modern life – esterinaanderson.com

I’m on a tear about technology today. It started this morning at work when I was asked to make two calendars from one our workgroup has on SharePoint. Simple enough, right? Make a new calendar, move what’s needed, and delete it from the old.

But no. It’s not that simple.

Without going into all kinds of boring details, there’s no longer a clear button to create a new calendar (which, by the way, used to be hidden—and knowing how to find that one was a feat in itself).

Now there are new apps that don’t even have names a normal human would recognize. After spending far too long searching, I found a “calendar-looking” app. I clicked on it and was asked to request access. Then I was given a link to check the status of my request.

About ten minutes later, I got an email from IT about my request. The app wasn’t approved yet—but I received another link to a help page for finding apps. That’s where I learned there’s a link to the “Classics.”

The classics are documents, calendars, announcements, group chats…

The classics? You mean what real, living, breathing employees actually use? Am I that old?

I just can’t with this stuff.

I thought I had finally learned how to use my “smart” TV. I know what the remotes do, how to add and delete apps, subscribe to channels—things my older family members still struggle with. Maybe my kids have it figured out, but I’m not so sure.

Then I went to watch a few holiday movies I had purchased. Turns out Fandango, where I bought them, had been sold. I spent about an hour trying to find my account, reset passwords, and locate my “purchased content.”

I never found it.

We just ended up watching what was free.

What was so wrong with owning something you could hold in your hand and keep in your cabinet? I still don’t know what happened to the movies I paid for.

My car is a 2017 Prius. It has a touchscreen and built-in navigation that never seems to work. Or when it does, I can’t figure out how to turn it off. I’ve tried every button, every option—there is no “End Route” or anything like it.

Sometimes Siri works. Sometimes it doesn’t.

I probably don’t know 80% of what my car can do. And this car is already years old. I don’t even want to think about what newer models can do that I’d never figure out.

Every time I get into my husband’s Tesla, I can’t even find the button I need because updates have moved everything around.

I look around and I don’t see many people using all these features with ease.

And when I do figure something out—it stops working.

I programmed Alexa with a morning routine, but the news app kept cutting out halfway through. It worked for a few days, then stopped. I changed the news source—same thing.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried to play a song or album I know I purchased, only to find it gone from iTunes.

Family Share barely works. Apps don’t transfer. Music doesn’t show up. I’ve spent an unreasonable amount of time trying to make it work.

What is it even for?

We had a smart oven for a short time. The buttons were so sensitive that brushing it with your sleeve could turn it off. One of our cats walked across it and turned it on.

There was a lock feature—but then the “smart” features didn’t work.

I still don’t know why we bought a smart oven.

Same with our smart lights. They constantly unlink from the system. When you just want to turn on a light and forget the programming, they blink uncontrollably.

At that point, your options are:

sit in the dark
or pull out your phone and spend 5–10 minutes fixing it

We also have a Wi-Fi-enabled dryer. I have no idea how to use that feature—or why I would.

At work, I’ve seen hundreds of really useful tools built over the years—things that genuinely made life easier. But most of them have broken over time due to updates, moved systems, or lost knowledge when someone left.

I spend more time trying to fix what used to work than creating anything new.

Even here—on WordPress, where I’m writing this—I feel the same way. Every time I log in, something has moved or changed names. I’ve been using this platform since 2015, and all I really know how to do is write a post.

I know it can do so much more—but every time I try to learn, I hit a wall and give up.

This just isn’t cool.

This is a colossal waste of time.

The world is getting too complicated, and regular people can’t—and don’t want to—keep up with the constant changes forced on us.

Can we just… slow down?

Competition drives faster and faster innovation—but for what?

Just because we can create something doesn’t mean we should.

It reminds me of the industrial revolution. We figured out how to produce more and more, faster and faster. Then we created marketing to convince people they needed it all.

Now we work more to afford things we never needed in the first place.

Life didn’t necessarily get better because our homes got bigger and our possessions multiplied.

Maybe we need to pause.

Technology for consumers isn’t working as well as we think. People haven’t caught up—and honestly, the products haven’t either.

I wish the tech world would stop creating new things for a while and focus on making what already exists actually work.

I know humans thrive on innovation. Henry Ford said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”

But right now, it feels like we skipped right past cars and are handing people spaceships they don’t know how to fly.

