Data and me 2030

eustina
eustina
Nov 3 · 2 min read

Mimi Onuoha asks — “How does our attitude towards data change if we see it as the result of a relationship rather than an end in itself?” Imagine you were to start collecting data about yourself over the next ten years (2020–2030) to store in a time capsule. What data would you collect and why?

Right now is the least “online” I have been in a very long time — what finally got me to log off was data I had collected about myself. Data I was super proud of — I found that the moment I got online I would look at my data vs everyone else’s data and I would feel like shit. I would look at my data and it felt disconnected from the way I felt when I was doing the thing that made that point of data. Some of the data that was good pointed to bad times. Some of the worst data on my collection came from times I was happier by a comparison not logged from data.

I still collect data. I log my weight in a sheet. I have my fitbit badge for losing 70lbs and my chart and points that show week by week how I lost nearly 80lbs and I got joy from looking at my chart and my data for maybe two months. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done and the dream I had for years — (what data set could someone want more?) and it was so quickly a relic and I felt compelled to go on to the next data set. I’m afraid that data set will go bad. Data anxiety. This was something I had never I log how much I dead-lifted and squatted and bent-over-rowed into a sheet week-by-week. I get frustrated often by how slow the data moves. When I was applying to grad school I logged all my application data points into a sheet. School / Degree / Deadline / Length / Date Submitted. When I start applying for jobs I will log all my job applications into a sheet. Company / Title / Location / Date Submitted.

I started logging data because I hoped it would make me feel connected and I would remember things but no one’s progression is linear upwards and over the mountain. Everyone will have times over the next ten years they will want to forget.

    eustina

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    eustina