The pendulum is starting to swing back - our pattern as a society seems to be to swing from one extreme to another. I also feel like I have experienced life in another era being in my 50's now. I feel like I have gained wisdom just from living. That also reminds me that we can gain wisdom by consulting with people who have lived different lives from ours. That's why we love stories. Thanks for sharing your wisdom with us!
Please thank Toby for me! That has helped immensely with some stuff I’m going through right now. I have a tendency to wallow in regret and guilt, so his wise words are going to have long term payoff for me.
Yes, Carl, I think You’re right. I think our High Tech, is finally leading to appreciation for more High Touch. I’ve been writing on Medium for 6 Weeks and I have had 1,032 and 70 Followers. I only started here, on Substack about two weeks ago, and I have near 700 views, but just 9 Free Subscribers. My writing is vast and varied, but on Medium it’s primarily my Memories, Memoirs, Short Stories, and personalized Genealogy and Historical Fiction. It seems the more personal the touch the better the response.
I love the point about regrets! I like to say "if when you made a decision you thought it was the wisest one, there's onpoint in regret."
This upgrade to seeing regrets as made up is even more powerful. The narrative is an illusion and whatever happened got us to where we are now, what we can pass on, etc.
I'm glad I found this substack. I really needed to read the part about regret. I'm going to hang on to that advice and remind myself of it whenever regret tries to rear its ugly head again.
Thank you for sharing your insightful and validating thoughts on technology. I recently built a place for people to vacation and learn how to balance the rhythms of nature with moderated doses of tech. It’s a gamble of a business endeavor…your post reaffirmed that it might just work. Thank you:)
Nice one mate, sometimes you just have to take the leap. I saw one of my favorite directors called Tarsem speak about his feature film, The Fall. His entire plan to make this film made zero economic sense. But he did it anyway. And it flopped. But over 20 years because a cult classic. I keep a framed poster of it on my wall to remind me that you just have to follow your instinct sometimes.
I’ve been off Meta platforms for 8 weeks and I’m feeling a remarkable improvement in my mental health. I was recently given a turntable with FM radio which I’m enjoying listening to. I’m spending more time outside, I’m completing projects so I know focus has improved.
We are pulling everything off the cloud saving files on an 8tb external hard drive.
Cancelled Apple Music subscription, cancelled tv, ( we do stream). I’m reading actual books more often, or listen thru the Libby app.
I’d love to revert back to 35 ml film and film processing again.
Gardening is a fundamental, healthy distraction that actually produces food for our household. I’m prepping for a build of a hoop house.
Lots to do when we put technology aside for a bit and create actual material content that sincerely serves you.
Wow, you’ve really created a whole offline life. Sounds great. I just quit the streaming platforms too. I’d click around for an hour and find nothing. Also drifting back to books from Kindle. Feels good.
This concept of this is just so exciting. I fantasize about a reality where tech is available but utilized with awareness. My husband and I have gone back to watching DVD’s and I too am taking pictures with a digital camera.
There can always be too much of a good thing. As far as tech is concerned, I think we’ve passed that point long ago. Still, let’s not convince ourselves that we don’t have the power to choose what tech we’d like to incorporate into our experience. There’s always a choice. Great read!
Thank you Dominique. I went to a new friend’s house for dinner recently. He and his partner had a literal wall of DVDs. I looked though it for half an hour. I was jealous. When I changed countries, Apple and Amazon actually took back half my library I’d already paid for because the licensing was different in my new country. COuldn’t understand how that was legal.
Definitely loved that as a 60's born, I got to experience heaps of things that are a thing of the past. Photos developed from a camera, what a hoot having to wait and cross your fingers that they came out ok or it was money down the drain. And the time it took to take the photo, posing to make sure it was just right, being traumatised from the picture taker yelling at you to smile and stand up straight or whatever. Hah good times indeed. The other downside of photos from then are the albums. While they are lovely sentimental and nostalgic treasures, they can be a burden too. Tell me about it as I look at a stack of 10 at least huge photo albums, six of which I inherited from my Mum and she managed to organise hers beautifully with captions and stories alongside the photos. My 16 yr old niece is keen to start looking through them when she visits and I have gone to them to find the photos of someone who has passed (yep, that's what age I am at now; it's getting more frequent to go look too). It's tricky to know what to do about them, no one will really want to inherit them, understandably so. I also have about 30k photos on iphone and I've hardly looked at any of them. No albums but. Hah.
My Mum keeps photo albums and I look at them most times I’m home. I have an old phone so I had to start taking pics off it and my cloud and put them on a hard drive and I started wondering, what are all these? I can tell you the photos of my Mum’s and hardly any of mine. Your niece might want them all, you’d be surprised.
I can see in youngest generations this nostalgia of this time without technology... even if they don't experimented.. maybe we can reach an equilibrium of use it but being desconected also when's necessary.
Great piece on so many levels! Regret, oh the chains that keep us tied to the past and dreaming of a future that was not. Wow, your brother's advice is so freeing. Thanks!!!
I so appreciate the young entrepreneurs who are doing good and the elders who hold the wisdom of experience and everyone else. Humans hold the power in their own hands and we should never use systems to force others to behave as someone else wishes!
The pendulum is starting to swing back - our pattern as a society seems to be to swing from one extreme to another. I also feel like I have experienced life in another era being in my 50's now. I feel like I have gained wisdom just from living. That also reminds me that we can gain wisdom by consulting with people who have lived different lives from ours. That's why we love stories. Thanks for sharing your wisdom with us!
For sure Dawn, my pleasure. I'm really enjoying this community we're making here.
So many great points! This one stood out most to me:
“Regrets are totally made-up. They presume the other thing you did would have worked out. It’s a total fantasy. Forget regret.”
