on gratitude?... We started end of January. We've now sent over 5 million messages.” [08:39]

2. Personal Refugee Experience & Shaping Activism

[08:59 – 12:44]

• Escaping Iran as a Child: Early memories include forced chants of “death to America/Israel” and fear under the morality police. Mandana and family resettled in the US as religious refugees, aided by HIAS.
  • “As a child, every morning I started preschool with chanting, death to America. Death to Israel. And so many of my earliest memories were of the morality police... And when we arrived to the US... I understood how lucky I was to be one of the girls that got to leave.” [09:15]
• Rebuilding in America: Profound gratitude for safety, democracy, and the Jewish community’s support, which later fueled her dedication to civic initiatives like I Am a Voter.
• Family Traditions: Despite losing all possessions, family unity and rituals like Shabbat grounded the family through adversity.

3. Building for Impact

[12:45 – 16:19]

• Careers Spanning Industries: Fashion, media, politics, tech – for Mandana, the connective tissue is a love for incubation and a drive to connect authentically with audiences.
  • “I love to build, so I think the incubation is probably just very exciting for me. And I love, and I think I generally understand consumers and how to connect to them. And so to me, that was sort of the through line.” [13:03]
• Starting I Am a Voter: Born from outrage at US family separation policies, Mandana called on a network of women to create a nonpartisan voter engagement platform.
  • “I actually called 25 amazing women and asked them to help me start. I'm a voter. And so they became our founding team... And in aggregate, we had hundreds of millions of dollars of donated media.” [15:14]

4. Empowering Students & Jewish Voices

[16:26 – 19:27]

• Our Campus United and OCU Chronicle: Created as direct responses to rising antisemitism and student censorship on campuses, these initiatives elevate Jewish student perspectives and solutions.
  • “The courage that I have seen in these students is unlike anything I could have ever expected... I flew out, I want to say 10 or 12 of them to LA. We convened a two day summit and I just looked at them and said, what do you need?” [16:41]
  • Shift from begging for space in traditional campus media to launching their own platforms.

5. Echo Chambers, Bridge-Building & The Pace of Change

[25:16 – 27:24]

• Jewish Diaspora’s Engagement: Acknowledges value in both insular (echo chamber) and outreach work.
  • “In some ways igniting, exciting, informing the Jewish Diaspora is actually very important. So that is a priority that we have to continue to maintain.... I think it's going to be a lot of work for a very, very long time. I think the hardest part right now is helping people understand how long change takes.” [25:23]
• Multiple Forms of Activism: Silent support, private conversations, and “showing up” beyond social media are all valid and impactful.
  • “I think calling your uncle and telling him that the thing that he said at the table was racist is activism… We show up in so many ways... sometimes we have to give people a little bit of grace. Like, I think everyone is so eager to just be mad because we're all so hurt.” [27:25]

6. Motherhood, Legacy, and Feeling at Home

[29:53 – 33:17]

• Parenting with Purpose: Mandana involves her two daughters in her activism, teaching them leadership and empathy through action.
  • “I realized the most important thing I could do is include our kids. So they've just come with us for everything … they get to meet everyone and they get to sit at the table and they get to ask people questions.” [30:10]
• Full-Circle Jewish Pride: Emotional moments of pride witnessing her daughter participate at the White House Hanukkah celebration, and her father installing a mezuzah at the Vice President’s home.
  • “I fled my country because it wasn't safe for me to be Jewish or a woman. And now, within one generation, my daughter is standing, telling the President of the United States that she's gonna be president at a Hanukkah party at the White House.” [32:26]

7. Hope, Integrity, and Redefining Jewish Identity

[33:21 – 39:16]

• Protecting Hope: Activism requires a kind of “hopeful idiocy”—the radical optimism that change is possible, supported by integrity and community.
  • “You just have to wake up a hopeful idiot. You know what I mean? I wake up every day... I believe that I can make a difference. You have to believe. You have to believe that change is possible.” [33:31]
• What Being Jewish Means Today: Deep pride, gratitude for global Jewish kinship, and cherishing traditions—especially the ritual of Shabbat.
  • “I feel so lucky to be Jewish. I feel so lucky to know that I could walk into the home of any other Jewish family in the entire world and be, like, hugged and loved by them… and there's so much within the Jewish culture that has defined all of the values have defined me so much and how we raise our kids.” [36:47]
• Shabbat Traditions: Vivid, loving portrait of her Persian-Jewish family’s lively Friday night dinners.
  • “Persian Shabbats are really different. They're really loud. There's so many people... There's so much food. I love, like, chaos, and it's just so much love and so much fun.” [38:17]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Jewish Resilience and Symbolism:
  “There’s a quote that says, you know, they tried to bury us. They didn’t know we were seeds… the flower of Israel is this red anemone.” — Mandana Dayani, [06:04]

