Sorry for Apologizing - Steve Leder - Why We Need Men: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Sorry for Apologizing - Steve Leder - Why We Need Men: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Missy Modell:
Welcome to Sorry For Apologizing. I'm your host, Missy Modell. Activist, strategist, and recovering chronic apologizer. In this podcast, we'll explore all of the ways women have been conditioned by society to play small. Whether it's being expected to have children, tolerate chronic pain, or accept gender inequities from orgasms to paychecks. This season, we'll work to challenge the cultural beliefs that brought us here and discuss all of the reasons why we should be asking for forgiveness rather than permission. It is time to stop apologizing.

Missy Modell:
Welcome to Sorry For Apologizing. I'm so thrilled to talk about today's guest. It is a very dear friend, a friend I met on Instagram through another dear friend, Mara. And we have on New York Times bestselling author and rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles, Mr. Steve Leder. How you doing?

Steve Leder:
I'm great. I always love talking to you, Missy.

Missy Modell:
I always love talking to you, too. And it's funny because we talked about doing this kind of episode today because you are indeed the first male on the show. So congratulations and welcome.

Steve Leder:
Thank you. I'm honored.

Missy Modell:
And we talked about it. So why did you think, based on the theme of the podcast, it was important to have a male contributor?

Steve Leder:
I think it's just as important for women to understand men as it is for men to understand women. And men don't really understand men all that well, at least, that's been my experience, and we really need, obviously, we're speaking in generalizations, and generally speaking, we really need women who understand us, and men do want to be understood. And I don't know how that happens unless we have candid conversations about gender differences and the ways in which your generation, mine, we're an entire generation apart, how we were raised. And both approaches have consequences, unintended consequences that are worth discussing.

Missy Modell:
Mm. So how were you raised? If we're going to go back a little bit in time.

Steve Leder:
I was raised to believe that work was everything and the only thing. It was the only thing that could protect you, it was the only thing that could define you, and it was the only thing by which you would be judged. And that's partly because I was raised by a dad who grew up on what then was called, what did they call it? Hold on, I'm blanking on it. Uh, what was then called social welfare today, or public assistance, and today, we would call it welfare. So my dad grew up really poor in Minnesota. They burned wax paper in the winter to stay warm. They made their living, there was an empty lot next to their house where they allowed people to dump garbage for a fee. And then they picked cans, tin cans out of the garbage and took them to the junk dealer, and made a little money. That's how Leder Brothers Metal started, which is now a third-generation business.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
But my dad, I think that it came from just being incredibly poor. And also my, I'm sure, my father suffered from terrible anxiety, and it drove him. And I suffered from terrible anxiety, which I've been very open about, and it drove me. I wish, I think my father would have had a completely different life with 125mg of Zoloft every day, but he used work to suppress all of that anxiety and, in a way, treat it, and that's the trap. This is, the thing that makes you successful is also very often the thing that enslaves you, and this was very true with me. I worked so hard and, but it was really to keep the demons of my anxiety locked in the basement of my psyche, and it made me very successful. And so that anxiety drove me, but it also entrapped, and that's the conundrum. That's the cul-de-sac you go around and around in, and until you get some perspective on your own life. So I was raised, you know, and I was also, of course, raised by gym teachers and coaches, which are real father figures for most men and now for women, but back then, mostly for men, and we learned a lot of negative things from coaches.

Missy Modell:
Like what? Because I think, don't be a pussy. You run like a girl. Like kind of these. Are there other things?

Steve Leder:
Get up, yeah. Don't be a pussy. Get up, get out there. That's nothing. What's wrong with you? That kind of stuff.

Missy Modell:
Suppressing, pushing down.

Steve Leder:
And being judged on your physical prowess. And some guys were the last guys picked every time. So it was a very different world. And then, of course, your generation, I think girls were raised more like boys of my generation.

Missy Modell:
100%.

Steve Leder:
Not completely, but to a much greater degree than my sisters. My nieces have been raised very differently than my sisters were raised. My sisters had to be, I'll give you a tiny example. I didn't get braces until I was 37. There were five of us. I have three older sisters and a little brother. The girls had to be pretty, they got braces. The boys did not need braces. The boys just needed to be smart and work hard.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
That's just a little glimpse.

Missy Modell:
That's so good. It's so true.

Steve Leder:
That says a lot. Yeah, it says a lot.

