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April 10, 2021 - Dennis Prager Show
09:41
Why You Need Shock Absorbers
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Happiness Hour is brought to you by Dennis Prager every single week.
No exception.
Not COVID. Not 9-11.
What else can I think of?
Those were the two biggest challenges.
Say it again?
I do the plagues.
I usually do the plagues.
Oh yes, whether they're a vermin or lice or the smiting of the firstborn.
Hey, by the way, isn't that a great word?
Have you ever seen the word smite outside of the Bible?
I think we should reinvigorate the word like in sports.
Yeah, the Dodgers smote the pirates.
Not smited.
Smote.
Very important subject, happiness.
Happy make the world better, the unhappy make it worse.
I have a big subject for you today.
So big, it could be life-changing.
I know I've said that on about 282 occasions, and they've all been true.
My subject today is shock absorbers.
There's an interesting moment in my life when Dr. Stephen Marmer, the professor of psychiatry at UCLA, who's periodically on the show and has done a number of PragerU videos, at some point, and I think it was on the air, said to me, you, Dennis, have very good shock absorbers.
And he's known me for 30 years.
He knows me well and is a psychiatrist.
And he is right.
So I'd like to offer you some thoughts on shock absorbers.
One, I assume to a certain extent they're built in.
And some people have, like anything else, they may be partially built in and partially absent by your nature.
Just like a musical ability is built in, but even if you don't have great musical ability, you can play an instrument.
Virtually every human can learn to play an instrument, and nicely.
But obviously some will become great.
Okay, so whether your nature has shock absorbers or not, I have some advice.
Life gives you shocks.
Life produces shocks.
So one way of looking at how one deals with life and the happiness level possible to attain is how do you deal with the shocks of life?
I know nobody Who has been exempt from shocks?
Do you?
It seems like there might be people who are, when you think of, you know, maybe the super rich.
But you don't know.
We don't know their lives.
And then you find out, oh, they lost a child through a drug overdose.
Or they have no relationship with a child.
Any number of possible things.
Shock.
So you need shock absorbers.
So here is my biggest piece of advice.
Most people develop shock absorbers after the shock.
The trick is to develop shock absorbers before the shock.
Right?
Your car has shock absorbers.
It doesn't wait until it goes over a bump.
One of those often moronic speed bumps.
When they build those speed bumps, by the way, do they think about fire trucks?
And how it slows them down or makes...
Their ride that much more difficult.
But anyway, so think of the speed bump.
If your car has no shock absorbers, unless you're going two miles per hour, some people do, usually the ones with the most expensive cars, you will feel the shock tremendously.
So you have to put in the car shock absorbers before they get to the speed bumps.
What are some shock absorbers in advance?
Believe it or not, I believe that they are largely philosophical.
Well, let me put it to you this way.
That is how I have built my shock absorbers.
And given what Dr. Marmer said to me, which I know to be true, that I have good shock absorbers, I'd like to tell you what has helped me develop mine.
They're in, to a certain extent, they're in my book on happiness.
Happiness is a serious problem.
Which I wrote now, let's see, about 22 years ago.
Happiness is a permanent subject.
The book is not in any way dated.
Anyway, I write all my books not to be dated.
So here's an example of a way to...
I knew from a very early age that life will not be easy.
That I and everyone else will get real speed bumps in our lives.
One of the worst things about Shocks is that they shock you.
There are like two definitions in the shock absorbers, in the shock word.
So people are surprised.
For example, I'll give you a religious example, and I have to say this is sad to me because I'm religious.
And this is true for Jews and Christians.
The two groups I know best.
And that is, there are people who, religious people, who expect that given their fervent and honest and sincere and deep religiosity, that will protect them from shocks.
Then they get one, and they're less prepared than secular people.
I don't think secular people...
Tend to walk around thinking that they will not get shocked.
That they are protected somehow.
So they have to develop ways of protecting themselves.
Whereas the religious very often think they won't even get the shock.
I'm religious.
I won't get cancer.
I'm religious.
I won't lose a child.
And you just fill in the rest of the sentence after the words, I'm religious.
Those are people who not only do not develop shock absorbers, they open themselves up to terrible pain from the bumps of life.
I have never, and anyone who's listened to me knows my deep commitment to God and to religion, but I have never thought for a moment that God will protect me more than the next guy from a drunk driver or cancer.
He might, but I have no reason to believe that he would.
And those who believe that, how do you account for the next guy having tragedy in his or her life?
They weren't religious enough?
God ignored them?
Developing shock absorbers is the topic.
I will continue and take your calls.
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