Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hi there, and welcome back to the Midlife Happiness Project.
This week's episode is a bit of a departure from our regular format. Today I'm speaking with an expert on mindfulness and how the practice of mindfulness can lead to greater happiness, reduced stress, better sleep, and a whole range of other benefits. My guest is my friend, Alan Weiss. He is a fascinating person. He was a professor at Stanford and now he is a retired USC professor, a successful entrepreneur, author, mindfulness teacher, and perhaps the most zen human being I have ever met. So join me on today's episode and learn how mindfulness can add to your personal happiness.
My guest today is Alan Weiss. Hello, Alan.
[00:01:03] Speaker B: Hello, Sarah.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: A little bit about Alan Alan received a B's from UCSB in electrical engineering and an MA from Ohio State University in counseling psychology before turning into a professional musician with a band in Kansas. He then went on to get an MBA and PhD in marketing and started his academic career at Stanford. He then finished his career at USC where he became the director of Mindful USC.
He is also a senior teacher at Insite LA, where he has taught mindfulness classes for the past 17 years. He started meditating in the mindfulness tradition in 2005, and in 2011, Los Angeles magazine noted his basics of mindfulness class at Insite LA as the best of L. A.
Side note, he has also recently published a book called the Brand's Benefit Playbook, which is a strategic guide that helps businesses win in the marketplace by focusing on brand benefits. That's just a little side note. If he wasn't interesting enough, that's just another little detail. But clearly Alan is a busy guy. He's a very interesting, complex person with a lot of life experiences, and I cannot wait to, to find out more. So again, welcome, Alan.
[00:02:50] Speaker B: Well, thank you so much, Sarah, for having me.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: Absolutely. So we could probably talk about any number of subjects with you. Without doubt. But today I thought we would focus on mindfulness. And before we start getting into it, I think a lot of our listeners and viewers have sort of this idea of mindfulness. We hear that word thrown around a lot. I think we have sort of a vague idea, but can you sort of define, as you know it, what do we mean by mindfulness?
[00:03:28] Speaker B: Sure. Mindfulness is that the way I explain it to my students is really. It just got two parts. Okay. The first part is just paying attention to the present moment. Okay. And that means your body sensations, your emotions, and your thinking. Okay. But the second part is just doing this without reacting, without judgment, just, just noticing. Okay. This is thinking. This is thinking, okay, anxiety arises, you know, oh, this is anxiety, or anxiety's like this. Okay. It's really, that's really basically what mindfulness is now. It doesn't come easy, of course, and this is the reason why people have to meditate, because nobody has this naturally. But that's how, that's how it basically works.
And as I mentioned, I've been doing this for a long time, but I can tell you the story if you're interested in how I got into it, because I actually practiced, I learned transcendental meditation a long time ago, but I couldn't stick with it because in retrospect, it was a concentration meditation. And that's not what mindfulness is, because it allows your mind to, if there's an emotion, you move your attention to your emotion, etcetera.
But what happened for me was that I was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 1997.
Anyway, I had an operation. It was successful and all of that, but I had to go back every year to have an MRI done. And it was during that time period when my anxiety level just went through the ceiling, because I was so anxious about every year that I had to do this MRI. And I tried all sorts of things. I tried psychotropic drugs, I tried psychiatry, I tried psychology and all of that. None of it was working for me. And I ended up going on a, on a kind of a mindfulness retreat for two days in Los Angeles. And it was really interesting because I went up to Trudy Goodman, who was running it, and I told her about my experience, and she said, okay, if you want to get rid of your anxiety pretty quickly, I want you to meditate 45 minutes every day. And I went, what? And she said, yeah, try it. And so that's exactly what I did, was I started meditating and I joined a group and I started doing this, and I've been doing it ever since.
I think Trudy just saw me because I was a faculty member at USC. She thought I'd be a good teacher, so she got me involved in all of this. And so that's how I got into mindfulness. And I've been teaching it now for, as you mentioned, since about 2007, I guess, is when I started teaching it. And it's been fun. It's been really enjoyable. I've learned a great deal about a lot of different things. And I think one of the things that we're going to talk about is what I've learned about happiness and kind of like, and how that arises, you know? And I'm not saying it just comes from mindfulness. It comes from a lot of different things, but.
