My Experience with Modern Technology

Now I’m not going to sit here and lie to you people. I love my phone. If that’s even possible, then yes, I love my phone. Ask anyone in my family and they’ll say I’m glued to it. I always find a way to shoot a text to my friends.

Recently though, I’ve had some problems regarding friends and family and I found that my cellular telephone was just adding to the stress. My original solution to my problems was to move, but when that idea got shot down, I decided I was going to give up my phone. Not for lent or anything, but simply because I wanted to.

In trying to decide how long to give it up for, I had a small debate with myself-one week, or two? In the heat of the moment two Mondays ago, I decided two. Right before leaving for dance, I went down to my mother with a huge metal-free grin on my face and said, “Mom, this is my phone,” I put the phone in her pocket and said, “and you are going to keep it from me for two weeks. Hide it and don’t give it back to me no matter what.”

You may be wondering Why? How? How are you able to give it up just like that? And my answer is simply: I don’t know. For someone who is constantly texting and attached to technology, I don’t quite get how I can give it up and not miss it. Literally, I did perfectly fine. I did it because I figured it would help in solving my issues. The truth is is that yes, it did help. Some people I know still don’t believe me that it has helped. I have solved most of my recent issues and its wonderful. I don’t even care that I might have 30+ texts waiting for me when I get home from school tomorrow!

On the other hand though, I haven’t been completely cut off from civilization. There is a wonderful invention out there called Skype. For those of you that don’t know, Skype is something where you can chat, voice chat, and video chat with friends and family across the world. So instead of having my phone I have been communicating through my friends on Skype. As my wonderful step-dad asked me during week one, ‘Are you replacing your phone with Skype?’ And in my opinion I didn’t because I didn’t say I was giving up technology I just said my phone.

A lot of people these days don’t realize what a huge impact technology and electronics have on our lives. Just look out around us- everywhere you look there are people texting or on the phone. Even adults can’t go anywhere or survive without their phones because of jobs. If they don’t get reception I know plenty of people who will freak out.

So my over-all conclusion to these past two weeks is this: I am so proud of myself for surviving without my phone. I have solved a lot of my issues mainly because it gave my time to think on my own without the pressures of friends constantly. Although these past two weeks have been dramatic at school, it’s nice to know that I can leave it at school and just focus on me and my dance at home.

My suggestion: I suggest that everyone at some point during this year give up their cellular telephone for a period of time. Just see how you do. It doesn’t have to be long but see how your life is different or how things change when you don’t have your phone.

My final thoughts: Now, when I get my phone back tomorrow, I’m not going to magically be one of those people who only texts between 2 and 4 PM and turns it off while doing homework or anything like that. I do believe that I will have more discipline when it comes to texting. Maybe (hopefully) I’ll be able to say ‘gtg do hw’ or ‘ttyl im busy’ more often so I’m not over-stressed out. But in the end, I am very proud that I survived these two weeks and I have no regrets.