The Power Of Discord

Healthy relationships are mismatched 70% of the time. That's not a problem to fix. According to today's guest, it's the whole design.

Dr. Claudia Gold is a pediatrician and co-author of The Power of Discord with Dr. Ed Tronick, the researcher behind the famous Still Face experiment. Their work shows that the out-of-sync, messy, imperfect moments in any relationship are where trust actually gets built.

Rex and Claudia get into what that means at work: why curiosity beats certainty, what emotional absence looks like on a team, why "good enough" is essential and not just acceptable, and why "not knowing" might be the most underrated skill a leader can develop.

If you've ever felt a working relationship go sideways and didn't know how to fix it, this one's for you.

Find Claudia: ClaudiaMGoldMD.com | LinkedIn: ClaudiaMGold

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

In a world increasingly shaped by technology, the Human Up Imperative explores the significance of human connection with each other, with the communities we serve, and perhaps most importantly, with ourselves. Join Rex Wallace and his guests as they discuss the ever-important role of authentic, meaningful connection in healthcare. It's time to human up.

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Hey everyone, welcome back to the Human Up Imperative. We've talked before about the importance of or about the fact that cross-functional programs like Medicare Star Ratings that a lot of us are deep into are very human-dependent programs and human interactions are messy and complicated. According to today's guest, that's not just okay. It's actually maybe ideal for our social and emotional development. In a book she co-authored, she shows how working through the inevitable friction of human connection is the necessary path to better relationships, even with work colleagues. So please join me as we hume it up with renowned pediatrician and co-author of The Power of Discord, Dr. Claudia Gold. Claudia, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_01 1:11

I am legit thrilled to be talking to you today. I'm a huge fan of this book, and we'll talk a lot more about that in a second. But first off, um, I really want people to get to know you before we get into the discussion. So can you take a minute and let our listeners know a little more about you and the work you do?

SPEAKER_02 1:29

Sure. Well, I worked uh for about 20 years as a general pediatrician. Um and I was exposed to a kind of a world of knowledge and research that pediatricians don't generally learn about, uh, one of them being Dr. Tronik, who's my co-author. Um and so after this practicing for 20 years, I went and was a fellow and then a faculty member uh on this early relational health uh fellowship training program, um, which opened my mind to uh a whole world of uh knowledge that was so relevant to my work as a pediatrician. And then I began to shift into being more of a writer. I've actually written five books in 15 years uh and a teacher, uh, although I do still do clinical work. Um so I get to be in intimate relationship with families with young children while also teaching uh and writing and speaking to uh a variety, a wide variety of audiences all over the world.

SPEAKER_01 2:35

And the our discussion today won't necessarily be about children, but um but i b since we're recording this the day after Mother's Day too, right? It is very relevant for all personal relationships, right? I mean, some of the some of the um one one of the key tests that the book was even based on, right? The still face test, right? Um so powerful in parenting and in interpersonal relationships, and period, but especially parenting. So yeah, if uh this is you're we're we're we're talking mainly in a work context today, but what we're talking about today, just for our listeners, it's probably even more relevant for those personal connections like with your kids and with and with others. Um and I do have to tell you, well, let's f let's first let's back up and talk about the book for a second. So before we get into like questions, can you can you maybe take a minute and talk about the book, how that came about with Dr. Tronic and and uh this kind of concept of harmony and disharmony and repair?

SPEAKER_02 3:43

Sure. And and I think uh just to link it to relationships throughout the lifespan and in all contexts, really the infant caregiver relationship is the prototype of all future relationships. Um and so Dr. Tronik and I came at the book from slightly different places. I'll tell you where he came from first, that which is that he was a a researcher uh studying uh child development. Um, and this was back in this late 60s, early 70s, where there was this kind of uh idea that parent-infant relationships were perfectly attuned and it was this graceful dance, um, and then and that the infant was really a passive participant. Uh and then he went on rounds with Dr. Barry Brazelton, uh also a renowned pediatrician, uh, and he saw that actually from a very young age, infants have a lot to say about the relationship. And then he set up this experiment to test that hypothesis. And that is the still-face paradigm, which you mentioned earlier for which he is most famous. So we in the fellowship we we learned all about that and how it showed uh that each that the infant really has a lot to say about the relationship. Uh and then now I come from a very different place. So he's primarily a researcher, which is that I'm a general pediatrician and I am there when infants and parents meet each other for the first time, going to deliveries in the middle of the night, um, so very much immersed in the clinical world. Um and then I was his student and then one of his co-faculty, uh, and he wanted to write a book uh describing the relevance of his infant research on relationships throughout the lifespan. So then, since I was a clinician but also a writer, having by that time written uh three other books, he asked me to co-author this book with him. And so that's how it came to be. And it was really uh it is what it's about. So he and I, totally different people, coming from totally different backgrounds, had to somehow manage to produce a book together, which was very messy and very imperfect. Um, and I think what you'll see if you read the book, it is we ended up with quite a good product after a lot of messiness.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