[00:07:04] Speaker A: So here's a question then. Can you practice mindfulness without meditation, or are meditation and mindfulness one in the same?
[00:07:15] Speaker B: Well, I mean, you can do walking meditation, okay, which is really where you just walk and instead of, like, just noticing the physical sensations of walking, okay.
And we actually do this on retreat a lot, you know, where you just literally are just walking. But instead of, like, saying, oh, there's a bird over here, and this is really nice, you're just paying attention to the physical sensations of walking. And that's it. That's one way to do it. You can actually sit outside and close your eyes and just listen to sounds, okay. But instead of saying, oh, there's a bird, there's this. And that, you just basically say, okay, this is hearing. This is what hearing is like. And just noticing, like, what I call the kiss of the sound, okay. The very first touch of the sound. And so those are simple ways that you can actually practice mindfulness without having to close your eyes, sit down, and, you know, and do a daily meditation. Although, you know, you can, if you daily meditate for even five or seven or eight minutes or so a day, you start getting the benefits of a meditation practice.
[00:08:26] Speaker A: But I like what you're telling me because I have to admit, I went down the path like a lot of people did and tried to really get into meditation first and foremost, I should say, it's harder than one would think. I certainly was in the group that thought, well, you're just sitting in a quiet room. How hard can it be? But it sounds so ridiculous. But it is the truth. Thinking of nothing and being present in the moment is incredibly challenging.
You think you are committed, but then you start making lists in your head and next thing you know, you're worrying about something else. But over and above that, I like what you're saying about how you can take this mindfulness, this meditation, and use it in a more practical way.
Going for a walk, sitting outside. I think sometimes meditation can be maybe intimidating to people. They have to maintain a certain pose in the right environment and they think, that's not really going to work for my life.
[00:09:31] Speaker B: Right, right.
But can I just say one thing, Sarah?
[00:09:35] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:09:37] Speaker B: First of all, if I sit down and my mind is going crazy, okay. And I'm going to meditate, I just close my eyes and I go, this is what a crazy mind is like. This is a crazy mind. If I get impatient, like, you know, you're saying, I just go, okay, impatience is like this. This is what it feels like to. And so you're not. You're not. It's not like you're denying. And people who meditate, it's not like they have these calm minds and all of that. They have planning minds. Just that instead of kind of going like, oh, this is horrible, I have a planning mind. Just go, okay. This is planning. This is planning.
[00:10:18] Speaker A: So you're owning the feeling and you're owning that moment. It almost sounds to me like an out of body experience, right? You're looking down on yourself and saying, oh, so that's what it's like to feel manic or anxious or whatever the case might be.
[00:10:35] Speaker B: Yeah, that's all it is, you know? And so it's really. It's really simple, you know?
But, yeah, a lot of people think that because they plan a lot and they're doing all these things. It's just. You just notice it. This is thinking. This is thinking. This is what thinking is like. Okay. I'm not saying it's easy by any means am I saying it's easy. I've been on the first retreat I did. First long retreat, which was 30 days. I remember feeling locked up when they shut the gate at Spirit Rock because I thought, oh, my God. But, you know, two days into it, I was a very mellow, low key person.
[00:11:15] Speaker A: Well, I'm going to need you. I'm going to need you to be a little bit more specific because you're very modest. You're playing this down. The part of this he's not sharing is that this wasn't just a 30 day retreat. It was a 30 day silent street, which, I mean, let me tell you, that's a. That's a long time to be silent. Can you share with us about that first experience? Because I know you've done similar things since.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: Right, right. Yeah. No, the first time I was. I was. My back was hurting. There was all these things going on, but I decided I was just going to do it. And so it's like a lot of things in life where you just say, okay, I'll try this out. I'll just try this out.
And you just.
I'm not trying to sell people here on mindfulness. Okay. I know, because there's something more profound that I've learned through this whole process that I think is general for everybody. And I think it's really kind of a sense of our happiness, and it's something that I've learned about myself through this whole process.
