The Lost Art of Reflection

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In today’s society, the urge to immediately respond to fear, information overload, and others’ actions often compels us to comment and define our positions before we have time to reflect. The pressure to shape the narrative in real time, especially on social media, overshadows thoughtful reflection. As a result, there is a growing loss of the ability to pause and consider events more deeply, leaving us feeling that unexpressed opinions lose their value.  No pause to complicate the grand meaning of the moment. No examination of the choices that led to the act to unfold as it did. Every action has a cause and a reaction.

Without reflection, we bound into the next moment with the momentum from the previous moment. We end up trashing through life the way the oblong football does when it’s fumbled by a player. We bounce randomly, unpredictably, and land in places we were never meant to land in. Days and confused, we get up to do it again and again, not understanding what came before and what is going to happen next. Just doubling down on whatever the first opinion we had whenever we started trashing around.  We become shells of ourselves, almost cartoon-like, with all the solid moral standing we once held, undercut by our need to react, to never reflect, and just power through to the next.

I’m not smart enough to outline here how to get more people in a reflective space, and I do mean people. People from every background, part of the country, the world, and across all social and economic statuses. To set aside the foundational beliefs we have weaponized and reflected on what if I’m wrong.  I understand that it may seem like a passive thing, and our current culture appears to be primarily concerned with aggression. That’s a dangerous place to find any culture. Aggression all the time leads to a lot of senseless violence. Even without reflection, we all know senseless violence seems to be occurring at a greater rate in lots of different places among different groups.

At some point, if we are always moving and bound into the next moment, the most counter-cultural move is to reflect. To spend time thinking about how we end up here before we spring into action. What actions am I taking that are helping or hurting my community, my family, and the greater good for all? I know most of us are not concerned with everything mentioned in the sentence before, but more of us should be. It matters greatly for all of us to be concerned with the larger community and the greater good. Realizing that would also mean we need some time to reflect on where we are and where we are headed.  Whether we like it or not, a big part of life is reflection, and the best people we all know actually still practice this examination of life, culture, and their actions. Do not let it become a lost art in your life!