There is a good chance that you can read this on your newest top of the smartphone or tablet of the range.
But take a moment to throw your mind back on a time before your favorite newspaper was delivered to your iPad.
When we were not overwhelmed by people like WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter and Tiktok. Before the widespread use of mobile phones and social media was even something … until 1999.
That year 35 other guinea pigs and I were stranded on Taransay, from Harris in the outer Hebrides for a groundbreaking social experiment.
The BBC wanted to celebrate the Millennium by sending a group of people of all ages and backgrounds to restart a community, so we fell by helicopter with only gumor boots, waterproof, watertight nets and a handful of books.
That was it. No electronics. No telephones. No computers.
There was a single satellite telephone for emergency use, but no newspapers, no visitors and no phone calls – the only physical communication with the outside world of the film team that came once a month was.
We were allowed to write and receive letters that have arrived for two weeks once and I can still remember the excitement of opening post of loved ones.
Ben Fogle said he learned to appreciate the value of peace and loneliness during his time on the Scottish island of the Hebridean island Taransay while filming reality -TV show Castaway
Ben Fogle dreams of a Taransay -Terugkeer
The Castaways spent a year cut off on the island of the rest of the world
But it is only now, 25 years later, that I can really appreciate what an extraordinary luxury that time of insulation was real.
Without external distractions, news or tittle-tattle, we were forced to live absolutely at the moment.
We lived. I really mean lived. We spoke to each other. We communicated, held and laughed.
Maybe I look back through pink glasses, but I cherish those endless summer days. We had each other alone. Our news was the news. Our gossip was the gossip.
We lived a lot in our own timeline. Since then, the world has changed further than all recognition, and most of our lives in someone else's timeline.
We are bombed with information. Most of us, including myself, are glued to our smartphones or tablets and scroll endlessly by updates about the latest online gossip or the horrors of Gaza or Ukraine.
Go into a coffee shop, sit in a bus or train and I would have a gamble that 95 percent of people will stare in the abyss of their phones.
We like to dress it as useful and progressive. But what kind of use does it really do to us?
In my case it led to a small malfunction and I had to throw away most social media apps and limit my time online to achieve normality again.
Like many, I always assumed that I was immune to the pressure of modern life. After all, I spent my career taking the virtues of simplicity.
But I am only people and my brains just couldn't take the over -stimulation.
We have filled our brains quite literally with so much waste that sometimes we cannot process all information quickly enough.
How different it was on that beautiful island.
We had animals to grow and harvest back and washed, children to teach and a common kitchen to run. We had buildings and fences to build, grassen to cut and float to collect for our fires. But the most valuable we had was time.
The Hebridean winter evenings are long, dark and cold and with only an old animal that is stable for shelter and a single wood stove, the entire community would crawl around the fire for hours.
We played card games and talked, shared stories and hope and dreams. We sometimes argued, but we had a common basis in our isolation.
We went for a walk and gathered Flotsam and Jetsam, not a life from likes and swipes but from dikes and walks.
I walked every centimeter of that island with my dog ​​Inca. We would run without a goal or a destination, a life of freedom and obstinacy.
I could spend hours daydreaming in the Macharm or on top of the small peaks and staring at the horizon, lost in mind, in my own world.
I would walk the white sandy beaches and take a dip in the ice -cold North atlantic waters.
I didn't know it then, but the real freedom of Castaway was not so much the island itself, but in my mind. Without stimulation my brain felt free – it could breathe and I could.
IronicCastaway would be the first of many reality shows that would change the structure of society.
Nowadays reality shows attract people who become caricatures of themselves. It has become a popularity competition and an extension of the rest of the ailments of the online world.
I don't think you could repeat Castaway now because the innocence has been lost.
None of us applied to go on the show for Roem and Fortuin. We did it for the possibility to live as a Robinson Crusoe on the last days in one of the most beautiful places on earth.
For the past 15 years I have traveled the world to spend time with people who have deposited the schedule to lead a simpler, more humble life, full-time shipbraken.
I have now visited nearly 150 people, couples and families around the world for my channel 5 -series, New Lives in the Wild. Everyone of them has found satisfaction and happiness by leaving the grid.
I learned so many lessons during that incredible year about Taransay, about community and friendship and what it really means to trust others for help and company.
There was no voting. No winner. No prize money. None of us was paid. The goal was to work together and to stay a collective from 36 until the end of the year.
In the end, a handful of people chose to leave, which was a failure for us as a community.
There was no 'unfriending', 'ghosting' or 'canceling' – we learned to agree to disagree. We have debated and we listened to each other to understand each other's perspective.
The shipwreckers were totally self -sufficient, which meant that they even milk their own cows
We have learned to be liberal and open and attentive. There was no online shopping or over -consumption and we learned to take care of our environment.
Everything was exciting and it seemed like a never -ending adventure full of possibilities and positivity, blissfully free from distraction.
We could think and be daydreams and be creative, just reflect on the luxury of nothing. We lived a healthy, authentic, friendly life where we respected each other and our environment.
It may have taken me 25 years to fully realize it, but life in the analog world makes really friendly, happier people.
Find that inner satisfaction – and the off button – and you may have just found the ultimate key to happiness.
Ben's stage show Ben Fogle-Wild Visits 24 locations throughout the country from 2 March. Tickets from Nothird.co.uk/ben-fogle
He can also be seen in Endurance: Race for the Nile, on Channel 5, 9 February at 9 p.m.
Off Grid: A simple life is the key to happiness, Ben Fogle believes that 'a healthy, authentic, friendly life with respect for each other'
