Speaker 1: Today, It's great to have Michael Lewis on the podcast.
Speaker 1: Michael is an orthopedic surgeon at the Illinois Bowen and
Speaker 1: Joint Institute. He has been an orthopedic consultant to the
Speaker 1: Chicago White Sox baseball team, in Chicago Wolves hockey team,
Speaker 1: and the Chicago Bulls basketball team, with whom he earned
Speaker 1: two championship rings. Doctor Lewis has treated numerous world cliff
Speaker 1: athletes from several continents, including all star professional basketball and
Speaker 1: baseball players, and Olympic medal winners. He's the author of
Speaker 1: several books, including a memoir entitled The Balls in Your Court,
Speaker 1: where he shares life lessons from Michael Jordan, Phil Jackson,
Speaker 1: and non other than Abraham Maslow. Michael, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for chatting with me today. Thank you, Scott, thank
Speaker 1: you for inviting me. Does one even begin with someone
Speaker 1: like you? Will? I will say this, I've long said,
Speaker 1: people say, well, who's your two dream dinner guests? You know,
Speaker 1: if you could pick anyone in the world, you know
Speaker 1: the people have that thought experiment, I say, Michael Jordan
Speaker 1: and Abraham Maslow, and you're actually someone whose existence intertwined
Speaker 1: with both of their existences. It's unfathomable to me. It's
Speaker 1: almost like a dream, a dream come true, that someone
Speaker 1: could actually do that. And you're no slouch yourself. I mean,
Speaker 1: you're an awesome dude as well. You know. So this,
Speaker 1: this conversation today is not just you know, me talking
Speaker 1: to someone who knew these two. It's talking to a
Speaker 1: really cool human being who's done really cool, amazing things
Speaker 1: in their own lifetime, who happen to intersect with these
Speaker 1: two other people, as well as lots of other people.
Speaker 1: So yeah, again, how do I even start with someone
Speaker 1: like you? Well, that's a very generous introduction, Scott, I
Speaker 1: will say that. Just imagine, as you're suggesting, imagine how
Speaker 1: fortunate it it has been to spend quality time behind
Speaker 1: the scenes with Michael Jackson, Phil Michael Jordan, Phil Jackson,
Speaker 1: Abraham Maslow and other inspiring teachers, and how exciting it
Speaker 1: would be to learn learn from them what it takes
Speaker 1: to be world class, what it takes to be the
Speaker 1: best version of Scott Berry, Kaufman or Michael Lewis, what
Speaker 1: it takes to be successful. So the book that I've written,
Speaker 1: The Balls in Your Court, a Doctor, shares life lessons
Speaker 1: from Michael Jordan, phil Jackson, Abraham Maslow and other inspire
Speaker 1: hiring teachers attempts to share those life lessons and the
Speaker 1: really good news is works for all of us. That's
Speaker 1: the beauty of my time with them and my experience
Speaker 1: with them. Well, let's before we jump into all that,
Speaker 1: I'd like to start with your childhood a little bit.
Speaker 1: You know, how does Selwyn growing up deep in the
Speaker 1: heart of Houston, Texas in the fifties, Like, how did
Speaker 1: those experiences shape shape who you became? Well, Houston, Texas,
Speaker 1: when I was growing up, we felt very proud of ourselves.
Speaker 1: We were the fourteenth largest city in the country and
Speaker 1: we had a population of six hundred thousand. Houston now
Speaker 1: is the fourth largest city in the country with a
Speaker 1: population of six million. At the time, it was the
Speaker 1: wild West, and it was the late nineteen fifties, and
Speaker 1: if you were a white male and you worked hard,
Speaker 1: there was a good chance that you were going to
Speaker 1: be successful. And used at that time was it was
Speaker 1: really a sense of the new frontier, and there was
Speaker 1: a sense of unlimited opportunities. And when you look at
Speaker 1: all of the remarkable people who came out of Texas
Speaker 1: from that time, you knew there was this sense of
Speaker 1: unlimited opportunity. Whatever your political affiliation. There was LBJ, there
Speaker 1: were both the Bush George Bush presidents. Even Eisenhower was
Speaker 1: born in Texas. Equally important, there was Willie Nelson, Johnny
Speaker 1: Mathis and Ben Hogan the Golfer, and Jimmy Demerit. So
Speaker 1: so Texas at that time really was an exciting place,
Speaker 1: very provincial, but an exciting place to grow up. And
Speaker 1: when you entered was a brandice as an undergraduate. Is
Speaker 1: that right? Correct? When you entered under you were eighteen
Speaker 1: years old. You entered undergraduate, did you know what your
Speaker 1: You didn't know what your major was going to be
Speaker 1: at is that right? I was a frightened, directionless, insecure
Speaker 1: eighteen year old. And that was when Maslow came into
Speaker 1: my life, and that absolutely changed my life and has
Speaker 1: changed my life since then. For the next sixty years,
Speaker 1: Abraham Maslow was a mentor to me. Abraham Maslow, as
Speaker 1: you know, very well, changed the face of psychology at
Speaker 1: the time. In the nineteen fifties and early sixties, Sigmund
Speaker 1: Freud dominated the field, and Sigmund Freud's idea of personality
Speaker 1: was based on his studying mentally unhealthy people, people who
Speaker 1: were psychotic and neurotic. And Abraham Maslow came up with
Speaker 1: this at the time radical revolutionary idea, which was, let's
Speaker 1: study the people in the world who were people that
Speaker 1: you and I would most admire, and let's see what
Speaker 1: their qualities are like, and let's see if that results
Speaker 1: in a different theory of motivation and personality. And for
Speaker 1: this insecure, directionless eighteen year old, that was like the
Speaker 1: holy grail. I jumped on the bandwagon and I haven't
Speaker 1: gotten off since. And by the way, welcome aboard. It
Speaker 1: seems like you've jumped on that same bandwagon and have
Speaker 1: brought Maslow into the twenty first century and have helped
Speaker 1: give scientific validity to a lot of his theories. So, Scott,
Speaker 1: we're very grateful to your major contributions to Abraham Maslow. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you. That doesn't mean a lot to me. Do
Speaker 1: you think Maswow would have liked me? What do you
Speaker 1: think he would have thought of me? In my book?
