Here’s what I was into for the last two weeks: learning about how people are affected by and distracted by our electronic gadgets.
Here is what I am doing: being distracted by TV and not doing anything else. The first movie was a much better excuse: Up in the Air, one of my favorites. Since then, a mix of things that I have no particular loyalty to, just useless stuff. Fascinating, isn’t it?
I have been doing some email checking and Facebooking, and of course deleting the spam comments that show up regularly here. The first couple of times there was a comment, I got all worked up and excited, but now I am cynical and assume they will be badly worded, unrelated, and merely existing to put spammy links on blog sites. I have not been surprised with any real comments yet.
I mentally set myself a deadline to do something by a certain time. Then I mentally made up excuses to wait a little longer. Then I just ignored it and told myself it didn’t matter. Then I mentally felt kinda bad but didn’t do anything about it. Now I am doing something entirely not that thing.
I tried to set up a little motivation with a challenge created on a website – something reasonable and requiring some effort for me. The challenge got blown away by someone who completed the goal all at once, who shouldn’t have bothered with my wimpy old challenge. If you do this, stop it! Let people have their little goals and little motivations without stomping all over them.
Turning off the TV. It’s difficult – the remote is not within reach. There is a cowboy yelling at a kid who hid the money… I really really don’t need this.
Time is flying by. I am being left behind. I am moving slowly. Very. Slowly. I try to think of what will make my life easier, but I have a hard time because it seems that easy is not doing those things. Maybe I’m just too warm and I need to turn on the cooler.
I know this has been thrilling to read about. My doing nothing. Does it make you feel better?
Now, without the TV, I am almost sufficiently bothered by my lack of effort. Some part of me wants to be moving, and fixing, and changing, and making. I just might let it.