Transcript

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Hello and welcome to the Dr. Nurse Mama show prescribing Hope for healthy families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner and mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck. Well, hey there friends and welcome to my favorite time of day, my favorite day of the week. It is the. It's not the 4th of July. I wish it was the 4th of July. It is already a week after the 4th of July, but it is Friday. I cannot believe it has been a week since we got together together to almost a week. It'll be a week tomorrow to celebrate our country's 250th birthday. And I hope that you were able to spend some time with family and friends and spend some time reflecting on what that looked like to you. Really. The fourth of July reminds us as a people how much we treasure freedom. We talk about as cherishing our freedom that we have as Americans, especially our religious freedom, the freedom to gather with family and friends and freedom to worship. But. But what if one of the greatest threats to our freedom isn't something that's outside our homes, it is quietly sitting in our pockets. This is the great paradox that I see. We are fighting for our freedoms in the public square and giving it away in spades at home. This is the paradox facing the American family today because we are tethering ourselves to technology and giving away some of our freedoms. Now the good news for you in this is that we're going to talk about some healthy habits for technology for families. If you've been following along since the beginning of the year, we started in January. Every Friday we talk about healthy habits and we started with four core spiritual disciplines. Then we moved to six rhythms your family needs. We talked about eight communication patterns. And now we are in the middle of talking about technology. We started with reading out loud, which actually can be very low tech, which is good. Watching faith based films, being in pictures, unplugged, plugging while you're on vacation. We've talked about tech free zones and tech free times and tech tracking. And today we're going to be talking about two habits. Actually, we'll be talking about tech tidying, tidying up your tech, cleaning up your tech and being transparent with your tech. Because discipleship really crosses the realm of the digital world. It is on your smartphone. We need to be thinking about this in terms of discipling our family. And technology is one of the greatest, greatest gifts of our generation. We have seen more advances in one generation than we saw in the last all of American generations. And technology can allow us to work remotely and decrease our commute time, increase our time with our families. We can connect across continents or countries. We can connect with long distance loved ones. We can capture memories in a more meaningful way. We can learn new skills and we can even share the gospel farther than ever before. And we've been sharing many guests with different applications and different work in the way that they are doing that. It's allowing speedier translation of the gospel. But every gift has the potential to become a taskmaster. And most of us don't realize how much our technology shapes our habits until we try to put it down. And we talked about tracking that, tracking our tech, and really being honest about the amount of time that it's stealing from us. Most of us have adopted a part time job that we don't even see as a part time job job. And that is our screen time. It is the equivalent of a part time or a full time job in many cases. And today's children are growing up in the first generation where nearly every moment of their lives. I want you to think about this. Every moment of their lives is mediated by a screen. And adults aren't immune either. The average person touches their phone thousands of times a day. And notifications are competing for our attention. Algorithms are competing for our affection. And there are entire industries built around keeping us engaged. Just one more minute. I talked about that Wednesday with Kathi Lipp and the rise of consumerism culture. The danger isn't simply that technology wastes our time. That's not good stewardship. But it is more than that. It is slowly reshaping our, character. And technology can quietly encourage two things that scripture actually warns us against. I hear often, you know scripture. How do we even apply scripture to the challenges of technology? But scripture does talk to us about hiding things, about keeping secrets and how that can be destructive. And it also warns us repeatedly against distraction. Hiddenness pulls us away from integrity. Distraction pulls us away from relationships. These are two things that the enemy rejoices over. He wants people to fall in their integrity. He wants people to fail in their relationships. And both hiddenness and distraction can slowly erode the kind of people and families that God has called us to become. And we're not even paying attention. We're just letting it happen because we feel overwhelmed. We may feel apathetic. We may have already adjusted to self medicating through our screens. And that's why we're. That brings us to today. Today we're talking about two practices that can dramatically change the atmosphere of Your home. I'm talking about two today, because last week we were off for the holiday. The first transparent tech. Living your digital life with the same integrity online that you live in person. And also tidying up your tech, creating some digital spaces that support peace instead of chaos. Now, neither of these require expensive