Honestly—if I’m someone with a master’s degree, living in a first-world country, and still struggling to keep up…

Who exactly are we building all this technology for?

Thanks for taking the time to read. I’d love to hear your thoughts!

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This blog is mostly in response to one my husband Daren wrote a few weeks back: https://darenamd.wordpress.com/2016/07/23/on-the-value-of-rituals/

We did chat about it that day in a coffee shop, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since. One of the reasons rituals are so meaningful is because they trace something back to its roots and honor it in its entirety. But nothing really exists alone in its entirety. Anyone who is Facebook friends with me (and paying attention) has probably seen the quote I’ve had on my profile for years:

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” — John Muir

I love that quote. I’ve used it in conversations and presentations in many forms. We can trace almost everything—including ourselves—back to the stars. We and everything around us are made of star stuff (thank you, Carl Sagan, for that one). If we really sit with that idea, it can feel like either nothing at all or complete chaos. But when we narrow our focus too much—when we isolate one piece—we lose sight of the beauty of how it all ties together. And we feel alone.

Our brains need to draw lines to make sense of things. But those lines also need to stop somewhere manageable so we can understand what we’re looking at. What I think is happening now is that the lines we draw are becoming smaller and smaller.

Take a shoemaker 150 years ago. He had a small shop in the center of town. People came to him for their shoes. He knew his customers. Everyone in that town had a role, and they supported one another through trade, barter, or money. There was a sense of connection—of being part of something whole.

That shoemaker made each pair from start to finish. He knew where the materials came from and how they came together. Every stitch, every sole—his hands touched all of it. When he walked through town, he saw his work on people’s feet. There was pride, connection, and meaning. Making shoes was a ritual. The lines were drawn around the whole process, and that process was tied to community and to people.

Then machines came. Assembly lines broke the process apart—not just for shoes, but for nearly everything. The lines became smaller. Instead of making a shoe, someone made a sole. Or hammered the same piece over and over. The ritual was lost. The connection to the final product faded.

Supply chains expanded. We no longer see what we make or who it serves. Many people leave their towns, commute long distances, and spend their days doing work they feel little connection to. Ironically, as the world becomes more connected, we become more disconnected—from what we do, from where things come from, and from each other.

I love Daren’s example of the record player. Playing music used to be a ritual. There was anticipation in setting it up, in placing the needle, in waiting. That effort made the experience richer. Now, with every song available instantly, I don’t enjoy music the same way.

The same goes for coffee. There was something meaningful in grinding beans and making it by hand. The waiting was part of the enjoyment. Now we grab coffee from a drive-through or a machine, often without even thinking—sometimes multiple times a day. And somehow, it feels like less.

Our on-the-go lifestyle has started to strip the pleasure out of everyday life. We’re less connected to what we do, to what we consume, and to the people around us. We start to see ourselves as separate instead of part of a whole.

Unless you own your own business, many of us feel little connection to the mission of our work. We become parts in a machine, disconnected from the outcome—and sometimes from our own humanness.

I see it in myself. I walk through the VA facility where I work, passing patients in the hallway, and sometimes I experience them as obstacles—something in the way of where I need to go next. Already late. Moving quickly. It’s only when something interrupts my routine—like having to go to another floor—that I notice the waiting rooms, the check-ins, the people. It’s only then that I remember I work in a hospital.

That feels like a symptom of something that’s gone wrong.

I wasn’t around in the days of the shoemaker, but I’ve experienced enough of the “in-between” to feel the shift—record players, cassettes, CDs… even watching my mom grind coffee beans at the store and then make coffee at home. There was more presence in it. More enjoyment.

Now everything is faster, smaller, more efficient. But to what end?

We’re doing more and more, faster and faster. But are we actually enjoying it more? Are we happier?

I’m not.

And maybe I’m not alone.

I don’t think this means rejecting the world we live in—but maybe it means choosing, in small ways, to step out of the rush. To slow down where we can. To reconnect with process, with ritual, with the bigger picture.

I find myself wanting that more and more.

Less speed. More meaning. More connection.

A return—not backwards—but inward.

Thanks for taking the time to read. I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Please feel free to leave a comment or subscribe for future updates.