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I'm Oprah Winfrey. Welcome to Super Soul Conversations, the podcast.
I believe that one of the most valuable gifts you can give yourself is time.
Taking time to be more fully present.
Your journey to become more inspired and connected to the deeper world around us starts right now.
Last time, Nate Berkus and I began a conversation we'd never had before, really.
We heard about some of the spiritual milestones of his life so far, the roots of his lifelong passion for design, his journey of coming out to his family.
And we got a glimpse of who Nate calls the love of his life.
Today, we continue our heart to heart with the devastating event that changed everything for Nate, the massive 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
You write, and the things that matter.
Good title, may I say.
Thank you. You write that since December 26, 2004, I've never defined myself by anything other than my ability to survive.
I don't think about whether I'm successful or I'm not successful, famous or not famous, busy or bored.
To me, the ultimate question, the only question is, can I survive or can't I?
That's what matters.
Really? That's it. That's it.
does the tsunami, when you go through a traumatic event experience like that, is it always with you in some way?
Always, always in some way.
Even now, I'm back in love, personally, really in love.
And I see myself behaving in a way with my new boyfriend that is fear -based, that something will happen to him.
Or worse, how I think to myself how he would be should something happen to me.
And those kinds of thoughts are not, they can be healthy, they can motivate you to be present, and they can trap you.
And so I have to be conscious of that because that's just in my consciousness now, and I have to be aware.
It takes a heightened level of awareness in everything.
Well, I would have to say you went through a tsunami.
I know. Not just a flood or hurricane, but a tsunami.
Right. Yeah. And that is physical, but it's also metaphysical.
It's spiritual. It's emotional.
It's all of that. It really was.
I don't recognize myself.
I thought I knew myself well when I was growing up.
I always thought that I knew myself.
And I don't, I really don't recognize the person that I was before the tsunami.
And everything that I've learned from that experience, really everything, I wouldn't trade.
I really trust myself and like myself.
After that. I do. Yeah.
And I know that I can survive.
And I, you know, I miss, parts of me will miss Fernando and parts of me honor Fernando still by living so fully.
Born in Argentina, Fernando Bangochea was an internationally acclaimed photographer.
His work appeared in major magazines, including O.
He traveled the world on assignment but met Nate for the first time on a photo shoot for O at Home magazine.
That was in 2003. You dedicate the book to F?
I do. The first book and this book, both to him.
You know, I think about all the time, where would we be had he survived?
Would we still be together?
Could he, would he have agreed with the decisions that I've made since then in life?
What would he think about who I am today?
Because it's certainly different than who I was in 2004.
What I also, aside from how beautifully and poignantly and movingly the story is told, I mean, I've heard you tell it.
I looked in your eyes shortly after it happened, but the way you write about it here, I could feel him, his last feeling you, actually, in that water.
But you say that he helped you to see life differently in a more beautiful way.
This is the quote I've been looking for.
He showed me a bigger life than I ever dreamed of for myself.
Yeah, and he really did.
I have to say this chapter In this book This was the hardest thing for me to work on And I didn't set out to write the story Of Fernando and I Or the tsunami in a design book But what happened was It's a design spiritual book It really is And what happened was When I started getting all the stories
back From everybody else that's included in the book And they were so forthcoming And so honest about who they've loved And what they've lost And their stories I knew that I really had to dig in.
And so I wasn't always prepared emotionally to dig into this story the nine times I had to do to get it right and to get it to be what I needed it to say.
But it was a process.
It was a very cathartic process to even write it down.
I would like for you to read the excerpt from page 27 on how you and Fernando met.
Okay. Fernando and I met in 2003 at a photo shoot for Oat Home magazine.
He had been hired to photograph the makeover process of a living room I was brought in to redo.
The day I met him, I could see through his photographs how he saw me.
And I remember thinking, things don't get any better than this.
How did he see you?
He saw me for how I wanted to be seen.
