Sometimes, when I’m at the airport waiting for my plane, I start feeling really sad. I look around at all the people around me and notice that a huge percentage of them are looking down. Yep. You guessed it. Staring at their phones.
It’s not just at the airport either, people are staring at their phones while waiting in line at the grocery store, waiting for their kids’ piano lesson to finish, walking down the street. Everywhere I go, I see people looking down. Missing all those in-between moments that are speeding down the road of their way-too-short lives, unnoticed.
I have been guilty of it myself. I shudder to think how many beautiful moments in my life I may have have missed – and for what? Another mindless scroll? Another Instagram reel?
Seriously ya’ll, life isn’t inside that greasy little device force-feeding us thoughts that aren’t ours. Life is all around us. It’s in the random bits, the unscripted moments, the non-manufactured spaces that have a way of cracking open our minds like a coconut and letting a little light inside.
…Your 8 year old wandering into the kitchen with his hair sticking straight up from last night’s sleep….the chance to make that the elderly lady’s day, just by saying hello at the store… the guy who just walked by with blue hair and pink pickle socks.
We’re missing it all, guys.
And here’s the hard news. Our obsession with our phones is really an obsession with ourselves. Because we literally cannot genuinely care about the people surrounding us if we refuse to even look at them. We can’t do something about the litter on the ground, or enjoy the birds singing in the trees if we refuse to even notice that they’re there.
My suggestion: Stop filling up every moment. Stop cramming your own distractions into life’s seemingly monotonous cracks. Instead, let the in-between moments breathe and start noticing.
Open your eyes and for Pete’s sake, Look Up.
You’re missing everything.
