Isn’t it great that we have modern technology to simplify our lives. Or is it?
I’m self-employed and spend much of my time at the computer. Modern technology is fantastic in the way it has helped me save time and effort on many tasks, such as banking, finding information on any subject online, paying accounts, quickly correcting typing mistakes and instantly connecting with people around the world. Technology has helped me to simplify my life.
On the other hand, technology has complicated my life. While at my computer I found I was often distracted with emails, Facebook, news and sports bulletins, on-line articles and blogs. It’s insidious.
A while back I read about an author who does not use email and has no phone in his office, so there are no distractions. I thought, :how great that would be, I’d love to be able to do that”.
Then the penny dropped. Of course I could, it was simply a matter of turning off my phone and not opening the internet or emails until it suited me.
This led me to critically analyse my online habits. I realised that by scanning most news and sports headlines, without reading the full article, I could still be informed about what was going on in the world and save a hellava lot of time.
Similarly I recognised that the majority of online articles I read were of little value to me and I was really indulging in distraction. And is the sky going to fall in if I don’t instantly respond to emails? Probably not… and if it does, then it doesn’t really matter. So, I turned off the indicator that signals when an email arrives and now check emails twice a day, which is plenty.
Then there is Facebook… the ultimate timewaster. Rather than drop Facebook, I decided to scroll rapidly and speed read, without getting caught up in it. This alone saved a huge amount of time. In turn, I slashed what I posted to Facebook, thus doing my buddies a favour by reducing the amount of distraction in their lives.
Yet more importantly, why had I been distracting myself? What was I distracting myself from?
Through the presentations by Serge Benhayon from Universal Medicine I realised that I was using distractions to numb myself to hide from and not accept the absolute love that I hold within. By doing so I held back from being open and willing to share and receive love.
It was as if I felt I was not worthy, hence I used distractions as a means to bury and keep me further removed from love. Crazy?!
The technology was not the problem. I was.
So now I’m choosing to use technology as a tool, rather than be numbed by the endless distraction technology can offer. It’s simply a matter getting on with life.
I’m making progress… which is my cue to stop typing right now.
By Rod Harvey, Gold Coast, Australia
319 Comments
This is a brilliant blog as you have come to the realisation that it is not the technology that’s the problem but you not accepting the beautiful you in full. And how many of us cannot accept or maybe believe we are in fact worthy of the divine love that is on offer to everyone every Nano second of the day.
Anything that keeps us from Love is crazy, because, we are simply choosing an ill energy, as we have on offer our divine connection to our essences (Soul) and thus living in the appreciation of what God is offering in every moment?
Anything that keeps us from Love is crazy, because, we are simply choosing an ill energy, as we have on offer our divine connection to our essences (Soul) and thus living in the appreciation of what God is offering in every moment?
Technology does have uses and does have it’s place. However it is also being horribly misused and used to abuse. It’s not the computers fault, it’s how we use it.
With the technology of the motor car it depends who is driving the car whether it is a useful tool or a hazard to the driver and everyone else.
Absolutely Mary, and it can be said it is the same with a gun it is the person and the energy they are connected to that pulls the trigger, as a Soul-fully connected being would never be involved in these mass murders!
When I think of social media I can see how technology has played a massive part in dropping standards, lowering the bar and allowing abuse to be the norm.
It’s crazy how we can spend hours on social media and not accomplish anything. Sometimes I go on Facebook and I give myself 15- 30 minutes to catch up with my relatives (thankfully a small family). It’s all designed to hook us in and then spend hours reading things that have no true value.
Technology has huge potential to support us in our everyday lives but we are the ones who have the choice whether we use it responsibly or use it to check out. We can justify as much as we like but the reality is that we know when we are being productive and when we are checking out.
A great realisation and understanding, yes, its how we are with ourselves and then with technology, ‘The technology was not the problem. I was.’
If anything soical media had led us to become more unsoical than ever before!
I know from my own experience that I feel more disconnected to myself and others after staring at social media for an extended period of time.
So true Leigh we have amazing tools but we need to discern when to use them and when face to face communication is more appropriate. So much on social media is portraying an aspirational lifestyle which is unachievable for many.
Great to keep technology in its place, and not let it run your life, ‘So now I’m choosing to use technology as a tool, rather than be numbed by the endless distraction technology can offer.’
For me there is almost a correlation to how often I check my phone for emails or go online on my computer with how I am with myself. The more I am focused and feel my body filled with love and my movements made with love the less technology I use as distraction but to support me.
It is so true – we forget we are in charge!!! The technology does not have legs, it does not chase us! So turning off notifications and actually not opening mail when working at your computer is a great first step to reclaiming your time and space.
