the attention economy is killing us.
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- Опубликовано: 7 сен 2024
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I feel sad that when asking for more vacation or personal days at work, the only argument I feel I a can use is ‘it increases productivity’ rather than ‘I’m a human being and i need to spend my time doing human things instead of generating wealth for you’
Feudal serfs had more of an inherent right to life than the average worker has today.
@@Praisethesunsonit fucking sucks
@@Praisethesunson Sorry to be that guy, but how? Where is the source for that?
@@aurelmirashi4501 It's one the rights in the Magna Carta for serfs "freeman".
Today the capitalist system makes no pretense to do anything to keep you alive if you don't generate profit.
@@Praisethesunson I understand many thanks
When I started my RUclips channel, the first thing anyone would ask me was, "how are you going to make money out of THAT?"
The question annoyed me, because I just wanted to make videos. While not exactly "quiet contemplation", the act of doing it was a creative outlet that I didn't have, and that creation was the purpose; I had no other goal in mind.
Now, my RUclips channel _has_ been wildly successful, and that has been wonderful for me in many ways, but it also turned my creative outlet into a job. I now have schedules and contractors, and sponsorship agreements.
I miss the days when I had a "pointless" creative outlet.
Of course the only reason I was able to make RUclips videos for fun was because I had the wealth of time and money afforded to me. Many people don't have that luxury.
I would like to live in a world where anyone could "afford" the time to do "nothing". I think we'd all be better off.
Interestingly, that Second thought has made a video covering on this exact topic using examples of youtuber quit videos. He says, that capitalism incentivises this burn out.
Woah, one of my favorite (completely unrelated channels) comments on one of my new favorite channels! Love when this happens! Cheers everyone!
This was posted 17 seconds ago and I feel like me seeing this and consuming it so quickly might be relevant.
Same,
I feel like me reading this comment while listening to a song and scrolling reddit instead of watching the video might also be relevant.
extremely.
Now did you watch the video all the way thru?
I think the fact that you feel relevant only because you are consuming content and then commenting about it, might also be relevant.
(And yes... I know. This is true for me as well.)
One thing I found interesting here is how you mentioned that it seemed a bit pointless in the beginning to do things with your grandma because she would forget it and all... It made me think about how much our minds live in the future and the idea of memory being so important?
Your grandma would have a nice day with you and whether she eventually forgot about it, it wouldn't change the fact that when being with you was her present, she enjoyed it.
I feel like we focus so much on how something will be or on how this something will seem that we forget that maybe just experiencing today is enough.
yeah this is definitely true. We have become so conditioned to evaluate experiences that we no longer value fun.
That explains why old folk homes are family free zones.
@@Praisethesunson
old folks homes are physically on the edge of towns, out of the way, hidden away, so people have to take longer to drive there.
They are claustrophobic, upsetting, and you have to book meetings.
At a certain point, old people become so unwell that they just want to sit with you, watch you be happy, and be comforted.
Thats very hard to do in an old folks home.
Remember to die well.
Everything's concerned with accumulating wealth for some unknown part of the future. No one wants to exist in the now
Great point. We'll all forget everything eventually, as will everything we've done be forgotten. That's quite liberating if you let it be.
I love the term "toxic cottagecore" omg
Itll be its own spinoff ;) a cottage full of poison mushrooms 😂
Sounds like a horror title
This is the first time i am hearing that and it oddly sounds catchy and interesting.
It sounds like a weird underground rock/metal band. lol.
Constantly caught between the two poles of "I need to slow down, I'm doing too much" and "doing less is giving up and admitting defeat"
ever thought about the notion that the game being played can't be won? (except maybe precisely by giving up and being "defeated")
Yeah, accepting "defeat" is not easy. The social game is to keep going even if you are running towards a cliff. I think people who give up on society standards have tremendous power and strength in themselves, although society would look at them as losers.
Truth is, if you don't play the game, the game will disqualify you and will make you pay for it. Humans have a deep need to feel validated by society, and in capitalism, that means winning the game of achievement.
Can you explain what you mean by defeat?
same, it's a toxic and confusing place to be.
That concern over boredom is in every part of raising a child too, my husband is coaching tee-ball and the instruction guides tell you to change activities every 5 minutes to keep them engaged. One day he had them practicing throwing a ball at a soccer ball on the tee and the kids eager kept at it for 20+ minutes and my husband had to fight the idea that they need to keep moving, keep doing. Those kids were learning to throw the ball and aim at a target AND they were having open ended fun. I read so many books studying child behavior when my son was a baby that insisted kids can only pay attention for a few minutes at a time, so we should embrace it. Yet I have had many conversations with different parents who had to acknowledge that their kids would engage with something they enjoyed for a long time and it was the parent who got bored and pushed a new activity on their child. The adults had to learn how to give their full attention to something, not the kids.
