2024-09-18 08:00:00
Work's back in full force, which has been interesting from a digital balance point of view. I know a lot of people who can't disconnect, have to check their emails and social media inboxes at all times, that sort of thing. I'm not one of them, these things don't stress me out like they used to. From a digital balance standpoint, going back to work from the summer holiday made little difference.
Don't get me wrong, I get plenty stressed by other things at times. Just like with the end of the year and its "we have to get this done now" nonsense, a lot of clients want to kickstart the autumn with deliverables. There's a difference between these periods of time because people come back somewhat energized from their summer breaks, whereas they just want to get things done by the winter holidays at the end of the year. Funny thing is, it always tapers off after the initial rush, so January and February are usually calm, and while the same might not be said by late September and October, it's back to business as usual at least.
I guess these stressful periods could be even more so if you were glued to your phone and had to check it when you wake up in the middle of the night, but I'm not that person.
What has happened since last time is that I've delegated the Punkt MP02 to weekends. There are too many situations where I need my iPhone. I can't even enter the gym without it unfortunately, a place where I really don't feel like I need it (music streams from the Apple Watch). I've mentioned needs like online identification through BankID, as well as the taxi services, but I've had to rely on the Maps app a couple of times as well. It's a different thing, a different life even, when you need to be able to navigate a city, where you're expected to have a smartphone at all times. Missing out is a real thing, and it's not just the good stuff either, it's crucial things like parking and charging the car. There's a way too silent debate in Sweden about the older generation and how they're not at all in tune with this new way to do things. I get that, society is a lot harder to navigate without a smartphone.
That doesn't mean that you have to be glued to you phone at all times obviously. Just putting it away for a month has removed a lot of those situations where I pick up the iPhone out of habit. I wouldn't say that it was a huge issue before, but it's even less so now. I put my iPhone on the charger when I get home, where it acts as a ridiculously overpriced clock, and then I take it off when I leave for work in the morning.
Some random thoughts, thus far into the experiment:
I'll be keeping tabs on my usage the coming weeks and months, to see if something changes. I do want to read more on paper, but it's tricky to break the habit of reading in bed, in the dark, with a screen that can handle that. We'll see how it goes.
— Thord D. Hedengren ⚡
2024-08-25 08:00:00
Hi!
I've been continuing the Digital Balance challenge, and come to the realization that not many people call me. As in, call me from a normal, actual phone number. Not FaceTime or a voice call through Telegram or Signal, just a typical phone call.
The setup I have for this challenge is that I'm forwarding my phone calls (and text messages, except iMessage obviously) to another number. I use an eSIM in my iPhone, and while I'd be able to move my number to a physical SIM card, I don't want to do that. Instead, I'm forwarding everything, which means that if you call or text me, the call or text ends up on my iPhone replacement. And yes, that's still the Punkt MP02.
Which brings me back to the amount of calls I get, or rather, the lack thereof. I've had several longer conversations through digital devices, but they've been video calls or through Telegram or Signal. Thinking about it, I'm pretty sure this is normal for me. The only people who call me the traditional way are my parents, my wife if something's really urgent (which it rarely is), and delivery companies. This week, I count three calls in total. And yes, one of those calls was indeed an UPS delivery person, which I missed.
Other than the fact that I apparently don't need a phone in the old school sense, I have some random thoughts from this week's adventures.
In no particular order, then:
No big surprises there. I will say however, that I've not kept my phone – iPhone nor MP02 – nearby at home. It's not there for easy access, I'm not scrolling Instagram or anything on it because I can't pick it up subconsciously, and get stuck doing something I hadn't planned on doing. When I get home, I put it on its charger, and it sits there until I need it. It's never on the table within reach or anything.
Not having the iPhone nearby has cut down on unplanned screen time for me. I use my iPad more, but that's a device that I, when I decide to pick it up, use with purpose. I won't get stuck doing nothing due to picking it up without thinking. The only time I pick up the iPad is when I want to do something specific.
This is true to a point, of course. I easily get stuck reading things, going down rabbit holes, if I'm not looking for something in particular. Question is, is that a bad thing? It depends. It's fine getting lost sometimes, when you're looking for something which leads to something else. What I don't want is to get lost when I didn't have a destination in the first place.
