Please Take My Phone Away From Me

The Guardian

Since the beginning of the age of cell phones, we youth have been criticized for constantly being dependent on our phones, and you know what? They’re totally right. 

Okay, so they may just be talking about me...

I have a phone problem. I didn't think it was that bad until I read a book called How To Break Up With Your Phone in my COMP 132 class, and I realized how much I hate being separated from my phone. I can't even walk downstairs to the kitchen to get a bottle of water without taking my phone with me.

So how did it get to this point?

I got my first cell phone in eighth grade. It was a slide-up keyboard kind of phone and I only used it to text my mom when I would travel for sports. Then, my freshman year of high school, I conveniently lost my phone in a Peter Piper Pizza (the Chuck E. Cheese of San Antonio). After that, my parents decided to replace it with an iPhone 6s. Now, this wasn't my first Apple product. I had an iPod touch already (and even an iPod Shuffle before that). So I was already familiar with an app layout. I used my iPod Touch to watch YouTube and play games. My only form of social media was Instagram at the time, since my mom never allowed me to have a MySpace or Facebook account.

So I guess it was my introduction to social media that started my phone addiction. Soon after I got my first iPhone, I created my first Twitter account. I considered it a fan account since I didn't use it to follow people I knew and instead followed YouTubers and celebrities I liked. Eventually I also got a Snapchat and now a TikTok (I'm still ashamed).

My addiction doesn't stop at social media. Netflix and Hulu has also consumed my time. I also read books from an app on my phone. Every once in a while I get addicted to a mobile game as well, but I quickly get bored of it and stop playing it.

The only time I don't pull my phone out is at work or classes that explicitly state in their syllabus that phones are not allowed. Meaning, I can't go a whole lecture without pulling my phone out at least once to check Twitter or send a text. When I'm watching a movie with my family, I pull out my phone. When I'm eating, I pull out my phone. When I'm at a party, I pull out my phone.

I will say I don't pull out my phone much when I'm with my boyfriend. Especially when we go on dates. It's never been made a rule by any of us, we've just never felt the inkling to pull it out when we're around each other. We even comment on it because we notice we're not like the other couples we see on Instagram or Snapchat who post their whole date. And I'm not trying to play the "we're not like other couples card." It's just something I've noticed because it's a huge accomplishment for me.

My average screen time per day is 6 hours. That's a quarter of my day that I spend on my phone. I get about 6-7 hours of sleep at night. So technically I spend less than half of my day in "the real world." It's quite alarming, but I have this mentality of "that's just how the world works now."

Is it?

Distraction is Inevitable, So Why Not Spice it Up?

               Everyone gets distracted. Of course no one in this world is able to just sit down and be at a point of maximum efficiency all the time for their entire life. But while distraction may be inevitable to a certain extent, there are countless ways to get distracted. James Williams discusses how phones, which are probably the first thing that came to your mind when I brought up distraction, are basically built to distract you as much as possible. However, there are more ways to get distracted. So, if it's going to happen anyway, why not add some variety?

                But here’s a quick disclaimer before I start talking about other ways you can rewire the ways you get distracted—I’m not saying that any of this is necessarily good or bad. I don’t think that phones are bad at all. They’re great or whatever, they’re just also distracting. And so is all of this! But maybe some of these things will let you be more efficient upon returning to your work than others. Maybe, with some of these, it’s easier to hop back into your work after a few minutes of allowing yourself to be distracted. Different stuff works for different entities!

                Have you ever tried pacing around in big circles for long periods of time? It’s great!

…Hey wait, come back, just listen!

                Sometimes, you just have to walk around your room and give yourself your own TED Talk. Sometimes you just have to walk around outside and let yourself work though all of those interesting, creative thoughts that are preventing you from focusing on far less interesting work. By the time you sit back down to work, it might be easier to focus, since you’ve let your mind run its course. The important thing, and the reason that I said to walk around in “big circles” is that the movement must be mindless. The only thing you should be doing is daydreaming, working through ideas, or trying to boost your own morale.

