2017.2017. 2017.2017.2017.2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. hi, everyone! Welcome to the second day of the Obama foundation Summit! We're thrilled to have you all tuning in. I hope you have really enjoyed the main stage events. A reminder, we're here to inspire, empower and connect the next generation of leaders. You're critical to that. We hope you stay in touch with the Obama Foundation as we go forward. As part of this, we'll get into some conversation with great leaders and hear their perspectives with civic engagement and the work we can do together. First up, we have a writer, award winning film maker and activist. Welcome. Thank you so much. Thank you for being here. Thank you. I want to start by first letting our viewers know that you have done really important, innovative work in France when it comes to addressing issues of race, gender and religion. I would love to hear from you your view of civic engagement, how do you think about what that is and how has that informed your approach to addressing these issues? Thank you for allowing me to share my views. First thing, I think that it is important for every citizen to think about himself or herself as someone important. As someone that can have a voice and that can be part of the global conversation. I started my organization because I was tired of hearing people speaking about me as a woman, as a French woman of color without having me on the set. I decided with my organization to tackle every day racism, especially statements authored by public personalities. You mention that we try to be innovative, we created a ceremony, an award ceremony that would reward the worst racist sentences offered by public personalities. It was a way to use humor and to work with comedians and at the same time raise awareness on the fact that when you hear the media, public despair, you hear much racist statements and you feel there is nothing that you can do about that. Having that ceremony was a way to be vocal in that. Wow. Thank you. Thank you for your work! Thank you for sharing it. You're welcome. I'm curious, you mentioned you created this organization, the indivisibles, I'm curious as a young woman, as you were recognizing the need in this space what inspired you to create an organization as opposed to joining others, other organizations in this space? Just tell us a bit about that process of creating that. Because I had the feeling that the other organizations were doing a great job, but they weren' really working on the specific topics of prejudices that I was concerned about. Actually I was inspired by another woman, another European woman, I watched a dock ministry on -- a documentary on a black German, she said you cantic German and black at the same time, you can do this and be black at the same time. I contacted her, she -- we just spoke and she said you should gather with your friends and start something. That was all. We were only six at the beginning. I had never, ever would have known that it would be that big in France. Wow! Thank you. Last question for you. Just tell me a little by the about -- we're in day two of the Summit. What are you taking away? What have you enjoyed and inspired you? The first thing I enjoy a lot is the energy. Everybody is enthusiastic, we have people from all around the world. Wherever I turn around, I just jump into someone that's amazing, that's doing an amazing job in his or her city or his or her country. That's something I really want to bring back to my country. It is inspiring. I have the feeling that I can connect with everyone here to work back in my country. Wonderful. A final question. What advice do you have folks watching, perhaps what you have said about questions of identity, making a difference in your community, perhaps really resinate butt not but not sure o get started. What would you share about the first steps to take. Everyone has to learn that power is in our hands. We can do whatever we want to do as long as we believe that we're fighting for the right cause. You know, I had no idea about where I would go with my organization but we were convinced we were doing the right thing. That's the feeling I have being here connecting with people who are working on causes in other places. Wonderful. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you. We're proud of the work that you're doing. Thank you for encouraging me. Thank you. Next up, we have another special guest, this is Joe, he's a cofounder of RBNB which of course we know -- many folks watching right now, they have taken advantage of the the service in the past. Welcome, Joe. Come on up. For anyone watching the morning session, if you're able to stream that, you know that Joe joined an exciting, interesting I think conversation about the role that business has in thinking about civic society and that's really where I would like to start, Joe, in case folks did miss that. We think at the Obama Foundation a lot about the role that people have, individuals have as we're -- we want people to feel that they have the power to make a difference in their communities. I'm curious with the hat that you wear as running a business what do you view the role is for business and institutions in terms of creating the type of civic society we want to have together. A great question. I'm excited to be here. It was a fascinating panel. I think to get right into it I feel like companies in the 21st century have a responsibility to go above and beyond the normal calls of duty of the business, to actually take whatever the strengths are, whatever they're good at and go out in the world and solve problems and they can do that through partnerships with the public sector, obviously, so I'm thinking right now specifically of things that we're good at as a company, short-term hospitality, creating trust between strangers and a global scale through a technology platform. It showed up for us, how to answer the question, how do we put the roof over the head of people that need it the most, we create a pod, open homes, allowing anyone to house someone that's been displaced by natural disaster, political conflict, and so we host all over the& world and they're going above and beyond even hosting a traveler, saying I want to open my home to somebody that needs it. Wow. Tell me a little about it, Joe, you mention on the panel this morning the story of how airBNB came about, you had to pay the rent. It was the asset, it is key to understand the assets that you have in the community organizing. I'm curious for a lot of us, you have an idea, the reality is that a multibillion dollar company like AirBNB followed with an idea and tenacity to make it real. It can be hard when we have ideas floating in and out of the heads of that can be a -- that can be a major company, a powerful way to make a difference in my community, change the world. What advice do you have for folks that are trying to figure out how to even begin that process? What did you learn from that experience? It is funny. Today is November 1st, 2017, 10 years ago to the date in 2007 was when a rent check was due that we couldn't pay. Happy anniversary! Thank you very much! It is a lot of reflection of ten years ago, we had our backs up against the wall, we quit our jobs to be entrepreneurs, no idea what we wanted to do, the rent is beyond our means and we have to think of a creative solution to keep our apartment. I pull an air bed out of the closet, what if we host a designer that needs a place to stay, they can offset the rent and we can maybe make a connection in the process. We ended up putting three air beds in the living room, making a website, hosted three people who got to feel like they belonged in San Francisco, they stayed with locals. We became economically empowered as a result, we stayed our apartment through the money we made and it sparked a bigger idea which is how do you create a platform to enable anyone with extra space to share in a way that they want to connect to someone else. Wow. Do you have advice from that experience? >> Absolutely! It is incredibly important that an entrepreneur out there who is watching this right now, thinking about starting something, solving a problem that they -- that they're facing themselves, they're solving their own problem. Why is there important? -- this important? Bringing a new life to life, it is met with rejection, people say no, it is crazy, if you are motivated because you are solving your own problem it allows you to have the perseverance to really breakthrough and get through the adversities and rejections you will face. Thank you. Last question for you. I know you've tended different sections, you were on the main stage this morning, what are you as a business leader trying -- hoping to take away from this experience and the Summit itself? I'm really trying to take away how do private companies intersect with the public sector, with the civic sector really. It is great. I have had phenomenal conversations, this is by the way one of the most diverse conferences -- I wish every conference was this diverse. I met people from Africa, Asia, South it America, North America, you start the conversations and it is funny where the intersectionalities between private companies and the assets they have with the civic engagement and the community building of some of the other organizations here. So some of the things that we're up to, working with the national domestic workers association to allow our hosts to provide living wage to any houseworkers who work in the airBNBs, we saw an MEU with the World Bank to bring tourism to places like India, Bangladesh, Philippines, so I'm insanely interested