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How to Fall in Love with Someone | Yale Conversations with David Brooks | Yale University — Transcript

by Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs · 10,562 words · 1,855 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:01[applause]
0:04>> It's great to be back here. I've been
0:06teaching on and off since the '90s here
0:08at Yale.
0:10And I just had lunch with that 16 or 20
0:12students at Timothy Dwight College. Uh
0:16and every time they remind you why it's
0:17worth a 5-hour train ride from
0:19Washington to come here. They're
0:21electric. They disagree with you.
0:23Um they're smarter than you are.
0:25Uh and so for those of you who are
0:26undergrads and some of you who are
0:29overgrads. Uh
0:32Uh just can't say what a pleasure it's
0:34been to be up here.
0:36Now, uh I am uh
0:38I've This is the fourth of the talks.
0:40And I noticed somebody told me that one
0:43of the talks has roughly uh 500,000
0:45views on YouTube.
0:47So, that surprised me a little. Uh you
0:50can never tell what's going to go viral.
0:51Um but now I realized um I need to up my
0:54game.
0:55Uh I need to really if I'm going to have
0:57a big audience, I got to provide you
0:59with some practical wisdom. So, as sort
1:02of an amuse-bouche
1:04before we get to the main subject, I
1:06decided to pass along some of my
1:08favorite life hacks.
1:10Uh which and some of these were
1:11collected by a guy named Kevin Kelly,
1:13some are mine, some are other people's.
1:15But I'm just going to pass along a few
1:16bits of wisdom that I've encountered on
1:19the internet. And where else can you
1:21find wisdom?
1:22So, So, these are some life hacks.
1:25Uh when you have
1:2790% of a large project completed,
1:29finishing up the final details will be
1:31another 90%.
1:33Anything you say before the word but
1:36does not count.
1:38Denying or deflecting a compliment is
1:40rude. Accept it with thanks.
1:43Getting cheated is a small price to pay
1:47for trusting the best in everyone.
1:49Because when you trust the best in
1:50others, they will treat you the best.
1:53The thing that made you weird as a kid
1:55could make you great as an adult.
1:58It's not an apology if it comes with an
2:00excuse.
2:02Just because it's not your fault doesn't
2:04mean it's not your responsibility.
2:07If you think you saw a mouse, you did.
2:10And if there's one, there are others.
2:15Something does not need to be perfect to
2:17be wonderful, especially weddings.
2:21If you can't make up your mind between
2:22two options, flip a coin. But don't go
2:25by how the coin came up, go by your
2:27emotional reaction to how the coin came
2:29up.
2:31Take photos of the things your parents
2:33do every day because this is how you
2:35want to remember them.
2:37And finally, and this one comes from
2:38Warren Buffett, you can always tell
2:40somebody to go to hell tomorrow.
2:43So, take the extra day.
2:45So, I I admire those life hacks, so I'm
2:47passing them along.
2:48And now I asked people uh at Yale and
2:51elsewhere, "What should I talk about?"
2:54Uh and two of the words that came up
2:57again and again, the first one was
2:58agency.
3:00How do people claim agency within a
3:01system like that?
3:03And the second one uh was love.
3:06So, people said, "Talk about love."
3:09And
3:11I once taught a class here on humility
3:13uh and I thought it was hilarious to
3:15have a New York Times columnist teaching
3:17humility at Yale University.
3:19>> [laughter]
3:21>> But you might as well do something
3:23that's kind of absurd and ridiculous.
3:25And so me on one hand, me talking about
3:26love especially for the undergrads in
3:29the audience, um is kind of ridiculous
3:32in that my social life is I radically
3:36different from yours.
3:38And I don't pretend to understand it and
3:39I'm not going to talk about it. There
3:41are people who study dating and romance
3:43these days. I am not one of them.
3:46But I have written four books on social
3:47connection.
3:48Starting with a book called The Social
3:50Animal and the most recent one called
3:52How I Known a Person.
3:53And so I have over the last 20 years
3:55spent a lot of time reading about social
3:57connection
3:58and even the most intimate of
3:59connections, which is the love
4:01relationship.
4:02And so I've harvested from some of those
4:05people some wisdom that I thought I'd
4:07pass along. One of my favorite sayings
4:08about being a writer
4:10is writers are beggars who tell other
4:11beggars where they found bread.
4:14And if I find something that I I find
4:15useful in my own life, I like to pass it
4:18along and that's what I'm going to try
4:20to do today.
4:21Now, the first thing to say about love
4:24is that the meritocracy
4:27has a tendency to make loving harder
4:29than it should be.
4:31Because the meritocracy is a system of
4:32competition and exclusion
4:35that encourages people to become shrewd
4:37animals
4:38to uh enter into life with the spirit of
4:41calculation. How can I get ahead?
4:44And C.S. Lewis has a paragraph on what
4:47will happen to you
4:48if you approach life not with a poetic
4:50frame of mind,
4:51but with a calculating frame of mind.
4:54He writes, "Love anything and your heart
4:56will certainly be wrung and possibly
4:58broken.
4:59If you want to make sure of keeping it
5:01intact, you must give your heart to no
5:02one, not even to an animal.
5:05Wrap it carefully around with hobbies
5:07and little luxuries. Avoid all
5:09entanglements. Lock it up safe in the
5:11casket or coffin of your selfishness.
5:14But in that casket, safe, dark,
5:16motionless, airless, it will change. It
5:20will not be broken,
5:21but it will become unbreakable,
5:23impenetrable, irredeemable."
5:26And so Lewis is writing about the
5:28process of not falling in love, of
5:30manufacturing a coldness in the heart.
5:33Now, falling in love, I'm going to just
5:35walk us through the steps as experts
5:38smarter than me have described them.
5:40The first is a glance.
5:42You can be at a dinner party and you
5:44exchange what the what the Deborah
5:46Tannen calls an anchoring gaze.
5:48When someone holds your eye for an extra
5:50two or three or four seconds,
5:53that is an extremely powerful reaction.
5:56I myself have never
5:58experienced love at first sight. The
6:00people I've been in love with I was
6:01friends with or for years.
6:04But I I met a woman or I met a guy
6:06actually
6:07who was a hairdresser in Houston.
6:09And there he told me the story of a
6:11woman who was uh a pianist in Houston
6:15and was going to move to San Francisco
6:17to be with her fiance.
6:19So she walked into this salon called
6:21Etude de Paris.
6:24And she's walking in and she's going to
6:25the room in the back where you get your
6:27gown
6:28and she sees a guy cutting another
6:29woman's hair
6:31and she goes into the room with get her
6:32gown, pulls out her phone, and calls her
6:34mom and says, "I've just seen the man
6:36I'm actually going to marry."
6:39So she's in the chair
6:41and she's in the chair the guy I had
6:42just spoken to and his name is David.
6:45And he asks her her life story and she
6:48says, "Well, I'm pianist. I'm going to
6:51San Francisco to be with my fiance,
6:53but I won't do it if you'll marry me."
6:57And as David told me the story, he said,
6:59"I never felt more free in my life."
7:02And he said, "It's a deal."
7:05And so they
7:06got to know each other and got married.
7:08So that's love at first sight.
7:10That's not typical.
7:12>> [snorts and laughter]
7:13>> Usually it takes a little longer. And so
7:15after the glance, after the first
7:17exchange, the next stage uh is
7:20curiosity.
7:21They say love is blind, but really love
7:23is the opposite of blind.
7:25We want to know a lot about the things
7:26we love, whether it's a person or a
7:27subject or anything.
7:30So we ask some questions.
7:32Uh we want to see, you know, the some
7:34joyous exploration,
7:36absorption, a sense of deprivation
7:39sensitivity that when you're not with
7:40this person, you wish you were with
7:42them.
7:43And this this curiosity begins to sow
7:45interest.
7:47And so you start uh dialoguing.
