Something felt off.
I had thought my problems would be solved after leaving social media. I’m fully into digital minimalism now! I’ve done it. The days prior were weekends, too; hence, I should feel well-rested and with more than enough resources to get back to work. But yesterday, I noticed them: the restlessness, the hidden urge to check on something, anything, which hides on a compulsive move from one activity to another.
The worst of them: that feeling of having so many thoughts in mind that nothing comes out on paper, hence, it just seems like there is nothing in mind at all.
Digital Minimalism
After reading “Deep Work,” I jumped straight to Cal Newport‘s next book, “Digital Minimalism” only because I had enjoyed his writing so much and it was the easiest non-fiction book to get to next. Similar to reading the former book, I was only expecting the theoretical parts of the book to be helpful for me and that the more practice ones wouldn’t.
I am halfway through the book and while I wasn’t entirely wrong (so far), I’m relieved to be corrected in that one such concept I’ve learned recently had helped me with my earlier dilemma.
Redefining solitude
Where I am in the book so far centers on the concept of solitude—its benefits, application, and relevance to prolific thinkers throughout history, among other things. I have been enjoying and highly recommend the related literature specifically on this topic. What has struck me the most, however, is this: a clear definition of solitude.
Newport (Digital Minimalism, 2019) anchors his discussion of solitude on Kethledge and Erwin’s definition that solitude is a “subjective state in which your mind is free from input from other minds.” It took a weekend and a couple of days for me to realize what it means.
During the past couple of days, yesterday, in particular, I thought I have had sufficient solitude. I was off of social media and had been, as normal, spending more time alone than with family. Yet during those times, I was constantly on something: sometimes a book, other times another book, or on my tablet doing research on “something else,” or with a podcast playing in the background. Those seemed harmless, if not directly beneficial and productive. I was studying, learning—what could go wrong?
Nothing much. Not until I got to work and words just wouldn’t come out. Even with my journals, I had nothing to say. There were so many things in my mind that there was essentially nothing substantial.
I turned back to reading and, fortunately, I was met once again with a rehash of the definition from earlier. This time, through the words of an old friend:
Nietzsche emphasized this point when he contrasted the originality of his walk-stimulated ideas with those produced by the bookish scholar locked in a library reacting only to other people’s work. “We do not belong,” he wrote, “to those who have ideas only among books, when stimulated by books.”
Newport, Cal. Digital Minimalism (excerpt from p. 127).
It reminds me of this seemingly paradoxical result when, as accounted in posts related to the topic, creatives who leave social media, despite initially having those applications as a space for inspiration, end up being more creative and able to produce more authentically artful works after leaving.
Walking is essential
The chapter which talks about Nietzsche details many other accounts of the benefits of talking meditative, solitary walks. Before the pandemic crisis put the whole world on lockdown, I, too, had a habit of going on long walks several times a day. Whenever I could, but routinely every morning and late afternoons, I’d walk around the university campus where I had been residing. I’d usually opt to go without music or anything playing between my ears as my thoughts, especially at the end of the day, would be plenty enough for more than an hour of going around. Sometimes, mostly in the morning, I’d carry with me a rosary and pray once my mind’s been cleared of its clutter.
Those walks had helped me stay a little more grounded despite the busyness that came with university life and everything else that one might experience in their 20s.
However, because of the virus and the fact that chronic stress has made me more susceptible to infections, I haven’t been able to go on similar walks as of late and I terribly miss it even more now. Back then, it was only the appeal of a refreshing stroll that would keep me from scheduling my calendar to the brim. Without it, I have mindlessly filled out all my hours and found myself again restless and, quite literally, rest-less.
Not a day goes by that I do not imagine myself in a nice secluded cabin located in a forest near the beach where I can take long leisure walks to and fro the sea.
An alternative to walking: meditation
But, as such is not possible these days (nor any time soon here) and I must find a way to keep my sanity (really: my brain to continue functioning effectively), I had to think of an alternative to walking. I could go around my house, around my mother’s garden, a hundred times but it just doesn’t seem like it would feel the same.
Until it hit me: that sort of walking is essentially meditation.
Maybe it was the narrowed down definition of meditation that I have unconsciously adopted that I didn’t have that realization earlier. Whenever I would meditate, at least the last couple of times I remember doing so, I would enforce strict guidelines on myself: absolutely no thoughts, or only one single thought to back to until the time passes. If not any of those two, it would be a meticulous form of prayer. I had thought of simply being alone with my thoughts as indulgence as I did not get to produce anything tangible during those times and it was not either of the “accepted” ways of meditating.
But now I realize that it might just be exactly what I had been restless for.
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