Killing an elephant

I was reaching out my hand toward this massive yellow moon rising over the silver ocean when, suddenly, my rod bent almost all the way to the water, twitching like crazy. "A fish," I thought to myself, gripping the handle tight—and a big one at that. Slowly, pulling against the fish while it pulled back against me and my boat, we drew closer to our inevitable encounter, and just as I was about to haul it in, a giant clock leaps out of the sea and starts ringing, ringing, and ringing...

I snap my eyes open, jump out of bed, kill the alarm on my iPhone 3G, and check my gold Christian Dior. "Seven AM—gotta get to work." With heavy legs and hands that still ache from hauling in that massive fish, I brush my teeth with my electric toothbrush, shave with my electric razor, get dressed, and splash on some cologne—carefully, so I don't stain the shirt. I look out the window—sunny—so I decide to bike instead of drive, mentally running through my to-do list and the meetings I have lined up. I shove something into my bag, then remember last minute that I’ve got a meeting with some guy from a travel agency, so I'll need my laptop to show off his vacation rentals.

Actually, ever since I bought this little laptop at AT&T, it's been the family favorite. Even though we have another laptop and two desktops, this one is somehow the star. I toss the "lap" into my backpack, throw on a beanie (still cold out), crank up my Gepida, and head out toward the bridge in downtown Chicago.

I'm thinking. Once I get to work and knock down my mandatory sugar-free morning macchiato, I'll fire up the office computer, catch up on the last few days, scan the news, hop on the forum to see if anyone replied to my theories, and... get to work. Of course, the radio will be blasting in the background, cutting in with news every hour, so by the 3:00 PM update, it's just mindless white noise. Then, I head home on my bike, eat lunch, sit down at the big computer, check my mail, and open the forum again. In the background, the Soniyev TV is playing one of its endless reruns interrupted by commercials, while from the other room, I hear some supposedly "pleasant" but actually horrific music my daughter is headbanging to. We've got five TVs in this place—one in every room—and over 700 channels (who even understands digital cable nowadays?). Honestly, I don't even watch TV.

I'm beat. I turn down the TV, crank up my wat line and speakers (just something light), lie on the couch, and close my eyes. I can't sleep, though—so I turn to my library of over 1,300 books, grab one, and start reading. Five minutes later, I have no idea what I just read or even which book I'm holding. My mind won't shut up. All the bills I have to pay, how am I going to afford everything since my daughter starts college this year, when am I going to prune the trees, what needs painting at the lake house, I need to buy my younger daughter a professional digital camera—but where's the money coming from? My son has to take those certification exams that cost an arm and a leg, and cash is tight right now. I haven't even renewed the hosting for my website... etcetera, etcetera.

I get up because my wife walks in, and we start talking about her issues at work. The phone rings (I have two, and I never know where they are—the house is huge and the kids leave the receivers in impossible spots), and friends call to say they're coming over. I sprint to the store for drinks, there's no bread, my wife is yelling—"get coffee too!"—and me, cursing, I pull my shoes back on, hit the ATM, run to the grocery store, and then help her prep dinner and get ready for the guests.
The best friends showed up, lots of laughing, joking around, gossiping about people who aren't there, and by eleven o'clock, I feel absolutely exhausted.
I’m lying here, and my wife tells me I crashed out like a freight train. Meanwhile, I’m stuck trying to get back into this dream where there’s a massive yellow moon and a fish that just won't surface.

__________________________________________

Here’s the question:

Is there an absolute breaking point for the pace of life—a limit to how fast a person can go biologically and psychologically before they snap? And what actually happens when you cross that line?
The thing is, everyone around me thinks I live at a snail's pace. I don't rush, I take it easy, and honestly, most people are pretty jealous of that.

It exists, but everyone has their limits. Cross those lines, and things stop working the way they're supposed to. That doesn't have to be a bad thing—it might be painful—as long as it leads to some kind of transformation.

Honestly, Servantes, I’d love to experience that kind of mental strain in such a desolate setting—just daydreaming about lazily grilling fish off the deck of my boat until a golden Christian Dior wakes me up.😁
😂😂

Man, sorry, but you have me laughing so hard instead of waking up, it’s starting to feel pointless...🙏

hollowtinker18 said:Honestly, Servantes, I’d love to experience that kind of mental strain in such a desolate setting—just daydreaming about lazily grilling fish off the deck of my boat until a golden Christian Dior wakes me up.😁
😂😂

Man, sorry, but you have me laughing so hard instead of waking up, it’s starting to feel pointless...🙏

Hey there.

