Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
This is Later with Lee Matthews the Lee Matthews Podcast
more what You Hear weekday afternoons on the Drive.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Carlos Whittaker is bringing hope to humans all over the world,
and he's pretty good at it. He's an author, a podcaster,
a global speaker, and he's written such books as How
to Human and The Moment Maker and Get Your Hopes Up.
His newest creation is called Reconnected. How seven screen free
weeks with monks and Amish farmers helped me recover the
(00:33):
lost art of being human. Carlos Whittaker, I just got
to tell you we need this now, and we've needed
it for a long time.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Absolutely, and I've needed it for a long time, which
is why I did it.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
I have done this exercise on a small scale, and
I try to as often as I can. And I
always thought it had to do with the fact that
I work in news and as such, I have to
know what's going on in the world all the time,
and so when I get time off, I really do
try to put that damn phone down and not pick
(01:09):
it up.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yeah, yeah, I get it. Listen, and everybody needs to
do it, because what everybody knows is it's just not
our friends in the news that are actually looking at
their devices all the time. The normal human being is
still not that you're not normal, No, no, no, it's guilty
is charged, but they're still on their phones. I was
(01:31):
averaging seven hours and twenty three minutes a day looking
at my phone. The average American averages six to seven
hours a day. Lee, Can I tell you that is
forty nine hours a week two entire cycles of the sun.
Were looking at our phone three months a year. It
adds up to and for me, if I live to
be eighty five years old, that means I'll end up
looking at my phone for ten years, ten years of
(01:55):
my life. And when I saw that notification slide across
my screen, that's when I just said to do something radical.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
The notification about the time, how much time you've spent?
Speaker 3 (02:04):
Yes, yes, you know, because we all get it on Sundays, right, Yeah,
the notification comes to side, you have averaged this much
time staring at your screen. And you know, I think
that if the notification said you will lose ten years
of your life if you continue this way, I think
it would change our habits. But that's not what it says.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Well, I did find that I was happier, and I
did find that I slept better. I found I was
less consumed with what was not necessarily going on in
the world, but but what other people were doing, and
saying I was less consumed with it.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
Yeah, absolutely, no, you are, and honestly, like I believe,
you know, if you just look at the history of humanity,
and again this may be a strong statement to say,
but I just don't think we were created with the
capacity to consume the amount of content we consume, to
know the amount of stuff that we know. You know,
you see the rise of mental health challenges in America.
(02:55):
You see all of these things, and it's no I
think accident that when you look at that data, it
lines up to when the smartphone was it became prevalent
in our society. And so I just think, obviously, not
everybody has to spend seven weeks like I did and
don't look at a screen. You don't have to move
into an homage.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
Farm or mansiri.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
I did that for you, and let me help you,
let me help guide you with some of the lessons
that I learned.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Well, let's talk about the initial motivation. You saw the
screen thing, and you said to yourself, Holy potatoes, I've
got to do something about this. But what got you?
What focused you on? I'm gonna go hook up with
some monks, I mean totally yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
That makes sense, you know. My I just started thinking, well,
I could go to like a cabin for two months
and I would probably lose my mind or end up
like Tom Hanks on whatever that movie was, talking to
a volleyball. So so let me, let me try to
find some maybe subcultures in America that maybe look at
phones less. And so I just thought, well, monks probably
just walk around and pray all day. I'll go hang
(03:54):
out with them. The homish. I think their technology freeish,
so let me go hang out with them. So that's
really how I chose them. And let me tell you
the monks it was seven that let's see, we prayed
seven times a day, but it was twenty three hours
a day of silence and so like that was very
shocking to my system. I literally was like detoxing off
(04:14):
of the drug of this phone for the first few days.