Speaker 1: I think he would have loved you. And I'll and
Speaker 1: I'll tell you why. Abraham Maslow in my experience and
Speaker 1: he was a mentor to me, and I spent a
Speaker 1: lot of quality time with him. He at the time,
Speaker 1: he certainly was a scientist and has spent time in
Speaker 1: Harry Harlowe's lab, who did these famous wire monkey studies,
Speaker 1: so he had a lot of scientific background. But at
Speaker 1: the time, in the early sixties, he really was a
Speaker 1: revolutionary thinker. He was a philosopher. And I don't know
Speaker 1: if he knew Albert Einstein's famous quote, which was not
Speaker 1: everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that
Speaker 1: and what counts can't necessarily be counted. But he would
Speaker 1: have loved that because he was It really was a
Speaker 1: very exciting age of intellectual ferment, and Abraham Maslow hung
Speaker 1: out with Carlo with May, with Carlo May, with Gordon Alport,
Speaker 1: with so many of the great thinkers in psychology at
Speaker 1: the time. But he was so interested in getting his
Speaker 1: theories out there that he would have been thrilled to
Speaker 1: know that you would have come along and added scientific
Speaker 1: validity to his to his theories. That's very touching to hear.
Speaker 1: I want to take you, know, take me back to Wednesday,
Speaker 1: March thirteenth of your junior year of college. Was at
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty two. I'm making that up somewhere around Okay,
Speaker 1: so you're in Maslow's cramped office, piled with books and
Speaker 1: papers on every surface, and there was a rare life
Speaker 1: changing epiphany that occurred in his office where he looked
Speaker 1: at you and he solemnly said what he looked at me,
Speaker 1: and he said, someone is going to make a difference
Speaker 1: in the world of psychology. Why shouldn't it be you?
Speaker 1: And the ground shook. And as you know, they're not
Speaker 1: that many times in a person's life when the world changes.
Speaker 1: But as you know also that went, particularly when you're
Speaker 1: feeling especially vulnerable, someone an adult or teacher, or someone
Speaker 1: influential in your life, can change your life. It can
Speaker 1: change the direction of your life. And that's what happened.
Speaker 1: And he may well have said that to many other students.
Speaker 1: But my reaction was I felt this thunderbolt of energy
Speaker 1: and confidence going through my body, and I thought, the
Speaker 1: great man just told me that the future of psychology
Speaker 1: is in my hands. And as a result, I went
Speaker 1: to medical school because Abraham Maslow told me to go
Speaker 1: to medical school because at the time psychology was in
Speaker 1: its infancy, and he felt that being a psychiatrist, being
Speaker 1: a medical doctor and a psychiatrist, you had a chance
Speaker 1: to make a bigger impact. But just on that subject
Speaker 1: of how someone can influence you at a vulnerable moment.
Speaker 1: I think of the Duke coach Mike Krazuski, who said,
Speaker 1: sometimes the statement I believe in you can be even
Speaker 1: more important than I love you. I think that's what
Speaker 1: happened that day. That's beautiful. So what was he like
Speaker 1: as as a lecturer? Did you what course did you
Speaker 1: take of his? Did you take more than one of
Speaker 1: his courses? I did. He taught an introductory course and
Speaker 1: then he taught an advanced course on motivation and personality,
Speaker 1: and he took that advanced course. You took that? Yes,
Speaker 1: so you took that class. That's amazing. Okay. To tell
Speaker 1: me more about what he was like as a lecturer,
Speaker 1: I have the ones from his nineteen sixty two class.
Speaker 1: My feeling about Abraham Maslow was that he enjoyed teaching UH,
Speaker 1: but he was so involved in in UH and in
Speaker 1: getting his ideas out there, and his his sort of
Speaker 1: profound UH philosophical ideas which he understood changed the course
Speaker 1: of psychology. UH. He was very interested in the reaction
Speaker 1: of students, and I think he may have used me
Speaker 1: as a sounding board in some way to find out,
Speaker 1: you know, how students were reacting to his course. But
Speaker 1: I think really he was more concerned with with UH
Speaker 1: uh Russians, with UH Rollo May and Gordon Alport and
Speaker 1: UH and his UH and his friends David Reesman and
Speaker 1: the people that he connected with and even Alan Watts.
Speaker 1: He was very interested in Eastern philosophy, and I'm sure
Speaker 1: that if he'd lived longer, he would have had he
Speaker 1: would have pursued those interests and incorporated those interests to
Speaker 1: a greater extent. As you know, he coined the term
Speaker 1: peak experiences, and he was fascinated by Eastern religions. And
Speaker 1: it's tragic at so tragic that he diet at age
Speaker 1: sixty two. Yeah, oh, it's quite tragic. And then, as
Speaker 1: you know, he talked about the Plateau experience even more
Speaker 1: closer to the end of his death, which he said
Speaker 1: was like lambs. It was like lounging in heaven, not
Speaker 1: getting so excited about it, That's what he said. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: so that's incredible. So you were in both those classes.
Speaker 1: So let's go to the large lecture hall. Were you
Speaker 1: in like the front row? Like what can you take
Speaker 1: me back? There, like, like, can you describe the scenery?
Speaker 1: Can you tell the story? Like what was he like
Speaker 1: as a lecturer? I'll never be able to experience it,
Speaker 1: so can you tell me what it was like? Uh?
Speaker 1: He was. He wasn't a dynamic lecturer. He was His
Speaker 1: uniform was more traditional that the uniform of the day
Speaker 1: was a white shirt, a traditional tie, a sport coat
Speaker 1: with with you know, padded sleeves. So he he he
Speaker 1: wore the uniform of the day and and wasn't an
Speaker 1: overly dynamic lecturer. He certainly was known as being a
Speaker 1: great man at the time. And it's interesting when I
Speaker 1: think about the reaction of the people in the class.
Speaker 1: My feeling is is that most people in the class,
Speaker 1: it's like a bell shaped curve. As far as the reaction,
Speaker 1: maybe eighty percent of people thought this was interesting. I'm
Speaker 1: really glad I took this class. But a small percentage
Speaker 1: of people thought this is a waste of time, this
Speaker 1: isn't what it's bill to be. There too many fallacies
Speaker 1: in his theory. And then there was another ten percent,
Speaker 1: like Michael Lewis, who thought it was the holy Grail
Speaker 1: and felt it that this was something to pursue and
Speaker 1: to give meaning to life. And sixty years later, I've
Speaker 1: continued on that bandwagon and actually wrote a book about
Speaker 1: Abraham Mass You wrote a book about you mean seeing
Speaker 1: more Colors? Correct? Bomb right here? Wait? So were you
Speaker 1: Were you in class with Aaronson, the social psychologist, because
Speaker 1: he took Maslow's lecture course as well. Did you know Aronson?
