Design your life to include more money, health and happiness with less stuff, space and energy.

Design your life to include more money, health and happiness with less stuff, space and energy.

The Week of Living Connectedly

As regular LifeEdited readers know, I am no tech zealot. Sure, I use the stuff copiously. I have up-to-date gadgets: 15″ Macbook Pro with SSD, iPhone 5, iPad 2, etc. I am pretty facile with social media: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. I know my way around apps, how pay bills online and troubleshoot my network printer when it goes offline. But I am no true believer. I certainly don’t believe in salvation through technology. I shudder when I see people glued to their phones. I find the concept of the Singularity frightening. Like many of us who were not fully immersed in technology from the womb, people who remember vinyl, landlines and bunny-ear antennae, I hold onto a certain degree of technological nostalgia. I often wonder whether we’d be better off if technological progress stopped right after humans figured out how to stop plagues.

In many ways, because of these beliefs and prejudices, I don’t give tech a chance. I don’t see how it can and does improve my life. I wonder what my relationship to tech would be if I were to let go of these beliefs and take on the idea my friend Jason Silva calls “radical openness”–a state abetted by technology, where the free-flowing exchanges of ideas initiates an unprecedented rate of growth for human evolution and consciousness? What if technology is here to help me grow and connect with something greater than myself?

So I am conducting an experiment. Rather than going on a tech and online media fast as many are wont to do nowadays, I’m going to pig out for the next seven days, I’m going to avail myself of as much technology as I can and be as connected and reachable as possible. I even took my first selfie (though it may be my last).

Here’s where I’ll start:

  • Turning on all of my chats: Facebook, Google +, G chat. (they’re all black right now. Skype is reserved for work).
  • At least 10 tweets/day.
  • At least three Instagram pics/day.
  • Share at least five things/day I’m reading across various social media channels.
  • Regularly checking in my location with Facebook and Four Square.
  • Experimenting with other social networking sites such as Nextdoor.com.
  • Most important, I will be proactive in reaching out to others–i.e. not just a passive observer of the others who do share (I think this is the big one).

You are personally invited to find me, engage me, introduce yourself, drop me a message, if you happen to see that I’m near you, say hi to me. Share your ideas for LifeEdited, your editing challenges and triumphs, you experiences with tech, whatever. Below is where you can find me online:

I’ll be reporting regularly on my experience and write up a summary on this site next week. I look forward to meeting you on the interwebs and exchanging ideas.