January 7, 2025 • 46 mins
Things feel pretty out of control these days, and it’s so tempting to get caught up in what others are doing, and how aggravated they make us. Mel Robbins proposes a new path: The Let Them Theory.” This two-part theory helps us let go of what we can’t control (“Let Them”) and maximize what we can (“Let Me”--because we only control ourselves!) Using extraordinarily candid examples from her own life and practical tips for applying the theory to your own situations, Mel’s latest book is best described by none other than Oprah, who said this is “ this is the single best self help book” she has ever read. High praise!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hi everyone, I'm Kitty Kuric, and this is next question.
What if the next time someone annoyed you, antagonized you,
or confused you, and you just said let them? It
might sound counterintuitive, but Mel Robbins, the Queen of Practical Wisdom,
(00:24):
says those two words can actually change your life. In
her latest book, The Let Them Theory, Mel unpacks how
letting others be themselves and focusing on your response frees
you to let go and take control of your own happiness.
Mel generously offers anecdotes from her own life and from
(00:45):
her daughter Sawyers, with whom she wrote the book to
illustrate how she's used, and sometimes to her chagrin, not used,
the let them let Me theory. It's an amazing tool
that will stop you from being mister or misfit, which
come on, can be exhausting, and help you get clear
about what's really important in life. Sounds pretty good, right.
(01:09):
Here's our conversation. First of all, Mel Robins, I can't
believe I've never met you. Welcome to our little podcast.
Next question compared to yours, it's kind of little.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Well, it's still important, and I cannot believe I haven't
met you. Either because I have admired you and watched
you from afar forever. So thank you for the opportunity
to meet you, thank you for the opportunity to sit
down and talk to you. Thank you for the opportunity
to spend time with the person that is spending time
together with us right now. I'm really excited.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Yeah, I am too. And before we talk about your
new book that you wrote with your daughter Sawyer, called
The Let Them Theory, which I have a lot of
questions about, I have to ask you a little bit
about your life, Mel, because we're just getting to know
each other. I've read a lot of profiles of you,
and you're you're kind of exploding right now. Although you've
been working very hard for I guess the last thirteen
(02:05):
years or so, building your reputation and your company and
more recently your podcast. But you've been writing books, you've
been doing audio books, you've been doing Ted talks, so
you have been working hard. So how did you become
Mel Robbins? How did this happen? And I love that
you give advice, but how did you get to a
(02:28):
point where you felt like, yeah, I know enough about
the world and about life to give advice.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
You know, the way that I got to where I
am is first I screwed up my own life, like
I have to learn everything the hard way. I don't
know what it is about me, but I either have
to fall into a hole because I'm not paying attention,
or I have to dig one for myself and then
sit in it and wallow and wish somebody would come
and help me and solve my problems. And I've learned
(02:58):
over and over and over in my life that no
one is coming to save you, and that your life
is your responsibility. And let's look at the word responsibility.
Responsibility is the ability to respond. And I didn't know
until recently that we give so much power to things
(03:21):
that are beyond our control. Whether it is your past,
it's already happened. And at any moment, you can decide
that you're going to become a different person, and you
become a different person by figuring out what direction you
want to move in and then slowly but surely aligning
your actions every day with the kind of person you'd
like to be or the things it is that you'd
(03:42):
like to do. And one of the things that surprises
me now that I look back and I think it's
the reason why I'm so driven to share, to teach,
to have conversations like the one that you and I
are having to with the person that's listening to us
right now, is that I have caused myself so much
(04:05):
headache and so much heartache, and I've caused other people
so many headaches and so much heartache, Katie, because I
didn't know, and I didn't know what the problem was.
I didn't know what I was dealing with. And it
covers everything. It covers everything from I'll just give you
an example. I had no idea that I struggled with
(04:30):
ADHD and dyslexia until I was forty seven years old,
no idea. I am part of a lost generation of
women who were diagnosed with anxiety in their late teens
and their twenties when the real issue all along is
that you had undiagnosed dyslexia or undiagnosed ADHD. And I
(04:54):
didn't know that the real issue was an anxiety. See,
anxiety is a symptom. It's a symptom that something is
not getting addressed. And instead what happened is I would
sit in classrooms and clearly I've got a brain that's
not able to learn the way that public schools are teaching.
And I also have ADHD, which presents other issues around
(05:18):
the ability to direct attention. But back in the eighties,
nobody knew that girls could get ADHD because they had
only studied boys. And so there's this entire generation of
women that were diagnosed with anxiety medicated for anxiety that
are now finding out that they have ADHD later in life.
(05:39):
And you want to know the number one way that
women find out that they have ADHD. How their kids
are going through the process in elementary school and middle
school of being assessed for quote, behavioral problems and then
a neuropsychoval lo and behold, turns out that they have
a learning style difference or they have attention issue us
(06:00):
And if you don't address this, you have a human
being that can't do well.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
That's so funny that you mentioned your kids, because my
daughter always tells me I have ADHD. I don't think
I have ADHD.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Mail well, if your life is working well and you're
not experiencing anxiety, then maybe you do or maybe you don't.
But for me, I could never understand why I Why
am I so confident? And I can't remember birthdays. Why
is it that I'm always running late? Why do I
have to have fifty thousand things going on?
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Why are you really managed so well? You went to Dartmouth, right,
I mean, it's hard to get into Dartmouth.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
Nine nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
That's really hard. No, come on, now, I disagree. It
was still hard to get into the Dartmouth so you
had to do pretty well. Then you went to law school.
So I'm just saying you were highly functioning individual.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Right, Yes, I was high functioning, but let's talk about
law school. So if you have dyslexia, And by the way,
Dartmouth was basically one giant wash for me, I don't
remember it because I was constantly in a state of
fight or flight, because I had actually not been diagnosed
with anxiety. So I went through college in a constant
(07:14):
state of feeling on edge and over compensating by drinking
procrastinating all nighters. I was a walking red flag Katie
because I didn't know what the problem was with me.
And so I was the kind of person that, yes,
I could freestyle really well, but it nearly killed me
to finish a paper. And when you start to look
(07:35):
at yourself through a lens that number one. If I'm
not doing well, there's probably some problem that's underneath all
this that I've never actually realized is an issue for me.
And until I figure that out, I'm going to continue
to struggle. And the good news is as soon as
you kind of know what you're dealing with or what
(07:56):
you would like to change in your life, there are
simple things you can do.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
The first book, I guess, or one of the first
books you wrote, was The five second Rule, and that
was when you were forty one. You were eight hundred
thousand dollars in debt. That's a lot of unemployed. You're
watching your husband's restaurant business crumble. That's what you're writing
in the book. You write, it felt like we had
failed at life, with no hope of ever escaping the debt.
(08:23):
Under the weight of this situation, you found yourself procrastinating
and avoiding solving the problems. But then you were like,
let's try this five second rule. I mean, how did
you come up with that?
Speaker 2 (08:35):
And what is it?
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Exactly? Okay?
Speaker 2 (08:37):
The five second rule is a little mindset hack that
helps you push through any excuse or any emotion or
any feeling that you have, so you take action. And
the thesis is very simple. Just like food drops on
the floor and you have five seconds to pick it
up right, blow the dog here off, and then you
can eat it. You have five seconds to act on
(09:00):
an idea before your brain contaminates your will to move.
It's that simple. And what happened for me, here's the
true story is. And again I'm going to jump back
and forth between what I knew then and what I
know now, Because when you find yourself stuck in life,
whether it's crippling grief, which I know you've experienced, or
(09:21):
it is all of a sudden the world changes, or
your job changes, or circumstance changes in a relationship and
you find yourself single, or you find yourself in a
new chapter, or you find yourself as an empty nester,
or you find yourself in a situation where you don't
like what's happening in your community or the world around you.
It is normal to feel stressed about that and paralyzed
(09:43):
us right and actually in the moment, if the issue
is big enough, feeling stressed or paralyzed is a sign
that you're mentally well because the response is actually appropriate
to the thing that you're dealing with. The issue is
that none of us understand that when and you get
to a point where you're super stressed about something and
(10:04):
you start to feel anxious, which is simply just feeling
stressed all the time. I mean, anxiety and stress are
the same physiological things in your body. I didn't know
this at the time when I was forty one. I
just knew that I had eight hundred thousand dollars in debt,
that the bills were piling up on the kitchen counter.
I couldn't open them. I didn't have money in the
bank anyway, I didn't. We were struggling to get gas
(10:26):
in the tank and food on the table. I hadn't
told my parents, I hadn't told my friends, friends had invested.
We're also in a community where we have lots of
friends and you're trying to keep up and you don't
want people to know. And so I did feel paralyzed.
And the thing that's interesting that I really want to
underscore for particularly the person that's listening and spending time
(10:46):
with us right now, whether this applies to you in
your life at this moment, or it applies to somebody
that you love who is seemingly stuck. Is that nobody's
actually stuck. A person who's stuck isn't actually paralleled because
you're in deep conflict with yourself. You know when you're
not thriving. You know when you're making decisions that are
(11:11):
taking your life down the wrong road. Like the hardest
working person in a classroom is not the person getting a's.
