Dr Gary Small is in charge of the Memory and Aging Research Center at UCLA—the University of California, Los Angeles. He is concerned by the fact that, on average, young people spend nine hours daily with technology: email, the web, mp3s, TV, and gaming. Teen brains are not fully developed, so the effect of this activity will profoundly affect the brain’s integration of 60% of the synaptic connections that are fine-tuned during adolescence.

He wonders how much, 20 to 30 years from now, young people will be different from those in later life today. What other skills will they develop and will they have an overall view of life—will they see the “big picture” or just focus on life narrowly within their dominant activity? Some anxious commentators have even suggested that the nerd, beloved of Hollywood’s “growing up” teen movies, will become the dominant social type.

The easy availability of a music stream is affecting the upcoming generations. People were able to communicate with each other over the radio and television. But now music comes directly into the ear and has an hypnotic effect so that the words of songs, often repeated, take on the role of a post-hypnotic suggestion. Marc Pensky, the author of Don’t bother me Mom—I’m Learning, believes that music is taking over as the new silence for teens. Will they ever learn to communicate in such an environment?

Then we have the old fear (old, but not forgotten) that all this electrical stuff in the ether will damage the brains of the young. This is not the same fear first expressed when heavy metal came into vogue, that everyone would go deaf listening to such noise. That is still true, and borne out by the fact that a lot of aging loud-music devotees are now suffering from above-average hearing loss. This new fear is medical—will the electrical currents in the atmosphere and, especially, in cell phones cause cancer? It seems likely that some people will suffer as a result of over-use.

Then there is the Wiki-syndrome (my phrase). Increasingly students, especially college students, rely on the Internet’s pre-packaged answers  to questions. There is no real difference between searching for answers in books and looking things up online in Wikipedia and a zillion other sites. Using either method, students still have to deal with questions of bias, inadequacy, and mistakes. But never before was plagiarism so easy—or so prevalent. Now we can copy passages directly without understanding what has been said at all.

WODEN SAYS:  This is evolution in action!

In my discussion with the soul of Charles Darwin (in Talking with Leaders of the Past) he told me that “evolution can occur in a single generation,” and that “human beings have an awareness whereby they can consciously effect changes within themselves by their powers of divine manifestation.” When our souls come down to Earth, and each incarnates in a human body, it is with foreknowledge of all the important issues we will be facing, including this assault on our brains. There are no surprises, though we do forget where we came from and what we knew before.

Life-lessons are not only about meeting negative challenges; they also concern dealing with change.  We live in a time of multifaceted industrial revolution. The computer is changing where and how we work. Whoever dreamed before today that so many of us would be working at home, which was what weavers did before the Spinning Jenny revolutionized the weaving trade. Sailing ships gave way to steam, and then came the airplane, and big distances were no longer a major hurdle to communication. And so on…you know the list…industrial revolution never seems to stop. Human beings change and evolve as a result.

As we get ready to climb into electric cars; as we heat and cool our double-insulated homes with solar, wind, or geothermal power; and as we work on the computer at home, our lives will change.  That’s for sure. But some things remain the same:

• We will still have to deal with our aloneness and our fears about living.
• We will still have to deal with our relationships with people generally.
• We will still have to deal with our health and our sexuality.
• We will still have to deal with our understanding of the purpose of life.
• We will still have to deal with our death and our times of grieving.

For these things, and many more daily challenges, we need to understand more fully the journey of the soul. There truly are solid answers to the questions “Why am I here?” and “What is the purpose of life?” and “Why do bad things happen to good people?” It is a study that takes a little time, but is worth the effort. Start with www.mastersofthespiritworld.com and take it from there. Remember to look at the books being offered, especially the booklet The Masters’ Reincarnation Handbook. Have a little gentle music coming through those ear buds and enjoy!