And I felt that from the very first moments with him.
What does that mean?
It meant that he captured, not only what I looked like, but I felt like he captured my humor and my self.
And he, I don't know how he did that.
There was an energy that sort of came over the room and the whole shoot and the whole location between the two of us that was really, really powerful.
And we both felt it, although we couldn't articulate it.
And then I had the sort of the presence of mind to believe that that energy was just between him and I until we started dating.
And I realized that that was his gift, that anyone that he put his lens in front of also felt that way and wanted to be seen that way.
We wanted to be with him.
Yeah. Around that energy.
Around it. Because this is the real truth and the real powerful spiritual lesson for all of us that Toni Morrison shared when she was on the show years ago.
When she talked about your kids entering the room, do your eyes light up?
Do your eyes light up when I enter the room?
She said, that's what everybody wants to know.
Everybody. Do I matter?
Do my eyes light up?
And also, what every human being wants is what you just said.
We just want you to see us.
right not just for not just for who we are but for the best that we can be yeah you sang that yes that's it really did i knew that found that it was an enormous the first time that had ever happened and um i didn't really know what to do with that level of energy it was really hard to receive at that moment
um but i but i did and i took it in and i and i sort of that feels like love doesn't it yeah when somebody sees you that way it does it is love feels like that is what love feels like wow aha that's it i love how you say that rinando was audacious and complicated and spontaneous and sophisticated and charismatic
and demanding and graceful and volatile and extravagant and occasionally impossible wow that's that that's a relationship that is and that's knowing somebody and really honoring them for being all of those things you know one of the There's a peacefulness that comes over when you've found the right person for you.
And you just know that whatever happens, that's a person that you're going to be with.
And that's how I felt about Fernando.
Nate says Fernando broadened his world, convincing him to take a three -week trip through Southeast Asia, something Nate had never done before.
I didn't know people that went on vacation for three weeks.
I didn't even, that was totally, the idea of being separate from your life for that long Yep.
Made no sense to me.
A week. Yeah. You know, and even then that was challenging, but he was adamant that we go.
He was adamant that he planned it, and he was adamant that I give him the time he felt that that type of vacation deserved.
And I said, but you're crazy.
I have a million things going on.
I'm designing products, and I have work, and I have my design firm and all this stuff.
And he said, I don't care.
Figure it out. Well, we're not going.
This trip requires at least three weeks.
So that's what I need from you.
And then I'll take care of everything else.
I'll figure it out.
And I said, okay, so the trip was Thailand and then Cambodia and then to Sri Lanka where we would tour a little bit the larger cities and then end at the beach.
Were you in your second week, first week?
Second week, end of the second week.
Okay. And being there with him was magical because he was magical and we were magic together and we knew it which is another thing to have to be functioning on that level.
and it was so incredible um just how connected we were the whole time and when we came i wish that for everybody i do too yeah i do too yeah it was um because that is the thing that matters that's really where it all stems from yeah it really is so we went to Sri Lanka and he had been there before 12
years prior yeah as a photographer's assistant he wanted me to see what he had seen, and like most places that you go back to, it's never what you remember.
And then I remember saying to him, relax, I'm here with you.
I'd rather be here with you than doing anything in the world.
I don't care that there's smog or that the traffic is noisy or that it takes forever to get or this hotel is in.
Who cares? We're together.
That's the only thing that matters and from that moment on he was much better and then and we went to the seashore.
And we actually asked the mayor of the town, the small town, if he could tell us the names and the ages of the children for the 10 poorest families, because there was a small Main Street, and I thought, you know what, we have nothing to do.
I always believe that you should leave a place better than you found it, no matter where you go.
And we assembled backpacks for the kids.
He gave us the name with the list.
So the night before the tsunami...
This was the night before the tsunami.
The two of you are putting together these handmade backpacks...
Right. ...with school supplies...
School supplies, and we were trying to be really thoughtful.