software. The good news is it doesn't even require to be tech savvy. And this Gen X girl is really grateful for that because I have to have my kids help me with so much. But neither requires deleting all your technology and going to live under a rock and a compound off the grid. Both simply require one thing. I'm just asking one thing, and that is intentionality. You have to decide you're going to do it. Because healthy families don't just manage technology, they disciple themselves through it. Let me come to you from scripture, from Psalm 101, verses 2 and 3. I will walk with integrity of heart within my house. I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless, anything that is vile, some, of the translations say. And Psalm 101 is really fascinating because David isn't talking necessarily about governing a nation. He's talking about governing himself. I will walk with integrity. Integrity really begins at home. Long before it's public, it's private. And your private life eventually spills over into your public life. Sometimes, that is, by discovery, Someone discovers something that you don't mean for them to discover. Or sometimes that's by disclosure. The weight of what you're carrying becomes too great, that you finally, you have to confess it to somebody. You have to say it. And technology has dramatically changed what private looks like. Privacy is not anything. What it is, it promises so much more, but delivers so much less. Never before has every member of the family carried a private television, a private library, a private shopping mall, a private casino, a private relationship portal, and private entertainment streaming all in their pocket on a little square. I want you to think about that. All of those things you're carrying in your pocket, and all of those things are quote, unquote private. That is unprecedented in human history. And because technology feels increasingly personal, it is hyper personal, personalized. It feels hyper private, and it encourages secrecy. Now, this is by design, because when we have secrecy, oh, maybe we'll buy more than we agreed to budget. Maybe we'll stream something we wouldn't normally stream. These are, marketing behaviors. But it's also a tactic of the enemy to trip you up. That's just the truth. Our devices are designed around privacy and secrecy. That's what we Hear really talked about in the public square and policy arena this, and sometimes that conversation is very appropriate. When we're talking about the debate between adults right to privacy and kids right to safety, that's a debate that is an appropriate debate to have. But we know that to some degree we want privacy. Our banking information should be protected and medical records should be confidential. But here's the, here's the difference. There's an important differentiation between privacy and secrecy. And this is what we need to be teaching our families. There's a difference between privacy and secrecy. Now privacy, the intent of that is to protect, to protect your sensitive information, to protect your dignity. Secrecy conceals. Secrecy is meant to hide something that you don't want to come to the light of day because you're afraid of the consequences that may happen with that. Privacy actually builds trust because when I have a disagreement with my husband and he talks with me about that in private and spares other people around us from the indignity of our, of our, of our difference, that that's respectful, that's loving. But when we have conversations that are secret and we don't tell those to our spouses, that's where we don't build trust. We destroy it. Look at modern technology. It doesn't just allow for secrecy. It is a key selling feature. I want you to think about all the built in features that allow you to have secrecy on your smartphone. Just think about this. You have a hidden photo album. It comes default on most settings on most devices. You can lock your notes. You can have incognito browsing where you open up a browser. You don't have to delete the history. This is just my private on the side. Don't want anybody to see you have messages that vanish. Oh, they won't stay there. Nobody will know. You have disappearing stories. You have secret folders, you have burner apps, you have calculator apps that hide photos. You have alternate or spam or ghost accounts. You have multiple profiles. You have archive features, auto deleting messaging features and locked browsers. Every year more tools appear that make hiding easier. Why? Because companies know secrecy sells, that hidden life feels really exciting for some reason. But scripture repeatedly teaches us that darkness can be dangerous. That things that are hidden will come to light, that our sin will find us out, that those things will, will come, that will eventually come forward. And from Genesis onward you see hiding immediately after sin. You remember the story, of course, Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, right? Then what did they do? They hid. Not because God couldn't find them. But because shame always seeks darkness. And throughout Scripture we see the same principle, that sin grows best in isolation when you're alone. And that inner monologue can really do a number on you. Truth grows best in the light and the light. Often the darkness doesn't want the light, but the light is cleansing. The light is purifying. When we're hiding something, our hearts always know before someone else does. Maybe it's pornography. Maybe it's an emotional affair, secret spending, a gambling addiction that no one knows about. Private conversations that you would much rather not see the light of day, doom scrolling political rage. Maybe your screen time entertainment that you would never watch if someone else sat beside you and that you're not sharing with anybody else that you're watching. The issue isn't just the content that's not edifying, it's the secrecy surrounding it that pulls you into a whole different snare. So here's a powerful question for you. I, want you to imagine when you get that weekly screen time report, if it wasn't just sent to you, maybe it was sent to everybody. You know, maybe it was sent to your whole family. Maybe it was projected on your, on a screen in front of your life group.