With no fees er minimums. Banking with Capital one is the easiest decision in the history of decisions. That's banking reimagine what's in your wallet. Terms apply see capitolwe dot com slash bank Capital one NA member FDIC. Hi everyone, I'm Katie Couric and this is next question. Hi everybody, welcome. Once again, it's Katie plus one and I'm so thrilled with my date today. This time it's Kelly Corrigan. She's an author journalist. She's the host of the podcast Kelly
Corrigan Wonders. She has written four New York Times bestselling memoirs in the last decade, earning her the title of the Poet Laureate of the Ordinary from the Huffington Post and the Voice of a Generation from Oh Magazine.
Wow.
Kelly Yeah. She's worked in nonprofits for ten years. That decade created her worldview, which goes people are struggling, make yourself useful. She paints almost every day in her garage, often in her pj's like a crazy person, but a happy crazy person, and that's what's working, so she keeps doing it. Kelly, thank you for being my plus one on this podcast.
Oh I'm so happy to be with you the last time you were my interview subject on the PBS Show.
That's right, that's right, And I actually should have mentioned the PBS Show, which is wonderful as well. And Kelly, I think you do have this every woman wisdom that people just gravitate to, and so that's why I thought you'd be the perfect partner for me to talk with David Brooks, who I have long admired, You've long admired. But before we open up the conversation and let David in, let's just talk very briefly about how we know each other, which is kind of a fun story because it dates
back to the Today's Show. Can you tell everyone how we first connected.
It's two thousand and four. I had just finished a year of cancer treatment. My hair was just starting to grow back. I was thirty seven, two little kids, and my dad had cancer at the same time I did. And it was the first day of Breast cancer Awareness Month. So the Today Show always does a big, full coverage of that topic, and so I was invited to come on with my dad. And it was so funny, Katie, because we were in the green room and we're all made up and fancy and I and my dad's a
big character, like he really lets it rip. And I was like, you know that, this is like keep it, keep it in the pocket at first, like let's just try to like, you know, play it.
Tighten it up down, Yeah, tighten it up, brother.
And we get out there and you came right across the room like it was your home like that. That was my immediate sense was like, Oh, you're going to take care of us, like you're welcoming us into your space. You came all the way across the studio. You didn't sit in your chair and look at the teleprompter and get ready. You came to us, which I just thought was really lovely and doesn't always happen. And you said Hi, I'm Katie, and I was like, Hi, I'm Kelly. This
is my dad, George. And my dad instantly said, Katie, my son went to Washington and Lee, which is where your husband, your first husband went, And he said, right, and he played for coach so and so, and you said, I don't think my husband really, I don't think Jay really liked him. And my father Zach Emmer right, and my father said, oh, he's a dick. And I was like Oh my god, Dad, this is exactly what I told you not to do, like we're keeping it in the pocket.
And then we walked out.
You'd laughed so hard, and we walked over and sat on the little sofa. And then you know, when you go on the Today Show, like they try to get it organized for you in advance, where they give you the questions and you practice answering them, and you know, they give you a little window of content. And the very first question you went off script, and I was like, Oh, this is so cool, Like she's just going to talk to us because you know so much like to me.
I was like, it would be so rude of me to be nervous right now because I'm talking to someone who has lost two people, You're two dearest people to cancer, and so I'm just going to talk to you like I would if there were no cameras, because heart to heart, there aren't any cameras, like this is my story, this is your story, this my dad's story, like and it was so wonderful, and I think we were on for like seven minutes or something like I remember after it
was over all my cousins were like, oh my god, that was insane.
Uh, and you were brilliant, and I think you know, your voice maybe emerged that day and led to so many other wonderful opportunities because of your honesty and your heart. So I feel like I was there when it all started. I'm so glad you're doing well and are in good health, and I'm so proud of what an important person you've become in the world. So many people, Kelly, Honestly, it's
a wonderful thing to witness. Okay, Kelly, Before we go on and on, because it's a mutual admiration society, here, let's bring in David Brooks to talk about his new book, How to Know a Person, The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen. David Brooks, Welcome, Kelly, and I both welcome you to the podcast.
This is a double barrel of fun and willing and able look out.
Mister.
I'm really excited to talk to you about this, and I think it's something that interests Kelly a great deal too. Kelly, when you heard about David's book, How to Know a Person, The Art of Seeing Others Deeply, Being Deeply Seen, what interested you about it?
Well, I'm a little bit curious about David's journey, because I once heard him say that in his house the ethos was think Yiddish, act British, and that I know you to be, you know, a journalist of the highest order, and a specific kind of journalist, which is to say, not like Katie, whose job it is to ask questions, but rather someone who's supposed to summon an opinion and present it, which is sort of the opposite of what
you're asking people to do in this book. So that my deepest curiosity was how funny that you should come to this urgent message after a somewhat aloof life where you could be in a cerebral space nine days out of ten and not really have to operate on this level.
Yeah, and thought about that way. But my whole life has been a journey to being more like Katie. And I'm totally cool with that.
By the way, It's not a bad trajectory.
Right, because I grew up, as you say, in a super intellectual world with my family, my answer professors, and then when I got to be eighteen, the admissions officers at Columbia, Wesleyan, and Brown decided should go to the University of Chicago.
I laughed, at that, Lie David also.
A super heavy place, and I fit right in.
My joke is our fun goes to die right right.
The best saying about Chicago it's a Baptist school where atheist professors teach Jewish students. Saint Thomas Aquinas so super intellectual, and I fit right in my joke is I had a double major in history and celibacy while I was at Chicago.
Not a lot of connection, not a.
Lot of connection going on there, and so I was cerebral and it, you know, it worked for me. But at some point you just want to get wise, right, Like, smart people know about things, but whise people know about people and life and life and the circumstances we find ourselves in. And so, you know, whise people have a sorehouse of knowledge about human nature. They're curious about other people. They're good at having conversations people remember for a long time.
They're good at sitting with someone who's suffering. And so I just wanted to be more like that. I mean, one of the dualisms in the book is in every community there are some people who are diminishers and some people who are illuminators. And diminishers make you feel small and unseen and not curious about you. They stereotype you, and illuminators light you up with their care and they're just really good at making people feel seen, heard and understood.
And now I'm intimidated. I'm in the presence of two pretty good illuminators. So that's when my life journey.
Well, it's interesting, you know, David. I mean, I've so much to talk to you about. I really enjoyed your book, and I think you're very funny in it. I like when you said when it comes to spontaneous displays of emotion, I had the emotional capacity of a head of cabbage.
And you really talk about how.