                Similarly, it’s easy to find yourself staring into space for long. Long. Looooong. Periods of time. I prefer the former to this one, as this one is less active, and, as it feels less like you’re giving yourself permission to take a little break, it feels like an accidental timewaster for me. But again, different things work for different people (and cryptids). Maybe the act of walking is a distraction for you, even if it’s being done in a repetitive way. If that’s the case, then this is the variant for you! But, if you’re able, try to be conscious of it. Move your head to stare up and think, “I need to let these thoughts run their course for a few minutes,” or “I need to explore this idea” or even “I just need to take a moment and reassure myself that I can do this.”

I know full-well that you’re probably going to see this one and roll your eyes at this. You’re going to think I sound like a cartoonish old person. But, if you’re still reading at this point, that means you heard me out when I told you to walk around in circles for fun, so you should be able to handle this, okay?

Books. There it is. Read a gosh dang book. Not something boring, unless you’re into that, I don’t judge. There are countless types of books, and if you just think reading is lame, it’s probably because you just haven’t found the genre, author, or writing style that’s exciting for you. James Patterson is great if you want supernatural teen drama, action, and themes of rebellion. Pseudonymous Bosch’s The Secret Series is great if you want something quirky and strange. Frankenstein is surprisingly fantastic if your dad is the actual worst and you need an outlet. Come up with some standards, and do some quick internet searches to find something that meets them. Books are a great distraction, because it’s easy to say, “I’ll let myself read ten pages, and then get back to work.” Well, unless the part you’re reading happens to end on a cliffhanger, then that particular method may not work. And comic books/graphic novels are, perhaps, even easier, because they’ve got visuals and usually take less time to finish reading. Though different, they’re equally respectable types of reading material, and you should feel no shame in going with whatever works best for you.

I’m kind of surprised that this next one isn’t more common, especially since this is something that most people probably do in class sometimes. Drawing, doodling, sketching, and venting your frustrations and stress onto a page are great distractions. All you have to do is keep some paper and a pencil nearby. In fact, you might even be able to do this while you’re working, if you’ve hit a mental roadblock and your hands are moving while you’re sorting that out. It’s fun, and there’s no pressure to be good or share what you’ve created—even just squiggling can be fun to do for a while before getting back to it.

                There are, of course, many, many other ways to get distracted while doing work, some being more healthy and productive than others. Tidying up your room! Making a snack! Getting really introspective while staring into space and either having an epiphany or a breakdown! But again, different things are best for different entities, and there's no one correct answer. Distractions are distractions any way you look at them, but they can still leave you feeling inspired, or assured, or even just little bit more ready to focus.

Reality of distractions

Another good discussion in class that really got me thinking about my situation on where I stand on this topic. As we were talking, Dr. Vrooman used the word Muppet, and I took away that it meant we were being controlled or pulled away from certain things in life such as our goals, happiness, friends, family,etc. In the reading from the class, Williams  talks about the informational technologies that has lots of power to pull all of us away from the good things in life. He mainly says that these devices take up majority our time which weakens our mind and drags us to another "goal" that is someone else's and not our very own. The thing distracting us the most is the little device that lights that grabs our attention so much. We are doing something that does not involve our phones and we are just sitting eager waiting to hear the buzz go off or see the phone light up and we finally have a reason to get on our devices and continue being on it for absolutely no reason. Lets face it, we sometimes  have an obsession with little thing that we can take everywhere in our pockets that has easy access at any time of the day. Isn't that the point of having a phone you ask?