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Group. They.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: And somebody would see. Somebody would see everything. Every website, every app, every search that you made, every hour that you spent, every minute that you spent online. If you knew that that was going to happen, would you feel peace or would you feel panic? Now, early in the days of social media when I was teaching, I did, an experiment one day where I used public social media profile pictures. Because no matter, even if you have a private social profile, your profile picture is public. And I used those public profile pictures to call roll in my class. Let me tell you, it really caused panic I was not expecting because they thought, no, that's not my school Persona. That's a question. And it's not meant to create shame. It is meant to reveal integrity. Because integrity means your private life and your public life are telling the same story. And that's the story that we need to be telling kids to write for themselves. Transparent families intentionally reduce secrecy. And some of those practical examples can happen in marriage and in parents and in households. And when we come back, I'll talk to you about some of the practical ways that you can encourage transparency, merit, technology use. And I'll talk about some of the specific dangers that lie ahead when kids are using technology secretly. And we'll talk about how to recover when you mess up, because that'll happen too. I'll see you on the other side of this break.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: We worship the God who was, We worship the God who is. We were worship the God who ever more will be. He opened the prison door? He parted the raging sea? My God, he holds the victory. There's joy in the house of the Lord there's joy in the house of the Lord Today we won't be quiet. We shout out joy in the house of the Lord.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back, friends. That is House of the Lord by Phil Wickham. And there is joy in the house of the Lord today. I hope there's joy in your heart. It is Friday and and we're talking healthy habits. We're right in the middle of our technology series. And today I'm, right in the middle of talking to you about tech transparency. This is one of the most important habits for integrity that you can have for your family. And I was just about to start to talk about some practical ways. So what does this look like? Let's stop for a minute and break this down. What does this look like in a marriage having tech transparency? Well, it means you know each other's passwords. It means not because you distrust each other, but because you've just chosen radical openness. Nothing hidden, nothing protected from your spouse, nothing off limits. Because healthy marriages don't fear accountability. They welcome it. And that doesn't mean that, of course, a spouse couldn't intentionally hide something. But it's a step forward. It's a gesture. It is there now for parents. Children should know they don't own their own devices. I say this all the time, actually. People ask, do you check your kid's phone? I say yes, I pay. I say, that is how it goes. If I am paying for their device, that device is mine and it is on loan to them. And as such, as you loan any device, any from anywhere, anything that I rent, any device that I rent, any hotel room, anything, I am subject to their terms of use. So they are subject to my terms of use. Parents, though, are shepherds and not spies. We are there to protect, not to police. Okay? Checking phones shouldn't feel like it is, you know, all of a sudden def, alerts going off. It should just be a normal, expected part of parent a family life. This is tech transparency. And ask yourself, this is really even a little more radical. Would your child feel equally free picking up your phone? Now, I know they don't pay, but we need to model that back. Do your kids pick up and look and see? Could they Flip through your social media and see what you've been watching, see who you've been messaging, and could they hand you your device without you feeling nervous? Children notice hypocrisy long before they hear lectures. And another way for any family to have tech transparency is for devices to stay in community. One of the healthiest family habits is keeping screens in the places where the most people gather. So computers in the living room, gaming system and the family room, streaming television in the common area, charging station at the kitchen counter. Why? Well, because light protects. And when devices move behind closed doors, temptation often follows, especially in those secret sacred spaces where things feel like you feel safe. Bedrooms were designed for sleep, not endless scrolling. And I've talked about that before. And especially for adolescents, removing phones from their bedroom is associated clinically with better sleep, improved mental health, and reduced exposure to online risks. And that is certainly, certainly true