We all have this level of comfort that we find with our phones when we go out. If we go to an event or a place out by ourselves where we don’t know anybody, we all feel comfortable looking at our phones right? Make it look like you have friends and you’re busy talking to somebody. We all do it.

I always see all these awesome events I want to go to; concerts, races, stuff like that. I always try and find somebody to go with cause I’m scared of going alone. But what sucks is that most of the time my friends find an excuse not to join me. My friends can be so lame. There’s always a reason we can’t do something, I get it. But why should we let that stop us from going anyway and enjoying it?

I went to my first 5k run ever on the beach this weekend. I almost didn’t go cause nobody wanted to go with me. But I ended up having an awesome time anyway. And I didn’t even have to look down at my phone either.  I met some pretty cool people who also ended up going on their own for the same reason. And these are the kind of people that make you forget to look at your phone.

We all have FOMO (fear of missing out) but we shouldn’t miss out on other things in life just cause you’ll be by yourself. You have way more fun anyway not having to worry if the other person is enjoying his or herself. I haven’t been abstaining too much from my phone lately cause it’s hard (especially with final projects and all), but what I think we should practice more of especially in our generation is enjoying ourselves more without the fear of going alone. It’s crazy to think I wouldn’t have had such a good time last night if I let the fact that I went on my own stop me. We all start out as strangers and you never know who you’re gonna meet and all the friends you’ll make.

I think we as a generation care too deeply about what others think and we honestly shouldn’t. Social media makes us more self-conscious and aware if we are really having fun or not. Like if I didn’t post about it, did it really happen? Or was it fun at all? Yes it was. I had more fun hanging out with strangers at the island running in the dark and drinking some beers than staring at my phone for an hour. And nobody held my hand while I did it either. 

Technology has obviously made our lives a lot easier. From mapping out directions to googling anything and everything we can think of, we pretty much have it made. Does any of that make us lazy??

I ask because I recently came across an article on Time Magazine talking about how “lazy” our generation is. How we wait to move out of our parent’s house till we’re thirty and rather get an education as opposed to starting a family or joining the army. This article was published in 2013, but 3 years later of course it’s still very relevant. Yes this was also written by a man in his 40s.

He has some good points on how we can be narcissistic and feel entitled to certain things and how technology has kept us connected with others all day long but we also lack the ability to interact with those people face to face.

Is technology to blame for us being “lazy” or entitled? No. It’s not our fault we were born in an age when it started booming. If this had happened in any other era, our textbooks would be filled with selfies and whatnot. And maybe even with more of an insight into what politicians and other important figures had thought about certain situations. If only Facebook had been invented back then right?

I am a part of this generation and I don’t consider myself to be lazy. I work full time and attend school full time as well. It is not easy. On my free time I’m either helping out at the tv station at school trying to gain extra credit, filming at baseball games for extra cash or in bed trying to nap. And I have many peers who can say the same for themselves and many who cannot. We are all different and come from many different backgrounds but I do not consider any of us lazy. If anything, most of us have to work harder for what we want.

Here’s a link to the article. I encourage you guys to read this.

   

http://www.prjohnsonenglish.org/uploads/5/3/8/5/5385246/millennials_themememegeneration.pdf

Technology is widely blamed for our lack of exercise. Kids these days rarely go outside to play. Instead they play on their IPad. And yet technology itself has become a huge part of fitness. There’s wristbands and watches that can now track our heart rates and let us know how many miles we walk in a day. A friend of mine had a watch that would keep track of his heart rate. We were smoking cigarettes one day and we used it to see how much one cigarette would affect our heart. And sure enough it did. It was fascinating but mostly amusing. If there’s anything good that comes out of fitness type technology, it’s that it gave us the ability to “connect” with our bodies. We pay attention to how we take care of it more. But it is very time consuming, as you have to keep up with inputting all this information (like if you have apps and such).

As much as I like going to the gym, I don’t own any of these fitness products. No particular reason, I just don’t have anything. But when I work out, I cannot do it without music. Head phones in, world out. I don’t know if it’s cause I rather not be bothered or what but I can’t do it unless I have my music with me. For those 1 or 2 hours, I need it and I think that’s my main attachment with technology. I will not go out for a run unless I have my headphones and music with me. I refuse!!  It separates me, puts me in the zone so I can exercise in front of all these people without feeling awkward that I probably look awkward.

