WEBVTT - Rabbi Steve Leder: Transformed By Pain 0:00:05.760 --> 0:00:09.000 Hey, everyone's surprised. It's Brian and we're back with the 0:00:09.000 --> 0:00:12.240 show a week early and have got a bonus episode 0:00:12.280 --> 0:00:15.280 of the podcast. Well, actually I have a bonus episode 0:00:15.360 --> 0:00:19.440 for you. Katie is off filming several documentaries for National Geographic, 0:00:19.480 --> 0:00:21.439 which you're gonna be hearing a lot more about in 0:00:21.480 --> 0:00:24.680 the new year. They're actually pretty extraordinary and cover a 0:00:24.720 --> 0:00:28.800 wide range of topics. But for this episode, I sat 0:00:28.800 --> 0:00:32.600 down with my friend Steve Leader, who is better known 0:00:32.680 --> 0:00:36.320 as Rabbi Leader. He is the senior Rabbi at Wilsher 0:00:36.400 --> 0:00:41.240 Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles. Steve is one of the warmest, 0:00:41.760 --> 0:00:46.279 most thoughtful, wisest people I have ever met. He's a 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:49.599 very deep thinker and full of the kind of wisdom 0:00:49.680 --> 0:00:51.599 that you'd hope for that I think all of us 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:55.240 are seeking from a religious leader or a leader in 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:58.680 any walk of life. And our conversation centered on topics 0:00:58.720 --> 0:01:01.760 from his new book Bok, which is called More Beautiful 0:01:01.800 --> 0:01:06.720 Than Before, how suffering transforms us. And I know that 0:01:07.040 --> 0:01:08.600 you know, maybe you're not in the mood to hear 0:01:08.640 --> 0:01:11.160 about suffering, but I think all of us in life 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:16.039 go through various challenges. The illness of a loved one, 0:01:16.600 --> 0:01:20.440 whatever hardship gets in our way. And I think that 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:24.440 from thirty years as a rabbi ministering to a lot 0:01:24.480 --> 0:01:27.480 of people, Steve has drawn lessons that are going to 0:01:27.600 --> 0:01:30.600 be very useful in the lives of just about everyone 0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:33.880 I know, and hopefully in the lives of people listening 0:01:33.920 --> 0:01:35.920 to our show. So we talked about everything from the 0:01:36.000 --> 0:01:40.640 drawbacks of working too hard to finding meaning in life's 0:01:40.680 --> 0:01:44.319 most difficult moments. So I hope you'll enjoy this episode. 0:01:44.400 --> 0:01:50.840 Check it out and let us know what you think. So, 0:01:51.200 --> 0:01:55.800 you've written this book more beautiful than before. What inspired 0:01:55.840 --> 0:01:59.600 you to write about tragedy and crisis and pain as 0:01:59.640 --> 0:02:04.000 a friend of mine? In describing my job, which of 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:07.680 course is also very much my life as the senior 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:10.960 rabbi one of the largest congregations in the world, he 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:13.840 described it as having a front row seat to life. 0:02:15.000 --> 0:02:17.320 I've been on the inside of other people's lives for 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:22.360 thirty years, and that definitionally means I have been witnessed 0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:25.440 to an awful lot of pain, and so I've learned 0:02:25.440 --> 0:02:32.440 an awful lot about pain, healing, growth, surviving. The first 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:34.720 essay in the book is called when you must You can, 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:39.560 which is so important to have faith in when the 0:02:39.639 --> 0:02:43.280 darkness comes. You were sidelined by a major health problem, 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:45.560 which I think is part of what led you to this. 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:50.079 Can you describe that? Uh? So? I'm I'm a person 0:02:50.160 --> 0:02:54.720 who has always worked extremely hard, punched above my weight, 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:59.280 um making enormous sacrifices because I believe in what I do, 0:02:59.440 --> 0:03:02.760 and it's a noble calling and and a worthy life 0:03:02.840 --> 0:03:06.840 to help others. But it takes its toll. For me. 