It’s hard to connect with people. We live in an era of media saturation. We are surrounded by, and inundated with information, but … instead of discourse, we get targeted messaging–one-way streams of data, engineered to engage our stress-response centers and hijack our amygladas and adrenal systems.

We get information, but we don’t really get connection.

We get a simulation of contact never quite satisfies the human drive for social interaction. It comes close, but it subverts our expectations and gamifies them. We substitute intangible emotional connections for quantifiable, scaleable engagement.

We don’t have many opportunities to practice active, engaged listening. We passively consume content without making eye contact.

We don’t share our direct emotional responses, unfiltered by commoditization and publication, and we don’t know how to receive them.

Let’s talk about our feelings. Let’s listen to each other without descending immediately into outrage and shouting.
Let’s listen, without jumping to conclusions or passing judgment or demanding something immediate.

Let’s connect, emotionally, just to recognize the emotional experience of others–without passing judgment or adding anything to the message. Let’s find ways of establishing non-judgmental emotional contact.

Let’s get connected. Just to get connected.