#417: Dr. Vivek Murthy — Former Surgeon General on Combatting COVID-19, Loneliness, and More

All of us, regardless of what stage of life we’re at, we have three basic needs: We all want to know that we matter, we all want to be seen for who we are, and we want to know that we’re loved.

When I think back on the people that I had the privilege of caring for in the hospital at the end of their life, I think a lot about what they talked about in those final days. And what they talked about were not the promotions they received or how big their bonuses were. They didn’t talk about how many followers they had on Instagram … What they talked about, really, were the quality of their relationships. They talked about the people they loved, about the relationships they wish they'd spent more time with. They talked about the joy that the people in their life brought them. And I think that is a very powerful signal to us of what really matters.

Love is the greatest source of strength that we have. I, as a doctor, have written many prescriptions for powerful medicines and antibiotics, but there is no medicine that's more powerful than love.

Loneliness is more than a bad feeling; it has real consequences for our health ... Loneliness is associated with a shorter lifespan. You find that it's associated with an increased risk of heart disease and dementia and depression and anxiety. The mortality impact, if you will, of loneliness is similar to the mortality impact of smoking 15 cigarettes a day—it's greater than the mortality impact of obesity or sedentary living.

If you and I went to a street corner in any major city in the United States and we pulled 100 people aside and we asked them all what their top priority in life was, I can almost guarantee you that all of them would have a person as their top priority... But if we look at how we live our lives; if you look at where we put our time, energy, and focus; if you look at what society tells us constitutes success, it’s actually very different.

It is our relationships that are the foundation on which we build everything else—good health, fulfillment, and a good life.

The times in my life where I have felt anxious and worried, the times where I felt just lost… Those moments were often when I've lost touch with the people in my life—the people who know me almost better than I know myself, the people who can remind me of who I am even in those moments when I forget … That, to me, is a true definition of a true friend.

We really do need each other. And as much as we live in a world—and in a country, I should say—that’s built on an ethic of individual responsibility and that's built on a narrative of the single entrepreneur who builds the company or the single scientist who solves a major disease and finds a cure, the reality is that we are far more interdependent and interconnected than perhaps those narratives might suggest. I think that this experience of COVID-19 is a powerful reminder of that.

A real friend is somebody who reminds you of who you are even when you forget.

The workplace is an incredibly powerful place for us to cultivate human connection. When we don’t have workplaces where people feel like they have strong relationships, that has a strong impact on productivity, retention, and overall satisfaction at work.

Our emotions are not a source of weakness; they are, in fact, if used well, our greatest source of strength.

In reality, I think what gives us the deepest joy and fulfillment in our life is actually our relationships.

Every now and then, there’s a moment in the world’s history where we are faced with a challenge that’s far bigger than any one of us or that any one country can solve on its own—and COVID-19 has presented us with one of those challenges.

If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.

Does it always have to take a crisis, particularly one that involves a loss of life and great suffering, for us to realize that we truly need each other and that we need to come together and put our collective well-being over individual interest? I hope it won't always take that.

In those most important moments in life—birth, death, and the critical moments in between... you hope that there will be people there for you and you'll be surrounded by those you love, but for so many of [my patients], there was nobody at the end.

~20-25% of people in the workplace struggle with loneliness.