Wednesday, September 5, 2007

the adulthood disconnect

after some friendly chit-chat amongst my web-world parent friends the other day, i began to think about why we feel so disconnected from the rest of the world once we become parents, spouses, professionals, whatever. i guess i was a little surprised to find out that a large percentage of them felt the same way, because usually i imagine myself as somewhat of a recluse compared with others. where did all of these insecurities come from? at work, we spend most of our time trying to act like a "grown up". in social settings, we preoccupy ourselves with attempting to be funny, witty, casual... most importantly, likeable. when did our own skin become so uncomfortable? i reminisce on days when i thought the entire population loved me just as much as i it. now it seems to me that as we grow older, we allow most (if not all) of our relationships to weaken. perhaps it only seems that way to me because most of mine were not meant to be strong in the first place. i am currently sacrificing geographical proximity for emotional proximity. the people that are close to my heart are actually quite far away. illinois, north carolina, california, nevada, northern michigan, etc. it makes me wonder, though... would i still feel the same way about these people if they were across the street? or would that just be too close? my simplified conclusion: i think that although we all long for a deeper connection with others, it's just easier not to. there's less risk involved - less chance of being dissapointed because we "don't fit in". and thanks to this wonderful thing called technology, it's even easier now to monitor our own level of disconnect. oh, how i love the art of text-messaging and emailing. what better way to "connect" to people without truly connecting?

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