Am I the Distracted One…?

How judging someone made me more self-aware

Hi, friends 🌺

Hola, amigos 🌞

I wasn’t going to write a post yet, but I had a bit of an epiphany the other day…and wanted to share this simple but possibly profound thought…

We went on a waterfall adventure last week. I drove my girls down the mountain, and we met up with a small group of our friends for a little jaunt into Tamanique Falls. It’s a spectacular place, with many different falls of various sizes in multiple directions, surrounding pools of refreshing mineral water. We’ve been there several times in the last few years, and it’s one of our favourite places in El Salvador. And it’s only about a 30-minute drive to get to the little town of Tamanique. From there, it’s an easy, 45-minute walk downhill. You need to pay a guide $8 each to go with you, even though it seems unnecessary if you’ve been there before. But it’s always a good opportunity to practice speaking Spanish with a local.

We walked down the road, and then took it slower going down the hillside trail with its rustic stairs. We had to slow down near the bottom where the stairs are steep and there are cables at arm-level to grip to avoid falling forward.

As soon as we arrived, our group of 6 kids 4 adults jumped in, excited to cool down. We all enjoyed the mineral-rich, clear agua near the base of a huge fall basking in the sun, water, and incredible rock formations around us.

We ventured up a bit higher from the first pool, only to find another natural pool with waterfalls coming into it as well. This one had rocks near the falls at different heights, where you could jump in. I left my phone below, so I don’t have photos except from the lower pools.

There was an older woman, enjoying the water, swimming around, clearly in her element. It looked like her 2 sons were with her in the water. And sitting by the water pool, with her feet in the water, was a younger woman. But she wasn’t present.

And it struck me—this woman only had eyes for her phone. I sat about 20 feet away from her, watching my girls and the others jump in from a nearby rocky perch, psyching myself up to do the same. At this point I suppose I was a little distracted by this woman.

There’s no cell service here. How is she this obsessed with her phone out here?!

She held it near her face as she pursed her lipstick-coated lips and opened her eyes wide for another selfie. Changing her angle, and flipping her hair, she posed for another, and another. I crept past her on the rocks, wanting to join my girls and our friends on the other side of the pool by the falls where they were jumping in. She paused momentarily, not wanting me to obstruct her background.

We enjoyed another hour of jumping in to the water—some of our group from about 20 feet up—splashing around, and relishing in the beauty of nature by the waterfalls, and then headed back up the trail.

I realized later that although I’d judged a distracted woman, I should actually be judging myself…

Just because I wasn’t on my phone at the falls, I’m justified in judging someone who was?! But…I struggle almost daily with addiction to my phone.

It’s true. I let it take my time away from my kids, my husband, and sometimes even nature, being alone with my thoughts, meditating, praying, or just some deep thinking.

Mostly I’m addicted to it at home in the afternoons or evenings when I’m tired, and tell myself I deserve this me-time. But then I let it be a substitute for time with those who matter most to me…or even let mindless scrolling be a substitute for reading a REAL book or having a REAL conversation.

All this to say, I’m becoming more self-aware.

“Hi, my name is Emily. And I’m a cellphone addict.”

I’m starting to make a conscious effort to just put my phone down. Put it on airplane mode more. Let go of obsessing about messaging my friends or checking certain websites or watching videos. Stop scrolling. Social media doesn’t have the answers I need.

What can I do about my addiction, when my brain wants more dopamine hits from scrolling? Set limits for myself. But I also have to remember that my kids will only be young for so long…and if my husband is beside me, am I giving him my full attention when he’s talking?

All I have is today. There’s no guarantee any of us will have tomorrow.

Here’s the chorus of a song that comes to mind that my sister and I used to listen to about 30 years ago…

Seize the day – seize whatever you can.

‘Cause life slips away just like hourglass sand

Seize the day—pray for grace from God’s hand…then nothing will stand in your way.

Seize the day.

—Carolyn Arends

One final thought…I wrote about Abél in my last post, our gate guard who was recently killed in a motorcycle accident. The other day I was asking another guard, Mauricio, how old Abél was. He told me he was just 56. Wow. As I continued on my morning walk, I was pondering…

“How do we ever know when our lives will end? When I was younger, I often wondered if I’d die young. I could still die next week, or even in the next few years. But, I could live to see my grand babies…

But, it struck me again—TODAY is ALL I have. How will I live it?

Carpe diem, mis amigos.

Until next time…🕰

Hasta la proxima vez…🙏

Seize the day…and let’s be present with those we care about…today.

💚💚💚💚💚