I’ve got something very important I want to tell you.
Could you be in the grips of a new disease that’s ruining your life?
Have I got news you won’t want to miss.
It’s urgent. It’s information you need to survive in this ever-changing, increasingly scarier world.
It’s news that only I can tell you. News you need to know. News that I’m going to reveal. After the break.
We interrupt this important announcement with another important announcement.
One simple tweak of your voice mail system could help change the world. That’s right. Save the world time because time is money.
Tired of listening to a voice mail’s automated voice tell you over and over again … “to leave a voice mail, press one, or just wait for the tone. To leave a text …”
How much collective time would the world save without having to wait for this message (doesn’t matter that pressing 1 helps. Most people don’t know this).
Do your part to end the voice mail madness. Save yourself and everyone who calls you the pain and misery of an automated voice telling you over and over again … “to leave a voice mail, press one, or just wait for the tone …”
How? To find out how to terminate the automated voice, stay tuned to the next break of this interruption …
Back to the matter I was blogging about before I interrupted myself: I opened this post by saying I had something very important to tell you. I hinted at a gripping new disease.
Then I mentioned that it was news that only I could tell you, granting myself an exclusive, slowly building your interest in this vague story I’m telling you.
Like modern TV shows, I’m giving you this recap of what I told you before the break, just in case your multi-tasking brain went elsewhere and forgot my message, the one I was telling you before my other message about automated voice mail messages consuming the world’s precious time.
Now that you’re fully up to speed again, here’s the original breaking news you won’t want to miss:
The digital age had produced an alarming side effect in human behavior.
That side effect: distractaphobia, the fear of missing out on that which is transmitted digitally.
A signal from the digital gods is a Clarion call to interrupt life and pay homage to the signal.
Answer that phone. Listen to that voice mail. Read that text. As soon as you’re called upon, forsake all others and bow down to the interruption of life.
And if you can’t respond immediately, you owe the gods an explanation for your failure to worship, complete with details, like:
“I was just getting out of the shower, picked up the phone, got it all wet, had to wipe it off, and by that time, it stopped ringing so I figured I’d dry myself off and put some lotion on before I called you back … and now I’m getting your voice mail, so I guess … oh, wait, this is probably you calling back on the call waiting while I’m trying to leave you a voice mail, hold on while I call you back while you’re calling me back …”
We interrupt this interruption to get back to my point.
A phone used to sit and wait for us. Now we sit and wait for the phone. Or text, or email, or voice mail.
When the call comes, the call becomes all there is, above all else, including that which is in front of us, to see, to feel, to touch, to engage. Those have become the things we do between the interruptions, which have become more of what life is all about.
Twisted I know. Only you can’t twist it back.
Don’t run like Pavlov’s dog when the bell rings, forsaking that which you were doing before the interruption. Tongue hanging out, salivating over what comes after the bell.
Ask yourself: what else can I be, besides someone who keeps interrupting myself? Think about it, during this brief interruption, or station break.
So how do you stop your callers from suffering through the automated misery of an automated voice saying, “to leave a voice mail, press one, or just wait for the tone …”
It’s easy. Most voice mails have “user options.” Most user options include a BYPASS AUTOMATED INSTRUCTIONS option. Just think, if you use it, and tell one person to use it, and they tell one person to use it, and maybe Tyra Banks or another beautiful celebrity does a public service ad, we could all bypass that automated misery.
What would you do with all that spare, uninterrupted time?
Anyway, sorry for that little interruption. Wait, what was I blogging about? Writing this post has taken longer than I expected. I had to stop to listen to two voice mails. One was hard to hear, so I had to send a text, asking for clarification. If that text or call comes in, I have to interrupt this piece again.
Like I was saying, distract yourself from distractaphobia. Don’t be in such a rush to answer that bell. Terminate the automated instructions on your voice mail. But remember: always to stay plugged in to Randy Boyd’s Blocks.
We promise less interrupted disruptions. And now back to our previously scheduled interruption.
Randy Boyd author 