First of all, Happy New Year! I hope you had a lovely holiday season. Mine was filled with a great deal of food, family, and a lot of game and movie nights. I cooked and baked and sat around in pajamas drinking coffee or hot tea with my kids. I actually had all my shopping done three weeks early and everything was wrapped and under the tree two weeks early. That was a complete first. It felt really good and so much less stressful.
I have now put all the Christmas finery away and everyone went back to job and school today except my college student. He drove back in today after a trip for a funeral with his fiancé (her great grandfather). She is now with her family and he is back here for a few days before a new semester begins. We will take every minute he will give us.
Now, about this analog thing… What do I mean by ANALOG? There are several different definitions but we will go with letters c and d here… I will highlight it for clarity.
Definition of analog
1a: of, relating to, or being a mechanism or device in which information is represented by continuously variable physical quantities Your speakers are analog technology in all its nearly century-old glory … .
b: of or relating to an analog computer
In an analog machine each number is represented by a suitable physical quantity, whose value, measured in some pre-assigned unit, is equal to the number in question.— The World Treasury Of Physics
c:: of a timepiece : having both hour and minute hands
an analog watch
d: not digital : not computerized
What I am not doing is going off to live in a cabin in the woods with no technology. I am just evaluating the distractions and putting some things down for awhile. What kinds of things in our lives are dependent upon being plugged in and signed on? I will be taking the next few weeks to determine how much of my life is digitized or computerized. I suspect it is more than I realize. Then I want to make a plan to make 2022 much more “analog” than it is now.
The one place I won’t cut out is this little corner of the internet. I want to continue to share here but there will be some serious slashing of the rest of my digital life by January 31st. Has anyone else felt that tug to leave the internet behind more? As talk of a metaverse has surfaced I have felt compelled to leave much of it behind. I am not interested in living in a virtual world. I like the real world much more. I don’t want to get to the end of every day and think that it was wasted. I don’t want to be ruled by an addiction that hypnotizes me into lethargy and slothfulness. The things I do want include, but are not limited to…
Benefits of Offline Living
- Deeper walk with Christ
- Build a richer personal life
- Becoming more human and less product – our internet use has made us the product. (check out the documentary on Netflix entitled The Social Dilemma)
- Reducing the idols in my life – because we all have them.
- Bring more balance and real productivity to my days
- Real friendships and relationships outside of the internet
- Building my attention span and focus
- Slowing Down and living in the moment
- Downtime with my husband or time to think alone.
I have deleted all non-essential apps on my phone already. That would include my YouVersion app. I have deleted all of my social media except for Instagram (but it is still not on my phone) and I am really living on the fringe with that one. I am contemplating a switch to a dumb phone. My computer usage is limited to email, blogs, articles and recipes from reliable sources, instructional videos on YouTube and music. I am keeping some podcasts for news and updates but my list is very limited. For the most part I am moving back toward old fashioned analog tools. I already limit my screen watching time by not having cable or news access. We do have Roku with a few subscription channels for when I do want to enjoy a movie but I don’t just sit and watch anything just to veg out. I read books to do that. LOL
Analog Tools
- Floral soft cover NASB Bible (my birthday gift from my husband) and a Paul David Tripp Devotional that was gifted to me by my youngest son a few years ago (replacing my YouVersion app)
- A printed Chronological Bible in a year reading plan to go in my Bullet Journal
- Scripture memory cards handwritten on index cards
- A real paper book of maps
- Paper books from my shelves
- An old analog watch dragged out of a drawer with a new battery added
- My old Canon AE1 analog camera (I have discovered a few sources for old 35mm film)
- My Bullet Journal with hand drawn calendars, lists, trackers, etc…
- Markers, pens, pencils, notebooks
- A hand written food and exercise journal
- I have a real turntable and some vinyl albums . This unit also includes a real knob tunable radio, cassette and CD players and an aux outlet to plug in my ipod or phone if I just need to. LOL We found this in a box in Dan’s mom’s garage after his father died… totally brand new in the box. She gifted it to us. Some things are worth keeping even if they use some digital technology.
- Tennis shoes for outside walks instead of using the treadmill (unless the weather is miserable)
- A Ukulele and a printed chord finger chart (also dragged out my flute and fife) and a huge list of songs to learn
- Crochet supplies and yarn
- I had my sewing machine serviced to use more often.
- A list of sewing and home project ideas
- A large collection of real cookbooks for hours of cooking fun and personal kitchen therapy.
Some Further Reading
8 Analogue Productivity Tools – article
Digital Detox articles from 2021 plus some Digital Detox Resolutions for 2022
A cool blog I have discovered… Life Analog: Resources Page
What’s Next?
I am hoping to write more on this throughout the year. It is really all just one big experiment for me. If you are interested in this please share below if you have changed how you use technology or how you might want to change your usage in this new year. Are you interested in joining me? Accountability is always a positive step. I hope something I have shared is helpful if you are on this journey, too.
I will continue to strive for two posts a week in 2022 with a random recipe post along the way. I am really going to restart my newsletter, too. I think I will start with a seasonal newsletter and see how I do with staying on track with that. My life has slowed a great deal since last April so I want to make that commitment. If you are interested in a newsletter there is a link to sign up for that when you open my blog. I do not post often so I won’t overload your inbox, I promise. I would love to have you join us. I will see you next week.
Happy New Year Blessings,
~Leann
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