Humans weren't made to tick off checklists and clear inboxes. We've lost sight of who we are, amid the mindless excesses of hustle culture and a drive-thru existence. Here's the case for slowing down.
I never fail to learn something from your wonderful posts, Brian. And further, to benefit from a more informed perspective. I've been thinking a lot about the age-old practice of contemplation, in whatever form, from my grandson's current fascination with minerals (which I've abetted by gifting him a set of fossils, gemstones, and other interesting minerals from Nat Geo!) to my late afternoons in the garden, taking in the feast for the senses, the pure joy of watching the squirrels and birds (not so much the groundhog who just ate the pumpkin I've been growing for Halloween) and soaking in the bounty and dignity of the trees in a contemplative exchange. (I like to think the trees may be contemplating me, as well.) Yesterday, on my 'fitness walk' (note the capitalistic quantitative directionality of that, vs a good old British stroll) I observed the majority of my fellow fitness walkers staring at their phones, and wondered two things: Were they missing the sense of their own muscles working, the breath in their lungs, the beating of their hearts in favor of whatever readout was on their tiny screens, and Did they even notice the taste of the wind, the colors of the flowers, the brilliancy of the clouds overhead? IMO if we don't reach a dead end with those screens soon we may become too depressed and detached to bring our DNA forward into the future. So I picked up a gel pen with cranberry ink when I got home, and wrote a few lines, loving the color, the drag of pen on page, the letters themselves. Might be a poem in there somewhere...
I don't know if I can post links here, but it reminded me of a fun song Randall Kromm wrote called "Train of Zombies," chronicling his commute home on Boston's MBTA in our digital age. I get no benefit from sharing this, but Randall is a friend.
The "Uncle Alex" quote brought a tear to my eye. My wife passed away in April, and I remember thinking how rarely we see the good times for what they are. Thank you for this piece, Brian.
I was attracted to Substack because of writers like you, and began to write myself because the quiet moments we encounter, the people and places we take time to engage with, deserve to be savored, and where possible, shared. It’s what makes life so wondrous. For the life of me, I cannot understand why people need or even want a bucket list when the best of life is so unpredictable and spontaneous.
Substack has evolved, as is to be expected, and it’s harder to find writers like you, if they’re still here. Thanks for that. And thanks for the note of peacefulness.
Part of my concern about the future of Substack lies in the overwhelming news/commentary emphasis on the “behaviors” and the ever expanding state of national shame emanating from our minority president and congress. I’ve shut off notices because of this. Really, how many breathlessly announcements of Parnas Perspectives (to name one) do we need each hour? We lose ourselves, and more importantly our purpose if we allow this to permeate our daily existence. It is the self reflection and thoughtful writing and exchanges that will reveal a pathway out of this morass, not the cacophony of complaint absent direction pounding a funeral drum.
This essay brought back the memory of Gerry, an Irishman I worked with in Australia. He was a project manager at the software company where we worked. He was universally loved, just a prince of a man, always smiling and ever kind. Colleagues would gather round when he booted up his laptop in the morning, waiting to see the fireworks of cascading reminders of unfinished tasks from his projects. He didn’t stress; he just chuckled. His projects came in as reliably as his peers who feverishly ticked off tasks, and his client approval was off the charts.
I learned after he died that he had been in a reading group that had read Finnegan’s Wake not once but multiple times. Once they finished they would start again. I marvel at the patience that takes but also at Gerry’s ability to make time for what mattered to him-sitting with friends over pints at a pub, relishing the language of an Irish story teller.
My mother had a framed embroidery in our kitchen that said “Bloom where you are planted”. I advised my children to plant themselves where they feel they’re blooming. I have, ironically, done best as an epiphytic.
That is something I was taught in scuba diving. Charge around blowing lots of bubbles and you won't see much. Slow down and watch and you will see a lot more.
Great piece of wit, history, and multidisciplinary perspectives. I'd offer my new world of retirement as another world that suffers from personal checklistsm as a means to "adjust" to a world of less stress...lol. We moved to the Oregon coast in 2020, and I've been realigning my former academic and creative career with newly acquired, massive amounts of available time. I can't make enough art (nor want to) in order to fill this new time-space. I do enjoy contemplation a great deal more, but feel a little guilty about it. I've found solo trips into wilderness or vast landscapes a balm, a will continue to do the kind of short travels that put me more alone, and more aware.
About that Pickersgill image: not to argue with your main point in the least (which is entirely accurate and much needed), but...the image looks "absurd" only if we imagine they're looking at phones and presuming what's on the phones is pointless.
If we imagine they were all instead reading the works of the great philosophers, is the scene "absurd"?
