Getting Unplugged

I started this blog seven years ago. In that time, technology has opened its maw wider and all but swallowed us. People check Facebook umpteen times a day. Texts fly from microwave towers millions of times a minute. We check our email once an hour and access the web with smart phones from just about anywhere. We are psychologically enmeshed with virtual space and technology in general. Enmeshment is a serious psychological condition, and we need an intervention, people.

It's bad enough that we have to listen to other people's conversations on line at the bank and grocery store or while sitting in a doctor's office or walking through Walmart. For example, I don't care whether the woman in front of me is having problems with her promiscuous sister in Arizona. I have enough problems of my own without listening on a daily basis to several dozen that belong to other people. Enough! people's public use of technology is rude, and I also hate being interrupted ten times during a conversation because someone says, "Excuse me, but I have to take this." You're not excused!

As mentioned in my last post, I recently returned from Tibet, where I was on assignment. When I finished my work, I stayed for a few weeks and decided to unplug all the way. No cell phone, no email, no PC. Cold turkey. It was pretty hard, and I felt isolated at first. But then I felt quite peaceful and recalled my childhood, when computers were nothing more than glorified word processors. In Tibet, there was no Internet, no constant demand for my attention, no messages, no calls. It was me and beautiful blue sky with mountain ranges in the background. I'd forgotten what "normal" life felt like. I could actually talk with people and focus on daily activities, like walking and eating and reading a book without interruption. I believe my brain chemistry must certainly have changed, for being "normal" was paradoxically now perceived as an altered state.

I'm stepping back from technology, people. If I don't get every piece of info in a timely fashion, or ever, so be it. Besides, I don't need to know who won American Idol or what Justin Bieber is doing. I have a life to live, and it doesn't depend on silicon chips.

Cat Spaulding.