With the technology development and new conveniences emerging, which were meant to enable people to have more time on hand, the opposite is happening. There are less time available to think and enjoy life than in the ‘pre-technological era’. Pico Iyer in the article ‘The Joy of Quiet’ discusses the issue of life values and importance of having uninterrupted time in quietness and stillness.
In the world today, there are myriads of ways to get people’s minds occupied; however, many of those are simply distractions and time-wasters. A contemporary designer Philippe Stark contribute his professional success to the fact that he stays away from those, namely from TV and needless magazines, social pastimes, and mostly lives alone. Consequently, his thinking is not conditioned by conventions and stereotypes.
To have the luxury of staying in a hotel room with no TV, people are willing to pay enormous sums of money and the demand for those services is growing. As much as time-saving devices allow us to always stay connected, people are striving for freedom and are looking for a way to ‘disconnect’. These include Internet Rescue camps for children and Freedom software, etc. The importance of uninterrupted working time is recognized even by companies such as Intel, which introduced obligatory ‘quiet time’ hours.
The statistics show that the time people spend in front of the screen and texting has dramatically increased and keeps rising. Therefore, the urgency of slowing down, although it is not a new concept, becomes so evident that more and more people are turning to yoga and other practices such as meditation to bring depth to their life. Although the technology and information enabled us to have more ways to communicate, to live easier and faster, it also made our lives more superficial. Therefore, to have some time for slowing down, some observe ‘Internet Sabbath’ every week, or create special opportunities for personal interactions, or ‘forget’ their cell phones, etc. Studies show that those people who take time in quiet settings allow their brains to work more efficiently and with no stress.
Recognizing the need for quietness, the author paces his personal and work life and tries to stay away from going on Internet unnecessary. He also moved to a more rural neighborhood. Although it is important to stay abreast with the news, and the author travelled to various places in the world, he realized the importance of getting away from usual settings to just think, read, understand, etc.
The future depends not only on the new intentions and conveniences, but on the essentials, of which possibility to have time to be quiet is one of the primary. It should be not only realized but also taught to the children of tomorrow as this will set them well on their way to personal freedom.