In praise of fragility and loneliness

For years, social media have been praised for their ability to create connections between people who are far apart. Over time, however, it has become clear that they are neither good nor evil in themselves, but that they have the ability to engage different dimensions of the human being, both positively and negatively. It all depends on how the user interacts with them and on their level of attention and awareness.

The debate that has arisen from this new awareness reflects the complexity of the situation: in fact, different areas of human life and different actors, both public and private, are involved. It is difficult to account for this complexity and its implications in the next few lines, but certainly the user is the person who should most question how they engage with this debate—that is, with what capacity for (self-)criticism they analyze their interaction with social media.

The question is not what we can do through social networks—and what, without them, we could not have done (for example, finding and contacting distant people, exchanging information, expanding our network of contacts, etc.)—but what we have delegated to them that we could instead continue to do without them. Whenever I see families and groups sitting in a restaurant while members of the group continue to use social media instead of interacting with those present, I wonder what space, what gap, social media is filling. I wonder whether checking social media has become just a trivial habit, like playing with your hair or stroking your beard, or whether this habit says something about us. Loneliness, emptiness, and boredom are cracks that we instinctively want to avoid but that, when we agree to remain in them, can give something of ourselves back to us: our fragility, our needs.

The distracting element, the search for novelty, and the fleeting enthusiasm that characterize the gesture of scrolling through social media suggest that a part of us does not want to inhabit that fragility and prefers not to know. I am referring to that “self-knowledge” that can give us back a part of ourselves. So “following someone on social media” means chasing someone else’s life, which seems able to hide that void without ever filling it. In the same way, getting others to follow us, gaining views and followers, pushes us to show anyone those parts of ourselves that, in our opinion, create a better image of us—certainly incomplete, if not outright fake. All this effort, this game of illusions and mirrors, just so that we can feel that we are “there.” But “there” for whom? And where?…

Through social media, the world expands and we can add connections, but this often distracts us from relationships. Being able to be anywhere prevents us from being here and now. The risk is that we allow ourselves to be captivated by the allure of potential.  Social media suggests infinite possibilities, while our corporeality and our need for meaningful relationships as part of our identity point toward depth rather than extension.

On closer examination, the way we use social media invites us to reflect on how we inhabit our time—not in the sense of an era, but as the time we experience and live each day: our own time, and how we fill it—or fail to fill it—with meaning.

If the desire to go “beyond oneself,” overcoming one’s spatial and temporal limits, can call to mind the crossing of the Pillars of Hercules, not every act of overcoming is actually an improvement or an achievement of one’s nature.  In some cases, to “go further” is to expand, almost to dissolve, to disperse oneself, to escape We must then reflect on the criterion by which we pursue this overcoming and on the end we intend to achieve.
It is therefore not only a matter of “what,” but also of “how” and “why.”

King Solomon’s dream comes to mind, in which God asked him what he wanted, promising to give it to him. The young ruler, who succeeded his father David, is now at the head of a numerous people and replies, “Please. Give me the wisdom necessary to administer justice among the people and to distinguish good from evil. Without your help, who is able to lead your people, who are so great?”

Solomon’s request pleased the Lord. Then God said to him:

— You didn’t ask me to live long, get rich, or let your enemies die. Instead, you asked me to know how to administer justice. I will do as you have said; indeed, I will give you so much wisdom and intelligence that no one has ever had or ever can have (First Kings, 3, 9-13).

King Solomon has gone down in history as a wise king, that is, as someone able to discern good from evil and to use the appropriate means to achieve his ends, aware of his human finitude and of the importance of observing the Law, given by God to the people to teach them how to remain alive (Exodus 19:1-8), rather than out of blind obedience.

Solomon’s request begins with the awareness of his own fragility, his own limitations, but also with the loneliness of holding power as king of the people. Fragility and loneliness do not, however, lead him to flee, nor do they make him arrogant; instead, they lead him to remain in this condition and seek the best help. Welcoming one’s fragility is the first step toward placing one’s trust in another. The king discovers himself to be a man.  The fracture becomes an opening; the lack becomes a request. His request is already an expression of the wisdom that God will multiply in his heart: Solomon asks for nothing for himself, but rather for what he needs to fulfill his responsibility toward the people. His perspective already makes a difference. It is this perspective that makes him better, which does not mean perfect; indeed, he himself asks for the wisdom to discern.

Experiencing loneliness and recognizing our need and fragility can be a starting point for reflecting on the meaning of our sociability and the ways in which we seek to satisfy it; on how we “fill” our time; and on what drives our constant search for “more”—a “more” that does not necessarily make us better or contribute to the integral development of the person. The need to be visible sometimes risks becoming a request for confirmation that we exist, as we content ourselves with a fleeting glance like the one we absentmindedly give others through social media.