I completely agree. It was uh a great product, and the stories from your perspective and from his perspective are different and all the different case studies that you guys give. Um but yeah, it comes together so so well. I've obviously read it. I actually listened to it on Audible, uh, or I would have a hard copy right right here on display for us. But um, yeah, I can't recommend it highly enough for kind of all of your human connections. Um, you know, and and I and I do think it's incredibly relevant for for work when we're working in cross-functional relationships. And I apologize, my dogs, I can totally hear them, Stefan, so they're going crazy. Um okay, so Claudia, the the book definitely less left an impression, right? So this concept of um, you know, I when I think of my relationships, and and we'll just stick with work, right? Um there are so I think the way you the way you guys phrase it in the book is it's all the every human connection is a dance of harmony and disharmony, right? Um and I think the point in the book is something like 70% of of the time that we make make sure I get this right, but something like 70% of the the time within a relationship, an intimate relationship or a close working relationship, 70% of it is some type of disharmony where we're not completely aligned in something that is that is that high, or is that is that that representative.

SPEAKER_02 7:34

No, that's accurate. So but just to to tell you where the number comes from, it's it's from research with infants. So again, it's uh microanalyses of videotapes of typical uh caregiver-infant interaction. Uh so they slowed it down so that they could see exactly when they were in sync or out of sync. And so on average, and this has been uh reproduced in many different cultures all over the world, many different research settings, that on average the interactions in in in a microscopic way are mismatched uh on average 70% of the time. Um but the the key is that uh they are then repaired. So development proceeds in a healthy way when these mismatches are then repaired. So they're you're out of sync, then you're in sync, then you have another moment where you're out of sync, and then you and then you rejoin. And so the idea is that this is uh, as I said, a prototype of all our relationships, that in this messy uh way you you don't quite get where the other person is coming from, but that you then repair it, and that's the repair that's the essence of healthy relationships, the capacity for repair, which is where trust and intimacy um grow out of those uh repeated experiences of repair.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

And that's the what really stuck with me is is sort of you know the the part that we own in in any relationship, right? It's it's it's easier to imagine with a like a parent and a child maybe, but but with two co-workers who have to work together, or uh or the leader of a team and the people on that team, or whatever the relationship might be between two people, just knowing and understanding that it is very normal for there to be um times of mismatch, times of disharmony, you know, and I guess there's there there's a spectrum there of like levels of there might not be necessarily friction, but there's mismatch in there, and then the spectrum goes up to, hey, it's it's really bad between these two people. But knowing there's gonna be s there's gonna be a l the majority of the time there's gonna be at least some kind of mismatch. And the the point being um ideally both parties being intentional about repairing that. If so, I'll go back to another study that I lean on a lot called the um Drexler Sibett model, it's a team performance model just showing that that people have when people come together as a team or work together, um they have to get oriented on a common goal, they have to build trust with each other before they really start trying to execute, or before they really start trying to work together to execute on some kind of strategy that they've come up with. They can maybe come up with a strategy together, but it's a different animal when you're trying to execute that, right? And until you've built trust with that person, you you will probably never be able to really work together closely, collaboratively to execute that at the highest level. So this feels very relevant to me if two people are trying to work together, knowing, understanding there's there's going to be some disharmony between our relationship in our relationship between us, but um being conscious about repairing that relationship. I'm curious if you can can you maybe paint the picture? What does repair look like? Um, especially in a work setting um that that people should be conscious about trying to create.