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.160 Part of the toll was ignoring my own body and 0:03:09.200 --> 0:03:11.560 the signals from my own body. So I was in 0:03:11.639 --> 0:03:15.120 a pretty serious car accident, from which I believed at 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:19.320 the time I had walked away, you know, unscathed. And 0:03:19.360 --> 0:03:22.680 then about two or three months later, I started having 0:03:22.680 --> 0:03:26.200 these horrible shooting pains, and I ignored it, and I 0:03:26.200 --> 0:03:28.919 ignored it, and I ignored it, and I continued to work. 0:03:29.200 --> 0:03:34.200 And one day I was essentially paralyzed from the waist down. 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:37.080 I could not move, and this was the first time 0:03:37.080 --> 0:03:40.960 in my life when I could not will myself to 0:03:41.000 --> 0:03:44.520 do something. I made it about three feet into my 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:49.440 study and I just bawled up in a fetal position 0:03:49.960 --> 0:03:54.240 and started weeping and begging for morphine. It was that bad. 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:57.800 It was torture, and that started me down this path. 0:03:58.480 --> 0:04:01.320 You know, one of the things when you're rabbi for 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:03.200 a large community, there are a lot of doctors who 0:04:03.200 --> 0:04:05.760 want to take good care of you. So I had 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:10.600 three different doctors prescribing pain killers, opioids, and steroids trying 0:04:10.600 --> 0:04:14.080 to get me through this, and I became dependent on 0:04:14.080 --> 0:04:18.160 these opioids. You you literally start eating them like like 0:04:18.200 --> 0:04:22.440 they're candy. And I would say it was about a 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:26.720 five or six month period and I became very depressed. 0:04:26.760 --> 0:04:30.640 I had never been a depressed person before, and the 0:04:30.800 --> 0:04:34.520 depression was very deep, very dark, very heavy. The way 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:37.960 I described it to people who don't understand what it 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:41.880 means to be depressed is that you literally see no 0:04:41.960 --> 0:04:46.640 purpose or reason for living. You're not suicidal, You're just 0:04:46.920 --> 0:04:51.480 entirely without ambition or purpose. Do you believe the opioids 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:55.040 caused the depression. I think it was a combination of 0:04:55.080 --> 0:04:57.920 being at that time a fifty four year old man 0:04:58.040 --> 0:05:03.680 discovering that he was not immort and the steroids and 0:05:03.800 --> 0:05:07.120 the opioids. I had something called posteroidal dysphoria, which is 0:05:07.160 --> 0:05:09.520 you know athletes have this. They either rage or they 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:14.200 get depressed, and I got depressed. Uh, and this caused 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:16.919 me to start really thinking about my life in a 0:05:16.960 --> 0:05:20.320 new way. And I made the decision that I was 0:05:20.320 --> 0:05:22.200 going to seek help and that I was going to 0:05:22.200 --> 0:05:25.560 turn this into a midlife opportunity and not a midlife crisis, because, 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:28.080 believe me, it could have gone either way. So you 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:32.400 talk in the book about workaholism as the last acceptable 0:05:32.800 --> 0:05:36.200 is um. There are other is ms racism, sexism that 0:05:36.240 --> 0:05:39.159 we've all agreed, or at least many of us hopefully 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:44.800 should be exercised from our society. But why has workaholism 0:05:44.839 --> 0:05:48.400 stuck as the thing that is okay and in fact 0:05:48.440 --> 0:05:52.479 admirable to a lot of people. Well, I think part 0:05:52.480 --> 0:05:56.159 of it is the value we place in our culture 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.839 on net worth, the ways in which we continue to 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:04.760 find ourselves by what we do in quotation marks. I 0:06:04.839 --> 0:06:08.320 do a lot of funerals, and I'm always amazed at 0:06:08.320 --> 0:06:12.840 the uniformity of inscriptions