We bought fabric...
And cloth, fabric. Yeah, so that the kids could sew their own clothes, the parents could sew their clothes and it would last for longer.
And you were just doing this because you wanted to give something back to you.
Yeah, it was a beautiful place with beautiful people in many ways.
And it's Christmas.
And it's Christmas, and we thought, you know, we should leave this place better than how we found it.
And that was my first memory of the tsunami hitting, was the sound first and then laying in bed and seeing the backpacks, seeing the water come into our little shack and seeing the backpacks start to swirl all over the place.
And that was the first thing that the tsunami took were those backpacks.
And when you're in the middle of it, your brain doesn't have time to calculate where am I, what's going on.
Your brain just calculates, let me get the next breath.
Breathe. Yeah, breathe.
Just breathe. And it's, you know, having been, I guess, almost dead and fighting to survive in that moment.
That is really all you care about is is taking that next breath at any expense.
Nothing flashed before me.
I wasn't conscious of the fact that I was going to die.
I wasn't thinking, oh, no, I am going to die.
I was just thinking I need air and I don't have it.
breathe look for the light because it was 9 30 in the morning swim towards the light when you can which you couldn't it just popped you up when when the force of the sea wanted you to but if i could get to the light i thought i can i can breathe and that was all i could focus on say you've always wanted
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but who's going to make it happen.
Look in the mirror.
That person you see is more powerful than you think.
Every uplifting word, every small act of compassion, it all adds up to something bigger.
So take the first step, whether it's in your neighborhood or your workplace.
Change starts with you.
Join Cricut Nation this Black History Month and get inspired while discovering change makers just like you.
Because the world doesn't change by itself, it changes one person at a time.
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I remember back in 2005 when you were on the show, talking about this for the first time, and when you see this tape of yourself, I mean, you're kind of, you're still not really fully there.
And what struck me at the time, you were talking about being in the water and all the other things swirling by you, and, you know, huge objects.
And I remember hearing about that pole, that telephone pole and you're speeding toward the telephone pole and then all of a sudden a mattress floats in the water and just floated in between Fernando and me we were heading towards this telephone pole at probably 40 miles an hour was the speed of the water
with the two of us in it and and I thought we need to grab that pole but it's gonna kill us so what if we hit our heads on the pole there were iron spikes coming out of it that people could climb up the water level was probably 12 feet at this point and um and then i realized that there were electrical
wires and i thought we'll be electrocuted and i'm thinking all of this while he's next to me and we're going 40 miles an hour towards it and i thought we're just gonna have to grab it whether the impact hurts us or not we're just gonna have to grab it so that we can stop moving and that twin size mattress
just came in between us and it just went like this around the pole around the And we ran into the mattress.
Instead of the pool.
Instead of the pool.
Isn't that... How does that happen?
Well, you know how that happens.
Right. And then you held on.
We held on. And I asked for that.
I remember asking him, what was that?
Meaning the whole tsunami.
And he said, I don't know.
Could you hear each other?
Because I'm thinking of the water.
No, we were talking.
Now we're on the mattress.
Now we're good comparatively.
I mean, we're not drowning.
We can breathe. We're in the sun.
Everything's floating past us, but we're together and we're able to have a conversation.
And I said, what was that?
And he said, I don't know, but it's over now.
And I said, but what was it?
And he said, I don't know, maybe a tidal wave.
I'm not sure, but are you okay?
And I said, yes. And he said, are you okay?
And I said, I am, but now I'm scared.
Like now that I can see what's going on, I'm really scared.
Because you can see people screaming from the rooftops.
Everything. And you could see the devastation and babies floating by.
I mean, there's no getting that out of your head.
The fact that I can function after witnessing that is a testament to the love and the support that I had when I got back.