My point wasn't about waking up to Christian Dior. I was trying to highlight our obsession with technology. We built this stuff to make life easier, but now it's become our secret master, forcing us to adapt at an insane pace. Our nervous systems—our ability to process endless streams of data, tackle multi-layered problems, and escape the constant flood of useless info—are being pushed to the absolute limit. It's a test of whether we can even function normally anymore.

Where do we draw the line, and what happens when we cross it?

Look at how nobody writes by hand anymore. Handwriting is practically a lost art; even little kids would rather use a keyboard. I know from experience. I can touch-type blindly with all ten fingers. I once had a keyboard where the letters had completely rubbed off—terrible quality, by the way—and it didn't bother me one bit. The problem was my wife. She rarely types, so she struggled, yet all three of our kids could use it without any issues.

And then there's the question of how to protect yourself from hearing or seeing the same news cycle over and over again. Most of it doesn't even involve you personally. It just dumps someone else's problems onto your plate, making you carry their weight, while the person on the TV, radio, or internet acts like it's breaking news you absolutely need to care about.

Look, man... I was just trying to crack a joke during one of those sleepless nights.

CDs, satellites, smartphones—it’s all there. I heard that cell tower signals are actually wrecking the bee population, making them lose their way until they just die off en masse...
You ever hear anything like that?
Did you ever finish that "winning octopus" thing of yours? 😁

And why does everyone obsess over these useless gadgets and tech that ultimately just alienates us from being human in the first place?
Take care.

Technology actually delivers some wins—like the fact that we can have meaningful discussions right here.

Drew Morgan said:Technology actually delivers some wins—like the fact that we can have meaningful discussions right here.

Spot on, Drew Morgan. Technology freed us from back-breaking manual labor and opened up entire new worlds of needs and possibilities. The real question is: at what point do those "chains of freedom" turn into shackles?
Is the human brain actually wired to keep pace with this kind of rapid technological evolution?

It seems this isn't a technical hurdle, but a systemic one. Take the old days: we used to waste hours manually sending faxes to a hundred different recipients. I expected email to let me blast those hundred messages in sixty seconds and hand me back my free time. But the system won't allow you that freedom, even when the technology makes it possible.

I have to bring up the legacy of Tesla again. He pioneered the tech that could provide us with limitless energy. Yet, the system stifled that development because they'd rather sell us electricity by the kilowatt.

Drew Morgan said:Technology actually delivers some wins—like the fact that we can have meaningful discussions right here.

True enough.
But have you ever heard of internet addiction?

hollowtinker18 said:True enough.
But have you ever heard of internet addiction?

Unfortunately, I am, as evidenced by the attached 😍😍😍
And I’m just as hooked on texting!

Mark Torres14 said:I was reaching out my hand toward this massive yellow moon rising over the silver ocean when, suddenly, my rod bent almost all the way to the water, twitching like crazy. "A fish," I thought to myself, gripping the handle tight—and a big one at that. Slowly, pulling against the fish while it pulled back against me and my boat, we drew closer to our inevitable encounter, and just as I was about to haul it in, a giant clock leaps out of the sea and starts ringing, ringing, and ringing...

I snap my eyes open, jump out of bed, kill the alarm on my iPhone 3G, and check my gold Christian Dior. "Seven AM—gotta get to work." With heavy legs and hands that still ache from hauling in that massive fish, I brush my teeth with my electric toothbrush, shave with my electric razor, get dressed, and splash on some cologne—carefully, so I don't stain the shirt. I look out the window—sunny—so I decide to bike instead of drive, mentally running through my to-do list and the meetings I have lined up. I shove something into my bag, then remember last minute that I’ve got a meeting with some guy from a travel agency, so I'll need my laptop to show off his vacation rentals.

Actually, ever since I bought this little laptop at AT&T, it's been the family favorite. Even though we have another laptop and two desktops, this one is somehow the star. I toss the "lap" into my backpack, throw on a beanie (still cold out), crank up my Gepida, and head out toward the bridge in downtown Chicago.