As I started meditating and something happened to me, that really started putting it all in perspective, because I'm like a lot of people who've kind of gone through life, and I found times when I've done things that I've really. That brought me happiness, etcetera, but I couldn't understand, like, well, what is it about these things that really, you know, made me happy? You know? Yeah, they were things I liked, but whatever it is. But, you know, it was. What was interesting was that I started working with this one teacher named Lee Brazington, and he was referred to me by Jack Kornfield, who's a major figure in mindfulness and Buddhism. And he got me interested in what's known as the JHNas, which are these deep states of meditation that bring just amazing amounts of joy and happiness during the meditation. It's an amazing experience to experience this. But he had a teacher that said something that I thought was really interesting, and it started mapping into my own personal experience, which was, her name was Ayakema, and she was a buddhist nun from Germany. But she said something that I thought was very interesting. She said, when you see a beautiful sunset and you get such delight from it, it's not the sunset that gives you the delight. It's the immersion in the sunset that gives you the delight.
And when I read that the first time, I went, oh, that makes. I get that. So what it told me, and I've actually since met researchers who have studied this process, but it was actually this kind of immersion that when we get immersed in something, okay, so let's talk about what immersion means. It really basically just means to be absorbed, be totally kind of involved with something, but doing it with a quiet mind, okay, if you're going to sit there and go like, oh, I'm doing this, and why am I doing it? And all that, that's not going to get you happy. But if you're just doing something and you're just totally invested in it, you know, you're totally absorbed with it, you can see that it brings happiness. And for anybody who doubts this, just think about a movie you've gone to that you've just been totally absorbed by and how much you enjoyed it. The absorption is what made you enjoy it.
If you have a book or something, Sarah, you run, etcetera. I'm sure there's times when you're running where you're just totally absorbed in the whole experience, and all of a sudden, if you look, you've got a smile on your face, and that's because of the absorption that you're in. And what that told me about was that it doesn't make any difference what you do, because I got into these amazing states by just being absorbed into my breath. I mean, breath isn't that interesting, right? It's not like a. It's not like a.
It's not like a, you know, sunset or a beautiful sunset. It's just breath. And what it says is that it doesn't make any difference what you're absorbed in.
It's just the absorption itself is what gives you the delight and happiness. Okay? And so in a lot of ways, you know, since this is about, like, a happiness project, you know, what I'm basically saying is, which the job for every one of us, like, you know, I used to be a professional songwriter, etcetera, I still write songs. And whenever I say to myself, gosh, I'd really like to be happy today, I just go into my. Into actually this room that I'm in, which is my studio, and I sometimes sit at the keyboard, or I'll sit and I'll just kind of, like. I'll just put on headphones, and I'll just be in this absorbed state. Okay? And I just. I just love it, you know? And it's not because I'm a great musician and all of that sort of stuff. Again, it's the absorption. It's the immersion that is actually creating this experience that I'm having. And so my. You know, when I think about, like, your listeners and the people who are watching this, I'm. I'm different than other people. And I guess this is where. What you were trying to get at, because I'm not saying it's unique to every single person. It's almost like if you want to find something that's happy for you right now at whatever stage of life is, just look around and say, what can I get absorbed in? What can I get immersed in?
Knowing that it's the immersion that's going to create the delight rather than what it is.
Okay? And that's where people. That's what I say. This is the lesson from Ayakema and from other people that I've talked to since I started realizing this, which is.
Most people come on a show like this and talk about, okay, so this is what I did. That's true. Like, in 2000, I started an online company, okay? And it still is around, all right, or as a musician or whatever, but I'm not saying go out and be a musician or start an online company, and that's going to be great. I'm saying that's kind of irrelevant in a lot of ways. It's whatever for you is something that you can get immersed in. It doesn't make a difference at all what it is.
This is kind of key, and this is what's kind of nice about it. You know, as I sometimes kid to myself, friends, if I'm talking about this, I said, if I took a Coca Cola can and I stuck it here in the middle of the room, and the five of us sat around and we just looked at the Coca Cola can and just focused on it and did nothing else other than just calming our minds and just immersing ourselves in it, I said every one of us would have a smile on our face. Okay?
In fact, here's something that, you know, people in the audience can try, okay, just to see an example of what I mean by this, because this is a really simple test of this whole idea. The next time you're, like, walking around or you're someplace and you see something that brings a smile to your face, okay, what I want you to do is just stop, close your eyes, and just put your attention on your smile.
Okay? Just. Just put your attention on your smile. Don't think about anything, etcetera. Just. Okay. Smiles are like this. This is what a smile is like. I can tell you if you just stay there without thinking about it, without doing anything, but just stay there with just. This is what a smile is like. That smile will stay on your face as long as you want it to until you say, like, why am I smiling like this? Then that's gone.