Missy Modell:
It says a lot. And it's funny because, like, I even think of myself and the messages I'm being delivered, it's, be the CEO you want to marry, and it's very work-focused and a lot of pressure and like that traditional masculine energy. So I'm just wondering now what the shift is in the masculine world, because I don't really see much of a shift. There's definitely inching towards more vulnerability and openness and these movements.

Steve Leder:
I'm seeing a shift in working women being perceived. I do a lot of weddings, a lot, yeah. And I've married, I've been at it for 38 years, so I've married two generations.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
I'm now doing weddings for people whose weddings I performed, I'm doing weddings for their children.

Missy Modell:
That's unbelievable.

Steve Leder:
What's interesting now is I'm seeing the dynamic between couples in two different generations. And in many cases, I saw, literally saw it in their parents, and now I see it in them. And one of the things that is a major shift is how admirably younger men, and by younger, I mean in their 30s, mostly is when people get married used to be 20s, how admirably they see women who are professionals working at their craft, and that was not so much the case. I think, I know that men are taking women much more seriously in the workplace and as equals in terms of professionals. Do I still think women are caring most of the water at home? Yeah, I do. But I also know that we're bumping up against some biology here, all mammals, and at some level, we're mammals. All mammals have a gender-based division of labor, that's how they survive. So it doesn't really surprise me that there are some imbalances here and there, but I think a lot of progress has been made a lot. I work with far more women than men now. 38 years ago, that was not the case.

Missy Modell:
It's so interesting. Eve Rodsky was on an episode, and she talked about.

Steve Leder:
She's a member of my congregation.

Missy Modell:
I know, I know. And, but she said something that stood out so much to me, which is that don't look for a supportive partner. That shouldn't be your, that should be status quo. I feel like so many women think I need to marry someone supportive, as if that's such a unique trait or that should just be inherently there. What do you think about that?

Steve Leder:
I think you have to look for everything you hope for in a partner because it may not be there. I wouldn't assume it's there. I don't agree with you about that. I really don't. No, you have to. It's like saying, don't look for a partner of good character. Just assume the person has good character. What? Come on. I wouldn't assume that. I would want to beta-test that a little bit.

Missy Modell:
We'll get her back on for a panel discussion.

Steve Leder:
Yeah, I don't, here's the thing where I think that I don't want to make this about Eve. So let me say it generally: one of the things that I say to every couple I marry is that whoever said marriage is 50/50 is an idiot. It's never 50/50. Some days, it's 70/30; some days, it's 99/1. After my spinal surgery, when I was on all those opioids and in all that pain and so depressed, I had nothing. It was 99% Betsy and 1% me.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
So that's marriage. That's marriage. And I think this idea of parity 50/50 is a road to ruin in a marriage because it involves keeping score, and it's pretty hard to stay married and in love if you're keeping score.

Missy Modell:
And you witnessing all of these marriages, and I'm assuming cycles, potentially divorces, things that might go wrong, do you find, and also with all of these new gender dynamics that have emerged in recent generations? Are you finding different things equate to successful marriages versus before now, or it's the same? So what do you, what are-

Steve Leder:
It's exactly the same.

Missy Modell:
Tell me.

Steve Leder:
It's exactly the same. Well, let's start with what it's not. It's not keeping score. It's not 50/50. I think the fundamentals, in fact, I'll go beyond. I think, I know the fundamental mistake is, oh, when this particular external pressure goes away, we'll be fine, and you won't be fine. So many couples say to me, after the wedding, we'll be fine. It's just our parents can't get along, and we don't get along with each other's parents, but after the wedding, it'll be fine. Or it's just so stressful for the wedding, and we're not handling that stress very well, but, you know, after the wedding, it'll be fine. No, it won't. No, it won't. Okay? Because there's going to be more stress. There's going to be children. There's going to be lumps. There's going to be parents who died. There's going to be economic setbacks. So what I say to couples is everything almost comes and goes in a marriage. Money comes and goes, houses come and go, careers come and go, our health comes and goes, and we pray comes back to us again. And even our children, as the parents standing alongside me so bittersweetly understand, even our children, just as surely as they come into our lives, they leave us to begin their own families and their own lives. Everything comes and goes, but if one thing remains, then the wedding becomes a beautiful marriage. The wedding and marriage are not the same thing. Weddings don't make you married. Weddings are beginnings. I'll tell you when you're married is when you're standing on the side of the chuppah, and you see your own child being married beneath it, and you look into each other's eyes, and you know it in some indescribably deep and powerful way, you're married, and it's powerful, and it's beautiful. And how do you get there? Every culture has some kind of story or myth about a person going on a journey, leaving home to go on a journey to find some kind of treasure and not finding it, and returning home. And of course, sometimes it's under the stove, sometimes it's under a tree, but the treasure was always kind of hiding in plain sight back at home in the first place, which is, I think, a way of illustrating the point I want to make about everything coming and going except one thing, and that one thing is your friendship.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
If your friendship remains, you're going to stay married. And how do you do that? I'm giving you my chuppah speech now, Missy, but I'll write all new stuff for yours, don't worry. All new material.

