Having seen Saved by the Bell still airing reruns on TV over the weekend, I couldn’t help but think back to what it was like before everyone having a smartphone and “living online.”
Long gone feel the days of running around looking for a payphone and waiting for a phone call. Checking our answering machines, and wondering if we actually had mail. Talking online with a person we had never met, so taboo. Chat rooms. Forums. We had desktop computers, and paper calendars. So retro?
Now, couples and friends sit at dinner with their phone screens keeping them company. Conversations have turned into emojis and snapchats, and in person conversation has dwindled. Recently attending an event, I realized how socially awkward more people are becoming when they’re used to talking less and less in person, and more and more through apps. Where does that leave us for relationships and our day to day social being? Quality of life?
Balance.
Being a digital marketer, my life is surrounded by screens. And I’m a geek about it. I love new technology, new apps, and exploring what’s cool about them, and how they can further my brand, as well as what consumers will find cool about them (as well as me). I am a digital being. But when it comes to my life, I need balance. I need a moment to kick back and take a moment away. Have face to face interactions. Have physical exercise that allows me to exert myself away from the daily madness. Time to walk around the city, listening to the sounds of my favorite music, or the sounds the city offers. Read an actual book. Flip actual pages of a magazine. Play fetch with my furball.
Giving myself a moment to escape.
Escape the digital world we have built around us. The world we live in and survive by. I don’t know what I’d do without my iPhone or my other technologies, but I do know, that I need a break from them each week in order to appreciate them more. To take a step backward, a step back when I was a kid and ran around with a basketball and worn book.
A moment to radiate daily.
#radatedaily
