‘Don’t lose your joy’: Kamala Harris on self-care, struggle, and telling her own story

Kamala Harris gets candid about self-care, her book, her thoughts on the 2024 presidential election and more.

After surviving 107 days campaigning against Donald Trump, Kamala Harris is a master of self-care.

The former vice president opened up about how she coped — and how she continues to cope in the aftermath — during a lively and candid sit-down with Evan Scott on the latest episode of “House Guest.”

“What I do every morning, for years, I work out every morning,” she expressed. “No matter how little sleep I’ve had.” 

She added, of her routine, which consists of 30 minutes on the elliptical and 15 minutes on the treadmill with weights in hand, “It’s mind, body, and spirit.”

That discipline, Harris said, was more than just fitness. It was how she maintained her personal power when the campaign threatened to take everything out of her. 

“We cannot let our spirit be defeated…we cannot allow it to cause us to just throw up our hands when it’s time to roll up our sleeves,” she continued. “You can lose a game, but don’t lose your joy.” 

She reminded the American people, “Our democracy, in large part, is a function of the power being with the people, right? So the people cannot give up their power.”

Another self-care choice, Harris revealed, was holding back from revisiting the hardest moments from her campaign, including election night, at home. Even after the campaign ended, she and her husband didn’t discuss election night until she began writing her book. 

“Everything kept moving,” she noted.

The conversation with Scott was part promotion for her new book, “107 Days,” and part unguarded kitchen-table chat. Between reflections on resilience, Harris confessed she doesn’t recommend “washing” raw chicken, teased Scott into trying anchovies, and explained why cheese pizza with anchovies is special to her. 

It was the same meal she ordered the morning President Biden told her he would not run again, the day her story began in earnest. When asked why she was choosing to relive that story from start to finish by penning “107 Days” now, Harris gave a simple answer. 

She said, “One of the reasons I wrote the book is because, as a historic vice president running a historic campaign for president, I was not about to let history have other people tell my story.”