This Is the Age of Broken Things
Do we ruin the things that need to be fixed?
Have you ever bought something online only to find out it’s utterly unusable?
Or have you ever purchased anything costly only to use it for a very short time?
I can’t remember the number of times I purchased something on the internet only to find out it’s defective later on.
Although none so far have been very expensive, the hassle of filling out the return form was never commensurate to the refund I was able to get.
“I shouldn’t have bought it in the first place!” that’s all I could say in frustration.
I also remember the time that our television set broke. It was during the COVID-19 pandemic and we tried to avoid going out of the house if not for very important reasons. If possible, we just wanted to have it fixed and so we tried to contact the repairman who lived in our neighborhood.
Unfortunately, however, he couldn’t fix it saying many of the recent flat screen models weren’t made to be repaired like before. They are now in fact “disposable.”
Given no other choice, we decided to go to the mall and just buy a new one. We didn’t want to risk ordering online and suffering the risk of another defective purchase.
That’s one of the two rare trips we made to buy something from an appliance store during the pandemic. The other one was when my laptop also needed to be “disposed of”.
Things break down just when you least expect them to.
But I guess that’s how it is in our world today. After all, this is the age of broken things.
It’s that time when the app you’re very satisfied with will suddenly need an update. It’s when you need to always upgrade your mobile phone because its memory has already run out.
Have you ever bought anything in the last couple of years that stood out in endurance and usefulness?
We used to have refrigerators that lasted for decades and television sets that served the family until the kids had grown. Even electric fans endured years of being used before they’re finally thrown away.
Today, however, everything seems to have been designed to die an early death. We buy things thinking we’d own them, but it’s more like renting everything for a very short time.
We pride ourselves on acquiring the latest phone models because that’s what some people want us to think. That we needed to buy new things all the time.
Why? Not because we needed them, or because there have been some very vital changes we could use. But because they were not made to last in the first place. They were not made to endure but to be broken.
It shouldn’t surprise us anymore why our world is suffering from pollution and environmental damage.
How could it not be when we have so much waste?
Instead of repairing things, we dispose of them. And instead of using something for a long time, we throw them away in just a couple of months.
We destroy our world but we pretend to be so concerned about saving it.
How do we save it when we can’t even save ourselves?
We’ve become addicted to the fleeting pleasure of enjoying these broken things.
We work non-stop to acquire more and more. But we never get enough.
None of these things could satisfy us or fill our empty hearts. None of them can cure what’s aching deep within us.
The truth is that we ourselves are broken.
Have you ever thought about your online relationships? We may think that we have a lot of virtual friends and followers, but in the end, they are just as fragile and expendable.
I remember the time when I had an issue with an online friend. I was so surprised by the harsh words I received that I had to block that friend and never hear from him again. It is so quick to judge people online, and also just as easy to cut off anyone you disagree with.
In this age where everything can easily be thrown away, I feel that even our closest human connections can suffer from this perspective.
That may be why we search for love everywhere but we can’t find it. We try to upgrade the clothes we wear, the cars we use and the houses we live in. We post our photos on the internet so people can see how beautiful we are. In the end, however, all they get to see are the masks that hide who we are within.
Once they see the broken parts of us, they dispose of our relationships as though even that can be refunded once returned.
It’s hard to reveal yourself.
When you know that you can be judged and disposed of any time, it’s not easy opening up the most vulnerable parts of you.
As a single woman, I have experienced many words of rejection and criticism for still being single at my age (I’m now in my forties). For all you know, I’d soon be in menopause without having had the chance to bear children of my own.
In a world that cherishes the young and the strong, how do you continue to assert your self-esteem?
Would I soon be considered a woman past the age of being beautiful? Will the number of years I have lived weigh against me and count me as nearing my expiration date?
These are harsh words but we live in very harsh times. It’s that age when the likes of me can easily be judged as broken because I have not lived the kind of life that was expected of a woman like me.
Isn’t there anything anymore that lasts?
Have all our treasured possessions turned out to be disposable trash?
Perhaps the problem comes from our warped line of thinking. Of not trying to fix what is broken. And of breaking everything that should have lasted for a long time.
We ruin everything from our fear of being ruined. And we run from every little sign of discomfort so we choose death instead of healing.
I wish we lived in a far more lasting time.
When we choose to build everything to last. And when we do everything in our power to save what’s still worth saving.
It’s the same with our relationships. I wish we didn’t enter any just for the sake of trying it or enjoying its fleeting pleasures.
Because if we built our relationships out of true devotion, we’d dedicate our all to make it work. And our thoughts wouldn’t be about having that upgrade, choosing another or throwing away what doesn’t work.
Our thoughts would be about looking into our deepest needs, making every necessary sacrifice and giving it our all so that every brokenness may be fixed and all our most painful wounds may be healed.
Last but not least, I wish we could look at everything with a more open mind. Perhaps if we could look more deeply, we can see something valuable even in the things we just wanted to throw away.
This is the age of broken things. But who has ever said that even the broken ones can no longer be beautiful?
“The world breaks everyone, and afterward many are strong at the broken places.” — Ernest Hemingway
You may also want to listen to my song titled “Lord, Mend My Broken Heart”.
No matter how broken our hearts may be, God can heal us and make us whole again.
“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted, saves those whose spirit is crushed.”
- Psalm 34:19 (NABRE)
Jocelyn Soriano is the author of the book “Mend My Broken Heart”.
