I have been thinking lately about the growth of technology, and just the changing times in general. As time goes on the opportunity to become offended grows.
I can't help but think about the, "Good Ol Days". Just thinking back to when I was a kid we didn't have cell phones, Internet, emails, facebook, or even pagers (until I got a little bit older), or caller id. We did have answering machines when I was a kid. I think back even further when there weren't even phones!
With all this instant gratification leads us to get hurt so much easier. Allow me to demonstrate
Voicemail (or even with answering machines): "Why aren't they returning my call? I'm not gonna buy it again that the machine ate my message!"
Caller ID: Now we know people know it's us, so we can now think, "they know its me, that is why they don't answer." So we leave a voicemail and get upset again when our call isn't returned after they know what we want.
Cell Phones: Now we can be bugged ALL the time! I admit I miss the days before cell phones sometimes. Even I have gotten spoiled with the convenience and want those instant results and questions answered, and help right when I need it. I feel this is a blessing in ways but also a curse, our memories are dwindling, no longer do we need to memorize phone numbers.
Internet: It is a blessing to have so much knowledge at our fingertips, but I feel like we don't think for ourselves as much as we used to. With spell check I have gotten so lazy with my spelling. I actually do miss sounding out words and using my brain to remember how to spell certain words. Now I type it in phonetically it I don't know and it auto corrects it for me! I was thinking today, while at church about when I used to prepare for talks. I would go through all of my Grandma's old Ensigns, and search out church books for quotes. Preparing a good talk back then took time!!
Even in High School we started having to use the Internet to do our reports and assignments. I hated that. I didn't know how to use the Internet at that point so it was VERY hard for me get my resources from the computer. I miss just using books. And now, we don't even need to turn pages anymore!! We have Kindles! =( That is the worst inventions of all. I'm really upset about that one. I love my paper books!! A Kindle doesn't give you that new book smell, or that old library book smell either. Poo on Kindle. =)
Email: I wrote a post about this before. Email do not allow for voice infection or expression. Yes, we do have our smiley faces (emoticons) but we all have an example of a time when we read something other than the way the sender intended it. Thus getting our feelings hurt.
Facebook: The ultimate curse! Why do they call them "Friends"? When we never hear from well over 2/3 of them?! That really is maddening to me. I have kept my FB list of friends relatively low. I think I'm at 95. I do comment on status's and pictures that I like. But this is another big area where we can get hurt. When we write on our wall we all hope to have people give there response and feedback, we want them to "like" our pictures, laugh at our jokes, and give sympathy and advice when we are in need or sad. So when we don't get that, naturally it is very sad.
Blessings that are curses. I do long, at times, for the good ol days of letter writing and only 1 telephone for the whole house connected to a very long cord to keep you relatively close, with your families ear shot, was the only form of communication! Oh, and of course that VERY out of date thing called, Face to Face conversations!! =)
so true!
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