Blogging And Digital Minimalism

Byrichard

Blogging and Digital Minimalism are related. Blogging is about finding a topic and focusing on it for an extended period of time. Social media has shifted from being a conversation between individuals to one where personalities broadcast, and their audience is ignored.


When I saw an article, read a book, or had a thought I would tweet or write one or two sentences and post it to Facebook or Google Plus. When social media was about private conversations between individuals, and when no one was making profits of billions from our habits it made sense. Today using social media is about wasting our time, while others benefit, without benefiting ourselves.


I started to read Digital Minimalism. He and others argue that our digital habits are about addiction rather than about feeling that we are connected with others. In the age of the car and the commuter, it makes sense for us to use digital devices to connect with others. Neither Facebook and Instagram nor Twitter have this at their core anymore.


Social media was a distraction from working on projects because it was a means by which to connect with others. Now that this is no longer the case we can revert to blogging and other projects.


Recently someone joked that no one reads blogs anymore. The value of a blog post is not derived from whether someone reads it, likes it or shares it. The value of the blog post is in taking half an hour to two hours to focus on a specific topic. It is an investment.


Returns on Investment


Focus: By writing a blog post you go from skimming through dozens of tweets a minute to thinking about a single topic for minutes or even hours. You go from skimming to thinking. Some journaling apps ask if you want to count the time you spend writing, as mindfulness minutes, I.E. meditation.


Writing: Writing for half an hour to two hours every day trains you to come to a blank page and fill it. You need to be creative or inspired. Shifting from copying a link, writing a sentence or two for Facebook or Twitter, and then sharing it is easy. You can repeat it countless times an hour. Writing a blog post, especially three hundred or more words is a challenge. That’s why it has value. Blogging is a skill. Through daily practice, you improve both your confidence and your ability to generate written content.


Editing: The more I write, the more time I have to think about form and style. When I run out of inspiration I go back over the previous paragraph and I re-work sentences and phrases, tightening them up and making them clearer. As writing becomes easier, so more time and attention is devoted to quality control. The result is a higher quality of content.


Ambition: Spending time on social media is passive. You read and comment on the work of others in short bursts. Blogging requires people to have the focus and self-confidence to write, edit, and then share long-form content. On numerous occasions, I have written blog posts and never shared them. This is either because I ran out of inspiration halfway through or because it was not positive enough.


Consistency: Nanowrimo and other projects teach you to be consistent for a week, a month or an extended period of time. Blogging fulfills the same role. It’s about having the discipline to sit and focus on a regular basis and write. It’s about training yourself to think about what you’re going to write tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. It’s about developing the habit of inspiration.


The Journey


Blogging, for me, is a way of reaching the goal of Digital Minimalism. By writing a blog post and focusing for an hour or two, I produce a tangible product. By taking a picture during a hike, bike ride or other activity and writing a blog post I am investing my time. If I had allocated the same amount of time to social media I would have nothing to show for it.


Having said this Digital Minimalism is a concept I am not familiar with so expect a different perspective shortly.

Approaching Day 180 In a Row of Learning German

Byrichard

I am approaching Day 180 in a row of learning German and I finally progressed to the emerald league on Monday. In my previous post, I wrote of the futility of striving to achieve the Apple Activity challenges. I see the Duolingo challenges in a different light.


When learning a language it’s easy to hit walls and it’s easy to lose enthusiasm and drive. Starting a new module entails making a lot of mistakes and this discourages you from spending time on it. Life also gets in the way, with its distractions.


For a while I studied at the end of the day, just to keep my streak and to stay within the league I reached. The decision to revert to revising modules I had completed has helped.


Revision and consolidation


I went back through and revised the modules that it told me to revise, and when my confidence grew enough I went back to trying new modules and learning new words. Eventually, I revised some modules so much that I don’t need to look up the words. I don’t need to listen to a phrase three or four times to get every word. I am at the point where I hear the phrase once, and I can write it down.



Last week I earned around 658 XP, with 58 lessons completed, 33 words learned, and three hours and fourty two minutes spent studying. This excludes the one or two podcasts I listened to while doing other things. Yesterday when I listened to a podcast I noticed myself understanding more words.


The League Tables


Position 12 in the Emerald league with 236 XP so far today.


League tables encourage you to study harder. On the first day you study to place yourself in the top ten, and that means up to ten lessons at a time. Now amplify this by seven and you’ve got the motivation to complete 70 lessons or more per week. That’s an investment of three hours per week to learn a new language. Contrast that to the 50 XP per day daily goal. That’s 35 lessons. The encouragement has doubled.


