Liking is For Cowards. Go for What Hurts.

"Liking is for Cowards. Go for What Hurts" Summary and Response

 By: Jonathan Franzen

Switching from his Blackberry Pearl to a Blackberry Bold after three years, Franzen is impressed with how technology has advanced. So impressed, he becomes infatuated with his new devise. He had a relationship with his Pearl, but over three years, the relationship had faded, issues were created and he had outgrown what he and his phone had. Franzen explains that things we can do on our phones now, would seem like magic to people 100 years ago. A phone is something that you can ask for nothing from it and yet, it will still give you everything you ask for in return. There has become desperation to be liked, thanks to Facebook. To like, is the commercial substitute for loving. We give up on being loved for who we really are and dedicate ourselves to being likable. The world of liking is a lie. No one can like everything about another person. People avoid love and stay in the world of liking to avoid rejection. Rejection is painful, but you have not lived if you have not felt pain. Franzen likes the environment. He tries to make it better, but realized he cannot do very much on his own. Instead, he becomes infatuated with birds, causing him again to be worried about the environment because that is where the birds live. Franzen loved these birds and that is where his trouble began. Franzen realizes that his love for birds became a portal to a part of him that he didn’t even know existed. He was forced to face a part of him that he was unaware of. This idea brought him to the conclusion that one day you will die. That’s where the anger and pain comes from. You must either hate it or embrace it. Once you open up to real people and the real world, you have to accept that you might love some of them and you just don’t know what will happen to you once you love someone.

Franzen “Liking is for Cowards. Go for What Hurts,” was a very interesting read for me. Franzen talks about having a relationship with his phone. I feel that I have a relationship with my phone as well. I even buy things for my phone. For example, I buy it a case for it to be more attractive and to protect it. Being a user of Facebook for a couple years now, anything I post I enjoy when people like it. I can see how the world has changed the word love. I do not think that it means what it used to. People abuse the word love these days and that is why many people prefer to be liked, there is no pain in being liked. But to love once then to be hated causes pain. No one really wants to feel pain. I agree with Franzen toward the end of his writing. No one knows what might happen to you if you love something, but you put your all into it. If you are rejected, you just have to accept that life goes on and that one day, you will die. So living life to your fullest is your best choice!