now. When we look at the dangers of non transparent technology use, just giving them a device and letting them use it in secret, it really can increase emotional distress. So teens who engage in secretive behaviors, they don't seek help often. They see something, they engage in something, they experiment with something, and the lures are there, they are great. And it's really hard for them to come forward because they're developmentally wired to think abstractly, to be afraid of punishment, to be afraid of losing the device, and most of all, to be afraid of losing your respect and love. For them, isolation really amplifies that risk because children who feel like, okay, I got myself into this mess, I'm going to have to figure out how I get myself out of this mess. Well, they're not equipped to do that. So it will bring anxiety and depression and feelings of hopelessness. And secrecy reinforces shame. Many times kids feel shame and they don't even know why. They encounter something they never sought out, they didn't intend to see. Maybe that's pornography or sexting or inappropriate content or whatever it is, violence, it creates a cycle of guilt, but, also curiosity. And they go back and look because their brain's trying to figure out what it is they saw. The other danger is that predators thrive in secrecy. Online groomers frequently encourage kids move the conversation to a private channel. That should be a big flag and an absolute no. They'll say, keep secrets from parents. I taught my kids from a very early age, no, I cannot keep a secret. Or they use disappearing message features which really aren't disappearing. And fake identities are really a harder to detect when adults are excluded from that child's Digital world. And I want to talk about something that's a tough truth. Pornography exposure is increasingly common at an earlier and earlier age. And research suggests that most children have encountered it before age 13, and most of them encounter it the first time accidentally. And private device use increases that accident and frequency. And we know about the dangers of that explicit material. We're talking about distorted expectations of relationship and body image and consent and violence. And it is all kinds of a world of hurt. We know that having devices in the bedrooms and not having transparent use and scrolling at night when you think everybody else is asleep and nobody's going to judge you, it impacts your sleep. It and which impacts your mental health and your academic health and your emotional health. All of those things are there. Children can also experience cyberbullying online. And many, many times when they experience it, they do not tell anyone about it. Most of the time because it's so embarrassing, it's so confusing, it's so hurtful, it's so shameful. And then when we find out they, they hit it, then they're in trouble even more, which reinforces that cycle of secrecy and they're afraid they'll lose their device privileges and so they won't report it. And lack of transparency delays parental intervention until already they've experienced significant emotional harm. That absolutely happens Here. We see also kids engaging in risky digital behaviors that might be sexting or nudifying technology. And this technology is so easily accessible, it's so pervasive, it is constantly thrown to children and advertisements when we don't have widely adopted verification platforms. And children perceive it as harmless or they're just not sure what will happen. Their executive thinking center in their brain goes offline when they have emotions, especially fear, and their thumb moves faster than their brain does and they think, oh, let me see you just what will happen? They don't think through the consequences. And then all of a sudden they're in really, really big trouble. And so they tend to hide. That's why fina accounts like fake Instagram accounts or ghost accounts, spam accounts, secondary hidden profiles, because a parent may say, you can't have an account, so they hide it. And then parents think, oh my gosh, they have, you know, just completely violated all of their morals. When we know moral and spiritual development doesn't mature until the early 20s. No, this is just a lack. It's not a moral failure, it is a decision making failure. And it's very hard when you are going so fast to put up guardrails that are going to Be safe and effective. And secrecy erodes trust in both directions. Because parents become suspicious, children become defensive. And that healthy transparency needs to have light in it. It needs to have opportunities not for lecturing, but for lovingly coaching our kids, discipling them, problem solving before crises develop. We know that parental engagement and monitoring remain the strongest protective factors for online safety. Now this doesn't mean that your kids aren't going to mess up. Every kid is going to make a mistake online. Because we live so much of our lives online, is it possible to expect that level of perfection? Some might make a big mistake and some might make a little mistake. And so when you have discovery or disclosure, meaning you discover something or they disclose it, discovery is a different place because that can be a tough place to walk into. But how you respond in that moment can change the trajectory of their life. Disclosure is a little different because that means they're ready for help. They realize they've exhausted all of their self help and they're at a tipping point and they're really scared. So coming to them and when they come to you or when you discover something, telling them in that moment, I love you and we