I'd like to go back to the Muppet concept. In class I was asked what percent of muppet I was and I had to think about it and really see how much time I spend on my phone and how much time I am doing other things that don’t involve the use of a device such as a phone or computer. I said that I was about 50/50 and that the reason is because I find myself distracted on my phone a lot of the time when I know that it is not good for me to do so. On the other hand I am also a very busy person which helps me stray away from using technology to could be a negative factor in whatever I am trying to accomplish. For the most part during the school day, I find myself actually focused on my work and after that I play baseball so my day is usually taken up by that. By the time I am done, of course I want to relax and just look through all of my social media’s as a “reward” for just having a long day and I think that is something that majority of us kids do these days. Technology does not have to be a bad thing.

I think there are people out there that are a lot worse than me. The “phone zombies” are everywhere and can’t go a couple minutes without looking at their phone. These are the people that may shy away from their actual goals because they tend to get caught up in all the hype that revolves around that little screen lighting up in our pocket or countertop. There is a time and place where it is okay to be on it but for a lot of the kids in this generation, it is their everything. This makes us so used to talking to people on the phone that it is harder for us to talk to people in person and we have a higher chance of being anti-social with bad public speaking skills. If this is you, please try to stop! You are ruining this world. Lol just kidding but still, try not to be that person who can’t have a conversation because of something on your phone. This is not me trying to bash on everything the phone has to offer because quite frankly, it is something that we cannot live without at times. I think technology has come a very long way and we use it on a daily basis for good reasons. A lot of businesses would not be where they are today without the advantages of what social media had to offer. Life would be much more of a hassle if we did not have our devices handy as their are messages that we need to send people in case of emergencies and just to meet new people easier.

Long story short, I suggest that you go out and find things that you enjoy and are good at and just go out and interact with people without any form of technology being used. Have a good balance of the outside world and the world that you keep secret on your device at home and that will make you a much better person.

Am I (Wo)man or Am I A Muppet?

Hannah, GET OFF YOUR PHONE!!

The day that I got my first smartphone was the day that I started to get “distraction talks” from my mother. She would tell me to quit spending so much time on my phone, to get off Instagram, and that I had so many other better things I could be doing with my time. And honestly, she was right. She’s still right to this day, because after eight years of having an iPhone I still don’t know how to put it down. I’m sure everyone else who’s lived under their parent’s roof has heard the same spiel, whether it was about a phone, video games, or magazines. Parents and children have been having the same discussion for so many years. But are parents more right than they were before? Are we truly a more distracted generation than any other? 

http://bit.ly/38xjsLJ

TikTok...aka My Downfall

It’s no secret that phones are distracting machines and that a big part of this is because of  social media. Without social media, smartphones are pretty bland and boring. Social media creates a huge majority of the distractions that we experience on our phones everyday, and some platforms of social media are a lot more addicting than others. For me, if it wasn’t for TikTok I wouldn’t be spending nearly as much time on my phone as I do. The constant flow of creative content is easy to find myself being sucked in to, even when I don’t want to. Multiple times a day I find myself unconsciously opening the app and scrolling through. The addictiveness of the app contributes greatly to its popularity. 

There is a running joke on TikTok that everyone downloaded the app as a joke, got sucked in, and are now addicted to it. That’s definitely what happened to me, and because of this it’s contributed greatly to my overall addiction to social media. Before downloading TikTok I could go days and sometimes weeks without getting on social media. It was very common for me to purposely delete Instagram because I was bored with it and needed time away from my phone. Since downloading TikTok, I have only been able to do this maybe once or at most twice. I just can’t get away from my phone. I feel a need to check my phone and be on it more than I ever have before. I have also been able to feel and see the consequences of my addiction which makes me understand that my mom’s warnings are not really so crazy after all. 

http://bit.ly/muppetofaman 

Am I (Wo)man or Am I A Muppet?

