The Skype Drink – Technology Hacks

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Technology doesn’t always have to be a bane to us simple-seekers.

I learnt about a new phenomena this week, called the Skype drink. I doubt you’ll have heard of it because I’ve borrowed the expression from a friend who might be unique in his adoption of this adaptation

It entails setting up a time to have a drink with a friend who is a long way away and instead of doing it in a pub or bar – having that drink on Skype. He sits there with good friends sipping on a beer or cup of tea and sets time to have a chat, regardless of the usual ‘get the conversation done’ attitude that Skype can promote.

I love it when we break with the norm and use technology, or habits, in ways that help us rather than hinder us.

Rather than ‘like’ a friend’s post, or forward an email, here are a few things I like to do:

  • Write a note to a friend who I haven’t spoken to in a while, or have been thinking of to say ‘I love and miss you’. Perhaps followed by an encouragement that the person doesn’t have to respond
  • Ring someone for absolutely no reason at all
  • Write a postcard, even if I’m at home. There’s one friend (you know who you are), to whom I always send postcards that come from one place and then send them from another. i.e. pick up a postcard in Prague and then write it and get a friend to send it when she heads out to Beijing. Quirky, but fun!
  • Make a mix CD and send it, the days of mix tapes are gone, but the love of them aint. The reason why I have a house in Kenya is probably because I once sent a mix CD out to a new friend out there and that’s when she realised we were buddies.
  • Using an iPad as a table tennis bat*
  • Set up a reminder on your computer not to use your computer any more
* not true

B-Town, Simplicity and Authenticity

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I’ve been in Berlin now for all of three weeks, so this may well be premature, but this city seems to embody simplicity so much more than London.

I’m moderately hard on London in my posts. I wonder whether this is because it was the city I grew up in and, therefore, an expression of some internal discontent that is more about me than my birthplace? Or perhaps London truly is difficult and anti-simple? Most probably a mixture of the two.

Instead of being a bore and continuing the anti-London rant, here’s why Berlin seems so great, so far:

There is a latent authenticity, captured in the melting pots of the city, the attitude, in people’s clothing – a general sense that people are following their passions, without any regard for financial or status-driven motivations. The city seems filled with artists, musicians, poets and writers.

Living with housemates well into your 30s is not considered poor form. Being broke isn’t frowned upon. For some, it is a badge of honour overtly displayed to celebrate the focus on one’s integrity.

Whereas money is overtly displayed in London, Berlin has a healthy disregard for bling. Clearly Berlin is poor and that life can be difficult, but that doesn’t mean you have to go work for a bank.

In many parts of the city, Berlin is ugly, but that doesn’t mean that an individual cannot make their corner beautiful and different.

It may well be that it’s August and I’m a foreigner, but at cafés, bars and out on the streets, people seem remarkably friendly and much more willing to engage with one another. It is highly unlikely that in London a German would be welcomed into people’s social lives on first meeting, yet here people offer you friendship with genuine grace.

More important, wherever I go, people seem to be walking slowly, and enjoying themselves.

I’m told that the winter months are extremely difficult here. Perhaps I’m just witnessing the blooms of summer?

Nonetheless, with increasing love for the city, I wonder whether I’ll be here for a month or a year. Then I remember to try not to plan and let this next month pass before I step into the next.

Either way, Berlin seems like a never-never land, with a similar spirit to my beloved San Francisco, where people seem freer and happier, friendlier and ready to ‘carpe diem’. A place where life is lived.

Thank you B-town.

Simple Letter of the Week

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The Letter of the week in the week a few weeks back was a wonderful reminder to disconnect:

To the Independent:

“I went to hear James Cleick talk at the British Library a few weeeks ago about how we are constantly subjected to almost infinite amounts of information. I talked to him about this later, and we agreed that self-filtering is an inevitability. Not spam-filtering – self-filtering.”

“I walked home thinking about this, and had a Eureka moment somewhere around Clerkenwell. I threw my iPhone in a bin. I expect a homeless person now has it; best £500 I ever threw away.”

