Episode 73: What to Do About Our Loneliness
Watch EpisodeWelcome to Wisdom from the Aerial View, the podcast for those who wish to crush their anxiety and find meaning and purpose in their lives. Good morning, good afternoon. Hello, Dr. Klein. How are you today?
>> I'm great, Enid. Always so great to see you. I look forward to these conversations every single time.
>> I do too. I do too. This has really actually given me some meaning and purpose in my life. Interestingly enough, I think it's important that we have conversations. I think it's important that we we have dialogues with our friends and even our neighbors. I think that's really important because we're living in a world right now where we're people are lonely and socially isolated. And when we talked about what we should talk about today, you said, "Let's talk about that." And I think you're right. Let's let's talk about that. So what I wanted to do was the first thing I wanted to look at was um what are we talking about here? And there's several articles that I found. Um the first one is called America's loneliness epidemic. What to be done? And so this was sort of interesting the definition. Loneliness can be a normal part of life. This professor, this doctor said it's the distressing feelings we have when we have fewer social connections than we want and need. But being lonely is different from being alone which might not be a bad thing. In fact, there may be times when we seek out solitude as an escape from business as usual. Loneliness and social isolation become detrimental when they persist for extended periods of time. We are wired as human beings to connect with others. Our brains are designed for social connectedness. Our survival from birth into adulthood depends on it. We are wired to be social, aren't we?
>> It would seem so. I mean, you and I certainly are.
>> Yeah. Yeah, we are. That's for sure.
>> No doubt about that. Um, you know, I think what we talked about what you know about this topic uh you know what you just read is that people want to be alone sometimes and we do. So being alone sometimes is fun and we enjoy it and we it's quiet and we get to think what we think and do what we want to do and eat what we want to eat and all those great things. Yeah,
>> but then we know when there's something missing. So these things are not shouldn't be confused and I don't think they're difficult to I don't think it's I don't think it's difficult to separate the idea of when you want to be alone versus loneliness.
>> You know, I've I I have a a couple of interesting things that I do in my life uh that address these this topic directly on on a very some might say superficial or almost silly level, but I'll tell you what they are. So when I go to a restaurant, all my friends know this and you and I have been to restaurants together. Uh I 100% of the time ask the waiter or waitress um their name,
>> right? So why do I do that? Well, first reason is because it's like including them in the world. Like you're not just here to serve me. You're a human being.
>> I want you to know that we, you know, we appreciate you doing this and you always, if you take the time, you usually find out something interesting about the person, whatever it may be, right? So that takes a little more time, but I often will do that too. So that's number one. Number two is a lot of times if I'm in like an elevator or a um you know some public waiting area, maybe even at an airport sitting around um not to be annoying, but if I think that it's appropriate, I'll talk to the people around me and then what happens is just fascinating. Let's say you're sitting in the airport and you know we're sitting at you the rows face each other and there's a lot of people in the at the gate and you know some people have kids and some people are reading and some but but you know generally speaking there's people just kind of milling around or looking around and if you start talking to somebody next to you or across from you often what will happen is somebody else in that row or that you know the area will chime in and all of a sudden you have a conversation.
>> It could be the silliest thing. It doesn't have to matter what it's about, right? But people will generally chime in. Not everybody. There are certainly people who will who will look at you like, "Why are you bothering me? I'm trying to listen to my music or watch a video, whatever." And there will be people like that, which is fine. They're entitled to their privacy uh and their quiet time, whatever, their alone time. But there's always people who will jump in, right? And what does that tell you? There's this natural instinct to want to join. I'm sure you've seen this. You go to a restaurant, right? And uh the other night I was at uh this is the opposite. This is the part that that didn't work out, but I was in Ohio and I was on business and I happened to be in this hotel overnight by myself and I went down to the restaurant. I didn't feel like going out and walking around Cleveland. I was I was just kind of tired. So, I feel like just go down to the restaurant. So, I walk in the restaurant. There are two other guys there sitting at tables that are 180 degrees opposite each other but across the room.
