As I approach mid-life (well, I suppose I might already be there
statistically speaking, but I’d rather not think about that right now), I am
more and more aware of how precious our short time here on this rock really
is. I want to be intentional with my
life. Yet, I am so easily distracted from it.
Let me say that again—I am
distracted from my life! How absurd, but I am. I am distracted by the latest sporting event,
the latest “breaking” news story, by the text I just received, by all that
stuff that Upworthy thinks I should hear about, by the podcasts that I have to
keep up with, by so many things. And
some of these distractions are good. I
mean they actually are things that I want to know about. I want to be an informed citizen, I am
interested in what is happening in the world of sports, and I definitely want
to keep up with friends, but it seems like the recent “advances” of technology have
drastically changed the way that I encounter these bits of information and I
don’t know that it is working for me.
As a stay-at-home dad, I
almost always have the opportunity (or temptation) to turn away from a
household chore or playing with my three-year-old daughter to pick up a device
and engage the outside world instead. And even more than that, my phone
can alert me to someone, or something, that wants my attention—right now! A text from a friend, no matter how trivial
has an urgency far beyond it’s content.
The fact that I can check email from anywhere, makes me feel as though I
have a responsibility to do so, notifications of world events from CNN (since
shut off) seem to have a greater pull than their “this-just-in” predecessors on
television. Maybe it’s just a matter of
getting used to these things, but I’m not so sure that is the case.
An example: A couple of nights ago Ohio State played Oregon
in the national championship football game.
Now, I like football, but I don’t follow college all that closely and
have no connection to either school. We choose
not to have cable so I couldn’t watch the game at home, but I had checked the
score on my phone mid-evening and found myself checking back frequently since
it was a close game. I was essentially
“watching” it via sporadic, written play-by-play and stat checks (which, in
case you’ve never tried it, is no way to watch a football game). But after deciding to turn in for the night
(and I really wanted to get to bed because of my new year’s resolution to get
up earlier in the morning), I couldn’t shake the temptation to get up and grab
my phone or ipad and check the score. Why? I didn’t really care. I know that I’ve turned off equally
significant (or insignificant) games on television in the past and easily
slipped into sleep, but for some reason the fact that I knew I could quickly
and easily check the score made the temptation that much stronger. Something about that mode of “watching” made
it harder to turn away from. I had the
will power not to give in, but as I lay there (annoyed that I wasn’t just
falling asleep already!), I realized that my mind—my consciousness—was not where I wanted it to be or where it
naturally would have been had I not checked that score two hours earlier. There are numerous things I’d rather have
been thinking about as I drifted off to sleep that night—reflections on the day
just over, dreams of the future, prayers for my children and family, even simple
plans for navigating the tasks of the week ahead. But instead of using that valuable end-of-day
time on and my life, I was distracted…
Now, maybe this isn’t a big deal. Maybe everyone else is already acclimated to
this way of engaging one another and the world outside and this isn’t a problem
for them. But when I find myself responding to any text
the moment it comes in, or I see the mom at the library completely missing the
fact that her son or daughter just walked into the next section because she’s
glued to her phone, I can’t help but wonder if these ways of connecting with
the world are helping us or if all they really do is offer a constant temptation
to dis-connect from what is before us—our actual life—only to take up the latest
breaking, extremely urgent, needs-to-be-addressed-now… distraction.
If you haven't, read Fahrenheit 451. An eerily accurate prediction of the future to come by a 1950s by Ray Bradbury.
ReplyDeleteThanks. I should give it a re-read. Pretty sure I read it in school at some point and I have to admit that I remember very little except something about burning books.
Delete(I may be posting this twice - apparently I'm blog illiterate now)
ReplyDeleteI had this same feeling last April actually. I felt as though I was missing out on MY life by being so connected and informed to other people's lives. That I wasn't in my own present. So I did the big disconnect. I shut down Facebook, I took every time wasting app off my phone and I made a conscious decision that between 4-7pm I wouldn't have my phone on me. I would be 100% focused on my life, my kids.
It lasted until November of this year when I realized that I'd missed so many wedding and births and deaths that I was appearing as though I didn't CARE rather than the fact that I didn't KNOW. Facebook is the only way people communicate anymore and that scares me.
So now I log in once a week and hope that the quick peruse will update me on the big news. I need to re-impose my own "phone-down" hours, I broke those. But overall, I feel BETTER.
There's actually a book called the Big Disconnect. I have been meaning to read it. I will buy it now and let you know. But just FYI, I'll read it on my e-Reader, does that make it counterproductive?
Thanks, Katie! Your experience illustrates the new space we inhabit so well. I haven't taken the leap of any sort of big disconnect, but I really want to. I want to reclaim my time, but I know that I would be missing out on some things that I truly do value. I just don't know how to get the balance that I seek.
ReplyDeleteWhat you did with defined times of disconnect seems to be a good move, but it takes so much will power and I think the real trick would be to develop that as a real habit (ritual, even) in our lives, so that our brains actually disconnect at those times as well. I've heard of people taking a cue from the Jewish Shabbat to practice a sabbath of sorts from technology for a day each weekend, like literally shutting down all internet connected devices for a full 24 hours each week. That seems healthy to me, it seems important.
I guess what I really want to know is what we are losing if we don't do that, if we don't remember how to be present for ourselves and the people around us without that pull of connection to people and places elsewhere...
I've heard before (I have not researched this one bit, so take this with a grain of salt) that there were similar questions raised when radio was first invented and catching on. And people will argue that we assimilated to radio well enough and that it hasn't diminished our lives but has enriched them. But as someone who easily falls into turning on any sort of conversation I can find on talk radio (political, religious, environmental, anything), I can tell you that we easily become addicted to even something as innocuous as radio, and that just because it has an accepted and healthy role in our society doesn't mean that it doesn't also impact our ability to be present in our own lives.
Smart phones and social media have simply upped the ante and made it that much more important to be mindful of how we are using our technologies. I just wish it wasn't so much work!
I need to add a thought on another aspect of this too. I'm interested in how our ability to share things with everyone all of the time is impacting the way that we share things with the people that we do see regularly. There have definitely been times in my life recently where I have either shared or had shared with me small, everyday happenings or accomplishments through text or email to specific people only to then see those people a day or two later and feel like we have little to talk about. An easy example would be whenever the kids are doing something particularly cute or if they are experiencing something new and I take a picture, I always feel the urge to text and share with someone. But if I text it to someone like uncle Greg, I pull him out of his world whenever he receives that text (which he probably looks at right away regardless of what he is doing) and I then don't have that to share with him when we see him in a day or two. We never wait to tell anyone anything anymore. Again, maybe just something to get used to, but I feel like something is being lost there. Sure we are gaining a level of connection in the moment, but we are losing connection later.
I don't know. I think I've written enough for a comment thread.