“The next day I bought a little Nokia with a decent-ish camera on it for £50, and downloaded my phone numbers onto it from my laptop. Then I took the laptop into my office and haven’t brought it back. I now live without a computer. It was like giving up drugs.”

“That Saturday I lay in bed reading a book. I have started scanning Time Out over lunch to see what’s on, and now go to see interesting stuff in the evenings as I used to. I’m not sure why this has happened, but it has. My partner has commented on how relaxed I am and how much more I seem to do in a day. I am aware of the common pitfalls of reformed addicts so I hardly ever mention this to my friends. The ones who have noticed think I’m a weird luddite.”

“I feel a little like the only AA person in a pub. They all sit checking their iPhones frantically every minute or so. And me? Well, I don’t”

Tim Pyne, London

Welcome Tim! Not sure about the tramp with the iPhone, maybe a charity would have been better – but sometimes you just don’t worry about what trousers you’re wearing when you have a Damascene moment.

There has also been other pieces recently about disconnecting. This from Rowdy Kittens is a nice piece, plus I noticed another article which mentioned that more and more people are disconnecting from Facebook. Bring it  the on. Or is that off.

Have a great bank holiday, UKers.

Simply Berlin and Vagabonding

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About five days ago I moved to Berlin, continuing my theme of vagabonding rather than settling. In the last three years, I’ve lived in San Francisco, Kenya and now Berlin is my home. The first two were both unforgettable and life changing, so I hope this meandering remains as positive as it has been.

At this stage in life, probably just short of the looming familiar responsibilities that tend to arise in one’s 30s, I’ve been fortunate enough to have had the opportunity for this exploration.

At times I’ve envied others whose businesses and relationships have gone from strength-to-strength. At others, I’ve figuratively pounded my itchy feet in the dust of freedom and lived in a way that wouldn’t have been possible if things had gone ‘to plan’.

One thing is for sure, I’ll never regret these last few years, even if I’m far from where my younger self imagined I might be and I suffer a fair few lonely evenings.

Although my new business is based in the UK, the nature of the work (almost solely phone-based) and my desire not to get sucked into London life, means that Berlin offered a inexpensive, accessible alternative.

Yet the changes haven’t been without strain. Starting a new business on your own is difficult. Really difficult.

It requires the dedication to get out of bed each morning and to self-motivate, even when there’s little other than your wavering self-belief to keep you at your desk. In an industry like mine, where you rely on just a handful of contracts each year, it also means you can spend many months working hard before your first cheque arrives in the mail.

It is an unsettling time – leaving you unsure whether it will be next week or five months down the line that you start to see tangible results. It involves trusting yourself, your offering and the process enough to keep you motivated. Sometimes, the insecurity can get a hold of you, but you have to persevere and push through the self-doubt.

My decision to move to Berlin is questionable. It could further exacerbate the feeling of alienation. In London I have friends, family and a home. Surely when you’re working alone and hard, it’s good to be around those who can support you?

This line of thought holds some truth. Yet there’s also something to be said for spicing up one’s environment and enjoying new perspectives to keep things fresh.

Certainly it’s possible that I won’t be able to enjoy the city as I might if I were here to study, or simply to learn German. That’s a sacrifice I’ll have to make.

Yet the benefit is that at the end of each day I can reward myself with something new and different. Being in a new place, there is a lack of community, but there is also a chance to learn on every street corner and meet new people.

I have no idea how long I’ll stay. At the moment, I’m committed to spending a couple of months and seeing how this vagabonding goes, and to try to make it work for the short-term. Who knows, the short might extend into the long.

All you can affect is the present.

***

POSTSCRIPT - I realise I’ve recently meandered into navel-gazing rather than simplicity tips for you, dear reader – so I will make an effort to try to add the existential with the practical. More to follow and I promise to be less of a curmudgeon about London and life in the UK (as one reader noticed – negativity isn’t the way). I guess after Africa you sometimes see things with fresh and alarming perspective.