I'm thinking. Once I get to work and knock down my mandatory sugar-free morning macchiato, I'll fire up the office computer, catch up on the last few days, scan the news, hop on the forum to see if anyone replied to my theories, and... get to work. Of course, the radio will be blasting in the background, cutting in with news every hour, so by the 3:00 PM update, it's just mindless white noise. Then, I head home on my bike, eat lunch, sit down at the big computer, check my mail, and open the forum again. In the background, the Soniyev TV is playing one of its endless reruns interrupted by commercials, while from the other room, I hear some supposedly "pleasant" but actually horrific music my daughter is headbanging to. We've got five TVs in this place—one in every room—and over 700 channels (who even understands digital cable nowadays?). Honestly, I don't even watch TV.

I'm beat. I turn down the TV, crank up my wat line and speakers (just something light), lie on the couch, and close my eyes. I can't sleep, though—so I turn to my library of over 1,300 books, grab one, and start reading. Five minutes later, I have no idea what I just read or even which book I'm holding. My mind won't shut up. All the bills I have to pay, how am I going to afford everything since my daughter starts college this year, when am I going to prune the trees, what needs painting at the lake house, I need to buy my younger daughter a professional digital camera—but where's the money coming from? My son has to take those certification exams that cost an arm and a leg, and cash is tight right now. I haven't even renewed the hosting for my website... etcetera, etcetera.

I get up because my wife walks in, and we start talking about her issues at work. The phone rings (I have two, and I never know where they are—the house is huge and the kids leave the receivers in impossible spots), and friends call to say they're coming over. I sprint to the store for drinks, there's no bread, my wife is yelling—"get coffee too!"—and me, cursing, I pull my shoes back on, hit the ATM, run to the grocery store, and then help her prep dinner and get ready for the guests.
The best friends showed up, lots of laughing, joking around, gossiping about people who aren't there, and by eleven o'clock, I feel absolutely exhausted.
I’m lying here, and my wife tells me I crashed out like a freight train. Meanwhile, I’m stuck trying to get back into this dream where there’s a massive yellow moon and a fish that just won't surface.

__________________________________________

Here’s the question:

Is there an absolute breaking point for the pace of life—a limit to how fast a person can go biologically and psychologically before they snap? And what actually happens when you cross that line?
The thing is, everyone around me thinks I live at a snail's pace. I don't rush, I take it easy, and honestly, most people are pretty jealous of that.

Honestly, your neighbors aren't wrong. Enjoy that peace while it lasts. Just to give you an idea, here's what a typical day looks like for me. 🙄

Michael Anderson2 said:Honestly, your neighbors aren't wrong. Enjoy that peace while it lasts. Just to give you an idea, here's what a typical day looks like for me. 🙄

I guess so. A few of my buddies and old classmates run their own businesses. Most of them are loaded, but they’re still dreaming about actually taking a real vacation.

So, what's your take—has technology made our lives easier, or just made us slaves to it?

My philosophical take? Technology just manufactures artificial, unnecessary desires. I don't have the bandwidth to build out my full argument right now—deadlines are breathing down my neck! 😁

I'll dive into the details once things settle down.

On a global scale, it’s been a net positive. More output in less time translates to more cash, a better lifestyle, and—ideally—a longer life expectancy. 🤷
On a personal level, though, everyone gets to decide how much tech they want integrated into their daily grind. I was actually reading the paper the other day about some rancher out in Montana who can't find a single farmhand willing to take a job that offers housing, meals, and a decent thousand-dollar paycheck 🙂
.

Mark Torres14 said:I was reaching out my hand toward this massive yellow moon rising over the silver ocean when, suddenly, my rod bent almost all the way to the water, twitching like crazy. "A fish," I thought to myself, gripping the handle tight—and a big one at that. Slowly, pulling against the fish while it pulled back against me and my boat, we drew closer to our inevitable encounter, and just as I was about to haul it in, a giant clock leaps out of the sea and starts ringing, ringing, and ringing...

I snap my eyes open, jump out of bed, kill the alarm on my iPhone 3G, and check my gold Christian Dior. "Seven AM—gotta get to work." With heavy legs and hands that still ache from hauling in that massive fish, I brush my teeth with my electric toothbrush, shave with my electric razor, get dressed, and splash on some cologne—carefully, so I don't stain the shirt. I look out the window—sunny—so I decide to bike instead of drive, mentally running through my to-do list and the meetings I have lined up. I shove something into my bag, then remember last minute that I’ve got a meeting with some guy from a travel agency, so I'll need my laptop to show off his vacation rentals.

