My #SoapBox: Put down your smartphones
Could it be that your Mr or Mrs Right is standing in front of you at Starbucks or Protein Bar?
Can you live without it for a week? Day? 5 minutes?
Put down your smartphones people. Let me repeat. Put down your smartphone. Well, after you read this blog of course.
Every morning, I stand in line at Starbucks waiting for my daily grande black eye and roasted ham and swiss sandwich. Yes, a creature of habit, I get the same thing every day, 510 calories of buttery goodness. But I digress. As I stand in line, I look at the diversity of people standing around me. I see tall and short. I see black, white, Latino, and Asian. I see thick and thin. I see business women, artists, bicycle messengers, and lawyers (lots of lawyers, actually). I see gay and straight, tall and short. Lots of people I find attractive, and some you might find attractive even if I do not. And, more often than not, NONE OF THESE PEOPLE ARE ACTUALLY TALKING TO EACH OTHER. No actual engaging in human interaction with other beings. What are they doing? They are on their smartphones.
Texting. Facebooking. Snapchatting. Emailing. Tweeting. Blogging. Calendaring. Working. Planning. Doing just about everything except actually communicating with people nearby.
And all I can think is, what a missed opportunity? Growing up, I remember my mom taking me to the grocery store with her. While waiting in line to checkout, inevitably, she would end up in conversation with the person behind her. My dad would share his opinions with just about everyone he ran into in a local hardware store or at the police station after work. I grew up communicating with people and the love of communicating, coupled with my fascination with people watching, has been with me for decades. Enter smartphones.
And now, yes, I find myself standing in line searching for the latest blog by Switch and Shift, seeing what my colleagues are chatting about on Yammer, religiously following back on Twitter, and fighting the never ending battle to clean out my email inbox (Sad reality: It will never happen. Just accept it.) So, lest I be called a hypocrite, I will admit what I am asking you to do is difficult. INCREDIBLY difficult. Â But let’s try it together.
Let’s put down our cell phones.
1) Set a target for how long you will leave it in a drawer or the car.
Only you can decide what is a stretch but realistic target in terms of period of time. Could be a a week? A day? How about an hour during the business day? 5 minutes?
2) Go somewhere you go fairly regularly, and strike up a conversation with someone around you
During your no cell phone (day/week/hour/minute) make a visit to a grocery store, coffee shop, food spot, office break room, or anywhere you typically find yourself on a fairly regular basis. Do what you normally do EXCEPT use your phone (to completely avoid temptation, pay with … gasp … CASH rather than using your smartphone payment app). If you, like me, get energy from others and are more extroverted, strike up a conversation. If you are more of a people watcher, just observe the traits, attitudes, outfits, hair, whatever! If you are bold, flirt with the amazing person you now realize comes to the same place at the same time every day.
3) Encourage someone else to do the same thing.
You will meet someone cool, notice a new hair style or fashion, or maybe even simply realize for the first time how good your coffee tastes when you drink it piping hot and only focus on the experience. Share that with someone, share it with me or others on this blog. Spread the word.
With so many dating sites around, perhaps some of you are spending this time on these sites, editing your profile and replying to messages? There are sites for Christians, Jews, farmers, baby boomers, gay men and lesbian women, millionaires, and more. And I have many many many friends that are long-term or recently single. As I look around at the heads bowed down, eyes focused on phones and tablets, I can’t help but wonder if perhaps we are missing something fairly basic.
Could it be that your Mr or Mrs Right is standing in front of you at Starbucks or Protein Bar? Look up. Now!
Be Well. Lead On.
Adam
One final note >>>
Pedestrians: Put down your cell phones. Unless you live in a city that has one of these special cellphone lanes. Yeah, I think its pretty sad too!
Cellphone Lane? (China Daily via Reuters)
Adam Stanley
Adam L. Stanley Connections Blog
Technology. Leadership. Food. Life.
AdamLStanley.com
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