Shared Ground

Episode 14: Quick Hits - Defining Resilience, Finding Hope with Drew, Anuj and Lisa

• Sean Knierim & Allan Marks

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What does resilience actually mean - and where do we find it?

We recorded a series of special episodes at a recent gathering focused on rebuilding to insurable standards in Altadena and the Palisades.  

Sean sits down with three thoughtful leaders working across architecture, energy infrastructure, and philanthropy:

Each offers their own lived definition of resilience, rooted in design, systems thinking, community care, and hard-won personal lessons.

Drew talks about how buildings and people alike must be prepared to endure and adapt. Anuj speaks to the challenge of keeping the lights on in a warming world, and the deeper meaning of community resilience. Lisa reminds us, quoting Rocky Balboa, that it’s not how many times you get knocked down, but how many times you get back up.

From data fatigue to hope found in collaboration, from personal recovery to helping others through tragedy, this short, moving episode captures what Shared Ground is all about.

🎧 Listen, subscribe, and send it to someone you think might need to hear this today.

 💬 Then leave a comment or reply—what’s your own definition of resilience?

 🌍 More stories and resources at shared-ground.com

Shared Ground is produced by Sean Knierim and Allan Marks. Thanks to Cory Grabow, Kara Poltor, Corey Walles (from The Recording Studio) for your support in launching this effort.

For more stories of resilience & rebuilding, kindness & generosity: visit shared-ground.com and subscribe to Sean's substack. We invite you to share your own stories of resilience at the Shared Ground website - whether in response to the January fires in LA or other situations.

Follow us at seanknierim.substack.com, Instagram, or wherever you listen to podcasts (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, etc).

Sean Knierim:

So we're sitting here at an event focused on building and resiliently in Altadena in the Palisades, and I'm joined by three pretty astounding people that I really respect. We're going to go around and just say you know who are you, what do you do, and then I'll come back around saying what is resilience and then what brings you hope. But start with you, drew.

Drew Pedrick:

I'm Drew Pedrick and I've been an architect for 44 years and for the last 14 years been running a practice in LA called McTeague.

Sean Knierim:

Fantastic.

Anuj Desai:

my name is Anuj Desai. I work at Southern California Edison on climate adaptation and resilience issues, particularly how we build partnerships around those particular areas.

Lisa Cleri Reale:

Hi, I'm Lisa Cleri Reale. I'm a philanthropic and nonprofit advisor for the last 25 years here in LA.

Sean Knierim:

All right, so three people that are serving our community in pretty different but intersecting ways. So, drew, and then we'll go around. How would you define resilience? I know you have a good answer on this one.

Drew Pedrick:

I define it personally, first of all, and I define it in terms of our mindsets, our bodies, our own physical strength, our community, so our society, and even spiritually. What does the world really mean to us and how do we interact with it? And from an architecture point of view, I look at buildings the same way. So we look at the physicality of the building, we look at what it means to people, qualitatively and quantitatively, and how it can withstand all sorts of conditions that come upon it. Most of them are environmental, but they're also economic and social and others.

Sean Knierim:

I love the focus on the multifaceted realities that fall into this concept. Anuj, for you, how would you define resilience? I don't know that.

Anuj Desai:

I have a word to add that you didn't already mention, drew, but it's a great way to be thinking about it. I guess maybe try to just to offer a different perspective on it, or kind of I think about, at least in the capacity that you all have kind of just met me under, which is at work. I think about resilience. As you know, we're operators of a grid that in a country where everybody expects electricity 24-7, and so when we think about resiliency now moving forward, it's about practically speaking. It's about thinking about forecasted climate risk and how that impacts our assets, operations and services and how we can start making investments now for those future forecasts. And what's really interesting for us as a utility is that we have a very defined process by which we can actually identify and propose and hopefully get those investments. We're not chasing grants, for example, and so that's kind of how I think about it professionally.

Anuj Desai:

I think, personally, it's a lot of what you said, drew. You know I think it happens at multiple levels. It's about physical infrastructure and that's kind of where it intersects with work it's about, but I think it's really about community resilience and it's about personal resilience and finding ways for that to take place and creating spaces, because I think community resilience and personal resilience can be defined differently. Some people might find that in a spiritual sense, some people might find it in a daily exercise routine. Whatever the case might be, trying to find ways where we have a world and a society where all that can be not just take place, but also it can be facilitated and uplifted as a way that drives other sets of decision making beyond the scope of where your own kind of personal boundaries you think your personal boundaries lie, or you think a community scope lies, wanting to expand and see that change evolve over time.

Sean Knierim:

Thank you very much. Lisa, What would you add on the concept of resiliency?

Lisa Cleri Reale:

Well, very simple, and my son and daughter, who are now in their 30s, roll their eyes because I quote from movies all the time. So I quote from the movie Rocky Balboa and I say to them it doesn't matter how many times you get knocked down, it matters how many times you get up. That's resilience, very simple, and I think that it's something that we absolutely need to teach the next generation In some way. I don't think we do enough of it, but the next generation of children, youth, that's a skill that is critical to their existence and their sustainability as successful adults.

Sean Knierim:

None of us rolled our eyes at that, Lisa. Where do you all find hope, so, in the jobs that you're doing, moving across these different systems? Where does the hope come from? We'll start with you this time, lisa.

Lisa Cleri Reale:

Well, I'll tell you, you know I go to these things all the time these conferences and you read reports and data. That just drowns you. It's so daunting what we face in LA and across the country and the world, but every day I get overwhelmed by what I'm hearing and then I meet people like all of you and people like I've met all today, who inspire me. The energy is powerful, the passion is there and they're doing something that's innovative and creative. So it counters how daunting I just felt. That gives me hope.

Sean Knierim:

Thank you.

Anuj Desai:

I think it's really it's what you're seeing play out in this conference as well. It's the multi-sector collaboration. You know it's become almost collaborating is kind of political these days in some ways, but I just think it's so inherent to who we are as human beings and can be from that. But I think collaborations and the way I see collaboration taking place at this event, the way you see people respond, trying to develop new models for public, private and community partnerships, all of that energy and ethos, I think it comes from a very for some individuals it can come from a very kind of instinctual place. But the way we're seeing that kind of play out now, I think it's really exciting and very yeah, it offers a lot of potential and a lot of energy and just a path forward for doing things differently in the future.

Sean Knierim:

Thanks. Drew, Bring us home what's bringing you hope these days.

Drew Pedrick:

Well, so much was just said that I'm kind of on the end just listening to this wonderful discussion. The thing I would like to add in terms of resilience is and there's a fellow named Arthur Brooks. Arthur Brooks talks about many things, including the people in the world who recover from tragedy faster. Why is that? And it goes back to a core part of the brain and the ability to come out of that and heal and not suffer PTSD or other long-term factors is because they're helping other people. So a nurse, fireman, someone you know, in a position where they can care for others while they're even suffering their own tragedies, they survive better and faster.

Drew Pedrick:

And in late January I was talking with my team and we were talking about how optimistic we were and Arthur Brooks came up. We realized what is going on for us is exactly that we lost everything, but we're helping other people. So we're trying to figure it out. We're suffering through how do we have enough insurance, money and what decisions and what permits, how fast we get it, but we're helping along the way and that just maybe it disperses the energy a bit and it makes it a little more palatable, a little more human.