9 ms·

On the Pleasures and Sorrows of Life Without Screens

127 points by quickben 7y ago

scotty79 7y ago
Funny how younger people don't even know how the true boredom looks like. They think they get bored on their phones. Only after they go on screen detox they realise how much more fucking boring the life is. Especially if you don't have an obsessive hobby and do not want to bother other people just because you personally are bored. I feel bad for people older than me that never got adjusted to the smartphones when they have to wait staring blankly into space or trying to start up a monologue to random stangers because they can't stand how dull the inside of their head is. Before smartphones your only salvation was a book and it was limited tool also not for everyone. Smartphone as entertainment devices are the greatest social invention so far.
- juskrey 7y ago
  Those who are never bored can't detect toxicity
- _tulpa 7y ago
  Please tell me you just forgot the /s or were hoping most people were less cynical than me...
- jarfil 7y ago
  Maybe I'm just too old for it, but what is this "being bored" thing you're talking about? I clearly recall staring blankly into space while solving problems in my mind, or even just feeling the surroundings, as some of the most interesting moments of my life. I don't recall ever getting bored, not once.
  - scotty79 7y ago
    You are very lucky. I clearly recall intense boredom from pre-phone times. Every time I was forced to stay in some place and do nothing, like while waiting at the doctor's, using public transport, at school during some classes, at family dinner, at couples dinner, in church, even at the funeral, sometimes even in my own home. There was a saying that intelligent people are never bored. Untrue. I have IQ over 150 and boredom brought me to tears more than once. I'd read to kill it, i'd play solitaire with real cards, I'd play one player games with pen and paper. Now when I'm older I can handle being bored much better. As I accumulated scars I can reminiscence on how effed my life is and daydream of pleasure. Buy I still prefer my phone wherever it's socially acceptable.
    - tmn 7y ago
      If you want people to take you seriously. Never cite your iq unless there is a very good reason. This is not one
      - scotty79 7y ago
        I was providing data point disproving (dumb) claim I heard some people make. If I just said I'm intelligent and bored you could just think I'm not that intelligent. I thought it was better to tell you exactly how intelligent I am so you can decide for yourself if that's intelligent enough or not. IQ is just a number like height or age. I just stated it as it was measured by Mensa membership test. And I don't care much about people taking me seriously.
  - crispinb 7y ago
    I'm with you, fellow alien! I don't know how to be bored. Sitting, standing, breathing, thinking, observing - it all seems quite captivating to me, with or without further activity.
  - coldtea 7y ago
    >Maybe I'm just too old for it, but what is this "being bored" thing you're talking about? Something for people that lack all of: personal life, friends, interests, goals, and curiosity.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    I feel bored when I have to listen to boring conversations (or worse, monologues), and can't divide my attention without losing the thread.
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- WalterBright 7y ago
  Boredom is what drives people to accomplish things.
  - scotty79 7y ago
    Except when they are in the spot where they can accomplish nothing. Then boredom is an itch you can't scratch. Becomes torture.
    - Veen 7y ago
      You always have your mind. Are you incapable of just sitting and thinking about things? Do you need constant external stimulation? There's a famous quote from Blaise Pascal that goes "All human evil comes from a single cause, man's inability to sit still in a room." I wonder if someone like Richard Feynman would have accomplished anything at all if he had a phone to distract him and he was incapable of simply sitting and thinking. Einstein came up with the central ideas of the Theory of Relativity while he was day-dreaming at work or on public transport.
      - icebraining 7y ago
        You can't daydream if you must focus your attention on something boring. I wonder if Einstein would have come up with Relativity if he had to write mind-numbing reports all day.
      - scotty79 7y ago
        > You always have your mind. Yeah. Human mind is very limited tool without external support. That's why writing was such a boon for humans and notation was such a boon for math. > Are you incapable of just sitting and thinking about things? Yeah. I can but that rarely acomplishes anything. If you think you can solve a problem just with your mind think again. Most problems are problems because you lack some information. And you won't get any missing information just by thinking. And if you have all the information, you just need to process it then you are still out of luck. Even moderately complex processing let's say roughly as hard as derivating moderately simple calculus requires at least a pen and piece of paper to support you wonderful mind with crappy operational memory that can hold at most seven things at once. I would much rather do the thinking with my phone than without it. I'm not Feynman and Einstein had plenty of paper.
- dan00 7y ago
  I think you got it completely the wrong way. You can get a lot more bored if you're used to be entertained the whole time. I can only tell from my own personal experience, that reducing entertainment also influences my consciousness, that I'm feeling less easily bored and I'm better able to just enjoy and see the beauty of my surroundings.
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  - scotty79 7y ago
    You are right that you can build up resistance to boredom by reducing entertainment. I gained a ton after sitting through family dinners at my SO parents and grand parents. Initially I was bored out of my mind. Gradually I adapted and suffered less and less. But I don't see it as something positive. I feel like it broke my mind in some way. It replaced frantically struggling against boredom with nearly catathonic apathy. It feels more like a learned helplessness than improvement. If you are in the rain for few minutes you are running and hiding. If you are in the rain for few hours you can no longer give a fuck as your feet melt in swampy shoes.
    - dan00 7y ago
