We love to be distracted. We’ll pay good money for the opportunity to escape the present.

In 2020 the tech industry brought in nearly $80 billion in app sales. While there are some incredibly useful apps out there, those aren’t the ones making the big bucks. The top five apps, in terms of revenue, were games—each garnering more than $1 billion. In fact, while only 1/4 of all apps are games, they account for more than 70% of all revenue made in global app sales (businessofapps.com). We might love our tool tech, but drool tech is moving the market. 

Distraction is big business. 

This income disparity between creating and consuming holds true with our time use as well. The average American teen spends nearly 8 hours a day on Drool Tech, consuming entertainment. The four largest companies in the world, each worth more than $1 trillion, are tech companies invested in creating both the tools for modern work as well as the most lucrative distractions mankind has ever seen. 

Just think of this: The same companies who provide learning devices for our schools, and the digital meetings services we use at work, also design many of the games, social media, and streaming platforms that distract us from getting work done–sometimes using those very same “work” devices they sold us in the first place.

This isn’t a complaint about “tech these days”, or even “kids these days”. Instead it is a call for us to reflect on our own tech behaviors as adults and parents.

Model healthy tech.

Let’s do a quick self-check: Where do you spend most of your tech time? 

Open your phone and go to Settings. Click Screen Time > See All Activity (just below the Daily Average time use). How much time are you giving to tech each day? Which apps do you use most? Screen Time even lets you see what times of day you’re using certain apps. You might find, as I did, that your use exceeds what you expected.

Yet living healthy tech lives is about more than simply avoiding tech mistakes. We must remember that there are companies who are more than willing to train us to be proper consumers. 

Where will we set our minds?

It’s easy to point the finger at the trillion-dollar behemoths, but in truth, we can’t blame them. They are convinced we want to be distracted. With the way we’re spending our time and money, what else could they think? In 2020 alone we watched more than 2 billion hours of content on Youtube. Add Netflix to the mix, another 600 million hours, and we’ve got nearly 300,000 years of attention invested in escape (Business of Apps). The only reason we have so many distractions is because we keep asking for them. 

Being spiritually disciplined

The solution to our distraction epidemic isn’t to avoid tech but to allow something bigger and better capture our attention. We need to let God, not Google, capture our imagination. We must choose to set our focus on His truth, and set our minds on the things of the Spirit (Romans 8:4). The very act of making time for God requires we take stock of where we’re spending our time in the first place.

The old-school term for this process is spiritual discipline.

Today, make time to pray and read God’s word. 

*If you don’t know where to start reading, try the Gospel of Matthew. 

*If you don’t know how to pray, start just by saying exactly that. God’s amazing at helping us when we have no idea what to say. 

*Attend a church that makes disciples, not just converts. 

*Reflect on what God is inviting you to do, have, and be in Christ today.

Then, take a step to share this journey with your family. Say one thing at dinner you got from your time with God today. Just a verse, an insight, or something you prayed. It’s one intentional step to live out our faith; it is only our hearts changed by God that will break our demand for distraction.