The teardown of human connection
Why there is and how to stop it.
“You’re so Art Deco, out on the floor
Shining like gun metal, cold and unsure
Baby, you’re so ghetto
You’re looking to score
When they all say hello
You try to ignore them
’Cause you want more (why?)
You want more (why?)
You want more (why?)
’Cause you want more”
⁃ Art Deco by Lana Del Rey
We live in an emotion deprived society with a strong drive for new experiences and a compulsive longing for external stimuli. This makes us senseless and empty. It is a vicious cycle, a distraction of what really is happening inside of us.
We missed out of what makes us humans, but feel a strong urge to tickle our ego. Now we are sunken into an endless search for stimuli. We are emptying ourselves and left with no real consent. Not building value we can trade with each other, but rather smoke whatever fill our souls. Distracting ourselves from what we should focus on, that is a fulfilling life, not an emptying one. Fulfillment does not come from distraction, it comes from a life of self development and life work, to become an honorable and fulfilled person.
We find our self in a situation where emotional orgasms has lead to loneliness. After years living without any consent towards your own nature, we realize that there is more then just good experiences. It is building value in people. By making time, making products, making art for people, to enhance their life. By doing so we connect. When we connect with ourselves and the world we can make a transformation.
When we realize we want someone in our lives to share, not to share moments on social media, but to share moments of love, grieve and joy with a real person; we also realize how hard it is to connect with real people and the real world, when everyone is connected online.
‘… people in Western societies overwhelmingly feel lonelier. According to the National Science Foundation’s 2014 General Social Study, a quarter of Americans feel they have no one they can talk to about their problems. One study from British relationship charity Relate finds almost ten percent of people have no close friendships at all, and 20 percent of those in relationships rarely feel “loved.” ‘— Sirin Kale in The Life of the Skin-Hungry: Can You Go Crazy from a Lack Of Touch
We are living in a society that is more lonely then ever and does not know how to resolve the issue. There is a strong emotional hunger around so many and so many feel inadequate. It is because there is a lack of connection in a connected world.
‘Believers, agnostics and atheists all recognize the power of connection; the peace and calm that comes from opening your heart to another. In those moments, we know we’re in the presence of something that inspires awe; something synergistically bigger than ourselves.’ — David E. Greenan from Deeper Dating
One of the places where we exist are in relationships. We would be better of by building relationships and inspire the other. The sad thing is that our society is not build for that (especially when time is money), rather for optimum performance (that is no backfiring us in the face with loneliness) to gain more profit out of everything, even other people.
We should be careful with what we follow and what we believe, because it takes just a choice to go upwards or downwards in whatever spiral we are.
Alone in an alienated emotion deprived society
By constant seeking approval from others, to be liked, to be accepted, to be in connection; we burn our authentic self for validation, for the sense of belonging and importance. In the process we are transforming ourselves in gun metal, always luring for more (approval). When this is just the echo experiencing emotional hunger for connection first with ourselves and secondly with others.
‘Social-networking sites like Facebook promise to connect us to friends. But the portrait of iGen teens emerging from the data is one of a lonely, dislocated generation. Teens who visit social-networking sites every day but see their friends in person less frequently are the most likely to agree with the statements “A lot of times I feel lonely,” “I often feel left out of things,” and “I often wish I had more good friends.” Teens’ feelings of loneliness spiked in 2013 and have remained high since.’— Jean M. Twenge from ‘Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation?’
Damaged in security and comfort by a number of social factors people end up emotionally deprived. If you ask me, it is because we do not honer ones gifts, but instead shame the other person, to cover ignorance and insecurity, instead of dealing with them.
‘It is painful but bearable for people to experience these feelings of hunger and face their own emotional needs. Unfortunately, most individuals choose to deny or avoid this pain as they did when they were young. They seek outlets or choose courses of action that help them deny their pain or kill off the sensations of aloneness.’ — Dr. Robert Firestone Psychology today.
Welcome in the age where we spend more and more time alone and where we have less and less sex. There is a correlation between the two. One effects the other. When we are emotionally deprived we can get the feeling of being frustrated, unloved, undesirable, unattractive and feelings of loneliness (which can lead to a premature death).
‘We have lost the basic codes of kindness that create the possibility for intimacy. This has dead-ended countless potential relationships, and has led to a singles culture filled with deep loneliness.’ — Ken Page in Deeper Dating
There is a difference between emotional hunger and love. One is emptying and the other is giving. Before we can give, we have to give ourselves time and permission to know, to fail, to engage with inspiring people, this is not done by seeking more stimuli.
What do you do when you really want to engage, but there is no one who want to share it with you too! When they feel, you are not one of us?
Take time to know the other people, they need time to know you too. Because you are a stranger, especially in an environment where people know each other well.
