A Prompt

I am pondering the dissonance and disconnection we are experiencing in late-stage capitalism. Delivery apps, single occupancy living, and the rising prices of pretty much everything have led us into a state of despair, constantly choosing comfort over connection. A societal shift. We look for safety amid collapse of industry, of structure. In uncertainty we look to what is certain; in roiling seas we seek solid ground. Where this ground was once community - your friends, neighbours, extended family, co-workers, the person you make small talk with - is now a self-centred bubble. ‘I cannot change what’s going on out there’, we say, ‘but I can at least guarantee safety in here’. In here with my shows on repeat, with my comfort meal, with my phone on DND. In here where I am not challenged, in here where I am not tasked with showing up, in here where I can ignore out there. The need for safety is important. The need to create emotional safety within yourself is important. The need for spaces where you can retreat, lay down your burdens, recuperate are all important. But chat, this isn’t it. People don’t heal in loneliness; societies don’t change without intervention. Creating a sense of safety in a bubble of your own making does not change the world, and is itself an unsustainable mode of healing. Showing up for ourselves and each other is a deeply uncomfortable process. It’s slow. Revolutions take time. If we cannot co-regulate even our emotional state, how do we plan to co-create… anything? If we cannot live our lives with the contradictions that come from our friends/family/ community (differing wants and needs, disappointments, multiple points of view) how can we expect to create a cohesive, harmonious or even vaguely functioning society? If you can’t accept disagreement or disharmony from those you love, how will you deal with those you hate? Our empathetic levels are at a critical impasse. We are constantly choosing ourselves and our perceived safety, over anything. We continue to stoke the fires of invented difference via our devices, while we stay in our fluffy socks. We constantly yell “it’s all TOO much!” while doing nothing to make real change. Change doesn’t happen to us gently. It does not sneak in while you’re asleep and gingerly carry you to a paradise you can bask in upon awaking. That is death. Change is an action you take. Change is how you say ‘it is TOO much so let’s DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT’. Change is how you prioritize a safer future for all, over the perceived defanging of a harmful present. Do you seek real safety, real connection, real life? Or are we just going to close the curtains, lie down, start the episode over again…