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orgotten that she was sometimes attending these sessions too. To be honest, I had forgotten about her existence until she wrote to me again.Hi. Yeah. The meeting took place at two. The EST hour changed. It will take place at two all week. I’m not sure when this change happens here.My answer. I was expecting her to say something after, but the conversation died there. There was no reaction to the news, no words of sorrow because of having missed the session and especially no “thank you” or “have a good day”. Nothing but silence.We don’t communicate regularly, so it felt rather weird that she ended the conversation so abruptly. It even felt a bit rude.This incident did not matter much, but it reminded me of other instances when people did this in the past.I have a cousin who triages the messages she gets. If she considers them to be of importance to her, she replies. If not, she just reads them and never answers. So, if one needs some piece of information from her, they might never get it if they text her.I once asked her about this propensity to mark messages as read without replying. She very innocently said that she had never thought that people who wrote to her expected an answer in return. This quite amused me. It also made me secretly conclude that she thought the whole world revolved around her needs only.Another friend of mine gets my texts on WhatsApp, marks them as read, and replies after many hours (sometimes even days). Last week I asked him if he was overwhelmed with his tasks at work as he was replying with such a lag. He had been promoted to a management position a while ago and I felt that this had to be why.He answered that he regularly checked who wrote to him but he replied only when he felt like it. Apparently, he finds it hard to have a nice online chat while he is working or doing something else. He prefers talking in person. This way he is not getting in and out of multiple stories all the time.According to him, it is like listening to good music. One cannot buy groceries and enjoy listening to Chopin at the same time.I loved his answer. It also provided me with a bit of insight into how his mind works. We might all function like this but how many of us are aware of it? Multitasking is a trendy word these days, but it’s also a big lie. Our brain

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s are certainly not designed to do more things at once that need our full attention. But I digress.So, is choosing not to respond to texts, emails, and other digital messages rude? Or is it sometimes necessary? According to <a href="https://www.wikihow.com/Psychology-of-Not-Responding-to-Text-Messages#:~:text=Things%20You%20Should%20Know,to%20your%20text%20right%20away.">Wikihow</a>, “text anxiety, ADHD, or digital burnout are also possible reasons that someone might feel too overwhelmed or anxious to reply to your text right away”.There are messages I choose to not respond to either. If I’m in a chat with more people, I rarely say anything unless I have relevant things to say.There are also times when people insist on the same things over and over again and no amount of explanation works, so I reply with a considerable lag to those messages too. There might also be times when I am too busy to spend time on my phone, so I just make sure to get back to the person when I have some free moments.If however, I am the one initiating the conversation to get valuable information, I do say “thank you” and “goodbye” after getting what I need. Nobody owes me anything so this is the least that I can do if they provided the help or the enlightenment I needed.Having said all these, there might be myriad reasons why some people choose not to reply. Some might not have the time to. Others might not feel that online conversations have to have a beginning and an ending like face-to-face encounters. Others might simply be having a bad day.Our minds always jump to negative conclusions (as this is what they are prone to do) and tend to project our inner wounds into the silence, but the truth is everyone communicates differently. This rule applies both to offline and online encounters.I think that I might need to reconsider how I feel about this whole incident. My principles are definitely not everybody else’s principles, so why take this personally and consider it rude? Each to their own.What is your stance on this? I’d love to know other opinions on the subject.PS: No sooner had I finished writing this article than the lady thanked me and apologized for her late answer. So, like I said, the mind will always jump to a conclusion, but it’s up to us to see that it might not be the right one.</article></body>

The Choice of Not Responding to Online Messages

Is it rude to not reply to texts and other digital messages?

Photo by Volodymyr Hryshchenko on Unsplash

Hi. Hope you are well. Do you know anything about the Zoom session that was supposed to take place today? Did George say anything about it on Saturday?

This is a message I got yesterday from a lady who works in the same company as I do. We have never met in person, so I cannot say that I know her. She however sometimes attends the meditation Zoom sessions held by George (a Heartfulness trainer from the States) that I attend.

The participants in these calls are from all over the world. A few weeks ago she realized that we were both working in the same company and she said hi. We acknowledged each other and we exchanged a few words about how great these sessions were. It was the only time we spoke. That is until yesterday.