7:50And when any humans talk to each other,
7:52this doesn't have to be a loving
7:53relationship, uh we synchronize.
7:55We synchronize our breathing, we
7:57synchronize our wording, we synchronize
7:59our vocabulary levels. So we're equal,
8:01[snorts] and so we're getting along. We
8:02achieve what you might call uh
8:04limerence.
8:06And when couples are getting together,
8:08first they start laughing.
8:10And you would think laughter would be a
8:11response to jokes, but the laughter
8:13experts, yes there are some, uh say that
8:16only 15% of laughs are in response to a
8:19joke.
8:2185% of laughs are in response to
8:23synchronicity.
8:24There's been a difference in our
8:26relationship, we realize we see the same
8:27thing. And people start laughing. And
8:30they produce what they call the Duchenne
8:31smile, which is when you're you can't
8:33control a certain muscle in you
8:34consciously. And so when you have a
8:36genuinely natural smile, it's a
8:38different eyebrow motion than others.
8:41And when we see that, we know, bingo,
8:44something good is happening.
8:47And so that's synchronicity.
8:49And you're looking for similarity.
8:51You're like, do we have the same musical
8:52taste? Do we have the same post poster
8:54on our bedroom as a kid? Do we both
8:56think $6 cupcakes is ridiculous? Like
8:58the same those things. And synchronicity
9:01and similarity brings begins to bring
9:04people together and warm the heart.
9:07Uh now the biggest phase problem in the
9:09dialogue phase is fear.
9:12Fear of intimacy.
9:15The process is like a tennis court. I
9:18volley a little intimacy, you volley a
9:21little intimacy back.
9:22And
9:24we're secretly asking ourselves,
9:26if I unveil, will you protect me?
9:29If I pause, will you respect my privacy?
9:33Will you hold me when I need help
9:35healing?
9:36And so the non-obvious point is the
9:38timing and collaboration of the trust
9:40spiral as we learn to trust each other.
9:43It takes a lot of skill.
9:45It takes a lot of patience to not go too
9:47fast, to not go too slow.
9:50And it's an extremely delicate skill. I
9:52remember you you might think of it as
9:54pushing open the gates.
9:56I'm going to walk through this doorway.
9:57Well, can I walk through that door? You
9:59can walk through this door of mine. Can
10:00we walk through that door?
10:02I was once beginning a friendship with
10:04somebody and it was over email and I
10:07sent an email that was a little pushing
10:08the vulnerability a little further than
10:11we'd had established. And I got on a
10:13flight. It was a cross-country flight
10:15and I'm desperate to know, did she
10:18uh respond? And the flight has no Wi-Fi.
10:22I'm stuck there for 5 hours thinking,
10:24"Oh, no, did she respond? Oh, this is
10:26over. She hates me."
10:29Fortunately, it was a nice response, so
10:30our relationship deepened.
10:32And what strikes me about this is the
10:34power of words to incite strong
10:37emotions. Just the act of communication
10:41can produce extremely strong emotions.
10:44One of my heroes is a guy named Isaiah
10:46Berlin.
10:47Isaiah Berlin uh lived in England. Uh he
10:50was visiting Moscow during World War II.
10:53And he hears his friend says, "Would you
10:55like to meet Anna Akhmatova?"
10:57Anna Akhmatova was a poet.
11:00And Berlin didn't know much about her,
11:01but he said, "Sure."
11:03And so they went over to her apartment
11:04then about 4:00 [snorts] in the
11:05afternoon
11:07and they start talking.
11:09And uh she told him about her first
11:11husband. Then she told him about some of
11:13her loneliness.
11:15Uh and then they start talking about
11:17literature.
11:18And first they she begins to read a song
11:20from Byron's Don Juan and then she
11:23begins to read some of her poetry.
11:25And by now it's midnight
11:27and they keep talking.
11:29And by 4:00 in the morning, they're
11:31talking about Pushkin and Chekhov.
11:34Uh Berlin likes uh Turgenev. She likes
11:37Dostoevsky. They read all the same books
11:40and they're just talking and talking and
11:42she's confessing her loneliness. She's
11:44talking about the death of her husband,
11:47her her internal exile. She was really
11:49brutalized by Stalin. But they just kept
11:51talking and talking about all the big
11:54ideas from people who take big ideas
11:55seriously.
11:57And Berlin desperately has to go to the
11:59bathroom.
12:01But he doesn't want to break the spell.
12:04And so he finally returns home after
12:06talking all night at 10:00 a.m. He flops
12:08down on his hotel bed and says to his
12:10roommate, "I'm in love. I'm in love. I'm
12:12in love."
12:14And they never touched each other.
12:17It was all conversation.
12:19And Michael Ignatieff, who writes
12:20Berlin's biography, calls it the most
12:22important night of Berlin's life.
12:25Cuz he established such a deep human
12:27connection and Akhmatova wrote a poem
12:29and a book about it later called The
12:32Visitor from the Future.
12:34And that's just the power of love, the
12:36power of love to create enchantment.
12:40Uh and so it's that power of love to
12:43create intimacy. Garry Shandling is a
12:45comedian
12:47who said, "My friends tell me I have an
12:48intimacy problem, but they don't really
12:50know me."
12:52And so about a fifth of adults,
12:54according to experts, uh fear intimacy.
12:57They just don't want to get close cuz
12:59they're afraid of what will happen.
13:01And you can tell someone fears intimacy
13:02if they
13:04disappear from the relationship all of a
13:06sudden.
13:07Or if they don't like terms like
13:09girlfriend and boyfriend.
13:11Or if they ask you a lot of questions
13:13but never say anything about themselves.
13:15These are all signs that somebody's
13:16fears intimacy.
13:18But if you go through the intimacy
13:20gradient, you achieve what Stendhal
13:22called crystallization.
13:24And that's idealization of the other
13:25person. You idealize them.
13:27And Stendhal said, he wrote a great book
13:29called love, and he said, it's like
13:31there's a salt mine near Salzburg, and
13:33if you dip a branch in and leave it
13:34there for a month, when you pull the
13:36branch out, it'll be covered with
13:38crystals and it'll shimmer.
13:40That's what falling in love is like.
13:42You think the other person is vastly
13:44better than they actually are.
13:48Virginia Satir, who was a writer and
13:50therapist, said, love
13:51uh
13:52flourishes in an atmosphere where
13:54individual differences are appreciated,
13:56mistakes are tolerated, communication is
13:59open, and rules are flexible.
14:02And so, if you can create that kind of
14:03culture within yourself, you're creating
14:06a kind of enchantment. Well, the weird
14:08thing about love is that something
14:09outside you touches something deep
14:11inside you, and you get combustion.
14:14And that could be another person. It
14:16could be a book. It could be a subject.
14:18It could be an activity. Anytime you
14:20fall in love with anything.
14:22And one of the things I try to
14:22emphasize,
14:24uh especially to undergrads, is that
14:26life is more about more like falling in
14:28love than it is like making a decision.
14:31The big transformational chases of your
14:33life will because you fell in love with
14:35an activity, you fell in love with a
14:36town, you fell in love with an idea, you
14:39fell in love with a job.
14:41And that happens when there's
14:42combustion.
14:43No great thing was ever achieved in a
14:46prosaic frame of mind.
14:49A poetic frame of mind is really what
14:51you trust when you make these big
14:52decisions.
14:53George Washington doesn't strike me as
14:55the most romantic human being in
14:56American history,
14:58but he once wrote to his stepdaughter or
14:59granddaughter,
15:01"In the composition of the human frame,
15:02there is a good deal of inflammable
15:04matter.
15:05However dormant it may lie for a time.
15:08And when the torch is put to it, that
15:10which is within you must burst into
15:12blaze."
15:14And so, even George Washington, who was
15:15like a marbly stiff figure, he
15:17understood.
15:18John O'Donohue was a writer and
15:19essayist.