Closed off you were to feelings, emotions, connections, and it made me wonder frankly, and I think Kelly and I both I don't know. I'd love to hear about your childhood, Kelly. I have been always extremely empathetic and attuned to the emotional well being of people around me, to a point where it's a lot. You know, if I see someone
by themselves, I always go and talk to them. When there was only one African American girl in my piano group, I said to my teacher, I hope she wins the prize today because I felt that she felt lonely and different. So I've always been that way, and it made me wonder is empathy the result of nurture or nature because your parents obviously were not particularly touchy feely. But I feel like it's more than that. It's almost something you're
hardwired to be. And I'm curious what you found out about that, David.
Yeah, I think empathy is like it's like athletic ability. Some people are born with more of it others, but everybody needs training and everybody does better if they work on it. And so to me, empathy is three skills. The first is mirroring, and that's catching the emotion right in front of you, and that's the natural you're comfortable with your body, you send somebody else emotions and you
share it, you feel it. That's mirroring. The next one is mentalizing, and that's the ability to see, Oh, I had an experience like she's going through, so I sort of know what she's going through. So like on the first day of the job, I remember, Oh, on my first day of the job, I was nervous, I was excited, I was overwhelmed. I had all these scattering of different emotions,
so I'm mentalizing, I'm projecting what I think. And then the third thing is caring, the ability to accurately care and so kids like, if you come home from work crying, your two year old will hand you a band aid, which is sweet, but it's not what you want. So you have to effectively care. And so there's a guy named Rabbi Elliot Kukla who wrote about a woman who had a brain injury. So she fell on the floor.
She just fell down sometimes, and she said people are always rushing to lift me up because they're uncomfortable seeing an adult on the floor. Sometimes they just need to get down on the ground with me. And so empathy is knowing sometimes you just have to get down on the ground with someone. And I put in the book, I'm going to read out a little empathy test so you can tell how naturally talented you are at empathy. And I'll read you a few statements and see if
you agree with them. First, is I find it hard to know what to do in social situations. It doesn't bother me when I show up late, people say I went too far and driving home. My point, if those apply to you, you probably you're naturally a little lower on empathy. Interesting, here's some other statements. Interpersonal conflict is painful to me. I mimic the mannerisms of those around me. When I make a social blunder, I'm extremely disturbed. And so if you say yes, this sort of applas to me,
that's a sign you probably have higher empathy. And so we have it. We're born with a certain level, but we on need training to get better at it.
I have two questions.
One is do you think that life experiences accelerate change, Like you had a really hard period in your life, your marriage fell apart, and you did a little self evaluation and didn't really like the results. Katie has obviously been through a terrible loss twice over sister husband. I had cancer in my thirties. It took two years to get rid of. So I wonder about those big moments,
and then I want to drill down on mentalizing. But first I'm curious do you think that if you are sort of not a great empathizer by nature, do you think that an ordinary life can get you there or it takes something extraordinary?
Well, I have a pretty ordinary life or really a blessed life. But I've had moments of suffering. I used to tell my kids, my students, you know, you can be knowledgeable with other people's knowledge, but you can't be wise with other people's wisdom. You have to live through it, and you know, suffering. One of my favorite sayings about suffering,
it's from Paul Tillic in nineteen fifties theologian. He said, suffering, moments of suffering, phases of suffering interrupt your life and remind you you're not the person you thought you were, and that he says, they carved down through the basement of what you thought was the floor of your soul, and they carve through that and reveal a cavity below. Then they carve through that and reveal a cavity below. So you see, at least I think most people do.
They see into depths of themselves they didn't know existed in moments of suffering, and they know only spiritual and relational food will fill those depths. And so people have a choice, which is they can be broken or broken open. And some people are broken, they get bitter, they get hard, they close in on themselves. But some people get broken open and they feel more, they get more vulnerable, they
have greater empathy. And I do think that after you've been through suffering, you'd come out of it if you use those horrible moments well with a certain sort of knowledge. There's a phrase quotation I left from Thornton Wilder, which is, without your wound, where would your power be? It's your very remorse that makes your low voice tremble in the hearts of men in love service only Wounded Soldiers conserves.
That Thornton Wilder, he could write that guy.
You get a nice twist of phrase that one.
Before you talk about mentalizing, though, I'm curious, David, so it seems to me this has been a life long something that you have wanted to improve for some time. Or was it exacerbated by, as Kelly said, a life event, the fact that your marriage didn't work out, or was there an event or a series of events that really precipitated this longing and this search, or is it just something that you felt was missing in your being?
Yeah? I felt something was missing so frankly, and the story of telling the book Big Baseball Fan, and I never all the big games I've gone to, I've never gotten a foul ball, And.
Oh yeah, right, This is a funny story.
I go to the game in Baltimore with my youngest son and the batter loses control of the bat and it lands at my feet. It flies in the stands, and I've got a bat, And any normal human being would be jumping up and down, high fiving, hugging everybody around me, getting on the JumboTron. But I just put the bat at my feet and like sit there like inert, like a turtle.
That's when you would describe you having the emotional capacity of ahead of cabbage.
Yeah, so I'm like show a little joy man. And so that that's the aloof reticent version of me. And I did it. I tried to improve myself for change the universe Chicago way. I write books about it. So I wrote a book about emotion. Then I wrote a book about a character formation, and I wrote a book about suffering. And this book is really about how to be wise about people and how to make them feel lit up. And so that's you know, I have, you
know work. Writers are usually working out their stuff in public, and I'm working on my stuff and I'm trying to share what I learned with others. One of my favorite phrases of writing is we're beggars who tell other beggars where we found bread. And so when I find something that's useful, I shared, and that's like my highest satisfaction. And I'm going to name drop to show that I've made progress in life.
Oh I know this story?
Yeah, so Oprah?
Yeah all right, so you're gonna pull out the big oh whatever.
Special to David.
If you ladies want to praise me, I'm happy to put your story in place.
Go ahead, David.
I didn't know I was going to walk into this amount of rivalry now.
Never, you know, just being honest, He goes a thing.
Okay, So the Oprah story that one, Sorry I missed it. Maybe I'll tell my Anne Hathaways for instead.
That's funny.
I know we like that one.
So the Oprah story is that she interviews me two times, once in twenty fourteen and once in twenty nineteen, and after twenty nineteen, after the taping, she pulls me aside and said, I've rarely seen someone change so much in middle age. You were so emotionally blocked before. So that was for me, that was like graduation day. I can show that, you know, I've made some progress in much.
That is I all kidding aside I think. I mean, obviously she's so highly perceptive and intuitive. Just you know that goes without saying. But I think for her to recognize it, And did you feel obviously, as you said, you felt validated. But do you think she was right? I mean, do you think there's a way you carry yourself differently, that you talk to people differently, that your body language, that everything about you has opened in some way.