But then, oh my gosh, lee that fourth day, third
or fourth day, it legitimately felt like an elephant stepped
off my chest and I didn't even know that I
wasn't breathing, and it was so good and it was
so pure and so yeah, so that's how I ended
up with the monks. But I'll go ahead and tell
(04:34):
you monks have phone problems too, like like like like
they've got smartphones. I was. I remember spilling my heart
to Father Francis one day in his studied, like day ten,
and I'm like crying about something and his phone goes,
excuse me, young man, And I'm like, did this monk
just totally leave this conversation to answer his phone? So
and he starts laughing, Oh, Carlos, I need to read
(04:56):
your book too, and so you know, you know this
isn't just a problem that we have. It like everybody
on planet Earth that I think is feeling this pain point,
which is why I wrote the book.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
It's called how seven free weeks I'm sorry, seven screen
free weeks with monks and Amish farmers helped me recover
the lost art of being humid reconnected. Carlos Whittaker is
the podcaster and author, and he is the one who
has brought it to us. Now, the part about the Amish,
I think people would be I don't know, pleasantly, maybe
not so pleasantly surprised. At least the Amish in Prior, Oklahoma,
(05:30):
where I frequent, they do have cell phones, they just
can't use them on certain days, in certain times of day. Yep.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
So I learned when I got there really quickly.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
You know.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Willis is the farmer I lived with, and we were
out there plowing and he's like, oh, you know what,
I need to call my brother to find out what
the weather's going to be. And I was like what,
And he pulled out is his cell phone? And now
the thing is he his order this order of Amish.
If you own a business, you can have a flip phone.
So it wasn't a smartphone. It was a flip phone.
So you know, you know, I begin to ask, you know,
a lot of questions to the Amos. Well, wait a second,
(06:03):
why do you why can't you use phones? Well this
and that? Why do you have a generator to you know,
to power this? And well? This is what I love
about the Homos, and I think that we all need
to ask this question ourselves. Whenever new technology is introduced,
they ask themselves, is this technology going to bring us
closer together? Or is this technology going to tear us
farther apart. That is the premise for every decision that
(06:25):
they make. That's why they'll never have cars, because if
Miss Sally's barn burns down and all her amised neighbors
are five hundred miles away, they're not going to be
able to be there for each other rebuilder barn. So though,
that's the decision making process that they use, and so
I begin to implement that in my life. Is this
gonna bring me closer to my community or tear me
farther apart?
Speaker 2 (06:44):
That's a good that's a good chapter in this book,
I imagine, because that that we need to ask ourselves
that more and more and more constantly. Carlos Whitaker reconnected
how seven screen free weeks with monks and Amish farmers
helped me recover the lost start of being humid. Do
we need to just limit our exposure to these devices
(07:08):
that's not just phones, it's anything that's digital or the connections.
Do we need to limit that or is will it
spell our demise eventually?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
So, so I think that that's a that's a very
important question to ask. This is what what I found out.
I found out that I actually did not. When I
got back, I didn't like put, like you know, screen
time alarms on my phone and set up all these rules.
What what I found out and you're gonna find out
when you read the book, is when I started to
(07:37):
fall in love with what's on the other side of
the phone. When I start to fall in love with
noticing again, wondering again, getting lost and finding my way again, noticing, savoring,
a solitude, all of these things that are uniquely human
that we have uniquely lost. When I finally tasted those
things again, I just picked my phone up less. My
(07:57):
phone time is gone from seven and a half hours
a day to three hours a day. I haven't made
a single rule, but I fell back in love with
living life, and so I just think that's the thing.
Once we taste it again, you're not going to want
to pick this thing up because it is so good
on the other side of the screen.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Reconnected how seven screen free weeks with monks and Amish
farmers helped me recover the lost art of being human.
Carlos Whittaker, this is pushing my buttons. I think it'll
push a lot of buttons if you read it and
then start implementing some of the practices. Thank you for
joining us, Thanks
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Leaving, Thanks for listening to Later with Lee Matthews, the
Lee Matthews Podcast, and remember to listen to The Drive
Live weekday afternoons from five to seven and iHeartMedia presentation
This is Later with Lee Matthews the Lee Matthews Podcast
more what You Hear weekday afternoons on the Drive.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Carlos Whittaker is bringing hope to humans all over the world,
and he's pretty good at it. He's an author, a podcaster,
a global speaker, and he's written such books as How
to Human and The Moment Maker and Get Your Hopes Up.