SPEAKER_02 11:24

Um well, I think I'm gonna back up a little bit to say what has to come before there is a possibility of repair. Because uh the people involved, especially if there's one who's more uh the manager or the leader, uh needs to approach the relationship from a stance of curiosity or uncertainty. And then realize that they may not exactly understand where the other person is coming from. So when people get into trouble is when they think they know not only the right thing to do, but what the other person needs to be doing. Um and so when there's space for not know, what I call not knowing, or what we talk about as playing in the uncertainty, I'm not really sure where you're coming from. Uh, and and you're two people, I mean, in any relationship, they're two people with their own separate minds uh who need to somehow make sense of where the other person is. So if you approach a relationship from a stance of uncertainty or not knowing, then you can say, well, you know, I didn't quite get that. And what did you mean by that? And and can you explain that to me? Uh and then and that's where you have the space for the repair. Um, but if you just know and you're certain and you're rigid in your thinking, then there is not that space, and so therefore you can't have the repair.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

That makes perfect sense. So essentially, yeah, creating that s psychologically safe space, right? And if you are um the leader, especially. And you have that um so if you are the leader, then you have the responsibility to to create that space to make sure the other person feels like you're not pushing your will on them, but you're generally being curious to try to um it it does it look different if you're peers, if it's two people you know, co-working. I think I'll project.

SPEAKER_02 13:34

I'll give you an example from our process of writing the book, which is where I remember this day very well because I mean one difficulty we had in writing the book is that Ed is an academic. So he writes in an academic way. And I needed to write a book that a lay person, you know, such as yourself could understand. Um and so one day he said, I think we need to have a chapter titled, uh I'm not gonna remember, but it was like the multiple, it was very, very academic. And my first reaction was like, you know, absolutely not. You don't get this, you don't know how we can write, you know, to totally reject what he was saying. But there was actually a tremendous amount of wisdom in what he was saying. Um uh it was something to do with the the multiple ways in which uh one can heal. Uh and so I had to kind of s let go of my frustration and and listen to the the value of what what he was saying to me, and then say, oh, okay, yes, but we need to say it in a way that makes sense to someone who is not in this field. Um and then we ended up that it was a it ended up being a really good idea, but it it only because we had first that friction and that you know moment of intense conflict uh that that then this good idea grew out of from the repair.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

And if that repair is not happening, um it's pretty obvious. Are there I'm I'm I'm I'm trying to I'm imagining our listeners thinking, you know, what what should I be looking for to know if if if repair is not happening in an effective manner?

SPEAKER_02 15:31

Um Are there red flags or signs or Yeah, I mean I think we give an example in the book of a workplace uh situation where uh a person came in, uh a new person to an organization had a lot of their own ideas, and the hierarchy was such that that there wasn't really a welcoming environment for new ideas. And so what you might see and is that the person who's new and and alive and vibrant with ideas becomes more withdrawn, less enthusiastic, eventually they may quit. Um if they they do not feel that they are their ideas are being met with with I mean they might not be right, but they have to if they're met with a sense of value and and curiosity. Um but if they're not um then people get discouraged and they lose energy. Uh energy kind of dissipates from the system.

SPEAKER_01 16:33

Yeah, that's um I can I can totally picture that. It kind of makes me think of the the other concept of emotional um emotional absence. So in the book you say there must be opportunities for repair. Emotional absence does not create them. Can you describe that? So in a you know, what would what would emotional absence look like in a work setting and what what can leaders do to help foster a culture absent of emotional absence?

SPEAKER_02 17:07

Well, I mean I'm gonna take you back to the original research, which is the the still face, you know, people who so in that that's an artificial setting where the mother uh interacts with the baby in a typical way and then doesn't move her face. Uh that so that's the literal manifestation of emotional absence that you don't show emotion on your face, you have a still face. And that's very disorganizing to a baby and it's disorganizing to an adult too. Um and so the yeah, I think the being emotionally present with your uh colleagues. Now how you do that, you know, that's that's I don't have a how-to manual to become capable of being emotionally present. Um I I think just that that's important to to I I was at a conference recently uh called Leading from Experience about how using your own emotional experience in the work environment can be actually very useful uh as long as you understand yourself well enough that you're not just imposing your your own history of trauma on your poor uh employees, which unfortunately does happen quite a bit um when these things are are unconscious. Um but I think bringing your your authentic self, uh I would say, if if you have uh are in touch with your authentic self, then to bring that person to your work relationships is how to be uh emotionally present.

