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Are we becoming more undisciplined?

Steve Tobak sees the signs in a recent article for Fox Business on the “Lost Art of Discipline”:
“...I rarely have a coherent thought before noon and my workdays are peppered with blood-pumping and synapse-sparking activities that bear little resemblance to what I do for a living. But throughout my career I have always sacrificed whatever I had to and pushed my people to do the same to ensure the job got done. And that’s getting harder and harder to do all the time. Granted, there have always been distractions – the archenemies of discipline – but these days, they seem to be multiplying at an alarming rate. And, more importantly, nobody’s immune, not even our business and political leaders…”

“....Twitter CEO Dick Costolo recently got himself embroiled in a ludicrous online debate over the gender constitution of his management team and board of directors... not a great idea, especially with an IPO on the way….Senator John McCain couldn’t get through a Senate committee hearing without playing poker on his iPhone….Even highly focused overachievers like me – who grew up in the tech industry and should definitely know better – sit down to work only to find that, a few tweets, texts, and emails later, half the day is gone and the work is a long way away from getting done…”
In short we are now addicted to distraction. And as he later puts it, it now comes in many shapes and sizes including, tweeting, posting, blogging, emailing, gaming, shopping…..And if he is right, the “the threshold for human susceptibility to these addictions is getting lower all the time”. It is a powerful reminder that the human heart is an idol factory! We are constantly looking to fill that God shaped hole with anything we can lay our hands on!

Copyright © Chola Mukanga 2013

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