Michelle Obama doesn't regret saying 'no'

Summary

Wild Card with Rachel Martin: Michelle Obama Doesn't Regret Saying 'No'

Episode Release Date: June 26, 2025
Host: Rachel Martin
Guest: Former First Lady Michelle Obama

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Introduction

In this captivating episode of Wild Card with Rachel Martin, Michelle Obama joins host Rachel Martin to delve into life's profound questions using a unique deck of cards. Unlike typical interview podcasts, Wild Card encourages guests to explore uncharted topics, offering listeners an intimate glimpse into their personal experiences and philosophies.

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Memory Round

Question: Where would you go when you wanted to feel safe as a kid?
Timestamp: [01:53]

Michelle Obama reminisces about her childhood home on 7436 South Euclid, emphasizing the sanctuary it provided amidst the challenges of growing up in a working-class neighborhood in Chicago. She fondly recalls her parents, Marian and Fraser Robinson, as pillars of safety and love:

“Safety was our little house on 7436 South Euclid... I could always come back home.”
— Michelle Obama [01:59]

Rachel Martin probes deeper into the uniqueness of her upbringing, highlighting that not everyone has a secure home environment. Michelle acknowledges her parents' intentional efforts to instill emotional empathy and resilience in their children, preparing them to navigate a world that often undervalues them:

“My mom would always say, I love you. You're special, but you're not singular.”
— Michelle Obama [04:42]

Question: What's a piece of advice you were smart to ignore?
Timestamp: [04:43]

Michelle shares a pivotal moment from her high school years when a college counselor discouraged her from applying to Princeton:

“She told me, I don't think you're Princeton material.”
— Michelle Obama [05:06]

Initially furious, Michelle used this setback as motivation to prove doubters wrong, ultimately gaining acceptance into the institution and reinforcing the importance of self-belief over external validation.

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Discussing Her Podcast: IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson

Timestamp: [09:54] - [16:33]

Rachel Martin steers the conversation towards Michelle's new podcast, IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson, exploring its inception and purpose. Michelle explains that the podcast emerged as a way to honor her late mother and step into a role of wisdom alongside her brother, Craig:

“Once my mom passed... there was something to carry on the tradition of family.”
— Michelle Obama [14:11]

She emphasizes the personal and authentic nature of the podcast, distancing herself from her previous political life to engage in meaningful dialogues that resonate with listeners seeking genuine insights.

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Round Two: Beliefs and Ambition

Question: How comfortable are you with change?
Timestamp: [17:36]

Michelle reflects on her adaptability, crediting her husband, Barack Obama, for fostering her comfort with change:

“I married a man that got me real comfortable with change... so I am now very comfortable with change.”
— Michelle Obama [17:41]

She discusses the significant shifts brought about by Barack's political career, highlighting the challenges of uprooting her family's stability to embrace the uncertainties of public life.

Question: Has ambition ever led you astray?
Timestamp: [20:26]

Michelle candidly explores her relationship with ambition, distinguishing between team ambition with Barack and her personal ambitions as she enters a new phase of life:

“I think I'm now at a stage in my life where all my choices are mine... right now, I have not regretted it.”
— Michelle Obama [22:17]

She acknowledges the sacrifices made to balance personal aspirations with family responsibilities and expresses a renewed commitment to embracing her own ambitions independently.

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Addressing Despair and Finding Hope

Question: What's your best defense against despair?
Timestamp: [33:26]

Michelle shares her profound connection with youth as a source of hope and resilience against despair:

“Being around kids gives me hope... When you despair, you stop acting.”
— Michelle Obama [33:26]

She recounts her experiences making surprise visits to high schools, emphasizing the transformative power of genuine interactions with young people. Michelle highlights the importance of taking action, whether through community engagement or personal endeavors, as a means to combat feelings of hopelessness.

Rachel adds her perspective on managing despair by focusing on the immediate, tangible aspects of her environment, promoting the "power of small" actions:

“The power of small... If everybody just exercised their full small power, the butterfly effect...”
— Michelle Obama [39:06]

Together, they underscore the significance of individual contributions in fostering a supportive and proactive community.

---

Memory Time Machine

Final Question: If you could revisit one moment in your past without changing anything, what would it be?
Timestamp: [40:36]

Michelle chooses a cherished memory from her childhood:

“One of the nights after dinner when my dad agrees to play a game... everything is right and safe back in that safe place on 74th and Euclid.”
— Michelle Obama [41:07]

She describes the warmth and security of family gatherings filled with games, laughter, and music, highlighting the profound impact of those moments on her sense of belonging and safety.

