David Brooks: belief

Transcript context

…I asked in high school, and I was rejected every time, but it wasn’t a challenge to ask, right? Now you have a phone, you don’t have to ask. One of my students said to me, “I’ve had four boyfriends in my life, and all of them ghosted me at the end.” None of the young men had been taught you need to have a breakup conversation, and you need to have the skill to break up with somebody without crushing their heart. This young woman told me, “Of course, I’m distrustful, and of course, I’m hesitant to be in a relationship because I’ve been burned every time.” I think there’s just a lot more anxiety about that. Second, there’s a values problem. Here, I will criticize the younger generation. The thing I learned most from in high school and college was my romantic relationships, they were more meaningful to me than my classes, even the breakups. I would sit around smoking French cigarettes and moping about getting dumped. I say to young people, “One of the most important decisions of your life is who you’re going to marry. Get really good at making that marriage decision. You need practice. You need to have relationships. A marriage is a 50-year conversation, ideally. Find someone you can talk to for the rest of your life. Love comes and goes, but admiration stays, so find someone you admire.” So many of my students were like, “I don’t have time for relationships. I’m busy with this student activity, that student activity, this class, that class.” I would say, “You’re doing this wrong. Put relationships first and get practice being romantic.” So, I’m a little cupid on Ivy League campuses. Why don’t married couples have more sex? They’re there together. It seems better than anything else they could do. Is it the same reason younger people are not having more sex? If a married couple, after a while, is doing it twice a week, that’s thought of as . . . but there’re seven nights in a week and there’s some shortfall. Is it a price control?…

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