Welcome to our newest guest blogger, Jackie Manley!
espresso957@aol.com
espresso957@aol.com
"No man is an
island." Or, in these days, no man is a self-contained electronic unit.
Many of us who have been harmed by other people in whatever way
struggle to maintain a connection with others. It is not easy to reach
out after we have been abused or have had our feelings dismissed. Often
it is easier to just shut the door, crawl back into bed and pull up the
covers; it feels good, at least temporarily, and helps us to avoid the
real problems of emotional intimacy. But, as the Bible says, man is not
meant to live or die to himself; God made flesh and blood people with a
desire to be emotionally close to other humans and to Himself. We are
not walking Ipods, self satisfied with our own internal applications;
eventually, we get tired of our own company and are compelled by our
God-given instincts to seek out another person with whom we can share
our hopes, goals, disappointments and hurts. Sometimes the best we can
do is what I call "detached contact': perhaps an email to a friend, a
Facebook post, or instant messaging. I have often found it easier to
email people in a support group or to Facebook than to actually call or
visit someone in person. Electronic media is limited in that, unless you
Skype, you can't see the other person, but it can feel safer and enable
us to take that first step in connecting with a larger community. It
gives us a feeling of control; if we don't like the reply to our
message, we can delete it. We can, if we wish, "unfriend" someone on
Facebook. But "detached contact" has its limits; it can become a crutch
or an excuse to avoid people. Dean Martin once sang "Everybody loves
somebody sometime." We will be touched by others sometime and even if it
hurts, it hurts worse in the long run to isolate oneself. "Detached
contact" should not mean absence of contact.
. Shortly after its release, the book became an Amazon #1 bestseller in April, 2009. 