Next week will be a hectic one, with a heavy workload as well as social obligations and plans. It'll be interesting to see what that does to my device usage. Because as of now, I'm quite enjoying the fact that I'm a bit disconnected to the digital world, without the plethora of notifications and distractions it brings.
— Thord D. Hedengren ⚡
2024-08-18 08:00:00
Hey there! 👋
It's been a minute since the last letter, hasn't it? I decided to take summer off to figure out what to do with Bored Horse, and my online presence overall. Then I heard about the Punkt Digital Balance Challenge, and I just had to do it, so here we are.
→ Read more about my partipation in the Punkt Digital Balance Challenge
I'm focusing a lot on smartphones in my take on the challenge. As stated in my post linked above, I aim to not use my iPhone as much as possible, but I won't get away from it completely. That's fine, this isn't a quit tech challenge, it's about balance.
I've been thinking a lot about digital balance for quite some time, as regular readers might recall. A lot of the things I do for work and leisure is deep in the digital world.
That's a lot of digital things right there. That's okay, some are inherently digital and there's nothing to do about that. The problem, and where the whole balance thing comes in, is the lack of non-digital alternatives, as well as the fact that other digital things will take time from digital things done with or for a purpose. Doomscrolling comes to mind, but browsing Reddit is just as bad.
For example, I'm currently playing Starfield. That's a digital activity that I've decided to do, and are looking forward to. However, being tired after a long day at work, it's easy to get caught scrolling Reddit instead. The barrier of entry is so much lower – the iPhone is right there, whereas I have to make a conscious decision to rig up the gaming laptop. I haven't tracked this, but I can safely say that a shocking number of times, I start the game hours later that I'd originally planned, or not at all, due to fooling around with apps on my phone.
The smartphone and its apps is the worst culprit, but the same can be said of an iPad or laptop, too. It's easy to get caught up in the vast abundance of things you can do in apps or on the web. It's draining, scrolling Instagram, and when it's not done purposefully, and quit in accordance, it'll steal time from valuable experiences. Like playing Starfield.
Digital balance is a lot about choosing what to do, and not just do other things because it's easier.
It's also about not choosing the digital option at all times.
Being able to read books on a screen is great. I keep different hours than my wife, and thanks to screens I can read in bed while she's asleep. This is a good thing.
However, if I want to cut down on my screen time, I could read a physical book instead. Sure, it's tricky in bed, I'd need one of those worm-lights, and they're perhaps a bit bright, but it is possible. I could also do my reading in the living room before going to bed.
I love physical books, but the convenience of digital ones are hard to beat, for me.
That said, it was a pleasant experience reading a couple of stories in the paper edition of the New Yorker while having lunch at the office the other day. They keep sending the print edition, we keep piling it, and ultimately recycling it, but the stories I typically read, I read in their app for iPad. It's more convenient. That particular day I'd left my iPad at home due to errands, and since I'm making a point of only using my iPhone for crucial things, I picked up the print editing. It was nice. I should do this more often, I thought.
That's where the balance thing comes in. It's so easy to just keep using devices, relying on screens and apps. It's convenient, which is great, but it comes with a risk of distractions. When you're not really choosing to do something, when your actions aren't purposeful, the balance is off.
I'm focusing a lot on the smartphone, putting away my iPhone for all but the most crucial things. That's not the whole story however, and I'm happy to see my thinking around these things evolving, one week in. It's interesting, for sure. I'll keep you posted.
— Thord D. Hedengren ⚡
2024-08-15 08:00:00
I've written a lot about our reliance on tech, and the way social media apps are designed to be as addictive as possible. It should come as no surprise that I'm curious in the various alternatives. You might even remember my posts on various outlets on smartphones vs. dumbphones, as well as combinations with tablets to avoid smartphones in particular. Let's face it, that wonderful computer in your pocket is the real problem here, right? We all use it too often, too much, and instead of other things, out of convenience as well as addiction.