On March 10th the EST time changed. In my part of the world, setting clocks forward occurs at the end of the month. As a consequence, the meditation session took place one hour earlier starting yesterday. This will happen for two weeks or so.

Daylight saving time (DST), also referred to as daylight savings time, daylight time (United States and Canada), or summer time (United Kingdom, European Union, and others), is the practice of advancing clocks to make better use of the longer daylight available during summer, so that darkness falls at a later clock time. (Wikipedia)

In the past, I also missed a few sessions because I was not aware of this difference. This time however I kept getting an automatic email one hour earlier than I usually get it. This made me realize the EST time change had taken place. So, I did not miss the Zoom call.

It however never crossed my mind to let the aforementioned lady know about this in advance. We haven’t talked at all since that first contact, so I have forgotten that she was sometimes attending these sessions too. To be honest, I had forgotten about her existence until she wrote to me again.

Hi. Yeah. The meeting took place at two. The EST hour changed. It will take place at two all week. I’m not sure when this change happens here.

My answer. I was expecting her to say something after, but the conversation died there. There was no reaction to the news, no words of sorrow because of having missed the session and especially no “thank you” or “have a good day”. Nothing but silence.

We don’t communicate regularly, so it felt rather weird that she ended the conversation so abruptly. It even felt a bit rude.

This incident did not matter much, but it reminded me of other instances when people did this in the past.

I have a cousin who triages the messages she gets. If she considers them to be of importance to her, she replies. If not, she just reads them and never answers. So, if one needs some piece of information from her, they might never get it if they text her.

I once asked her about this propensity to mark messages as read without replying. She very innocently said that she had never thought that people who wrote to her expected an answer in return. This quite amused me. It also made me secretly conclude that she thought the whole world revolved around her needs only.

Another friend of mine gets my texts on WhatsApp, marks them as read, and replies after many hours (sometimes even days). Last week I asked him if he was overwhelmed with his tasks at work as he was replying with such a lag. He had been promoted to a management position a while ago and I felt that this had to be why.

He answered that he regularly checked who wrote to him but he replied only when he felt like it. Apparently, he finds it hard to have a nice online chat while he is working or doing something else. He prefers talking in person. This way he is not getting in and out of multiple stories all the time.

According to him, it is like listening to good music. One cannot buy groceries and enjoy listening to Chopin at the same time.

I loved his answer. It also provided me with a bit of insight into how his mind works. We might all function like this but how many of us are aware of it? Multitasking is a trendy word these days, but it’s also a big lie. Our brains are certainly not designed to do more things at once that need our full attention. But I digress.

So, is choosing not to respond to texts, emails, and other digital messages rude? Or is it sometimes necessary? According to Wikihow, “text anxiety, ADHD, or digital burnout are also possible reasons that someone might feel too overwhelmed or anxious to reply to your text right away”.

There are messages I choose to not respond to either. If I’m in a chat with more people, I rarely say anything unless I have relevant things to say.

There are also times when people insist on the same things over and over again and no amount of explanation works, so I reply with a considerable lag to those messages too. There might also be times when I am too busy to spend time on my phone, so I just make sure to get back to the person when I have some free moments.

If however, I am the one initiating the conversation to get valuable information, I do say “thank you” and “goodbye” after getting what I need. Nobody owes me anything so this is the least that I can do if they provided the help or the enlightenment I needed.

Having said all these, there might be myriad reasons why some people choose not to reply. Some might not have the time to. Others might not feel that online conversations have to have a beginning and an ending like face-to-face encounters. Others might simply be having a bad day.

Our minds always jump to negative conclusions (as this is what they are prone to do) and tend to project our inner wounds into the silence, but the truth is everyone communicates differently. This rule applies both to offline and online encounters.

I think that I might need to reconsider how I feel about this whole incident. My principles are definitely not everybody else’s principles, so why take this personally and consider it rude? Each to their own.

What is your stance on this? I’d love to know other opinions on the subject.

PS: No sooner had I finished writing this article than the lady thanked me and apologized for her late answer. So, like I said, the mind will always jump to a conclusion, but it’s up to us to see that it might not be the right one.