We'll pay almost anything to experience true togetherness, but the good news is that you don't have to break the bank to experience it, as long as you know where to find it or how to create it.
I'm wondering if how we seek togetherness has changed after COVID. People want more depth of experience and won't just show up for the same old thing. For example, I have more people coming to smaller groups in my church, but fewer are coming on Sunday morning. We now have a large online attendance, which makes the togetherness in the church feel less vibrant. As I shift to a more informal and personal style, more people have been coming, but it runs into pushback from others who like the rituals of the past. I find I have to be much more intentional to create moments of togetherness that previously would have just happened. It takes more art to create the opportunities. Some of this is good, and some of it is exhausting.
Hi Kelly, I agree with you. People are full of emptiness, an emptiness that they think is outside them, but which is actually inside them. That's why social networks are so successful.
My way of looking for togetherness is to look for what's inside me, so that I can be open and available to others. It's about starting from the inside, not the outside, because when you look outside, you're wrongly looking for fantasies
I think diminishing innocence and desensitization from our innocence is part of the ongoing battle we fight.
As fun as TV is/was to bring us together, it has introduced a lot of ideas about why we have to separate ourselves. As bonding as it feels to connect with people at concerts and sports events, they also lead us to take on a priority of "other thinking" which often leads us to lose momentum in thinking how to connect with people who are not in "our" group that share "our" interests.
I believe your thought provocation about the beauty of humanity and the power of togetherness is accurate. I believe it is marvelous and wonderful. I've witnessed it for myself. But, it is fleeting. It is more like a sugar rush than a nourishing meal in its genuine effect. There is a difference in how I enjoy this little group versus how I enjoy a scintillating event full of sensory distractions. I walk away from time spent here and seek out my family and friends and look to share more of myself. I look up after reading one of your books and have a deeper appreciation for myself and my true feelings and I open up to my wife and my children. I think the sense of community that is truly rare and more valuable is one that puts us on to where we are, who we are, and how we are strongest together with those in our immediate circle of influence rather than connecting to strangers we may never see again. I'm not trying to dissuade anyone from having fun or having a moment of joy from some form of entertainment, but I feel like there are deeper connections being missed when the lives we live revolve around meeting the costs of togetherness that you have mentioned. I think the effort and the return on value for such expenses are actually taking away from better efforts and higher values that are best expended in proximity to where we stand.
At this stage in my journey I am focusing on prioritizing being together with myself. Others cannot afford to be with me, if I am not with me. Other affordable moments of togetherness: a walk with my spouse. Each Thursday we take one of the grandkids to dinner. Intentional time, one at a time, is gold for us. Sometimes a text... an email... a phone call to connect, to say I miss you, or ask, "Are you okay?" can be rich soil for togetherness.
My name is the front door to the complexity of who I was, who I am, and who I hope to be. When family and friends welcome me as I am, and when I walk through the door and step into the complexity of others... that's togetherness... and it definitely doesn't have to coast thousands of dollars. There is a price. And I sometimes I don't want to pay. Grace, humility, vulnerability is currency that, sometimes, I find hard to part with. Well... maybe more than sometimes. But, it's always is worth every penny.
Kelly, this is such a fabulous description of how I felt the first time I went to a Doctor Who convention, and why I keep going even though it can be crazy expensive. It’s the only place where I can really be ME about this goofy thing I love (and which my family has never understood and therefore done its best to make me feel stupid or weird about) with other people who love it as much as I do.
That first time was like suddenly being at home for the first time. Everyone in the hotel was my friend even though we didn’t know each other, because we all had the same thing in common. We all speak the same language. And now I have a few good friends thanks to these events, which makes them even better. (And makes the rest of the year in between more fun, too.)
I think the real trick/question is how to recreate these moments on a smaller scale, closer to home—and more often. My family is scattered across the state (and for half the year, across the country), so I don’t get to see them very often. My friends have scattered over the last few years, too. It’s more challenging now, for sure.
This is why I like to both take and teach classes at my local art center. Yes it’s about learning something new but I could do that at home on YouTube. It’s learning together and forming bonds and friendships.
This is so heartbreakingly true. I hadn’t really thought about all the asynchronous entertainment we consume (and that “Lost” finale party we hosted!).
Two “togetherness” things I love are
1) the small group from our church that my husband and I gather with almost weekly on Sunday evenings, and
2) watching Gilmore Girls with my two young adult daughters. We started GG when they were home during the pandemic and still have about 4 episodes left in the final (7th) season, but we live apart now so it’s a challenge to watch together. We recently streamed at the same time and texted our comments to each other. While I prefer being in the same room, it was the next best thing to being there.
