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"During the last lecture of his class, Eric Schmidt shared some life wisdom, and one comment in particular stuck to me: 'Success is determined by the people around you.' I couldn't choose better people to surround myself with than the classmates, professors and friends who I shared these last two years at the GSB with." –Conrado Marturet (MBA ’16)
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Congratulations to the Tepper School Ph.D. graduates who were recognized at today’s Carnegie Mellon Hooding Ceremony. #CMUGrad #TepperLife
Sheryl Sandberg at UC-Berkeley’s 2016 commencement
Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg delivered an extraordinary and unusual commencement address today at UC-Berkeley’s graduation ceremony. For the first time ever in public, she spoke from the heart about the death of her husband, who passed away last May. Three years ago, the Harvard MBA wowed graduates at Harvard Business School with an inspiring speech at commencement. This time, she had lived through one of life’s great tragedies and came to Berkeley to open up about it.
“One year and thirteen days ago,” Sandberg told the graduates, “I lost my husband, Dave. His death was sudden and unexpected. We were at a friend’s fiftieth birthday party in Mexico. I took a nap. Dave went to work out. What followed was the unthinkable—walking into a gym to find him lying on the floor. Flying home to tell my children that their father was gone. Watching his casket being lowered into the ground.
“For many months afterward, and at many times since, I was swallowed up in the deep fog of grief—what I think of as the void—an emptiness that fills your heart, your lungs, constricts your ability to think or even to breathe.
‘THE DEPTHS OF SADNESS, THE BRUTALITY OF LOSS’
“Dave’s death changed me in very profound ways. I learned about the depths of sadness and the brutality of loss. But I also learned that when life sucks you under, you can kick against the bottom, break the surface, and breathe again. I learned that in the face of the void—or in the face of any challenge—you can choose joy and meaning.
“I’m sharing this with you in the hopes that today, as you take the next step in your life, you can learn the lessons that I only learned in death. Lessons about hope, strength, and the light within us that will not be extinguished.”
Over the course of a 25-minute, often highly emotional speech, at times holding back tears, Sandberg explained what it was like to return to her job at Facebook after losing her husband. “I remember sitting in my first Facebook meeting in a deep, deep haze, the Harvard MBA said. “All I could think was, what is everyone talking about and how could this possibly matter? But then I got drawn into the discussion and for a second—a brief split second—I forgot about death. That brief second helped me see that there were other things in my life that were not awful.
THE THREE Ps SANDBERG WISHED SHE KNEW WHEN SHE GRADUATED FROM COLLEGE
“A few weeks after Dave died,” continued Sandberg, “I was talking to my friend Phil about a father-son activity that Dave was not here to do. We came up with a plan to fill in for Dave. I cried to him, “But I want Dave.” Phil put his arm around me and said, “Option A is not available. So let’s just kick the shit out of option B.
“We all at some point live some form of option B. The question is: What do we do then?
“As a representative of Silicon Valley, I’m pleased to tell you there is data to learn from. After spending decades studying how people deal with setbacks, psychologist Martin Seligman found that there are three P’s—personalization, pervasiveness, and permanence—that are critical to how we bounce back from hardship. The seeds of resilience are planted in the way we process the negative events in our lives.
“The first P is personalization—the belief that we are at fault. This is different from taking responsibility, which you should always do. This is the lesson that not everything that happens to us happens because of us.
BLAMING HERSELF FOR HER HUSBAND’S DEATH
“When Dave died, I had a very common reaction, which was to blame myself. He died in seconds from a cardiac arrhythmia. I poured over his medical records asking what I could have—or should have—done. It wasn’t until I learned about the three P’s that I accepted that I could not have prevented his death. His doctors had not identified his coronary artery disease. I was an economics major; how could I have?
“Studies show that getting past personalization can actually make you stronger. Teachers who knew they could do better after students failed adjusted their methods and saw future classes go on to excel. College swimmers who underperformed but believed they were capable of swimming faster did. Not taking failures personally allows us to recover—and even to thrive.
“The second P is pervasiveness—the belief that an event will affect all areas of your life. You know that song “Everything is awesome?” This is the flip: “Everything is awful.” There’s no place to run or hide from the all-consuming sadness.
