The Ben Mulroney Show - The Human Connector in studio. How to make a better world.

Episode Date: April 29, 2026

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Human connection. We lost it during the pandemic. And some of them, some of us have had a hard time getting it back. For certain people, they took right back to it like a duck to water. And there's an entire generation of young people who have lived with a dearth of it in their lives. And they don't necessarily have the skills on how to build those connections. And so I'm sitting here with Pete Bombachi from genwellproject.org. And Pete and I had a great conversation offline.

was it a week ago? Yep. And this, we just wanted to do more of this. And so Pete, talk to me. Tell the listeners what we talked about, but how you started this organization, what you were doing before. And you said, you had a eureka moment.

Yeah, the original inspiration behind this was the summer blackout of 2003. So 50 million people on the eastern seaboard in North America lose power for two to seven days. I go to a friend's house right here in Toronto, up in North Toronto. And at nine o'clock at night, walk out onto his front porch and the street is packed with people. And at that time, I lived on a

busy street. So I was just, I admired this street. I thought, oh my God, this is a street that everybody knows each other. I walked out onto the street and I said, oh, God, this is amazing. I love how you guys all know each other. And they all stopped, looked at me and said, we don't know each other. Yeah. And that was the, oh my gosh, why do we need to wait for a crisis before we actually reach out to the people that we live beside, work beside, go to school beside, everywhere. I think the impact of a blackout today would be even more incredible. Because what I mean by is your phones wouldn't work. Like our, we are so, we're fighting against that temptation all the time.

And so back then, that was way before the mass adoption of social media. So if we could live in a world for an entire night where the entire city of Toronto, for example, or anywhere in North America, where just your phones didn't work. I think that you would see things you haven't seen since the 90s. Yeah, I think, Ben, it's a real, you know, I've had people say, hey, can you go to Ontario hydro? Can you go to Toronto hydro? Can you shut it all off? Obviously, there's some other challenges that come when, you know, for people who have

mobility issues and other things, elevators. But, you know, I think just helping people create those, that opportunity to disconnect. Yeah. And we have Genwell weekend, which is just one of our campaigns coming up this weekend. Right. And all it is is intended to be an excuse, an opportunity. permission to say to each other, hey, if we know that social connection is so important for our individual health and societal well-being, hey, why don't I be part of the solution by

reaching out and go and grabbing a coffee or going for a walk with somebody? Yeah, we've seen a rise in a spike in all sorts of issues related to mental health. And at first I thought, oh, well, it's because we're diagnosing it more, you know, like the issue, oh, there's a spike in autism. No, not necessarily. We just know how to spot it more. We know it's a spectrum, right? So, that's what I thought. But now we have so much data to not suggest that to point the finger and accuse social media, for example, but social media is not social, right? And social connection is.

And so we know the problem is there. And by taking control of that social connection, we can stave off a raft of those issues, which, by the way, we're all paying for in the health care system. So there's a financial incentive to being more social. Hey, there's an incentive in every way. So when we build healthy connection habits, so to your point, I think it's a really important insight, which is we've been telling people to put the phone down for 20 years

and how's it working? Not so well. But what I know, Ben, is while you and I have been chatting and in every conversation I ever have with people, I never worry about my phone when I'm in a great conversation where we're exchanging ideas and thinking. And so maybe the solution to our disconnected world is one where we engage with people more often,

and so that we don't even think about the phone because we're so intensely in those conversations. But when we think about the phone and we think about all the challenges that we face, what we need to understand is less time together increases your risk for anxiety, for depression, heart disease, dementia, diabetes, just about every illness is connected to that increasing disconnection. We call it chronic or persistent loneliness. And that's the feeling that eventually leads to that inflammation in the body, anxiety, depression, which actually creates that.

illness within us. Yeah, when the U, what was it, the U.K. was the first country in the world to have a cabinet position for loneliness. That to me, everyone says, oh, that's a headline grabber, but that's not a, that's not a, you don't take a victory lap for that. That is an abdication of failure that we have failed at keeping people connected. And we as a society have not done what we've needed to do. Well, are you a society if you actually have to have an elevated cabinet position because people are living such separate, disparate, lonely lives. Oh, Ben, you know, I'd come across and hug you right now because at the end of the day, you know, a political figure with a title is not the solution to our disconnected world.