on headstones. You know, when you 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:17.560 have to distill a person's life down to fifteen characters 0:06:17.560 --> 0:06:23.200 per line, it is essentialism at its most essential. And 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:28.320 what do most headstones say? Not your resume, not your 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:31.400 g P. A not your net worth. Most of them 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:41.040 say loving husband, father, grandfather, friend, loving wife, mother, grandmother, friend, 0:06:41.520 --> 0:06:45.400 loving brother, loving sister, that's it. So what you're saying 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:48.520 is we should think more about our headstones that our resumes. 0:06:48.560 --> 0:06:51.239 That's correct, and more about our headstones than our net worth, 0:06:51.320 --> 0:06:53.479 and to understand that our net worth and our self 0:06:53.520 --> 0:06:56.839 worth are not the same. Now, it's impossible given the 0:06:56.880 --> 0:07:00.000 culture in which we live, which bombards us with message 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:03.320 is about the meaning of things, of the material. It's 0:07:03.320 --> 0:07:05.479 impossible not to be affected by that. All of us 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:08.320 are I am, you are? All of us are? Can 0:07:08.360 --> 0:07:12.400 you be aware of that and then do something with 0:07:12.480 --> 0:07:18.800 your life that isn't completely informed by it? So let's 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:21.280 go back so that our listeners can get to know 0:07:21.400 --> 0:07:24.120 you a little bit better. You write in the book 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:28.520 about how both your parents fled poverty and abuse. They 0:07:28.560 --> 0:07:32.480 had five kids, including you, before they turned thirty. Your 0:07:32.560 --> 0:07:37.360 dad ran a junkyard. You grew up in Minnesota. You 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:41.160 write pretty bluntly in the book about your father as 0:07:41.240 --> 0:07:47.600 belittling and tyrannical. Tell me about that childhood and how 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:55.000 somehow you emerged as the wise and benevolent person whom 0:07:55.040 --> 0:07:58.840 we all know well, sometimes our parents teach us what 0:07:58.960 --> 0:08:01.520 not to be. But I grew up in a house 0:08:01.560 --> 0:08:04.600 where there was a lot of anxiety and fear. My 0:08:04.680 --> 0:08:07.760 parents were seventeen and eighteen when they got married. They 0:08:07.840 --> 0:08:12.680 knew nothing about parenting. They felt that if they, you know, 0:08:12.800 --> 0:08:16.280 didn't beat us, they were a vast improvement over their 0:08:16.320 --> 0:08:20.720 own parents, and that was enough. And my father's entire 0:08:20.800 --> 0:08:23.400 life was about work and it was the only thing 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:28.520 that mattered to him. He had great insecurity about money. Um, 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:31.200 he was not a Holocaust survivor nor the child of 0:08:31.200 --> 0:08:33.680 Holocauster Harbors, but he still buried gold coins in the 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:37.080 backyard in case we'd have to make a run for it. 0:08:37.120 --> 0:08:40.320 And this isn't, you know, a suburb of Minneapolis, as 0:08:40.320 --> 0:08:43.120 if the Cossacks were or the the s s were 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:46.640 beating down our doors. So my dad was a blue 0:08:46.640 --> 0:08:50.120 collar guy, you know. He grew up in that world. 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:51.880 He lived in that world. He did not own a 0:08:51.880 --> 0:08:55.480 metal recycling business. He owned a junkyard and I started 0:08:55.480 --> 0:08:58.960 working for my father on saturdays when I was five 0:08:59.040 --> 0:09:01.240 years old. When I was five years old, I was 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:05.760 on the floor in that junkyard scrubbing it with a 0:09:05.800 --> 0:09:08.320 scrub brush. And a bucket on my hands and knees, 0:09:08.520 --> 0:09:10.480 and all, I want to see our elbows and asses. 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:12.679 And my dad would say I, all, I want to 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:16.320 see our asses and elbows. And I was five and 0:09:16.440 --> 0:09:21.160 that was my life until frankly, I suffered this injury. 