You Are Not Broken It may feel astonishing to you that someone finally seems to truly understand you. After a lifetime of helping others - giving, supporting, carrying - you may look around and see mostly disappointment, especially from those closest to you. When that happens repeatedly, something inside begins to adapt. You might start speaking faster, saying more than you intended, shifting between social masks just to stay connected or protected. Trust becomes difficult. Loneliness becomes...

The Age of Emotional Substitutes During an ongoing and definitely unintended human experiment of my own, I have already come to realize something unsettling: the human being no longer seems capable of deep, authentic feeling without supplementing it with objects, with curated images, with the “right” graphics. It is far easier to replace emotion with a financial exchange or a string of emojis. This is the age of anti-affection , just as it is the age of anti-intelligence . In the past, people...

The Three-Line Crime God forbid you try to communicate in full sentences, and without emojis. You’re doomed. No one will like you anymore, and soon enough you’ll be considered slightly unhinged. And then completely. Because you write long messages. Because no one can read past the first five words anymore. No one. Regardless of age. Attention span now depends on how wide our device screens are. Let’s try an experiment. Take any of these so-called "long” messages. Format the complete, not even...