After reading this talk, and even before I have been thinking about the effects of technology in my life. I know that as a college student, technology and the internet are a big part of our lives out of necessity. But I think that I have (as many do) a little bit of an addiction to my online life. I have "the rounds" that I check, blogger, twitter, pinterest, facebook, instagram, the list goes on and on. And I still believe this is healthy, but to an extent. I have seen that this "cycle" has become an ever increasing part of my daily life. It's easy, it's mindless, and it becomes a habit so quickly and so easily. I don't want this to go any further and I want to ease myself back to a healthy amount of my online life. Still trying to figure out just what that balance is though. I have never though of it quite in this way, but Elder Bednar puts it in a way that I have never thought of before. When we are living our life "virtually" we are degrading the importance of our bodies and Satan wins. Crazy to think about, but it completely makes sense.
"Today I raise an apostolic voice of warning about the potentially stifling, suffocating, suppressing, and constraining impact of some kinds of cyberspace interactions and experiences upon our souls. The concerns I raise are not new; they apply equally to other types of media, such as television, movies, and music. But in a cyber world, these challenges are more pervasive and intense. I plead with you to beware of the sense-dulling and spiritually destructive influence of cyberspace technologies that are used to produce high fidelity and that promote degrading and evil purposes.
If the adversary cannot entice us to misuse our physical bodies, then one of his most potent tactics is to beguile you and me as embodied spirits to disconnect gradually and physically from things as they really are. In essence, he encourages us to think and act as if we were in our premortal, unembodied state. And, if we let him, he can cunningly employ some aspects of modern technology to accomplish his purposes. Please be careful of becoming so immersed and engrossed in pixels, texting, ear buds, twittering, online social networking, and potentially addictive uses of media and the Internet that you fail to recognize the importance of your physical body and miss the richness of person-to-person communication. Beware of digital displays and data in many forms of computer-mediated interaction that can displace the full range of physical capacity and experience."
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