I play a game with people in the gym, though they’re unaware of it.

When I see someone near me fiddling with a smart phone, which happens pretty much every time in the gym, I see how many sets I can do in the time they’re playing with the phone. My record is 11.

That occurred one morning when I was doing a CrossFit-style WOD (workout of the day) consisting of pull-ups, pushups, air squats, burpees, moutain climbers, and crunches. I do four sets of each, non-stop, for a total of 24 sets. It takes just 20 minutes and it’s one of the toughest, though most beneficial, 20 minutes I spend all week.

One day I made it through nearly half the session while a guy played with his phone between sets of dips. I imagine he scrolled through social media and email, perhaps sent a text or two, or scanned the headlines.

Regardless of what he was doing, he was sabotaging his workout. Not only was he resting way too long between sets, he was bringing no focus or intensity to his training and, thus, likely would receive little benefit.

It’s a shame since he accomplished the hard part by getting to the gym before 6 a.m. He paid for the gym membership, after all, and at least on some level committed to training. But like so many people he no longer can disconnect from the digital world for even an hour. Instead of feeling the endorphin rush of training, he craves the dopamine fix of digital media feedback in the form of social media likes, text responses, emails and other notifications.

Instead of working out, he’s suffering from fear of missing out (FOMO) even at 6 a.m.

I’ve trained at the same gym for more than a decade, long enough to see the smart phone era evolve. I marvel at how people set their $700 phones down on weight benches or even the floor where they can be stomped on or crushed by dumbbells, both of which I’ve seen happen. Some people even carry around iPads to serve as nothing more than giant stopwatches.

Disconnecting from media has numerous benefits in the gym. When you focus more on the movement of your body, you train more effectively. It’s impossible to create intensity and focus when you’re stopping for minutes at a time to visit the world of social media and email. It takes several minutes to return to a focused state at a desk, let alone in the gym.

I train at 5:30 a.m. And since I live on the East Coast, there’s nobody that needs to reach me at that hour. That’s one reason I train at that time; nobody can steal it away from me. Turning to my smart phone would be no different than inviting business commitments into the gym with me. Not people who want to train with me; that would be fine. No, it would be like bringing work to the gym.

One reason CrossFit has soared in popularity is that it forces athletes to train non-stop. If you’re following the designated WOD, your goal is to do AMRAP (as many reps as possible) in the allotted time. Not only that, there’s a communal aspect to it where you’re pushing your fellow athletes.

Which isn’t to say phones don’t appear in CrossFit boxes. But thankfully the culture is one where it seems like a breach of etiquette to do so. That’s not as true in conventional gyms. I take a 5:45 a.m. spin class several times a week and I’ll often see folks checking their phones during class.

Then there’s yoga, which many people turn to in order to find that mind-body calmness that’s so lacking in modern society. You’d think people might leave their phones in the car or in a locker. No such luck. Instead of the lying or sitting on mats quietly before class, some will look at their phones. When there’s a pause in the practice – say for a water break – some will glance at their phones. Even in yoga, some cannot disconnect. No surprise since some can’t make it through church services without checking a phone.

Call waiting and digital media made it possible for us to screen calls and take them on our time. But we defeat that purpose by interrupting ourselves throughout the day to check social media and email.

Never is that more apparent in the gym, which should be a sacred time.

My CrossFit WOD is coming up tomorrow. My goal is 12 sets while someone near me is on the phone.

Sadly, it’s a goal I’ll probably reach.

 

As a kid in the 1970s and ‘80s, I was a big-time collector. I went through stamp, coin, and beer can phases, but my biggest passion was sports memorabilia.

I started with baseball cards and graduated to autographs. One summer when I was 14, I wrote to every living member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. This being 1984, before the autograph market exploded, most of the baseball legends sent my items back signed. (I knew to always include a self-addressed stamped envelope.)