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:24.400 That was the first time that I woke up and 0:09:24.440 --> 0:09:27.600 thought to myself, I have been my father. I have 0:09:27.800 --> 0:09:33.120 been the driving, critical, belittling person my father was, and 0:09:33.160 --> 0:09:36.160 I went to work changing that. And the end result 0:09:36.200 --> 0:09:39.959 of that, Brian, is that I realized that the physical pain, 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:44.640 while at the time so crushing and depressing, was ultimately 0:09:44.720 --> 0:09:49.200 what liberated me from the tyranny of my father, because 0:09:49.200 --> 0:09:53.720 it helped me choose to change and lead a different 0:09:53.800 --> 0:09:57.800 kind of life. There's something about brokenness that actually makes 0:09:57.880 --> 0:10:01.400 us more whole. So do you believe pain is often 0:10:01.520 --> 0:10:05.440 or even always character building, because sometimes it just seems awful? 0:10:05.760 --> 0:10:08.960 It is? It is always awful. You know a friend 0:10:09.040 --> 0:10:12.760 of mine who had cancer three times, and the third 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:15.120 time I was visiting him in his hospital and he 0:10:15.160 --> 0:10:17.360 was clearly dying and he looked up at me and 0:10:17.400 --> 0:10:22.520 he said, this much character I don't need, you know. So, 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:26.320 this is not a book about glorifying pain. But the 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:28.079 fact of the matter is we don't get to choose 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:30.440 these painful things has happened to us with no control 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:33.280 over most of them. The only thing we have any 0:10:33.280 --> 0:10:36.880 control over is whether or not we make something of 0:10:36.880 --> 0:10:39.840 our pain. You know. That's what I mean when I 0:10:39.880 --> 0:10:42.640 say in the first paragraph that everyone goes through hell, 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:44.920 but the point is not to walk out empty handed. 0:10:45.440 --> 0:10:49.800 And I'm not even for a moment positing that these 0:10:49.840 --> 0:10:54.960 painful experiences are worth the insights and changes they can 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:58.800 create within us. But I am saying neither are they 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:02.120 worth less. So there are a lot of lessons in 0:11:02.160 --> 0:11:05.800 the book about how to grow and become a better 0:11:05.840 --> 0:11:10.520 person having experienced pain, or helping those around you who 0:11:10.520 --> 0:11:13.880 are in pain. Um, let's let's just go through some 0:11:14.000 --> 0:11:18.120 of them. Um, there's a word henany that comes up. 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:21.400 What does that mean? Henany is a Hebrew word that 0:11:21.480 --> 0:11:24.800 means here i am. It is spoken by the two 0:11:24.880 --> 0:11:30.520 greatest men of the Bible, and that's Moses and Abraham, 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:35.280 not in that order. When called by God and called 0:11:35.320 --> 0:11:40.200 by others, they simply say henani, here I am. I 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:43.040 give a piece of advice in the book that anyone 0:11:43.080 --> 0:11:47.160 who has suffered, I think will validate in the book. 0:11:47.160 --> 0:11:49.920 I tell people never to say these seven words when 0:11:49.960 --> 0:11:53.600 someone you know is suffering. Never say let me know 0:11:53.920 --> 0:12:00.120 if you need anything. That smacks of false empathy. And 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:04.360 even if it's sincere, it's nevertheless placing the burden upon 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:08.360 the sufferer. That is not love, and that is not care, 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:13.240 and that is not friendship. You should anticipate the sufferer's 0:12:13.360 --> 0:12:17.880 needs and meet them without being asked or being told. 