Missy Modell:
Good.

Steve Leder:
So how do you remain friends, okay? The simplest of words. You know, the older I get, the more I realize how the most important things we say in life are said with the fewest words. Think about it. No, I do. It's a girl. He's gone. These are the most powerful things we say, or said, fewest words. And it takes just a few simple words said with sincerity in your heart to protect your friendship and turn a wedding into a marriage. And the first one, and I've talked about this before, the first one is the hardest thing for most people to say, which is, I was wrong. Not I'm sorry, because, you know, I'm sorry has a lot of wiggle room. I'm sorry you feel that, it requires a subtitle. It requires a second sentence. I was wrong is complete and total ownership, and it immediately takes the sting out for the offended party. I was wrong. It won't happen again. Please forgive me. I love you.

Missy Modell:
Taking ownership.

Steve Leder:
Yeah, that hasn't changed as gender roles have changed. That hasn't changed at all.

Missy Modell:
It's so interesting though, because like within relationships and talking, like right now in a heterosexual relationship, the idea of masculinity and just generally, there's so much conversation about healthy masculinity, toxic masculinity, positive masculinity. What is to you, modern, healthy masculinity, versus toxic?

Steve Leder:
I was wrong. Are you mad enough? Are you mad enough to say that? I was wrong It won't happen again. Please forgive me. That's healthy masculinity.

Missy Modell:
What's toxic?

Steve Leder:
You're wrong. I don't care. Or really, the most toxic things I see in heterosexual relationships, probably all, but I've only been in heterosexual relationships is when both parties turn into little attorneys. You want to spend your marriage in court? Really? Is that really what you want? So I think that toxic masculinity is a lack of empathy, the inability to see anything through another person's eyes. I don't think it's so much about being guarded because I know a lot of women who are very guarded also. I think that's a personality trait unrelated to gender, much more related to upbringing. But I think also obviously, violence, abuse, self-abuse. And I also think that toxic masculinity is, it also includes weakness. I think the weakness that doesn't enable us to reach out for help when we need it, that weakness is toxic masculinity. You ask most men who their best friends are, Missy, and most men are going to give you the names of 2 or 3 guys who live in other cities who they see once a year, and they are their best friends. They mean it. When men go out together, what do they usually go to? A game or a concert, right? Talk about how they're sitting, or a bar. Think about how they're sitting. Shoulder to shoulder, they're not even looking at each other.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
They're together watching something. It's a vicarious experience. It's a point-of-view experience. It's not a human experience. They're watching entertainment together, and men just don't have these full, juicy, whole friendships that women seem to create so naturally, and again, I know we're generalizing, but what else can we do? My wife, Betsy, she makes friends all the time. She makes new friends, and within days, they know everything about each other, everything. And they call each other or text each other before they do something. Then they do something, and then they talk about what they did, and they have these big, whole, juicy friendships. They know about their, each other's husbands, and their hemorrhoids, and what's sagging and what isn't, the problems with their kids, they know it all. Okay? Men, on the other hand, tend to have task-specific friendships. There's their colleague at work. There's their tennis buddy. There's the guy they go to the bar with on Sunday mornings to watch football. And those friendships rarely transcend those limited boundaries. There's their fishing buddy. Okay? But they don't see that guy any other time. So these task-specific friendships leave us without people to really talk to, and that, to me, is a weakness. Going it alone is a weakness, it's not a strength. And this took me years to learn, decades to learn. Because we are taught by our fathers and our coaches and even our mothers of my generation that unless you can go it alone, you're weak. I would say, if you believe you have to go it alone, you're weak. That's toxic, that will destroy your life.