Period. The end. But we're looking around, we're noticing the devastation, we're noticing the death, we're noticing the injuries and the people floating in the water and the animals and everything.
and he said it's over it's over and then the water changed direction Wow and as fast as the water came in overland it's as fast as the water would drew out so all of a sudden we were ripped off the Pole again and drowning again and in that same experience that we just had survived a second time and I
felt him hang on to the waistband of my underwear, and then I felt him be torn away.
And that was the last that I saw him.
The last that you felt him.
The felt him. Yeah.
And you still wear his bracelet today?
I do. This is from a tribe in the Amazon in Brazil, and it's hand -woven in the jungle, and it's one thing, so you don't take it on and off when you shower.
You stretch it and put it on.
And I've worn it because when I first met him, he asked me if I wanted one, because he was wearing one.
And I said, sure. And he said, I found this at a store in Rio.
There's only one store in the world that sells these.
But if you put it on, you can never take it off.
So you have to promise me you'll never take it off.
Wow. And I said, OK.
And he said, really, though?
I mean, I know you like style, and it may not be your style, and you have to wear it with a tuxedo, and you have to wear it all the time, but you can never take it off.
Do you promise? And I said, I promise.
So here it is. Was that kind of like you all getting, it's like getting a ring?
Yeah, I mean, it was very early on, which was very typical of Fernando.
It was probably, we were dating probably three weeks before I asked about it on him.
And then he said, do you want one?
Had he not always spoken of not living past 40?
He always did. He always did.
I don't know. I mean, Fernando always said that he couldn't envision himself living past 40, that he just couldn't see himself aging, he couldn't see himself growing older, and he talked about the future, we talked about the future all the time, but he sort of, I guess, knew on some level.
He must have known, and he was vain, and he wouldn't have wanted to be seen, and he was never seen again, I know that he wouldn't have wanted to be seen.
He wouldn't have wanted his body to be exhumed from the sea.
He wouldn't have wanted a funeral.
He wouldn't have wanted any of those things and he didn't get them.
He just disappeared.
He just disappeared by one of the greatest natural disasters the world had ever known.
Had ever known. It was the force that took him out at 39 years old.
Spiritually, how did you come back and put the pieces together for yourself i mean that that is obviously physical tsunami but the devastation to your own psyche has got to be equally as enormous so a few things happened that made sense to me um one that i was there to witness fernando disappearing
because i felt that that gave me a lot of strength when i came home because i I have always been a very visual person, and I needed to see what that tsunami really was in order to accept, truly accept, that he was gone.
I would never have accepted it if I heard about it on the phone or saw it on the news.
Or if he had been on location there and I had been in New York or Chicago or wherever, and somebody called, just like my family was called and said, Nate was in the tsunami.
Had I not survived, I don't know how my family, my, my, the people closest to me would have been able to envision the force of what took me away.
And I was grateful that I was there because the focus for me when I came home was on the loss of him, not what I had seen and what I had gone through.
i was able to grieve for him which was terrifying because i'd never never lost a grandparent at that point i had never had anyone close to me die and here was the love of my life who's disappeared but i was able to understand how he disappeared and that somehow was made it more manageable for me that i
had borne witness that i had gone through myself which as you're saying that makes me feel for all the the people who don't know where they're phone call you get the phone call and they don't know how it happened or where it happened like in the cases of murder yeah a lost child gone forever armed forces
yes yes i mean yeah how many people missing with no one that witnessed their disappearance i mean how many families have gotten that phone call just like fernando's mother did um and so the rest of the interesting actually in the end became a comfort the witnessing was a gift was a gift yeah the idea of having
my eyes opened to what other people had gone through what suffering really felt like was also a gift because it made me a better person it made me a more compassionate person I no longer could stand in line at the drugstore and just ignore everyone around me for the first time I started thinking what has that woman behind
me gone through what have they been through in their lives we're not protected anymore I felt raw and I felt really open to what it felt really insignificant and I felt afraid very very afraid for myself would I ever become normal and you came over I remember about three days after I came home and I
was in my bed um and i asked you why i wanted you to tell me why yeah i know but sorry wait that was a answer that was a comfortable moment yes well you were oprah i was like listen my mother doesn't know my father doesn't know but i mean i remember saying you know why why did this happen why and i
remember how you answered it and you said to me when the soul gets what it came to get it goes someone told me that once you told someone who told you that once and you gave that to me and And that made sense.