I think that's accurate. I do. I hope it's accurate. I'm still not all the way there. I'm not like the most since I'm not a naturally gregarious person, as you know. But if you come up to me with a problem, I'm comfortable enough with your pain to sit with you in your pain a little more. And so I used to like freeze and fear because I didn't know what to do. And I've learned to storify life to try to get stories. So there are two ways
of thinking. There's the paradigmatic mode, which is making an argument, which is what we do if we're making a strategy memo or writing a newspaper column. And then there's the narrative mode, which is getting people to tell your stories and so like, even in political journalism, I'd only ask people what do you believe about this? I ask people, how did you come to believe this? And that way they're telling me about somebody who shape their values or
some experience they have. There we're in story mode.
I asked Sarah Palin that question, David, and she didn't have a very getting right.
I said, what newspapers and magazines do you read? And actually all of them, honestly, I know all Kitdting decaught. It was looking for some kind of deep answer that helped me understand what shaped her, what shaped her values, what shaped her outlook, her worldview? And you know, it was an unsuccessful inquiry, but it's interesting because that's really I was genuinely curious about what leads someone to have
a certain political ideology. You know, sometimes your parents sometimes I thought she could say William F. Buckley or you know, honestly, even the Bible. I just was looking for what was a very formative experience that made her the woman she is today.
It's very curious that she couldn't answer that question. Well, was she genuinely lack a story about the values that formed her. Did she think, oh, I can't tell that in public, it might not be helped me politically, or maybe nobody had ever asked her and so she didn't. A lot of people no one's ever asked them those basic questions.
Well, remember when Roger Mudd asked to Kennedy why he wanted to be president and Teddy Kennedy was speechless.
I was just thinking exactly of that episode, Yeah, exactly.
I think she just didn't read much and had no intellectual curiosity, honestly, and I think she got tripped up on naming things and I kind of left it wide open. But anyway, it's really interesting. I'll be right back with David Brooks and my special Plus one guest Kelly Corrigan. With no fees or minimums. Banking with Capital one is the easiest decision in the history of decisions, even easier than deciding to listen to another episode of your favorite podcast,
and with no overdraft fees. Is it even a decision that's banking reimagined? What's in your wallet? Terms apply see capitolwe dot com, slash bank Capital one NA member FDIC. Kelly and I are back with David Brooks.
So I just wanted to loop back on mentalizing, because what you were suggesting is that if a person comes through with a certain shape of a problem that you could identify and say, oh, I've had something similar, I know what that might feel like. But that bumps up against the UT research that you unearthed for the book, which is pointing us toward this terrible interpersonal arrogance where we have too much confidence in our ability to read
body language and expression and gesture. And it brings up one of my all time favorite concepts. We did a series on it on my pod last year about intellectual humility. So can you talk about the UT research and what it points out about our over estimation of our own perceptive skills.
Yeah. First, I love that phrase interpersonal arrogance.
That's that is what were yours. Take it run with it.
It was stolen about thirty seconds ago. So the research is guy named William Mikes who's at the University of Texas, Arlington, and he finds that when we meet a stranger and have a conversation with him for the first time, we're accurately reading each other's minds only twenty percent of the time, and some people when we are with friends and family. We are accurately reading each other thirty five percent of the time, and so some people are pretty good at
it fifty five percent they're accurate. Some people are terrible zero percent and they think they're one hundred percent. But the point is we're all sort of creative. We all have our own distinct point of view. We all see the world in our own way. And while it's important to mentalize to try to think, well, I've shared this experience, you probably have to. We have to be humble and know we probably can't imagine our way into somebody else's mind.
The only way in is ask. And that's why to me that the central humanistic skill is the ability to be a great conversationalist, not just a good one, but a really great one. And this is another area where we're not as good as we think we are. We all think we're good conversationalists, but being a conversationalist, I mean, you guys do it for a living. But it's a
high art form. And I've been in over the last year I think back, I've been in some phenomenal conversations, and I've been in some terrible ones that I don't really remember. And the phenomenal ones invariably revolved around some big question. Somebody put a big question on the table and it allowed us to explore it altogether.
I think about that bringing intellectual humility into our most important relationships. So I have a twenty year old and a twenty two year old, and I think my job is to say, tell me more, what else? Go on until we unearth the thing behind the thing behind the thing, because otherwise they're presenting and you're speeding to a point of view, and you're advising with your clever advice, and as soon as you start talking, they're tuning out. They're like,
she literally doesn't even know what I'm talking about. I haven't even told her that the real reason I'm upset is because parents weekend is coming up and I don't know who we're having dinner with on Saturday night. But what I told her is I felt a little anxious in mad class, and now she's talking to me about caffeine.
You know what I mean.
That's fantastic, that's fantastic. Yeah, the rule is asked three times, like your job is to stand in their standpoint, is to say, Okay, what was that? And then ask it the same question different phrasing than the third time. The third time you actually are beginning to get some answers.
In many ways, I think this book is a blueprint for everyone on how to be a better person, how to be a better partner, how to be a better friend, how to be a better parent. And I think everybody wants that. And what do you think are some of the you know, obviously we can't view the whole book, David, but what are some of the key things that you need to do to really know someone to make sure
that person is really seen just parenthetically. I don't know about you all, but whenever I go to a funeral, I leave and I think, Gosh, I wish I had known this person better. I never knew this. I never asked them about that. A friend of mine recently died, and I have to say she believed nothing should be left unsaid. She always told me, we always told each other how important we were to each other in our lives. And she saw me and knew me deeply, and I
think I knew her deeply too. I didn't have that feeling at her service, but so many other times I feel like Gosh, I had such a superficial relationship with this person? Why didn't I know them better? And I'm just curious a if you guys ever feel that way when you go to funerals And again be David, what are some of the ways we can we can feel closer, more connected and see people who are important to us?
Yeah? I mean the nicely about funerals is they talk about people talk about what matters. And when I had this earlier book where I made a distinction between the resume virtues and the eulogy virtues right right, and the resume virtues of the things that make you good at your job, and nobody talks about that at a funeral. They talk about whether you're a courageous, honest, capable of
great love. And so you know, I think, as I say, big questions are the way you get to know somebody, Like you're having coffee with someone, you're at a dinner table, whatever, And we're shy about asking questions, but there's some questions you can ask that lift people out of their day to day life and get them seeing themselves from thirty thousand feet. So it's like, what crossroads are you at? Often we're at a moment of transitional life it's interesting
to ask what crossroads you at. Other questions are like, if this five years is a chapter in your life, what's the chapter about, what's the commitment you've made that you no longer really believe in. I was at a party with a political scientist. He said, I'm eighty, what do I do with the rest of my life? And that was a great conversation about his interests or how you do old age well and what you should do
in the year's approaching death. And so we went on for like ninety minutes talking about Wow, various things that's spun off from that, and it's just like you think, oh, it's just a memorable conversation, But I'll never see him the same way. I know a lot more about that guy, and I had the pleasure of really seeing into the interior of a very wise person's life.
