Own the Technology, Don’t Let It Own You

“We don’t have a choice whether we DO social media, the question is how well do we DO it.“

– Erik Qualman

I think we can all agree that the internet, social media, artificial intelligence, and the vast technological soup we’ve been brewing for decades are here to stay. The genie isn’t just out of the bottle—it’s shattered the glass and has nowhere else to go.

If anything, this technological landscape is only going to grow more complex and more woven into our lives. So, we might as well not only embrace it but own it.

What Do I Mean by That?

We can sit back and let technology distort and disorient our lives—or we can make it serve us.
We can be victims of it, or stewards of it.

But what we can’t do is wait for it to figure itself out for us.

Over time, I’ve come to terms with a few personal “rules of thumb” for my own use of technology. I’m not claiming to be the most informed user—I have plenty left to learn—but I think I represent many people, even younger generations, who have allowed technology to quietly infuse their lives instead of consciously directing its role.

My Personal Rules of Thumb

For me, technology should serve one (or more) of three main purposes:
Learning. Creating. Connecting.

Entertainment has its place, but it should occupy only a small slice of the time we spend using these tools.

I call this the 30/30/30/10 Rule—not as a strict formula, but as a framework for awareness. It helps me reflect on where my attention is going and how my time is being spent.

Creating

For me, creating means building posts that inform and inspire, but it also includes content that supports my business or personal growth—podcasts, blogs, and other media that align with my purpose.

That purpose?
To challenge convention, create change, and inspire others so they can live their best lives.

This purpose drives everything I create.

Learning

My curiosity fuels my learning. I seek out what I don’t understand, not to defend my beliefs but to deepen my perspective. I work to challenge my assumptions and organize my thoughts so I can better express them through creativity and connection.

Connecting

I use technology to stay connected—with friends, peers, and the wider world. It helps me stay informed, inspired, and aware of how people are living and how things are changing.

Staying Conscious

Of course, I’m not immune to doom scrolling or falling into the algorithm’s trance. But I’ve developed an inner voice—a little character that pops up to remind me of my own rules of thumb. It tells me when it’s time to unplug or reclaim control. I want technology to serve my purpose, not the other way around.

As I grow older, I’m doing my best to remain informed, involved, and intentional. I don’t want technology to own or constrain me—I want it to empower me. That means investing time, effort, and purpose into how I use it.

Your version of this might look different. What you create, how you learn, and who you connect with will be unique to you. But if you stay true to these principles, you’ll find yourself expanding your possibilities rather than shrinking under the weight of distraction.

If not these rules of thumb, then what are yours?
If you don’t have any, chances are you’re already deep in the vortex.

Beware of the vortex—it can eat you up.

Unless you eat it first.

Reclaiming Imagination

“Imagination is the beginning of creation.“

– George Bernard Shaw

In the world of digital imagination we inhabit today, the timeless skill of imagining — something our minds have been doing for millennia — is being quietly detrained. Even worse, it’s being retrained toward negativity and passivity.

Our brains, wired first and foremost for survival, are naturally biased to focus on potential threats. This tendency to interpret things negatively once kept us safe. But in the digital age, where we’re bombarded by information, it means our attention is drawn more often to the dramatic, the divisive, and the destructive. And over time, this rewiring is costing us one of humanity’s most powerful tools: our imagination.

I don’t think Steve Jobs ever contemplated the full consequences of the iPhone. His vision was optimistic: a device that put creativity, knowledge, and possibility into the palm of our hands. Just like the MacBook had expanded what we could do on a desk, the iPhone promised to do the same for life on the go.

At first, that promise seemed to hold. A phone, a music player, the internet — all in one place. It was convenient, exciting, even liberating. Early skeptics — the “Crackberry” devotees — mocked its lack of real buttons and clung to their email pings. But even they couldn’t see what was coming.

The iPhone wasn’t just a better phone. It was the spark that ignited an entire ecosystem. Soon, apps were everywhere — for entertainment, productivity, connection, commerce, and everything in between. Social media evolved from simple reconnection into something far more complex: a tool for influence, manipulation, and monetization. What started as a means to expand our creativity slowly turned into a machine that captures and monetizes our attention.