15:21He writes, "When you find yourself
15:22deeply attracted to someone, you
15:23gradually begin to you lose your grip on
15:26the frames in which you order your life.
15:29Indeed, much of your life becomes
15:30blurred as the countenance comes into
15:32clearer focus.
15:34A relentless magnet draws all your
15:36thoughts toward it. Wherever you are,
15:38you find yourself thinking about the one
15:40who has become the horizon of your
15:41longing.
15:42When we are together, time becomes
15:44unmercifully swift. It always ends too
15:46soon.
15:48No sooner have you parted than you are
15:49already imagining your next meeting,
15:51counting the hours.
15:53The magnetic draw of the presence
15:55renders you delightfully helpless.
15:58A stranger you never knew until recently
16:00has invaded your mind. Every fiber
16:02of your being longs to be closer."
16:05I guess it's a nice It's We need poets
16:06to describe what love feels like.
16:09Many essayists have, including
16:12Augustine, have noticed that love
16:14eliminates the distinction between
16:15giving and receiving.
16:17When you give a gift to your beloved, it
16:19feels like you're receiving because
16:20you're giving to a piece of yourself.
16:23And that you have actually merged
16:24together.
16:26Uh
16:27that kind of friendship Montaigne had
16:29with a guy named Etienne de La Boétie. I
16:30think I'm pronouncing that correctly.
16:32And he he writes an essay on friendship,
16:34a beautiful essay.
16:36And he writes, "Such a friendship had no
16:37model and itself can only be compared to
16:39itself.
16:41It was a mysterious quintessence of all
16:43the mixture
16:44of the process his process of his will
16:46into my will would lead me to put my
16:49will into his will.
16:51And he said it was because we became
16:53friends because I was I and he was he."
16:55And one of the nice things I like about
16:57Montaigne's
16:58uh friendship with La Boétie, uh La
17:00Boétie died young, very young.
17:03In the very end, he called his family
17:05and friends around him to his deathbed.
17:07And he gave little speeches to each
17:09person,
17:10thanking them for who they were and
17:11describing what their that relationship
17:13had meant.
17:14And later Montaigne wrote,
17:16"La Boétie's speeches were very
17:19but they could have been a little
17:20shorter.
17:22Well, that's true friendship when you
17:23say on your deathbed, you know, you
17:25meandered there.
17:28Sometimes love is painful.
17:31There's a prose poem by a woman who was
17:33a Native American in Southern Alaska
17:35that was she wrote in 1896.
17:38Fire runs through my body, the pain of
17:40loving you.
17:41Pain through runs my body with the fires
17:43of my love for you.
17:45Sickness wanders in my body with my love
17:47for you. Pain like a boil about to burst
17:49with my love for you. Consumed by fire
17:51with my love for you. I remember what
17:53you said to me. I'm thinking of your
17:54love for me. I'm torn by your love for
17:56me. Pain and more pain.
17:59Where are you going with my love? I I'm
18:01told you will go from home. I'm told you
18:02will leave me. My body is numb with
18:05grief.
18:06And so you're
18:07when you fall in love, you're signing up
18:09for that.
18:10Potentially.
18:13Uh
18:15So then you are in love.
18:18And at this point, it's important to
18:19have a fight.
18:21There's going to be a crisis in every
18:23love relationship, and you're going to
18:25have a fight.
18:26And it's probably going to fight over
18:28your central disagreement. In every
18:30relationships, there's some things that
18:32two people just don't agree upon,
18:35and it will never go away.
18:38And sometimes these are kind of trivial,
18:39but I I I think that a lot of things
18:41that test relationships are one person
18:44likes to be on time, the other person
18:45doesn't mind being late.
18:47One person likes being neat, the other
18:48person doesn't mind being messy.
18:51Uh one person doesn't care about money,
18:53the other person intensely cares about
18:54money.
18:56These are subjects these disequalities
18:57are just hard to deal with.
18:59But so there's going to be a crisis, and
19:01there's going to be a fight, and people
19:02are going to say things that they
19:04shouldn't say.
19:06One of the things I've learned about
19:06having fights
19:08is that your motivations to
19:12When you start the argument, you're
19:14arguing about something in principle.
19:16But as the argument goes on, you're not
19:18arguing about something some principle.
19:20You're arguing about who's smarter,
19:22who's more powerful, who's better.
19:26And once you detect that your your
19:27motivations are deteriorating, you
19:29should shut up.
19:31Because everything you say after that
19:32will be hurtful.
19:34And I had a guy tell me uh that he got
19:36divorced because
19:38he and his ex-wife did not stop talking
19:41when the motivations deteriorated and
19:43they said things that can never be said
19:44left unsaid.
19:46And so the fight is important because it
19:48gives a chance of forgiveness.
19:51Martin Luther King was to me the world's
19:53great leading expert on forgiveness for
19:54obvious reasons. He said forgiveness is
19:56not an act, it's an attitude.
19:59It's the attitude that says people are
20:00sinful, people are weak, people are
20:03going to screw up, expect it.
20:05And so your attitude
20:08should be that they're going to wrong
20:09me.
20:10And I will forgive them.
20:12And he says he who is devoid of the
20:14power to forgive is devoid of the power
20:16to love.
20:17So the person who's been wronged creates
20:19an atmosphere in which forgiveness can
20:21be asked for.
20:23And once that atmosphere, then that
20:25wronger
20:26That's not a word.
20:27Uh
20:28said begins to show penitence.
20:31Begins to ask for forgiveness. Begins to
20:33offer reparation. Goes through all the
20:35steps you have to go through to
20:37obviously be forgiven.
20:39And the person doing the forgiving is
20:41strong enough to show they're angry over
20:42what just happened.
20:44But strong enough to say my anger will
20:46not be interfere with our relationship.
20:48So the sin is not forgotten, but it does
20:50not come in the way of relationship.
20:53And if anybody's
20:55had a friendship, had a marriage,
20:57whatever, you know that these things are
20:59built on rupture and repair.
21:02That rupture and repair is the process
21:04of building a relationship. And as I
21:06argued a couple weeks ago, it's the
21:07process of recovering in
21:11We as individuals and as nations, we
21:13grow through a process of rupture and
21:15repair.
21:19So then you've gotten over that, you're
21:20stronger, and then couples do the thing
21:23that really begins to lead to marriage.
21:26And that's the process of creating a
21:28mutual future together.
21:31It's saying, "Oh yeah, I'd like to have
21:32a house kind of like that.
21:34I'd like to have a paint a kitchen with
21:36blue walls.
21:38And wouldn't it be great if we took a
21:39vacation to Hawaii?"
21:41And that process of creating a mutual
21:44future together is the process of
21:46creating a marriage.
21:48Because you're putting in your mind,
21:50"Oh, our the the story I tell in my life
21:52includes this other person."
21:55And you may not even be thinking about
21:56marriage yet.
21:57But you're creating it because once you
21:59create a future together,
22:01if you're going to break the
22:02relationship, you have to dismantle the
22:04future you've created.
22:06And that is a big barrier to breaking a
22:08relationship.
22:09And so that unconscious process of
22:11thinking, "Okay,
22:13we're going to have a future together."
22:15And that future,
22:16this is Simone Veil, a French mystic who
22:18died around World War II.
22:21It has to be a future where each person
22:22is completely committed to each other
22:25and each person has space to be
22:26themselves.
22:28It's that idea, "Genuine love," she
22:30wrote, "is the act of attending to the
22:33beautiful thing or beautiful person
22:35without consuming them.
22:37It is the capacity to let the other be
22:38other.
22:40To perceive their reality without
22:41annexing it to your own needs, to admire
22:43without possessing, to be nourished by
22:45their existence without devouring it."
22:48She writes, "To love purely is to
22:50consent to distance. It is to adore the
22:53distance between ourselves and the other
22:55and that which we love.
