I’ve had an unintentional theme over the last month with three books touching on various parts of the relationship that we have with technology, and the ways that technology — particularly smartphones and social media — make our lives worse. Digital Minimalism is the best book of the three, and a welcome respite from the mess that was Survival of the Richest.
The author advocates for readers to reclaim their time and attention from the constant distraction that social media and smart phones offer and then devotes much of the book to sharing practical advice on how to build a healthier relationship with digital technology by paring it back to the pieces that are essential and valuable for your life.
Reading this book didn’t add many new ideas for cutting back on technology for me, but that is because I had already taken conscious steps on my own. For folks who want to cut back on their social media and smartphone use and are struggling to start, Newport’s book is a great introduction to both the why of cutting back on technology and how to get started.
This read, along with The Loop and Survival of the Richest have helped some thoughts that had been percolating for a while, and I’m adding more related reading to my list to help those ideas keep churning.