Comments for sursumcorda.salemsattic.com/post/digital-minimalism

Comment #4233

2021-06-29T16:56:07Z

6/29/21 Public Service Announcement: The Kindle version of Digital Minimalism is again on sale for $1.99.

Comment #4232

2021-05-16T16:38:59Z

5/16/21 The Kindle version of Digital Minimalism is currently on sale for $1.99.

Comment #4231

2020-10-20T13:31:35Z

I don't know the right balance between travel and rootedness either. My friend MB gives her kids stern warnings about the difficulties of living far away from family. That seems wise - at least they've been wanred. But more to the point, it doesn't matter what the ideal is or whether I know it or not. I find myself far from family. What do I do now? The options aren't stay or move, they are much more complex than that. What I'm doing now is not working. It's working worse than letters and not seeing family for 7 yeary (wait, I've nearly done that!). I want to find out why and what to do differently. Newport's book helped me break out of the mould that there is only one way to use technology, and that is how I'm using it by default. For me sending a message and having to check for an answer is a highly disatisfying way of keeping in touch. I understand if it's different for you. I don't think this is a case of absolute truth, but how do we feel loved and listened to?

Comment #4230

2020-10-17T21:25:38Z

I haven't read the book, yet even with only the excerpt I wonder if you might have misunderstood Newport.

I don't think the commuting executive means to force people to communicate his preferred way, but is instead making it easier for folks to have a conversation with him where he's not mentally wishing it would end because he has something else to do. And in particular he's making it easier for those who might hesitate to place a call because they know he's a very busy man and shouldn't be interrupted.

I don't think Newport is telling people the coffee shop variation is the gold standard or the right way to do it. I think he offers the example as an idea to inspire others. Even I—not an extrovert—wouldn't mind an hour a week in a comfy chair with a tasty beverage and a book, but if 30 dollars a month break your bank there is nothing stopping you from establishing such an hour at home. If you can set aside an hour where you aren't trying to get other this-or-thats done, where you're ready to just be with and give your time to whomever takes you up on your offer of leisurely conversation, the only reason your home might not be as ideal as a coffee shop is that the coffee shop likely is easier to get to. I'm willing to bet that if you made, say, Thursdays from 10:30 to 11:30 your "armchair window," where it's known that you are intentionally available to folks, with distractions intentionally kept at bay, you'll find yourself welcoming visitors and fielding phone calls fairly regularly. And when you don't, you get an hour of uninterrupted reading. It sounds wonderful to me!

Comment #4229

2020-10-14T15:33:21Z

You are absolutely right; there is nothing like physical presence for staying close. If I could I would have all my family within walking distance. But since we can't so that, I'm grateful for the technology, which for all its faults is so much better for keeping close than it was for previous generations, when letters would take months to exchange and families were lucky to see each other every seven years.

I would go further and say that mere face-to-face isn't enough. I have, in the past, struggled with people who think it is, and insist on intimate conversations before trust has been established.

Time is as important as space, and nothing is better than working together on a shared project for building connection. No, I take that back. That does a lot, but even better is being close enough physically to share everyday moments of life: preparing and eating meals, baking cookies, shoveling the driveway, gardening, visiting the library, reading stories, playing games, putting up drywall, going on a hike, visiting a museum, wrestling together, surprising one another with small favors, being there for one another during emergencies, late-night and early-morning conversations, opportunities to practice apologies, understanding, and forgiveness—all the little and big, planned and spontaneous, serious and silly things that are the happy glue that bonds people. (There is bonding in sorrow, too, but there's enough of that in the world without asking for more.)

I don't have the answer. People talk lightly about "my church family," or "my choir family," or "my friends are my family," and I don't belittle the importance of those relationships—but I think that's like saying daycare is a good substitute for parents, or a shared-custody divorce situation works as well for children as a stable, loving family. It isn't, and it doesn't. Substitutes are better than nothing, but pretending they're as good as the real thing is wrong and not helpful.

So is this. Not helpful, I mean. I don't know the answer. I don't know how to reconcile the importance of being physically close with the importance of travel and experience for opening our minds and hearts. I had an argument with the Front Porch Republic folks over this years ago, with them coming down firmly on the side of staying in one's local community. I don't know. I've seen the disadvantages of an inbred, insular vision. There ought to be a way to have the benefits of being out in the world and solidly anchored at home. But it seems very difficult.

Comment #4228

2020-10-14T12:33:23Z

I had a few words for "Jennifer" myself when I read the book . . .

For someone complaining about snobery, you sure come across as a snob. ;) Why are you offended at his opinion? Why can't he say "you don't need to read difficult poetry to get Bennett's point"? It's not the activity that is snobbish, it is the dismissal of other activities that is snobbish.

I wonder if face-blindness plays a roll in all this. I read a lot into body expression and really miss it in the written word. For a heart-to-heart, live is best. But I get that not everybody reads such cues (and that sometimes cue-reading can be wrong).

The deeper issues for me is this, why is it that despite blogging, email, facebook, and WhatsApp - all technologies I started using to keep close to family while being overseas - I feel always behind and never close? Somehow the broadcast aspect of those technologies prevents that connection that I crave. It could very well be that I use them the wrong way, but after decades of trying, the idea that maybe there is a problem with the technology itself is attractive.