It is scary to show who you are. So what do we do? We look what the culture is and try to adapt to it, so we can fit in. We try to conform. There is a healthy level, but also one, that destroys authenticity, where people become fake. On the outside it looks that they have a lot of friends, but there is no real connection between a fake person and the people with whom the person interact. Since there is no real connection with the self and no added value either, just an empty gesture.
When we know our worth, that is the knowledge of our personality, the knowledge of what we count as valuable and invaluable and are not afraid to show it, despite the possible rejection. Then we can truly connect.
To do so we build a movement of what we believe in (our values), by living accordingly. That is focusing on it and not by oppressing it, doing so we get a direction in life where we can find people with whom we find a match with our values and personalities. This indeed is a brave act, which can lead to a lot of rejections, when we don’t know how to protect ourselves, or better said hide what moves us, what is important to us, but showing it step by step at the right time at the right moment and observe how well it is received.
By being genuinely kind we will find the people we may otherwise have missed. From my experience, most of the time kindness is not well received, because some see it as weakness (the opposite is true), or people see it as a portal to a new source where they can misuse your kindness or simple because people are not able to react well to it.
By slowing down our acts of kindness, giving tiny drops of it, by a smile, wishing someone a good day , etc. Remember that real kindness always has some positive effect, maybe you don’t see it, when we search friendships, our kindness should be received or else abuse is waiting on you at the next corner.
We find people, by movement, focus and direction, otherwise it is just another club, full of suckers.
Social tensions
We are expected to show a strong self, otherwise you are not cool. On top of that you are expected to perform. This only ads up to more tension and frustration management. It is remarkable how tensions drops as soon as we feel validated and excepted. Our masks fall of and we are able to express our feelings. Maybe because it all was a puppet show to hide an ugly truth of mood-swings, unhinged behavior, fears and doubts.
How do we do this in an inhuman society where profit is our Lord, the king of Society. The obvious first step is awareness of the problem and an understanding of it. The second step is creating an environment that supports people, with fair salaries and social groups (social groups are not only for churches).
‘Our culture has eliminated so many opportunities for subtle acts of kindness as a result of the pace of our interactions and new technologies that allow less and less warm contact. Moreover, current dating advice tends to stress confidence and maintaining a carefully modulated distance to keep the other person guessing.’ — Ken Page in Deeper Dating
When our actions have a positive response we feel a satisfaction or relieve, when our actions have a bad response we feel anger or frustration. Sexual tension is the desire to act upon and to gain the acceptance of the significant other, but this desire is withhold, because of the fear of reaction, causing tension.
Acting from kindness, real kindness helps dissolve tensions between people, and lessens the overall anger and frustration. When we start to smile at strangers and when they smile back, the relieve and the warmth you get is healing and lessens tension between people a lot.
Our search should be one for inspiration and not that of stuffing the ego, like the stuffing of a teddybear full of fluff, but bears no real content.
The un-safety of pride and ego
Our cultural heritage of competition and puppet show, where life is more like a chessboard then a playground for exploration, we become people who have little trust in one-another. When on the winning side the ego is filled with pride and when on the loosing side the ego is filled with anger, frustration and jealousy, the true self is lost and you do not truly know what it wants.
‘When we lead with an airbrushed version of ourselves we feel inadequate and insecure. Why? Because our false self is inadequate! It has no link to our personal power. … When our goal is to connect with our personal truth and to interact with the world from there, everything changes. We feel a sense of creativity and worth. Our fear of rejection becomes less tyrannical. Connecting with the world as we really are becomes our new passion’ — Ken Page in Deeper Dating
The ego exploits, whereas your core self brings you back home, where there is no pride, where there is no ego, only the naked you, nothing to show, nothing to fill with pride. It is really hard to acknowledge our craziness, weirdness. The ego promises to be a bunker, a mask to cover every crack in our personality.
The sad thing is that the ego always wants more, there is no such a thing as enough, there is no such thing good as enough. Not enough to brag about, not enough to shut the other ones mouth against critique, not enough to let others in awe. I agree, it is necessary to have a certain desire to move forward, but as with everything we should know what our boundaries are and think realistically about what we want to gain and pay for it. By doing so we distance ourselves from others.
Once you have found yourself, soon after you will find other people too, who share what you share, the things that resonates with you too.
Elbert Hubbard, ‘why people spend so much time deliberately fooling themselves by creating alibis to cover their weaknesses. If used differently, this same time would be sufficient to cure the weakness, then no alibis would be needed.’
We should not suppress our healthy desires, because it comes back and shows up as neediness. We should learn gratitude and understanding towards ourselves, looking at our qualities and positiveness that are part of our lives. Only when we honer our true selfs, we can grow toward a healthy, not self abusing, life full of healthy relationships.
