Time is our most precious commodity. We all lead busy lives & don't have enough of it, especially if we are working. Although I'm retired, because I'm single, I am the only one to keep the "show on the road", so I too am sometimes "time poor".
Because I had a family & a professional, demanding, job I know what life is like trying to keep all the balls in the air at the same time. Now, as an observer of the lives of others, it seems to me that things have not got better.
My concern is that we are losing something in this onslaught of complexity. We are losing real conversations, with family, friends, neighbours & colleagues. Talking to strangers can be viewed as odd. Lonliness is everywhere, at every level of society and in every demographic. Depression & psychological disorders are rife - Addiction, self harm, suicide, obesity, anorexia.....
The coping mechanisms of my parents generation - a network of good, reliable, family, friends & neighbours seems a thing of the past. Instead we have a plethora of self help psycho-babble books because the NHS doesn't have enough resources to deal with the numbers of people needing "talking therapies". Often relationships seem superficial. There seems to be in-built obsolescence. Living together isn't working - Ok, move on & try someone else. A friend is replacable. We have lost the art of working at relationships & accepting differences.
In the "developed" world we are becoming divorced from our humanity. We communicate via technology. We interract more with smart phones, computers & TV than eachother. We solve problems by giving money or gifts instead of our time. It's nice to get a bunch of flowers through Interflora if something bad has happened, but it's much more useful to be able to talk to someone about it. A friendly voice is more theraputic than any number of flowers. It's basic. It's the need to share & know someone understands & sympathises. Or the need to laugh with someone else. There is something hollow about laughing out loud on your own.
On the upside, I have noticed that now I've lived in a city for 2 years, locally people I don't know do smile at me as we pass. I do chat to people in queues & on the bus. I do have the time to listen to my grandchildren & daughter & be a part of their lives.
The elderly have a lot to give, but it isn't a one way street, they need to receive too.
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