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:22.040 Figure something out. You can do, whatever it is, a 0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:25.280 meal dropped off at the front door, car pooling for 0:12:25.320 --> 0:12:28.520 their kids, play dates for their kids, sending a massage 0:12:28.559 --> 0:12:34.720 therapist to their home, simply emails and calls. Uh, you 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:40.000 know in cards. These things matter and you should not 0:12:40.320 --> 0:12:44.160 wait to be asked. Show up. People call me all 0:12:44.160 --> 0:12:47.440 the time and say, Rabbi, my best friend is dying. 0:12:47.480 --> 0:12:50.360 He's been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I'm flying back to 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:53.080 New York to visit him. I don't know what to say. 0:12:53.679 --> 0:12:57.280 My advice just walk in the room. The rest will 0:12:57.280 --> 0:13:00.559 take care of itself. Just walk in the room. Show up. 0:13:01.480 --> 0:13:04.680 I have this and I've been visiting the sick and 0:13:04.679 --> 0:13:09.440 and distressed for thirty years and often I don't know 0:13:09.480 --> 0:13:11.880 what I'm going to say. I only know I need 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:15.240 to walk in that door because it's the feeling of 0:13:15.280 --> 0:13:19.920 isolation an abandonment that is one of the worst aspects 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:24.200 of pain, and when someone just shows up, it pierces 0:13:24.240 --> 0:13:31.960 that sense of isolation and abandonment. Let's take a quick 0:13:31.960 --> 0:13:34.680 break and I'll be right back with more of Rabbi 0:13:34.760 --> 0:13:49.360 Steve Leader. One of the most powerful parts in the book, 0:13:49.720 --> 0:13:52.880 to me at least, was when you wrote that everyone 0:13:53.000 --> 0:13:55.800 is in pain, the stranger on the subway, the guy 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:58.920 who cut us off while we're driving. That you need 0:13:58.960 --> 0:14:03.320 to have some empathy and recognition of the fact that 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:06.480 other people in the world are facing challenges. They're not 0:14:06.559 --> 0:14:11.600 just acting like schmucks. That's right. There's a reason why 0:14:11.640 --> 0:14:13.920 people behave the way they do, you know. Speaking of Henani, 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:16.440 here I Am. That's the title of Jonathan Saffron Feuyer's 0:14:16.760 --> 0:14:21.360 relatively new novel Uh. And in that novel, there's there's 0:14:21.360 --> 0:14:23.960 a wonderful line which I quote in the book, in 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:29.600 which he says everyone is wounded, and if you can 0:14:29.680 --> 0:14:33.440 remember a person's wounds, it makes it easier to forgive. 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:38.000 Because people don't wake up in the morning deciding to 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:40.200 be bad human beings unless you're a psychopath, and there 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:45.040 are some, but very few. Uh So, it's very important 0:14:45.080 --> 0:14:49.640 to remember that we are no different and others are 0:14:49.640 --> 0:14:51.520 no different. Sometimes when people come to me with some 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:54.320 sense of, you know, self righteous indignation at the behavior 0:14:54.320 --> 0:14:58.360 of another, I sometimes say to them, are you so perfect? Well? 0:14:58.400 --> 0:15:01.720 And and where do we draw the line and say 0:15:01.720 --> 0:15:05.840 that this person doesn't deserve empathy? You know, Harvey Weinstein 0:15:05.920 --> 0:15:08.960 has been all over the news. Uh And and that's 0:15:09.040 --> 0:15:13.000 led to a flood of stories about sexual harassment and 0:15:13.160 --> 0:15:18.480 assault in our society. Do we forgive the harasser? There's 0:15:18.520 --> 0:15:22.240 a difference between empathy and forgiveness. They're not the same. 0:15:23.760 --> 0:15:26.680 Can we empathize with a person whose life and ego 0:15:27.320 --> 0:15:31.040 are so out of control that he's willing to frighten 0:15:31.080 --> 0:15:37.880 and abuse innocent and vulnerable women? Can we empathize with that? 0:15:38.040 --> 0:15:40.720 I would say I can in the sense that the 0:15:40.880 --> 0:15:46.760 degree of um insanity behind the behavior to me indicates 0:15:46.800 --> 0:15:52.000 a pretty enormous degree of inner turmoil, dysfunction, or at 0:15:52.000 --> 0:15:56.200 the very least lack of humility, an extreme and enormous 0:15:56.360 --> 0:16:00.520 degree of narcissism, and by the way, empathy for the 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:04.320 perpetrator does not preclude empathy for the victims. Everyone loses. 