Listen in on how a weekend in Austin taught me just how much unintentional phone addiction can overshadow real-life interactions, how important it is to know your inner voice, and how being intentional through every season in life can offer up the best of lesson learned. Look up and join the moment with me, it will be gone before we know it.
Follow me on Instagram! @Donavon.Baeza
Listen in on how a weekend in Austin taught me just how much unintentional phone addiction can overshadow real-life interactions, how important it is to know your inner voice, and how being intentional through every season in life can offer up the best of lesson learned. Look up and join the moment with me, it will be gone before we know it.
Follow me on Instagram! @Donavon.Baeza
We just gotta remember to not let ourselves get caught up in the what ifs or get lost in the guessing of what might or might not be going on on the other end of these text conversations we're interacting with at any given moment and, in turn, forget about what's going on in front of us here right now. What is cooking? Good looking, I am so happy you're here. Thanks for joining me here at Donations. The sun is shining. I hope it's lighting every step that you take and I hope you're doing good. I genuinely do. I hope things are working out in your favor today.
Speaker 1:I've been so lucky lately to have been surrounded by so many great people in so many great places. It's mind boggling to me and, like I said, I'm so grateful. It's been people in places that have inspired me and have brought me to some very eye-opening realizations, which is my favorite thing, and, whether these people have realized it or not, they've genuinely offered me very hefty lessons to keep in my back pocket, including a couple of weekends ago when some friends and I drove over to Austin for the Austin City Limits Music Festival. We got there a day before the festival started and we have a couple of friends that lived there, so, naturally, we found ourselves changing as soon as we arrived so that we could hit downtown and enjoy a night out, as one does when you go out of town. It wasn't long before we were out bar hopping and found ourselves settling into, I think, the third or fourth booth slash table and getting ready to put our drink orders in, when I hit the sleep button on my phone and looked up and realized that I was the only one at the table who had taken a quick moment to look down at my phone. Okay, maybe it was more than just a quick moment, but it was surprising to me, because that's usually not the case, that I'm the only one looking at my phone. I mean, yeah, I'm not afraid to admit it, I'm looking at my phone pretty often throughout the day, but so are those around me, and don't give me that look or say what I think you're about to say, because we all do it.
Speaker 1:I know a lot of people talk shit about some of us not being able to put our phones down for one second, but the truth is we do live in a very online world now, with our phone being one of, if not the main, source for being online in order to access things we need throughout the day, because everything's digitalized now. And it was in that very moment that I truly felt the weight of that. I was out of town and my kids also known as my dogs were back home waiting for me, so I did the occasional camera system check to make sure they were okay. I had other friends that weren't with me at that moment that I was in the middle of text conversations with, so I was taking a moment to respond, and I had family reaching out to see what I was doing and if I had made it to my destination. Okay. So there was also that.
Speaker 1:And when I had all that taken care of and looked up to see everyone else living in the moment, it made me realize how sometimes those relationships and friendships and connections that we're intentionally maintaining through our phones can sometimes feel like they deserve just as much of a response as the conversations and connections that were going on in that booth that we were all in in that moment, in that real world, which I mean, of course they do, especially if building them up is important to us. But it felt even heavier than that. It felt almost like a sense of obligation to continue responding to those friendships and connections that were only available online for that moment, as if they were going on right in front of me, as if they were a moment in time that I wouldn't get back to, just like being in that booth was, and it felt like, if I put my phone away for too long, that that moment would be gone and hard to get back, and, with that in mind, it can sometimes feel like everything offline has to be put on hold for a second. But what the amazing people I actually was in front of made me realize was that we were very much together in the middle of a bustling city, with a sort of vividness humming around us that could very much not be experienced online or while looking down at my phone. They showed me what held the most weight in this equation nuts presence.
Speaker 1:They helped me put into a new perspective how many times we're sharing music through our phones or sending a funny TikTok or sending a selfie of our outfit of the day, and the amount of distance between us and those that we're sending those things to, but how, in those instances, we're only hearing and experiencing the song or the laughter from the video on our end and how those things are great when there very much is distance between us and we have no other choice, right? But how meaningful the weight of the music and the laughter and the photos being taken around us are when we put our phones down and look up. Are those text conversations just as worthy as the conversations being had in person? Absolutely, otherwise we wouldn't be engaging in them, right? We just gotta remember to not let ourselves get caught up in the what ifs or get lost in the guessing of what might or might not be going on on the other end of these text conversations we're interacting with at any given moment and in turn, forget about what's going on in front of us here right now.