It's the person that's failing because they're struggling all the time.
Even if it looks like they're not doing anything on
the outside, they're constantly in conflict knowing that they are
not reaching their potential, that they're not trying how they can.
(11:33):
Same thing is true with health. Someone in your life
that you wish that would be healthy. We make the
mistake of thinking they're not motivated. That's not true at all.
They're in deep conflict with themselves. They know that there
are things that they can do. It's not an issue
of willpower, it's an issue of skill. And so I
think that's an important backdrop because I didn't know any
(11:55):
of this, and so you can start to feel like
you're the only one that's trapped. You're the idiot that
can't figure this out, that somehow you screwed up when
truly it's not just you that there are things you
can do. And for me, I knew what I needed
to do. I'm not an idiot. I knew that if
we're that much in debt, Katie, I need to get
(12:17):
a job. I could ask for help. I need to
get my butt out the front door and go for
a walk, because all the experts say it's going to
make me feel better. I know that drinking half a
bottle of bourbon every night is probably not helping the situation.
Neither is waking up hungover and then hitting the snooze
button six times. But you get so stuck in the
stress of it, and that keeps you in it. And
(12:40):
so what happened, And this is the true story. It
was February two thousand and eight, and so also the
housing crisis going down, and I'm sitting in front of
the television.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
I'm like, that's it.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Mel Robbins. Tomorrow morning, woman, it's a new you. Tomorrow morning.
You have got to stop drinking. You have got to
stop screaming a Chris. It's not like he tried to
fail at the restaurant business. You know, you gotta call
your parents. You got to you got to pick up
the phone and look for a job. And by God, woman,
when that alarm rings, you cannot lay there like a
(13:11):
human pot roast, marinating and fear staring at the ceiling.
You have got to get your butt out of bed
and get those kids on the bus. And all of
a sudden, this rocket ship launches across the television screen,
and it gave me this crazy idea. I thought it
was like a sign from Like, that's a sign from God.
Tomorrow morning, when that alarm rings, mel you are gonna
(13:34):
launch yourself out of bed like a rocket ship. You're
gonna move so fast you're not gonna be in that
bed when that anxiety hits. Now, it could have been
the four bourbon Manhattans. It gave me that idea because
I was drinking an awful lot back then, and.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
It sounds kind of stupid.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
Yeah right, They're delicious, especially this time of year, so
it sounds stupid. So the next morning, the alarm ring,
and that's when I saw something that I'd never seen before.
And once you embrace what I'm about to share with you,
you will never look at life the same again. There
is a five second window that defines your whole life.
(14:12):
It determines how much money you make, It determines how
healthy you are, It determines the kind of relationship you
have with your kids and with your parents and with
your loved ones. It's this five second window between knowing
what you need to do and actually doing it. There's
this moment of hesitation that we all have in the
small moments in life, where you have this instinct that
(14:35):
you should pick up the phone or start the conversation,
or get off the couch and go to the gym,
and instead of actually doing it, we make this fatal
mistake where we hesitate and then we stop and think
about how we feel about doing it. And so that morning,
Tuesday morning, February two thousand and eight, the alarm rings
and I immediately remember that dumb idea at a launch
(14:55):
out of bed, and I stop and think, do I
feel like getting out of bed? I'm like, it's it's cold,
it's winter in Massachusetts. How the hell is this going
to help. I'm mean, hundred thousand dollars in day, I
don't want to get out of bed, and I start
reaching for the snooze button. Because it was a habit
and a habit's just a pattern. And for whatever reason,
I just started counting backwards that morning, five four three
(15:17):
two one, and then I stood up and it struck
me like, I was kind of like, that's strange. And
I was in such a state of desperation that I
just dismissed my kind of pragmatic, cynical side, and I thought,
what if this is a sign from God? What if
(15:38):
this is a magic trip, what if this works? And
so I made myself a promise. I said, any moment
that I have today where I know what I could
do but I don't feel like it, I'm just going
to count backwards and see what happens. And that was
the beginning of an entirely new life.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
If you want to get smarter every morning with a
breakdown of the news and fascinating takes on health and
wellness and pop culture, sign up for our daily newsletter,
Wake Up Call by going to Katiecuric dot com. So
(16:27):
here we are seven years later, and your journey has continued. Yes,
and you are still writing and thinking about ways that
could improve your life that as a result, is improving
the lives of so many other people. And your new book,
(16:47):
which you wrote with your daughter Sawyer is called the
Let Them Theory. So that's obviously the focus of our
conversation today because we want everyone to read this book.
And I know you just had an interview with Oprah
and she said, I mean, this is a woman who
knows about self help. Mel And what did she say
to you about your book?
Speaker 2 (17:08):
I'm still processing it. She said that this is the
single best self help book she has ever read.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Wow, And that.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
It is the message and tool that humanity needs right
now for this extremely overwhelming and challenging and conflict driven
moment in time that we're all living in. Because ultimately,
the Let Them Theory is about what you can control
(17:41):
and what you can't control, and it is ultimately a
book that will fundamentally change your relationship to yourself and
your relationship to other people.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
This all started in May of twenty twenty three. Yes,
when you posted on TikTok about the Let Them Theory
of video that went uber uber viral. Yes, you were,
I guess writing the book at the time. Oh no,
no, no no, So the TikTok video prompted the book.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Well, what happened is I had an experience I never
thought i'd be sitting across from you, Katie, saying, I
discovered something at a high school prom that changed my life.
But it was our son. We have three children, they're
twenty five, twenty three, and nineteen. It was Soakley, right, Yeah,
Oakley was at his prom and I was your typical
psycho micromanaging mother from the carsage, to the tucks, to
(18:33):
the shoes to this to that. And we're at the
pre prom party and our daughter Kendall, who's twenty three,
was home from college at the time, and they're taking
photos and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, Katie,
it starts pouring ring And so you got twenty kids
in black tie and all these parents milling about and
they're about to all leave to head out, and nobody
has umbrellas and nobody has any raincoats. And by the way,
(18:56):
for some reason, all the kids in southern Vermont drive
to the prom, which was new to me, you know,
raising our daughters in Boston, where everybody had buses and
this and that. And so I'm like, wait, you're driving.
Why are you borrowing dad's truck? Like, what's gonna happen
with it? I don't understand this, And now it's raining.
And then I say to Oakley, where are you guys
going for dinner? As they're trying to head out the door,
and the parents are like, wait, you can't go yeah,
and he's like, I don't know. And I was like,
(19:18):
you don't have reservations for prom? He's like no, And
I turned to my husband. I'm like, they do I
have reservations for prom? And he's like, a guest's not.
And I'm like why. I don't know why it bothered
me so much, but it bothered me Katie. And so
I go, well, hold on, let me see if I
can find you something. And now all the parents are
milling about and I'm starting to you know, when you
get that like volcano of emotion.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
That just yeah, you know, I'm familiar with that.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
And as it's coming up and you feel the words
coming you're out of your mouth, or the text that
you're about to kind of send coming, and I'm starting
to feel that wave of panic hit as I'm trying
to find a reservation and we're trying to get twenty
kids to not run out into a rainstorm and just
destroy their hair and their dresses and their shoes. My
(20:03):
daughter sees it coming and she reaches out and grabs
my arm and yanks me to her, and she like
grits her teeth and she's like, them, you're being annoying.
If they want to go to the taco stamp, let them.
If they want to be in the print, let them.
If he's going to run his shoes, let them. And
she started saying this cascade of let her ruin her hair,
let them ud get under dress, let them do what
(20:25):
they want to do, and she kind of ended it
with mom, it's their prom, not yours. Let them, and
that final let them was like a sledgehammer, And all
of a sudden, my shoulders just dropped, and I thought,
let them, like why do I care? Like why am
(20:47):
I not thinking about where I'm going to dinner? And
so I said to o, hey, Oak, and he turned around.
He's like, what you know, because of course I've been
super irritating and annoying. And I'm like nothing, but here's
forty bucks. Go have fun. And then you saw his
shoulders drop and there was this huge smile that his
face and that was that. And the next day I
(21:10):
woke up and I'm at the grocery store and there's
like five people in front of me and one cashier
and it's like beep pep me. And again that sort
of like volcano of emotion starts rising up, and I start,
what do you do in line when that's happening.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
You get exasperated and you're rolling your eyes and you're
like clearing your throats and you're getting aggravated.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Yes, and you now think that you know how to
run a grocery store better than the manager. And I said,
let them, and my shoulders dropped and I just started
using it and I started to notice something. Oh my god,
people are really annoying. Holy cow. People's moods are really
getting to me. Wow, that Zoom meeting really drained me.