SPEAKER_01 18:50

We um our our organization is not not huge, you know, a dozen employees, but we've you know reached the point to where you know we've started conducting an annual survey of our employees and we just went over it recently with our team. And um but I think um that feels like also a way just to get feedback from the team on leadership, right? And on the culture and on um on um you wouldn't ask about emotional absence, but but but but you would get that from the results from the survey, I think, right? Do you and I know you you're mainly your day job is really pediatrician, you're you're not working with corporations to gather employee feedback or anything, but that feels like um a natural step to help to help uh at least be aware of red flags and then show up for your employees and be present. Um what if what if what if only one person is seemingly intentional about the repair? Can can the working relationship still be productive?

SPEAKER_02 20:06

Yeah, that's an excellent question. Uh and again, I'll use uh an example. Um w when I was uh well I I I think I'll depersonalize it a l a bit. There was a a course being taught um and there was a person who was leading the course. Um and then uh, you know, we live in an era in education where a lot of very highly emotional charged issues are coming up around inclusion, diversity, um, and different people in the group were had different levels of comfort talking about these very, you know, powerfully emotionally charged issues. And and the leader of the group was completely averse to engaging in the mess. Uh so uh in an ideal world, this group of of teachers would have engaged these very controversial, not controversial, but you know, emotionally charged topics and and been honest about how they felt about them, what role they should have in their teaching. But the person, again, who was in charge was absolutely unwilling to engage in that, knowing that it would be difficult to have such a conversation. And it ended up that they were uh unable to teach the course because the the complexity and the messiness was completely shut down by the person in charge. Um so I don't know if that that speaks to your question, but but I hope that gives an idea of of what it can look like in the workplace.

SPEAKER_01 21:47

Yeah, and and just and how important it is to I mean, we've had a lot of these conversations over the last couple of seasons talking about human connection and the importance of showing up and And and trust and respect. And, you know, w we most of our conversations we think of it in three ways, right? So our connection with ourself, our connection with others, and then our connection with the broader community. And some some of the things you mentioned to, you know, many of our clients, our organization's clients, are Medicare Advantage Health Plans. So they serve, you know, elderly and disabled members. And for anyone in healthcare, it's it's a you know, it's a very sensitive topic, right? So when they have a healthcare issue, especially as we get older or are disabled, it's a really important part of our life, our quality of life, right? It's something we have transactions, emotional, financial, everything, every day in some in some capacity, usually, right? So it's a very sensitive um and sort of fragile area that we that we deal with every day. So we're talking largely about employees today, but you know, we could easily, you know, be talking about um a health plan serving its customers or its members and and m making sure you're emotionally present in those interactions with, you know, every interaction with a member to make them feel it's the same dance, right? It's the same dance with an organization and a customer, harmony, disharmony, and repair. And the good the good organizations have have rapid recovery. They have rapid repair, um, service recovery or in in whatever manner. So just um it it's intuitive to some degree, but um, but it still hit me really hard in the book because we don't um outside of customer service where we talk about service recovery pretty often, I don't feel like we talk about work relationships, especially the importance of repairing them all the time. That's like sort of this continuous state of repair because there's this continuous state of disharmony, disharmony, right?

SPEAKER_02 24:05

Yeah. And I think that's really the most important point is that it's uh, and this is the where what comes from infants, it's a developmental process. Any relationship is a developmental process. Even if you meet someone when you're 75 years old, um in these sort of moment-by-moment interactions, you get to know each other and you don't know each other at first. You're two, you know, you ha in a you know, in a work situation, you're people who are, before you start working together, you have a whole life outside of that. So it just is inevitable that it will be a process over time to be able to connect with each other. And so I think when there's sort of a forced sense that everything has to be perfect from the beginning, that is a recipe for failure. So it to expect that there is going to be a process over time as people learn to work with each other. And in that process is how, you know, new ideas and healthy development for babies and healthy development for companies happens uh in that in that developmental process.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

You you talked earlier about about I think you used the word rigid, which I know is in the in the book too. And I think so a a work culture with rigid thinking that shuts down discord will fail to operate. And then you also say in the book, the only way to get out of this mess is to get into it. Um right? So to uh it's almost like to be fair, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:42

I went back to the book and looked that up, and that was not me who said that. Okay, that was David Brooks who said that in an op-ed in the New York Times. But and he was actually referring to the political discord in this country. So uh so I just I want to be sure not to take credit for someone else's words. But I mean I think the idea was that you see this issue uh you know in many, many, many different settings. It it helps make sense of a lot of things. Uh that the uh the only way to get out of a mess is to get into it.