>> And the way the hostess seats me in the middle at a table. So, there's this little triangle of three guys of varying age, right? And of course, I'm looking at both of them, seeing if I can, you know, just figured we're the only people in this restaurant. Now, we're not right next to each other, but we can't possibly disturb anybody because there's nobody there. I could not get anybody, either of the guy's attention. One guy was on his phone nonstop. I didn't see his eyes move once. The other guy was also on his phone. He ordered a quite quite a lavish dinner. I just started something small. But and I'm thinking, boy, what a missed opportunity, right? This is just a missed opportunity. I mean, not to say we're going to be best friends, but you know, I I can guarantee that everybody's going to feel better if we just we chat for a few minutes because there's something about it, like you just said, there's some need that we have to be social. So, I, you know, like to take the opportunity whenever I can to kind of see if I can ignite a small little fire. Sometimes it works, like at the airport, sometimes it doesn't, like at the restaurant the other night. But I think I think most people, not everybody, but most people find that enjoyable.
>> You know what's interesting when you think about this whole notion of uh we we call what we're doing on the phones and whatever social media. Well, it's not so is it? In fact, one would make the could make the argument that it is a deterrent to being social.
>> Oh, I think it's an easy argument. Yeah, you're right.
>> Yeah. I mean, that man and maybe there are always you go and to a restaurant, somebody's eating alone. In the old days, they used to bring a book. They'll read a book and I do that myself. And now it's you're on the phone. And I think we do that for several reasons. I think it's because we are social and we sort of don't want to be with ourselves. We're afraid to be with ourselves. We had a conversation about that a while back. I think people are afraid to be with themselves. And so, you know, the phone. Yeah.
>> I have a question for you. So, let so let's put you in those kind of analogous situations that I was talking about.
>> Okay. What's your instinct?
>> Oh, I talk to everybody. I I mean, I'm an idiot. I just will talk to anybody and say anything to ignite something. I'll I'll crack a joke. I'll I mean, I'll do anything but talk about the weather because I don't care about Although sometimes I'll do that to to icebreak. But I think as a woman, if I'm alone in an elevator with a man and I'm trying to strike up a conversation, you got to be a little bit more careful.
>> That's true.
>> Yeah. But but that has still not stopped me. It doesn't matter to me. I want to have a conversation. I want to talk to somebody. I want to be social. Um I don't know why that is, but I do. Yeah. I I like to do that.
>> Well, let's get back to the beginning of this conversation. Before Before we start the podcast, we always chat, you and I, for a while.
>> Uh and uh I think people who listen to us know that we obviously like each other a lot. But we also really enjoy talking to each other, right? And that is part of the whole thing. And it's not just um and you and I didn't talk to each other for years and years and years. So it wasn't like we have this history that we just used to talk to. There was a big big big gap when we didn't talk to each other.
>> But we like talking. So why is it why is it that we enjoy enjoy that? It's not just you and me obviously, right? And what you said earlier that social media is anything is anything but social. So the question is I think uh a how detrimental is the current situation in our society today and then b what do we do about it? So
>> that's the
>> I know you have a lot of thoughts on this. Well, I do, but but I you know, I think that um we have a shared background. We have a shared history. We've got a past that was very on the same plane. We we did that. Um and yet you go out and you make new friends and you have college friends or business friends and whatever. But the whole notion and one of the things that I've always loved about you is you think the most important thing, one of the most important things in life are relationships. And that's to me what it's all about. If we have relationships with people and even if they're strangers, we can have a relationship with a stranger. Even if it's for five or three minute elevator ride, you strike up a conversation, there's some sort of relationship building there. Doesn't mean it's going to go on. It doesn't have to go on. It can be a spur-of-the- moment relationship. And I think to me, even spur-of-the- moment relationships are important. They take me, they take the person out of who we are and and bring it to somebody else. And I think you can have that. I think a spur of the moment relationship is almost as important because it says, "I see you. I hear you. I asked the waiter's name because we're all part of the same universe." And we need to understand each other and respect each other's space, but also respect each other's time, but also respect each other as human beings on breathing in the same air in the elevator, in the restaurant, or a longtime friendship.
