The Perks of Being a No Phone Person

Yes, I wish "No Phone Person" could rhyme with "wallflower", I sincerely do. But then not having something rhyme is at least better than having broken up your phone while on an "adventure" with friends in the lower Himalayas, and that too at 12am! It was definitely a fair enough reason to be sad about, but I still remember how I was laughing with my friends just moments after we all had finished with our rescue operation to find the battery, cover and the main body of the phone using flashlights in the dark!

Like a fallen soldier, there was the knight in white lying in the dark, and it just had nothing to show to me after that. It just stopped talking to me. The screen was shattered because of hitting the rocks and my friends were confused whether to start laughing right then or wait for some more time (kyunki har ek friend kamina hota hai). Their confusion was solved when they joined me in the laugh. Yes my darling Note 2, the knight in white was broken, but the incidents which led to the fall had made me laugh.

11pm of that "fateful" night (3 April, 2014), we had planned a random dare of going towards Kasauli in Himachal from Chandigarh, the city we were living in since the past few months. The challenge was to face the cold blows of the hills, yup, on bikes! Very soon inside Himachal along the road, I had a bet with a friend that there is a railway track on our left, which was about 10-20 feet higher than the road. He disagreed. We both walked up there, found the track, rejoiced a little, but while coming down, my left foot got stuck in a cable lying there, and the next thing I know is that I was down on the rocky slope. The Note 2 which was aiding me with its flashlight was down somewhere. Rescue operation was launched (definitely for the phone!), and you know the rest of the story which started with the laughter with a pinch of body pain! We returned back to Chandigarh after sitting in a Dhaba just opposite the site by 2am. Amidst all this, little did I know the freedom I was going to feel in the days to follow.

With no backup phone with me in Chandigarh, I decided to stay without one as I was soon going to visit Patiala, my home. May be, the fallen knight might have also felt a bit better seeing my faithfulness towards it.

The first few hours the next day were really the toughest, although I was still at peace with the past (Whatever happens, happens for the best). I was still exchanging laughs and smiles with the past, whenever someone brought up the issue. Amidst all this, my mind was still looking for alerts saying "Chief, your troops are ready for battle!" (Clash of Clans), and needless to say, WhatsApp and FB messages. I called home and told my parents that my phone is "no more" because of a "fall", and I am phone-free for the next few days. At the end of the day, I really felt a sense of freedom, a sense of being at peace. Although I am not much of a calls and messages guy, the feelings at the end of the first day were just so great! I just felt like I just got myself out of a web, in which every one of us is trapped, without even being aware about it! I will call this the moment of "Phone Enlightenment - Phase I". No more did I feel bound to attend calls, respond to texts and fight battles the very instant my army was ready in COC (although now I was taking care of the morale of my troops via Bluestacks in laptop ;) on a day-to-day basis).

The next day, I realised the balance that one must maintain with the use of phones. The "Phone Enlightenment - Phase II" was there and let me summarize what it taught:

• Vatsa (disciple), a phone is a tool supposed to be used when required, not to let it use you whenever it requires you to.
• The most basic function of the yantra (tool) is to let you communicate what is required, not chatting for hours when you can easily meet the loved one (or the bitter one) for real, on this planet itself. Real communications happen offline!
• It is always good to have the power to do things on the go! But with great power, comes great responsibility. Handle it responsibly.
• There's so much more happening around you: a dog wagging his tail constantly at you, a kid smiling at you, or the summer Sun looking at you (or a beautiful girl walking by ;-) ), while all your mind is thinking about is what #HashTags to put in describing the hot weather.
• Live the moment! There's so much to do, to learn and to feel in the moment.

Last but not the least, I won't be doing justice to the article if I don't thank Saif Khan, whose article Project Offline which I read an hour ago inspired me to write my own experience and share the lessons I learnt. Afterall, sharing is caring!

If you're wondering if there was any "Phone Enlightenment - Phase III", kindly allow me to tell what it taught:
"No Knight Falls Without A Purpose. The Fall Always Gives Back Something Exceptionally Unique!"


A post dedicated to The Fallen Knight.