You know, it would be fun to do a game. I think they have this like conversation starters or something. I don't know. I never I've been given it and I've never used it, which may be part of the problem. But maybe do a list of big questions that will open up a conversation. So actually, when you're at a dinner party, it becomes much more meaningful and worth your time than a bunch of small talk with the person to your right.
I think it's almost like there's an awkwardness. You feel like a goon. Like we used to do those conversation cards and put one under each plate, and then at any point during dinner you could lift your plate and take the card and ask somebody next to you, like what's your biggest fear? Or if your high school did superlatives, what would yours have been? Or if your mother wrote a book about you, what would it be called? Is
there anyone you would like to apologize too? Like there's so many juicy questions, and most people have like a little bit of a guard up and they feel goofy trying to take it from like you know, the kid's soccer game or your Christmas plans to something much deeper. Well, David, I think David writes Kelly that we're not taught how to do this, and I think that they're in life the rub right totally. And there's whole generations who think
asking these types of questions is completely rude. Like my mother would say, oh, for God's sake, like, you know you know how every now and then on Instagram or TikTok, it's like, ask your mother these seven questions before she dies. Like, I can't even I sent that to my daughter recently. I couldn't even ask one question before my mom's cut me off and said, oh, for god.
Sake, Kelly, who wants to talk about that?
So, like, not everybody's playing the same game here, and not every generation is used to operating on this level. But we do have this million dollar opportunity where many many more people have read many many more of these types of books, have been to therapy, have sat on dorm room floors like bearing their Soul. We're just more practiced in it, and hopefully it will lead to like a different kind of societal conversation, although it sure doesn't seem to be trending that way.
David Brooks, Yeah, well I do agree with you and I you know, obviously you've got to pace it so you don't want to walk in meet somebody, you know, how do your ancestor show up in your life?
Like, Hi, I'm David. When was the last time you cried?
You know? I start just with like, uh, where'd you grow up? And we just want to get people talking about their childhood. People are fantastic talking about their childhood. And so I travel a lot, so I've probably have been to the place and we can have a conversation or even like where'd you get your name? Like gets people talking about their family and stuff like that, and then you know the shallow conversations like I once asked a group of people, tell me about your most enjoyable,
unimportant thing about yourself. And so I learned this austere academic guy loves trashy reality TV. So it was like a window into them, and I got to talk about my obsession with early Taylor Swift's albums.
Really wait, slow down, mister, give us a leerless, give us a lyric or two.
Hey, you're cheercime. I'm on the bleachers. You're the cheer captain.
Did you relate? Did you meet that?
That's so you know I'm a what's her lyric? I'm your nightmare dressed as a day dreams?
I so relate, I thought, so, well, my god, it all goes back to Taylor Swift. Here's what David Brooks is a swifty like just yeah, let's stop the presses.
We're breaking news. David Brooks is a.
Swifty A good friend of mine today said Taylor Swift isn't a singer, she's a lifestyle.
Yeah, she's a religion at this point she is.
She has a lyric that from her new album Let's See if I can redress it. That's it's narcissism dressed up like altruism, like some sort of congressman. I think that's a fantastic, pretty good.
Yeah, she's brilliant.
Well wait, so so you're talking about interesting ways in to get to know people, and I love it. And Kelly, I imagine you and I probably do stuff like that because we are just naturally curious and interested in other people. But I feel like you could always I could always hone those skills even more. And to pick up on Kelly's last point, David, I think you know when she said things aren't trending this way. Society is not making
this easy, these deep connections, meaningful relationships. And you talk a lot about that, how the way we live is almost antithetical to creating these deep friendships where people feel seen.
Yeah, I mean that was in some ways they impetus by the book. Not only might desire to personally grow but looking at society around me, and we're in the middle of some sort of social and emotional and relational crisis, and so you know, rising mental health problems, rising suicide rates. Fifty four percent of Americans say that no one knows them well. The number of people who say they have no close personal friends is up by four times in
the last twenty years. Thirty six percent of Americans say they feel persistently lonely. Forty five percent of teenagers say they feel persistently hopeless and despondent. The number of people that are not in a romantic relationship is up by a third. It's just like one statistic after another where we're just in an emotional and relational recession. And I think it's caused by this rising cycle of distrust, and distrust has caused because people haven't been trustworthy, and especially
young people feel that others have betrayed them. And I used to talk about the levels of distrust with my students, my college students, and one woman said to me, well, have you seen our social life like you can imagine you go through life, you're getting ghosted by somebody who thought was your boyfriend or your girlfriend, you're getting savaged on social media. People are cruel to you, and so you have this rising level of distrust and to me, the only way to fight it is with the skills
I'm talking about in the book. And some people think, like the stuff we're talking about is like woo woo and squishy, but to me, it's the only practical way out. Like, it's not woo woo to like, lead with curiosity, it's not woo woo to lead with respect. And the only way you get out of our social mess is by acting in this way.
Can you talk about I guess you were giving a talk, David, and you've got a question on an index card that you said has haunted you for a very long time. Can you tell us about that?
Yeah, I was in Oklahoma and it's one of those talks where at the end of the talk they don't ask questions face to face, they just give you index cards. So I'm running through the cards and most of the questions are like politics or something, and then I turned to one card and says, what do you do if
you no longer want to be alive? And that to me was like a window into a lot of the pain that's out there in America, and at the moment, I didn't know what to say, and so I let it go without even answering or without even acknowledging it. And I think if I could go back, I would say, first of all, I want to salute you for your courage and your endurance, because you are still here, and you're in a lot of pain, but you're still here.
And then I would like to repeat to you something Victor Frankel said in Man Search for Meeting, which is that life is not stopped expecting things of you, and that there are still many good things you can do in the world. And then I would say, and I mentioned I have a chapter in the book about losing my oldest friend to depression. And you know, I would say, listen, there's no words I can utter that can heal your pain, but I can assure you that we're never leaving. We're
here for you. And I think when you're dealing with someone who's suffering from that much pain and depression, all you can say is I acknowledge the reality of the situation. I'm here for you. I'm not leaving. I'm just here.
When you described your embarrassment at a dinner the very next night. What happened.