I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels like this. Are there any people out there that do use any products like this?? Do any of these products help you stay healthy or maintain a healthy lifestyle?? Or is it just a distraction?? 

Where does everybody get their news from these days? Ask anybody most would just say Facebook. It's so convenient. Thanks to all the pages I follow and friends I have, I'm pretty up to date on most world news.

My last blog post I promised I would try getting just newspapers for my news. I must say I've become so used to the expediency that is provided by our smart phones and social media.I never realized how impatient I can be. Reading newspapers is definitely not my favorite thing to do. It's a dying profession. And trying to find quarters everyday for it to catch every morning takes a toll on my laundry money but at least I helped out the paper guy on the corner make some. I felt slow. And to be honest the only thing that really caught my attention was big headline news or "front page" stuff. Sports and weather; sorry but I never got that far. If I really wanna put that effort to not use my phone as much then yeah it would be something I can get used to, but it's the lack of expediency that gets to me. I am not a patient person. I want my news now. I think that is also an effect of what smart phones and internet have done to us. Seriously, who even reads real magazines anymore when everything you want to know about a celebrity or entertainment, you can easily google.

I went an entire month without a phone. It was fun and interesting while it lasted. But I had to get one again since I had to take a trip to Dallas. I didn’t want to risk anything happening on the way over there or getting lost in general. San Antonio is whatever; I’ve been there so many times I almost know it (sort of). Dallas is farther and unfamiliar to me.

It’s nothing fancy though. The camera sucks and I don’t have any apps on it which is probably a good thing so I don’t waste the majority of my day just looking at my phone. I miss “going off the radar” like that. It’s like a mini vacation cause nobody can bother you cause you’re unreachable. But I’m reachable again.

 SIGH.

I get a lot of my news through Facebook or CNN but I can’t really remember the last time I read a newspaper. I’m gonna try it out for this coming week just getting my news from that so we’ll see how that goes.  

You know how they say it takes 21 days to develop or get rid of a habit?? I guess I lost the habit of being attached to my phone but I developed the habit of always checking my social media accounts. I use Facebook more than anything to connect with peers, but if I want to discover anything interesting or see what’s going on in the world or the news, I turn to Twitter or Tumblr which then take me to other websites I browse through like Consequence of Sound, NPR, Highexistence among others..

Social media is a huge part of our world now. We wouldn’t know what was going on half way across the world if we didn’t have it. We wouldn’t even be interested in politics the way we are now. We wouldn’t even know where our old classmates are at in life if it wasn’t for social media deeming high school reunions pointless. On the other hand, too much social media can lead to depression on account of having expectations and comparisons to those of other people online.

I want to know what you guys think of the impact social media has had on our society. Good or bad? What impact it has had on our generation and the generations to come? Has it effected our ways of communication or has it improved? 

First road trip I have taken without the use of a GPS or smartphone.

It was eye opening. Lucky for me I already know how to get to San Antonio but where 281 ends and all the other high ways begin, I'm shit out of luck. I didn't think I could do it, to be honest. I wrote the instructions from google maps down before I left home and told my brother I'd be there in 4 hours. Coming and leaving SA was the hard part cause I took so many wrong exits trying to head south. Without the comfort of a GPS telling me where to go, I felt helpless and frustrated at times. I stopped at a store for directions to the hospital when I first got there, and the guy I asked just looked at me and asked me why I didn't have a GPS. (???)  Finding your way around is not that difficult if you're already familiar with the place. I would not do it in completely unknown territory. I'd lose my mind!!
That comfort and that fear right there is the result of a society and generation dependent on technology. And that's all of us and that's scary. If I'm gonna keep up this whole "disconnection" from technology, I'm gonna need to learn to read a map.

Also not being able to reach anybody when you're in a different city for anything really sucks. I don't know how people did it back then to travel or tell somebody they are somewhere so they can meet up. I had a hard time being stuck out of my brother's apartment with no way in and no way of reaching my dad to know where he was at with the key. Like NO WAY. They don't have payphones anywhere. I had to wait for EVER!!

If you try it, I'm sure you'll live. It just takes a lot of patience.

If you don't really know the place you're going to, please take a map and bring somebody with you. It's better to be lost with somebody than to be lost alone. And ALWAYS bring a selection of good music cause it's gonna be a long drive.