Learning to Love: Dr. Leo Buscaglia on The Human Condition

[00:00:02] Speaker A: Okay, so here with us today are my good friends and also co workers from the Hawk foundation for Mental Health, starting with, to my left, Mary Capps, our wonderful cross unit liaison, Elizabeth Stauber, who some of you may already know as our archivist, records manager and repeat guest, and for the first time, our digital content strategist, Darrel Wiggins, who's a pretty indispensable right hand to me as the person who makes all of our stuff look dazzling and who we depend on heavily for much of what the things that you see on our website look and behave like. I want to welcome all three of you for just. Thank you for taking the time to be here with us today and take time out of your very busy work days. [00:00:57] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:00:57] Speaker C: Thank you for having us. [00:00:58] Speaker D: Thanks. [00:01:00] Speaker A: So I thought first, Elizabeth, this is not our first time going back to the Human Condition archive, but perhaps for those who are new, you could tell us just a little bit about. About what this was and about kind of its place in the, in the firmament of our. Of our history. [00:01:19] Speaker C: Yeah. The Human Condition was a radio show produced by the Hogg foundation and the Longhorn Network, which is a precursor to KE and it aired from 1971 to 1983 and was hosted by Bert Krueger Smith, who was a program officer at the Hogg foundation. There's over 400 broadcasts, and in those broadcasts it features interviews with experts in subjects related to mental health. Burt Krueger Smith interviewed people like Mercedes McCambridge, who was an Oscar winning actress, and she spoke about alcoholism to people like Dr. Kenneth Clark, who spoke about his research on the effects of racism on children, which was used in the Brown v. Board Supreme Court case. So there's a lot of really great, wide ranging, fascinating experts that she featured on the Human Condition back in the day. [00:02:20] Speaker A: Okay. And so about this particular episode that we're going to listen to, do you have much in the way of background for that? [00:02:30] Speaker C: I know that this episode aired in the 1973-1974 season, and that's about all I've got. [00:02:38] Speaker A: Yeah. And some of you, and I don't want to make this an age thing, but I think it kind of is. You may know the name Dr. Leo Buscaglia as, as kind of someone who once upon a time was, I guess, a pretty big name in the human potential movement. And as you're about to hear, he has a very distinct voice that can sound away depending on what generation you hail from. And if you can kind of put yourself back in the 1970s and how a voice like his may have seemed maybe a little bit less discordant back then as compared to the time that we're coming at you from now, February of 2025, actually, y'all, I think I may cheat in later a little bit more about Viscalia and his biography, but I'm not gonna put the burden on this conversation to fill in those gaps. So, anyway, we're going to have a conversation about this old episode of the Human Condition, get my friends reactions to it, what it is that they think does and perhaps does not work about the Buzcalan perspective. And we think that this will be a mighty interesting discussion and always trying to keep mental health obviously kind of fixed in front of us as the main concern. So without further ado, I will begin playing clips from this episode of the Human Condition. Bert Krueger Smith interviewing Dr. Leo Buscaglia for his insights on love. [00:04:50] Speaker E: From Communication center, the University of Texas at Austin, the Longhorn Radio Network presents another conversation about the human condition. [00:05:03] Speaker F: I worry about sensitivity groups that get people together and insist that no matter where you are, you hug the person next to you or you touch the person next to you, or you lie on the floor with them, or you take your clothes off and reveal yourself. I think we have to be very cautious not to walk in people's heads. [00:05:29] Speaker E: Produced in association with the Hogg foundation for Mental Health at UT Austin, these conversations are about people and mental health as a part of every human experience. Your hostess is Bert Kruger Smith, executive associate at the Hogg Foundation. Now, this week's exploration of the human condition. Our guest this week is Dr. Leo Buscaglia, Associate professor of education at the University of Southern California. [00:05:56] Speaker G: We're always talking about love, and yet we're. We're always saying something different. Let me ask you, have your ideas about love, people, and what we need in this particular time of life changed? [00:06:13] Speaker F: Oh, yes. My feelings are always changing. I think a long time ago, if I didn't say it, I wish I had said it. Wherever you are in love, you're only just beginning. And I find that out every single day of my life. And, you know, you started, Bert, by saying we're always talking about love. I don't really think we do. I think the sad part is that we don't. And if I'm on any sort of a personal crusade, and I'm not really, I have nothing to sell, I think it would be to get people to start thinking about it again, because as far as I'm concerned, we don't deal with it enough, we. We sort of assume that it's there, that everybody has it, that everybody's born with it, and that all they have to do is just reach a certain point in life, and there it is, full bloo and it isn't so. And it frightens me about, for instance, the divorce rate, the suicide rate, and even more, the inability of people to form relationships. [00:07:08] Speaker G: This is what I was going to say. Let's move back and get back to what do we mean when we talk about love? Is this the very popular song kind of love? Give us a definition. [00:07:19] Speaker F: I don't have any definition. It's part of the popular song stuff, too. And my definition is constantly changing. As I grow, it grows. And that's what excites me because it's. It's sort of an endless thing. It just seems to become more and more and more until it encompasses all things. I play with