“The Trouble Is, You Think You Have Time.”
Buddha
Blogs are often written from a personal perspective. The fact that we discuss Quality Attention, and that we write about Focus, Online Addictions, and Digital Wellbeing, says something about Margus and me. Speaking for myself, I recently moved from China to Thailand because I couldn’t really handle the chaos inside one of China’s fastest growing cities anymore. Now coming at ease here in Chiangmai, I discovered something about myself. Namely: I can’t focus aymore. The past 6 years have been so intense. I don’t even remember what true focus feel like. I know that I’ve experienced it before, I just can’t remember how I did it.
I seem to never be able to finish my work. I don’t even know when my work is ever finished. It’s basically a continuous flow of being ‘busy’. This also makes me think about planning. I can’t really plan properly anymore either. I don’t know whether I should use a week, month, year as my range. I can’t use my calendar. I use several calendars. I don’t know where one stops and another continuous. They overlap, but they shouldn’t. I forget birthdays. There’s too many birthdays. I don’t know which birthdays should be added to my calendar and which ones I shouldn’t. I don’t know who my friends are, or what friends are. I have too many contacts. People seem too busy to keep in touch but simultaneously they spend many hours per day viewing crap on their phones.
I can’t wake up at the same time every day. I’m exhausted at night from consuming content. There’s too much content. Everything is interesting. All media seems perfectly tailored to me. Oh wait.. it is perfectly tailored to me! I can’t keep myself to my own promises. I have too much to keep up with. I use several to-do apps that are full of to-do’s. Only more to-do’s are added but few are done each day. It’s like a never ending growing pile of lousy to-do’s. For who do I do these to-do’s? If I should trust the media there won’t be a planet left for anyone soon anyways.
I can’t meditate. I can’t keep track of my progress. I can’t properly stay in touch with my friends and family. I can’t prioritize. I can’t find help. I don’t have time. I don’t have time to sort photos. I don’t have time to read novels. I don’t have time to study a new language. I don’t have time to engage in politics. I don’t have time to keep track of technological changes. I don’t have time for the gym. I don’t have time to sort plastics. I don’t have time to become vegetarian. I don’t have time to do anything. Let alone write a blog. I only seem to have time to watch videos. Consume digital junk food.
My head is full.
My head is overloading. I need to work harder. My brain feels heavy. I don’t even know what I want, because I want too much. What is happening? It wasn’t always like this. I used to live another life (in another universe?). I vividly remember my ability to focus and the availability of free time. It was about a decade ago. In this reality, idle time was something you could deal with without instantly grabbing your phone. You would just be able to stare to the ceiling or the wall, and just fantasize something. I was able to study for five straight hours without thinking about anything else. My brain was functioning at a much higher capacity than it is today. As I’m typing this I can suddenly recall the actual feeling of the workings of my brain, solving equations and tackling complex problems. It is exhilarating just to think of it again.
What messed up my mind this much over the past decade? How could I ever have derailed to such an extend? I am here today to solve that mystery.
I believe a combination of various societal changes, technological advancements, and a global epidemic of consumerism and narcissism are all factors that contributed to the destruction of my mind.
Well, time to fight back.