As we talked about in class on Friday, my phone has made me become more of a muppet. It’s like my phone has control over me from the inside out and all of my actions are results of what my phone is telling me to do. Of course this isn’t as literal as it sounds, but my phone controls my choices and how I spend my time most of my days. Every now and then there will be a day where I’m busy or I’m just enjoying spending time in someone’s presence and my phone won’t even be on my mind. The one thing I am thankful for is that I’m not so addicted to my phone that I can still focus on real important things when they are present in my life. It’s on days where I have nothing to do and am laying in bed bored that I feel my need to satisfy my addiction most. Of course there are still days where I find myself hanging out with friends and I’m still glued to my phone. But unlike some people, I am usually able to quickly realize what I’m doing and pull away from my phone until I’m back at home or in a situation where it’s more appropriate. Honestly, when I recognize what I am doing it hurts me a lot because it makes me mad when other people do it to me so I know exactly what my friends are feeling when I do it to them. It makes me feel like a really crappy person. 

http://bit.ly/parentalcontrolspic

I Want to be a Great Parent

When it comes to distraction and our phones, I would say that pretty much all young millenials and Gen Z would ultimately agree with their parents that the distraction their phone causes them is hurting them more than helping them. We are a generation that has had an unlimited amount of comedic, creative, and explicit content thrown in our faces nonstop for years and years, and it’s not going to stop. As long as I am alive, I am going to have a constant stream of information from the internet always being thrown in my face. I will neve be able to escape it. While this is something that scares me, I have to be able to learn from my mistakes and those of my peers and prepare to be able to help my kids face the same issues that I have had because of the distractions from my phone. We are an experimental generation and I want to be able to harness the information that is found from us and be better equipped to help people in the future because technology is distracting and it’s only going to get worse.

Ok "Boomer" you may have a point...

pxfuel

wikimedia commons

I refuse to be held captive by my phone. Yeah, I'm sure y'all have issues with social media addiction, easily getting distracted by your cell phones, but I'm different. I could never...hold up... I just got a text...I wonder what I missed on twitter...LMAOOOO this YouTube video I just watched! Wait.

Unless you are a hermit, purposefully self-secluded from modern society, you likely in some capacity struggle with some form of cell phone addiction. I haven't even wrote a hundred words, and I'd be lying if I said I hadn't check my phone for several extended periods of times.

And why wouldn't you?

Cell phones are easily one of the, if not the most, important inventions in all of human history, allowing for nearly instant access to any information one could possibly need.

Our pocket computers make so many parts of our lives so much easier. We can communicate with others in an instant, regardless of the space between us, through text and call from anywhere. If we don't know how to do something, or are having an issue, there's likely hundreds of youtube videos answering all of our questions in a concise, easy to understand manner. We can do a quick google search, and seemingly the entire library of all human knowledge is there, available to us for free, right at the edge of our fingertips.

The major convenience presented by the cellphone, should, and in many ways does, make life much more convenient and efficient. These days, ignorance is almost a choice, as while the ability to educate oneself was so elusive in decades prior, today we can learn more than our predecessors would've ever dreamed of.

However, despite the fact that cell phones are one of the greatest tools man has ever created, it is also becoming our downfall, and causing major harm in ways that I doubt its pioneers would have envisioned (although they likely did, because corporations are evil). The general populace has become extremely impulsive, weak-willed, and the average attention span has been drastically reduced to a near comical extent.

I've certainly felt the harmful side-effects of the cell phone in my own life. I can't remember the last time I read an entire book for fun, when I used to love reading when I was younger. I rarely go hours without checking my phone to escape the moment, or the anxieties of daily life. For every way in which cell phone access has helped me in my personal life, it's likely hurt me in many more ways than I can even Imagine.

In the book Stand out of our Light by James Williams, Williams explores the harmful effects of the world's most widespread legal drug, the cell phone, and questions if it's release into society was ever even ethical, talking about it as if it was a man-made pathogen used for biological warfare.

One way in which Williams explores the nefarious effects of the cell phone is by creating an allegory with a made up technology, the iTrainer, which has obvious parallels to the cellphone.

