When Childhood Was Lived, Not Logged

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What struck me most in a recent conversation with a friend wasn’t our age difference — I’m turning 63 this year, he’s 46 — but how quickly we landed in exactly the same place when talking about childhood. Despite nearly two decades between us, and despite growing up on opposite sides of the world, we both felt a deep certainty that we had experienced something children today largely don’t. And more than that, neither of us would choose to be a child growing up now.

He grew up in Cape Town, South Africa, with days shaped by sun, movement, independence and a sense of place. I grew up largely in Australia, immersed in an outdoor, adventurous childhood where the world itself was the teacher.

Our experiences differed in geography but were remarkably similar in texture: long stretches of unsupervised time, physical play, real-world consequences, and learning through doing rather than observing. Childhood wasn’t curated. It wasn’t broadcast. It simply happened.

We didn’t have social media. We didn’t have rooms filled with technology, phones in our pockets, or constant digital noise. Our lives weren’t mediated or measured. If we failed, it was local and temporary. If we succeeded, it was felt in the body — stronger legs, better balance, deeper confidence — not validated by likes or comments. We learned who we were slowly, privately, without an audience.

What made the conversation even more interesting was that my friend is now a father to a 13-year-old and a 16-year-old, and both of his children have independently chosen either not to have social media at all or to step away from it after trying it. Not because their parents forbade it, but because they themselves found it toxic. That detail matters. This isn’t older generations looking back through rose-tinted glasses; it’s young people inside the system recognising that something is off.

There is now a growing body of research that helps explain why these instincts — across generations — feel so aligned. Psychologist Jean Twenge has shown through large-scale generational studies that adolescents who grew up with smartphones and social media report higher levels of anxiety and depression, spend less time outdoors or with friends in person, and reach markers of independence later than previous generations. Her work isn’t moralistic; it’s environmental. The world changed faster than human development could adapt.

Similarly, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt describes modern childhood as physically overprotected and digitally underprotected. Children today are often shielded from manageable physical risk — climbing trees, roaming neighbourhoods, navigating minor conflict — while being exposed far too early to social comparison, algorithmic outrage, and adult-level complexity online. The result is a nervous system under constant strain, without the balancing feedback that embodied experience provides.

Developmental psychologist Peter Grey adds another crucial layer to the field through his research on free play. He argues that unstructured, self-directed play is not a luxury but a biological necessity for emotional regulation, resilience, and social competence. The steady decline in free play over recent decades closely mirrors the rise in childhood anxiety. When I think back to childhood in Australia — hours outdoors, inventing games, taking small risks, negotiating rules ourselves — it’s clear how rich that environment was in exactly the kind of experiences his research identifies as protective.

What ties all of this together is the distinction between first-hand and mediated experience. We grew up learning directly from the world. We touched things, broke things, fixed things, got lost and found our way back.

Today’s children, by contrast, are often learning about life second-hand or third-hand, through screens that compress experience, flatten context, and reward performance over presence. Identity becomes something displayed rather than discovered. Mistakes become permanent records rather than fleeting lessons.

This doesn’t mean earlier generations had perfect childhoods — many didn’t. Hardship, neglect and trauma certainly existed. But there was often more room to be unfinished, more tolerance for boredom, more forgiveness for growing slowly. Time itself felt different. Summers were long. Afternoons were empty. There was no constant sense of urgency, no background hum of global anxiety carried in your pocket.

What gives me a quiet sense of hope is that some young people can now see this clearly themselves. Choosing to step away from social media isn’t a rejection of connection; it’s discernment. Studies increasingly show that teenagers who leave or limit social media often report feeling calmer, more focused, and more themselves. That awareness, coming from within the generation rather than imposed from outside, suggests something important: when children are given enough stability, a grounded adult presence, and real-world engagement, they can recognise what harms them.

Perhaps that’s the role for those of us who grew up differently. Not to romanticise the past or condemn the present, but to remember what mattered and quietly reintroduce it where we can. Slower rhythms. Fewer inputs. Real conversations. Time outdoors. Permission to be bored, awkward, and unfinished. These are not small things. They are the conditions under which humans have always learned to become who they are.

When adults across generations — and even teenagers — say they wouldn’t want to grow up now, it isn’t cynicism. It’s an intuitive recognition that something essential has been crowded out. And when we listen carefully to that instinct, backed now by both lived experience and research, we’re not longing for a vanished world. We’re naming what children have always needed — and what they still do.

Published by Earthly Comforts

The Earthly Comforts blog supports my gardening business.

6 thoughts on “When Childhood Was Lived, Not Logged”

  1. This post makes so much sense. I’m glad I grew up in a world of climbing trees, riding my bike, playing outside with friends. Technology has a lot of advantages, but is so cold, with no human touch to it.

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