Political tensions, anxiety, and loneliness are on the rise,

but problems like these aren't new, and the solutions don't have to be either.

For thousands of years, societies have asked questions about how to live, thrive, and love.

And it was spiritual traditions that offered wisdom and tools to help people find their way.

Tools that science is now discovering offer real benefits. Join me, Dave Dosteno, to

explore how we can all use this wisdom, whatever our beliefs. Listen to How God Works from PRX,

wherever you listen to podcasts. Okay, Shira, you ready?

Hannah, I was born ready.

Hello, and welcome back to chutzpahd, real life lived better, where each week we apply Jewish tradition and the Dead Poets Society to answer a letter sent by you, the listener, about an issue that is live in your life.

I'm Rabbi Shira Stutman. And I'm Hannah Rosen.

I like how lively you got around Dead Poets Society. That was very huge. I was trying to

enunciate Hannah because I'm a podcaster. Oh, good. Good. You did good. All right, Hannah.

Yeah. Speaking about high school, I want to bring you back to what I don't actually know were maybe the difficult days of high school for you.

And I want to ask you about your relationships with your teachers there.

Did you have close relationships with your teachers in high school?

Hmm.

It's funny you would put it that way.

I would not say that they were close in the traditional meaning of close.

I would say that I kind of revered them almost in a very old fashioned way.

Like I, my big brain teachers are teachers who were funny or teachers who were genuinely

interesting or who had a life outside of school that I knew about, like one of them was a

novelist or, you know, they wrote in magazines. I would say I didn't totally think of them

...