Speaker 1: I did not. I've read his books subsequently, but I
Speaker 1: did not remember him in the class at the time.
Speaker 1: It was Elliott Aronson has seen his professor Josh Meers. Okay, so, uh,
Speaker 1: you know when I read it, when I read the
Speaker 1: you know, the journals his personal mass those personal journals,
Speaker 1: he talks sometimes about the students as being like little shits.
Speaker 1: He feels under unappreciated. Towards the end of the journals,
Speaker 1: he talks about, you know, he didn't feel that way
Speaker 1: at Brooklyn College, But I feel like when he was
Speaker 1: at Brandeis he felt or no, no, maybe that was
Speaker 1: more when he was at Brooklyn he was a Brooklyn
Speaker 1: College leader. Is that is that right after college before?
Speaker 1: So when he came to Brandeis, I felt like he
Speaker 1: wasn't he felt as though he personally felt like he
Speaker 1: wasn't as appreciated by the students as when he was
Speaker 1: at Brooklyn College. And I was wondering if you picked
Speaker 1: up on that. So he said that some of the
Speaker 1: students felt as though he was like preaching to them,
Speaker 1: you know, like like being like lecturing to them, like
Speaker 1: you know, to like to buckle up and be a
Speaker 1: responsible adult already. And some of the students did appreciate that.
Speaker 1: Did did you see any of that? Now? I think
Speaker 1: you're I think you're onto to something. My my my
Speaker 1: feeling is is that at the time, you have to
Speaker 1: understand the intellectual currents at the time, and uh, there
Speaker 1: was a trend, a sort of an anti authority trend.
Speaker 1: So if you could, you could get your intellectual stripes
Speaker 1: by criticizing the great man, so criticizing Maslow and and
Speaker 1: not appreciating him as as much as he would have liked. Uh,
Speaker 1: was was an intellectual current of the time in that
Speaker 1: h it was. It was much broader than that. For example,
Speaker 1: books that were important were the only crowd by David Reesman,
Speaker 1: who talked about being interdirected versus outer directed. So the
Speaker 1: idea was was that you came up with your own
Speaker 1: ideas and you weren't overly influenced by people in authority.
Speaker 1: So again there was earning your intellectual stripes by being
Speaker 1: anti in this case anti authority and in this case
Speaker 1: anti Maslow. I think also there was there was a
Speaker 1: current of Abraham Maslow came from a sort of a
Speaker 1: lower middle class family, and those were the students that
Speaker 1: he taught at Brooklyn College before he came to Brandeis,
Speaker 1: and I think he very much identified with those students,
Speaker 1: who often were first generation college students and were working
Speaker 1: very hard. And obviously it was a generalization, but I
Speaker 1: think that that part of him felt that there was
Speaker 1: a sense of entitlement among many of the students at Brandeis.
Speaker 1: I certainly didn't feel that way, and I think that
Speaker 1: was a hypersensitivity on his part, because I think most
Speaker 1: of the students were highly motivated and very dedicated. But
Speaker 1: I think there was an element of his feeling that way. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: you said he wasn't dynamic of a lecture, but you
Speaker 1: said in the book you thought he was charismatic. Maybe
Speaker 1: that you said it wasn't full inced by your prior
Speaker 1: conceptions of him as a legend. But whenever I hear
Speaker 1: I have audio recordings of him giving lectures. Unfortunately I
Speaker 1: don't have the video, but I have the all audio,
Speaker 1: and they sound to me very charismatic. But again, maybe
Speaker 1: I'm influenced. I think that's uh yeah, I think that's
Speaker 1: our our bias, since we we worship him, and so
Speaker 1: it's going to be our bias to feel that one.
Speaker 1: But he's very funny. I mean, I listen, I have
Speaker 1: all the recordings of his essolent Institute like public lectures
Speaker 1: from sixty seven to sixty eight, and he's he's funny.
Speaker 1: I mean, is it just maybe I just have a
Speaker 1: similar sense of humor as him or something. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: the definition of a someone who has a good sense
Speaker 1: of humor is if they laugh at my jokes. So
Speaker 1: so I think no, I think he did have a
Speaker 1: wonderful sense of humor. But again you have to remember
Speaker 1: that these are often twenty year olds who may not
Speaker 1: be quite sophisticated enough or mature enough to really appreciate
Speaker 1: his sense of humor that you and I may have
Speaker 1: been more appreciative of later on. Well, it's so interesting
Speaker 1: how chrisma can be in the eye of the beholder,
Speaker 1: I guess, but correct his writing was certainly dynamic. You know,
Speaker 1: you read his writing and it's just it's almost poetic. So, hey,
Speaker 1: how did you make the transition from maybe I'm going
Speaker 1: to be a psychiatrist too, I'm gonna be an orthopedic
Speaker 1: surgeon for sports teams. Where did you make that transition? Well,
Speaker 1: when I went to medical school, I, as I said,
Speaker 1: previously went to medical school to be a psychiatrist because
Speaker 1: the great man Abraham Maslow told me to go to
Speaker 1: medical school. And while in medical school on the psychiatry rotation,
Speaker 1: I would have these wonderful sessions with patients and they
Speaker 1: would tell me that they never saw things so clearly,
Speaker 1: and they were so grateful for my insight, and I
Speaker 1: would come out on cloud nine. There was just one problem.
Speaker 1: The following week, they hadn't responded to my brilliant insights,
Speaker 1: and they hadn't done one hundred and eighty degree personality
Speaker 1: change or gotten a new spouse or gotten a new job.
Speaker 1: And I was just too immature to understand that people
Speaker 1: didn't didn't change personalities so dramatically. So I literally became
Speaker 1: an orthopedic surgeon a degree h reaction to seeing immediate
Speaker 1: tangible results. If the hip was worn out, we could
Speaker 1: put a new hip joint in. If the wrist was broken,
Speaker 1: we could set it. The beautiful irony is that I
Speaker 1: think all of medicine really is is psychology and nurturing
Speaker 1: and relating to patients. So it's come full circle. But
Speaker 1: that was how I went from psychiatry to orthopedic surgery. Okay,
Speaker 1: And one of your earliest jobs of the Chicago White Sox,
Speaker 1: you encountered Bill Vick, Is that right? And Bill Beck? Yes? Beck?