Yeah, the woman who was at our house for dinner said, well, my brother committed suicide a few months ago, and then I mentioned it. I have my bunch of buddies and I get on a zoom call every Thursday, and I mentioned it to that group, and like half the people had some sort of suicide in their family and their life. And then, you know, as I mentioned later, I lost
my best friend to it. And it just feels like the pain in society is something pervasive that it's touched everyone who has lost someone to addiction, to suicide, someone who has a kid who's suffering with mental health issues. It's just like rivers of pain in society. And it's hard to have a healthy democracy when your society is rotting from the foundation. And this is what I worry about most, this social fragmentation.
I think about sometimes the increase in therapy and antidepressant medications and the decrease in mental health, like those two lines are not working together to take us to a better place.
I think David talks about that Kelly, because he says looking within can lead people to become vulnerable narcissists and I've wondered about that too, because when you look at surveys about happiness, it's really and I've interviewed people about this, so I'm sure all of us have. It's really about service to others and not being so self absorbed and
self focused that leads you to happiness. And I thought, you know, David, you could talk about what happened after World War Two and how sort of the focus on the individual and now the uber focus on our own quote unquote well being has impacted our ability to form deep relationships.
Yeah.
I mean, I think we've just got a much more individualistic culture. I mean when America was founded, that the founding fathers had a pretty realistic view of human nature that we're generous, well, we're also self centered, and so they had the idea that if we're going to build a country, a democracy out of these people, we need to do moral formation. And moral formation is a pretentious word, but it's really three basic things. One is it gives
you tips for how to control your natural selfishness. Two, it helps you find a purpose in life and ideal to organize your life around. And three it teaches you the skills of being considered in the complex circumstances of life, and so how do you ask for an offer forgiveness? How do you break up with someone without crushing their heart? These are basic social skills, and I think we've forgotten how to teach them, how to pass them along to generations.
And then we just live in a much more individualistic culture where people decide I don't need to pay attention to some external morality. I just need to get in touch with myself. And my basic rule is you're happier when you're thinking about other people, and you're less happy when you're thinking about yourself. It's just like that simple. And a lot of our happiness industrial complex gets people
thinking about themselves, and I think it's self destructive. And there is research that show that people who spend their most time thinking about happiness are least happy.
Yeah, yeah, I know.
And so this is my mom's whole opinions. So my dad sold ad space in women's magazines, and so we had women's magazines in our house, going back to like McCall's and then Get how Keeping whatever, and she would look at them, and even though her whole life was being underwritten by these magazines, they drove her bananas, because she was like, the answer is go to church and volunteer.
That's the answer. Like what is all this nonsense, all this lumination, all this self focus, all this me me me, and I need a bath every day and I need to have my massage massageer for my shoulders. She's like, that is nonsense, Like, get your ass in church and go help somebody.
Well, I do think there's a happy medium, you know. I do think kind of quote unquote self care. You know, the idea of putting your oxygen mask on first so you can be a better person to those you love.
I do think there's some legitimacy to that, but I do think the pendulum has swung a little too far, and I think it's honestly, I think it's kind of a modern day medicine for loneliness that if you can spend your time worrying about your pores, then it's actually just taking time that it makes you feel better because you're thinking about something other than your own misery.
Right, Yeah, No, it's just loneliness is a perversity because no one wants to be lonely. And yet now, as I said, thirty six percent are persistently lonely. Why don't they just get together with the other loner people. But one of the problems is loneliness distorts your view of reality and it makes you suspicious of other people. So you begin to fear what you long for most, which is human connection.
But also our sense of community has unraveled, David. I know with your Whole Weave project, you're looking at people who are developing a sense of community. But you think about church attendance and religious services. The attendance has declined a lot, and there aren't like rotary clubs and Kuwanas clubs, and you know, people don't seem to get together as much. So these things that gave us a sense of community.
Of course, it was exacerbated by the pandemic. So I think bringing some of those institutional structures back is really important too, Because you say, I'm curious, you say loneliness leads to meanness, so you know it's not only distrust, but it's actually meanness.
How So, well, if you feel invisible to the world, there's nothing crueler than indifference, and so if you feel you're not seen by the world, you regard that as an injustice, which it is, and so you want to lash out. You decide the world's a very dangerous place, and you want to lash out. And I think what a lot of people have done is they've taken loneliness and they've taken really a moral vacuum they find themselves in,
and they've tried to fill it with politics. And so, in a healthy society, we have the politics of distribution, like where should we put the resources of money, how hi shad taxes be, what should we spend money on? That's a healthy society. We have the politics of recognition, where we want to have a politics where my side is elevated and respected and your side is shamed and destroyed. And so politics gives you the illusion that you are living in a moral landscape. There's us good guys and
those bad guys. Gives you the illusion you're doing moral action. I'm getting indignant about those people who are ruining the country. It gives you the illusion of community, like you're in a party. But these are just illusions, like you're not
really in the community. You're not getting to know somebody, you're just hating the same people together, and you're not really in a moral landscape, which is about the line between good and evil runs through every human heart, not between groups, and so you've traded your moral vacuum for sort of culture war and moral war. And I think that's one of the reasons why everything in society has gotten so politicized.
But also so black and white and so lacking of nuance. You quote a researcher named Ryan Streeter, he's director of Domestic Policy Studies at the AI American Enterprise Institute that lonely young people are seven times more likely to say they are active in politics and young people who aren't lonely. And I think this is elaborating on what you just said. It gives them some sense of community to be with like minded people. It's almost their little tribe of people
who they can feel connected to. But what you're saying is they're not really connected to them.
They're just sharing their Twitter feeds, and you know, they're not really doing good. They're not sitting with the poor, serving a widow. They're just registering their feelings or their emotions about some political issue. And so to me, it's like a very impoverished way to live. Cover politics. We care about politics, but politics is not more important than family. Politics not more important than your friendships and your relationships.
And when I look at the rise of misery in this country, I could tell a lot of stories, Like Katie, you told the sociology story, we just aren't active in civic life. I could tell the social media story, which is, you know, social media's driving us all crazy, which I was also a true story. I could tell economic inequality story, we're just more separated from one another. I can even tell the coddling story, where overprotective parenting leads to kids
who are not resilient in the face of challenge. But to me, the core story, and the one I addressed in the book, is we're just not treating each other well. I mean, we're just at a basic human level. We find ourselves in the world that's distrustful and brutal, and the meanness comes up. You know. I was at a restaurant in New York a couple months ago, and I happened to be chatting with the owner and he said, I have to throw people out of this restaurant every
week now for rude behavior. A friend who's a nurse, and she said, I have trouble keeping staff because the patients have gotten so abusive, that the nurses want to leave the profession, and so there's just been this rising tide of hate crimes. You know, the incidents on airplanes. COVID made it all worse. But loneliness leads to meanness.
