Dr Zach Bush MD - Why We Shouldn't Aim For A New Normal | Modern Wisdom Podcast 286

If we rephilosophize where we are, and what does human integrity rather than human ethic look like, what does human unity rather than human conformity look like, if we start stepping through that philosophy, the behaviors that we see filling up the headlines simply disappear. (airplane whooshing)

What is the biggest lesson that you took from 2020?

Wow. You know, I think y- it's hard to dissect them all out, but I think if I were to, you know, take a reductionist approach to that, um, I'm, I'm ultimately just glad to be alive at this moment. Uh, what a privilege to have witnessed 2020. Uh, it, it's, it's n- difficult to overstate the tipping point situations that are so multifaceted; tipping point of human health, tipping point of socioeconomics, tipping point of sociology and psychology o- of, of populations, and that just is extraordinary space to be in. So, uh, I- I am walking away with a new sense of gratitude to the moment that I showed up in. And so, that's, I think, a way of looking, uh, positively at a, at a year in which so many people lost so much and so many people gained so much. And, uh, in that, uh, dichotomy, uh, what a privilege to be alive, what a privilege to be witness to it all.

That's a really interesting take on it and one that I actually quite appreciate. (clears throat) I, I wonder whether there is a ... whether there is an advantage to living through history. Um, you know, like it is ... it was uncomfortable, you know. Like I, I preferred 2019 in terms of an experiential, uh, adventurous world than 2020. But, you know, if you look at between sort of in the '60s, there have been people that have born and died and had a good amount of life without actually living through a massive amount of history, you know. Um, I wonder whether that's part of something that can add meaning to life, going through something which is a global trauma, species-wide, civilizational threat. I wonder whether that's something that can add meaning and is actually worthwhile living through, whether it is, as you say, a, a blessing almost to, to have endured it.

I think it is a blessing. I think if we look at the generations that have not witnessed war or not had to be a part of war, there's a lethargy that sets in in that generation, and there's a laziness. Uh, there's, uh, there's a tendency to take things for granted, uh, in that, that, uh, group. And I think that my grandfather's generation really struggled with, uh, the younger generations who had not, uh, seen global co- conflict on that scale before with the flippancy that we would talk about politics or we would talk about civil liberties. Um, eh, you know, people who lived through the initial civil rights movement, uh, and watching how flippantly we've given away those civil liberties and civil rights in recent months and years, uh, I, I think there's a real discouragement, uh, there. And so when we find ourselves as a, a new generation that's in, in the mix of massive, you know, catastrophic events or, you know, conflict, uh, whether it be socioeconomic or military or otherwise, uh, we do have to be cognizant that we are brushing against the very thing that it means to be aware. And so, uh, to be aware is to be, uh, threatened in some ways. Unfortunately, the neural network of the human brain, uh, is easily distracted and is easily, uh, tempted into the, the, uh, the softness of comfort, uh, when we're not in a fight-or-flight state. And in that comfort state, we tend to dull our senses. Uh, we can see this in the way that we celebrate, right? We can, we ... or in the way which we s- you know, we deal with bad things. You know, you, you get fired from your job, you go to the bar and you drink with your friends to dull your- dull the pain. You get the big promotion, you go to the b- same bar, you drink-