      > But I don't see it as something positive. I feel like it broke my mind in some way. It replaced frantically struggling against boredom with nearly catathonic apathy. For me the opposite of boredom isn't apathy, but more a kind of freeing your mind from any entertainment needs. If the need vanishes then there's also no pain. > It feels more like a learned helplessness than improvement. Needing entertainment is IMHO a lot more a learned helplessness.
      - scotty79 7y ago
        > Needing entertainment is IMHO a lot more a learned helplessness. Needing entertainment and seeking entertainment doesn't really fit the definition of learned helplessness. Learned helplessness is when you are suffering no matter what you do so you stop making any attempts to lessen your suffering because you learned nothing works. If human had learned helplessness attitude toward boredom and entertainment he wouldn't even bother pick up the phone because he'd believe that it won't help him be entertained. You would probably think the guy is depressed and you'd probably be right because bordom and entertainment are such foundational features of the brain that it would require some serious brain damage to end up like that.
- tumetab1 7y ago
  I think that's a fair notice. I have reduced my reliance on digital tools for passing time and I'm starting to remember boredom and why I was avoiding it. Many articles portrait boredom too much as being good instead portraying it like the necessary rest you need between work outs. Allowing yourself to get bored is good but you should understand why and what's a good/bad way to stop being bored.
- coldtea 7y ago
  >I feel bad for people older than me that never got adjusted to the smartphones when they have to wait staring blankly into space or trying to start up a monologue to random stangers because they can't stand how dull the inside of their head is. Looks like you have it backwards. You should feel sorry for them for how "dull the inside of their head is" -- not for not being used to having smartphones to compensate.
  - scotty79 7y ago
    I don't feel sorry for people for being worse. Not everybody is the same, noone is perfect. But I feel sorry to see them suffer while they might have not if they were able to use smartphone for entertainment.
    - coldtea 7y ago
      >But I feel sorry to see them suffer while they might have not if they were able to use smartphone for entertainment. Well, they also might have not if they have gotten a hobby, learned to read books, and so on. Why feel sorry that they're not accustomed with one of the worse options? And one that everybody and their dog seems to want to cut down these days?
      - scotty79 7y ago
        Smartphone is not one of the worse options. It's one of the best options. Thanks to it I'm just discusing ideas with you while lying in a garden. Which is at the moment my preferred way of wasting my time. No other tool would allow me to waste my time this way. If I couldn't do it I'd read fantasy book I got for my recent birthday but it wouldn't be nearly as intelectually stimulating.
        coldtea 7y ago
        >It's one of the best options. Thanks to it I'm just discusing ideas with you while lying in a garden. Which seems like a totally detrimental use of one's time!
- nunodonato 7y ago
  There are no boring moments, only boring people :)
- seedie 7y ago
  True boredom seems to be something that we learn over the years. Watching my 3y old daughter she never seems to get bored. If shes not entertained and realizes she won't get entertained anytime soon she starts singing (improving songs with her own text ;), telling herself stories that evolve while shes talking, exploring things that are around her. She grabs everyday things and looks what she is able to do with them and what the charecteristic of the object is. She knocks it on the table, sees if she can bend it, if they can be stacked etc. Shes not looking at them for what she learned they are, but what she can do with them. I often caught myself when I wanted to say "that won't work or that's not how it is used" just to see her doing something wonderful or funny or stupid.. She does that to not be bored. Getting creative is a wonderful smartphone replacement.
  - scotty79 7y ago
    > exploring things that are around her. That works for first few years of life. > She does that to not be bored. Exactly. But at age 7 or 9 she'll have most of the things figured out and when you place hear in novelty lacking, restricted environment like at or near the table adults are eating and talking about same things seemingly forever you'll see her suffer. I hope you'll notice and help her find entertainment.
    - mrhappyunhappy 7y ago
      I grew up without phones, and for the most part without computers (early years). There were many times I was bored as a kid but most of the time I found activities to fill that time. Being bored a is okay and should not be seen as time needed to be filled. Kids require boredom to enable creativity. It takes imagination to go from bored to doing something. It’s actually part of the developmental process and should not be disrupted by screen time. My guess is you don’t have kids. This certainly feels like an opinion of a younger person and I can’t blame you for thinking that way. We were all once ignorant and if you ask a person yet older, we never stop. Think about how long it took for humans to involve to get to where we were before instant entertainment. Now think about how long it’s been since we advanced from first mobile entertainment to now. Do you think hay sudden change is good for you as a natural evolving being?
- jonjacky 7y ago
  "No one is bored, everything is boring." -- K-Punk
JosephJoestar 7y ago
Interesting topic but is this not just an advert for this guys book?
- Veen 7y ago
  Is there information in the article that you find useful or interesting? Or that someone else might? If so, then what does it matter that he wrote a book on the same topic and mentions it? Would it have been better if he'd written exactly the same article but not mentioned the book?
  - JosephJoestar 7y ago
    Fair point, I just worry about the prevalence of "stealth" advertising. For me at least, the article seems to boil down mostly to "Look what my lifestyle book did for this person". But if others are getting value from it then who am I to judge :)
  - andai 7y ago
    If the article was valuable, it follows the book is even more valuable.
- coldtea 7y ago
  Isn't everything these days a promo for something? And this or that technical post is an advert for the company whose devs wrote it.
- douglaswlance 7y ago