Missy Modell:
And it's funny you mentioned that we're raising our little girls like little boys. And what should we be teaching our boys? How do you forge these friendships early on and encourage this openness? And these may be different forms of activities to share with one another.

Steve Leder:
Well, here's the tricky part that I will say. I have just come to appreciate now that my kids are in their 30s. My son is 34, and my daughter is 31. It's hard to model that at home because they don't want to be that with their parents. So as much as I might when the kids were teenagers or younger, when they're very young, of course, they're open, but when they become teenagers, it's hard to model this kind of openness in your home because they don't want to share. They don't even want to be in the same room with you. I mean, that's, they drop me off at the end of the block, and I'll walk to my friend's house stage of life, right?

Missy Modell:
Right.

Steve Leder:
But what we can do as parents is encourage, make room for their friendships. Bring the friends with you out to dinner. Take them friends with you when you go on vacation. Have the kind of home that their friends want to be in. Don't guilt them when they want to be with friends and not with you. We had an accommodation, obviously, Shabbat was a big night at our house, and once the kids got driver's licenses, they wanted to go out with their friends on Friday, and the deal was when dinner was over, they could do that. I know a lot of rabbis who wouldn't have allowed that, but I think it was important because it helped them maintain and establish their friendships, but they have done it elsewhere. Yeah, I think sending kids to camp is hugely important. I think camp is as safe and experimental lab in the human condition as a kid can have.

Missy Modell:
It changed my life.

Steve Leder:
You learn to live. You learn to live with other people. You learn to get along with other people. You learn to experience other people's point of views. You eat family-style around a table. You have a young adult to look up to who is not your parents, who hopefully can guide you. You get to experiment with other genders in a relatively safe and cautious way. There, I think sending your kids to camp, super important. Why is it freshman year of college when kids start to learn these skills? They're too old to learn these skills, and they're frankly too hormonal to let more in than just this sort of raw sexuality that goes on on college campuses. So I really think camp is super important. I don't know that sports teams really are that game. I can't say, I think the coaching is better, but I really don't know. I think that sports for my son and daughter, I don't know, I can't tell you if it was a net gain or not.

Missy Modell:
Well, it depends, right? On the level of aggression. What are the motivations of the game? It's tough.

Steve Leder:
And it's interesting because we tried to have a delicate touch with all of that, and one of the things that, now that he's 34, our son is wrestling with is, why did you let me quit baseball when I was second string instead of first string catcher, and I was unhappy? Why did you let me quit? You shouldn't have let me quit. Now I have trouble finishing things. And my honest answer was, you had so much going on with school and other things, we didn't feel you needed the pressure if it was something you didn't want to do.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
So I'd, that's just one small example of how a pendulum swings by generation. I remember very well when my son Aaron was three, my dad was really a hard ass. We were visiting my parents in their condo in Palm Springs, and my dad and I took Aaron to play at the park, and Aaron was just being a three-year-old and playing, and my dad wanted him to do something and he ignored him and ignored him. And then I, he was eating sand. I don't know what I said, Aaron, don't do that, and he kept doing it and kept doing it. And my dad finally looked at me, and he said, He's not listening. As if my parenting was too soft. And he said it again in a way that I understood what he was saying. He was calling me a pussy.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
And I, this is one of two times I faced my father down in my life, only two. I looked at him and I said, I am not raising him to fear me.

Missy Modell:
What did he say?

Steve Leder:
Nothing. And maybe I erred too far on the side of friendship and leniency, but I don't think so. I just couldn't. Did we make mistakes? Of course. I just couldn't raise my kids to fear me. Like my dad used to say when we were little kids, I don't want to have to hit anyone because if I hit, I break bones. Who says that? Who says that? He never did of course.

Missy Modell:
So interesting. I, yeah.

Steve Leder:
And he was an amazing guy, too. Like, he was hilarious and loved life, and I learned a lot of good things from him. But parenting, we lived in a very militaristic kind of home, full of anxiety and fear, and I just wasn't going to do that to my kids.

Missy Modell:
It's interesting. I had, the way I was raised with my sister, my parents were very strict in many ways, and I had my mouth washed out with soap. I don't know if that was of the time, but I, and I have half-brothers that are. How old? 36. I don't know. They're 20. What's, ten years younger than me, let's say? Ish, and a little younger, and very different parenting style. And you would think it'd be the opposite, like maybe a gentler approach for girls, a little harder on the boys, and they are not hard on the boys at all. So ...

