Blog Wednesday 24th May 2023
Title: Addiction
Today’s topic is about addiction. I’m not talking about addiction to the usual alcohol, drugs, cigarettes etc. I’m talking about the soft addictions to the phone, TV, food, gym and anything that we do to escape reality or for whatever the reason. You can even get addicted to work in some cases. I’m no expert on this matter but I am like a lot of you, addicted to the small screen, ie the phone. I have to admit, from when I get up, to when I go to bed, that shiny, black piece of metal, plastic and glass is always with me. Any chance I get, I’m on the phone searching the numerous social media apps, email and text for something. What am I searching for? The meaning of life perhaps, the next big thing that just broke out in the world maybe, I don’t know. Who knew that the internet would marry a “smart phone” and give birth to this beautiful monster that is devouring us all.
The mobile phone connected to the internet is some sort of reverse engineered alien tech. If you put the phone down for a second and really think about it, the mobile phone shouldn’t be a thing. I mean, have you seen the inside of a phone. It’s just a bit of microchips, metal, plastic and glass. I’m not an engineer, designer or anything like that but how can something that’s that simple looking provide endless supply of information that keeps us hooked that much since the creation of processed sugar. In lot of ways this new tech changed our lives for the better. These days you can find a job, new clients and order food along with anything consumable, heck, you can even find love online within seconds. We are already living some sort of virtual lives. I have to say there are more downsides to the mobile phone than benefits. When I go outside, literally 90% of the people on the streets are staring down on their phones anywhere I go. I don’t know the stats (I can probably google it) but many pedestrians get injured or killed on crossing the road with their eyes glued to the phone. What are we all looking for on the small screen that we can’t find in real life. I’ll tell you what we find in there, bunch of nonsense made by people crying out for help, bad news, porn and so called “information” designed to keep our cortisol levels up. It literally is the new sugar, giving us cheap dose of endorphins followed by a crash that leads to jacked up levels of cortisol so that we are forced to keep consuming the crap.
I’m not totally shitting on the phone. I like consuming motivational contents and information about business and education. But sometimes, I get sucked in for hours on six second videos and find myself hypnotised. It really quite scary. The phone is really nothing more than a fancy yellow pages. In between your favourite videos are ads selling some unhealthy sugary thing, alcohol or app all of which you can do without.
I don’t have the answers here as I myself depend on the phone for work and fun but I’m starting to realise that this small, black shiny thing is taking us all over. I’m not gonna get on the high horse and tell you that I try to use it moderately and I do other non-online things to balance things out, cos I don’t. Even if I go to the beach, gym, cinema or another country, I have to post about it. It really is kind of a big problem. I mean, just look at me, I’m spending an hour typing out this little rant just to post it on my website. I don’t know what’s becoming of us?!
I’m not gonna say, I’ll get better at phone usage cos, that’s not feasible at this point. What I will say is that I will upkeep and practice my writing skills so that I can string more than two words together. I will write physical with pen on paper before I transfer that onto the screen. This rant is not a solution by all means, but I will try my best to treat it as another tool to make life better rather than something that I’m bound to like a slave.
That’s all for now guys.
Talk to you tomorrow.
PEACE