What's Important

Interesting how the likes and comments on Facebook posts have been a kind of thermometer taking the temperature of what people care about and respond to and think is important. If we post something announcing a new book or upcoming concert or award we’ve received, most people are sincerely happy for our small success. But that can be mixed with a touch of envy or a sense of the person tooting their own horn beyond what we’d like to hear. If we post some political piece, even if it’s filled with good insight and might help folks consider another point of view, still it’s in that murky subject area we’re told to avoid at family gatherings. In my experience, both kind of posts above reap a modest number of likes and comments. 

 

But if we post something that reveals our vulnerability or our love for others or our honest confession of what’s either hard for us or delightful, people really respond. Like my recent wedding anniversary post. Not only 378 “likes” in one day, but an off-the-charts percentage of those people commenting—160! So sweet to see all those names and remember how our paths crossed and read their comments, especially from the kids Karen and I both taught at The San Francisco School. (And interestingly, mostly kids we taught back in the 70’s and 80’s! Did our teaching decline after that? :-). )

 

The point? We can’t avoid what passes for politics or religion or issues of social justice. They need to be part of our national discourse and why not use every medium available to put ideas out for consideration? And yes, Facebook is one of many ways to announce concerts, publications, art shows, book readings and so on and also a good medium to post little clips of live music or dance or theater. All of that is fine as far as it goes.

 

But not far enough. For what we really crave is the sense that we’re all in this together. That we delight in being reminded of the bed of roses we all have lain in and equally need to hear that others also are tangled up in the thorns that come with a human incarnation. In short, we are not alone. That’s the place where all the divisions that can come from the list above ( and yes, even art, as folks can be as passionate about what music is good and what is bad, which artist is the cat’s pajamas and which is a feral alleycat rooting around in garbage cans), that’s the place where divisions can be healed.

 

A good honest confession of our vulnerability, for those who need the courage to face their own and to feel that others are with them—well, that above all is what those Facebook numbers show is important. 

 

And it is.