• On Starting Over in America:
  “I understood how lucky I was to be one of the girls that got to leave, that didn’t have to wear hijab every morning, that had safety, that had democracy.” — Mandana Dayani, [09:55]

• On the Humility of Leadership:
  “My life is a series of phone a friends.” — Mandana Dayani, [16:19]

• On Responding to Student Censorship:
  “You don’t need to beg your lame newspaper that no one reads … We’re just gonna make the things that they're gonna try to take away from us.” — Mandana Dayani, [18:00]

• On “Hopeful Idiocy” in Activism:
  “To be an activist … you just have to wake up a hopeful idiot.” — Mandana Dayani, [33:31]

• On the Joy of Shabbat:
  “I always define our life as, like, a cross between my Big Fat Greek Wedding, Everybody Loves Raymond, and, like, a little hint of Borat … So that is Shabbat. That is life. That is every day.” — Mandana Dayani, [38:17]

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Suggested Listening Timestamps for Key Segments

• Kalanet/One Mitzvah Day & Digital Activism: [05:00 – 08:57]
• Refugee Journey & Early Experiences: [08:59 – 12:44]
• Career Transition Reflections: [12:45 – 16:19]
• Campus Advocacy & Student Journalism: [16:26 – 19:27]
• Echo Chambers, Patience, and Bridge-Building: [25:16 – 27:24]
• Motherhood, Jewish Pride, Intergenerational Moments: [29:53 – 33:17]
• Defining Jewish Identity/Shabbat Traditions: [36:47 – 39:16]

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Tone & Takeaways

• Mandana speaks with candor, humor, compassion, and sharp insight—balancing vulnerability about loss and disillusionment with an infectious, dogged optimism about the power of stories, tradition, and community.
• Rather than dwell in indignation or despair, the episode demonstrates how the Jewish response since 10/7 has been one of collective action, gratitude, and relentless hope.

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For listeners looking for inspiration on identity, activism, and building bridges in turbulent times, Mandana’s journey offers stirring clarity, warmth, and actionable wisdom.

Transcript

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Hi.

[Zibby Owens]

This is Zibby Owens and you're listening to Totally Booked with Zibby. Formerly Moms don't have Time to read books. In my daily show, I interview today's latest, best selling, buzziest or underrated authors and story creators whose work I think is worth your time. As a bookstore owner, publisher, author and obviously podcaster, I get a comprehensive look at everything that's coming out and spend my time curating the best books so you don't have to stay in the know, get insider insights and connect with guests like I do every single day. For more information, go to zibbymedia.com and follow me on Instagram Ibbeowens.

Today's episode is part two of a special series from the On Being Jewish now event that I hosted but was too sick to attend. Alex Strauss and Stacey Eagle heard my call for help and took over hosting. Stacy ended up interviewing Madonna Dayani about her life and career and everything else which I should have done but couldn't. So I am deeply grateful to Stacy for doing this. Here's a little bio about Mandana and Stacy has been on this podcast before. She is the author of Finding the Calm and the Chaos. Mandana Dayani is a business leader, human rights activist, and the co founder of I Am a Voter, a national nonpartisan civic engagement organization. Most recently, she was president of Archwell, the production, audio and philanthropic company founded by Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Prior to Archewell, she spent 15 years building and scaling brands across politics, entertainment, tech, fashion and digital media. Madonna is a globally celebrated brand and marketing expert and regularly appears on Morning Joe on msnbc. She is an active angel investor and advisor to global consumer brands, nonprofits and political leaders. Mandana is an immigrant from Iran who credits her experience immigrating to the United States as a religious refugee as one of the most formative inspirations behind her activism. Mandana is an outspoken advocate against anti Semitism, recently speaking at the United Nations Special Session on sexual violence on October 7, and her video condemning Hamas was viewed over 50 million times. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and their two daughters in a giant golden doodle.