Speaker 1: Is that wreck? Yes? Bill Beck? I hope he forgives
Speaker 1: me for his name. Tell me you think he's an
Speaker 1: unforgettable character? Is that right? Yes, Bill Veck. I do
Speaker 1: have to tell you that when I was looking for jobs,
Speaker 1: I was in the military in England, and I went
Speaker 1: all around the country looking at different job opportunities, and
Speaker 1: I met these two doctors in Chicago, and one of them,
Speaker 1: doctor William Meltzer, was the first, one of the first
Speaker 1: people in the country to be performing hip replacements. And
Speaker 1: they taught at the university. And then in the interview
Speaker 1: they told me, and by the way, we're the doctors
Speaker 1: for the Chicago White Sox. So I started trembling, hopefully
Speaker 1: not noticeable by them, and I thought, how much am
Speaker 1: I going to have to pay these gentlemen to have
Speaker 1: the opportunity to be the Chicago a White Sox doctor,
Speaker 1: because it was such an extraordinary opportunity for someone just
Speaker 1: joining a practice. But Bill Veck was a fascinating character.
Speaker 1: He had a wooden leg, and he cut a hole
Speaker 1: in his wooden leg. And the first time I saw
Speaker 1: him put a cigarette out in the hole that he'd
Speaker 1: cut out in his wooden leg and used as an
Speaker 1: ash tray, my eyes almost popped out of my head.
Speaker 1: He also was one of the most creative people on earth.
Speaker 1: He once showed me in a huge file of index
Speaker 1: cards with thousands of ideas on them. Bill Veck is
Speaker 1: the person who invented the exploding scoreboard. He invented putting,
Speaker 1: taking a bow after hitting a home run. He put
Speaker 1: the names of players on the back of uniforms he
Speaker 1: had in Chicago, Harry Carey singing take me out to
Speaker 1: the ballgame in the seventh inning stretch. His idea was,
Speaker 1: it's more exciting to give one fan a thousand cans
Speaker 1: of beer rather than a thousand fans one can of beer.
Speaker 1: He was just an incredibly creative person. But he also
Speaker 1: to me define that the true definition of sophistication, which
Speaker 1: is he was so comfortable with himself that he made
Speaker 1: everyone around him more comfortable. So, for example, he'd had
Speaker 1: many as I said, he had an amputated leg. He
Speaker 1: did many surgeries. He was a medic during the Korean War,
Speaker 1: so he knew how to talk to doctors in their lingo.
Speaker 1: He had written books, so he knew how to talk
Speaker 1: to the media people in their lingo. You would hear
Speaker 1: him talk about Faulkner and Hemingway as well as baseball players,
Speaker 1: and he knew how to talk to the average fan
Speaker 1: in their lingo. He also had a wonderful sense of humor.
Speaker 1: He had been the owner of the Saint Louis Browns
Speaker 1: in the late thirties when they had the lowest attendance
Speaker 1: in the league. And one story that he told me
Speaker 1: was that someone called the stadium and asked about the
Speaker 1: Saturday matinee and asked about what time the game was,
Speaker 1: and Bill Veck happened to answer the phone, even though
Speaker 1: he was the owner of the team, and he said,
Speaker 1: how many are in your party? So the person said
Speaker 1: six people. So Bill Vick said what time would be
Speaker 1: convenient for you to start the game. So he had
Speaker 1: a wonderful sense of humor. He was a real character.
Speaker 1: And there is a book called Vecka's and Rick, which
Speaker 1: I would highly recommend. Very cool. And so you knew
Speaker 1: him personally, Oh yes, I spent several years with him.
Speaker 1: And what I didn't do at the time was keep
Speaker 1: a diary so that when I did have the opportunity
Speaker 1: to be the doctor for the Chicago Bulls, I kept
Speaker 1: a diary, which was which I was a very good
Speaker 1: decision in retrospect, I'm glad. I'm glad you did. I'm
Speaker 1: glad you did. So how did you get the job
Speaker 1: with the Chicago Bulls? Was that homeslice? What's his name? Krause?
Speaker 1: Jerry Krause? Over there? Was it thanks to him? You know? Uh?
Speaker 1: Jerry Krause was a had been a doctor in our practice,
Speaker 1: and he knew our reputation and he wanted to make
Speaker 1: a change in the medical staff and uh he so
Speaker 1: he picked our group. And uh, I know you've had
Speaker 1: experiences in your life, for example, when you were accepted
Speaker 1: to the PhD program in Yale where you you get
Speaker 1: a phone call and It's one of the exciting moments
Speaker 1: of your life. So getting a phone call from Jerry
Speaker 1: Krause saying you're it, You're the doctor for the Championship
Speaker 1: Bulls was it was one of those extraordinary I I
Speaker 1: just got a chill for you. That's I mean, I
Speaker 1: can't that's incredible. Well, this is is this nineteen ninety six?
Speaker 1: When is this ninety seven? It was? And it was
Speaker 1: actually on my birthday and it was nineteen Yes, nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety six. So you were there for the last dance? Correct?
Speaker 1: What do you think of the documentary the Last Dance?
Speaker 1: By the way, I mean, are you in it? Are
Speaker 1: you in any of the images? If you if you blink,
Speaker 1: you'll see me very quickly. Yeah, if you toss the
Speaker 1: screen at some moments. Because you had the front front
Speaker 1: court's seat to the whole last dance, how many people
Speaker 1: can how we hold let's just let's just step back
Speaker 1: a second. You just you know, that's that's a that's
Speaker 1: an understated correct you. I'm gonna repeat this, I repeat this.
Speaker 1: You had front court play, you were on the player's
Speaker 1: bench during the last dance of the Chicago Bulls. Well,
Speaker 1: I just have to tell you one story about that
Speaker 1: to give you an idea. One reaction is that it
Speaker 1: was such a wonderful nostalgia trip. Michael Jordan. Here we
Speaker 1: had in our midst the greatest athlete on the planet.
Speaker 1: And as you know, Abraham Maslow invented the concept of
Speaker 1: peak experiences that he coined that phrase, and Michael Jordan
Speaker 1: was a continual peak experience creator for all of us.
