The generation that Forgots How to Be Alone

The silence we keep escaping

I don't think we are afraid of being alone anymore. I thinkwe are afraid of ening alone with our own thoughts.

Watch people in any waiting room or elevator it train station or bus stop. The moment there is nothing demanding their attention almost every hand reached for a phone. A few seconds of silence feels uncomfortable. We scroll through without purpose not because we are looking for something but because we are trying not to feel the emptiness of doing nothing.

Even sunsets have becomes interruptions to our scrolling instead of other around.

When did the Boredom became the enemy?

As child een boredom was not something we feared. It was the beginning of an adventure.

At stock because a sword. A cardboard box become a spaceship. Our imagination filled the empty spaces because there was not always ei.rthing else to consume.

Now those empty spaces rarely exist. Every spare moments is occupied by music or video or podavst it notification or endless deed. We have trained our kind to expect constant simulation and int return they gave forgotten how to rest.

Somewhere all along the way we have started to mistake happiness for having entertained.

My own Reflection

I have caught myself doing it more times than I would like to admit. Sometime I unlocke my phone without realising why. I will switch between apps and read things I will forget in minutes and somehow twenty or thirty minutes disappear. While I finally put my phone down I don't fell fulfilled. I don't feel relaxed. I just feel distracted.

It made me wonder ehthere I was using my phone because I wanted to or because I have forgotten what it felt to simply sit with my own thoughts.

Thete have been moments when I forced myself to leave my phone behind drui g an evening walk. At first it felt strange. My hands reached for somthing that wasn't there. But after a while I stared noticing things that I had been missing. The sound of birds settling into trees and children laughing inthe distance and the breeze carrying the smell of the rain and the changing colors of the sky.

The world has not been more beautiful. I simply started paying attention more.

Technology is not the enemy. It is one of humanity greatest achievement. It connects us and teaches us and makes our life easier in countless ways. But perhaps we have forgotten that solitude is not the same as loneliness.

Solitude is where ideas are born. It is the place where we process our emotion and understand ourselves and rediscover what truly matters.

If every quiet moment is filled with someone else's vkycr they were slowly start to lose touch with what is ours. May be happiness is not found in constant simulation. Maybe it is found in learning to enjoy our own company again.