See also
Outside Lies Magic by John Stilgoe (1998)
Walkers in the city and everywhere
11–20 of 55 posts
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#12I guess I have been practicing something radical since I was a kid.....this is just how I walk around. I call it being observant.
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#13I don't get it. A bunch of paragraphs on going for a walk?
You're going to hate Proust.
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#14One of my past awesome significant others, I found due to something like some of the awareness talked about here. She'd made a post on a dating site, asking, simply, what was your favorite part of the city, and why. I responded with something about the different atmospheres of rather small areas, where the transitions are, etc. I won, and our first date was to be a lunch break from her science lab work on a weekend.…
A lovely story thanks for sharing! You might be selling yourself short with that kind of emotional intelligence (hopefully you found your person :)).
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#15flâneur: a great word. when I see all these people walking around staring at their phones, I want to slap them with that word. Whatever it is on your phone, it'll wait. Whatever's happening in front of you: that will not wait, and it'll never come again.
That's at least superficially also true when I'm sitting on the toilet.
Every sunset is unique, and so is every bowel movement.
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#16For anybody interested in being more present while walking, I recommend photography. You will become more aware of your surroundings if you look for cool things to photograph. I recomand using an actual camera, the quality of it is irrelevant. Using your phone will be a distraction since you open it to take a photo, but see a notification from x and then you will at least think about how to respond, even if you don’t…
Related to this: I have been working towards not carrying a phone around at all. Being a hyperconnected and reachable as we tend to be nowadays does not feel healthy. I recently set up a JMP Chat account so I can proxy SMS and calls to my XMPP account.
Super advanced pro level - keep the phone and just don't spend the whole time playing with it. Also when a notification comes in just ignore it. If it is important, they will leave a message.
It's like having a cigarette in your mouth, a lighter in your hand and not smoking - if you can do that then you have truly kicked your addiction.
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
Related to this: I have been working towards not carrying a phone around at all. Being a hyperconnected and reachable as we tend to be nowadays does not feel healthy. I recently set up a JMP Chat account so I can proxy SMS and calls to my XMPP account.
Super advanced pro level - keep the phone and just don't spend the whole time playing with it. Also when a notification comes in just ignore it. If it is important, they will leave a message. It's like having a cigarette in your mouth, a lighter in your hand and not smoking - if you can do that then you have truly kicked your addiction.
Not to be much of a shill but iOS’ focuses are great for this. Create a ‘chillin’ mode that kills all notifications and still lets you use maps.
I am sure Android has similar.
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#18I guess I have been practicing something radical since I was a kid.....this is just how I walk around. I call it being observant.
Exactly. Walking for leisure is about exploring and observing your environment. This is article is pretentious af
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
Related to this: I have been working towards not carrying a phone around at all. Being a hyperconnected and reachable as we tend to be nowadays does not feel healthy. I recently set up a JMP Chat account so I can proxy SMS and calls to my XMPP account.
Super advanced pro level - keep the phone and just don't spend the whole time playing with it. Also when a notification comes in just ignore it. If it is important, they will leave a message. It's like having a cigarette in your mouth, a lighter in your hand and not smoking - if you can do that then you have truly kicked your addiction.
Cheeky intermediate hack, put it on silent and in your backpack. Helps kick the habit by making it less accessible. You have enough time for self-awareness and shame if you have to take off your backpack to get to it.
Re: Walkers in the city and everywhere
#20For anybody interested in being more present while walking, I recommend photography. You will become more aware of your surroundings if you look for cool things to photograph. I recomand using an actual camera, the quality of it is irrelevant. Using your phone will be a distraction since you open it to take a photo, but see a notification from x and then you will at least think about how to respond, even if you don’t…
Related to this: I have been working towards not carrying a phone around at all. Being a hyperconnected and reachable as we tend to be nowadays does not feel healthy. I recently set up a JMP Chat account so I can proxy SMS and calls to my XMPP account.
The experiment part (proxy to XMPP) is interesting. Here is how I did the crude and manual way.
- There are no social apps (Instagram, LinkedIn, etc) on my phone. I prune apps that I do not use, once a while and have set an arbitrary limit of less than 42 non-Apple apps on the phone. I will keep reducing that number and will negotiate my mind to less than 10.
- The first thing I did on any new installation is disable notification[1]. The only notification I have on the phone is the critical ones such as Health, Calendar. I have been doing this for more than a decade.
- I carry a phone but it does not even ring[2], except for some of my family and friends. I have left/forgotten and intentionally left the phone while walking around the neighborhood and had never missed it. I do have a watch on, at almost all the time and that also allowed me to de-tether the phone much more.
1. https://brajeshwar.com/2014/missing-step-productivity-activi...