How many times a day do you check your smartphone?
How many times a day do you check your email, facebook, or twitter regardless of device?
How much of your time is spent with your head bent downward and your face washed in the warm white glow of an electronic device?
Do you have a desire to accomplish something, study something, or read something, but the ease and draw of digital amusement brings you back?
Heck, do you want to remember what it was like to talk to your spouse or your friends?
A New Drug
We’re in a peculiar place. Smartphones are these “gotta have it” things that we pay a lot of money for. We use them to “stay connected” to people yet they cause us to be disconnected in meaningful ways. I’m old enough to remember the emergence of cell phones and to have witnessed the change in attitude toward them. It used to be that answering a phone when talking to people, at dinner, etc. was frowned upon as rude. (Because it is.) Now, we expect and accept these interruptions as our drug rings in our pocket and we can’t help but take a hit by answering.
“A little over the top there, Nick!” I’m sure some of you are saying that. I have not one, but two smartphones. I have an iPhone as my personal phone and a Samsung Galaxy S4 for work. I am not anti-smartphone, I am pro-human interaction. I first got a cell phone nearly 17ish years ago. They’re great tools and the advent of smartphones has made them powerful. I now carry in my pocket my music, my notes for college courses, my email, social platforms for engaging others, a camera, and numerous podcasts to listen to. I’m not saying we ought to get rid of smartphones.
What I am saying is that we ought to control them. I’m firmly convinced at present they control us. Next time you go out to dinner, look around and see how many people are staring at phones. Look at tables where only one person is doing it and the other is sadly staring at their dinner guest. I see this often in what looks to be marriages or relationships. Usually the guy is engrossed in their phone while the lady stares sadly at him.
Look at a group of young people who are hanging out. Most of them will be on their phones.
Talk To Me!
When did interpersonal communication become such a task that we can’t tolerate it? We talk until silence hits and then anxiously pull out our phones to studiously ignore someone sitting a few feet away. Are we so uncomfortable being who we are we can’t tolerate a lull in the conversation? On social media there is no lull. We are all awesome online. We’re exactly who we want people to think we are. Carefully crafted profile pictures. We “like” certain things to communicate our approval for things. We engage in conversation we wouldn’t dream to have in person. At least I hope so because if I’m wrong everyone is just really rude and ugly.
When you walk down the street can you bear to keep your phone in your pocket and keep your eyes up? When you sit down to dinner with your spouse can you put your phone in another room and simply talk to them? If you’re with a group of friends can you accept the challenge to actually talk to them rather than like another picture of food on Instagram?
We are humans. We were created by God for relationship. (Genesis 2) God is trinitarian so our need for relationship is not alien to us but natural as our Creator made us in his image. We are not trinitarian, but we desire and indeed need relationship.
Love God and serve Him always. It’s long past time we dialed back our unhealthy addiction to strange cat videos, stalking people on facebook, and trying to show the world how fabulous we are. We don’t need to know everything there is to know about making deck furniture from shipping pallets or decorating the house for every hallmark holiday. We certainly don’t need to argue with everyone we think is wrong.
People are much more interesting when you can talk to them and be with them.
Don’t Just Sit There, Do Something!
“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Don’t just think about what it was like before you had a smartphone. Don’t think about what it would be like to control your use of it. Do it. Turn all the notifications off on your phone so you don’t know every blessed second that someone on the internet did something. If you put your smartphone down for a minute you might just realize it has you on a hamster wheel running nowhere. It’s time to get off.