  It isn't just an advert because it has other value for the reader than just promoting the book. It is promoting the author and his book, because that's how he makes a living and feeds his family. You get a bit of value from the post, you are exposed to the author, and perhaps in exchange you will buy his other work and give him and his publisher some money.
- rchaud 7y ago
  It's on calnewport.com, so I imagine some pitching is going to happen. Same with pretty much every website these days, it's all mostly content marketing.
wortelefant 7y ago
The article is quite optimistic about peoples' abilities to transform their newfound boredom into something creative, but as in the example with books, this digital minimalist "healthy" boredom also has its prerequisites to make it work. By likening social media use to addiction, only the negative effects are highlighted. For example, the waiting line in the supermarket used to be full of aggression, it has become much calmer with phones, and some people might even revert to alcohol or other destructive habits when they feel uncomfortable with being alone. In some cases, distraction can even be beneficial, as playing Tetris reduces PTSD and flashbacks. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tetris-shown-to-lessen-ptsd-and-flashbacks/?redirect=1 https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tetris-shown-to-l... Perhaps a better metaphor might be travelling: When I travel too often and move aroung all the time, there is a certain "up in the air" - emptyness - it feels as if I don't ever arrive anywhere, and I spend far too much time in airports and in transit. When I travel less often, it is easier to enjoy the ride and the experience has a positive impact.
- taneq 7y ago
  It seems to me like they need to differentiate more strongly between "using social media" and "using the computer". If you only ever look through windows to spy on your neighbours then you'd come to the conclusion that windows are bad and you should limit your exposure to them, yet there's nothing wrong with an excavator driver staring through a window at the work they're doing. > When I travel too often and move around all the time, there is a certain "up in the air" - emptyness - it feels as if I don't ever arrive anywhere, and I spend far too much time in airports and in transit. I've absolutely had this. The whole world starts to feel unreal and I start to feel disconnected from everything. It really messes with my head.
- ryanmercer 7y ago
  >the waiting line in the supermarket used to be full of aggression, it has become much calmer with phones, What? Grocery lines used to be people reading magazines/tabloids/tv guides or sending their kid to go get something they forgot, now it's people yacking loudly on their phone or playing candy crush waiting for the person in front of them to finish self checkout.
mark_l_watson 7y ago
Digital Minimalism was probably my least favorite Cal Newport book, not for the subject matter but because of the reliance on third party stories. I like to hear peoples’ stories first hand. Even though I ended up being a partially failed case for using this book, I still got value from it. I mostly did the thirty day digital detox but ended up going back almost to my old routine. The difference is that I have perhaps reduced wasted time on my devices by about 1/3. I am more aware of how much time I am spending, while I am spending it reading Twitter, HN, or playing Chess or Go when I have short periods of non-busy time. I am considering removing Chess and Go apps from all my devices. If you are going to read just one Cal Newport book, I recommend choosing Deep Work.
- kashyapc 7y ago
  As I've noted here before[1], Newport is on a 3-book contract on more or less the same topic with minor tweaks. And is likely to subtly market them to the hilt at every opportunity. Besides unsound fundamentals (relying too much "third party stories", and other issues noted elsewhere), he focuses too much on "quantity" and "productivity" than on quality and effectiveness. Sure, he has something of value to say, but he should absolutely have compressed it into one book, and avoid the filler content. But my (uncharitable?) conjecture is, as he values "productivity", he happily gives into the demand of publishers to have X number of pages in a book, to sell, lest it looks like a pamphlet. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19047303 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19047303
  - mark_l_watson 7y ago
    You make good points. I used major publishers like McGraw-Hill, J. Wiley, Springer Verlag, etc. for the first ten books I wrote. You really give up a lot of control over subject matter. I now use Leanpub, write whatever I enjoy writing about. I pitch the advantages [1] of writing to people I know, and usually suggest writing one or two books with a publisher and after that self publish. [1] largest advantage is getting to meet and get to know really interesting people. I enjoy writing but being an author also opens up a lot of opportunities.
  - paulriddle 7y ago
pard68 7y ago
I am a good dancer, well only Lindy and East coast swing. Not much weight for me to lose. I have a black belt in Kenpo. But I am also a systems administrator, enjoy my Switch, and generally spend at least a few hours looking at a screen each day, more than 12 hours on a work day. So I fail to see the correlation... Seems like less about tech minimalism being the key and more, learning how to have self control. I am not knocking that, I believe that if you do not have the self control to manage a habit than you should remove that habit if it is a detriment. Nonetheless, the article, IMHO, is off the mark.
- ck425 7y ago
  I think the value of his work is in helping folk become aware of how much time they waste. You sound like you have a good grip on that already, so probably aren't the target audience.
upofadown 7y ago
If you want to distract yourself while not doing anything you will find a way to do it. Before smart phones there were computers and video games. Before that there was television. Before that there was printed fiction of many sorts, most of it of no personal or social value at all. It is good to strive to do worthwhile things. The worthless things you do to fill your time are not preventing you from doing anything else. You do what you do...
- Bakary 7y ago
  Good point. I would say that modern day distractions have an extra oomph however. I've never developed an addiction to books, crossword puzzles, or television whereas I've come to the point where I can't have a healthy relationship with video games.
  - asark 7y ago
