As school approaches, I’m reminding myself not to get thrown back into the chaos of being constantly plugged in. It has taken me two months to get back to paying single-focused attention to the events going on around me. In July, my idea of unwinding meant surfing the net and answering messages while watching TV. By the time I got to the cottage we rent every summer, I couldn’t even allow myself to just sit on the beach and enjoy watching my children, the waves, or absorb some sunshine. That’s even without a signal going to my cell phone. I had to read book after book, fiction and non-fiction, to focus my wandering mind. I took walks every morning and night to calm my nerves. By mid-August my heart palpitations had finally calmed down.

Now I look to another busy year of teaching Communications Technology to high school students and teacher candidates, working towards the paperless classroom, and continuing my research on teens and technology, and I know I must find good and efficient daily coping methods. While filming a documentary for my Masters I talked about stress and technology with Dr. David E. Meyer of the University of Michigan and with Linda Stone, former executive of Apple and Microsoft. I put together a short video on how stress builds and what it does to us, as well as coping methods.

Dealing With the Stress of Living in a High-Tech World
Dr. David E Meyer and Linda Stone