There were many positives to plowing a good chunk of my lawn mowing money into sports memorabilia. I learned at a young age the value of my work and how that translated into consumer goods. I was forever organizing baseball cards, either alphabetically or by number, and that improved my math and reading skills. Because I looked at all those faces over and over, I’m convinced that’s why I’ve always been good at remembering names and faces.

My obsession with sports memorabilia collecting, coupled with my passion for sports, gave me a head start on my career. I knew exactly what I wanted to do on the first day of college and I graduated with a job as a baseball writer for USA Today, which was years beyond an entry-level gig. In my twenties I wrote two books on the sports memorabilia industry.

Perhaps collecting was in my blood. Dad collected Lionel trains and Hummel figurines. Mom had record albums and sheet music.

But collecting, whether sports memorabilia or anything else, has a downside. It produces a mindset that everything has value and that you should continue accumulating until you have the definitive collection. You spend a disproportionate share of your time on collecting stuff rather than doing things.

Eventually you lose interest or no longer have space and must dispose of the stuff. That’s when you realize how much – or rather, how little – your prized collection is worth.

People don’t collect like they did a generation ago and on one level that’s good. No longer do they fill their homes with collectibles and knickknacks. Our society is more fast-paced, or at least digitally obsessed, and people are less likely to spend an afternoon tinkering with Lionel trains or organizing baseball cards.

If nothing else, hopefully people have learned a lesson from the crash of the sports card industry in the 1990s and the implosion of the market for beanie babies around the turn of the century. When items are mass-produced and marketed as can’t-miss investments, they’re unlikely to have lasting value.

These days the motto for many folks is to collect experiences, not things. Experiences produce more lasting, personal memories and don’t take up space.

I sold the bulk of my sports memorabilia collection last year. Selling a collection is almost as time consuming as accumulating it and the best way to do it, if possible, is to dispose of it at once. No matter how realistic you are about its value, it’s worth less.

Dad recently asked me to help sell his Lionel trains collection. I have fond memories of our basement train layouts but have neither the space nor the time to put together a similar display in our home. Since Lionel train collectors are an aging demographic – Dad is 77 – I’m unlikely to find a buyer under 65. Unfortunately, most train collectors are downsizing themselves.

My sons already have gone through several brief collecting phases: Thomas the Tank Engine wooden trains, Legos, and Magic the Gathering cards. None have taken hold and perhaps that’s a good thing.

For unlike Dad, who played with Lionel trains as a way to de-stress from work or how my involvement with sports memorabilia served as career training, collections today don’t seem to provide much value in our digital world.

Today, for better or for worse, they’re just clutter.

Cleaning the kitchen is an endless chore. No matter how diligent we are about it, it never seems totally clean. The bigger your family, the more food and traffic is involved. The sink, counters, floors, appliances, and cabinets take a beating.

Here’s one simple way to keep your kitchen cleaner: Don’t eat anything that makes crumbs. Much of the mess in the kitchen – or elsewhere if you or family members eat beyond the kitchen – is caused by food that makes crumbs. Coincidentally, almost all food that makes crumbs is stuff low in nutritional value.

Name anything that makes crumbs – bread, most cereals, chips, cookies, cake, pie, crackers, donuts, pretzels, and almost anything that comes in a box or airtight bag – and you’ll find something that is dirtying your home, attracting pests, and making you fat. All of this food should be eliminated to live lean.

This is not to say that vegetables, fruit, and lean proteins aren’t messy. The difference is we tend to notice the mess from slicing these food sources and clean it up immediately. Plus, there tends to be less mess with these whole foods. Crumbs tend to go unnoticed.

This also is true of drinks. You can spill water pretty much anywhere in your home and not do damage. But spill a soft drink, milk, coffee, or alcohol (especially red wine, as we’ve learned!) and you’ve got a sticky mess – and possibly some permanently damaged upholstery or carpeting.

By eliminating stuff that makes crumbs, you’ll also clear out lots of space in the refrigerator and pantry. In fact, you might no longer need a pantry. Food that makes crumbs is produced to last for months, even years, on supermarket shelves – and in your pantry. It’s a natural attraction for bugs and rodents. So, too are crumbs in the home.