It is funny (or sad) to notice, that when you are fulfilled and happy with yourself, people want to engage with you when you need them the most less, when you need people the most, then it’s very hard to connect, because of internal struggles, people are rather be friends with winners. It is logical from an evolutionary or ego (being friends with someone higher in the social ladder) viewpoint but not from a viewpoint of friendship. Where is the mutual respect and exchange of value, kindness and understanding? It is self centered bullshit, that alienates people from each other.
‘In an atmosphere of judgement and criticism, intimacy dies and isolation flourishes.’ — Ken Page in Deeper Dating
Weakness vs weak
When you don’t act according to whatever social norm, you are left out in the dark. When you know your worth, you know, you shouldn’t bother. When you are aware of this you are also aware of people who inspire you. Never give in, to be liked for the sake of it, since they will never be your real friends. When you are living in your own worth, you will find those people, meet new people, it is well worth the effort even when you are very introverted.
I know very well, that when you are hurt over and over, how hard it is to open yourself up again, to stand up and show your face again. I know, how painful it is when people you know as an acquaintance turning their head away, when you see them somewhere on the street. When you know what your worth is, you also learn to protect it, we need to learn this. When we start to know when and where we can show more of who we are, we start to be a lot less hurt in the future.
You can be weak, not weakness in character, but weak because of tiredness. Everyone is weak sometimes, drained of all those demands. Your energy is draining away, you are not able to fill up again. When we try to gain kindness, we will encounter rejection instead, the second we realize is that we go down the spiral. We should look for inspiring people instead, who help us face our fears, who understand our struggles and give emotional comfort to stop the downward spiral and stand up again.
Shame
With gender roles in our heads we put constrains on others. When one does not act according to our understanding of gender roles, then that person is shamed, put aside, even when that person is better in decency, understanding, kindness and morality.
The genuine friendships and relationships are “gone to hell”, replaced by an eternal search for stimuli. People are being hurt and left in the dark. Society shames you when you are not doing what the others are doing, namely ruining your life, when you have a sane amount of critical thinking ability to know this is not going to work out in the long run, but still lessens for not following the same shit as everyone else does and forcing the same emotional worldview or collective knowledge.
We want to conform, we don’t want to be left out of the equation. We want to be part of the story, but when we are not doing so, we are ashamed.
Male shaming
You absolutely don’t know what you did wrong, you just are wrong. If it would be one person, then you can say it was just a person, but when a society does shame you, what does that do with your self image. You may say, fuck it, it is better to be alone than constantly be remind of my shortcomings.
Shaming comes from an insecure ego, afraid that it’s own shortcomings will come to light.
‘How ironic and appropriate that the very thing men have been accused of, is now something more men are quite happy to avoid. An ever expanding population of men have quite simply had enough of watching other men laying down their lives for pointless reasons, and giving their life’s labour for some greater good that just doesn’t exist anymore. Perhaps it never did.
Men have decided “the greater good” means something else, and it doesn’t include their own disposability. When a cost/benefit analysis reveals there is no benefit, it doesn’t take a genius to remove himself from the equation. In this kind of climate, a smart man does not effectively show his value by giving more, or by working harder. He shows his value by removing himself entirely. It requires no effort to make the same impact. ‘
— Clint Eastwood from https://www.mgtow.com
There is a growing number of men who feel that they are not welcome anymore, that their personality, their feelings and their accomplishments is of no value. Why would a sane male put his head out?
‘Men are human, so they’re not always pillars of strength. They get frightened. They feel vulnerable. They make mistakes. They sometimes feel small and weak, like scared little boys. Yet they don’t feel like they can let themselves be seen in these states of weakness, so they armor up. Unless men develop what Brené calls “shame resilience,” when men feel that rush of inadequacy and smallness, they wind up either getting pissed off or shutting down emotionally. ‘— Lisa Rankin M.D. from Psychology Today
Being shamed for showing their real emotions. It is like that the preferred state is that the world portraits a view that guys need to be like a tank, with no feelings, only brut force. The shaming is not far away to also portrait a negative view on guys who always have a hard dick, luring on some prettiness (rape culture). A mindset that distance people from each other.
More and more men start to walk their own path and leave the dating culture full of shame and blame on its own. Away from an image of men that the only have shallow desires. Away of the image that men are only good for fixing things and paying the bill. Away of the narrow path of limited self expression. Away from culture that has no kindness and understanding only demanding a fake performance to stuff someone’s ego.
