It was one of those rare summer mornings. Crystal clear; crisp, cool air; soft, gentle light.

My run had been magnificent through the woods and along our meandering river. I luxuriated in the experience of being in my body as it flowed over the ground surrounded by such beauty.

Along the way, I passed a man in his mid-forties walking two substantial dogs. I said, “Good morning.” His head was down. There was no response.

I looked over my shoulder as I passed. He was transfixed.

By his iPhone.

A sufferer of Continuous Partial Attention Disorder. CPAD.

He is not alone. I’ve had bouts with it myself.

And it has become epidemic.

There are studies that suggest that some folks check their smartphones as many as 900 times a day. We get email alerts and text message alerts and LinkedIn alerts and Facebook alerts and CNBC alerts and weather alerts. Dinging and pinging and competing for our precious, narrow, limited bandwidth.

Folks complain that they don’t have enough time. The truth is that we have all the time in the world. We have the same amount as presidents and kings. We have all the time that there is.

It’s just that we’re not terribly good stewards of it.

CPAD is one of the greatest challenges of our age. It dilutes our focus, degrades our productivity, and damages our relationships.

It causes accidents and mistakes.

More important, it is a thief. It robs us of the only real asset we have, the only time there is: The here and the now.

It steals from us our ability to fully experience the wonder and the beauty of this – this precious moment. Instead, we allow ourselves to stay in a constant state of distractedness and overwhelm.

There are lots of simple ways to treat CPAD. I teach them to our coaching clients. Here are just a few:

• Turn off all of your alerts
• Close your door; silence your phone; create distraction-free space
• Work in blocks of time on just one thing
• Pay attention to just one task, one project, one conversation at a time
• Don’t multi-task; it can’t be done
• Don’t take your smartphone to bed
• Don’t check you email first thing in the morning

Most important, give yourself the space the time to breath each and every day; time to rest, reflect and re-create.

Pay attention, not to what was, not to what might be, but to what is.

Experience the present moment.

CPAD can be eradicated in our lifetimes. But it will take a concerted effort by all of us to make that happen.