TED Radio Hour - A guide to being brave in relationships

Episode Date: August 22, 2025

From sustaining a marriage to making new friends, forming connections requires courage. This hour, TED speakers guide us through being brave during the most difficult moments in relationships. Guests include writer and podcaster Kelly Corrigan, journalist Allison Gilbert and clinical psychologists Julie and John Gottman. Original broadcast date: November 1, 2024TED Radio Hour+ subscribers now get access to bonus episodes, with more ideas from TED speakers and a behind the scenes look with our producers. A Plus subscription also lets you listen to regular episodes (like this one!) without sponsors. Sign-up at: plus.npr.org/tedSee pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

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From TED and NPR. I'm Anoush Zamorodi. Writer Kelly Corrigan's daughters are grown now. But back when they were tweens, she noticed something. If they came home from school really mad or upset and she tried to help them, they would just turn off. Their emotion would change and they would go from something raw. to something kind of tired and dismissive, and then they would wander away. And I would think, what just happened?

Like, they told me they were upset about X. We brainstorm solutions to X, and they seem so unsatisfied with my parental interference. This really bothered Kelly, until one day when she was on a road trip with her old college roommate, Tracy. We were going back to some reunion, and she was in graduate school. to become a therapist. As they drove, Kelly's daughter, Georgia, called. And she was very upset about something. And Tracy was sitting next to me, and I put the phone on speaker.

Because I really wanted Tracy to hear the drama in Georgia's voice, and also maybe to, like, Cyrano de Bergerac me. Like, to just tell me what to say. Georgia was crying. She hated sixth grade. All the girls in class were turning on her for no reason. So Georgia said her things, and then Tracy said, tell me more. Say tell me more. And then I'd say, oh, tell me more. And then Georgia would tell me more. And then Tracy would say, that sounds really hard. And then I'd say, oh, that sounds so hard. She said, it is. And George would go on, go on, go on. And then Tracy would say, what do you want to do about it? And I'd say, so what do you want to do about it? And it was like acting. I was completely. Completely trusting Tracy's advice, and it was uncanny to me how effective it was.

And what it taught me is that I think it's kind of humiliating when you bring a problem to someone and they solve it like lickety split. Because basically the underlying message of that is, what are you so upset about it? It's not that hard to figure this out. And that's a terrible feeling versus the joy of like untying the knots yourself. So I always picture someone picking through like a giant jewelry box full of necklaces and earrings and bracelets and brooches and everything's all tangled up. And there is a tremendous satisfaction in separating all those items once and for all. And so either you're going to let a person have that satisfaction or you're going to steal it. And once I heard myself phrase it that way, that it's stealing satisfaction.

That helped me stay on the right side of things. Like, don't you dare solve this for them. Don't grab that. That's greedy. Like, let her solve it. That's really the call here. And that's brave because you are putting aside your own methods and your own sort of delivery mechanisms that are most,

comfortable for you. You have to decide that their needs are paramount, that you are not trying to serve both needs at the same time, and you're definitely not trying to serve your own needs over theirs. We want to fix problems, win the argument, make friends with the tap of a screen. But what does it mean to truly be close to someone? And how can we have the courage to put ourselves and our fears aside. Today on the show, ideas about being brave in relationships. From dealing with family baggage to a scientifically proven way to stay married, and from one of the most famous relationships therapists of all, wisdom on how to make friends in what can

feel like a lonely world. Kelly Corrigan believes that to be the most helpful to the most important people, in your life, you just need to say a few phrases. Tell me more. Go on. What else? Those are the seven words. And you can get pretty far in life just with those seven words. She spent years talking about families, her own and many others, on her PBS show, her podcast, and in her four bestselling books. And Kelly thinks that when it comes to a crisis, that is when we most need that quiet, soft kind of bravery. Inside every crisis you think you might be ready for are a hundred dirty surprises that are not in the playbook. Here she is on the TED stage. I had stage three cancer in my 30s, and I can tell you

that following the chemo schedule didn't take nearly as much courage as admitting to my husband that sex felt less sexy after my boobs, which were once a real strong, suit for me. We're made weird and uneven by a surgeon's knife. This bravery I'm talking about might even be better understood if you look at the smaller moments of injury and family life when there's not really an answer, or it might be your fault, or it might remind you of something you'd rather forget, or because people are so suggestible, and the wrong tone or expression or phrasing might somehow make things worse. Say your kid was dropped from a group text.