Williams begs the question-"If you wanted to train all of society to be as impulsive and weak-willed as possible, how would you do it? One way would be to invent an impulsivity training device – let’s call it an iTrainer – that delivers an endless supply of informational rewards on demand." By creating this fictional device, the iTrainer, Williams makes it so that we are detached of any urge to be defensive of our usage of cell phones, which he highlights are specifically designed so that we will build an attachment and dependency on them.

Williams discusses the awkward early years, which many of us remember, when the cell phone was seen as new, weird, and an unnecessary luxury that initially attracts odd looks, and how it now it has become so universal, and so much a part of our society that life without them seems much more far-fetched than a life in which we are entirely addicted to them.

Instead of highlighting the positives associate with the cell phone, by using the example of this evil iTrainer, he shows that by over-exposing us to technology, our lives would become much harder to live, with too many distractions. We would prohibit our children from using the iTrainer, although continuing to use it ourselves because we are trapped too far down the rabbit hole to ever return.

The iTrainer further damages our mental health by implementing a rewards system of validation and economic gain that would push many to try and make that money by any means necessary, no matter how slimey the methods are in doing so. Our brains would be, and are, so hardwired to seek validation through the reward of a like or attention that we never leave home without our own iTrainer.

Jeanne Menjoulet

The iTrainer, like the iPhone (and various counterparts) would become the most important thing in many of our lives, what we look at when we wake up and lay our head to rest, what we check constantly for new information, and get anxiety over.

The most harrowing thing Williams says in his long analogy is "Of course, the iTrainer project would never come anywhere close to passing a research ethics review. Launching such a project of societal reshaping, and letting it run unchecked, would clearly be utterly outrageous. So it’s a good thing this is all just a thought experiment." Which sounds like the final words to a goosebumps book.

Williams presents the iTrainer, the iPhone, as a device of horror, an unethical, evil invention that would quickly degrade our society as a whole, and anybody reading this can likely self-reflect and realize how much the cell phone really has ruined us.

Baby Nut and the Increasing Profitability of Digital Advertising

A Slight Detour...

I'm gonna talk about Baby Nut for a second.

Baby Nut on Twitter

We all know that the original Mr. Peanut was a bourgeois capitalist hypocrite who sold out his own kind (his fellow nuts) for profit and fame.

So in an effort to move away from the stale and mishandled iconography of the original mascot, the Mr. Peanut brand (Planters) mercilessly killed off their own mascot in the most ridiculous way possible in front of the entire world during the Super Bowl.

But like a phoenix rising from the ashes, Baby Nut was born from the dead remains of Mr. Peanut, fertilized by the tears of the Kool-Aid Man.

It all reads like a highly specific fan-fiction, the kind of which the world was unprepared for.

Conceptually, I actually think that this is a stroke of brilliance, however the execution is what is lacking.

Appearance vs Reality

It is one thing for an advertising campaign to take a swing and a miss, but this was a big swing and a big miss. But oddly enough, not big enough to warrant even all that much bad-publicity. On the day of the Superbowl, this was definitely one the key stand-out moments, but in the last few days, to my knowledge, nothing of consequence has really been happening with Baby Nut. 

It is true that Planters is trying to start up a Baby Nut Tour, but what that could possibly contain is beyond me. I thought that the horrible weird look of the Baby Nut was because of a rushed schedule, bad design artists, or company interference. It seemed as if they were trying out a new clean style, but  failed to do so properly.

As I've done more and more research into the Baby Nut Twitter Account however, you can see that there's nothing "clean" about this monstrosity.

Baby Nut on Twitter

They keep posting these weird low resolution videos of the Baby Nut dancing and wiggling around in a similar style as the first-generation Veggie Tales. Frankly, it looks like someone made a very bad mod of the video game Fallout, that relies on unrealistic textures that look like hard plastic contorting in too-smooth movements from a sliding skeleton rig.

The feet clip into the floor, the face lies on the surface of the skin like a moving tattoo, and the hat doesn't even have a brim. Not even a brim! It's just a flat piece of paper.

