Short Story: When the (Human) connection is lost – HELP!

- "Dear judges, My name is Human, and today I plead guilty... When the internet connection was weak, unstable, or even out of reach the other day, I was, to say the least, bothered, trying to find any possible way to reconnect it. I went above and beyond to find someone who could share it with me.

My Evidence #1 - on Sunday 8th of December 2019: Facebook sent me a notification to celebrate the birthday of my date, called Potential Love. We have had marvelous sparks since the day we met and I must confess, he might be the life partner I have always dreamt of. I instantly wanted to send a quick birthday message but the wifi was somehow going very slow this day... I was anxious to miss this opportunity to show him my appreciation... luckily with most of the phones nowadays we can immediately keep in touch, and know what the person is up to without even meeting or interacting with them in real life. In the end, I was not among the first ones to post my best wishes but at least I did it...

Evidence #2 - Wednesday 23rd of May 2018: That was the day when I was supposed to meet my sister, called Best Friends. But we have been very busy lately with our lives, between work, the kids, and trying to keep everything else together. She just texted me through WhatsApp to ask if we could postpone our gathering. I, of course, understood so suggested having a quick Facetime instead. Again the connection was playing against me, I felt irritated, constantly seeing the images on and off... We couldn't hear and barely speak properly... so we ended up catching up by text with brief news about each other.

Let's go even further back in time. 

Evidence #3: Saturday 19th of November 2016: I was on holiday in this paradisiac island. The sun was shining, not a cloud nor a noisy kid screaming around. I captured this peaceful moment and wanted to share it with my parents, called Mom and Dad. I thought it would have been lovely to show them this unique moment. No need to warn you how upset I was to not have any network around me. Next thing you know, I found a wireless connection in the restaurant bar owned by 2 locals where I could finally send the perfect video to my parents (who btw didn't know how to play the clip on their phones). I also stayed there longer to share and interact on my social media (where I received much more feedback than my parents).

In my defense, you need to understand that when the connection was awfully poor, it felt like my life had stopped. I was unable to communicate, connect, and share some moments with the important people in my life... What would you have done differently?"

- "Dear Human, thank you for your honesty. We can feel your heart is pure. We can hear you are caring about the ones you are sharing your life with and that you are craving for more connection. We are not blaming you for using the new devices and social media the modern society is offering. We are just conscious when hearing these different stories that losing the internet connection looks somehow more dramatic than losing the real human connection. We have lost the importance of meeting face to face and enjoying the present moment without using the virtual world. The virtual connection is saving many long-distance relationships. But the risk comes from the idea that only using social media to maintain our closest relationship is enough. Unfortunately, or luckily not! So let's review and share our ideal vision for each situation:

1. If Potential Love was really worth it, we would have tried a different approach that would stand out from the crowd. Don't get me wrong, a simple message is nice to receive from an acquaintance. To some extent, it might show that you cared enough to write a little cheerful message. But in this case, we want to be more than a simple acquaintance, so we would have done something more meaningful and original that would happen in the real world (i.e. handing him a homemade birthday card or why not offering him a pair of silly Lego socks to remind him of the time when you two laughed so hard about the joke he made the other day). This would have made the difference in showing more affection to win his heart a bit more.
2.  Regarding Best Friends, it was, of course, unfortunate and understandable when you knew she was overwhelmed in her life. We do appreciate you still tried to stay in touch with her but sounded like after getting some short news, no deeper connection really happened until the next time you meet. Again it would have been fine if she was a simple acquaintance but showing something a little extra (i.e. offering help to ease the workload or sending her favorite incense to remind her to take a bit of time for herself) would have shown much more care to her.
3.  Finally, for Mom and Dad, unless you have decided to bring them on this holiday with you to spend more quality time together, there was nothing more you could do to share this piece of paradise since the internet was obviously not covering the whole island. The best could have been sending a beautiful postcard or arranging a brunch when you are back in town to share your extraordinary experience with them. Unfortunately, it also seemed like you spent a little too much extra time on social media replying to the feedback you received on the idyllic video you shared rather than enjoying fully this unique experience right when you were there. You could have deepened this unique experience by exchanging with the locals who have so much history and personal insights to share.

Human, we know that you are consistently looking for ways to maintain high standards for anything important to you so to make it up, we ask you to read and follow the Golden Heart blog, section Strong Relationship to help you re-connect with your loved ones and remain inspired with useful tips to keep any type of relationship healthy."