(22:00):
Holy cow. I've got opinions about traffic, I've got opinions
about my mother in law's expectations, I've got And it
occurred to me, holy cow, I'm allowing so many people
and so much stuff that's beneath me, and that is
not my job to manage to drain the two most
precious resources I have in life, time and energy. See,
(22:23):
your life is determined by what you put your time
into and what you pour your energy into, and so
I've got news for you. If you are tired, or
you are overwhelmed, or you feel like you're last on
your list, or you're just frustrated with some dynamic in
a relationship, or you're frustrated with the world at large,
or you're just not as happy as you'd like to be,
(22:46):
the problem isn't you. The problem is that you unknowingly
give power to other people and to things that you
can't control. And all day long, you're allowing people who
are an annoying or who are emotionally immature, or who
are doing things that you're never going to be able
to control.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Anyway, to impact you.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
And it's stupid. And so I use this for a week,
and I'm telling you, Katie, just like I felt, I knew.
I have never felt this peaceful. I have never felt
like I truly could put boundaries up between me and
the world. I had never felt more in control. And
so I naturally went to social media and I shared
(23:32):
this simple thing, and I was literally like, you know,
if your friends don't invite you, out let them. If
your kids don't want to help you do something, let them.
If the person that you're dating doesn't want a commitment,
let them. Let people reveal who they are and what
they care about, stop trying to manage them. Because when
somebody reveals who they are and what they care about,
(23:52):
now you get to choose. You get to choose whether
or not you pour time and energy into this. In
twenty four hours, it was fifteen million views.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
Why did it resonate so much? You think, why do
you think it did? Maybe because increasingly people have felt
out of control in this crazy world we're living in
for a whole host of reasons. Yes, And maybe their
impulse to control has gotten stronger as the world's gotten scarier.
(24:23):
And so maybe that, you know, to Oprah's point, at
this moment in time, this is what people really needed
to hear, because people feel out of control, and I
guess your response is to control more when you feel
that way, right.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Exactly, And actually you're the first person that has explained
it that way, and you're exactly right. And one of
the things that is so powerful about this, especially in
this moment in time, is that ultimately every human being
has a hardwired need to be in control. It is
(24:58):
it is a survival mechan it is something that you
will never get rid of. And we've been working against it. See,
when you're in control of your life, you actually feel
safe and you feel confident, and you feel.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
Like less scared.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yes we are, you know, yes we are. Whether you're
scared because your adult children aren't doing well, or you're
scared because your parents' health are failing, or whether you're
scared because of the state of politics, or you're scared
because you see the rising cost of living, or you're
scared because you have a health diagnosis. And so we
(25:41):
need to feel like we're in control of our decisions,
of our actions, of our future, of our lives. And
we also, by the way, and this is where it
gets tricky, is that when somebody around us does something
that worries us, or hurts us, or frustrates the hell
out of us us or stresses us out, guess what,
(26:03):
it makes us feel like we're not in control because
now we're worried about you. So then what do we
do We try to control you and fix problems. Yes, right, yes,
But then here's the problem, Katie. If your behavior is
stressing me out and I then step in and try
to tell you what to do, guess what. You also
have a need to be in control of yourself, and
(26:25):
so you are going to push back against me. And
so we have gotten into this state in our families,
in our love lives, with our kids, with our friends,
and even at a global level when you talk about
global conversations or the way that people are so polarized.
We have gotten to a point where our need to
(26:46):
control has spiraled out of control. And the fundamental thing
that I need that I'm trying to make everybody understand
is this. If there is one thing on the planet
you will never be able to control. It's what another
person does, says, or feels. Period. Any energy you put
into trying to control what somebody does or trying to
(27:08):
manipulate how they feel or trying to ensure that they're
going to think a certain thing will backfire. It will
create more stress and frustration for you, and it will
create more friction and tension in your relationships. I worked
against this fundamental law in every relationship I had for
fifty four years. And when I discovered the let them theory,
(27:29):
and I started saying let them because here's how the
theory works. There's two parts. Any moment that you're frustrated,
you read the headlines, you're frustrated for me. This morning,
I literally got stuck in an elevator and had to
be rescued by the New York City Fire Department. Shout
out to Latter seven. You guys were amazing. We're in
there for fifty minutes. Do you want to know how
(27:50):
I didn't have a panic attack. I recognized in the
moment what's in my control. It's not, So let them.
Let them take their time, them figure out how to
do this safely. Let them do what they're.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
Going to do, the same thing happened to me on
Saturday night, but only for ten minutes.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
Yeah, but your mind can start spending very quickly.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
So when you say let them, you recognize there is
nothing about being in an elevator that you have control of.
So when you say it, you're actually detaching from the
thing you can't control, and so therefore you're protecting yourself
from a necessary stress and you're conserving your energy. And
then you say the second part.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Which is let me Right, I was going to ask
you about let me before we talk about let me melt,
let me ask you about one of your them examples. Yes,
and it was letting your kids If your kids don't
want to do something, let them. So I have to
say I had an immediate reaction to that, and I
(28:50):
sort of envisioned my parents wanting me to go to
Sunday school when I was a kid, or if I
wanted my kids to go somewhere because we had made
a commitment to be somewhere. I can't even think of
an example. I mean, if you just let them, isn't
that an invitation to raise really entitled spoiled brats. Absolutely,
(29:15):
and that example, honestly, I was like, I'm with mel
all the way, but not with kids necessarily.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Well, it depends on the age of the kids, and
it also depends on the dynamic. And so first, this
is really a book about adult relationships, and so with kids,
you're actually in charge. And there's a huge distinction in
this book. And at the very end of the book,
in the appendix, there's a guide that you can download
(29:43):
that is all about how you use this with small
children versus how you use this with young adults and
adult children.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Got it, But what about say I was envisioning teenagers
right who didn't want to go to a funeral. I'm
just throwing that at as an example. I'm not going
to let them say I don't want to go.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Well, here's what you can say. You have to let
them say they don't want to go, because that's what
they're saying. It's already happened. But then you say, they
let me part, and you realize that my control here
is truly in what I think, what I do, and
how I react to my own feelings, Because if a
(30:25):
kid doesn't want to go, that might be a really
mentally well response to a very overwhelming situation that scares
the hell.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
Okay, yeah, maybe it don't use funeral as an example,
like a grandmother's birthday.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Yes, of hear no one wants to?
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Yes, and so you're going to just you say let
them right, because you don't want to get pissed off,
because then your emotions are now driving how you respond.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
And well, how do you respond when your sixteen year
old says, I don't want to go to Nana's birthday?
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Yeah? I completely understand, and honestly neither do I. But
here's the thing. Do you love her?
Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (31:07):
And how do you think it's going to make her
feel if you don't go? And what kind of character
and value do you have as a person? And don't
you think it's going to make you feel like a
good person to show up for your grandma? Like sometimes
(31:29):
in life the decision to make is don't go because
it makes her feel good, go because it makes you
know that you're a good person, because you show up
for people that show up for you.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
So let them is not necessarily for kids or even teenagers.
Let them acknowledge their feelings, but none don't.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
Override them like a psycho bitch like I used to be, Like,
I don't care how you feel, Get in the car,
get your stuff running late anyway? Like do you see what?
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Do you see the difference?
Speaker 2 (32:00):
And do you see the other thing that I was
doing in the role play?
Speaker 1 (32:04):
See?
Speaker 2 (32:04):
As a parent, you are responsible for your children's emotional
well being. You're responsible for feeding them, for keeping them safe,
for providing for them, and you're also responsible more importantly
for helping them figure out who they are and helping
them understand what character means. And what I was doing
(32:27):
because I was able to say, let them, let them
be a sixteen year old, because no sixteen year old
wants to go to a grandmother's birthday for crying out loud.
They want to be on their phones with their friends.
That's an age appropriate reaction to that situation. So me
reacting like a tornado or a volcano just makes them wrong.
And what I do instead is I get control of
(32:48):
myself and I act like a mature adult instead of
an immature adult who then bars and vents at my child.
I acknowledge how they feel, and then I step into
my role, which is this is a teaching opportunity.
Speaker 1 (33:21):
So I was going to ask you to close the
circle on the let them and how it leads to
the let me, because that's such an important part of this.
So tell me what's in it for me? Everything?
Speaker 2 (33:35):
Just three selfish everything. Do you want to feel peaceful?
Do you want to feel powerful? Do you want to
go through life and insulate yourself from all the stressful
things that happen all day long? Of course you do.
And you can't do that without first giving up control
(33:55):
of everything around you. So you can't get sober until
you stop drinking. You can't take control of your life,
or your confidence, or your power until you stop trying
to control everyone and everything around you. And when you
say let them, two things happen. Number One, you detach.