Steve Leder:
But you're over it. But you're.

Missy Modell:
I'm over it, totally. Yeah, like not talking about in therapy at all. It's totally fine.

Steve Leder:
Always wanted to write a book called Have Your Second Child First.

Missy Modell:
That's so good.

Steve Leder:
Or how to Have Your Second Family First or How To Have Your Second Marriage First.

Missy Modell:
Your next book.

Steve Leder:
Well, they're great titles, but you cannot write that book.

Missy Modell:
Why?

Steve Leder:
There are certain things you simply cannot learn without living them. And that's the sad part of parenting, is you make mistakes, and how could you not?

Missy Modell:
It's so interesting that everything comes back to parenting, right? Like, this is a conversation about masculinity, yet it's all in how we're raised. Society, our homes, school.

Steve Leder:
Let me tell you something. You are 100% correct. Many years ago, when I was a young, young rabbi in my late 20s, I started, I noticed there were no men at the synagogue, which is contrary to what people believe, but there are almost no men in liberal synagogues anymore. So I started a program called 100 Jewish Men, and I invited 100, I actually invited ten men to invite ten men, and it was three generations. And we got together once a month, and we did this for 15 years.

Missy Modell:
Oh, my God.

Steve Leder:
And the very first program that I did with them, as I put them around tables, ten tables of ten. And each person got 3 or 4 minutes to say what their Hebrew name was and how it was true. Now, in Hebrew, we name children, their last name is their, for men, is their father's last name. So I'm Shalom, Ben Ari. Interestingly enough, Palestinian Arabs do it the opposite way. You're known as like Abu Mazen, the father of Mazen. And from the Jewish perspective and tradition, you're known as the son of someone rather than the father of someone. The psycholinguistics of that I find fascinating, but probably for another episode. But in any case, these men, ages 80 to 25, went around the room and talked about their fathers and how they were like their fathers, and you could tell you could feel the barometric pressure in the room change because almost to a man, they said in their own words, All I ever wanted was a pat on the back.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
Great job. I'm proud of you. And that's all I ever wanted, and I never got it. And this is so deeply embedded in the basement of our psyches. And we carry that harshness on our shoulder the rest of our lives, the harshness, the anxiety, the addiction, you name it. If our fathers had it, we carry it on our shoulders, and it's whispering in our ear, all our lives. And it isn't until we can be aware of that and identify it, That's my father talking. I don't need to behave that way. I don't need to feel this way. He was wrong. Until you're able to do that, you really can't be free of it, and you really can't fully realize how it animates your life and takes away your agency.

Missy Modell:
So true. And like you said earlier, I think women and girls are given opportunities to receive accolade and feeling seen in other ways other than their parents. And obviously, we still carry our parental issues, but I feel like there are more opportunities. Do you feel like that contributes to this maybe rise in loneliness and depression amongst men and boys? So just some quick stats from Liz Plank's book, which was amazing, For The Love of Men, which talks about this very topic. 99% of school shooters are male, trigger warning for this part, men in fraternities are 300% more likely to commit rape. So what is going on in our culture, do you think, that is creating these trends? Are they stemming from parenthood? Are they societal? Because it has grown in recent years, or maybe not, or maybe we have more data.

Steve Leder:
I'm not a neurobiologist, Missy, but I would suspect that 2000 years ago and 5000 years ago, men did most of the killing and the raping. I don't, I think there's something, and again, this is not an excuse for the behavior, I'm just telling you, I don't think it's any better or any worse. In terms of statistics, it's all terrible.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
I'm not here to defend ... violence and rape. What I'm saying is, is I don't think it's some new phenomenon that has metastasized. I think it was extraordinarily common. I mean, read the Bible. Read the rules about warfare and who you can rape and who you can't, right? Who you can take as a slave and who you can't. And by the way, you killed all the men. So someone once said that the single thing most responsible for the good old days is the faulty memory. Life was horrible and violent. Our ancestors had no reason not to think they would be raped and murdered, no reason not to think they would die of a plague, no reason not to think that a flood or a fire would do them in. 2000 years ago, 50% of all children didn't make it to their fifth birthday, and many women died giving birth because there was no C-section with crushed ice and a Netflix and an epidural. You died. So I don't want to, the statistics you quote are horrible. I don't, I am not convinced that there are more horrible than life 3000 years ago or 5000 years ago or 2000 years.

