It’s no secret that I love my smart phone.

Probably the main reason I love my smart phone is because it is connected to the internet, which I also love.

It is also true that I’m probably slightly addicted to both the internet and my smart phone.

This is not a unlikely confession. I think most people today are addicted to the internet and staring at their device in the palm of their hand.

It gives a whole new meaning to the idea of being “left to our own devices.”

Sometimes I feel I have a love-hate relationship with my smart phone. It really is awesome, but I don’t like being a slave to it either.

For one, I don’t always love the idea that I should always be available to anyone at any time. On the other hand, I also like that I can make contact with people any time I need to.

But at a certain level, having a phone with us at all times has taken away the advantage of being unavailable when we are doing other things that are either more important or more enjoyable than being available or interrupted by the phone ringing, beeping, or buzzing.

I have a family member who does not have a cell phone, and he is a young person, not an octogenarian or Luddite or anything. I would say the majority of his family members are super annoyed that he doesn’t have a phone and therefore is “unavailable” or “unreachable” what seems like to them most of the time.

For me, I get it, and I not-so-secretly admire that this person has stood his ground and not sucumbed to the “I’m always available to everyone and everyone is always available to me” mentality. It more likely that he just doesn’t want to spend the money on the cell phone every month. But I like to think there is also a rebellious spirit to his decision as well.

I am almost envious of this person’s freedom from the cell phone, and this may be why I subconsciously forget to turn my phone’s ringer back on after I’m done with a full day of teaching classes, sometimes for days, and that I resist checking my phone’s voicemail box, and when it is full, I resent clearing it when people inevitably start getting frustrated with me that it is full. That is most certainly my own rebelliousness at play.

But even this guy with no cell phone has a hand-held device. And he stares at it a LOT.

Another thing about my smart phone that irritates me is that I’m almost constantly tempted to stare at my palm.

I’m annoyed with myself for doing this, I’m annoyed with my students for doing it, and it annoys me to see people out in public staring at their palms and obviously ignoring the living, flesh-and-blood human being that is sitting right across from them or next to them.

Photo credit: “Let’s Not Talk to Each Other” by Michael Coghlan

Today, I feel that I stared at my palm more than I should have when I could have been giving more attention to my kid.

This feeling causes “mom guilt,” which is another subject entirely that I will likely approach at a later date.

All day I kept making a conscious effort to put my phone down and look up, be present, actually listen and respond to my son, knowing that, relatively speaking, it won’t be that long before he will also be staring at his palm and not that interested in what I have to say or even if I’m listening and responding to him.

I really dread that day, and I hope I can prevent it from coming somehow, or at least deter the impact of it. I don’t want to be the family of people who are all staring at their devices when they think they are having “family time” together. I know this happens, and it makes me sad.

But I’m trying to do my best.

I will need to teach my son how important it is to actually SEE the person in front of him, to live in the present moment, and resist the pull to constantly scroll through the digital universe in the palm of his hand.

This is a value thing that most people probably will not just instinctively or naturally adopt in the stare-at-our palm age.

My son has been left to his various devices since before he was even two years old. It is my job to teach him about the importance of enjoying the present moment and giving attention to the people that surround him.

I still don’t put my phone down enough to enjoy what Eckhart Tolle calls “The Power of Now.”

I like Eckhart. He reminds me of a benevolent elf. He exudes a calmness and peacefulness when he speaks about savoring the joy in every single moment.

Here’s a quick video in the person-drawing-out-the-message-with-a-squeaky-marker genre that explains the Power of Now.

For those who haven’t actually heard Tolle speak, I really recommend  listening to the man himself. Just hearing him speak and seeing his elfish, happy face is almost like a meditation in itself.

Basically, according to Tolle, if your house isn’t on fire or you are not in an immediate situation that threatens your life, then well, probably things are pretty good really, and any problems or discomfort you might be feeling is probably coming from your own mind.

If you stop to think about it, this makes a tremendous amount of sense.

Almost all of my problems are either caused by or exacerbated by my thinking about them or, in some cases, even creating them in my mind.

I don’t know for sure, but I think Tolle would agree that staring at our palms does not exactly allow for the fullest experience of the power of now.

Of course, it is not always bad to look at our devices, but it is also very important to check in with our five senses, all five of them, and more fully experience and engage with the world around us, especially when it is the people we love who surround us and long for not only our presence but our attention.

I kept looking up and scolding myself today. “I’m being that parent, the one that lets the kid run around the playground and never looks up, not even when the child excitedly calls out to them, or when they try to engage them in games of imagination. I’m not being present. I’m missing it.”

“Uh huh, that’s nice sweetie. Uh huh, I see you. Yeah that’s great.” Scroll, scroll, scroll.

It makes me sick to be this person, but I am sometimes. I am consciously trying to balance staring at my palm versus harnessing the power of now.

I’m not always good at this, but I’m glad I’m trying to be better at it, and I hope to be able to teach my son to do the same and look up to see the real-life beauty of the people and places of the NOW around him.

A “NOW” moment that I’m glad I didn’t miss, even though I used my device to capture it.

There are a lot of great things about being left to my own devices, but there are also a lot of great moments that I hope not to miss along the way.