So now one of the reasons why this is also
so extraordinarily powerful is because I didn't just create this
(34:18):
out of thin airror this exists. The let them theory
exists in a time continuum that dates all the way
back to ancient history. The let them theory is deeply
rooted in Stoicism, Buddhism, radical acceptance, detachment theory. So the
(34:40):
power that you're feeling is from thousands of years of
people really talking about Stoic philosophy or being a practicing Buddhist,
or learning about radical acceptance. In fact, we were with
doctor Martin Luther King, Junior's son and his daughter in
law couple days ago, and as we were talking about
(35:02):
the let Them theory, they reflected that this is representative
of doctor Martin Luther King's work because it is all
that is the heart of civil disobedience and peaceful protest,
that you have to learn that the power is not
in the oppressor. The power is in your response to it.
(35:23):
That peace, that love, that non response at times is
so much more powerful than hate, and that's the only
thing that's in your control. And so I know that
this works because I have such deep respect for the
lineage and the history through religion, through philosophy, through psychology,
(35:48):
through some of the most important moments in human time
about what actually created power and breakthroughs for people for
moments in time. And it's in focusing on the power
that you have. You know, Professor Margaret Meade said that
(36:08):
quote that you and I both love, which is, you
know it just takes a handful of committed citizens to
change everything. In fact, that's the only thing that ever has.
And if you don't like what you see happening in
your community, or in your family, or in your marriage
or with your adult children, don't look to them to
fix it. Look to yourself. Stop underestimating your power, your
(36:31):
ability through your energy and your action to shift anything
over time. And that's why I think this has resonated.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
I would think this would be the anti let me
fix it mentality, right not.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
See, most of us when we say let's fix this,
are obsessed with what we're trying, with the thing we're
trying to fix, or what other people are doing. Stop
looking at what everybody else is doing, and come inward
and drop into your value and your character and decide
what matters to you and the way that you know
that something matters to you is not because you're thinking
(37:07):
about it. It's because you're doing something about it. And
when you are spending so much time I'm worried about this,
or I'm worried about that, or that person's frustrating me.
What's happening every time you allow somebody else's behavior or
what they say to hurt you, to impact you, is
you're draining the very energy and time that you need
(37:29):
to get to work or to get out of the relationship.
And one other thing I want to be very clear
about because you know, one of the things that a
lot of people, you know, when they are saying, well,
what about this, it's always about kids, And you're one
hundred percent right. This is not for little kids. This
is for you as an adult to actually be the
mature adult and to be in control of your emotions
and to model behavior and values for your children, because
(37:51):
that's who they learn it from. And most of the
problems that we have right now are because we've got
a bunch of adults walking around that are basically immature
eight year olds inside of big bodies, and we're treating
them like adults instead of seeing that their little children
emotionally let them because you can't control them, and then
when you say let me, there's only three things you
(38:12):
can ever control. It's your thoughts about what just happened
and what you want to do next. It's whether or
not you want to respond and how you respond. And
it's how you allow your emotions to rise and fall
and what you do with them or whether you let
them run you over. That's it.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
That's all you got, speaking of emotions. It's I think
you make some interesting observations about jealousy and about comparison.
And I think we live in a world where you know,
when I was growing up, I didn't know who had
what I mean, I might have known the neighbors got
a fancy new car, right, you know, could afford to
(38:47):
do something my family couldn't. But it wasn't, you know,
it wasn't in my face all the time. Yes, And
now we are seeing all these different life experiences. And
in addition to Margaret Meade, I love the quote that
comparison is the thief of joy, which I thought was Emerson,
but it's actually Teddy Roosevelt. Although a lot of people,
(39:10):
I guess have been that quote has been attributed to
a lot of people. You talk about using those in
a positive way. That jealousy is actually not a bad thing.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
No, unless you're wishing somebody bad, But again let them like,
I can't control whether or not what somebody does with
their jealousy, but I can teach you how to use
it to your advantage. So, first of all, jealousy is
deeply personal because it's tied to what you desire, and
you're never going to feel jealous over something you don't want.
(39:42):
Like I'm not jealous in the least when I see
somebody pull up in a Lamborghini. I don't want one.
I don't care about it. There's nothing that you could
do to make me jealous of somebody. But if I
see somebody that I was just talking to my friend
Jays Shetty and he has.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Really does any of the most beautiful eyes not to
be oh my gosh, you're like.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
Light light, light, light, light green. So we were just
hanging out the other day, I were really really good friends.
And that's the other thing I want to say. The
very people that you're jealous of because they're doing what
you're doing, should be your closest friends because they're the
only people on the planet that know what you're going through.
And what a shame is it that you look at
(40:24):
people that are in your industry or that are doing
what you want to do as competitors or enemies that
you're against, because they should actually be your greatest collaborators.
This was this huge revelation with let them, because I
used to look at my friends and be like, they
got a new kitchen, she has a beautiful handbag, she
just got a promotion, now she's getting married, they're pregnant.
(40:44):
I'm what does that do? That sort of energy just
rises the stress in you, and then you start thinking
about it and you tell yourself it's never going to
be me.
Speaker 1 (40:56):
And I love this idea of upward comparison versus downwards. Yes,
so it is basically envy versus gratitude.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Yes, like we are we default to looking up and
above and seeing people that are doing better and then
using somebody else's example to shame ourselves or beat ourselves up.
It's never going to be me. There's already too many podcasts.
I shouldn't launch one now. Ur I'm never going to
be able to renovate my kitchen because she just did.
(41:24):
I can't have white cabinets because my friend is going
to think I somehow copied her, yes, exact. Can you
know what ridiculousness this is? And so learning to say
let them taught me something important about life. Other people
never block your way. They only lead the way because
you're not actually playing against people in life, you're playing
(41:46):
with them. And if you can say let them, let
them have their success, let them have their Lamborghini, let
them have a million dollars, let them get married, let
them have the love story, let them earn a million bucks,
let them do this, let them do that. Now you're
detached because you're only jealous because you want that thing.
So let them, let them lead the way, and then
(42:06):
say let me, let me remind myself that if they've
done it, there's a formula, and if I'm not so
day i'm emotional and jealous, I can wake up and
follow the formula. And if I just let me remind
myself that if I put my head down, I can
slowly chip away at it. And I can ten years
from now, fifteen years from now, five years from now,
(42:27):
I can save my money. I can change my job.
I can learn how to be financially responsible. I can
learn how to find love again. Let them, let them,
let them, because the more you let them lead the
way and then you say let me, the faster you're
going to find the way to all the things that
you want.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
At the end of the day. I guess your book
is really about control and letting go and not sweating
the small stuff or really the big stuff. Right now,
sometimes letting go can be very painful, especially I think
during these divided times. And you write in your book.
Speaker 2 (42:59):
But this isn't and go. It's very different, I believe, okay,
because for me, being a complete type a control freak,
I don't want to let anything go because it means
I lost. See when you say I just have to
let it go, I have to let it go that
you know they voted for that person. I have a
(43:19):
different I have to let it go. Doesn't that feel
like you're surrendering to defeat. Yes, that's why I hate it.
I've never been able to let anything go. Let them
is very different because let them is you seeing things
as they are and you are detaching from it, which
(43:41):
means you are choosing to no longer put time and
energy into it. And it's the opposite because when I
say I have to let it go, I feel defeated
and less than when I say let them, I feel
superior because I'm kind of like, I see what you're
doing over there, and I recognize that my time is
better spent attacking this a different way.
Speaker 1 (44:02):
But also, I think you mean let them do whatever
they're going to do, because, as you write in the book,
these people will reveal who they are through your detachment, yes,
and allowing them to show their true character, true selves.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
Yes. So you know some people will say, wait, I'm
just supposed to be treated like a doormat. I'm supposed
to let them abuse me. Absolutely not, You're already doing that.
When you say let them, you're actually, for the first
time doing what psychologists need you to do, which is
you're detaching from the person and you're probably seeing them
for the first time. It's amazing because when you say
(44:41):
let them, you detach from something you can't control. When
you say let me, you take your power back because
you prompt yourself. In any moment, whether it's at the
grocery store line that's stressing you out or it's something
that somebody said that hurt you, let me is where
you actually get to choose what you do in response
to it because what you think, what you do, how
(45:01):
you process your emotions. They'll let me part is everything
because that's where your power is, and you always have power.
And that's what this taught man, It's what it's going
to teach you.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
I love that you take your life experience and then
translate it into great practical tips for people. Mel Robbins,
thank you very much. The book is the Let Them
Theory written with your daughter Sawyer. I want to make
sure she gets credit here too. Thank you so much.
This was so much fun and I can't wait to
put into practice this whole philosophy because I'm a bit
(45:33):
of a control freak too.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Well, you're going to love it and your kids are
going to love it even more.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
Thanks for listening everyone. If you have a question for me,
a subject you want us to cover, or you want
to share your thoughts about how you navigate this crazy world,
reach out send me a DM on Instagram. I would
love to hear hear from you. Next Question is a
production of iHeartMedia and Katie Couric Media. The executive producers
(46:07):
are Me, Katie Kuric, and Courtney Ltz. Our supervising producer
is Ryan Martz. And our producers are Adriana Fazzio and
Meredith Barnes. Julian Weller composed our theme music. For more
information about today's episode, or to sign up for my newsletter,
wake Up Call, go to the description in the podcast app,
(46:28):
or visit us at Katiecuric dot com. You can also
find me on Instagram and all my social media channels.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
Hi everyone, I'm Kitty Kuric, and this is next question.