Actually, ever since I bought this little laptop at AT&T, it's been the family favorite. Even though we have another laptop and two desktops, this one is somehow the star. I toss the "lap" into my backpack, throw on a beanie (still cold out), crank up my Gepida, and head out toward the bridge in downtown Chicago.

I'm thinking. Once I get to work and knock down my mandatory sugar-free morning macchiato, I'll fire up the office computer, catch up on the last few days, scan the news, hop on the forum to see if anyone replied to my theories, and... get to work. Of course, the radio will be blasting in the background, cutting in with news every hour, so by the 3:00 PM update, it's just mindless white noise. Then, I head home on my bike, eat lunch, sit down at the big computer, check my mail, and open the forum again. In the background, the Soniyev TV is playing one of its endless reruns interrupted by commercials, while from the other room, I hear some supposedly "pleasant" but actually horrific music my daughter is headbanging to. We've got five TVs in this place—one in every room—and over 700 channels (who even understands digital cable nowadays?). Honestly, I don't even watch TV.

I'm beat. I turn down the TV, crank up my wat line and speakers (just something light), lie on the couch, and close my eyes. I can't sleep, though—so I turn to my library of over 1,300 books, grab one, and start reading. Five minutes later, I have no idea what I just read or even which book I'm holding. My mind won't shut up. All the bills I have to pay, how am I going to afford everything since my daughter starts college this year, when am I going to prune the trees, what needs painting at the lake house, I need to buy my younger daughter a professional digital camera—but where's the money coming from? My son has to take those certification exams that cost an arm and a leg, and cash is tight right now. I haven't even renewed the hosting for my website... etcetera, etcetera.

I get up because my wife walks in, and we start talking about her issues at work. The phone rings (I have two, and I never know where they are—the house is huge and the kids leave the receivers in impossible spots), and friends call to say they're coming over. I sprint to the store for drinks, there's no bread, my wife is yelling—"get coffee too!"—and me, cursing, I pull my shoes back on, hit the ATM, run to the grocery store, and then help her prep dinner and get ready for the guests.
The best friends showed up, lots of laughing, joking around, gossiping about people who aren't there, and by eleven o'clock, I feel absolutely exhausted.
I’m lying here, and my wife tells me I crashed out like a freight train. Meanwhile, I’m stuck trying to get back into this dream where there’s a massive yellow moon and a fish that just won't surface.

__________________________________________

Here’s the question:

Is there an absolute breaking point for the pace of life—a limit to how fast a person can go biologically and psychologically before they snap? And what actually happens when you cross that line?
The thing is, everyone around me thinks I live at a snail's pace. I don't rush, I take it easy, and honestly, most people are pretty jealous of that.

There is definitely a ceiling on how much stress a body can handle. Stress comes from everything—adapting to change, solving problems, interpersonal friction, internal turmoil—you name it.
If it drags on too long, you pay the price in health. 🙂 We’re talking migraines, obesity, insomnia, heart issues... some even claim cancer is linked to chronic high stress.
Too much stress destroys you, but too little is just plain boring. 🤷

placidranger said:On a global scale, it’s been a net positive. More output in less time translates to more cash, a better lifestyle, and—ideally—a longer life expectancy. 🤷
On a personal level, though, everyone gets to decide how much tech they want integrated into their daily grind. I was actually reading the paper the other day about some rancher out in Montana who can't find a single farmhand willing to take a job that offers housing, meals, and a decent thousand-dollar paycheck 🙂
.

Exactly. It freed us from backbreaking physical labor. We’re cleaner, we live longer, and we actually have something called "free time." At the same time, we're being absolutely bombarded with information—most of which we don't need, didn't ask for, and have zero power to stop from flooding our brains.
At work, computers "simplified" things by making it so that everything I used to do on paper now requires both paperwork AND digital input.
That brings me to what Michael Anderson2 mentioned. The creation of unnecessary needs.
How much of modern life is spent being a slave to those needs, versus how much of our identity is built around satisfying them?
It really is the real question. For all our talk about freedom and independence, why isn't anyone lining up to herd sheep for a thousand bucks a month plus room, board, and cigarettes?
Does nobody know where the Trečićs are hiding?😁

Mark Torres14 said:I guess so. A few of my buddies and old classmates run their own businesses. Most of them are loaded, but they’re still dreaming about actually taking a real vacation.

So, what's your take—has technology made our lives easier, or just made us slaves to it?

