This column, written by LVEDC President & CEO Don Cunningham, originally appeared in The Morning Call and on the newspaper’s website on Feb. 9, 2025.
That which is often closest to our eyes goes unseen.
In a time of the relentless pounding of news and information, Tik-Tok and Reels, Instagram and texts, streaming services, reality television and cable channels, the human senses and emotions are subjected to more than one can handle. 
Our primal genetic coding triggers alarm, outrage, anger, fight, or flight. We can’t look away. For we are only human. We are titillated and amused, disturbed and aggravated, charmed and entertained.
We are no match for the algorithms of information.
Our bodies and minds were programmed for a different time. And while we’ve made progress in overcoming and evolving the hard wiring that early humans needed to survive among the dinosaurs and saber-toothed tigers, the age of technology and information is a new challenge.
The only defense is to shut it off. But to be employed, raise children and to function in a society that requires we be connected it’s not possible to do so permanently. It’s a battle for little victories — snippets of time when our minds and eyeballs are our own.
When the aphorism was written about not seeing the forest for the trees it was a world of many more forests and trees and no 24-7 news cycles. Today, it takes great work and discipline to see either the forest or the trees.
In hearing of nearly everything that occurs everywhere in real time we remember and learn next to nothing. For it remains true that the 5-pound bag can’t hold 10 pounds of sand. Our brains purge the overflow of today’s information in a day or so to make room for the next day’s new barrage of tweets, snippets, cat videos and headlines.
Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote in the 1800s that “man only likes to count his troubles; he doesn’t calculate his happiness.” That is why the predominate view of Americans polled today is that they are less happy and satisfied despite having more wealth and resources than any human that has ever lived.
Bad news sells. It gets our eyeballs and clicks. We are programmed to be on guard to sense danger and prepare for trouble.
Our primal brains and self-defense wiring typically see the source of trouble as coming from “others” — potential attackers from other species or humans outside the tribe. Elected and unelected demagogues have always understood this and used it. Bad news both sells and motivates. It generates votes easier than calls for self-examination or personal responsibility.
Long gone is President Reagan campaigning on the idea of it being “morning in America” or President Kennedy asking, “not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.”
This deluge of information that fires synapsis, releases endorphins and generates clicks creates a blurred vision that makes it difficult to notice that which is closest to our eyes.
In our little corner of the world, here in the Lehigh Valley, last year, we reached milestones and received recognitions as never before, some to little notice.
Not only was the region’s economic output the largest in history at $55.7 billion in Gross Domestic Product, more than that of three states, Alaska, Wyoming, and Vermont — but median wages at more than $22 per hour and median household income at $81,700 also broke records.
More people than ever were employed, 339,615, with manufacturing jobs reaching 37,000, higher than at any time since the days of steelmaking. Manufacturing is 16% of the region’s total economy, while 12% in the U.S.
The chugging Lehigh Valley engine that could also began to draw recognition from around the nation and the world.
The Moravian Church Settlements of Bethlehem were added to the UNESCO World Heritage List, one of only 26 locations in the U.S. to receive the prestigious honor that recognizes sites across the globe for cultural and historical significance.
For the fourth consecutive year, a Lehigh Valley community ranked on Realtor.com’s annual list of hottest ZIP codes. The 18062 ZIP code includes Macungie and parts of Lower Macungie and Upper Milford townships in Lehigh County.
The West End theater district in Allentown was named one of the top underrated locations by a national nightlife website while Easton’s downtown was ranked as one of the best in Pennsylvania by WorldAtlas.
Lehigh Valley International Airport finished second as America’s best small airport and Historic Hotel Bethlehem the country’s best historic hotel in reader’s choice awards by Newsweek and USA TODAY.
Bethlehem was named one of America’s “Top 100 Best Places to Live,” by Livability.com, a website that ranks America’s most livable mid-sized cities, and the best place to go in the U.S. at Christmas by CNN.
But it’s not the rankings or statistics that matter in the end. It’s just realizing that in these times of angst and endless information that those of us in the Lehigh Valley inhabit a special place of opportunity and livability.
We just need to take an evening, shut off the information flow and enjoy that which is often unseen.