60. Showdown in Edge City

To me, living on the edge means embracing an environment of constant change at the speed of light. But the faster everything changes, the more transience and impermanence come to define our lives. And the faster the rate of change, the more our humanity is lost because much of our humanity is rooted in connections based in the present. When our relationship to people, places, things, information, and organizations is undermined, we are told that social media connections provide a suitable substitute. But as we have all seen, social media can be, and is, a very misleading and divisive force which is no substitute for authentic connection with the rich texture of our social fabric. The virtual world steps in again and offers itself as the cure.

It comes down to managing the rate of change. Change has always been a necessary and important part of human life and development. But no one seems to be considering the psychological impact of the accelerated rate of change which is keeping us constantly off balance and largely responsible for the polarity and adversarial nature of human relationships. In short, everyone is increasingly on edge, with the predictable result that many people are looking for a savior to bring back security and stability which accounts for the recent rise of authoritarian leaders. (and UFO reports (LOL)

Let me say this again. Change is good and necessary for human progress. But too much change in too short a time is a root cause of what is eating at our society.

I owe my newfound understanding of this phenomenon to a book that was published in 1970 called Future Shock, written by Alvin Toffler. It is absolutely incredible how much of what he wrote over 50 years ago has come true and how much no one has paid any attention to the facts.

We are so eloquent when it comes to stating a problem, but then we do nothing about it. It echoes what the Covid anti-vaxxers say when they catch the virus, "I didn't think it could happen to me." But then it does.

I will be following up on this idea in the development of my new play Edgy which seems to be emerging as my creative project with the most juice at the moment. It will be a long road. But then Rome wasn't built in a day.