What if the next time someone annoyed you, antagonized you,
or confused you, and you just said let them? It
might sound counterintuitive, but Mel Robbins, the Queen of Practical Wisdom,
(00:24):
says those two words can actually change your life. In
her latest book, The Let Them Theory, Mel unpacks how
letting others be themselves and focusing on your response frees
you to let go and take control of your own happiness.
Mel generously offers anecdotes from her own life and from
(00:45):
her daughter Sawyers, with whom she wrote the book to
illustrate how she's used, and sometimes to her chagrin, not used,
the let them let Me theory. It's an amazing tool
that will stop you from being mister or misfit, which
come on, can be exhausting, and help you get clear
about what's really important in life. Sounds pretty good, right.
(01:09):
Here's our conversation. First of all, Mel Robins, I can't
believe I've never met you. Welcome to our little podcast.
Next question compared to yours, it's kind of little.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Well, it's still important, and I cannot believe I haven't
met you. Either because I have admired you and watched
you from afar forever. So thank you for the opportunity
to meet you, thank you for the opportunity to sit
down and talk to you. Thank you for the opportunity
to spend time with the person that is spending time
together with us right now. I'm really excited.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Yeah, I am too. And before we talk about your
new book that you wrote with your daughter Sawyer, called
The Let Them Theory, which I have a lot of
questions about, I have to ask you a little bit
about your life, Mel, because we're just getting to know
each other. I've read a lot of profiles of you,
and you're you're kind of exploding right now. Although you've
been working very hard for I guess the last thirteen
(02:05):
years or so, building your reputation and your company and
more recently your podcast. But you've been writing books, you've
been doing audio books, you've been doing Ted talks, so
you have been working hard. So how did you become
Mel Robbins? How did this happen? And I love that
you give advice, but how did you get to a
(02:28):
point where you felt like, yeah, I know enough about
the world and about life to give advice.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
You know, the way that I got to where I
am is first I screwed up my own life, like
I have to learn everything the hard way. I don't
know what it is about me, but I either have
to fall into a hole because I'm not paying attention,
or I have to dig one for myself and then
sit in it and wallow and wish somebody would come
and help me and solve my problems. And I've learned
(02:58):
over and over and over in my life that no
one is coming to save you, and that your life
is your responsibility. And let's look at the word responsibility.
Responsibility is the ability to respond. And I didn't know
until recently that we give so much power to things
(03:21):
that are beyond our control. Whether it is your past,
it's already happened. And at any moment, you can decide
that you're going to become a different person, and you
become a different person by figuring out what direction you
want to move in and then slowly but surely aligning
your actions every day with the kind of person you'd
like to be or the things it is that you'd
(03:42):
like to do. And one of the things that surprises
me now that I look back and I think it's
the reason why I'm so driven to share, to teach,
to have conversations like the one that you and I
are having to with the person that's listening to us
right now, is that I have caused myself so much
(04:05):
headache and so much heartache, and I've caused other people
so many headaches and so much heartache, Katie, because I
didn't know, and I didn't know what the problem was.
I didn't know what I was dealing with. And it
covers everything. It covers everything from I'll just give you
an example. I had no idea that I struggled with
(04:30):
ADHD and dyslexia until I was forty seven years old,
no idea. I am part of a lost generation of
women who were diagnosed with anxiety in their late teens
and their twenties when the real issue all along is
that you had undiagnosed dyslexia or undiagnosed ADHD. And I
(04:54):
didn't know that the real issue was an anxiety. See,
anxiety is a symptom. It's a symptom that something is
not getting addressed. And instead what happened is I would
sit in classrooms and clearly I've got a brain that's
not able to learn the way that public schools are teaching.
And I also have ADHD, which presents other issues around
(05:18):
the ability to direct attention. But back in the eighties,
nobody knew that girls could get ADHD because they had
only studied boys. And so there's this entire generation of
women that were diagnosed with anxiety medicated for anxiety that
are now finding out that they have ADHD later in life.
(05:39):
And you want to know the number one way that
women find out that they have ADHD. How their kids
are going through the process in elementary school and middle
school of being assessed for quote, behavioral problems and then
a neuropsychoval lo and behold, turns out that they have
a learning style difference or they have attention issue us
(06:00):
And if you don't address this, you have a human
being that can't do well.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
That's so funny that you mentioned your kids, because my
daughter always tells me I have ADHD. I don't think
I have ADHD.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Mail well, if your life is working well and you're
not experiencing anxiety, then maybe you do or maybe you don't.
But for me, I could never understand why I Why
am I so confident? And I can't remember birthdays. Why
is it that I'm always running late? Why do I
have to have fifty thousand things going on?
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Why are you really managed so well? You went to Dartmouth, right,
I mean, it's hard to get into Dartmouth.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
Nine nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
That's really hard. No, come on, now, I disagree. It
was still hard to get into the Dartmouth so you
had to do pretty well. Then you went to law school.
So I'm just saying you were highly functioning individual.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Right, Yes, I was high functioning, but let's talk about
law school. So if you have dyslexia, And by the way,
Dartmouth was basically one giant wash for me, I don't
remember it because I was constantly in a state of
fight or flight, because I had actually not been diagnosed
with anxiety. So I went through college in a constant
(07:14):
state of feeling on edge and over compensating by drinking
procrastinating all nighters. I was a walking red flag Katie
because I didn't know what the problem was with me.
And so I was the kind of person that, yes,
I could freestyle really well, but it nearly killed me
to finish a paper. And when you start to look
(07:35):
at yourself through a lens that number one. If I'm
not doing well, there's probably some problem that's underneath all
this that I've never actually realized is an issue for me.
And until I figure that out, I'm going to continue
to struggle. And the good news is as soon as
you kind of know what you're dealing with or what
(07:56):
you would like to change in your life, there are
simple things you can do.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
The first book, I guess, or one of the first
books you wrote, was The five second Rule, and that
was when you were forty one. You were eight hundred
thousand dollars in debt. That's a lot of unemployed. You're
watching your husband's restaurant business crumble. That's what you're writing
in the book. You write, it felt like we had
failed at life, with no hope of ever escaping the debt.
(08:23):
Under the weight of this situation, you found yourself procrastinating
and avoiding solving the problems. But then you were like,
let's try this five second rule. I mean, how did
you come up with that?
Speaker 2 (08:35):
And what is it?
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Exactly? Okay?
Speaker 2 (08:37):
The five second rule is a little mindset hack that
helps you push through any excuse or any emotion or
any feeling that you have, so you take action. And
the thesis is very simple. Just like food drops on
the floor and you have five seconds to pick it
up right, blow the dog here off, and then you
can eat it. You have five seconds to act on
(09:00):
an idea before your brain contaminates your will to move.
It's that simple. And what happened for me, here's the
true story is. And again I'm going to jump back
and forth between what I knew then and what I
know now, Because when you find yourself stuck in life,
whether it's crippling grief, which I know you've experienced, or
(09:21):
it is all of a sudden the world changes, or
your job changes, or circumstance changes in a relationship and
you find yourself single, or you find yourself in a
new chapter, or you find yourself as an empty nester,
or you find yourself in a situation where you don't
like what's happening in your community or the world around you.
It is normal to feel stressed about that and paralyzed
(09:43):
us right and actually in the moment, if the issue
is big enough, feeling stressed or paralyzed is a sign
that you're mentally well because the response is actually appropriate
to the thing that you're dealing with. The issue is
that none of us understand that when and you get
to a point where you're super stressed about something and
(10:04):
you start to feel anxious, which is simply just feeling
stressed all the time. I mean, anxiety and stress are
the same physiological things in your body. I didn't know
this at the time when I was forty one. I
just knew that I had eight hundred thousand dollars in debt,
that the bills were piling up on the kitchen counter.
I couldn't open them. I didn't have money in the
bank anyway, I didn't. We were struggling to get gas
(10:26):
in the tank and food on the table. I hadn't
told my parents, I hadn't told my friends, friends had invested.
We're also in a community where we have lots of
friends and you're trying to keep up and you don't
want people to know. And so I did feel paralyzed.
And the thing that's interesting that I really want to
underscore for particularly the person that's listening and spending time
(10:46):
with us right now, whether this applies to you in
your life at this moment, or it applies to somebody
that you love who is seemingly stuck. Is that nobody's
actually stuck. A person who's stuck isn't actually paralleled because
you're in deep conflict with yourself. You know when you're
not thriving. You know when you're making decisions that are
(11:11):
taking your life down the wrong road. Like the hardest
working person in a classroom is not the person getting a's.
It's the person that's failing because they're struggling all the time.