The key to eating lean, saving money and time while maintaining a lean physique, is eating fewer foods. The easiest way to cut back is eliminating the ones that make crumbs. Clean the diet and your home naturally will stay cleaner and you’ll spend no time dealing with crumbs.

 

 

I still have the blue backpack I’m wearing in this 1987 photo. I haven’t kept many things 30 years, but this pack is a reminder to live lean.

Upon graduating high school in that year, I had the great fortune to backpack through Europe. A former classmate who finished high school in Switzerland invited me to travel with him and three others. He’s on the right in this photo.

I arrived at my buddy’s home in Geneva with an overstuffed suitcase. He tossed the contents on his bed and shuffled through them, shaking his head. He presented me with the blue backpack, identical to his red one, and said everything I could take needed to fit in this pack.

For the next five weeks, the five of us – just 17 and 18 years old – traveled through France, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Italy, and Greece with only these packs. We slept on trains, ferries, park benches, beaches, campgrounds, and the occasional youth hostel. My companions had grown up mostly in Europe, spoke five languages between them, and we breezed through the continent on about $25 a day, a pittance even by late ‘80s standards.

Since 1987, I’ve stayed in luxury hotels, traveled the world, and spent a good chunk of my twenties living in Marriott properties. But I have never traveled as efficiently nor experienced as many things as I did in that five-week stretch.

That’s because we traveled lean. We managed with a capsule wardrobe of one pair of jeans, sneakers, light jacket, ball cap, three T-shirts, a collared shirt, two pairs of shorts, swimsuit, underwear and socks. We each carried a foam sleeping pad, a sheet, and between us hauled three tents. Throw in toiletries, decks of cards, small journal notebooks, pens, and the small cameras of the era and that accounts for everything we carried – all on our backs.

This being 1987, we carried no digital devices, just maps and Eurail passes. Our parents would not have known what country we were in on any given day. Sure, we got lost a few times, even waking up on a train one morning in Belgium instead of Germany. We drank too much on occasion but managed to avoid getting into serious trouble.

Because we traveled lean, we spent little time packing and unpacking or checking in and out of hotels. That’s because we only had our packs and managed to live, as some might suggest, one standard above homeless people.

I would argue we traveled like kings. We saw Barcelona, Paris, Nice, Lyon, Cannes, Geneva, Milan, Florence, Rome, Munich, Brussels, Athens and the Greek islands. We already were independent teenagers, but getting around Europe for five weeks took things up a notch. We lived like locals and ate like natives.

Imagine today’s helicopter parents, the ones who issue iPhones to their 11-year-olds “for safety,” sending their 17- or 18-year-olds to Europe to travel unsupervised with friends for five weeks? That would never happen even if Liam Neeson hadn’t made the “Taken” trilogy.

We’ll leave the modern child rearing discussion for another column. The lesson from our trip is that you could literally travel the world with a backpack and no itinerary. And if you could do it as a teenager, the world is your oyster.

My buddy grew up living all over the world; his parents worked for the State Department. He returned to the United States a week before college started and we were freshmen roommates. He had only a suitcase when my parents drove the two of us to school; I had a suitcase and a fan.

After spending five weeks with backpacks, that seemed like more than enough. Other kids arrived with U-hauls of dorm furnishings, clothes, and electronics.

Eventually we needed winter clothes and a few other things; we rented a small refrigerator. His parents bought him one of the earlier Apple computers, a 1987 version that used discs that were literally floppy.

But we continued to live lean. After traveling for most of the summer, making up our itinerary as we went along and grabbing food wherever, it seemed odd to go back to a school schedule and adapt to a spoon-fed life of dining halls and dorm life.

As for the blue backpack, that was not its last trip. When I graduated college in 1991, it went back to Europe on another five-week barnstorming tour. In 1998, it returned to the Greek islands on my honeymoon with my wife carrying a similar pack. We checked no bags, got off at Athens, and boarded a ferry with only our backpacks and no reservations.