They were in it, they mattered, they belonged, and then poof. Or your husband blew the big deal at work, or your mom won't wear the diapers that would really help her get through Majong on Wednesdays. And how should we calibrate the exquisite bravery to respond productively when someone in our family looks at us and says, do I know you?

I weigh myself before and after every meal. I hear voices. I steal. I'm using again. I bought a gun. I stopped taking the medication. I can't stop making online bets. Sometimes I wonder if more life is really worth all this effort.

Bravery is the great guts to move closer to the wound as composed as a war nurse holding eye contact and saying these seven words. tell me more, what else, go on. That's how the brave shine. That's all they do. They say, tell me more, what else? Go on.

Even if they're scared of what might happen next, even if they have no training or experience to prepare them for this moment, even if it's late and they have an early flight. The theme through your books, through your talk, is about how important it is to be present, to listen, in our family relationships, however you want to define family. But it is so hard to do when you are tired, when you're trying to get dinner on the table, when you feel like, oh my God, my kid is like complaining again.

Like, do you know how much it costs to send you to that camp? What advice do you have for being present in a, I guess, a doable, way. I do think that it speaks to the inconvenience of vulnerability, like anyone who has children knows that they often come in right as you're turning off your light to go to sleep. Yep. And they want to tell you something, or you're pulling up to the airport, or there's some imminent drop-off coming. And I think that bravery requires a setting aside of self, and a setting aside of ego such that your whole being, everything you've got cognitively and emotionally, is available to the other person to lean on. If a person is in front of you telling you,

I want to say all these horrible things, I want to tell you how awful I feel. Like, can you even hear it? Can you absorb that? And are you signaling that you can? Because another thing I've thought about a lot over the years is that the job is, if you really love someone, the job is to make sure they know it, which requires a little customization. You know, not every kid wants to be hugged repeatedly or sent cards in the mail. Like the whole love language thing is so valuable here, which is what would it look like? if I were to custom design a feeling for you, what would the shape of it be, what would the sound of it be,

don't put too much pressure on yourself to say the right thing. I'm so thrilled by the idea of that kind of emotional hospitality, where you're like, I tell me something. I'm here, I'm listening. So few people love to listen. most people, it seems, love to talk. Here's two things the brave don't do. They don't take over and become the hero.

In families, bravery is mostly just sitting there. Personally, I thought love meant action. I had no idea it could be so still. When things get hairy for one of my people, everything in me wants to grab a clipboard, make a do-list, and start calendaring appointments. and all that can accidentally put us center stage, no longer the coach or the minister,

but rather one of the afflicted. But these gritty endurance types I've been admiring have no self and no needs and no agenda, or at least they know how to override all that for the main character who is not us. The second thing the brave don't do, leave or hide inside. I'd work or hobbies or some other socially acceptable busyness.

In my worst moments, when sitting on my hands, it's just unbearable. I have dreamed of going to get an MFA in Paris. Because if I can't help, why do I have to watch? It would be nice to leave and start again. Hardly anyone who's been in a long marriage hasn't at least wondered how it is that the object of their desire has become so burpy and farty. Sometimes I see myself naked,

stretch marks from pregnancies, scars from cancer surgeries, other things that I don't feel you need to be visualizing right about now. And I think it's a miracle that man stays with me. But, you know, he's not untouched by time either. And that's just the physical. I mean, who here hasn't wanted to be with someone who hasn't seen us eating on the toilet

or bitching at the Comcast guy? leaving behind our own humiliating history, maybe with the nice person we met at art school in Paris. It's an option. People take it. The brave hang around. They are available and ready to bear witness. In a moment, Kelly Corrigan explains how she applied this same philosophy to the final days of her father's life.

On the show today, bravery in relations. I'm Manoosh Zamoroti, and you're listening to The TED Radio Hour from NPR. Stay with us. It's the TED Radio Hour from NPR. I'm Manus Shumeroody. On the show today, what it takes to be brave in relationships. We were just hearing from writer Kelly Corrigan on why sometimes the bravest thing you can do for the people you love is nothing at all. You ended up applying this same philosophy in one of the last conversations you had with your father.

