Switch off

Is it time to disconnect from a hyper-connected world?

It was a Whatsapp message from my nephew that first alerted me to the fact that something was up. “Hello, I’m not going to be using a phone any more,” he announced cheerily to all his contacts. “If you’d like to get in touch, I’d be delighted to hear from you on email.” It’s now been a few weeks since that announcement and Arjun maintains that he’s never been more at peace than since he gave up on his phone. There are no incessant calls and messages, both personal and professional, no constant notifications from social media platforms; instead there is blessed quiet in which he can hear himself think.

I would have dismissed this as just my nephew being his usual eccentric self – he did, after all, give up on being a successful lawyer to train in drama therapy – if I hadn’t meet many other millennials since then who also seem to be disenchanted by phones and what they are doing to their lives.

One of them confessed that she felt so stressed at the thought of having to take work calls at all hours of the day that just the ring of her phone was enough to trigger an anxiety attack. Another had deleted all social media apps like Twitter and Facebook from his phone, using them only when he accessed his laptop, and felt much more productive as a consequence. And then, there was the one who was so concerned by his ‘screen time’ reports (did he really spend 2.3 hours on Instagram on average every day?) that he had downloaded an app that automatically cut off his Internet usage once he had breached a certain time limit.

I could go on, but you probably get the point. I certainly did, and inspired by these young people, over the last fortnight I have attempted to bring down my ‘screen time’ as well (no, you really don’t want to know how long I spend on Twitter every day) and see if that helps me concentrate better on the book that I am working on at the moment. My way of doing this was to activate ‘Airplane mode’ when I sat down to write, so I had to perforce focus on my writing rather than disappear down the rabbit hole that is the Internet.

I must admit that it wasn’t easy to begin with. With an almost Pavlovian response, my fingers kept reaching out for the Twitter or Instagram icon, as my attention wandered from the computer screen in front of me. But when the feed would not – or more accurately, could not – refresh – I had no option but to turn back to my writing. The first few days were tough as my brain rewired itself to focus on one task rather than flitting from one to another as it had become accustomed to doing. But after a period of time, I actually began to look forward to these islands of time when I could concentrate on one thing to the exclusion of all else. And now, two weeks later, I can’t even begin to sit down to write without first activating ‘Airplane mode’ on my phone.

One happy outcome of this is over the last fortnight, my screen time is down by 47 per cent. And it would be even lower if it wasn’t for the fact that I have downloaded the Kindle app on my phone and do all my late-night reading on it.  The time I spend reading news sites is still a bit high, but I justify it to myself by calling it work (which, in a way, it is) rather than pleasure. I dip into Twitter only once or twice a day, and I feel much calmer – and much less outraged! – as a consequence. And I treat Instagram like a late-night treat rather than an hourly indulgence, which makes me appreciate it a lot more.

I am now pushing the envelope a little further by leaving my phone behind when I go on my daily walks. It felt a bit strange at first, not being able to listen to music or an audio book as I ambled through Lodhi Garden. But as I walked on, I began to appreciate the real world around me a lot more when I didn’t have a distracting soundtrack playing in my ear. I drank in the beauty of the flowery verges, the majesty of the monuments that suddenly sprang up on me, and the sweet sound of birdsong as the sun set on another day.

In a way it was a throwback to a gentler time, to my mobile phone-free youth, when I used to leave work in the evening and head straight out for a bracing walk secure in the knowledge that nobody could get hold of me for the next hour or so no matter how hard they tried. This is not a feeling that most young people these days are at all familiar with, given the hyper-connectedness of their lives, when they are never truly off the grid. Work mails keep pouring in at all times, bosses Whatsapp at odd hours and expect an instant comeback, and parents want to know exactly where you are and what you are doing at any given time.

No wonder the poor dears want to turn their phones on silent, or even switch the damn things off. In this day and age, sadly, that’s the only way to get some peace and quiet – and a tiny sliver of time to yourself.

Attention, please!

In this age of hyper-connectivity, have we lost the ability to live in the moment?

Last week in Chennai I had my first experience of an A.R. Rahman concert. Given that I am a huge fan, I was looking forward to seeing him perform live along with his troupe of super-talented musicians. And Rahman did not disappoint, playing all his biggest hits and then some, with Hariharan and Sukhvinder coming on to do their bits.

What intrigued me, though, were the people sitting around me. Instead of immersing themselves in the music, clapping in rhythm or even singing along – as keen concert-goers should do – they were all busy on their phones. Some were holding them aloft to take grainy pictures; others were recording (even grainier) videos; some were updating their BBM status to tell their extended social circle that they were watching Rahman LIVE; others were doing much the same on Facebook.

None of them were doing what they had presumably come here for: to listen to Rahman and his band play. They were so busy recording the event or telling other people that they were at it, that they had lost sight of the essential purpose of why they were here: to listen to a live performance.

Many musicians have complained about this cell-phone nuisance, where people are more engaged with their mobiles than the music during a performance. And some have even said that this new practice of everyone ‘recording’ what it is going on actually takes away from the energy of the show. And given my own experiences of live music events, I have to agree.

But more than that, I can’t help but wonder if this is not just another indicator of how we have lost the ability to live in the moment.

We can no longer just listen to a singer belting out his greatest hits. We are not content to hum along, clap in time, or even dance. No, even the event unfolds before us, we feel this compelling need to record it and then share it on social media to prove what interesting, fulfilling, fun-filled lives we lead. I can bet that none of the people recording the Rahman performance on their mobile devices will ever look (or hear) that clip again. The only time they will whip it out is when they need to tell someone else about how they were at this ‘awesome’ concert.

And it’s not just music concerts alone. Even in movie theatres, people seem unable to succumb to a willing suspension of disbelief for a couple of hours. No, they must post their thoughts and mini-reviews on Twitter or Facebook even as the action unfolds; or at the very least, BBM or IM their friends to tell them how it’s going. Thankfully, it is illegal to record a movie on a mobile device or else we would have to contend with the mobile-held-aloft syndrome in cinema halls as well.

But it is on holidays that our inability to live in the moment becomes most obvious. Instead of enjoying the sight of a riveting sunset, we are busy adjusting camera settings so that the redness of the sky can be faithfully captured for the family album. Rather than feast our eyes on the majesty of a tiger in the wild, we are struggling to frame him perfectly against that clump of trees. Instead of feeling the sea breeze in our hair, the warmth of sunshine on our backs, or the flakes of snow as they waft past our faces, and just enjoying the moment, we are so focused on recording it that we destroy its essential magic. In making sure we remember the moment, we fail to actually savour it.

Focussing on even the simplest thing seems to beyond us these days. We cannot watch a TV debate without venting our outrage on Twitter. We cannot read a book without stopping to check the newsfeed on our phone. We cannot try a new recipe in the kitchen without posting a picture on our blog so that everyone can exclaim over it. We cannot eat in a restaurant without taking pictures of every dish so that we can share it on social media.

Oh well, you get the picture.

The only problem is that we don’t. Or at least we don’t see it for what it is. Instead, we are deluded enough to tell ourselves that all this flitting between stuff is a good thing. We pat ourselves on the back and tell ourselves that we are really great at ‘multitasking’. Oh look, how clever I am! I can watch a TV show, check the latest news headlines on my laptop and tweet on the phone AT THE SAME TIME! Isn’t that AMAZING?

Well, since you ask, it is anything but amazing. It is, in fact, a bit shaming that we cannot bring ourselves to commit to any one thing at any one time. It is, in fact, a sign of our ever-decreasing attention spans, a sad corollary of our frenetic lives in the age of hyper-connectivity. And it doesn’t look as if it’s going to get better any time soon.