No matter what you believe about life, current events, or the systems that have sustained us since we were born, one thing is obvious: things are changing. I’m sure you can feel it.
What I never expected, though, is that relationships would change so drastically too. We talk all the time about truth now. Real truth. My truth. Your truth. Subjective truth. Personal truth. Lived truth. For a culture so obsessed with the word truth, there seems to be very little actual truth left.
Over the past fifteen years or so, since social media planted itself in the middle of daily life like an uninvited ficus tree, I’ve noticed that we have become less social and more performative. We are very good at shouting about what is wrong. We are less practiced at quietly doing what is right.
Instead of sharing from the heart, we look around first to see what everyone else is doing. We read headlines and make assumptions. We mistake reactions for convictions. We mistake visibility for intimacy.
Instead of talking, we text. Instead of living, we curate. Instead of being honest with one another, we manage impressions, avoid discomfort, and sometimes, if we are being very honest, we gaslight each other with a smiley face at the end.
I am convinced there has been social engineering in the mix, but that is a topic for another letter and possibly a pot of coffee. For today, I want to talk about friendship.
The Strange New Loneliness
Real friendship used to happen more naturally, before every conversation had to pass through a glowing rectangle. I think modern technology gives people a false sense of closeness because we can technically reach anyone at any time.
That sounds wonderful. It also sounds like something a robot would say right before ruining civilization.
The problem is that because we can reach out anytime, we often don’t. We think, “I’ll text her later.” Then later comes, and we are distracted. Or someone texts us, and we think, “I’ll answer when I have more time.” Then we don’t.
Then we feel bad because too much time has passed. Then we think, “Well, now it’s awkward. I’ll catch her next time.” Then we don’t. The cycle continues.
No big fight. No dramatic ending. No slammed door. Just a slow fading, one unanswered text at a time.
As much as I enjoy a funny meme, and believe me, I do appreciate a well-timed meme, nothing compares to sitting face to face with a friend. Last week, I had three friend dates. Three. In one week.
By today’s standards, this is practically a social marathon. I should have received a medal, a banana, and one of those silver thermal blankets they give runners at the finish line.
The funny thing is, I didn’t leave those visits drained. I left feeling more like myself. That is what real friendship does. It returns you to your own body.
It reminds you that you are not just a profile picture, a text bubble, a calendar conflict, or a person trying to keep up with everyone else’s highlight reel. You are a living, breathing human being who needs laughter, eye contact, tone of voice, shared silence, and the comfort of being understood without performing.
Somewhere along the way, we forgot how important that is.
Why Texting Makes Us Weird
We also forgot how strange modern communication is for the nervous system. You text someone. They do not respond. Your brain starts scanning for danger.
Not because you are dramatic. Not because you are needy. Not because you need to “calm down,” which, by the way, has calmed down approximately zero women in the history of women.
It happens because humans are wired for connection and belonging. Silence creates uncertainty, and uncertainty often gets processed by the body as potential threat.
So the mind begins looping. Did I say something wrong? Are they mad? Did I overshare? Are they ignoring me? Should I text again? Was my last message too much? Was their last message weird? Do they hate me, or are they just at Costco?
This is the modern friendship spiral.
The brain hates unfinished social situations. It wants closure. It wants resolution. It wants the open tab closed.
There is even a psychological idea sometimes called the Zeigarnik effect, which suggests that unfinished or unresolved things tend to stay mentally active longer than completed ones. In plain English: your brain keeps the tab open.
An unanswered text is like a song that stops in the middle. A movie that cuts off before the ending. A door left slightly open. A sentence that never quite finishes.
Your nervous system keeps waiting for the pattern to complete. That is why it can feel so physical.
These loops are not just thoughts. The body gets involved too. The stomach tightens. The shoulders creep up. The heart rate shifts. Attention narrows. Your body starts behaving as though this matters for survival.
That sounds extreme until we remember that, for most of human history, belonging really did matter for survival. Being rejected from the group was not just emotionally unpleasant. It could be dangerous.
