"What are you reading?"

Not about reading

Kensington

Hi there,

Walking around the city, good company, good food, soaking up the sunshine, ignoring the digital >>>

Five things to share:

1. This time, I’m hanging out with a 10-year-old. It’s getting late and I’m telling her to go to sleep, it’s way past her bed time, kids these days, etc. “I hate sleep!” she says to me and I can tell she wants to talk to me, but I am on my phone, paying half attention to reddit, half attention to her. After a couple more attempts at a conversation, she asks me, with genuine curiosity, “what are you reading?” I immediately feel guilty, and a little bit ashamed. “Um, nothing,” I tell her, and it is nothing, nothing important anyway. I have a million excuses in my head: It’s late, I’m tired, I just want to escape into mindless entertainment online— kid, please go to sleep! But there she is, with all her curiosity, boredom, and a million questions for the adult in the room, wanting to talk to me and wondering what could be important on my phone that I am ignoring her to pay attention to it; and it is nothing.

2. What if you don't need 8 hours of sleep? And how exposure to blue light at night from devices can affect the quality of our sleep.

3. A quote I want to share with you:

   Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.

   — Anais Nin

4. Sell your cleverness and embrace bewilderment.

5. A question for you (from the Dilbert Principle):

   If you could connect your computer to a vast network of information, how would you use this service?

   A) Gather valuable scientific information.

   B) Improve my education.

   C) Demonstrate my complete lack of personality by spending countless hours typing inane and often obscene sentence fragments that can be viewed by people just like me in “real time.”

   👀

That’s all for this week!

Thank you for reading, and please share with anyone you think may benefit.

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Until next time,

Mehret