How to Strategically Plan Your Resilience with Dr. Kelly Culver
Welcome to Resiliency the Podcast, the place to find stories, strategies, and inspiration on how to embrace change, overcome challenges, and redefine resilience in today's ever evolving world. I am Jen Quater. I am a strategic communications expert and CEO of a firm called The Smart Agency. I am joined today by a rare treat, our producer and today's co host, mister Asif Quater, who also happens to be my very handsome husband. Our show brings together a diverse group of leaders from all over the world who inspire, educate, and motivate our listeners to find their own inner strength in everything from the minutiae of everyday life to world altering problems.
Jenn Quader:And today, we have a massively important, exciting, wonderful guest who I'm so honored to introduce. She was the keynote speaker at the recent TEDx event in Paris called Resilience Redefined. She's a seasoned global leader with 34 of experience as a founder, director, entrepreneur, strategist, and executive coach. Renowned for empowering CEOs and global leaders to develop resilience, navigate changing business landscapes, and create innovative solutions to global challenges, she holds a unique PhD in strategic resilience. Her research was conducted in Paris, where she also formed her own personal life after a tragedy we're gonna hear about in this very episode.
Jenn Quader:Ladies and gentlemen, it's my true honor to introduce you to a brilliant, brilliant resilience strategist named doctor Kelly Culver. Welcome, doctor Culver.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Oh my goodness. Wow. Thank you very much.
Asef Quader:Doctor Kelly, I get to play your part today, and I'm so excited to do it. So I'm gonna do my best doctor Kelly Culver impression. Kelly, as you know, resiliency, the podcast is a global podcast. We have had guests from Europe, from North America, guests who are from South America, all over the world. Where in the world are you today?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I am so glad you asked me that question because there's I have an exciting answer. Yes. I'm in Canada. I'm in Ontario. I am in Norfolk County, on the farm where I grew up.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And can you see my pin? Today is Canada Day. It's July. Canada Day. It's our national day.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'm wearing my red jacket and my red shoes to celebrate.
Asef Quader:I love it.
Jenn Quader:Happy Canada Day.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Thank you.
Asef Quader:What did you do to celebrate?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Last night, we did the typical, probably similar stuff that you do, barbecue, fireworks, family fun.
Asef Quader:Fire guns, No. Fireworks?
Dr. Kelly Culver:No. Guns are illegal in my country. I'm not not American. They are
Asef Quader:not enshrined in our constitution.
Dr. Kelly Culver:No. No. No.
Asef Quader:No. No. But let me ask you this, doctor Kelly. What does resiliency mean to you?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Yeah. I knew you were gonna ask me that question, because I usually ask or guess that question. It's a trick question. You'd think I'd have the answer. You know, it's funny.
Dr. Kelly Culver:When I was doing my research on resilience, I refused to define it. I didn't want to be known as someone who made a new definition for resilience. I wanted to look at how do you use resilience in order to achieve other things. So for me, resilience, it's a capacity, it's a strength, and it's a superpower.
Asef Quader:That's great.
Jenn Quader:Doctor Kelly Culver, before we get into your TEDx talk, I would like to know, since resilience is one of your superpowers, what is your superhero name and costume?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Oh my god. Yes. That's the challenge. It has to be red. We've had this chat before.
Dr. Kelly Culver:If resilience was a color, it would be red. That's why our logo is red, folks. You know, listeners pay attention. We're deliberate in things, So it's red, and it has to involve red shoes with some kind of a heel. I like to wear dresses.
Dr. Kelly Culver:You know, I like a bit of glam in my life. I've lived and worked in countries around the world where you had to dress like this, and so my superpower would be a red dress.
Asef Quader:A red dress. I love that. Yep. It'd make flying a little hard, but
Jenn Quader:It ain't hard. You can do anything in a dress.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Exactly. That's a red dress.
Jenn Quader:I love it. Well, with that image of that red dress, I would like to invite our listeners into a a really special treat, which is that we're gonna take a moment and we're gonna listen to your TEDx talk. And I'll remind our listeners that you were invited as the keynote speaker to this event, you were the concluding speaker for the event, and frankly, brought the entire house to its feet. So I think it's an interesting and beautiful way to get a sense of who doctor Kelly Culver is, and and really, she talks in this about how her her development of the skill of resiliency really began. So it's a a great origin story for the red dressed superhero that is Doctor.
Jenn Quader:Kelly Culver. And then I want to invite our listeners, a reminder that we will listen to the TEDx and then we will come back, so please stick with us. We have some great discussion to be had just after the talk, or we're gonna dive in and learn more from doctor Culver. So in the meantime, please settle back and relax. We have a beautiful TEDx talk coming to you right now that is entitled how to strategically plan your resilience by doctor Kelly Culver.
Dr. Kelly Culver:According to a mobile touch research study, we touch, tap, swipe, or type on our phones more than 2,600 times per day. How many of you here wanna stop for a moment? Just stop the bus. How many of you think things are going just a bit too fast? Imagine what it would be like if you could tap the brakes.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Stop the zips, the zings, the pings of the WhatsApps, the text messages, the TikToks, just for one day. We need to stop. Our gut even tells us we should stop. But we are so caught up in running, running, running, doing, doing, doing on that treadmill of life. Everyone's running at pace, and we have to keep up.
Dr. Kelly Culver:We need to take a break. But to do what? To become more resilient. Doing is a verb. Verbs are about action.