And there are plenty of old photographs (and some newer ones) showing crowds of people reading newspapers, books, etc....yet somehow these are rarely criticized. It's still presumed that anything in print is superior to anything online.
I mean, what if all those removed phones' screens had this very newsletter on them? ;-)
Case in point, for my 2-3 mile walk this morning, on a very quiet road through a forested area approaching the Miles River in St. Michael’s, MD, I chose to read Brian’s Red Queen Fallacy article. I’d read a few paragraphs, then think about them while taking in my surroundings, and repeat. I was about 1.5 miles in when I finished the article, and I spent the next mile of my walk relaxing and appreciating the sights and sounds around me. Usually on my walk I’m making phone calls to catch up on my to-do list with things I can do while walking … what Red Queen behavior! This time I thought both about the article, and the need to forget thinking about it while I was on my walk … I was torn😇! I thought about the need to let things go, with the old Suzanne Vega “Calypso” song coming to mind for no good reason. And of course the Tolkien “not all those who wander are lost” phrase echoed through my mind. I’ll be heading to Dolly Sods WV in August to hike (6 mile remote trail each way) to the Lions Head overlook, and I’ll be careful to enjoy the journey and not focus too much on the destination!
Lovely reflections both. And yes, phones aren't inherently bad -- I use mine too much and wish I didn't -- but I also use it to discover the world. The vast majority of time most people spend on phones (with exceptions, of course for those virtuous readers!), however, is passive and isn't (in my view) good for us. And Cliff, have a great time in Dolly Sods - and think to yourself when you are bathing in nature: "If this isn't nice, what is?"
Brian, thank you for making the case for (Gawd I hate this phrase...) "mindful living." (AKA: good old-fashioned relaxation.)
These last waning days of summer are a perfect time for reflecting on how we spent our previous days of summer; and to decide that the rest of our lives need to be balanced in a healthy way.
(One of the most impactful song lyrics I ever heard was from Don Henly's, The Last Worthless Evening: "...but there are just so-many summers babe, just so many springs.")
It doesn't help when our alarm clocks (or equally alarming noises) automatically reset our minds to the "FRANTIC" mode every morning,
thus, begins our day of urgently ignoring our need for deep appreciation, sincere gratitude and sufficient rejuvenation.
Like it or not, life is a road-trip.
We choose daily whether we are going to stop long-enough to laugh at ourselves as we take selfies next to the fiberglass-dinosaurs and half-buried Cadillacs...
or ditch the idea of creating memories, and photos filled with smiles.
We've been warned... there are just-so-many summers.
Beautiful piece, and perhaps especially poignant for thoughtful and conscientious Americans trapped in a dystopian, long-running reality show that has truly gone off the rails. In the last month I started making a conscience effort to shift my thinking to better cope with it all, try to free myself from the tyranny of my attention and well-being being hijackd daily, and think much farther (and dare I say more productively?) down the road for when we will emerge from this. Your essay gives me a lot to ponder. Prioritizing well-being and pursuing happiness and a sense of peacefulness in the face of everything strangely feels like the ultimate act of rebellion in 2025. Our equilibrium has great value.
I can think of two examples in my life, one very recent, one from the year 2000. In that year, my husband and I took our two kids, then aged 10 and 5, to Kenya, where we went on a two-day safari. We had forgotten our super-duper SLR camera, and had a couple of those throw-away ones with no zoom. Consequently, we looked, rather than photographed, and my visual memories of that extraordinary experience, where we the grown-ups were as enchanted and overwhelmed as the children, have stayed with me. Had we had photos, proper ones, as opposed to the 'I think that blob is an elephant', I would remember the photos, but not the experience. Very recently I went to Rosendale NY with my son Pierre on a very hot day. We walked up the Wallkill Valley Rail Trail and Pierre said I should walk on the left, without explaining why. Suddenly, the ambient temperature started to drop until we came level with the opening to an old mineshaft, out of which what felt like A/C blasted around my legs. There was visible condensation in the stream of air coming from the cave, and a micro-ecology of plants in the plume of the cold air. It was quite extraordinary, and I felt privileged to experience an entirely new sensation at my age. Yup, the world sure is wonderful.
