emotional (dis)investment

This state of affairs goes beyond compassion fatigue. Our around-the-clock overexposure to global human suffering, our daily feed of what we once considered catastrophic events — political, ecological, cultural — when combined with diminished attention spans, smaller and smaller chunks of content, and baked-in cross-platform imperatives to remain

These phenomena aren’t matters of indifference or bad taste. This is what arises from our increasingly unnatural experience of community, of culture, of public life, of identity, of bodies in space.

widespread, insidious shifts in how we experience each other face to face, not just in our most intimate relationships but also in our communities and public spaces

The negative side effects from this new way of living are too countless to list. We don’t have the patience for anything, let alone the slow unfolding of human emotion. Ask anyone on a dating app how that looks up close, how it plays out over time. Pundits lament that the global populace is enduring a plague of psychobabble that adds up to

Nevertheless, we need to keep showing our vulnerable hearts to each other. The stakes are enormous. We need more chances to connect and bond with each other in public. We need reminders that total control and complete divestment from others isn’t possible and it certainly isn’t desirable. We need to learn how to forgive each other and reassure each

how it’s critical to have people in your life who love you and see you when you’re fun and sparkly and on top of the world, but also love you when you’re stagnant and petulant and self-sabotaging and letting them down. It’s about how that kind of love makes you believe in other kinds of love. It’s about how the essential texture of life is, yes,