ESSAY: Are we connected or isolated?

In the age of smartphone, we are seemingly getting closer and closer with one another. We can communicate with anyone across the globe , exchanging texts, voice, and live videos.

It seems that we have overcome the limitation of geographical distance. Even if you are left alone in an isolated island, no problem. You can enjoy chatting and playing video games with your friends.

So, we are connected. No distance. There is no wall that is separating us.

But, is that really so?

When I get on a train or a bus, I find most of the people getting absorbed in the screen of their own smartphones. They seem to be in their own psychological space.

Even though we share the same physical space , we are not connected. We are, in a sense, isolated. The distance seems to be getting greater and greater as the technology progresses.

I feel afraid that someday some sensitive younger generation might realize the vulnerability of living in the cyber space and get lost, wondering WHERE AM I?

The more we get into the cyber space, the more unstable we might get. We are eroding our ground on which we stand.

When I was in university, I majored in philosophy. I had an feeling of uneasiness with my identity. Where am I ? Where I stand?

Out of insecurity, I started one thing. Walking travel.

Walking from one place to another place, all day long, under the sky. When the sun sets, pitching a tent in the field. I just wanted to feel the vastness of the physical space. The smell of the wind. The trivial change of sunlight touching my skin. Everything the actual space has to show.

Through my own body, I could feel something solid. The existence of the vast nature and myself. I AM RIGHT HERE.

It was a certain feeling that reassured me. It was much more reassuring than ideological understanding like “ I THINK THEREFORE I AM”.

Plus, walking travel delivered me some more amazing feeling. The sky is with me, the wind is with me. All the things surrounding me are loosely connected. And co-exist. I am a part of this profound space.

Ive been enjoying this style of travel for more than 20 years. Ive walked more than 3000km, from Kagoshima to Fukushima , and branching out from the spots I have visited.
In the age of cyberspace, the importance of physical space is also increasing. To acquire an actual feeling of being connected to people, world, we should get back to the nature.

We are living in a world which connects us and separates us simultaneously. When getting on a train, it will be nice sometimes to get your eyes off the smartphone and enjoy watching passengers who happened to share the same space with you.