Virtual UNreality.

As I can recall not that long ago in my young life, my siblings and I spent our days out in our backyard pretending to be in an entirely different world from the one we were presently in. We rode our bikes, climbed our giant rope swing, and absorbed possibly too much Vitamin D. Dirt was permanently stuck beneath our fingernails and I had very few clothing items that I hadn't played in the mud with. The laughter that filled our backyard and home was real and felt. Nowadays, I can't say that children don't play outside because they still do, but there is something much different about my generation and the one following it now as I'm older. Television, iPods, iPads, noise, static, images, stimulation stifle the imagination and authenticity of the youth today. Instead of becoming lost in the pages of a book or the world outside our front door, we are lost in the pixelated screens in front of faces and in our palms.

Technology is wonderful, but too much of good thing isn't beneficial either. Technology has brought us life. Due to technology, medicine has expanded, business has boomed, and daily life has been enhanced. Ironically, it has destroyed life as well. The images projected in front of faces present a life that appears genuine, but it hinders us from fully living REAL life. As we strive to have more followers, more likes, more retweets, and more friends, we find ourselves with an emptiness that we constantly try to fulfill but cannot find online. The false sense of connectivity of the social media we indulge in with people we don't see, let alone even know, isn't palpable. The individuals are living, but the interactions are not authentic.

There's something noticeably different about a copy of a painting compared to the original. It looks very similar; in fact, sometimes it is hard to distinguish the differences, but it is different. However, when you see the original, it surpasses the magnificence of the copy and it holds a quality that the copy lacks: authenticity. Such things can be said concerning the two lives that we lead. I can build a life virtually, with my excessive pinning of home projects I aspire to complete on Pinterest, or build a social life by posting excessive statuses and following people that don't even know I exist. But am I really living? What about the life that is passing me by as I stare at my phone for hours? What will be of it? Am I actually constructing anything? These devices that control our lives, don't fulfill them. The world is at our fingertips and we can explore the beautiful world in moments. However, we aren't actually and physically exploring it. We hide behind the walls of our own homes glued to the devices that have become new limbs, and we receive a secondhand take on life.

Life is beautiful and tactile and available. While technology has profited our world by helping us to connect and grow, it has inhibited us by disconnecting us and counterfeiting something so brilliant it cannot be adequately copied: life. The incomplete feeling that follows receiving 100 retweets or thousands of followers highlights how unreal that life is. The laughter that filled my backyard years ago, the friends I had to talk to face to face, the people I got to know in person, the times I spent riding my bike until sundown was real.

Unplug, disconnect, and power down. Paradoxically, when we turn off, we actually reconnect with ourselves, others, and the world. Run while you can, fall in love with everything surrounding you, enjoy the people you can SEE, and soak in the satisfaction you were searching for all this time. God created this earth and gave us life, I do not think He desires us to idly waste it on a watered-down version of the magnificent original.