Even if it looks like they're not doing anything on
the outside, they're constantly in conflict knowing that they are
not reaching their potential, that they're not trying how they can.
(11:33):
Same thing is true with health. Someone in your life
that you wish that would be healthy. We make the
mistake of thinking they're not motivated. That's not true at all.
They're in deep conflict with themselves. They know that there
are things that they can do. It's not an issue
of willpower, it's an issue of skill. And so I
think that's an important backdrop because I didn't know any
(11:55):
of this, and so you can start to feel like
you're the only one that's trapped. You're the idiot that
can't figure this out, that somehow you screwed up when
truly it's not just you that there are things you
can do. And for me, I knew what I needed
to do. I'm not an idiot. I knew that if
we're that much in debt, Katie, I need to get
(12:17):
a job. I could ask for help. I need to
get my butt out the front door and go for
a walk, because all the experts say it's going to
make me feel better. I know that drinking half a
bottle of bourbon every night is probably not helping the situation.
Neither is waking up hungover and then hitting the snooze
button six times. But you get so stuck in the
stress of it, and that keeps you in it. And
(12:40):
so what happened, And this is the true story. It
was February two thousand and eight, and so also the
housing crisis going down, and I'm sitting in front of
the television.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
I'm like, that's it.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Mel Robbins. Tomorrow morning, woman, it's a new you. Tomorrow morning.
You have got to stop drinking. You have got to
stop screaming a Chris. It's not like he tried to
fail at the restaurant business. You know, you gotta call
your parents. You got to you got to pick up
the phone and look for a job. And by God, woman,
when that alarm rings, you cannot lay there like a
(13:11):
human pot roast, marinating and fear staring at the ceiling.
You have got to get your butt out of bed
and get those kids on the bus. And all of
a sudden, this rocket ship launches across the television screen,
and it gave me this crazy idea. I thought it
was like a sign from Like, that's a sign from God.
Tomorrow morning, when that alarm rings, mel you are gonna
(13:34):
launch yourself out of bed like a rocket ship. You're
gonna move so fast you're not gonna be in that
bed when that anxiety hits. Now, it could have been
the four bourbon Manhattans. It gave me that idea because
I was drinking an awful lot back then, and.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
It sounds kind of stupid.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
Yeah right, They're delicious, especially this time of year, so
it sounds stupid. So the next morning, the alarm ring,
and that's when I saw something that I'd never seen before.
And once you embrace what I'm about to share with you,
you will never look at life the same again. There
is a five second window that defines your whole life.
(14:12):
It determines how much money you make, It determines how
healthy you are, It determines the kind of relationship you
have with your kids and with your parents and with
your loved ones. It's this five second window between knowing
what you need to do and actually doing it. There's
this moment of hesitation that we all have in the
small moments in life, where you have this instinct that
(14:35):
you should pick up the phone or start the conversation,
or get off the couch and go to the gym,
and instead of actually doing it, we make this fatal
mistake where we hesitate and then we stop and think
about how we feel about doing it. And so that morning,
Tuesday morning, February two thousand and eight, the alarm rings
and I immediately remember that dumb idea at a launch
(14:55):
out of bed, and I stop and think, do I
feel like getting out of bed? I'm like, it's it's cold,
it's winter in Massachusetts. How the hell is this going
to help. I'm mean, hundred thousand dollars in day, I
don't want to get out of bed, and I start
reaching for the snooze button. Because it was a habit
and a habit's just a pattern. And for whatever reason,
I just started counting backwards that morning, five four three
(15:17):
two one, and then I stood up and it struck
me like, I was kind of like, that's strange. And
I was in such a state of desperation that I
just dismissed my kind of pragmatic, cynical side, and I thought,
what if this is a sign from God? What if
(15:38):
this is a magic trip, what if this works? And
so I made myself a promise. I said, any moment
that I have today where I know what I could
do but I don't feel like it, I'm just going
to count backwards and see what happens. And that was
the beginning of an entirely new life.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
If you want to get smarter every morning with a
breakdown of the news and fascinating takes on health and
wellness and pop culture, sign up for our daily newsletter,
Wake Up Call by going to Katiecuric dot com. So
(16:27):
here we are seven years later, and your journey has continued. Yes,
and you are still writing and thinking about ways that
could improve your life that as a result, is improving
the lives of so many other people. And your new book,
(16:47):
which you wrote with your daughter Sawyer is called the
Let Them Theory. So that's obviously the focus of our
conversation today because we want everyone to read this book.
And I know you just had an interview with Oprah
and she said, I mean, this is a woman who
knows about self help. Mel And what did she say
to you about your book?
Speaker 2 (17:08):
I'm still processing it. She said that this is the
single best self help book she has ever read.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Wow, And that.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
It is the message and tool that humanity needs right
now for this extremely overwhelming and challenging and conflict driven
moment in time that we're all living in. Because ultimately,
the Let Them Theory is about what you can control
(17:41):
and what you can't control, and it is ultimately a
book that will fundamentally change your relationship to yourself and
your relationship to other people.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
This all started in May of twenty twenty three. Yes,
when you posted on TikTok about the Let Them Theory
of video that went uber uber viral. Yes, you were,
I guess writing the book at the time. Oh no,
no, no no, So the TikTok video prompted the book.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Well, what happened is I had an experience I never
thought i'd be sitting across from you, Katie, saying, I
discovered something at a high school prom that changed my life.
But it was our son. We have three children, they're
twenty five, twenty three, and nineteen. It was Soakley, right, Yeah,
Oakley was at his prom and I was your typical
psycho micromanaging mother from the carsage, to the tucks, to
(18:33):
the shoes to this to that. And we're at the
pre prom party and our daughter Kendall, who's twenty three,
was home from college at the time, and they're taking
photos and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, Katie,
it starts pouring ring And so you got twenty kids
in black tie and all these parents milling about and
they're about to all leave to head out, and nobody
has umbrellas and nobody has any raincoats. And by the way,
(18:56):
for some reason, all the kids in southern Vermont drive
to the prom, which was new to me, you know,
raising our daughters in Boston, where everybody had buses and
this and that. And so I'm like, wait, you're driving.
Why are you borrowing dad's truck? Like, what's gonna happen
with it? I don't understand this, And now it's raining.
And then I say to Oakley, where are you guys
going for dinner? As they're trying to head out the door,
and the parents are like, wait, you can't go yeah,
and he's like, I don't know. And I was like,
(19:18):
you don't have reservations for prom? He's like no, And
I turned to my husband. I'm like, they do I
have reservations for prom? And he's like, a guest's not.
And I'm like why. I don't know why it bothered
me so much, but it bothered me Katie. And so
I go, well, hold on, let me see if I
can find you something. And now all the parents are
milling about and I'm starting to you know, when you
get that like volcano of emotion.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
That just yeah, you know, I'm familiar with that.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
And as it's coming up and you feel the words
coming you're out of your mouth, or the text that
you're about to kind of send coming, and I'm starting
to feel that wave of panic hit as I'm trying
to find a reservation and we're trying to get twenty
kids to not run out into a rainstorm and just
destroy their hair and their dresses and their shoes. My
(20:03):
daughter sees it coming and she reaches out and grabs
my arm and yanks me to her, and she like
grits her teeth and she's like, them, you're being annoying.
If they want to go to the taco stamp, let them.
If they want to be in the print, let them.
If he's going to run his shoes, let them. And
she started saying this cascade of let her ruin her hair,
let them ud get under dress, let them do what
(20:25):
they want to do, and she kind of ended it
with mom, it's their prom, not yours. Let them, and
that final let them was like a sledgehammer, And all
of a sudden, my shoulders just dropped, and I thought,
let them, like why do I care? Like why am
(20:47):
I not thinking about where I'm going to dinner? And
so I said to o, hey, Oak, and he turned around.
He's like, what you know, because of course I've been
super irritating and annoying. And I'm like nothing, but here's
forty bucks. Go have fun. And then you saw his
shoulders drop and there was this huge smile that his
face and that was that. And the next day I
(21:10):
woke up and I'm at the grocery store and there's
like five people in front of me and one cashier
and it's like beep pep me. And again that sort
of like volcano of emotion starts rising up, and I start,
what do you do in line when that's happening.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
You get exasperated and you're rolling your eyes and you're
like clearing your throats and you're getting aggravated.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Yes, and you now think that you know how to
run a grocery store better than the manager. And I said,
let them, and my shoulders dropped and I just started
using it and I started to notice something. Oh my god,
people are really annoying. Holy cow. People's moods are really
getting to me. Wow, that Zoom meeting really drained me.