words. I love words. And I was putting. The other day, I was writing sort of a hierarchy of words that have become very meaningful to me in the past. Words like compassion, words like empathy, words like harmony. I love that. Words like awareness. That almost sounds mystical to me. And then as I went up the hierarchy, I reached place. Now, I used to end with love. And now I find that love is perhaps just a tool for something beyond that which I call unity, kind of a bringing everything together and everyone together, feeling at one with trees and flowers and beauty and people and joy and the whole thing. And that's maybe where my mind is right now. If you say, have I changed? Well, in this respect, yes, I think I have. [00:08:29] Speaker G: I'd be interested in knowing. Do you think that some of what you're talking about, some of this feeling is part of what we have lost and are seeking in our very urbanized rush kind of culture. Is this an additive that we're putting back? [00:08:45] Speaker F: Well, you know, I don't believe that anything that we have ever had, we have ever lost. And I think that the sad part is that people have really never had the opportunity, many people, of experiencing love, real love. I have. I have a feeling, and I don't know, maybe this is something that can't be tested. Wouldn't bother me if it couldn't be tested. I believe in a lot of things. I think most of what exists has not been tested, and I still believe it exists. But if we could do something with this idea of love, we'd find that not many people have really come into contact with love without ifs. Children are constantly learning that what love means is giving up some of yourself to satisfy another person's if I will love you if you become toilet trained at the same time as all the other children, then they move into I will love you if you eat the foods without giving me trouble. I will love you if you don't give me trouble in school. I will love you if you bring home the grades and so on. And pretty soon we really think that love means ifs. And I have a theory that if in our life we could find one person who would say I will love you, period, I think we wouldn't have very many problems then. [00:10:06] Speaker A: I know that we here at Hogg, we kind of like to play our own definitional games around concepts like respect, integrity. But Mary, let's let you kick things off. What are you thinking about over there listening to this? [00:10:25] Speaker B: And if you get into the speaker, into the microphone. Well, let's see. One of the things that, you know, I didn't include this in my notes, but listening to it again, it occurs to me he doesn't address the issues of cultural differences because, you know, when he talks about if we just did this, then, you know, if we love, everything would be fine. Well, no, it presumes that all cultures react to the emotional experience of love in the same way. And that's not fair. But also when he was talking about the. The if with children, oh my God, it felt like it was a. That children. And he didn't say some. He said this like a blanket statement that children are blackmailed by their parents into good behavior without addressing the thing that, you know, being loved doesn't mean that you aren't going to disappoint people. Loving people doesn't mean you are not going to disappoint people. And it just seemed very simplified. [00:11:35] Speaker C: I agree. I think that a lot of what he has said so far is very broad to the point of not saying too much, which I think is in some cases the constraints of a 30 minute radio program trying to get across the broad idea about love, which has so many, like you said, different cultural connotations. And what does it mean exactly? Bert asked him, do you mean like the movie sense kind of romantic love? I think she was going after. I do think that his point about love is assumed is an interesting and poignant thing to talk about. And that the way that I heard it, and I think you can really insert a lot of your own experiences in such a broad conversation like that. But the way I heard it is that you have to, you have to work for love, you have to be intentional about love, and you can't just assume that you will love or you will be loved. [00:12:47] Speaker B: It was also when he had that brief mention of the divorce rate and the suicide rate, and it's like, well, first of all, do all marriages spring from love? Maybe they should, perhaps, but they don't. And if people don't, if there isn't love anymore, should they stay together? [00:13:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:13:03] Speaker B: So why be appalled by. [00:13:04] Speaker C: And the divorce rate at this time was a result of a lot of different political and social factors that weren't just about love. Like you said, a lot of people are getting divorced because maybe they didn't get married in the first place for love or it disappeared or whatever. [00:13:27] Speaker B: And when he mentioned the suicide rate, that really. I mean, does Duke is. Is. Does suicide result from a dearth of love? I don't think so. [00:13:39] Speaker C: Yeah, that's dangerous. [00:13:42] Speaker B: Yes, exactly. [00:13:43] Speaker D: And I. You know, just speaking to the unconditional love that he was going for, she's like, it does have a profound effect on an individual, like, coming to you as somebody who experienced unconditional love from my grandmother and how, as I grew up and the man I became was different from her own personal views, she saw through those differences we had and still gave me that unconditional love and said no matter who I was or our disagreements, that her love was important and something that she always wanted to know, that she felt for me, and that did have an effect on who I was. [00:14:26] Speaker C: There's no ifs in her love for you. [00:14:28] Speaker D: There was no ifs. [00:14:29] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:14:31] Speaker A: Okay. So, I mean, it's. Yeah. I mean, that's interesting. I guess maybe it leads us to this idea that love is somehow, like, radically connected to your ability to see someone. It's not reducible to that and the unconditionality aspect of it. And is there. Is there a deeper level of seeing that, you know, that goes beyond you being able to recognize the person as something that's similar to you, as something that reflects you. And I guess we're kind of. We're lurching toward a conclusion that maybe. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's that you. You. When you see a person kind of in there all together, however. However peculiar their. Their behavior or their attitudes may otherwise be to you? And is that. Is that a way of seeing that can be cultivated, you know, or does. [00:15:55] Speaker B: Someone just have it, acknowledging the authenticity and the uniqueness of an individual? And it's like, that's not like me, but I appreciate that, and I love that person because they have all those unusual things about them that make them them. [00:16:12] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. So returning to this conversation with Dr. Leo Biscalia, thank you for all of that. [00:16:27] Speaker F: We know there was a place that when we went back there, they'd take us in. Like Robert Frost says, you know, home is a place that when you go there, they have to take you in. And maybe I'd change it and say they want to take you in. [00:16:41] Speaker G: Well, let's talk a little bit about the way many people feel in our world today. Alienated or isolated. Are we very often, you know, afraid to show this kind of love to other people? Is this something that you think we can learn to do a little more? [00:17:01] Speaker F: Oh, yes. You see, I believe that love is learned. In fact, if I have anything to contribute to the process, it's that. And that excites me. That doesn't bother me as it does many people. What do you mean, love is learned? You know, it's exciting to me because anything that is learned can be unlearned or can be relearned or could be added to. And so consequently, the idea that love is a learned phenomenon excites me because that means there is hope for everyone. And it doesn't matter where you are in love. There's more to know. And I know, you know, that I facilitate. I don't use the word teach because I'm not at that place, but I facilitate a love class and a bunch of students and I sit down once a week and we talk about love in a positive sense. And I see people learning to love before my very eyes. I mean, we feel more comfortable. You use the word afraid. I think it's true. I think we are afraid to love. But if you learn what are some of the things that are involved in love, and then you practice them, you're less fearful. And most of love, even though we think it's a very complicated thing, I think as my book reads, it's very simple. Most of the things that I think about as being ways of revealing love, of sharing love, are so simple remembering. I say, you know the husband that puts a little note under his coffee cup in the morning and says, I think you're keen, you know, and here's the poor haggard wife who has to rush off to work or something, and she picks up the coffee cup and there's a statement. And, you know, if she doesn't die of a heart attack right off the bat, she gets so excited, she can't stand it. Someone has recognized me. Someone has stated it. And little things like that picking up not, you know, two dozen roses or waiting for goodness sakes, Valentine's Day, picking up a daisy and giving it to someone you care about. And say, here. I thought about you picking up the phone and calling somebody and saying, hey, Mabel, I was doing something really neat today, and I thought about you, and I just wanted you to know it. I'm glad you're in my life. You know, we need so much of that. It makes us feel. It makes us feel good. It makes them feel good. It's not a complicated psychological deep. You know, it's a very simple thing. Touching you makes me feel different. [00:19:33] Speaker G: Someone was speaking at a lecture I heard about the fact that we take little children and we're very free to touch them, cuddle them, love them. Then as they older and they can understand speech, we begin to substitute words for touch. And then we don't touch them anymore. [00:19:48] Speaker F: And we don't have the words that substitute for touch either. One of the things I teach classes in counseling, and it always really amuses me because I say to a class after we've been involved with something, how does this make you feel? How can you relate your feelings to other people in words? Use feeling words. All right. If it was a situation that made people angry, they said. They say, it makes me angry. I say, good. And what else? It makes me mad. Fine. And what else? It burns me. Good. And what else? And then they run out of words, and they haven't any more words to say. We're so limited linguistically that if we're going to depend on words, we're certainly going to be lost. We need more than that. We need every avenue we can get. We need the flower, we need the touch. We need the word. And we need to develop the words. We need a whole love vocabulary again. [00:20:45] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Don't touch me, please. Don't. Kidding. But we can dig it, right? Some of it. At least what he's saying. I mean, you know the difference that tangible expressions can make. [00:21:03] Speaker B: Well, you know, he said we need all of the things. It's like, yes. You know, because it seemed at first he was disparaging words. And it's like, okay, just because somebody ran out of words. I know if I've said the one that I believe to be accurate. And then somebody says, and what else? I'm not. I'm good. Like, so you didn't hear what I just said. It feels like somebody's not listening to me when you keep pushing me for more words. It's like, so what about the Words I just used that didn't work for you. But the thing that really bothered me about that more than anything, anything, anything was, I mean, I love my cats, I love other dog, you know, people's dogs. He anthropomorphized the dog. He assigned these, that the dog knew what was going on in the room. And it's like he's, he's a dog. If he's raised in a certain way or has a certain personality, he's just going to naturally trust people. People don't naturally trust people. Some people do, but not all people. So