Dr. Kelly Culver:There is no direct verb for resilience. Resilience isn't about doing. Resilience is about being. In fact, resilience is a state of being. How would you describe resilience?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'm curious, because there's over 47 different definitions for that word, and yet they all have something in common. They describe resilience as a capacity, a strength, a superpower, a state of being here and here. Being is the key to success in any environment. Harvard Business Review refers to achieving a state of being as a moment of greatness. Resilience, then, is the penultimate state of being for us to be successful, for us to be happy, to have the right frame of mind to become the very best version of ourselves.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Today, I invite you on a journey, one that flies above a landscape of our daily fast paced lives. Let's stop, just for a moment, the constant noise and notifications, and dive into the essence of resilience, a concept that is profoundly personal and yet universally relevant. My story of resilience starts on a farm in Simcoe, Ontario, Canada. Growing up as a little girl might not look like it, but I grew up on a farm. It's part of my identity and where I first learned to be resilient.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I remember I was six years old. The sunlight sparkled over the barn, running through the cornfields with my dog Bobo, feeling so tiny because the corn was so tall, and hoping not to run into a skunk. Later that night, the wind howled. The trees shook against the house. Little pebbles banged against the glass.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'd heard storms before, but nothing like this. The monsters outside scarier than the monsters under the bed. The next morning, it was quiet, still, except for the sound of my mom crying, say keep saying we could lose everything. Creeping to the top of the stairs, I know something is wrong. As I put my foot on the step and peer through the railings, I see mom standing with dad in the kitchen, his arms around her, tears streaming down her face.
Dr. Kelly Culver:What does this mean? Halfway down the stairs, frozen, unable to move forward or run back to bed and hide, stuck in my own little storm, uncertain what to do. It takes every ounce of courage I have to walk down those stairs into the kitchen. When I get there, my dad says, Good morning, Kelly. Take my hand.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Let's go outside. Holding this hand, this great big hand that's held me since I was born, he pushes open the door, and as we step outside, we are struck by a blast of wind so strong it stings my eyes. Standing on the porch, my heart sinks. The blue sky is there, but the corn is not. Looking out over the landscape, all we see is destruction.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Walking in the fields together, feet crunching on hailstones as big as golf balls, the corn smashed to the ground. Gone. Wiped out. What are we going to do? My body shakes.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I am gripped with fear, but my dad is tall and strong. And looking up into his big gray eyes, he said, Kelly, mother nature is teaching us a lesson here. There's been a storm, but don't worry, I know what to do. We are more resilient than this. Looking up at him, not even knowing what the word resilience means, that steadfast look on his face, his quiet, unwavering strength, his state of being, gives me hope.
Dr. Kelly Culver:This is the first time I learned to care about resilience. Seeing my mom cry, hearing my dad say I know how to fix this, my life changed forever. This storm moment that could have been so tragic, learning that resilience isn't just about weathering the storm, but rebuilding in its wake became my resilience moment and my life's calling. This early lesson stayed with me as I ventured far beyond the boundaries of our farm. My work's taken me all around the globe, helping countries and cultures in the Caribbean, Africa, and the Indian Ocean change and transform to become more resilient.
Dr. Kelly Culver:In Mauritius, a small island with big dreams, I saw resilience in a new light. Here, amid the turquoise waters and lush landscapes, I learned that resilience can shape nations, lift economies, and forge new destinies. I arrived in the spring of twenty sixteen to help build a national transformation strategy for a high income economy. Within the first three weeks, I had fallen in love with the country, the people of Vibe. We worked hard coming together to do what needed to be done, to build a better economy and lift people out of poverty.
Dr. Kelly Culver:We achieved our goal in just over two years. It was amazing. Then, one night, a storm came, and an oil tanker crashed on the reef, in front of the nature reserve, home to the most endangered species spilling three quarters of its load into the waters and onto the shores of beautiful Blue Bay. You've all seen pictures of oil spills. We've all seen pictures of oil covered birds.
Dr. Kelly Culver:What you're not ready for is the smell. The air thick with the acrid smell of oil. It stings your eyes. The waves sound gloopy, little blurps and bubbles coming onto the shore. This was a dire challenge.
Dr. Kelly Culver:But within twelve hours, imagine what they saw. A response that was testament to the power of collective action. Picture this. Miles and miles of hair shimmering and glistening on top of the water, soaking up the oil. They say you learn something new every day.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Did you know that human hair is the best natural absorbent for oil? You might not believe this, but literally one week before that oil spill, the University of Technology Sydney published a study which said human hair is the best thing to use to soak up oil. All across the country, hair salons offered 50% discounts on haircuts. Men and women flocked to sheer their locks with lineups as far as the eye could see. This response wasn't just unique, it was a symbol of unity and innovation.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Their resilience ripped around the world, inspiring global solidarity. You know in times of crisis, you find out who your friends are, and it's amazing how many joined in. Here in France, more than 3,000 salons collected hair. In Australia, they gathered up more than 10 tons of hair and flew it to Mauritius. They knew they had to act immediately, people didn't wait, they had a plan.
Dr. Kelly Culver:They came together in community and collaboration. Some countries never recover from an oil spill. In Mauritius, they turned it around in a matter of weeks. They found their resilience. They created a collective state of being, woven from the hairs of shared experience and purposeful actions.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Now you know that resilience is a force that binds us, especially when faced with adversity, and I know this firsthand. While all of this amazing work was happening in Mauritius, tragedy struck for me personally. My husband Peter was diagnosed with cancer. Now, obviously, along the way, things happen that try to pull you off your path. If you are resilient, you stay on your path no matter how hard it might be.
Dr. Kelly Culver:My husband was dying, but he wanted me to have a plan for what we called the day after tomorrow, to keep going that next day when he would no longer be here. In a leap of faith, I enrolled in a doctorate program at the Paris School of Business. I remember it was December 2020. The first two weeks of classes were online because of COVID. The week the classes ended, Christmas week.
Dr. Kelly Culver:On Christmas day night, Peter, the love of my life, the man who encouraged me to do the impossible, who showed me how to be fearless and brave and walk through that storm called cancer, my biggest supporter died. And if I hadn't had my plan for the day after tomorrow, my life might have taken a less resilient path. Grief is a storm you have to navigate. I faltered. I doubted myself.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I said, I can't do this. And yet, six months later, I sold the house we had built together, put everything into storage, packed two suitcases, and moved to Paris. It was a personal test of resilience. When you are heartbroken, it's hard to know who you are, what you want to do, and how you want to spend the rest of your life. It's hard, but we all know that diamonds do their best work under pressure.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And so in this beautiful flat in Passy, in the Sixteenth Arrondissement, studying and researching and writing on the science of resilience, here in this city of lights, I find illumination on how people, countries, and companies can use resilience to grow and thrive, not just survive, but grow and thrive in times of uncertainty, change, and disruption. In this ever evolving world, our approach to resilience needs to be dynamic and multifaceted. I discovered what I call the resilience trinity. First, a framework to bounce back after crises. Second, a plan to remain steadfast and stay on track in our daily pursuits.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And third, a strategy to seize future opportunities. Each one of these elements is crucial working in harmony to navigate the unpredictable tides of life. This, my friends, is the secret to achieving a resilient state of being. My personal journey, marked by profound loss and significant triumphs, has been shaped by the resilience trinity. My own resilience toolkit has a set of tools forged in the fires of experience and ready for you to use in your life.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Number one is change. The world is a changing place, it's with us, it's constant, and sometimes we screw up, we can adapt. The next is learn to use what you have. Trust yourself. Listen to that inner voice.
