Learn from your children

I have the best two kids I could ask for, they give me more insights to life than any single book could. Every single day, their being reminds me of the responsibility we all have to safekeep our world – their future. This one is for them:

‘Airitage’

‘While we breathe the same air that
went through our fathers’ lungs
we can still make better use of it
with our very own tongues.’
– MP

Modern technology and the impact on our relationships

Sherry Turkle – Professor of Social Studies of Science and Technology at the MIT – speaks about the impact that modern technology has on our relationships:
she speaks about phantom phone ringing, where people are anxious to get more exciting news; global connectivity that makes us always on; and how remote and alone we finally remain within this illusion of being connected.
– A speech so brutally true, that I should rather not have posted it on Facebook where people tend to create the ideal image of themselves. Even if Sherry puts her words with quite some drama and does not really provide solutions, we should THINK TWICE how we want to treat technology better, before it is treating us worse…

Some quotes:
“from multi-tasking to multi-lifing” – “technology proposes itself as the architect of our intimacies” – “technology is seductive when its affordances meet our human vulnerabilities”

“we are lonely, but fearful of intimacy; connectivity offers for many of us the illusion of companionship, without the demands of friendship. We can’t get enough of each other if – if – we can have each other at a distance in a manner (?) that we can control. Think of Goldilocks (siehe Wikipedia: ‘Goldlöckchen und die drei Bären‘), not too close, not too far, just right.”

“connection made to measure [..with..] the ability to hide from each other” – “too put it rather too simply: we would rather text than talk”

“often we are too busy communicating to think, too busy communicating to create, too busy communicating to really connect with the people we’re with in the ways that would really count, in continual contact, we’re alone together…”

Steve Jobs 1955-2011

Steve Jobs was not perfect, by any means he was not the iGod as some of his most enthusiastic followers would have labelled him. But whatever we may conclude about him as a person, he ultimately was a human being that dared to make a difference with his products and ideas. Still, what will keep him in our mind for some time after this, will be something non-commercial: his will to make a difference by sharing his insights to life, and by encouraging others to go their way.

Find below some of the quotes I personally found the most touching from his June 12, 2005, commencement speech at Stanford University.

May he rest in peace, and may his being encourage others to unrestfully work for peace.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most importantly, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Stay hungry. Stay foolish.

Quality

Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives.
– William A. Foster (?)