Digital Minimalism | Workspace Wednesday Ep. 8
Summary
TLDRIn this episode, the speaker discusses their journey towards digital minimalism, inspired by Cal Newport's book. They reflect on their values and how these should guide their technology use. The speaker evaluates their social media engagement, particularly Twitter, and shares their strategy for mindful usage. They also explore the idea of replacing digital activities with real-world alternatives, aiming for a more intentional relationship with technology.
Takeaways
- 🌟 The speaker is exploring digital minimalism and its impact on their social media use.
- 📅 At the beginning of December, the speaker evaluated their social media platforms and set guidelines to reclaim their attention.
- 📚 The concept of digital minimalism was introduced to the speaker through personal websites, not directly through Cal Newport's book.
- 🔄 The speaker had previously done a social media detox, inspired by Terence McKenna's talk, and found it beneficial for their creativity.
- 💡 Digital minimalism is defined as focusing online time on a few, optimized activities that support personal values, and happily missing out on everything else.
- 🤔 The speaker emphasizes the importance of aligning technology use with personal values and having an intentional mindset.
- 🔍 The speaker conducted research on personal philosophies, which include values, core beliefs, goals, and habits.
- 📝 A personal philosophy dashboard was created in Tana to assess technology use based on values and principles from Cal Newport's book.
- 📊 The dashboard includes fields for core values, goals, and technology use, with a focus on evaluating the impact of each technology on the speaker's life.
- 🕒 The speaker uses Twitter for 20-30 minutes a day, interacting with a curated list of people and learning from shared interests.
- 🚫 The speaker has removed Twitter from their mobile devices and restricted its use to a fixed social media window to limit constant checking and time spent.
Q & A
What is the main topic of discussion in the video transcript?
-The main topic of discussion is digital minimalism and its impact on the individual's relationship with social media and technology.
What book influenced the speaker's approach to technology use?
-The book 'Digital Minimalism' by Cal Newport influenced the speaker's approach to technology use.
What does the speaker aim to achieve by evaluating their social media use?
-The speaker aims to reclaim their attention and shift from an addictive relationship with social media to a more intentional one.
How did the speaker initially engage with the concept of digital minimalism?
-The speaker initially engaged with the concept of digital minimalism through a social media detox, inspired by a talk by Terence McKenna.
What does the speaker consider as the core of their personal philosophy?
-The speaker considers their values and core beliefs as the core of their personal philosophy.
How does the speaker apply their values to the use of technology?
-The speaker applies their values by assessing how different technologies align with their core values and whether they support the things they deem important in life.
What specific actions did the speaker take to limit their use of Twitter?
-The speaker removed Twitter from their phone, restricted their use to a fixed 20 to 30 minute social media window, and mainly interacted with a curated list of people.
How does the speaker evaluate the impact of technology on their time and attention?
-The speaker evaluates the impact by considering the amount of time spent on a particular technology, its alignment with their values, and whether it distracts from their goals or other activities.
What is the purpose of the 'personal philosophy dashboard' the speaker created in Tana?
-The purpose of the 'personal philosophy dashboard' is to serve as a tool for the speaker to reflect on and evaluate their technology use based on their core values, goals, and the principles of digital minimalism.
How does the speaker plan to use the 'personal philosophy dashboard' for future technology evaluation?
-The speaker plans to use the 'personal philosophy dashboard' as a dynamic tool, updating and refining it over time to reflect changes in their values, goals, and technology use.
Outlines
📝 Introduction to Digital Minimalism
The speaker introduces the topic of digital minimalism, reflecting on their personal journey with social media and technology use. They discuss their initial approach to social media, the principles they set for themselves, and the influence of Cal Newport's book 'Digital Minimalism'. The speaker also mentions a previous social media detox experience and how it sparked a re-evaluation of their relationship with technology, emphasizing the importance of aligning technology use with personal values.
🤔 Defining Personal Philosophy and Values
The speaker delves deeper into the concept of personal philosophy, which includes values, core beliefs, goals, and habits. They emphasize the importance of understanding one's values as a guiding principle for life and technology use. The speaker shares their own process of identifying and articulating their core values, and how this self-reflection led to a more intentional approach towards technology. They also discuss the broader concept of personal philosophy as a North Star, influencing goals and habits.