Because here was a person who never felt like he had a home, who had left Argentina to live in Brazil, who had traveled around the globe, who truly never had established his own family and life on his own terms.
And all of a sudden, I was home to him.
I represented home, metaphysically, physically, everything.
and he had gotten what he had come to get by being with me i really believed that and so it made sense to me that that's what his soul needed and and that was the final thing but when you're in that moment and for everybody who's going through it or has been through it it's hard to hear it because you're
just like why i needed to hear it i needed to hear anything i mean i remember i was reading everything about loss i just started to look at life in a different way it's the time of year when we're all thinking about goals and priorities now is the time to plan your next trip whatever kind of travel
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and free expedia made to travel i would I'd like to say this, or ask this for you, because this is what I believe.
That for me, all death is a reminder to turn up the volume on your life.
That's what all souls coming and coming into the world and leaving the world, those who are born and those who are leaving are saying, better get with it, better turn up the volume.
That's for me what came to pass with his death.
I knew that I had two choices.
I could mourn his death and I could stay at home and I could be sort of a recluse and I could stay stuck in that grief or I could choose to honor how loudly he lived his life by doing everything that came my way that felt like living.
Because otherwise, there really would have been two tragedies.
Right. That, to me, was worse than one.
If you stayed stuck, then that's right.
Then I'm not living my life, what's the point of surviving?
And because you'd said that He showed you a bigger life than you'd ever dreamed of for yourself, now it's about, His passing is about, get on and live it.
I showed you. I came here.
Do it. I opened that door for you.
Do it. Walk through that door.
Walk through that door.
And it doesn't matter if I'm not by your side.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I am, in some way, obviously.
Of course. But I can't be there for you.
But I've given you what you needed to know that you can do it.
So go do it. Go do it.
and have you? I did.
I am. And you are. I am.
You know, what's interesting about this, Nate, I think everybody thinks, particularly who's gone through a tragic experience, and you survived and others don't.
And over the years, I talk to so many people in plane crashes or car crashes and like, why me?
And people often say, you know, there must have been a reason.
There must have been a reason.
You know what my answer to that is?
Every day is the reason.
Right. Exactly. It's not now snatched exactly yeah it's every day i it's all the little things yeah every little moment stitched together turn up the volume turn up the volume it's every time you answer the phone and a friend needs you it's every time you create something beautiful and someone gets
joy out of it it's every time you make coffee for somebody in the morning because they really want it it's not it's it is about every day and and there isn't anything noble about it i just survived no one else.
A lot of people didn't.
Yeah. But what would have been a tragedy for me would have been to have been given the gift of survival and the skill set to understand or at least come to some level of understanding about why this happened to me and just choose to waste that.
And to waste it. Your home is still filled with mementos, right, and treasures from your life with Fernando.
How does one strike a balance?
Because I've obviously done shows with people who are still holding on.
I remember that show I did with a woman who hadn't changed her daughter's room in 10 years.
You know? It happens all the time.
You went through that where you didn't want to change anything until one day you woke up and said...
It was ridiculous. I mean, for me...
I think grieving is...
people have to go through it at their own pace.
I don't believe in shrines.
I never have. I have objects and things that obviously remind me of Fernando, remind me of my grandparents, remind me of anyone who's passed on in my home, but they're there because they give me joy.
They don't make me sad.
And I think the distinction is that when you leave a space untouched in honor of somebody who's no longer here to enjoy it, then you're not honoring yourself and you're not moving forward in a way that's healthy for you, you're living still in the past.