22:56It is the otherness of the beloved. It
22:59is the belief that the other will grow
23:01away from you.
23:02And the ability to celebrate that
23:03belief. Cuz each person gets their own
23:06trajectory of growth.
23:09So, so far I've been talking about
23:12affairs of the heart.
23:14The emotions, the passions, the
23:15unconscious processes, even the
23:18smelling. We people forget we're we're
23:19mammals.
23:21And when we smell, when we're with the
23:23other person, the pheromones are in
23:24there,
23:25and we that smell is powerful. I read
23:28somewhere when I wrote the book The Sex
23:30The Second Man or no, The Social Animal,
23:32that when people kiss and exchange
23:34saliva, they are unconsciously
23:36appraising the other person's immune
23:38system.
23:40I don't know if that's true, but
23:42um
23:43it's an impressive act of the
23:44unconscious mind.
23:46But But before you actually marry
23:48someone,
23:49you can't totally go with your heart.
23:51Cuz people a lot of people who totally
23:52go with their heart wind up divorced.
23:54So, there must be some rational
23:55appraisal you have to do.
23:57Uh and so you have to step back and give
24:00the prefrontal cortex its moment
24:03to think this through carefully.
24:05And the first questions the experts
24:07suggest asking,
24:09our tendency is to ask questions about
24:11the other person.
24:13But it's really best to ask questions
24:14about yourself first.
24:18Are you in a place where you're ready to
24:20do this?
24:21Are you ready for marriage?
24:24Uh do I like the person I am when I'm
24:26around him?
24:28What's my core issue and does this
24:30person fill my core issue?
24:33How high is my bar?
24:36There are debates and down through
24:37history about whether it's prudent to
24:39settle when you marry.
24:41Some people say, "Hey, it's Life is, you
24:43know, you're you're an imperfect person.
24:45Settle. You're never going to find your
24:47one true love. Settle. Find somebody
24:49who's good enough."
24:51Jane Austen
24:52um said never settle.
24:55And as usual, I'm with Jane Austen.
24:58She said, "You shouldn't settle first
25:00because you're going to need
25:02we a lot of raw passion to hold you two
25:05together when the tough times come."
25:07You really have better fuse yourself
25:09together with raw passion. Second,
25:12are you going to tell the other person
25:13that you're settling?
25:15Are you going to say to them, "Well, you
25:16were my fourth choice, but"
25:19probably not the best basis for a
25:20marriage.
25:22Or if you don't tell them, you're going
25:24to a marriage with dishonesty. Probably
25:26also not the best basis for a marriage.
25:29So, I'm persuaded by Jane Austen, never
25:31settle.
25:34But you need to have some analytic
25:36method
25:37to evaluate whether marriage is a proven
25:40thing to do.
25:41And so, to me there are three lenses to
25:43apply.
25:45The first is the psychological lens.
25:48What's your personality and what's the
25:49other person's personality?
25:51And there's a guy named Ty Tashiro who
25:53writes books about this. What kind of
25:54personality types go together?
25:56And his main finding is
25:59if you're going to marry someone who
26:00scores high on the personality trait of
26:02neuroticism, think really carefully
26:04about that.
26:06Because neurotics stay neurotic. And
26:08neurotics are people who are extremely
26:10sensitive to negative emotion.
26:12And they tend to create drama. They
26:14create instability. And I mentioned this
26:16to a buddy of mine in New York who was
26:17serious about it, a woman.
26:19And he said, "What do you do if you're
26:21neurotic?"
26:23>> [laughter]
26:23>> I said,
26:24"Marry another neurotic. You'll make two
26:26people miserable and not four." I said.
26:30Not really an ideal answer, but it what
26:32what those came to mind.
26:34So, that's the psychological lens.
26:36The second lens is the emotional lens.
26:39The Greeks made these taxonomies of
26:41love.
26:43And they for example, they said there's
26:45philia,
26:46which is friendship.
26:47There's eros, which is passion.
26:50And there's agape, which is selfless
26:51giving.
26:52And if you're going to marry someone,
26:54you should have all three.
26:56If you just have eros, you have a hookup
26:58but not a marriage.
27:00If you have philia, you have friendship
27:01but but not a marriage. You should have
27:03all three.
27:04And so, you think about which emotions
27:07are really aroused in your heart.
27:09And the third lens is the moral lens.
27:12Love comes and goes, but admiration
27:14stays.
27:16And so, marry someone you admire.
27:19The good John Gottman, who I'm going to
27:21quote in a minute, says the ultimate
27:22killer of relationship is not pain, it's
27:25not fighting, it's contempt.
27:28Once you cease to respect the other
27:30person, it's really hard to get it back.
27:33And so,
27:35ask, "Do I deeply admire this person?
27:38Is this the person who keeps his or her
27:40promises?
27:41Does this person possess qualities I'd
27:43like to pass down to my children?
27:46Do they brag about things they shouldn't
27:48be bragging about?"
27:50And these are all signs of you're
27:52looking for someone with high character
27:53who you could admire, and that's the key
27:55to a marriage.
27:57Now, once uh you fall in love
28:01and you have crossed crossed the
28:03rational threshold,
28:05then you want to make promises to that
28:07person.
28:09Um
28:10and that commitment to the other person
28:14uh is powerful. I had a friend um who
28:18got married, uh they struggled to have
28:20kids for a while, and they eventually
28:24uh got pregnant, and the his wife went
28:27into the hospital to deliver their baby,
28:29and for some reason she lost a ton of
28:32blood.
28:33It went terrible.
28:34And the doctors told him that about 85%
28:38of the people the women who go through
28:40this die, and so you should be prepared
28:42for that.
28:43And those who remain have serious blood
28:46damage cuz their brain they've shut
28:47down.
28:48And so he's sitting there in the
28:51hospital room having been told this
28:52news, and the thought crosses his mind,
28:56now I get to test my marriage vows.
28:59Cuz this is the you realize how powerful
29:02a commitment I've made to this person. I
29:03will be there for them no matter what
29:05how what shape she comes out in.
29:08And she actually miraculously came out
29:10fine.
29:11They had a kid. I had dinner with them
29:13many times.
29:14Um
29:15And so but Joseph Campbell for for
29:17examples like that called marriage a
29:19heroic quest.
29:22Uh a quest in which the ego was
29:24sacrificed to make way for the sake of
29:26the relationship. A marriage, he wrote,
29:28is a moral microcosm of life in which
29:30each person freely chooses to take on
29:32responsibilities for others, becomes
29:34dependent on others in order to do
29:37something larger and historic.
29:40Marriage involves a lot of big jobs.
29:44To separate from emotionally from your
29:46family of origin, to build intimacy,
29:48to embrace uh the little baby if they
29:51come along,
29:53to confront the inevitable crises of
29:54life, to have a rich sexual life, to
29:57create a safe haven for the expression
29:59of differences. These are big jobs and
30:01they're hard to do unless you really
30:03have wisdom and passion.
30:05And it's filled with a lot of little
30:07jobs.
30:08Marriage is knowing that she likes to
30:09get to the airport really early for a
30:11flight.
30:13Marriage is taking the time to make the
30:14bed even though you know if you didn't
30:16she probably would.
30:18Marriage is a little glass of water in
30:20the night.
30:21There's a book by a guy named Sheldon
30:23Van Auken called a a severe mercy.
30:26And they had a the refrain in his
30:28relationship with his wife a little
30:30glass water in the night.
30:31And it was when you should when somebody
30:34when your wife or husband asks you,
30:36"Can you go down and get me some water?"
30:38at 2:00 a.m.
30:39It's a great privilege to be asked, and
30:42it's a great gift to do the asking.
30:45It's just like a little glass of water
30:46in the night. Doing nice things.
30:49And then words are um
30:53not only the key to falling in love,
30:54words are the key to marriage.