SPEAKER_01 26:23

Right. Especially w y uh with this um when um I don't know, I mean, you know, it was maybe that's the part that's counterintuitive, right? Is uh is even understanding that there is going to be a lot of disharmony. Um you don't um and and then then think you're you know the point being that you need that disharmony to to really build trust. You know, um in a in a lot of cases. It uh it doesn't necessarily mean that you create disharmony or I guess that's where, you know, so I know some people are thinking like um does that mean you you don't create it, but you ex understand that it's going to come and when it does, you repair it as quickly as possible, right?

SPEAKER_02 27:08

You don't need to create disharmony. I mean it's gonna come. It's just a part of human nature that people don't exactly know where the other person is coming from. And then you you um uh again, i this uh not knowing and curiosity and uncertainty about the other person uh is is just an important stance to have. Uh in and then and and you know it again, I keep going back to babies, but you learn a lot uh from babies. So Winnicott, who's a pediatrician, uh coined this term the good enough mother. And people often misunderstand it and say, oh well, you don't have to be perfect, it's it's okay if you're not perfect, but that was not the idea. The idea was that you it's essential to not be perfect, that the the m the is m the misunderstandings are critical. So it's not just okay to be okay with mistakes, but but you ha you have to make mistakes, but I'm not saying you have to intentionally make mistakes, but you will make those mistakes because, again, by virtue of the fact that humans have their own minds and brains uh enclosed in their body, and that they need to have this kind of approximation process in order to feel connected. Um and and so uh yeah, don't don't worry about making messiness because it will be there.

SPEAKER_01 28:35

It'll it'll it'll come. Um and then one more from the book. Um you say, I hope I got this right, capacity to be alone grows out of relationships with others. And while the ability to be intimate with others is rooted in the capacity to be alone. Um and uh so my thoughts here are if if if if uh so I I encourage clients all the time to to spend time in solitude, right? Like as they're when they're strategizing, when they're planning, when they're trying to even even thinking through like what are my what are my goals for this year for the program, for the cross-functional program that I'm leading, like you really need to get inside yourself and and spend some time, I think, in quiet, right? To to to to let that come and lay it out before you maybe go start um sharing it or getting feedback from other people across the teams. Um but you but you need but you need that first. I I believe. I I definitely benefit from it. Maybe maybe everyone doesn't, maybe everyone doesn't need it. But um, you know, I'm bad about thinking that the things I need are the things that other people need too, and that's definitely not always the case. But um so if colleagues find themselves unable to be transparent with others and trusting of others, this it seems to imply that they they need to be comfortable with themselves. How do they how how can someone increase their capacity to be alone, which in turn would make them able to be more transparent, intimate with others? Do you have thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_02 30:13

Okay. Yeah, well, this is again a developmental concept. So that idea of the capacity to be alone uh comes from our earliest relationships. So so but it's a parallel kind of thing. So that as a baby is with a caregiver, but that caregiver is not like on top of them all the time, exactly in tune with them, then their own sense of self begins to develop. So then so they're in the relationship, and that's where they develop a strong sense of their internal self, and that gives them the capacity to be alone with their own mind. Right. So a baby who has uh not been in that kind of messy give and take will have less of a strong sense of self. Um and what you're describing for the healthy process in the work world is to be able to have a conversation with yourself where you say, now what is it that I really want? Who am I really in this role? Um and only then, when you're centered in who am I, can you then interact in this kind of uh then the parallel messy process with with the other people as you begin to get their ideas. So if you're not centered in yourself, it's very hard without, you know, people have uh feel hurt, they get they get angry, they have personal reactions, they they they act out things unconsciously if they don't have a strong sense of themselves. Now, I am not one to give advice about how to develop a strong sense of yourself. I mean, that is a process. And if people are struggling, uh then that's that's a whole other question about how do you center yourself in your role. Um you know, there are many different ways. Uh climbing, you know, going hiking, uh yoga, psychotherapy, uh other intimate relationships. Uh you know, so so your sense of yourself comes from a lot of different places, and there are many, many ways. If your sense of yourself is is fragile and uncertain, this is where that chapter came in, and that's what's in the book. It's a whole host of ways in which you can uh heal from that. It's not just one or you know, one thing or another, but really an immersion in different ways of being that can bolster your sense of yourself if it is faltering for whatever reason, uh which is uh obviously beyond the scope of the level you're dealing on, um, but that's the level I deal on. Sure, yeah. Uh you know, as an infant parental health specialist. Um it's it's complicated. I guess I would quote my colleague, Dr. Tronic, uh the answer to your question.