[Interviewer/Host]

Can we all clap for this amazing, amazing woman? Before I get started in these questions that we prepared, we just talked outside about your nonprofit wing which is named. Can you describe the name of the foundation and what it meant and why you brought this?

[Mandana Dayani]

Oh, the anti Semitism one, yes. So after October 7th, I think like everyone in this room, I just didn't know what to do with my life anymore. Three weeks after the attack I went to Israel and I had done a lot of work in the misinformation space, particularly at Archewell, looking at bad actors, how misinformation gets created and spread, and I really wanted to understand what was happening with all the bot farms. It was so clear that we were experiencing digital warfare as well. We raised a big round we did a lot of work in the digital misinformation space for a while. And then I think sort of after a while, I started understanding. I think what I'm good at is building brands, understanding how to talk to consumers, how to make something like emotional and timely and to break through the noise. And so we pivoted and created the Kalanet Foundation. So it's named after Kalanit in Hebrew, which means anemone. Doing a lot of this brand work after October 7th, I realized how much I look at Israel as this beautiful thing that blossomed in this sea of autocracies. And I think so much. I am such a visual person. And I felt like as I would analyze a lot of the visuals around the Jewish space, there was this over indexing on black squares and candles and this, you know, thinking about all the harm that happened. And I kept thinking about Israel as this beautiful thing that blossomed. You know, there's a quote that says, you know, they tried to bury us. They didn't know we were seeds. And I always look at Jewish people like that. And that quote has meant so much to me. And so the idea that the flower of Israel is this red anemone. And after October 7th, all the fields where the Jews were massacred, these beautiful red anemones blossomed. And I just kept thinking like, that is who we are as a people. That is who we are as a nation. And so Calnet was really born out of this desire to sort of give honor to the virtues and the values of who we are as Jewish people. And so the concept initially was to find problems that we could pinpoint and build solutions for them, incubate them, and then once we had proven success, hand those off over to one of the legacy organizations that could really carry it further. And so I looked at us really more as an incubator. And so we created our Campus United and Stand with us with 20amazing student founders that were all the leaders that testified before Congress and that is now lives with Stand With Us and One Mitzvah Day, which also created Global Mitzvah Maker Day out of it has been amazing. It's amazing.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah. Actually with our I'm being Jewish now, you had all the authors share a mitzvah a day which was beautiful. So we got a stream of emails from you and all gave our own mitzvah that you honored on being Jewish now the book.

[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah, I was in.

[Interviewer/Host]

So thank you.

[Mandana Dayani]

I was in D.C. and one of my friends who's a congressman, said to me, you know, Madonna, it's I can be as pro Israel as you want me to be and stand up against anti Semitism, but every time I do, my team fields a thousand phone calls of people calling them one horrible thing after another. And you rarely say thank you, and you rarely show up in T shirts with my name on them supporting me. And I realize in that moment, we've done so much to sort of take down bad actors, but we weren't doing enough to reward good actors. And someone who's built grassroots movements. How beautiful would it be to build a movement centered on gratitude? So one Mitzvah day really started as building an infrastructure digital. So you get a text every morning and you click on it, and it pre populates a thank you to anyone who stands with the Jewish community or Israel. So you'll thank everyone from Trader Joe's for continuing to sell Israeli products even though they're trying to be boycotted, to Paramount Films for releasing October 8th or any bipartisan member of Congress. And we have seen. We started end of January. We've now sent over 5 million messages.

[Interviewer/Host]

Wow. Congratulations.

[Mandana Dayani]

It's pretty wild.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah. I want to bring it back to your childhood. And you shared that your family fled Iran when you were a child. How has that experience of rebuilding from nothing shaped how you lead and use your voice today so much?

[Mandana Dayani]

I think. I mean, as a child, every morning I started preschool with chanting, death to America. Death to Israel. And so many of my earliest memories were of the morality police and people and just fear in everyone's eyes. And as a child, that just seemed so scary, and I didn't really understand what was happening. And then we fled in that uncertainty of leaving everything and everyone, you know, behind with no security, no safety. And when we arrived to the US through an amazing Jewish organization called hias that helps Jews resettle. And I remember coming to New York, which to me was the scariest place I'd ever been.

[Interviewer/Host]

Even though you were fleeing from a.