We've educated people in our country as long as I've been alive. I've learned that I should exercise and eat well. I should get eight hours of sleep, eight glasses of water. I shouldn't drink too much and I shouldn't smoke. But the research now tells us that our social connections, our social health have a greater impact on our health, our happiness, our longevity, and on society than all the things that we educated people on. But unfortunately, we never told anybody. We thought that proximity when we went to the office and the gym, we thought that that meant connection. And what I think we're really

waking up to and the pandemic certainly put it on hyper speed is it just because we're in the same room doesn't mean we're actually connecting with each other. And you know, you and I were talking about and I've said it many times on this show because sometimes you hear something that rings so true to you, can't unhear it. And you see everything through that lens. And we talked about that TED talk that gentleman had about Rat Park and how the conclusion of these scientists that were studying drug addiction and rats was that the opposite of addiction may not be sobriety. It may be connection. And, you know, if it, there's a simple principle there, which is if, if your emotional bandwidth is chock a block with people, then you don't have any room for those other things, which are,

which are, come in as substitutes, as supplements to that as, as a replacement because you don't have those connections. Yeah. A member of our scientific advisory panel, Dr. Quam McKenzie said to me back in 2017, you know, when you have healthy connections in your life, it helps you cope. So if you're going through something, it helps you get through that. It helps you find solutions. So it helps you figure out what am I going to do next, whether that's a job loss.

whether it's addiction, the introduction of a caring, loving human being while you're in that situation, that gives you options. And then ultimately, that leads to resilience. And resilience, I think, in the time and the world that we're in today, I think is more important than ever before, Ben. So when we're going to talk more about Genwell weekend after the break, but generally speaking, what if somebody's listening right now and they say, well, that's fine and good if you have people in your life. You'll just, you'll just, if you have your setting at medium, you'll just turn it up to high. But what about people who have chronic loneliness or people who have a tough time forming those relationships? What do you say to that generation that we referenced off the top that they do not have the skills?

They don't know how to connect. Well, we are about building a national movement. We're about awakening 41 million Canadians about the importance of face-to-face social connection as a proactive step that we can all take for our health, happiness, longevity, and the betterment of society. if somebody's chronically or persistently lonely, Ben, the likelihood is that they won't be able to solve it. And that's unfortunately what we've done for many decades is we put the burden of the solution on the person who's suffering.

Versus saying, hey, if everybody around that person understood what that person might feel like or what they might be going through, maybe you and I could actually invite them out for a walk or a coffee or can I come over and help that person address that sense of disconnection so that we rebuild their confidence through these little micro connections. Yeah.

And then finally, I'll just throw in talking to strangers. Yeah. You know, every person we know today was once a stranger. And the research, although we've told people, including me, I was told for 50 years not to talk to strangers. Yeah, stranger danger. Stranger danger. The research shows that those who talk to a stranger just once a week are up to

three times happier. And we wonder why people are walking around, you know, not connecting because we told them for 50 years. You know what I've, I think I've told you about this. I try to, whatever my interaction is, you know, if I go, get a cup of coffee. I try to spend three times as much time with that person as I typically would. So I'll ask them not just say, hey, how are you doing and walk away? But like listen and then give them a follow up. Or if somebody asks me, how was your night? I will tell them how my night was.

And I'll see what sort of reaction I get. It's fascinating what you can learn from people. I say in a mic beforehand, it's like it costs no money. And if we understand just how many benefits it's come from those little interactions that you're creating. You might be the only person in a case of a coffee shop. It's probably not the only person they talk to today. But none of us knows what's going on in the lives of people around us. And those little conversations may not just change somebody's day. It may change their life.

All right. Well, when we come back, I'd love to get some tips on somebody who's building a movement around social connection. How people can do those things. Talking to a stranger sounds good. But how do people do it? And again, I do want to drill down on this younger generation. I believe we have failed.

I see it in how they talk to each other, how they talk to adults. There is a mountain to climb there. And the calls to action for Genwell Weekend. So don't go anywhere. This is the Ben Mulroney show. Seems like yesterday when we arrived here. Hi. The story we know.

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