Missy Modell:
So what do you think is the biggest threat or issue facing men today that maybe is unique to this era time period we're in right now? Or maybe there's nothing unique, and like you said, it's kind of been sustained over time.

Steve Leder:
I don't think there's much that is unique. But obviously, and I'm the millionth person on a podcast to say this, social media is an accelerant. You know, the news is not the world. We sort of know that, but it's really hard to remember it when the news represents so much misery and terror. Yet no one ever stands in front of a city gate and says, it's Joe Schmo from CNN, and I'm reporting today from a nation that's been at peace for 300 years, or I'm reporting today from a world where 40,000 people climbed out of poverty, or that's not, that is true, by the way. Every day about 40,000 people climb out of poverty in the world, but that's not the news, and it's very easy to think the news is the world, but it's not. Most men are not violent, most men are not rapists, most men are weak because of their understanding of strength. Their definition and view of strength is their weakness, certainly was mine, and is becoming less so. I'm working really hard at that. But for many years I saw life as a zero-sum game. The other person had to lose for me to win. The other person had to be wrong for me to be right. And this is very masculine, it's kind of a kabuki of strength. It's fake, but that's what we're raised to believe.

Missy Modell:
Then how did you get the courage? Because you speak so openly about your mental health and anxiety and depression, which is something I also share with you, and we've spoken about this. How did you find the courage and truly dismantle the system that you've been taught internally? How did you find the courage and what has it done for you?

Steve Leder:
I wish I could tell you it was courage, but it really was, it was pain. I see the inside of a lot of people's lives, Missy, for a lot of years. It's only pain that cracks us open. I was in so much pain because of my anxiety, and I was in so much, at one point, physical pain because of the injury to my spine in a car accident. I was so vulnerable, and it just broke me open. I needed help. You know, The Talmud says, there's a very powerful phrase in the Talmud. I won't bore you with the whole story, but the punchline is the prisoner cannot free himself. That's a very powerful idea. The prisoner cannot free himself. You have to reach out. So these things, the spinal surgery, the something happened in January of 2020 where someone I had helped privately, who I believed and still believed deserved that help, it became public that I helped this person. And a lot of people turned, and I thought I was going to be canceled by my own community.

Missy Modell:
Wow.

Steve Leder:
That all these years of work, because it's hard to remember exactly how fractious life was back then and how at each other's throats we were, and how COVID scared us. So and then my dad, right? My dad died before that, and that cracked me, broke me open. So I wish I could tell you. Well, I made a decision to, no, you know what got me into therapy? Enormous pain. You know, it got me on Zoloft? Enormous anxiety. I didn't have a choice. And that's why I think pain is the only teacher. It's the only teacher. Disruption is the only guide. And so, to be honest with you, I was just in intense emotional pain. So I didn't have a choice. It was change or ruin my life, and I needed help changing.

Missy Modell:
So what would you say to somebody that might be listening and doesn't know where to turn? Is there something you would recommend as a piece that helped you?

Steve Leder:
Well, let's go back to that very simple but not simplistic folk motif of a person searching and eventually discovering that the treasure was at home all along. It's very likely someone very close to you. I found, for example, when my after my dad died. I've talked about this a lot on podcasts, so forgive me if anyone's hearing this twice, but I think it's instructive. Grief is a non-linear experience, it comes in waves for the rest of your life. They do grow further apart and less violent. But when you lose someone you love, when someone you love dies, or a dream you love dies, or part of your body gets amputated, it's grief, and it comes in waves. The old Steve Leder, Lenny's son, my default setting, when confronted with a wave, didn't matter. Wave of hard work, wave of anxiety, wave of stress, financial stress, whatever. Illness didn't matter. My default setting was, I'm fine. There's the wave. I'm going to plant my feet in the sand, stick my chest out, and take it because I can stand up to any wave. I'm Steve Leder. Shit about that wave. Watch. Then my dad died, and that didn't work. When I tried to stand up to it, I just found myself thrown upside down, gasping for air, slamming into the rocks. So I had to change my default setting, meaning, when the wave comes now I lie down and I float with it. I just let it wash over me, with the faith that by doing that, there will come a moment when I can stand up again. And I also found that when I reached my hand while floating, there was almost always someone there who would reach back and help lift me from my suffering.