Dr. Kelly Culver:This is how you begin to build your inner resilience. The third is to act. You have to act. You can't freeze even when you are afraid. Find the courage to walk through the uncertainty, because there is something better and more powerful on the other side.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And the last, and this is tough, you need a plan for the day after tomorrow. You have to show up and be present because it matters to so many people. Now look around you. It's springtime already. Spring is about rebirth and renewal.
Dr. Kelly Culver:The seasons teach us that the world is resilient. There is something comforting in this certainty, even when the world around us feels uncertain. We're almost in April, and that means a spring in our steps as we move towards May, when things start to grow, like the corn. Here, today, in March, I ask you to stand with me, in unity and determination, stepping into a spring of new beginnings, marching forward together, where every challenge has a seed of opportunity. We are the architects of our resilient futures.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Now let's use this inspiration to change the world.
Jenn Quader:Kelly, tremendous.
Asef Quader:Amazing. Amazing.
Jenn Quader:Just tremendous.
Asef Quader:As powerful as it was the first time I've heard it. And I've heard it, many, many, many times now, and it's still powerful. It's still fantastic, Kelly.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Thank you. Thank you very much. That means a lot.
Asef Quader:Our standard opening question, doctor Kelly, how has this talk changed your life?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Well, you know, it's interesting on a number of different levels. I find it fascinating. There's been more than a hundred thousand views of that TED Talk. I have no idea why, which is really kinda interesting. We have a podcast together.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Look what's come out of that. Would you have thought the day that we were you know, Jen, you were there when we were doing our dry run. Would you have thought we would be doing a podcast called Resiliency the Podcast? No. I have a book that is basically it's a tiny, tiny, tiny little only 29 pages, but it's the TED Talk, sort of topped and tailed with with my learnings around resilience and, you know, in your own life.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'm able to sort of convert this work in resilience to a speaker series, a resilience series for businesses that'll be happening in the fall in London and Paris and Geneva and probably New York, maybe even working with an AI expert digital resilience index using AI, things I had never expected.
Asef Quader:Wow. That's fantastic. Let's let's talk about your book real quick. Tell tell us about your book. It's about the TED talk.
Asef Quader:Yep. I'm assuming you go more in-depth in different things and different ways people can be more resilient. Tell us about it.
Dr. Kelly Culver:It's really short. It's only 29 pages. So the middle chapter is the TED Talk. But I wanted to start by talking about what is resilience and what does resilience mean to people and what have I learned in my journey of resilience than the TED Talk itself. And at the end, I do a bit of a play on words.
Dr. Kelly Culver:So it's three chapters because I like things in threes. And the third chapter talks about resilience metal and metal, m e t a l and m e t t l e. So when you build your metal, you're building your power. And metal, m e t a l, can be malleable and change. And so how how does an individual build resilience, metal and metal?
Asef Quader:To follow-up on that, the many different definitions of resilience, you said there are 47 different definitions. How do you define resiliency yourself?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I deliberately chose not to create a definition for resilience when I was doing my research. So when I talk about the different 47 different definitions, it's across a number of different sectors. Like, how does engineering define it? How air traffic control, health care, education, management, psychology, international cooperation, where I cut my teeth for a long part of my career, all define resilience in different ways. There's a general core, though.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And the core is it is a strength, a capacity, and a superpower. My word, superpower. And to come back to your question at the beginning, you know, what does it mean to me? Really, I guess, for me, resilience is a state of being. What's my definition?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I guess that's it. I have fought against myself to create a definition for resilience. But I guess it would be it's a state of being. It's a mindset. Because you have to have the mindset before you can act and achieve something.
Jenn Quader:I wanna dig in on that and ask, you know, from your global perspective, you've seen this across different countries. You talk about people, companies, countries. Does that state of being look different, or does resilience as a state of being always look the same no matter what country you're in?
Dr. Kelly Culver:No. It's very different. It's a really super question. It's different depending on where you are, and this is probably one of those Kelly gets struck by lightning moments, but and that happens a lot.
Jenn Quader:Keep us safe, Kelly. I know. You'll learn from me.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'll just tell it like it is. I have found in the different countries I've worked in that the more we have, the less resilient we become.
Asef Quader:Interesting. Very interesting.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Countries that I would say developing countries that have to use all available assets. It's like, you know, when I said trust yourself, learn to use what you have. So what do you have in your hands? What are your all of your available assets, and how do you repurpose and reuse them to have something shining come out of that, like a phoenix coming out of the ashes? We have lots of tools at hand in The United States or in Canada for us to be resilient as countries, as companies, and as people.
Dr. Kelly Culver:But my observation is the more we have, the less resilient we are because we forgot how to just handle things at a very basic level.
Jenn Quader:Listen. That resonates with me at, like, a really deep level because I've spent a lot of my twenties and my thirties crying on the phone with my best friends going, I just have too many choices. I just there's so many things I could do. You know? And and it's I mean, what a what a and I wanna acknowledge the gallons of privilege in that statement.
Jenn Quader:You know what I mean? But I think that it's so interesting for you to say that. And then the antithesis there is, as you said it, which what you said is, the more we have, the less resilient we become. I had this vision of this, news story I read, and I'm forgetting exactly where in the world it is. But it's a a place in the world where a group of people have been displaced, and they are not welcome on the soil.