Speaker 1: But when you're talking about the impact, it wasn't just Chicago,
Speaker 1: it wasn't just the United States. It was all over
Speaker 1: the world, and people all over the world saw me
Speaker 1: on the bench. But the story that just was most
Speaker 1: remarkable to me was a patient of mine who was
Speaker 1: in the Peace Corps in Mauritania, which is in the
Speaker 1: Sahara Desert, called me to tell me that he saw
Speaker 1: me on on Moroccan television, which was in French. So
Speaker 1: that's an example of how extraordinarily widespread the Michael Jordan's
Speaker 1: impact was in the world. But I did have another
Speaker 1: reaction was it was as a wonderful nostalgia trip. But
Speaker 1: I thought they did that they did a disservice to
Speaker 1: Jerry Krause, the general manager, Jerry Krause, Unfortunately, died a
Speaker 1: few years ago and wasn't around to defend himself. And
Speaker 1: admittedly he wasn't a people person. He wasn't He was
Speaker 1: a pr disaster, but in his own way, he was
Speaker 1: a genius. It's important to remember that Jerry Krause, the
Speaker 1: general manager, brought in Phil Jackson when no one else
Speaker 1: was interested, and Phil Jackson he discovered Scottie Pippen. He
Speaker 1: brought in Tony Koukoach, which was really the first major
Speaker 1: person from Europe to come into the NBA. And he
Speaker 1: brought in Dennis Rodman, which was obviously a potentially explosive decision.
Speaker 1: But I have to tell you one of my favorite
Speaker 1: Jerry Krause stories to just illustrate who the man was.
Speaker 1: One night, he was his bags were packed and he
Speaker 1: was leaving the United Center, which is where the Bulls
Speaker 1: were playing, and it was during the playoffs. So I said, Jerry,
Speaker 1: where are you going. He said, I'm going to Europe
Speaker 1: to scout a player. So I said, Jerry, it's the
Speaker 1: middle of the playoffs. As if he didn't know that,
Speaker 1: why don't you just watch tape? And he said, I'm
Speaker 1: going to Europe to scout And during the tape during
Speaker 1: the game and to watch his body language on the bench.
Speaker 1: So that to me was a very powerful, profound lesson
Speaker 1: of what a perfectionist he was and how uh you know,
Speaker 1: how far he carried his craft as well as Michael
Speaker 1: Jordan and other world class athletes carried their craft. Would
Speaker 1: would you say you were friends with Jerry Kross? I
Speaker 1: actually was. I had the what was in the extraordinary
Speaker 1: position of having a relationship with all the each of
Speaker 1: the players and Phil Jackson, the coach, and we had
Speaker 1: so much in common when Kindred Spirits and Jerry Crouse
Speaker 1: when we were on the road, the the the team
Speaker 1: doctors during the playoffs would would be with the players
Speaker 1: on the on their private plane and we would be
Speaker 1: with them in the playoffs, and Jerry Cross often would
Speaker 1: UH have meals with the medical staff. So uh, so
Speaker 1: I I was in the really unique position of having
Speaker 1: a relationship with each of the different UH members of
Speaker 1: the of the team. Why didn't you why weren't you
Speaker 1: like the U N Why didn't you like bring together
Speaker 1: piece so that there could be more bull seasons? You
Speaker 1: could have been the one uh the UH well, as
Speaker 1: I said before, Jerry Cross, UH was the one who
Speaker 1: hired Jackson, and for a long time the relationship really worked.
Speaker 1: And then Phil Jackson's book Sacred Hoops, which was I
Speaker 1: think published in nineteen ninety five, he was still in
Speaker 1: very good terms with Jerry Crouse and credited Jerry Crouse
Speaker 1: with a lot of the ideas in his book. But
Speaker 1: this may shock you to know, Scott, but sometimes egos
Speaker 1: get in the way, and I think that's what eventually happened,
Speaker 1: and the relationship deteriorated, and it was beyond my ability
Speaker 1: to repair it. I mean, you told me, you said
Speaker 1: in the book that you in one conversation you had
Speaker 1: with Phil Jackson, he admitted, you know, maybe I've been
Speaker 1: a little bit too hard on Jerry Kraus. He said
Speaker 1: that to you. Is that right? Yes, Yes, that's huge,
Speaker 1: that's huge, well, Phil Jackson. One thing that Phil Jackson
Speaker 1: did was Phil Jackson was a master manipulator of each
Speaker 1: individual on the team, and he had a very high EQ,
Speaker 1: a very high emotional quotient and knew just what buttons
Speaker 1: to push for each player, and he also knew which
Speaker 1: button buttons to push for the team as a whole.
Speaker 1: And I can tell you that traveling with the Bulls
Speaker 1: must have been similar to traveling with the Beatles. There
Speaker 1: was so many distractions. Wherever we went, there were thousands
Speaker 1: of people. So his ability to keep the team focused
Speaker 1: was extraordinary. And one of the techniques that he used
Speaker 1: was the Rudyard Kipling wolf pack idea. The strength of
Speaker 1: the wolf is the pack, and the strength of the
Speaker 1: pack is the wolf. And it was very much us
Speaker 1: against the world, and so he acknowledged that part of
Speaker 1: that was us against Jerry Krause, and that he did
Speaker 1: acknowledge to me privately that that probably went too far.
Speaker 1: So tell me about Game six NBA Finals, June nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety seven, Well, that that was one of my That
Speaker 1: was my first year as an orthopedic surgeon, and so
Speaker 1: was I was. First of all, I was an the
Speaker 1: orthopedic surgeon. I was a fan. I had had season
Speaker 1: tickets before we were the doctors for the team, and
Speaker 1: I had written books, so I had the mentality of
Speaker 1: a writer. So I got there two hours early just
Speaker 1: to soak up the atmosphere, and I sat in the
Speaker 1: upper bleachers and there, believe it or not, there was
Speaker 1: a fan on the row near me who was practicing
Speaker 1: as heckling two hours before the game, he was saying,
Speaker 1: go back to Utah, go back, go back. And then
Speaker 1: two hours before the game, the Utah Jazz were hitting
Speaker 1: ninety percent of their shots. So if I had if
Speaker 1: I had placed a bet at that time, I would
Speaker 1: have bet the mortgage against the Bulls because the Jazz
Speaker 1: were just done, stopped. But when they came out for
Speaker 1: their last warm up thirty minutes before the game, they
Speaker 1: only hit thirty percent of their shots. And I'd asked
Speaker 1: Bill Winnington, the seven foot center for the Bulls, about
Speaker 1: what it was like playing in the finals, and he said,
Speaker 1: the pressure is just staggering. It's it's extraordinary. And he
Speaker 1: said the technique that he used was that when he
Speaker 1: was on the court during a game, he had to think,
Speaker 1: I'm on a playground. You can't think I'm in the
Speaker 1: you know, the NBA Finals. You've You've got to get
Speaker 1: your your you know, your mind in a more relaxed,
Speaker 1: in the flow in the zone place. During the game. Uh,
Speaker 1: the Bulls were behind much of the game, and I
Speaker 1: was actually on the bench and toward the end of
Speaker 1: the game, I heard Michael Jordans say to Steve Kerr,
Speaker 1: be ready, you heard him say it. I did. I've
Speaker 1: heard him. Oh god, you actually heard him say that?
