According to physicians, therapists, pollsters and others, we are sadder than in the past. We smile less and feel gloomier, leaving many without much hope or enthusiasm for the future.
In fact, about one in four, or some two billion people, report they don’t have the old zip and bounce in their step. One study says only 20 percent of us didn’t even bother to make New Year’s Resolutions this month. This type of sadness is often expressed as apathy.
Being cheerful has gone out of fashion and treated as a suspicious behavior. Smiling with intent may get one arrested or canceled because it is too elitist, privileged and must have something to do with the exploitation of someone on the margins of society.
Apathy and sadness are usually based on mourning and frustration. The older we get, the easier it can be to get that way.
The pandemic and Great Shutdown of five years ago was hard on us and that pain lingers. Remember those white circles on the floor at checkout lines that instructed us to keep six feet away from others? No more seeing an old friend and shaking hands or air-kissing. No sliding up to someone to tell a joke or the latest news.
As for masks the only fun about them was walking into a bank without setting off alarms. Even that got old after a while.
Gone were dinner parties, having friends over for conversation and refreshments, board games and cards. Gone were lunches, shopping trips and day trips. Someday they would return and it would be life as normal.
Meanwhile, we Zoomed, video chatted, did business and held remote meetings from home. Meanwhile, we lost opportunities to advance in our careers or travel to places we wanted to see.
As the months dragged on, we kept promising ourselves that just soon as health officials sounded the all-clear, things would return to normal. Once that happened, we would pick up where we left off and party like it was 2018.
It hasn’t worked out that way. One example came from a priest who lamented that his parish’s men’s group probably will die out in another year.
“I think women find it easier to make connections,” he said. “Men need the connection there for them. It is terrible that something this important is dying as we helplessly watch.”
I recently heard a podcast from a bishop who told how, back when he was ordained, there were nearly 200 parishes in his diocese. A decade ago there were 100. He predicts by the end of this decade there will be no more than 70. Compounding the problem is an acute shortage of priests.
Many community and fraternal groups and service organizations see declines as well. Older members die off and new ones don’t take their place.
We mourn for how much we lost during the pandemic, know there is little chance we can make up for lost time and it leaves us saddened.
A friend and fellow writer from Minnesota turned 80 this past year. He did not find this milestone demoralizing. turn that milestone age and find it demoralizing.
“That’s the sell-by and expiration date according to the Good Book,” he wrote, “and I’m not ready for that to happen. There is still more I want to do, if only I could get my body to go along with the plan.”
That’s the ticket to break free of this malaise, and surprisingly it is based on Isaac Newton’s First Law of Motion: A body in motion tends to stay in motion; a body at rest tends to stay in rest. As President Theodore Roosevelt said, “Take Action!”
Every small accomplishment or success gives us a sense of optimism and hope. Many people use a checklist of tasks to be completed. Check a few off and we feel better about themselves.
Taking action helps, but we also need other people and a sense of community. Scrooge was described as being as solitary as an oyster, and his personality was cold, lonely and miserable. The money he made was doing no good for anyone, not even himself. It was only when he learned to reconnect with the wider community he found joy
My wife Pat and I recently saw a harried mother at the grocery store trying to herd four young children. They kids smiled at and said “Hi” to us as if we were long-lost friends. They wanted a sense of belonging in an adult world.
Or walk into a retirement home, where residents sitting in the front lobby look at you, smile and hold out their hands. They want and need human contact, as we all do.
A friend who’d retired from Al Capone’s long-ago Chicago Outfit told me, “We never had meetings. We had sit-downs, and there were rules and a lot of respect.
“Respect is a big thing,” he went on. “Respect for the (street) captain and the boss, but you spoke your peace. Face to face we hashed things out because we were a family. Respect came first.”
That method is in contrast with many college students who find it hard to meet face-to-face with people. Most were in high school during the pandemic, missing out on learning to function in society. They are wary of others and saying something that might not be popular. To have to carry on a conversation, much less speak in front of classmates, is a terrifying experience for them.
Unfortunately, that leads to more isolation, depression and loneliness. If you want to turn your life around, get up, take action and connect with more people. Go stir things up, but don’t forget the element of respect.