I never fail to learn something from your wonderful posts, Brian. And further, to benefit from a more informed perspective. I've been thinking a lot about the age-old practice of contemplation, in whatever form, from my grandson's current fascination with minerals (which I've abetted by gifting him a set of fossils, gemstones, and other interesting minerals from Nat Geo!) to my late afternoons in the garden, taking in the feast for the senses, the pure joy of watching the squirrels and birds (not so much the groundhog who just ate the pumpkin I've been growing for Halloween) and soaking in the bounty and dignity of the trees in a contemplative exchange. (I like to think the trees may be contemplating me, as well.) Yesterday, on my 'fitness walk' (note the capitalistic quantitative directionality of that, vs a good old British stroll) I observed the majority of my fellow fitness walkers staring at their phones, and wondered two things: Were they missing the sense of their own muscles working, the breath in their lungs, the beating of their hearts in favor of whatever readout was on their tiny screens, and Did they even notice the taste of the wind, the colors of the flowers, the brilliancy of the clouds overhead? IMO if we don't reach a dead end with those screens soon we may become too depressed and detached to bring our DNA forward into the future. So I picked up a gel pen with cranberry ink when I got home, and wrote a few lines, loving the color, the drag of pen on page, the letters themselves. Might be a poem in there somewhere...
So on point!
I don't know if I can post links here, but it reminded me of a fun song Randall Kromm wrote called "Train of Zombies," chronicling his commute home on Boston's MBTA in our digital age. I get no benefit from sharing this, but Randall is a friend.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu1rKAbJHRw.
The chorus lyrics:
On a train of zombies, unaware but still upright.
Black boxes in their hands, lit with otherworldly light,
some connected to their brains with wires that were white.
I was on a train of zombies, headed out into the night.
The "Uncle Alex" quote brought a tear to my eye. My wife passed away in April, and I remember thinking how rarely we see the good times for what they are. Thank you for this piece, Brian.
I'm really sorry for your loss, Patrick. And yes, that's one of the best and most relatable Vonnegut quotes of all time, which is saying something.
I came across it in one of his essay collections and never forgot it. I work at remembering to ask myself that question at least a few times per day.
I was attracted to Substack because of writers like you, and began to write myself because the quiet moments we encounter, the people and places we take time to engage with, deserve to be savored, and where possible, shared. It’s what makes life so wondrous. For the life of me, I cannot understand why people need or even want a bucket list when the best of life is so unpredictable and spontaneous.
Substack has evolved, as is to be expected, and it’s harder to find writers like you, if they’re still here. Thanks for that. And thanks for the note of peacefulness.
Part of my concern about the future of Substack lies in the overwhelming news/commentary emphasis on the “behaviors” and the ever expanding state of national shame emanating from our minority president and congress. I’ve shut off notices because of this. Really, how many breathlessly announcements of Parnas Perspectives (to name one) do we need each hour? We lose ourselves, and more importantly our purpose if we allow this to permeate our daily existence. It is the self reflection and thoughtful writing and exchanges that will reveal a pathway out of this morass, not the cacophony of complaint absent direction pounding a funeral drum.
This essay brought back the memory of Gerry, an Irishman I worked with in Australia. He was a project manager at the software company where we worked. He was universally loved, just a prince of a man, always smiling and ever kind. Colleagues would gather round when he booted up his laptop in the morning, waiting to see the fireworks of cascading reminders of unfinished tasks from his projects. He didn’t stress; he just chuckled. His projects came in as reliably as his peers who feverishly ticked off tasks, and his client approval was off the charts.
I learned after he died that he had been in a reading group that had read Finnegan’s Wake not once but multiple times. Once they finished they would start again. I marvel at the patience that takes but also at Gerry’s ability to make time for what mattered to him-sitting with friends over pints at a pub, relishing the language of an Irish story teller.
My mother had a framed embroidery in our kitchen that said “Bloom where you are planted”. I advised my children to plant themselves where they feel they’re blooming. I have, ironically, done best as an epiphytic.
This is why I like moving slowly; preferring walking over running, bicycles over cars, sailing over motoring. The slower we move, the more we see.
That is something I was taught in scuba diving. Charge around blowing lots of bubbles and you won't see much. Slow down and watch and you will see a lot more.
Great piece of wit, history, and multidisciplinary perspectives. I'd offer my new world of retirement as another world that suffers from personal checklistsm as a means to "adjust" to a world of less stress...lol. We moved to the Oregon coast in 2020, and I've been realigning my former academic and creative career with newly acquired, massive amounts of available time. I can't make enough art (nor want to) in order to fill this new time-space. I do enjoy contemplation a great deal more, but feel a little guilty about it. I've found solo trips into wilderness or vast landscapes a balm, a will continue to do the kind of short travels that put me more alone, and more aware.
Big thanks for this jolt of reality.
About that Pickersgill image: not to argue with your main point in the least (which is entirely accurate and much needed), but...the image looks "absurd" only if we imagine they're looking at phones and presuming what's on the phones is pointless.
If we imagine they were all instead reading the works of the great philosophers, is the scene "absurd"?
And there are plenty of old photographs (and some newer ones) showing crowds of people reading newspapers, books, etc....yet somehow these are rarely criticized. It's still presumed that anything in print is superior to anything online.