We rush kids so much and then bemoan their laziness because the fun they're having when they relax is not 'productive' enough. We're not happy living this way for ourselves, but we bend our children into it.
people really dont give kids enough credit, its wild how much theyre stifled by the limitations adults expect of them
What I found particularly interesting in Burnout Society is the idea that we went from a society with an excess of negativity (too much you can't), to a society with an excess of positivity (an excess of you can). Too much yes, too little no. He has a section where he analyses how Freudian psychology, which emphasizes repression (so you can't), is no longer useful to understand the burnour society. We are no longer subjects (as in subjugated, as in you can't), but projects - constantly in a state of endless potential. But, he says, our personalities - who we are - exists for a large part in what we reject or negate. The danger is that we become this endlessly moldable clay that capitalism can use. Not only that, but your self-molding. You see what capitalism expects of you, you internalize this, and then you mold yourself. But this is exhausting. Peace comes from rejecting this endless potential, from saying no, from rejecting endless potential, from being a person instead of a project. Capitalist society has told us that endless flexibility and endless potential are a good thing, but it's better to reject this and form a stable personality. Something that gives you a grounding to reject those things that don't fit you. In doing so, we can stop being exhausted.
I assume many people watching this have, like myself, a seemingly endless thirst for knowledge. In the last year I decided to buy a piano since music has always interested me. It quickly turned into me acquiring a reasonable amount of gear to start making music on my own, throughout my journey I've tried to practice self control when it comes to learning new things. I'll get a baseline of where I'm at, jam for a little bit and eventually hit a wall, try my hardest to get past the whatever blockage is keeping me from progressing, and eventually watch some tutorials or learn some vital piece of music theory I was missing. throughout this process I've realized that there are simply just some things I don't want to learn. In order for me to keep the magic alive when it comes to making interesting sounding music I need to NOT know everything. There's often this temptation to look up "how to achieve X, Y, and Z." But overcoming the desire to know everything keeps some sense of childlike wonder alive and keeps things really fun overall. I hope I made some kind of point without coming off like a wannabe scholar lol
@@MrFrigid247 I get what you mean. I have something similar with games. For most games there's a meta - an optimal way to play the game. You can look this up easily online. Watching some RUclips videos on it is all you need usually. But this takes the fun out of discovery. I had the same thing at the gym. Knowing the optimal way to train is kind of exhausting. I miss the days when I was just messing around and doing whatever I enjoyed in the gym.
I guess it depends on whether you enjoy discovery/curiosity/play or mastery/competition. With the first it's all more about the journey and like you said there's a good reason not to hurry this journey along too much
@@DKH712 If there are any available in your area you should try a rock climbing gym. It's made working out so much more fun for my girlfriend and I. we split our week up with climbing and lifting, but it really feels more like playing on a jungle gym. I love that you share a similar opinion on things.
I can't guess on if what you're saying comes from you or from some kind of informational knowledge derivede from some external source. But I feel that we as humans can't be potential in the way you express it, that's just an illusion. I feel that I have a work trough which gives me the opportunity to express good intention towards humanity so I do the work everyday because my sense of contribution renews itself and growths adding on past memories. I don't know if that's moldable as you say or if that enters the realm of capitalism, if I am a capitalist I don't know. Maybe yes. But how can you tell that a man is just a man or some kind of illusionist illusioning ourselves? I feel that now that I am writing I have the power to mold the attention of whom will read, so I have to be careful I guess.
@@MrFrigid247 I feel like it when scrolling through youtube. I wanto to give a meaning to what I am doing so I say that I will watch videos for the sake of increasing my knowledge and perspective, but then I find myself criticizing too much, but when I decide to pay attention to the opinions and maybe knowledge of the authors, then I keep confronting their views with mine. I don't know if this view can help you but maybe life is just a confront-like series of events in which we chisel out what we don't think it's true about ourselves and add on what we think it's true. I don't know if this is only my view or not.
i love having the world explained to me in a calm voice by educated women.
The psychology behind what caused u to say that is actually pathetic
@@Sensei.shonuff someone else write a reactionary comment, i won't
@@strahlungsopfer exactly. ....
