The Rules of Unhingement

The first rule of unhingement is that we're definitely gonna talk about it.

Hi friends!

The one thing I think we can all agree on right now is that as a “society” we have never been more insane. I would marvel at our ability to consistently uplevel the crazy if I wasn’t so deeply horrified by the state of the world and terrified because I didn’t realize the road enraged Prius drivers in my neighborhood could run even more stop signs while I’m simply trying to enjoy my five mile sanity walk.

It feels like just yesterday we were anthropomorphizing radical sea creatures and trying not to boil, globally. Now, here we are, collectively bearing witness to endless death and destruction, a global swell of hate, and the most intense and unrelenting political discourse to ever hit the internet. Our evolved little monkey brains were already teetering on the brink, sending prayers to us all.

Any student of history knows that human beings have never been known for en masse good behavior. None of these horrors are new and neither are the groupthink, propaganda, movements for vengeance or justice, and protests that surround them. What is new — and what defines our Age of Unhingement™️ — is that we now each hold a portal to broadcast, witness, and engage in conversation as it all unfolds.

Observing through a phone screen is a privilege since it means we are safely at a distance, but we are emotional beings hardwired to feel fear, it’s how our species has survived, and we are not made to absorb all this pain, to process all this grief, to transmute all these screen-shotted opinions into one cohesive truth. If something funny doesn’t happen on the internet soon, and we stay scrolling, they’re going to have to build an asylum big enough for everyone.

us on the way to the asylum, you’re driving

Social media gives anyone with a phone access to a platform and that has allowed the dark corners of our world to be illuminated in powerful ways — over the past decade or so we have reckoned with many hard truths and sides to stories that were never told. It’s also a potent weapon of misinformation and a tool for mobilizing hatred that has dire offline consequences. At its best, social media is a haven of connection and expansion, the birthplace of paradigm-shifting action, at its worst, a mind-altering substance that is threatening to destroy what remains of our ability to hear each other out, a broken collective consciousness owned by immoral billionaires trying to keep us addicted and outraged.

The rules of unhingement are simple — stay apart, stay afraid, and stay attached to the status quo. It’s not a coincidence that the separation of the pandemic years led to so much out of pocket behavior once we all set ourselves back out into the world. Whether we choose to acknowledge it or not, we are all grappling with loss, isolation, uncertainty, and the lack of time and space to process any of it before the next video call.

This is an era of relentless change and it’s hard to feel safe when you don’t know what is around the corner, how devastating tomorrow’s existential threat will actually be. It’s hard to gauge your own safety when you’ve been on high alert for generations, when your DNA knows how hateful rhetoric can turn into catastrophe, time and time again.

It’s hard to hold multiple thoughts at once, it’s much safer to see the world as us versus them, to relieve yourself from the burden of navigating your own way through an impossible situation. It’s hard to think a new, better way is possible if you spend your time reading the comments. But the only cure we have to this unhingement is each other, and the only real path forward is one where our hearts do not harden to anyone’s pain, including our own.

We are living in a different world and the rules have changed. I think the people in power right now grossly misunderstand how social media has reshaped the way anyone under 40 experiences both connection and reality. I think the expectation that everyone who has a profile needs to post an opinion is completely unhinged and so is thinking that a collection of curated posts is an absolute reflection of how someone thinks and feels.

There’s a lot more to unpack here but we will have to revisit as I’m now off to the spa in celebration of my birthday tomorrow as I continue my glorious ascent towards middle age.

Sending love to anyone who needs it and a reminder that you’re allowed to log off whenever you want — there is no moral high ground in ingesting information until you lose your mind entirely. I, for one, can’t wait to put on a bathrobe, turn off my phone, and just for a moment, feel the serenity seep back into my now.

Less Lessons More Blessin’s™️

Liz