will get through this together. Yes, I'm upset, but I love you and I'm so sorry you experienced this. That's such an important opening because yes, there will be consequences. Most of those will be natural consequences. Yes, there is going to be fallout. Yes, there will probably reset boundaries. But it's so important to set the tone for that because kids live in a cancel culture and they feel like one mistake can cancel them forever. And we see kids at this point of desperation where they make one mistake and they feel like their life is over and all of a sudden they're more afraid of living than they are of not living. And that is a terrible place to be. So when we look at online dangers, and I'll talk about this in tech safety in a few weeks, but most online dangers don't start with a predator. They start with privacy. That's where the danger can start. When privacy crosses the line into secrecy, that is your danger alert. Healthy families don't eliminate all privacy, but they eliminate the expectation that your digital life is completely hidden from the people who love and protect you most. That's not important. And so again, and I just want to encourage you because I hear a lot from parents who will say, oh, my kid has a social media account that's hidden from me. They lied to me about having it. my kid did this risk taking behavior that hiding is developmentally expected. And they hide. They don't have the words to describe what they saw. They feel shame before they understand guilt. Their brains are wired for self protection and they care so deeply about what, what you think of them. They worry so much that you'll be angry or disappointed. Many times, for me, as a healthcare provider, kids will tell me things before they tell their parents. Not because they don't want to tell their parents. They can't stand it. they are hiding, they're lying. They tell me because they're trying to gauge what the reaction is going to be from their parents if I say, oh my gosh, this is a really big deal, that increases the fear. Like, okay, all right, you're really upset. My parents are really going to be upset. They're just trying to see and I'm a much safer person. But because they don't really care what I think of them as much as they care about what their parents think of them, that is important. We also got to teach our kids that curiosity is not the same as consent. If children click on something or respond to someone or, or just look at something because they're curious and they don't know what it is, we need to make sure that they know that that is not their fault. And sometimes they feel bad about that. So pause before reacting. Take a breath. That first response often becomes your child's expectation of whether it is safe to you to come to safe to come to you again. Thank them for telling you. I know that wasn't easy. I'm so glad you came to me. Praise their honesty, which is a, virtue before addressing the behavior. Stay emotionally regulated because children are going to borrow from our nervous system so we panic and yell and shame. They'll learn to hide better next time rather than to seek help sooner. Separate the child from the choice. You're not in trouble for telling me. This is a good choice to tell me. It is always the right choice to tell me. You are not in trouble for telling me. We will figure this out together. And after everyone is calm, we're going to coach. We're going to coach. What happened? How did it make you feel? What could we do differently next time? How can I help you if this happens again? Just like you would do if they struck out at the mat, at the, at the bat or whatever. Sports, analogy. My husband thinks every parenting problem can be solved with sports analogies, and he's probably right. But use that moment to coach discernment, not just enforce compliance. If we make honesty feel safe, kids are More likely to come to us before a problem becomes a crisis. And our goal cannot be to raise children who never make mistakes. That's impossible. Our goal is to raise children who know exactly where and to whom to run when they do. And that is a beautiful picture of the gospel truth without minimizing sin, grace without withholding love. That is important. So I want you to ask yourself, what do the devices in your home? Where do they exist in a culture of accountability? Is there any secrecy there? Could your child immediately come to you if something concerning appeared on their screen and it is more difficult than you think it is? That is hard. So pay attention to some warning signs that may not seem obvious at first. If someone suddenly guards their phone, they're tilting their screen away, they're clearing their history, they're sleeping with their devices, they panic when someone borrows their phone. They're only using devices in private, or you find multiple accounts, they're very defensive about their screen use. Sometimes those things can be innocent, and sometimes they're not. Either way, it's always an opportunity for conversation, not immediate condemnation. Remember, be curious. Curious. Curiosity before accusation, connection before correction. Truth that is always, always wrapped in grace. And so think about what could transparency look like in your home? Well, how can you demonstrate integrity through tech transparency? Well, let me give you a quick checklist. Let's talk. Go really quickly through here. Walk through your home, through your devices. with me, think about your device. Devices. Do you know the password for everybody's device and account? If you have a child in your house that has a device and account, is the password somewhere? Do your spouses