You can't exist outside of an echo chamber....you need the world explained to u by others who say what u wanna hear
Then u need someone else to respond on ur behalf
No takers? Cool. Then the comment is that much worth ignoring. Anyway, you’re right. This video format is relaxing! Gonna pause it and watch the rest while drinking tea.
@@Window4503 🙄
*I HAVE RECENTLY BECOME* fascinated with boredom.
I have long covid, I was forced to take a 10-minute total break from any stimuli at all for 10 minutes every hour. To begin with, I was almost having panic attacks, then my brain started to process decades-old traumas, then came calmness and creativity. I don't NEED it as much now, but I still do this for the mental health benefits. I think human brains NEED boredom.
I love doing nothing and just think. it's what helps me after a long week of processing things, not scrolling
Awesome, I've started doing this as well when I realised that relaxing watching videos online was leaving me more overwhelmed. Now I just lay down and stare at the wall and breathe until I feel more mental calmness. Sometimes it's ten minutes, sometimes it's twenty.
How do you think Philosophy came to be?
The guys who invented had FREE TIME TO THINK!
So it's not for everyone but the biggest benefit I get from going on long runs *without any music* is a solid block of time in which my brain can just WANDER, and it is so, so crucial to my mental health now.
may I ask why were you forced to do that? sounds novel
"We're exhausted from having to attach purpose to everything we do. We live in denial of life's pointlessness instead of accepting it and creating meaning from that"
This.
I've been trying to live my life in a way that has meaning for me. I'm aware that there's no real point and sometimes that makes me really depressed. But other times it allows me to fully immerse in whatever I'm doing/making. Truly be in the moment for no reason other than being in the moment. And I get a lot of pushback from the people around me. Pushing me to do things they believe have value but are really just societal standards. Those standards hold no meaning for me. As long as I can do what I want to do, live out my creative hearts desires, then I don't see why I should have to justify any of it to anyone else with a meaning that means something to them.
About the criticism on "happiness": in my opinion, contemplation creates happiness in the sense of "serendipity". If I were not taking a walk at a certain moment and in a contemplation state, I wouldn't see bees, some birds interacting, hear a funny human interaction. Being able to experience that because I was available for that moment does make me happy.
Burroughs gave a really cool lecture talking about how synchronicity and serendipity are almost unavoidable when you calibrate your attention properly- - most of our lives (even before 'smart'phones) are spent with background noise, to-do lists, anxieties, etc. When we shed that stuff and try to be "one on whom nothing is lost" (Nabokov?) it's almost astonishing how much of the chaos around us operates in loops, rhythms, magnetic forces etc. I think he said he learned this from befriending a guy who worked as an undercover bodyguard and trained himself to be 100% observant in very busy public situations, really cool to try out any given day.
The panopticon never went away; we've internalized it.
The point was that it was always internal
@@comradetrashpanda8777 yeah, that's my issue with Han's argument, he seems to be misrepresenting what Foucault meant by disciplinary society
Panopticon? Is that a transformer?
@@robwalters2537 Yes, it is a transformer of sorts.
@@lucasballestin9085 Yes. Foucault's argument still stands. We have just become even more enamored with policing ourselves and others in the pursuit of "productivity," normalizing the disciplinary structures ever more subtly into private spaces.
I have been pondering this recently too. People have such fond memories of older media, and I feel like that is due to the fact that we weren’t as overloaded with constantly new experiences and content, so we were able to actually meditate on the meanings of the media and find bits of ourselves in it. Nowadays I feel like we scoop things up and then drop them so quickly that almost nothing ‘makes a mark’ and has a chance to help to shape the person long term.
Binge watching content also wasn't a thing 20 years ago. When you only get to see one episode a week that gives you a full week to think about, discuss, and reflect on what you watched. A full week to wonder what will happen next. But with binge watching it is like eating breakfast, lunch and dinner all in one go. You don't have any time to digest what you consume before you stuff more in.
@@brianc5617 Binge watching was only possible 20 years ago if you bought tv series vhs/dvd sets.
@@brianc5617I was about to say this exact thing!! Binge-watching culture is so frustrating to me because I feel like if I don’t watch all 8 hours of a TV show on the day it comes out, I may as well never watch it, because if I consume it at my own pace, everyone will have moved on by the time I’m done. And reflecting upon all the binge-watching I did when I was younger, I find that I barely remember what about it I liked enough to watch it all at once. Maybe I didn’t even like it that much, I was just pushed to watch by FOMO.
