El Communicado Manifesto

Alright my lovelies.  It's time to hit this topic.  Hard.

I've been thinking about this one a lot lately, and it's so clearly an important (and often neglected) topic of conversation (Oh irony, you're hilarious) ;)

Let's not beat around the bush:  I am not always the best at communicating with people.  No, wait, scratch that.  Let me rephrase.  Because I am actually really pretty good at communicating with people - but I am not always good at getting back to people in a timely manner...

(GASP!)  What?  No!  (you say).  Yes, it's true....

There are several reasons for this, but none of them include me not caring about the people in my life.  Please, PLEASE, puh-LEASE hear me on this.  If you are in my life, then I care about you, and making you feel like I don't is absolutely the last thing that I want to do.  

But.

Some people just don't get me.  They could've known me for YEARS and still expect a return text or phone call within minutes and are hurt and/or angry when that doesn't happen.  Here's the thing though, I have NEVER been that person.  I mean, really.  Never.  Thirty-one years on this earth and not one of them has seen me being an instantaneous responder.  But, because that is their style and communication timeline, they expect it from others.

And I guess I can't blame them, because it's really our culture.

Our culture, seriously.  Can I just say how ridiculous we are about instant gratification?  We over-communicate in the very worst way.  We FB, Instragram, tweet, swipe, blog (oh hey there again irony, sup?), text, call, link, message, and connect in every possible sort of app out there.  There are literally a hundred ways to communicate with people.  But, even 15 years ago, that was not the case.  And certainly not for thousands of years before that.  I mean, how did people ever survive?!  Without being able to send someone a text and get an immediate response?  Catastrophe must have reigned!  Without instant communication, how would we know if we needed to buy a red onion or a white onion when we forgot our shopping list at home on the kitchen counter?  How would we know if Tom's party moved from Thursday to Friday (and it's ONLY 4 weeks away!)?  And for God's sake, how WOULD WE KNOW if someone just changed their relationship status to "It's complicated"?  Oh the humanity!

Ok, I'm being silly, sure.  I get it, instant communication is actually a pretty good thing sometimes.  Being able to contact someone in an emergency?  Very good thing.  Being able to order a pizza from the grocery store when you've collapsed in a heap on the crate of clearance toilet paper oddly placed in the frozen foods section (don't tell me you've never done this!), having given up on any sort of coherent shopping and all adult budgetary choices?  Uh, yeah, obvi fab.

But, I think we've gone a bit overboard.

Because it's no longer about emergencies and important communication.  Now, it's all about availability.  And expectations that there will be instant contact.  

And because of those things, and the culture that they have created, if that instant contact doesn't happen - we take it personally.  We get hurt, or annoyed, or even worse, angry.  And why?  Because there is an expectation.  I wasn't alive back in the 1800's, but I can pretty much bet that Mary wasn't pissed at Jane when she didn't get a return telegraph from her in a day.  Heck, until the telephone gained popularity, if you didn't live within a few minutes of someone, you probably didn't even SEE them for days (or longer), let alone chat it up.  And did they have any less meaningful relationships than we do now?  Nope, certainly not.

What changed?  Well, technology is the easy answer.  But, it's not the culprit.  Always easy to blame technological advances for our problems, right? :)  I think it was the technology that enabled us, but we were the ones to create a culture that expects - no, DEMANDS - being in constant contact.

And I want to fight back against that.  Not just because I am an introvert, and all of this over-communication is exhausting and not life-giving.  I want to fight back because I think these expectations hurt our relationships.  In fact, I think sometimes they actually cause problems when there weren't any to begin with.  We start making things up in our minds, we start believing things that are totally untrue, and it can tear us apart.

Don't agree with me?  Try this situation on for size...

Sam:  Huh, I texted Lola yesterday and she still hasn't texted me back.  I wonder if she's pissed at me...?  Oh gosh, what did I do?  Hmmm, when did I see her last?  What did I say?  I wonder if it was because I didn't like that Facebook status that she posted a week ago.  Or maybe because I didn't re-tweet that shout out from last month?  Oh no, what if she's seriously mad at me?  I mean, it's been a WHOLE day!

Lola: (Camping for 3 days, no cell phone service, hasn't even seen the text)

Sam: Oh my gosh, it's been TWO DAYS!  She must hate me.  I can tell.  This is the worst.  What am I going to do!?!?!?  Should I text her again?  Or will that piss her off more?  Does she think that I don't care if I don't try to text her again?  Or should I call?  Would that make it worse?  What if I just FB messaged her?  That's like half-way between a call and a text, right?  Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Lola : (Still camping...)

Sam:  THREE DAYS!  This is an epic level of anger, I don't know what to do!  Lola must be livid.  I should call.  But will that be too aggressive?  I don't want to make her even more mad!  Alright, I guess we're not friends any more.  Oh gosh, does this mean I'm not going to be in her wedding?  Crap, I'm going to have to try to return that bridesmaid dress...

Lola: (Third day, texts Sam back) "Hey, I was camping, let me know when you wanna catch up."

Sam:  WHAT IS HAPPENING?!!?

Ok, for real, this is a lil' over-dramatic, but honestly, it's not too far off base for some folks. What I am trying to say is that the convenience of talking to people quickly is great.  In fact, it's pretty awesome for some things, but you can have too much of a good thing.

So, after all of this back and forth, I sat down and wrote my own little communication manifesto.  How I want to live my life, even if I haven't been so great at this stuff in the past :)  Here goes...

I refuse to give in to a culture of instant gratification communication.  I refuse to let those expectations sour my relationships.  And, most importantly, I refuse to let my life be consumed with constant communication.  

Instead, though my communication may be less often, I will strive to make it more meaningful.  I will strive to be present in the moment and not constantly worrying about who I have and have not responded to.  I will strive to help those that I love understand, that just because I don't immediately get back to them, that I still care deeply about them.  I will strive to be understanding of other's time lines when getting back to them, because that's what you do for those that you care about.  I will strive to not give in to the culture of go, go, go, and instead, make space in my life for peace and quite, and for a still-small-voice.

So.  There you have it.  I won't apologize for not being an instantaneous responder.  I will work to cultivate important and meaningful communication, and not just filling the voids with noise.  I will fight for those that I care about, and also, encourage them to remember that while communication is necessary to sustain a relationship, it's about quality NOT quantity.

If you've skipped to the end of this novel, don't worry, I understand :)  And if you leave this page remembering only one thing, let it be this:  Don't let the expectations pushed on us by our crazy culture define how you live your life or how you sustain your relationships through communication.

And, on that note, peace out yo.