Jenn Quader:And so they literally built themselves a place to live on the water, and they live out on the water. And and it made me think they are constantly in a state of being that is resilient. So to tie this back together because, again, like, those are two extremes. You know? If someone wants to start looking for their own state of being that is resilience, where do they start?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Oh, wow. That's a real zinger of a question. Where do they start? I mean, because it's different for each of us. Right?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Our experiences are different. I know that, you know, some people sometimes ask me, well, how did I manage and navigate the grief that I found myself in when my husband, Peter, passed away? Each of us does that in different ways. It looks different for each of us. So my process, my system, or my solution might look different than yours.
Dr. Kelly Culver:One is neither better or more important than the other. It's you have to do a lot of listening to yourself and you have to unblock I don't want to say unblock negative thoughts, but I love to ask this question, and it comes from children. You know, by the time kids are 15, they've lost their sense of imagination because we force them to learn in a particular way. But if you can ask yourself, I wonder what would happen if and not be afraid to ask yourself, I wonder what would happen if, and then fill in the blanks, you start to build the trust in your own judgment, in your own confidence, and in your own abilities. And don't compare yourself to other people and what they have or how they do things.
Dr. Kelly Culver:If I come back to, my international development work and then and, again, this isn't a criticism. It's an observation. I worked in countries where kids just wanted to be able to get up and go to school. They wanted a school to go to. They didn't wanna get killed on the way there.
Dr. Kelly Culver:They wanted to have a teacher who did more than walk and breathe, could actually fill them with knowledge and learning. And yet I see I use my country role models for kids. We've lost the plot on what's important and what's special and what's necessary to change the world. That's the only soapbox I'll do today. I promise.
Jenn Quader:And it's a good segue into you know, I take from that trust in your own judgment, which is important, but also look at what matters. And and you talk about this a little bit in your TED talk. The question I wanna ask is related to your relationship with your father because he really showed you an example of resilience. And and it also really ties to what you just said, which is, you know, we have to remember what matters. But I wanna just say this before I pose the question, which is I was struck listening to the talk this time.
Jenn Quader:Every other time I've I've envisioned your dad. I've envisioned him, you know, putting his his hand out and taking you outside. But this time, I realized you said he was embracing your mom while she was crying. And so I think there's something so important about that when it comes to what matters, when it comes to community, when it comes to collective resilience. So talk about how important is it to have someone in your life to learn from in those hard times?
Jenn Quader:And then equally, how can how can we be those people that matter for others?
Dr. Kelly Culver:It's really important to have someone that you can lean on and commiserate with and learn from when there are challenges, when you are faced with challenges. It's really, really important. It's hard to do those things on your own because sometimes we get that crazy voice on our shoulder, and it's saying things that aren't true because we're really good at making stuff up. You know, we have that imagination, so we make things up that aren't necessarily true. But I think it is really, really important to have someone or something you can lean on in hard times.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I know in the example that I gave at the farm, there had been a tornado that came through. We weren't impacted as bad as other people were. But the community is what helps you. The community is what gets you through. When my husband, Peter, passed away, we moved into, the day after, shelter in place lockdown with COVID.
Dr. Kelly Culver:So I didn't have anybody around me. Nobody could come to the house. I couldn't have a funeral. Couldn't do any of those things. So I had my studies.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I had my doctorate. I had something that gave me an anchor. It wasn't a great one, but it was something so that I wasn't adrift at sea alone.
Asef Quader:That's so powerful. We talked about your husband a couple times now, and we're so sorry for your loss. I know it's super powerful. But it also sounds like he helped you a lot. We talk about the figures in your life that help you stay resilient, and and you talk about he talked about you having a day after tomorrow.
Asef Quader:Mhmm. What would you what would you tell to someone who maybe doesn't have that time, with someone that they're about to lose? How can they be more resilient in losing someone that that might have happened just really suddenly?
Dr. Kelly Culver:One of the questions I think that you need to ask yourself is, how can you live your life to celebrate and honor the person who's no longer at your side? And, you know, in the first few days, that question's irrelevant because you're still coming to terms with the silence of the person not being there. The silence is hard. But how do you live your life in a way that can celebrate the person who's long who's who is no longer at your side, to make him or her happy in what they see that you're continuing to do, the honors, the person that they continue to be in your heart.
Asef Quader:That's, it's so interesting because I know, we'll get into it in future talks with Jen and her talk, but we we have gone through similar issues and similar things. And I know that is something that I have thought many times that I want Jen to celebrate that. I want her to move on and and be happy and not wallow in in the misery. It's something hard and very, commendable to you to be so strong in being able to commemorate Peter and and move on. And you keep his memory alive through these talks and through this resiliency, and I think it's very amazing what you're doing.
Jenn Quader:I agree with that, and I wanna just deepen for our listeners so that they understand. What we're talking about here is Asef went through his own, pretty deep cancer battle. He had, he was diagnosed with, Hodgkin's lymphoma. He went through two rounds of chemo, a round of radiation, and then a bone marrow transplant. And, we have the the fortunate ability to say that he's here with us helping us to host.
Jenn Quader:And so but there there are two things to be talking about here. You know, first of all, there's cancer, you know, f cancer. Right? And and that is its own thing to deal with. And then there is the then there's loss.
Jenn Quader:You know? Then there there's someone actually leaving. And and as you mentioned, the silence is deafening. I think what I wanna ask in this, because in both cases, it's hardship. Right?
Jenn Quader:In both cases, whether you are fighting cancer or whether you are you've received that, okay. This is the final chapter. There there's so much hardship. So when we zoom that out and look at it as a universal issue, which is to say everyone deals with some sort of illness or death or, you know, those types of things. The question I'm trying to get to is, what can you find in those times to help you build resilience?