Can you tell us that story too? Yeah. So my dad was just days away from dying. And he was completely willing to have me sit in bed with him, to hold hands with him for hours. Like, he was telling me in the way that he was responding to my outreach. that like this is it and we should, sorry, we should gobble up this time than we have together. And he felt more or less at peace. He was 84 years old.

He'd had a spectacular time while he was here. But there was this day where he felt kind of agitated. And you could only see it if you were very quiet and very tuned in, which I consider to be an active bravery, to not rush around. and be moving things around on his nightstand and telling him to go to sleep and bossing people around, but rather just sliding in next to them

and mirroring their mood. And so I was looking at his forehead and it was all wrinkled up and tight. And he said, oh, lovey, I should have gone to see your Uncle Tommy more. So Uncle Tommy is my mother's brother. He died at 46 of a brain tumor. My dad loved this guy.

And it had been a long time. It had been maybe 40 years since Tommy died. But right then and there, he had this discomfort with his failure to give more to Uncle Tommy. And instead of saying, oh, come on, you're an amazing brother-in-law to him. I said, tell me more. And he said, I should have named a kid after my lacrosse. coach. And it was like, what? Why? Tell me more. And he said, he was so important to me. I went to college on a scholarship, and I almost blew it. I was partying too much. I didn't take it seriously.

I was late to practice. And the guy took me by the shoulders and said, you got one more week on this team or I'm sending you home. And he shaped me right up. And it was like, what else? Like, is there more? And of course there was. And so we spent the day reviewing these little regrets that he had that were so, to my mind, so innocent. I mean, it was almost like the mood of him was that he was going to tell me he had cheated on my mother, or that he had an illegitimate child or that he had embezzled. But the fact of it was very small to me, to my eye. But of course, that goes to this larger point, which is it doesn't really matter what it looks like to my eye. Like, whatever's weighing on you is weighing on you. And it was like, I'm going to hear you. I'm going to absorb

this thing with you. I'm going to mirror your seriousness about it. And maybe that can let you rest. And it did. And he leaned back and his pillow and said, I'm good, love you. That's good for today. What a gift you could give him by doing that. Well, yes, I suppose, but I'm a also such a gift to me to get to give it. Like, it's so hard, it seems almost impossible, really, to love someone effectively and productively and sufficiently in that moment. And he was offering me away. And I took it. And I all always have it. The final act then of the truly brave is leaning back and letting them go. The reward for all this break. is a full human experience, complete with all the emotions at maximum dosage,

where we have been put to great use and found an other-centric love that is complete in its expression and its transmission. The reward is to end up soft and humble, empty, and in awe, knowing that of all the magnificence we have beheld from cradle to great, the most eye-popping was interpersonal. So here's to anyone who notices and reads between the lines, who asks the right questions, but not too many, who takes notes at the doctor's office and wipes butts, young and old, who listens, holds, and stays.

We, who, untrained and always a little off guard, still dare to do love, to be love. That's brave. Thank you. That was Kelly Corrigan. Her latest book is called Tell Me More. You can see her full talk at TED.com. So that's being brave, showing up for your family. But what about your spouse or partner? How do we show courage one-on-one? especially when we're in disagreement. Yeah, fighting is very normal. It's very natural. Just by virtue of the fact that each of us has a different brain from the other person,

we've been raised differently. We actually need conflict because we're not attracted to people who are just like us. And we have to keep understanding our partner as we change and grow. John and Julie Gottman have been married for over 35 years, and they are very well known for being pioneers in the field of couples psychology, specifically researching why some couples stay together and others don't. It all goes back to 1986 when John and a colleague created a laboratory to study couples at the University of Washington. Julie joined them soon after. They called it the Love Lab. We wanted to see whether we could predict the future of relationships.