💻 Assessing Technology Use in Tanso
The speaker describes their practical application of digital minimalism by assessing their technology use within the Tana workspace. They created a personal philosophy dashboard to evaluate how different technologies align with their core values. The speaker uses Twitter as an example, discussing its impact on their creativity and social connections, and the changes they've made to optimize its use. They also mention setting standards for technology use, such as time limits and curated content, to prevent mindless scrolling and maintain focus.
🌐 Balancing Digital and Real-World Activities
The speaker explores the balance between digital activities and real-world interactions, considering alternatives to digital tools that might better support their values. They acknowledge their introverted nature and preference for online interactions but recognize the potential benefits of engaging in offline activities. The speaker concludes by discussing their ongoing process of evaluating and adjusting their social media use, influenced by the principles of digital minimalism, and invites others to share their thoughts on the topic.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Digital Minimalism
💡Social Media
💡Values
💡Personal Philosophy
💡Technology Use
💡Intentional Use
💡Digital Declutter
💡Core Beliefs
💡Goals
💡Habits
Highlights
The speaker discusses digital minimalism and its impact on reclaiming attention from social media.
In December, the speaker evaluated their social media usage and set guidelines to change their relationship with technology.
The speaker was inspired by Cal Newport's book 'Digital Minimalism' and personal websites to re-evaluate their technology use.
Digital minimalism is defined as focusing online time on activities that support personal values and ignoring the rest.
The speaker emphasizes that technology use should be directly influenced by personal values.
The speaker previously did a social media detox, which significantly improved their creativity.
The concept of personal philosophy is introduced, including values, core beliefs, goals, and habits.
The speaker shares their personal core values and how they relate to technology use.
A personal philosophy dashboard is created within the digital workspace application Notion.
The speaker outlines a structured approach to evaluate the impact of technology on their life, using Twitter as an example.
The speaker has reduced Twitter usage to 20-30 minutes per day by curating their follow list and removing the app from their phone.
Standard operating procedures are set for using Twitter, such as specific time windows and interaction limits.
The speaker considers alternatives to digital tools, like engaging in social activities or attending courses.
An archive is maintained to track the evolution of the speaker's social media use over time.
The speaker's experience with digital minimalism is an ongoing process of reflection and adjustment.
The speaker invites feedback on digital minimalism from their audience through various channels.
Transcripts
hi everyone welcome to episode 8 of Rick
space Wednesday as I posted on Twitter
yesterday I want to talk about digital
minimalism
at the beginning of December I wrote
here about my current approach to social
media where I evaluated the different
platforms that I was using heavily at
the time and I set out some guidelines
and principles that I wanted to follow
in order to begin reclaiming my
attention
and I went into a bit of detail here
on the blog post
identifying the benefits the drawbacks
and kind of next steps and actions that
I wanted to implement that I would
Implement in order to begin changing my
relationship with social media from
being an more addictive one to an
intentional one
and at the time of writing this which
was December 3rd
I had not yet read digital minimalism by
Cal Newport it was on my reading list
and it was even on my Kindle but I just
didn't get to it yet however around this
time I was exposed to these personal
websites that I linked here in the post
and these would have sparked this
evaluation or rather re-evaluation of my
relationship with technology
and I say re-evaluation because earlier
this year I did do a social media detox
where I didn't use any form of social
media for one month I actually went
beyond one month because I found that it
was really really beneficial for my
creativity and uh Carl calls this
actually a digital declutter and at that
time it was inspired by one of my
favorite Talks
by uh Terence McKenna which I have
linked here and I also have it in the
blog post as well
but this is what would have sparked all
of this and would have kind of had my
gears tuning back to digital minimalism
right so let's kind of get in to see
what Carl defines digital minimalism as
he says that it's a philosophy of
Technology use in which you focus your
online time on a small number of
carefully selected and optimized
activities that strongly support things
you value and then happily miss out on
everything else
and my main takeaway from this was that
the technology that we use and the way
that we use it it should be directly
influenced by our values and I found
that throughout the first part of
digital minimalism Cal really focused on
the values right so that led me
naturally to to ask you know what are
our values and these are the guiding
principles that are most important in
our life
therefore in order for me to interact
