My friends laugh at my lack of technological mores... I only
turned to a laptop when my bulky behemoth of a PC exploded (yes really); I got
the Internet at home about five years after everyone else; and I still don’t have a smartphone (just a
£12 handset that does two things: calls and texts. Because that’s all I need it
to do. Really).
It took a lot of convincing to get me on Facebook, and even
more to set up this here blog. I like my photos to be printed so I can flick
through them, old-skool stylee, in an actual album, though I do upload them
onto my laptop (but only so I can change the wallpaper when it takes my fancy!).
I like my music on CDs, though when the Walkman (yes, really) packed up several
years ago, I had no choice but to invest in an MP3 player, so now I download
tracks...but never albums, because that’s what CDs are for. And I can play them
in the car, hah! (I do know that you can attach iphones etc to car stereos...I
just don’t want to.) And don’t even get me started on ebooks...! You can guess
what my personal preference is – but I do accept that we can’t stop the technological
evolution!
As you can see, I dip in and out of today’s technological
life as and when it suits me – and earlier today I almost didn’t look up. I
almost didn’t stop scrolling. Statuses spooled and spooled up the screen, my
eyes scanning for the ‘why’ – the why I’ll stop and read; why I’ll give someone
my time. I almost didn’t take the second to click the link to read a particular
shared status. I almost didn’t listen.
But I did. I listened to and loved Look Up by Gary Turk (click to listen or scroll down to read my transcription –
because I can’t be without actual text, me!).
When I heard this, I heard Gary Turk telling us to find
balance. To me, he isn’t telling us to ignore the technological world, he’s
telling us not to be a slave to it. He’s telling us to live a real-time, real
life. Now get out there and live it. I am.
Look Up - by Gary
Turk
I have
four-hundred-and-twenty-two friends, yet I am lonely. I speak to all of
them every day, yet none of them really know me.
The problem I have sits in the spaces between looking into their eyes or at a
name on a screen. I took a step back and opened my eyes; I looked around and
realised the media we call social is anything but.
When we open our computers, and it's our doors we shut. All this
technology we have it's just an illusion. Community companionship, a sense of
inclusion yet, when you step away from this device of delusion, you awaken to
see a world of confusion.
A world where we're slaves to the technology we mastered, where information
gets sold by some rich greedy bastard. A world of self interest, self image, self
promotion. Where we all share our best bits but...leave out the emotion.
We’re at our most with an experience we share, but is it the same if no
one is there? Be there for your friends and they'll be there too, but no one
will be if a group message will do.
We edit and exaggerate, crave adulation. We pretend not to notice the
social isolation. We put our words into order and tint our lives a-glistening.
We don't even know if anyone is listening!
Being alone isn't a problem, let me just emphasize: if you read a book,
paint a picture, or do some exercise, you're being productive and present, not
reserved and recluse. You're being awake and attentive and putting your time to
good use.
So when you're in public, and you start to feel alone, put your hands behind
your head, step away from the phone! You don't need to stare at your menu,
or at your contact list. Just talk to one another, learn to coexist.
I can't stand to hear the silence of a busy commuter train when no one wants to
talk for the fear of looking insane. We're becoming unsocial, it no longer
satisfies to engage with one another, and look into someone's eyes. We're
surrounded by children who, since they were born, have watched us living like
robots, who think it's the norm.
It's not very likely you'll make world’s greatest dad if you can't entertain a
child without using an iPad. When I was a child, I'd never be home. Be out with
my friends, on our bikes we'd roam. I'd wear holes on my trainers, and graze up
my knees. We'd build our own clubhouse, high up in the trees.
Now the parks are so quiet, it gives me a chill. See no children outside and
the swings hanging still. There’s no skipping, no hopscotch, no church and no
steeple. We're a generation of idiots, smart phones and dumb people.
So look up from your phone, shut down the display. Take in your
surroundings, make the most of today. Just one real connection is all it can
take, to show you the difference that being there can make.
Be there in the moment, when she gives you the look that you remember
forever as 'when love overtook'. The time she first held your hand, or first
kissed your lips, the time you first disagreed and still love her to bits.
The time you don't have to tell hundreds of what you've just done, because you
want to share this moment with just this one. The time you sell you sell
your computer, so you can buy a ring for the girl of your dreams, who is now
the real thing.
The time you want to start a family, and the moment when you first hold your
little girl, and get to love again. The time she keeps you up at night, and all
you want is rest. And the time you wipe away the tears as your baby flees the
nest.
The time your baby girl returns, with a boy for you to hold, and the time he
calls you granddad and makes you feel real old. The time you've taken all
you've made, just by giving life attention. And how you're glad you
didn't waste it, by looking down at some invention.
The time you hold your wife's hand, sit down beside her bed, you tell her
that you love her and lay a kiss upon her head. She then whispers to you
quietly as her heart gives a final beat, that she's lucky she got
stopped by that lost boy in the street.
But none of these times ever happened: you never had any of this. When
you're too busy looking down, you don't see the chances you miss.
So look up from your phone, shut down those displays: we have a finite
existence, a set number of days. Don't waste your life getting caught in
the Net, because when the end comes there's nothing worse than regret. I'm
guilty too of being part of this machine, this digital world, where we are here
but not seen.
Where we type as we talk, and we read as we chat. Where we spend hours together
without making eye-contact. So don't give into a life where you follow the
hype. Give people your love, don't give them your 'like'. Disconnect from
the need to be heard and defined; go out into the world leave distractions
behind.
Look up from your phone. Shut down that display. Stop watching this video. Live
life the real way.
~ ttfn ~