[00:19:54] Speaker A: People think I'm crazy.
[00:19:56] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.
But that's what I mean by. But this is a simple way to kind of see what it's like to just really be. Just focusing on one thing, you know?
[00:20:09] Speaker A: Because I love all of this. Because I have to tell you, it warms my heart, because I am completely on your page here. I'm an artist. I'm a painter. And, you know, obviously, when things aren't gelling and aren't working, it's very frustrating. But the flip side to it is when you are so. I love that word, immersed. Because when you are in this activity, in my case, in painting, and I'm so immersed in it, I honestly am at my happiest. It also. It's one of these things where, you know and I know other people have similar experiences. When you're really involved with something that you love and you're just really in it, time goes by.
You have no sense of time. You know, I look up and I go, how's this possible? I've been doing this for 6 hours.
[00:21:05] Speaker B: Right?
[00:21:05] Speaker A: Again, it's because you are truly in the moment. And what I also think is really interesting, and this is, I have to kind of mention this is, this is sort of distinctly at odds with what a lot of people do in a quest to be happy, which is busy themselves, right? So this idea of, oh, well, I want to be immersed, so I'm going to do this, I'll take a class here and I'll do a bit of this and a bit of that's great. And hey, if you want to better yourself and learn something new, I'm all for that. But I think that is distinctly different than what we're talking about. We're talking about finding something that you can really sink your teeth into and give it all of your attention, but it's not work. This is something that just you're good at. It brings you joy and it's just you are completely invested in that thing. But again, it's different than keeping yourself busy, if you know what I mean, because there are people that they don't have 2 seconds to themselves, but if they wrote you a list of what they did in the day, it's this and that and this and that. But that will not give you the same sort of feeling.
[00:22:29] Speaker B: I think when people do that, it might give them a little bit of happiness. The only way. The problem with it is that they don't know exactly how to get back to that place of happiness.
[00:22:43] Speaker A: Right?
[00:22:44] Speaker B: When you realize that it's about immersion, then you realize, okay, I just need to get immersed. I mean, that's my path. You know exactly what you have to do. You know, you can be like sitting there with your crazy mind, you etcetera, and say, okay, I got to get. I want to get happy right now. Okay, so how do I do that? You know, you can't. It's not going to happen by making yourself more busy. It's going to happen when you identify what it is that you can get immersed in. Now, I will say this. If you can get immersed in your job, okay? And what I mean by immersed, you can't be sitting there like in your job and working and doing all of this and at the same time going like, am I good enough? And all of that, because you don't have a quiet mind anymore. Like, you know, I, for example, I never, I got an electrical engineering degree and I didn't do anything with electrical engineering. I immediately got a counseling, psych degree, and all of this kind of craziness and went off and became a pivot.
When I had that brain tumor thing, I ended up.
I ended up learning how to program a website for my class because I was teaching the core marketing class, and I thought it was a good way to kind of get back into the act. Well, I've become a pretty decent programmer. Not a great programmer, but I program first. Sometimes when I'm just programming, okay. I write python code or something like that, and I'm just, like, right in the middle of just trying to get something done.
I'm having a great time, you know. Now if I start thinking about it and say, oh, I need to commercialize it. I got to do this, I got to do that, that kills the whole thing. You know?
That's the whole. This is something I always tell my students. I say, when you have a difficult emotion and you start thinking about it, it actually increases. And if you have a positive emotion and you think about it, it kills it. Okay? So what you want to do is you just want to have the positive experience, the immersive experience, and don't start thinking about, I'm sure, Sarah, like, if you're sitting there saying, okay, can I sell this? How much can I sell it for? And all of that, all the fun goes away.
But if you're just, like, in the moment, just saying, oh, I can try this, I'll try this, etcetera, that's when the happiness stays. And so it's kind of. It's just important to understand the distinction between, like, you know, what is immersion? It's a quiet mind and being absorbed into something and being.
[00:25:26] Speaker A: And, you know, the cliche people talk about being present in the moment, but this is a perfect application, because certainly what we're talking about, certainly, as it pertains to me with painting, let's say if you are focused on the end result, you're four or five steps ahead. If you're invested in that moment, what you're doing, the results are better, ultimately, and you are happier, without a doubt.