it was like that. I just found that to be kind of an odd example. [00:22:14] Speaker C: I am. It's difficult. I'm thinking about the way in which he's talking about these concepts and the way in which we might talk about these concepts today. And it's very different. I think that this feels very 70s and the language he uses to talk about it is very 70s love and unity and all of that. And I think today, I think that there's a lot that he is touching on that we talk about today, but just in a different way. So at the Hogg foundation, we're always talking about community minded. We're always, we're talking about supporting our communities. And when he talks about unity, I think today we would talk about community minded and reaching out. [00:23:18] Speaker A: Right? [00:23:19] Speaker C: Making the effort, say hello to your neighbor, get to know them, be there for them in times of crisis. I think his point about love is learned is important. Again, I mentioned this earlier, but I don't think that there is an inherentness in understanding what it takes to be in community and love with other people and that it takes work and it's not just natural and it doesn't just happen and that you have to. You have to put yourself out there and you have to allow people to put themselves out there. And he touches on that a little bit. It's just in a funky 70s kind of way. [00:24:10] Speaker B: I think a lot of the way he talks comes from the peace movement from the late 60s. So, you know, and in fact, part of that, there were parts of this country, maybe other countries too, but certainly in this country that pushed back. If you used words like he uses, oh, you know, you're a hippie. And that wasn't necessarily true, but what it did is it made people who weren't part of the youth movement feel like, oh, I can't really say those things because somebody will think I am. Even though that, you know, they may have felt that community unity was a good Thing, it's like, oh, well, if I use those words, people are gonna judge me and think that I'm part of that. You know, those communist hippies these days. [00:25:00] Speaker A: The word cringe does a lot of that work. [00:25:03] Speaker B: Yes. [00:25:04] Speaker A: Nobody wants to be cringe now, you. [00:25:07] Speaker D: Know, and also, speaking on unity, it's really a nice sentiment to have, but in the bigger picture, it's a little unrealistic in today's world to have unity, especially when many of our leaders just refuse to try to compromise and work with others who have differing views than themselves. And I also agree that love is a learned thing. To be truly loved by someone can make a huge impact on an individual's life. But in the same way, hate is also learned and can also be unlearned. But again, in today's world, many people refuse to see their action as hateful. And unlearning to hate and learning to love can become impossible in those situations. [00:26:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, the idea of a love class is not. Is not inherently suspect to me. That was an interesting way to phrase that. Have any of y'all ever been in anything that either felt like or purported to be a love class, whatever it was actually called, and that may either reinforce or call into question what we've heard? [00:26:32] Speaker B: Yes, actually, that's interesting. And it wasn't that long ago, I think a couple of you might recall, when we had the yoga instructor coming in, and he came in for a little bit, but then encouraged us to go to the class which was on campus, and it was primarily students. And I think there were just two of us who ended up doing that. That was me and Tammy. And it was. I really started to feel of a cult vibe. It was so, so bizarre. I mean, I love yoga. It feels really good, you know, to get inside yourself, to release things, to just relax, to stretch. But there was this, you know, oh, touch the person next to you. And I'm like, this is not. If I know someone, and I'm comfortable doing that, that's fine. We should have autonomy about how we express ourselves, and we should also respect other people's autonomy. If somebody doesn't. Like you said, you know, don't touch me. You say that jokingly. It's like. But sometimes it's like, no, it's okay for some people to touch me. I don't want everybody to touch me. And I expect other people feel very much the same way. And it. You know, it really got to a point after about four classes where I was just, no, no, no, no. I would be a Bad candidate for a cult. [00:27:58] Speaker A: I mean, it's hard to trust gurus in general these days, you know, I mean, because the. The me too scandals right around the corner with a lot of. With some of these types. But I know that I'm. In saying that I. I'm only demonstrating my own cynicism. But does it ever surprise us anymore, you know, when the other shoe drops with these figures, you know, who are all about love. [00:28:39] Speaker B: And then you're made to feel like, oh, that's something you need to work on. It's like, I've been working on stuff like this a long time, and I feel like I'm in a pretty good place. [00:28:50] Speaker A: You'd hope that Dr. Pascaglia had some adeptness as a facilitator when it came to navigating that. Yeah, I mean, just reading between the lines of other things that he said. He may see what he's trying to do as distinct from the kind of love bombing that you're talking. [00:29:10] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then one thing to note is like, love. Love languages are. Are a thing. And one of some love languages are touch. And you know, if somebody's love language is touch, and you know that it's probably fine to touch them, but in a post me too world, you can't just go around touching people unless you know for a fact that somebody wants that touch, or at least asking, do you mind if I hug you? Do you mind if I, you know, put my arm around you? [00:29:41] Speaker C: Well, I think that expression of love requires a level of trust and relationship building before you get to it. [00:29:52] Speaker B: And actually, I thought that was interesting. That is something I wrote down is throughout this, he never mentions the trust aspect of love, which to me