Yeah, an accompaniment like in the Pote Francis way, is a very advanced move, like for a human being to be able to do that, because accompaniment is sort of antithetical to the fix. What do you mean by accompaniment? It's just like, I'm just gonna sit with you. Like you can just tell me your weirdest, hardest thing. You can say I think my marriage is ending. You can say I don't. I'm as much money as I pretend like I have. You can say I think that my
daughter is suicidal. You can say these horribly difficult things, and I will not dive in with my smarty pants solution. I'll just sit with you. I'll just sit right down with you in it. But that is like very advanced, Like not that many people I know in my life are that good at biting their tongue because it's so uncomfortable.
Yeah, I'm not. I always try to fix things, yes, people, or that's my immediate impulse. How can I fix this problem for you? Yeah, and I think you're right.
Let's tell me more. What else go on?
Like those seven words will take you so far, And it's so relaxing to be like, I'm actually not formulating, we're not taking turns talking. I'm actually just absorbing and I'm gonna let Like I remember talking to Claire, my daughter, during the pandemic, and she was such a she was so bright eyed the whole time she was baking and learning Spanish and like doing the pandemic, like getting an a and pandemic. And then she cracked one day and
I said, what else? And she said lacrosse? Like we can't play lacrosse, which means I'm not getting any exercise, which means like I'm sluggish all day. I'm like, what else? She's like, there are no parties, like I just watched fash times at Ridgemont High. None of that is like my high school experience. My high school experience is sitting in my bedroom. What else go on? Everybody's fighting over who can go to parties and who can't?
What else? I mean?
She must have had twenty five things and all we did was let them surface and I had no answers at all. It was just like let the river run and Claire like say it all. I don't care. I'm not going to stop you. We need to talk to Kelly Moore. David.
I know, I know there's a thing called the midwife model that your job in some conversations when somebody's hurting is your job is not to be the You're not giving birth, You're just the midwife. You're helping the person give birth.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Accompanyment is a noble aspiration person to person. I've never even heard of that, so I'm going to think about that.
Yeah, it's like a pianist accompanying a singer, Like the pianist is paying attention to the singer and he knows he's not the star, but he's doing what he can to make her shiney.
Like coming up underneath.
It's so beautiful.
Yeah.
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your wallet? Terms apply see capitolwe dot com slash bank Capital one NA member fdic Kelly and I are back with David Brooks. I wanted to ask you, I just you know, everything you've talked about, of course, is surfacing in the aftermath of those horrific barbarian attacks in Israel that were just honestly so unspeak I don't even I think words failed to even describe what happened in Israel, and now of course the humanitarian crisis that is unfolding
and Gaza. I think words failed there as well. But the reaction, David has been so intense, so angry, so lacking in humility. You know that maybe you don't have all the answers, And I'm curious how you've seen that in light of writing this book and are afraid social relationships, how you've used your lens to watch this and analyze it.
Thank you for asking that. It's obviously been a very intense period. I guess at first I've sometimes had the thought that we're in this epic battle between the forces of dehumanization and the forces of humanization. And if you want to know dehumanization, the ultimate form is somebody who can go to a music festival and murder and rape innocent teenager, very young people. I mean, that is the essence of dehumanization.
It's like they were characters in a video game or something, right.
It's the failure recognized the humanity of the people right in front of you, and to cackle while you're killing them. And then, Frank, I saw the Israeli defense ministers say we're going to war against animals, and I think Hamas is evil, but they are human beings and we just shouldn't call human beings animals. First of all, it's not fair to the animals. They're not going around committing genocide. But also it's just we should always respect there's another human being on the side here.
Well, I think more importantly is that Palestinians are you know, Hamas doesn't represent all Palestinians. I mean, honestly, the way they behaved, and maybe this is wrong. I had no issue with him calling the people who committed these crimes animals because they were subhuman. To your point, David, But I think the mistake is tarrying all Palestinians living in Gaza as such.
Yeah, and some people, you know, you have to fight iron with iron. You can't like reason with hamas like, you just have to fight them. And that's the grim reality. But you know, I was late at night one night, I was doom scrolling through Twitter or whatever whatever's left of it, and I was seeing all the videos of the kids were killed in Israel, the bombings and Gaza,
just ream of dehumanization. And then I scroll and somehow in my Twitter feed there I come across a video of a short interview with James Baldwin, the great novelist from the fifties and sixties, and he's saying, there's not as much humanity in the world as one would like, but there's more than you think there's enough. And you have to remember when you walk down the street and you look at the other people, you have to remember
you're looking at you. That could be you. You could be the cop, you could be the monster, you could be the cruel person. And you just have to make a conscious choice to decide not to be that. And so in the midst of all this dehumanization. When you see Baldwin, you see a defiant humanist, a person who's not going to put away as humanity in the midst of conflict, in the midst of racism, which is dehumanization, who's going to try to extend end up for the
human dignity in the human mind. And I just found that defiant humanism in the face of dehumanizing circumstances is so inspiring. It's like Mendela coming out of prison in South Africa. It's like gold in my ear in Israel, in the Middle East, it's like Gandhi in India, like in brutal circumstances, discovering your humanity. And I'm a big fan of a woman named Eddie Hillissom who was a Jewish woman and grew up in Amsterdam the thirties and forties,
and when the Nazis occupied Germany. At that point she was twenty five and frankly self indulgent and a little spoiled. But over the next few years she was transformed into someone who was basically a human saint who spent her time caring for those other Jews in Amsterdam who are in danger of getting shipped to Auschwitz, and she was remembered as this warm, glowing, other centered person, and her
biographer wrote of her, she changed by paying attention. She paid close attention to the people who were suffering, and by power of that attention, she sort of grew by looking. And so she understood the anxiety in some of these voice, the fear in somebody else's, and in that way she was transformed. And I've always found her example of somebody who refused to get numb by bitterness, and who insisted on being open and available and giving and accompanying people even in the most brutal time.
I actually think that goes to the single most important line in your book, which is that our greatest moral act is the quality of our attention.
You also quote Peggy Noonan saying people are proud of their bitterness.
Now, yeah, in every one of Peggy's columns there are like three or four sentences you want to clip out and say forever.
Yeah, it's true, isn't it? But it is depressing. And you know, I have been chagrined that this whole idea of practicing dialectical thinking holding two opposing views at once. Yes, the Israeli policies towards Gaza have been in some cases inhumane, and this attack was unconscionable and deserves universal condemnation. And it just doesn't seem like people can hold those two
thoughts at once. Some people can, but they're even being accused of being complicit if they're holding these two thoughts. And for me as a journalist, honestly, it's been very, very difficult to cover this because I get angry DMS twenty four to seven from both sides. And do you think they're people who are able to try to look at to have empathy for both places or are those people in the minority?