[00:26:01] Speaker B: Yeah. I think in terms of aspiration instead of expectation, okay, you aspire for this. But once you say, okay, I expect this, then all of a sudden it's game over, you know? And I know this is hard, but this is a distinction that, in Buddhism that I often make, you know, which is the difference between kind of expectation and aspiration. You know, it's kind of like, you know, it's. It's. You aspire to it, which is great. You know, and we all want to be better at what we're doing. That's great. But once you say, I expect to be boom, then everything is off, you know, then the joy is gone, the happiness is gone. It's just, it becomes just work at that point.
[00:26:52] Speaker A: Right. So what would you say to listeners or viewers of this podcast who are listening to this and saying, either I can relate to it or I want that feeling. I want to know how I can immerse myself. Just for anybody out there, the average person who wants to sort of get started with this, what first steps would you recommend?
[00:27:24] Speaker B: Well, the very first thing I would do is just think of it being experiment. Try different things. Okay.
Don't limit yourself. Don't say, oh, I can't do that, or, you know, it's all the negative stuff. I'm not that kind of a person and all that. Just try different things. Experiment. In fact, if you're like, earlier enough in life, you know, where you can experiment, it's good, good to start experimenting with a lot of different things and just find something and just test out things. Okay. Is this something that you could get immersed in? Okay. If it's not, move on. Experiment with something else. And so my suggestion is experiment, you know, rather than have somebody say, you should try this.
Okay, I'll experiment with that. So I told my wife, who, you know, you know, when she was about to retire, I said, just experiment. And she experimented with different things. And she came, you know, she started doing art and she just loved it. I mean, she just, she wasn't trying to sell it. She wasn't going to be like a vendor, you know, etcetera. She just liked, she just loved learning and experimenting, etcetera, and she just fell into that.
[00:28:43] Speaker A: Okay, so here's a question for you then. This is kind of a tough one. So we have people, a lot of women who like to do activities and learn new things in a group, right?
Is this something, if somebody wanted to, like you say, experiment and see if they're maybe ceramic, some type of art, is this something that you can gain, this mindfulness, really immerse yourself with a group or with friends? Or is it best to be by yourself?
[00:29:24] Speaker B: I can see doing it with a group as long as people aren't saying, oh, I like your thing, and I don't like your thing, and all of a sudden you get into a comparison because that's going to kill it, as you can understand. I mean, then all of a sudden it's just your mind going all of that. But if you're all doing it together. Absolutely. I mean, when we. You know, in Buddhism, we just call that a sangha. You know, it's like people who meditate together, they come together. They. Yeah, they meditate, but then they socialize, and they do all these things, and it's a wonderful way to develop a practice, and the same goes for other things in life. And so I'm a big fan, of course. Activities. Yes.
[00:30:05] Speaker A: I like that. So it's all for be it by yourself or with a group. But if you're with a group, make sure you're all on the same page. You're all there involving yourself in this activity for the right reasons, as opposed to, sure, I'll join you. I've got nothing better to do. Well, whoa. Let's make sure we both have the same agenda.
[00:30:29] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:29] Speaker A: Yeah. And my last question for you, it's kind of broad, but this notion of mindfulness, immersing yourself in something, in what ways can this make you happy? How does this express itself? And maybe this is more of a personal question with regards to how it affects you, rather than just say, well, you're happy in that moment, which is great, but you can't exist in that moment. So how does this feeling of happiness permeate into your life?
[00:31:09] Speaker B: Well, I think what happens is that once you start understanding what it is that, like, you know, like, that makes you happy, it starts spilling over to other parts of your life, you know? Because then you realize that, you know, as long. It's kind of like. You know, it's kind of like if I go out playing with our dog, for example.
Who's a cute dog. Yeah. Yeah. The one thing I start thinking about is, okay, if I can just get, like, immersed in this experience, I'll be happy. Okay. And so, yeah, so we're just kicking the ball around, and I can kick the ball around and go, like, why am I doing this? This is such a drag and all that, but when I get really into it, then all of a sudden we have a great time, and so it starts spilling over, because, as I say, it doesn't matter what it is. It's the immersion itself that creates the delight, not the activity. The activity is just a trigger. I know this is kind of tricky for us because, as I say, it starts with noticing that it's the immersion in whatever that gives you the delight.
It's not the thing itself.