know each other's passwords or have access to them in case of emergency? Do devices belong to the family, not just exclusively to the individual using them? I'm talking about children who are using, devices given to them by adults. Do parents reserve the right to periodically review a device in an age appropriate way? Way? Location. Let's think about location, location, location. Are the computers and gaming systems in common areas? Your TVs, your streaming devices, your phones, your tablets, your laptops. Are they charged overnight outside the bedroom? And is the screen easily visible? Like when somebody's walking through the room, they could see what it is. What are the expectations around use? That you don't have any secret social media accounts, no hidden devices, that there shouldn't be any conversations online, that you wouldn't discuss offline with a trusted adult? And parents should model the same transparency they expect from their kids. Do you understand the difference between privacy and secrecy? Think about ways you could put accountability into your home. Do you have a weekly screen time report? Do you report out to your family? Do you review them without any shame or embarrassment? But just as an accountability ask yourself kids, has something online made you uncomfortable this week? And children should know that the first response for punishment isn't automatically losing their devices, that they report something concerning mistakes are opportunities for coaching, not just punishment. When we come back, we'll talk about a transparency tech test and I'll talk about tech tidying. We'll be right back.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: I be lying if I said that I'm okay cause right now I'm lost and lost count of the broken prayers I've ah prayed and it's true that someday days it'd be easier to doubt but your word has never let me down. so I believe you believe when you say you're fighting for me. I hm, believe you when you tell me that my story isn't over just yet. I will rise up again. You promise me that I will make it through. And I believe you.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back friends. That is I believe you by Megan woods welcome back to this fry.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Yay.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: It is Friday friends. I hope you're having a good one. We are doubling up on habits today since we had the 250th birthday of our great nation last week. And today I'm talking about tech transparency and tech tidying. Tech transparency is one of the most important things you can do for integrity, for accountability. It is such a critical discipleship issue that we should be talking to families. This is a family culture issue where we talk about technology openly and regularly and questions are welcomed without fear and honesty is celebrated when we mess up and grace and truth guide our conversations along with guardrails that come in place to help set us up for success. Our goal is not perfect behavior because that is an unachievable goal that will leave us all frustrated and disappointed. It's about growing integrity. So let me give you a transparency test, okay? These are the questions you can think about that will help you think through the level of transparency that you have in your own personal life and in your home. Would you do this? Would I do this if my spouse were beside me? Would I watch this show? Would I message this person? Would I spend this much time? Would I do this if my spouse were right beside me, shoulder surfing, watching over my shoulder? Would I be comfortable if my child saw this, saw this website that I visited, saw what I was shopping for, how much I spent or whatever it is? Would you be comfortable if your child saw saw it, would you want it included in your weekly screen time report? And most importantly, does it draw you toward Christ or away from him? Many times when we have those moments of secrecy and we just quiet the Holy Spirit and move away, sin separates us from God and the Holy Spirit. Influence gets less and less, and then all of a sudden, we find ourselves hardened and cast ballast. The line here is help between healthy privacy and unhealthy secrecy. And that's a line your family needs to figure out where it lies. So this week, I challenge you to choose one act of greater transparency. Maybe you share your password with your spouse. Maybe you move a streaming device into a common space. Maybe you create a family charging station. Or maybe you just have an honest conversation about your online habits. Because small steps toward the light build stronger families and help build trust and help us to have lives that are marked by integrity. So technology does give us incredible opportunities, but there are also risks there as well. Psalm 101 reminds us that integrity begins in our own homes. And healthy families don't just have parental controls. We're cultivating hearts and relationships with the Lord. We're cultivating heart spirits to love the light. And that is something that leads us to have the second habit that we're talking about this week, tech tidying. Now we can feel overwhelmed by the mess of tech. We got devices everywhere. Wait, so you're talking about streaming? Like, there's devices in every rooms of our house and every car and every pocket and every purse. So we have got to have some discipline in the clutter. If you're listening along long on the declutter diary series, we're talking about physical clutter for the most part. But now we're going to talk about some digital clutter that really has the same principle. Let me