Today, that small rectangle of glass and circuitry isn’t just a tool — it’s the engine of our minds. It feeds us exactly what we want to see and shields us from what we don’t. It keeps us scrolling with the false promise that something important is just around the corner — even when what’s waiting is just more of the same.

The result is an addiction far deeper than the “Crackberry” days. Our devices shape how we think, how we feel, and how we connect. They identify our desires and vulnerabilities — and then exploit them. And as our minds become conditioned to this steady stream of digital candy, our capacity for deep thought, creativity, and imagination atrophies.

As a parent who grew up without this technology, I’m often paralyzed by its grip on my child. We can pry the device from their hands for a while, but so much of modern life revolves around it — including the comfort of knowing where our kids are. That convenience keeps us tethered to the very thing we’re trying to escape.

We tell our kids to disconnect, but we can’t model that behavior ourselves. We’re just as addicted. And while living a fully “unplugged” life might sound appealing, in today’s hyperconnected world, it’s almost impossible without retreating into total isolation.

So here we are — caught in a strange new reality where “connection” no longer means physical presence or shared experience. It means data transfer. Likes. Notifications. Our kids are less and less capable of forming real, meaningful connections, and more resistant to them until they’re immersed in them.

Every summer, we send our daughter to a sleepaway camp that’s completely tech-free — a digital detox. And every year, the results are remarkable. She imagines. She explores. She creates. But the moment she returns, the gravitational pull of the digital world takes hold once again.

This, perhaps, is the greatest cost of all: the erosion of imagination. Yes, some people harness digital tools to create incredible things. But for many, the screen has become a passive consumption machine, numbing the very faculty that once made us explorers, dreamers, and innovators.

In the years ahead, we must rethink what it means to be human in a technological world. We must learn not just to live with what we’ve created but to live well with it — in harmony, not subordination.

Our imagination is still there, waiting beneath the notifications, pings, and endless scroll. The question is whether we’ll continue to let machines train it for us — or whether we’ll reclaim it and once again use it to build a future worth imagining.

Love More, Hate Less

“What the world needs now is love, sweet love, it’s the only thing, that there’s just too little of.”

– Burt Bacharach

I grew up in Canada.

I’ve experienced many places around the world — I lived as a baby in Singapore, spent formative years between nine and eleven in London, England, and later as an adult in New York City and its suburbs. But Canada is what I know. It’s the soil beneath my feet and the cultural fabric that shaped my worldview.

I truly believe it’s one of the best countries in the world — multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, and, for the most part, tolerant of differing political and social beliefs. We’ve done our best to build a place where citizens feel both liberty and opportunity, while also experiencing a sense of community and belonging.

Have we gotten it perfect? Of course not — no one has. But I do believe we’re trying.

Canada is a nation founded by immigrants and continually renewed through immigration. That policy, while imperfect at times, is built on the essential belief that those who seek a better life and are willing to contribute to the ideals of freedom and democracy are welcome here.

But long before it was called Canada — long before anyone migrated or immigrated here — this land was home to Indigenous peoples. Their cultures were rooted in deep connection with the earth and in stewardship of the land. And yet, flawed as our ancestors were, and flawed as we remain, we imposed our own beliefs and systems upon them. In doing so, we stripped them of theirs — and with that, their dignity.

Only now are we beginning to truly reckon with the nature and impact of what was done in the name of religion, power, and control. We cannot be proud of that legacy — but it is ours to bear, and ours to reconcile.

Recently, on the podcast, I had the privilege of interviewing Jovica Savic — a Serbian immigrant who arrived in Canada with his family in the late 1990s as a boy. They fled the violent dissolution of Yugoslavia and the atrocities that tore through the region.

Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia were once united under a Soviet-style socialist federation led by Tito. But upon his death, everything unraveled. What was once stable became volatile. And as has too often been the case throughout human history, the deepest divides were drawn along religious lines.

Neighbors who once shared meals and playgrounds became enemies — and in some cases, perpetrators of violence, displacement, and death.