Here's what they would do. Couples would come into the lab, sit down, typically facing one another, and we would ask them to think about a problem that they hadn't solved yet, that they wanted to talk about. The Gottman's interviewed couples over the course of weeks, months, even years. But there was something unique about. their method. The conversations were recorded, and each person was hooked up to monitors to measure heart rate, blood velocity. Skin conduct and sweating from the palms and the hands,

respiration, and variety of other signals, and they were synchronized to the video time code. Analyzing what their facial expressions, their body movements, their words, and their tone of voice, all conveyed. After collecting reams of data, The Gottman's started to see patterns. For example, if someone got upset and stopped responding in the conversation. Their heart rates were typically over 100 beats a minute. They might be breathing very shallowly. They are basically having great difficulty hearing the other person,

interpreting what that other person is saying, and creatively problem-solving. Over the years, they would follow up with couples and track whether they stayed together. And we found, surprisingly, that we could predict with over 90% accuracy, the future of our relationship. This work continues today, but with a boost from artificial intelligence. Now, most of that is automated, which is somewhat miraculous. We are getting hundredth of a second by a hundredth of a second, what is happening to a couple? They've now studied thousands of pairs in conversation and codified their findings into various laws or rules for relationships. The most famous one is called the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Basically, four reactions that if they show up during a fight may mean a couple's demise. Here are Julie and John Gottman on the TED state. The first one was criticism, blaming a problem on a personality flaw of your partner. For example, oh my God, this place is such a mess. Why are you such a slob? The second horseman is contempt. Contempt is like criticism, but it has a dash of superiority. You include scorn, disgust, sarcasm, and nasty insult.

The third horseman is defensiveness. That's the most common one. And that's when we act like an innocent victim. I did too pay the bills. The fourth horseman is stonewalling. When we shut down completely, and we don't even give the speaker any signs that we're listening. And what we discovered from the physiological research

is that people who stonewalled tended to be what we call flooded, which actually means in fight or flight. So, you know, when you're flooded, you really feel like you're in danger of dying. You feel so threatened by your partner that you start to really secrete these stress hormones, cortisol, and adrenaline.

And it creates a kind of tunnel vision where they can't really listen, they can't really process information very well, and they wind up repeating themselves, thinking if they repeat themselves louder and louder, they'll be more persuasive. Soon as you recognize there's flooding in the room, you say, I think we need to take a break.

And you say, when you will come back to continue the conversation so that the other person doesn't feel rejected. On the break, you distract yourself by reading, by listening to music, maybe watching TV. So your body has a chance to calm down. And then you come back at the designated time you agreed to. And typically, people look like they've had a brain transplant when they sit down and talk again. Okay.

Your latest book is called Fight Right. how successful couples turn conflict into connection. And in it, you share examples from couples that you have studied. And I want to ask you about one argument in particular. This is a young couple discussing an upcoming visit from the in-laws. We have actually created a reenactment of their conversation, and we can play this case study now. Oh, by the way, I told my parents they could stay in our room this weekend when they visit.

We'll sleep on the couch. You already told them? Well, yeah, they're my parents. You know I don't sleep well on the couch. Come on. It's just for the weekend. What's the big deal? I just, I want to be at my best with your parents.

And I don't want to be grumpy because I didn't get the... Like you're ever at your best with my parents anyway. Wow. Okay. Why are you making that face? You know it's true. I'm trying to make an effort with your parents. Oh, yeah?

Why has it taken three years for you to do that? Three years. Why is this the weekend? You don't think that I made an effort for three years. Okay. So, in-laws, it's a, I don't need to be a scientist to know that it's a touchy subject for many couples. Tell me, what did you each hear in that conversation? Well, I heard a lot of criticism and a lot of contempt from the woman.

First of all, he was caught off guard by her announcement. He sort of expressed that, but really didn't talk about his feelings. She failed to listen to his feelings about it. What's the big deal? She's minimizing his feelings, invalidating his feelings. He's really hurt by that. He goes defensive. And there's no listening going on whatsoever.

Yeah, he was ready to withdraw. We also know that his heart rate goes up to $95. each a minute very quickly. Right. This was a real couple. We're playing a reenactment, but you actually measured them in your lab. That's right. Just by using the video, we could measure the heart rate of both people. And turns out the trust really falls dramatically in this interaction. Trust means each person is really not just interested in their own benefits, but also really working to ensure that their partner's benefits are maximized. Is your partner there for you? Do they have your back? And we can compute that moment by moment. So they very quickly become strangers and enemies. So how can they fix this?

