A Distracted World: The Mental and Spiritual Dangers of Distraction

In a recent video entitled, “You Need to Be Bored. Here’s Why”, Harvard professor and researcher Arthur, C. Brooks points out the critical need for us to allow our brains time to do… nothing. He notes:

“The default mode network is a bunch of structures in your brain that switch on when you don’t have anything else to think about… When you think about nothing your mind wanders and thinks about, for example, big questions of meaning in your life. What does my life mean? You go to uncomfortable existential questions when you’re bored. That turns out to be incredibly important, incredibly good.”

In our digital age of 24-hour connectedness and digital distraction, our constant fixation with our phones and social media is creating brain patterns that prevent us from being able to open our minds to consider the great questions of life. Not only is this having a serious impact on mental health, but it also has serious spiritual implications.

Tune in as Scott and Shawn continue their discussion about learning to think like Jesus in a digital age. In this episode they unpack and discuss both the physical and spiritual cost of the constant distractions facing us in our digital environment.