My two-year-old has a habit of grabbing my phone out of my hand, and while, like most curious toddlers he does enjoy playing with it, often he reaches for it as a not-so-subtle reminder for me to pay attention to him.

His usual move involves taking my phone, setting it down on the coffee table, then taking me by the hand and leading me to his blocks, trucks or whatever else he feels like playing with at the moment. As I am writing this, my son has already pulled me away several times, lest I forget to give him my full attention.

I admit, this behavior can be annoying at times, especially when I’m exhausted from being up all night with a difficult sleeper, and just want to relax and screw around on Facebook. However, even those moments are a reminder not to get caught up in the digital world and be present in the life that is happening in front of me.

During my child-free days, it would have been nice to have a toddler on hand to pull me away from my phone or computer, when I was spending too much time looking at stupid, or worse, negative stuff that didn’t make me any happier. Then again, I always had that inner voice telling me to get off line, now it is just in the form of a two-year-old boy.

I know I won’t always be able to rely on my toddler to pull me away from my phone, and soon enough I will be the one prying his hands off of whatever digital device is popular at that time. Until then, I won’t beat myself for stealing a few minutes to read yet another Buzzfeed list, and remember life is all about balance.