In the end we can always find something to distract us from feeling, accepting, and living the amazing love that we all have within us, whether it be via computers, a hobby, excessive work, or exercise. It comes down to beginning to take care of ourselves in a way that we begin to feel that self-loving way is our natural way and that anything that hinders, numbs, or blocks the connection with our essence does not belong anymore.
Sometimes we tell ourselves that we are using Facebook as a way to catch up with our relatives, see what’s going on but let’s face it we only post what we want people to see and not what’s truly going on. No amount of Facebook checking will be able to replace having a proper conversation with our loved ones.
I realised that checking Facebook was using 80% of my data on my phone. I could recognise that I was going to it like a drug almost. A nervous energy constantly checking it but I wasn’t even sure why, it is not like there is anything super exciting on it. I have since deleted it from my phone and it has made a huge difference to my day. I don’t feel owned by it or am not using it to seek relief.
Technology is what we make it – curse or blessing. If we become dependent, use it to numb and desensitise ourselves we are its slaves; if we use it wisely, it can become our servant.
Is it is what you think about technology ?
Mobile phones are more addictive than slot machines and very similar to them in many ways too. That said, it is not the technology that is the problem. It is the choice to distract ourselves that we need to deal with.
You need to be 18 in most places to get into a betting shop or casino. These days most school children I see have smart phones. It’s a medium for addiction that is not yet realised or widely controlled.
It feels lovely having a lid on my new phone as I close the lid whenever I feel I need to focus on some work without being distracted.
Technology, like anything temporal we have access to in this day and age can be utilised for evolution or for comfort or distraction. It is always a matter of how what the quality of our approach, as the purpose behind all our actions is what leads us to the quality of life we experience.
“Through the presentations by Serge Benhayon from Universal Medicine I realised that I was using distractions to numb myself to hide from and not accept the absolute love that I hold within. By doing so I held back from being open and willing to share and receive love.”- This habit I can absolutely relate to, as I have noticed lately that there is a pattern I tend to fall into that whenever I am feeling more connected to my true inner self and am having a greater sense of awareness to what is going on in my life and for other people I tend to distract myself with things on the internet almost as if it is some reward for myself doing so well and feeling great. But the irony is that this quickly makes me feel yucky as if I am just wasting my time and life away via pointless distractions and information that in the end will not serve anyone. This blog surely helped me to see some of the reasons I may be doing this.
What was under the tree this year? What would be the percentage of gifts that did not require batteries? We now have IOT ‘information of things’ so we can now control things like; the coffee maker, room lights, the temperature of our house, see and talk to who is ringing our doorbell. The list is endless. But, are these tools or are they just another way to disconnect from others?
Technology potentially be about supporting connection and understanding but the way that most of us use it is definitely time wasting and distraction. I go through periods when I do not linger on social media but some times I do and it is a sign for me to look out for, I agree it supports us deeply to be aware of our relationship with technology and how we are using it, rather than taking how we are with it for granted.
It is interesting to consider that we do seek to simplify our lives, which you can’t argue technology has done to some degree, so that we have more time. But the question is what is it that we want more time for, and what is it that we are filling up this space with? Are we seeking to simplyfy our lives in order to have more time to escape? Or are we making it count with purposeful activity that supports us to deepen our connection to who we are and with others, in order to grow, progress and truly advance ourselves.
I agree escape is a big thing for most of us, we dream of holidays, food, computer games and the next block buster TV series rather than think we want space to offer something back or to support our own self care. I put my hands up to seeking escape, it is false however like a mirage in the desert it does not hold the quality we seek. When we want to seek escape from stimulation outside ourselves we will not be elevated of the tension we feel, which is what we are in fact attempting to mask. We feel squeezed, squashed and isolated and we want to feel space, we connect with space by honouring ourselves, caring for our bodies and being purposeful in life and not making it all about the myself, I and me.
Technology can be very consuming using it for wanted pleasure that you are not giving to yourself or trying to understand how it works. I work in IT and if it is not used for the purpose to connect through yourself by extending your expression of passion, I have found I use it to extend my lack of expression.
What I’ve come to realise is that, in order to be in front of a computer and not being caught by the whole amount of information that the internet offers, I have to be really focused, holding the purpose that takes me there in that moment. If not, if there is a little bit of need of escape or comfort, my energy and time quickly disappear.
I have grown up with the birth of the internet that started with a green screen that was replaced with Windows One that had a mouse thing to move an arrow around the screen. The genie had been let out of its bottle never to return. Have we now occupied the space in the magic lamp the genie left behind, that is called the world wide web?