Your body does not know that the person may simply be tired, driving, overwhelmed, distracted, socially drained, or standing in the cereal aisle trying to remember why they came to the store.
Your body just knows there is no answer. So the mind fills silence with story. Usually a negative story.
That is what the nervous system does. It would rather detect danger where there is none than miss danger where there is some. Useful if you are avoiding a saber-toothed tiger. Less useful if Linda from book club forgot to text back.
The Problem With Digital Limbo
Modern texting makes this worse because it removes almost everything humans use to understand each other: tone of voice, facial expression, timing, context, warmth, and reassurance.
A delayed response could mean anything. They are busy. They are tired. They are overwhelmed. They forgot. They need space. They are emotionally fried. They saw your message while carrying laundry, feeding the dog, answering a work email, and pretending they know what is for dinner.
The brain, however, often chooses the most painful explanation first.
This is how we end up living in what I call floating social uncertainty. The conversation exists, but not really. It is not in the room. It is not on paper. It is not spoken aloud. It hangs in digital limbo, waiting for someone to complete it.
No wonder people feel more anxious, more lonely, and more unsure of where they stand.
We were not made to maintain our most important relationships through tiny bubbles on a screen. We were made for presence. For voices. For hands on coffee mugs. For walking together. For laughing until one of us makes an unattractive sound. For noticing when a friend’s eyes fill with tears before she says a word.
We were made for sitting across from someone and remembering, “Oh yes, this is what connection feels like.”
Real Life Settles the Mind
There is a reason real life settles the mind. A person deeply immersed in the physical world tends to loop less.
Gardening. Cooking. Walking outside. Cleaning the house. Writing a letter. Making art. Reading a real book. Setting a pretty table. Lighting a candle. Praying. Laughing with a friend. Touching fabric. Smelling flowers. Hearing birds.
These things bring us back into reality. They tell the nervous system, “You are here. You are safe. You can stop scanning now.”
That is one of the reasons beauty matters so much to me. Not glamour. Not perfection. Not performance. Beauty.
The kind you can touch, smell, hear, see, and feel.
A handwritten note. A meal served with care. A porch with flowers. A real conversation. A letter in the mailbox. A friend who says, “I thought of you today.”
These are not small things. They are repair work. They are how we come back from a culture that has trained us to be everywhere except where we actually are.
Closing the Loop
When you feel yourself looping over an unanswered message, try not to shame yourself. Your mind is trying to resolve something. Your body is trying to protect you.
Instead of circling the same drain, gently close the loop another way. Tell yourself, “I sent the message clearly. Their response time is not a measurement of my worth. Silence is information, but it is not automatically rejection. I do not need to solve this right now.”
Then do something physical. Go outside. Move your body. Make tea. Wash a dish. Pull weeds. Pet the dog. Call someone safe. Write the thing down. Put your feet back in the real world.
Logic can help, but often the body resolves these loops faster than thinking does.
Rumination feels productive because the brain thinks it is preventing pain. Most of the time, it is not problem-solving. It is vigilance. There is a big difference.
Problem-solving leads somewhere. Rumination circles.
This is why friendship, beauty, grounding, prayer, nature, music, ritual, creativity, and physical presence are not frivolous. They are medicine for a disembodied age.
They remind us that we are not meant to live as floating heads, scrolling, reacting, waiting, wondering, and interpreting silence through a screen.
We are meant to belong to real life. To each other. To the ordinary sacredness of showing up.
So maybe the next beautiful rebellion is not loud at all. Maybe it is calling instead of texting. Visiting instead of liking. Writing instead of reacting. Forgiving the awkward gap and reaching out anyway.
Putting a stamp on an envelope. Making the tea. Opening the door. Sitting across from someone you love and letting the conversation unfold without a notification interrupting it.
Because friendship was never meant to be curated.
It was meant to be practiced.
And like all beautiful things, it needs our attention before it disappears.