Swiss company Punkt makes a wonderful feature phone called the Punkt MP02. I've reviewed and used it in the past, as well as its predecessor. The phone is a testament to the fact that just because you put away your high-end smartphone, you don't have to sacrifice design and style for something that looks like a plastic toy. So, when Punkt announced their Digital Balance Challenge for 2024, I knew I had to participate. Luckily they agreed, and sent me a beautiful MP02 to replace my iPhone 15 Pro Max for a bit, or more, who knows?!
My main goal is to get away from my iPhone as much as possible. I won't be able to put it in a drawer and forget about it unfortunately, due to the fact that there are apps that I rely on daily.
I'm sure there are more things, but these are the crucial ones. This is interesting in itself, seeing how the society I live in is tied to services utilizing, and often requiring, a smartphone. It's a problem for older people in particular, especially now that many places won't even take cash anymore.
So, I'll have to carry the iPhone, but it'll sit in a purse of sorts (more on that later), and the idea is to not use it for calls, texting, or anything other than the necessary things. I might even do a focus mode for this, we'll see.
While I'm doing this Detox Challenge, I'll also experiment with my setup because why not? After all, I'm not looking to eliminate all digital things, it's detox, and finding something sustainable after this is over. Expect thoughts on this going forward.
I've already carried both my iPhone and the Punkt MP02 this week, to get a feel for it. As of today however, I'll start documenting this more, and you can look forward to updates in the newsletter on a semi-weekly basis or so. There might be the occasional post here, too, outside of the newsletter, and I'll do something on my Swedish site as well.
So, to follow along on this experiment, peruse these channels:
I'll also do occasional posts on Mastodon, Bluesky, and on TDH.se.
Let's get to it!
2024-06-01 08:00:00
I’ve been tracking my sleep, on and off, for the last fifteen years. It started with a revelation: I thought I slept poorly but really didn’t, which changed my mood in the morning. It has felt useful ever since. To be fair, said revelation was probably enough, but my curiosity was piqued.
Sleep tracking tools has come and gone. For a long time, I thought that Jawbone’s bracelet models were the ideal form factor. They were not the best, but they had a feature that none other, save smart watches, has: A reliable alarm clock. When you sleep next to someone else but want, or more likely need, to get up early, a garish alarm going off isn’t particularly nice. Waking up by vibration on your wrist however, that’s limited to disturbing just you. I’ve missed that, so much that I used my Apple Watch as a sleep tracker and alarm for months. Unfortunately, I didn’t care for it at all. Not only does it mess up overnight charging, it’s also uncomfortable to sleep with a watch. That’s what the bracelet type sleep trackers got right: They weren’t horrible to wear in bed. Not ideal, not by a long shot, but a lot better than a bulky watch. I stopped wearing the Apple Watch to bed a couple of months ago.
Prior to the Apple Watch sleeping experiment, I’ve gone through a handful of Oura rings. They’re good enough for sleep tracking I guess, and they look okay, but they lack a vibrating alarm. I stopped wearing these things when my fifth ring started to show battery problems – they all end up there. That, together with the €6/month to use a product I purchased for €450, finally turned me off them. Hence, when dropping the Apple Watch sleep tracking, I went without for some time. No big deal.
A ring with a vibrating alarm, that’d be perfect. I’ve said that for years.
Well, turns out it exists, and it’s called Circular. I finally got mine a few weeks ago, after months of wait, and I’ve been using it since.
I’m not going to review the ring, that’s not what this is about, but I will say this:
But you know what, alarm vibrations on your finger works fine. That’s the primary feature I’m looking for these days, so even though the Circular ring feels like an inferior product, it does what I want it to do. Without a monthly subscription, which I approve of. My version costs €260, so it’s no surprise it’s not as premium a product as the €450 Oura ring. I’d be fine paying a premium as long as the vibrating alarm feature is present. I’d even be okay with a monthly subscription.
I’ve all but stopped buying gadgets. AI tools like Rabbit R1 and Humane AI pins doesn’t interest me one bit. I haven’t imported the Apple Vision Pro, and doubt I’ll get one unless work demands it. I’m done with the rushed tech cycle, and buy or replace what I use and need, nothing more. Sleep trackers are the exception to the norm. If Circular, or any other health device player, release a new version that has the feature set I want, I’ll likely give it a go. I’m still on the hunt for a better sleep tracker and, more importantly, vibrating alarm. For now, Circular fits the bill.
