“Cleanliness is next to godliness,” we have heard this saying from our childhood. Being clean and pure is being godly. It is physically, emotionally, morally and spiritually virtuous, that is cleanliness and hygiene are multifaceted. Cleanliness is a mindset—a positive habit that keeps the body, mind and environment happy, healthy, simple, neat, and delightful. It touches every aspect of our life. It is growing and developing in integral way.
The term ‘cleanliness’ is often interchanged with hygiene, sanitation, and healthy; it is opposite of dirty and impure. Good hygiene keeps away all diseases; hygiene is a sign of development; cleanliness protects environment; cleanliness brings godliness ubiquitously. Being clean and keeping the environment around us clean is a desire and deliberate choice. In the crowded, noisy and polluted world of today everyone needs to make thoughtful effort to keep this humblest civic virtue to keep clean—being oneself clean and keeping the world around us clean.
Greedy and acquisitive world endlessly finds new ways to compromise on cleanliness. In every compromise we make on cleanliness, we deliberately make the world dirtier and uninhabitable. All humanist, be it Jesus, Buddha or Gandhi insisted on internal purity so as to keep the outer purity—maintain the world pure and healthy. Jesus said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God,” (Matthew 5:8) as his first manifestation of his mission on earth. For him, purity is the matters of heart and mind.
Inner purity is a guarantee for outer purity. When our environment protection remains only as policies and documents without being internalized, our environment will continue to deteriorate. Soon we will find ourselves in peril. Jesus compared the hypocritical focus on outward purity to a beautifully maintained cemetery (Matthew 23:27) while looking decorated, it is rotten inside, noting that while they appear righteous outwardly, they are internally filled with spiritual decay. Mahatma Gandhi put the same in other words, “I will not let anyone walk through my mind with their dirty feet.” He advocated keeping mental space pure and untainted, keeping guard over every filthy influence that come on our way.
World is imbued with digital influences. We are constantly saturated by social media, web platforms and Artificial Intelligence that pretends to know more than human beings. Through their (apparent) unlimited potentiality, they can surely bring enormous benefits, they also bring potential threats that brings filth and lewdness.
Today’s digital environment calls for Digital Hygiene. It is very much like keeping personal hygiene for our good health. Often it has the similar procedure to that we follow to keep our hygiene spick and span.
The following procedures or simple actions can help us to keep digital hygiene.
1. Keep the phone and digital gadgets away from your bedroom, dining room and places of rest and study. Our willpower to resist temptation is finite and weak. Keeping temptations away will give us healthy environment.
2. Treat your phone as a tool not as an emergency alert-er. Turn off all the alert notifications so as to be in peace. Remember that every time your phone alerts you of a call or a message it takes away at least 23 minutes of your deep focus. You be the one to choose your phone, not the algorithm to choose you.
3. Today in the world of instant gratification, Apps are created to give you endless instant gratifications and satisfactions. We need to apply our God-given wisdom to know the right ones that will truly enhance our life and serve our needs. The ancient wisdom applies here too: Not all that glitters are gold. Know that many Apps are made to make profit at the expense of your peace.
4. Digital world is full of reel. There are endless invitations for you to follow and like. Not all that calls you are friendly and helpful. Unfollow anyone who makes you feel less than after watching them, even if they are your friends. Reconnect in real life rather than reel life. Your self-esteem does not need their ‘likes’ and followers. Know that today many people choose to become famous by showing their skin, flaws and messy life. They are not good examples to follow.
5. Today’s discipline, especially for the young depends on the right allotment for communication, entertainment, study, career, etc. Screen time dominates the lives of youth and those intending to be professionals. Exaggerated time spent on phone, internet time and social media can ruin careers. When young people (also others) have learnt to appropriate time wisely have conquered their life and the world around.
6. It is important to say no to the use of screens at crucial moments of the day, such as early morning, bed time, and other moments meant for deep focus and career engagement. Today we need to fix digital sunrise and digital sunrise for our day.
7. Allocating screen time and being faithful to it also trains us in reducing compulsive and addictive behaviour. Like other well-known addictions such as alcohol and substance abuse, Smartphone and digital addiction are beginning to dominate. This also has adverse effect on our mental and physical health.
8. Digital Hygiene has largely to do with pornography and access to unhealthy content. When screen addiction is combined with pornographic addition it is of serious concern. It begins to have adverse effect on our personal morals, relationship with people and living with inner peace and serenity.
9. Digital Addiction is also related to gambling and betting which are rampant today. It has affected people of all walks of life—educated as well as uneducated, affluent as well as ordinary, urban as well as rural, employed as well as unemployed. Once people have compromised on living with dirty and murky environment, it can become difficult to clean up.
10. Over use and dependence on algorithm sites—Artificial Intelligence can kill people’s creativity and innovations. Digital Hygiene can save us in being clean with our intellectual potentiality and right use of human-made digital platforms.
Digital hygiene is not about restriction—it is mindset shift. It is taking control of oneself. Ask yourself every night: “Did I use my phone today, or did my phone use me?” If the answer stings, that sting is your internal compass working.
Rev. Fr. Lazar Arasu SDB
Priest and School Administrator.
arasuafrica@gmail.com
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