Dr. Tara Narula

And what became clear to me was what we just talked about, which is resilience is the ability, in my opinion, to retain your wonder, joy, excitement, investment, engagement in life

despite what happens to you.

So you are not ever going to go back to where you were.

You're going to move in a different direction.

And this again comes out of my clinical experience.

You know, when I am telling someone who has no idea they have heart disease, that they have coronary artery disease or plaque in their arteries and they thought they were completely healthy, or I'm telling someone your heart function is 20%, not 50%, you have heart failure.

The look that I see on their face, Mel, is the same every time.

It is kind of a look of just

fear and paralysis.

And they ask me, when am I going to be myself again?

That's what they want to know.

What do you say?

And I say, you will never, ever be yourself again.

You will never be yourself again.

But, and here's the big thing, you can be a beautiful, different version of you.

Your life can be an incredible different version or chapter.

And, you know, I think a lot about the quote of Michelangelo, which I used in the book about how he said he carved the marble to set the angel free.

He saw the angel in the marble and he carved until he set the angel free.

This idea that

We are this piece of marble and life is sort of changing us and we're evolving, but there's still something beautiful that can come out of it.