Doomscrolling shouldn’t be your day’s bookend (start and end). Catch yourself and do something that your future self will thank you for.
We are indeed living in the age of screens. As I write this post on my laptop, my wife is watching something on her phone while my two children are playing games on theirs. It isn’t a great look, but it’s a common one.
The Age of Attention
Attention is the currency of the Information Age, and the medium of choice is the phone or computer screen. It’s hard to compete with the glut of media available at the touch of a finger or on a keyboard. When too much data is available, we get analysis paralysis in choosing the poison we consume.
Pros of Living in Our Current Age
- We are most likely the most informed people so far in history
- We are all connected more than at any other time in history
- We can quickly become multifaceted persons as anything you may want to learn can be pulled up and searched
- Content can be consumed in multiple forms through a vast array of media
- With the propagation of AI tools, a lot of repeatable tasks become trivial
Cons of Living in Our Current Age
- Our attention (and time) is sucked up like a vacuum hose through the black holes of social media
- We’ve forgotten how to appreciate long forms of content; unlimited scrolling is a dopamine booster
- We’ve become more susceptible to echo chambers as the algorithms pump out the same type of content we consume
- We can often reinforce our biases without critical thinking and become indoctrinated without us knowing
The Vast Potential of Downtime
One day, while scrolling on my phone before going to sleep, I realized I had been looking at my phone for over a few hours. A few hours per day adds up to quite a lot of time. Three hours a day is 21 hours a week and 84 hours a month.
Our working hours are structured because we know the times we need to get into and out of work, but downtimes are usually not. Downtimes have the greatest potential for us to work on ourselves.
For example, if we could allot one of the three daily downtime hours to increase our skills and showcase something we create, we would be much better in a month. In a month, we would have twenty-eight hours worth of study. In a half-year, 168 hours.
The operative word is to create rather than to consume.
I understand that downtime can be used to unwind and de-stress after a long day, and it may seem like I’m advocating doing pseudo-work after actual work. But you should focus on something that you want to do, and this would lessen the friction because it is focused on manifesting your best self.
We are focusing on lessening our feelings of hopelessness after “wasting time” by actively scheduling what we do with our time.
We can manage things we can measure.
What I Do to Manage My Downtime
I consider myself a meticulous person. I like to plan things out before I do them. This is why I use my Knowledge Management System to flesh out everything that I need to do, record notable things that come to mind, and track things that I do.
I use many tools to manage my KMS and phone alarms to manage my downtime. My downtime is typically at night before bedtime, the best time for a father of two young kids. My creations of choice are my blogs, and I generally push for a post once a week.
First Hour: KMS Upkeep and Controlled Consumption
My downtime is typically two to three hours a day. It starts with an alarm at 8:30 PM, and I use around 20 minutes for my KMS upkeep. Afterward, I spend the rest of the hour watching things that interest me.
I usually watch videos from subscribed YouTube channels. For long-form content like podcasts, I use a tool called Fabric to summarize it into smaller, digestible chunks. All of these still go into my KMS. If the summary of a specific video or content interests me, I bookmark it and schedule a watch.
Second Hour: Creating Posts and Related Content
I have another alarm at 9:30 PM, prompting me to start my blog post routines. During this hour, I return to what I was working on yesterday. I may be working on multiple posts, as there are times that I have writer’s block on some pieces I’m writing.
I don’t force myself to finish, as it would show in the final product. I would rather write until I have accomplished everything that I need to write.
Sometimes, I don’t feel like writing, which can be due to a lack of energy or motivation. If this is the case, I try my best to push out a couple of sections, or if the words don’t come, I create outlines for the next ones.
I can also check out some of the topics I have in storage and write some outlines for those.
If all else fails, I simply go back to consuming controlled content. I would rather read a book or watch a podcast than doom-scrolling until I fall asleep.
Wrapping Things Up
You don’t need a KMS, nor do you need to do what I do, but the main point is to manage our downtimes and contribute something to achieve our best selves.
We don’t need mindless consumption but mindful creations.
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