>> You know, the question, you know, me, I'm always like, okay, let's dig down one more level. Yeah.
>> So, so we would agree that most people feel similar. They that that they appreciate that relationships are very very valuable. For me, obviously I I put them at the top of the list, but you know, people don't have to agree with that, but they're certainly clearly very important. And so the question is, why are they so important? Why is this interaction with other people so important? Why why do we talk about it? Why do we why do we say loneliness is bad? Why do we why do we feel that loneliness is bad? We don't just say it, we we sense it. We experience it. You you know, you've seen you work a lot with the elderly. You see a lot of loneliness. you know, it's not healthy and it's and it's bad. Okay. So, the question is why? Why is it unhealthy? Why is it healthy to have relationships and social interactions, direct social interactions, and and why is it unhealthy or undesirable not to? Well, you know, again, let me let me go back to some of the things that I've looked at because I think it's fascinating. Um, according to the surgeon general, this was um a surgeon general's report. Um, he said that social isolation increases the risk of premature death by 29%. I'm going to get back to that. Uh, it's equivalent to the impact of smoking 15 cigarettes a day. I'm going to get back to that. Um, loneliness increases the risk of heart disease, stroke, and dementia, as well as other serious medical conditions. So, here's the question. Two things. It does cause physical problems and mental problems. Let's put that aside for a second. It gets back to your whole thing about facts. Excuse me. How do you know that it increases it by 29%. Not 32%, not 26, but 29%. Where in God's name do they come up with this? You tell me.
>> Well, people can't see us because this is a audio only podcast, but you have me smiling because I love when you I love when you do this.
>> It's silly. But but yeah, I agree. These all these numbers are silly. I mean, we see it all the time. They're just silly. And the reason they're silly, just to have our listeners understand why, is because when you do an experiment, uh, and you want to find out if something's causing something else, your goal is to isolate one single variable, right? And everything else stays the same. Which is why we do age match control scientific experiments. You take people the same age, same experience, same height, weight, whatever, as many things as you can match, and you only have one thing different. You eat tomatoes or you don't eat tomatoes. Everything else is same. Right? Now, of course, it's nearly impossible to do that with humans. In fact, it is impossible. So, you can't. So, if you're only controlling, you know, a handful of of all the potential variables, your data doesn't mean a thing. It's nice, but we can just say, forget about the 15 cigarettes a day or the 20. Let's just say people who have relationships do better in life. They're healthier. They're happier. They live longer. It's true of, you know, of married people. It's true of people who go to church. There's a lot of groups like this. We can't really say what it is probably. It's none of those particular things. It's all of it together. It's their personality. It's the way they look at the world. It's not just whether they go to church or are married. It's like how do you look at the world? How do you interpret the world? How do you react with other people? So, I want to get back to the question of why that I actually asked. Yeah. Um, and I'll tell you what I think is that that the fact that that we do poorly when we don't have these social interactions or do worse. It's like it's like this impetus to say, "No, no, no. You're getting this wrong. Get out there and do it because if you don't do it, you're going to feel sick. You're going to get old. You're going to get sad." So, our bodies, our our instincts, our inner psycho psyche is saying telling us, "Get out there. Get out there. You got to do it. You got to do it." Right? And our bodies telling us it's really important. Okay. So, why is it really important? It gets back to me to to why we're doing this podcast. It's all about purpose, right? Yeah.