with technology with an intentional
mindset I needed to determine my values
and basically let those guide how I use
technology which clearly is not what I
was doing before I'm not sure how many
people maybe the people that Cal would
have had in his little survey in his
book they would have thought about this
in an intentional way but
most of us kind of got sucked into the
addictive scrolling and the constant
checking of notifications that social
media essentially is built upon
and in my last newsletter I wrote that I
never gave much thought to values in my
life of course it's not that there's
nothing meaningful to me I just never
took the time to articulate that meaning
specifically so if for example someone
were to ask me at that time what are
your core values or what are your values
I don't know who would be asking me this
but if they did my answer would have
been pretty generic basically that I'm
not trying to kill anybody I'm not out
here harming people so Do no harm is
would have been a value that I would
have said and I probably would have also
remembered creativity because creativity
has always been pretty important in my
life
and
this this questioning of my values kind
of led me and of course I would have
researched this I would have looked
online and looked in books where I would
have uh read a similar views on this
topic and in my research I realized that
values are just one piece of the puzzle
or one facet of a broader concept and
that concept is having a personal
philosophy
I know it seems like we're going down a
few different rabbit holes here but just
bear with me okay so personal philosophy
what is that well our personal
philosophy is our North Star it is the
compass that we live our lives by and a
lot of the time we we essentially
everyone has a personal philosophy
it's just that it's not articulated or
it's not something that we think about
but
this philosophy actually at least in my
reading I'm not saying that this is
wrote or written anywhere but in my
reading whenever I read about personal
philosophy these these facets came up
right so
our personal philosophy comprises our
values and our values as we said before
the guiding principles that are
important in our life
it also comprises our core beliefs which
which is basically the lens through
which we perceive reality so it's how we
think it's our mindset
and these our values under core beliefs
influence our goals that we set for
ourselves and of course to actualize
these goals we need to have habits or we
need to act in a certain way
to achieve these goals so
um
essentially these are these are the
components and I would have focused more
on values at least at this point simply
because that's what Cal also focused on
in in the book as a as an important part
of determining how we interact with
technology
so
the values that I essentially
I went through a list so James Clay has
a list of his core values and there were
other lists I will most likely in my
newsletter this week I will compile all
of these links that I would have used as
sources but I will compile the put the
link for James Claire's or you can just
Google it James Claire core beliefs or
core values that will come up first
but in that list
these are the these are the principles
that stood out to me as being the most
important in my life
um
so once I determined these values I then
started to think okay how am I going to
flash this out more how am I going to
make some notes and to write down what
these things mean to me in some more
detail and also relate that back to
digital minimalism using the concepts
and the principles that Cal would have
talked about in the book
and that's where I went into my digital
workspace and I went into Tana
specifically and I began to really
assess uh my technology use based on
those suggestions from Cal in the book
so here we are in Tana I created this
sort of personal philosophy dashboard
and right now it's pretty bare I'm not
gonna lie it's pretty bad literally made
this again this is these digital free
space videos are what I'm doing right
now in my workspace so it may not be
completely oh well it is not fleshed out
in any way
but over time I go back and I work on
these things as I'm thinking about it
and as it pertains to my life so
I have my core values goals and
Technology use so I did create a super
tag for values because I had a mind that
there were a lot of different things
that I would need to think about but I
kept it very simple
to begin with so I just have a
description which is where I will type
the why why is creativity important to
me why is it essential in my life and
how do I want to use creativity in
different facets of my life life in
terms of Life areas right whether it's
career whether it's personal projects
Etc
and I also included a field for
clarifying questions and that is because
in James Claire on his website he does a
an Integrity report where he asked
himself uh different questions
pertaining to each value and I did put
some of them hair
so these are directly from his website
for one of his values it wasn't Ruth I'm
not sure it actually may have been Ruth
he asked himself these questions so
these are the kind of questions that I
want to answer in that this portion of
the value super tag
so I have my values I have my goals
which I would have talked about in the
annual review video last week and
Technology uses what we are talking
about today so as a list you can see