personally, is huge. You know, when I trust someone, that just opens the door to love. If I don't trust someone, it's like it's never. I'm never gonna go there. [00:30:16] Speaker A: Okay, so let's see. We're about maybe a little. A little past halfway point, so let's just pick it back up. I'm enjoying. Enjoying listening to y'all. This is a different one. [00:30:31] Speaker G: You know, this is what I wonder. Dr. Pascaglia, we have all of these new kinds of techniques of teaching people to touch and to be all kinds of schools. Why do we need this kind of thing in this particular culture? [00:30:46] Speaker F: Well, maybe because somewhere along the line they haven't gotten it, and maybe some people feel that it's necessary for them to get. You know, it's always amusing to me that, for instance, we talk about Telling people. We had an amusing instance in our love class, for instance, of a young lady who was sitting there in the group and it's quite a large group and a dog walked in. And of course, everybody responded immediately to this dog. And you know, there's something about an animal that takes risks. He looked around, he saw all these people sitting around in his love class and he must have picked up the vibration or something. So he started wandering through. Everybody touched him, everybody petted him, everybody hugged him. And all of a sudden this girl said, damn, you know, we all sat up and we what is it? And she said, you know, I've been sitting here in this group of so called lovers dying to be touched, and nobody reaches out and touches me. A dog walks in out of the street and everybody immediately does it. She said, now maybe I understand a little bit why one is that he's willing to risk another one. He makes himself vulnerable. And then she said, and a third, he shows you. And maybe he needs, we need to tell people. And so she said, I need to be touched. And then she got on all fours and she wandered through the class and everybody touched her. You know, sometimes we just need to be able to admit to people like, I need you. What a nice thing to say to somebody, you know, not I want you or I want to possess you, but I need you. It's nice that you're here, you know, that kind of thing. I'm all for returning to the point where we can admit our feelings honestly and share them with people. And that's the only way we're ever going to let people know. I say that in order to be loved, you must be loveable or love able. [00:32:40] Speaker G: Haven't there been studies about children who were in orphanages and who were given all kinds of care? [00:32:47] Speaker F: Oh, indeed. [00:32:48] Speaker G: But they were not touched, cuddled, loved, spoken to. And we know what happens to them. [00:32:55] Speaker F: Well, and for years they were mysteriously, in quotes, dying. And even though they were on a good diet, and there is a wonderful study by a Dr. Skeels and he calls his latest paper on that Head Start on Head Start. And what he did was simply take a little group of children in orphanages and bring them across town to some retarded girls, young adolescent retarded girls. And he just gave them these little babies and the others, he left them in the hospital and he did nothing. He had these two groups and of course he had to really work hard to get this group released because somehow they were holding onto them even though they were dying. But he brought them over. And these girls couldn't teach them anything intellectual. They were not intellectually oriented or cognitively oriented, but they did love these kids to pieces. And every time the bus would come to take the kids away, they'd cry. He tells wonderful stories about these things. And the thing that happened was just outrageous. With the one group that were left there who were fed adequately and clothed adequately and so on, but not fondled or touched or loved in an outward expression of it, at least half of them died. Most of them went into forms of retardation, into states of schizophrenia. The other group, all of them, to a man then this is 30, like following up 30 years later to a man. Every single one of them is functioning adequately. They have a job. Most of them are married and have family. I believe there's only one divorce. Now that isn't certainly the only circumstance, but that was a nice start. [00:34:42] Speaker G: Well, let me ask you something. I don't know whether any studies have been made, Dr. Pascaglia, but suppose some have. Wonder what would happen in Latin countries where men are permitted to show emotion versus the American male. Are there differences, do you think, in relationships? [00:35:03] Speaker F: I think cultures where the extended family is still around. And I love that concept where you always belong and you're always taken care of and you're always loved. It doesn't matter that you get old. You're not stashed away in Sun City or the ideal community where you can supposedly die of joy and happiness playing golf or organize games. But rather when people reach this age where they really become meaningful, they're given a meaningful job to do with children so that they can continue. And then the young people are then free to go out and really live it up, to work, to be productive. You know, there's one of my students is doing a wonderful study where he's bringing little children into old folks homes where the old people are being just allowed to just sit all day long doing nothing. There is no program. They're going to go mad and die before their time. He's bringing in little kids and setting up a nursery school right there, a day school in an old folks home. And then he's going to try to measure what happens both to the children and to the old people and the changes in behavior. And I think it's going to be a startling and very important study. [00:36:24] Speaker G: We have seen some beautiful examples of that in the foster grandparent program. [00:36:28] Speaker F: Yes, that's a very fine one. [00:36:29] Speaker G: And in one of them that I know about, the old people haven't even died. They Put them in people who were ill or well, and people who, you know, should by now have died probably are still working with these little children. [00:36:43] Speaker