>> If you don't have relationships, if you don't spend time with other people, then you are minimizing the the uh effect you can have on the world through helping other people and and sharing with other people. It is so critical. Um before we started this podcast today, I was boring you with some physics as usual
>> and you were kind enough to listen to me. But it really comes down to you can look at all the science you want, you know, and I'm a science guy. I love science. I you know me, I watch physics videos. I I study all this stuff. I love it, right? I'm a real believer in science. But I take science with a grain of salt because gr science cannot possibly answer the most important questions. It cannot. You can ask the greatest physicists on the planet, they will tell you science cannot answer the most important questions. You know we can describe we can explain mostly describe what's going on in s that makes sense but we can't say why we can't say why this is why we are why are human beings the way we are why is the world the way it is we can't science cannot tell us that but these kind of other things give us hints what we call what I call clues to why we're here and this idea that when we're alone when we're not sharing where we're isolated our bodies react everything reacts negatively it's saying no no no you're getting this wrong
>> you got got to get out there. Why? That's why you're here. That's why you're here. So, when you and I, you know, when you crack a joke in an elevator at a restaurant and try and get a conversation going or I do something not as funny as you, but make my best effort, uh, it's because we know, we know this is what it's all about. Pay attention. You know, look, we have all this, we talked about conflict a few weeks ago. We have all this conflict in the world. It is very difficult to hate somebody that you know, that you spend time with. I I let me put this way. Hate them. You can dislike them. You can say, but to the point where you want to shoot them
>> or throw them off a cliff, it's much harder when you have some type of relationship. And when people hide behind their what you, you know, very approply called antisocial social media accounts. Yeah.
>> And they don't know people, so they call them names. You ever noticed, I give you an example. I just happened to see something uh today um commenting on somebody in government who was going to be on TV or do something on TV and the first reaction was this blitz from the other side of how terrible this is and how wrong this is and why are people's first reaction to be negative you know their first reaction is be negative no your first reaction should be what we talked to my wife last week and that people are going to hear um very that are getting that have already heard last week about her attitude. Uh, and she never does things like that. She never uh she's always happy for other people. When you're happy for other people, when you create that kind of bond, even like you said, the three-minute relationship, everybody feels better. It's a magic trick, right?
>> And and you can't hate as much. You can't want to destroy and bring down. You don't you don't sit on your computer on your phone and say and just throw venom at other people who you've never met and you don't know.
>> Yeah. Yeah. And the antidote is to know them as much or not them particularly but as many people as you can. This is a to me the most critical component of of any society. Well, one of the things we learned we're talking about um loneliness but when we talk about social isolation we learned a lesson I hope from COVID we socially isolated everybody. Now you said I I work with with the with the elderly. I am elderly and I work with the elderly. And I realized that what we did in particular with both ends of the spectrum, the kids and the old folks. I'm not sure what happened to the ones in the middle. I think they were better. They fared better. But we isolated kids. We told them, don't go to school and sit at home. And we told older people, don't talk to anybody. Don't go to the senior center. Don't talk to people. You don't go to the grocery store. In fact, in fact, I was thinking the other day they made us go to the grocery store at 6:00 in the morning. It was they were open for old people at 6:00 in the morning and they lined us up as though we were rats in a we were lined up and we went into the grocery store. We looked at each other like, "What are we nuts?" Had a mask on and we couldn't smile at each other. And by the way, that was not good either. We couldn't smile at each other. They isolated us to the point that we were not even allowed to smile at one another. And then what we found is the kids, getting back to this, kids on the spectrum, they suffered. They lost how many years of schooling, how many years of participatory work with other kids playing in the schoolyard. And the old folks, they suffered and they were all alone. And how many years do we have left? So what we did, we socially isolated people and we said, "You'll be okay when it's over." And we're not.
>> You know, it's interesting. I I think I've told you this, but in the very very beginning of COVID in 2020, I think it was March, it started 2020. I'm pretty sure that's when it was. And about a month later, with very short time later, I said to my wife, I said, 'You know, um the the uh secondary effects of what we're going to what we're going to do, what we're doing with COVID is going to dwarf the actual medical the medical uh uh events that will occur. Now, we were going to lose people.