Speaker 1: Who and uh? And so Michael Jordan was double teamed,
Speaker 1: and then he passed the ball to Steve Kerr, who
Speaker 1: did what every every kid on the planet would hope
Speaker 1: to do, hit the winning basket in the NBA Finals.
Speaker 1: And Steve Kerr, in his wonderful, self effacing way, later
Speaker 1: on said, Uh, what Michael Jordan actually said to me
Speaker 1: was it, I get too nervous in these situations, so
Speaker 1: I'm gonna pass the ball to you. And everyone laughed,
Speaker 1: you know, hilariously, including Michael Jordan when he said that.
Speaker 1: But then at the end of the game, I was
Speaker 1: in the the winner's locker room, soaked with champagne, high
Speaker 1: fiving all the players, and actually held Michael Jordan's Finals
Speaker 1: MVP trophy hoping some of it would rub off on me.
Speaker 1: So it was one of the a night that I
Speaker 1: wanted to last forever, and it was a glorious memory. Now,
Speaker 1: you know, in Hamilton, do you see the musical Hamilton? Yes?
Speaker 1: Do you know, there's like a phrase like in the
Speaker 1: room where it happened exactly you were in the room,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean it's amazing. So, well, tell me
Speaker 1: some stories about people don't realize that the fate of
Speaker 1: the whole series could actually be in your hands, and
Speaker 1: the decision that you make about certain injuries. So can
Speaker 1: you tell me about two decisions you had to make,
Speaker 1: one with Scottie Pippen and then one with Jordan himself. Yes, Well,
Speaker 1: there was a playoff game. This was on May twenty fifth,
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight. It was in Indianapolis and the Bulls
Speaker 1: were playing the Indiana Pacers, and in the first quarter,
Speaker 1: Michael Jordan went up for a rebound and was poked
Speaker 1: in the eyelid and blood was pouring from his eye.
Speaker 1: So he and I walked off the court together, and
Speaker 1: I had a decision to make, and that was do
Speaker 1: I suture the eyelid, which would have meant that the
Speaker 1: blood would have stopped, but he couldn't have gone back
Speaker 1: back into the game. Or do I scary strip the laceration,
Speaker 1: which meant that he could have gone back into the game,
Speaker 1: but that the wound could have come open and blood
Speaker 1: could have started pouring out again. So for a moment,
Speaker 1: while I was making that decision, in my mind's eye,
Speaker 1: I saw the headline in the Chicago Tribune next morning,
Speaker 1: Chicago Bulls lose playoff. Doctor Michael Lewis drops the ball. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So so it's not just stressful for the players. The
Speaker 1: doctors sometimes have stressful moments as well. But the U
Speaker 1: and actually in the last dance you can see an
Speaker 1: image of Michael Jordan with his stery strips and fortunately
Speaker 1: the stay strips held. But it was a profound lesson
Speaker 1: for me and humility, because I could have done everything
Speaker 1: right and the results might not have worked out well.
Speaker 1: So it was it was again a profound lesson in humility.
Speaker 1: Another that was a very where I learned an important
Speaker 1: life lesson was with Bill Winnington. I had to tell
Speaker 1: Bill Winnington, who sustained a foot injury, that he couldn't
Speaker 1: participate in the playoffs in nineteen ninety seven, and of
Speaker 1: course he was upset, but his reaction was, I've had
Speaker 1: a good run. I've been in the league for ten years.
Speaker 1: Most people are only in for three or four years,
Speaker 1: and so I'm okay with it. And one lesson that
Speaker 1: I try to tell to my to the residents that
Speaker 1: I work with, and my children and grandchildren is the
Speaker 1: test of a character isn't just how things are going
Speaker 1: when things are going well, but how you handle those situations,
Speaker 1: but how you handle adversity. And to me, that was
Speaker 1: a powerful example of the way to handle adversity. Bill
Speaker 1: Linton seems like a really classy guy. Yes, you also
Speaker 1: asked about Scottie Pippen, And again, this was my first
Speaker 1: year as the team doctor, and it was a playoff
Speaker 1: game against Miami, and I had to tell one of
Speaker 1: the fifty greatest players in the history of the game
Speaker 1: that he couldn't go back in for the second half
Speaker 1: of the game because he also sustained a foot injury.
Speaker 1: And he was very upset with me because he wanted
Speaker 1: to go back in, but he eventually agreed that it
Speaker 1: was the right decision, and I eventually convinced him that
Speaker 1: we needed to operate on his foot. So he and
Speaker 1: I flew to New York and a doctor William Hamilton,
Speaker 1: who was a world authority on foot injuries, and I
Speaker 1: operate on Scottie Pippen's foot, and I'm pleased to say
Speaker 1: that he did very well. That's great. I'm glad he
Speaker 1: did well. So about Michael Jordan in a second, what
Speaker 1: was what was he like one on one. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's that's incredible. You you puck him up from all
Speaker 1: these thousands of people watching him. It's just you and
Speaker 1: this guy, Michael Jordan in a room, just you and him.
Speaker 1: You know, everyone else is waiting outside. You know what's
Speaker 1: it like just being in that one room with him,
Speaker 1: one on one? How would he describe the way he
Speaker 1: talked to you? You know? What was that like? Well?
Speaker 1: There I have several stories about being with Michael Jordan
Speaker 1: that even though there have been so many books and
Speaker 1: articles and specials written about Michael Jordan that not everyone
Speaker 1: knows about. And one story is that ten minutes before
Speaker 1: a game we were playing Minnesota that night, and he
Speaker 1: had such severe pain in his neck that he couldn't
Speaker 1: move his neck in any direction. He couldn't move one
Speaker 1: inch in any direction. So I naively suggested, I said, Michael,
Speaker 1: why don't you not play tonight? And he looked at
Speaker 1: me like I was crazy and said, people have come
Speaker 1: from hundreds and sometimes thousands of miles away, and I'm
Speaker 1: not going to disappoint them. So his dedication of the
Speaker 1: game and dedication to his fans, I think not everybody
Speaker 1: really realizes and understands. I'll give you an important number.