SPEAKER_01 33:19

Well, and you know, as we talked about earlier, you know, when we came up even with the concept of this show, it was about again connecting with ourselves, connecting with others, and connecting with our community. And we've had some discussions, and I think this is one too where you can you can you know kind of say that the um you know it's um the the more we connect with ourselves, the more we understand ourselves and and kind of give ourselves what we need. And that you mentioned some great examples of getting grounded. Um, you know, time and nature, going on a hike. Um, you know, we've had we've had you know Zen experts on here and talking about the importance of meditation or Zen for some for some people. Um for some people it's faith and and um prayer or and things like that. It's it's but it's it's personal, right? It's um but it's so important to understand what that is for yourself. And the the and the point that we make is that when you do that, when you take care of yourself, when you can connect with yourself internally, it helps your other relationships, right? If you're having friction across, and I'll just keep it work-related, if you're having friction across multiple work relationships, it may be a sign that you, you know, that you need to get grounded yourself, and it it may be time to look in the mirror, right? And and I mean, obviously it's a um every dance is a take it takes two to tango, right? So um we all play a role in those connections and though we um yeah, and and and I think getting grounded and understanding ourselves and connecting with ourselves can greatly impact our relationship with others and how we how calm we are and how grounded we are and how how how we don't take maybe we don't take things as personal when we're grounded, right? And and it helps that helps more collaboration, more less friction, more more uh a better relationship.

SPEAKER_02 35:09

So exactly.

SPEAKER_01 35:11

Yeah. What are we what have we not talked about you know again, knowing, kind of knowing our audience, knowing, you know, these are people that work in an organization that have to work with other people that don't report to them and they're just trying to collaborate. It's really important that they trust each other, that they build trust, that they, you know, understand there's gonna be disharmony and they need to be intentional about repair. Um we've talked about that. But what are we any anything else you'd want to leave them, leave them with?

SPEAKER_02 35:41

Yeah, well, you know, I wrote this book uh six years ago, and I have subsequently written another book, uh which so that so I would say my thinking has evolved on the subject to really put, and I've I've mentioned this throughout our conversation, to put this idea of not knowing at the center. That in any whatever situation you're in, uh however messy and complicated and upsetting it is, is to to anchor yourself in curiosity, uncertainty, and not knowing. That that's okay. It's a place of anxiety, you know, uh certainly as a clinician and as a parent, it's a place of anxiety. As a team leader, it's also a place of anxiety to not know exactly what where you are and what the other person is trying to do. But that that that is really kind of your superpower, whether you're a parent or a teacher or a boss, is to be able to be comfortable not knowing exactly what's going on, uh and let it kind of unfold, because then you have created the space for the repair. Um and if you always have to know and you always have to have the answer, that in the short term that alleviates your own anxiety as the boss, uh, but it does not help uh to grow relationships or to grow an organization.