As someone who has endured a lifetime of trauma, I often live in the past. This gives a great perspective!
It’s helped me enormously too. I have the same tendency to look back. Getting better at it these days!
I THOROUGHLY enjoyed reading this. Thanks Karl.
Thank you Carlie! I have a lot o fun writing them. It helps me figure out what I’m thinking and seeing in the world.
Please thank Toby for me! That has helped immensely with some stuff I’m going through right now. I have a tendency to wallow in regret and guilt, so his wise words are going to have long term payoff for me.
He’s a smart one my brother, I’ll pass your best on, Martha.
Thank you also for thinking of the rest of us and sharing it!
Yes, Carl, I think You’re right. I think our High Tech, is finally leading to appreciation for more High Touch. I’ve been writing on Medium for 6 Weeks and I have had 1,032 and 70 Followers. I only started here, on Substack about two weeks ago, and I have near 700 views, but just 9 Free Subscribers. My writing is vast and varied, but on Medium it’s primarily my Memories, Memoirs, Short Stories, and personalized Genealogy and Historical Fiction. It seems the more personal the touch the better the response.
I think so too. People want to hear from humans here.
In the immortal words of Jonathan Larson, "forget regret, or life is yours to miss...no day but today"
I love the point about regrets! I like to say "if when you made a decision you thought it was the wisest one, there's onpoint in regret."
This upgrade to seeing regrets as made up is even more powerful. The narrative is an illusion and whatever happened got us to where we are now, what we can pass on, etc.
It's all reframable
I love this.
Cheers Julie!
I'm glad I found this substack. I really needed to read the part about regret. I'm going to hang on to that advice and remind myself of it whenever regret tries to rear its ugly head again.
You’re welcome Jennifer. I remind myself of it all the time. My brother really changed me with that conversation.
Thank you for sharing your insightful and validating thoughts on technology. I recently built a place for people to vacation and learn how to balance the rhythms of nature with moderated doses of tech. It’s a gamble of a business endeavor…your post reaffirmed that it might just work. Thank you:)
Nice one mate, sometimes you just have to take the leap. I saw one of my favorite directors called Tarsem speak about his feature film, The Fall. His entire plan to make this film made zero economic sense. But he did it anyway. And it flopped. But over 20 years because a cult classic. I keep a framed poster of it on my wall to remind me that you just have to follow your instinct sometimes.
Great story!
Thank you KAL!
I’ve been off Meta platforms for 8 weeks and I’m feeling a remarkable improvement in my mental health. I was recently given a turntable with FM radio which I’m enjoying listening to. I’m spending more time outside, I’m completing projects so I know focus has improved.
We are pulling everything off the cloud saving files on an 8tb external hard drive.
Cancelled Apple Music subscription, cancelled tv, ( we do stream). I’m reading actual books more often, or listen thru the Libby app.
I’d love to revert back to 35 ml film and film processing again.
Gardening is a fundamental, healthy distraction that actually produces food for our household. I’m prepping for a build of a hoop house.
Lots to do when we put technology aside for a bit and create actual material content that sincerely serves you.
Wow, you’ve really created a whole offline life. Sounds great. I just quit the streaming platforms too. I’d click around for an hour and find nothing. Also drifting back to books from Kindle. Feels good.
This concept of this is just so exciting. I fantasize about a reality where tech is available but utilized with awareness. My husband and I have gone back to watching DVD’s and I too am taking pictures with a digital camera.
There can always be too much of a good thing. As far as tech is concerned, I think we’ve passed that point long ago. Still, let’s not convince ourselves that we don’t have the power to choose what tech we’d like to incorporate into our experience. There’s always a choice. Great read!
Thank you Dominique. I went to a new friend’s house for dinner recently. He and his partner had a literal wall of DVDs. I looked though it for half an hour. I was jealous. When I changed countries, Apple and Amazon actually took back half my library I’d already paid for because the licensing was different in my new country. COuldn’t understand how that was legal.
Definitely loved that as a 60's born, I got to experience heaps of things that are a thing of the past. Photos developed from a camera, what a hoot having to wait and cross your fingers that they came out ok or it was money down the drain. And the time it took to take the photo, posing to make sure it was just right, being traumatised from the picture taker yelling at you to smile and stand up straight or whatever. Hah good times indeed. The other downside of photos from then are the albums. While they are lovely sentimental and nostalgic treasures, they can be a burden too. Tell me about it as I look at a stack of 10 at least huge photo albums, six of which I inherited from my Mum and she managed to organise hers beautifully with captions and stories alongside the photos. My 16 yr old niece is keen to start looking through them when she visits and I have gone to them to find the photos of someone who has passed (yep, that's what age I am at now; it's getting more frequent to go look too). It's tricky to know what to do about them, no one will really want to inherit them, understandably so. I also have about 30k photos on iphone and I've hardly looked at any of them. No albums but. Hah.
My Mum keeps photo albums and I look at them most times I’m home. I have an old phone so I had to start taking pics off it and my cloud and put them on a hard drive and I started wondering, what are all these? I can tell you the photos of my Mum’s and hardly any of mine. Your niece might want them all, you’d be surprised.
I can see in youngest generations this nostalgia of this time without technology... even if they don't experimented.. maybe we can reach an equilibrium of use it but being desconected also when's necessary.
Love your perspectives and content excellent read
Thank you Stacey
Great piece on so many levels! Regret, oh the chains that keep us tied to the past and dreaming of a future that was not. Wow, your brother's advice is so freeing. Thanks!!!
I so appreciate the young entrepreneurs who are doing good and the elders who hold the wisdom of experience and everyone else. Humans hold the power in their own hands and we should never use systems to force others to behave as someone else wishes!