OMG these next 5 minutes really did change my life....

http://www.upworthy.com/loneliness-illustrated-so-beautifully-you-will-need-to-tell-someone?c=upw1

OK OK, Damn it. I just got knocked onto my ass 0_o after watching this video. Argh, I really hate upworthy sometimes, but the link above opens to an animated video that in 4 minutes captures what I've been trying to say about loneliness in a way more articulate way that I am.

There is so much fodder to fuel my project from this short clip, where the creator Shimi Cohen- a graphic designer, blatantly calls out social network as the innovation of loneliness and how our need for self actualization (thanks Gardner) has led to an alienation of real relationships and thus leads us to being addicted to the virtual leaving us lonely- the largest sickness facing the western world away.

Because we are in major control of what we can put online- we have way more control that allows us "to edit, and present ourselves as we want" thus losing the risk of spontaneous and real interactions.

He says that social networks grants us "fantasies"
-we can focus on what we want
-we will always be heard
-we never have to be alone

and he then culimates this amazing video with a new mode of thinking "I SHARE THEREFORE I AM"

and then bam, my face started to melt with his final thought.

"if we're never able to be alone, then all we'll ever know is how to be lonely."

He speaks directly to what I'm trying to say that we've become so dependent on our networks that we are indeed compelled to continually feed content to our online profiles, and are more focused on our narcissistic selves than real connections. Because the potential for us to maintain relationships over great distances and distract ourselves from "the ones we're with," and our growing addiction/need to always feel up to date with other online content, it's incredibly difficult to disengage and re-evaluate our relationships, and thus understand what it is to be alone and inversely- what it means to be in a relationship/not alone. (relationships being any form of relationship with other people).

I really want to succinctly capture the messages in this video somehow in a live (performative) way. I need to figure out a way to make this happen.

I keep saying it over and over again, and I don't know what I am trying to say. I've been lonely my whole life. I was raised by lonely people who only spoke through yelling or hitting. I've been so lonely that I'd take abuse, rape, drugs, and debt for a few moments of love. But funny enough, I've never given up art or education for a relationship. I've never given up a career for a relationship. Though I've run away to those things so I wouldn't have to deal with it.

I work 5 jobs. I don't need to work 5 jobs. (OK I might need to work 5 jobs- grad school isn't cheap), but so many of those jobs are because I need to have some sort of human interaction or I am left lying naked in bed alone all day, too depressed to walk out into the sun, or crying alone in my stark, almost sterile, mouse infested studio with little more than facebook to keep me company.

I can't speak enough about how this video captures me. And the people I want to address.

How do I make this happen?