Jenn Quader:I mean, I I think what I'm trying to say is we're we're building a resiliency toolkit. We know that you need resilience when you go to work. We know you need it in those times, but boy, you seem to need a super dose of it when you're fighting cancer and when you're looking at, like, that kind of thing. Kelly, guide us a little bit on how how does that look when you're in the throes of a real storm?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'll just use me as an example. It could be different for other people, but it was 2015, and and Peter was diagnosed with cancer. And I have an international career. I live and work around the world, helping countries, again, become more resilient or transform. And and this occurred just as I was about to start a three year residency in Mauritius.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And, and I didn't wanna go. I didn't, you know, wanna complete the terms and conditions of the assignment that I you know, that had essentially dropped in my lap. And he said to me, no. You need to do this because it's gonna be fun. And so what we decided is the disease doesn't define you.
Dr. Kelly Culver:It opens up this door of we are going to cram everything humanly possible into whatever time we have, and we don't give a damn what anybody thinks about what we're doing. Thinks they thinks we're crazy. Who cares?
Asef Quader:Yeah.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And so I know I mean, we have world class health care here in, in Canada. And Peter, he was given three years. He was here for six. World class health care, and he traveled. He continued to travel with me, and his doctor said, you go because where you're going and what you're doing, your spirit is staying alive.
Dr. Kelly Culver:So we we went to places we would never have done. We went on the last year of his life, we went on an around the world trip. We went from here to Hong Kong to Australia to watch tennis. Oh, my God, this is too funny. So I'll tell this story again.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Australia again. Yeah. So we go to the Australian Open January twenty twenty. As we're leaving at the end of the month to go over to South Africa, Australia's going, there's something weird going on in China. This thing called COVID, maybe we should take it seriously.
Dr. Kelly Culver:We land in South Africa. We look at we go to Cape Town, then we go to Namibia. When we left Namibia, they closed the borders to people from China because this COVID thing was getting serious. Then we went to Mauritius for a month. And as we were leaving Mauritius the day before we left, they made the plane from Italy turn around because Milan was now a hotbed.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Then we landed in France, who'd already closed its doors. There was nobody in Paris for a whole week. We had the whole city to ourselves. Then we went to Switzerland, where I had to actually do some work for about a week. And then, we were going to London to visit Peter's sister, and our oldest son called and said, you gotta get dad home now because Canada's closing his borders.
Dr. Kelly Culver:So we were away for three months riding the wave of COVID. You know, every country we left closed its borders, and we got back. And, I still talk about that with the kids, how much fun that was, the excitement. So we just said, you gotta grasp life because I don't want to regret that I didn't do something. I'm gonna live to 50, and I still don't wanna regret that I didn't do something.
Asef Quader:And we talked about that before. I remember we were talking about that with you in Paris about, age and and expected life expectancy. And I think you said you want to live to 150. I said I want to live to 126. And I think those are I think you have to be pretty resilient to, get to those ages at this point.
Asef Quader:But I think, healthcare, like you said, world class healthcare in Canada, world class healthcare we get in in America, I think it's very doable to do that. And you look around the world, a lot of the oldest people, in the world are in third world countries that don't have great health care. Probably has something to do with diets, or, you know, like you had said at the beginning of the talk, where these people who are in these, developing countries are more resilient because they have to be. Mhmm. And they end up living to these late later ages than we do in these countries that are more developed where we have so much, and we aren't as resilient because of it.
Jenn Quader:It's fascinating too in in through the lens of doctor Culver's, not definition, not an official definition of resilience, but but of her her interpretation of resilience as a state of being. So when you say I wanna live to a 50 or I wanna live to a 26, that means that when you wake up in the morning, you see the light and you understand that it's a beautiful day. You know what I mean? Like, it it means that you understand that even if there are problems and there's things in your inbox you don't wanna face and there's, you know, a challenge down the road, that that life is worth it. I think that that that's what perhaps our listeners, perhaps those in this community all wanna get to is that place where we all know life is worth it to the point that I wanna be here till I'm 150.
Jenn Quader:And and and I'm willing to exist within what is, which
Dr. Kelly Culver:is to say that when you are 149,
Jenn Quader:Doctor. Which is to say that when you are 49, doctor Culver, you know, your body may not work the same way it does today. But rather than thinking ahead and worrying about that and thinking, I don't want that, you simply know, I'm gonna love that day. I'm gonna wake up and look at the light and look at the clouds and go, I love life today. And I to me, that boils down to a true resilience.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And curiosity. Curiosity. Curiosity about what's gonna happen next. You know? Absolutely.
Dr. Kelly Culver:It's fun.
Asef Quader:And I'm gonna do a little segue here. I wanna talk about something you touched on, and we have done a bunch of episodes together. And you guys host it. I'm in the background producing. Nobody sees me.
Asef Quader:You guys hear me, nobody else does. But I am privy to a lot of what people say, and you said something that no one else has said, and I I think it's important to talk about imagination, and its role in resiliency. Of course, when you said it, it was like, yeah, of course it is. But somehow, we've never touched on it throughout all the episodes we've done.
Jenn Quader:Except Elizabeth. You Elizabeth Tobias.
Asef Quader:Elizabeth's eyes did
Dr. Kelly Culver:talk about it a
Asef Quader:little bit. Yes. Yes. She did. You are correct.
Asef Quader:What I wanna ask about imagination is a lot of us have natural ability to imagine. We can close our eyes, and we can play the what if game. What if I could fly? Oh, what would I do? What if is such a fun question to ask, and it's amazing how it can actually help you build resiliency.
Asef Quader:What I wanna ask about this is, like I said, I I myself, am very naturally gifted with imagination. I like to close my eyes and think about different things. In that question, my question is, is resiliency and imagination something that is nurtured, or is it something that's natural? Is it something that I just have innately in me? And for someone who doesn't, can they learn to do that?
Asef Quader:Can they can you teach imagination? Can you work on imagination?
Dr. Kelly Culver:There is, there used to be, anyways. There used to be a master's level course at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia on imagination. Wow. In the early nineteen nineties. Yeah.
Dr. Kelly Culver:So you can teach it. It's like, how do you create an idea, and then how do you give that idea shape and form? A colleague of mine has this formula. You have an idea. You give it shape and form, and then it becomes an innovation.
Dr. Kelly Culver:But in order to have the idea, you have to imagine. So I think it can be learned. I also know with resilience, yeah, I think some of us have we're hardwired differently, but it doesn't mean that you can't learn it because I I learned in my in my research. So my work around how can countries and companies and people use resilience strategically to leverage or to enable growth and success. You can learn it.