[Mandana Dayani]

Country that was just like the lights, the language, it's so different than anything I'd ever seen. And none of us spoke any English and we had no money. You have no idea what's next. And I remember holding my mom's hand and knowing that I would be okay because I had my mom and I had my family, and that was really all I needed. And I think my whole life, I understood how lucky I was to be one of the girls that got to leave, that didn't have to wear hijab every morning, that had safety, that had democracy, and that sort of gratitude. To this country. That patriotism, I think, you know, is what led to me starting, I am a voter. And, you know, when I saw the child separation policy, it took me back to that exact moment when I held my mom's hand. And I couldn't understand how the country that saved my life could rip apart families and, you know, the most vulnerable populations in that way. And so I dove deep into starting, I'm a voter. And so, yeah, I think the virtues and the values of that experience shaped everything for me.

[Interviewer/Host]

You mentioned. I was telling you about my vintage. My mom's done a canon, and you said your mom left all of her clothes in Iran. So, I mean, you just had to start from scratch. I mean, this is. How did. I'm gonna dive away from this for a second just to hear more about that experience. I mean, did you. Were you able to. Were clothes given to you when you got here? I mean, an amazing story.

[Mandana Dayani]

My dad started working as a shoe salesman. I think he made $4.10 an hour. We all lived on one. We slept on one bed in Queens in some studio that HIAS helped us get. And a yeshiva let my brother and I go there for free. So we would go there every morning, and then the teacher would take time away every day to teach my brother and I English. And my mom could never go back to work or anything, obviously, so she spent all of her time trying to help us navigate the city and country and learn English. And, I mean, you realize your entire life there's just heroes that show up every day and people that helped us. You know, my dad came to LA because someone called him and told him they have the best public schools, and we couldn't afford school. And so he came here and walked around with, like, a wad of cash and just tried to find the perimeter, like, walk the perimeter of Beverly Hills and couldn't. We had no credit. He didn't have a credit card, but he didn't have anything. And he found this, like, amazing Chinese immigrant who looked at my dad and said, I've been where you are. Please don't screw me over. And so we moved to la and we got to go to amazing public schools. But there's so many people that are such a big part of our journey and us succeeding in our family. And, I mean, honestly, traditions like Shabbat, we've never missed a Shabbat dinner together as a family. And I think that just kept us so grounded and so close.

[Interviewer/Host]

It's beautiful.

[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Host]

So you've moved across law, fashion, media, and Activism, as we heard in your bio, what's the through line that connects all those chapters? And when did you realize your work had shifted from building success to. To creating impact?

[Mandana Dayani]

I think I love to build, so I think the incubation is probably just very exciting for me. And I love, and I think I generally understand consumers and how to connect to them. And so to me, that was sort of the through line. And a lot of what I did mirrored what I was really excited and passionate about at the time. So I loved fashion. That was the most exciting thing for me to figure out how to do. Even though I knew nothing, literally nothing about it when I started.

[Interviewer/Host]

You look fabulous today.

[Mandana Dayani]

Thank you. A lot of fake it till you make it to get here today. I mean, even in entertainment, I remember standing on a red carpet and googling like, what is a step and repeat? Because my boss was like, go meet the town. I never knew what I was doing. So the pivot to impact, I mean, I had been doing that. I started my first charity in fourth grade. I had done community service and that was such a big part of me my entire life. I worked on as volunteer on presidential campaigns in high school and college. But it was, I mean, I remember, I think. Did you think what prevents us from doing things so many times, especially as women, is that we overthink things and we always think that we shouldn't do something until we know everything about it and we're super prepared. And I think I just dive in really deep, even though I don't know anything. And I'm very committed to just learning along the way. And I remember sitting across from a senator and I really thought after, like after the child separation thing, I was like, I'm just gonna help. So I'm gonna meet with members of Senate in Congress. I'm gonna ask them what to do and how to help them on their campaigns and I can help them on messaging and audience segmentation. And they kept saying, you know, if you really want long term change, we need higher voter turnout. And I really had that Legally Blonde, like, what? Like, it's hard moment because you just think, like, how many people have we gotten to buy a mascara or watch a Marvel movie? Like, it can't be that hard to get people to go do something that my family risked their lives for. You know what I mean? It's actually a cool thing.

[Interviewer/Host]

Did you think you were successful at that point or did you think, I'm actually going to make impact? Was there a moment that that impact all the work you were doing? When you started this organization, like, you saw the impact, like how many people came out to vote.