    I think video games went from "fun for a while, but eventually you wanna stop and go ride bikes" to "wait, what do you mean it's Monday morning?" at or a little after the 16-bit console era. There were always people who could just play Super Mario 3 all day or that one guy who did nothing but play Doom for six months or whatever, but most kids (and certainly most adults) would knock it off after a while. It wasn't a widespread issue, even among the small segment of the population that played games, even if some did have problems even then. There was the occasional eat-your-life-for-weeks-on-end game but they tended to be confined to genres like 4x and RPGs (Ultima series, say) and you didn't see multiple high-quality works of that sort every single year. The other big exception was probably MUDs and other games where social, online multiplayer was a major component. I think a combo of 1) refining and focusing games to drive "engagement", 2) games just getting better over time, in a lot of ways, 3) multiplayer and social elements becoming more common, and 4) digital distribution putting unlimited novelty at one's fingertips, has made the whole artform kinda scary, unless you stick strictly to shortish, tight single-player games. Or local multiplayer, I guess, since it's hard to binge that until 3AM on a regular basis, for obvious reasons. Leveling concepts, lengthy turn-based games, randomness of rewards, and online/social components are all especially dangerous. Actually point 4 goes for most things, now. It's kinda too fast & easy to get... well, almost everything. I think there's a reason an unfettered will and easy gratification aren't usually things depicted as improving characters in fiction, for example, and often do the opposite.
mancerayder 7y ago
How about the pleasures of life without other people's music and TV, which adults and children play aloud with no headphones in NYC, on a subway and in a forced, enclosed space? Should we thank the geniuses who designed phones with amplified speakers and no headphone jack (some people are too poor/cheap for Bluetooth I suspect)? Or do we thank Facecrook and Instascam for out-loud videos cranked up at a higher volume on Android? Or a breakdown of norms due to being a permissive, some call freer society? Whatever it is, it's a quality of life detriment for those of us in dense areas, and a personal pet peeve.
- criddell 7y ago
  People playing their music loudly in public spaces isn't new. What's new is that it's coming out of a tiny phone rather than a 12 D-cell powered boom box.
  - Funes- 7y ago
    >What's new is that it's coming out of a tiny phone rather than a 12 D-cell powered boom box. And that makes all the difference. You cannot possibly compare the number of times you would be bothered by a boom box in the 90s in public transport, for example, and how frequent it is now to be bothered by other people's phones on the exact same circumstances. Let's get real.
  - onemoresoop 7y ago
    Whats also new is that it's become a lot more pervasive.
beat 7y ago
I read Digital Minimalism back in February, and did a cleanse in March per his recommendations. One thing I noticed... I normally keep track of books I've read. I jumped from reading two books a month to reading six. Was I seriously reading four books a month in bullshit screen scrolling and arguing with people who are wrong on the Internet? Apparently. I still use the phone as distraction, but now I do it with the Kindle app. I keep my phone Kindle loaded with books I can read in short bursts without extended concentration (currently about to finish the financial planning book I Will Teach You to Be Rich, by Ramit Sethi), and carry my regular Kindle around for books that require more engagement. I already avoided video games; I've done so for years, because I recognized that I have an addiction problem. When it comes to videogames, I'm like an alcoholic that doesn't drink for fear of the consequences. What I didn't realize is how carefully crafted the addictions of Facebook and Twitter are, how they sucked me in worse than video games ever did. I have a long ways to go to fully engage with the world again, but I'm getting better.
- p1esk 7y ago
  Wait, then why are you here?
  - beat 7y ago
    I thought about that. What I decided was to distinguish between social media driven by deliberately addictive engagement in order to sell ads (Facebook, Twitter), and social media that doesn't depend on ad revenue and invites active engagement rather than passive scrolling (Hacker News, and a guitar forum I read regularly). I don't need to give up all online interaction, just the ones that are actively and deliberately unhealthy.
    - p1esk 7y ago
      I don't know man. This sounds like: "I used to have an alcoholism problem. I used to drink wine, beer, hard liquer, you name it. But then I did a cleanse in March, and I stopped drinking hard liquer and wine. I only drink beer now. But that's ok, because I actually like the taste of beer!"
agentultra 7y ago
Whatever you want to call it, I'm all for digital minimalism these days. I find modern computing to be filled with stress and anxiety. Computers, at one time, used to sit idle until used. Using a computer was to use a tool to help you get some task done that was previously menial and boring. These days as soon as I sit down at a computer I start getting messages, advertisements, pleas, bargains, warnings, requests... it seems like it never ends. I sit down to get some work done and an hour later I've finally managed to get enough of the messages down and distractions over with that I've nearly forgotten what it was I intended to do in the first place. And this experience has been following me in my pocket for more than a decade. Since 2008 or so it has been getting louder, more obnoxious, and demanding. Offers for new phones and data plans when I'm trying to bathe my kids vibrate in my pocket waiting to be heard. Advertisements tailored to my interests and desires follow me everywhere. Messages from people trying to contact me whenever the whim comes to them. There is little room for silence in my days anymore. I have a dream inspired by the folks behind http://screenl.es/ http://screenl.es/ -- a version of computing where there screens are not the primary interface for computing. One that is diverse, invisible, and intentional. I'd like a version of computing that is controlled by me and bends around my needs and not the needs of product designers, advertisers, and whims of others. Until I can realize that dream or someone else gets it done I think I'm going to continue my trend of cutting out as much technology from my life as possible. I need more silence, solitude, and intentional, meaningful interactions. I don't want a deluge of social opinion on every happening in the world aimed right at my brain.

