The Modern Rush That Is Killing Our Time and Energy—Our Only True Possessions

   The Modern Rush That Is Killing Our Time and Energy—Our Only True Possessions

                                           In this article, I review another section of my book:

 “The Gray Area: Rushing into the Great Tribulation”. Here, we examine what I call the modern rush.

This book reveals the harmful effects of the great modern rush—those who believe the first five minutes of a human encounter are enough to make an educated assertion about the soul they’ve just met, as if life’s wisdom can be distilled into self-improvement titles like The First Five Minutes of an Encounter.

It is for those who want to decipher the cloak of the influence of junk entertainment, bombarded with constant messages urging them to rush through everything and savor nothing. They don’t truly stop to smell the roses—they race past them, oblivious to the stench of sewage in our oceans and taking hurried vacations in temporary luxury prisons disguised as resorts. Places filled with drugs, alcohol, and other intoxicants—expensive retreats for those who can’t imagine joy beyond false perceptions and numbing indulgences.

Vacationers are cautioned not to cross resort borders, shielded from the poverty, violence, and chaos beyond. But their rush makes them either too busy—or too afraid—to truly pause and witness the madness of the corporate race consuming the world.

Junk media proclaims that patience is weakness. It mocks the idea of taking time with our work, suggesting instead that speed equals wisdom. Being super busy portrays being super important.  It cultivates low self-esteem by encouraging people to pretend they already know everything—because they can afford to hire help, even if that help is purposely incompetent. Meanwhile, they perform humility in public.

These are the types who appear on talk shows proclaiming that cooking is such a challenge they “burn water.” They say these things not in shame but as a display of wealth—able to hire out even basic tasks like mopping floors or cleaning bathrooms.

They cannot understand genuine humility—born from the everyday tasks carried out by those living modestly out of necessity.

Not for the Rushed: A Reflection on a Provocative Book

This book brings awareness to those sprinting through life with earbuds full of junk music which echos the junk entertainment, minds cluttered by instant opinions.  Those who equate speed with sophistication or busyness with importance. This work is a slow-burning confrontation—a theological and psychological rebuke of modernity’s obsession with haste, distraction, and vanity disguised as humility.

It calls readers to pause. Not just to smell the roses—but to recognize when the roses have been replaced by the stench of collapsing oceans and corporate sewage labeled as progress. This false progress, the Bible teaches, is driven by the yield of filthy lucre.

In this book, patience is not weakness—it is rebellion. Wisdom is not busy—it is observant. Humility is not performative—it is earned through direct engagement with chaos, not curated social appearances.

This is a book for the brave—for those willing to linger in discomfort, wrestle with contradictions, and question what it truly means to know. Those who are willing to go the extra mile to decipher the cloak of the Modern Rush.

“In your patience possess ye your souls.” — Luke 21:19 

“Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?” — John 10:34

It is a quietly radical reminder of our power to do both good and evil. In an age of acceleration and emotional fragmentation, the true battleground is internal. Patience becomes a spiritual discipline—a way to hold steady while the world convulses. It’s not merely surviving but preserving the soul’s integrity.

Only through intentional pause and spiritual resilience can we reclaim ownership over our inner lives—and resist being hollowed out by the noise.

Let us reflect on the junk entertainment and music that glorifies condescending attitudes—especially in soap operas, where characters claim they are “too busy” for their families. That emotional neglect leads to tragic outcomes: children sent to elite schools and gifted material luxuries end up addicted, confused, suffering from low self-esteem—becoming suicidal or spiritually and socially self-destructive. And if they don’t become addicted, confused or suicidal they become an even worst nightmare to society, they end up becoming exactly like their neglecting parents, perpetuating a vicious cycle.

The Myth of Material Substitution

Our music and entertainment portray a flawed archetype: wealthy parents who substitute presence with possessions. The child receives the newest tech, lavish vacations—but no meaningful conversation, no eye contact, no feeling of being truly seen.

Consequences of Dismissive Affection

• Confused Identity: When worth is based on achievements or brands, children chase external validation, never forming a stable inner compass.

• Low Self-Esteem: When affection feels conditional or scripted, the child internalizes inadequacy. Trophies can't silence the ache of being unseen.

• Addiction & Despair: Drugs become anesthetics for emptiness; suicide whispers when the world sparkles but feels hollow.

Cinematic Superficiality vs. Real Pain

These narratives are framed in glossy melodrama. The CEO father “can’t cancel the meeting,” the socialite mother insists “you’ll thank me someday.” But no one thanks a ghost parent. And even when the twist arrives—a cry for help, a fatal overdose—the resolution is edited for ratings, not redemption therapy only leads to relapse. You can believe me as a psychologist: junk art imitates social reality—and social reality imitates junk art.

Let us confront the lie that busyness is a virtue, and that emotional absence equates to dignity. Especially when material wealth is earned through practices devoid of empathy or spiritual intention.

 Perceived Comfort Breeds Disconnection

It is disturbing how emotional absence hides behind material excess and is rebranded as personal success.

The Crisis of Invisible Suffering Worldwide

Divorce of their parents and addiction among upper-middle-class youth continues to rise, often rooted in civic numbness and emotional suppression. Suicidal ideation is common even in well-resourced communities—because emptiness doesn’t discriminate. Identity confusion festers when love is conditional and worth is reduced to metrics of wealth or performance.

Amid the great rush, these individuals vanish from the lens society should use one focused on spiritual wealth, patience, love, and acts of faith. Instead, they’re caught up in a culture that glorifies false living, Vanity, pretending, isolation, and hypocrisy.

Junk entertainment adds confusion to the chaos—mirroring the threat of nuclear extinction, the fear of poverty, the hopelessness seen in crime, violence, homelessness, addiction and the trauma of the billions.

Entertainment as Subliminal Programming

Soap operas and junk media don’t just fail to condemn rushed living—they amplify it: Busyness becomes virtue. Emotional avoidance becomes “independence.” Spiritual longing is mocked as naïveté.

This is no accident. These media forms are teaching tools—molding social behavior, especially among viewers drowning in daily chaos. This is more than critique—it’s a wake-up call. A prophetic lens urging us to turn our gaze from flashing screens toward eternal truths, captured in themes like:

• The Entertainment Machine: A False Gospel

• The Disfigured Lens of Modern Spectacle

• The Circus on the Brink

Let us reflect deeply, turning toward repentance, seeking personal and social transformation—so we may move away from the Great Tribulation we are rushing toward, blindly following the blind.

“They be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.” — Matthew 15:14