Dr. Kelly Culver:You can plan it. If you can plan it, you can learn it. If you can learn it, you can institutionalize it. You can predict it. Well, and
Jenn Quader:I wanna push into that a little because, you know, I'm a business owner. I'm interested in that. I I wanted you to talk a little bit more about how are you teaching companies and and entities like that. You know, I I'm sure it's companies, nonprofits, things like that. But how are you teaching organizations to become resilient?
Dr. Kelly Culver:The first thing, you have to bust down the myth that resilience belongs in disaster risk recovery or that resilience is about business as usual or that resilience is about having an insurance policy or an audit trail or, you know, you're financially resilient, we tend to wanna put it in a bucket that's about return to normal and recovery. And my my lesson to or my my my challenge back to businesses is, yeah. Okay. That's fine. You have to be able to bounce back after something happens after a crisis.
Dr. Kelly Culver:But you also have to have some kind of plan where you stay on track. You remain steadfast in the day to day. You can get up on Monday and pay people. You know how to you can adapt at what the day brings to you so you still have a sense that you've achieved something. But then you always have to have your eye on the future.
Dr. Kelly Culver:It's that sort of future scenario, future planning, future strategy. Because the other thing we saw in COVID, all kinds of businesses had opportunities dropped in their lap, and they couldn't take them because they didn't have the imagination to move it forward. Look at all of those breweries that were, you know, brewing beer and then all of a sudden could make hand sanitizer out of it. Just a simple example, but they never thought about that, did they? Here's this gift, and some of them repurposed their manufacturing, and they were able to adapt, and they're still here doing a bunch of things, and others just went down.
Dr. Kelly Culver:The entertainment industry, you know, service industry here in Canada was really, really hit. So my challenge to business owners is, too often, you look at resilience as an eitheror. Either I'm building back, or I'm staying on track, or I'm looking at the future. And I'm saying, no, you're doing all three at the same time, all the time, every day. And when you stop that, you're not resilient.
Jenn Quader:Well, it it makes such perfect sense. I mean, truly, it's it it is like prep on top of prep on top of prep, and it brings me back to your talk, the the trinity you called it, the three the three items that you have to do because what you're kind of saying is what everybody thinks they need is just that framework to survive. They're like, no. No. We got the crisis comms plan.
Jenn Quader:We don't really need to plan on anything else. You know? And what you're saying is, no. No. You you need to go beyond that.
Jenn Quader:You yes. You have to have your framework to survive, but you also have to have that plan, and then you also have to have a strategy. And I think Mhmm. A lot of people, don't understand the difference between a plan and a strategy. I deal with that a lot in in PR.
Jenn Quader:You know, they they kinda think, let's get right to it. But it's really important that you iron out what that future is going to look like, and then that plan can speak to it. How are you finding the response, Kelly, in in in the current climate? It's 2024. There's a lot of change happening.
Jenn Quader:Where's the most need, let's say at the company level and then at the country level? Like, who who needs this resilience training the most? Where where's the demand?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Probably everybody. You know, the simple answer is everybody. What I'm finding, though, really interesting, I'm finding that people in the in The UK, companies in The UK are very interested in this concept, probably because they're going through an election that will be sorted on Thursday this week, you know, in some way. But it's the, businesses, private equity, venture capitalists are all saying, you know what? Yes.
Dr. Kelly Culver:We're going to have some pretty heavy restructuring that's coming on in the third quarter. We're interested in what are your top 10 questions. If you had to do a a 10 question resilience assessment on my company, what would they be? And so you fire them off. And then you help them on, well, how would you build a resilience strategy that's, you know, constantly and always moving?
Dr. Kelly Culver:One of the other really interesting things is people are starting to say, I understand what you're saying that resilience is multi pronged. It isn't just one thing. I hadn't thought of it that way. It's not that complicated then to implement in my company because you've made me look at it in a different way. And and I guess, lastly, one of the things that seems to scare people, keep them up at night, is what's what's the impact AI is gonna have on my company or on our country or on society at large?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I've had the good fortune to meet a really interesting person who leads the World Economic Forum's AI Council. He designed MapQuest years ago, for those of you before Google Maps. And we're working on how do we create a digital index that measures resilience so that what are your indicators to bounce back, to stay on track, and to leap ahead? And how does that how does that whole system come into play in a way that's easy and uncomplicated, not a bureaucratic process? I'm surprised at how many people are interested.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'm surprised at how quickly people change their frame of reference for what resilience is when I talk about it as multifaceted. They say, well, that is just so simple. I should have thought of that myself. I was like, yeah. You probably should have.
Asef Quader:Is it surprising to you that that they they're just realizing the need for this?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I had, someone from McKinsey say to me he's a very senior person at McKinsey in in Germany, and he said, you're very interesting because I have this is him talking. I have, global companies coming to me, and the leadership team knows that they need to build a resilient they need to build resilience, but they don't have a vision of it. They don't know what it looks like, and they're tasking their teams to go out and create something. Make us resilient. Go and make us resilient.
Dr. Kelly Culver:But they have no concept of what that looks like for them. He said, you've nailed it. You can create the vision for people and help them navigate to get there. He said, you've done something we haven't been able to do.
Asef Quader:It's almost like you have a doctorate in it.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Maybe.
Jenn Quader:Well and and the right philosophy. You know what I mean? Because because as you mentioned, Kelly, this is your your work doesn't stop with the doctorate. You're not you're not academically publishing. You're not trying to do that.
Jenn Quader:What you what I hear and what you say you're doing is you're really trying to to take this concept, this state of being, and help people, like, help them create their own toolkit for how they can do it. And and it is a constant process of reinvention is what I think. The way I see it is kinda like companies used to just make products, and now you really have to look at the whole process. Mhmm. And meaning, maybe they they've always had a process.
Jenn Quader:I'm I'm picturing in my head a factory, if you will. Okay? They've always had a process. The factory does the work and the thing comes out. But for a long time, that process just didn't change.