😅
I have been finding myself listening to retro videogame music, watching more relaxing game discussion content about indies/retro games, and playing more retro games myself. I think I’ve just been burnt out on AAA games, too much visual stimulation, too much to do, online connectivity= achievements and leaderboards etc. I guess I feel a sense of peace consuming older videogame content/indie games because of its simplicity and intention.
I disconnect from internet 1 or 2 days a week. I come to visit my grandma who doesn't use internet connection. I help cooking, shop groceries for her, read and talk. Long talks where i hear i lot. Also sleep without reading from a phone. It helps a lot
I have been comparing our society with chickens in an industrial meat farming setting, where we are constantly agitated so much that we lash out at anyone around us like the chickens that pick and hurt each other.
And unlike the chickens, we are also more likely to get served divisive content that tells us to "hate" each other.
Pure coincidence: when I started watching this I didn't speed up the video to 1.5x or more like I use to. In the last years I've accumulated so many videos in my "watch later" playlist that I try to optimize time by merely consuming them as fast as possible, and it must have an impact in my appreciation, understanding and enjoyment of them, but there is this neurotic will inside me to watch them all, and FOMO too.
real
Absolutely agree with your last point re: quiet enjoyment. Noise has always been an issue for me as an autistic person, but I've finally moved somewhere really quiet and honestly, even though I still sleep badly, my stress levels have gone down dramatically. It's even made me more relaxed when I'm not at home and the environment is noisier than I'm now used to.
I'm autistic and living in a tiny unit with no soundproofing. I can't afford to move elsewhere. I feel like it is killing me. I am always burnt out.
I think a valuable extension of the conversation in this video is the ableism inherent in capitalism and hyper productivity. How it creates environments that are physically and sensorially hostile to many bodies, and how it creates value systems that frame non-earning bodies as worthless.
And also, I suppose, how 'toxic cottagecore' and the capture of anti-work rhetoric by wellness peddlers can often be used to exploit (and placate) underserved populations such as disabled folks.
@@Jack-ns9sz You can create a degree of soundproofing for yourself. Soundproofing panels can be purchased and hung, and just a few of them can make an incredible difference, even if you can't completely cover your walls. If that's out of reach, any kind of wall hanging reduces the ability of sound to bounce around. Especially fabric hangings. Curtains on your walls are great. A walk-in closet is great if you've got one, even a tiny one, since all that hanging fabric absorbs sound really well. A last-ditch emergency solution would be to close yourself in your bathroom and drape blankets over everything, throw a duvet over the shower curtain rod, cover the floor with towels, and hang out for an hour or so of relief. I do that occasionally. It's obnoxious to have to put everything away afterward, but that's as close to quiet as I can get living on a major thoroughfare.
I hope your situation changes soon and you can get somewhere that allows you peace.
@@Jack-ns9sz Same, and it's been several years. I've lost two jobs because of it and everything feels like chaos right now. I feel you and hope we will both find quieter places in the years to come. 🤞🏻🤞🏻
This video feels a lot more personal than usual, I appreciate that
Me immediately clicking the thumbnail is both high irony and the most self aware of my self destructive tendencies I have been for some time
what's sad is that many people will not even have attention enough to finish this video fully...
I'm so embarrassed to say that it actually took me so much effort, I found myself scrolling at least 8 times watching this video and had to stop myself to go back to full screen...
@@RossoAmareno to be honest, same, but hey at least we finished it!
You can configure the speed of the video, actually.
1.25×
1.5×
Sometimes, if I have a hard time paying attention, I just increase the speed. It's pretty helpful.
Always recommend doodling a bit to keep the attention
I finished the video!
...while doing nonograms ;_;
self-improvement is an on-going process ok
I'm so sorry about your grandmother, Alice ❤. (I know that is not the main part of your video but) thank you for sharing--I found that part about assigning meaningfulness to the gesture of playing her song really beautiful.
Me too
But also the part about solidarity with our pets!
Excellent timing with that one. I've recently quit Instagram because of overstimulation, wanting to check if I am really burnt out or if my brain is just grilled with all the dopamine and overstimulation from doomscrolling. Guess what? I feel so relieved right now and my stress levels decreased significantly, I became less aggressive and more open to new people and new situations. What's more, I also noticed how weird it was to constantly check Instagram basically to watch other people's lives instead of just talking to them. We internalize so many unnecessary emotions and information from the social media that it's surprising to me how rarely we talk about social media putting literal garbage into our heads 24/7.
