I feel pulled in various directions each year. A lot of it comes from the pressures of our modern society in which I feel I’m expected to stay informed. I am to know of all the global wars, genocides, and injustices, and then I’m expected to have feelings or opinions about those things, and to speak up about them in some sort of way. If I don’t, I will get criticized for the privilege of being able to experience a life where I can live untroubled and insulated from the realities of such atrocities.
But so be it.
I don’t need to know of every war or even of every genocide. We fool ourselves into thinking we already can. There are plenty of things happening throughout the world that are horrific that we have no idea about. Must be nice to be us! The powers that be let us know about what they want us to know about. The terrors of our newsfeeds — that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The world is actually much worse than what we know about.
The thing is, I have a family of my own: a wife and two sons, 11 and 13. I have an adopted adult daughter than ran away from our family three years ago. My house is filled with teenage girls placed with us who have experienced traumas of all sorts and various kinds. Seventy in total, now. If I need to feel troubled or heartbroken about the world, I can just look around the table at dinner.
When we are left to our own devices, we make some really terrible decisions. I think a lot of it stems from wanting to be better people but not being able to do it very well on our own. We look to external sources of comfort to help make ourselves feel better about this, or to project a sense of confidence. Perhaps often motivated by a desire to simply be accepted.
I’m convinced we can’t be successful on our own. We need honesty and accountability with others who care about us if we are to actually make sustainable life changes. We might be able to push through a stretch of time or season on our own, but we aren’t built to make it through life on our own. We need lives integrated with the people around us.
There’s something strange about being able to shout our frustrations to strangers online, often talking online in ways we’d not talk to people if they were standing in front of us. And then going about our days passing by human beings living their lives with just as a complex inner and daily life as you or me, and we just brush past them. Whether it be the clerk at the gas station, the server at the restaurant, the coworker we find annoying, the person stuck in traffic alongside us — these are all human beings living with the pressures of generational dysfunctions, childhood traumas, financial pressures, relationship strains, job stress, and griefs of every kind.
Yet, we ignore them, or get annoyed by them. But we need these people. They are our neighbors. We are told to love them, not ignore them. And definitely not curse them.
I can’t do a lot about global war. I can’t stop genocides no matter how often I bring it up in conversations, or how angry I get, or if I post on social media about them. And this is the stuff going on in the world that does matter! Forget celebrity gossip and the fashion trends of next season. We wear the jeans that we are told to wear to keep us buying jeans. It’s not so different than the news, you know. Why else would I see a video of a bombing in Gaza next to an ad for new bedsheets? (600 thread count Egyptian cotton!)
To be informed about the world but not be integrated into our own community isn’t actually healthy for us. Anyone can sit behind their computer or look at their phone on the toilet and be informed. You care about what’s going on in the world? Well, what does your relationship with your neighbors look like? (This is not meant to be a judgment, just a consideration.) In what ways are you involved with your community? Do you have people near you that you share experiences with? Do you recognize your barista as a real person, and if there’s not a long line, ask them about their day or life — something that lets them know you are interested in them beyond what they can do for you? What kinds of conversations do you have with your barber or hairstylist?
I think being more integrated with and interested in the people we already interact with on a regular basis is more important than informing ourselves on our news feeds or nightly news. That’s how we make this world a better place.
This year I’m spending my time more focused on the people around me than on my news feeds and social media. Instead of convincing myself of the need to know about all the things going on in the world, I think I’ll speak to my neighbors more this year. I’ll make plans to get to know people more deeply, and follow through. I’ll write a letter to a friend. And in our home, instead of simply praying for ourselves before dinner, we’ll pray for our neighborhood, each family one by one throughout the year.
That sounds like a lot of intentionality, I know. And that can be exhausting. So what about what I will do to relax, to chill out, to rest or even zone out? I don’t think entertaining ourselves is a bad thing, but instead of watching video shorts on media apps designed to keep us watching them, which is being proven to be bad for our brains, I’ll read thought provoking novels and give room for my imagination to expand with intentional storytelling — something that has been proven over and over to be good for us. If I watch something, I’ll watch movies or TV shows that value good storytelling and art — the kinds that can make me laugh and cry within a few moments of each other.
And I’ll continue to invest my time with the kids in my home, to show them that to be healthy and to grow as people in this big and scary world of ours, we need to be in it together. And that takes imagination and patience and gentleness and honesty with one another — aspects of our lives the influence of social media seems to be stealing away from us.
So here’s to a more integrated 2026, one where I notice that what I need is actually right here around me. I don’t need to go searching online for more things to own, and I don’t need to fill my time with more videos. What I need…is here.
And the kids who look to me and my wife, I want us to model that for them. They don’t need to go searching for affirmation from whomever the cool kid at school is this week. They don’t need to break rules or make risky decisions. They don’t need to make plans of a life of grandeur or fame. They need to have nightly family meals. They need to be asked about their days. They need to be told they are loved and safe. And those needs are right here. What they need…is here.
Stepping Back 