WIE: In your work, you speak to thousands of people about their most intimate personal circumstances. In light of your experience, how unique do you think people really are?

LS: There are commonalities of the human condition and spirit and psyche. We all look different but if I punch anyone in the mouth, they'll probably be upset. Right? We're wired to have certain kinds of reactions. We're critters. So an ouch is an ouch. It doesn't matter where you've been or what you've gone through. But ultimately, each one of us is exactly the same in that we have the same obligations. We all don't have the same experience. We all don't have the same qualities. We all don't have the same intellect. We all don't have the same looks. We all don't have the same health. That is completely variable. But we all have the same obligation—and potential, spiritually—and that is to be decent.

WIE: What is that potential?

LS: To be decent. We're not innately decent. We're potentially decent or moral. It has to be taught.

WIE: One thing we've been noticing as we have explored this issue and spoken with many different people is that it seems that many of the most intelligent people—the philosophers and great thinkers in numerous fields, particularly in academic circles—seem to be fundamentally cynical about what our potential is as human beings.

LS: I wonder if they're cynical about our potential or if they aren't depressed that we don't seem to be reaching it in their lifetime. I'm sad with what I see. I'm cynical about some people being willing to do what they're supposed to do. But ultimately I am hopeful. I think it's easy to sit back and say, "Look at this garbage! It's terrible." I don't think they're cynical about our ultimate potential. I think they're cynical about our current willingness to try to attain it.

WIE: What I'm referring to specifically is that one often hears things like, "Well, we're all only human," or, "You can't expect perfection." Even when people do things that most would admit they find despicable, the common view seems to be that because we're all flawed, this kind of behavior is to be expected.

LS: I handle that in my book and I get crazed when anybody says that we're only human. Because again, we have potential in that humanity to behave either like a termite or as though we're made in God's image. You pick it. That was how I started writing that book. This was going around and around in my head. And the day I started writing, we were on vacation, and I turned on the TV and The African Queen was on. Do you know that movie?

WIE: It's been a long time.

LS: You must go see it. Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn. She's a prim missionary and he's sort of a drunk who has a little boat, and she engages him to do this noble thing and take out this German warship. They fall in love. He gets really soused one night because this is a hard job. There are leeches, and it stinks, they're getting shot at, it's terrible. And so he gets drunk and the next morning, she's just cold. She has a Bible in front of her and you can just see her eyes over the top and he's going, "Oh, come on. I'm a guy. It's a guy thing." And she makes a comment about the drinking, and he says, "Well, I'm only human. It's only human nature." The Bible comes down, and she says, "We were put on this earth to rise above nature." Whoa! I went right to my computer and the book started right there. I'm still moved because that is the ultimate hope. We have that option. God didn't make us like my son's little toys from Star Wars, which are made as they are and that's it. I have no clue as to why it's the way it is because I'm not going to second-guess God. But if you're cynical, you make me mad because it's arrogant and it implies that you've quit. God didn't say the job is easy. He didn't say you were going to see it fulfilled. It's arrogant to sit there and say, "Too many are not doing the job. I quit." That's contributing to the evil. I can get as mad as the next person when I see garbage going on but I've got a job and you're not allowed to resign.

WIE: One of the people we spoke with for this issue is social critic Andrei Codrescu. He said he feels that the cultural climate in modern America favors image over substance, that images are being used to manipulate us on every level and that this has so permeated the way we relate to things that it's hard to even see real meaning, hard to actually discern it from anything else.

LS: Yes, I agree, and I pray this does not come across as arrogance because I certainly don't mean it that way—but I think that's why my show is important, because I'm trying to change that. That's the point of my life. That's the point of my work. That's true and it's a disaster. People are miserable and families are crumbling and what they're missing is the ship with the rudder epoxied into place. (Laughs) I'm trying to give them that. And I feel it's working. The show is extremely successful. People often come up to me and relate to me that there's been some fundamental change in their thinking and behaving.

WIE: It's interesting that you have gained this kind of popularity, because in many ways it seems that, particularly in America, the majority of people are primarily seeking greater comfort and convenience.

LS: Yes. They aren't getting that out of me though. (Laughs)

WIE: In a country where that does seem to be what most people are pursuing with all their might, why do you think it is that you are becoming so popular?

LS: Oh, they might be pursuing it with all their might, but people aren't stupid and they know something's missing. And some part of it, at least, I think they feel they're finding with me. You can say "I want to party," but some part of you knows you can't do this forever and that this is really messing you up.

WIE: So you're speaking to something in people that's—

LS: I'm speaking to that conscience. I'm speaking to that potentially moral space. It has ears.

WIE: What are the crucial ingredients that make people change, truly change?

