Why should I care about others?

Untethered “freedom”

Are you more Elsa or Snow White? OK, so Encanto’s Mirabel ripped up the Disney princess script a few years back, and Rachel Zegler took Snow in weird directions this year. But does 1937’s homemaking, animal-whispering porcelain princess resonate, or are you feeling the fierce, sassy and powerful snow queen? Voting Elsa makes sense as she reflects our culture having emerged from it. The focus on the individual is intense, perfectly encapsulated within the kids party sing-along, Let it go:

“No rights, no wrongs, no rules for me – I’m free.”

But free… to be what, exactly? Free to be me. Whatever that means. Maybe Elsa just needed a little “me time”. But that freedom comes at a price.

Left untethered to something bigger, that individualistic view of freedom leads to narcissistic, self-absorbed… and increasingly lonely people. The research findings for Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation are a depressing read.

Jean Twenge, author of Generations, calls it “the dirty little secret of life” where we are bombarded by messages that we need to “know ourselves and love ourselves first, and not to depend on anyone or anything else – but being alone sucks.” Just ask Elsa, stuck in an ice-castle of her own creation, with the only company a demonic snowman called Marshmallow.

We were never designed for that kind of freedom.

Authentic faith

I want to help you find language for conversations with your youth and children to show just how broken and unsatisfactory our individualistic culture is, and give you confidence in ……