Did you ever have a day when your computer just froze up on you when you were in the middle of something really important? Or your mobile battery wouldn’t last for more than two minutes and you were lost and needed to call someone urgently?
Or the new gadget you purchased went wrong a day after the warranty got over? And the list can go on, can’t it? Don’t you agree in some ways that to err is human, but to screw things up in a really bad way requires technology? And that sometimes technology gets so embedded in our lives, that when they go wrong, we feel that our lives are thrown out of gear?
All of us today are surrounded by technology all around – be it from the tip of your pen to your credit card, from refrigerators to incinerators, from satellite communication to cell phones. Ask any professional, and s/he would not hesitate to say “My BlackBerry runs my life.”
Our uber-connected lives have made us virtually available at any time, at any place – the subway, the aeroplace, traffic lights, you name it. We are now more wired than ever. Although millions join social networking sites to ‘connect’ to their friends, they are getting more ‘disconnected’ from life as 1 out of every 2 Americans suffers from depression!
Researchers from the University of Glasgow found that half of the study participants reported checking their email once an hour, while some individuals check up to 30 to 40 times an hour. An AOL (America Online) study revealed that 59 percent of PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) users check every single time an email arrives and 83 percent check email every day on vacation.
The study also examined how different technologies were used in the context of education. “Shockingly,” said Professor Andrew Kakabadse, “a high proportion of teenagers (59.2%) admitted to inserting information straight from the internet into schoolwork, without actually reading or changing it. Almost a third (28.5%) deemed this as acceptable practice despite recognising that such behaviour is considered plagiarism.”
Although technology has made life so much more easier for us, our stress levels – individually and collectively – keep increasing every day, and life gets tougher despite all our efforts to make it easier. And through some funny equation, the very purpose of technological innovation gets defeated when the advancement of technology makes life more miserable than easier.
We would not like to blame the technology, but rather the unrestricted minds of those which use such technologies and thereby get entangled in their own mind-web. Maybe it’s time to shut down Windows™ for some time of the day and open up vistas to a happier, more relaxed life through the window of spirituality ?
The Bhagavad Gita (18.37-39) says that something that begins with excitement and ends in disappointment is in the modes (guna) of passion (Rajas) or ignorance (Tamas), whereas something that might take a bit of an effort in the beginning, but ends in joy is in goodness (Sattva). In which mode do you want technology to help your life? Do you use technology or do you get used by it?
The comic strips © Bill Watterson
The idea and reflective essays © Abhishek & Adhiraj
Like this:
Be the first to like this page.