I recently read something that mentioned this is why Halloween is such a huge holiday. It’s one of the few things people still do embodied and together.
It is so true that asynchronous entertainment and information gathering, as well as personal electronic devices, have effectively torn the fabric of our togetherness. There was a time, in my hometown, where everyone was watching the same TV show. During the commercial breaks, one could literally hear all the toilets in a big housing project flush at the same time! Now that's some form of togetherness! LOL!
It is sad that togetherness is now being used as a commodity, and its rarity has made its price inelastic, demanding premium pricing. To me, the ticket prices to certain events, such as those examples you included, are simply obsene. It's like price gouging, and people willingly pay for the experience because they belong to a certain social economic class who can afford it. So, togetherness has become a privilege of the rich. That is just so wrong on so many levels!
Luckily, there are cheaper and free ways to create the togetherness experience. Competition abounds, coming primarily from the addiction to personal electronic devices,. It would take a lot of effort to break the inertia that accampanies the many activities that are done alone nowadays (including scrolling, scrolling and more scrolling).
This made my eyes well up. Especially the part where you pointed out the goodness of the one upgraded subscription-providing you the opportunity to be in community better or differently. I also got more excited about seeing Zach Bryan this summer in KC 😂
You're good at riling up a positive crowd, Kelly : )
My dad had the good fortune of working in marketing for the nfl, which got us to a couple of stadiums including one super bowl in Orlando where the Giants barely beat the Bills. Every time I walk into a stadium that is full, it is a spiritual experience for me. Absolutely about some shared connection with other human beings that I do not even know.
Otherwise, these days it looks like...
Sitting around a fire in my backyard with my guy friends passing questions that matter, one at a time sharing our answers.
Dinner at Grandma's every Sunday eating authentic pho from her Vietnamese lineage.
I loved reading this. Togetherness is what I crave as well. For me, it explodes the joy of the experience of who we are in to a beyond wonderful words moment. And it lessens the weight of sorrow.
After the death of each of my parents, my siblings and I could sit in the deafening silence together and feel seen.
I'm wondering if how we seek togetherness has changed after COVID. People want more depth of experience and won't just show up for the same old thing. For example, I have more people coming to smaller groups in my church, but fewer are coming on Sunday morning. We now have a large online attendance, which makes the togetherness in the church feel less vibrant. As I shift to a more informal and personal style, more people have been coming, but it runs into pushback from others who like the rituals of the past. I find I have to be much more intentional to create moments of togetherness that previously would have just happened. It takes more art to create the opportunities. Some of this is good, and some of it is exhausting.
Hi Kelly, I agree with you. People are full of emptiness, an emptiness that they think is outside them, but which is actually inside them. That's why social networks are so successful.
My way of looking for togetherness is to look for what's inside me, so that I can be open and available to others. It's about starting from the inside, not the outside, because when you look outside, you're wrongly looking for fantasies
I think diminishing innocence and desensitization from our innocence is part of the ongoing battle we fight.
As fun as TV is/was to bring us together, it has introduced a lot of ideas about why we have to separate ourselves. As bonding as it feels to connect with people at concerts and sports events, they also lead us to take on a priority of "other thinking" which often leads us to lose momentum in thinking how to connect with people who are not in "our" group that share "our" interests.
I believe your thought provocation about the beauty of humanity and the power of togetherness is accurate. I believe it is marvelous and wonderful. I've witnessed it for myself. But, it is fleeting. It is more like a sugar rush than a nourishing meal in its genuine effect. There is a difference in how I enjoy this little group versus how I enjoy a scintillating event full of sensory distractions. I walk away from time spent here and seek out my family and friends and look to share more of myself. I look up after reading one of your books and have a deeper appreciation for myself and my true feelings and I open up to my wife and my children. I think the sense of community that is truly rare and more valuable is one that puts us on to where we are, who we are, and how we are strongest together with those in our immediate circle of influence rather than connecting to strangers we may never see again. I'm not trying to dissuade anyone from having fun or having a moment of joy from some form of entertainment, but I feel like there are deeper connections being missed when the lives we live revolve around meeting the costs of togetherness that you have mentioned. I think the effort and the return on value for such expenses are actually taking away from better efforts and higher values that are best expended in proximity to where we stand.
Sometimes you want to go
Where everybody knows your name
And they're always glad you came
You wanna be where you can see
Our troubles are all the same
You wanna be where everybody knows your name
At this stage in my journey I am focusing on prioritizing being together with myself. Others cannot afford to be with me, if I am not with me. Other affordable moments of togetherness: a walk with my spouse. Each Thursday we take one of the grandkids to dinner. Intentional time, one at a time, is gold for us. Sometimes a text... an email... a phone call to connect, to say I miss you, or ask, "Are you okay?" can be rich soil for togetherness.
