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A BOOK ON LIFE AND LEARNING
“Tuesdays with Morrie”
The book is about an old professor, a successful young man Mitch Albom (the book author) who had been his student, and the time they spent together talking about the lessons in life as death awaited the old man.
Mitch, the student, has lost track of his mentor in the pursuit of his own career. He rediscovered Morrie, the professor, in the last months of the older man’s life. Knowing he was dying, Morrie visited with Mitch in his study every Tuesday just as they used to do back in college. Their renewed relationship turned into one final “course”: The Meaning of Life.
No “grades” were given but there were oral exams every week. Mitch was expected to respond to questions and also to pose questions of his own. Mitch was also expected to perform “physical tasks” occasionally such as lifting the professor’s head to a comfortable spot on the pillow or massaging his leg to keep the blood flow.
No books were required but the “course” covered many topics, including the world, regrets, death, family, emotions, money, love, marriage, culture, forgiveness, and good-bye.
And there was no graduation, only a funeral.
In his conclusion, Mitch said that “none of us can undo what we have done or relive a life already recorded.” He also said that if Professor Morris Schwartz taught him anything at all, it was this: “there is no such thing as ‘too late’ in life. He was changing until the day he said good-bye.”
INSIGHTS
The book was a thrilling experience to read. I could not put it down once I started reading it. It was full of wisdom and emotion. I felt like I was being talked to. The style was simple, even conversational and unmindful of the rules of syntax, but dedicated to creating a change in the reader, the kind that perhaps all reading materials should be. I did not have to stop reading to catch the meaning of a word or a phrase. I only had to breathe in the meanings that the experience conveyed. I did not detect any attempt at showboating, only honest-to-goodness storytelling that kept me asking for more.
But over and above the author’s inimitable style, I love the insights that I myself gained about life. To be sure, the “topics” were old, even tired ones. But just like the gospels, it sets you to think each time you hear them although they were really not new to you. For instance, it talks about love and the need for us to “let it come in”. it says “we think we don’t deserve love, we think if we let it in we’ll become too soft.” And that “love is the only rational act.” It talks about family – the fact that “there is no foundation, no secure ground, upon which people may stand today if it isn’t the family.”
While the book is about life’s greatest lessons that a dying professor gives to his ward, it is as much if not much more about the change that is unfolding within a person, Mitch.(BLURB) He personifies human development and learning in process. Mitch has been the typical young punk that university has produced and coughed out into the arena called life. He lost contact quickly with most of the people he knew in college, including professor Morrie. The years after graduation hardened him into someone ready to offer the world his talent. Young, ambitious, and in a hurry, he piled early and quickly one life experiment after another. He experienced failure for the first time in his life. After he lost a dear uncle, he resolved to move forward and upward. Before long, he was a success, having an excellent job as a sports journalist, being financially stable, and having a wife to live life with. He buried himself in accomplishments, because he believed that with accomplishments, he could control himself. And now, face to face with Morrie every Tuesday, he is yet to learn and be molded by a force outside of himself.
Morrie, as a force, is irresistible. He pounds Mitch with life’s greatest questions. “Have you found someone to share your life with?” “Are you giving to your community?” “Are you at peace with yourself?” and “Are you trying to be as human as you can be?”
Profound questions – and Mitch squirmed as Morrie shot those questions on a Tuesday. Mitch had promised himself he would never work for money, that he would join the Peace Corps, and that he would live in beautiful, inspirational places. Instead, he had been in Detroit for the last ten years, always busy but not quite understanding the meaning of life. His days were full but much of the time, unsatisfied. He had allowed his environment to dictate the nature and pace of his life. Or did he? Wasn’t it something inevitable?
Morrie seems to provide the answer. He says, “Well, for one thing, the culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. We’re teaching the wrong things. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn’t work, don’t buy it. Create your own. Most people can’t do it.”
Mitch knew that he had developed his own culture – work. It was to the point that his identity is wrapped around it. Such that when the unions at his newspaper went on strike and the place was shut down, he realized that he did not know who he was. He was stunned at how easily things went on without him. He knew he was chasing the wrong things. He knew that the way to develop himself is not only to allow the environment to shape himself. He knew that in the same way, he must also shape the environment by creating something that gives him purpose and meaning. And that’s where Morrie’s profound questions come in.
Speaking of Morrie, it would not be fair if I end this book review by giving the impression that it is really Mitch, the student, who had learned in this story. As a matter of fact, this book is about Morrie, the professor; Morrie, the enlightened. In other words, even as his experience talking to Morrie has transformed Mitch, this story is also about Morrie transforming himself. After all, that is the nature of a developmental experience in the ecology of human development and learning. It takes two to tango. In many cases, it takes several to dance the music of change.
Morrie had always loved to be independent. Now that he was dying, he spoke about his increasing dependency on other people for even the most basic routines in life. When asked by Ted Koppel of Nightline on primetime TV “what Morrie dreaded the most about his slow insidious decay,” he looked straight into Koppel’s eyes and said: “Well, Ted, one day soon, someone’s gonna have to wipe my ass.” It bothers him because that is the “ultimate sign of dependency.” But he also said about “trying to enjoy the process,” that the cycle of dependence and interdependence goes on, that when we were babies, we were completely dependent on our parents and when we sit helpless as he does in the twilight of our lives, we again are completely dependent on others.
So, I get this insight about the interconnectedness of people and the events around them. It we come down to it, our actions or the lack of it impact on others in ways that we may not even know. As a result of these interactions, our attitudes develop, our lives change, or they decay if we don’t find meaning in what we’re doing. No man is an island. And even if we decide to be an island, we can never be along because the winds will blow our hats off and jar our existence. (BLURB)
Morrie and Mitch are two sides of the same coin. Or, better still, they are two players who nourished each other in the dynamic field of life.
By the way, this book is highly recommended for reading. In fact, they should make a course out of it.
Cesar P. Baltazar
Program Chair, PMAP Annual Conference
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