127 points by quickben 7y ago

Funny how younger people don't even know how the true boredom looks like. They think they get bored on their phones. Only after they go on screen detox they realise how much more fucking boring the life is. Especially if you don't have an obsessive hobby and do not want to bother other people just because you personally are bored. I feel bad for people older than me that never got adjusted to the smartphones when they have to wait staring blankly into space or trying to start up a monologue to random stangers because they can't stand how dull the inside of their head is. Before smartphones your only salvation was a book and it was limited tool also not for everyone. Smartphone as entertainment devices are the greatest social invention so far.

juskrey 7y ago
Those who are never bored can't detect toxicity
_tulpa 7y ago
Please tell me you just forgot the /s or were hoping most people were less cynical than me...
jarfil 7y ago
Maybe I'm just too old for it, but what is this "being bored" thing you're talking about? I clearly recall staring blankly into space while solving problems in my mind, or even just feeling the surroundings, as some of the most interesting moments of my life. I don't recall ever getting bored, not once.
- scotty79 7y ago
  You are very lucky. I clearly recall intense boredom from pre-phone times. Every time I was forced to stay in some place and do nothing, like while waiting at the doctor's, using public transport, at school during some classes, at family dinner, at couples dinner, in church, even at the funeral, sometimes even in my own home. There was a saying that intelligent people are never bored. Untrue. I have IQ over 150 and boredom brought me to tears more than once. I'd read to kill it, i'd play solitaire with real cards, I'd play one player games with pen and paper. Now when I'm older I can handle being bored much better. As I accumulated scars I can reminiscence on how effed my life is and daydream of pleasure. Buy I still prefer my phone wherever it's socially acceptable.
  - tmn 7y ago
    If you want people to take you seriously. Never cite your iq unless there is a very good reason. This is not one
    - scotty79 7y ago
      I was providing data point disproving (dumb) claim I heard some people make. If I just said I'm intelligent and bored you could just think I'm not that intelligent. I thought it was better to tell you exactly how intelligent I am so you can decide for yourself if that's intelligent enough or not. IQ is just a number like height or age. I just stated it as it was measured by Mensa membership test. And I don't care much about people taking me seriously.
- crispinb 7y ago
  I'm with you, fellow alien! I don't know how to be bored. Sitting, standing, breathing, thinking, observing - it all seems quite captivating to me, with or without further activity.
- coldtea 7y ago
  >Maybe I'm just too old for it, but what is this "being bored" thing you're talking about? Something for people that lack all of: personal life, friends, interests, goals, and curiosity.
- icebraining 7y ago
  I feel bored when I have to listen to boring conversations (or worse, monologues), and can't divide my attention without losing the thread.
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WalterBright 7y ago
Boredom is what drives people to accomplish things.
- scotty79 7y ago
  Except when they are in the spot where they can accomplish nothing. Then boredom is an itch you can't scratch. Becomes torture.
  - Veen 7y ago
    You always have your mind. Are you incapable of just sitting and thinking about things? Do you need constant external stimulation? There's a famous quote from Blaise Pascal that goes "All human evil comes from a single cause, man's inability to sit still in a room." I wonder if someone like Richard Feynman would have accomplished anything at all if he had a phone to distract him and he was incapable of simply sitting and thinking. Einstein came up with the central ideas of the Theory of Relativity while he was day-dreaming at work or on public transport.
    - icebraining 7y ago
      You can't daydream if you must focus your attention on something boring. I wonder if Einstein would have come up with Relativity if he had to write mind-numbing reports all day.
    - scotty79 7y ago
      > You always have your mind. Yeah. Human mind is very limited tool without external support. That's why writing was such a boon for humans and notation was such a boon for math. > Are you incapable of just sitting and thinking about things? Yeah. I can but that rarely acomplishes anything. If you think you can solve a problem just with your mind think again. Most problems are problems because you lack some information. And you won't get any missing information just by thinking. And if you have all the information, you just need to process it then you are still out of luck. Even moderately complex processing let's say roughly as hard as derivating moderately simple calculus requires at least a pen and piece of paper to support you wonderful mind with crappy operational memory that can hold at most seven things at once. I would much rather do the thinking with my phone than without it. I'm not Feynman and Einstein had plenty of paper.
dan00 7y ago
I think you got it completely the wrong way. You can get a lot more bored if you're used to be entertained the whole time. I can only tell from my own personal experience, that reducing entertainment also influences my consciousness, that I'm feeling less easily bored and I'm better able to just enjoy and see the beauty of my surroundings.
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- scotty79 7y ago
  You are right that you can build up resistance to boredom by reducing entertainment. I gained a ton after sitting through family dinners at my SO parents and grand parents. Initially I was bored out of my mind. Gradually I adapted and suffered less and less. But I don't see it as something positive. I feel like it broke my mind in some way. It replaced frantically struggling against boredom with nearly catathonic apathy. It feels more like a learned helplessness than improvement. If you are in the rain for few minutes you are running and hiding. If you are in the rain for few hours you can no longer give a fuck as your feet melt in swampy shoes.