to find these conversations and intersectionalityies. Thank you for sharing your perspectives and for the great work you're doing. Thank you. Wonderful. Okay! I think that's it for our time. Thank you, everybody, for joining! We have coming up next, you're not going to want to meet it, Mrs. Obama will be in a conversation with poet Liz Dozier. poet Elizabeth Alexander. I promise it is not a conversation you want to miss. Alexander, Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Welcome to the Obama Summit 2017. Please welcome, poet, educator and social justice arts advocate, Elizabeth Alexander! [applause] ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Hello everybody! All you beautiful people! Good day. Today we are here together to hear from Michelle lavonne Robinson Obama! You have to say the whole thing when you're on the South side! Lawyer, humanitarian, daughter, wife, visioner of unseen possibilities, cultivator of gardens, human gardens, nurturer of dreams, and for eight years with sheer and unflinching perfection first lady of the United States. All around the world she has shown grace, courage, intelligence, necessary humor, integrity and beauty which radiates from the inside out. She has inspired us with self possession. She is also a sister friend to many, and to my great fortune, a blessing of my life to me, before children, throughout children and through the many twists and turns that all lives offer. Michelle Obama is true north, she is a compass. She's steady in the churning sea. To anyone who knows her up close or at a distance, she's always been adamant about the importance of belonging to and serving her community in circles moving out from home and radiating throughout the world. So today we're going to have a conversation, please welcome my beloved, our beloved, Michelle Obama. MICHELLE OBAMA: Threes nothing like being introduced by a poet. I love you. I love you too! The way this conversation was shaped and put together, it is really exciting, so many of you were asked what you wanted to talk about with Michelle Obama. Those questions, those hundreds and hundreds of very rich, wonderful questions were my basis for beginning to craft and shape some themes, some areas. Your voices are in all of the questions and areas that we will go over today. I wanted to start off by saying that in the arts we often say the specific is universal and the topic I thought that we were really in the zone is the self in the world. In the arts we say the specific is universal and from the village we can know the world. So today in shaping this conversation around the self and the world and how all of us go about our individual lives from our communities out into larger worlds, I was thinking about how, place, you went from a girl on the South side of Chicago, to the global stage filling this room here as we have come together with people who want to understand what we're thinking about from here to there. How do our roots define us as we move outward from where we begin. Also to sort of mark the space of the conversation over the course of our many years of friendship and your increasingly public life, oh so public, you have always been someone that's self-effacing about your own accomplishments, matter of fact about them and empowering about the collective, always turning that individual energy out to the collective. We'll be thinking of how we take our power as well and move it out for other people. We're going to talk about how we can demonstate and teach and inspire young people to keep on keeping on and how taking care of ourselves is an important part of that. Also we'll talk about how art and culture have a very unique and particular role in making our civic space more liveable, more beautiful, true, hopeful. So that's what we're going to talk about. MICHELLE OBAMA: Sounds good. You like that? Snaps! Th's what you all do! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I love the snap! Make sure we do that! MICHELLE OBAMA: Okay. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: We'll start off with the power of words and inspiration. We know that words not only matter, but also words are how we -- they carry meaning and they carry who we are. Our words and our language are the main way that human beings give themselves to each other and say who it is that they are. You have put some words out into the public that have been very, very useful to people. I could list many, but, of course, when they go low we go high -- MICHELLE OBAMA: As much as we can. we can. We always can! We always have a high place. MICHELLE OBAMA: We can. Yes, we can. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I wonder, that's been a useful thing to so many people. What are some words, poems, prayers, words that have been and are meaningful guides for you? MICHELLE OBAMA: Yeah. I have been thinking about this, whether there are -- words, music, all that, there are many points of inspiration for me when you think about -- when I think about the words that stay in my head that guide me when I wake up to every day, it is the voice of Marriane Fraser Robinson who is sitting over there right now. [applause]. MICHELLE OBAMA: Because it shows that, you know, words don't have to be poetic, they don't have to be set to music. Most of the words that guide us are those words that we have heard growing up, those messages. For me, I had some pretty powerful parents who were very understated and humble in their own rights, but I live each day trying to make them proud. I think a lot of that, you know, comes from my father -- many of you know my father's story, but -- my parents didn't go to college. They were not of wealth. They were not of means. My father had MS. He was an athlete until he was stricken with MS in the prime of his life. He used to box and swim. Imagine someone with that much life all of a sudden for no apparent reason not being able to walk without the assistance of cane. That's how I always knew my father, as someone with a disability. The other thing I knew about my father was that even in his disability he commanded a level of respect. He was the center of not just our nuclear family, but our family. You know, my father used to sit in his chair and people would come for advice, they would come for money, they would come for love, for affirmation. He would give that affirmation so willingly. The thing I remember about my father, he never complained. He got up. He went to work. Not a work that filled him with passion, that was something that my parents didn't even understand, working for passion, you worked to make a living, you worked at the water filtration plant right here in Chicago his entire life. He got up, put on the blue uniform, got in his car and whatever pain he must have been experiencing throughout his life, fatigue that comes from MS, the inability to lift your own leg without help and assistance he never complained. I grew up -- someone with that much power, influence, love, never complained once. You know, those are the things, the stories, the messages, the images that roll around in my head that tell me I have no reason to complain and I am a blessed child -- maybe I didn't have the money but I was blessed with the love of a father and a mother that gave me gifts that were priceless. For that I owe so much. I think about that. I think about making them proud. I think of with every word I utter, what does that mean for them? How do I speak to their legacy? I don't know that it is a song. If I was to pick a song, it would be a Stevie Wonder song of any kind. If there were poetic words, it would be the words of mya Angelo, powerful, true. If there are every day words, they're the words of you, saying do what you're going to do, to be honest, true, to treat people with dignity and respect and it wasn't just their words but was their actions, it was the open hearted, to be empathetic and to make your life useful, to define that usefulless as broadly as you can. Those words guide me. They led me to Barack Obama who reminded me very much of my own father in his decency and honesty and compassion. So that was my -- that was my foundation. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: You know what's interesting, it also the words that were not spoken, the words of complaint that were not spoken and how much silence also teaches us. I think also, you know, one of the amazing things about you, you have such a healthy skepticism. I say that -- true skepticism, which is to say I wonder if your parents ever said anything to you along the line of, you know, don't believe the hype. MICHELLE OBAMA: Gosh, having Marianne in the Whitehouse with you for eight years is a grounding experience for all of us! For every Obama! She was just not pressed ever! She is like, you know, I can go home any time! Yes, we know you can, mom! You know, yes. It is that sort of matter of fact, it is not where you live, it is not what you have, it is who you are. That's the ethos of my entire family. We were working class folks from my immediate family to my extended family. We were a family of carpenters and teachers and police officers and, you know, seamstress. We weren't lawyers and doctors. You know, there was a skepticism of those folks who tried to be uppity, there was a skepticism of unabashed wealth or privilege. A skepticism, my father never believed in joining, that you were independent throughout your life. Those were kind of messages that we got not just from my father but from my grandparents, my grandfather. We were privileged to have been raised with all of my grandparents, maternal, paternal, so in Chicago, we talk about this at dinner, but in Chicago you were very much a part of your neighborhood. In our neighborhood, our neighborhood was comprised mostly of my extended family. You know, we lived in a house above my maternal aunt. We lived around the corner from my grandmother and another aunt, my grand father and grandmother, they were separated, never divorced, they lived around the corner from one another. That's black Chicago right there. They lived right around the other corner. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Functional. MICHELLE OBAMA: It is functional dysfunction. They didn't speak to each other either. (Laughter). They lived around the corner but you didn't talk to them or talk about the other one with the other one. My paternal grandparents lived in Parkway gardens, a 5-minute drive from our house. We grew up with a lot of these messages and, you know, my maternal grandfather South side we called him, he loved jazz, he filled the house with music, he put speakers in every room of the house even when my mother was young because he didn't have a lot of money, all of his music collection, they were hodgepodged together, turntables that didn't match, a real to real he found in the alley, you know, cabinets he made, speakers he borrowed, but the house was filled with Miles Davis and Coaletrane and we blew out candles at birthdays and he fried chicken and drank milk shakes at midnight. There was healthy skepticism and fear. There was fear of other people, fear of leaving that unit, fear of what could happen to you out there in the big bad world. We came from a place of skepticism, but it was interesting that my parents out of all that, they always pushed us beyond that initial fear. You know, I was talking -- a favorite it comedian Chris Rock tells a joke about what it is like to live in a dangerous neighborhood that your world just gets more narrow. They say stay on the block, don't leave, stay on the front ward, the porch, stay in your room, it is dangerous, before you know it, you're hopping around in one foot in your living room. A lot of black people live like that. Fear is real. I had parents who pushed us beyond that fear. They encouraged us not to be so skeptical that we couldn't explore and experience and take risks. I don't know where they got that from. That's not how they were raised. They were very much raised to be within the limits that were set by segregation, Jim crow and lynching and inequality. My patients pushed us beyond that. Skepticism still was the foundation that would protect you. I think in many ways it is that skepticism that I carry with me that you don't be too high, don't be -- don't enjoy the highs too much, don't wall low in the lows too much, there is a -- there is a balance that you have to have in life to succeed. It takes a little skepticism to sort of hold on to that. Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: I got some snaps! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: In that skepticism, I think also, are critical thinking tools in order to -- I remember there was a magazine profile on -- an early profile of you where you talked about some of your uncles and said in another social order they would have been bank presidents with the way -- their quality of mind, what they were good at in particular, but you were in a particular social order. I think being able to really have critical understanding of the lay of the land is also something that you have brought forward with you. MICHELLE OBAMA: Absolutely. That's --, you know, some is life context, some is study, some is statistics and understanding charts and Graphs and how things work. You know, that's also what makes I think Barack and I such a good team. He's a lot of the head and I operate a lot from the gut. It is the sort of stuff that you learn about, how the world works. That's informed me and maybe it is growing up in the inner city, you know, just walking around the block to school you could get your butt kicked if you talk like a white girl, you have to figure out how to exist in a world where you were intelligent, but still had to survive. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: There is a lot of that the that comes -- that comes into play as I understand how the raw world works and how oppression and segregation and all of that You know, gritty stuff works. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. Yes. Yes. You also just in that beautiful portrait of growing up talked about living with art, the music that was playing, with all of the record players. What it is to have art at the ready all the time to help you feel a lived life. Could you talk more about living life with art in all kinds of ways? MICHELLE OBAMA: You know, I don't think I appreciated how much art was a part of our little modest working class life. It was essential. My father was an artist, a beautiful artist. He was a painter and a sculptor. Again, had he been from a different family of a different era of a different race he may have known that art could have been a way of life. But that wases to go back to the skepticism, that was -- that was a luxury. You know, to watch him paint, to sculpt, you know, he loved to do nudes and take a plain mold of clay and turn it into from the bottom up something beautiful. He worked with charcoals and oils and water paints. It was a gift of his. There was that part of it that used to paint all of the backgrounds in our little opereta workshop foundation. We would sing and dance. I had -- most of my family, they were musicians, migrate aunt was a choir director -- my great aunt was a choir director at the church and they taught us to be in plays, to sing, performing, it was a big part of growing up, not to mention the music. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I didn't know that. MICHELLE OBAMA: We did -- ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Operetta? MICHELLE OBAMA: We didn't sing operettacially. One year my brother was hansel and I was a fairy Princess. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Mommy is laughing remembering. MICHELLE OBAMA: Every year there was a big performance at a church basement or in a school, you know, theater that was borrowed. It was a rag tag little theater group that my aunt used to teach. I think that was mine first -- those -- the little things in my life that were -- that brought art into my world. But then as I went to school I realized that there were kids who were only there because of art. That's the power of art that we all know. It's -- art is the first language we speak. Truly, every child before they can talk, they're given a pencil, a paper, some crayons and they're drawing and it is life that yanks that instinct from them. We're now living in public school systems where art and music and PE, the things that bring life and Joy are the first things that are cut. When I was growing up, those are the things that would hook some of those kids that weren't good at math or reading because their brains worked differently, they were motivated by something different. For them you would see those kids light up when it was time to draw or to speak or to sing. That's the power of the arts. As we know, it is often the hook that gets kids to then understand why math is important. It is the thing that gets them to school to do reading. It is why we made art and music and culture such a center piece of our Whitehouse. We were trying to remind this country, this world, that arts are not a luxury. It is not something to be given to those that can afford it, that we have so many talented young people who are shaping this world and can shape a vision. It is the thing that unites us. We see that with my favorite piece of art to date right now is Hamilton. We see the power of arts, music, dance, rap, poetry, to spoken word to teach history in a way that that history teacher can't reach people. How we deny that, how we don't support that, it is amazing to me. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: It makes no sense. I think also you brought up all of the culture in your time in the White House. I think that Earth, Wind Fire was the first concert you had. MICHELLE OBAMA: the governor's ball. It was great to see the governors jamming. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: They did though! It called them into that space! I think what was so important about that, it was saying that just because you grew up to it, that it is not high art -- that you groove to it doesn't mean that it is high art. What does it mean to every artist to have the precision, the light right of that music, it is -- MICHELLE OBAMA: It is an intellect, a skill, a gift. We take it for granted because we enjoy it. It is a sad kind of thing. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. Yes. I think also moving out, to me, Earth, Wind Fire, they're of the basement, they're of the -- MICHELLE OBAMA: of the red light. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: of intimate spaces. But then it was on the world Stage -- I'm just carrying on like I just didn't do that -- I think that -- I think about, you know, Chicago, Gwendolyn brooks, I must call her name when in her space, she had a wonderful poem contrasting the Chicago Picasso with the wall of respect, talking about what it meant in community for people to experience art and beauty and greatness as a way of saying this is who we are and this has brought us together. MICHELLE OBAMA: When you think about how little art there is, public art there is from the communities from the South side, a thing that we hope to do with the Obama presidential center -- there is -- you know, there needs to be places for public art outside, just like downtown, just like the Picasso, like the Bean, there is nothing -- those pieces in communities are few and far between. They become the gathering places for community, not just a place to see beauty and possibility, but it is a place for people to come together. We deserve those things in our communities just as much as the rest of the city. [applause] ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: That's right. I haven't even turned a card! We have to turn a card. Let's turn a card. We have covered all of it. Words, inspiration. This is an interesting zone. There were some wonderful questions from -- one from Sri Lanka, others, about moving your voice and moving out of the zone of the voice in an artistic sense, how do you use your voice to express disagreement? How can you be productive in disagreement? What do you know about that? Where did you see that modeled? How do you take that forward? MICHELLE OBAMA: Well, when thinking about this question I started a little bit -- I pulled back a bit. I think the question of how you use your voice comes after you find your voice. I think that's something that a lot of people take for granted, that having a voice just happens. So you have to know how to use it, how to use it carefully, how to debate, you have to find it. I think in particular for women as we have seen now, finding that voice, you know, it doesn't just happen overnight. I think about me, sort of where did my voice come from, again we talked about this at our table at dinner, but again going back to my special parents who from a very young age, not people that read parenting books, they probably didn't think that their role models of parents were asper effect for them --my grandparents were better grandparents than parents. For some reason my parents understood that teaching children at a young age that their voice was valuable was important. I didn't live in a household where kids were told to be seen, not heard. I was allowed to speak my mind at 3 and 4. They asked my opinion, they wanted input from me and my brother about things that involved the family and life. We knew about money and paying bills and we knew about issues in the family. You had to be respectful, but the notion was that a 5-year-old wouldn't have feelings on how their life went was not something that my parents believed in. My parents always said she was raising adults, not children, she spoke to us as people because that's what you needed to practice. I think all of that early stuff for those of us that were parents out there, who are thinking about how to empower our children, it starts very early. You can't sh ush them bus you don't agree with them -- them because you don't agree with them. When you do that, you're telling them there is a difference between respecting something that you see is wrong and not feeling it and speaking out about it. You do it in a respectful way but you're never -- we were never taught what we saw, felt wasn't real. If a teacher taught me unfairly in class I couldn't go immediately off on them. I could come home, go off about it in the kitchen, we would talk about it, then Marian would hustle up to school and go off on them, unbeknownst to me, I heard of many teachers shut down -- well, you're going back to school, you do what you're supposed to do. I always knew I had a defender, an advocate which made me ready to use my voice. When we think about women in particular, you know, we ask them to speak up, we ask them to speak their mind, we ask them to just say no, to speak out against sexual harassment, to speak out against inequality, if we don't teach our young girls to speak at an early age, that just doesn't happen, it takes practice to have a voice, you have to use it again and again and again and again before you can say no or stop, don't touch me. You know, if you're taught that adults are right all the time, it is hard to go against the power that is around you. I don't think that I had those roadblocks when I was young. I thought I was funny. I thought I was smart when I was little. I thought that I made sense. From moving from that place of understanding the power and the rightness and the truth of my voice, then how you use it is more link to the values than anything else. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: That's right. MICHELLE OBAMA: Then it goes back to how you were raised. When you have a voice, you know, you just can't use it any kind of way. You can't just say what's -- this whole tell it like it is business, that's nonsense. You don't just say what's on your mind. You don't tweet every thought. Most of your first initial thoughts are not worthy of the light of day. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: I'm not talking about anybody in particular. I'm talking about us all. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Not talking about anyone in particular. MICHELLE OBAMA: Everybody does that. Young people, tweeting, social media, that is a powerful weapon we just hand over to little kids. You know, a 10-year-old, here you go. Tell it like it is. No you don't! You need to think and spell it right and have good grammar too! [applause] ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I think also that understanding of not only of having a voice, but also understanding that you have advocates in your parents and that is part of that -- I think that's definitely -- I'm thinking was I taught that way explicitly? I think I was actually, and was also taught -- my dad -- I had a crisp bill on me at all times because he said if you have to leave the job, the man, the situation, danger -- MICHELLE OBAMA: You have your 20. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: It was a 20, it was crisp. You get out, then people will help you sort the other things out later, that that is a profound thing to carry in this life with all of its unexpected things. MICHELLE OBAMA: When you have the power of support -- ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: How you debate -- you're a lot more respectful. You're a lot more cautious. You know, you're not so ready, you're humble, you're a little skeptical and that skepticism is not just about the other person, but you have to have a healthy skepticism in your own view that you are not always right. That you have to -- we all have to be open to the differences and the possibilities of other people's truths. You're careful with your words, you're careful with how you debate. I think when -- the First Lady, president, commander-in-chief, you have the power, the voice, the platform, the responsibility -- what comes with that is responsibility to know that every word you utter has consequences. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: I said this in the course of many of my speeches, that words matter at this level. They -- you learn how much they matter at this level, but it doesn't mean that anybody in this room is free to be careless with words and how they debate because at this level you see how much words matter. The truth of how much words matter is true for each and every one of us. You can't just slash and burn up folks because you think you're right. You know, you have to treat people as if they're precious, all of them. Even the people you don't agree with. If we thought that way, if we lived life that way, we wouldn't have to be taught how to debate. We would treat each other as decent human beings. We would treat one another with respect. Again, I think that starts with the values that you learn growing up. If nobody is valuing your voice, it is hard for you to know control and compromise and it starts very young I think. The consistency of seeing those values throughout your life affects how you debate, how you disagree, how you talk, how you advocate, how you speak up for yourself. It is all practice. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: That leads us into civic work, community work, this is a -- you know, sort of a little bit of a move into thinking about how you take care of yourself so that you can be a helpful person in your community so that all of this wisdom can be shared. I wanted to just read a few lines from a poem I really love, it feels like it is speaking to what you were describing earlier with your parents and maybe it is not here, but it is by Marge, a great Detroit poet, a few lines, this is her poem, many of you probably know it, to be of use it is called.The excerpt goes the people I love the best jump into work head first without dallying in the shadows. I love people who strain in the muck and the mud to move things forward, who do what has to be done again and again. The pitcher cries out for water to carry. A person for work that is real. So that's from Marge Piercy, I love it. I think that that's all of you here. MICHELLE OBAMA: All here. