Lost In the Age of Technology

by Kristin Saunders

The luxuries of the twenty-first century are not to be laughed at. In one day it is possible to talk with someone for hours half-way across the world, cook a meal in minutes when it used to take hours, and travel a hundred miles in relative ease. We have created such glorious things for ourselves. The futures we can imagine are just as grand. It would be possible to travel from New York to Tokyo in a few hours by vacuum-sealed bullet train or even farther via instantaneous teleportation. It is easy to see sterile work environments that gleam without the aid of a dirty mop, and machines tending our every need. It is so easy to imagine the next step, and the step beyond that. Every convenience easily imagined, then the device eventually engineered.

Stop. Think.

Is this the luxury you really want? I only ask because your microwave meal is currently lacking the flavor of the prepared food your mother made. That bullet train may get you where you are going, but you may miss the journey and the experiences a trip halfway around the world would give you now, or even one-hundred years ago when you would have had to cross the ocean by boat.

Face Time may try to replace face-to-face conversation, but you miss out on the small ticks like a person’s twitch or their general body language. Never mind glitch wireless or the overall warmth of a person’s actual presence. Nothing can replace that feeling of being in the moment with someone.

Technology has its place in our lives. It does afford us time, but it can also waste it both in quantity (Internet) and quality (traveling to the grocery store by bike versus driving a mile down the road.) If we really thought about every piece of technology we used, I’m certain many of us would go without some portion of it. I know given the chance I’d go without my cell phone and keep it to house service, because outside a car breakdown, I just don’t need or want that much connectivity in my life.

Recently, I’ve even taken yoga to tear myself away from the Internet and the television. The most relaxing moment being an instructed ujjayi breath or “yoga breath.” They are simple to do, draw a breath deep down into the core of your belly. While holding it, allow your mind to focus on your body. Exhale through your mouth and let the thoughts of the world fall away and exit with each breath.” This type of breathing requires focusing all your attention onto yourself. It is a meditative exercise and can bring a person to really respect the body they are using.

Technology is not an entirely bad thing, but I do think it comes with its demons. And expecting that we will have more technology in the near future I think it’s time we started asking questions like, “When was the last time I experienced the living world outside my door?” It may sound silly, but in an age where technology is carried with us in every moment of our lives it could be very easy to lose your sense of self. Something that should be precious. The future is waiting at our doorstep and I’m hoping we find a way to separate ourselves and know ourselves outside of the technologies and luxuries we create.

Kristen Saunders is an intern Penumbra EMag. She loves to write science fiction in her free time and recently started her own blog The Musings of a Growing Writer.