[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah. So I feel like I always have really good ideas and I know how to execute, but I always know that my friends are way smarter than me. So I actually called 25amazing women and asked them to help me start. I'm a voter. And so they became our founding team. Truly the most talented, amazing women. And none of it would have happened without them. And then caa, the talent agency, joined as our co founders. And I think together we were just able to do so much. And I always looked at it as sort of this community service project. Like we went out to everyone that we knew and said, what can you throw in the pot? Like, do you have windows at your store? Can we use them? Do you have unused ads? Can we use them? What is happening in your life and what company do you have and what can you give us? And everyone just started throwing things in the pot. And in aggregate, we had hundreds of millions of dollars of donated media. And it was incredible. And I think it's because it wasn't mine. It was sort of everyone's project.

[Interviewer/Host]

And you brought, I think, was it Steve Jobs who said, always surround yourself with smarter people. So that's sort of what you brought together.

[Mandana Dayani]

Oh my God, you have no idea.

My life is a series of phone a friends.

[Interviewer/Host]

Is it? Right. It's important. I think I learned that 10 years into my business.

So you recently helped launch our Campus United, which you mentioned, and the OCU Chronicle to give Jewish students a voice. What have you learned from listening to students on today's campuses about real advocacy and what it looks like?

[Mandana Dayani]

You know, the courage that I have seen in these students is unlike anything I could have ever expected. I mean, they are so brave and so courageous. The way that they have shown up and testified before Congress and traveled, the vulnerability it takes to share their experiences and stand up to their friends and these weird terrorist loving lunatics on campus. I mean, it's wild what they have taken on and with what such strength. Yeah, I don't even have enough words when I started seeing what was happening on college campuses. I think again, as someone who's Iranian, you remember the images of that in Iran and how that was such an early indicator of something really terrible happening in our country. And so I was so disturbed by it. Obviously, I was touring the school, speaking on some of the campuses, and again, I had always been this progressive advocate. Right. I had worked on every major social issue and it was so hard to see people Sort of violate all the social norms we had created together, right? Like why are you creating an unsafe space for someone? Why are you targeting them? Why are you making. How do you not know throwing rocks at a kid trying to go to class is a bad thing, Right? Like these are not complicated boundaries. And so the hypocrisy of it was so painful to watch. And as I met these students, I was just blown away by their stories. And I flew out, I want to say 10 or 12 of them to LA. We convened a two day summit and I just looked at them and said, what do you need? Right? Because you guys, there's so many of these organizations but sometimes the access is hard and things don't move as quickly as you want. And so, so we sat there and we whiteboarded for days the solutions that they felt like were really missing for them and gave them a real seat at the table and made them co founders. And we spent six months doing peer to peer interviews. They were publishing their own booklets that were just how to guides for them and how to navigate everything. Templated emails. I mean it was amazing what they built. And then a few months later, a few of the students kept saying that they were being pushed off of their student newspapers or they weren't allowed to write anything about Israel or antisemitism. And that really pissed me off. And so I was like, okay, cool, we'll just launch a newspaper. Like, you know, I don't. You don't need to beg your lame newspaper that no one reads, you know what I mean? For permission. Like, this is so dumb. We're going to go on substack. We hired amazing editors who came together, we brought amazing creative directors and we created the OCU Chronicle. And all these kids got to publish whatever they wanted to publish and interview anyone they wanted to interview. And like, yeah, I think I'm like over the like begging. We're just gonna make the things that they're gonna try to take away from us.

[Interviewer/Host]

Do you feel they are able through on being Jewish now we donate to. We're part of actually the authors against anti Semitism. So we bring Project SHAMA goes into colleges to teach about antisemitism. Anyone can come. Do you think through the work you're doing.

They'Re speaking to just one group of people or they're really able to share what they're feeling through the Chronicle and other people who can learn and make change? Because we're in this constant talking to the same people. Do you feel that this is happening in those places you're going to or they're able to get their voice out in a way that can change one person's mind. Just to be sympathetic to what's going.

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Now.

[Zibby Owens]

Goodbye while I go fill another frame for a very lucky recipient in my family.