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: You are the people who just get up and do what has to be done. That is you. That is is the President. You know, you can give and give and give to be helpful, but how do you think about staying strong and the roll of self-care, not just as luxury but part of being a person in a community. MICHELLE OBAMA: It is tough. My girl friends circle, we talk about that all the time, self-care. I think self-care is something that you have to practice as well. You have to value yourself to want to care about yourself. It starts there. You have to think that you're worthy. You know, sometimes a lot of us do-gooders, doers, we're doing for others because somehow we can't also -- we can't do it for ourselves. The work that we do, sometimes it is a distraction from focusing on what we as the individual needs. It is easy to focus on fixing somebody else because it allows you to ignore the stuff that you need to work on internally. It is sometimes a distraction. It is a good socially acceptable distraction, but it is a distraction nonetheless. I think it starts with thinking about that point. It is like what are we all doing for ourselves in the midst of this? How do we expect to keep going and doing for others if we ourselves are not emotionally, physically healthy? You know, if we don't take the time, the moment and for so many, it really is just a moment, a moment to take time out to exercise, it is -- you know, nobody is telling anyone to run a Marathon. It is just a matter of figure out how to walk every day, stand up, move your body, you know, how to get blood pumping through you. It doesn't have to be miraculous. We have to think about when it is time to do that, why, what stops us. Everybody in this room has to answer that for themselves. That's the things that haunt us, the things that keep us from taking care of ourselves. You also learn when you're a mother, something that -- I learned a will lot of this whenI became a mother, when you have children you have to be fiercely organized to get anything done. I learned if I don't put myself self up on the priority list that somehow my kids will eventualy get knocked down on the list. If I'm not protecting my time, if I'm not learning how to say no, even to the best things, even to the most worthy things because I need to sleep or I need to eat or I need to take time out to exercise, that I am no good to my children. Once again, it is one of those -- as a do-gooder, it is good for me to make changes because of this baby than it is for me to do for myself but we need to have that conversation because our health is -- it is the thing that will keep us going which is why I focus so much on health and nutrition in the White House. It is something that we can't afford to ignore, self-care, medication, timeout, yoga, whatever it is for you, it has to happen. A trick that I learned, and I learned this as a working mother because I looked up and realized a year can go by and I talked to my sister-in-law about this too, you say yes to everybody else first, you say yes to the conference, yes to the rally, yes to the speech, yes to the, you know, political event, and before you know it, your calendar is booked. All right. Your whole year, you have given it away. If you think about it, by so readily saying yes to everyone first you look up and you don't have time because let me tell you, when people are trying to get stuff done, they're organized, they have people, they're calling you, a year in advance, I started getting insulted when people would call me a year in advance. I'm like so you want me to give you in a year -- you want me to tell you now in a year that you can have this whole day before me and my kids have even thought about what that day means for us. Do we want that day? Do my kids need that day for a class? A pot luck? What happens, you say yes, then she comes up, we have a class play, well, mommy gave that time away a year ago. Well she's like I wish I had a scheduler! I would have gotten on your calendar sooner! I'm 4. You start thinking well, yeah, that's kind of crazy. It plays out in terms of whether you're going to go to the gym or not. You know, my mom says, we all get up and we go to work sick, tired, you name it, but the minute you talk about can I walk on the treadmill for 30 minutes, I don't have time. I started working my schedule so we start the year before I would do anything I would put me and my kids on my calendar first. That takes work. It was -- granted, I had help and assistance and people that could look at calendars, and when you're First Lady, you have a lot of help. Can you organize this in a year, we would force the school to answer some questions and it was -- it would take a couple of weeks to get them to make sure that every parent/teacher conference was on there, every school game, tournament, we would -- I put that on the calendar first. Then I would put me on there. When do I want to hang out with my girl friends? When am I going to exercise? When am I going to take a vacation? When am I going to breathe? How do I want my life to flow first? I put that on the calendar. Then what was left was left for everybody else, work -- well, BA BArack, he was on there too, he was oen there, he was up high! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: What you're hearing is gospel here! I think it is actually profound, and you always had a great deal of clarity, we became mothers within two months of each other with the children -- MICHELLE OBAMA: They were on the floor playing with each other and we would be talking and drinking wine like they're fine! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Just a little fine! It was before they could get into anything! MICHELLE OBAMA: Just a little bit! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: You always had clarity also that you had to be systematic, that you had to put the oxygen mask on first. Also that this myth of the super woman, this idea that -- MICHELLE OBAMA: That's a had lie! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: That you would only be made crazy trying to do everything simultaneously. That very -- you know, kind of almost methodical breakdown and ordering, it is a hugely important principle that I think needs to be drilled into us. MICHELLE OBAMA: We're not ruthless about ourselves. You know, with he do -- when you talk about all of that that we do, everybody in this room is used to doing that for their projects, organization, kids, their program participants, for their community. We all operate like that, everybody in this room operates like that. We just cut that off had when it comes to -- cut that off had when it comes to our lives, we don't apply the same principles. That's when I said to myself, I'm applying that, I can get a lot done. I'm ruthlessly efficient. I have to be organized about me. I have to be as organized about my life as I am about my work. I have to be -- I have to plan my happiness. That's the thing, we think happiness just happens, it can but you have to work in some happiness too, you have to think about in this year when am I going to laugh? When am I going to have fun? When am I going to stop and smell the roses? Then you have to plan it. If you don't, the work, the need, the agenda will always overcome everything. Look, the thing is, the work, the need, the agenda, it will always be there. Even in the process of me putting myself higher up on my list, the work was still there. You know, we got a lot done in the eight years that I was First Lady, quite frankly, I'm pretty proud of that. [applause]. MICHELLE OBAMA: I was able to do that and create sanity for my team too. A lot of us are working and leading teams of people, and they will take their sanity queues from us at the top. We're crazy, pushing all the time for every -- what I tell my team, for every event I do, that means you're doing three times the work just to get it done. Tina is over there laughing. I would tell Tina, don't put it on the calendar because that means three times the work for everybody else. Everybody has to be ready to understand that. I always put work and time into context. That's something that we don't do. We just let it happen. We let it takeover us. I think we can do good for others and take -- we can do a better job of doing good for others if we take care of ourselves. The we have to start having those conversations. [appluse] ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Explicitly, to the question of women and women friends and sister friends, you know, and this business of scheduling your laughter, which I have observed in the presidential years it feels that your friendships with women have deepened. MICHELLE OBAMA: God, yes. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Your circle of us have deepened. You Fed that. We have been Fed -- we Fed each other in that. Can you talk about your women friends and laughing and why that's -- MICHELLE OBAMA: I love my husband! I'll tell you that! He's my rock! My girl friends are my sanity. When you live eight years in the White House when you can't even open a window, you can't walk out on your balcony without notifying three people so that they can shut down security, you walk outside, you walk around the same circle in the South lawn over and over and over and over again because the thought of you leaving those gates requires 50 people's attention and work and inconvenience. When you live like that for eight years you need your girl friends. You know, in order to -- nothing is spontaneous. I learned because all our spontineity was taken away from us. You have to plan when you can't be spontaneous. There was never any such thing as me -- I even do this now, it is like can I leave? I ask somebody, can I walk out the door? I don't move until some 30-year-old tells me ma'am, you can leave now. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you very much. So I have to plan my time with my girl friends that kept me grounded and brought me laughter. I have a whole -- I have a crew of just wonderful -- I'm blessed to have a wonderful community of girl friends and people I have raised my kids with and I have a whole set of mothers that are at our girls' school that keeps me out of the gossip but notified by what's going on. Girl, you don't want to go to that pot luck! Okay! Thank you! All of that has kept me whole in a way that -- You know, that's something for all folks. I think women we do it better than men. You know, -- I know, sad for you guys. You all should get you some friends! [applause]. