Seattle Freeze

This article from the Seattle Times recently caught my attention.  It explores the Seattle Freeze.  This is the term used by many to describe a manner of being among Seattleites that favors isolation.

Through a research study funded by Pemco Insurance, 40% say that “they do not feel it is important to make new friends.”  “A whopping 49 percent said they don’t even want to interact with people they don’t know.”  Those are some startling statistics.

Many people have explored the roots of the Seattle Freeze that seems to predate the tech boom.  Some have conjectured that it matches Seattle’s Scandinavian heritage.  I would love to see a study to see if it has grown in prevalence over the years?  And Seattle has become so much more ethnically diverse; so how does The Freeze continue?

I was saddened to read that the new normal is to have one friend.  Some people report ZERO friends.  Yikes.  Is it any wonder that mental illness is on the rise?

I believe that we are all relational beings.  God made us that way.  Even the Trinity itself reveals to us some thing essential to the nature of God; interdependent relationships between Father, Son, and Spirit.  God has made us this way too.  That is the reason why the Bible speaks so often about the church being “the body with many members” (1 Cor 12:12-27).  We need each other.  We are made to know each other deeply, and to depend upon each other.

As Simon and Garfunkel sang in 1966, “I am a rock, I am an island.”  I fear this is more real and true than we know – especially in Seattle

I’m on the side of exploring how to thaw the Seattle Freeze.  I believe our health and flourishing depend upon it.