Jenn Quader:You were like, oh, we make this product. This product goes out. The fact and now that factory needs to change its operations about every three to six months. Oh, this new now this machine works this way. Now we can break this part up.
Jenn Quader:And it's the people who are sitting trying to return to normal, which my my way I see that I always see that as, like, trying to put kids in clothes they've outgrown. I'm like, dude, when your child is now in a six t, you don't cry over the fact they don't fit in a two t. Why are we going backwards? So I so I think there's such such great clarity in the fact that you're helping them. And when I say them, people, businesses, everyone to find not how do we change the factory, but how do we change our mindset so that we can run the factory while everything keeps changing?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Exactly. How do you change your mindset to run the factory while everything is changing? Be confident in the in the uncertainty with the end goal that we've gotta remain relevant in the marketplace? Mic drop.
Asef Quader:How how does the fear of change hinder resiliency in the workplace, in our own personal lives?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Oh, change is scary, you know, in our own lives or in the workplace. In in countries, I'll speak with my experience with countries. Change is really tough. Most countries know the solutions that they need to embrace, but they don't wanna change. Why don't they wanna change?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Because it means giving up power. It means sharing power. It means redistributing the power. And we are comfortable with what we have. We like what we have.
Dr. Kelly Culver:It's comfortable. It's like you asked me about grief earlier, and grief's a very personal thing. But some people make a choice not to go beyond their grief. They want that to define them. That becomes their identity.
Dr. Kelly Culver:You know, it's like me. I can tell you, return it doing my tax return the year after Peter died, and I had to tick the box that said widow. Damn near killed me. Not because that's what I was, but I didn't wanna be defined by that. Like like the Louisa May Alcott Little Women book that that is now what I am.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Right. I'm proud to be that. It sucks, but I'm proud to be that. But don't define me, love. I'm the merry widow.
Dr. Kelly Culver:You know? Like, you know, from your from your, what's the waltz? You know, the merry widow waltz? That's me.
Asef Quader:That that speaks to me. And and because, like Jen said, I am a cancer survivor. And the other night, we were out with friends, and, one of my friends said to another one, oh, you know, he he's a survivor. And it really, you know, I'm I'm proud of it, but I don't like it, because I don't wanna be defined as a cancer survivor. It's something that's not defining me.
Asef Quader:A lot of people take that as with pride, and they should, they should. It's a powerful thing you have to go through, and I'm not trying to belittle anyone who who finds power in that. For me, it's something I never wanted to define myself as. I never wanted to define myself as cancer survivor, because to me, it's limiting. It's then Mhmm.
Asef Quader:That I survived cancer, and that's it.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Like Yeah. Like, I'm not gonna do anything else the rest
Asef Quader:of my life. Else. Right. Yeah.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I know what you mean. And
Asef Quader:to me, I find resiliency in that. Right? Cancer was a battle I went through, and now it's on to the next one. Yep. You know?
Asef Quader:I I I don't wanna put it life as a war, but there are a series of battles in life, and if you define yourself by one battle, then you're done after that.
Dr. Kelly Culver:That's very wise, and it's very true.
Jenn Quader:It is wise. Yeah. And and I the only thing I'll do is change the analogy to a book of chapters because, you know, war is so sad. But It is. It
Dr. Kelly Culver:is. Yeah.
Asef Quader:As I was saying,
Dr. Kelly Culver:I was
Asef Quader:like, I don't know if war is the right analogy.
Jenn Quader:You're allowed to use any you want. I just
Asef Quader:but but Folks, I'm not a host.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I'm a producer. But I but
Jenn Quader:I think what what what we're talking about here is and, again, we're we're we're hitting on something that's so important to resilience. It it was it's bringing me back to is Kelly saying, I'm gonna live till 01:50. Asif saying, I'm gonna live till 01/26. You have to wanna write the next chapter.
Asef Quader:Mhmm.
Jenn Quader:You know? And so and and if you decided, like, my chapter ends at cancer survivor, and that's all I'm gonna do. And, again, you could that's your choice. Isn't it's your choice. You could take that and write 80 books about being a cancer or or sit with people at a library and tell them about your experience, whatever you choose, but it's your choice to then go, I'm gonna make up the next chapter and then the next.
Jenn Quader:And if you want something that lives on, if you wanna create a legacy, which a lot of people do, it is in the constant state of reinvention is what I'm hearing. Before we get into the last chapter of of rapid fire questions, I was just gonna ask, Kelly, how do you when someone doesn't feel like writing the last chapter or the next chapter, when they when it's midway through their life and their grief has enveloped them to the point that they'd rather see that as the final chapter. How do you start to see the little seedlings of faith and hope? Where does that come from?
Dr. Kelly Culver:I don't know where that comes from because, you know, each of us has our journey, and each of us defines what we want the end point of that journey to look like. And so if someone says this is where I want to stay because I'm comfortable or I can't take that next step forward, far be it for me to judge whether they're right or they're not or they're not. It's their life. I've worked in 23 countries. I've I've visited 33 countries across five continents.
Dr. Kelly Culver:The world is a beautiful place. It just is.
Asef Quader:Absolutely is. Alright. Let's write the next chapter of this podcast. Let's move into our favorite section, the rapid fire questions. Okay.
Asef Quader:I know that you have thought about all of these questions multiple times and you have asked these questions many times over. Your turn now Doctor. Kelly Culver. What is your favorite movie or TV show that makes you feel resilient?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Okay. Nineteen seventy seven, Star Wars. I went to the opening of what is now number four. Right? Because four, five, six were the first ones that came out.
Dr. Kelly Culver:They're a trilogy, and they are bounce back, stay on track, leap ahead, and I see the resilience trinity in those three, four, five, and six. So for me, it's Star Wars.
Asef Quader:Kelly, I've never been more happy to find out how nerdy you are. I'm a big Star Wars guy. I I Yeah. I'm huge Star Wars guy. So, yeah, that's So so amazing.