0:16:04.760 --> 0:16:12.280 Everyone loses. Now, what about forgiveness? Uh, forgiveness? And again 0:16:12.320 --> 0:16:14.000 I talked about this in the book based on the 0:16:14.400 --> 0:16:17.520 work of my Mondi is the greatest rabbi and Jewish 0:16:17.520 --> 0:16:20.720 teacher of the medieval period. Died over eight hundred years ago. 0:16:21.240 --> 0:16:24.080 Over eight hundred years ago, he worked out this system 0:16:24.120 --> 0:16:26.360 by which you can determine whether or not a person 0:16:26.440 --> 0:16:30.640 merits forgiveness four steps. Four steps. First, the person has 0:16:30.680 --> 0:16:39.520 to stop the behavior. Stop. Secondly, confess that behavior out loud. 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:44.040 There is a big difference between saying to oneself, I'm 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:48.120 a sex addict, I'm a gambler, I have an anger problem. 0:16:48.160 --> 0:16:50.920 There's a big difference between saying that internally and actually 0:16:51.000 --> 0:16:55.680 saying it out loud to God and another person. Thirdly, 0:16:56.040 --> 0:17:02.040 you have to apologize and seek forgiveness. And finally, you 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:06.920 have to avoid repeating that sin or behavior when given 0:17:06.960 --> 0:17:10.800 another opportunity to do so. If you go through those 0:17:10.840 --> 0:17:18.160 four steps, you deserve to be forgiven, and the victim 0:17:18.520 --> 0:17:23.359 is obligated to forgive. And if the victim does not 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:26.919 forgive three times, says my monides. The sin is then 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:32.520 upon the victim. People have a right to change the 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:35.560 three strikes that you're out well one strike. If the 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:37.840 change isn't sincere and you don't go through these steps, 0:17:38.560 --> 0:17:41.720 you don't merit forgiveness. And I would also say that 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:45.320 forgiving doesn't mean forgetting. But if there's been a true 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:48.560 and sincere change, and the behavior has stopped and isn't repeated, 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:51.159 you can forgive. You don't have to forget that it happened. 0:17:51.160 --> 0:17:54.960 You can't forget that it happened. I've learned over the 0:17:55.000 --> 0:17:56.879 years that the most important things are said with the 0:17:56.880 --> 0:18:01.880 fewest words. I do you know it's a boy, it's 0:18:01.920 --> 0:18:07.920 a girl. Yes, I'm sorry, no more than i'm sorry. 0:18:08.440 --> 0:18:11.720 In the book, I talked about something related to apology 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:15.399 and forgiveness that I think is more profound than i'm sorry. 0:18:16.920 --> 0:18:19.200 And they're the three hardest words for most human beings 0:18:19.240 --> 0:18:24.760 to say, which are I was wrong. Saying I was 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:29.200 wrong is a much higher degree of culpability than I'm sorry. 0:18:29.240 --> 0:18:32.560 I'm sorry. You can mean i'm sorry it happened, I'm sorry, 0:18:32.560 --> 0:18:37.320 I got caught. I'm sorry, I'm sorry you're offended. There's 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:40.720 a lot of wiggle room and I'm sorry, I was 0:18:40.800 --> 0:18:45.920 wrong is a full acceptance of full responsibility and I'll 0:18:45.920 --> 0:18:50.240 tell you something. It immediately takes the sting out. It 0:18:50.359 --> 0:18:56.920 immediately changes the barametric pressure in the relationship. And look, 0:18:57.240 --> 0:19:00.520 people are hesitant to say it mostly has of ego 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:04.000 and pride. There's a reason foolish pride are words that 0:19:04.040 --> 0:19:06.959 go together often. But it is also true that we 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:10.240 live in a culture that punishes people for accepting responsibility 0:19:10.240 --> 0:19:13.080 and saying I'm sorry. You know, doctors, when they make 