Speaker 1:And in relation to that, think about how many times have we been venting to our friends and we know they're listening because they've been responding and putting in their two cents every now and then and offering up their opinion and some advice, right? But then their phone goes off with a notification alert and there they go, reaching for it and it just derails the whole vibe. And we do the same things too sometimes. So we know it's not being done intentionally to cut us off, but it's still a heavy feeling. And this isn't all to say that phones are horrible and we should put them down and never pick them back up again, because I'm sure you'll see me pick mine back up the minute I'm done recording this episode. But it's just to say to be weary of the times we think our phone can help us capture the moment but really maybe ends up ruining the moment. Or how a harmless glance at the screen can sometimes get in the way of a connection going on right in front of us, or the times we take a moment to send a quick message and end up sending the wrong message to those around us. And what all of this made me realize, and what it just goes to show exactly, is how many directions were pushed and pulled into on a daily basis and how important it is, I think, to be able to center ourselves and learn how to balance and distribute the importance throughout in a way that allows us to be as present as possible. So, for the sake of not sending the wrong message to those that I was with, I put my phone down for the rest of the night and really pushed myself to be cognizant about the times throughout the entire weekend that I was looking down rather than looking up. And the more I pulled myself away from my phone, the more I found I was able to kind of pull myself back into myself and really pay attention to what was going on on the inside, how the face to face interactions I was having were making me feel what emotions and reactions the live music and the performances were triggering inside of me and what my inner voice was getting off his chest because of all of those feelings.
Speaker 1:If you've ever been to a music festival or an event done at such a grand scale the way Austin City Limits is done then you know coming down from the experience is quite the drop. It is something else. There's just so much hype and excitement constantly flowing inside the parameters of Zilker Park and it can be quite a lot to decompress from. Hopefully that doesn't discourage anyone from ever attending a festival or experience like that. But just honestly it can feel like an extreme quiet versus the constant loudness when you're in the middle of experiencing it. It can kind of be in not such a negative way but an overstimulation. And if you know anything about being overstimulated then you know I remember after our first night out at the festival, waking up the next morning felt very sobering, like a hangover almost, and I hadn't even been drinking, but it still very much felt like the booze blues were hanging over my head, which is weird, I know, and if you've ever had the booze blues then you know it's like all the heavy emotional stuff you've been kind of trying to avoid dealing with. It's just there laying in bed with you from the minute you wake up. And again, I'm not saying you're going to feel this if or when you go to a music festival, but it was what I was experiencing after the first night and thank God for one of my friends suggesting a workout to start the day, because if there's any place where I can easily access my inner voice and face my demons and sort through them, it's usually a place where I can break a good sweat. So I got some equipment sorted next to the treadmill and hit start on my first interval and plugged my headphones in as the tread sped up blasting music I don't even remember listening to because the second my feet caught up to the speed I set. I started dealing with my inner voice.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of us, when big worries or heavy stresses come up, maybe rely on what the outside world says we should do and when we aren't as in tune with our inner voice as we'd like to be or feel like we're in a moment that we can't trust that inner voice, I think it becomes human nature to bounce ideas off those we're closest to and that we do trust to get their opinion on what we should do or how we should be feeling. But I think those uncertain times are the best times to listen and lean on our inner voice and talk back to it, practicing strengthening it and building trust in it, by reminding it of all the decisions it's made in the past and all the feelings and emotions and everything it's sorted through and overcome to get to the point we're at now. I mean, when we're laying down, at the end of the day, it's just us, right? I mean, yeah, we maybe have a partner next to us or maybe there's a family member or a roommate in the other room, but when the world is asleep, it's just us and our inner thoughts. And when it's like that, we'll easily find that when our inner voice isn't strengthened and is unable to deal with itself and is constantly looking for the input of others, then it's like who are we waking up from sleep to burden with that, and what accountability are we not taking within ourselves?