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Friends! MICHELLE OBAMA: Get you some friends! Talk to each other! That's the other thing we do. We straighten each other out on some things, our girl friends, we were -- I just wish like sometimes Barack, who you talking to? It can't just be Marty! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: This is a whole conversation! MICHELLE OBAMA: I see a lot of men laughing. You all need to go talk to each other about your stuff. There's so much of it! [applause] MICHELLE OBAMA: It is so messy! Talk about why you all are the way you are! You're runnin' the world, that's a he request, it is like raising our men, we have to -- I was talking to my mother about that the other day. It is the problem in the world today is we love our boys, we raise our girls. You know, we raise them to be strong and sometimes we take care not to hurt men. I think we paid for that a little bit. That's a "we" thing because we're raising them, you know. It is powerful to have strong men, but what's that strength mean? You know, does it mean respect? Does it mean responsibility? Does it mean compassion? Are we protecting our men too much? So that they feel entitled? A little, you know, a little self-righteous sometimes but that's on us too as women and others, you know, as we nurture men and push girls to be perfect. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I wanted to get more deeply into that. No! Because -- I was thinking about the conversation that you had recently with S had. Aunda and you were talking about child rearing and you said we have to cherish our girls. You put the word cherish. I was like, yes, yes, yes. I also as a mother of boys and as, you know, sort of an auntie to many thought but what about our boys. Can you say more? I also think not just our black boys, you know, I think that cherishing black boys is necessary in a world where they are not always safe, loved, valued. I know we see that the same way. I'm really interested in thinking further about what we teach our girls and our boys, what cherishing and love means for boys who are also caring sometimes a responsibility that is too much when it comes with all that be strong, lead -- MICHELLE OBAMA: Yeah. Yeah. Look, I don't have boys. I'm not raising boys. I'm raising girls. A lot of my focus as a mother, I think about how do I make sure that these girls are sturdy, able to sort of exist in this world where -- it is a world that's dangerous for women. You know, I think it goes back to Marian Robinson. We have to raise our children to be people, whether they have had struggles, whatever the world has for them, it's -- we have to raise them to be ready to be independent, well-meaning, kind, compassionate people. I don't know that that's different for boys or girls regardless of what they are confronting in the world. Sometimes we treat our children too preciously because of the issues they have dealt with. We thought with our girls, we could have spent 8 years feeling sorry for them that they were living in a bubble that every misstep for them would be on YouTube, that they had to drive around in their teenager years with men with guns, that their privacy, they didn't have access to their father in a way, we could have felt bad for them, there would have been a truth there. Our view was this is life for them, this is their life. We can't apologize for the life that they have because a whole lot of it is good. Get up, go to school, don't feel sorry for yourself, it is hard, it is hard for everybody. Go to school, get over it. Life is hard, it is not fair, you have to still get up, get -- be a man, I can't protect you from everything. I can't cherish you to death. It we have to raise our children to be the adults we want them to be. That starts young. You can't be so afraid that life will break them that you don't prepare them for life. I think that's as true for our boys as it is for our girls. Sometimes our fear keeps us from pushing our kids out into the cold, cruel world and then they're not ready and we wonder why. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: We wonder why they're broken, why they're nervous, why they're fearful, why they -- you know, but it starts young. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: Those messages. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. We have amazingly -- MICHELLE OBAMA: You didn't get through the cards! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: We talked around all kinds of things. I did want to end with a wonderful question -- one question from me, you know we're going to end here, another wonderful question from the audience. MICHELLE OBAMA: Okay. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: from a listener in Detroit. MICHELLE OBAMA: Detroit. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I want to say a listener in Detroit like I was a D.J. It may not be a listener in Detroit! My question is an example of something that has given you hope in the last week, and the audience question, which is a beautiful one is what has recently brought you to tears? You can answer that in a couple of different ways, however, you wish. MICHELLE OBAMA: Hope is right in this room. This -- these -- this Summit, all of you here, the conversations, you know, your voices, your missions, your goals, the possibilities that you all have to be leaders in the world, that gives me hope. You know, I can sleep better after this, this isn't just happening here but around the world. Thank you for giving me personally a little hope. [applause]. MICHELLE OBAMA: It is fun to watch and it will be fun to watch what you continue to do. What's brought me to tears? In fun ways, in all ways, probably the answer is children. Children. You know. I mean, my children have brought me -- my two girls have brought me so much happiness and pride, how they have carried themselves and responded to pressures that they didn't ask for, living a life that they didn't want, and coming out on the other end as good solid people, that happiness and pride can bring me to tears just talking about them. You know, tears of sadness, children, you know, when I see any child mistreated or unloved, or uneducated or unwanted, when we don't value our children, the most precious people on this planet and we do it so often when we don't want our taxes raised, we don't want kids to be educated equally or we don't really focus on healthcare and we're not thinking about our environment, I have worked in hospitals, I have seen children dying of cancer at very young ages, little babies in the nicu and any time I think about that, the brokenness that's in us that doesn't force us to get our acts together for our children, you know, when we talk about immigration, our DOCA kids and we talk about what we want for this world, when we think about what we're not willing to do for our kids, that brings me to tears. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: Then I can -- you know, I can have tears of just so much complete Joy when I think of all the interactions I have had with children over the course of my life and in the last eight years. You know, little Girl Scouts sleeping, having a sleep over on the White House lawn, you know, little trick-or-treaters, little kids that, you know, are so full of wonder and Joy, the little ones who don't know to be hateful yet who are still -- you know, they still rely on us, they still look to us to protect them and to love them and they are so open. That brings me to tears, the -- that sheer happiness and the innocence of children. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: I think if we're guided by that very raw instinct in us, as the producers of human life, that if we, you know, just act every day not for ourselves, not for some greater good, but just for the little kids in our lives, you know, and we treat those kids and think that the kids that we know, the ones that we have born life to, that we're auntie, uncle, that we mentor, if we value them and value all kids as much as we value them, we'll be fine. If we operate with that level of goodness in our hearts, but that requires us as the grown-ups to sacrifice a lot more than we're willing to do. It requires us to be put on the back burner in the way that my mother and father put themselves on the back burner to make us the most special people in the world. We have to get out of the way. Our egos, our -- you know, our hatred, our jealousy, we have to push that all down as the adults in the room because now we're all adults and we have to get out of the way for the possibility of children. I hope that every one of you in this room leaves with that sentiment. With that compassion, with that vision that this is not about us. It is about our kids. If we can do that, we'll get this right. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Yes. MICHELLE OBAMA: But that puts us way far down on the totempoll, our egos need to be checked in a powerful way and we have work to do on that front. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Well, thank you. MICHELLE OBAMA: Thank you, guys? Thank you, Elizabeth! My girlfriend! ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: One more thing to say! MICHELLE OBAMA: One more thing. ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: I'm concluding this, that is to say -- it is just that -- what I just wanted to say in saying thank you to you is that your intimate self, the self you are up close, the self that I feel so lucky to know and love is the same self that you share. That the self is consistent. I think that in that is a powerful, powerful, powerful lesson and Example of knowing yourself and sharing that love in a consistent way and for that, we all thank you. Thank you. MICHELLE OBAMA: Thank you so much, guys! [applause]. Hello, everybody! This is Barack Obama and we're here at the first Obama Foundation Summit in Chicago. We have brought together amazing young people from across the country, from 60 nations around the world, people of different backgrounds, different professions, but all of them are asking themselves how can they make a difference and bring about change in their communities, in their countries, in the world. We have three wonderful examples right here. I'm having a chance to talk to them this morning. All right. We have Mandeep Singh, cofounder of Flip National. He'll tell us about what the organization is. We have C a. Ssandra Begay. We have Daniel Flynn, cofounder of bank you. So, tell me a little bit about how you got started and wanting to give back to your community and what you hope to get out of the Summit? Thank you for having us and organizing this Summit. It is an honor to be here. I'm Mandeep, I'm from New York City originally. My family moved to Queens, New York and I live this very two-world duality in Queens, I was a New Yorker, born and raised and I had a tie to a whole immigrant community, working class background and they were often struggling to find resources and get the opportunities that they needed to move forward. So my journey on my educational journey through Colombia, my alma mater, I learned I'm passionate about building organizations that empower under resourced communities. Most recently I have been doing that through student activism, I started the first generation of low income partnership, a dedicated organization for poor kids to get the materials they need to succeed, we graduated in 2015 and we started flip national, trying to build community but not doing it across college campuses throughout the country. Fantastic. And what are your parents make of you getting all active and involved? Sometimes that first generation of immigrants, coming here, they want to keep their head down and work hard and make sure that you're a doctor, an engineer, something. It is the second generation that sometimes starts to feel as if, you know what, my voice matters, I can get engaged, involved, hopefully they're proud of some of the stuff they're doing now. >> The incredibly proud. When I said I wanted to be an urban city major, it didn't go over well. They were taken aback that I wanted to do the community organizing work but they see the impact I'm able to have in my community they have been incredibly proud to raise me and I'm grateful for them. What do you hope to get out of the Summit? For me, the Summit, there's a lot going on in the world, a lot happening in my native city yesterday as a lot of us know, there is a lot o of hurt, pain, for me, this Summit has been incredible energy and incredible healing energy and I'm looking to use the people and the family that I made here to continue working together and building a better world for us all. Fantastic! Cassandra, tell me about you, tell me a bit about how you got involved as somebody who obviously has enormous pride of being a member of the first Americans, tell me about how you have thought about your activism in your communities. Thank you, Mr. President, it is a great honor to be here. I want to let you know that I'm really proud of you for carrying this on and the good work. I'm a member of the largest Native American tribe, the N a. Vaho tribe, and growing up on an Indian reservation I saw injustices that were done to our people and oftentimes how our voice is suppressed and our voices is made out to be small and it is really difficult to elevate that voice. I wanted to make a change, a positive change. What I did, as I cofounded a a non-profit called Pandos standing for peaceful advocates for Native American dialogue and organizing support, I'm a community organizer, an advocate for Native American communities and populations in the four corner region of the United States. Our non-profit primarily serves to elevate that indigenous and Native American voice around Native American issues and we hope to organize also around Human Rights and protecting our shared home, mother earth. Obviously, you know, tribal communities, Native American populations, you know, suffer from a lot of challenges, but also there's enormous resources and opportunity to do wonderful things and sometimes we focus% only on the negative and not enough on the positive. As an organizer, how do you think about tapping into the amazing young people who are there, what kinds of opportunities do you see moving forward for PANDOS to really bring about change in some of the areas that you work in directly? We recognize our youth are the future generations and they're the most powerful generations and youth around the world are very powerful in their beliefs and stance and they're struggling in the difficult times and they have a lot of resources and technology. In fact, our youth stewarded one of the biggest Civil Rights movements, an American Indian movement, standing rock protest against the pipeline and our youth are back home, my friends, we're protecting 1.35 million acres of mother earth, we're the guardians, the lawyers at the frontlines, the gate keepers of the land because we have ties to that land for much longer than anyone else in this country. That way we provide our youth value from this country from a strong heritage and that way, we -- I serve as a positive role model. I do that by walking on the red Road and encouraging them to pursue higher Education. I'm the first person to get a college degree. We do this by sustaining our culture and doing that with story telling it, our dances, our traditional dress, my grandmother made this dress. It is beautiful. Yes. So I hope to show the women back home that it is beautiful to be ourselves and our culture. That's great. Last question, very quickly, what do you hope to get out of the Summit? To the left and right, I see relatives, we're the human race, there is no difference between any of us, we're all the same. I'm proud of you and that you're a family member and you're a leader and you have helped elevate all of us and lifted us up together and what I hope to see moving forward is this global family here at this Summit I want you to continue to include us and include us at the table and have a voice at the table as indigeous people. Great. Finally we have from down under Daniel who has been doing amazing entrepreneurial work tying together good business with good deeds. Tell us about the work that you have been doing and how did the idea come to you and how do you hope to grow it? Thank you, president Obama. For me it started with a moment when I was in front of my computer watching stories of kids as young as 4, 5 walking to collect water for families in parts of sub sub is a hair of AI get it from my tap for free, doesn't hurt our family. I remember feeling this is wrong. There was a number, the 50 billion that was being spent on global water globally, I thought bottled water is the dumbest product on the planet. We live in ard would with extreme poverty and extremity, this whole idea of thank you, it is let's launch a social enterprise that gives 100% of the profit and we started with water, but now we're into body wash, diapers if you ever need them! We have everything! That's night! We're good! Yeah! All right! But we're funding infant health products and it is an idea of global citizenship, together we can combine the little bit that we do have to make an impact and solve some issues like extreme poverty which should not exist in our generation. Two quick questions for you, why -- what is it -- where did you get that sense of compassion or empathy that made you feel so moved by the sight of these kids. Frankly you see that every day, not everybody acts on those ideas. Did you always have a can-do, entrepreneurial, let's start of business kind of spirit or did these things all kind of evolve over time? I was at dinner last night sharing with our table that I was the kid at school running around selling everything. >> The you were always -- you knew -- you had an idea? Yeah. I'm selling gob stoppers or everything, whatever. What are those? You said pet yabbies? I should have said diapers! That was my amateur area! They chuck them in the mouth. I'm selling them, they're candy. Candy! So I was that kid. I sponsored a kid at World Vision at 19. I thought that was taking that box. I thought I had done my bit for the world and wanted to get into business, Entrepreneurship. Then this moment confronted me. I reckon -- I want to give credit to my parents that will watch this no doubt -- but it is 2 a.m. in Australia! They brought me up with this whole understanding of living your life for other people. I think I want to get into business but when I saw this, it was not -- it was why not use that passion to solve something that needs solving and that's where we began. Fantastic. What do you hope to get out of% the Summit? How do you think that work of leaders like you or entrepreneurs like you that are interested in business want to do well but also want to do good, what do you think they can draw from this and what kind of resources would be helpful in you achieving your goals? Yeah. At this dinner you set up last night, around the table, everybody at the table had done the most amazing things. You're sitting there pinching yourself like wow! There is a common thread as we went deeper and deeper, we