The Digital Disconnect
Summertime in Washington D.C. is gruelling. An old friend of mine, part of the U.S. diplomatic corps, recounted how foreign diplomats in the mid 1900s dreaded being posted in the nation’s capital. They hoped to be assigned to more moderate climates with livable summers even if that meant being further away from home. How things have changed.
This summer the oppressive heat and humidity feel worse. The barrage of news about scandal after scandal, tweet after tweet, and absurdity after absurdity are compounding the feeling of being stuck, literally. I found myself being even more addicted to the news cycle, and feeling more stressed than ever before. As screenwriter Randi Singer recently tweeted, “the news is now the best cardio”.
So to bring a level of normalcy back to summertime in D.C., I will disconnect from smart technologies and news for a week. A digital disconnect of sorts. I do plan to carry my cell phone but utilize the call feature only. Waiting for the bus back home will be time to read (a real book), think, people watch. Time to notice the surroundings, and time to get bored.
To gauge the experiment empirically, I will track how my sleep, diet and exercise change. While a week is a short time, I am curious whether I will feel phychologically calmer and physically more energized.
The digital disconnect, starting July 25.