Matthew Breitfelder

𝗖𝗮𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗯𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗲𝘃𝗲 𝗶𝘁? Robert: Matt, when you think about “Can you believe it?”, where does that story begin for you? Matt: It starts with the grief of losing a pillar of my identity. My grandmother was such a pillar of who I am today. I felt the loss of not having her with us anymore and wishing I could talk to her. When I started thinking about why I was so sad, I realized it was because of everything she represented to me. She was reliable, strong, consistent, and safe. My parents were working hard and pursuing their passions, and my grandmother was the one who got things done. She was always there. Robert: What had her life been like? Matt: She was an uneducated immigrant from Sweden. She grew up on a farm, lost a lot of her siblings early in life, and lived through World War II. She came to America and became a cleaning lady in Chicago, where I grew up. She had a hard life, but she was still a pillar of strength and safety. She was the oldest of a big family and spent her whole life taking care of other people. And I was one of the people who benefited from that. Robert: Is there one moment with her that captures who she was? Matt: In her last years, my family was able to move her into a very elegant retirement community. It was much nicer than anything she'd ever experienced. I used to have lunch with her there. I'll never forget one conversation. She looked at me and said, “Can you believe it? I don't have to cook. I don't have to clean. I come down here, someone shows me a menu, I pick what I want, they cook it, somebody brings it out, I eat it, and then I just stand up and walk out.” She was probably 85 years old. It was like someone describing the concept of a restaurant for the first time. She was looking at me like, “Can I do this three times a day? I don't even have to pay? It's incredible.” And around her were people complaining about the food or their seats. My grandmother was beaming. She acted like she had won the lottery at every meal. Robert: What did watching her teach you? Matt: The greatest gift she gave me was gratitude and optimism. After 85 years of cooking and taking care of other people, she finally got to enjoy what it felt like to have people take care of her. That story encapsulates the greatest lesson I got from her: we're all equal, and you've got to be grateful for the most fundamental things. You can transform an experience completely by the attitude you bring to it. I could sit in that dining room and watch two people have the exact same experience. One person was saying, “This is below my standards,” while my grandmother felt like she had won the lottery. At my best, I'm trying to alchemize my circumstances with optimism and gratitude. Robert: What makes that lesson hard to live out? Matt: It's not a very grateful or optimistic world. You've got hundreds of reasons coming at you for why you should be skeptical, frustrated, or dissatisfied. And my grandmother had hundreds of reasons to be bitter. She lost siblings. Her husband died. A lot of hard things happened to her. A lot of us have been dealt pretty good cards. She was dealt some pretty bad cards. But somehow, she was more optimistic than everybody else. That's the part that stays with me. Robert: What does “Can you believe it?” mean to you now? Matt: It's a reminder of the attitude she brought to life. She never sat me down and taught me this lesson. I just got to witness how she lived. The Dear World experience helped me realize that gratitude and optimism were a pillar of my identity because of her. Now, I want to keep bringing curiosity, meaning, and growth into my life. I want to build something meaningful and hopefully be a guide or coach for other people. But underneath all of that is what my grandmother showed me. You may not get to choose every circumstance. You do get to choose the attitude you bring to it. And I can still hear her saying, “Can you believe it?”