Originally Posted by
sefalik
Well, I think that's sort of his point: whenever people aren't "doing" something, they turn to the gadgets. It takes us out of the moment. Even when something exciting happens, many people reach into their pockets for their phone to take a picture or capture a video of the event. To me, you're no longer living in the moment then. I purposely go rid of my smart phone because I didn't like that I myself did those things. Every second I spent not "doing" something, I pulled out the phone. I think you can loose an appreciation for life when you're constantly distracting yourself with various entertainment.
Granted, I'm guilty--I carry my kindle every day to work. And if you're on a long bus commute every single day, I don't see it as a real negative that you might read, play games, text, and so on during that time. But my drive to work takes about an hour, and although I like listening to music or audiobooks, I also spent a lot of drives listening to nothing. Sometimes I'll use the time to think, other times I really don't think about anything. I'm just driving in silence, and it's a meditative sort of experience for me. In the moment. It relaxes me. One thing I've noticed since I've dropped my phone is that I don't get stressed as easily, nor am I as tired throughout the day. I imagine it's because I used to never give myself a break. If I was physically and/or mentally able to hold a phone and play around on it (as in, I had nothing else to "do"), I would.
Anyway, just my thoughts. I'm certainly a bit hypocritical, seeing as I play a lot of games on my PC and do use technology a lot in general. I guess I just like to balance things, and by keeping that much tech on me at all times (the phone; essentially a small computer), I wasn't in balance. I'll nerd out when I'm home, but once I leave, I've got nothing (well, except the kindle, but I don't even get internet access with that outside my apartment, and all that's on it are books).
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