Personal Narrative: Dealing With Not Using Technology

We rely on technology for everything in our lives today. It is hard for us to be more than ten steps away from our phone. Dependence on technology is even evident in Fahrenheit 451. In the novel, the TV is everything to some people. It becomes their friend their family and even their life. They even have technology that butters their toast and medical procedures. We use technology everyday whether it is our phone, laptop, or ipod. We use them every single day all day long. If something was not to work for a single day our society would crash with the absence of technology.

Ever since technology began so prominent in the modern world, can anyone remember going outside for more than 30 minutes and not see a cell phone or computer? Probably not, as these pieces of technology have become so ingrained in people’s lives, no one wants to leave their home without still being connected. And there is no reason to, as friends, family, and strangers share the same sentiments. Unplugging from technology is not only a decision people don’t make for personal reasons, it simply isn’t conducive to a productive life, as many people’s work and social lives wouldn’t be the same, if exist at all, without being connected to other people or the internet with just a single touch.

The article focuses on the importance of going “screenless” for a day and taking a break from technological impacts. In my opinion, it is important to take a break from social media and technology for a bit. My generation focuses our entire lives on social media. Ask any teen in modern-day society if they have Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, or Tumblr and I guarantee they will have at least one of these social medias. Going screenless for at least two hours of one’s day would leave them at peace and give them time to read, take a nap, or just

People think that technology is their life but in reality it is not. Technology is just something that entertains you. It is not the most important thing in life you can literally go at least a month without your phone even though you think that you cannot. I have had to do it before for six months. People can live without their phones and one example of putting our phones down is when I went to Altitude last night and we were all on trampolines playing dodge ball and throwing and dodging during the game and being active and none of us had our phones out texting or looking at social media so it really was not that hard to put down my phone. In Fahrenheit 451 there was a character named Montag

Technology is changing who we are. This sentence will likely resonate with most people who feel it to be true. A remarkable American novelist, Jonathan Safran Foer, also the author of this article, wrote “How not to be alone” published on June 8th, 2013 in the New York Times. He conveys the idea that technology has created distance among people. In this wonderful editorial, Foer begins with pathos, then he uses logos to point out the fact that people are obsessed with cyberspace, he tries to build credibility by adding ethos, and he applies hyperbole and pathos again as well.

What is technology to you? For some people, it's a lifeline they can't go without it. If you were a gamer, how would you feel about not being able to play for a whole week? What about music junkies? Not being able to match a song to each of your feelings for a whole 168 hours. Possibilities are endless but participating in “Shut Down Your Screen Week” is not one of them. For instance, being plugged into social media allows you to look over and receive news, and look at the diversity of the world. Also, the internet contains so many astonishing materials. Although, screens provide us with many convenient things it is also addicting.

But it was mainly the little things of technology that they miss, the little things in their normal day routine that they missed. “An incomplete list: No more diving into pools of chlorinated water lit green from below. No more ball games played out under floodlights. No more porch lights with moths fluttering on summer nights. No more trains running under the surface of cities on the dazzling power of the electric third rail. No more cities.” (. St. John Mandel’s) People don’t take things for granted till they lose it. Technology clearly serves an important part in our society; most people cannot even be without their cellphones for at most 5

Over history technology has changed mankind’s overall culture. From clock to computers use of technology is occurring every day in all most all situations. In Manjoo’s article “Why tech Is Starting to Make Me Uneasy” he introduces how the latest tech ideas are shaping the future. Manjoo explain new surprise of technology ones felt like Christmas morning, it’s now like the darkened basement. He feeling so bad about tech because he thinks smartphones and social networks might be ruining the world. Also, he explains new tech may well improve much about our lives but may also put millions of people out of work, and some worry that it could wreak global havoc.

Technology abolishes human interaction with one another. Human interaction becomes less frequent as technology advances. Many people have access to technology. For instance, walk into a diner, or a fast food restaurant, and then discover a group of people at a table all on their electronic devices. People need to be more aware of how technology is affecting the relationships among people. People are going to lose their friendships because they failed to separate their cyber life from their social life.Melissa Nilles describes her experience as a nightmare that was actually reality. In the “nightmare,” she lost many opportunities because of being attached to her cellular device.

The advancement of technology has given us two realities, our digital self and our real self. We have come to rely on technology, to such an extent in our daily functions, that we get anxiety when we are not using it for a period of time. The usage of technology is not inherently bad, but the neglect of the people we around, is bad. We feel the need to constantly stay connected to our virtual reality, that we may forget that we are living in the present day.

Technology is part of our lives; or is our life, and it has too much of an effect on everything. The internet started out as an amazing experiment, now it became this enormous

It contained experiments performed by credible scientists of this field and scholarly quotes from experts within the realm of this extent. Its main focus is to portray that technology is becoming an addiction that is rapidly spreading throughout the entire world, causing us to become impatient and forgetful. One of the investigations was an experiment with a college student who couldn’t use any technology for one day, and she reported feeling very lonely and secluded from her life. She said “Although I go to a school with thousands of students, the fact that I was not able to communicate with anyone via technology was almost unbearable.” This goes to show how much of a toll technology has taken in our lives. People can barely survive without the comfort and luxury and technology in life. Nicki Dowling, a clinical psychologist who led a study on technology dependence, prefers calling it “Internet dependence”

People have found it hard to function without their technology. Parents have been known to go hours without feeding their children, or feeding themselves sometimes causing the child to die from being malnourished, or the parent to fall ill due to the lack of nutrients (Maney 1999). In 2013, Mark Knapp and wife, Elizabeth Pester were charged after their three year old child was rushed to the emergency room, weighing only thirteen pounds; the couple was then arrested from their Tulsa home after they left their child in the hospital to return to their video game (Kemp 2013). Research shows that too much time spent with a tablet or cell phone and the radiation that it emits has led to minimal cases of cancer as well (Nordenberg 2000). Teenagers on average check their phones thirty-seven times an hour (Ritchel 2010). Teens report feeling anxious or sick to their stomach when their phone battery dies, saying they “need to have it back” (msv13 n.d). America has fallen in love with gadgets that will consume the ability to function in the “real world” (Della Cava 2011). Not being able to perform daily activities without your phone or tablet should be considered an addiction, it needs to be cured. Actions to prevent a technology dependent society include company management having “no-tech meetings” to insure that decisions are not being made without communication in the group, as well as schools having a “no cell phone policy”

The technology fast was not a difficult experience for me. I have experienced and experimented with living a day without technology before. Not taking too seriously during the previous times, I did put more focus into completely eliminating technology out of my life for the day. I ran into moments of unaware actions like paying for a drink with my debit card or using my scale in the morning to check my weight. The overall experience was interesting and lead me to explore some hobbies I had forgotten I enjoyed.

Dr. Lary Rosen the writer of this article is a psychiatrist and for 30+ he studied the “Psychology of technology” and says that he always has a strong positive towards the impact of technology in our culture and all of his writings would consist of how we can make the most of the marvellous inventions. He said that from the start of the internet to the rapid rise of the world wide web, smartphones, laptops and tablets we already have the world at our fingertips whenever and wherever we want.