📺 I’d hoped to announce a fun project that Bored Horse is sponsoring, but it’s not quite there yet. Not the project itself, it’s all on me and my ridiculous workload the past month and a half. But soon! Prepare for adventure...
🎮 While I stay off the tech upgrade and buy all the new things cycle, I did pick up a gaming laptop for use in the apartment. Can’t fit a rig here, so that moved to the countryside house. I went with a ROG Zephyrus G16, which turned out to be a nice machine. My workflow is Mac based these days, but I could see myself using the G16 in a pinch.
📚 I’ve been reading a lot. The reading log’s on my Swedish site, if you’re curious. Rocannon’s World by Ursula K. Le Guin stood out.
🏋🏻♀️ Finally got time enough to getting back to the gym. Which is to say, I went yesterday and will go again on Monday. Looking to restart that habit. I might have to ask my brother for coaching (which you should do too, if you’re serious about strength training) to motivate myself further, and be held accountable.
🏡 We’ve opened the countryside house, which is a small cottage and not a mansion if you for whatever reason thought that, for the summer. Not that it ever closes, but there are things that need to be done as things start to grow. Like mowing the lawn, preparing the small guest house for visitors, and all those projects that a house comes with. I look forward to moving the base from Stockholm, to the countryside, in a few weeks. We’ll be based there for summer.
😅 Work’s been stressful lately, but I can see the end of the tunnel. Four big assignments are now down to two, and when one of them wraps in just over a week’s time, I think I can finally wind down a bit. Scheduling fell through this spring, which sometimes happens when you’re juggling multiple clients, and the projects don’t follow the plan. It’ll be fine, although it’s been way too much at times. I deserve a rest.
Work really put a pin to my various plans. I haven’t written anything, be it blog posts, newsletters or fiction, for way too long now. It’s a shame, and it makes me feel bad, but that’s just the way it is sometimes. No sense in beating myself up about it.
So, if you have something you feel you should’ve done but haven’t been able to, be nice to yourself. The world’s a hard enough place as it is for you to be unnecessary hard on yourself. Try to remember that, I know I am.
Until next time, take care!
— Thord D. Hedengren ⚡
2024-04-29 08:00:00
I've been looking at all my personal stuff to try to minimize a bit. My brother did that the hardcore way, moving to Greece with what he could fit in a carry-on. He sold the rest, stored just about nothing, and that's that.
It's a compromise, only owning what you can carry. I'm not willing to go that far, but looking through all the stuff I've got, I want to cut back. What I'll keep are things that really mean something, or are necessary for whatever reason. Spark joy, and all that jazz, you know. It's not a bad way to look at ownership, asking yourself if the item in question makes you happy or not, Marie Kondo hype be damned.
Take clothes for example. I have a lot of t-shirts, some that I just don't use. There's nothing wrong with them, I fancy another look these days, and yet, there they are because they can be, there's space. This brought me to the question, how many t-shirts do you need?
Fifteen, as it were.
That breaks down to eight black ones (three oversized, three more fitted, two randoms), four white, and three for the gym.
I have more than forty, so I'll donate those to charity. Nuts really, but there you go.
Shoes pose another issue. I have a lot of sneakers by design, as I wear them down too quickly otherwise. That said, two pairs of regular sneakers, a slightly more fancy pair, and then a pair of boots (got to get that cowboy look going), fancy shoes, gym shoes suitable for weightlifting, and two pairs of winter boots (for different temperatures) – that's a lot of shoes, even after having given away five pairs... Not sure what to do about that, actually.
Other things are easier to get rid off, like paperbacks I'll never read again, redundant kitchenware, all those old charging cables and whatnot. It gets a bit trickier when I look at my game collection, which these days is mostly digital, but for all those Game Boy games that I haven't had the heart to get rid off. I'll keep them for now, but I’ll find a decent storage solution for them. They're part of a project I want to do in the future, too, so I'll use that as an excuse.
