Here is something I read last week in a research paper. I wanted to stay at home, but after posting this I decided to go fetch a wine bottle and have a chat with my awesome neighbor. It's saturday night for god's sake. :)
We live in a world where the pace at which we live our lives makes it increasingly difficult to create real connections with the people and world around us.
We're stuck in fast-forward and the culture of speed is spilling over into our social lives. This speed makes it harder to connect and satisfy our basic human social needs for belonging, closeness, conviviality&friendship.
It's ironic that in a world where we are more connected than ever we feel less connection. We are connected all the time, in real time through mobile, email, instant messaging, tweets, texts&posts yet as a society we feel the depth of connection is missing.
It's never been easier to make friends but never been harder to form friendships. Our culture is increasingly defined by the quantity of friends we have on Facebook not the quality of friends sat around the dinner table.
And, when we do meet face-to-face it's getting more difficult to get beyond the small talk to the big talk. We consume everything in convenient bite-size. Chat shows now have 5 guests in an hour, we tweet in 140 characters and news is delivered in 60 second sound bites. Our digital behavior has influenced our real life social behavior. We've forgotten how to hold a conversation, stay on one subject, get beyond the small talk to the good stuff, the deep stuff, the rich stuff, the revealing stuff, the juicy stuff.
We've been given the media to get our ideas and thoughts out there. We are constantly on transmit but have forgotten how to listen? When it comes to conversation listening is equally important to talking. We've forgotten how to listen, to question, to challenge, to be interested. We get stuck in the same place trading sound-bites about ourselves and miss the opportunity to embark on a conversational journey neither could make on their own.
Well said.it is a fact that we hardly have time for ourselves leave alone for others.we are just running on this material path leaving behind a lot of awesome things that god has created for us.i am still trying to find some answers.dont know when i will get to it.
ReplyDeleteI had not seen your beautiful text before. Between all, this sentence is great "It's never been easier to make friends but never been harder to form friendships."
ReplyDeleteYou're right: Dialogue between humans is not easy, and listening skills are a blessing for those who want to talk. Exchanging spent most of our lives, we would know if we were lone wolves. Sometimes just a glance that the trade is more beautiful than any phrase, but we humans have need of the verb. I think that's what makes the success of "social networks", and if it allows us to share the impressions of life of other humans who live on the other side of the planet, it's very rewarding. However, the physical exchange will always miss, and the warmth of a tender glance or a friendly pat is virtually impossible to reproduce. The fact remains that the modern world sees us through the earth more easily than previous centuries, and the hope of real meetings is not impossible.
In french if you want remerber our langage...Vous avez raison: Dialoguer entre humains n’est pas facile, et savoir écouter est une bénédiction pour celui qui désire nous parler. Echanger fait l’essentiel de notre vie, cela se saurait si nous étions des loups solitaires. Parfois il suffit d’un regard pour que l’échange soit plus beau qu’avec n’importe quelle phrase, mais nous les humains avons besoin du verbe. Je crois que c'est ce qui fait le succès des "réseaux sociaux", et si cela nous permet de partager les impressions de vie des autres humains qui vivent de l'autre côté de la planète, c'est très enrichissant. Cependant, l'échange physique manquera toujours, et la chaleur d'un regard tendre ou d'une caresse amicale est impossible à réproduire virtuellement. Il reste que notre monde moderne nous permet de traverser la terre plus facilement qu'aux siècles précédents, et l'espoir de rencontres réelles n'est pas impossible.
Je vous souhaite un heureux week-end pleins de rencontres réelles.
Marie-Christine G