From Awareness Builder 101: Chapter 20

20. Smartphone

 

Sunday. In the summer time that means work, at least to my wife. The fun thing about lunchbreaks where we live, is that they are frequently up to two hours long. What do you mean, a quick bite from a sandwich ham/ cheese from the drawer in your desk? No, for lunch the French take their time and if possible, in a restaurant. We do our utmost to integrate in the culture, so I suggested I would come to pick her up and go out for lunch together. Yes, sometimes adapting to another culture is ‘hard work’…..

 

We had a simple, but good lunch whilst enjoying sitting on the terrace and the nice and relaxed atmosphere. At some point a family joined, young parents with two gorgeous small girls and a baby boy. I can’t help myself but totally enjoying such a picture perfect, again also impressed how well French children behave in restaurants. Whilst daddy was helping the girls ordering, the mother prepared a bottle for baby-boy. All so cute and what a joy to witness!

 

A couple of minutes later the hungry baby-boy had finished his lunch and was resting in his mother’s arms. The rest of the family was waiting for theirs. The girls were doing their own thing and the baby just looked around a bit. Mom and Dad were fully focussed. Not on each other or their lovely kids, no, on their damned smartphones! Or should we say, on their freaking ‘stupid-phones’….?

Whilst being absorbed by whatever it was on their phone, there was no contact whatsoever with the children, nor with each other. All that seemed to matter was their phone and because of that, totally missing the gift of the breathtakingly beautiful picture of their gorgeous kids. Missing that short yet very special moment babies are at their cutest. What do you mean ‘social’ media…….

 

Over and over we witness these kind of moments. A couple in a restaurant, hardly speaking with each other yet fully available for the rest of the world. Deaf and blind for their partner, yet very curious to anything Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp has to say. Or that email which, for sure, cannot be responded to the next day…. Or the phone became the way to keep kids occupied and, with their pale, blueish faces they are totally occupied by that funny movie on YouTube, preferably with the volume so high that everybody around them can listen in, whether they are interested or not.

 

Did you also noticed the first question we ask these days when arriving somewhere for the first time, is no longer ‘How are you doing’ but ‘What is the Wifi code’…. And let’s not even start about the accidents caused by using the phone whilst driving. Horrific. Lives, or precious moments of lives lost because of that wonderful invention called the smartphone.

 

And let’s be honest, more or less every owner of a phone is guilty of the above. Some of it, or all of it. Just sometimes or frequently. I am guilty to it as well. And I just hate this stupid behaviour!

 

So, I can only come to one conclusion: the phone only becomes a SMARTphone when the owner knows when to put it down or switch it off.

 

 

Journaling questions for this chapter:

 

How do I describe my relationship with my phone?

 

What parts of life am I missing because of my phone?

 

What’s the wake-up call I need in this matter?

 

 

© 2025. Alex Verlek, Coaching Works International.

 

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