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Conclusion

Rachel Martin wraps up the episode by celebrating Michelle Obama's new podcast and encouraging listeners to tune in for more heartfelt conversations. The episode offers a deep dive into Michelle's personal journey, her reflections on ambition, change, and coping with despair, all while sharing timeless memories that shaped her.

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Notable Quotes:

• “Safety was our little house on 7436 South Euclid... I could always come back home.”
  — Michelle Obama [01:59]

• “She told me, I don't think you're Princeton material.”
  — Michelle Obama [05:06]

• “I think I'm now at a stage in my life where all my choices are mine... right now, I have not regretted it.”
  — Michelle Obama [22:17]

• “Being around kids gives me hope... When you despair, you stop acting.”
  — Michelle Obama [33:26]

• “One of the nights after dinner when my dad agrees to play a game... everything is right and safe back in that safe place on 74th and Euclid.”
  — Michelle Obama [41:07]

---

Production Credits:
Produced by Lee Hale, Edited by Dave Blanchard, Mastered by Robert Rodriguez
Executive Producer: Yolanda Sangweni
Theme Music: Ramtin Arablouei
Visuals: Filmed by NPR's visuals team

For more enriching conversations, subscribe to Wild Card+ and support NPR. Discover more episodes and reach out via wildcardpr.org.

Transcript

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[Rachel Martin]

Has ambition ever led you astray?

[Michelle Obama]

Wow. I don't know if my ambition has ever fully been able to actualize itself. I think I'm now at a stage in my life where all my choices are mine.

[Rachel Martin]

I'm Rachel Martin, and this is Wild Card, the show where cards control the conversation. Each week, my guest answers questions about their life, questions pulled from a deck of cards. They're allowed to skip one question and to flip one back on me. My guest this week is former first lady Michelle Obama.

[Michelle Obama]

I am not going to be in politics. I'm not giving another political speech. I'm not campaigning for another candidate. But I'm here.

[Rachel Martin]

Michelle Obama has lived a lot of her adult life under immense scrutiny, which meant carefully thinking through every word she uttered in public. But she is in a place in her life now where she gets to integrate her public and private self a little more. And for listeners to her new podcast, eager to hear what she has learned in this life and it is a real gift. The podcast is called IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson, her brother. And I am so very happy to welcome Michelle Obama to Wildcard.

[Michelle Obama]

Thank you, Rachel.

[Rachel Martin]

Thank you for being here, Rachel.

[Michelle Obama]

I'm at Wildcard. Yay.

[Rachel Martin]

All right, memories round. First three questions. One, two or three?

[Michelle Obama]

Let's do two.

[Rachel Martin]

Two. Where would you go when you wanted to feel safe as a kid?

[Michelle Obama]

Oh, that's an easy one. Safety was our little house on 7436 South Euclid. I mean, the whole house home was safety for me because I had two amazing parents, Marian and Frasier Robinson. And there was a lot to find safety from. Growing up as a working class kid in on the south side of Chicago, you know, our neighborhood wasn't dangerous, but things happened, right? Fights happened, trouble happened. School wasn't always a safe space because sometimes your teachers didn't believe in you or challenged you or second guessed you. You know, so when life happened like that, when people doubted you or questioned your ability, I could always come back home. You know, when I wrote in the Light, I have a chapter about my mom and her parenting principles and one of them was come home, we'll love you here. You know, that philosophy was like, you can't count on other people to love you. Because as a black kid, a Lot of people won't just because of the color of your skin. So you cannot base your whole being on what other people think of you, especially as a black kid. So come home.

[Rachel Martin]

How long did it take you to realize that that is special? Like, not everybody gets that? For so many people, home is not necessarily. Even if they have great parents, great family life, for home to be that secure for you, that's a special thing.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah. I think I got it pretty early on. And I think our parents, they made it a point to make sure we were aware of that because of that emotional empathy that they had. They understood that they were giving us what a lot of kids who were just as smart, just as capable, just as able in our communities and our families weren't getting just because of the roll of the dice. Right. So my mom would always say, I love you. You're special, but you're not singular. It's like you're smart, but you're also blessed. I had a mother who was an advocate when a teacher didn't do what they needed to do by me. But she also knew that she had to be the advocate for other kids there. She was like a room parent before there was a room parent.

[Rachel Martin]

You know, she was going to mother all the people.

