Digital Declutter Reflections

A few days ago, I finished my Digital Declutter Experiment. Here’s what I accomplished: Successfully fixed my leaky kitchen faucet Attempted to replace the burned out lights in my car’s climate control dashboard, but did not succeed. It turns out you have to take apart a ton of the dashboard to replace the tiny light-bulbs which burned out. I spent an hour and a half on it before deciding it was more work than it is worth to me. Worked out 3-5 times at the gym each week. This goal got severely impeded by a nasty cold I’ve had off and on for several weeks. It became clear that the amount of energy I was expending in exercising was causing me to relapse into sickness again, so I’ve had to take more time off than I wanted or anticipated. Read several books Seveneves by Neal Stephensen Untrue by Wednesday Martin Discipline Equals Freedom by Jocko Willink How to Become a Straight-A Student by Cal Newport Started a puzzle with Sinah Significantly cut down my time on-line Had significantly more face-to-face interactions with friends and family Things I’ve learned YouTube Can Be Awesome YouTube was very helpful in fixing my leaky faucet. The tutorials I found were accurate, clear, and to the point. This made fixing my faucet significantly easier than it would have otherwise been. ...

2019-03-23

Digital Declutter Experiment

I recently finished “Digital Essentialism” by Cal Newport. As part of my resolution to get more value from the books I read, I will be conducting his recommended “Digital Declutter” experiment for the next 30 days. As such, here are the technology rules I will follow from 2019-02-19 to 2019-03-21. The Rules Email My personal email will be checked once per day. I already do this, but feel like it is a useful habit, so I am continuing it. Text messaging / message services All group threads will be muted. Reddit I will not use Reddit during this time. It’s a black hole! Streaks I will not use my habit tracking app during this time and will pause all habits it is tracking. Streaming Video Media Includes: YouTube Netflix Amazon Prime etc. I will limit this to no more than 5 hours per week. It must be with my wife or friends. I will track it with a sticky note next to the TV. IMDB I will not use IMDB during this month. Exemptions and Operating Procedures This a list of apps or services I which are exempted from this experiment. ...

2019-02-19