30:56And this is where John Gottman, who is
30:58the leading marriage expert in America
30:59probably, comes in. He says a
31:02conversation, especially with a spouse,
31:04but with any friend, any relationship,
31:06is a pattern of bids and volleys.
31:09You make a bid. Say
31:11uh
31:12you're sitting there at a a table and
31:14some friend or spouse of yours says,
31:16"Look out the window, there's a
31:17beautiful blue jay."
31:19That's a bid.
31:20You have three options. You can look out
31:23the window and say, "Oh, that's a
31:24tremendous beautiful bird. Thank you for
31:27pointing it out." They call that a
31:28toward bid. I'm moving toward you.
31:31Or there's a neutral bid, which is I'm
31:34reading the paper here.
31:35Or there's a turning away bid, which is
31:38stop bothering me. You're always
31:40bothering me.
31:42And the Gottmans have found that a
31:44healthy marriage, there are five toward
31:46bids for every turn away or neutral bid.
31:50And so they say relationship geniuses
31:52are actively looking for ways to express
31:54gratitude to the other person.
31:57And they say that a marriage ends not
31:59when cuz there's a fight, not cuz of
32:02pain, not cuz of disagreement, it's when
32:04they get the ratio wrong.
32:08Uh
32:10It is also marriage as uh Lord
32:13Shaftesbury, who was a I guess a 19th
32:14century English guy,
32:16um he says it's like a a gem tumbler. It
32:19takes two people, any relationship, and
32:22it puts you in a little
32:23container, and it stirs you up so you're
32:25bouncing off the each other all the
32:26time.
32:28One of the best marriage books is called
32:29The Meaning of Marriage by a couple
32:31named Tim and Kathy Keller.
32:33Uh and they say in a marriage the
32:35following is going to happen.
32:37About 6 months in, you're going to
32:38realize that the wonderful person you
32:41married
32:42is actually kind of selfish.
32:46And as you're making this decision about
32:48the other person,
32:50they are making this decision about you.
32:53And so the Kellers say that you have two
32:56choices. One is to have a truce
32:58marriage,
32:59which is when both sides decide not to
33:01talk about the other person's
33:03selfishness,
33:05or you can have a real marriage, which
33:07is when you realize that your own
33:09selfishness is the only selfishness you
33:11can take care of.
33:13And a great marriage, they say, is when
33:15both couples are working on their own
33:17selfishness.
33:19And I think that's pretty impressive. Um
33:24And so
33:26preserving a marriage and keeping it,
33:27and I've had some marriages preserved,
33:29and I've been through a divorce, so I I
33:30know both sides.
33:32Uh
33:33takes not only that those kind of
33:35commitments,
33:36but just some practical
33:38um
33:39practical advice I got from the internet
33:41again, source of great wisdom.
33:43A woman named Lydia Netzer, who I don't
33:46know anything about, wrote a blog post
33:47called 15 ways to stay married for 15
33:49years.
33:51And she had some good advice, which I'm
33:52going to pass along.
33:53One of it was
33:55go to bed mad. You know how they say you
33:57shouldn't go to bed? Sometimes just go
33:59to bed. Get some sleep, wake up, make
34:01blueberry pancakes. Just go to bed mad.
34:05Second,
34:06be proud and brag.
34:08Brag about your spouse and have them
34:10overhear you bragging about them.
34:14Third,
34:15to his mother, not to yours.
34:18If you complain about him to his mother,
34:20she'll forgive him. If you complain
34:21about him to your own mother, she never
34:24will.
34:26Trust the person you married.
34:29Be loyal.
34:31You and your partner are a team of two.
34:33Nobody else is allowed on the team.
34:37So, be loyal to each other. I thought
34:38that was good advice.
34:40If you do all this,
34:42you get to achieve
34:44uh
34:45what I hope some people in this room
34:47have, which is second love.
34:49The first love is the stuff they make
34:51the movies and write the songs about.
34:53It's the hot passion.
34:56But, then there's a second love that
34:57comes years or sometimes decades later.
35:00And I love reading people in these
35:01marriages talk about them.
35:04There was a flosser named Andrew Gores
35:06who wrote a letter to his wife.
35:08You're 82 years old.
35:10You've shrunk 6 cm.
35:13You only weigh 45 kilos and you're still
35:15beautiful, graceful, and desirable.
35:18We've lived together now for 58 years
35:20and I love you more than ever.
35:22I once more feel a knowing emptiness in
35:24the hollow of my chest that is only
35:25filled when your body is pressed against
35:28mine.
35:30It's nice after 58 years.
35:33It can last even after death.
35:35Victor Frankl tells the story, the the
35:37guy who wrote Man's Search for Meaning,
35:39of an old guy who came into his office
35:41one day. He was a therapist.
35:43And
35:44his wife had died 2 years before and he
35:47was he's
35:48still the grief is raw.
35:50He's in intense pain.
35:52And he goes to Frankl for some help.
35:55And Frankl asks him,
35:57"Uh suppose it had been you who died
35:59first.
36:01Would your wife have experienced the
36:02same kind of pain you're experiencing?"
36:05And she said, "Oh, for her this would
36:07have been terrible. She would have
36:08suffered."
36:10"You see," Frankl replied,
36:12"such a suffering has been spared her.
36:14And it was you who spared her that
36:16suffering."
36:17And the guy shook Frankl's hand and
36:19said, "Thank you, I'm done. We can leave
36:20now."
36:21Left the office.
36:23My favorite expression of second love is
36:26a novel called Corelli's Mandolin, which
36:28I hope some of you have read by uh Louis
36:29de Bernières.
36:31And in that
36:33he has has an old guy talking to his
36:35daughter
36:36about his love for his wife, who is now
36:37passed on.
36:40And he writes,
36:41"Love itself is what is left over
36:44when being in love has burned away.
36:47And this is both an art and a fortunate
36:48accident.
36:50Your mother and I had it.
36:52We had roots that grew towards each
36:53other underground.
36:55And when all the pretty blossoms had
36:56fallen from our branches,
36:58we found out that we were one tree and
36:59not two."
37:01Now, to me is if you can do all the
37:04stuff that the experts and the poets and
37:06the writers
37:08I've just quoted,
37:09you can get to that if you're lucky.
37:12And that's a good life.
37:15Thanks very much.
37:17>> [applause]
37:23[applause]
37:26>> All right. Now, the tradition is we have
37:28question and answer. I don't know, you
37:29can ask me about
37:31Iran or my love life.
37:33Um
37:35But uh we we do uh like to prioritize
37:37the uh Yale students of undergrad or
37:40overgrad variety. So, if any We'll start
37:43with the students and then open up to
37:44every anybody who wants to have a
37:46question, make a comment, and we have
37:47microphones and as uh you've heard me
37:49say before,
37:50all I ask is your question be long and
37:52rambling with no question at the end.
37:55>> Hi there. Um my name is Nico. Thank you
37:58so much for the talk. It struck me as
38:00you were talking that everyone in the
38:01audience probably occupies sort of a
38:03different orientation to the talk. There
38:05are those who are
38:08not yet at the point of experiencing
38:10love and looking for this as guidance of
38:12what that might feel or look like, those
38:15who are in it and sort of identifying a
38:17verisimilitude with your conception of
38:19love versus theirs,
38:21and maybe those who are
38:23thinking back on a love that no longer
38:25exists with sort of fondness.
38:28Um in your experience,
38:31is there one of those orientations
38:33that's the most gratifying, sort of
38:36Yeah.
38:38>> I'll go for the first week of marriage,
38:40but uh
38:42>> [laughter]
38:43>> Um
38:44But, you know, one of the things
38:45actually I've learned teaching here
38:48is that the classes I teach all have
38:50different names.
38:52Um
38:53that I I've I've last 10 or 15 years
38:56when I have taught it has been through
38:57Jackson, which is a school for global
38:59affairs.