[Michelle Obama]

She was going to mother all the people. So I think I knew that early on. Mm. Okay.

[Rachel Martin]

Three new ones. One, two, or three?

[Michelle Obama]

Let's do one.

[Rachel Martin]

Let's do one.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah.

[Rachel Martin]

What's a piece of advice you were smart to ignore?

[Michelle Obama]

Oh, my gosh. You're not Princeton material.

[Rachel Martin]

Who gave you that one?

[Michelle Obama]

My college counselor in high school.

[Rachel Martin]

Are you serious?

[Michelle Obama]

I'm so serious. Yeah. I've written about this, but, yeah. I was a senior at Whitney Young Magnet High School. And, you know, it's a big school magnet program. I was a great student. I was an honor student. I was the treasurer of the senior class. But when I sat down with her, the woman who was supposed to encourage me, she looked at my dreams.

[Rachel Martin]

Big doors. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

She told me, I don't think you're Princeton material.

[Rachel Martin]

So what was your. In the moment, I was furious.

[Michelle Obama]

I was furious. But I was familiar with that bar lowering right, because it happens to minority kids, poor kids, kids of color, all the time. People make snap judgments based on their biases and their limitations. They don't ask questions. And it helped me because throughout my life, when I would hit those roadblocks or meet those people, I was lucky enough to be the child with the temperament that it didn't wound me. It angered Me. And it made me think, I'll show you. Oh. Oh, you don't think I can do this? I'll show you. You know, and I think I just walked away from that woman. I never talked to her again.

[Rachel Martin]

Do you remember getting. I mean, it was probably an envelope in the mail, right? When I got envelopes in the mail.

[Michelle Obama]

Your acceptance letter.

[Rachel Martin]

It wasn't an email.

[Michelle Obama]

It wasn't an email. It wasn't a click on.

[Rachel Martin]

Do you remember, like, looking for. I can't remember. The bigger one. That was.

[Michelle Obama]

Which is kind of harsh. Yeah, no, it was. It was one of the proudest moments, you know, to. And again, I didn't have a lot of support. My parents loved me. But once we started doing things like applying to Ivy League schools, I mean, we were kind of out of their league. Right. I mean, my mom could read over my essay, but, you know, everything I did felt amazing to her. I don't know if she or my dad felt like, well, you could change this segment, or, you know, I mean, they weren't editing us. They were encouraging us. It looks good.

[Rachel Martin]

Go for it.

[Michelle Obama]

It's great. Yeah. So it's like, okay, the safe house I'm in. They're like, go forward. You are fabulous. Right? So I was. I was relieved.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

To prove the doubters wrong.

[Rachel Martin]

Right? It wasn't just your parents who knew.

[Michelle Obama]

It wasn't. Somebody else sees this out here. External validation. Yeah.

[Rachel Martin]

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[Rachel Martin]

Okay, so with your permission, I'm going to push back from the game for a minute. Okay.

[Michelle Obama]

Yes, let's push back.

[Rachel Martin]

Because let's talk about your podcast. Oh, yeah, that. Okay. It's called IMO with Michelle Obama and Carl Robinson, your brother. IMO obviously stands for. In my opinion. It also stands for I'm Michelle Obama.

[Michelle Obama]

I know. My nephew.

[Rachel Martin]

Have people pointed this out?

[Michelle Obama]

My nephew, my. My brother's youngest son who's in seventh grade. He pointed it out.

[Rachel Martin]

Did you really not think that?

[Michelle Obama]

No, we did. We did. Yeah, we did.

[Rachel Martin]

And also the subtext of that is like, this is me.

[Michelle Obama]

I am O. Yes, this is you.

[Rachel Martin]

Is this you owning your voice in any way?

[Michelle Obama]

You know, I. I think people who have known me and seen me have felt like, ah, she pretty much. She owns her voice. She speaks out, she says, you know, but yes, this is the period in my life when, you know, the gosh, the stakes are not so high.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

You know, I mean, 10 years in the public eye, eight years in the White House, where every word.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

Every utterance, every heel on my shoe, every blink of my eye, every fist bump was analyzed, dissected, and broadcast. Celebrated in some instances and ridiculed or disparaged in others. So even when you're an honest, authentic person, you're watchful and mindful because you don't want to be the one that creates problems for the President of the United States, who happens to be your husband. We also knew that we were on a razor thin wire of ability to make mistakes as the first.