>> You know, when you have a pandemic, you know, people think there's a magic wand. You can do everything right and nobody will die and everything will be fine. But of course, that's ridiculous. It's not the way it works. We can't. We do the best we can, right? And I'm one of those people. I think that, you know, the people that were in charge of the government in those times, I think I think they I I know some of those people. They cared. They weren't trying to hurt people. They got wrong, but they weren't trying to hurt people. They were good people who spent their lives dedicated to helping people. So, I don't I don't throw them under the bus. I just think it was clear to me right in the beginning that this that these uh that the ancillary or or secondary sequelae the the things that were going to happen a result of all the decisions you just mentioned were going to dwarf the medical complications the loss of jobs the loss of interactions the loneliness we're talking about the education loss I mean on and on people lost their businesses I mean it was just so so egregious but uh but we can't go back right so and like you you know I'm going to This will happen again. We're going to repeat this at some point in the future. You and I probably won't be around for it, but we'll repeat it. But but you're right. If we The lessons should be that personal interactions, you cannot you you're going to have to live with death. You're going to have to live with illness. But if you take away all the inter personal interactions, it's a it's a it destroys the civilization. It destroys the society and the individual all together. You can't do it because that's why we're here. That's the whole purpose of why we're here. these relationships, these interactions. When you're in the aerial view and you hang out there like I do a lot and you look at all this stuff, it is so I don't want to say this the wrong way to me it is extremely obvious. Extremely obvious. That's when I watch all the political arguing and all this stuff going no no no no no this is you're getting this wrong you know finding find a great most of these things there's a happy medium you know stop thinking about your own personal power and aggrandizement and think what's best for people and we can get to this we can all together get to pretty much the same place on most topics but but when you when you allow decisions to to to create separation in a society when you isolate individuals You are from the aerial view, you can see this. You're missing the whole point. This is why we're here. We must be together. We must share. We must interact. We must have relationships, either long-term ones or five minute ones like you were talking about. We must have those. That's how we evolve. That's how we make this evolution from selfish to selfless, from inward focus to outward focus. This is why we're here. Anything you do that dampens that or suppresses that is going to be a big mistake. Even if occasionally it means illness or loss of life. I'm a doctor. You think I want to see anybody die? Of course not. But I know people do and I know people will. In fact, I know I don't know if I've shared this with you, Enid, but do you know that everybody alive today is at one time going to be dead?
>> Oh my goodness.
>> I don't know if you knew that.
>> Really? Yeah.
>> It's a It's a terrible idea, but it's true. Right.
>> So, okay. So, we're going to suffer. And I don't mean to minimize suffering or loss. You people who have listened to me a long time know I don't find these things funny. Cruelty, I don't find any of these things funny, right? But I recognize that that that there are always going to be trade-offs in life. But do never trade off the ability to interact, to socialize, to spend time with other people, to share, to create relationships. This is the essence. So be careful. Be careful when you make decisions about your world, about your society, about your communities. Be careful. any anytime you do something that's going to the detriment of that particular foundational entity relationships is generally almost always going in fact it will always go on the limit say it will always be wrong you will always be a mistake you'll always taking the wrong road
>> yeah I mean you look at some of the things that that science you you love science let's talk about science um they they talk about that loneliness and social isolation it can I mean it shortens your lifespan there's cognitive decline. I I think this is interesting to me that um loneliness can affect cognitive functioning, increasing the risk of Alzheimer's and dementia. Now, I don't know the scientific basis of this, but I find that absolutely fascinating that when we're isolated, when we're lonely, um whether it's by choice or not, it increases the risk of Alzheimer's and dementia.
>> I think it has something to do with Froot Loops, but I don't know for sure. But I would say but I would say look here's how I feel about this. If you have if you're socially isolated and you're by yourself and you've no interactions well then your whole purpose of life has been eliminated. Yes. At that point it's not surprising that you go into your own head. Now whether it's why I don't know nobody knows enough about Alzheimer's. A lot of the dementias we don't know enough. And I'm certainly not going to sit here and say that you know it could be a virus. It could be genetic. It could be environmental. It could be a million things. I don't know. It's probably multiffactorial. It's almost certainly multiffactorial, but we know there are certain things you can do. I was watching uh I think it was either CBS Sunday Morning or 60 Minutes or one of those shows a week or two ago and they were talking had this scientist on from Harvard uh a neurologist and he had Harvard has this brain care test. It's called I think it's called the brain care test. Have you seen it?
