Overwhelmed by the world? Glennon Doyle says focus on staying human at heart

Each week, millions tune in to the podcast “We Can Do Hard Things,” on which writer Glennon Doyle, her wife, Olympic gold medalist soccer player Abby Wambach, and her sister, former lawyer Amanda Doyle, interview famous guests. The podcast’s title was inspired by a sign with that phrase that hung in her colleague Josie’s second-grade classroom just around the corner from her own at the time. (Doyle was a young teacher trying to get sober.)

Shelf Help is a wellness column where we interview researchers, thinkers and writers about their latest books — all with the aim of learning how to live a more complete life.

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But two years ago, the hard things were starting to pile up again: Glennon was diagnosed with anorexia, Amanda was diagnosed with breast cancer and Abby’s brother died suddenly. To help Abby through her grief, Glennon left a Samuel Beckett quote on her pillow. Abby returned the favor with a quote about body image. The pattern continued, and the three hosts began collecting nuggets of wisdom from their podcast and other sources to help one another. Soon enough, they’d built up a gigantic digital file full of lessons on grief, body image, health and other topics. That file inspired their book, “We Can Do Hard Things: Answers to Life’s 20 Questions” (Penguin Random House), a collection of lessons on every life category, answering questions like Chapter 1’s “Why am I like this?” to Chapter 20’s “What is the point?”

For them, the book is a manual for being alive. “When you travel through a new country, you need a guidebook,” Doyle says. “When you travel through love, heartbreak, joy, parenting, friendship, uncertainty, aging, grief, new beginnings — life — you need a guidebook too.” As such, the book offers advice and wisdom from 118 “wayfinders,” many of whom were Doyle’s prior podcast guests.

The Times spoke with Doyle about how she stays hopeful in dark times and aims to raise compassionate, resilient children.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Glennon Doyle

(Photo by Alex Hedison)

In the book, Elizabeth Gilbert discusses social media’s negative impact on women. You recently said that quitting social media this past year has been as impactful on your nervous system as quitting drinking. What is your relationship with it like now, especially in terms of marketing your book?

Social media made me feel terrible: [When I was using it,] I felt less human and more angry, and I started to lose my ability to see people as people rather than ideologies. A day after deleting it in the fall, I texted my team to give me the passwords again (which they didn’t). I was reminded of when I used to hide bottles of booze from myself above the refrigerator; the next day, [I would] find myself making ladders out of chairs and pillows to get it. Now that I’m off social media, I’m starting to feel braver about my art, because I no longer worry about how people will respond to what I put into the world.

One of your book’s chapters is largely inspired by the wisdom you’ve acquired throughout your journey with anorexia. What’s it like to be so public about your eating disorder in a culture that stigmatizes mental illness?

I do OK if I am not hiding anything. Recently, I wrote in my newsletter about how when my eating issues pop up again, I worry that my whole family is thinking, “Are you freaking kidding? Why aren’t you over this yet?” A stranger wrote back saying, “Humpback whales are born with one song they sing from the time they’re born till the time they die, and that’s how they locate their family. You’re just a humpback whale.” That gave me such comfort.

The other night at an awards show, a woman said to me, “You look amazing! What is your secret?” I often find people tell me I look my best when I’m doing my worst. So I said, “My secret is that I have anorexia. I have a severe mental disorder. This isn’t healthy, and I’m trying to beat this.” I’m trying to find a way to walk through the public part of it, but telling the truth always helps a little bit.

At one point, the book suggests that our anger can signal to us when things are wrong in our society. Generally, do you stay connected with people whose political beliefs are opposite to yours?

I agree with James Baldwin: “We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.” If you think it’s OK for a child to be dragged out of their home, put in a detention center and put in a court with no representation or explanation, I’m not interested in building bridges with you.

That said, in a way, I feel less divided now. Human rights have become so threatened that if you’re somebody who wants to protect the most vulnerable people in this country, right now, I don’t give a s— what else you believe. Let’s just band together and fight. The rise of fascism has always occurred when the left was busy arguing about who they would and would not align with. I’m more open now to aligning with people who agree with me about the basics: Children should be protected, people should be able to love who they love, and people of any class or skin color should have access to money, hope and freedom.

What would you say to people who want the experience of being parents but don’t want to bring children up in today’s world?

When I say that I’m glad that I did, I’m really glad. I’m not saying I wish I had known better so that I wouldn’t have. I do feel, especially lately, a deep terror about my children being in this world. I taught them a lot about justice, and now they’re doing brave things out in the world related to justice that are scaring the crap out of me. They’re still young, and it breaks my heart to think about them wondering where the adults are in all of this. Some of the people I know who have the most amazing mothering energy, who mother me the most, are people who don’t have kids. I think that the idea that a parent or mother is something you are only if you give birth to a kid is wrong. There’s a mothering energy that we need more than ever right now, that every single person can unleash in their communities, families and local governments, whether or not they have children.

(Maggie Chiang / For The Times)

The last chapter of your book is called “What is the point?” What do you say to people who have all the same feelings as you about the state of the world but feel that working toward change is moot?

My favorite story is about a Vietnam protester who used to stand outside the White House every night with one tiny candle. It looked ridiculous to everybody, and after enough time, a reporter came and said, “What are you doing? Do you think this one little candle is going to change policy?” And he said, “I don’t stand out here every night to change them. I stand out every night so they don’t change me.”

Our job isn’t to change the world. The reason to show up is not to make other people more human — it’s so that you don’t become inhuman. You have to do whatever you can each day to ensure you don’t lose your love, joy, humanity or will to live. That sounds dramatic until you study the rise of fascism throughout history, which has always required a slow deadening, numbing and apathy in people. Whatever you can do to stay believing, stay in love, stay in hope and stay in compassion, is your duty.

Shelf Help is a wellness column where we interview researchers, thinkers and writers about their latest books — all with the aim of learning how to live a more complete life. Want to pitch us? Email [email protected].