So what she could have said instead is what we call a softened startup. Let's say the fellow's name is Dan. So Dan, I'm feeling a little anxious. about my parents coming for this weekend. I really want them to be comfortable. So how would you feel about our giving our bedroom to them while we sleep on the couch in the living room just for the weekend? Okay. That would be an opening question that gives Dan some freedom of choice. Yeah.

But, you know, he could really improve the interaction as well. well. You know, if she says something like, you really haven't tried for three years, you know, he can say, gee, that's a really strong reaction to how I've treated your parents. I want to hear more about that. And give me a chance to really understand what your feelings are. So both people can play a role in getting to mutual understanding. And mutual understanding is really the goal of conflict. I've been married for nearly 20 years. years now. And the thing I hear from people is almost in a resigned way, like, oh, we had a fight. It's the same fight we always have. You call these perpetual fights. Right. Are we all doomed in a relationship to have the fight that we've been having since we first got together over and over and over again? Yes. However, this leads to a different intervention. It's called the Dream Within Conflict. exercise. We have a series of six questions that really draw out the subterranean levels of how

somebody feels about a particular point of view. You know, people are poised to fight one another because underneath their position, there are a lot of very important beliefs and hidden dreams. 69% of all relationship conflict problems are perpetual, which means that they never go away. And so we learn that conflict really mostly needs to be managed rather than solved. Fighting to understand means taking a conversation about an issue and going much deeper to understand what's beneath your partner's position on the issue. That builds the connection.

There was a woman who we will call Jenny, who was adamantly opposed to getting a dog. But her partner, Allison, was all for it. So they decided to try the dreams within conflict conversation. When Allison asked Jenny, so what is your ideal dream? here regarding this issue. You know, if we don't have a dog, we're not tied down, we're not burdened.

We're free to travel the world together. That's what I really want. Now listen to what Allison said. You know, I see getting a dog as a practice run for having kids and having a family. That's what I want. Beneath the surface, it was about leading a life of adventure and travel versus staying home and raising a family. You generate such a level of understanding

that then they can compromise. Let's find the solution that honors your dreams and my dream. But what if there is no solution? When we come back, Julie and John Gottman on deal breakers, the issues that no amount of understanding can fix and that can spell the end for many couples. Today on the show, bravery in relationships,

You're listening to The TED Radio Hour from NPR. I'm Manoosh Zamorodi, and we'll be right back. It's the TED Radio Hour from NPR. I'm Manus Shumeroody. On the show today, bravery in relationships. And we were just hearing from renowned couple psychologist John and Julie Gottman about how to fight right, to use conflict, to strengthen a relationship. But let's say people follow the Gottman's methods,

and come to the conclusion that they want different things in life. What then? It's true that sometimes one person's dream is the other person's nightmare, and they cannot reach a compromise, but at least they know why they're breaking up. A good example is one person really doesn't want to be a parent, and the other person really needs to be a parent. You know, that's a common reason why people, why many people break up.

Another one that I've seen is geography, and this is interesting, you know, especially in our dating on the Internet world. I treated a couple where they had met at a conference and then they had several rendezvouses together after that. He lived in Uganda. She lived in Switzerland. And where were they going to live? They loved each other, but they couldn't make their future come true. Another is polyamory versus monogamy. That's a more common one these days.

Are you seeing that working for people? It seems like the jury's out on that, at least here in the United States. Yeah, there's no research on it, unfortunately. So, you know, we really don't know empirically what makes polyamory work. Another deal-breaker, Manus, that's really emerged quite recently in the last couple of decades, is when a relationship really doesn't fulfill the growth needs, either career or emotional or spiritual growth needs of one person. And that's one reason sociologists have been saying that it leads to the end of a relationship. I want to just make sure I ask you. you know, what is the payoff of fighting right? If we are brave enough to get in there and do the work, what do you see on the other side?