What you have to come to terms with, and this is why I think everybody needs their own timeline for this, is that you have to come to terms with that you are living a new normal.
Your new normal is nothing to do with what it was when that person was alive.
I think the most important thing that you said here, and I think I actually remember saying to you, that your life isn't not going to be the the same you have to create a new normal and most people are trying to hold on when they have the things they're holding on to wanting the life to be what it was what it
was never will be never will be and the the one of the greatest spiritual lessons I've learned from everybody who's sat in this chair whether it's Eckhart Tolle or Deepak Chopra whoever or me or you or you or Nate or Nate, is that, and you just said it, is that when you are resisting the reality of what is,
that is where all of your suffering comes from.
You're wanting the moment, the time, to be something that it can't be is what causes you the suffering.
Absolutely. And your ability to transcend and accept that that is gone and now I must move on and create a new normal is the real great spiritual lesson, no matter what it is you're going through.
so what is your new normal now my new normal is you know it's it's a very normal life I have I have my work which I is very fulfilling to me um you know the creativity is still kind of going through me and I know that I'm doing what I should be doing right now and it feels good it feels good to be here
talking about something I created it feels good to be behind what I'm doing now a thousand percent um but it's um it's also you know there's relationships that come in and out there's friendships that have tension tension among the relationships in my family just like anyone there's just and i think
hopefully what i bring to it is the desire to resolve things even in a way that allows everyone some joy and some happiness around me because i know for a fact that we don't know how long we have here yeah you've lived it I've lived it you've lived it and what are the things that matter to you people
number one truly number one I've never been more inspired than by someone's personality ever it's always a starting point for me with any project with any friendship with any great evening that moment when you connect to somebody and use the door how they present themselves and what they have to say.
And people are really inspiring to me and they matter.
And animals matter.
Dogs matter. Dogs matter.
Never underestimate the dog people.
That could be your next book, Dogs Matter.
Dogs matter and dogs matter.
And I think being able to be a good boyfriend, a good son, to try and be a good friend, and to try and maintain sort of a standard of joy and of happiness and of optimism, and not to let my light dim.
That matters to me a lot.
And I think what matters for me is time and being happy.
And being happy. And that's it.
Finish the sentence.
The world needs - Kindness.
I believe in - Love.
I'm grateful for? For having survived.
Having survived. Where do you feel most at home or at peace?
In my home. I better be.
It's what I stand for, but I really do.
There's nothing that feels better to me than being at home.
And what room? Usually the TV room, the family room.
But I love waking up in my bed, too.
Oh, yeah. I love it.
I love it. Crave it.
Would I say, could you say, that you are comfortable and feel at home in every room in your house.
Oh, absolutely. Every space.
Do you consider yourself a spiritual person or a religious person?
Spiritual. And what is the difference?
I grew up in a very traditional Jewish culture and religion, but religion wasn't as important as the cultural things around it.
and I think that, for me, I guess, defining being more spiritual than religious means that I'm not tied to the religion that I was raised with.
I can find my spirituality in anything, and I think I do.
I find it in my work and I find it in other people and I find it in teachings from other religions.
What's your greatest fear?
My greatest fear used to be being alone, and I think my greatest fear now would be losing the people that I love which will happen so it's sort of a funny thing to fear when you know it will happen what is the best piece of advice you've ever gotten?
best piece of advice okay so you need to settle something with me with this because I quote you as saying this but you quote somebody else I don't know where this came from when people show you who they are believe them the first time Maya Angelou.
Thank you. What is your secret strength?
I think my secret strength is my ability to survive and my perspective.
Mmm. Because when you have the perspective that I have on life, you can really navigate it in a way that is, um, effective.
When you're not, when the worst has already happened and you're not afraid to speak your truth, you get a lot done.
Thank you. Thank you.
This was great, Nate.
Fun. This is great.
Thank you. I'm Oprah Winfrey, and you've been listening to Super Soul Conversations, the podcast.
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