Now a family of four, we take most of our vacations in the form of long driving trips where the challenge is to pack only what can fit in a minivan for a month or more. That’s a live-lean challenge of another sort.

My wife and I will celebrate our 20^th anniversary in 2018. We plan to return to the Greek islands.

Guess which backpack will be coming along?

About three years ago I replaced my traditional fruit-heavy smoothie with one dominated by greens: spinach, avocado, kale, etc.. I typically drink one in the morning or post-workout and sometimes a second one mid-afternoon. The results have been dramatic, both in terms of body composition and energy levels. The smoothies also guarantee that I’ll be getting more than enough green veggies every day.

The most encouraging thing is that one of our two sons will drink what he calls “green juice” and I’m working on the other one. There’s no way I’d get them to eat a plate full of those foods (lucky if they’d try just one), but when it goes into the blender and comes out as a smoothie, the oldest actually enjoys it.

I’m forever tinkering with the formula, but here’s what’s working right now:

12 oz of water

6 ice cubes

1/2 avocado

1 cup of Costco “Power Greens” (a mix of kale, spinach and chard)

I eat asparagus several times a week for dinner, but don’t throw it into the smoothie. It probably would work very well.

For taste, I add half a frozen banana and half a scoop of chocolate whey protein powder, which also provides 14 grams of protein. I’ll also add 2 ounces of orange juice and also strawberries, when in season.

Transitioning to green smoothies can be a challenge at first, which I why the sweeter ingredients are important. But like anything else, it’s possible to train yourself to like anything and gradually scale back on the sweeter stuff.

That’s why I also throw in a cap-full of apple cider vinegar. When I had a kidney stone five years ago (before reforming my nutrition program), I was told apple cider vinegar can help prevent stones. Maybe it’s an old wives tale, but when you’ve had a kidney stone, you’ll do anything to avoid another. I couldn’t stomach ACV at first, but now I throw one cap-full of it into the smoothie and do another shot straight up. Good stuff.

For the smoothie, consider ACV optional.

Avocado is a key ingredient as it gives the drink more of a smoothie texture. Otherwise it’s more of a juice. You could go with a whole avocado, though that’s a lot of calories.

I use a BlendTec Home Total Blender, which admittedly is a pricey item (starting at $399, though occasionally less at Costco). Then again, it has a 3 horsepower motor and is quite durable. I’ve put mine to the test. According to its digital counter, I used it more than 3,000 time this morning since getting it late in 2006. That’s just 10 cents a use. I can’t think of anything motorized or electrical I’ve owned since then that’s still operational – let alone that works so well.

Enjoy and please let me know what green smoothie ingredients work well for you

 

 

 

 

Nobody has time to read. We’re a fast-paced, overscheduled, digitally-connected culture incapable of giving our attention to anything more than 140 characters. Perhaps a short blog post or text. Maybe an actual newspaper or magazine article, but only if we can find it on our smartphone quickly.

A book? Well, only if it’s short. And only if it can be read on the phone.

I don’t buy that. Not for a minute. Nor should you.

It’s never been easier to find the time to read. Stephen King, the prolific thriller author whose best book, ironically, might be his autobiography/writing advice book On Writing, says the key is to read in sips rather than gulps. If you wait for a long stretch of time to read, it probably won’t happen, though we recommend using the last 30 minutes before turning off the light at night to read.

But we agree with King that there are numerous 10-to-15 minute windows to read during the day. How about while parked – parked, not moving or at a stoplight- in a car line waiting to pick up kids? Or standing in line at Chipotle? Or waiting for the doctor or dentist? Or while waiting for food to cook or laundry to wash? Or while waiting for the kids’ practice to end? Or for the mechanic to finish with the car? How about while waiting for your co-workers to inevitably arrive late for the meeting? If you watch televised sports, how about during the endless commercials?

