Day 10 of the “Digital Declutter experiment”, and three weeks more to go (and in case you don’t know what this is about, check this post).

With my absence from social media platforms where I usually share my posts, I can’t help but wonder how many people actually check in here:) I was tempted to check the stats for last week’s post, but I decided against it as I wasn’t sure what to expect. Well, if you’re reading this in the week it was posted, welcome to our weekly update on the month-long experiment I’m currently on.

Expectations vs. Reality

So far, it’s been an interesting experience. The mental tranquility that comes with unplugging from the hyperconnectivity makes for a conducive environment for deep contemplations. Also, I’m currently reading the book “Essentialism” by Greg McKeown, and I’m learning that not many things are truly essential. It is necessary to discern the vital few from the trivial many.

However, there’s a huge contrast between my expectations coming into the experiment and my experience. First of all, I had expected to assume some superpowers and blaze through all my set goals and tasks. But unfortunately, that isn’t happening. There are days that I just want to be lazy, doing nothing but watching one random YouTube video after another.

Well, that’s not a luxury I can particularly afford, so I end up dragging myself through my tasks. I eventually end up not getting much done. Usually, when things go that way, I would beat myself up for not being so productive, but I’m learning that it’s okay to be lazy sometimes.

Aside from the intermittent lack of motivation, I have realized I am very prone to overestimating my abilities. It’s one thing to set tasks, and it’s another thing to be realistic with the feasibility of achieving all your set tasks.

I’ve been experimenting with time-blocking lately —a productivity technique that involves assigning a time block to each task in the day. The results have shown that my estimates are often exaggerated. I might estimate a task to take 2 hours, only to go at it for 5 hours (of course, this is worsened by the fact that time seems to run at twice the normal speed these days).

This discrepancy between my estimation and reality eventually disrupts the plan for the rest of the day, and I’m unable to get to some things. The good thing, however, is that I’m aware of the time required for the task in question the next time I plan it into my schedule.

Gathering Momentum

Well, not everything isn’t going as planned — some things are. Even though the projects I had planned for this window aren’t getting done as fast as I’d want, I seem to be faring well with building habits.

For starters, I have successfully gotten out of bed at 7 am for several days in a row. I am also developing routines for bookending my day. My mornings start with my Quiet Time (a personal time of fellowship with God). At the closing end of the day, I have taken to traditional journaling (pen and paper style). I also try to do some reading before bedtime, which ranges from midnight to 1 am.

These habits, as insignificant as they seem, bring about an increased feeling of mindfulness. They also help in optimizing my productivity. We all know that waking up late often leads to a chaotic day. Also, daily journaling helps me analyze how the day went as well as track my progress. I haven’t gotten them fully under my belt yet, but I am definitely gaining momentum.

Social Media Lockdown

Of course, this entry would not be complete without mentioning Monday’s momentary social media shutdown. Interestingly, I delete the apps for 4 days, and then they stop working for hours.

I was working on my desk when one of my roommates walked up to me and asked if my WhatsApp was working as his own wasn’t. I thought it was just another network failure until another roommate came in moments later and confirmed the universal outage.

I was curious to know how the world was reacting to the situation, so I logged into Twitter via my browser, and I guessed right. I searched up “WhatsApp”, and the memes were already all over the space. There were different reactions —some made fun of the situation, others were somewhat disappointed at such an unexpected breakdown, and more so, the time it took to fix it. Some even claimed they were slowly turning to ape-men. Some claimed that their businesses were affected, and they had lost money. Some claimed Mark and his team were outsmarted by hackers, and some others believed it was an intentional move on their end to cover up a brooding scandal. I’m not sure what claim is true.

But one thing was clear in the few minutes I spent on the platform. Social media has become so integral in our everyday interactions, and eliminating it will cause a serious ripple effect across the board. As expected, there was another group of people who wished the shutdown was permanent. I’m not sure if this would be ideal, but I couldn’t help but imagine the effect of a permanent shutdown on our civilization. I think it’ll be fatal.

Side Gist…

My 10 days offline have made me realize how much I enjoy sharing the valuable gems I stumble upon in books or on the internet. Whenever I come across something that hits home with me, my first instinct is to share. But then I remember I’m offline, and I’m forced to keep the goodness to myself.

In another unrelated gist, I attempted to cook Fried rice by myself for the first time over the weekend, and I think it was a good trial —at least, my roommate thought so too:)

Until next week folks…

Ciao!