Last night, while the world was watching the news coverage of Osama bin Laden’s death, I got the luxury of getting away from the television and just visiting with two really close friends of mine. As we sat there, and I kept having moments of extreme happiness because it was just conversation among friends with a bottle wine, it occured to me that my most fulfilled moments in life are when I am in that zone with loved ones. Other examples of this would be when I am home for Christmas and the family is all around the table, after dinner, playing games or sitting up late at night while in college on the floor of the hallway, chatting about whatever came to mind with my roommates. Those moments, the ones where true human connection is happening, are the best moments of my life.
It seems hard today to picture people still able to actually forget about their phones and get caught up in the conversations that they’re having but it still does happen. People need that human connection and I fear for the younger generation known as the Millennial Generation. Friends of mine that work on campuses throughout the country have been telling me how college freshman now need to be taught how to hold conversations with each other. Specific classes are created to not only teach them how to study, research, and be a college student but also how to approach there professors, resolve issues with their roommates and how to get involved on campus by meeting people. I heard a story about two dorm mates that weren’t getting along and they wouldn’t address each other face to face. Instead, were facebooking one another and texting, while they were both in the room! This is where we have gotten to on the college campus. These young people will be our neighbors, our doctors, our government officials and they aren’t able to hold a simple conversation with the people around them.
I do feel that this isn’t a problem that can’t be fixed; I just worry that we have began tackling it a little late. The solution I think, just starts with getting involved with this generation’s life while they’re learning what they missed because of technology. They just need more practice being in conversation and if we enroll them in our conversations, then they will hopefully fall into a trend where they do the same thing. We may even learn something about them through this. We don’t know what is going to happen with this Millennial Generation and those to come, but if we are involved in their lives though, then we can at least continue in a forward direction with them, knowing who they are.
If you want to read more about this generation, here is the Wikipedia link. Since I’ve been on Project Kinect, and have met many different younger college students, I have heard a lot about communism. Something interesting with this generation is that they don’t have any knowledge of the Cold War, the Berlin Wall falling or the breaking up of the USSR, so communism is a brand new concept to them. In the Wikipedia link, they mention that. I just find this interesting, with no significance other than I’m happy that there is still free thought happening in their heads.
