Have you noticed how our society is moving away from “literary thought” and speeding towards “media guided thinking”? Our thoughts no longer get charged from something we read in the morning newspaper, a magazine, or a book that we could curl up with… no, our thoughts have become a jumbled smush of micro minutes (often Nano1 seconds) fluttering from one topic to another. Why is this?
The always-on world has become a set of handcuffs. I’m feeling deep concern about the loss of times to just “think” being replaced by reacting to the latest bit of information that the tone on my PDA is alerting me to. We are often too busy to take time to pause and even consider what is important.
Not only do we not think, the experiences that we are having right now are often not valued. Our world has become an always-on world. Our lack of focused attention has moved us to worry about what we’re missing, what else is going on simultaneously with what just might be more important than what we’re doing right now. Therefore, what we’re doing now is devalued because it might in time prove out to be not as important as something else that we could have done, so we’re caught not appreciating the moment because of what else might be happening.
Take a look at this three-minute clip of Renny Gleeson2 (found on TED), he talks about the ‘always-on world’ and the way we've learned to handle the constant thirst for the information flow that we are addicted to:
While I don't approve of some of Reeny's language, seen and heard in this clip, I don't think we can afford to miss the message being presented.... We as a society are addicted to the 'connected' need-more-information-now-streaming. We're 'always-on' and we don't have time for anything else, but to tragically grasp for more bytes of information to satiate our addiction.
A famous King of old once wrote: “I will remember the works of the Lord. Yes, I will remember the amazing things you did long ago! I will think about all you have done; I will reflect upon your deeds!3” Are we to advanced to stop and consider? There is much to learn from what has happened – can we still take time to ponder? That same King took time to ponder and then exclaimed: “O God, your deeds are extraordinary!4”
I think it is time for us to unbuckle ourselves from all the 'speed' in the 'always-on' streaming and take some time to meditate as part of our Sojourn. When that famous King did that, he exclaimed, “May the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.5”
Along the way of My Sojourn, I've found the words of the song, 'Listen to our hearts' by Steven Curtis Chapman & Geoff Moore to go deeper and reflect thoughts in my heart - away from the busy 'always-on' world around me. Be extravagant, take some time, and listen to the words....
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1. Nano: The root comes from the Greek for dwarf. The prefix was formally adopted in the late 1940s to mean one-billionth (10-9) part, as in a nanometer. The construction had been floating around since the early part of the 20th century. Nano along now carries the connotation of the very small, typically on the nanometer scale. A bond between two carbon atoms is about 1/10 of a nanometer.
2. Renny Gleeson: Busted! The sneaky moves of anti-social smartphone users
3. Psalms 77:11-12 (the King was David; 1023-971 BC)
4. Psalms 77:13
5. Psalms 19:14
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