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[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah, I think we have of everyone I know in the Jewish advocacy space, we have a lot of conversations about echo chambers and I think that it's obviously a real concern, but it's also a strength sometimes. So in some ways you look at the Jewish Diaspora. And this is the most engaged and most informed it's ever been. This is the most the Jewish Diaspora has ever donated to Jewish, Jewish causes. And so in some ways igniting, exciting, informing the Jewish Diaspora is actually very important. So that is a priority that we have to continue to maintain. Being able to have conversations. I mean, these students on campuses were hosting Shabbat tables and leaving seats open for anyone that would join them. They've walked up to people, you know, you've seen them on the, you know, with the sort of mics on the street kind of. I think they're doing everything that they can. And I know that we did a lot of bridge building exercises and we had conversations behind closed doors with leaders in other communities and I know that they're doing that on campuses. I think it's going to be a lot of work for a very, very long time. I think the hardest part right now is helping people understand how long change takes. I think in this Amazon prime, people want change to arrive in 24 hours at your door and it's just not gonna happen that way anymore. And it never did. So I think the patience to keep showing up, keep doing the work, keep explaining yourself, be vulnerable, share your story. I mean, I remember one time I shared a video of something that happened to my daughter and I had so many of my friends call me and say, oh my God, I didn't even think about the impact this could have on your kid. You know, and I think it's. They're not. Honestly, the majority of the people are not thinking about us.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yes, agreed. I heard something you were on. I did a lot of research last night because I was told at 3pm yesterday I was doing this interview, but there was a. I listened to a podcast and you talked about silence, how some people show up in different ways. And you know, we can't. I don't. I believe you said, you know, we can't be upset with people who don't talk about it. They might be talking silently to other people. What do you feel about that?

[Mandana Dayani]

Like, I think that there's activism happens in so many ways. Like I think calling your uncle and telling him that the thing that he said at the table was racist is activism. Like there's so many telling the parent in your class that the thing that they did is wrong. Teaching your kids how to be good people is a form. I mean, there's so many ways that we show up and ultimately really is sort of in community. Right? It's to protect the community, to Teach everyone the same values and to uphold the values of kindness to each other and understanding of each other. And I think that does happen. Listen, I think the expectation that everyone is gonna post about every single issue is definitely not okay. Not okay. And it's not genuine either. Right. But I mean, there are so many people I know that did pick up the phone and call. People that wore, you know, the Artist for Ceasefire pin and said, dude, what the hell are you doing? You know, and that call is important because they will listen. And if they had posted on Instagram, they wouldn't have listened. Right. So I do think there's a lot of ways, and I think that sometimes we have to give people a little bit of grace. Like, I think everyone is so eager to just be mad because we're all so hurt. Like, we haven't had a chance to grieve. I mean, the worst thing since the Holocaust happened to our family and we didn't have. We didn't get to sit shiva. We had hostages. Right? Like, we've been fighting for two years. We're tired, we're sad. We've been abandoned by our friends. This is a really, really hard time. And I think, yes, this week was amazing, and it was such a relief to see these hostages come home. But the grieving. We're not done with the grieving process.

[Interviewer/Host]

I had a text come from a friend this week who had not spoken up about anything. But I knew she was there and supportive, and she said, you know, a yellow heart and a blue heart text. And I'm feeling really grateful for you and for. And as much as I feel. I know what you're feeling, but had never said anything in the past two years. So in that sense, you know, we can't expect everybody to show up on post or in articles, but as friends, they come in different ways.

[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

Right?

[Interviewer/Host]

So, okay, let's go to the next question.

[Mandana Dayani]

The question, though, I will say for the people you care about, you have to tell them how to show up for you. That's true, too, and it feels unnatural, but I have done that. And I've actually called my best friends and been like, I know this doesn't make sense, but this is really, really important to me, and I need you to understand why, because it's not always so logical.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right. Or they've not. There's no one who they can relate to that this has happened to.

[Mandana Dayani]

Yes.

[Interviewer/Host]

So let's go to being a mommy as a grandmother. Yeah. Where are we going here? Do you like it? You're raising two daughters While leading real change, what do you hope that they take away from watching how you navigate your values and your work?

[Mandana Dayani]

So I. And my husband who's here, is the best and very supportive, but I think at some point, I realized the most important thing I could do is include our kids. So they've just come with us for everything. Like, they've registered voters with us since they were this tall. And we have. I mean, if I'm traveling to D.C. for something, if it's the UN General assembly, whatever it is, they come and they get to meet everyone and they get to sit at the table and they get to ask people questions, and they. And so for me, the most important part is including them. I really, like. I have watched them transform so much, and they are so engaged, and they're so excited, and they have so many questions, and they've just become such leaders themselves. And it wasn't something I forced on them in any way or told them they have to care about an issue. They just so naturally started to gravitate towards these things because I think they met the people, they got to understand so many of them. And I don't know, it was amazing. And our daughter.

