Digital Declutter
For the next 30 days I will be undertaking a digital declutter. During this time, I plan to abstain from the use of any “optional” technology.
In an age of rapid technological advancement that has permeated almost every aspect our daily lives, the goal of this exercise is to take a step back to gain some perspective and understanding on when, how, and why I use technology in my life.
What is a Digital Declutter?
The idea was inspired by the book Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. It’s based on the principle that gradually changing one’s habits around technology is ineffective, especially when opposed by the “engineered attraction of the attention economy” and “the friction of convenience”.
Rather what is needed to build a better relationship with technology so it works for us rather than the other way around is a rapid transformation in a short amount of time that is executed with conviction.
“In my experience, gradually changing your habits one at a time doesn’t work well — the engineered attraction of the attention economy, combined with the friction of convenience, will diminish your inertia until you backslide toward where you started.” — Cal Newport
For those of you who know me well, as someone who already does not regularly participate in most social media platforms and enjoys pontificating about the benefits of focus on productivity, this may not seem like as much of a significant challenge as it might be for some individuals.
True as this may be, there are still a number of areas in my life where I believe I could definitely afford to trim the digital fat that may be getting in the way of being more present and productive.
The Digital Declutter process
For a better understanding of the process (and its potential benefits) you should really check out the book however for the sake of convenience to my readers I’ll do my best to summarize it here.
The steps in my digital declutter are as follows :
Step 1 : Define your technology rules
Since any individual’s relationship with technology is well, individual, it’s important to define rules that work for you.
Given the current health climate in the world, and nature of remote work in 2020, it would be nearly impossible for most people to completely eliminate technology from their lives for 30 days. This is why each person needs to develop their own definition of what they consider to be “optional”.
For me this included making three lists — in, out, and restricted.
Examples of things that are “in” include essential tech I use for work related activities such as software development tools (ex. Github) professional communities (ex. LinkedIn, AngelList) basic communication tools (email, chat — more on this later) and of course blogging on this website.
Things that are completely “out” are non-essential social platforms (ex. Twitter) on-demand media (ex. Spotify, Netflix, Twitch) and video games (mostly MTGO). I also unsubscribed from most non-essential email lists.
Then there is the “restricted” list which are pieces of technology that I cannot (or don’t want to) completely abandon for 30 days but I plan limit the way they are used. For example, I use the Strava app to track my progress training for trail races. In order to continue to enjoy the benefits of having this data for training purposes (at least until after the Boulder Beast) but to avoid the interruptions and distractions that can be caused by the social features of the platform I disabled all notifications.
Step 2 : Take a break for 30 days
Once the rules of the game have been defined it’s time to take a break. The key to this step is to not just suffer in silence but rather replace the time that would have been spent (either intentionally or unintentionally) engaged with optional technologies instead on low-tech activities that bring you genuine joy and satisfaction.
For me this includes pursuits such as reading, writing, trail running, cooking, card games, board games, and going to the beach — which I haven’t done nearly enough since moving to a town on the shore!
Step 3 : Reintroduction
Finally, after the 30 days are over I plan to gradually reintroduce some of the non-essential technology that I eliminated back into my life if I believe it adds actual demonstrated value. At this time I’ll hopefully have the benefit of a more clear headed perspective generated by the temporary reprieve. As for those apps/tools/gadgets that I either didn’t miss or found a better way to achieve the same result, we’ll be saying goodbye forever.
Start where you are
I’m planning to document this process starting tomorrow and over the next 30 days with semi-regular posts along the way, although I won’t be cross-posting them to Twitter or any other social media platform.
Also please forgive me if I’m slow to respond to comments, since disabling all email & push notifications may require a little getting used to… onward!