  - dan00 7y ago
    > But I don't see it as something positive. I feel like it broke my mind in some way. It replaced frantically struggling against boredom with nearly catathonic apathy. For me the opposite of boredom isn't apathy, but more a kind of freeing your mind from any entertainment needs. If the need vanishes then there's also no pain. > It feels more like a learned helplessness than improvement. Needing entertainment is IMHO a lot more a learned helplessness.
    - scotty79 7y ago
      > Needing entertainment is IMHO a lot more a learned helplessness. Needing entertainment and seeking entertainment doesn't really fit the definition of learned helplessness. Learned helplessness is when you are suffering no matter what you do so you stop making any attempts to lessen your suffering because you learned nothing works. If human had learned helplessness attitude toward boredom and entertainment he wouldn't even bother pick up the phone because he'd believe that it won't help him be entertained. You would probably think the guy is depressed and you'd probably be right because bordom and entertainment are such foundational features of the brain that it would require some serious brain damage to end up like that.
tumetab1 7y ago
I think that's a fair notice. I have reduced my reliance on digital tools for passing time and I'm starting to remember boredom and why I was avoiding it. Many articles portrait boredom too much as being good instead portraying it like the necessary rest you need between work outs. Allowing yourself to get bored is good but you should understand why and what's a good/bad way to stop being bored.
coldtea 7y ago
>I feel bad for people older than me that never got adjusted to the smartphones when they have to wait staring blankly into space or trying to start up a monologue to random stangers because they can't stand how dull the inside of their head is. Looks like you have it backwards. You should feel sorry for them for how "dull the inside of their head is" -- not for not being used to having smartphones to compensate.
- scotty79 7y ago
  I don't feel sorry for people for being worse. Not everybody is the same, noone is perfect. But I feel sorry to see them suffer while they might have not if they were able to use smartphone for entertainment.
  - coldtea 7y ago
    >But I feel sorry to see them suffer while they might have not if they were able to use smartphone for entertainment. Well, they also might have not if they have gotten a hobby, learned to read books, and so on. Why feel sorry that they're not accustomed with one of the worse options? And one that everybody and their dog seems to want to cut down these days?
    - scotty79 7y ago
      Smartphone is not one of the worse options. It's one of the best options. Thanks to it I'm just discusing ideas with you while lying in a garden. Which is at the moment my preferred way of wasting my time. No other tool would allow me to waste my time this way. If I couldn't do it I'd read fantasy book I got for my recent birthday but it wouldn't be nearly as intelectually stimulating.
      - coldtea 7y ago
        >It's one of the best options. Thanks to it I'm just discusing ideas with you while lying in a garden. Which seems like a totally detrimental use of one's time!
nunodonato 7y ago
There are no boring moments, only boring people :)
seedie 7y ago
True boredom seems to be something that we learn over the years. Watching my 3y old daughter she never seems to get bored. If shes not entertained and realizes she won't get entertained anytime soon she starts singing (improving songs with her own text ;), telling herself stories that evolve while shes talking, exploring things that are around her. She grabs everyday things and looks what she is able to do with them and what the charecteristic of the object is. She knocks it on the table, sees if she can bend it, if they can be stacked etc. Shes not looking at them for what she learned they are, but what she can do with them. I often caught myself when I wanted to say "that won't work or that's not how it is used" just to see her doing something wonderful or funny or stupid.. She does that to not be bored. Getting creative is a wonderful smartphone replacement.
- scotty79 7y ago
  > exploring things that are around her. That works for first few years of life. > She does that to not be bored. Exactly. But at age 7 or 9 she'll have most of the things figured out and when you place hear in novelty lacking, restricted environment like at or near the table adults are eating and talking about same things seemingly forever you'll see her suffer. I hope you'll notice and help her find entertainment.
  - mrhappyunhappy 7y ago
    I grew up without phones, and for the most part without computers (early years). There were many times I was bored as a kid but most of the time I found activities to fill that time. Being bored a is okay and should not be seen as time needed to be filled. Kids require boredom to enable creativity. It takes imagination to go from bored to doing something. It’s actually part of the developmental process and should not be disrupted by screen time. My guess is you don’t have kids. This certainly feels like an opinion of a younger person and I can’t blame you for thinking that way. We were all once ignorant and if you ask a person yet older, we never stop. Think about how long it took for humans to involve to get to where we were before instant entertainment. Now think about how long it’s been since we advanced from first mobile entertainment to now. Do you think hay sudden change is good for you as a natural evolving being?
jonjacky 7y ago
"No one is bored, everything is boring." -- K-Punk