It really comes down to the individual, I suppose... There are those who have been completely swallowed up by all these tech innovations, people who can't even function normally anymore because they're so hooked... My husband, for instance, won't even step out to grab a coffee without his smartphone glued to his hand. 😁
Then you have the others, the ones who actually see technology as a tool to serve them, using progress to actually facilitate their own lives and let them act more naturally... Like, back when we stayed at our cabin in the mountains and didn't have electricity, we’d all just sit together by candlelight under the moonlight... Now my sister-in-law complains constantly that having power killed the romance of it all. But honestly, I don't buy it! If you want romance, you can always just flip the switch and turn the lights off... But if you need it, click!—there goes the TV, the computer hums to life, and you've always got plenty of ice for a cocktail. 😁

Technology is the ONLY thing actually working for us!

If humanity has any kind of future worth mentioning—and if there’s even one path that holds the potential for what I’d call "Enlightenment 2.0"—that path is undeniably technological in nature.

The real issue right now, though, is that everyone is sprinting toward new tech without actually grasping how it works. Because of that, we’re trying to tackle modern-day problems using yesterday’s tools, which is why there's this massive wave of global anxiety sweeping through society. Right now, technology is still largely being steered by global politics and the corporate elite at places like Wall Street or Silicon Valley giants, but honestly? That era is rapidly dying out. Once the average person takes the time to truly wrap their head around the tech they use every day, technology will finally return to its true purpose... it'll become "a tool for human liberation."

rustymaker5 said:It really comes down to the individual, I suppose... There are those who have been completely swallowed up by all these tech innovations, people who can't even function normally anymore because they're so hooked... My husband, for instance, won't even step out to grab a coffee without his smartphone glued to his hand. 😁
Then you have the others, the ones who actually see technology as a tool to serve them, using progress to actually facilitate their own lives and let them act more naturally... Like, back when we stayed at our cabin in the mountains and didn't have electricity, we’d all just sit together by candlelight under the moonlight... Now my sister-in-law complains constantly that having power killed the romance of it all. But honestly, I don't buy it! If you want romance, you can always just flip the switch and turn the lights off... But if you need it, click!—there goes the TV, the computer hums to life, and you've always got plenty of ice for a cocktail. 😁

But rustymaker5, we can't just hand-wave everything away. Sure, tech gave us stuff we couldn't have dreamed of, but it also injected this restless impatience into us that just wasn't there before.

Your beach house story sounds exactly like mine. We used to hang out with the whole neighborhood, now we barely even wave hello. It's true that electricity brought everything we imagined when we were building it, but it also took away the joy of anticipation once it was done. Sure, we could go back to the old ways with one flick of a switch, but why does nobody ever flip it? Instead, everyone just sits around talking about the "good old days" with a sigh.

Edward Flores4 said:Technology is the ONLY thing actually working for us!

If humanity has any kind of future worth mentioning—and if there’s even one path that holds the potential for what I’d call "Enlightenment 2.0"—that path is undeniably technological in nature.

The real issue right now, though, is that everyone is sprinting toward new tech without actually grasping how it works. Because of that, we’re trying to tackle modern-day problems using yesterday’s tools, which is why there's this massive wave of global anxiety sweeping through society. Right now, technology is still largely being steered by global politics and the corporate elite at places like Wall Street or Silicon Valley giants, but honestly? That era is rapidly dying out. Once the average person takes the time to truly wrap their head around the tech they use every day, technology will finally return to its true purpose... it'll become "a tool for human liberation."

I would argue that technology is the only thing that *could* help us... provided, of course, it isn't held hostage by massive corporations. As long as they maintain that level of control, all that immense potential will either sit idle or, more likely, be weaponized for less than noble ends... if you catch my drift.

In my view, the internet ought to be at the forefront of that much-vaunted "human liberation." I can’t quite pinpoint the exact mechanism or provide a rigorous academic defense for it, but I simply perceive the internet as an emerging utopia. It is a realm that offers endless opportunities for networking—and no, I am not referring to Facebook or those other superficial social media platforms—alongside a vast ocean of educational content and literature spanning every conceivable field of human endeavor and theoretical thought. A wealth of everything the mind can conceive... all accessible, and all free.
Furthermore, beyond its efficacy as a real-time connector for people, the internet serves as perhaps the greatest and most vital archive ever assembled. Of course, there is always room for refinement...

If you were to strip away the internet while leaving all our other technological "tools" intact, humanity would still find itself significantly ahead of where it started. 🙏