Similarly, even the text-posts aren't worth the effort.

Baby Nut Twitter

And that's the point. Baby Nut was never supposed to be something "pure." It was always meant to be somewhat unsettling, because it was made to be mocked. We thought they were jumping on the bandwagon started by Baby Groot, and in a way they are, but they are doing something different.

Sidenote: 

Baby Yoda is the most popular of the babies, but Baby Sonic is the most recent addition. Though I personally have a soft spot for Baby Dory, she is not really a part of the discussion. Weirdly enough, Baby Thanos is a part of the discussion (a bit of sour to make the sweet taste better), despite only ever being mentioned offhandedly to service exposition for how time travel works in the MCU.

Back to the Nut: 

The CGI in the original video was just good enough to fool people into thinking that Planters was genuinely trying to ride the coattails of Baby Yoda in their rebrand (which in a way they are, but not how we thought). Now it is obviously clear that Baby Nut is purposefully bad.

Baby Yoda is puppet-like to reference original star wars, and make people care about an obviously fake object (we have a hard time connecting to CGI, because it's too good to be true, or too bad to be believable). The makers of the Mandalorian, actually admitted that they made the CGI version of Baby Yoda move like a puppet because people are more willing to care for a physical object with a face that can move than they are a too-realistic "has-to-be-CGI" creation.

Baby Nut on the other hand went in the other direction, being entirely CGI, and being entirely bad CGI. And I think I know why.

It was Meme-Bait that No One Took

In his book, Stand Out of Our Light, James Williams argues that ever since the digital age came about, the idea of advertising has had to evolve into something virtually unrecognizable when compared to how it began.

"The scalability and increasing profitability of digital advertising made it the default business model, and thus incentive structure, for digital platforms and services. As a result, goals and metrics that served the ends of advertising became the dominant goals and metrics in the design of digital services themselves."

I believe that Baby Nut is merely the latest in a series of essentially pointless digital topics, that companies are trying to push specifically with the intention of having something to talk about, so that they can maintain their brand's cultural hold on the populous, despite no new developments in whatever their specialty.

Nuts haven't changed. Peanut butter hasn't changed. Kool-Aid hasn't changed. And yet, companies seem to believe that they must rebrand in order to stay relevant, which in a way is true, and yet they do not even pretend anymore that their rebrand is worth anything, and therefore, we do not find it valuable either.

Now, Kool-Aid is even selling "Magic Tears" as part of a cross-promotion with Planters despite having nothing to do with anything!

Kool-Aid Twitter

I'm actually all on board with this latest promotion, because Kool-Aid creating a new product that doesn't need to exist, but can actually have an impact on my life. I can taste the Magic Tears. I can experience the change. I cannot experience Baby Nut except through social media.

This would be fine, if they were funny. But they are not.

That doesn't mean that they are unsuccessful, or that they cannot become funny or valuable in the future, but if they want to make it funny in a way that is purposefully... I can't believe I'm about to say this...

...Cringy...

...they'll have to go much more amateurish and bad in order to come back around the wheel of popularity to be on top again.

Then again, maybe I'm just crazy.

After all, it sparked this absolute masterpiece:

Nina Matsumoto "Peanut Devouring his Son"

It is based on "Saturn Devouring his Son" by Francisco Goya, in an adaptation that truly captures in horrifying detail the spirit of what I believe is really going on. In this piece, Mr. Peanut isn't the character of Mr. Peanut, but is a representation of Planters itself, trying to milk Baby Nut of everything it is worth, which isn't much.

If you actually compare, both nuts actually have way more pronounced ridges than the recent art style would have you believe, in an effort to evoke original Mr. Peanut imagery and provide further depth into the piece.

Similarly, Baby Nut's colors are much more vibrant than Mr. Peanut's showcasing the potential for growth and life that Baby Nut could have had, if it wasn't being so mishandled by Mr. Peanut (Planters).