How about at the airport, a series of waits to check bags, board (inevitably late), take off (delayed again), while in the air, and later sitting on the runway waiting forever for a gate to open. King, a huge baseball fan, takes a book to the ballpark and reads between innings. Why not? What else are you going to do?

Most of us spend more time in the car than we’d like. Why not listen to books on CD or digital download? It beats talk radio, morning zoo deejay nonsense, and listening to the same tunes over and over. Plus it’s a lot less safer than using a smartphone in the car.

You no doubt have at least some of those opportunities above. It’s easy to fall into the habit of spending that time mindlessly reaching for the phone, checking social media and email, or watching whatever nonsense there is on TV, especially now that televisions have been mounted anywhere people wait: doctor’s offices, the mechanic’s wait room, restaurants, etc.

I attend several book festivals, sometimes as a presenting author myself, and it’s always amazing to see people standing in a long line with a book they just purchased, waiting for the author to sign it, and yet they’re either standing around bored or, more likely, scrolling through a smartphone. Just a thought: Why not start reading the book you just paid for and are waiting to get signed? Or some other book? You’re at a freakin’ book festival!

Here are just a few reasons to read:

 It sets a good example: If you want your kids to read, shut off television and digital media and read yourself. Set aside family reading time. Read books together. The young adult genre is the strongest segment of literature because the books appeal to kids and adults. You’ve no doubt seen the Harry Potter, Hunger Games, and Divergent movies. Why not read the books with your kids? There are plenty of other similar series our family has read together, including Gregor the Overlander and The Unwanteds. Go back further and try The Lord of the Rings or The Chronicles of Narnia, to name just two. If you read, the kids will read, learn, thrive in school and establish a lifelong habit of learning. What a wonderful gift.

 You might, um, learn something: As a writer, I talk to high school and college students that aspire to write. When I ask what they like to read, I get puzzled looks. They don’t have time to read. They might keep up with the news via social media. Such a shame. The only way to build vocabulary and writing ability is by reading. Aspiring to be a writer without being a voracious reader is like wanting to be a singer or musician but not listening to music.

It’s mostly free: As someone who has made a good chunk of my living writing books, I’m hesitant to admit this. But I rarely buy books. That’s because the public library is America’s best bargain. You can check out virtually any book for at least two weeks. And if you’re not done with it, you usually can renew it for another two weeks. If it’s not a new release, you can get another two weeks. How cool is that? Not only that, you don’t have to search for the books. Get a library card, go online, and see if the book you want is available at your local library. If not, they’ll track it down from a neighboring one, have it brought over, and send you an email when it arrives, giving you at least three days to pick it up.

Not only does this save money, it keeps you from accumulating clutter. Books are heavy and take up space. Rarely do you read anything twice. For those occasions, just retrieve the book from the library. I once had a massive home library, but I donated or sold 90 percent of it since I could retrieve the books from the library or the information online.

Sure, you might have to wait for a new best-seller to become available at the library since many others have discovered America’s best bargain. But there are hundreds of thousands of terrific older books to read in the meantime.

I rarely do any book reading online or on a device, unless it’s an e-book not available as a physical product. That’s because it’s too easy to get sucked into the Internet or social media rabbit holes. Plus, reading on an electronic device at night affects sleep, making your mind believe it’s still light outside. Physical books and magazines are preferable.

The key is to take a book or magazine wherever you go to take advantage of the opportunities to focus your attention on what you want, not the tired magazines in waiting rooms, the nonsense chatter on TV, or searching for something on your phone.

By limiting your screen time, you’ll discover a dozen 10-minute windows a day — two hours — to read. Combine that with 30 minutes of reading before going to bed and you’ll be one of the most avid readers in America. Your knowledge and focus will expand, your productivity will soar, and you’ll live lean.

 

 

 

You’re stopped at a traffic light, perhaps three or four cars back. The light turns green. Three seconds pass, then four, then five.