read to you from Hebrews 12:11. No, discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful later on. However, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace. Well, how about having a little discipline and tidying up our tech? We definitely can cultivate a harvest of peace because have you ever cleaned out a closet and just immediately brightened your day, like you felt so much better about it? You cleaned out your garage. Nothing outside your body changed, but something inside you did. Because order creates peace. And that same principle applies in our tech lives. And many of us have been so become so accustomed to the clutter of tech in our lives, we just don't even notice it anymore. How many of you? I know there's two kinds of people listening right now. There are Two kinds of people. There are the people who have a thousand plus notifications on their unread emails, and there are the people who have zero. That is the two kind of people. Or maybe that's text messages. You can pick your way, whatever it is. And the people who have zero are like, I could not live like that. How are you living like that? And the people who are living like that say, that's okay. But we have hundreds of notifications. We have photos we are never going to revisit that. We took a picture of that. We screenshotted that recipe that we are never going to make. We. We have apps that we never use because we just downloaded it once for the discount. We have text that we don't need because I'm too scared to leave the group text store again. I signed up for the discount. We have downloads that we forgot existed in our file folder. We have multiple browser tabs. Oh, my husband is calling me out on that right now. We have open reminders. We have streaming watch list. Digital clutter quietly becomes mental cloud clutter. That is the problem. I'm calling it tech creep. It is tech creep in our homes, in our hearts, and it rarely becomes overwhelming. Overnight, it just accumulates. One app notification. I'll just. One email subscription, one social media account, one shopping alert, a calendar reminder, a text thread. Until eventually our devices begin managing us instead of serving us. Because every notification is a competition for our attention. Look here. Every badge says, hey, you forgot something. That vibration interrupts so rudely into real life. Every red bubble whispers like, okay, pay me attention. And our phones are like digital toddlers that are just tugging on us all day long. It is like a needy toddler, and they're just not nearly as cute. Toddlers are cute and sweet. Okay. It's also emotional clutter, because that digital clutter isn't just visual, it's emotional. If you go back and revisit an old conversation you haven't deleted, that can reopen old wounds. shopping cart is going to tempt impulse spending, Trigger a fight with your spouse. Social media memories trigger comparison. Oh, that was life then. This isn't life now. Unread emails make me feel guilty and anxious, and I can't even begin to handle my inbox, so I'm just gonna go bed rot. Or. You have a constant notifications that fragment your attention. Oh, okay, I need to. Oh, yes, I. I need to grocery shop, but. Oh, okay, I have this calendar reminder. Oh, but I'm gonna play this game. Oh, but the sale is there. All of it keeps our minds partially tethered to our devices. Even when we're sitting beside people we love, we're physically present, but mentally and emotionally way somewhere else. Like I said, discipline rarely feels excited. Exciting. Deleting thousands of emails is not something I would look forward to putting on my day. Unsubscribing takes a little effort. Organizing photos, oh my goodness, so overwhelming. Turning off notifications, you think, yeah, but what if I missed something important? But listen, discipline creates freedom. Every unnecessary notification removed is one less interruption pulling you away from your family. Family. Every app that you delete, every email you unsubscribe, it's one less temptation. Every cleaned inbox reminds and removes another mental burden. And peace is followed by pruning. So we've got to take that discipleship to our digital lives. Because like I said, it doesn't happen overnight. It's just quietly, without intentional boundaries. Convenience means constant accessibility, and that means constant distraction. And if we're not intentional, technology is going to just naturally occupy more space than we ever intended. This is changing childhood, because childhood shifts from exploring things to consuming things. They're not creating, they're not imagining, they're not exploring the world around them. They're not playing with Tinker toys, they're just moving their thumbs. That's it. And play is replaced by screen based entertainment. When we have unstructured play, kids learn how to problem solve and how to get around problems. It's highly stimulating, but the now we have just visual stimulation all the time. Boredom is so rare. Previous generations learned how to wait, how to wonder, how to create. Now we just have just constant entertainment and consumption. But kids don't feel fulfilled because they're just consuming things. They're not creating anything. And consuming just leaves you feeling empty and guilty. Guilty friendships are mediated by technology. Screens are crowding out family rituals. Because we see screens dominating meals and car rides and bedtimes, and children are encountering adult content earlier than ever before. Attention is fragmented. All of these things are related to digital clutter. Because the more technology we allow to unintentionally invade our