Go deep

A friend recently gave me the way forward by yung pueblo. I was reading the other night, trying to clear my mind of frustration and hurt so that I could fall asleep. This passage particularly got me thinking. I actually find it takes more energy to perform and maintain superficial interactions. Going deep is easy. It's real. It requires less effort because it only requires me to be me.

So, I wonder why so many of us revert to the performative behavior and superficial interactions. Isn't it tiring? It makes me tired... Is it perhaps that even though it takes more effort to perform, it poses less risk. The potential consequences of going deep are scarier than the energy it takes to remain on the surface.

But why should that be? Why should it be dangerous to be real in our interactions with each other? Why have we been conditioned to think that? Or why has our society cultivated that reality? It makes me wonder about what's to be gained, or who gains, from our isolation and superficial interactions -- media, beauty industry, fitness industry, tech, healthcare...they all gain from this reality. And who loses? We do.

A 2024 survey from the Harvard Graduate School of Education suggests that "21% of adults in the U.S. feel lonely, with many respondents feeling disconnected from friends, family, and/or the world." Technology was identified as one of the top contributors to loneliness. But, encouragingly, a majority of people identified “taking time each day to reach out to a friend or family member” as a solution to loneliness.

So, today I ask you, and myself, to take a moment to reach out to a friend you haven't talked to in a while, or a family member who makes you smile. And go deep. Be present. And tell them you love them.

Thank you for being here. I love you.