JosephJoestar 7y ago

Interesting topic but is this not just an advert for this guys book?

Veen 7y ago
Is there information in the article that you find useful or interesting? Or that someone else might? If so, then what does it matter that he wrote a book on the same topic and mentions it? Would it have been better if he'd written exactly the same article but not mentioned the book?
- JosephJoestar 7y ago
  Fair point, I just worry about the prevalence of "stealth" advertising. For me at least, the article seems to boil down mostly to "Look what my lifestyle book did for this person". But if others are getting value from it then who am I to judge :)
- andai 7y ago
  If the article was valuable, it follows the book is even more valuable.
coldtea 7y ago
Isn't everything these days a promo for something? And this or that technical post is an advert for the company whose devs wrote it.
douglaswlance 7y ago
It isn't just an advert because it has other value for the reader than just promoting the book. It is promoting the author and his book, because that's how he makes a living and feeds his family. You get a bit of value from the post, you are exposed to the author, and perhaps in exchange you will buy his other work and give him and his publisher some money.
rchaud 7y ago
It's on calnewport.com, so I imagine some pitching is going to happen. Same with pretty much every website these days, it's all mostly content marketing.

wortelefant 7y ago

The article is quite optimistic about peoples' abilities to transform their newfound boredom into something creative, but as in the example with books, this digital minimalist "healthy" boredom also has its prerequisites to make it work. By likening social media use to addiction, only the negative effects are highlighted. For example, the waiting line in the supermarket used to be full of aggression, it has become much calmer with phones, and some people might even revert to alcohol or other destructive habits when they feel uncomfortable with being alone. In some cases, distraction can even be beneficial, as playing Tetris reduces PTSD and flashbacks. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tetris-shown-to-lessen-ptsd-and-flashbacks/?redirect=1 https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tetris-shown-to-l... Perhaps a better metaphor might be travelling: When I travel too often and move aroung all the time, there is a certain "up in the air" - emptyness - it feels as if I don't ever arrive anywhere, and I spend far too much time in airports and in transit. When I travel less often, it is easier to enjoy the ride and the experience has a positive impact.

taneq 7y ago
It seems to me like they need to differentiate more strongly between "using social media" and "using the computer". If you only ever look through windows to spy on your neighbours then you'd come to the conclusion that windows are bad and you should limit your exposure to them, yet there's nothing wrong with an excavator driver staring through a window at the work they're doing. > When I travel too often and move around all the time, there is a certain "up in the air" - emptyness - it feels as if I don't ever arrive anywhere, and I spend far too much time in airports and in transit. I've absolutely had this. The whole world starts to feel unreal and I start to feel disconnected from everything. It really messes with my head.
ryanmercer 7y ago
>the waiting line in the supermarket used to be full of aggression, it has become much calmer with phones, What? Grocery lines used to be people reading magazines/tabloids/tv guides or sending their kid to go get something they forgot, now it's people yacking loudly on their phone or playing candy crush waiting for the person in front of them to finish self checkout.

mark_l_watson 7y ago

Digital Minimalism was probably my least favorite Cal Newport book, not for the subject matter but because of the reliance on third party stories. I like to hear peoples’ stories first hand. Even though I ended up being a partially failed case for using this book, I still got value from it. I mostly did the thirty day digital detox but ended up going back almost to my old routine. The difference is that I have perhaps reduced wasted time on my devices by about 1/3. I am more aware of how much time I am spending, while I am spending it reading Twitter, HN, or playing Chess or Go when I have short periods of non-busy time. I am considering removing Chess and Go apps from all my devices. If you are going to read just one Cal Newport book, I recommend choosing Deep Work.

kashyapc 7y ago
As I've noted here before[1], Newport is on a 3-book contract on more or less the same topic with minor tweaks. And is likely to subtly market them to the hilt at every opportunity. Besides unsound fundamentals (relying too much "third party stories", and other issues noted elsewhere), he focuses too much on "quantity" and "productivity" than on quality and effectiveness. Sure, he has something of value to say, but he should absolutely have compressed it into one book, and avoid the filler content. But my (uncharitable?) conjecture is, as he values "productivity", he happily gives into the demand of publishers to have X number of pages in a book, to sell, lest it looks like a pamphlet. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19047303 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19047303
- mark_l_watson 7y ago
  You make good points. I used major publishers like McGraw-Hill, J. Wiley, Springer Verlag, etc. for the first ten books I wrote. You really give up a lot of control over subject matter. I now use Leanpub, write whatever I enjoy writing about. I pitch the advantages [1] of writing to people I know, and usually suggest writing one or two books with a publisher and after that self publish. [1] largest advantage is getting to meet and get to know really interesting people. I enjoy writing but being an author also opens up a lot of opportunities.
- paulriddle 7y ago

pard68 7y ago

I am a good dancer, well only Lindy and East coast swing. Not much weight for me to lose. I have a black belt in Kenpo. But I am also a systems administrator, enjoy my Switch, and generally spend at least a few hours looking at a screen each day, more than 12 hours on a work day. So I fail to see the correlation... Seems like less about tech minimalism being the key and more, learning how to have self control. I am not knocking that, I believe that if you do not have the self control to manage a habit than you should remove that habit if it is a detriment. Nonetheless, the article, IMHO, is off the mark.

ck425 7y ago
I think the value of his work is in helping folk become aware of how much time they waste. You sound like you have a good grip on that already, so probably aren't the target audience.

upofadown 7y ago

If you want to distract yourself while not doing anything you will find a way to do it. Before smart phones there were computers and video games. Before that there was television. Before that there was printed fiction of many sorts, most of it of no personal or social value at all. It is good to strive to do worthwhile things. The worthless things you do to fill your time are not preventing you from doing anything else. You do what you do...

