`Who wants to talk to me?” asks Dr. David Viscott.
Viscott is the shrink to the masses, the inspiration for an ongoing bit on ”Saturday Night Live.” He`s on the radio. He`s on TV. He writes books
(”I Love You, Let`s Work It Out”). He records audio tape cassettes (”52 Minutes to Turn Your Life Around,” ”David Viscott Live!”). He`s got a line of greeting cards (”No matter what happens, we always have us”). He runs cruises (”Find inner paradise in paradise” as you island-hop in the South Seas, overcoming your inner obstacles by day, discoing by night). He conducts seminars (”When Having It All Isn`t Enough”).
And on this particular day he`s leading a one-day program at the Drake Hotel. He`s says it`s about ”finding out what you want and learning how to get it.” But it really isn`t. It`s really about the world according to David Viscott, 50.
First there`s everything you ever wanted to know about the man: His haircuts cost $75, and he massages baby oil into his thick brown tresses; he collects antique rugs that he buys for a song and restores until they`re worth a bundle; he picked up his current wife at a ski resort, and they dwell in blissful harmony; he strongly identifies with Beethoven-one genius to another; he`s from Boston and ”cars” and ”cause” come out sounding the same; and his life is a crystal bowl brimming over with big, sweet, juicy cherries.
Then there`s free association, Viscott roaming widely, spouting a line that`s a cross between Rod McKuen and ”How to Be Your Own Best Friend”:
”The world is a scavenger hunt. We find whatever we`re looking for.”
” `I want to` and `I don`t feel like it` are the only answers you ever have to give anybody.” ”We`re so worried we`re going to spill on the rug, we forget the cup is full.” ”Say `yes` to yourself and no one can say `no` to you.” And finally, ”The ultimate secret of life is learning to say `ouch`
when we feel the pain.”
And then there`s the confessional. This is where seminar members, who have paid $75 (breakfast included), divulge their deepest, darkest secrets before a roomful of strangers. Some of them are therapy groupies who spend their weekends at ”Learn to Love Yourself” retreats and have standing appointments with their shrinks.
In response to his question, a lot of people want to talk to him. The first to speak is Lucille.
Lucille is a workaholic. She knows there`s got to be more to life than her graphic arts business, but she doesn`t know how to get it. Life is just work, work, work. And she`s been like this ever since she put herself through school.
”Why did you have to put yourself through school?” asks Viscott.
”Because I wanted to be an artist, and my father refused to pay for art school.”
Aha!
Just the clue Viscott needed. The instant therapy he does in seminars and on radio and TV depends on enormous intuitive leaps. ”Your father hurt you,” he tells her. ”Write him a letter. Tell him you forgive him-not to make life easier for him, to make life easier for you.”
Next.
Connie, a teacher`s aide, wants to write, but she has writer`s block.
Has her work ever been rejected?
Well, as a matter of fact, 16 years ago she wrote this 100-page letter to her boyfriend, and he told her it was repetitive and boring and she hasn`t been able to write since.
”You`re just looking for an excuse not to test yourself, aren`t you?”
asks Viscott.
Connie nods.
”Just do it,” he tells her. ” `Sixteen years of silence.` That`s not a bad opening sentence.”
Next.
Annette feels dependent, and she has panic attacks. When did she have the last one?
”I don`t want to say. I`m ashamed.”
”Share,” says Viscott.
”Well, I called this guy I was dating, and when his line was busy, I figured he was talking to another woman.”
She breaks down in tears.
When did the attacks start?
When she saw her father have a heart attack.
”You never dealt with your feelings about your father, and now you brag about your weakness-you`re looking for someone to protect you.”
Next.
Bob`s daughter died last month from breast cancer. He and his wife want to be sure they`re mourning in the right way.
”The only thing you can do is not hold anything in,” says Viscott.
”You have to be awake for the pain or you`ll end up being asleep for your life.”
Next.
There`s Karen who has low self-esteem; Jack who`s afraid to grow up; Stan who`s been legally separated for nine years and is afraid to get on with his life; and Veronica who wants a relationship.
Viscott jump-starts them all. At the end of the day they stand up and one by one say they`re feeling much better now, thanks. Lucille`s going to forgive her father. Connie`s going to write. Annette feels more independent. Bob feels better about his mourning. Etc, etc., etc. They leave, after a stop at the Viscott boutique to buy books and tapes and sign up for cruises, smiling.