A: So just any. What thoughts did you have? [00:36:46] Speaker C: I think his last point was very important, which, having love in the broad sense for everybody. And I think it's something that's very easily lost in people's day to day lives. It's very easy. It's much easier to love your spouse, to love your immediate family members, to love your friends who you see every day. And it requires much more effort to extend that love to people that you don't know or that you just see passing on the street and to have that want to make their lives better as well through this love. And I think that's important and is very, very much lost often today that we see in our, in our broader cultural context. [00:37:46] Speaker D: You know, I think maybe in modern terms we would say be kind. That's, you know, just being kind to your neighbor, being kind to a stranger you pass on the street. Being kind to someone suffering from homelessness. You know, just. That's a way that we would make that more modern today. [00:38:07] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:38:08] Speaker B: To recognize people's humanity, common humanity, and not so much that, oh, well, they're different than I am. Don't extract people as the other. We're all part of humanity. [00:38:23] Speaker C: Yeah. It should be a given that you love your spouse. [00:38:30] Speaker B: It should be, but it isn't always. [00:38:32] Speaker C: So there's. Yes, exactly. But it should be. To me, that's the lowest, that's the easiest. That's the lowest hanging fruit when it comes to love. Yeah. [00:38:42] Speaker B: See, I would think the lowest hanging fruit would be the parent child, not necessarily the child to the parent, but the parent to the child. Because so many people when they have a child, it's like my child was born and I had. I mean, it's one thing with a mother because the baby has been growing inside her and so there's a physical connection. But so many fathers will look at their child and it's like, I never knew I could feel like this. And they weren't the one who physically gave birth or gestated the child, but the first time they see their child, they hold their child, it's like something just blooms in them. So to me, that. That would be the first. [00:39:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I found interesting the things that he said about, about the, about the elderly and what sounded like a swipe that he was taking at retirement communities. That was interesting. And I was, I was actually, I think, vibing with, with a lot of what it was what he was saying about the, the impact that, that cross generational contacts can have. Yeah, so I thought that. Yeah, I thought that was, I was nodding my head at that. We use the term care work today and people are talking more about the care economy, depending on how you define that. It's enormous, but also not often thought about. And a lot of the people who do it are grossly overworked and underpaid. [00:40:16] Speaker F: Yes. [00:40:19] Speaker A: And that could be a way in for a Buzcalian point of view, even if we're looking for junction points. [00:40:31] Speaker B: I think part of the problem that we see in the care industry is, you know, I'm going to go there. It's capitalism, you know, it's. People will put their family members in care homes. Now sometimes it's because they just don't have the experience to care for them properly and that's that, you know, there's some medical concerns with that, but sometimes it's. They don't have the time and they count on somebody else to have the time, but they, they don't really want to pay for it because they. Maybe they can't afford to, but maybe they just don't want to. So makes us a little capitalism. Makes us a little less engaged with our fellow humans, right? Yeah, in a positive way. [00:41:24] Speaker A: Alrighty, back to the human condition. [00:41:28] Speaker G: Now, we were talking about love, if I'm reading you correctly, we're not just talking about a man and woman. The kinds of things that you were talking about, the techniques. What about parent, child and what about, you know, teacher child or friend to friend? Is this pervasive? [00:41:47] Speaker F: Oh, yes, indeed. And I also think it's very restrictive to talk about love only in terms of, let's say, a man and a woman. I think there are tremendous. There is only one kind of love. I don't believe that there are kinds of love. I think there are, there are deepnesses, if you will, of love. Determined upon how much opportunity we have to get together to relate as human persons. If you're passing in the street, I have one kind of love for you as human being to human being. If you stop and talk to me and reveal a little of yourself to me, I have a different type of. Not type, but level of love with you. And then if you're in my life very deeply to the level of intimacy which we're able to attain. So then can I give the love that I have, but I first have to have it because I can't give anything I don't have. And that's why? It's essential that each person dedicate himself to becoming the greatest lover in the broadest sense of the word, because then he'll have that to give everyone. And so that he can end up being a Schweitzer or a Martin Luther King who says, I love all men equally. I certainly have more opportunity to love my wife because she's in my life space. But that doesn't make me feel any less dedicated to the poor person who is starving in a ghetto, or the child who will become brain damaged because he isn't getting proper food, or the people who are in a drought in India and dying like flies. As long as there is a man suffering or in pain, he's my responsibility, Schweitzer said, and that's the highest level of love. [00:43:33] Speaker G: Let me ask you, Dr. Pascalis, I'm listening to what you say, and suppose I'm the kind of person who really does not reach out easily to other people. Is it better to begin to try to learn this by doing it, by acting it, whether you feel it or not? Is this one way in which a person learns. If I've been restrained all my life, can I begin to learn some techniques for reaching out to other people? [00:43:59] Speaker F: Well, I believe that it should be. It should