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Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

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61–70 of 193 posts

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#61
"The difference between loneliness and solitude is who you are alone with and who made the choice."

I was told this 3 weeks in to an Outward Bound course in the colorado wilderness when I was 18.

It has stayed with me my whole life now (i'm 43!) and I think of it often.

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#62
post #31

There's also the long-standing idea that people come up with great/interesting ideas while in the shower (so much that it's an internet meme), and that's attributed to the shower being one of the few places where you don't have media or electronics trying to capture your attention.

That phenomenon is very real in my personal case. Unfortunately the ideas go away by the time i get hold of pen and paper after the shower. Possible solutions to this are welcome.

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#63

Sometimes I wonder if our preoccupation with information consumption is a catalyst for our inability to have epiphanic thought. We’d probably have more Einstein-like breakthroughs in science if we weren’t constantly reading to find the answer and instead let our minds connect into the collective consciousness that already knows all.

"We owe the cultural achievements of humanity—which include philosophy—to deep, contemplative attention. Culture presumes an environment in which deep attention is possible. Increasingly, such immersive reflection is being displaced by an entirely different form of attention: hyperattention. A rash change of focus between different tasks, sources of information, and processes characterizes this scattered mode of awareness. Since it also has a low tolerance for boredom, it does not admit the profound idleness that benefits the creative process.

...

"hyperactive intensification leads to an abrupt switch into hyperpassivity; now one obeys every impulse or stimulus without resistance. Instead of freedom, it produces new constraints. It is an illusion to believe that being more active means being freer.

"Without the “excluding instincts” Nietzsche praises, action scatters into restless, hyperactive reaction and abreaction. In a pure state, activity only prolongs what is already available. In contrast, a real turn to the Other presupposes the negativity of an interruption. Only by the negative means of making-pause can the subject of action thoroughly measure the sphere of contingency (which is unavailable when one is simply active)."

"The Burnout Society" - Byung-Chul Han

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#65

Has anyone experimented with having a "dumb phone" and taking that with them just in-case people need to contact them or for emergencies? Lately, I've had a few times when I accidentally left my phone at home and after an hour or so realized how much fun I've had without it.

Apple Watch with cellular lets me leave behind my phone when I feel like it and still be contactable.

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#68
post #67

> The thinking group expected to enjoy the task significantly less than the news-checking group, but afterward, the two groups reported similar enjoyment levels. Does the study really suggest not checking the news then?

Following the news very closely is a dubious activity, even though being ignorant is worse.

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#69
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, that and the world is a pretty terrible place. Think about it for too long and you'll get pretty depressed.

The trick is not to think about it. I stopped following the 24 hour news cycle a some time last decade and my quality of life improved radically. I curate what I read myself, with RSS feeds, Reddit subscriptions and whatever happens to get to the front page of Hacker News =) I don't need to know up to the minute death tolls from COVID the war in Ukraine or the latest natural disaster. I don't need to know which polit…

I hope someone else also finds irony in taking advice on avoiding extensional terror from The Shrike.

Re: Put down devices, let your mind wander, study suggests

#70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iOS has it, it’s called focus mode. But good luck actually having the resolve to stay in it. (Plus the app drawer kinda defeats the idea again).

Yes. The idea is great: hide some of the screens when in focus mode. Problems: cannot totally disable apps like in the app usage settings. And there you cannot really schedule blocks where you can access them. Also: the allowed apps list has a bug which makes it unusable. I have no idea why these two features are distinct. (mean thought: maybe apple doesn’t actually want us to use it properly?)

To me it seems that for a while Apple has become a bit Microsoft-ish with iOS (certainly influenced by its immense popularity) in that they never clean out the old stuff, only add in new stuff on top of it. Exhibit A: Stage manager living on top of but not replacing the previous multitasking features. On your point I totally agree, app usage should be unified with focus mode.
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