After the seminar, Viscott relaxes in the Drake`s VIP suite. He`s a short, plump man with a pudgy face and bright blue eyes. (”They get bluer when I do therapy,” he says. ”I don`t know why.”) He`s dressed in Malibu mod: baby-pink sport jacket, pink-and-blue plaid shirt, tan pants, bone shoes. He`s quite pleased with himself. And he`s especially pleased right now with the seminar.
”It`s a fascinating performance, isn`t it? It`s like a one-man road show, a kind of phenomenon. I am the growth process. I shine a very bright light onto people`s lives, and that has enormous shock value. They`re not used to someone sitting there and telling the truth. It`s almost like a freak show.”
The amazing part of the freak show is not Viscott. It`s the people who get up and spill their guts. Why do they do it?
”It`s my eyes. If I look at a person in a certain way, he`ll start crying. On my television show, they had to change the angles of the chairs because everyone burst into tears the minute they saw me.”
Why?
”Why, indeed?”
No, seriously, why?
”They felt loved and saved, which is real. Is there anything you couldn`t tell me? Look at me.”
While Viscott talks, he reduces a bowl of mixed nuts to a few peanuts. When he finishes, he wipes his fingers on the reporter`s notebook. ”Viscy oil” he calls the greasy blotch.
–
Viscott is a special man. If you don`t believe that, just ask him. He once said a voice told him, ”Someday you will tell people what they really feel inside.” He`s been special all his life.
”I was born that way,” he says as he starts in on a tray of canapes.
(”Life in the fast lane is canapes, you know,” he says.)
”When I was very young, people used to borrow me to play with me. I made them feel good. I remember being at the beach-they used to call me Tarzan; I had curly hair and these amazing blue eyes-and I`d be very huggy and I just made people feel good by being around me. All my friends, from school and my past, I`ll run into them at a busy thoroughfare, and they`ll stop and kiss me. They say, `Davey, you look great.` They confess their feelings for me, how they`ve always felt love for me.
”I bumped into a friend I hadn`t seen in years-I wouldn`t have recognized her for anything, anything-and she said, `David Viscott. David Viscott. That glorious energy. It`s always been around you, ever since the 5th grade.` ”
And then he bumped into another friend . . . .
”He said, `David, how come you haven`t gotten older?` He said, `You look wonderful.` He said, `It`s not that you look wonderful, you are wonderful.”
And another friend . . .
”She said, `You know what I remember about you, Davey? When you would pass my window and smile at me, I would feel better.` ”
–
Every day Viscott hears problems of ”loneliness, desperation, the inability to make a relationship work, addictions, boredom and lack of direction.” He calls it ”America in the `80s.”
But it`s truly remarkable that none of these problems has ever touched him. He claims never to have been depressed.
Never?
”Never. Nothing`s ever happened to me. I`m all at peace in my life.”
Life, the way he relates, has been one long uninterrupted series of successes. He did ”brilliantly” at Dartmouth College; he put himself through Tufts University medical school with ”an outrageous amount of money” that he made by playing the stock market; his first week in practice as a psychiatrist in Boston he was ”instantly successful.” He had Jaguars, yachts, a gorgeous house, a lovely wife, three children. Everything except the grand passion. He met her-Katharine-on the ski slopes in 1975 while he was still married. But his wife understood perfectly because ”she loves me.” As for his
relationship with Katharine: ”Very frankly, I need to be adored.” She does her adoring in a home that has, besides a swimming pool, tennis court, and guest house, a room set aside just for cutting flowers.
”I guess you could say I was born lucky and I`ve worked at it.”
–
The work takes place in the empire that Viscott has established in Beverly Hills. Besides the books, syndicated radio show, TV appearances, greeting cards, board games, audio cassettes, seminars and cruises, there`s the Viscott Center for Natural Therapy, which employs five therapists, and a new magazine in the works called Feelings. In all, he figures he employs about 100 people. He does a lot, but as he says, ”I have a lot to give and I think it would be criminal not to give it.” His gift, he says, is his heart.
”The best thing I have is my capacity to love people and find something in them to love. I help them understand what they feel. I don`t know how to do much else. I don`t torture myself. I don`t worry about being wrong, because I`m never wrong, because I`m always me. I am continually and predictably me over and over again. I tell the truth as I perceive it. I can`t pretend to do more than that.”
The reporter suggests that Viscott may be the last happy man.
He corrects her: ”The only happy man.”