come from you. I think you should want to do it so that you start wherever you are, which is a good place to start. I love the statement, I don't know who made it. I wish I had. I know I didn't. But someone who said, no matter where I am, in order to begin to love, I must love where I'm at. So wherever you are, if it's. For instance, if you're not demonstrative in terms of your love, you can still be a very sincere and beautiful lover. It doesn't mean just because I run around hugging people and saying, I love you and. And bringing flowers, that I'm a greater lover than the man who's very silent but in. In many different ways, sends out vibrations of love and obvious things that he does. But wherever you are, you make the decision for the next step, and that decision that is most suitable and comfortable and least threatening for you. I worry about sensitivity groups that get people together and insist that no matter where you are, you hug the person next to you, or you touch the person next to you, or you lie on the floor with them, or you take your clothes off and reveal yourself. I think we have to be very cautious not to walk in people's heads. We have to show them many, many alternatives. And then Say, select that alternative that is most comfortable for you and move in that way. [00:45:16] Speaker G: I think this is part of what I'm trying to ask. Say, I am this kind of person and I would like to be more loving. What are some of the ways in which I start to be. Do I begin to try to feel with somebody else? Do I do this consciously? [00:45:31] Speaker F: Well, I think there are many ways, but all of them are really very simple. And when you sit down and someone asks a question like, how do I begin to love? Well, very simple little things like smile at someone and see what happens. If you can handle it, touch someone. Be demonstrative in terms of the fact that you will say to somebody, I'm so happy you're in my life. But always see what happens. Always be aware of what your response is, your feeling is, and what their response is and their feeling is. See if it's congruent with what you're feeling and what you. Does it make you happy to do that? Does it turn you on or does it turn you off? Be aware always, and then decide if you want to take the next step. And maybe it isn't. The way we're doing it is not right for you. That's why, for instance, love class has one rule, and that is, if it isn't your bag, well, then get out of it. There is another one for you somewhere else. I very much hesitate. I love to share. Love is a sharing. I love to share everything I am and everything I believe. But I will not put this on to other people. I can only say, this is my way. If there is anything on my way that is suitable for you, for goodness sakes, take it and use it with joy. Because nothing belongs to me. I want to share everything, but if it doesn't, discard it, throw it out. You know, I had a Zen master once who slapped me very hard across the face once because I tried to tell him or put my life on him. And he said a wonderful thing that I've never forgotten. He said, don't walk in my head with your dirty feet. And so, you know, I'm very careful to wash my feet very carefully many times a day and to make sure that I don't walk in people's heads, but rather that I set up maybe a gourmet table and I invite them to come and eat, but I let them be free to select what they want on that table, not put it on to them. [00:47:43] Speaker G: Do you find out of these classes you've taught a number of these? [00:47:46] Speaker F: I'm sure you have six years worth. [00:47:48] Speaker G: Are there changes that happen? [00:47:50] Speaker F: Oh, indeed so. And the thing that's marvelous is that when students leave these classes and then start classes of their own, you know, I get little notes that like one one of the girls graduated and she's now an airline hostess and she has a class in Florida and she just opens it up. There's a fellow that was just covered in an article in Ohio who was one of my ex students who started a love class. I mean, we're not starting a campaign and I don't tell them go out and do it. But all in a sudden they find the wonder of sharing what they know and how happy they are to have found it with others. You know, that's one thing that you can't hold down when you love. It comes bursting out all over the place like spring. [00:48:30] Speaker G: Are you been spending a whole bunch of years, Dr. Pascagia, thinking in terms of what happens when we grow more loving? Could you in one minute for us sum up? [00:48:42] Speaker F: I can't do anything in one minute, you know that, but I'll try. What would you like me to sum up in one minute? [00:48:47] Speaker G: Some of what will happen as we become more loving as people. [00:48:51] Speaker F: Ah, that's easy to do because I told you about thinking about that hierarchy. I think when we become more loving, we're going to become more together. I think the highest point on that hierarchy is unity. I think we're going to find tremendous peace and joy in relationships. We're going to be able to accept nature and what is natural. We won't try to fight the elements. We won't try to change what is perfect. I was quoting Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu last night in a lecture I was giving. And he says a wonderful thing. He says each person is perfect. He is the perfect. He and everything outside all the natural things are perfect in themselves. It's only when we try to tamper with this perfection that we have neuroses and we have psychosis. So I think in answer to your thing, I think it would be unity. I think we'll find ourselves wanting to be closer and closer together until we become one. [00:49:52] Speaker G: Thank you very much, Dr. Leo Biscaya for being this week's guest on the Human Condition. [00:49:59] Speaker E: You have been listening to another conversation about the human condition. For more information and free publications, write the Hogg foundation for Mental Health, the University of Texas, Austin, Texas 78712. That address again is the Hogg foundation for Mental Health, the University of Texas, Austin, TX 78712. This program is produced and distributed by