And could we potentially gin up some empathy for the people who are so drawn to certainty, Like could we say to all the people in your DMS, of course you want it to be black and white. Of course you want it to be clear as day. Of course you want it to be unequivocal, Like we want that every time everything comes across our transom, that's what we do. We're sorting as fast as we can good or bad, good or bad, good or bad.
But things aren't good or bad. I mean, I think you're talking about factor fiction, but things are messy right, they're nuanced, They're complicated totally. And people are so righteous, yes, and you can understand that. And I want to be empathetic, as you say, Kelly, to those who are righteous, because I think they are bearing the burden of, you know, decades of oppression or decades of fear, decades of anti Semitism, or decades of being thought you're less than because of
your circumstances. So I get it. It's just so hard to navigate.
David.
Yeah, you know, I covered it for twenty years or so, and it was the hardest thing to write about because people are so polarized about that as issue. But I remember once I was at a dinner at when Shimo and Peiz was president of Israel. Heated dinner with like forty or fifty people, and he invited the Palestinian leadership was there. I remember Abu Allah, who was a lead Palestinian negotiator, and then the Israeli people who had been
in the peace process for all their lives. It was a un named Dan Meridor and others, and a bunch of journalists were invited, and there was such a warmth in the room that it was as if everybody in the room was like a bunch of old guys who were in the peace process business, and they had been through crises, they'd been through years and decades of negotiation,
and I remember that warmth and there. This was back in the nineties when it really did seem like peace was at hand, and those were people who were just dealing with the complexities of the situation, like how do we have a settlement where the Palestine get sovereignty over the Aluxeamosque and the Jews get sovereignty over the Western Wall? How do you do that? How practicality is how you do it? Now, nobody's talking about practicalities. Frankly, it's all theater.
It's all terror theater, and people are just trying to get their message and their narrative across without just the elements of like how actually would you have a two state solution? And I think what's happened is that both sides have given up on practical thinking. They just have decided, well, we'll postpone when we get but we're going to get it all. Someday we're going to get it all. We're
going to wish that the other side didn't exist. And that's just not true, and the other side is going to be there forever and ever, and yet we're into the just I want to make a statement on Instagram and that's how I wage my politics these days.
And that's what wins. I mean nobody. I have this scientist friend, Lisa Feldman Barrett, who I think you know, David, and she's often quoted. She's like one of the top one percent of scientists quoted in other people's reach, but she's never in the paper. And I said, why aren't you in the paper? And she said, because I won't say unequivocal things. And that's not what anyone wants to hear.
So the journalists hang up and they call another scientist who will say, oh, yes, it's always this or it's always that, like black and white cells, and nuance is exhausting, like vitriol is very energizing. Righteousness you talk faster, you sit up higher, you draw people to you. It's like a total ego buzz and like sitting around saying like, Eh, this is really complicated. Look what are you going to do about that?
Well, it's an engagement through enragement, right, I mean exactly the whole name of the game. These days, you know, David Kelly, and I I think could talk to you all day. But I'm curious as you look to the future because i hate to say it, but I'm very pessimistic. I mean, I guess, you know, in terms of solving these issues and changing it on a macro level. So when all is said and done, is the best thing you can say to people is change your life on
a personal level. That developing these bonds and these friendships will somehow bubble up and make the world a kinder, gentler place. To paraphrase George Bush Senior.
You know, I think we need top down change, Like it's very hard to have a calm society when your political leaders are ripping it apart, ripping it to shreds from the top. But we also need bottom up And when you look at moments in world history where in societies have really turned themselves around, and there are examples of this and written in the between eighteen thirty and
eighteen forty eight. In eighteen thirty, it was like a totally screwed up society where alcoholism was rampant, domestic violence was rampant, poverty and cruelty, and by eighteen forty eight, you know, it was suddenly no longer acceptable to get drunk and beat your wife the way it was acceptable thirty years before that, And so you had the beginnings
of Victorian morality. And this country between eighteen ninety and nineteen twenty or so, we took a society that was pretty brutal, filled with economic uncertainty, and we became a much more trusting society. And so you need top down political change, like in the our case, the progressive movement in nineteen tens, but you also need bottom up civic and relational change and cultural change. And so to me, you can't have a society at the top with democracy
if you don't have trust at the bottom. And two generations ago, if you ask people do you trust your neighbors, it's sixty percent say yeah, people my Neighborho's are pretty trustworthy. Now that's down to thirty percent and nineteen percent of millennials and Gen Z. And so the only way to fix that is trustworthy behavior, showing up for each other, having a sense that as I go through my life in the casual encounters of life at grocery store, at
a coffee shop with somebody buying a cash register. There's a little hint of recognition with each other, and then better relationships with my neighbors, better still relationships with my close friends. And so I'm enmeshed in this dance, this dance of people who are looking at me and are hearing me in big ways in little ways, and then you begin to feel calm. Then you really kind of establish a trusting work relationship. But it requires those minute, daily interactions of life.
When I ask the barista, how are you, she says, I'm good, Thank you for asking. I mean, it really only takes very simple interactions to have an open heart and to actually care in big ways but small ways as well, you know, to smile at the person on the street, or I don't know, I've always been that person. I don't know what it is about me, but I see part of my job is to make somebody's day a little bit better. And I sound like Shirley Temple right now.
No, that's why we love you.
Kaddun with you and you are making so many people.
But Kelly, you too, and now David you too. I think it takes a little bit of effort. It takes a second, you know, And John gets mad at me sometimes when people occasionally approach me or they want a selfie or whatever. He says, exit question exit questions, because I do end up sort of hearing their life story
in some cases. But I think, you know, if I can make someone happy or feel seen coming back to the book and feel important and they are by the way, I feel like that small amount of effort is so worth it. Plus I don't want them telling their friends I was a real bitch.
They're sad as well. All altruism is self servey.
You see, Taylor was riped. It all goes back to swift.
Isn't there some great social science around the value of weak ties?
Yeah, there's. First, as Katie was talking, when my youngest son was nine, somebody came up to me on the street to say that my work whatever. And my son looks at me afterwards and said, you know, they come for you, but they stay for.
Me, so right, So right? Is he a stand up?
He wanted to be at that age he wanted to be a stand up.
Yeah, that's funny.
There is. Yeah, the strength of weak ties is like if you want a job or you want an opportunity, the people you know well know all the things you know, but the people you don't know well know things you don't know, and so it's it's those weak connections. And conversely, you were talking about being nice to the barista. If if somebody at a cash register is cruel to me or aloof or cold and clearly pissed off at the world,
it dampens your day. I mean, these these minute interactions are weirdly powerful and shaping how you go through, you know, life.
