Please Let This Mean Something

“Better yet, folks, we can combine[social networking websites] all into one site called “knowny” which records every interaction, every movement of every person on earth and posts them online like a storm of random data points that shouts out to the blind, indifferent universe, “WE EXIST! WE EXIST! PLEASE LET THIS MEAN SOMETHING!”

- Stephen Colbert

 

Source: google.com via Elizabeth on Pinterest

 

I’m starting to feel the weight and responsibility of social media pressing down on me like so many tons of html-coded brick.

I wonder about myself and the role of things like Facebook and Twitter and sometimes even this blog in my life. What part of my identity is really revealed in these things? This probably goes hand in hand with yesterday’s post about sharing too much of your heart with the world but…I am beginning to question my attitudes toward social media.

Facebook feels like a chore and yet, I continue to log on, incessantly almost, to see if people have liked my status or tagged me in a picture or commented on the YouTube link I just posted. And then I think, What is wrong with me? Why do I care? What about all of this do I truly find self-affirming? Helpful? Healthy?

Let me be clear. This is not an attack on anyone who is totally plugged in to their Facebook and Twitter and Google Plus and Flickr and Tumblr and Pinterest and YouTube and Blogger and Instagram and so on. I can easily see all of the amazing benefits and unbelievable assets that come with living in this internet-powered decade. It’s kind of mind-boggling how connected to the world I can be with just a click of a mouse (or sometimes less). I see the advantages and I am blown away by the advances in technology that allow us to learn and grow and move with the globe in exciting, revolutionary kinds of ways.

I’m just not sure if it’s really good for me anymore. I actually find myself more and more unhappy with the role of all this stuff in my life. I don’t even want to count the hours I while away, automaton-like, moving between three or four websites like some kind of deranged robot. 

Source: google.com via Elizabeth on Pinterest

 

I find myself torn between the desire to keep up with all the cool and new and hipster and deep well of desire to shut it off, shut it down. I long to drive to the library, not for the list of books I downloaded from the online catalogue but to browse the card index, to revel in the Dewey decimal system, to press my nose to yellowed library book pages and wonder about all the people who checked this book out before me. I dream of meeting each of my Facebook friends, instead for a cup of coffee (my treat) to look them in the eye and say, “How are you? I’ve missed you.” I imagine taking my rolls of film to the Walgreens and leaving them there, sometimes for a week, before receiving a set of prints, often blurry and disappointing and unedited, but fully tangible. I remember when I didn’t text or email, what it was like to call my friends or write them a letter, to hear their voice, to trace the line of their scribbled cursive across the page. I miss that. I miss the part where people had to ask you what your favorite movie was or what you did on Saturday night. Now it’s a click to my profile and you can read a list, a summary, a form meant to condense my entire personality and self – my faith, my politics, the books I’ve read, the quotes (not mine) that are somehow meant to express my depth and worldview and profundity. It’s a strange thing.

I guess I’m looking for balance in my own existence. This is not meant to be an answer for anyone else or even for me. I will keep blogging because I love it. I will keep my Facebook because I want to keep in contact with my family far away. I will Tweet because I enjoy quipping. I love my social media. I kind of hate it, too.

What about you? Do you struggle with this? How have you chosen to find balance in your life?

love, elizabeth

DIY: Valentine’s Day Decorations

Like I said, Valentine’s Day is kind of one of my favorite holidays…and this year I had fun making my own decorations.

I wrapped some strips of newsprint around plain glass votives and tied them with ribbon.

This is a recycled metal rose that Kyle bought me at a renaissance fair a few years ago…

I glued five or six white and black hearts together and hung them staggered in the living room window.

It’s interesting how things connect in our brains. All the heart shapes and images that have shown up this February have stuck with me.

Sometimes I’m not sure who can be trusted with my heart. I have lots of wonderful friends and family and I love them all. But I think sometimes that I open myself up too much. Am I too trusting, too careless with my heart? I only have the one very vulnerable, very young heart and sometimes I worry about giving too much of myself away.  I wonder about this and I wonder about my fear and I wonder about the wisdom of really being yourself fully and totally in this world.

It’s important to let people in. But maybe I do this too easily, too much. The fact is, not everyone deserves my whole heart. Only a few, in fact. I also want to be sure that I’m the kind of person that can be trusted with the hearts of others. It’s not every day someone hands you their heart.

What about you? Who do you trust with your heart, your deepest, most personal thoughts and feelings and self? Do you always feel safe doing that? Have you ever regretted it?

love, elizabeth

I Forget All the Time

Someone told me recently that we're all just steps away from our selves as children. We are all so fragile, so breakable and I think we forget that. Sometimes I make eye contact with a stranger and think, "You are seconds away from shattering."

And I want to reach out and take your hands and say, "I am so sorry."

Because for a second, I forgot. I forgot you were a human heart, pumping blood through a human chest, and I forgot.

God forgive me, I forget all the time.

love,

elizabeth

Today, please remember…

Your heart is a place of both incredible strength and unbelievable vulnerability. Remember to treat it kindly.

If the day goes horribly awry, if nothing turns out as it should, if you make a mistake, consider the things that truly last forever…and the rest will fade away.

You are capable of great things. But the small things matter, too. So  if all you accomplish today is to make someone smile, then your time was well-spent.

You are beloved. You matter.

I needed to remind myself of this today…how about you?

love, elizabeth