His newest creation is called Reconnected. How seven screen free
weeks with monks and Amish farmers helped me recover the
(00:33):
lost art of being human. Carlos Whittaker, I just got
to tell you we need this now, and we've needed
it for a long time.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Absolutely, and I've needed it for a long time, which
is why I did it.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
I have done this exercise on a small scale, and
I try to as often as I can. And I
always thought it had to do with the fact that
I work in news and as such, I have to
know what's going on in the world all the time,
and so when I get time off, I really do
try to put that damn phone down and not pick
(01:09):
it up.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yeah, yeah, I get it. Listen, and everybody needs to
do it, because what everybody knows is it's just not
our friends in the news that are actually looking at
their devices all the time. The normal human being is
still not that you're not normal, No, no, no, it's guilty
is charged, but they're still on their phones. I was
(01:31):
averaging seven hours and twenty three minutes a day looking
at my phone. The average American averages six to seven
hours a day. Lee, Can I tell you that is
forty nine hours a week two entire cycles of the sun.
Were looking at our phone three months a year. It
adds up to and for me, if I live to
be eighty five years old, that means I'll end up
looking at my phone for ten years, ten years of
(01:55):
my life. And when I saw that notification slide across
my screen, that's when I just said to do something radical.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
The notification about the time, how much time you've spent?
Speaker 3 (02:04):
Yes, yes, you know, because we all get it on Sundays, right, Yeah,
the notification comes to side, you have averaged this much
time staring at your screen. And you know, I think
that if the notification said you will lose ten years
of your life if you continue this way, I think
it would change our habits. But that's not what it says.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Well, I did find that I was happier, and I
did find that I slept better. I found I was
less consumed with what was not necessarily going on in
the world, but but what other people were doing, and
saying I was less consumed with it.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
Yeah, absolutely, no, you are, and honestly, like I believe,
you know, if you just look at the history of humanity,
and again this may be a strong statement to say,
but I just don't think we were created with the
capacity to consume the amount of content we consume, to
know the amount of stuff that we know. You know,
you see the rise of mental health challenges in America.
(02:55):
You see all of these things, and it's no I
think accident that when you look at that data, it
lines up to when the smartphone was it became prevalent
in our society. And so I just think, obviously, not
everybody has to spend seven weeks like I did and
don't look at a screen. You don't have to move
into an homage.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
Farm or mansiri.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
I did that for you, and let me help you,
let me help guide you with some of the lessons
that I learned.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Well, let's talk about the initial motivation. You saw the
screen thing, and you said to yourself, Holy potatoes, I've
got to do something about this. But what got you?
What focused you on? I'm gonna go hook up with
some monks, I mean totally yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
That makes sense, you know. My I just started thinking, well,
I could go to like a cabin for two months
and I would probably lose my mind or end up
like Tom Hanks on whatever that movie was, talking to
a volleyball. So so let me, let me try to
find some maybe subcultures in America that maybe look at
phones less. And so I just thought, well, monks probably
just walk around and pray all day. I'll go hang
(03:54):
out with them. The homish. I think their technology freeish,
so let me go hang out with them. So that's
really how I chose them. And let me tell you
the monks it was seven that let's see, we prayed
seven times a day, but it was twenty three hours
a day of silence and so like that was very
shocking to my system. I literally was like detoxing off
(04:14):
of the drug of this phone for the first few days.