‘ … A growing population of men … refuse to subscribe to the utter nonsense perpetuated in the culture, the media, magazines, on television, or in society at large. They are passionately curious, will question everything, and are fundamental seekers of the truth — no matter how painful the truth may be. They are the men who will choose and prefer to go their own way, independent of what we are subjected to on a daily basis. ‘ — Clint Eastwood from https://www.mgtow.com
Yes, when one start to recognize his own ability instead of forcing himself into a mold, he start to know his own worth and will not conform anymore. If we as society want to have healthy relationships with one another, we have to start with empathizing with each other. Otherwise we have what we now have, a society full of shame, frustration and anger. Who is unable to talk about itself, because otherwise it is shamed with ridiculously of being weak, when the opposite is true. Showing your real emotions takes courage.
Slut shaming
When a women is as open about here sexuality as men, she is condemn to be a slut. Women are sexualized, but are not allowed to talk and act on it themselves.
‘… “slut” is simply a misogynistic catch-all, a verbal utility knife that young people use to control women and create hierarchies. There may be no real sluts, in other words, but there are real and devastating consequences to slut-shaming.’ — Olga Khazan
It comes down that being a women, you are not allowed to act and live as freely as men do when it comes to women’s sexuality.
You are asked to show your beauty and act out to escalate to higher ranks in society, but on the other hand you are not allowed to do this, since other females are afraid you getting higher in the peck other.
It is really hard to brake out from the social constrains. People either settle down or leave it altogether.
‘Slut-bashing [or shaming] is a cheap and easy way to feel powerful. If you feel insecure or ashamed about your own sexual desires, all you have to do is call a girl a “slut” and suddenly you’re the one who is “good” and on top of the social pecking order.
But the most important thing that all of us need to work on is this: to stop calling or thinking of women as “sluts.” Face it: At one time or another, many of us have called a woman a “slut.” We see a woman who’s getting away with something we wish we could get away with. What do we call her? A “slut.”
We see a woman who dresses provocatively, and maybe we wish we had the guts to dress that way ourselves. What do we call her? A “slut.” […]
Most of us recognize that this stigma is unjust and unwarranted. Yet we have used the “slut” insult anyway: Our social conditioning runs too deep. We must will ourselves to be aware of the sexual double standard and of how we lapse into slut-bashing on an everyday level. If we become aware of our behavior, then we will have the power to stop. ‘ — Leora Tanenbaum (Harper Paperbacks, 2000.): Slut! Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation, p. 238–240.
- When people learn to deal with there insecurities, then maybe we can build a more polite and friendly society.
- It starts with a good self reflection on our own attitudes. We as society should more empathize instead of judging according its own perverted worldview.
- When we are honest toward ourselves and others, then maybe, we will not live a double standard. That is on one hand wanting wild wet sex from a women desiring itself and on the other hand demanding to be prude virgin, an untouched flower, waiting to be plucked.
Isolation, the feeling of I am not welcome
Even people, who are perfectly capable of being alone need some kind of connection.
It is the emotional engagement with lot of smile, willingness to know, to engage with the other person, free without asking anything in return. Playing the game of seduction, trying psychological tricks, is one of the ugliest and shallow pitch you can give someone. What value can someone give to the other when that person can’t even make the other feel good? What does that person expect in return, when the desires are that low, that of give me without me giving?
It is sharing our gift with the world, that will give you the emotional riches people desire. To make real friends there most be equality and more or less equal willingness to engage. Then one is the mirror of the other and can make soulmates. Yes, we should make relationships a priority, always, it is where our sexual energy freely can flow, otherwise we go down in a spiral of frustration and disengagement.
We are weird, I am weird, you are weird. Its show in what we watch, as a kind of reflection of our inner worlds. When we understand what does points where we care most about, then that is probably our most vulnerable part too. These places in our soul are probably most hurt too. We rather dig al that pain away into a big pit. By doing so we distance ourselves form our core self and distance from the people around us.
This whole thing, comes with a lot of fear, fear of what might happen if you are just you with your weirdness.
We should stop asking the question, as Ken Page puts it, from ‘how well we rate in love’ to ‘Can I be brave enough to treasure my most intimate self, generous enough to share it, and wise enough to choose the right people?’
To wrap it up
- When we silence the outer noice to hear our own inner voice, we can start to connect with ourselves,
- being careful what we fallow and what we believe,
- stop seeking constant approval (for the ego) as a kind of reassurance of the empty nerve wrecking behavior, stop building the ego into an air-castle,
- empathy, kindness and understanding are powerful tools for connection, real ones,
- not shaming other people and not living double standards,
- expressing our feelings more freely,
- honoring our own identities with its own weirdness,
- choose the right people.
We can reconnect and resurrect from the dead-emotions. We start to feel a warmth and a pull towards others ,when we learn the art of making friends, we find a balanced fulfilled life. We will avoid frustration, stress, be at ease and never feel left out and lonely.