It really is so obvious that technology has not simplified things… Quite to the contrary… But of course it cannot be just in itself vilified, humanity has a propensity to distract itself because to be truly still would be to feel the awful mess that we have got ourselves into.
” The technology was not the problem. I was. ” Thank you Rob this is such an important statement. People blame technology when in truth its the way people live is the difficulty.
Yes there are lots of ways that technology can simplify our lives as long as we are discerning and use it purposefully. There are also ever increasing ways that it can massively distract us and cause major complications but it is not the technology that is at fault but the humans who choose how they use it.
One but needs only to look at three years, since this blog was published and the way technology has bounded forward. Faster, cheaper and smaller. IOT (Internet of Things) is now a part of our lives! Everything can now be connected! Is there a flashback to that movie where machines all over the world were connected to everything and decided we were the problem? It’s our choice of how we now use this technology to move us all forward or let the machines take over.
By reducing the amount of distractions in our day to day lives we make more space to be able to focus on what actually is important.
Ha! That’s some great awareness Rod. I love how simple it can all be, this need to be so immediate with emails etc is crazy. I had never considered not getting email notifications. I LOVE the idea of only checking once or twice a day, but I’m not sure how well I would do at that! Much to ponder on here.
I remembered using windows 1 and worked with someone that was using a strange cube to do graphic work things on something called a Mac. These were tools for doing simple things. The main feature was a word processor with its noisy dot matrix printer. All of this was just 31 years ago. The first digital watch was 37 years ago, and all it did was tell the time. Today, technology is in everything, which is perfect for trees for who prints today? Or, is it bad for trees for all the boxes to ship the things we buy on line? It is our choice to use the tools of technology and evolve or sit and just spin our tires and go nowhere!
It is scary to see how reliant on technology we have become, and for some of us having grown up with these things available to us, and then there are those of us who remember the first telephone being installed within the house which was huge in it’s day, let alone the first colour TV. We may have more instant access to technology but it does not feel as though we have grown as people.
It is easy to lose ourselves in Social Media and get affected more than we know by what we read which is feeding us a lot more than we acknowledge. It is important to stay present and discern and use and contribute to it but not be used by it.
A great example of how we can be so trigger happy blaming an aspect of our life like technology, yet often if we take a moment to truly reflect we will realise it comes back to us and our own relationship with it. It is up to us and our own responsibility if we use technology to distract, check out or grind ourselves into the ground, or if we use it as a support toward a true purpose.
Technology is great if used appropriately but not good if we indulge in it – it becomes an addiction like anything else we don’t apply balance to.
I find when I stay on the computer too late in the evenings it’s too stimulating & it disturbs my sleep; so to support me I’ve learnt to switch it off by 7pm.
Thank for this blog, it is a great reminder that we have a choice and also a purpose. If there is no true purpose in using the technology why indulge. For me know I check my emails a few times a day when I know I have key projects running, otherwise it could be even once a day. I find this really support for me.
I love what you show us here Rod, that it always comes back to us, that we can decide how our life is and unfolds. We need to stop blaming everyone and everything else for what is happening to us and take our lives in our own hands and live in a way that we like the world to be, otherwise nothing will change but only get worse, and we keep on living in a way we do not want to live.
I agree it is very much about how we use it rather than how we are used by it. I use it a lot and find it fantastic.
I like this, how we can blame technology for so much, when actually we are the ones using it for all the different purposes we attach to it – such as numbing or distraction.
” I realised that I was using distractions to numb myself to hide from and not accept the absolute love that I hold within.” I am finding this more and more true lately, that I wonder off in my mind to avoid feeling and claiming that I am worthy of living life from a place of connection to this love within me as my guide.
As with most things, it is the way we use them that is crucial – whether that be food, technology, exercise, anything at all. We can choose to indulge and distract ourselves or we can actively and consciously engage and imbue every activity with purpose.
Great blog Rod, a problem that many of us have caught up in the continual endless information that the internet provides. Becoming aware of wasting time in checking out offers us more time to get on with life.
Ha ha Rod that cue at the end made me giggle! You have given me food to consider here – Do I really need notifications of when I have an email? Can I work in a more focused and efficient way? I probably could and it needs to start now. Thank you for my new beginning!
I know how easily it is to get distracted whilst on the computer, I mean sometimes after reading someone’s blog, I then start reading comments and then freak out because an hour has passed and I should have left for work already.
Awesome Rod, yes I know it’s not about ditching everything and go into the forest and eat bark but to have a bit of discipline and discernment and it will all be fine.
Thank you Rod! Technology can be a trap for many of us if we are not on the ball. While it saves time in many ways it takes it away in others.