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21st Annual Mirmelstein Lecture: 'People Behaving Badly -- What versus Want'
Posted on August 27, 2009
Dr. Charles Bertolami, Dean of New York University College of Dentistry presented an insightful lecture entitled "People Behaving Badly -- What versus Want."
Insight can't be given, it must be discovered. Dr. Charles Bertolami, dean of the New York University College of Dentistry, says the insight is discovered by listening to the silence between our words. When Dr. Bertolami spoke as the Mirmelstein Ethics Lecturer on August 20, he entertained, engaged, and enlightened students, faculty and staff with his unique interdisciplinary perspective on the importance of insight and its effect on ethics and professionalism.
"Charles is one of the most gifted speakers I know," commented Dean Ron Hunt. "He has a talent for describing situations and ideas in a way that resonates with people from diverse backgrounds of all ages. This is the third year he has come to VCU and people say he improves every year."
At the beginning of the lecture, Bertolami, quickly pointed out, when he doesn't like the dictionary definition of a word he makes one up. Although Webster may define insight as "the power or act of seeing into a situation," Bertolami calls insight that Ah-Ha or "percussive moment," when you see something for the first time and it clicks. To help listeners simulate the feeling he engaged the audience with several mind-teasers. "Insight," he said, "is the subtext of our interactions, the unspoken, unwritten ways of being, that once understood, make human interactions more meaningful and life simpler."
Bertolami spoke about three transformational insights and shared how applying them to everyday life can create a more meaningful existence. To illuminate the insights he used arithmetic principles, management theory, Christian mysticism, and Greek philosophy.
The first insight he shared is that making little changes can yield exponential results. Change, he said, can be as simple as smiling at passersby or writing a thank-you note. The second transformational insight is that the difference between good and great isn't much. He showed how in English, as long as the first and last letters are correct, readers can understand and make sense of every word in a paragraph. The third transformational insight he described involved how difficult tasks become easy once passion is injected. Paraphrasing the author Anthony de Mello, Bertolami commented, "It is not difficult for a lover to go to his beloved, or a mountain climber to climb the highest of mountains. When things work right, everything comes together for the good."
His point was that little things can make a big difference—including making life a lot easier. When life is easier, the need for unethical behavior diminishes. As one is gradually habituated into doing the right thing during the good times, this praiseworthy habit persists when the going gets tough. Unethical behavior just doesn’t fit into the person’s self-identity. But it’s an approach that takes time and has to be cultivated. He cited the inspirational speaker, Jim Rohn, who says if you really want to fail in life, here’s what you must do: Make a few (just a few) errors in judgment—and repeat them every day. He encouraged the listeners to use these insights to guide interactions with people with the expectation that they will see their lives changing for the better in both subtle and major ways.
For more information, contact:
Martha Bushong
(804) 828-9757
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