Thanks for all your kind thoughts, support and wishes. It’s a surprise to me how many people actually read these ramblings.

iQuit (part 2) Simply giving up

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Not altogether.

iQuitting completely would be a little bit over dramatic.

But I’m iQuitting or at least reducing a number of habits. Bad ones.

I used to be a slave to e-mail. I still find myself checking the e-letter-box each morning with an alarming neurosis, but I’m slowly improving.

It feels good not to check mails for a few days. I press the delete key more often, and check e-mails considerably less.

I need to send a lot of emails for work, but I’m stemming the tide… slowly.

I used to have two iPhones, one for the US and one for the UK. I still have them because I don’t believe in buying new stuff for the sake of it – but I use ‘pay as you go’ and therefore can’t use any on-the-move Internet services. It’s just a phone. Sure, it’s like filling a Ferrari with chip fat, but it works. I save a small fortune in time and money. Plus in the rare moments when I’m on the tube or waiting for a friend I can sit and think or, god forbid, read a book (no, not a newspaper or magazine, which is just more of the same).

I used to answer these phones and reply to text messages immediately. Now I leave them off for hours, or fail to reply. My friends and even my clients still seem to tolerate me — in small doses.

I used to be up to date with all the programmes that helped my efficiency, whether they be faster browsers, databases or widgets. Now I use a moleskin to write most things down and tend to ignore new installments, or software. You should try paper — it’s amazing — you can draw anything without having to plug anything in, and it has all the latest features like crossing out, sketching, writing and tangible capabilities, only limited by your own skill and page-turning abilities.

I used to desire the latest, shiniest, fastest computer, but now I use the same Mac I’ve had for four years. I recently took it in to be serviced and Apple kindly (despite this rant, they’re still a good company) made it almost as good as new, replacing a number of worn out bits. I hope it lasts another five years. If it’s a little slower than it used to be, that’s just fine.

I used to have a huge hard drive with all my songs and movies on it, in case I needed something. Now I delete all films I’ve watched and all songs I don’t like.

I used to keep chat open in case people needed me. Now I always leave chat off, or remain invisible. They can call me.

I used to have a great stereo, fast car and all the gismos. Now I only have the things here in Berlin that I need, nothing more.

Here’s to iQuitting. I started a group on Facebook, relishing the delicious irony. It got a full eight members before I realised I had to administer every member. Then I realised how rubbish Facebook really was and decided to give up Facebook altogether. I tried deactivating my page, which felt good. Then I realised I don’t really abuse Facebook too often anyway, so I’m back, but Facebook-lite. If you’re reading this because of my link on my Facebook page, that’s automatic, by-the-by.

I truly believe that Facebook isn’t good for us – here’s an interesting article explaining why. 

This week I’ve started purging my Twitter account of useless followers. A few thousand down already, I’m going to see if I can get down under a hundred.

There will be more tales of deactivation shortly. First, I must revel in the sense of liberation I have from iQuitting.

Try unplugging, removing and ignoring.

It’s time to iQuit, bit by bit.

iQuit

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If I get yet another e-mail that smugly notifies me that the e-mail received was ‘sent from my iPad’ or ‘iPhone’, I will set up an auto-filter that highlights these e-mails to warn me that they were sent by someone with little time (or at least someone that is SO busy that they have to check e-mails on the move).

This might help me determine which e-mails have been sent thoughtfully and with love, rather than absentmindedly and on the hoof.

Or perhaps an auto-reply with something equally smug in return, like ‘sent from my iGod’… so important have these mobile devices become.

iPhones and iPads and instant messaging and Facebook updates and Twitter and Internet on effing planes – the onslaught is evil.

Yes that includes these rambles. Don’t bother reading this blog, go and have a cup of tea or a pint of beer with a friend if you can.

We’re all so busy keeping ourselves busy that we have no time.

Today I’m off to Berlin for a while…

I’ve had enough.

iQuit

It’s out of the Diary

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Spontaneity is dead.

I’ve only been back from Kenya for a couple of weeks and already my diary is chock-a-block full for every evening and weekend for the next couple of months.

How did this happen? I’m sure this isn’t part of the simplicity process?