[Rachel Martin]

Is it a hard habit to kick, though? Like, you know what I mean? The podcast, the mic is open, you're talking to people. You want to be loose. You want to be Free.

[Michelle Obama]

Well, you know, and I know my team is here. It's a hard habit for my team to kick. Right. And I say that with all the love.

[Rachel Martin]

They're looking out for you.

[Michelle Obama]

Exactly. And to move from first lady world into other worlds, the same cautiousness and habits, because we all have a little ptsd. We all felt responsible for the legacy of Barack Obama, for what that administration meant. Right. So everybody was always on alert, you know? So it takes a second when you start thinking, well, can you go here? Can you say this? Can you touch this third rail? You know, knowing that even in this phase in our lives, when Barack and I say something right or wrong, it does get covered.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

You know, the fact that people don't see me going out on a date with my husband sparks rumors of the end of our marriage. I mean, it's sort of. So we still, you know, so that is the apocalypse. It's the apocalypse. It's like, okay, so Instagram every minute of our lives. We are 60. We're 60, y' all. We just. You just are not gonna know what we're doing every minute of the day, you know? And, yes, I guess we're famous, but we're 60.

[Rachel Martin]

You are. You're real famous.

[Michelle Obama]

We don't take selfies. I just. You know, Barack was joking. He's like, you don't even take pictures of anything we do. I was like, I'm not thinking about a picture.

[Rachel Martin]

No.

[Michelle Obama]

Right.

[Rachel Martin]

You're trying to be in the moment.

[Michelle Obama]

I'm really bad at taking pictures. That's right. So anyway, so I think they. Them breaking the habit is as much of an adjustment.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah. So I don't have to tell you that you inhabit a special place in the culture. You do.

[Michelle Obama]

That's weird.

[Rachel Martin]

You just do.

[Michelle Obama]

You're not weird.

[Rachel Martin]

You're more than like, a role model. You're like. For many people, especially women, young women, young women of color, you're like a North Star. And it doesn't matter if you don't know everything. Michelle Obama. People think you know everything. People think you've got the answers to all the stuff. So I guess my question is this show, there's an advice component to this. So is this your way of kind of making peace with your place in the world and just saying, okay, yeah, yeah. Let me tell you some stuff.

[Michelle Obama]

I got some stuff. Yeah. I think it's a few things, imo, you know, it wasn't an accident that it. It's happening. Right after my mom passed, it's been a year. Just a month. Ago since my mother passed. And we were starting to have these conversations a little bit. But I think once my mom passed and the notion of doing something with my brother, you know, where we would be forced to see each other on a regular basis, became a big motivator. Right. To carry on just the tradition of family that you lose when you lose the last elder. It's also that time in life where Craig and I looked at each other and we're like, well, we're it.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

We are the elders in our family. Right. I guess my parents have passed too, you know, so there's just something psychological that happens to you when that baton you. Literally, it's not past. You're holding it. It's just you working over the cliff. That's exactly. Exactly Right. And kind of realizing, well, let's step up, because, you know, look, we did. We were blessed with a lot of wisdom and a lot of unique perspectives from two parents who are no longer here that helped us be where we are, and they're no longer here to deliver those messages. And a lot of people didn't have that. So we have an opportunity to keep their memory and that wisdom alive, to own the fact that we now have that wisdom and. And then to share it with others who may not have that same kind of support system. At a time when people are lonely, they're feeling even more isolated, you know, so all of that kind of played a role in thinking not only could this be a good idea, but it could also be fun.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

Which is also where I am in life. If. If it's not fun for me selfishly, then. Then let's not do it. But it's been all of that and just being able to still have a platform to give voice to people, to let people know that we're still here, not in a different way. I am not going to be in politics. I'm not giving another political speech. I'm not campaigning for another candidate. But I'm here. I'm here in different ways.

[Rachel Martin]

Did you ever think about not being here? I mean, not being here, but like going away, just living a super private life and curling up. Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

And I get that more than I ever have gotten it ever before. So everything is relative. Right. But I am. I'm 60, but I'm still just 60, and I still feel like I can't just. I can't stop yet.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

It's like, okay, I'm ready to slow down a bit, but not stop. And that time will come. Yeah. But it's probably too Soon. So finding creative ways to stay engaged that is still useful and is authentic to my nature, which is advice giving and talking, as you can see, I can talk is, I think, a good balance to strike. And I think our listeners are having fun with it.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah, I'm having fun with it. It's a great show. Round two with Michelle Obama. This is Insights. Three new cards. One, two or three?

