In my immediate family, we have a tradition that I cherish deeply. On every birthday, we write each other letters of wishes, thoughts and feelings, and we read them together. This is an opportunity for us to write with a pen, on a paper, and share an intimate moment where we simply share love.
It always feels like the gift we enjoy most. The gift of our hearts.
As we are awaiting this year's Valentines Day, an interesting — and yet somewhat sad — thought creeped into my mind; are we the only ones still writing love letters or poems in this time and age?
Human history is filled with examples of intimate letters and poems of love between lovers, friends. Just to share one:
“If I could spend just one night with her –
the girl with a soft body, broad shoulders,
lush alluring hair, who has stolen my heart –
I swear I wouldn’t want to live another day.”
— Nakkiraar
Disappearing Love Letters
With the technological advances taking over how we communicate, not only we don’t ever write with a pen and paper anymore, but we also stopped writing love letters altogether. I fear that even small love notes on the fridge may be a thing of the past! Soon enough the world will be tasking GenAI with feeling and expressing the emotions societies and relationships expect from us.
How does this affect our human connections, and are we “losing” on love?
According to a recent Ipsos research, we might be. When asked about the role of technology as a tool in our relationships, 22% said finding love will get easier, 35% maintained that finding love will remain the same, and 43% of the people around the world believed that finding a romantic match will become more difficult.
A quick Google search shared that online matchmaking websites are not new, yet while being introduced to the world in 1995, they were merely complementing the more traditional ways of meeting new partners, especially in India where matchmaking is so much more than a profession. Later, when mobile phones landed in our lives, “the second wave” of digital togetherness took over, and social media became the human connector.
Social Media — Hotspot For Self-Expression!
Social media has become the hotspot for self-expression among the current generation, with its growing popularity and trends like soft-launching partners online or first date selfies influencing GenZ's dating expectations, experiences, and approach to modern romance.
Bumble, the online dating and networking application, reveals how social media impacts GenZ's dating ideals: 33% use it to check potential partners' interests and lifestyle, 31% want to participate in social media trends with their partner, 27% want their partner to post about them, and 23% judge potential dates based on their social media presence. These factors simply makes it transactional. 37% of India’s GenZ are concerned about commitment and 49% are concerned about finding partners who meet their expectations
Unfortunately, technology has also changed the way we bond and express love to others. What was once conveyed in words or a whisper, by a look or a smile - openly elaborate or more discrete, is now conveyed in emojis, sometimes even memes, their colours depending on the day’s mood. One could argue that these are, perhaps, devoid of the emotions and meanings they are meant to represent; a simplified, yet altogether more complicated means of communication. Lacking the human touch, if you will.
Emojis and shortened words lack personal expression, nuance, sub text and intimacy no doubt. They lack softness and passion altogether. They lack the music, the sound of love. The world of online and digitalised dating has also brought about new dating cultures, rules, and definitions, especially for Gen Z; “ghosting” (disappearing and leaving potential partner ‘on read’), or “situationships” (a grey-area definition for a long term emotional-sexual partnership that isn’t exclusive).
Changing Concept Of Love
Some psychiatrists claim that eventually the very concept of love changed altogether, unlike what we’re taught to believe; psychiatrist Charles Johnston wrote in 2018 that we are seeing a shift from a Two-halves-make-a-whole type of love, to a Whole-person type of love.
This trend might be connected to the ever more individualistic world we are creating around us. And while Johnston doesn’t necessarily believe that we’re “losing” on love as such, I feel more concerned.
Esther Perel writes that many of the communal institutions gave way to individualism, as the younger generations turn to their partners to supply them with all their emotional needs — which in turn causes them to have impossible demands and expectations, makes finding true love, or maintaining a relationship, extremely difficult. To that, Perel adds the commodification of love, our constant questioning around “Is there someone better for me out there?”, and we have a recipe for failure. As if love is an investment, rather than a fundamental, uncontrollable human emotion.
That people don’t find or feel love anymore, and choose to stay single, or simply not to have children has more than obvious emotional risks — see India’s declining annual population growth rate, reaching 0.68%, its lowest value in many years, and India’s crude birth rate (number of live births divided by its population, expressed per 1000 people) falling from close to 21 in 2011 to just over 16 in 2022.
Health Concerns
It is no secret that love makes us happier. People who are socially connected, feel they belong, and have supportive relationships are more likely to make healthier life choices, and overall maintain better physical and mental health; they are also coping better with stress, anxiety, and depression, which is on the rise due to our deteriorating human relationships, our digital exposure, and decreasing levels of Oxytocin.
Known as the hormone of love, Oxytocin is released when we are in love, and in turn we feel contentment, calmness, and security. Research has proven that maintaining good human relationships is also linked to the prevention of serious illnesses such as dementia and heart disease.
Once again, the modern rat race, the fast pace of living, working in toxic environments, and our evolving individualistic state of mind, are robbing us of our mental and physical health. It’s not necessarily intentional, we simply have less and less time to feel, and fall in love; dating apps operate as “sieves” when choosing potential partners, and our work-life imbalance keeps everyone too busy for simply living the excitement in the relationship.
In this Valentines day, I challenge you to feel how you miss these little moments of love, and maybe miss the simple action of writing a love letter.
These moments impact not just our relationships, our souls and the colours of our lives, but our overall health as well.
In a world where loneliness prevails and digital seems to win over humanity, humans must fall in love again.
—The author, Sigal Atzmon, is President & Chief Executive Officer of Medix Global, a leading provider of innovative, high quality, medical management solutions, and a blogger (As A Matter Of Fact). The views expressed are personal.
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(Edited by : C H Unnikrishnan)
First Published: Feb 13, 2024 10:07 PM IST
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