(22:00):
Holy cow. I've got opinions about traffic, I've got opinions
about my mother in law's expectations, I've got And it
occurred to me, holy cow, I'm allowing so many people
and so much stuff that's beneath me, and that is
not my job to manage to drain the two most
precious resources I have in life, time and energy. See,
(22:23):
your life is determined by what you put your time
into and what you pour your energy into, and so
I've got news for you. If you are tired, or
you are overwhelmed, or you feel like you're last on
your list, or you're just frustrated with some dynamic in
a relationship, or you're frustrated with the world at large,
or you're just not as happy as you'd like to be,
(22:46):
the problem isn't you. The problem is that you unknowingly
give power to other people and to things that you
can't control. And all day long, you're allowing people who
are an annoying or who are emotionally immature, or who
are doing things that you're never going to be able
to control.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Anyway, to impact you.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
And it's stupid. And so I use this for a week,
and I'm telling you, Katie, just like I felt, I knew.
I have never felt this peaceful. I have never felt
like I truly could put boundaries up between me and
the world. I had never felt more in control. And
so I naturally went to social media and I shared
(23:32):
this simple thing, and I was literally like, you know,
if your friends don't invite you, out let them. If
your kids don't want to help you do something, let them.
If the person that you're dating doesn't want a commitment,
let them. Let people reveal who they are and what
they care about, stop trying to manage them. Because when
somebody reveals who they are and what they care about,
(23:52):
now you get to choose. You get to choose whether
or not you pour time and energy into this. In
twenty four hours, it was fifteen million views.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
Why did it resonate so much? You think, why do
you think it did? Maybe because increasingly people have felt
out of control in this crazy world we're living in
for a whole host of reasons. Yes, And maybe their
impulse to control has gotten stronger as the world's gotten scarier.
(24:23):
And so maybe that, you know, to Oprah's point, at
this moment in time, this is what people really needed
to hear, because people feel out of control, and I
guess your response is to control more when you feel
that way, right.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Exactly, And actually you're the first person that has explained
it that way, and you're exactly right. And one of
the things that is so powerful about this, especially in
this moment in time, is that ultimately every human being
has a hardwired need to be in control. It is
(24:58):
it is a survival mechan it is something that you
will never get rid of. And we've been working against it. See,
when you're in control of your life, you actually feel
safe and you feel confident, and you feel.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
Like less scared.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yes we are, you know, yes we are. Whether you're
scared because your adult children aren't doing well, or you're
scared because your parents' health are failing, or whether you're
scared because of the state of politics, or you're scared
because you see the rising cost of living, or you're
scared because you have a health diagnosis. And so we
(25:41):
need to feel like we're in control of our decisions,
of our actions, of our future, of our lives. And
we also, by the way, and this is where it
gets tricky, is that when somebody around us does something
that worries us, or hurts us, or frustrates the hell
out of us us or stresses us out, guess what,
(26:03):
it makes us feel like we're not in control because
now we're worried about you. So then what do we
do We try to control you and fix problems. Yes, right, yes,
But then here's the problem, Katie. If your behavior is
stressing me out and I then step in and try
to tell you what to do, guess what. You also
have a need to be in control of yourself, and
(26:25):
so you are going to push back against me. And
so we have gotten into this state in our families,
in our love lives, with our kids, with our friends,
and even at a global level when you talk about
global conversations or the way that people are so polarized.
We have gotten to a point where our need to
(26:46):
control has spiraled out of control. And the fundamental thing
that I need that I'm trying to make everybody understand
is this. If there is one thing on the planet
you will never be able to control. It's what another
person does, says, or feels. Period. Any energy you put
into trying to control what somebody does or trying to
(27:08):
manipulate how they feel or trying to ensure that they're
going to think a certain thing will backfire. It will
create more stress and frustration for you, and it will
create more friction and tension in your relationships. I worked
against this fundamental law in every relationship I had for
fifty four years. And when I discovered the let them theory,
(27:29):
and I started saying let them because here's how the
theory works. There's two parts. Any moment that you're frustrated,
you read the headlines, you're frustrated for me. This morning,
I literally got stuck in an elevator and had to
be rescued by the New York City Fire Department. Shout
out to Latter seven. You guys were amazing. We're in
there for fifty minutes. Do you want to know how
(27:50):
I didn't have a panic attack. I recognized in the
moment what's in my control. It's not, So let them.
Let them take their time, them figure out how to
do this safely. Let them do what they're.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
Going to do, the same thing happened to me on
Saturday night, but only for ten minutes.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
Yeah, but your mind can start spending very quickly.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
So when you say let them, you recognize there is
nothing about being in an elevator that you have control of.
So when you say it, you're actually detaching from the
thing you can't control, and so therefore you're protecting yourself
from a necessary stress and you're conserving your energy. And
then you say the second part.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Which is let me Right, I was going to ask
you about let me before we talk about let me melt,
let me ask you about one of your them examples. Yes,
and it was letting your kids If your kids don't
want to do something, let them. So I have to
say I had an immediate reaction to that, and I
(28:50):
sort of envisioned my parents wanting me to go to
Sunday school when I was a kid, or if I
wanted my kids to go somewhere because we had made
a commitment to be somewhere. I can't even think of
an example. I mean, if you just let them, isn't
that an invitation to raise really entitled spoiled brats. Absolutely,
(29:15):
and that example, honestly, I was like, I'm with mel
all the way, but not with kids necessarily.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Well, it depends on the age of the kids, and
it also depends on the dynamic. And so first, this
is really a book about adult relationships, and so with kids,
you're actually in charge. And there's a huge distinction in
this book. And at the very end of the book,
in the appendix, there's a guide that you can download
(29:43):
that is all about how you use this with small
children versus how you use this with young adults and
adult children.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Got it, But what about say I was envisioning teenagers
right who didn't want to go to a funeral. I'm
just throwing that at as an example. I'm not going
to let them say I don't want to go.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Well, here's what you can say. You have to let
them say they don't want to go, because that's what
they're saying. It's already happened. But then you say, they
let me part, and you realize that my control here
is truly in what I think, what I do, and
how I react to my own feelings, Because if a
(30:25):
kid doesn't want to go, that might be a really
mentally well response to a very overwhelming situation that scares
the hell.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
Okay, yeah, maybe it don't use funeral as an example,
like a grandmother's birthday.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Yes, of hear no one wants to?
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Yes, and so you're going to just you say let
them right, because you don't want to get pissed off,
because then your emotions are now driving how you respond.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
And well, how do you respond when your sixteen year
old says, I don't want to go to Nana's birthday?
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Yeah? I completely understand, and honestly neither do I. But
here's the thing. Do you love her?
Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (31:07):
And how do you think it's going to make her
feel if you don't go? And what kind of character
and value do you have as a person? And don't
you think it's going to make you feel like a
good person to show up for your grandma? Like sometimes
(31:29):
in life the decision to make is don't go because
it makes her feel good, go because it makes you
know that you're a good person, because you show up
for people that show up for you.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
So let them is not necessarily for kids or even teenagers.
Let them acknowledge their feelings, but none don't.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
Override them like a psycho bitch like I used to be, Like,
I don't care how you feel, Get in the car,
get your stuff running late anyway? Like do you see what?
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Do you see the difference?
Speaker 2 (32:00):
And do you see the other thing that I was
doing in the role play?
Speaker 1 (32:04):
See?
Speaker 2 (32:04):
As a parent, you are responsible for your children's emotional
well being. You're responsible for feeding them, for keeping them safe,
for providing for them, and you're also responsible more importantly
for helping them figure out who they are and helping
them understand what character means. And what I was doing
(32:27):
because I was able to say, let them, let them
be a sixteen year old, because no sixteen year old
wants to go to a grandmother's birthday for crying out loud.
They want to be on their phones with their friends.
That's an age appropriate reaction to that situation. So me
reacting like a tornado or a volcano just makes them wrong.
And what I do instead is I get control of
(32:48):
myself and I act like a mature adult instead of
an immature adult who then bars and vents at my child.
I acknowledge how they feel, and then I step into
my role, which is this is a teaching opportunity.
Speaker 1 (33:21):
So I was going to ask you to close the
circle on the let them and how it leads to
the let me, because that's such an important part of this.
So tell me what's in it for me? Everything?
Speaker 2 (33:35):
Just three selfish everything. Do you want to feel peaceful?
Do you want to feel powerful? Do you want to
go through life and insulate yourself from all the stressful
things that happen all day long? Of course you do.
And you can't do that without first giving up control
(33:55):
of everything around you. So you can't get sober until
you stop drinking. You can't take control of your life,
or your confidence, or your power until you stop trying
to control everyone and everything around you. And when you
say let them, two things happen. Number One, you detach.
So now one of the reasons why this is also
so extraordinarily powerful is because I didn't just create this
(34:18):
out of thin airror this exists. The let them theory
exists in a time continuum that dates all the way
back to ancient history. The let them theory is deeply
rooted in Stoicism, Buddhism, radical acceptance, detachment theory. So the
(34:40):
power that you're feeling is from thousands of years of
people really talking about Stoic philosophy or being a practicing Buddhist,
or learning about radical acceptance. In fact, we were with
doctor Martin Luther King, Junior's son and his daughter in
law couple days ago, and as we were talking about
(35:02):
the let Them theory, they reflected that this is representative
of doctor Martin Luther King's work because it is all
that is the heart of civil disobedience and peaceful protest,
that you have to learn that the power is not
in the oppressor. The power is in your response to it.
