Let the phone ring
What happens when the phone rings?
Do you pick up?
Do you rush through the house to grab it before the caller hangs up?
I sure do sometimes.
Yet, I also realize that it’s a symptom of a not-so-good way to live.
I’m old enough to remember “real” phones. The ones that were sitting in one room. Or fixed on a wall. Attached to a cable. The ones that you could not carry with you.
When we were out, we were out.
The caller would leave a message or just deal with it and call again later.
That “unreachable” disappeared with mobile phones. We’re now carrying a device with us that allows anyone to call us anytime, with a good chance of reaching us.
But isn’t it backwards?
Shouldn’t we decide when we’re reachable?
Aside from important calls (my wife, my kids at the top of the list), I don’t want or need to be “reachable”. I need to focus. I need to follow the course of action I’ve chosen without being interrupted.
If we allow the world to interrupt us at any time, we’re not actors anymore. We’re reactors.
And when we’re reacting, we’re not creating anymore. Others dictate where our attention is (probably not where it should be).
It’s true for our phones. But it’s also true for that email inbox we leave open, the message notifications, that Slack we leave open, all those notifications we didn’t turn off.
Note to myself:
Next time, let the phone ring.