39:00So, when I I taught this course on
39:02humility that I mentioned, I taught a
39:03course on making the big commitments of
39:04life. And but we had to give it a name
39:07that was consistent with Jackson's
39:09mission.
39:10So, when I
39:11taught a course on on marriage and
39:13making commitments and finding your
39:15vocation, we called it successful global
39:18leadership.
39:20And
39:20my class had nothing to do with
39:22successful global leadership.
39:24But, um
39:26one things I've learned and I the my
39:28students it didn't matter what the
39:29official title of the course was called,
39:31the students called it therapy with
39:32Brooks.
39:33Uh cuz you just spill our guts.
39:35Um
39:36But, one of the things I I learned and
39:38there are enough students who are going
39:39through something and they asked to have
39:41coffee with you.
39:42And so, you have coffee.
39:44And they want to throw sometimes
39:46relationship problem in front of you.
39:48And one thing I've learned through this
39:49process is that there are many different
39:52kinds of love.
39:53Uh there's same-sex as heterosexual,
39:56there's others, there are many different
39:57kinds.
39:58The problems that I've been presented
40:00with are all sort of the same.
40:02It doesn't matter whether it's gay,
40:04straight, or anything.
40:06The heart has some commonalities.
40:08Obviously, it has some differences.
40:10But, there are certain universals, I
40:12would say.
40:14Uh and the different people in different
40:17stages, people who are older can
40:19remember those stages, people who are
40:20younger can look forward to this what's
40:23stage the various wonders of love. And
40:26different cultures obviously have
40:27different conceptions.
40:29In one year we had a um
40:31a a Pakistani woman who was very spoke
40:35very movingly and supportingly of of
40:37arranged marriages
40:39on the wisdom contained in a the
40:41arranged marriage. And I think the
40:42saying in in arranged marriage cultures
40:44is you guys get
40:45married when it's hot and you cool off.
40:48We get married when we're cool and we
40:49heat up.
40:51And I found her her comments very
40:52compelling. But everybody's in a
40:54different stage of learning about all
40:56this. I had a I very smart young woman
41:00said I said one day in class, I suppose
41:03um
41:04that when there's a divorce, both sides
41:06are equally to blame.
41:08And we had a 35-year-old woman who was a
41:10captain in the army, a helicopter pilot.
41:12She said, "I want to call on
41:14that cuz my husband cheated on me. It
41:15wasn't my fault." Um
41:18So, everyone has different experiences.
41:21But I I do think the the thing I fear
41:25is that in a culture where everybody is
41:27busy
41:29and where the pressures are intense to
41:32keep up
41:34that the
41:36the time to have these kind of
41:37relationships will not be there.
41:39It will begin to seem inefficient.
41:42And it will begin to seem that the mind
41:45has to be
41:46calculating and prosaic.
41:49And so, one of my worries about how fast
41:51our culture has become
41:53is that
41:54people sort of put it on the back
41:55burner.
41:58And I tell college presidents, I've been
42:00doing this for years. I say, "Listen,
42:02the one of the most important decisions
42:05and possibly the most important decision
42:07that any of your students will make is
42:10who to fall in love with and who to
42:12marry.
42:13And so every course you teach this
42:15college or university should be about
42:17the marriage question.
42:19Should be the sociology of marriage, the
42:21neuroscience of marriage, whatever. Like
42:23teach Jane Austen and George Eliot, like
42:25learn from the masters.
42:26Nobody takes us up on me.
42:29But it's a sign that I often find in
42:31American culture
42:32the things that are the most important
42:34about life are things we barely talk
42:35about and the things that are least
42:37important we talk a lot about.
42:39And so I worry about the
42:41the
42:43de-romanticization
42:44of love
42:46as much. Um but as for the um as
42:50rounding back to your question
42:53I don't have an answer for I don't know
42:55that's a good question what for what is
42:57the best moment.
42:59Maybe cuz I would love There's a song Go
43:01on YouTube and
43:03uh it's called Come to Me by the Goo Goo
43:05Dolls. Now I'm really embarrassing
43:06myself. I'm quoting a Goo Goo Doll.
43:08Um
43:09but it's about lifelong love. It's about
43:11that second love.
43:13And there's something There's a reason
43:15when we find somebody who says we've
43:17been married 50 years, there's a reason
43:18we applaud.
43:20It's just It's just that that's a
43:22wonderful thing to see.
43:28>> All right. Uh thank you so much for that
43:29wonderful lecture. Um
43:31I think it's interesting [clears throat]
43:31you say that love comes and goes but
43:34admiration is timeless and truly stays.
43:37I wonder if there's tension between our
43:39own insecurities and um the admiration
43:41we have for the people we love. So um
43:43assuming that there is tension and I do
43:45think so, um how do you overcome those
43:47insecurities and make sure that, you
43:49know, you become the better version of
43:50yourself that can reconcile both?
43:52>> I find people say I love you not because
43:56they need they enjoy expressing it but
43:58they constantly need to be reminded, oh,
44:00I love you back. I love you, too.
44:03And it's that expression of I love you,
44:06I love you back.
44:07Uh
44:08that is uh that is part of the
44:10insecurity we all feel cuz it is the
44:12definition of vulnerability to say I
44:14love you.
44:15Cuz it means you could crush me if you
44:17wanted to.
44:19Uh and
44:21I And then there's the insecurity that
44:23comes from
44:26how does this person love me?
44:29Uh and I think the only
44:32uh answer to that is again constant
44:35re-statements of the obvious.
44:37That you know, I really love you.
44:40Um
44:42and you it just if you say it enough
44:44over enough time,
44:46I'm hoping that cures the insecurity.
44:49But
44:50you know, the
44:52a lot one of the parts of the
44:53psychological
44:55um
44:56thing when you're measuring somebody is
44:59attachment theory.
45:00There attachment theories are people who
45:02take
45:03babies who are 18 months old and they
45:06put them what they call the strange
45:07situation test. They put them in a room
45:09and mom is playing with them in the room
45:11and mom leaves.
45:14And some babies fuss and then settle
45:17and some never settle.
45:20They just stay mom has left I'm I've
45:22lost the core of my life.
45:24And the psychologists call that um
45:27disorganized If a secure attachment is
45:29when the baby settle and then mom comes
45:31back in the room, the baby goes over and
45:33greets mom and then goes back to
45:34playing.
45:36In a disorganized attachment,
45:38uh there's been no predictable
45:40relationship between mom and baby.
45:43And so uh
45:45the baby does not know how to settle and
45:47when mom comes back, the baby does not
45:49know how to greet her.
45:52It's all disorganized. There haven't
45:53been regular patterns.
45:55And then the third form of attachment is
45:57avoidant attachment.
45:59My personal specialty.
46:01Uh
46:02uh and that's when um
46:05the a teacher once described a kid with
46:07avoidant attachment as a sailboat
46:09tacking into the wind.
46:12You want to get close to teacher, but
46:14you don't know how, so you go sideways,
46:16tacking.
46:18And avoidantly attached people do the
46:21thing which is common, which is when
46:22their partner criticizes them,
46:25they withdraw.
46:27And then another then they criticize you
46:29for withdrawing and they withdraw
46:30further.
46:32And that cycle of criticism and
46:33withdrawal is a poisonous cycle.
46:37And so I would guess, I'm no expert
46:40here, but the only way to
46:41overcome that is to understand your
46:43patterns.
46:45We all have complexes
46:47lurking within us that are um
46:51that we find hard to explain.
46:53I read a book recently by a guy named
46:55about a guy named Roger Penrose, who
46:57some of you may know as a Nobel Prize
46:58winning
46:59um uh physicist.
47:02And I think the reason he became a
47:04physicist because he had a rotten dad.
47:07A dad who treated him as an interruption
47:09to his work.
47:12And one day uh
47:15little Roger, when he was like six, was
47:17out in the backyard and there was a
47:18column.
