Story highlights President Barack Obama gave a wide-ranging interview to the New Yorker

Obama discuss the election of Donald Trump and offered suggestions about how to deal with it

Washington (CNN) President Barack Obama's advice to his two daughters and anyone worried about the election of Donald Trump is not to "get into a fetal position" and put the outcome in context.

Asked by The New Yorker's David Remnick what Obama told his daughters Sasha and Malia about the election, the president said that "societies and cultures are really complicated."

"This is not mathematics; this is biology and chemistry. These are living organisms, and it's messy," the departing president said in a wide-ranging interview.

"You don't get into a fetal position about it. You don't start worrying about apocalypse. You say, O.K., where are the places where I can push to keep it moving forward," Obama added.

Protests have broken out in cities across the nation since Trump was elected. A white nationalist was bloodied during an anti-racist protest in Washington over the weekend.

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