Social Media

Communication is quickly becoming a lost art.  We no longer write eloquent letters to our loved ones or fret about misspelled words, instead we applaud acronyms in place of full sentences and send text messages instead of picking up the phone to call.

It is depressing that it has become acceptable for a family member to text you Happy Birthday rather than call or send a card.  

When did our lives become so busy?  When did it become too difficult to simply speak to one  another in order to communicate?

True, I am better in writing than in conversation.  Because when I write I am able to carefully say what I mean rather than jumble my words together and spit them out in a random thought that has a different or less meaning than I intended.  

This is apparent even in my text messages.  I send novels instead of fragments; I try to spell out every word and carefully say exactly what I mean rather than abbreviate.  But too often my novels go unread or unanswered like thoughts sent out to the universe with an echo...

When did we become too busy to respond?  We are so focused on what is going on in our own lives that we have forgotten how fulfilling it is to spend quality time with our friends and family.

We have digressed.

We've traded phone calls for text messages, text messages for no response at all.  We've traded greeting cards for e-cards and wrapped gifts for gift cards.  We're too busy to pick up the phone, to put pen to paper, or to go out to a store.  We have instead traded the corner store for Amazon, Blockbuster for Netflix, and cashiers for Google wallet.

Our society has become too busy to notice that we are failing at an elementary level.  We blame outsourcing jobs for our economical crisis yet we contribute daily to the problem by refusing to take the time to visit a local business.  

When was the last time anyone heard the word boycott?  It has become such a foreign concept to get a community of like minded people to unite in a cause and STOP.  

Instead we post our propaganda on Social Media websites and define ourselves by "friends" that we barely know and "followers" that we don't intend to lead. 

Social media has made us socially mediocre.  

But...it's not too late to become exceptional.

~M

Changes

Learning of the death of a loved one is cause for pause and reflection.
This evening was no different:  as I was sitting here on my couch watching a movie, I couldn't help but to, quite literally, pause the movie to reflect.

When I'm feeling philosophical and/or nostalgic sometimes I have bible verses pop into my mind that I learned when I was a kid.  
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8:
Verse 1: To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.

What a powerful way to think of time: as a period to every purpose. 

Life is fragile and should not be taken for granted:
We must instead live life with purpose and what greater purpose is there than love?  

For me, family equals love.  The family that we are born with,  that we make along the way, and that we build through lasting friendships.

This year has been different than the past several years;  our family dynamics are evolving. Some have been exceptional changes--yet others: devastating.  

Regardless of the reason for these changes, the time to every purpose will come.  
We will welcome birth, we will mourn loss, we will laugh, we will cry, we will be angry, and we will forgive...

...all of this in time, to every love.

~M