I took the bus to go home today. That bus was stuck in traffic most of the time, and as the rain was pouring outside, and I began to observe people.
Here is what I saw : 3 girls in the back were looking at their phones, the girl in front of me was doing the same, and she had been since I got in the bus 25 minutes before. As I turned my head towards the front of the bus I saw 4 people staring at their phones, 2 others at their tablets. The rest of them were talking, and a lady was reading a book.
In this observation of bus riders, tell me what the majority of them was doing. They were keeping their mind busy not to get lost in boredom, or maybe to prevent their imagination wander. Oh yes, I took my phone out of my purse too, because seeing those people inspired me this blog post, and I could not wait to begin and write a few ideas.
I am like them. And so are you.
We do have a problem, because even if we were all travelling alone, we may be doing the same with company. In fact, we all do.
The phone is on the table waiting for the next notification, the next call or text from someone who is not with us right now. We forget to be here now, we forget to fully enjoy and feel the moment. And our phone reminds us that we still have an escape if we get bored.
How did this happen?
How did we get so distracted from the real world?
Let me tell you what we are missing: moments with loved ones we can never get back because we are too concentrated on the ones who are not there, connections with strangers who can become close ones, opportunities, things only our eyes can catch but not the inbuilt camera of our smartphones.
We lost the power of imagination, the power to stop and think, the power to focus.
So, can you do me a favour? When you spend a moment with a friend, a sibling, please leave your phone in your pocket.
Facebook can wait.
If this call you are receiving is important the person will call back.
When you are taking a walk, enjoy it.
When you are at home, take a break from your phone for at least an hour to do the things you are procrastinating about, or just to think and focus on you and your goals and dreams.
Get back to enjoying the moment, to focus on the present, and stay in touch with the real world. Life is too short not to enjoy every moment.
Good day! This is my first comment here so I just wanted to
give a quick shout out and tell you I genuinely enjoy reading through your posts.
Can you suggest any other blogs/websites/forums that deal with the same topics?
Appreciate it!
Sure, what kind of subjects are you interested in? There are a few links in my “Resources” page, but there are more I know about
You know what ? I actually was (and still am I suppose) one of those people on the bus, like a zombie on my phone… I tried to reduce the amount of time I spend on it but then I get very frustrated because of the fear of missing out… So I started to actually reduce the amount of people or pages I follow on social medias, concentrating myself only on those that matter the most to me. It’s actually quite shocking to see the difference. I would say I now spend 50% less time on my phone and I’m done checking all my feeds in under 30 minutes!
That gives me so much satisfaction, and allow to spend more time with real people around me.
I actually started doing this when we got that new thing in work : the leadership journey (you might remember this), and one of the focus was “Be here now”…
So once again, thank you for such an inspiring post !
X
Will
I do remember the leadership journey and the Be Here Now subject. Maybe the best that happened to me at the time, it was so powerful! Thanks for reading 🙂