Thich Naht Hahn -
Suppose you talk to your smartphone. “Dear friend, I suffer. What shall I do?” And your smartphone says, “Oh! The first thing you have to do is to breathe in mindfully and go back to yourself.”
There is a Zen story about a person sitting on a horse, gallop ing very quickly. At a crossroads, a friend of his shouts, “Where are you going?” The man says, “I don’t know, ask the horse!” This often is our situation. Here horse is technology . The horse is supposed to carry us to a good destination, as is technology
We pick up a book to read, hoping to have a sensation. We go to the Internet, looking for pictures and songs and music to have a certain feeling. When you listen to music or read a book or newspaper out of routine, you are doing it so you won’t encounter yourself. Many of us are afraid of going home to ourselves, So we look for sensory impressions to consume. Technology, the Internet, is helping us to do this.
Many young people do this. A teenager confessed to us in a retreat that he spends at least eight hours each day with electronic games, and he cannot stop. At first he was playing games to forget, and now he’s addicted to it. Many young people are trying to fill up the loneliness, the emptiness inside, by looking for sensory impressions. That is the second source of nutrient.
There are many people who check their email several times a day and find nothing new. Because you are empty inside, you are looking for something new.-Thich Naht Hanh
You have to learn to generate peace and calm , : a feeling of joy, a feeling of happiness. That is possible with the practice of mindfulness.And not at all difficult ---My 2c .