Am I reading too much into this? I am. But what else can I do in world with no meaning? Enjoy your Baby Nut. I'll enjoy my "Peanut Devouring his Son". That I like.

In fact, if the painting wasn't sold out, I would literally buy it right now.

The Art of Distraction

Gonzalo Baeza

Take a second to be really honest with yourself, how many times a day do you pick up your phone subconsciously to check how many notifications you just knoowww you have? How many times a day do you realize that you have been on the phone for more time than you’re comfortable with admitting??How many of you are reading this on your phone??? 

If you have noticed these things before, or if you did not realize all of things apply to you until now, then you are part of the mass majority of the rest of the world. But before you start feeling guilty for the amount of time you spend looking at the tiny screen in your pocket, just know it’s designed to be addictive and distracting. The balance between the phone being something for play and for work is just perfect enough to keep us guessing. A surprise. A gift maybe! We never know until we open up our phone and flip the screen to figure the mystery out.

Ken Unger

I know for myself, I can spend an ungodly amount of time looking at this screen. It’s a combination of using my phone to do work (like I am right now) when I’m on the go, and mindlessly scrolling through the different social platforms that constantly have my attention. Everyone I have asked about how much time they spend on their phones admits that they realize they are spending hours of their day looking at the same screen. And I mean who wouldn't? This tiny little computer is there for everything! When we are pathetically bingeing a new Netflix series, when we are sad, when we get good and bad news, when we get updated on anything, it's there when we go to sleep and right there when we wake up. The most reliable and knowledgeable best friend that does exactly what we want it to, when we want it to. But why do we have this tiny computer during all of those times? Sure, emergencies and bad news that needs to be delivered immediately are a good reason but wouldn’t that take the fun out of having a phone in the first place? Would we not then become conditioned to think of our phones as a burden or something that we feel obligated to answer? 

Penn State

Our phones are designed to keep us distracted. It has all of the elements that humans need to stay entertained. It has sound, different sounds at that, it vibrates in all kinds of ways, it is visually stimulating and it's small enough to fit in our pockets. Tell me that isn’t the perfect combination of ways to remind us that it’s just sitting there, waiting, begging for your attention. “If you wanted to train all of society to be as impulsive and weak-willed as possible, how would you do it? One way would be to invent an impulsivity training device – let’s call it an iTrainer” James Williams begins to explain in his book Stand Out of Our Light: Freedom and Resistance in the Attention Economy. He very obviously adds the “i” in front of the trainer so that we very very obviously understand the point he is trying to make about the popular iphone. Impulsive and weak-willed are two words that are hard to swallow for those of us who really do understand how impulsive they are when it comes to their phones. I for one am so guilty of this. But how does this relate to the rest of our lives outside of our phone? Do we become more and more impulsive naturally with things that we normally do anyway? In other words, do we become trained to be this way in our daily lives? Another way to look at it in which my professor explained it, we become Muppets. The more impulsive we are, the less thought we put into checking our phones or living our lives in general, the more “Muppet” we are. Flopping around like mad people with no sense of direction, no idea where we are going or what we are doing until someone or something tells us so. I think most of us are more Muppet than we would like to believe but we can change this. 

Violette

Making a subconscious effort to put the phone down when we do not need to be on it, realizing how much time we have spent on it already and turning it away, bringing ourselves back to earth from the separate world of social media are all ways in which we can become less Muppet than we want to be. Finding time in the day to take a step back and enjoy the flowers, learn a new thing without writing in our phones to remember what that specific thing is. There are so many ways to step back and bring that Muppet meter down. The hardest part is retraining our brains to realize whatever is on that tiny screen of ours, is not actually worth the kind of praise that we seem to give it when we make an excuse to hop right back on. We can become less Muppet the more time we spend retraining ourselves and it will be a long journey, but hopefully a part of humanity will be restored in this age of technology.