Hello, my name is Sarah and I’m a Pinterest addict. I’m also a Facebook, blog and, in general, Internet addict.
Ok so I’m being a little extreme, but can anyone relate? There is so much grabbing at my attention online that I feel that I am addicted. I even have a whole routine set up. As soon as I put my little boy down for his morning nap, I make a bee-line for my laptop. Quickly, I become engrossed in the day’s happenings on Facebook, on friends’ and craft blogs, and then the beloved Pinterest, the virtual pinboard where you can share and organize cool things you find online with your friends. You can seriously be lost on there for hours. Then, to add to everything, my husband and I recently upgraded our regular phones to smartphones. I’m now connected everywhere I go.
So you can see what my problem is: balancing between the fun things online and the more important things offline. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not ignoring my motherly and wifely duties, but I’ll be honest – I can get a little distracted. So when a friend recently commented that she wouldn’t be getting on Facebook for a while because of Elder Bednar’s counsel in a CES fireside a couple of years ago, I thought unkindly, “Well, good for you, Miss Goody two-shoes.” Yes, the guilty taketh the truth to be hard.
So after fighting the urge, I finally looked up his talk. I was actually there in person when he gave the address at BYU-Idaho with my fiancé, now husband. It was an incredible talk - one that takes study and prayer to understand.
At first glance, it may seem that he focuses on the youth who play video games or have virtual online lives. But don’t be fooled; he’s also talking to the average LDS woman too. We may not be all that interested in video games (or maybe some of you are), but there are other things that cause us to become dulled and “past feeling.”
He says: “Today I raise an apostolic voice of warning about the potentially stifling, suffocating, suppressing, and constraining impact of some kinds of cyberspace interactions and experiences upon our souls. The concerns I raise are not new; they apply equally to other types of media, such as television, movies, and music. But in a cyber world, these challenges are more pervasive and intense. I plead with you to beware of the sense-dulling and spiritually destructive influence of cyberspace technologies that are used to produce high fidelity and that promote degrading and evil purposes.
“If the adversary cannot entice us to misuse our physical bodies, then one of his most potent tactics is to beguile you and me as embodied spirits to disconnect gradually and physically from things as they really are. In essence, he encourages us to think and act as if we were in our premortal, unembodied state. And, if we let him, he can cunningly employ some aspects of modern technology to accomplish his purposes. Please be careful of becoming so immersed and engrossed in pixels, texting, ear buds, twittering, online social networking, and potentially addictive uses of media and the Internet that you fail to recognize the importance of your physical body and miss the richness of person-to-person communication. Beware of digital displays and data in many forms of computer-mediated interaction that can displace the full range of physical capacity and experience.”
I can tell you when I finally pull myself away from the computer, I have to shake my head, literally, to wake up. I hate that feeling. I become mad at myself and realize I’m missing an important companion: the Spirit.
Elder Bednar suggests us to ask ourselves these two questions:
1. Does the use of various technologies and media invite or impede the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost in your life?
2. Does the time you spend using various technologies and media enlarge or restrict your capacity to live, to love, and to serve in meaningful ways?
I think we could all prayerfully study this talk and then make changes accordingly. I know where I need to improve. But first I need to update my Facebook status. Hey, one day at a time, right?
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About Sarah: Sarah is a stay-at-home mom to her adorable baby boy, who is growing up much too quickly and sugar momma to her hardworking husband of two years. She works for a local paper once a month and enjoy socializing, crafts and music. You can read more of Sarah at her blogs http://thejrsrfamily.blogspot.