Finally you blast the horn, alerting the drivers in front of you who have been staring at their smart phones. If you’re lucky, they respond quickly enough so that you make it through the light, a not unreasonable expectation for someone only three or four cars back.

This happens to me at least twice a day, every day. It wasn’t that long ago that we rarely used our car horns and then only to avoid a collision. As a young adult in Virginia, I’d dutifully take my car in for an annual state inspection, part of which included honking the horn. Since, until recently, most of used our horns only a few times a year, it made sense to test the horn to prove it was in working order.

We don’t have state inspections here in Florida. Heck, we know our horns work since we use them every day to wake up other drivers so addicted to their phones that they must send a text or check email or social media at every stoplight.

If anything, we’re wearing out our horns.

This isn’t about being considerate and not wasting other people’s time. This is about safety. When your eyes are focused on anything else but traffic, even while stopped at a light, you’re a distracted driver. You’re not scanning oncoming traffic for people running red lights. You’re not noticing animals that have wandered into the street. You’re not aware of runners, cyclists, and pedestrians, a group that’s increasingly dangerous themselves since they move about distracted by their own smart phones and ear buds.

No, you’re a distracted driver, one who is going to jerk forward as soon as you hear that horn and realize you’re holding up traffic. Hopefully there’s no cyclist, runner, pedestrian, or animal nearby because you won’t see them.

Some might think using those idle moments at a stoplight to catch up on things via the phone is a wise use of time. Heck, you’re living lean, making the most of every second!

Actually, that’s not the case. Much like frequent checking of email or social media at work or at home distracts you from the task at hand and requires you to re-focus, it’s also true when behind the wheel. It also reinforces a mindset that you must be doing something and have outside stimulation at all times.

Because of smart phones, many drivers are completely unfocused while stopped at lights. I used to be one of those people. I’d save certain phone calls for when I was in the car. At least that way I wasn’t wasting time. I checked my smart phone at lights constantly. By golly, I was making the most of my time.

Then I realized I wasn’t more productive. If anything, I felt less efficient, more frazzled. That’s because I was compounding the stress of traffic with that of trying to do work. I also was setting a horrible example for our children. I couldn’t very well limit their screen time and preach the value of living in the moment, in real time rather than online, if I spent so much time on the phone – especially in the dangerous environment of driving. We’ll have a teenage driver in our home in a few years, a scary prospect in the world of distracted driving, and he is learning from me right now.

So about four years ago I put the phone away. I turned it to silent and placed it in the console between the seats. This was about the time texting became ubiquitous. Since the phone rarely rings, I no longer have to worry about missing a call. There’s no text or email that can’t wait until I’ve arrived at my destination.

Once I eliminated phone use from the car, I found myself cutting back on the radio. I’ve adopted a low-information diet, eliminating as much useless chatter from my life as possible. So there’s no need for sports talk, news talk, no morning zoo deejay nonsense or rambling traffic and weather updates, and certainly no satellite radio, which we canceled in both cars. (Sirius XM gives it away for free for a week every month or two, which seems to always coincide nicely with our long road trips.)

I can get all the news I need each morning with 30 focused minutes online and with newspapers – yes, I still read physical newspapers.

Instead of driving being stressful, it’s become relatively enjoyable. I use it as time to chat with the kids or my wife – no devices in the car – and to actually think in quiet when I’m alone.

About two years after I adopted the no-phone, low-information drive time, I was in the first car accident of my life. A careless woman, speeding in a 25 MPH zone, blew through a stop sign and T-boned me, totaling our van and leaving me with injuries I likely will deal with for life. (Thankfully I was driving alone). She was uninjured but no doubt distracted, though we’ll never know for sure since she died of unrelated causes seven months later.

Was she using a phone? Or was she like many people who have become so stressed and rushed because they must fill every waking second with some sort of digital stimulation, giving up any focus to their lives?

I’ve forgiven this woman. Dead or alive, it makes no sense to spend energy on someone who has done you wrong. But I think of her daily when I see people behind the wheel with their eyes focused downward.