“The child psychologists I spoke to encouraged me to get my kids back to their routine as soon as possible. So ten days after Dave died, they went back to school and I went back to work,” she said. After being drawn into the discussion, Sandberg says she briefly forgot about her husband’s death.
Sheryl Sandberg
“That brief second helped me see that there were other things in my life that were not awful. My children and I were healthy. My friends and family were so loving and they carried us—quite literally at times.
“The loss of a partner often has severe negative financial consequences, especially for women. So many single mothers—and fathers—struggle to make ends meet or have jobs that don’t allow them the time they need to care for their children. I had financial security, the ability to take the time off I needed, and a job that I did not just believe in, but where it’s actually OK to spend all day on Facebook. Gradually, my children started sleeping through the night, crying less, playing more.
“The third P is permanence—the belief that the sorrow will last forever. For months, no matter what I did, it felt like the crushing grief would always be there.
“We often project our current feelings out indefinitely—and experience what I think of as the second derivative of those feelings. We feel anxious—and then we feel anxious that we’re anxious. We feel sad—and then we feel sad that we’re sad. Instead, we should accept our feelings—but recognize that they will not last forever. My rabbi told me that time would heal but for now I should “lean in to the suck.” It was good advice, but not really what I meant by “lean in.”
DON’T FORGET THE PIZZA–FROM CHEESE BOARD
Sandberg put a humorous touch into her speech, noting that “None of you need me to explain the fourth P…which is, of course, pizza from Cheese Board.
“But I wish I had known about the three P’s when I was your age. There were so many times these lessons would have helped.
“As I stand here today, a year after the worst day of my life, two things are true. I have a huge reservoir of sadness that is with me always—right here where I can touch it. I never knew I could cry so often—or so much.
“But I am also aware that I am walking without pain. For the first time, I am grateful for each breath in and out—grateful for the gift of life itself. I used to celebrate my birthday every five years and friends’ birthdays sometimes. Now I celebrate always. I used to go to sleep worrying about all the things I messed up that day—and trust me that list was often quite long. Now I try really hard to focus on each day’s moments of joy.
FINDING DEEPER GRATITUDE FOR THE GOOD THINGS IN HER LIFE
“It is the greatest irony of my life that losing my husband helped me find deeper gratitude—gratitude for the kindness of my friends, the love of my family, the laughter of my children. My hope for you is that you can find that gratitude—not just on the good days, like today, but on the hard ones, when you will really need it.
“There are so many moments of joy ahead of you. That trip you always wanted to take. A first kiss with someone you really like. The day you get a job doing something you truly believe in. Beating Stanford. (Go Bears!) All of these things will happen to you. Enjoy each and every one.
“I hope that you live your life—each precious day of it—with joy and meaning. I hope that you walk without pain—and that you are grateful for each step.
“And when the challenges come, I hope you remember that anchored deep within you is the ability to learn and grow. You are not born with a fixed amount of resilience. Like a muscle, you can build it up, draw on it when you need it. In that process you will figure out who you really are—and you just might become the very best version of yourself.
BUILDING RESILENCE
“Class of 2016, as you leave Berkeley, build resilience.
“Build resilience in yourselves. When tragedy or disappointment strike, know that you have the ability to get through absolutely anything. I promise you do. As the saying goes, we are more vulnerable than we ever thought, but we are stronger than we ever imagined.
“Build resilient organizations. If anyone can do it, you can, because Berkeley is filled with people who want to make the world a better place. Never stop working to do so—whether it’s a boardroom that is not representative or a campus that’s not safe. Speak up, especially at institutions like this one, which you hold so dear. My favorite poster at work reads, “Nothing at Facebook is someone else’s problem.” When you see something that’s broken, go fix it.
“Build resilient communities. We find our humanity—our will to live and our ability to love—in our connections to one another. Be there for your family and friends. And I mean in person. Not just in a message with a heart emoji.
“Lift each other up, help each other kick the shit out of option B—and celebrate each and every moment of joy.
“You have the whole world in front of you. I can’t wait to see what you do with it.”
DON’T MISS: SHERYL SANDBERG’S INSPIRING SPEECH AT HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL
The post Sheryl Sandberg’s Extraordinary Confession On The Death Of Her Husband appeared first on Poets and Quants.
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