I discovered Jovica by chance. I came across a post on Instagram from his account, @yatziruns, where he shared something deeply personal. He had been out training for an ultra-marathon and, while crossing a bridge, noticed a Canadian flag pinned to the railing. It moved him to speak:

“I ran past this Canadian flag here. And amongst all the hate Canada is getting these days, there are a few words I want to say.

Twenty-five years ago, my family came to this country.
We came here because that flag — and this country — was the only one that would take us in.
The only one that welcomed us from the aftermath of a bloody war, living as refugees in the basement of a shitty apartment building.
This is the only country that took us in.

I may not have been born here, but I am Canadian.
And you should be proud to be Canadian.

There aren’t many countries like this. Yes, we’re going through a lot, and yes, it’s hard. But I don’t think most of you know what real hard is.
Just count yourselves lucky… just count yourselves lucky… alright?”

Those words struck a deep and positive chord. A post from a man with only a handful of followers was seen by nearly 300,000 people and shared close to 40,000 times.

It clearly resonated — with those who saw it, and with me.

I wanted to know more about his story, which is why this week’s episode of Leave Your Mark (EP 445) is a conversation with Jovica.

I wanted listeners to hear the perspective of someone who came here seeking safety and hope. I wanted us to be reminded that what we have in Canada is precious — unusual, not usual — and that it must be cherished, supported, and reinforced.

It is far too easy to tear down what we do not understand, or to lose sight of our blessings amid the noise and frustration of everyday life. But perspective — especially the perspective of those who have suffered in ways most of us will never know — has the power to restore gratitude and inspire stewardship.

To truly understand one another, we must listen to one another. We must share our stories.

Because life is only made better through love and understanding.

Love more. Hate less.

The Bag is Empty

“While money can’t buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery.”

– Groucho Marx

One of the things I’ve come to realize as I’ve grown older is this: there is no point of arrival. You don’t “get there.”

There is no there, there.

I don’t remember the exact moment that truth landed, but I do remember a story told by Blake Mycoskie, the creator of TOMS shoes, on The Rich Roll Podcast – “The More You Give, The More You Live” (Nov 23, 2020).

“And maybe because I started early in my entrepreneurial life and I grew up fast, I achieved pretty much everything that I set out to achieve before I was 40. And that to everyone and myself at the time thought that was like a huge blessing.

But what I found was is that I woke up one day—or a series of days—and didn’t really think that my future was going to be better than my past. And that’s a really scary place to be in.

I think that leads to a lot of mental health issues and devastating situations for people. And it wasn’t that I didn’t like my life or my situation, or my business, or I wasn’t proud of what we accomplished with TOMS, but I realized that if we—anyone—and me specifically in this situation, if we are looking to external accomplishments, external praise, anything, anything, even your kids’ love, for your sense of peace and joy, ultimately you will realize that it doesn’t work.”

Blake then went on to recount an interview he’d prepared for at the United Nations with Ted Turner, the founder of CNN. Turner was someone Blake had admired for years—a larger-than-life figure who seemed to embody arrival.

“I spent months preparing for this interview and was really excited to do it. But right before we went on stage, we’re having this conversation.

Ted said to me, ‘In life and in business, especially in business, it’s like this ladder. And it’s not like the corporate ladder you’re thinking about, but it’s a ladder of believing that if you climb up it, at the top there’s something magical—something that’s going to give you everything you’ve ever wanted.

And as you start to climb the ladder, you see this beautiful bag on the top of it. You can only think what’s in that bag when you get to the top.’

He said, ‘I spent so much of my life climbing that ladder to get a peek into that bag.

And I’ve seen inside the bag.

I’ll tell you what’s in it…

The bag is empty.

And even though I’ve told you, you still need to climb the ladder and look for yourself.’”

In their conversation, Turner’s metaphor of the ladder clarified a simple but hard truth: the feeling of being complete once you’ve “made it” never actually arrives.

Yet Turner wasn’t saying the climb is meaningless. He cautioned that arrival isn’t the guarantee we imagine it to be—and that each of us must discern for ourselves what’s in the bag and whether it truly holds anything of value.

That metaphor stuck with me, too, because I’ve climbed many ladders in my own life.

