5 digital solutions I embrace

Tiny places where technology has led to flourishing.

My friend Elisha asked an excellent question in the comments of a recent post where I shared five digital-to-embodied swaps I prioritize: I’m curious about the other side of this conversation, she wrote. What tasks have you outsourced with the aid of technology, and how helpful have they been?

Here in 2025, the list of what I’ve outsourced to some form of technology is likely longer than what I’ve kept analog: our refrigerator, lighting, and climate control feel indispensable, of course, but even one-time technological advances, like our dishwasher, portable speaker, and robot vacuum, hardly merit notice now.

Technologies like these, while ever-present in our home, are easier to keep in their proper place: they are straight-forward tools. They don’t distract us, they don’t seek our attention, and they really can give us more time for the life that is truly life.

Other types of technology feel much more freighted. An iPhone, for example, literally travels around on our person, clumsily intruding into all sorts of situations where it’s not needed and has no business. (Much harder to keep in its proper place.)

Andy Crouch was the first person who made this distinction for me. Allow me to quote at length:

Technology is in its proper place when it helps us bond with the real people we have been given to love. It’s out of its proper place when we end up bonding with people at a distance whom we will never meet.

Technology is in its proper place when it starts great conversations. It’s out of its proper place when it prevents us from talking with and listening to one another.

Technology is in its proper lace when it helps us take care of the fragile bodies we inhabit. It’s out of its proper place when it promises to help us escape the limits and vulnerabilities of those bodies altogether.

Technology is in its proper place when it helps us acquire skill and mastery of domains that are the glory of human culture. When we let technology replace the development of skill with passive consumption, something has gone wrong.

Technology is in its proper place when it helps us cultivate awe for the created world we are part of and responsible for stewarding. It’s out of its proper place when it keeps us from engaging the wild and wonderful natural world with all our senses.

Here, then, are five places in my life where it feels like technology is in its proper place: making it easier for me to rest, care for my family, love people well, and do the other things that really matter to me.