My name is the front door to the complexity of who I was, who I am, and who I hope to be. When family and friends welcome me as I am, and when I walk through the door and step into the complexity of others... that's togetherness... and it definitely doesn't have to coast thousands of dollars. There is a price. And I sometimes I don't want to pay. Grace, humility, vulnerability is currency that, sometimes, I find hard to part with. Well... maybe more than sometimes. But, it's always is worth every penny.
Kelly, this is such a fabulous description of how I felt the first time I went to a Doctor Who convention, and why I keep going even though it can be crazy expensive. It’s the only place where I can really be ME about this goofy thing I love (and which my family has never understood and therefore done its best to make me feel stupid or weird about) with other people who love it as much as I do.
That first time was like suddenly being at home for the first time. Everyone in the hotel was my friend even though we didn’t know each other, because we all had the same thing in common. We all speak the same language. And now I have a few good friends thanks to these events, which makes them even better. (And makes the rest of the year in between more fun, too.)
I think the real trick/question is how to recreate these moments on a smaller scale, closer to home—and more often. My family is scattered across the state (and for half the year, across the country), so I don’t get to see them very often. My friends have scattered over the last few years, too. It’s more challenging now, for sure.
This is why I like to both take and teach classes at my local art center. Yes it’s about learning something new but I could do that at home on YouTube. It’s learning together and forming bonds and friendships.
This is so heartbreakingly true. I hadn’t really thought about all the asynchronous entertainment we consume (and that “Lost” finale party we hosted!).
Two “togetherness” things I love are
1) the small group from our church that my husband and I gather with almost weekly on Sunday evenings, and
2) watching Gilmore Girls with my two young adult daughters. We started GG when they were home during the pandemic and still have about 4 episodes left in the final (7th) season, but we live apart now so it’s a challenge to watch together. We recently streamed at the same time and texted our comments to each other. While I prefer being in the same room, it was the next best thing to being there.
I recently read something that mentioned this is why Halloween is such a huge holiday. It’s one of the few things people still do embodied and together.
It is so true that asynchronous entertainment and information gathering, as well as personal electronic devices, have effectively torn the fabric of our togetherness. There was a time, in my hometown, where everyone was watching the same TV show. During the commercial breaks, one could literally hear all the toilets in a big housing project flush at the same time! Now that's some form of togetherness! LOL!
It is sad that togetherness is now being used as a commodity, and its rarity has made its price inelastic, demanding premium pricing. To me, the ticket prices to certain events, such as those examples you included, are simply obsene. It's like price gouging, and people willingly pay for the experience because they belong to a certain social economic class who can afford it. So, togetherness has become a privilege of the rich. That is just so wrong on so many levels!
Luckily, there are cheaper and free ways to create the togetherness experience. Competition abounds, coming primarily from the addiction to personal electronic devices,. It would take a lot of effort to break the inertia that accampanies the many activities that are done alone nowadays (including scrolling, scrolling and more scrolling).
This made my eyes well up. Especially the part where you pointed out the goodness of the one upgraded subscription-providing you the opportunity to be in community better or differently. I also got more excited about seeing Zach Bryan this summer in KC 😂
You're good at riling up a positive crowd, Kelly : )
My dad had the good fortune of working in marketing for the nfl, which got us to a couple of stadiums including one super bowl in Orlando where the Giants barely beat the Bills. Every time I walk into a stadium that is full, it is a spiritual experience for me. Absolutely about some shared connection with other human beings that I do not even know.
Otherwise, these days it looks like...
Sitting around a fire in my backyard with my guy friends passing questions that matter, one at a time sharing our answers.
Dinner at Grandma's every Sunday eating authentic pho from her Vietnamese lineage.
I loved reading this. Togetherness is what I crave as well. For me, it explodes the joy of the experience of who we are in to a beyond wonderful words moment. And it lessens the weight of sorrow.
After the death of each of my parents, my siblings and I could sit in the deafening silence together and feel seen.
Walking and talking is my favorite form of togetherness! Women do this extremely well. Our wpm and mph always are in sync!
Love that togetherness created in spirit by a new subscriber and you buying your girls dinner 😇
Dear Kelly,
Thank you for putting into words what the past 3 years have felt like.
With deep gratitude,
Love this! Togetherness is something we all need on so many concentric circles
Sounds about right! When I pass other women talking - and they’re ALWAYS talking- it’s almost always about relationships.