[Michelle Obama]

Three.

[Rachel Martin]

Three. How comfortable are you with change?

[Michelle Obama]

I thank you, Barack Obama. I married a man that got me real comfortable with change, Right? So I am now very comfortable with change.

[Rachel Martin]

That was not the case when you came.

[Michelle Obama]

I, you know, I, I was, we were a perfect square in my household. Mom, dad, brother, sister, dad goes to work, has a shift job. Life was predictable. You know, we lived a, you know, stable, stable. Barack used to call us the Black Cleavers, you know, the Leave it to Beaver family, which was the total opposite of the life he grew up with. Being the son of a teen mother, not knowing his father, mother and anthropologist, living around the world, being, you know, sometimes living without his mother, living with his grand, you know. So his introduction to my little working class life was like Xanadu. Like, who are these people? Right? So when my husband approached me about getting into politics, a was like, what? Well, we don't do that.

[Rachel Martin]

And we got it good right here. Chicago.

[Michelle Obama]

We had replicated our little universe. We had that stability. You know, Barack, we both had great jobs. Barack could have done anything. He could be a professor, he could be an appellate courtier. He could have been a Supreme Court clerk. He's like, no, no, no, no. None of that.

[Rachel Martin]

Got all these big dreams.

[Michelle Obama]

Got all these big crazy dreams. The biggest, craziest one was Run, which was the biggest, massive change, not just in terms of a career move, but if he won, we'd have to move from the safety and security of a community, a city that was our own. I would uproot my kids in ways that I hadn't experienced. So how do you.

[Rachel Martin]

Maybe not how you visualize being a parent.

[Michelle Obama]

Didn't visualize that. So could I do that? But, yeah, I got used to change and I learned to realize that. Pivoting a bit, are you better swerving a bit? Yeah, I'm better at riding it. And I encourage people to practice it because it is a practice. Practicing change in the muscle and getting over that scary feeling of I don't know what this is going to be and being able to decipher between the fear that keeps you safe and that keeps the fear that keeps you stuck yeah. So I think I've become much more adept at it. Three more.

[Rachel Martin]

Three more. One, two, three.

[Michelle Obama]

Two, two.

[Rachel Martin]

Has ambition ever led you astray?

[Michelle Obama]

Has ambition? That's a good question. Let me flip this one on you. Just because. Just because I want to.

[Rachel Martin]

You know, I have not had this one flipped on me.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay. All right. Oh, Michelle.

[Rachel Martin]

I have sometimes lost my mooring. I have sometimes been attracted to the bright, shiny thing in a career that can promise more money, more notoriety, more attention.

[Michelle Obama]

And it's not.

[Rachel Martin]

It's. Those places aren't home to me, actually. And it took a lot for me to recognize. I did. I was able in the. In the moment to recognize I don't feel like me here.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah.

[Rachel Martin]

I don't feel like me here. It's all part of life experience, right? You try stuff off and you make mistakes. Right. So it's not all bad to indulge a little bit of ambition that may be leading you astray as long as you find your way back. You know what I mean?

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah. You know, the thing I keep thinking is, like, wow. I don't know if my ambition has ever fully been able to actualize itself because of the nature of what me and my husband have done. I mean, you know, I guess you as a team, you know, it wasn't.

[Rachel Martin]

About your individual ambition, was it?

[Michelle Obama]

Right. It was the team ambition. And I went along, arguably kicking and screaming. Right. And, you know, I think I'm now at a stage in my life where all my choices are mine. All my. You know, now I can say that whatever I'm doing from this point on is about my ambition, you know, and that's fairly new. Right. Because as a working mother, you know, I think all of that stuff, it kind of cut my ambitions short a little bit because I had to make a set of decisions. Okay. My husband's over here. Got these kids over here. I don't know if I can afford to be ambitious right now. So I have to take a step back. Even though ambition is there, I can see where I could make more money. I could do that. But I got these little kids that I love, and I do want to go to the Halloween parade, and I want to. So I think I kind of squelched my ambition. But now is a time for me to embrace my own ambition and to define it for me. So maybe the answer is, we'll see. Because I think I'm just now stepping fully stepping into my own ambition, and right now, I have not regretted it.

[Rachel Martin]

Part of ambition in living your own life is saying yes to things you want to do. It's also saying no, I imagine, to things that you don't want to do.