I mean, what if all those removed phones' screens had this very newsletter on them? ;-)
Case in point, for my 2-3 mile walk this morning, on a very quiet road through a forested area approaching the Miles River in St. Michael’s, MD, I chose to read Brian’s Red Queen Fallacy article. I’d read a few paragraphs, then think about them while taking in my surroundings, and repeat. I was about 1.5 miles in when I finished the article, and I spent the next mile of my walk relaxing and appreciating the sights and sounds around me. Usually on my walk I’m making phone calls to catch up on my to-do list with things I can do while walking … what Red Queen behavior! This time I thought both about the article, and the need to forget thinking about it while I was on my walk … I was torn😇! I thought about the need to let things go, with the old Suzanne Vega “Calypso” song coming to mind for no good reason. And of course the Tolkien “not all those who wander are lost” phrase echoed through my mind. I’ll be heading to Dolly Sods WV in August to hike (6 mile remote trail each way) to the Lions Head overlook, and I’ll be careful to enjoy the journey and not focus too much on the destination!
Lovely reflections both. And yes, phones aren't inherently bad -- I use mine too much and wish I didn't -- but I also use it to discover the world. The vast majority of time most people spend on phones (with exceptions, of course for those virtuous readers!), however, is passive and isn't (in my view) good for us. And Cliff, have a great time in Dolly Sods - and think to yourself when you are bathing in nature: "If this isn't nice, what is?"
You’re not wrong here. Thank you.
"...despair, and the incapacity for leisure are twins..."
"Leisure...is not the inevitable result of spare time...it is...an attitude of mind, a condition of the soul..."
"...a certain happiness in leisure, something of the happiness that comes from the recognition of the mysteriousness of the universe..."
p.26, 27-Joseph Pieper, Leisure, The Basis of Culture
Brian, thank you for making the case for (Gawd I hate this phrase...) "mindful living." (AKA: good old-fashioned relaxation.)
These last waning days of summer are a perfect time for reflecting on how we spent our previous days of summer; and to decide that the rest of our lives need to be balanced in a healthy way.
(One of the most impactful song lyrics I ever heard was from Don Henly's, The Last Worthless Evening: "...but there are just so-many summers babe, just so many springs.")
It doesn't help when our alarm clocks (or equally alarming noises) automatically reset our minds to the "FRANTIC" mode every morning,
thus, begins our day of urgently ignoring our need for deep appreciation, sincere gratitude and sufficient rejuvenation.
Like it or not, life is a road-trip.
We choose daily whether we are going to stop long-enough to laugh at ourselves as we take selfies next to the fiberglass-dinosaurs and half-buried Cadillacs...
or ditch the idea of creating memories, and photos filled with smiles.
We've been warned... there are just-so-many summers.
Armed with the knowledge that the universe perceives its own existence through our eyes.
I will consciously seek out more contemplative and nice moments.
This essay was one of those moments.
True to form Brian, you bring a bit of grounded sanity to our day. Nicely done.
Thank you! This is lovely and well argued.
Beautiful piece, and perhaps especially poignant for thoughtful and conscientious Americans trapped in a dystopian, long-running reality show that has truly gone off the rails. In the last month I started making a conscience effort to shift my thinking to better cope with it all, try to free myself from the tyranny of my attention and well-being being hijackd daily, and think much farther (and dare I say more productively?) down the road for when we will emerge from this. Your essay gives me a lot to ponder. Prioritizing well-being and pursuing happiness and a sense of peacefulness in the face of everything strangely feels like the ultimate act of rebellion in 2025. Our equilibrium has great value.
I can think of two examples in my life, one very recent, one from the year 2000. In that year, my husband and I took our two kids, then aged 10 and 5, to Kenya, where we went on a two-day safari. We had forgotten our super-duper SLR camera, and had a couple of those throw-away ones with no zoom. Consequently, we looked, rather than photographed, and my visual memories of that extraordinary experience, where we the grown-ups were as enchanted and overwhelmed as the children, have stayed with me. Had we had photos, proper ones, as opposed to the 'I think that blob is an elephant', I would remember the photos, but not the experience. Very recently I went to Rosendale NY with my son Pierre on a very hot day. We walked up the Wallkill Valley Rail Trail and Pierre said I should walk on the left, without explaining why. Suddenly, the ambient temperature started to drop until we came level with the opening to an old mineshaft, out of which what felt like A/C blasted around my legs. There was visible condensation in the stream of air coming from the cave, and a micro-ecology of plants in the plume of the cold air. It was quite extraordinary, and I felt privileged to experience an entirely new sensation at my age. Yup, the world sure is wonderful.