Virtual Communication

She sees herself as being in constant contact with the world, and in a way, she is right! Whether it be Facebook or texting or e-mail or even the rare telephone call, there is an increasing amount of communication between individuals. Today we can look at the role Twitter played in major political events, or pictures not otherwise available which were sent be cell-phone, and realize that the forms of communication are in flux from moment to moment. It is moving so fast, it is akin to the report of an observer of the world's fastest train: "Here it comes here it is there it goes!"
So what is the issue? People through the new social media are less inhibited, less restricted, more apt to talk about incredibly intimate and formerly private things and therefore the person we are dealing with seems more open, more real, more trustworthy than those we deal with in real life. If anything, because we have the protective shield of the internet or the phone, we tend to be more direct, even ruthless in what we say or the way we say it.
But the result is that we tend to fall into a untrusting stance. We will not go into the separate issue of knowing whether the person we are communicating with is really who he or she claims to be, It is simply that we no longer deal with each other face to face, in person. It is safer to tell someone off on-line than to look them in the eye.
This is why people fall into the traps on line. With internet porn, a man is assured that a woman will never say no. College courses on-line almost guarantee a passing grade. And let us not mention the various gimmicks, products, services that are for sale for such a reasonable price on line (until the next bank statement comes in.) It catches us by our human desire for the quick and easy answer.
It may seem hypocritical for the writer of a blog to criticize the internet, but the point is not the form of communication. It is the people who escape into a protected virtual world where all one has to do with those who upset us is to un-Friend them.

Saying You're Sorry

Apologizing has become a lost art. Too often it has been code for "Okay, so a mistake was made! Can we just drop the whole thing and move on?" Or it has been received as a pro-forma ritual prior to doing the exact same thing all over again. Regardless, there was no sincerity involved or intended; forgiveness was neither expected nor offered.
We are not talking here about the maudlin or melodramatic tears offered by some public figures who have been caught with their hands in some form of cookie jar; those who accept such displays at face value have their own reasons for accepting them without qualm or question. Religious leaders in particular have the script down pat, including the sense of martyrdom when they find they are expected to pay for their own failures. Nor are we talking about the apologias that are brought out by some spokesperson with all the concrete specificity and reality of the fortune in a fortune cookie.
Rather, we are talking about those moments when it is necessary to say "I'm sorry," and mean it. To say it with the hope that the other person says just as sincerely, "I forgive you." Neither of these essential statements should be said too quickly or readily. Apologizing means admitting there is something in fact to be sorry for, something that few seem ready to do. It is someone else's fault, not mine. I didn't really mean it. See my face filled with tears and take pity on me. We do not like to admit that we have in fact screwed up so thoroughly, nor to hand over authority to another for judgment on our behavior ('cause that's what we're doing here, ain't it?)
And it is not really up to us to expect pardon. Apologizing is something we do; forgiveness is something they do. When the other party is ready to let go of the hurt, accept the apology as real, and try to put Humpty-Dumpty back together again (although, of course, it will never be the same egg!), then forgiveness becomes a possibility. Sure, it might be in the other's best interests to forgive, but that is not up to us.
There are of course things which are very hard to forgive, even if we don't want to wave around the adjective "impossible." Some wounds are so deep, so severe, that healing takes the rest of a life. And some mistaken actions say so much about very nature of the person that forgiving one incident changes nothing. But this does no abrogate the need for a sincere apology, it merely makes pardon more a divine act.