>> Yes, I did.
>> Right. Okay. So it's like I don't know a dozen questions whatever and you basically all it's designed to do is to see what you can do to maximize or to minimize your chance of having cognitive difficulties later in life. Now it it can control for genetic issues, illness, viruses, things like that. But these are things that are under our control and they're mostly pretty common, pretty pretty pretty obvious, you know, exercise, diet, relationships,
>> sleep,
>> sleep, right? You know, right? So, right. So, we can So, those things because because at the end of the day, that's why we're here. We're here for these relationship. We're here for these interactions. You know, I don't I don't want to beat this horse to death, but uh we we get this wrong in so many areas. It wasn't just COVID. It wasn't just COVID. You know, we focus on the wrong things. We We've talked a lot about what we're teaching kids, you know, in terms of all the things we're not teaching them. how to, you know, how to control their emotions, how to behave, how to see the world, how to treat other people, blah blah blah blah. This is just another one of those things, right? If if we if we teach them, if we if we fail to teach them that that interacting with other people, that sharing, being part of a community, even a small community, you don't you don't have to you don't have to be on your city council, right? But hang out with people in your building if you live in an apartment building or your neighborhood or you know if you have kids natural you know one of the natural things is I have I have a lot of grandchildren and even when my kids were young they were all on sports teams and what happens when your kids are on sports teams is you is you get to be friendly with the parents of the other kids on the same sports team and then you have every weekend you're hanging out with the same people and there's a lot
>> it's a community
>> it's a sense of community right and you know you know it might be that you maybe you're cheering for your kids' team, but most of the time it's just you just get through friendships and these relationships and you meet people and everybody feels better. It's so obvious everybody feels better. You know, one of the I I've been involved in a lot of work um lately about suicide, suicidal ideation. And one of the things that that the research does show is that when someone loses their sense of purpose, they lose their sense of value, they lose um the sense of themselves because they're lonely, because they're isolated, because they feel alone. It increases suicidal ideation. They feel they have no worth anymore. And we talked at great length about the the number one cohort of those people who are um suicidal or in fact not just attempting but are have uh died by suicide are are older men 85 years and older because they've lost their sense of purpose. They've lost their sense of value and they are all alone. They feel alone. They feel lonely and they are socially isolated. So I think social isolation and loneliness um is a very frightening thing in that it can lead to so many horrible horrific things.
>> Well, let's spend the last part of this uh episode talking about what can be done because you have a particular knowledge set and skill set that I think is very valuable in this area.
>> I do.
>> You do. You've been working in the in the nonprofit world. You've been feeding people, especially older people. You've been you've been spending time with all the people not just to feed them but to to all the things you've talked about. You are you are truly an expert because you've been in this so long and doing it so long. So you have a particular insight that most of us don't have.
>> My only insight is this Mark and and I tell you I see it uh all the time. I see it every week. I see it every day. And that is when we get people together and we break bread together there's something so remarkable that happens to people. That's why seniors go to senior centers. That's why kids during the lunch hour at school, they have fun because they're sitting doing something. There's a commonality there. No matter what it is, if they're just eating lunch out of their lunchbox or they're eating lunch at the senior center, when we do something together, I think that's the the clue to all of this, doing something together. Not
>> so how do we So, how do we increase that probability? What do we what do we do as a society to make this obviously keeping kids off social media as much as we can, moving away from the phones is key. I think we all agree on that. What else? What else do you think we should do?
>> You know, I I it's a good question. I think we ought to stop bullying everybody. I think we ought to turn off the television because there's too much bullying going on. It's become the norm to be negative. The negative is the norm. And that to me is a very bad thing. The negative is the norm. We're saying things about people. We're saying things to people. We're cursing at people. We just You always say we we've picked teams. And me and I kept think, well, no, we haven't. Yeah, we have. We've picked teams. And any team we pick is the wrong team because we shouldn't be on a team. We should all be on the human team. We are all in it together. And the sooner we realize that and the sooner we stop bullying each other and the sooner we stop picking on each other, the better off we'll be. Now, that's pie in the sky. How do we get there? I don't know how we get there.