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:17.080 a mistake are told never to say I was wrong, right, 0:19:17.080 --> 0:19:20.240 They're told to shut up and lawyer up. But there 0:19:20.280 --> 0:19:22.840 are over thirty states now that have something called a 0:19:22.960 --> 0:19:25.720 no fault apology law. This is very interesting to me. 0:19:26.800 --> 0:19:30.200 And no fault apology law allows a physician to apologize 0:19:30.359 --> 0:19:32.840 to a patient for a mistake without it being admissible 0:19:32.880 --> 0:19:35.520 in court. And what do you think has happened in 0:19:35.560 --> 0:19:37.920 the states that have been no fault apology laws, number 0:19:37.920 --> 0:19:40.720 of lawsuits go way down, plumb it, They plummet because 0:19:40.720 --> 0:19:42.879 people don't really want to soothe their doctors. They just 0:19:43.240 --> 0:19:47.240 want someone to take responsibility and say I was wrong 0:19:47.480 --> 0:19:50.640 and I'm sorry. This is not only true between doctors 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:54.400 and patients. This is true between husbands and wives, between 0:19:54.440 --> 0:19:59.800 parents and children, and brothers and sisters. I was wrong 0:20:00.400 --> 0:20:05.560 is an extraordinary antidote to the bitterness of pain. So 0:20:05.640 --> 0:20:08.800 another extraordinary antidote to pain that you talk about in 0:20:08.840 --> 0:20:12.119 the book Towards Thank You. You talk about the power 0:20:12.240 --> 0:20:18.359 of gratitude in combating depression, in overcoming anxiety, and making 0:20:18.440 --> 0:20:21.800 our lives better, both the person expressing gratitude as well 0:20:21.840 --> 0:20:25.920 as the person receiving it. Yes, yes, uh. There's something 0:20:25.960 --> 0:20:29.119 called a gratitude experiment, which is you, in three words, 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:33.159 you write a statement of gratitude to someone in your life, 0:20:33.400 --> 0:20:35.600 and then you actually go and share it read it 0:20:35.640 --> 0:20:40.560 to them. When people do this, there's almost always just 0:20:41.480 --> 0:20:47.240 deluge of tears, and people report feeling happier and less depressed. 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:51.040 We all want to be appreciated. It sounds a little 0:20:51.080 --> 0:20:54.520 facile to say, count your blessings, but it's really a 0:20:54.640 --> 0:20:58.399 very important and powerful way to live. And you know, 0:20:58.520 --> 0:21:01.280 this also goes along with an another concept in the 0:21:01.280 --> 0:21:03.399 book that I think is so important, which is the 0:21:03.520 --> 0:21:07.400 dangers of catastrophizing the future. You know, our DNA survived 0:21:07.440 --> 0:21:09.720 because we're the descendants of people who lived as if 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:15.480 there was a tiger behind every tree. But things rarely, 0:21:16.200 --> 0:21:20.240 rarely turn out commensurate with our nightmares about how we 0:21:20.320 --> 0:21:23.040 believe they're going to turn out. And the less time 0:21:23.040 --> 0:21:26.399 we spend catastrophizing the future when we're in a difficult situation, 0:21:26.520 --> 0:21:32.960 the better. There's documented evidence that people in pain who 0:21:33.040 --> 0:21:39.480 catastrophies the future feel exponentially greater pain than those who don't. 0:21:40.640 --> 0:21:44.879 And so this involves changing messages from this is the 0:21:44.880 --> 0:21:47.680 worst thing that's ever happened to me too. I've been 0:21:47.720 --> 0:21:50.159 through other difficult things and I will get through this. 0:21:51.200 --> 0:21:53.560 I can no longer do these things too. This is 0:21:53.560 --> 0:21:55.520 going to lead me to new things. This happened with 0:21:55.520 --> 0:21:57.000 me with my back. There are lots of things I 0:21:57.080 --> 0:22:00.520 used to love that I can't do any longer. I'm 0:22:00.560 --> 0:22:05.200 just physically incapable of them. They have been replaced with 0:22:05.359 --> 0:22:09.120 some beautiful things that I never would have engaged in before. 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:12.359 I've spent more time in nature now, just walking. You know, 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:14.840 I used to love to do something called bouldering and 0:22:14.960 --> 0:22:18.520 Joshua Tree in California. Joshua Tree is an extraordinary place. 