SPEAKER_01 37:11

Yeah, I I I love that. Um and I need to know what that new book is, or I'll if if you get into so I I uh I gave a talk a while back last year at a conference, and we talked about um sort of the concept was in the key pro one of the key programs that we advise on that we talk a lot about is Medicare Star Ratings, right? So um and we uh the point of the presentation was star ratings is not is not astrophysics, um or it's not rocket science, right? And but the point we were making is not that it's not complicated, it's very complicated, but um but astrophysics has certainty. And you were just kind of describing uncertainty, right? Like not knowing what's happening. Um we're in a time in our industry of lots of uncertainty, lots of federal regulations continue to change, and we don't know where they're going, right? And and astrophysics are based on certainty because gravity doesn't wake up one morning and and just start behaving differently, right? Like gravity, you you can predict if you shoot a rocket to Saturn, you can nail within a few seconds of when it's going to get there because you know you know the behavior of gravity and you know distance and et cetera, and rotation and orbits and all of that. We don't have that certainty. So I think what you say is so important for our our listeners because they are facing lots of uncertainty. And I think um being okay with that is uh is something we talk a lot about, but things you can obviously do to prepare for it and to be prepared and right to make sure you are on top of it as possible, but you you don't know what's gonna happen, so we have to be okay with it. And I think that's a really important mental health topic for uh for our listeners too.

SPEAKER_02 39:01

Yeah. Yeah, we're all talk about you know, community, we're all in this kind of stew together of of uncertainty, which is hard. Uh very hard. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:12

Where where can people find you um if they want to follow you or learn more about your work?

SPEAKER_02 39:18

Okay, so I have a website, Claudia Mgoldmd.com. I do have Instagram, uh, ChildInMind24. I have to confess I don't use it that much. Not a huge social media fan, but I'm also on LinkedIn, which I use more often. Okay. Claudia M.gold. Um so those are uh a few options.

SPEAKER_01 39:44

So when we we will post snippets of this episode on LinkedIn, we will tag your LinkedIn profile and we'll put your website um in in the post as well. Um what's so last question, what's what's one book everyone should read?

SPEAKER_02 40:00

You know, I thought about that for a long time when when you sent that to me. And first of all, I mean I a little bit, I'll be honest with you, I bristle a little bit because who am I to say what every what everybody should do? Yeah, sure. Uh I will tell you a very influential book on me. Okay. When which I read when I was in high school, which was a long time ago, was uh the book of human bondage by Somerset Mom. Okay. Um and and kind of it's a beautiful depiction of what I was saying about the sort of messiness and uncertainty of life creating your own unique path, which is beautiful just because it is your life. Um and so I I love that book. Um and the other thing I thought of, which is a whole other subject that we didn't even talk about at all, but but a book that was recently a movie was Hamnet, which is about grief and loss. And I think that's another thing that I write about a lot, and I'm actually writing a new book, which is uh which is really about that subject, about the importance of uh processing uh loss uh in connection and healing. And Hamnet, I think, is a beautiful uh example of that.

SPEAKER_01 41:12

Okay. I've obviously heard of Hamnet, but I didn't even know what it was about. I haven't uh seen that yet.

SPEAKER_02 41:18

So okay, so we actually, but the the book is also fabulous. Beautifully written book.

SPEAKER_01 41:27

Okay. We actually had an episode last year on here about unacknowledged grief. Um specifically, you know, grief that people don't really it's not public, people don't know about it's not like someone died necessarily, but you're grieving something significant and no one really knows, and people aren't bringing you casseroles to your house, right? Uh there's no sort of social acceptance of it, so you just kind of go through it on your own. And um but yeah, grief, such an important topic. Um, I know even I've been trying to listen to more of Anderson Cooper's um grief podcast, and it's uh such an important topic. Yeah, maybe we'll have to have another episode and talk about that at some point.

SPEAKER_02 42:09

Okay. Sounds good.

SPEAKER_01 42:11

You mentioned your uh your I think your newest book is about um Not the Knowing, is that right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:18

Yes. The book I most recently wrote, not the book I'm writing now, is called Getting to Know You. Uh, but it's really the target audience is people who work with infants and caregivers. So it's more of an academic book um about uh early development and early relationships.

SPEAKER_01 42:37

Gotcha. Okay. I'm sure a lot of our listeners will still that'll still resonate. Okay. Well, Claudia, thank you so much. Uh I really appreciate you being on. I love the book and looking forward to uh to reading uh more more of your writing, but I really appreciate you being on and thanks so much.

SPEAKER_02 42:54

Well, thank you so much. Great talking with you.

SPEAKER_01 42:56

You too. Okay. Thanks everyone. We'll talk next time.