[Interviewer/Host]

How old are they?

[Mandana Dayani]

They're now 11 and 8. And when my older one was 8 years old, I took her to the White House for Hanukkah. And it was so last minute. And it was the. You know, you sort of have these moments where you walk in and there were all these, like, amazing rabbis praying in the lobby. And this one rabbi looked at me, and he's like, they used to not let us in this building, and now we're praying. And then I'm just like, I'm such, like, a democracy nerd. So I'm, like, crying, oh, my God, I can't believe this. Like, you know, and we fled Iran. I mean, the whole thing was nuts. And I was so excited to share that with Andy. And we go into this one room, we're all squeezing in, and Noah Tishby, one of my dear friends, was standing next to me. Deborah Lipstadt was there. We were all talking, and all of a sudden, I look up and, you know, Andy and Noah's son are standing on stage. And Andy has this huge, like, beautiful moment with the president, and everyone. You know, everyone's where she declared that she wants to be the President of the United States. And her. And her and President Biden had this incredible exchange. And I'm just sitting there like, wow. Like, I fled my country because it wasn't safe for me. To be Jewish or a woman. And now, within one generation, my daughter is standing, telling the President of the United States that she's gonna be president at a Hanukkah party at the White House.

[Interviewer/Host]

You're like, I mean, come on. You couldn't.

[Mandana Dayani]

Like, what?

[Interviewer/Host]

Wow.

[Mandana Dayani]

Like, if you wrote that in a script, I'd be like, okay, come on.

[Interviewer/Host]

It's like, totally.

[Mandana Dayani]

That's a little too far.

[Interviewer/Host]

I feel like that's that aha moment where you. That's where you pinch yourself and say, oh, yes, I've done a lot of great work. Right. Or do you keep moving to the next meeting?

[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah, I don't know how to do that. I'm really bad at that. But it was definitely one of the most, like, proud moments of my life. I also took my dad to last year to the. The vice president's house for Hanukkah, and he stood there was the first mezuzah that had ever been placed on White House property. And he stood over there, and his dad was a rabbi. He's Kurdish. And my dad stood over the mezuzah and prayed. And I was like, my dad grew up in a village with, like, no electricity and had a donkey for transportation. And he's just, like, sitting here praying. There are so many days where I'm like, what is this crazy life?

[Interviewer/Host]

It's amazing life.

[Mandana Dayani]

It is amazing, but it is wild, right?

[Interviewer/Host]

You're just like, what.

You'Ve spoken about often, about staying hopeful when the world feels divided. What helps you protect that hope and keep showing up with clarity and courage?

[Mandana Dayani]

I think to be an activist.

You just have to wake up a hopeful idiot. You know what I mean? I wake up every day, but it's true. I believe that I can make a difference. You have to believe. You have to believe that change is possible. You have to believe that your work not alone, but in aggregate with other people that also hold a torch with you, that you will be able to change and that that change is worth the work. And I wake up and believe that every day. And maybe it's because I get to look at our kids and you know, that they are worth fighting for. And I think for me, the most important thing I learned as a child was that, honestly, the only thing. And my dad used to always say, I was like, dad, do you care that we have no money? He's like, as long as I have my integrity, I don't need anything else, right? And that was sort of what defined me, was just knowing that doing the right things, knowing that I have integrity, knowing that I can look our kids in the eyes and say, you know, I did the right thing regardless of the consequences, you know? Cause people always ask me, like, are you upset about the consequences of standing up? And I'm like, no, it's a privilege to do what I do because it's, like, honest and it's how I feel, and it is the truth. And if I lose some friends, like.

[Interviewer/Host]

Okay, yeah, you're standing tall. By doing what you.

[Mandana Dayani]

By the way, I've gained so many new friends. I know I have my new friend over here.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

I'm gonna go to.

Your new organization. So the Kalanay. I pronounced that right. Foundation now brings many of your impact projects under one roof. What inspired you? Well, we talked about this in the beginning, but to create something that can turn individual ideas into long term systems of change, which we talked about earlier. But can you go more in depth than that?