Bakary 7y ago
Good point. I would say that modern day distractions have an extra oomph however. I've never developed an addiction to books, crossword puzzles, or television whereas I've come to the point where I can't have a healthy relationship with video games.
- asark 7y ago
  I think video games went from "fun for a while, but eventually you wanna stop and go ride bikes" to "wait, what do you mean it's Monday morning?" at or a little after the 16-bit console era. There were always people who could just play Super Mario 3 all day or that one guy who did nothing but play Doom for six months or whatever, but most kids (and certainly most adults) would knock it off after a while. It wasn't a widespread issue, even among the small segment of the population that played games, even if some did have problems even then. There was the occasional eat-your-life-for-weeks-on-end game but they tended to be confined to genres like 4x and RPGs (Ultima series, say) and you didn't see multiple high-quality works of that sort every single year. The other big exception was probably MUDs and other games where social, online multiplayer was a major component. I think a combo of 1) refining and focusing games to drive "engagement", 2) games just getting better over time, in a lot of ways, 3) multiplayer and social elements becoming more common, and 4) digital distribution putting unlimited novelty at one's fingertips, has made the whole artform kinda scary, unless you stick strictly to shortish, tight single-player games. Or local multiplayer, I guess, since it's hard to binge that until 3AM on a regular basis, for obvious reasons. Leveling concepts, lengthy turn-based games, randomness of rewards, and online/social components are all especially dangerous. Actually point 4 goes for most things, now. It's kinda too fast & easy to get... well, almost everything. I think there's a reason an unfettered will and easy gratification aren't usually things depicted as improving characters in fiction, for example, and often do the opposite.

mancerayder 7y ago

How about the pleasures of life without other people's music and TV, which adults and children play aloud with no headphones in NYC, on a subway and in a forced, enclosed space? Should we thank the geniuses who designed phones with amplified speakers and no headphone jack (some people are too poor/cheap for Bluetooth I suspect)? Or do we thank Facecrook and Instascam for out-loud videos cranked up at a higher volume on Android? Or a breakdown of norms due to being a permissive, some call freer society? Whatever it is, it's a quality of life detriment for those of us in dense areas, and a personal pet peeve.

criddell 7y ago
People playing their music loudly in public spaces isn't new. What's new is that it's coming out of a tiny phone rather than a 12 D-cell powered boom box.
- Funes- 7y ago
  >What's new is that it's coming out of a tiny phone rather than a 12 D-cell powered boom box. And that makes all the difference. You cannot possibly compare the number of times you would be bothered by a boom box in the 90s in public transport, for example, and how frequent it is now to be bothered by other people's phones on the exact same circumstances. Let's get real.
- onemoresoop 7y ago
  Whats also new is that it's become a lot more pervasive.

beat 7y ago

I read Digital Minimalism back in February, and did a cleanse in March per his recommendations. One thing I noticed... I normally keep track of books I've read. I jumped from reading two books a month to reading six. Was I seriously reading four books a month in bullshit screen scrolling and arguing with people who are wrong on the Internet? Apparently. I still use the phone as distraction, but now I do it with the Kindle app. I keep my phone Kindle loaded with books I can read in short bursts without extended concentration (currently about to finish the financial planning book I Will Teach You to Be Rich, by Ramit Sethi), and carry my regular Kindle around for books that require more engagement. I already avoided video games; I've done so for years, because I recognized that I have an addiction problem. When it comes to videogames, I'm like an alcoholic that doesn't drink for fear of the consequences. What I didn't realize is how carefully crafted the addictions of Facebook and Twitter are, how they sucked me in worse than video games ever did. I have a long ways to go to fully engage with the world again, but I'm getting better.

p1esk 7y ago
Wait, then why are you here?
- beat 7y ago
  I thought about that. What I decided was to distinguish between social media driven by deliberately addictive engagement in order to sell ads (Facebook, Twitter), and social media that doesn't depend on ad revenue and invites active engagement rather than passive scrolling (Hacker News, and a guitar forum I read regularly). I don't need to give up all online interaction, just the ones that are actively and deliberately unhealthy.
  - p1esk 7y ago
    I don't know man. This sounds like: "I used to have an alcoholism problem. I used to drink wine, beer, hard liquer, you name it. But then I did a cleanse in March, and I stopped drinking hard liquer and wine. I only drink beer now. But that's ok, because I actually like the taste of beer!"

agentultra 7y ago

Whatever you want to call it, I'm all for digital minimalism these days. I find modern computing to be filled with stress and anxiety. Computers, at one time, used to sit idle until used. Using a computer was to use a tool to help you get some task done that was previously menial and boring. These days as soon as I sit down at a computer I start getting messages, advertisements, pleas, bargains, warnings, requests... it seems like it never ends. I sit down to get some work done and an hour later I've finally managed to get enough of the messages down and distractions over with that I've nearly forgotten what it was I intended to do in the first place. And this experience has been following me in my pocket for more than a decade. Since 2008 or so it has been getting louder, more obnoxious, and demanding. Offers for new phones and data plans when I'm trying to bathe my kids vibrate in my pocket waiting to be heard. Advertisements tailored to my interests and desires follow me everywhere. Messages from people trying to contact me whenever the whim comes to them. There is little room for silence in my days anymore. I have a dream inspired by the folks behind http://screenl.es/ http://screenl.es/ -- a version of computing where there screens are not the primary interface for computing. One that is diverse, invisible, and intentional. I'd like a version of computing that is controlled by me and bends around my needs and not the needs of product designers, advertisers, and whims of others. Until I can realize that dream or someone else gets it done I think I'm going to continue my trend of cutting out as much technology from my life as possible. I need more silence, solitude, and intentional, meaningful interactions. I don't want a deluge of social opinion on every happening in the world aimed right at my brain.