As a technology leader over the course of the last 17+ years, I rarely if ever have opted to totally disconnect for more than a day. Two years ago over a long weekend, we took the family to Sebastopol California and discovered we were out of range of cell for two days and to our surprise we absolutely loved the experience. With my young pre teen + teen, we play board games, watched good all fashion DVDs together, read, ate and shared space.

I found in the next year plus I longed for that type of experience again for myself and my now very busy teens. I took an opportunity to go five days in Joshua tree National Park totally unplugged offline. It was an amazing trip. The family did bouldering, photography, played card games, read books, played boardgames, and just spent time together sharing space. The value of disconnecting was huge as we found ourselves in great weather outside enjoying the day together.

It is amazing how fast our culture has changed with the infusion of all elements of our lives being managed and moderated by some form of technology. I believe in today’s culture with young people especially, the value of teaching them to put down devices and go off-line be at for a long weekend or even the ability to go for a full week in the woods, in nature, or out of cell phone range is in valuable for recharging and resetting the body.

I am thankful for the ability to have done that trip last week and encourage all of you to find moments where you too can experience the same type of option off-line for even a weekend.

Disclaimer: I did use my iPhone X to shoot pics.