Communications center, the University of Texas at Austin, in association with the Hogg Foundation. Your hostess is Bert Kruger Smith. Production assistants, Charlene Warren Booth. This is the Longhorn Radio Network. [00:50:40] Speaker A: Don't walk through my head with your dirty feet. [00:50:43] Speaker C: Very evocative. [00:50:45] Speaker A: Very evocative. Yeah. I mean, that. That. I think that is a way of highlighting the. The importance of boundary setting that. I think that we, you know, that would be pretty familiar to all the ways that we talk today, and maybe to strike the right balance between admiring without, you know, without. Without messing with something too much, you know, in a way that starts to be overbearing or even exploitative. So that was kind of how I. How I interpreted that. [00:51:28] Speaker C: Or forcing someone to act or love in the same way that you want to. [00:51:35] Speaker B: Yeah, actually, that's what I thought was interesting, is he says the. There was this at the end, and then there was the bit at the beginning where it was something very similar. There are people classes where people tell you, you have to do this, you have to do that. You know, you have to touch people, you have to do that. But in the middle, then he has that story about the. The woman in the class who insisted everyone touch her. And I'm like, that almost seemed like a contradiction to that beginning quote and that end quote. It's like, maybe that woman wasn't being respectful of everybody in the class and respecting their boundaries, but she knew what she wanted and what she needed, and that's fine. But ask, you know, insisting people do that, it's like, okay, I. You know, I don't know. I thought it was interesting that those things can sometimes seem to contradict each other if we aren't made being very aware of them. [00:52:31] Speaker D: One thing it definitely brought to mind for me was the golden rule I was taught growing up is, do unto others as you want them to do unto you. And though I learned that in Sunday school through the Christian tradition, you can find that basic principle and almost every religious belief, every moral guide in the world. And that's just a principle I think every human can live by. [00:53:01] Speaker A: Yeah. And regarding how someone can get better at love, I mean, I think if we can allow that there are, in fact, authentically positive people with whatever caveats, who we could look to as role models if we choose, and maybe to kind of somewhat redescribe in our terms what he's saying, that there is some utility to practice liking, you know, And I know that for me, I sometimes have to remind myself that it actually can make a difference to try to set an emotional mode that is not just. I'm less annoyed right now, you know? You mean. I like that. I actually like that. You know, I really like this beer that I'm having right now. I really like this song that I'm listening to. [00:54:12] Speaker C: Find those moments of joy and appreciate them. [00:54:15] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:54:17] Speaker B: Don't always anticipate the worst. I know. I have said many times, expect the worst and you'll never be disappointed. Sometimes it is nice to let go of that and actually find that small bit of happiness. [00:54:35] Speaker A: I don't know Darrel. Anything in this whole. I mean, what he's talking about is. I would say it's deceptively simple, but any part of it that sort of maps onto your reality. [00:54:55] Speaker D: The saying that comes to mind is water off a duck's back. [00:55:00] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:55:01] Speaker D: So if somebody doesn't treat you the way that you would like to be treated, let it roll off your back like water would off a duck. [00:55:14] Speaker A: Right. Yeah. [00:55:15] Speaker B: I mean, to not take it personally. That's them. This is me. That's okay. [00:55:21] Speaker A: Yeah. However much. However much that could be sort of at odds with the more problem solving aspects of your personality that play a big role in getting you ahead, you know? [00:55:40] Speaker B: That is true. [00:55:41] Speaker A: Yeah, that's true. [00:55:43] Speaker C: I think listening to this episode from the 1970s where they're talking about such a very basic aspect of being human. Love. We're always going to be talking about love throughout the rest of humanity's time on Earth. And the way that we talk about it, the words that we use might be a little bit different, but it's always going to be a part of our lives, a challenge of humanity, a goal of humanity. And I think it's very interesting to listen to something from 50 years ago and find those nuggets of relation to ourselves today. [00:56:34] Speaker A: It's fun to think about future Hogg employees who might be listening to this conversation, commenting on that, wondering why the heck we were so hard on Dr. Buscaglia. [00:56:44] Speaker C: Not everybody was so hard. [00:56:46] Speaker B: I was gonna say some of us were a little harder than others. [00:56:51] Speaker A: But. No, I mean, there's. Yeah, it's. We're having a conversation kind of. Kind of with the past, and I think we're being pretty generous in some of the assumptions that we're granting. So. [00:57:09] Speaker D: But, yeah, the meaning. The words may have changed, but the meaning behind those words haven't. And that's kind of how I've been listening to this whole radio broadcast. [00:57:20] Speaker B: Yeah. To try to parse out when he says something that, like. And I was. I was actually trying to do this. When he would part, when he would say something that grated with me, you know, it's a little too maybe touchy feely for me. It's like. But what was he saying that I would say today? You know, to try to make sure that I'm not just judging the vocabulary of the culture of the time. [00:57:49] Speaker A: Well, then, Mary Darrell, Elizabeth, thank you so much. I really enjoyed this conversation. It was a lot of fun and we appreciate you and thank you so much. [00:58:07] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:58:07] Speaker D: Thanks. Till next time. [00:58:09] Speaker C: I love you all. [00:58:12] Speaker A: I love you all, too.