But then, oh my gosh, lee that fourth day, third
or fourth day, it legitimately felt like an elephant stepped
off my chest and I didn't even know that I
wasn't breathing, and it was so good and it was
so pure and so yeah, so that's how I ended
up with the monks. But I'll go ahead and tell
(04:34):
you monks have phone problems too, like like like like
they've got smartphones. I was. I remember spilling my heart
to Father Francis one day in his studied, like day ten,
and I'm like crying about something and his phone goes,
excuse me, young man, And I'm like, did this monk
just totally leave this conversation to answer his phone? So
and he starts laughing, Oh, Carlos, I need to read
(04:56):
your book too, and so you know, you know this
isn't just a problem that we have. It like everybody
on planet Earth that I think is feeling this pain point,
which is why I wrote the book.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
It's called how seven free weeks I'm sorry, seven screen
free weeks with monks and Amish farmers helped me recover
the lost art of being humid reconnected. Carlos Whittaker is
the podcaster and author, and he is the one who
has brought it to us. Now, the part about the Amish,
I think people would be I don't know, pleasantly, maybe
not so pleasantly surprised. At least the Amish in Prior, Oklahoma,
(05:30):
where I frequent, they do have cell phones, they just
can't use them on certain days, in certain times of day. Yep.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
So I learned when I got there really quickly.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
You know.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Willis is the farmer I lived with, and we were
out there plowing and he's like, oh, you know what,
I need to call my brother to find out what
the weather's going to be. And I was like what,
And he pulled out is his cell phone? And now
the thing is he his order this order of Amish.
If you own a business, you can have a flip phone.
So it wasn't a smartphone. It was a flip phone.
So you know, you know, I begin to ask, you know,
a lot of questions to the Amos. Well, wait a second,
(06:03):
why do you why can't you use phones? Well this
and that? Why do you have a generator to you know,
to power this? And well? This is what I love
about the Homos, and I think that we all need
to ask this question ourselves. Whenever new technology is introduced,
they ask themselves, is this technology going to bring us
closer together? Or is this technology going to tear us
farther apart. That is the premise for every decision that
(06:25):
they make. That's why they'll never have cars, because if
Miss Sally's barn burns down and all her amised neighbors
are five hundred miles away, they're not going to be
able to be there for each other rebuilder barn. So though,
that's the decision making process that they use, and so
I begin to implement that in my life. Is this
gonna bring me closer to my community or tear me
farther apart?
Speaker 2 (06:44):
That's a good that's a good chapter in this book,
I imagine, because that that we need to ask ourselves
that more and more and more constantly. Carlos Whitaker reconnected
how seven screen free weeks with monks and Amish farmers
helped me recover the lost start of being humid. Do
we need to just limit our exposure to these devices
(07:08):
that's not just phones, it's anything that's digital or the connections.
Do we need to limit that or is will it
spell our demise eventually?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
So, so I think that that's a that's a very
important question to ask. This is what what I found out.
I found out that I actually did not. When I
got back, I didn't like put, like you know, screen
time alarms on my phone and set up all these rules.
What what I found out and you're gonna find out
when you read the book, is when I started to
(07:37):
fall in love with what's on the other side of
the phone. When I start to fall in love with
noticing again, wondering again, getting lost and finding my way again, noticing, savoring,
a solitude, all of these things that are uniquely human
that we have uniquely lost. When I finally tasted those
things again, I just picked my phone up less. My
(07:57):
phone time is gone from seven and a half hours
a day to three hours a day. I haven't made
a single rule, but I fell back in love with
living life, and so I just think that's the thing.
Once we taste it again, you're not going to want
to pick this thing up because it is so good
on the other side of the screen.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Reconnected how seven screen free weeks with monks and Amish
farmers helped me recover the lost art of being human.
Carlos Whittaker, this is pushing my buttons. I think it'll
push a lot of buttons if you read it and
then start implementing some of the practices. Thank you for
joining us, Thanks
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Leaving, Thanks for listening to Later with Lee Matthews, the
Lee Matthews Podcast, and remember to listen to The Drive
Live weekday afternoons from five to seven and iHeartMedia presentation
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