May 03

Hey Man, Where You Been?

I remember when I was a kid and the phone rang, I was excited to answer it. In the days before Caller ID, it was, for the most part, an exciting and, more often than not, welcome interruption in my home routine.

Of course there were stretches of time when I and a friend were in a spat or had permanently fallen out or I had broken up with someone who kept calling and calling and calling. Those calls were not happily anticipated or answered. But, for the most part, I answered the phone eagerly.

I used to get the mail with the same eagerness. Not that much came for me; I saw my friends every day so no postcards arrived from exotic locales around the world. Birthdays were about the only time I anticipated something exciting in the mail for me. But, getting the mail was still sort of exciting, like a miniature treasure hunt.

Today the phone rings, I screen the call and let the speaker talk to a wall in voicemail, unless it’s someone I want to speak with. Used to be, if someone wanted to speak with me and I picked up, we talked.

Yesterday I went to the main San Diego post office to pick up a stack of mail I had allowed to clog my box to the point the post office stopped delivering. I had not picked it up in about a week. It’s all bills, supermarket flyers and Realtor postcards anyway.

Today I get about 50 emails a day - some from clients, some from classmates, some for solutions to physical problems I don’t have and hopefully won’t, and some from friends wondering where the heck I have been.

One email came in from a former client who has become a friend. She did some amazing work over two years to transform her life and career to suit her needs while simultaneously honoring her most cherished relationships. She’s an amazing woman.

The problem, though, was I read her email and felt a pang of oppression, like, Oh, shoot, add that conversation to my list of things to do. How unfortunate.

I now spend more effort and emotional energy scheduling and rescheduling phone calls and email replies with friends than I do in the conversations and on the emails. Used to be we’d have the conversation or send the letter and keep in close touch easily, without feeling tired, stressed or put-upon.

In short, I have allowed the pace, tone and temperament of a commercial culture and work life penetrate and alter the pace, tone and temperament of my private relationships. Small excitements like the wonder of who is calling, or what might be in the mailbox today have morphed into hassles of one more call to answer or one more sales pitch to dodge.

I wonder if this sense of ugh and stress doesn’t permeate all my relationships, business and personal alike. I bet it does.

So this question just popped into my head: What is the point of being busy and achieving if it makes me more alone?

Seriously, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this question. It seems to me in our zeal for achievement we end up with relationships built on shorter and shorter interaction and less and less depth. Is that what we’re going for?

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