Asef Quader:I love it. I find something new about you every day, and I love it. Love it. What song inspires resiliency within you?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Okay. So that's a tough one, and I should be ready for it, because I ask this question of all of our guests. So but I have to tell the truth. On any given day, it's one of two songs, depending on how I'm feeling. So I will take the high road today.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Actually, I'm gonna give you both. Alive Again by the Chicago Transit Authority, otherwise known as Chicago.
Asef Quader:CTA. Chicago.
Dr. Kelly Culver:CTA. Because it gets it makes me wanna get up and dance. Like, there's these powerful opening riffs, and then the trumpet starts. And it's like, yesterday, I could not have believed that tomorrow, the sun would shine. I am alive again.
Dr. Kelly Culver:How can you not wanna dance to that?
Asef Quader:I don't know. Chicago's amazing.
Dr. Kelly Culver:I know. But, like, coming in a nanosecond right behind that, because I'm a child of the sixties. There's a song that, you know, it will wake me out of a deep sleep, and that's Gimme Shelter by The Rolling Stones. That, just, I have to listen to that at 82 decibels. But again, you can't listen to it quietly.
Dr. Kelly Culver:But the song moves from murder is just a shot away to love is just a kiss away. I love that song.
Asef Quader:It's a good song.
Dr. Kelly Culver:It's my red dress song. That's my superhero song. Jen, red dress flying through the air? That's my song. Red dress
Jenn Quader:flying through the air. I'm gonna work on it. We're gonna get you a song.
Asef Quader:It's just a shot away. What was the last thing that made you really laugh?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Do you remember the cartoon series, Woody Wood Woody the Woodpecker? Of course. Well, then did you know that there's a movie out, Woody Woodpecker movie? I didn't know that. So I was with my five year old niece a couple of weeks ago, and I said, Charlie, what do you wanna do today?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Aunt Kelly, I wanna watch that Woodypecker movie. And I lost it. And she looked at me like I was this science fiction thing, and I couldn't stop laughing. Woody Pecker. I nearly threw up.
Jenn Quader:Woody pecker. Woody
Asef Quader:pecker.
Dr. Kelly Culver:We have an X rated podcast, folks. This is an X rated podcast. So let your imagination run wild with that one. I did, and I couldn't even talk.
Asef Quader:All right. What is one question you would like to leave for a future guest that you want answered?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Well, you know, it comes full circle to the question I got today at the beginning from Jen, because I describe resilience as a capacity, a strength, and a superpower. So it really is, if resilience is your superpower, what does your superhero costume look like? That
Jenn Quader:really is it. It's important to know. I know. It's really it's it's very important to have that visual. I think it's such an important question.
Jenn Quader:I look forward to asking future guests. Actually, you'll be asking it. So
Asef Quader:I hope I'm not asking it.
Jenn Quader:You might. You're still in the wings there, friend. You've you've done too well to to think you're not getting on camera again.
Dr. Kelly Culver:Yeah. You've done a great job today, Ossip. Really good job. We're in good hands. Thank you.
Asef Quader:Do we have a do we have a question from a guest for you?
Jenn Quader:Yes. We do. Kelly.
Asef Quader:If you had the means to do whatever you want and didn't have any fear, what would you do to change the world, and why haven't you done it yet?
Dr. Kelly Culver:Well, that's a really good question to ask me because for fifteen years, I've spent my career living and working around the world in countries, helping people's societies change to look at the world through a different view. And I feel like I actually can write that book. I am doing it, I'm living it, I'm breathing it, and I'm loving it. But it comes up being fearless. You know, you gotta do it.
Dr. Kelly Culver:And it's just so much fun. Like I said, the world is a beautiful place. You just gotta get out there and look at it.
Asef Quader:It's so true. And you are doing it, and I you inspire us. We talk about you all the time, Kelly. You you got in our household, doctor Kelly Culver comes up all the time.
Jenn Quader:Amen. You you again, you're you're the work wife extraordinaire, but beyond that, you're really a blessing of resilience. And I have to tell you, I love how we are gonna wrap this this podcast episode up with this idea that life really is beautiful, that you have visited 33 countries and life is beautiful. And I would like to say that I'd like to wrap it with an honor and memory to Peter, your your late husband. Because what I heard you say is when he got his diagnosis and you said, I don't know if I wanna go, he said, Let's go.
Jenn Quader:It'll be fun. Yes. And I I think that's to me, if I take anything today, doctor Kelly Culver, it's let's have some fun. Let's enjoy life. Let's take in all that's there at the feast, and that will bring us to that state of resiliency.
Jenn Quader:Doctor Kelly Culver, what a gift to have you as a guest today. I know that we will all get to hear from you, as a host in future episodes. But for that, I wanna just tell our listeners thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Jenn Quader:Thank you for listening to our show. Thank you for becoming part of the resiliency community. You can find Resiliency the Podcast anywhere you listen to podcasts, Spotify, Apple, etcetera. You can find us online at resiliencythepodcast.com. We ask that you like these episodes, subscribe to us, and become part of our community.
Jenn Quader:Check out the show notes. Take a look at that resiliency toolkit and see what can apply to your life. We really want this to be a practical application that helps you. So resiliency the podcast, as you know well, is the place to find stories and strategies and inspiration about how to embrace change, to overcome challenges, and to redefine resilience in what we all know is a very ever changing world. You can find me, Jen Quader, at jennquader.com.
Jenn Quader:You can find me at jennquader, j e n n q u a d e r, on all the social platforms. You can find my husband, an executive producer and cofounder of this podcast and cohost today at at acefquader, that's a s e f q u a d e r on all of the socials. He puts a lot of good food up there. You'll enjoy his food and wine perspective. And then, doctor Kelly Culver, our wonderful guest today.
Jenn Quader:You can find her online at the Culvergroup.ca. That's .ca because she is our wonderful Canadian on here on Canada Day. You can also find her online at doctorkellyculver.com and at kellyculver on both LinkedIn and Instagram. And with that, listeners, thank you. Thanks for coming in here today and listening to us, remembering that life is beautiful, and it is very much worth living, and that resiliency is a state of being that all of us can live in, enjoy, and find our way forward through.
Jenn Quader:So, with that, we love you, we thank you, we hope you'll tune in next time. That's it for us today on Resiliency the Podcast.
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