The Value of Peace and Quiet In A Connected Age

In this earlier post, Humanity Beat talked about the inspirational and powerful musical work of Corrinne May. Today, Corrinne posted something on Facebook that really spoke to this writer. Written by Pico Iyer, The Joy of Quiet talks about how just a few years ago, all of us were enamored with digital connectivity and highlights the current day need to "disconnect" and actually have quiet time for ourselves.

This quote from the article says it all: "The urgency of slowing down — to find the time and space to think — is nothing new, of course, and wiser souls have always reminded us that the more attention we pay to the moment, the less time and energy we have to place it in some larger context. “Distraction is the only thing that consoles us for our miseries,” the French philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote in the 17th century, “and yet it is itself the greatest of our miseries.” He also famously remarked that all of man’s problems come from his inability to sit quietly in a room alone."

Back in 1985, a popular music artist who is now in the Contemporary Christian Music Hall of Fame wrote "It's the fear of silence that gives us away, cause when we're alone we have to hear what our aching hearts try to say and we've been walking in dead men's shoes. Now there's only one saving grace and we're given the power to choose" - Randy Stonehill (Copyright 1985 Word Music, Word, Inc. / ASCAP / Stonehillian Music)



Over the more recent years, psychology, psychiatry, medical doctors, and social work professionals have been saying we have become a culture addicted to connected technology, and that it really isn't good news.They all said this internet and technology addiction was leading to obesity at alarming rates, and we have all repeatedly told these people to go find some real work to do and mind their own business. In our cynicism and arrogance, this writer is starting to believe that we may have figuratively shot ourselves in the foot.

Our society is at a crossroads today that begs the following question: "Has connected technology fed into our stubborn behavior pattern of being anti-social?" If we ask this question, we also have to ask this next question: "Exactly what has led us to this place in human social history that we have become so uncaring about social skills and real life social interaction?"

The two obvious answers we can start with have to do with the inborn human want for instant gratification, and a sort of burn out from being over socialized before the age of connected technology. Those older people in the world born before the Nintendo generation (The generation of which this author belongs) can remember our parents literally begging us to get out of the house instead of watching TV or vegging out while listening to the popular music of the day.

Because we didn't have Nintendo, Satellite TV, Cable, or connected technology; the only way to get information was to actually get out of the house and socialize. We learned how to make friends and build real life social networks in our communities, and we knew the value of books, libraries, and book stores. Part of the anti-social attitude indeed has to do with being forced to socialize with people we either had nothing in common with or we simply just didn't understand their mentality.

At the end of the day, we appreciated quiet time. We actually used it to reflect back on our day, our overall lives, and where we were heading in the world. Today, the contrast to that is so noticeable within our hurry-up and stay busy world that we have seemingly forgotten how important our inborn social skills are. One thing that has led to the connected life replacing real life outside the home is the whole desensitization movement that took place from the late 80s to the current day. This desensitization movement was created by mental health professionals eager to help people deal with a rapidly changing world in which personality conflicts, deteriorating community relationships, eroding privacy rights, and spikes in shocking violence rocked every single person in some tangible way.

Privacy rights and the "public right to know" about everyone around us was a direct result of the mentioned spike in shocking violent crimes worldwide that became graphic beyond human imagination. Now, more than ever, we need to be able to disconnect from technology which feeds public paranoia with too much information. In this connected age, the information and education we so crave is misleading, incorrect, and tainted by non-credentialed self-professed experts more often than not. (This doesn't go to say that credentialed "experts" are always any better than armchair experts at all times).

This is a good time to talk about how easy it is for people at large to use the internet to present theories that look good but have no basis to them. How easy it is to take good information with real research behind it and then manipulate it to the masses without offering any good logic and little or no offering of tangible evidence that stands on its own. This is another reason for us to routinely have quiet time and disconnect...we really need to re-orient ourselves to rules of reality that we have conveniently thrown away in favor of winning a convoluted war of words, and quick, easy,  entertainment.

Perhaps this whole infatuation with quick access to information, entertainment, on-line social networking, and on-line education is a symptom of filling a social and emotional empty place for many people. Here is Alexandra with a talk about disconnecting and using that disconnected time to connect with ourselves, our lives, and our families.



Now, go let yourself find a good space with peace and quiet. Let your mind quiet down, and only focus on what's important in the real world. Live the life that matters!