Checkpoints


I am now working through Checkpoints Four and Five. I am consolidating my knowledge of the words within that checkpoint. I am also working my way through learning new words in level five. It’s a slow process but I want to ensure that I learn the words properly. By going too fast a few weeks ago I overwhelmed myself and had to go back and revise, to continue. I am moving forward again.


Note-taking


I have started to keep notes by day. When I struggle with certain words or phrases I copy them to the Day One app. I can refer to them any time. I can revise these phrases more frequently. With repetition, these words or phrases will sink in.


The Web App


I liked to use the web app for a while. With the German dictionary, it made learning easier. I would start typing the word I wanted and it would auto-complete. With an update, the link between the app and dictionary was broken. This resulted in predictive text inserting mistakes. It went from being a comfortable mobile phone app to being a nuisance. Learning a new language is hard enough, without the predictive app adding an extra layer of difficulty.


With the web app I don’t have any such issues. It’s simple, effective, and when I struggle with a phrase I can copy and paste it into Day One for easy access.


Summary


It’s easy to install an app or start using a website and within days or weeks forget about it. In 2015 I installed the app but forgot about it. I started using it properly in February 2019. Since then I use it almost daily. My streak is at 178 days. I’m tempted to experiment with Babbel, in parallel because you get certificates for modules completed.

The March Walking Challenge

The March Walking Challenge

Byrichard

I’m on the Apple Activities March Walking Challenge this month. The app has decided that I must walk or run 298 kilometres. It’s an average of 9.6 kilometres a day. This is both easy and challenging at the same time. Walking 10 kilometres takes about two hours.


When I had a broken arm I walked more than two hours a day, because I had nothing else I could do. I also walked that much because I couldn’t bike, take the car or drive the scooter. As a result, I needed to walk for everything.


My arm isn’t broken anymore. I’m happy to do two hours of exercise a day. I like to devote some of that time to cycling. Cycling 300 kilometres for me would be around 10 bike rides. I would complete the challenge in 12 hours or less.


App Weaknesses


Last month the challenge was to reach 500 Calories per day for 28 days out of 29 and I would have reached that goal if it hadn’t been for making the mistake of uploading a workout from Strava to Garmin. By doing this the app decided that instead of burning 1200 calories according to the Apple Watch activity app I had done just 220. Instead of being angry or frustrated I simply decided to take it easy for the rest of the month (a whole two days left).


The problem with the Apple watch is that you have no way of saying “use this data, not that data. If you make a mistake you have no way of undoing it.


The weather


We just had two days of rain and today is sunny. When it’s raining the appeal of going for a walk is lower. Going for a walk involves dressing for the rain, not being able to see or hear as well as usual. It also involves feeling the cold wind. Luckily when I was facing into the wind for one leg of yesterday’s walk I was on the last stretch, and I was warm from walking.


I wore my hiking boots. The beauty of hiking boots is that they’re waterproof and you can walk through puddles and streams without getting wet. I did walk through streams and puddles. I enjoy it. I had walked through mud. My excuse for walking in the stream of water by the side of the road was that it would clear the mud off of them before I walked back into the apartment.


One of the paradoxes of apartment cleaning is that it’s always done on the day when you’re most likely to walk in the mud and bring some back in. When mud is wet it stays on the shoes. The next day, when you’re running down the stairs, as usual, you dump a nice trail of mud behind.


Routing (pronounced rooting, not grouting).


I considered changing my routes. I would walk through muddy bits at the beginning of my walks and the clean ones, on the way home. This minimises the quantity of mud on my shoes when I get home. The second option is to wear the hiking shoes I keep in the car, on muddy days. Bringing mud into the garage doesn’t matter.


Methods


  • Ten kilometres a day – two hours of walking
  • Ingress – either by completing missions or by participating in an event
  • Peak days – walk 20 kilometers on some days
  • Running – running the same distance takes less time, but impacts the knees


Walking ten kilometres a day can be achieved either by simply spending as little time sitting as possible. We easily walk ten kilometres a day during a conference. We’re even likely to walk the equivalent of twenty kilometers


Ingress Missions and days are a good way to stand, and walk for hours at a time. In both cases, you’re covering reasonable distances.


Peak days are those where you walk twenty to thirty kilometers on one day, and bank the distance, so that on other days you can devote time to other tasks, such as writing blog posts.


Running is a good way of covering bigger distances in the same amount of time. It requires the right surface and shoes.


The futile Challenge


At the end of the day, the challenge is futile. If I cycle thirty plus kilometers I’m challenging myself to climb up hills, I’m challenging myself to sprint as fast as cars through villages, and sometimes I keep up on 50 kilometer per hour sections. If the weather is good cycling makes more sense.


I should achieve the challenge quickly, and get back to cycling.