Whether the car is moving or at a stoplight, it’s hazardous to all of us.

And no way to live lean.

I set my alarm for 5:07 a.m., though I usually wake up a few minutes before the ringer sounds.

I could go with 5:00 or 5:15, but 5:07 is the perfect middle ground to get me to the gym by 5:45, where I either take a class or meet a training partner.

I wasn’t always a morning person. But I’ve found that the only way to remain dedicated to a training program is to get it done first thing in the morning. If you plan it for later, someone inevitably will steal that time away.

Training in the morning has been life changing. It provides an endorphin rush that carries me through the late morning hours, making it the most productive part of my day. It also gives me a feeling of accomplishment. No matter how crazy the rest of the day becomes, I know I at least nailed that workout.

Getting up at 5:07 a.m. is easy only if you get to bed at a consistent time, which for me is 10 p.m. That means lights out at 10. To be in position to fall asleep immediately thereafter requires a sleep ritual to wind the body down. That means no screens for the previous hour – no phone, tablet, laptop or television.

If that sounds like a Spartan existence, I won’t disagree. But I’ve found that if I can control the bookends to my day, it’s a lot easier to be productive for the 17 hours I’m awake. By getting quality, consistent sleep and working out daily at the same time, I have more energy and focus and require less caffeine.

Perhaps you work nights. I did, too, for a number of years and this schedule would not have fit. But judging by the vast array of occupations represented at my gym in the hours before 7 a.m., most people can make an early-morning workout fit into their schedule.

The U.S. Army once had a memorable ad campaign featuring soldiers hard at work or training in the pre-dawn darkness and then again as the sun came up. The tagline? We get more done before noon than most people get done all day.

When you get up early and train early, you can’t help but feel like you’re getting a head start on everyone else who is still sleeping. When you go to bed early, you’re getting a jump on those still watching television or living online.

This schedule isn’t for everyone, though it can work for most. If you’re struggling to find the time to train, however, it might be the solution.

 

 

It’s difficult to find a quiet place anymore. Retail stores feature pulsing club music. There are televisions in every waiting room – doctor, dentist, even auto mechanic – and even screens in taxis and elevators.

There’s no escaping the noise, not even in church. Church used to be a place of quiet, mindful reflection. Those arriving at church early knew to be quiet. It was understood that some were praying or at least engaging in the type of solemn reflection that probably drew them to a house of worship in the first place.

Not today. Enter a church 10 or 15 minutes before a service begins and it feels like you’re waiting for a concert or theater production to begin. There’s non-stop chatter. People are scrolling through their phones, checking social media, perhaps sending a few texts.

Before mass begins, a lector will make a few announcements, including a plea to silence all electronic devices. This never works. Inevitably during the mass someone’s phone will go off, usually during one of the most solemn points of the service and usually with the loudest, most obnoxious ring tone. And it’s often a phone belonging to a woman, who must scramble to retrieve the phone from the depths of her bag to silence it. Thus, the phone rings five or six times before it’s turned off.

Is there nowhere we can escape digital disruption? A Catholic mass, like the ones I attend, lasts roughly an hour, usually 50 minutes or so. Are we so digitally addicted that we can’t leave the phone in the car? Unless you’re an on-call physician, is there any possible emergency that can’t wait an hour?

Back when those hideous Bluetooth earpieces were fashionable – thankfully we moved away that – I knew a guy who would wear one in church. I always wondered if he planned to take calls during the service. I’ve sat next to people who text and scroll through social media feeds during mass.

Look, church isn’t for everyone. I’ve gone through periods, especially in recent years, where my attendance has been sporadic. But if you’re going to make the commitment to go, shouldn’t it be a time of prayerful reflection, a time to pause from the chaos of daily life and be mindful?

When 24/7 digital use became an issue a decade or so ago, priests used to address it. A few even called out the offenders. But now, like so much rude behavior involving phones – phones used at restaurants, movies, on airplanes, etc. – priests have resigned themselves to having disruptions in mass. I know they must do a slow burn at the altar, pausing while someone digs the phone out.

