Hint: Your little black book doesn't count
Holding Hands
I take joy in random connections. Sharing a grin on the subway. Finding an old friend by chance on the street. Having a new acquaintance say "I know exactly what you mean!" The more I travel, join online communities, and buy into the global economy, the more I'm technically connected to other humans. I have a nice long list of contacts and a healthy Linked-In network. But am I really connected?
The frenzy of today's average communication means I use multiple e-mail accounts, a VOIP phone, a cellphone, IM services, Skype, list-servs, and blogs on a daily basis. The problem is the meaning is often watered down or lost, and the ways I can feel guilty for not answering are multiplied. Keeping up is a challenge, and I often ... make that almost always, feel behind with my friends. Granted, due to technology I have made many truly rich friends that live halfway around the world from me, and I value those relationships tremendously. But that's not my point.
What are we in danger of losing in the tangle of technology and two-dimensional connections? Direct and deliberate human-to-human contact ... by touch, voice, or sight. I've had many "subway encounters" since I've lived in NYC that made me aware of the issue. An older man desperately trying to make some kind of connection with passengers around him, resorting to some deliberately startling measures, finally breaking out into a huge smile when I eventually looked him in the eye and grinned at his efforts. A stranger noticing me breastfeeding my squirming baby as discreetly as possible on a crowded train, and silently pointing out a blurb in his newspaper that commented on where we'd be if our ancestors had been afraid to do just that. A man just last night, madly 'blackberrying' e-mails right and left, hunched over the screen and utterly oblivious to life around him.
The first two encounters left me richer, happier, and feeling connected. We need connections to live. Real ones, and meaningful ones. It's been proven many times over that babies need human touch to thrive, and don't develop if they're deprived of it. So why don't we reach out more often? I believe we're afraid of having our personal space invaded, and of being rejected. There are times when it's great to be internalized and quiet. We need that too. But the new ways to communicate let us retreat behind that "don't bother me" wall more often than is healthy. We get pale and anemic if we don't get in the sun once in awhile. We also become pale and two-dimensional if we don't reach out to others with a touch or a word or a look. We lose the chance to share the experience of being human, vulnerable and open. Connected.
Remember the Ma Bell campaign that started in the late 70's with the tagline Reach Out and Touch Someone to sell phone service? They had the right idea. Try it! Often.
- Look your neighbor in the eye and say "Good morning!
- Ask "How are you?" and actually wait for the answer
- Complement a stranger
- Chat with the next person in line
- Cut the clutter ... drop publications and listservs you don't read
Take a chance on a friend or a stranger, and you'll both end up being the richer for it.