(35:23):
That peace, that love, that non response at times is
so much more powerful than hate, and that's the only
thing that's in your control. And so I know that
this works because I have such deep respect for the
lineage and the history through religion, through philosophy, through psychology,
(35:48):
through some of the most important moments in human time
about what actually created power and breakthroughs for people for
moments in time. And it's in focusing on the power
that you have. You know, Professor Margaret Meade said that
(36:08):
quote that you and I both love, which is, you
know it just takes a handful of committed citizens to
change everything. In fact, that's the only thing that ever has.
And if you don't like what you see happening in
your community, or in your family, or in your marriage
or with your adult children, don't look to them to
fix it. Look to yourself. Stop underestimating your power, your
(36:31):
ability through your energy and your action to shift anything
over time. And that's why I think this has resonated.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
I would think this would be the anti let me
fix it mentality, right not.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
See, most of us when we say let's fix this,
are obsessed with what we're trying, with the thing we're
trying to fix, or what other people are doing. Stop
looking at what everybody else is doing, and come inward
and drop into your value and your character and decide
what matters to you and the way that you know
that something matters to you is not because you're thinking
(37:07):
about it. It's because you're doing something about it. And
when you are spending so much time I'm worried about this,
or I'm worried about that, or that person's frustrating me.
What's happening every time you allow somebody else's behavior or
what they say to hurt you, to impact you, is
you're draining the very energy and time that you need
(37:29):
to get to work or to get out of the relationship.
And one other thing I want to be very clear
about because you know, one of the things that a
lot of people, you know, when they are saying, well,
what about this, it's always about kids, And you're one
hundred percent right. This is not for little kids. This
is for you as an adult to actually be the
mature adult and to be in control of your emotions
and to model behavior and values for your children, because
(37:51):
that's who they learn it from. And most of the
problems that we have right now are because we've got
a bunch of adults walking around that are basically immature
eight year olds inside of big bodies, and we're treating
them like adults instead of seeing that their little children
emotionally let them because you can't control them, and then
when you say let me, there's only three things you
(38:12):
can ever control. It's your thoughts about what just happened
and what you want to do next. It's whether or
not you want to respond and how you respond. And
it's how you allow your emotions to rise and fall
and what you do with them or whether you let
them run you over. That's it.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
That's all you got, speaking of emotions. It's I think
you make some interesting observations about jealousy and about comparison.
And I think we live in a world where you know,
when I was growing up, I didn't know who had
what I mean, I might have known the neighbors got
a fancy new car, right, you know, could afford to
(38:47):
do something my family couldn't. But it wasn't, you know,
it wasn't in my face all the time. Yes, And
now we are seeing all these different life experiences. And
in addition to Margaret Meade, I love the quote that
comparison is the thief of joy, which I thought was Emerson,
but it's actually Teddy Roosevelt. Although a lot of people,
(39:10):
I guess have been that quote has been attributed to
a lot of people. You talk about using those in
a positive way. That jealousy is actually not a bad thing.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
No, unless you're wishing somebody bad, But again let them like,
I can't control whether or not what somebody does with
their jealousy, but I can teach you how to use
it to your advantage. So, first of all, jealousy is
deeply personal because it's tied to what you desire, and
you're never going to feel jealous over something you don't want.
(39:42):
Like I'm not jealous in the least when I see
somebody pull up in a Lamborghini. I don't want one.
I don't care about it. There's nothing that you could
do to make me jealous of somebody. But if I
see somebody that I was just talking to my friend
Jays Shetty and he has.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Really does any of the most beautiful eyes not to
be oh my gosh, you're like.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
Light light, light, light, light green. So we were just
hanging out the other day, I were really really good friends.
And that's the other thing I want to say. The
very people that you're jealous of because they're doing what
you're doing, should be your closest friends because they're the
only people on the planet that know what you're going through.
And what a shame is it that you look at
(40:24):
people that are in your industry or that are doing
what you want to do as competitors or enemies that
you're against, because they should actually be your greatest collaborators.
This was this huge revelation with let them, because I
used to look at my friends and be like, they
got a new kitchen, she has a beautiful handbag, she
just got a promotion, now she's getting married, they're pregnant.
(40:44):
I'm what does that do? That sort of energy just
rises the stress in you, and then you start thinking
about it and you tell yourself it's never going to
be me.
Speaker 1 (40:56):
And I love this idea of upward comparison versus downwards. Yes,
so it is basically envy versus gratitude.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Yes, like we are we default to looking up and
above and seeing people that are doing better and then
using somebody else's example to shame ourselves or beat ourselves up.
It's never going to be me. There's already too many podcasts.
I shouldn't launch one now. Ur I'm never going to
be able to renovate my kitchen because she just did.
(41:24):
I can't have white cabinets because my friend is going
to think I somehow copied her, yes, exact. Can you
know what ridiculousness this is? And so learning to say
let them taught me something important about life. Other people
never block your way. They only lead the way because
you're not actually playing against people in life, you're playing
(41:46):
with them. And if you can say let them, let
them have their success, let them have their Lamborghini, let
them have a million dollars, let them get married, let
them have the love story, let them earn a million bucks,
let them do this, let them do that. Now you're
detached because you're only jealous because you want that thing.
So let them, let them lead the way, and then
(42:06):
say let me, let me remind myself that if they've
done it, there's a formula, and if I'm not so
day i'm emotional and jealous, I can wake up and
follow the formula. And if I just let me remind
myself that if I put my head down, I can
slowly chip away at it. And I can ten years
from now, fifteen years from now, five years from now,
(42:27):
I can save my money. I can change my job.
I can learn how to be financially responsible. I can
learn how to find love again. Let them, let them,
let them, because the more you let them lead the
way and then you say let me, the faster you're
going to find the way to all the things that
you want.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
At the end of the day. I guess your book
is really about control and letting go and not sweating
the small stuff or really the big stuff. Right now,
sometimes letting go can be very painful, especially I think
during these divided times. And you write in your book.
Speaker 2 (42:59):
But this isn't and go. It's very different, I believe, okay,
because for me, being a complete type a control freak,
I don't want to let anything go because it means
I lost. See when you say I just have to
let it go, I have to let it go that
you know they voted for that person. I have a
(43:19):
different I have to let it go. Doesn't that feel
like you're surrendering to defeat. Yes, that's why I hate it.
I've never been able to let anything go. Let them
is very different because let them is you seeing things
as they are and you are detaching from it, which
(43:41):
means you are choosing to no longer put time and
energy into it. And it's the opposite because when I
say I have to let it go, I feel defeated
and less than when I say let them, I feel
superior because I'm kind of like, I see what you're
doing over there, and I recognize that my time is
better spent attacking this a different way.
Speaker 1 (44:02):
But also, I think you mean let them do whatever
they're going to do, because, as you write in the book,
these people will reveal who they are through your detachment, yes,
and allowing them to show their true character, true selves.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
Yes. So you know some people will say, wait, I'm
just supposed to be treated like a doormat. I'm supposed
to let them abuse me. Absolutely not, You're already doing that.
When you say let them, you're actually, for the first
time doing what psychologists need you to do, which is
you're detaching from the person and you're probably seeing them
for the first time. It's amazing because when you say
(44:41):
let them, you detach from something you can't control. When
you say let me, you take your power back because
you prompt yourself. In any moment, whether it's at the
grocery store line that's stressing you out or it's something
that somebody said that hurt you, let me is where
you actually get to choose what you do in response
to it because what you think, what you do, how
(45:01):
you process your emotions. They'll let me part is everything
because that's where your power is, and you always have power.
And that's what this taught man, It's what it's going
to teach you.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
I love that you take your life experience and then
translate it into great practical tips for people. Mel Robbins,
thank you very much. The book is the Let Them
Theory written with your daughter Sawyer. I want to make
sure she gets credit here too. Thank you so much.
This was so much fun and I can't wait to
put into practice this whole philosophy because I'm a bit
(45:33):
of a control freak too.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Well, you're going to love it and your kids are
going to love it even more.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
Thanks for listening everyone. If you have a question for me,
a subject you want us to cover, or you want
to share your thoughts about how you navigate this crazy world,
reach out send me a DM on Instagram. I would
love to hear hear from you. Next Question is a
production of iHeartMedia and Katie Couric Media. The executive producers
(46:07):
are Me, Katie Kuric, and Courtney Ltz. Our supervising producer
is Ryan Martz. And our producers are Adriana Fazzio and
Meredith Barnes. Julian Weller composed our theme music. For more
information about today's episode, or to sign up for my newsletter,
wake Up Call, go to the description in the podcast app,
(46:28):
or visit us at Katiecuric dot com. You can also
find me on Instagram and all my social media channels.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
Host
Katie Couric
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