Together: Why Social Connection Holds the Key to Better Health, Higher Performance, and Greater Happiness

by Vivek H. Murthy

our Uber driver, a young man originally from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He said what he missed most about Addis was that people around you there took care of you, and you did the same. He added, “You can just leave your kids with your neighbor and go away for four or five days and they will take care of them. It’s what we do. We cook for each other, we take care of each other’s kids, and we spend time together.” As working parents raising our two small children far from our extended families, Alice and I were quite taken by this last remark and wanted to know more. He then told us that his own wife and children were still in Addis. I asked if he felt lonely without them. “Of course, I miss them,” he remarked, “but I met other Ethiopian families in the DC area, and we have built a smaller version of what we had in Ethiopia. We have each other so we’re not lonely.” Alice and I looked at each other. The world he was describing felt so different from the one we lived in. When it comes to our day-to-day life, we resort to modern stopgap solutions just like many of our friends. We hire a nanny to help us balance work and child care. We use reputable online sites to find babysitters when we travel for work with the kids. We think about how to attach tracking devices to our children for security and peace of mind when they go around town with various caregivers, and we have spent countless hours in the middle of the night between diaper changes searching for parenting advice on everyt...