Loneliness (Photo credit: Alex Abian (Also on flickr.com/alexabian))When inherently social creatures (such as we Human Beings are -- at least for the most part) are encultured into an isolating or isolated lifestyle, certain needs are not normally met, certain compensatory actions and activities are undertaken, and some industries thrive on dealing with this increasing and pent-up demand. The lonely, telecommuting lifestyle changes behavioral outlets, but not the impulses (to connect, to touch, to commune, etc.) which underlie them. Those impulses are biochemically encoded into our DNA and hard-wired into our perception of life and mood.
Sometimes we crave the physical comfort of communication (or even the fantasy of Human interaction on any of a variety of psychological planes) so desperately that we will do virtually anything to fill that need. Remember the movie "Castaway," starring Tom Hanks? Do you recall his conversations with an inanimate basketball he came to name "Wilson?" A lonely man needed to feel that he could still speak and be heard -- Tom Hanks and the basketball were excellent in their respective roles
The article excerpt and link which follow appear courtesy of Truthout:
Capitalism and Loneliness: Why Pornography Is a Multibillion-Dollar Industry
Harriet Fraad and Tess Fraad-Wolff, Truthout: "Massive social changes in the US labor force and in commerce have transformed the economy and powerfully affected personal relationships. Since 1970, we have changed from being a society of people connected in groups of every kind to a society of people who are too often disconnected, detached and alienated from one another…. One is the loneliest number, and in their personal lives, Americans are increasingly alone."
Read the Article
We are, with very few intra-species exceptions, hard-wired to interact socially. To be heard. To listen. To be part of a living feedback loop. Excessive introspection and reflection might be interesting in terms of its meditative potential, but it also creates a detachment and from, and distorted perception of reality.
Part of the challenge is that our personalities are formed, enlivened and exercised through interaction with others who think somewhat independently of us. Without that interaction, exchange of information, basis of comparison and companionable (hopefully) dialog, we run the risk of being imprisoned inside of ourselves.
Being lonely is not unlike the notion of sensory deprivation. It deprives you are signalling. It deprives of stimulus. It distorts your perception of self and of the world as a whole as the deprived insular mind coils around itself like a serpent.
Douglas E. Castle
No comments:
Post a Comment