Facebook exec Sandberg urges graduates to build resilience

BERKELEY, Calif. – Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg is encouraging graduating seniors at the University of California, Berkeley to persevere in life’s challenging times.

Sandberg, who lost her husband in an accident last year, addressed 4,700 graduation seniors on Saturday, speaking publicly for the first time about her husband’s death last year.

Sandberg says that for many months after her husband, Dave Goldberg, died in a treadmill accident while on vacation in Mexico, she was “swallowed up in the deep fog of grief.”

Sandberg says losing her husband helped her find deeper gratitude for the kindness of her friends, the love of her family and the laughter of her children.

She is encouraging UC Berkeley’s graduating seniors to build resilience in themselves, their places of work and their communities.

She says that when tragedy strikes, “know that you have the ability to go through absolutely anything.”