Sometimes I have to nudge myself to look someone right in the eyes, Like I just did it yesterday, taking this oil painting class, and it was the last class, and I wanted to thank the instructor, and rather than I put a lot of words on it and do a big show, I just made sure that I had her eyes, you know, for two or three seconds, and I just said thank you so much. I've loved this and it was like a thing like eye contact, like
real eye contact. Iyebought eyeball is more rare than I wish it was, because it's way more impactful than a whole bunch of words.
Well, I love this book, and David, you know, I'm a huge fan.
And I always have been.
I find you're writing more often than not, Like Peggy Noonan's more than a phrase. I find the things you say really profound and really influenced me in a positive way. So I would like to say thank you for all your writing, thank you for being so vulnerable and honest about your desire to grow as a person, because I think all of us want that despite all the societal things that are swirling around us that are actually working
against that. And you know, all I can say is I'm going to try to see people even more because I think we can always do better at that. And I think I'm also going to focus on my really deep relationships because I think for me, I have so many friends and so many acquaintances, and because I'm interested in everyone, sometimes I'm spread too thin and I can't be a good friend to the people who really really matter.
So I think that's important too, because there just aren't enough hours in the day to have this kind of relationship with people.
Yeah, that things were of being spread too thin. I was just talking to my wife about this, Like, we have a friend who her marriage split up, and we learned about it a couple weeks so, and we like, you should break everything and be there for her at that moment. But then we got this obligation in that obligation, and so I think we were thinking, you just have
to be ruthless. Like whatever obligation we're going to have to break, we won't remember it, but we will remember being there for her at that moment, and I will say, it's just such a pleasure to be with you. Guys. You guys are the superstars of this skill I'm trying
to learn. And Katie, where you just did there? Like one way one of the things I learned is how to end a conversation is you thank somebody for their time, but then you specify something you really appreciated they told you, and then you say it thanks, it's been great to be with you. And when they end the conversation gracefully in that way, it's like they put a cherry on
top you feel. You feel, oh yeah, what they liked about me is when I said that interesting thing about or told that interesting story and you think, wow, that person's a great listener. So another discreete tip on how to end conversations gracefully.
All right, so here's my ending for you. I was gonna say, I don't want it to end go ahead, Kelly.
I like that you've been willing to.
Modulate in public, Like I think that there's real fear of people public figures saying I was wrong or I changed my mind, and I think it's to the great detriment of society. Like people should change their mind as new information becomes available, as new evidence surfaces, we should adjust accordingly, of course, And for some reason, it's sort
of not done with public figures. And the way that your feelings about your party, the Republican Party have evolved over time for all of us to see, I think is a model for other people whose feelings might similarly be evolving over time. And it's essential that we set each other free in this way.
So thanks, thank you.
You know, I've always thought politics is a competition between partial truths, that in most issues both sides have something right, and the key is to try to find the balance in that circumstance. And you never, I found you never want to be too especially as a journalist, to be too associated with one party or not. And so I was conservative. I was never really Republican because I didn't want to be part of a team, because that like limits your thinking. And now one of my heroes is
this guy at Philosopher, Isaiah Eberlyn. He said, I'm on the right word edge of the left word tendency, and so that's where I am these days. I'm on the right word edge of the left wore tendency. So happy to be there.
Oh my god, a whole other podcast about what the hell is happening with the GOP, David, But that'll have to be for your next book or your next column, because what a mess. But we'll lend on a happier note. Good luck with the book, David. I really hope people will read it because I do think it'll improve their lives. And are you doing a big book tour? Are you talking to a lot of people? How are you getting the word out?
Yeah? I get to go on a tour of America. I tell my musician friends, imagine a rock tour with all the fun taken out, and so it's like, I mean, the fun part is I get to meet people and give talks and you know, do signings.
Thank you so much, and Kelly, what a treat to have you with me anytime.
David, You're the best. My love to Anne and thank you for writing this book.
Thank you for doing this. Of course, deeply appreciate both of you, LEAs.
So Kelly, that was so fun. That was so fun. I know, I loved it. It was great.
Thank you for doing this with me. I loved that conversation, and I honestly I loved having it with you.
Well, I'll do it anytime. I loved it too, and I love seeing your little face. I was just thinking that the one question that we didn't get to fall into was the male female side of this, which is to say, it's really quite different in terms of potential impact for this kind of content to be coming from a conservative male columnist rather than say, a female psychologist, right. And I was also laughing sometimes when I was reading it.
I was thinking, Oh, this is going to be so funny for Katie and I to be talking to him about this, because you and I are like holding people in the supermarket checkout line, you know, because they're telling us things on a street corner that he is just now learning how to elicit from a person. And I just wonder if many female listeners will agree that we have a tremendous amount of practice in this kind of conversation.
Yeah, and a distinct advantage yeah, and well, I think men are conditioned to keep a type less emotionally attuned to people. So I think I hope men read this book. And although I really think everyone could use it, I think yes, women are I think more emotionally available. Although you can't generalize too much, but I think all of us could learn. I mean, I feel like I could
be better. And I also think the bottom line of what David talked about, which is kind of captain obvious here, but I'm going to say it anyway, is is ask questions. You know, if you're in a social situation, or you are out on a date or with people. If you ask questions, if you are interested, people love to tell
you their story. They love to talk about themselves. And conversely, if somebody doesn't ask you a question, you know, if you're out on a date or something, you know, I say this to people I know who are single and the person doesn't ask you a question, check please, because bbye, you know no kind of empathy or interest or curiosity about you. So I think whenever you find yourself in a sticky situation or you're at a party, just ask questions and everything else will follow. It's so simple. But
something that I think people are not necessarily taught. So that would be my closing observation and instruction to everyone listening, be interested, be curious, and ask questions.
Yeah, I mean, I think I would double down on that, which is is you're you're like one great question away from something new, Like you're one question away from learning something that you don't understand right now, or from a feeling that you haven't had in a while, or the beginning of a friendship like it's you're literally.
One question away.
It couldn't be simpler or cheaper, and it couldn't be more impactful.
Thanks for listening everyone. If you have a question for me, a subject you want us to cover, or you want to share your thoughts about how you navigate this crazy world, reach out. You can leave a short message at six oh nine five point two five five five, or you can send me a DM on Instagram. I would love to hear from you. Next Question is a production of iHeartMedia and Katie Kuric Media. The executive producers are Me, Katie Kuric, and Courtney Ltz. Our supervising producer is Ryan Marx,
and our producers are Adriana Fazzio and Meredith Barnes. Julian Weller composed our theme music. For more information about today's episode, or to sign up for my newsletter, wake Up Call, go to the description in the podcast app, or visit us at Katiecuric dot com. You can also find me on Instagram and all my social media channels. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows with no fees
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