For years, the pinnacle I sought was professional hockey. I told myself: if I can just get there—if I can work in the NHL—then I’ll have made it. That job would be the bag at the top of my ladder.

And then I got there.

Eleven seasons inside the world I thought would complete me. The logos, the arenas, the flights, the access—living, as one staff member once said, “inside the glass.” It was supposed to mean I mattered.

But the bag wasn’t full.
It was emptier than I expected.

Long hours. No feedback. Constant pressure. And an emptiness in my gut that whispered: this isn’t it.

I had mistaken arrival for meaning.

We are convinced early in life that setting goals, acquiring things, achieving milestones, and climbing ladders is the pathway to fulfillment. We’re sold the idea that one day, at the pinnacle of success, we’ll arrive in a place where everything feels complete.

But the truth? There is always a bigger boat, a better car, a shinier title. We’re chasing the horizon—and the horizon never gets closer.

We’ve even been conditioned to consume this illusion as entertainment. In the past, it was Dallas or Dynasty—soap operas of wealth and conflict. Today, it’s Succession and Billions. We binge-watch these shows not just for the drama, but for the fantasy of power, status, and the inevitable implosion.

Would we really want to live those lives?

History tells us what they don’t show: the eccentricities of wealth don’t solve problems—they magnify them.

The cycle of rise and ruin is hypnotic because it reflects the illusion we secretly live ourselves: there is no final arrival. Always another mountain. Always another rung. Always the sense that we haven’t yet made it.

And then came the accelerant—social media.

In 2004, Facebook launched. In 2007, the iPhone hit the market. Together, they rewrote how we see ourselves. Suddenly, everyone had access to carefully curated lives. Instagram made it aesthetic. TikTok made it constant.

An entire generation was co-opted by an algorithm designed not to connect us, but to compare us.

The results have been devastating.

Suicide rates in the United States have risen steadily since the inception of these platforms, especially among young people aged 15 to 24. Depression now affects more than 18 million adults each year. It is the leading cause of disability for people under 45. Every twelve minutes, someone dies by suicide. More lives are lost this way than by homicide.¹ ²

We are more connected than ever—and more isolated than ever.

Does that mean we shouldn’t dream?
Should we abandon goals altogether?

Of course not. Aspiration is human.

We are meant to explore, build, and create. But the key is understanding that the reward lies in the pursuit—not in the arrival.

Fulfillment doesn’t come at the top of the ladder. It comes in the act of climbing, in the experience of discovering, in the growth that happens along the way.

Life is not a game you win. There is no formula that unlocks eternal satisfaction. When we make it about trophies, accolades, or numbers, we trap ourselves on a treadmill of more.

Another trophy. Another follower count. Another rung.

It’s a hamster wheel disguised as progress.

The truth is, the joy is in the doing—not in the done.

Think of J.K. Rowling. After the success of Harry Potter, she had everything—money, fame, legacy. She could have stopped. But she didn’t. She kept writing, kept creating, because the act of expression itself was the point.

Or Richard Branson. He didn’t stop after building one company. He created airlines, explored space, launched health initiatives. Not because he needed more, but because curiosity and contribution fueled him. The pursuit was the purpose.

And here’s the real irony: size doesn’t matter. We’ve been conditioned to believe that only massive dreams are worthy. But fulfillment isn’t tied to scale—it’s tied to depth.

A simple project, done with presence, can be just as profound as a global empire.

Restlessness and curiosity are not flaws—they are part of being human. They’ve driven explorers across oceans, astronauts to the moon, and artists into the unknown. But every explorer eventually discovers the same thing: when you get to where you thought you wanted to go, there’s always somewhere else to reach for.

Satisfaction can’t come from the false prophecy of arrival. It can only come from the effort and the experience of trying.

You’ll save yourself years of chasing shadows if you stop obsessing about getting it and start focusing on being in it.

Because in the end, as Ted Turner realized—and as I discovered in my own career—

There is nothing in the bag.

¹ Kessler RC et al. Prevalence, Severity, and Comorbidity of Twelve-Month DSM-IV Disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication (NCS-R). Archives of General Psychiatry, 2005 Jun; 62:617–627.
² Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS). (2013, 2011) National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, CDC (producer).