Anger Mismanagement

What makes you angry? It could be that little, petty pet-peeve or the one hot button that will encourage you to ruin everyone else's day. But more important, what do you do when you get angry? Aye, there's the rub (as the Bard of Avon mighta said.) See, anger is neither right nor wrong in itself; it is a feeling, like love or fear or happiness. And feelings have no judgement value. We are born with feelings, a God-given gift that like all other of God's gifts, depends on what we do with it.
See, if someone steps on my toe, and I say (calmly, of course), "Ouch, you big lummox, yer on my toe!" and they then apologetically get off my toe, no problem. On the other hand, if some steps on my toe, and I say, well the same thing as above, but I also pull out a weapon and remove the offending person that way, then there is a problem! As I said, it is not the feeling of anger that is the issue. Rather, it is what we do about it.
As a society, we don't know what to do with anger. Maybe it is because we have confused anger with rage and its attendant violence. Maybe it is because of our institutionalization of anger; the only people who are supposed to get angry are those authorized to do so, whether police officers or soldiers or politicians (whoops! not them, you say? then why do they...?) Maybe it is because we can't tell the difference between assertion and anger and in a world where more and more people are feeling powerless, anger becomes their way of dealing with that.
We shouldn't confuse the bully with the angry person. Bullies are usually very frightened people who have discovered how to get their way by frightening others. The loud, the abusive, the threatening are seldom angry, but rather good at covering up their own insecurity.
Nor should we conflate the violent with the angry.We hear of those who have been violent as "angry," in part an explanation, in part an excuse. The violent are those who cannot see any other alternative to their problems; when the tool you got is a hammer, all problems become nails.
And most of all, we should not diminish the impact of society: In some contexts, it seem to be in to be angry, angry at, well, everything. There is a sense here of the young child who does not get something, and in the tantrum that ensues, refuses any attempts to make things right (even refusing the exact thing that was wanted to begin with!) These people are angry because others are angry. They march and wave nonsensical signs and demand the impossible because this is what they think everyone else wants.
What makes you angry? In a world where people become angry because some else is driving on the same highway (road rage) or because their political point of view is disagreed with, the first step to handling your anger is to look at what makes you angry, and what you do about it. Don't blame the feeling. Look at the angry person.

Unnatural Disaster

Catastrophe has a way of telling us something about ourselves, even things we may not want to know, or already knew but would have preferred never to acknowledge. Whether we are referring to the recent hurricane or the earthquake before that (earthquake? what earthquake?), or to some personal trauma of whatever magnitude, we can learn much about who we are by the way in which we deal (or don't) with what has happened, as well as the aftermath.
Yes, sometimes we deal with traumatic events by flat-out denial. There's a scene from the classic movie Jumbo, where Jimmy Durante is trying to sneak an elephant down the Main Street of a town. (Don't ask, just see the movie!) Suddenly a police officer appears and says sternly, "Where you going with that elephant?" Durante looks around innocently and then says, "What elephant?" Following revelations of misconduct by any authority figure, even those who would not otherwise defend such suddenly find reasons why (a)it didn't happen (b)it wasn't all that bad (c)we should all just let it go and move on.
Sometimes we deal with trauma  by trying to deal with our anger over what happened and our shame. Well, see, even though we aren't to blame for what happened, we still have this irrational guilt as though we either made it happen or didn't do what might have kept it from happening. Rape or incest survivors often deal with this issue of both anger at the abuser and shame that they were somehow at fault.
And sometimes we deal with awful events by getting very busy. Sure, there are a number of practical things we have to do in the wake of disaster, but we can sometimes look for more to do as a form of distraction, as a way of reclaiming some sort of self-worth, as a way of imposing order on a world which seems suddenly chaotic.
And of course there are those who cannot get past it easily or at all. Soldiers and other military personnel who have been through combat face issues most of us could never handle. My son-in-law, a 20-year Army veteran, has to sit with his back to the wall when he goes out to a restaurant, simply so he can see all around himself and feel less anxious. But Post Traumatic Stress Disorder isn't just limited to vets like him. Other who have risky professions may have to deal with it.
One of the commonest ways of dealing with such experiences is by sharing what we have been through with others who have been through the same, or similar. We talk with one another about how we did during the hurricane. We join groups of others who have traveled the same traumatic path. We seek out a professional to guide us in this suddenly-unfamiliar land. Here we can talk of our anger, our shame. Here we can let go and move on. Here we can learn what catastrophe has to teach us.