Thursday, April 14, 2011

"Every noble work is, at first, impossible." ~ Thomas Carlyle

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

The Wonders of Technology

Do I wish that I had more time to spend sharing with anyone and everyone who wants to take the time to read my "little" opinions? I'm a reader - I've always been a reader and I will always be a reader. I read everything that crosses the scope of my physical vision, including flyers and advertisements that I'm not really interested in. I receive probably 20 emails a day that are posted articles - about politics, education, parenting, gardening - and the list goes on and on. These are email lists that I've subscribed to and I'm interested in learning more about what these people have to share. I'm also a learner which is why I read so much because I want to learn about EVERYTHING!!

As I grow older, I've realized that I also like to share what I learn with others. That's where technology comes in. I just read a blog post about another blog post and now I'm sharing it with you! Amazing!! The term viral has recently become a part of my vocabulary in a very different way. For most of my life, 37 years, viral has meant illness. On top of that, usually an illness that has no remedy. Many doctors have told us for years and are still telling us that the virus has to run it's course. We have to wait out the suffering until that microscopic bug finishes ravishing our bodies. Some viruses, of course, are worse than others. Being the avid reader that I am, I have read countless stories about what viruses can do to the human body. And some of it is not pretty!

However, within the last few months viral has begun to have a very different meaning and this time it can be in a very positive way. Lauren Rosenfeld has written and posted an article titled, Be Present: Ten Years from Now, What Will Have Mattered to our Children? In this article, she reminds us all of what moments in our daily lives are really important to our children, such as "Ten years from now, it won't have mattered whether or not the sink was perfectly scrubbed. Ten years from now it will have mattered that I stopped scrubbing the sink to listen to a problem they were having in school." I read about her post on Patrick McMillan's Happier Kids Now blog and now I'm sharing it. As we've learned with social networking, we can be in touch with everyone we've ever come into contact with and as we all share things that are important to us, the message gets around. And, boy, does it get around!!

I share with 4 people. Each one of my 4 friends shares with 4 people each and so on and so on. This process of sharing or networking being done on only two levels means that my message has been shared with 85 people. For fun when you've got nothing else to do, draw a chart and count how many people could be in your "network." It can become millions! And it's viral because in certain cases it happens so quickly, sort of like the flu! Networking has been around for a long time, but today's technology has allowed us to "speed up" our contact. I can share in minutes with my 250 facebook friends what would have taken me a day to share with just a few of my friends even ten years ago.

I just wish that I had more time to spend sharing what I learn. But I'm busy living life which is good too!