I have something to say about the Kairos Media Webinar…

The webinar conducted by Dr. Neethi Valsan, HOD of the Department of Psychiatry, Jubilee Mission
Medical College, Thrissur on Screen Addiction in Children and Parents, on Friday, September 6, 2024,
was timely and informative. The Kairos News team deserves praise for choosing such a relevant topic —
surely divinely inspired. At the onset, Dr. Valsan shared shocking studies on the screen time usage by
different age groups, after which she detailed the problems associated with excessive screen time. The
temporary ecstasy derived from screen time is produced by dopamine, a hormone secreted by the brain.
She then enlightened the participants on the methods to deal with this issue, with treatments such as
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), mindfulness, family/group therapy, and so on.
Personally, this topic was of much interest to me, as my research topic for my paediatrics postgraduate
degree was ‘Screen Time and Child Obesity’. I am a person who utilises social media for the glory of God,
I’m sure most of us do the same. It is indeed a wonderful ministry. However, after the webinar, the Lord
helped me realise that the time we spend scrolling through Instagram, Facebook, X, and other social
media, watching reels, and so on, even for religious purposes, is time taken away from our social, family,
and spiritual lives.Inspired, I took a week’s break from social media, which became highly beneficial for
my spiritual life, family life, and ministry. I deleted all social media apps from my mobile. But it didn’t
take long before I downloaded them again, overcome by temptation.
I then decided to keep aside my own strength and ask Jesus’ help. He suggested that I take a 33-day
break from social media, representing His earthly life of 33 years, assuring me that He needed me more
in other aspects of life than in my social media mission activities. I changed all my social media
passwords into Apple-generated ones, wrote them down on a paper, and gave it to a friend I love like a
sister, asking her to pray for me, by keeping it inside her Bible. That was when she revealed that the
same issue was troubling her too. She would get distracted by funny shorts whenever she opened
YouTube to play religious talks. We decided to pray for each other. Relying on His grace, I am successfully
on my social media-free journey right now! I pray during Holy Mass that He give me the strength to use
social media, according to His will, when I return to them. As Mama Mary said, nothing is impossible for
God (Luke 1:37).
Coming back to the webinar, Dr. Valsan gave apt answers to the questions asked by participants during
the interactive session that followed. Next, Dr. Chackochan Njavallil and Anto Puthur evaluated various
activities undertaken by Kairos Media and called for more participation in these. The webinar ended with
a beautiful time of Adoration.
I hope this sharing of mine proves useful to somebody.
Thank you, Kairos! Thank you, Lord!
Silvy Santhosh
The author is a member of St. Alphonsa Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, Coppell, Texas. Along with being a
paediatric nurse practitioner, she prepares young minds and their parents for their First Holy
Communion. She lives with her husband and three children in Dallas,Texas.
The Webinar is now available on the Kairos Studio YouTube channel in Malayalam.