LS: I had a very prim and proper teacher when I was in therapy school. She said, "This is how people change: Imagine people in a wood house with planks and the planks are six inches apart and they have no plumbing. So they poop in-between the planks. Now, when it gets too high, they move." Basically she was saying that when it's too much of a mess and it's too painful, people are more motivated to make a change. I have discovered that's not the only way. My experience with the audience through what I do is that when they hear something different and cogitate about it and think about what the possibilities might be with this new way of thinking, they become interested. So it's not as though they're pushed by the poop, but they're pulled by the potential. And maybe sometimes, it's in concert. The reason I read the faxes in the beginning of each hour is that there are often personal testimonials. Somebody took something from the program and did it. So I don't want people to wait 'til the poop gets too high, too painful. I'd rather suck them in at the other end with an idea, with hope, with possibilities, with an alternative. So we don't have to wait until it gets messy. I guess I'm more optimistic.

WIE: I have heard you speak about our being here for a purpose. How do you envision that purpose?

LS: In Hebrew, it's called "tikkun olam," and that means to perfect the world. Jewish thinking is that everybody is in cahoots with God to perfect the world. God didn't give us heaven here but gave us an opportunity to try to create it. That's the point, that's the purpose.

WIE: That's very moving. How is that perfection brought about? I get the sense from what you're saying that you feel there is something a human being can do to help realize that perfection.

LS: Yes. It is by your actions. It is totally by your actions. And, as you may or may not know, there are 613 commandments for Jews. Judaism has sometimes been condemned or criticized as being a religion of laws, but actually these are divine commandments. They guide our moral, compassionate, just and righteous behavior. You are commanded to visit the ill. You are commanded to take care of the needy. We are commanded to do things which are righteous and which are God's will. Period. It's not an option. You've got to do them. Now, in the orthodox thinking—I'm going to make this very simplistic so I'm sure some rabbi would have a heart attack, but I'm just simplifying it for general understanding—it's like at the fair, there's a game where you hit the base with a sledge hammer and the weight goes up and if it rings the bell, you win a prize?

WIE: Yes.

LS: Well, enough mitzvot, or observing of the divine commandments, the bell rings and then there's God's kingdom on earth.

WIE: So it's envisioned as something that's going to happen when we reach a sort of critical mass?

LS: Yes, critical mass. That's correct. Everyone that does good gets us closer to God's kingdom on earth.

WIE: Would you also say that in addition to the bell ringing, or a sudden dawning of paradise when we reach that critical mass, that also, in a more relative sense, if people are doing good more and more, there's going to be a more and more perfect world?

LS: Yes. Right.

WIE: What is your concept of God?

LS: In Judaism, God is not something conceivable. This messed me up a little bit because I grew up on Charlton Heston movies, in which, you know, God is a guy with sandals and long hair. But Jewishly, that's the point of the commandment regarding idols. One of the things you're supposed to die before you do is bow to an idol. God made it very clear that it seems to be all too easy for us as human beings to bow to all sorts of things—your Mercedes, the sun god and everything else. But God is something that we cannot comprehend, which is the story of Job. Job was sitting there saying, "Excuse me, why are all these bad things happening to me?" And everybody's telling him that he must have done something bad. They're trying to make rationalities for what Job's going through, based upon the kind of understanding that human beings have. A lot of people seem to be very dissatisfied with what God said at the end, because Job is going through all this misery. It goes on for thirty-seven painful pages. And then God's part is only about an inch. It's very unsatisfying to those who want the answer to 'evil.' But in Jewish understanding, basically God is unknowable. You cannot fathom the motivations. You can struggle to study. You can struggle to understand, but ultimately, it is way beyond us. I accept that, and find peace in that.

Now for somebody who's as intellectual as I am, and concrete as I tend to be, and compulsive and organized as I clearly am, I find it almost a relief to accept that I don't have to understand and may never truly know—but I can respect it and follow it and be ennobled in my life by it. I, strangely, am satisfied by that. You'd think I'd be the last person who would be.

WIE: You speak a great deal about the importance of honoring one's commitments to family and children, perhaps almost above all else.

LS: Oh, yes. Above all else.

WIE: Are you at all familiar with the life story of the Buddha?

LS: No. Sorry, I have to plead ignorance.

WIE: According to the historical accounts, he was a prince with a wife and child and a whole kingdom to look after. Then, at an early age, in his twenties, he felt a spiritual calling. He said he looked out on the world and he could see suffering everywhere and he just felt like he had to find out what the answer was, to find the end of suffering, to find some kind of spiritual liberation. So he left his wife and his child and his entire kingdom and he went out and dedicated his life wholeheartedly to the pursuit of spiritual life. He literally walked out the door and never came back. And through the attainment of the profound spiritual awakening that he eventually came to, he has influenced millions of people to live a more moral, more spiritual life and created a religion that survives him 2,000 years later and continues to influence people toward the good. Did he do the right thing by leaving?

LS: Since I don't know anything about Buddhism, I can't answer this. Jewishly, what he did wouldn't be acceptable, because Judaism is extremely focused on family. I mean a rabbi who isn't married with kids, like oy veh!