Scrolling on your phone may be keeping you from the meaning of life | CNN

The CNN Original Series “Kara Swisher Wants to Live Forever” follows Kara Swisher as she explores the people and ideas reshaping the pursuit of longevity. Stream full episodes on the CNN app. At the dawn of emerging technology around internet use and smartphone access, marketers promised that they would reduce the mundane tasks for people and leave room for the things that matter. Those could be be relationships, creative endeavors and the contemplation of big questions about life. The problem is that people grew comfortable turning to their devices to reduce difficulty in all aspects of their lives, which can drive them further from a sense of meaning, said Arthur Brooks, Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and professor of management practice at the Harvard Business School. (Brooks will be leaving his Harvard professorship to become an endowed professor at Vanderbilt University in July.) You’ll likely move on in 47 seconds. Can I hold your attention a little longer? “Any time the technology is a substitute for the things that we truly want in our hearts, it makes our life worse,” he said. “If it’s a

May 30, 2026 → May 30, 2026