David Campbell: ’We need to switch off and get back to real life’
OUR obsession with screen time means we are filling ourselves to the brim with data we don’t need, argues David Campbell. It’s time to stop living vicariously through other people’s lives.
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LOOK, I don’t have a lot of time. None of us do. With work, all the school stuff with the kids, including all their after-school activities and weekend birthday parties and lack of sleep, we only have gaps of the day where we can live.
I am talking about a crack in time. When the kids are asleep or at school, the phone is not ringing, there are no work emails.
This is your time. Time to fill in the gaps. We deserve it. Being pulled in all directions by tiny humans and a demanding job. It’s not fair, is it? As Shannon Noll said, “Let me back into the Crazy Horse …” No wait, he said, “What about me?”
This is why I love modern living. Pop culture and technology have perfectly combined at just the right moment in history to distract us and fill our heads full of useless facts, which make us so exciting at work and help us appear utterly brilliant in the eyes of our partner by showing them how much we are evolving as a human.
Except I hit a crisis recently. You see, I REALLY don’t have time. I filled it all up. I crammed my gaps with so many shiny, new, culturally significant things that I am full. Augustus Gloop in the tube full.
The crisis came, as they always do, in the middle of the night. I realised I had loaded my Netflix list with too many TV series and docos. My streaming has been blocked by my greed — my need to sit in the gap of life and finally watch all of The Good Wife from the beginning.
My IQ box is also chock-a-block. A whole series of The Walking Dead sits there staring dead eyed at me every time I sit on the couch.
Pop culture and technology have perfectly combined at just the right moment in history to distract us and fill our heads full of useless facts
I have 29 podcasts lined up ready to listen to. Twenty-nine. Different. Series. Some are weekly but a lot are daily, and I am weeks behind. This is the definition of optimism.
There are two books on the go, Chess For Dummies and a giant tome about Frank Sinatra. I don’t even want to tell you how many audio books are lined up on my computer.
I have subscribed to so many news sites in a bid to be more “in the know”, that I am basically only reading headlines in the morning, getting the gist and moving on to the next website.
I barely have a second of time to be on social media. Don’t tell Mark Zuckerberg, he’ll be devastated.
It has gotten so bad, I downloaded an app to learn how to meditate, in the vain attempt to clear some room IN MY HEAD!
This is where I am at now. Where we have all come to, in our quest to keep up with every single burp of popular culture, so we can appear cool and in touch. So when BuzzFeed makes a list about which character from The Big Bang Theory I am*, I am well-informed.
Instead, we are just filling ourselves to the brim with data we don’t need, when what we need is peace. Time to recharge. So when we play with our kids we are present. So we are the best husbands ever, nurturing and aware of our partner’s needs. We need to switch off. The systems are overloaded and we need to reboot and get back to real life. Not live vicariously through other people’s lives. Then we can happily live in the gaps and make the most out of our days.
On the other hand, if I stay up really late tonight, I reckon I can make a proper dent in The Good Wife.
*Dr Leonard Hofstadter, obviously.
David co-hosts Today Extra, 9am weekdays, on the Nine Network.
Originally published as David Campbell: ’We need to switch off and get back to real life’
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