0:22:19.119 --> 0:22:20.920 It's a state park the size of the state of 0:22:21.000 --> 0:22:24.159 Rhode Island. It's filled with these enormous boulders. And I 0:22:24.240 --> 0:22:28.240 used to boulder, which means essentially scampering up over these things. 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:30.040 And I can't do that any longer. So what do 0:22:30.080 --> 0:22:32.720 I do now? When I go to Joshua Tree, I 0:22:32.800 --> 0:22:35.440 go and find a small boulder that I can easily 0:22:35.480 --> 0:22:40.439 just step up onto, and I sit there and I 0:22:40.520 --> 0:22:44.120 let nature come to me. I hear the wind, I 0:22:44.160 --> 0:22:47.840 feel the breeze. I notice the subtle color changes as 0:22:47.880 --> 0:22:52.040 the day progresses. I see the lone coyote trotting, you know, 0:22:52.119 --> 0:22:55.520 through the underbrush. And the way I put this in 0:22:55.560 --> 0:22:57.960 the book is that I used to chase after God 0:22:58.000 --> 0:23:00.520 and chase after prayer, and now I've learned that if 0:23:00.560 --> 0:23:04.040 you sit still, the prayer comes to you. Another big 0:23:04.119 --> 0:23:07.760 fact of your biography is your marriage. You and your 0:23:07.800 --> 0:23:12.760 wife were both in pain as a result of bad breakups. 0:23:13.320 --> 0:23:16.880 You met and decided to be married after a few days. Yeah, 0:23:16.920 --> 0:23:20.960 we got engaged on our second date and and and 0:23:21.119 --> 0:23:27.000 have had a wonderful relationship. But that relationship changed during 0:23:27.080 --> 0:23:32.159 your illness. What happened, Well, just to give you a 0:23:32.160 --> 0:23:37.280 little more specificity about our meeting, I've met Betsy days 0:23:37.320 --> 0:23:41.240 after she had finished radiation therapy for Hodgkins disease. She 0:23:41.240 --> 0:23:43.960 had no hair on the back of her head and 0:23:44.440 --> 0:23:47.879 I had just gone through this horrible breakup. I was 0:23:48.440 --> 0:23:51.679 twenty three and thought the world was ending. We talked 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:56.439 for twelve hours about what she'd been through, and it 0:23:56.520 --> 0:23:58.840 was very clear to me that because of what she 0:23:58.920 --> 0:24:01.240 had been through, she was able to understand me in 0:24:01.240 --> 0:24:04.240 a way that most people had not at our age. 0:24:04.240 --> 0:24:07.439 You know, we were kids. And I literally turned to 0:24:07.480 --> 0:24:09.280 her on our second date and I said, you know, 0:24:09.400 --> 0:24:10.959 I don't know if I should say this or not, 0:24:11.880 --> 0:24:14.520 but I think you're in And she looked at me 0:24:14.560 --> 0:24:17.920 and she said I feel the same way. And then 0:24:17.960 --> 0:24:20.959 as only you know, a dumb twenty three year old can, 0:24:21.040 --> 0:24:22.359 and I looked at her and I said, so are 0:24:22.400 --> 0:24:25.479 we engaged? And she said I guess so. And that 0:24:25.560 --> 0:24:28.280 was it. We called our families, uh so, But it 0:24:28.359 --> 0:24:31.840 was pain that brought us together. The phone call was hilarious. 0:24:31.880 --> 0:24:35.440 I called my I called my parents. They both get 0:24:35.440 --> 0:24:39.000 on the phone and I say, I'm getting married and 0:24:39.040 --> 0:24:42.000 they both said to who. Yeah, I said, look to 0:24:42.080 --> 0:24:45.960 this girl and met last week And I said what 0:24:46.720 --> 0:24:48.919 And my father being my father said Stephen, you're not 0:24:48.920 --> 0:24:52.280 getting married, you're thinking about getting married, at which point 0:24:52.280 --> 0:24:55.400 I don't know if I can say this on a podcast. 0:24:55.960 --> 0:24:57.880 At which point, when my father said you're not getting married, 0:24:57.880 --> 0:25:00.200 you think about getting married, I said to my father, Dad, 0:25:00.400 --> 0:25:03.840 don't fuck this up. At which point my mother said, 0:25:04.640 --> 0:25:08.800 we're looking forward to meeting her. Huh, And we flew 0:25:08.800 --> 0:25:11.760 out to California so they could meet Betsy. Ten minutes 0:25:11.800 --> 0:25:14.359 after meeting her, my mother leaned over to me and said, 0:25:14.760 --> 0:25:19.160 she's perfect. Look, we've had our challenges with our children, 0:25:19.240 --> 0:25:23.000 with health, with money, with sex, with work, with all 0:25:23.000 --> 0:25:27.120 the things that every couple is challenged by. But it's 0:25:27.200 --> 0:25:30.480 it's been magical since the moment she walked in the room. 0:25:30.560 --> 0:25:33.240 And that hasn't changed. My heart still skips a beat 0:25:33.280 --> 0:25:36.280