So the payoff is that we can have a lifelong love. And research has shown that when you can do that, you actually live an average of 15 to 17 years longer. You're healthier and your kids turn out better. And their relationships when they grow up, turn out better as well. What I've seen in doing couple therapy for 30 years now is a different kind of love. It's much more profound, it's deeper, it much more recognizes the humanity of the other partner as well as your own humanity. And once you've seen one person in their fullness, including the crash, You tend to be more forgiving, I think, of other people. And look at this world, Manusch. This world is split and fractured,

and we desperately need a little bit more love and peace in the world. This is one way to start creating that. That was Julie and John Gottman. They are co-founders of the Gottman Institute, and their latest book is called Fight Right. How successful couples turn conflict into connection. You can see their full talk at TED.com. On the show today, bravery in relationships, which has to include friendship.

But before we get into Just Friends, a warning that this episode includes some frank talk about sex. Good evening. This is Dr. Ruth Westheimer. Right here on 97 WY&Y FM radio. So maybe you remember the iconic sex therapist, Dr. Ruth. Yes, you are on there. Yeah, we? Yeah. She rose to fame in the 1980s because she was one of the first people to openly talk about sex on the radio and on television.

The way you can talk about reading, writing, arithmetic, you can also talk about sex. She became a lively, warm, and non-judgmental voice for generations of Americans, including journalist Alison Gilbert. I was one of those listeners. Yes, you are on the air. Hi, Dr. Worktime, I know you always are concerned about birth control. Yes, I am.

I was a teenager with raging hormones who found myself with a closed bedroom door lights out radio really so low that I was surprised I could actually hear what she had to say. You know what I would do? What? Find yourself somebody else.

Oh, but I love Charlie, and he loves me too. Because the callers, it was a call in radio show, were asking her what I thought then were really naughty questions. Just give her as many orgasms as she would like. Try that, okay? That my mom was not prepared to talk with me about. In a way, I do want to go to bed with him. I'm afraid that if I do, it's wrong for me to do this.

Right. I tell you, sometimes when I hear a 16-year-old ask me that question. I would like to say, what's the rush? And so I was a fan before I was ever a collaborator. And so to say that I was in awe when I finally got to meet her at 95, she had been in my world, so to speak, since I was a kid. As an adult, Allison was thrilled when she was assigned by the New York Times to write an article about Dr. Ruth's new role. Dr. Ruth was on a mission to be appointed New York State's first ambassador to loneliness. She had been reading and observing what the U.S. Surgeon General has called an epidemic of loneliness

and isolation, and she was determined to be part of solving this health crisis by teaching people how to have the courage to form friendships. She knew she can help. She had something to say. And the article that I was assigned was to report on this mission. And then as soon as the article published, it's like both of our guards went down.

And before I really realized what was happening, she was enveloping me. And what I have come to understand is like her web of love and friendship. that seems now that I look back, ever growing, and I just found myself fortunate to be in that space. And what I found was that warmth you heard through the radio. Tracy, I think that you should find yourself in new men, okay?

That magic that captivated TV watchers when she went on television. Would you have changed sex for America? Don't you tell me that it's less good now? No, it's better now. That to me was still present in her apartment, in her living room, despite her being, when I met her, mostly confined to a wheelchair. Do you feel that you are a good friend to others? This is a recording of Allison and Dr. Ruth in the last few months of her life before she died at the age of 96 in 2024. I'm not only do I think that I'm a good friend, I was super friends.

I'm like the best friend that anybody could have. Allison became Dr. Ruth's collaborator on her final book, The Joy of Connections. Since my late husband died, I wanted to write about loneliness. So now I am very happy to write this book. Loneliness is a feeling that you want a deeper connection with people. And you feel like you're not getting what you most desire. But if you recognize it's a feeling, you can do something about it, that loneliness is, in fact, curable. But you can be your own doctor.

You can do it. And you can follow her lessons. And you're not alone. A lot of this, I didn't realize, stems back to her own personal story. It was a rough childhood from, 10 years old forward. During the Holocaust, her mother and grandmother put her on a train, part of the kinder transport, to remove German Jewish children, to safety.

Her father had already been taken by the Nazis, and this was their attempt to save Ruth's life. You can't control what life is going to throw you. away. Here's Dr. Ruth Westheimer on the TED stage in 2015. At the age of 10 and a half, when the Nazis came to power, I was sent to Switzerland to a children's home, hoping that my parents could get out of Germany and pick me up. The children's home became an orphanage. And I have learned some lessons from that particular time to take control. of my life and make the best of it. Nobody is going to pick up your worries.