>> Well, I have a couple ideas. See what you think about this. The we've talked one is not a new idea at all. It's not my idea, but I think having some type of public service for younger people, not just when they're 18 and graduate high school. I think we should try and, you know, because all my kids had to do this uh what do they call it? Community service thing, but you could do anything. It wasn't really community service, but it'd be good to have people in groups during during their childhood. Maybe during summers, maybe a week every maybe when school ends that next week before summer activities begin all kids do something like that. So start when they're young. Certainly public service when they graduate high school. I think that's a good idea. But older people, we need to create a opportunities for people in middle age, not not just older people, I people in their, you know, 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, you know, at each at each generation to find ways that we do things communally to create these these group activities uh in community. So we do spend more time together and then certainly with the elderly what you said is so you've told me this so many times you know the idea of breaking bread together or going to community centers we need to increase that if we spend and these things are cheap these things are so cheap relative to the things we spend money on in the society if we did this we could change the society maybe not overnight but in less than a generation we could do it quickly
>> those programs actually exist there are there are thousands of those programs that are out there what I think we need to do are public service announcements telling people that they're out there that there are places for them to go for seniors. There are senior centers is a program called the RSVP. The think back to John F. Kennedy and Sargent Shriver the Peace Corp. People got together to do good and that's what we need to start doing. I I have this the philosophy that that each and every one of us has to be the difference. We can be the difference but it starts with us. I agree. I'll tell you one little quick story. So, I mentioned to you uh that I was out in uh at a hospital out in the Midwest uh last week helping them begin a new program for colon cancer screening. And I hadn't, you know, my favorite thing in my career, as you well know, for many, many, many, many, many years. I was with patients every day and my tech staff every day. And I loved it. Right. And so now that I'm not doing that anymore, I'm doing other things, but it's more a little more isolated. I mean, I'm not sitting by myself all day, but it's not the same. So I walk into this hospital, very nice hospital in Ohio, and I meet all these techs and all these nurses and a couple of the doctors and of course the patients, right? And I start talking to a few of the patients and I'm like the happiest guy in the world. It was so joyful for me to be back doing that again. I was like I was hoping I was thinking maybe I hope I'm not overdoing it. You know, I'm not the story here. I'm just here to to help them set up this program. And it worked out great. But I was having so much fun, right? just being with these people. So, you know, I think, you know, just to wrap this up, our our reactions, the joy we get from being with other people, from helping other people, from being in groups, that's the clue, right? Our and the fact that when we don't do that, we're sick and we get demented and we get heart disease. I mean, what else do you need? Your body, your emotions, your reactions, your physical body are telling you what's good and what you should do and what's bad and what you shouldn't do. Good. be with other people. Interact with other people. Share with other people. Judge favorably. Be kind. Bad. Be alone. You know, sit sit behind a a computer screen or a phone and and and snipe at people you don't even know. You're going to feel terrible. So, on a very selfish level, if you want to feel good, stop doing the latter. Stop sniping at people and being on a team and throwing hand grenades at the other team or literally now throwing hand grenades at the other team. And spend time with other people. Judge favorably. Be part of a community. Interact with as many people as you can. This is the point, right? This is what our bodies, those quotes that you saw me are telling us. Our bodies are telling us what's good for us and why we're here. And again, from the aerial view, it's pretty simple to see.
>> You know, our brains on loneliness are not good. So, I guess the moral of this whole thing is um just just be kind, be good to one another, but the fact of the matter is be with one another. Don't be alone. So,
>> amen.
>> Yeah.
>> You get the last word.
>> That was my last word. I got no more words. Well, now do I have to hear my physics lessons from you? But no, I I thank you for this good conversation and uh let's all be friends.
>> We will be. Anyway, thank you everybody for listening. We'll see you next time.
>> Peace.