What's worth keeping, other than the necessities of life? Well, it's things like those Game Boy games, as well as vinyl records (we've got a decent collection) and books that have sentimental value. But other than that? Tech, like my ROG Ally, and phones and computers, headphones for music listening, but then it gets more questionable.
This isn’t a whim, I’ve been wanting to cut back on stuff for quite some time, but it had to happen now because we’ve downsized a lot as part of a move. We still split life between Stockholm and the small house on the countryside, but the new apartment is 40 per cent smaller than the old one, and has limited storage. The idea is to spend less on living in the city and, sometime down the line, look for something bigger in the countryside. Either way, this was a financially beneficial move, and a chance for us to do something entirely different. We went from an apartment from early 1910s, to something that literally was finished just over a week ago. The apartment has that brand new smell, which in this case means it smells like wood, as the eight stories high building is all made of wood, which is cool.
It all went fast. From idea to selling and buying, moving out and then moving in, was six weeks. Crazy fast, involving several hotel nights, but here we are.
I think I managed to downsize everything according to plan. It fits in the new place, but as I was hanging my clothes, I wondered if I’d saved too many things. That’s the thing with minimizing, I’ve come to realize. Once you start, it keeps on going.
📦 Moving house has put me behind on many things, as you, dear reader, might’ve noticed due to the lack of letters and updates. I’m still behind on, well, most stuff, but it’s getting there. As is a fun project that I’m sponsoring, which I can’t wait to share with you.
🎮 Downsizing in the city did mean that some things moved to the countryside. This is where my gaming PC now resides, which meant I got some modded Skyrim going when we stayed there for a week when we were between apartments. Unfortunately, it also means that I only have my ROG Ally, as well as the iPhone, I guess, for gaming in the city. There hasn’t been much of that going on, packing up has taken its sweet time and effort, but I’m curious to see if I think it’ll cut it. In the spirit of downsizing, I don’t want a gaming laptop that moves back and forth – a dedicated handheld is bad enough.
📚 There’s been plenty of reading though, albeit a bit one-sided. I’ve been binging the Dresden Files books by Jim Butcher. Out of the eight books I’ve read this year, five are from that series. Popcorn books is fine when you’re overloaded, and I’ve enjoyed them, but after the current one (Peace Talks), I think I’ll take a break. I keep a read books log on my Swedish site, if you’re interested.
📺 Finally watched Oppenheimer. I liked it a lot. Other than that, there hasn’t been much TV or movies, just a few ones, where Anatomy of a Fall stood out, but not enough for me to obsess over. We did finally watch the last two seasons of Game of Thrones though, which I thought was better than the earlier ones, but pretty weak as endings go. Done and dusted, I guess.
🎵 One downside with moving down in apartment size is that the vinyl collection won’t fit. Well, it would, but not in a way that we think makes sense for the apartment. It now resides in the office, and I’m curious to see if I’ll listen to any vinyls at all. I’m telling myself it’s temporary because I really want my collection at home. Just have to buy a bigger house down the line. Listening to vinyls makes more sense in the countryside anyway, I feel.
🏋🏻♀️ There’s a gym across the street from the new apartment. I intend to peruse it regularly, and I’m putting this here to put some additional pressure on me to actually follow up on this. Exercise has been scarce this year, and I need to get back to it.
🌻 Spring has yet to arrive in full. When it does, mowing the lawn will become an ever-present item on the to-do list. Last year, we had to hire help to get it sorted in the end because of poor planning, and being unlucky with the weather when we had planned to take care of the (fairly large) garden. I’m putting this here to be held accountable, too.
🙊 I’m almost off social media, rarely checking in on any of the networks. That might change now that the move’s done, but I doubt it. It feels as if social media is over, doesn’t it? Good riddance.
📧 This is a new format, as I said I’d change pace. We’ll see how it develops. If you have thoughts, do drop me a line. Email is best, obviously.
It’s been a couple of weeks for me, as I’m sure you can tell. I hope yours has been less stressful, but just as happy ones. I’ll write you again soonish. Until then, take care.
— Thord D. Hedengren ⚡