47:20And he's looking up at the top of column
47:22and he sees something up there.
47:24And he feels himself being lifted up.
47:27And he sees the thing on the top of the
47:29column it's a sundial.
47:32And he turns around and sees something
47:33he had never seen before, his father
47:35smiling at him.
47:38And he spent 20 minutes describing to a
47:40little Roger what a sundial was, how it
47:42worked, the theory behind it.
47:44And at that moment he had a moment of
47:46contact with his dad.
47:49And I think that was an enchanted moment
47:51that said, "I'm going to do physics."
47:53But that relationship left him with a
47:56what we would now call a disorganized
47:58attachment system. And he was just
48:01really hard to be around.
48:03And we all walk through relationships
48:05bringing this baggage into them.
48:08And so
48:10it's it's hard to do but to name your
48:12baggage
48:13and to ask, you know,
48:15how are you crazy? Here's how I'm crazy.
48:19Cuz everybody's crazy about something.
48:22And you know, these are the lessons you
48:23learn the hard way.
48:28Go up there.
48:29>> Is there any specific
48:31advice that you'd give about going
48:33through your life as a student but also
48:34being receptive to falling in love?
48:36>> So I I tell this to students and
48:39it sounds idiotic to say it. So please
48:42don't quote me even though we're about
48:43to be on YouTube.
48:44Um
48:45>> [laughter]
48:47>> And this is this reflects a generational
48:49change.
48:51So I went to a normal public high
48:52school. If you any of you saw the
48:54Breakfast Club, that was my high school.
48:57Sort of upper middle class big public
48:59high school.
49:00And
49:01I was not exactly
49:04star quarterback, big man on campus, Mr.
49:07Studley.
49:09And yet over the course of the four
49:11years of my high school, I had eight
49:13girlfriends.
49:14And that was not above average in my
49:16era. That was the norm.
49:18I was part of like a social clique with
49:20like 40 or 50 students and we all dated
49:23each other just in different orders.
49:26And I think that was good practice cuz
49:29in those days you we did not
49:32had yet not invented situationships.
49:35Uh and so you would have asked somebody
49:37out and you go out with them for three
49:39months and then one of you would break
49:40up with the other.
49:42Uh but it took time.
49:46And and then my senior year
49:49I really fell in love for the first
49:51time.
49:53And then we were sitting with a bunch of
49:54my friends around a campfire
49:56and this woman who I'd known as a friend
49:57for three or four years slipped her hand
49:59into mine.
50:01And it was one of the most blissful
50:03moments of my life.
50:04I'll remember it forever.
50:06I went off to the University of Chicago.
50:09She went off to a different college
50:11for her first year
50:12and my phone bill was super high.
50:16And I stayed home that that summer so I
50:18could be around her and so instead of
50:20working at a summer camp in Essex,
50:22Connecticut, I
50:24uh cleaned up popcorn at a movie
50:26theater.
50:27And I got to
50:29hang around her.
50:31And then she transferred to Chicago.
50:34And in those days in Chicago, there were
50:36three or four guys for every woman.
50:39So suddenly it was happy hunting grounds
50:41for her.
50:42>> [laughter]
50:43>> And within 3 weeks she dumped me.
50:46And I was crushed.
50:49I was in pain, more pain than I ever
50:51knew experienced it.
50:53And because I was an immature sophomore,
50:56I was sort of proud of myself for
50:57feeling that much pain.
50:59I was like, "Wow, I'm a deep guy after
51:01all." Like uh
51:02>> [laughter]
51:03>> And I went up to this fancy
51:06newsstand in Water Tower Place in
51:08Chicago
51:09and I bought French cigarettes.
51:11Cuz if I was going to suffer, I wanted
51:13to suffer like Albert Camus. I like
51:16>> [laughter]
51:19>> And I look back on that relationship and
51:21that experience of getting dumped as one
51:23of the most important parts of my
51:25education.
51:28It taught me how to be in a relationship
51:30and it taught me how to suffer and get
51:32over it.
51:34And so
51:35my if I were an undergrad now, I would
51:38ignore the advice I'm about to give you
51:40cuz who's going to listen to me? One of
51:42the things that
51:43I worry about is All right. I I you've
51:45all seen
51:46um Hamlet.
51:48There's a character in Hamlet named
51:50Polonius
51:51who's always giving people advice.
51:53And Hamlet's kind of a rough play except
51:55for the moment when Hamlet stabs to
51:56death Polonius.
51:58Nobody likes that. So, I worry I'm
52:00slipping into Polonius land.
52:03But,
52:04I would say
52:05invest time in relationships.
52:08And ask people out.
52:11Uh, and get broke, get dumped.
52:15You'll regard it as
52:17you'll you'll remember some of the
52:18courses, but I guarantee you'll remember
52:20that.
52:22And it will make you a better
52:23relationship person.
52:25You need practice. I had a a student of
52:27mine here
52:28maybe seven or eight years ago.
52:31She said, "I don't need to worry about
52:32that. Marriage is a box that'll come in
52:33the mail when I'm 35."
52:36I'm like, wrong.
52:38You may not get married till 35 or 40 or
52:41whatever, but begin practicing.
52:44Get some reps in.
52:46Uh,
52:46and I do think that's that's what I
52:48would tell a
52:49a student and
52:51but nobody listens to me, maybe wisely.
52:54So, thank you.
52:55Let's go up this stairway here.
53:03>> Thank you so much for this talk. I I
53:05guess I'm curious your perspective kind
53:08of on the younger generation, um,
53:11thinking about people falling in love
53:13with AI and the way that technology is
53:16kind of impacting, um, the way people
53:19build relationships
53:21and how that maybe has shifted people's
53:24interest or capacity to do what sounds
53:26like really hard work, um,
53:31for maybe an unknown payoff that has
53:34been described in like some of the poems
53:35that you're sharing. And then also just
53:38as a woman I'm I'm curious a lot of the
53:39things you brought were from, you know,
53:42pastimes thinking about marriage, but
53:44you know, 50, 100 years ago marriage
53:48for many women was like a means to a
53:50financial access and freedom. So, how do
53:53you kind of see that as women are
53:56um
53:56raising themselves in those ways, how
53:59marriage kind of plays a role in their
54:01lives.
54:02>> Yeah. One of the things I've learned is
54:03that people in your generation love it
54:06when people of my generation make
54:07generalizations about you.
54:10You just think that's the best.
54:12>> [laughter]
54:13>> Um
54:15and so I try not to do it, especially
54:17cuz I I have this um
54:19psychological disease, which is called
54:22maturity interruptus,
54:24uh which is that I like to listen to
54:26whatever music
54:2715-year-olds listen to at that moment.
54:30So, when I was 15, I listened to
54:32uh the things that were popular with 50
54:34with the people my age at I don't know,
54:37Abba.
54:38Um I don't know,
54:40Rolling Stones,
54:42uh Michael Jackson.
54:44And then when
54:46the '90s rolled around,
54:48I started listening to um
54:51uh
54:52Snoop Dogg and uh Straight Outta
54:55Compton. I'm writing conservative
54:56editorials for the Wall Street Journal
54:58at that time.
54:59But my at night I'm like Straight Outta
55:01Compton. I'm listening to
55:04to Biggie, all that stuff.
55:06And then in the 2000s,
55:09I'm uh
55:10I've got three kids. I'm driving a
55:12minivan.
55:13I'm listening to
55:15I kissed a girl and I liked it. I'm
55:17singing along. I'm listening to Ke$ha.
55:21I'm spending very little time
55:25dancing in the club with a bottle full
55:26of bub.
55:28>> [laughter]
55:28>> 50 Cent song. Uh
55:30but I spent a lot of time listening to
55:31that.
55:32And so I my maturity, I just stayed
55:35right there.
55:36At at Ke$ha.
