Time flies! It is a common expression of how fast time passes by. The busier we are, the more preoccupied we are the faster time passes us by. The advancement of technology has made humanity to be more effective, efficient and more productive. However at the same time humanity has lost lots of productive time for themselves and others. Busyness has become one of the important characteristics for modern life. Technology enables people to be connected across the globe and disconnected to their loved ones near them. Technology also enables information to travel at the speed of light and letting ourselves with the bombardment of new facts, new developments and new events that consequently consumes lots of our productive time and energy. It is indeed a great irony when someone saves extra time in order to kill the time. Boredom and loneliness have in fact fills our modern lifestyle.
What is your New Year wish? A new android phone, a new tablet computer, a new gadget? Consumerist culture has reduced humanity to be thingtified. Our secular culture is a culture reduced to thing and function. We find delight in things we have and work our best to acquire and accumulate them. However our joy quickly diminishes and soon enough we are bored. Our value is judged by our function. Respect and even friendship is very often determined by someone’s functionality. Unsurprisingly, the epidemic of loneliness and boredom has affected many people in our society. Technology is not inherently destructive to human well-being. It can be a very good tool for us to enhance our lives and well-being but it can also become a tool that reduces our lives to things and machines. Instead of becoming slaves of technology, let us be their master. Use technology wisely and lead a meaningful life. Every moment of our time is precious. Let us not dehumanize by reducing human beings to things and functions but to respect and love one another.
End of the year is a moment to seriously reflect on our lives – how we spend our time, how we nurture our lives, how we build our friendship and how we orient our lives. We may need some quiet time to ponder through before we write our New Year resolution. Beginning a new year is like embarking on a new journey or writing a new chapter of our lives. As I have succinctly discussed earlier, time really flies. If we do not make effort to make good use of our time, time will just pass us by and soon enough we will find ourselves wearing out and aging.
Resolution is needed to serve as guidelines to direct the path of our lives. Resolution can steer us away from this consumer world. What can you write in your resolution? Well, set your goal in life, motto of the year, and plans on education, finance, reading, health, travel, family etc. Spend personal time praying to God before sketching your resolution. Make your life meaningful by letting His Spirit to be your personal guidance.