Speaker 1:And that's not to say we can't occasionally lean on others, especially our closest friends or closest confidants. On the contrary, I think that's one of the best things in life that we have the ability to establish relationships like that and that we can get those second opinions from time to time, but we can't become someone else's problem or become something for someone else to sort through all the time, and I think the awareness to not do that or to not become that, is built by honing in on and strengthening our inner voice and being able to banter with it like a best friend and not run away from it. And this is all a realization that I realized while I was running on this treadmill and lifting these weights. But yeah, I get it. I know how it all sounds like. Really. You're on vacation with friends, in the middle of experiencing one of the best music festivals of the year, and you couldn't put all that heavy shit to the side for one second. For one second, donovan.
Speaker 1:The thing about that, though, is that things like that, those heavy things, they don't take vacations and, like I've said before, they come knocking at the most inconvenient of times. I mean, obviously and I know it's easier for some to just put it aside till later, but as someone who wears their heart and their emotions on their sleeve, I saw it as something that needed to be done then and there. So I worked out and worked through it and I felt so much lighter and energized and was able to experience the rest of that day with my heart wide open and, honestly, it's a day I'll never forget. Hell, it's an entire weekend I'll never forget. To be honest, even with all this heavy stuff, it was like this giant cake with like a thousand cherries on top, because I would never be able to pick just one. But one of those cherries specifically was kicking up the dirt on a very spiritual Sunday night with Mumford and Sons. They were playing all of their best stuff right off the bat and it literally lifted me up and transported me to a time 12 years ago that I had seen them last.
Speaker 1:A friend and I drove down to the good old Marfa, texas, to see them and Edward Sharp, I think it was, and the Magnetic Zeros, and we kicked up the dirt there too, and it was all really such a heart, feeling, experience and felt so special to be standing with some of the most amazing people in my life right now in Austin that weekend dancing to Little Lion man. The last time I had done that in Marfa with a very special person in my life. Back then it was such a full circle moment if I did a good enough job explaining that and you were able to follow it. But as if the lyrics of Little Lion man weren't enough, by the way, if you haven't listened to that song in a while, listen to it, and if you have listen again, the lyrics hit different. This later on in life.
Speaker 1:But the song, the experience, the whole thing really put into a very clear perspective just how true the phrase some people come into your life for a season is. And believe me when I say I've always hated that phrase because it's always been hard for me to accept that some people are in fact seasonal, meaning soon enough the weather will change and they won't be around anymore. I mean, come on, can someone mean so much to me honestly and make it seem as if I mean so much to them On whatever level our relationship or friendship is on, to only be meant to be around temporarily and not for the rest of our lives. And, honestly, what I've come to realize, for how many times that's happened, is that there's just no getting around it, unfortunately. But there is a way to honor it.
Speaker 1:Change is inevitable, right, and as we get older we grow, not only physically but mentally and spiritually too Especially, and we evolve, and we can't all evolve at the same time and place or at the same rate. So to honor whichever relationships or friendships may be seasonal, we've got to lean into them when they're happening, even if that means hoping for forever to then later be disappointed. And we learn and teach each other and we make each other better at every chance we get. And even through those growing pains and evolutions that we go through, we stay true to our North Star, the very thing that guides us home, regardless of who we become along the way, always holding the door open for any seasonal people and lessons that lie ahead, never being spiteful or holding a grudge for the ones that have passed in, the times that have gone wrong or didn't go our way, and by not being resentful any time we're done wrong and taking accountability for any wrongdoing we've done, and always being grateful and humble. And I think in doing that we leave behind no question as to the kind of person we are. And I know that's hard sometimes because for the times that things did go wrong or that we were done wrong, whatever, we don't always feel like being the better person and we don't always feel like forgiving and acting as if nothing ever happened and acting as if it didn't hurt.
Speaker 1:But what one of my closest friends recently taught me is that when we stay true to ourselves and our North Star, and when we share those special parts of ourselves with a friend or a lover that happens to end up as seasonal, there will be no questioning if you're capable of being the better person. And it was on the long drive home from this eventful weekend in Austin that I put my phone down and looked up and saw the most beautiful sunset and followed it back home like it was my North Star With a stronger faith in my inner voice, telling me to trust. And I'll be remembered for having the same intention I've always had and honoring the new season I'm in by not allowing old patterns to keep me from moving forward. And, my friend, I genuinely hope you're doing the same. Until the next one. Be careful.