55:38Um
55:40and then it was uh
55:41David Guetta, I don't know if that's how
55:43you pronounce his name. It was like Now,
55:44whenever I tell people I always have to
55:46reassure them, "Don't worry, when I was
55:47looking David Guetta and Pitbull,
55:49I was not actually moving. I won't don't
55:51want you to have that image in my your
55:53mind."
55:54Shakira says her hips don't lie.
55:56My hips are mute. They don't say
55:58anything at all.
56:00And so, I felt I could at least relate a
56:02little.
56:03And then I we crossed what I think of as
56:05the Billie Eilish line,
56:07where I just never could quite get
56:08Billie Eilish.
56:10And I think the culture has just changed
56:12a lot in in the last 10 years. So, I
56:15really am very humble about how much I
56:17understand about more romantic mores
56:20right now.
56:21And I I don't want to generalize. I
56:23think the one thing statistics show
56:25is that there's less of it.
56:28There are there are fewer people going
56:29out on dates, fewer people have had
56:31relationships when they get out of high
56:32school, get out of college.
56:34Uh
56:34and I think that's a function of you can
56:36all name the things, phones,
56:39a fear of uh sexual predators
56:43or being accused of it. Um and then uh I
56:47think the time pressures
56:49uh and so, all these things have built
56:52up, so it's a different world.
56:55And then a something really nasty has
56:57happened in our culture, and I started
56:59to talk about it last talk, which is
57:02a feeling of lesser than gets
57:04transmitted into resentment.
57:07And resentment is the feeling you you
57:11don't get the highest things you desire.
57:14And so, you decide those highest things
57:15are not worth wanting.
57:18That the highest that generosity gets
57:20perceived as uh
57:22a sham, just an act.
57:25Or kindness gets perceived as being a
57:27sucker.
57:28You just can't even acknowledge the
57:30higher thing, and if I get a little
57:31political,
57:34Donald Trump,
57:35when he was in Normandy in the first
57:37term, and he heard about the
57:40the men who had so lost, sacrificed, and
57:42lost their lives in Normandy during the
57:44invasion.
57:45Remember he called them suckers?
57:48I think that's someone who's so consumed
57:49by resentment he can't even understand
57:51why anybody would do that.
57:53Why the the highest value of sacrificing
57:56your life for country would be a noble
57:58thing to do. It's just to him It's not
57:59like It's just to him stupid.
58:01And I think he never got John McCain for
58:03this reason.
58:05And that's the process of what
58:07resentment does for you. It constricts
58:09your value system so you think whatever
58:11is lower is more real, and whatever is
58:13lofty is
58:17And I worry that if we get in a culture
58:19where there's a lot of resentment,
58:21cuz people feel they haven't been given
58:23access to things,
58:24uh and they're often right about that,
58:26by the way. Um that we'll lose this the
58:29romanticization.
58:30The one thing I will say
58:32is if, as I believe, that we're in a
58:34period of
58:36uh of resentment, a lot of resentment in
58:38this country,
58:40that if you look at historically what
58:42follows eras of resentment,
58:44it's eras of romanticism.
58:47If resentment is the
58:49devaluation
58:51of the higher values, romanticism is the
58:54ardor for the higher values.
58:56It's the desire through art and poetry
58:58and music to fall in love with stuff.
59:02And after the exhaustion of the late
59:05Greek period, you had the Neoplatonist,
59:07the romantic revival.
59:09After the uh exhaustion of what we used
59:12to call the Dark Ages,
59:14you had the romantic revival of the
59:16middle of the High Middle Ages, which is
59:18uh Sir Lancelot,
59:20Chartres,
59:22chivalry.
59:24That's romanticism. After the exhaustion
59:26of industrialization,
59:28you had uh
59:30poets like Wordsworth and Coleridge,
59:33social critics like John Ruskin.
59:35They were like, "We will not be turned
59:37into machines by industrialization. We
59:39will celebrate the passions."
59:42After World War I,
59:44you had the modernism and the
59:46romanticism of T.S. Eliot, of of Simone
59:49Weil, of Martin Buber, I and Thou.
59:54And so, one of the things that I'm
59:55hopeful about in America in the world is
59:57that culture goes through cycles,
1:00:00rupture and repair.
1:00:01And we've gone through this cycle of
1:00:03resentment. Eventually, people are going
1:00:05to say,
1:00:07"I want Mr. Rogers."
1:00:10And I don't know if you saw the
1:00:11documentary or the film with Tom Hanks,
1:00:13but a lot of people sat in that film
1:00:15weeping, including me,
1:00:17cuz he was just so good.
1:00:19And we want to be reminded of that.
1:00:22And Ted Lasso was another example of
1:00:25that.
1:00:26And then there's the TV show which I
1:00:27have barely seen called The Good Place.
1:00:30They're little They're little cultural
1:00:31wisps in the wind. I wouldn't call them
1:00:33more than that.
1:00:34Where people they just want radical
1:00:36goodness.
1:00:38And it would not shock me if we were in
1:00:39for a period of high romanticization
1:00:42of culture,
1:00:44as has happened many times in history
1:00:45before.
1:00:47In which case, I'll give a talk on uh
1:00:49don't get carried away with romance like
1:00:54Maybe I already did.
1:01:00>> Thank you very much. First, great four
1:01:02talks, you know, enjoyed it quite a bit.
1:01:05Thank you so much.
1:01:06Um so, I'll ask you a question and I
1:01:09realize I'm risking the response of
1:01:10weren't you listening?
1:01:12Um
1:01:13So, I've got a technical background. I
1:01:14kind of think in those terms.
1:01:16And and I think about love all the time,
1:01:19right? But at its core, is it physics or
1:01:22is it chemistry? Is it opposites attract
1:01:25or is it like likes like?
1:01:27>> Um yeah, the the evidence on this one is
1:01:29very clear.
1:01:31We we have the saying I opposites
1:01:33attract, but the evidence is likes
1:01:34attract.
1:01:36That the more similarities uh you have
1:01:38with the person,
1:01:40the uh
1:01:41the the the better your shot.
1:01:44That you think the same things, your
1:01:46instinctive reactants are the same,
1:01:48your tastes are the same,
1:01:51you like the same paintings, believe me,
1:01:54in marriage, what you hang on the wall
1:01:55can be a very contentious issue.
1:01:59And so, having all those similarities, I
1:02:01think the evidence is very clear, it's
1:02:02an advantage. And that's not to say
1:02:04that when opposites marry,
1:02:07they can't have a great relationship. I
1:02:09always try to make this point that
1:02:11whenever you're quoting social science,
1:02:12you're quoting averages across
1:02:14populations.
1:02:16It doesn't apply to you.
1:02:19Cuz human humanity is very complicated,
1:02:21and you can do everything the social
1:02:23scientists say is wrong,
1:02:26and it'll be right for you.
1:02:28And so, whenever I make these
1:02:30generalizations using social science
1:02:31data, you're you're talking about
1:02:33likelihoods, not certainties.
1:02:35Cuz people are really complicated.
1:02:38And so, I'm trying to think of
1:02:39great marriage Some of the great
1:02:40marriages in my own circle,
1:02:44yeah, they they become
1:02:46um
1:02:48they almost you know, they're the sort
1:02:49of people who like to finish each
1:02:50other's sentences.
1:02:52They begin to look alike.
1:02:54Um and it's just somehow there's a
1:02:56phrase, a word I love, limerence,
1:03:00which is when people are moving in and
1:03:01out, and you almost can't tell where one
1:03:03ends and one begins.
1:03:05And when you talk to them when they're
1:03:06old,
1:03:08they say, "We had We must have had
1:03:10fights, but I don't remember them."
1:03:13And then that's that's similarity.
1:03:16We are now at 5:05 past time.
1:03:19So, uh thank you, Yale community.
1:03:22>> [snorts]
1:03:22>> Uh
1:03:23and I'll see you in the spring.
1:03:28>> [applause]

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