[Michelle Obama]

For sure. And we experienced that. One of the major decisions I made this year, to stay put and not attend funerals and inaugurations and all the things that I'm supposed to. And that was a part of me, you know, using my ambition to say, let me define what I want to do apart from what I'm supposed to do, what the world expects of me. And I have to own that. Those are my choices. Whatever the backlash was, I had to sit in it and own it. But I didn't regret it, you know?

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah. Cause it's your life.

[Michelle Obama]

It's my life now, and I can say that now. But we'll see. Maybe next year we sit down, I go, you know, Rachel went a little too far.

[Rachel Martin]

I'm gonna reign it back in.

[Michelle Obama]

Reign it back.

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[Rachel Martin]

Okay, last round.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay. How you feeling? I feel great.

[Rachel Martin]

You feel good?

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah. We're breezing through this.

[Rachel Martin]

We are breezing through this. Okay. This is beliefs.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay.

[Rachel Martin]

Okay. One, two, or three?

[Michelle Obama]

Let's go with two.

[Rachel Martin]

Two. How often do you think about death?

[Michelle Obama]

Hmm. I should flip this one just because we're almost done.

[Rachel Martin]

I'll let you flip. I'll give you two flips. Cause my answer's so short.

[Michelle Obama]

All the time.

[Rachel Martin]

I think about death all the time. I mean, I do, right? Death is life. Death is life. It's the flip side. It makes living feel precious and urgent and vivid. And yeah, like I told you, my parents died.

[Michelle Obama]

It feels.

[Rachel Martin]

I made this show in part because I like to talk about how we live our life and how precious it all is and what does happen after we're gone. Yeah, I don't know the answers to any of these things, but they. They occupy my imagination. So I think about it. I think about it all the time.

[Michelle Obama]

I'm right there with you. I do. And not in a morbid way.

[Rachel Martin]

No, I read about this in your book and how your parents talked to you about dying.

[Michelle Obama]

That's right. That's right.

[Rachel Martin]

It was a. Nor to make it a normal thing.

[Michelle Obama]

Well, and also, you know, as we get older, you know, look, and my husband thinks this is morbid, but at 61, you know, if. If I am lucky, if I am truly blessed, I'm like 25 more summers.

[Rachel Martin]

Oh, yeah. I do that math all the time.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah.

[Rachel Martin]

You know, and I measure out how old my kids are against that because.

[Michelle Obama]

If you're not mindful about time, you know, like 10 years. We've been out of office for 10 years. Right? What happened? What happened in those 10 years? You know, I mean, it's like what I did a lot, right? I mean, two, three books, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. There's a lot that happened, but it went by fast. And I'm at the stage of life where I want the next 10 years to go by slowly because guess what? I love life. I love my life. I love life. But if you. What I feel is that if I'm not mindful about it, the years slip away and you wind up spending a year doing what? Did you do anything you wanted to? Did you spend time with the people that you wanted to spend time with doing the things that you wanted to do? And there's a part time in life for all young people where you just don't have that luxury because you're grinding and growing, growing and building. You haven't earned it yet. Right. And you should be out there doing and shaking and baking. But with 25 more summers, I want to know. I want to feel each one of them.

[Rachel Martin]

I know.

[Michelle Obama]

I want to be like, woo. This year. Woo. This was slow. It was like I didn't do much of anything. Did I accomplish anything? I got bored and I was like, oh, I Read another book. Oh, it took forever.

[Rachel Martin]

Do you think you're comfortable with. With real slowness, though? Like, do you think that's.

[Michelle Obama]

Yes. Oh, you are. Okay. Oh, yes, I am. And a day of nothing is one of those nice, slow days where you look up and go, ah, man, it's only noon. I want more of those because I want these last 25 summers to feel long and purposeful and mine not. Because I've given that time away and I looked up and it's all gone. I've given it all away to everybody else, and I don't even know what was left for me. And so I think all of that is a part of thinking about death. Totally. You know, and when it comes, look, I'm not afraid of it. But you're not. No, I'm not. But let me tell you one thing that was interesting to me, and I think you're. The first person I share this with publicly is like, the last year, my mom's life, she got. She was. Her body was just shutting down for a number of various reasons. And her last bout of illness, she was with me in Hawaii, in our home in Hawaii, which was a blessing, right, because she was forced to let me take care of her.

[Rachel Martin]

She didn't want.

[Michelle Obama]

Oh, my God.

[Rachel Martin]

She wanted to be a burden.