Missy Modell:
That's so beautiful.

Steve Leder:
So I would say, reach out. This is so hard for men. I know it's hard for many women, too, but I think, percentage-wise, extraordinarily hard for men. So we don't have those friends. Most men's best friends are their partner, and that's it in terms of a real whole, and you can't tell your partner everything. So that's my advice. Float with it and reach out. And also very important to get professional help. Very important. There are people who know their way around these rocks. They've studied it their whole lives, they've honed their craft. The human experience is not that broad. They're, human beings haven't changed in the last 2000 years, our problems haven't changed, and there really is help out there. And I'm going to say this because I think it's so important and I know you agree with me, and some of that help for some people is chemical. And the same men who wouldn't hesitate to take a statin so they don't die of a heart attack or take insulin because they, their pancreas doesn't create enough, or wear glasses because they can't see without them, these same men who wouldn't hesitate, these same men who go to the gym every freaking day, they wouldn't hesitate to take something to heal their body. But when it comes to taking something to heal their mind, their brain to calm their soul, to turn the volume down enough to function in the world, I don't understand that. What's wrong with store-bought? Why is store-bought fine for diabetes and your allergies, but it's not okay for your anxiety? It is okay.

Missy Modell:
Right. I love that.

Steve Leder:
It's a friend reaching back.

Missy Modell:
And I do, yeah, I think a lot of people are resistant to it. That's a whole other conversation.

Steve Leder:
... water like fluoride, I mean.

Missy Modell:
I mean, my Lexapro is fantastic. I actually just went up on it and I'm very happy with my decision.

Steve Leder:
You, I remember after eight weeks or so on Zoloft, I told the story on the Today Show, because I think it's just so important. About eight weeks after taking Zoloft, someone just asked me casually like they had most days of my life. Steve, how are you doing? And I turned around and said, Great. Then I thought to myself, Great. What? Great. Who is that guy? Great. But I was great. I felt great. I felt free. I felt like I was functioning in the world with a normal human level of anxiety, not the one in my DNA and the one inherited from my terribly anxious father. So come on, reach out.

Missy Modell:
So good. And just lastly, this podcast is called Sorry For Apologizing. So I always like to ask, what are you sorry for apologizing for?

Steve Leder:
This might surprise you, but I don't apologize when I'm not sorry. Now, I apologize a lot because I make mistakes. I really am sorry, but I knew this question was coming, and I was thinking this morning, when have I apologized and I'm sorry that I apologized? I couldn't.

Missy Modell:
Never?

Steve Leder:
I don't, nothing, I would just say that nothing comes to mind. I'm sure I've done it. I'm a normal human being, everyone else. But I can't think of some singular moment in my life when I said I was sorry, but I wasn't really sorry. I've plenty of shit in my life because of my mistakes.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
But those were my mistakes and I really was sorry, but I recall saying I'm sorry to situation to make someone else feel better when I wasn't sorry.

Missy Modell:
Or maybe you're sorry. No, I have one for you. Maybe you're sorry for saying you're okay when you weren't.

Steve Leder:
But that's not apologizing. I've been, sorry for things I've said. If that's the question, Oh, many times. But when have I apologized for something that I'm not sorry for?

Missy Modell:
So interesting. You're the first person who is not.

Steve Leder:
Yeah, and I'm sure I have. I'm just telling you that nothing pierces my consciousness when you ask when did you apologize for something, but you really weren't sorry. I, nothing immediately comes to mind.

Missy Modell:
That's amazing.

Steve Leder:
Now, I will say, yeah, I really, I don't know what that says. Maybe I'm just an unbelievable narcissist.

Missy Modell:
No, I think men and women, but this is a perfect example, honestly, because women are taught to apologize. We're forever saying sorry in our DNA. And I don't think men have that same thing. And it could be that -

Steve Leder:
Forever saying sorry. Let's just be clear. So I understand.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
You're forever sorry when you are definitely not sorry.

Missy Modell:
It's almost like an impulse. Someone bumps into me and I'm like, Oh, sorry. Somebody gives me my order wrong. But it's just an impulsive.

Steve Leder:
It's a reflex.