Speaker 1: During his time with the Chicago Bulls, the Bulls were
Speaker 1: in one hundred and seventy nine playoff games. I think
Speaker 1: you can maybe guess how many games Michael Jordan played
Speaker 1: in the answer. One hundred and seventy nine. That's remarkable,
Speaker 1: that's amazing. So his dedication to the game was one
Speaker 1: quality that I think is underappreciated. I'll tell you another
Speaker 1: very personal story. He and I were in the training
Speaker 1: room together and as you know, his father was murdered
Speaker 1: in a robbery, and so his alleged his father's alleged
Speaker 1: killers came on TV. And Michael looked at the TV
Speaker 1: and he looked at me and he just shrugged his shoulders.
Speaker 1: And everyone knew, and I knew how profoundly and deeply
Speaker 1: he loved his father. His father was his best friend.
Speaker 1: But my interpretation of that was that he was so focused,
Speaker 1: he was so able to eliminate distractions. He was such
Speaker 1: a zen warrior that he knew that focusing on his
Speaker 1: father's alleged killers wouldn't bring his father back, so there
Speaker 1: was no reason to spend any energy on that. And
Speaker 1: to me, that was a profound personal experience. Another example
Speaker 1: to me that I think is quite remarkable of his
Speaker 1: ability to focus was, in more than ten years of
Speaker 1: being in front of the media, night after night, thousands
Speaker 1: of questions, good questions, inane questions, mean spirited questions, he
Speaker 1: never once he had such self control that he never
Speaker 1: once said something really foolish. That's that's quite remarkable. It
Speaker 1: is remarkable. But was he cordial to you? Like? What
Speaker 1: was he like as a you know, what was it
Speaker 1: like to talk to him? I guess is what I'm saying. Uh.
Speaker 1: He first of all, he had a close relationship with
Speaker 1: the previous doctor and so he wasn't he wasn't pleased
Speaker 1: when Jerry Krause brought the new medical team in. So
Speaker 1: we really had to earn our stripes. And uh, it
Speaker 1: took it took a while for him to have a
Speaker 1: grudging respect toward toward mege which I think eventually did
Speaker 1: did happen. But if you if you exall him on
Speaker 1: the street, you know, walking down the street, like he
Speaker 1: would he would remember you, right, Yes, he'd be like, oh,
Speaker 1: Michael Lewis, you gave me the suitor and yeah, no, cool,
Speaker 1: very cool. Okay, So the God's talk about Dennis Rodman.
Speaker 1: Tell me, tell me about your experiences with that cut.
Speaker 1: So my favorite Dennis Rodman story is that I was
Speaker 1: treating Dennis and we were two weeks into his injury,
Speaker 1: and he was assiduously avoiding my brilliant advice. And then,
Speaker 1: by pure coincidence, he was in the training room talking
Speaker 1: to Steve Kerr about Janice Joplin rock Star, and I
Speaker 1: just sort of butted into the conversation and said that
Speaker 1: I had heard Janis Joplin concert. So suddenly the wheels
Speaker 1: started turning, and Dennis uh looked at me with renewed respect,
Speaker 1: and clearly he thought to himself, if this dude was
Speaker 1: cool enough to go to a Janice Joplin concert, maybe
Speaker 1: his medical IQ is higher than I thought. So maybe
Speaker 1: I had to start listening to him. And he did,
Speaker 1: and he recovered from this injury and was a significant
Speaker 1: contributor to the playoffs that year. That's pretty that's pretty awesome.
Speaker 1: You see, we don't know just to what extent you're
Speaker 1: influence on some of these people. You know, just one,
Speaker 1: just one other story that relates to you, Because I
Speaker 1: loved your story about Kobe Bryant, and you're and Kobe
Speaker 1: dunking over you in high school. So my somewhat analogus
Speaker 1: story was that one day in Utah after practice, the
Speaker 1: medical staff were shooting around and then we all got
Speaker 1: on the bus afterward to go back to the hotel.
Speaker 1: And I had no idea anyone was watching. But Phil Jackson,
Speaker 1: in a very loud voice, turned to everyone on the
Speaker 1: bus and said, doctor Michael Lewis has the worst left
Speaker 1: handed jump shot I've ever seen. I don't know how
Speaker 1: you how you would take that. The other the one
Speaker 1: other story that I'll tell you is that my first
Speaker 1: night as a doctor, we had. One of the major
Speaker 1: perks was we parked in the player's parking lot and
Speaker 1: there was an attendant who started our car, you know
Speaker 1: as just before we got out to the parking lot,
Speaker 1: and there were hundreds of people around waiting for the players.
Speaker 1: And the very first night I went out and hundreds
Speaker 1: of people were shouting Michael, Michael and I and I
Speaker 1: literally was so naive. I thought to myself, how do
Speaker 1: they know my name? Michaels, I got it. That's hilarious,
Speaker 1: that's really hilarious. So did you when when they when
Speaker 1: the when the Bulls won the ring the champions Did
Speaker 1: you get a championship ring? I have, Yes, I have
Speaker 1: two championship rings. What you have it? You have two
Speaker 1: Chicago Bulls Championship rings. I do that? Do you have
Speaker 1: it with you? Can you hold it up? I can
Speaker 1: go get it if you want me to go get it. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: I want to take a screen capture of it, and
Speaker 1: you have to you'll have to wait for it. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna tweet it. What so, I'm sure sure how to
Speaker 1: show it? Oh my gosh, that is right. Let me say,
Speaker 1: let's see, Yes, I see if I if I were you,
Speaker 1: I'd be wearing that like every day. Why do you
Speaker 1: not wear that? Like twenty four to seven? There's someone
Speaker 1: else in this story that I want to talk about,
Speaker 1: because there's a very tragic story which people can watch
Speaker 1: documentaries about Unsolved Mystery with Brian Williams. Right, But you
Speaker 1: knew Brian Williams as a human a person, but I
Speaker 1: thought maybe you can kind of bring him to life
Speaker 1: for a moment. Well, uh, Brian Williams was a fascinating person.
Speaker 1: For those who aren't familiar with Brian Williams, he was
Speaker 1: with the team for a very short period of time
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety seven. He was very different from any
Speaker 1: other professional athlete I've known. Brian Williams was brilliant. He
Speaker 1: was a philosopher. He was interested in Nietzsche. We first
Speaker 1: connected when we were on the Bulls plane on our
Speaker 1: way to Utah, when most of the players were either
Speaker 1: playing cards or listening to music on their headphones. He
Speaker 1: was reading a book called You Must be Kidding Mister Finnman,
Speaker 1: which was about a physicist. So and I had read
Speaker 1: the book, and I knew about mister about mister Finnman,
Speaker 1: so we connected on that level. Brian Williams ran with
Speaker 1: the Bulls and Pamplona. He hitchhiked all over the world.
