Chords for Leonard Cohen on depression and relationships

_ Last year, Cohen himself was ordained as a Buddhist [Bb] monk.
_ He gets up every morning [N] at 2.30.
I talked to Leonard Cohen in Los Angeles.
I bumped into this old man.
He seemed to be old when I met him,
although he is younger than I am, Roshi.
And he seemed to know a thing or two _ that I was interested in looking into.
But what was it that you were looking for?
What did he know that you needed?
I don't think anybody gets into this kind of activity
unless their personal level of distress _ _ reaches a certain _ _ non-endurable _ point.
You know, to be serious about it.
I mean, nobody gets into a very _ rigorous _ activity unless they're suffering.
What were you suffering from?
Depression?
_ Depression is one thing, but just a general sense of confusion,
bewilderment, a sense of _ _ _ shipwreck that you've screwed up badly.
When you talk about being in distress, do you mean depression?
Has mental illness been a strong factor in your life?
Yes. _ _ _
I feel like I'm coming out of the closet.
But _ depression has certainly been an element that I've had to deal with _ all through my life.
And, you know, my cover story looked wonderful.
You were just this bummed out artist and you had success writing songs about it?
The guy's doing okay.
Like, what's he got to complain about?
You know, nobody _ dealt me any bad cards.
But if you're manic depressive, you know, that's a bad card.
I think it just goes with the territory.
Everybody's got something that they've got to deal with that is rough.
And the solutions you sought included what?
Travel, drugs, _ scotch, Prozac?
Well, yeah, I still do.
I mean, you know, _ _ I'm_ _ _
What happened was that somewhere along the line I understood that this question had to be addressed on the fundamental level of consciousness.
You say that your cover story, dealing with depression, was that you were [E] an artist.
You had success with your songs, particularly some of the more depressing [N] songs.
Did you ever worry that if you dealt with the depression, that if you actually got better, that you would lose touch with your artistic side, that understood that kind of pain and expressed it so well?
No.
That's a popular notion, you know, that it is exclusively suffering that produces good work or insightful work.
I don't think that's the case.
I think in a certain sense it's a trigger or a lever.
But I think that good work is produced in spite of suffering and as a response, as a victory over suffering.
That's an interesting concept, a victory over suffering.
Yeah, because, you know, I mean, _ _ if the level, if the degree of intensity of anybody's distress or disorder is sufficiently high, I mean, you can't move. _
And for people who have experienced acute clinical depression, I mean, the problem is getting to the next moment.
You know, I mean, the room tilts, you lose your balance and _ _ you're incapable of coherent thought.
Have you been that bad?
Yes, yeah.
I've been _ there.
You said one thing about Roshi that he said you knew how to work but you didn't know how to play.
_ Yeah, when I first came there, you know, usually people are pressed into the rigorous activities of maintenance and meditation.
He sent me down the hill to learn tennis, take tennis lessons. _
Leonard, have a little fun, lighten up, have a laugh.
Lighten up, that's what enlightenment means, that you've lightened up.
So you play tennis?
Well, I never learned.
I mean, I did take a number of lessons.
_ I think the thing that scared me away was that automatic machine that hurled balls at you at about 90 miles an hour.
_ _ _ _ _ Tell me about women.
_ _ So you have much better authority on that.
No, well, I don't know.
Have you felt, do you feel that you ever really connected with women, that maybe there were separate relationships but there was no lifelong connection?
_ _ Sometimes you get lonely and you, _ _ you know, you enter in, you embrace some scenario of self-pity or loneliness.
But no, most of the time I don't because I have, I've had long-lasting attachments.
Also, I think having children _ _ takes the edge off that fundamental _ loneliness that people who don't have children might _ feel.
_ Having been close to my kids all through my life, and in fact they're living here now, and watching them grow up and _ _ being part of their lives, I think that undermines that fundamental sense.
So you're a good dad? _ _
I'm probably a lousy dad, but, you know, I think that everybody _ concerned understood that I did the best I could.
Yeah, I think, okay, you know.
And Adam's going to be an artist, a songwriter like you.
Well, he's the real thing.
You know, I kind of have croaked my way through the whole enterprise.
_ You know, I was interested in presenting some kind of _ curious voice and keeping some kind of record of my own activities.
But Adam is the real thing.
I mean, he's got a beautiful voice.
He's got perfect pitch.
He dances.
He's beautiful.
Born with a golden voice.
He really does have it.
So he's living in the Tower of Song.
How far above you is he?
Oh, I think he's floating _ above the structure.
He's got some very _ unusual gifts. _
And Lorca?
Lorca, she just finished a course at the Cordon Bleu in Paris, a special pastry course.
And she's finishing up at the Southern California School of Culinary Arts.
She'll have a cooking diploma.
She's got a good job at a trendy restaurant in town because she has to accumulate a certain