[Michelle Obama]

She didn't want to be a burden. And, ooh, did I. I had doctors and nurses and everybody coming in, and we had her diet and this, and I bossing her around, and she was mad, and she was, I just want to go home. And it's like, but you can't. You're stuck with me. You know, I could just take care of her. And she got better and went back to Chicago. But we were sitting on the couch watching one of her court shows because she liked court shows. And she was realizing that, you know, she might. She will not ever be the same old self that she was. She was starting to realize she's coming to the end. And this woman that prepared me for death, right, and talked to me about all this stuff and was like, I'm ready to die. Who needs to be old people around too long? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. She leaned over to me and she said, wow, this went fast. And I held her hand. I said, what are you talking about? And she said, life. She said, this went fast, and this was the woman who was ready. And what that told me was that even when you tell yourself you're ready, if you're living a good life, you're never really ready for it to end. Right. So I hope I feel that way, even though I will be ready for it, you know, because it's been good and purposeful that I'll feel like I wish I had more time. So I'm trying to live my life like that, you know? Rachel. Darn you. That's your stupid cards. Oh, back up. All right, last one. Flip. I don't even care what it is. Just flip.

[Rachel Martin]

You already got two.

[Michelle Obama]

You pick it. Okay. You pick the last one.

[Rachel Martin]

You want me to.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah, you pick.

[Rachel Martin]

These are all so good.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay, then you took all of them and. Okay. And I won't flip. Cause I've had my flips.

[Rachel Martin]

Fine.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay.

[Rachel Martin]

Dealer's choice.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay.

[Rachel Martin]

Because I really do want to know your answer. I mean, I want to know your answer to all of them.

[Michelle Obama]

But the others, you weren't so sure.

[Rachel Martin]

You should. Take it or leave it. What's your best defense against despair?

[Michelle Obama]

Mm. This is easy. It's being around kids, being around young people. That's why most of my initiatives in the White House involved young people. And I'd be having a bad day, and I talk to my team, and I'd be like, ugh, get me to some kids now, stat. You know? So one of the things we used to do was to make these surprise visits to high schools in the area. And my goal was to get to every high school, but it was like, we're not going to make it a big deal. We don't want kids fighting over who's coming. We don't want to shut down the school and all this. So if it's an OTR and off the record, you could pretty much do that, but it's still the first lady in the presidential motorcade. So we would always hook in the Secretary of education, who would go in as sort of the ruse of we're here to announce a da da da PA da PA da policy. And the kids would be there, and then I'd come in, and they'd just be like, what? No media? No everything? And then we'd just talk, right? We'd talk about life. First we'd have to get them to stop crying and stop screaming, you know, and that took a while because we would try to do these things in an hour. And I was like, these kids aren't going to settle down. This is too much of a shock. So we need to make the time limitless, like, until they can calm down enough. Because, like, kids, once they calm down and see that you're real.

[Rachel Martin]

Yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

You know, and it's like. And I'M just like this, you know, Then they start asking real questions, but it takes a minute. Those would be some of my best days, you know, of just like, get me to a school.

[Rachel Martin]

So what do you do now? There's a lot of.

[Michelle Obama]

A lot of despair. Huh? Despair.

[Rachel Martin]

You're just like, give me to a kid.

[Michelle Obama]

Give me to a kid. Yeah, what do you do? It's sprinkled throughout my life still. You know, when I did my book tours and we did book stops, we always went into the community, stopped by school or with a leadership group of some sort, or at a college or what have you. So we try to filter it in. But kids give me hope. And they remind me of the fact that we don't have the luxury of despair as adults, you know, because when you despair, you stop acting. It sort of gives you the excuse to just give up and be in your despair. And we can't afford that because when we aren't acting, doing our part, mentoring, voting, you know, doing whatever we can, caring, not being complacent or apathetic or so disappointed that I just can't be bothered, we are wasting. Apathy is dangerous. And it's dangerous for our kids because they can't act. They don't have a vote. They can't change anything. They live in the country we create for them.

[Rachel Martin]

But it also sounds like in a very granular way, when you, Michelle Obama, wake up and it's feeling too much and something happens and despair sets in. Your go to is to do. To act. Yeah, to like, get up and do something.

