Life’s Work: Dr. Ruth Westheimer

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Welcome to the HBR IdeaCast from Harvard Business Review. I'm Alex. Hi, I'm Alison Beard. In every issue of our magazine, we publish a feature we call Life's Work. It's an interview with someone who's been wildly successful outside the traditional corporate world. For our April edition, I spoke with a celebrity sex therapist, Dr. Ruth Westheimer. A Holocaust orphan, she studied psychology at the Sorbonne and Cornell Medical center before launching the radio and TV programs that would make her famous. At age 87, she remains active as a lecturer and writer. Here are some excerpts from our conversation. So I wanted to start by asking, you were over 50 when you started your television show, so it was very much a second act in your working life. What prompted you to say yes to that opportunity?

What a good question. First of all, the opportunity came when I was asked to present. There was a law in New York and Connecticut and New Jersey that any radio program had to have a component of community affairs. So a letter came to the program at Cornell University Medical center, where I was being trained to be a sex therapist with Dr. Helen Singer Kaplan, a foremost sex therapist, and that I came would one of us address the meeting of community affairs managers, because what they had to do is meet once a month to assess community needs. Nobody wanted to go because there was no money attached to that request. When I saw that letter, I said, I will go. I will have 15 minutes to talk to community affairs managers, and I will say that we have the knowledge about sex education, about contraception, about all of those issues of relationships that I want to talk about. And you broadcast us what is called in sociology, significant others, and you ought to have a program on the air. Never in my wildest dreams did I think that I would do a program. I thought I'd be a consultant to a program I've never done. I had, you know, I'd never done radio, never thought of doing that except in the academic setting and in the therapist office. And within one week I got a request from Betty Elam. Elam, she was the manager of community affairs for nvc, to do an interview with somebody by the name of Mitch Lebe l e B e who had a community affairs program called Getting to Know on Sunday mornings. And right after the interview, Betty Elam called him and said, I have 15 minutes a quarter after midnight, and guess what? I did the 15 minutes a quarter after midnight for one year. I build it up. I told people send me questions, and I answered them. And I had two researchers, two students help me to answer the questions. I read, signed every single letter. So after that year, we had thousands of letters. They gave me two hours and I did that 10 years, every Sunday night from 10 to 12. Then very shortly afterwards, I was offered the television. And the television was on cable, on the Lifetime cable network that had just started. They had just combined with the health network. So it was a perfect timing. And we did it. I did 450 television shows.

Did you ever have any hesitation about turning away from academia and one on one counseling to launch this media career?

No, because first of all, I stayed in the academic world. I did wonderful textbook with physicians, gynecologists. I taught six years at Yale, six years at Princeton. A seminar on issues of the family. It's always the family and sexuality. And now I'm my third year at Teachers College, Columbia University, in the spring, teaching a seminar on the family and the media. So I became what you call a pop culture.

Yeah.

I was on the COVID of People magazine as. What was it called? Something like Superstar on cable or something like that. The way I balanced it is because I did always at the same time, some academic book, not only the encyclopedia. I did a book about, called Heavenly Sex, Sexuality in the Jewish Tradition. I did a book called Sex and Morality. I did always something that kept one foot in the academic world. I was very conscious of that, that I said no to many more offers than I said yes. For example, Saturday Night Live offered me to host. And I said no, thank you, because I would have to spend one whole week rehearsing.

Right. You had such a tragic childhood, losing your family in the Holocaust. How did that affect how you conducted the rest of your life?

It affected me greatly because there were 1,500,000 Jewish children killed during World War II. I was saved because I was in, by chance, in Switzerland, with a kinder country. Kindertransport. If I had been in Holland or Belgium or France, I would not be alive. People like me have an obligation to make a dent in society, which is very interesting. Most of us either became social workers or nurses, counselor, something to help others. I wanted to study medicine. Impossible. I didn't have a high school diploma, no parents, no money. And so I said, okay, I'll be a kindergarten teacher. My grandmother once said I should be a kindergarten teacher. I'm so short I can fit on those little chairs. So there is no question. I did not know that my contribution to the world would be to talk about orgasms and erections. But I did know that I have to do something for others in order to justify that I'm alive.

You have lived in so many different places. Germany, Switzerland, France, Palestine, the us what have you learned about how to adapt to different cultures?

That's a very good question. First of all, you have to learn the language. And I was very fortunate. I have an ability for languages, so I learned when I came to. Hebrew is a very difficult language, but I mastered it when I came to Paris. I didn't know French, but I studied and learned. And then what? I also. I was always willing to socialize with the people from the country, not just with those people where I came from.

Right.

So that I speak German fluently. But I always knew that when you go to a country, you have to make friends with the people of that country.

Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned studying with Helen Singer Kaplan. What were the most important things you learned from her?

She was a psychiatrist and a psychologist. She first had a PhD in psychology and then an MD or maybe the other way around. And I think what I learned the most from her is her passion for her field. I think that was the most important thing that I learned. She was passionately interested in what she was doing. So her book, in my way of thinking, the New Sex Therapy is still the bible for sex therapists. Don't say the word Bible, say the Word. The world's most important textbook.

We talk a lot at HBR about the challenges that women face in the workplace. And you are not only a woman in the medical field, but you're also.

A very petite woman, very small, four foot seven. And I now lost a quarter of an inch. I can't lose anymore because then you won't see me anymore. But you will still hear me.

Sue, how did being so diminutive help or hurt you in your career?

It never hurt me. The contrary. When you say that, I think how lucky that I was so small because at the Sorbonne there was after, when I studied psychology, very little space in the auditoriums. I always found a good looking guy to put me up on a windowsill. So I made the most. When there's a big crowd and people, you know, don't dare to move forward. I know how to wiggle through.

How do you maintain such energy?

I'm just very fortunate I'm healthy. Some of the afflictions that I have, like other people, like diabetes too. I take care. That's interesting. I've never told that any journalists. So now you have it. So I'm just, I also, I'm very fortunate. I sleep well. I don't let anybody call me before 9. Lately, I have changed it to 10 and I don't. I take a lot of taxis that you can ride. I take car service. There's a car service in my neighborhood. They are all from the Dominican Republic. And when I call, I have an account with them. They say, Dr. Rose, come down, three minutes. That's very helpful.

Yeah.

So tonight I go to synagogue and then for dinner with friends so I don't have to worry how I get there. And I do take a lot of tactics.

Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

Thank you.

That was the celebrity sex therapist and author Dr. Ruth. For more life's work interviews, go to hbr.org.