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Key points
- Technologies like emails, social media, and video calls allow us to be in more than one place at once, creating a fragmented state.
- A fragmented state means our minds become fragmented, unable to process the single experience of what we are doing.
- To avoid the emotional instability coming from this fragmented state, we need to cultivate curiosity, that is, a little care for what we do.
We had just one body before the internet, smartphones, and videos. Our duty to presence was entirely devoted to that body and the people interacting with it. Now this body has become ubiquitous in time and space.
The flesh limits of my body extend to the wifi, to the camera of my computer, to the speakers of my smartphone, and so on.
Being present to ourselves when we occupy so many places at once is challenging. Our bodies have transformed into something much larger and more difficult to define.
From my body, I can do multiple things worldwide at once: check emails, be in a meeting, take care of my child, and prepare dinner. Although multitasking has always been considered a quality one can decide to use or not, this quality has become more and more a social virtue required to function properly in our society. This quality strongly challenges our capacity to be present.
To whom and to what should we be present? To the body that is in the meeting? The one reading emails? The body that is making lunch? More importantly, what happens every time we are not present to one of the tasks we are completing?
If we miss our chance to be present in our body, we fall at the risk of getting lost in all the fragments in which our body is scattered and consequently miss the full picture of what we are experiencing. Hence, we are at risk of growing anxiety and emotional instability because we feel overwhelmed by the places, tasks, persons we should be present for.
That’s why it is important to exercise our ability to be present to the whole body and not multitask our presence. Being able to see the full picture and caring for it can be a way to avoid emotional pain.
Where Is the Full Picture?
From my living room, I can exchange and collect information from worldwide. The internet of things, an expression coined in 1999 by Kevin Ashton, enabled us to send and receive data. Thanks to the Internet, the personal and business possibilities became endless.
In these years, a new transition has taken place from the internet of things to the internet of bodies. Our ability to have our bodies connected to our minds and the web changes our personal and professional lives. Our bodies are connected without being physically in a particular space. The speed at which we can reach each other and care for each other increases.
A creation of a new species my develop which will no longer be geographically bound; for example, if I moved to the U.S. before the development of Skype, WhatsApp, and other media, I would have become an Italian American, meaning my geographical dislocation would have meant a severe decrease of contacts with my family and friends and I would have adjusted to the new customs.
That did not happen for many other compatriots because technologies allow my geographical presence to be much wider. It is technology more than geography that shapes my being.
We can be everywhere at any time. Yet, how much technology can one take? How can we have the full picture of our physical being in the world when our mental being is so geographically boundless?
Plato’s Myth and the Full Picture
As Plato’s myth of the cave told us, we spend most of our lives stuck in a cave, looking at shadows that we think are real. But then one of us might take some courage, turn her face behind her shoulders and realize that what she is looking at are just shadows, and the real objects are behind.
With even more courage, this same person can decide to stand up and see these objects first hand. But then, standing up is not easy. She might realize that shackles are keeping her down. So, it takes some energy to get rid of them and move toward the objects. In moving closer to the source of knowledge, this same person will realize that these objects are just a reproduction of reality. They are just small statues carried on the head of people walking by.
Then the desire to know might become stronger. This person may want to leave the cave. But leaving the cave is hard. This person, alone now, runs toward the friends she left behind. She tries to explain what she saw. But they just want to be left alone.
Some mock her story. This person is disappointed but decides to overcome her fears and disappointment. She walks toward the entrance of the cave and steps a foot out. The sun blinds her. Everything is vivid, new, different. She sees the full picture, not a shadow, not an imitation but the full picture of how life looks like, and it’s blinding, difficult to explain, but exciting.
Being Curious As Being Present
Getting the full picture might be a lonely experience. It might be that our chances to find the cave a comfortable place will increase with the technology of the body. It might be that we will be able to do so many things at once that we will find that state comfortable.
We might be able to chat with many friends at once (but be intimate with none), see so many places scrolling our feeds (but stay on our couch), touching so many lives (but remain lonely in our office). It might be that the comfort of that cave might make us lonelier and a little absent from our whole being.
So, maybe what will push us out of the cave can be the same motor that can push us to strive for the full picture every once in a while—the curiosity. The word curiosity comes from Latin cura (care), that is, that little care for the reason behind our actions and our sense of reality. Every once in a while, we can let our curiosity run wild and drive us outside of our comfort zone to reconnect with the full picture of who we are.
That reconnection might help us be fully present, even if for only a moment, to our whole body, ourselves, and the people we love.
