The Online-Offline Button

One day I asked myself: How can I escape my online world?

No phone, no messages, no news, no games, no videos. Just one day or a week, or longer completely free.

I asked my mother. She said: "Sweetheart, I’d love to help you. You can have anything of mine. But this… I don’t know either. I struggle with it myself."

I asked my computer science teacher: "Where can I live without Wi-Fi or internet?" "That’s tough," he said. "Maybe out at sea or deep in the mountains. North Korea, maybe. But even there, it’s getting harder."

I asked my spiritual guide: "How do I escape my online world?" He replied: "Prayer brings peace. If things become overwhelming, turn inward in silence. I’ll email you a good prayer." But then I thought, he’s emailing me a prayer…?

So finally, I asked ChatGPT: “How can I escape the online world?”

It gave me a full list:

– Turn off notifications

– Set offline hours

– Try a digital detox

– Delete social media

– Walk without your phone

– Rediscover boredom 

But at the end, it said something that stuck with me: "What if every phone had just one simple switch an Online-Offline button? One press and you're free. No noise. No distractions. Just you. But of course… social media companies would never make that button. Silence doesn’t sell."

I smiled. Then I asked the one person I knew who had never owned a phone my grandfather. I told him that nobody seemed to have a real answer. His eyes sparkled. “Nobody?” he asked. “Nobody,” I said. He leaned in and whispered: “Have you asked the question... to yourself?”

Food for thought

• What if the off-switch we’re all looking for… is already within us?
• Would you press that "Online-Offline Button" if it existed?
• And until that day comes what stops you from choosing silence now?