Friends-A MUST read!!!

Excerpt from Grace@work

Still there is one factor that helps us feel more at home as we journey through this life --- friends. As Tom Rath and Donald O. Clifton remind us:

"Great relationships lead to a significant increase in life satisfaction. Noted psychologist Ed Diener found that 'the happiest people have high-quality social relationships.' On the other hand Deiner and other researchers found that lonely people suffer psychologically."
(How Full is Your Bucket? New York: Gallup Press, 2004, p. 96)

The destructive nature of loneliness was appallingly highlighted by the recent killings in Virginia Tech. Why did Cho Seung-Hui shoot 32 people before turning his gun on himself? Sharon Begley suggests various factors that led to Cho's madness including the reminder that "Rates of criminal violence are higher in mobile and heterogeneous societies where it is hard to put down roots and establish the social glue that binds people into a community." (The Anatomy of Violence, Newsweek April 30, 2007, p. 30)

In the same article Begley refers to "the competitive, individualistic aspects of American culture." (p.30) She could have been talking about Singapore or Kuala Lumpur or any major urban centre in the world. With globalisation so many of us are moving out of our communities to live and work in other parts of the globe. How many of us are therefore bereft of the life giving nurture of friends? And even if we stay put how much time does the modern "competitive, individualistic" workplace allow for us to build and sustain friendships?

Way back in 1981 Henri Nouwen already observed:

"Boredom, resentment, and depression are all sentiments of disconnectedness. They present life to us as a broken connection. They give us a sense of not-belonging. In interpersonal relationships, this disconnectedness is experienced as loneliness. When we are lonely we perceive ourselves as isolated individuals surrounded, perhaps, by many people, but not really part of any supporting or nurturing community. Loneliness is without doubt one of the most widespread diseases of our time."
(Making All Things New, New York: HarperCollins, 1981, p.32)

If loneliness was widespread in 1981 it is pandemic today. My "lostness" also serves as a reminder of its violence.

How will I move beyond my present sense of "lostness?" I have to work at rebuilding my network of friends. I have a number of good friends in Singapore. And some new relationships are promising.

Still, there is no instant connectedness. I have to take the first steps to connect and to reconnect. I will. I am. I have to. Like the disciples on the Emmaus road discovered, sometimes, when you walk with a friend, Jesus comes along side and walks with you (Luke 24: 13-15).
And that's home.


Your brother,
Soo-Inn Tan
E Mail: sooinn@graceatwork.org