it's just the type of Technology it
could be social media it could be an
application it can be a device but what
we're doing here is an evaluation right
so obviously I need the technology
evaluation you can shorten that to Tech
eval or whatever but
let's go into what I have for for
Twitter I like seeing this as a card for
something for some reason but um I don't
have any image
so these are the these are the this is
the default content here the fields for
each for these technology evaluation
super tag and this is kind of the guide
that I want to use when I'm thinking
about how I'm using this piece of
technology I want to keep my core values
in mind therefore
when I fill this out I can compare okay
how does this application impact on my
creativity or how do I want my
creativity to guide me in using Twitter
that's the the mindset behind having
this hair
I have a direct file you feel now quick
thing the only reason I have Fields is
because of the how I want to see the
information I don't have just plain
nodes because I got frustrated with
indenting and out denting and
it's just easier to see the information
side by side so I have it as a field
Direct Value what value does this serve
in my life for Twitter I know that I am
able to meet people with shared
interests I'm able to learn from these
people I can share my own ideas and I
can get feedback on my projects this is
how Twitter this is why I haven't
deleted my Twitter essentially because I
still get some value from it
now these questions here are all
questions that Carl would have
encouraged us to ask in the book before
we did or after we did a digital
declutter so he also asked how does a
tool how does this tool in this case
Twitter impact my time and attention but
time during the week how much time am I
spending on this you know so for Twitter
I use it approximately 20 to 30 minutes
a day and it's probably less than that
because I literally just go on check my
curated list of people that I want to
stay up to date and keep in touch with I
check my messages I check my
notifications and then I'm off so I've
really called down my use of Twitter
since I deleted it from my phone and
since I unboxed it from my web browser
from Arc
Cal also employs us to set standard
operating procedures which is
essentially how and when we are going to
use this tool so for Twitter
I do not have the mobile app on either
my phone or my iPad or anywhere I use it
via the browser within the fixed 20 to
30 minute social media window that I
have this prevents me from checking
notifications constantly and it just has
a restriction essentially to keep me
where I need to be
and to decrease my use of how long I
spend there
and I of course only well mainly
interact with my curated list this is
the compile list of people that I want
to keep in touch with sometimes I do go
back to home like once in a while to see
if there are any new updates of
different apps but generally I'm in my
curated list
alternatives are there any activities
that I enjoy outside of the digital
world that may be better than using this
tool now this one is a hard one for me
because I am not keen not that I'm not
keen I just don't enjoy I'm very
socially introverted so I don't enjoy
necessarily going out on socializing and
you know doing things face to face
and very much a homebody so I wrote that
I could consider if there are any
courses or Summoners on things that I'm
interested in although I can't really
see that happening maybe I will have to
be the one to make it because Trinidad
um is not
it's it's hard to find certain things
but you never know it might exist and
maybe that's a better use of my time or
some of my time so maybe I can augment
the daily use to
once a week twice a week three times a
week and the rest of my time I can put
that into actually going to some sort of
talk or course so this is the type of of
thinking that he's trying to jog when we
ask this question you know is there
something else that you could do in the
real quote-unquote world that might be a
better alternative
and lastly I just have an option field
for the type of media so whether it is
social media application or device
because I would like to use this
um do something similar to for iPad and
laptop Etc
and lastly I have an archive and the
idea behind this is that this is going
to change of course uh therefore I want
to keep the previous
versions of it so I can put the date
here and there's just screenshot this
and plug that in and that's kind of my
little Archive of how I've how my social
media use has developed over time
and that's where I am currently as I
said this is not a fully packaged thing
ready to go but it's how I'm currently
thinking about my social media use and
how digital minimalism the book by Kyle
Newport is helping me to interact and to
further evaluate my technology use
and um that is pretty much it for now
that's what I've been up to in my
digital workspace this week
I fee feel free to let me know your
thoughts on digital minimalism in the
comments on Twitter via DM or commenting
on the post or even sending me an email
Weitere ähnliche Videos ansehen
Digital Wellbeing | Annette White-Klososky | TEDxUCO
RULE ZERO | Deciphering Women's Social Media Behavior
Créer une Start Up de 0, à 21 ans | Build In Public Ep.2
The Non-Needy Networking Process (How To Make High Value Connections)
Hidup tanpa media sosial = lebih bahagia?! Maudy Ayunda's Booklist
Is your phone taking over your life?
5.0 / 5 (0 votes)