Missy Modell:
Pavlovian. Exactly. And I don't think men share that trait, and it was, I think that's really interesting.

Steve Leder:
Well, I might, I mean, if that's what we mean by apologizing, I've probably said sorry to someone who's bumped into me. I mean, if that's the level we're talking about, but.

Missy Modell:
No, it's.

Steve Leder:
I don't remember consciously saying to myself, okay, I'm going to tell this person I'm sorry, even though I'm not.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
I know they're wrong, I'm going to tell them anyway because it's going to, it's easier. It's going to make them feel better. I can't really recall. There was one time when someone, this was not that long ago. Someone was having a health crisis in their family and they felt that I wasn't being attentive enough over the long run. I mean, I was all over it the first couple of weeks. And rabbis, certainly rabbis with 10,000 people in their congregation, like ours, I really have to triage mental health and physical illness situations. I really have to be there when it's desperately crucial and I really then have to move on. And this person called, said, it really hurts we haven't heard from you in a month. All I was thinking was like, I got you out of the woods the first two weeks, that's what I do. I triage, bro. I don't, I'm not a therapist. I'm on the front line putting out fires. But I knew not to say that. And I did say I'm really sorry.

Missy Modell:
Okay.

Steve Leder:
But, and you know what? I, this is going to sound like such a dodge, but I was sorry that he was hurt, but I wasn't going to get into the explanation, because it would have sounded so defensive or whatever. And I just said, thank you, you're a friend. I know this comes from, this call is because, is the call of a friend, and I'm really sorry, etc., etc. So maybe that's one where I apologized but didn't feel sorry for how I had operated. I'll tell you why that is maybe, this has been one of the most challenging parts for me as a rabbi to learn to live with. This has required a thickening of my skin. When you deal with a community as large and complex as mine and a role as large and complex as mine, whatever I am doing this, I am simultaneously disappointing a number of other people because I'm not with them. I'm doing this podcast with you right now. I know that our communications director is waiting for the revised copy of my Rosh Hashanah sermon to post online. I know I'm keeping him waiting because I'm doing this because I've decided this is more important. This was booked long ago, he can wait. I do have to live with that feeling of constantly disappointing people. Do I apologize for that? If I'm sorry, I'm sorry that I'm late, I was busy with this or that, is an apology for, I've apologized for things that weren't my fault. I don't think I've apologized for things, well, maybe that's the same thing, Missy. You tell me, it's your podcast. I have apologized for things that hurt people's feelings, but that I knew I was doing the right thing.

Missy Modell:
Yeah.

Steve Leder:
So I apologized for that. Is that apologizing when you're not sorry, I guess?

Missy Modell:
Yeah, it's like, yeah. I think that's a great answer.

Steve Leder:
Okay.

Missy Modell:
I think you arrived at a good place. You are like everyone else.

Steve Leder:
I'm like everyone else? It can't be. That's impossible.

Missy Modell:
No, you're special. But speaking of which, where can we all find you if we want to follow you and all your beautiful words and your next evolution of self and all the amazing things ahead?

Steve Leder:
You can find me on Instagram @steve_leder, L E D E R. You can find all my books on Amazon. You can find me at Wilshire Boulevard Temple's website, www.wbtla.org. You can find me, I'm not a big Facebook or X, I guess that's what Twitter is called now, I'm not big into that, but I'm sure you can find me there, and I also have a website which is SteveLeder.com, so you can find me if you're motivated.

Missy Modell:
I'm motivated and we're all motivated to hear from you. And seriously, thank you so much for your time. I know you have a lot going on. And to everyone listening, I hope you enjoyed this podcast and follow Steve and make sure to rate, and subscribe, and share this episode with someone in your life that you think needs it most. Steve, thank you so much.

Steve Leder:
Thank you, Missy. I'm looking forward to seeing you. We'll talk it all out, okay?

Missy Modell:
I can't wait. I need it.

Steve Leder:
Yeah, I got you. I got you.

Missy Modell:
Bye, everyone.

Steve Leder:
Thank you, Mara!

Missy Modell:
Thank you for listening to Sorry for Apologizing, brought to you by Rescripted. If you enjoyed this week's episode, be sure to check out the show notes to learn more about our amazing guests. To stay in the know, follow me at @MissyModell on Instagram and TikTok or head to Rescripted.com, and don't forget to like and subscribe.

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