It's just a trigger. And so once you understand that, then you can bring happiness to all sorts of different parts of your life. And you can have the one thing, like you have art and I have, like, music, and my wife has art or whatever. Maybe it might be pickleball or whatever it is, right? Okay, so I've got some. Something, and I like to do that, and it's great. And I can always go back to that. But since I know that it's a more general principle, I can bring it to anything that I do. And in fact, I sometimes wonder if when people say I had a happy experience with anything, that really, what they said, what they are really saying is that I got really invested in thing. It's just that they don't notice it. That's what I mean by it's one of these subtle things that we don't know. And I didn't know why I was so happy. Like, when I started marketing profs, my company, it's just that I was having a great time, you know, I was just. I was learning something that's brand new, the web was brand new, and all of this kind of craziness, etcetera afterwards, I think I would have said to you, yeah, yeah, you should start an online, you know, media company. But I didn't. But now I understand why I was happy. It wasn't that I was starting this company, it's just that I was having such a great time invested in something that I had never done before.
[00:33:53] Speaker A: And owning that in the moment and saying it makes me happy. Because people, sometimes I think we're our own worst enemies, right? Like you get joy from something and maybe you say, oh, that was silly, or that was a passing thing, or I could never recreate that, or that was strange, whatever. And then they move on. Take a minute. Appreciate it if it made you happy, and it might be at odds with the person you think you are. We've all had experiences or tried things, and we think, well, that was kind of fun. But then you think, well, like you said, that's. That's not really my thing. Yeah, it's okay to own it and say it might not be aligned with your other interests, but if it makes you happy, embrace it.
[00:34:38] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. You know, you're not doing this for other people. You're doing it for yourself here. And, you know, you should look at your own well being first. You know, as we always say, you know, if you put on your mask first in an airline, you don't put on your kids mask first. You put on your mask first.
If you're. If you can be really happy, if you can really just find something to be into that will spread to other people. I guarantee it. These positive experiences that we have spread to other people as easily as negative experiences spread to other people. But I'm not into negative experiences. I'm just into positive experiences and how.
[00:35:27] Speaker A: It can be contagious. Yeah, absolutely. And lastly, the other thing, you know, we've talked about in this program before, which is interesting, because I know both you and your wife are retired, certainly from teaching, not from living very full lives, of course. But what's interesting is that the two of you have stopped doing something that you've been paid to do. You have that in common. You know that you have this professional life, and now you've switched over to this new life. You have. But I would suspect a lot of the reason you are happy is because you did the work right.
You thought about this mindfulness. You thought about how you want to spend your life, what you want to do with your days, what you value. It all sounds so simple and basic, but I know when you and I were last speaking again, it seems so like common sense. But the reality is most people, when they enter a new phase of their life, they're hopeful it'll work out and they'll continue to do things that they deem fun.
But the reality is you have to think about it. You have to be mindful and invest in. If you want to be happy, you have to have a plan. And just being conscious, sort of consciously thinking about this concept of mindfulness is part of that planning, as I see it.
[00:37:17] Speaker B: Right. Right. That's why I'm saying experiment. Now's a good time to experiment and just see.
And don't wait until some later time, because then you're going to feel like, oh, my God, I got to find something. But if you start experimenting now, you'll believe me. You'll come upon something, and it might be something that you never in a million years have thought about, you know, on your own. You know, it just kind of just showed up, and it was only because your mind was open and you were willing to try out different things, you know, as I say, you don't have to try out something very long before you either know, it kind of grabs you and would interest you or wouldn't interest you.
So experiment.
[00:38:04] Speaker A: Absolutely. Well, on that note, I have to say that after today's discussion, I think a lot of people listening and watching, next time they are appreciating a sunset, they will think about exactly what you said, myself included. And on that note, it's been a delight, delight to have you as a guest, Alan, on our show. And maybe at some point you'd consider coming back. I know we've just scratched the surface. You're an incredibly interesting person, and I've just cornered this one part of you to discuss. But it was an absolute pleasure having you on our show today.
[00:38:43] Speaker B: Well, thank you, Sarah. It was absolutely my pleasure to be on your show. Thank you.
[00:38:49] Speaker A: Absolutely. Okay, well, I will mindfully see you all next time. Thanks for joining us.
[00:38:57] Speaker B: Thank you.