Certainly it is nice to feel so ‘wanted’ by others to have plans-a-plenty, but without room for spontaneity, life becomes rather fixed. Certainly time passes much more quickly when one is always rushing from one ‘do’ to another. Is that a good thing?

Yesterday someone who I don’t know very well but would love to know better texted me and asked me for a drink. We gave up trying to find a suitable spot when we got two months away without an opening. They probably think I’m avoiding them – the opposite of the sentiment I was hoping to portray.

One of the reasons that I find London difficult is the sensation that this phenomenon is true for everyone. Each event or meeting is filled with people who are only there for a pre-planned period. People are continually aware of where they are going to be and when, meaning there is little fluidity. The distance needed to get around town also means that plans have to be made early.

It’s a sad state of affairs to live in a pre-ordained world of peripateticism and, I am convinced, it leads to the discontentment that drives much of our consumerist, self-centred behaviour.

I’d like to reclaim my valuable time and leave room for spontaneity and even, God forbid, boredom. Not that I actually want to be bored but much of this planning is about avoiding boredom, rather than enabling fulfilment.

A few simple diary rules for the Simpletom:

1)    Leave one or better still two nights a week plan-less, but book them into your diary as ‘free’ so you aren’t tempted to fill them.

2)    Book out times in the day in your diary to complete important tasks, or go for a walk

3)    Say ‘maybe’ to all events if you can without upsetting people, leaving you the opportunity to cancel if necessary.

4)    Over-estimate how much time things will take rather than under-estimate – leaving you with space rather than forcing you to rush around.

5)    Don’t put event after event back to back – try leaving some spaces, enabling a walk in the park between meetings.

6)    Learn to say ‘no’ to time-sucking friends or events that don’t contribute positively. You know who / what they are!

7)    Be brave enough to move people or events if necessary.

Now all that is left is to use these, rather than suffer the abuse of your own poor diarising.

Simply Getting Used

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I’ve been working reasonably hard recently. My body, not used to such unfair punishment, has been complaining.

After a day in front of the computer and on the phone, my neck, my back, my throat and my free-spiritedness hurts. Yet after a couple of weeks, I’ve noticed the pain, or perhaps the realisation of the pain, slowly diminishing.

A gentle reminder that we get accustomed to things.

Our ability to adapt is powerful. With attention in mind as this month’s theme (which when I attend to it again, I realise I have not been doing very well) – it’s worth pointing out that we stop noticing things the more we get accustomed to them.

That’s both good and bad – advantageous and disadvantageous.

Patterns help us develop good habits, and bad. Familiarity helps us see new things and ignore old.

It’s useful to bring this into focus.

For example, there are things that I find hard at first, such as work, running, meditation, not planning, being disconnected or simplifying – that become easier the deeper I delve and the harder I try. If these things remained as difficult as when starting, I would fail to persevere (even more than I do).

Yet there are also things that I become accustomed to quickly, like the tiredness London initiates, advertising’s prevalence, routine, the amount that people (myself included) drink when socialising, processed food, the weather, envy, not saying hello to people in the street.

It’s a shame when you begin to accept things that are wrong, just because they’re normal.

Reading back over my previous post about returning from Africa, I realise how quickly I’ve lost some of the wide-eyed-ed-ness.

It’s time to develop good habits, however hard they are to start, in the knowledge that they’ll become easier (while, of course, remembering not to try to pull too many of them off at the same time – Franklin-style)

Meanwhile, I’m trying to be attentive to the pieces of life that are unacceptable yet become normal because of a lack of awareness. I’m trying to imagine what it would be like for a Kenyan to see what I see and experience what I experience – to prevent the negative influences and habits breeding.

Making a Meal of Life

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Imagine you are a gourmet chef, preparing the meal of your lifetime. With one caveat – you only have your local supermarket to shop in.

How carefully would you select each and every spinach leaf? How long would you spend at the butchery counter, trying to find that perfect cut of beef? Think of the attention and focus you would use to ensure you got the finest ingredients that store had to offer.

