A Drifter Among Us: Digital Cleanse: Simplifying the Brain

Digital Cleanse: Simplifying the Brain

Posted in Labels: Digital Cleanse, story to make in 2010

Mention to anyone with computer savvy that your laptop has somehow gotten slower over recent months and they’ll ask you the same thing: “have you defragmented your hard drive?” Defragmenting works by taking small slivers of information stored in various locations and consolidating them so that they’re in the same place on the drive and thus easier to access in larger chunks. Hard drive fragmentation is a great metaphor for - if not a literal manifestation of - what’s happened to our brains over years and years of processing small bursts of information. 2009 took fragmentation to a whole new level given the rise of Twitter and the social acceptance of texting people as a substitute to making phone calls.

That’s where the one week digital cleanse comes in. I’ll be defragmenting my mental and psychological hard drive during the first seven days of the new year, and I invite you all to participate.

The cleanse will begin at 9am on January 1. This gives everyone a chance to text and tweet their new year’s well wishes, and theoretically begins upon waking up the morning of January 1. The cleanse will end at 9am on January 8.

Guidelines:

*email only from laptop or desktop computers

*cell phones can only be used to make calls, and no text messages or e-mails are allowed - if you receive a text, you must reply in voice over the phone. E-mails must be returned from a laptop or desktop computer.

*no use of Twitter or any other social networking site - this includes reading as well as posting.

*no visiting of any entertainment or gossip sites. (No need to detail which ones - you know what they are.)

I floated the idea last week on Twitter to see if anyone could envision themselves doing this, and the responses were interesting; some said they could definitely do it, but many were resigned to the idea, calling it impossible. If it is impossible, than my theory is already proven and we’re in big trouble as a society.

This can be done, people. Do it with me. When we pop back up on the grid on January 8, let’s trade stories on what it felt like, how hard it was, and maybe how hard it actually wasn’t.

JM

This was an idea John Mayer had at the beginning of the year. At first glance, I thought it was the dumbest thing ever. But after feeling disconnected from family and friends recently I’ve decided that I’m in need of stepping away from the areas of the internet I waste so much of my time on.

In today’s world we’re all so used to be tuned in and plugged in every second of the day, that it’s probably a good thing to step-away from it for awhile. Social Media has become a window into our world that people can peek through without engaging with one another. It saddens me to think of how superficial we've become because of it.

I don’t know about you but I’m tired of wasting my time with brainless activity. I’m tired of lost interaction with friends and family. I’m tired of being unmotivated to chase after my passions. I’m going to use the next week to read, call and talk to friends I haven’t talked to in awhile. I’m going to catch up on things that need to get done around my apartment. I’m going to be more productive.

So this is what it has come to, a digital retreat. Back in the day, men would go out wandering in the wilderness, or in solitary retreat in some dark cave, reflecting upon the world and the nature of reality. This is a way for me to "get away." So come Monday, I'm signing off, turning the apps on my phone off, shutting down the laptop at home, and getting re-acquainted with my friends in their physical form.

Today, with the digital overload, I can understand the need to filter out and quiet the noise. This “digital cleanse” is about relearning how to interact with the world.

Who’s in?