Hearing hearts has nothing to do with iPODs

I have noticed it many times before and I see it everyday around me. This time I was on the way back to Pune from Kolhapur the other day. I was traveling on a bus and everyone in the bus who was in reach of my sight was on phone for most of the time throughout the journey. These days while walking or traveling on road I see that eight persons out of 10 are either on phone or plugged in with some other audio device, even if they have somebody walking with them. My point of disappointment here is that 'most of the time we are not with the people mentally whom we are walking physically with'.

I remember those two weeks in the year 2007 when I had given up using mobile phone because it(the mobile) was busy half the hours I was awake in a day. Thank God, I realized it then that I was spending more time on phone than with real people.

Music is not bad, talking to loved ones is great, passing time while traveling is necessary but why has mobile phone replaced beautiful people is something I find hard to accept. I love kids and like to spend time with them as much as possible. These days I have seen children playing more with my phone or laptop than they would like to spend time with me. It is frustrating! I am sure many of you have noticed that. Is it because gadgets are probably more attractive than real people? or is it because real people are too boring to spend a lot of time with? I do not know the answer either. But I have come across the real problem, I guess.

I have heard many young people telling me that they need to spend time on movies or on their iPODs because they need to refresh themselves. They are tired. They are bored. They are lonely. They are uncomfortable, they say. They are lost and suffering, I say. Children have stopped talking openly to parents long back. Parents have stopped asking what their kids are up to? No one of us have time to listen to others and we cannot even recollect when was the time that we learned there is nobody to listen to us. We have no time to hear and even if somebody stands with us pouring out their heart, our heart is not in the same place there. It's a pathetic situation of all of us.

It is a sad fact that we have no time to share and we have no time to listen. Try giving some time to hear somebody and you will enjoy the satisfactions in their eyes. Shall we encourage someone to speak? Shall we listen to unheard voices? Shall we discover unspoken words? Shall we hear speaking hearts? Believe me, hearing hearts has nothing to do with iPODs.


Note: I have used iPOD as a generic word for music players and other gadgets that we may get addicted to.