Unleashed

A few weeks ago, my wife and I were privileged to get new smartphones. I say privileged because we couldn't afford them, and God sent an unexpected financial blessing for us no more than a day before her phone gave up the ghost; mine waited until the day after I activated my new device; reminds you of those stories you hear about couples who die a few days apart. :)

Long story short; a few days ago, my phone started to sound like a land-line with a bad cord. Conversations became nearly impossible given the static. My wife; knowing that I was buried, had mercy on me, packed up the hobbits and headed to Verizon on the way her destination.

As a result, I have been without a phone for the last six hours or so, and while this morning I was worried about what that might do to my day, I have to tell you... it has been wonderful.

Perhaps I am only speaking for myself (I bet not...) that we seem so busy trying to do everything at once that we end up getting little to nothing done.

Don't kid yourself, even if you have ADHD (in HD), you can only do so many things at a time, and for the most part, by so many things I mean exactly one. Multi-tasking is, by-and-large, a myth. Anytime you give some of yourself to an en devour, you are giving less of yourself to another. For instance, if you are trying to skim this piece while watching YouTube, you are missing the point entirely...

Scientists, psychologists, sociologists, and clergymen are actually approaching collective agreement on something: the perks of mobile technology do not seem to counterbalance the pitfalls.Studies have demonstrated that the copious amounts of screen-time we imbibe are actually changing our brains, and could be contributing to a marked rise in insomnia and anxiety in users.We don't need Morgan Spurlock to check this one out for us, you know its true.

We pick up our phone to snap a picture of our kid's game, only to notice that someone has posted a new photo to social media, then see on there comment feed that it is raining tacos... next thing we know the crowd is on their feet because our kid made a goal... but man, wasn't that a funny video?

It goes beyond the office, or the field, to our very souls.

When is the last time that you gave undivided attention to someone? to your kids, or your spouse? to God? It is nigh impossible to get in any prayer or devotional time when we are consistently being pushed updates, emails, breaking news, snapchats (of which I do not partake) and text messages. Even if we disable these features on our devices, there is still that nagging, addictive draw, like a digital nicotine fit, urging us to check our phones just in case the most hilarious cat video in the universe was uploaded and we missed it. Or, how many people liked our selfie, or the photo of that awesome dessert, or if anyone liked our article about how we should spend less time on our devices?

I am going to get on my laptop and find out...