went past the resumes, down into the core and we realized that it was a theme of isolation. We're busy, web know a lot of people, all speaking at conferences, 100,000 people one woman had in her movement but there was a feeling of isolation. We live in this generation, actually in your amazing speech yesterday, you said something at the end and you did a great talk, you set some guidelines and the last guideline was a bit of a trivial one, you said it is fun, we're here for yourself,my sell, yourself, no selfies, it is funny, when I came here, people said are you going to get a selfie with the president. I'm like I don't know! The generation we live in, it is a selfie generation, it is so about self, about what you can take from a moment instead of stopping and listening. You said the why behind it was we want to have not a photo, an in-depth conversation. I think that we need that. We need to move past the hey, here is what I do, can I get a photo with you to hey, are you doing okay? How are you feeling? Are you isolated? Let's do this together. I think that's one of the most powerful things I have picked up here and it is -- it comes from you both and it is inspiring and I want to be around more of it. >> The all right. Well, all of you I think are representatives of the talents and capacities and creativity we're seeing at the Summit. You know, part of our goal is to figure out how do we support work you're already doing, and then how do we get the 15, 16, 17-year-old versions of you guys to help create more and more of you over time because my strong belief is that you will be able to come up with those answers if we're able to break that isolation and if you are able to see that you're not alone. Sometimes this work is hard. In fact, there are a whole lot of people out there that are doing it and that we can learn from each other. You know, it may turn out with the work that you're doing, Cassandra, that Entrepreneurship on the reservation could make a difference in job creation instead of looking for resources from the outside, what do we have from the inside, you may check, you know, check out what Daniel is doing and maybe he can give you some tips in terms of how to set up some sort of business idea and conversely, you know, Mandeep you may think as you're supporting immigrant rights and how first generation young people are making their way some of the lessons that can be learned from the experience of the earliest Americans, those that were here first. You know, the one issue that I think all of you confront though is how to make sure that you stay in touch after a Summit. What -- we don't want this to be a one-off. My hope is that during the conversations, during the breakouts, et cetera, that you guys are exchanging information and feel free to take selfies with each other after -- yeah, that's what I Figured -- but what's the role of the on-line communities, how do we take those, then also move them offline so that they're just not instagrams, hashtags, but also something more substantial, something more real, how are you using social networks to build your organizations and what you're doing. Go ahead. >> The I think for me, being a first generation, being the one -- one of the first in my community to speak up about issues like racial justice, getting people into the room, I very much use it as a platform to let people know what I'm thinking in hopes of empowering other young people that I'm connected to and family to also speak up about the issues that they confront. For me, it is a form of empowerment, my voice ensuring that. Also it is a tool to reach out to younger people who are now very much on instagram, Twitter, Facebook that I sometimes cannot reach because I cannot be in the community, I may be moving around, I know I can stay in touch and see how they're feeling and how they're doing through this platform. Yeah. You're encouraging them to take action in their communities in addition to, you know, saying they like your comment. Yes. 100%. A concern I had with young activism is people think the hashtag, this, that, it is getting something done, sometimes it is spreading information but over time it has to translate into actual activity and people meeting and gathering. I definitely resinate with that. Usually there is an action item associated with me. You share the articles, do those things, but it is very much hey, donate to this fund, show up for this meeting, this person's organizing this, apply for this fellowship, it is all about research sharing for me as well. Excellent. Cassandra, one thing I'm interested in by the way is access, digital access because when I was president my priority was to make sure that we got a lot of Broadband connectivity in rural communities but sometimes the patches are not where that's always the case. A, is the access working? B, have you been able to use some of the digital platforms to help it advance your work? I love that we're talking about this. I feel like we in the life of activism and advocacy, it is -- we're forging a path as this younger generation. Sometimes it is really difficult to feel the support we need and it feels oftentimes lonely because we're in our own world. world.What I have been doing here, I didn't want that to be my experience. I have when I meet people, I ask them why are you here? What's important to you? At the end of the day, when you don't have your millions of dollars, as I sit across dinner here in front of the billionaire, when you don't have that money, when you don't have the properties, the bank card to take with you, the fancy things to the grave where we all go with none of this stuff, how do you want people to remember you? So I have been asking them this because when I go back home I'm going to take these reasons and I'm going to share it with my friends and family and this organization and say, listen, we're not alone in this. There are people from all around the world that are trying to make good change and that are good people and these are the things that matter to them. These are the things that matter to us. We are one and the same. We're a movement. We have power here. These times where oftentimes it feels like we don't, but I want to use that to reclaim my power and instill that, share that information when I go back home. In the reservations, we don't have access. That's part of why our voice gets suppressed. We live in some of the most desolate lands. What I do with technology, I always am going back home to the reservations and bringing the conversations and using my platform with my following and social media to share these messages, the struggles that we have using our non-profit PANDOS to elevate that voice, raise that voice up, we're not alone in this. You realize what I see is that a lot of times people, they know in the United States, there is three sovereign powers, and these sovereign nations between the U.S. government, the state level and the tribal nations, what people don't realize is that dynamic, how powerful it is and how we have to work together and how it is a beneficial relationship if we talk to each other and we have that dialogue and we really put away the phones at the dinner table. In fact, that's something that I try to incorporate with friends, you bring that basket here and I encourage you to do this too, try this initiative when going out with friends, put a basket on the table, say phones here and whoever picks up the phone first has to pay for the dinner for everyone. That I think is a very good tip! I will say when they came in the oval office they had to leave it outside because otherwise they couldn't come in. I enforce it at the dinner table as well with Malia and Sasha. We are out of time, I want -- obviously you're doing itself in Australia, Daniel, these days, markets are everywhere, how do you think about exporting what you're doing to not just other products but also other markets? That's a cool question. I think from the start we always had a dream this could be bigger. We found in America people wash their hands as well -- they do! We use water all the time! It is a global idea. We're launching in New Zealand, they're taking it on. A little closer. Maybe one day we'll go further. I think a big part of the thank you story is not just here is what we have done and we want it to go further, make a bigger impact but it is what can you do with your journey. I spend a lot of time speaking particularly in schools to younger people just finished a while back a tour of 10,000 9-year-olds, that makes you feel old when you're 29 and they're 9. Wait until you're 56! Okay. But it is going hey, yeah, you can sponsor a child, that's cool. You can use what you have in your hand, your passion, your career to make an impact, you% can make decisions now on where you're going to put your energy and time to leave this world better than you found it. I think that's actually part of thank you. It is spreading that message and our products one day too. If you have enjoyed this conversation, with these amazing young people, then it is giving you a flavor of what's happening all throughout the Summit, we're going to continue to be sending out all these live events that are coming out of the Summit and hopefully you guys are going to continue to tune in at Obama Foundation. If you are interested in any of the outstanding organizations that we have heard from, at the end of the Summit, one of the things we'll be able to do is to list connections and contacts so that you can potentially get in touch with Mandeep, Cassandra, Daniel, plug in to the great work that they're doing. Thank you so much, guys. You did wonderful. Thank you.
