Pick your phone and call someone now…
Let me tell you why.
The pronoun ‘I’ is the most used pronoun today. You need proof? I am being splashed daily with many emails, radio and tv commercials of how I can live my best life; how to be a millionaire (or better, a billionaire); how I can do better than others; how I can be more disciplined; how I can look more beautiful…and the endless list goes on and on…since you too have been bombarded with these, I’m sure you know how exactly what I’m talking about. But the noise keeps getting louder and louder.
Our focus is constantly directed by these things, to only concentrate on our lives. In other words, we are being pressed to become selfish, more selfish, and more and more selfish! We are flooded with tall lists about the benefits of putting ourselves first…and so everyone else can go hell!
This did not start today, and it’s not going to end, and unfortunately, it has worked. It has successfully produced a generation of self-obsessed humans who are so individualistic to the core that they do not mind destroying others or whatever that comes between them and their self-centered desires or goals.
The sense of community, caring for others and looking out for one another, have been relegated to the back, to those at the bottom of the social ladder. It seems that very soon, empathy will be associated with poverty and a lack of tough-skin needed to make it in life.
It’s sad but touching to realize that the most selfless and empathetic are those who do not have the means to give tangible care. Still, they care the most. If it isn’t money they can offer you, they will give you their limited time and bony shoulders to cry on.
Social support is rapidly dwindling in our environment, even within our families. If that isn’t true, what business do the elderly have in nursing homes when their children are very much alive? Some may not hear from their sons and daughters for years, not to talk of their grandchildren. No wonder suicide cases are getting higher in the elderly.
Recently, there has been a surge in suicides among the younger population as well. Well you can’t blame us. Thanks to social media and the new wave of high-end selfishness existing in us, we are constantly comparing ourselves and competing against one another. It’s either you clench your jaw in grit to win the race or you wither away and actually die trying.
We’re too self-absorbed to notice when a neighbour or friend starts hunching forward in their walking, looking bleak and sad, talking less, doing less, or just being slower than usual. These may be the first signs of depression, few steps away from suicide.
As at 2020, someone committed suicide every 11 minutes in the United States alone. Think about the whole world!
That’s not all. A much higher number of people think of committing suicide and even go on to attempt it!
Don’t wait to hear this before calling a friend, reaching out to a relative, caring about your neighbour or visiting a school or work colleague. Let’s be more empathetic and humane, for that’s what makes us human.
Start prioritizing ‘We’ over ‘I’. Learn to find ways of winning with others, instead of winning alone. We need and will always need one another way much more than we need anything else. If you doubt that, ask our ancestors how they were able to survive during a time when money did not exist!
Signed, Richeal.
P.S. Kindly support Med. Sch. Times by following and subscribing for more scoop into med. school life, even if you’re not a med. student. This blog isn’t for med. students alone, it’s for everyone, including you. Very little about med. school is known, and so I have decided to bridge that knowledge gap. Plus, the lessons from my med. school journey are applicable in other fields and aspects of life too. Thanks a lot for your support!
