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(film rolling)
Tiffany: I love technology.
Like everyone I'm totally addicted but it's also consumed all of my time
where I feel like I'm constantly responding to everyone
and not really responding to myself in some ways.
But a few years ago I started thinking a lot about time.
My father was dying of brain cancer
and sometimes he only had 1 good hour a day.
It made me think about how little of time we have.
During that time, my family and I decided
to completely unplug from technology 1 day a week.
We call it our Technology Shabbats.
We've done it every week for more then 3 years
and it's completely changed my life.
I'm Tiffany Shlain.
I'm a mother, filmmaker.
I founded the Webby Awards.
And this series is about how the future doesn't start
somewhere far off in the distance.
The future starts here.
(intro music)
Let me start by saying that I'm Jewish
but I'm not religious.
But I love the rituals, I love the rituals.
I'm culturally Jewish.
There's this organization I'm a part of called Reboot
that was doing a national day of unplugging several years ago.
My family and I did it and it was such a profound experience
that we've done it every week since.
It's like our modern version of a very old Jewish tradition
of taking 1 day off a week called Shabbat.
We still drive cars and use electricity but for us no screens.
No TV, no cellphone or anything that pulls us away from being together.
It's our interpretation of the essence of Shabbat, being present.
The idea of taking a day off has like happened all over the world
in all these different cultures.
To take breaks, pray, do rituals
or to experience time in a different way.
In the Jewish tradition, it's from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.
What one of my favorite Jewish philosophers, Heschel, calls a palace in time.
For Muslims the sacred day is Friday,
for most Christians it's Sunday
and for the never distracted Buddha, you could just say that being enlightened,
he was having Shabbat all the time.
But with all these new delicious technologies today,
when do we ever get the space to take time off?
I mean, doesn't it feel like you're always being distracted
(beeping) or beeped at or tweeted or ...
(beeping) I mean I just feel like I'm influenced by so many different things
(beeping) I feel like I'm in an emotional pinball machine.
(beeping)
It just seems like a good idea to have 1 day
where no one gets to affect your mood except yourself
and the people that you love right around you.
Now taking this 1 day off from technology every week,
I feel so much more grounded and balanced.
My husband, Ken and I, try to be as unavailable as possible
except to each other and our children.
I feel like a better mother, wife and person.
Every week it's like a valve of pressure releases
from the bombardment of interesting facts, articles and tidbits I consume daily
as I travel on this info rocket of discovery, procrastination,
productivity and then eventually overload.
Now, there's so much good that comes from technology.
Just know that I believe that
but I also think about what it's taking away.
Being present, being focused in the moment.
Man in white: No radio, TV, even the wire services are cut.
It's like the town was hanging in midair.
Tiffany: Researchers have compared the sense of technological dependency
on the feeling that we must be accessible and responsive at any time
to that of drugs and alcohol,
and it's all because of this hormone dopamine,
which is related to mood, attention and desire
whether it's for knowledge, food or sex.
It tells you that when you get something and it feels good,
you want more of it.
When you're up late licking,
(laughs) when you're up late but without licking.
I mean, clicking from website to website
or compulsively texting or e-mailing,
those are dopamine induced loops.
And just as we've discovered the hard way,
when we have too much sugar or too much alcohol,
you can have too much information.
I believe we're only at the beginning of truly understanding the effects
of too much technological stimulation on the brain.
Voiceover: Smooth as a baby's bottom.
Man with bowtie: The memory has been removed
like chalk erased from a blackboard.
Tiffany: As we rush into this era of hyper connected human evolution,
we need to evolve and adapt to be more mindful
of what we're doing online and when we should go off.
(calm music)
Since we've unplugged on Saturdays,
our Saturdays now feel like mini vacations.
Slow living that we savor like fine wine.
We garden, we take bike rides, we do art projects.
We're just present with the people right in front of us.
And it's such a beautiful day.
It's my favorite day of the week.
Now, there's one other benefit to unplugging each week.
By sundown on Saturday night, we can't wait to go back online.
We appreciate technology all over again.
But more importantly, the 1 day off to rest and think about the world
makes me reinvigorated to engage in the world with a new perspective.
Every week we remember that the most important thing about technology
is it has an off switch.
So, do you want to try it with us this weekend?
Think about it.
You can do all those things you've been putting off.
Garden, call your mom, look out the window, read a book.
(calm music)
Unplug.
(calm music)