[Michelle Obama]

And if it's with kids, or maybe it's just a workout, maybe it's moving, you know, but sitting still for me is the. It is the opposite of combating despair. Sitting in it, thinking too much about it, stewing in it, stewing in it, but moving and doing something. That's why it's like the key to depression for me. If it's not clinical, the first step is just get out of bed, get up and connect to people. We aren't built to do this life alone. And we need to be around each other to be reminded of who we are and why we exist. And we do not exist for ourselves because we can't survive on our own. We are as a human species, we're pretty weak. You know, we don't do well in the sun. We don't have fur, our teeth don't do anything. We have no claws. I mean, camping is very difficult. Camping is difficult for most people. You know, I mean, I. I Love those nature shows, the Alaskan bush people. I'm like, you are gonna be.

[Rachel Martin]

Just watch that with popcorn. You just watch that from the living room.

[Michelle Obama]

Oh, we'd be dead in an hour. You know, we need community, you know, so being in the presence of other people, you know, that helps me as well. What about you?

[Rachel Martin]

Oh, look at you. Just playing with. Flipping with abandon. Flipping with abandon.

[Michelle Obama]

It said that's less a flip. Cause I answered it first. So this is just more curious.

[Rachel Martin]

It's the same. It's to reach out to people and it's to get. It's to get micro. So much of my despair when it happens is macro. It's about the big stuff that I find hard to control. So it's like, let me think about the things that are in my patch of the world. Let me think about my next door neighbor and what's going down with her. Let me think about my kids and how I can make this meal special for them. And like, just get. I get. I try to get hyper local about it and it makes me. And it's selfish. Cause it makes me feel better, you know, and then it has the ancillary benefit of hopefully helping other people. But like, it's too easy to get lost in the existential dread.

[Michelle Obama]

I call it the power of small.

[Rachel Martin]

Yes.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah, totally. We think so much about big. Big change big. Everything's gotta be big and huge. And most of us don't have the biggest platform to make big things happen. But I've seen how big power can't do a lot. You know, the President of the United States, for reasons we are now learning there's a limit to those powers. And they should be. Because you can mess up a lot if your power goes unchecked. But if you think of the power of a good neighbor, the power of being a good parent to the kids you brought into this world, well, yeah, that's something each and every one of us can do. And we. If everybody did that, if everybody just exercised their full small power.

[Rachel Martin]

Oh yeah.

[Michelle Obama]

The butterfly effect that just around, you know. So I agree.

[Rachel Martin]

We end the show the same way every time.

[Michelle Obama]

Okay.

[Rachel Martin]

With a trip in our memory time machine. Oh, are you excited? So it's make believe. I just do this. Okay. So in the memory time machine, you get to go back to one moment in your past. It is not a moment you want to change anything about. Okay. This is just a moment that you want to linger in a little bit longer. What moment do you choose?

[Michelle Obama]

It's on. It's. It's gotta be on Euclid Avenue one of the nights after dinner when my dad's on a regular shift where he's home for dinner and he agrees to play a game because our parents were regular parents. Like, we're not playing with you, you know? Right. It's like, so the decision to play with us after dinner, big deal, was huge, right? Whether it was a game of hands down or this the way or singing or dancing game or any game, it's like he'd decide. And then to top it off, not only would my dad agree to play, but my mom would finish the dishes and come and play, too. And the four of us would be sitting in our, we're sitting in the living room just playing a game and laughing and music is on. And it feels like everything is right and safe back in that safe place on 74th in Euclid. I'd be back there.

[Rachel Martin]

That's a lovely one.

[Michelle Obama]

Yeah.

[Rachel Martin]

Michelle Obama. Her new podcast is called IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson. Congratulations on that show. Everybody listen and it's wonderful. Thank you so much for being here.

[Michelle Obama]

Thank you.

[Rachel Martin]

Thank you for listening. If you are new to the show, welcome. We are so glad that you're here. If you enjoyed this conversation, follow our show. For more conversations just like it. I might recommend checking out the chat that I had with LeVar Burton. He talks about the pressure of being LeVar Burton. Or the interview that I did with the writer Zadie Smith, who also tackles that despair question and has just incredibly beautiful things to say about it. There's also an episode with radio legend Ira Glass, who talks about how he plays basically a nicer version of himself on the radio. We've got a lot for you, so I hope you stick around. This episode was produced by Lee Hale and edited by by Dave Blanchard. It was mastered by Robert Rodriguez with engineering help from Jay Siz and Andy Huether. And a big shout out to NPR's visuals team who filmed it all. If you'd like to see that version, search for the show on YouTube. Wildcard's executive producer is Yolanda Sangweni and we had extra help from Natalie Winston. Our theme music is by Ramtin Arablouei. You can reach out to [e-mail] we'll shuffle of the deck and be back with more next week. Talk to you then.

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