You ARE making a meal of your lifetime.

With every moment that passes, you select the things to include in the basket that catch your attention and leave the rest – whether that be the job you select, the magazines or books you read and the people you choose to spend time with.

Besides, the reason for the local supermarket analogy is that most of us aren’t browsing in the organic delis of our lives. There you can find many rotten tomatoes, tasteless but juicy-looking morsels, items filled with hidden additives, things that have been coloured and packaged to assault your otherwise attuned senses.

Every time you sit down to watch a crap TV show, or drag yourself to meet someone you don’t like, or work another day doing something you don’t believe in, you cannot go back to get a refund for that time.

Besides, your basket is small – you can’t do it all later. I don’t particularly like the expression ‘Life is too short’. For some, life is too long.

I believe that life offers enough time for all of us, if we choose to focus our energy and our time wisely. I don’t mean you have to fill each day to overbrimming with events and pastimes, in fact if you select just a few good-quality things I believe it is even more nourishing.

I wrote about attention last week. I’m doing it again, because I believe that attention on attention is vital. Simply by choosing the things you attend to, you can change more about your lifestyle than almost any other way. In addition, by really listening to yourself and being attentive to the subtle intricacies of decision making, you can begin to make positive changes.

Attention!

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Ladies and Gentlemen, can I have your attention?

I said ATTENTION

Google makes billions of dollars by grabbing tiny pieces of it from the periphery of your web experience. Other marketers make their living by capturing it through billboards, magazines, newspapers, the television and prevalent logos.

I’m asking you for yours for a moment now, politely.

See how long you can remain focused. Can you read through this article without getting distracted? Your own brain is often unable to give attention, even when it wants to. Meditators seek it for longer than the few seconds we can normally last without drifting off.

Attention is perhaps one of the most sought-after commodities today, as well as one of the most valuable things you possess. In any moment, individuals can fix their attention on many thoughts, objects or people. That attention might be deliberate, or, as is so often the case, we might not be able to control the wandering thoughts of our monkey mind.

It is uncanny how receptive society is to messaging – or put another way, how unable we are to avoid having our attention grabbed. Presidential elections are usually won by those who spend the most money on marketing. Film quality is often less important than marketing spend, in terms of box office success.
Are we really such basic creatures that we cannot stay true to our beliefs when barraged with messaging? Why, just because we hear more of something, are we more likely to believe it? Are we really so simple?

Unfortunately so.

In his book Affluenza, Oliver James examines the phenomena that those countries whose inhabitants have a higher rate of television viewing are more likely to suffer emotional distress because they become less happy with their lives.

I want to make two principal points about attention, for your attention:

One

The first is how often and how much of our attention is grabbed, rudely, by others. Think about the way you use your phone or computer. How often do you switch among applications, programs and messages?

How can you wrest your attention back so you remain in control?

With the power of focus, we can move the mind across countless kaleidoscopes and choose the things we do and don’t pay attention to. We can be in control, but also out of control.

My own methods include switching off my phone, removing all notifications, not reading newspapers or magazines, not having the Internet on my mobile device, leaving myself invisible on skype, refusing all newsletters, and turning off the Internet while I’m writing.

None leave me feeling disconnected – each helps me stay attuned to the moment. Figure out where to focus your attention and what to ignore.

Two

The second is the power of focused attention. If you can harness your attention, it is surprising how much more can be extracted from the same experiences.

Too often I find myself unable to enjoy the moment I am experiencing because of my wandering mind, or inability to give 100% of myself to that moment. When I do, life is usually richer, brighter and more powerful.

My midyear resolution is to try to focus on the book I’m reading when I’m reading it, writing to you when I’m writing, walking when I’m walking. By training my mind to enhance my ability to focus that attention on the moment, rather than remaining lost in thoughts, I’m convinced that my life will be fuller and freer.

Free

I’ll share my experiments in due course. Do share any tips you have in the meantime for staying focused. Zen Habits has a good section on focus.

Just remember that a second, minute or hour that passes can never be regained – so choose the focus of your attention wisely.

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