By Hannah Webb | News Editor
We are remarkably incredible at disappearing without ever leaving.
But when everything is at our fingertips, there really is no reason to leave.
Our phones sit in our pockets, almost eagerly waiting to transport us somewhere else. It’s so easy to mute an overwhelming sense of loneliness beneath TV shows at max volume or drown out anxiety in blasting music. It’s completely free to force your bad day away with hours of scrolling TikTok. You can listen to a podcast about the carefully curated life of someone you’ve never met. You can find a community of strangers when you’re at your lowest and somehow convince yourself they understand exactly how you feel.
You can leave your own life without ever taking a step.
According to a 2025 study by the National Library of Medicine, the average university student spends more than eight hours a day on screens. While we should be appalled by that fact, it’s far too normalized.
Every generation has had its own methods of escape. For previous ones, escapism often required physically entering another world. You picked up a book, went to the theater or turned on the TV. There was a distinct moment and choice when you stepped away from reality and into something else.
Generation Z, however, has perfected escapism. There is no need to choose to step through the door when that door is always open. But it is increasingly difficult to know whether we are using that new world to rest or to hide.
Besides this escapism, Gen Z has simultaneously developed an almost obsessive relationship with nostalgia. We are infatuated with returning to childhood shows, old music, outdated fashion and games we played years ago. We romanticize decades we never lived through and turn the past into a refuge we can visit when the present feels particularly difficult to inhabit.
“Nostalgia evolves into a useful coping mechanism for managing life’s pressures, such as career changes, starting a family or navigating other significant milestones,” an article from the University of Florida College of Medicine on the psychology of nostalgia states. “Reflecting on the good ol’ college days or when you bought your first car helps reinforce our core identity, reminding us of where we’ve come from and providing a sense of continuity during periods of change.”
Living in “the good ol’ days” comforts us because the past has already happened. We don’t have to guess how it ends.
The present offers no such guarantee.
Rather, it asks us to make decisions we not yet know how to make. It confronts us about being people we are not sure how to be. It demands we sit with uncertainty instead of simply scrolling past it.
But for most of us, we don’t like that discomfort. So we find another door.
And when that door doesn’t work, we close it. We’ll open another in seconds, only to close that one too. We can easily create an endless, seamless cycle. Try all you want to get out of it, but the only way to escape is through more escapism.
I understand escapism can be restorative. Sometimes we genuinely need to step away from the constant noise. We need stories and tales to remind us that lives exist beyond our own. We need music and poems that let us feel something we cannot quite articulate.
Engaging in escapism can disconnect one from oneself and discourage self-awareness, according to a 2021 research article by Hannu Jouhki. In other words, escapism can be a refuge.
However, the danger comes when the refuge becomes more comfortable than the reality we are supposed to return to.
A refuge is designed to be temporary. It is somewhere you go when the storm becomes too strong, not somewhere you settle down and build a life in so you never have to walk back into the rain.
Psalm 46 calls God “our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”
Perhaps that is the distinction Gen Z needs to make. The question is not whether we escape — we should, we can and we do.
Rather, the question we must confront is whether our escape gives us the strength to return or simply gives us another reason not to.
And yes, I wish I could say the assignment you were stressed about would not be there, but it will. The difficult conversations will still need to happen. You will have to confront the loneliness. The life we keep escaping will still be waiting when the screen goes dark and the noise stops.
So take the chance to escape when you need it. Let your mind wander and disappear for a little while. Understand that escapism is not inherently an abandonment of reality; it can be a reminder that reality is bigger than whatever is hurting or stressing you right now.
But do not confuse the door of escapism with the destination.
Do not spend your whole life walking through infinite doors and running from the hurt and fear of the room you are in.