They will still be there the next day. But in meantime, you can enjoy the relationship. If you are lonely, my advice is don't just sit there and say, I don't have anybody. Do something. She felt she had what she needed to move forward after the worst happened. and that just made her want to seek and establish a chosen family throughout her entire life that was made up of friends. She kept collecting friends, bit by bit, like gems. It's a masterclass, really, of losing your entire family and yet pushing forward and rebuilding.

What are the main things that she thinks, Cures loneliness. Give us, like, the top tips. I will tell you a story that I think is so illustrative of her secret sauce. She would end nearly every conversation when I was packing up to go, and she would ask me the same question, when will I see you again? And that was my cue to take her paper calendar and to assign my name to a date and a specific time.

And it's a magical question. When will I see you again? It communicates so much that she wanted to see me again, which made me, of course, feel special that there was a burgeoning friendship. But it also showcases her real interest in being proactive about her life, that she was not going to leave to chance what she wanted. Okay, so you have to make an effort. Sounds kind of obvious, but necessary. I don't think it's obvious at all. I think we all spread ourselves so thin.

And that breath, Dr. Ruth would say, is at odds oftentimes with depth. And so opt for meaningful busyness, not just busyness. I love that. But she also says that you need to broaden your friend cabulary. I love that, right, because she didn't want to give people the wrong idea that, oh my gosh, I need a best friend. I need a BFF. If I don't have that one person, I'm doomed. You can have an acquaintance. You can have someone who perhaps you see infrequently, but what you do together is an experience that you feel broadens and deepens. I loved visiting her in her apartment building in New York City because when we would go outside, she would know everybody. They would engage her in conversation, but she would not let them go either.

These were just incredible brief conversations because even if we engage with strangers, just a simple hello, it helps us develop a sense of connection in community with other people. She was also kind of tricky. There's another tip where she says feign needs, like ask the neighbor for a cup of milk instead of going out to buy it just so that you can have an excuse to talk to them.

How can you not love Dr. Ruth? Sure, you may have a carton of eggs in the fridge, but if you're making a cake and you feel like you want to have an excuse to maybe have a conversation with someone next door, so what? Ask them for an egg. I mean, who is that going to hurt? Engage in those little conversations with neighbors, because that is what's going to progress a relationship.

It seems to me that what all of these tips and ideas and suggestions have in common is it's on you to make the first move to start up the conversation, to interrupt a group and insert yourself in some way. And you might be rejected, maybe, but that's okay. It's going to be hard. She had no patience for complaining. Let's just call it like it is. She would not have any of that. It is up to you, the individual, to do something with your life. You are given this opportunity.

Go for it. No one is going to come in and push you out the door to make friends. you have to decide that it's so important to you to feel better, to be enriched by relationships, that you experience the tailwind of needing to turn off Netflix and get out the door. Go where the people are, she would say. They're not on your couch. It's up to each person. You have to make the first step to make sure that, that you are combating the loneliness. What are you doing or not doing

that's put you in a place where you feel lonely? And she's going to show you step by little step how to move forward so you can feel that you belong because you are deserving of relationships that make you feel seen. That was journalist Alison Gilbert. We are dedicating this entire episode to the memory of Dr. Ruth Westheimer, whose TED Talk you can watch at TED.npr.org.

Her new book, co-written with Alison Gilbert and Pierre LeHugh, is called The Joy of Connections, 100 ways to beat loneliness and live a happier and more meaningful life. Thank you so much for listening to our episode about bravery in relationships. It was produced by Rachel Faulkner White, Hersha Nihada, and Katie. Montalione. It was edited by Sanaz Meshkampore and me. Our production staff at NPR also includes James Delahoussi, Fiona Gehrin, and Matthew Cloutier. Our executive producer is Irene Noguchi. A special thank you to Bumika Jane, Yush Bhutata, Mitra, Arthur, and a Johnny Daniel for voice acting.

Our audio engineers were Tiffany Vera Castro, Becky Brown, and Patrick Murray. Our theme music was written by Romteen Arablewee. Our partners at TED are Chris Anderson, Roxanne Highlash, Alejandra Salazar, and Daniela Balezzo. I'm Manus Shumeroady, and you've been listening to The TED Radio Hour from NPR.