[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah, I think that I sort of have always been the outsider. Like any industry I've worked in, I pretty much didn't know anything about it. And that always allowed me to be really objective. I think in some ways that always helped the work and in the advocacy space, I think the fact that I sort of came from outside of traditional impact organizations, and my friends and my colleagues are all the best creative directors and writers and storytellers, we would come together and the outcome was always so different and so innovative. And I think that that was really what I wanted to do within the Jewish advocacy space. So everyone who works at the organization comes from incredible consumer backgrounds. You've worked on massive consumer brands, celebrity brands, and they just have a very different take on things. And so I think it wasn't that I think anything we did was necessarily better, but that it was at least innovative and it felt at least different.

[Interviewer/Host]

And it's a collective of a group of 20 people. Right?

[Mandana Dayani]

That is our Campus United. Yes.

[Interviewer/Host]

Oh, that's Archampus. Okay, so this is.

[Mandana Dayani]

But there's sort of like a core group that works across all of our projects, and they're amazing.

[Interviewer/Host]

Got it.

[Mandana Dayani]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Host]

So as we wrap up, and you've been incredible, and your resume, I'm just fascinated by. Because I thought I had a really big resume.

But you blow me away. What does being Jewish mean? And how does it feel to you?

[Mandana Dayani]

Oh, God, it's just such a privilege. Like, I feel so lucky to be Jewish. I feel so lucky to know that I could walk into the home of any other Jewish family in the entire world and be, like, hugged and loved by them, that there are people across so many oceans and continents that care about our collective existence and thriving. And I love tradition. I love rituals. I love things that sort of anchor us to our past and sort of link us to our future. And there's so much within the Jewish culture that has defined all of the values have defined me so much and how we raise our kids. I honestly, I feel so. I know it sounds so corny. I really feel so, so, so blessed to be Jewish.

[Interviewer/Host]

We talked before we came here about your Shabbat dinner tonight. I grew up having Shabbat every Friday. I still try to do that within my home now. And my Shabbat tables are always different walks of life, different people from different cultures. My parents loved to bring that to the table. And my friends growing up who weren't Jewish want to do Shabbat now. They always tell me, we got to do Shabbat with you. So, you know that table of being with community and what they saw who weren't Jewish, like, how they loved it so much to come every Friday. So tonight, can you tell me what you're doing for Shabbat?

[Mandana Dayani]

Well, I will say that I'm also Persian, so. Persian Shabbats are really different. They're really loud. There's so many people. There's just.

[Interviewer/Host]

I feel like it's like Thanksgiving, right?

[Mandana Dayani]

It's just chaos. Like, you just walk in, there's kids running around, everyone's drinking. You eat dinner really late. There's. There's so much food. I love, like, chaos, and it's just so much love and so much fun and. Yeah. I always describe my life, unfortunately for my husband. No, it's sort of like a cross. Well, my whole family lives walking distance from our house, too, so I always define our life as, like, a cross between my Big Fat Greek Wedding, Everybody Loves Raymond, and, like, a little hint of Borat.

[Interviewer/Host]

And that is Shabbat for you.

[Mandana Dayani]

So that is Shabbat. That is life. That is every day. That is like my dad walking through the front door and just, like, opening up our bills and being like, peter, why are you spending so much on electricity? Like, no one has a boundary ever.

So, yeah, Shabbat tonight actually is. So I'm so excited. I'm hosting Shabbat with my friend Mona Vaynerchuk at her home. Our friend Zach Nieman is cooking Persian food, and I think there'll be 14 of us, and we just got to eat really, really yummy food. And, yeah, I'm very, very excited. I don't think we've ever, ever missed Shabbat, so it's like our favorite part of the week.

[Interviewer/Host]

Well, good Shabbos.

[Mandana Dayani]

You too.

[Interviewer/Host]

Thank you for being here. Oh my God.

[Zibby Owens]

Thanks for having us.

[Interviewer/Host]

Shabbat Shalom.

[Zibby Owens]

Thank you for listening to Totally Booked with Zibi, formerly Moms don't have Time to Read Books. If you loved the show, tell a friend, leave a review. Follow me on Instagram, Zippy Owens and Spread the Word. Thanks so much. Oh, and buy the books.

[Mandana Dayani]

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[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

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[Mandana Dayani]

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