Speaker 1: He was traveled all over the world. He played three
Speaker 1: musical instruments. His father was the lead singer for the Platters,
Speaker 1: a famous group in the nineteen fifties, and his mother,
Speaker 1: who we met at a Bulls celebration victory party after
Speaker 1: they won the fifth championship. He was a very elegant
Speaker 1: woman who was an anthropologist. So he was a fascinating person.
Speaker 1: He had a pilot's license. He invited me to to
Speaker 1: fly with him, and he signed a contract with the
Speaker 1: Detroit Pistons, and we talked about getting together when whenever
Speaker 1: he would come to town, and I really thought that
Speaker 1: our friendship would last for many, many years. But tragically
Speaker 1: he was on a boat with his brother, and no
Speaker 1: one really knows all of the circumstances, but it appears
Speaker 1: that he was murdered on and the boat and tragically,
Speaker 1: you know, his life was taken when he was approximately
Speaker 1: thirty years old. That must have been very hard for
Speaker 1: you when you heard the news. It was it was
Speaker 1: very hard for me. But I think about his mother
Speaker 1: who had two sons and his uh so, Brian was
Speaker 1: was was murdered and his son apparently died of an overdose,
Speaker 1: so she had to grieve over the loss of her
Speaker 1: two sons. So that to me, is is just an
Speaker 1: unbearable tragedy. Yeah, really unbearable. So are you in touch?
Speaker 1: Who are who are you still in touch with? From
Speaker 1: the Bulls Dynasty? Like do you ever give like Steve
Speaker 1: Kerr call and be like, yo, what's up, Steve? Like
Speaker 1: what's going on? Man? I am still I'm still in
Speaker 1: touch with Bill Winnington, the seven foot center who is
Speaker 1: now an announcer and has been an announcer for the
Speaker 1: Bulls for many years. And I'm also still in touch
Speaker 1: with Wilbert Wood, who was the all star pitcher knuckleball
Speaker 1: picture for the Chicago White Sox during the during the
Speaker 1: late seventies. I love it. I love it. Do you? Okay? Well, well,
Speaker 1: tell me some about your own, you know sort of books.
Speaker 1: You have other books. You have one world of View
Speaker 1: of seven Continents, you have Seeing More Colors. Again, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna put this up invitation to joy, you know, tell
Speaker 1: me about your other books. Well, I have been extraordinarily
Speaker 1: fortunate that I have been able to travel. I've been
Speaker 1: able to travel to all seven continents, and so I
Speaker 1: have written books and published photographs from all seven continents.
Speaker 1: And I've always loved quotations. So there's a quotation to
Speaker 1: a company each of those photographs. And as we've discussed earlier,
Speaker 1: I am extraordinarily grateful to Abraham Maslow for giving giving
Speaker 1: a direction to my life. And I have been on
Speaker 1: the Abraham Maslow bandwagon for sixty years. And the book
Speaker 1: that I wrote, Seeing More Colors described the different qualities
Speaker 1: of someone on the road to self actualization that Abraham
Speaker 1: Maslow described. Let me read one, Let me read something
Speaker 1: the value of friendship. Socrates wrote about how important friendship
Speaker 1: was to him. Quote, all people have their fancies. Some
Speaker 1: desire horses and others dogs, and some are fond of
Speaker 1: gold and others of honor. But I have a passion
Speaker 1: for friends. I should greatly prefer a real friend to
Speaker 1: all the gold of Darius. And there's a picture that
Speaker 1: accompanies that. You know, I I dedicate my whole book
Speaker 1: Transcendent to Abraham Aslow, a dear friend I never met.
Speaker 1: But I'm very happy to say that, you know, I
Speaker 1: meet a new friend today with you, and and it's real,
Speaker 1: it's uh, we actually talked to each other. So I
Speaker 1: just really want to thank you so much for appearing
Speaker 1: on the Psychology podcast and offering us your life lessons.
Speaker 1: Are there any last final sort of words of wisdom
Speaker 1: you want to offer? Yes, thank you, I would. I
Speaker 1: would say that one if I could leave you with
Speaker 1: one or two thoughts, One would be the importance of
Speaker 1: and and this is something that Maslow felt very strongly
Speaker 1: about the importance of being connected to a cause greater
Speaker 1: than yourself. And all of the proceeds from my books
Speaker 1: go to the Himalayan Cataract Project. This is an organization
Speaker 1: co founded by my friend Jeff Tabin, a professor of
Speaker 1: ophthalmology at Stanford, and he goes all over the world
Speaker 1: performing cataract surgery and teaching the local physicians how to
Speaker 1: perform the surgery. And my wife and I observed him
Speaker 1: in Ghana performing this surgery and for twenty five dollars
Speaker 1: an eye, people who've been blind for years suddenly the
Speaker 1: next day after surgery can see perfectly. It is such
Speaker 1: a miracle. So all of the proceeds of my books
Speaker 1: go to the Himalayan Cataract Project. Another final message that
Speaker 1: I would want to leave with you is the importance
Speaker 1: in this time of COVID to maintain perspective, and anytime
Speaker 1: is an occasion, to rise to the occasion. And I
Speaker 1: certainly would in no way ever want to minimize, quite
Speaker 1: the opposite, the significance of COVID. But I have I
Speaker 1: am blessed to have one hundred and three year old mother,
Speaker 1: And when I think about her life. During her lifetime,
Speaker 1: she has survived the pandemic of nineteen nineteen where fifty
Speaker 1: million people died. She has survived World War One, World
Speaker 1: War two, the Great Depression, the Holocaust, So many major crises,
Speaker 1: and we have lived through them, we have overcome them.
Speaker 1: So I would want to end on a message of
Speaker 1: hope and a message of this is a time that
Speaker 1: can bring out the best in each of us. Love
Speaker 1: that what a life, Michael wis, what a life you've had.
Speaker 1: It's not over yet, but so thar Wa of life.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for being on this episode. Truth. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Thank you thanks for listening to this episode
Speaker 1: of the Psychology Podcast. If you'd like to react in
Speaker 1: some way to something you heard, I encourage you to
Speaker 1: join in the discussion at the Psychology podcast dot com.
Speaker 1: That's the Psychology Podcast dot com. Thanks for being such
Speaker 1: a great supporter of the show, and tune in next
Speaker 1: time for more on the mind, brain, behavior, and creativity.