On Community

Having travelled around the world and lived abroad I have learned that we in North America are among the poorest people on earth.

The reason for this poverty of heart is because we are increasingly more isolated, lonely and disconnected from our communities. We have the most material possessions of any other society and we have the highest rates of any industrialized nation for murder, mental illness and addictions. A flood of new studies have revealed that in America the lack of community connections and regular human contact is literally starving people mentally, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually.

The medical field is diagnosing clinical depression in alarming numbers, most are false diagnosis that are more indicative of our societal handicap; that being our refusal to accept responsibility for our lives and choices and accepting discomfort or negative feelings of any kind. We want the pills to make the bad go away; if you're over weight and your marriage is a disaster, take a pill. How is a pill going to resolve ones gluttony or abusive marriage?

Pills don't solve problems they merely disguise the symptoms and as new studies are showing the cure can be worse than the problem; many patients on anti-depressants report decreasing quality of life, an absence of all emotional fluctuations and a numbing affect. The irony is that the patient is still over weight and miserable in her relationships.

There is not a medication in the world that can heal like human contact, communal sharing and friendship; for example while travelling in the Middle East I was privileged to attend a funeral and I say privileged because they have a custom that no one should ever weep alone so the neighbourhood women sat with the widow and when she cried the women cried with her. It was an astonishingly profound and deeply touching experience especially when contrasted with the barren loneliness I witness in North American suffering and grief where we're told to 'get over it' and most all friends and neighbours disappear after the funeral.

In Korea, anyone out alone is openly stared at and strangers will approach and ask to keep you company because they feel pity for anyone who lives even a moment alone. Can you imagine? Many years ago on a cold day in Seoul I grabbed my book and sat eating at a restaurant, alone and a young man and his girlfriend asked if I was there with anyone, when I said I was alone, they looked at me with such sadness and pity and insisted that they sit with me and then paid for our meal.

With the on line revolution, it's revelatory that blogs and social networking sites are being referred to as Communities; on line communities. Humans will mutate to evolve to their living circumstances and as loneliness deteriorates the work place, the family and educational networks, our society is re-building a new world of connections in cyberspace to share this world with others and be less alone.

This new frontier is a double edged sword because the phenomena is actually breading more loneliness and less human to human contact and commiseration which is proving that neither pills nor computers can replace the inspiration and bonding created within a community of human friendship.

What gives people around the world a sense of well being and purpose and connectedness that is missing in North America? Community; feeling and being a member of something stitched together to create a larger mosaic of humanity and caring.