No doubt the priests are praying that people can somehow become more mindful – at least for the one hour they’re in church.

I haven’t celebrated Mother’s Day in a long time. My grandmothers died years ago and Mom passed when I was in college. But as Mother’s Day approaches this year, I’ve been wondering what Mom would think of the world today compared to what it was like when she died in 1991, a generation ago.

She no doubt would marvel at how people fill their lives with digital distraction, connecting to video, music, or the Internet every waking moment. She’d be amazed at how often people eat out and how everything is much bigger, from homes to cars to televisions to bodies.

She’d wonder what happened to kids playing outside, families enjoying the outdoors together, and people living intentional, mindful, focused lives. She’d no doubt shake her head over social media, online shopping, participation trophies, reality television, and our narcissistic American consumer culture on steroids.

Mom’s lean living philosophy inspires the way I live today. Here’s what I learned from Mom:

WORK IN A GARDEN: Long before the terms “master gardener” and “organic foods” were popularized, Mom grew her own produce and flowers. She saw the value in raising beautiful things, toiling in the soil every day, and eating fruits and vegetables fresh from the garden. I’ve tried most every workout imaginable and yet there’s nothing that challenges every part of the body and leaves me as sore and exhausted as yard work. Mom understood that. She also believed in the value of “working” outside away from the phone, television, and other disruptions. The sounds of birds and insects and even the sight of an occasional black snake were sufficient entertainment. “One is nearer God’s heart in a garden,” the poet Dorothy Frances Gurney wrote, “than anywhere else on Earth.” We put that on Mom’s tombstone.

MOVE YOUR BODY: Long before fitness became a huge industry of gyms, gadgets, gear and classes, Mom performed yoga and rode her rickety three-speed bike 10 miles a day. I was a three-sport teenage athlete with a 10-speed bike and I struggled to keep up with her. She drank a gallon of water a day, long before it became fashionable, and bought low-fat and skim milk as far back as the 1970s when it was difficult to find anything but whole milk. Mom was a registered nurse and no doubt would be stunned at today’s sedentary, computer, cubicle culture. Mom played the piano and did a lot of sewing, but otherwise I have no memories of her sitting other than to eat.

NO SCREENS: Mom died before the Internet and cell phones. Computers in 1991 were little more than word processors. She refused to get cable and watched little television other than Jeopardy, which served an educational purpose for her three children. She believed in board games (preferably Scrabble and other word challenges), long walks, backyard badminton, Ping-Pong, tennis, eating outside and those 10-mile bike rides. Though she tolerated the obsession with televised sports Dad and I shared, I can’t recall her watching an event with us, not even the Super Bowl. She preferred to be a participant rather than a spectator in life.

GO MINIMALIST: Mom was wonderfully frugal. At the supermarket she could predict the total grocery bill within 50 cents. I often thought she could win a showcase showdown contest on “The Price is Right.” She wasn’t cheap – quite generous, actually – she just didn’t believe in buying non-necessities that cluttered your life. When I began lobbying to have a car at college, she worried that it would keep me from walking and riding my bike and feared it would inspire me to spend more time at stores and at the movies. Because Mom stayed in terrific shape, she looked great in any garment, even by the unflattering fashion trends of the 1980s. But she spent little money on clothing. If there were items my sisters or I weren’t wearing, she’d wear them.

EMBRACE EVERY DAY: Mom was a model of active, healthy living and still died at 51. Even though I have no chance of developing ovarian cancer, I’ve used her example as the benchmark for how I must live. Dad smoked cigarettes until he was 48, worked a high-stress career and never was admitted to a hospital until age 70. He’s still going strong at 77. There are no guarantees for any of us regardless of lifestyle, of course. I’m only a few years away from 51 and take nothing for granted. But I’d rather live lean like Mom to improve my odds and enjoy more along the way.