BITTERSWEET: Susan Cain on the Beauty of Sorrow and Longing

The Next Big Idea

Next Big Idea Club

Education, Social Sciences, Science, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 7 April 2022

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Are you elevated by sad songs? Have you ever been brought to tears by a TV commercial? Do you relish rainy days? If you answered yes to any of those questions, then you know the power of the bittersweet. Yet chances are there have been times when you’ve struggled to square your melancholic disposition with our culture of counterfeit cheer. Well, you won’t feel that way after you’ve heard Susan Cain discuss her new book, “Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole.” She argues that longing, sorrow, and grief are the wellsprings of connection, creativity, and hope. Download the Next Big Idea app today at www.nextbigideaclub.com/app

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	LinkedIn presents.
0:05.8	Whatever pain you can't get rid of,
0:07.9	make that your creative offering.
0:11.1	I'm Rufus Griskem and this is The Next Big Idea.
0:15.6	Today, Susan Cain on Loving Sad Songs,
0:19.2	the problem with normative sunshine,
0:21.6	and embracing the power of the bitter sweet.
0:30.0	My freshman year of college, I fell in love for the first time, Liz.
0:48.0	Head over heels, puppy love, I skipped around campus, floated,
0:53.1	lungs full of helium.
0:55.4	Sophomore year, she ended it.
0:58.4	I remember lying on the floor of the shower,
1:00.4	water running, crying, heaving for what felt like hours.
1:05.6	This, I thought, is what bedrock feels like.
1:08.6	Maybe when I run out of tears, I can build something on this.
1:13.2	That moment was, I think, the beginning of my adulthood, to some degree.
1:17.2	It was a birthing.
1:18.3	It hurt.
1:19.2	It felt like it very nearly killed me.
1:21.7	But it didn't, and in the months that followed,
1:23.6	it made everything sharper, brighter, colors more saturated.
1:27.9	And what a discovery that was.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Next Big Idea Club, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Next Big Idea Club and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.