Grab a refill and walk with me . . .
There’s a requirement, though. NO devices other than your phone, and that only for an emergency.
Tuesday morning I had to dodge a young female on a bicycle. She should have seen me walking on a nice, wide walkway in enough time to stay on her own side, for her head was up and her eyes open. No one was home, though. Can you say, “Self-absorbed?” metro.co.uk
Earbuds. Eyes glazed over by Middle Space. The rubber tires were her only contact with Earth. After taking my walking lap around the park, I readied to cross the street. Guess who’d been sitting totally absorbed in her phone and suddenly decided to cross also? Still spaced out via earbuds and texting, she barely kept her bike upright as she waited on me to mash the button to change the light. My texting’s too important to actually push the button myself. And SHH! I’ma hearin’ SWANG.
Processed noise. Garbage in, garbage out.
That’s not all. The only people on the walkway with me who weren’t likewise earbudded was a gabble of women who had perfected the art of conversation sans breath.
Processed noise. And a lot of it!
Point? Every news outlet and all social media process the deluge of daily information they receive. What you get on your screen or through your ‘buds is the processed noise they’ve decided you need to hear.
Processed noise has the same mental/psychological nutrition for your thinking as processed meat does for your body. And for the same reason. Anyone who’s observed processed meat being processed turns bile-green afterwards. Perhaps it’s time we began seeing processed noise with the same disgust. After all, it really is a bunch of baloney.
Spending quality quiet time each day, meditating and praying and listening is vital to your overall health and wellness. May I suggest leaving all devices out of reach and earshot for that time each day?
Simply put, I see a tsunami of mostly useless, entertainment-quality, frivolous, rarely-factual information flowing nonstop through them. You can’t stop the floodgates of ‘news’ and gossip. You can shut down the means by which they have 24/7 access to your mind.
I’m suggesting you do it more. Read more. Take walks more. Sit and listen to the day around you more. Go visit a neighbor. Share coffee or iced tea with them.
Or write.
© D. Dean Boone, June 2017