spaces, invade our homes, invade our hearts, invaders our our devices, then the more disconnection there is going to be. And that is something that's concerning for me. Tech creep. It usually doesn't look very dramatic. It's just childhood becoming a little less imaginative, a little less relational, a little less active, and just connected to a screen rather than a person. So think about the attention magnets that are around you. What are those things that pull your attention. What? What is that clutter that needs to be cleared out? Maybe it's notifications or emails or group text or apps or news or shopping promotions or social media updates. Each one is is competing for your attention. And children are watching far more than they're listening. So when parents are constantly interrupted by that digital clutter, kids learn that, hey, this is normal. This is just how we live. So I encourage you to schedule a regular digital reset for your whole family. Family, you together, say, hey, we're all going to clean up some clutter here. Bring your devices and let's talk about what we're offloading here and just start to clean up. Delete the apps that you don't use, turn off the notifications, go through your settings. Have your kids teach you how to do that if you need to. I know I certainly do. Unsubscribe from the emails that you want. Organize photos and files, re review your screen time reports, and delete what is distracting you most. Update those privacy settings. It's routine maintenance, just like changing the air filter in your house. You need to just clean up your tech. So ask when you're cleaning it up. Think, okay, is this app actively serving a purpose that is useful in my life, or is it just a habit? Does it deserve immediate access to my attention? Is it helping me connect, or is it distracting me from them? And when parents tidy up their technology, they often find they'll reach for their first phoneless. They'll have more uninterrupted conversations. They'll notice their children's bids for attention sooner and feel less mentally overwhelmed. Because kids don't just need rules about technology. They need parents whose technology is reflecting the priorities that they're saying are their priorities. It's not just about having a cleaner phone. It's about having a richer relationship that is really important, important. So some of those things that you can do together is just a notification audit. We talked about tech tracking and seeing. What are the notifications that you're getting during the day that have become so routine you don't even notice? You just dismiss, dismiss, dismiss. So keep those notifications only for things that are important, like phone calls or texts from important people, calendar reminders of important things or emergency alerts. Honestly, almost everything else can wait and keep can be scheduled. Delete those apps that you haven't used. If you haven't opened it in months, delete it. You can always reinstall it later if you need to. That's less visual clutter, less temptation, less distraction. That is really important. You can finally clean out those photos now. I don't think I'll ever get to this. I'm just going to be honest. This is such a challenge for me, but it is, it is a goal that I still have. And, and, or maybe it's an inbox reset. Maybe it's your home screen reset. Maybe you only keep the apps on your home screen that support your priorities instead of your impulses. I mean, if scripture is buried on page seven of your screen while social media sits front and center, my most frequently used. Well, your home screen is actually discipling you. Your home screen is prompting you and what to do and when to do. So arrange your phone around who you want to become. If someone opened your phone, would they see it clearly reflecting your priorities? Maybe it's just 15 minutes a week. That's it. Everyone just gets together. It would be amazing to see what you would do just 15 minutes a week. Maybe it's five minutes a day, maybe it's five minutes a week. But imagine the difference with that relationship when your conversations become longer and your meals are richer and you don't have as divided attention. Attention. It's not just about organizing your phone, it's about reflecting your priorities. Because if someone looked at your home screen what your notifications were your screen time report, would they conclude that your faith is the most important force in your life? Would they conclude that that is what is shaping your attention? That is your priority? I'm telling you, your credit card, your calendar, calendar, your smartphone are the ultimate accountability partners. It tells who you prioritize to text, whose calls you prioritize to take on the first ring, what emails are in the are starred and the most frequent there. The apps that you have on your home screen, are they apps that serve your family for a purpose? Are they apps that just self medicate? These are tough times, tough things. Technology is a wonderful servant, but makes a terrible master. So today we celebrated two simple but powerful habits. Transparent tech allows us to walk in integrity, while tech tidying reminds us that discipline creates peace. And what if the greatest freedom you could experience wasn't freedom to use more technology, but freedom from the hold it already has on you? I pray the Lord will bless you and keep you and make his face to shine upon you as you become families who walk in integrity in your home. I'll see you on Monday. The views and opinions expressed in this broadcast may not necessarily reflect those of the American Family association or American Family Radio.