Thank you for this amazing piece of content, crème de la crème as always!
i’m procrastinating studying for tomorrow’s exam by clicking on this notification and watching this video
same lol. good luck!
@@harryanthos good luck to you too! 🍀
@ville__ sorry that happened or congrats idk
@@josefaak hes a bot or a troll n comments stupid shit everywhere
i truly hope its not a real guy bc the amount of times i see him is alarming and pathetic (as much as how much time i spend using ytb maybe 👁👁)
Literally same
On the same line of Han's thought on purposeless, Ailton Krenak - a Brazilian indigenous activist - wrote a book titled Life is Not Useful. He shares the ancestral wisdom of originary peoples in Brazil as an antidote to contemporary concerns of us, "civilised" people. He also wrote Ideas to Postpone the End of the World.
Go on, I'm paying attention
I always thought it was interesting that in English you PAY attention. As it's seen as a transaction.
I never thought about this. In Spanish we say "prestar". So it’d be something like "lend your attention"
*LAST WEEK I BOUGHT A MECHANICAL TYPEWRITER* possibly one of the best 5 things I have ever bought in my life. I SLEEP BETTER, lots better...!!!
My mind works in a completely different, much calmer, much deeper way - its like driving on a fast country road with no traffic V driving on a busy highway
i think the term that defines that feeling of doing nothing and feeling not necessarily happy is “content.” you feel content when doing those things. or when doing nothing. it’s contentment that pours through one’s soul when they realize they don’t need to do anything to feel a pleasant emotion.
It is truly ironic how content is the same thing that’s killing us. 😂
@@anushkajariwala129 i actually love this reply thank god for homophobia
edit: homophones not homophobia but i’m keeping it bc autocorrect is wild
Recently left a super stressful and anxiety inducing job and burnout is REAL. After I left I was bed ridden and unmotivated for months. After 5 months I started feeling like myself again
From personal experience, I can tell you that it takes longer for me to recover every time I hit burnout. But I couldn't seem to give up "life in the fast lane" until I literally, physically, can't go full tilt all day. This is not pleasant. I would suggest being smarter than me.
@@ericakusske3321 wow man how many times have you hit burnout?? I’m only a few years out of college so this is my first time in the professional world personally.
I had not heard the term "hyperattention" before but it is quite appropriate. Hypervigilance, hyperactive, hyperattention all originate from a lack of contemplation, deep thought, awareness, serenity and peace. It is the result of a mindset that money and efficiency - in order to make more money to be able to have more entertainment - that these are better than being still and enjoying true leisure and repose. It's all DOING and fear of just BEING - human doings and not human beings. But there is hope! Being/contemplation is more powerful than mere doing/activity and it is becoming more and more apparent to many!
"We're exhausted from having to attach meaning to everything we do." This hit close to home. I find that as I grew up, I started to worry so much about the usefulness of the things that I do and the improvement that has to come with them.
As a kid, I didn't think about the reason behind doing something and I also didn't care about being good at it. If I wanted to write, I would write. If I wanted to draw, I would draw. I didn't care about the way it looked and I'd use just my imagination for it, not looking at references or anything (not saying that that's bad, but I was doing art just as a way of enjoying myself, not for being good at it).
Now I can't do these things anymore. I'm always worrying about being good, being productive. I can't write at all, even if my childhood dream was to become a writer, because it never feels good enough. The main focus for all the hobbies that I have now is progressing as fast as I can. Get fit. Become proficient in that language. And add on top of that the aspiration of getting good grades or doing great at your job and you never get a break from productivity. It's tiring.
As a retired person, who spent 40+ years in IT, I certainly understand the problem of burn-out.
And I probably spend too much time in front of the computer still :)
All my own fault, of course. I have every reason to live a quiet, contemplative life. I live in a remote valley on a tropical island, in the Caribbean. What could be quieter?
But as you say, the noise comes from within.
I _am_ trying to get better. I'm watching more long form videos, mainly of people surfing (it's amazing how relaxing that is :), or people working silently on some handicraft project.
What I _should_ be doing, is writing. I wrote less than 1K words today. Shame.
Thanks for sharing this video.
don't shame yourself, you are not alone in this problem
try to understand why do you avoid writing even though it is something you enjoy doing
@@alidelta7454 thanks for your support
This might sound kind of brain-broken, but I feel like your videos sometimes help as a moment of contemplation within my bad habit of consuming internet content. Helping me to stop and think about things from angles I didn't percieve before
RUclips has been recommending this video for a few weeks. I was like "Well, no. Because as the title suggests I should not let my attention be used so easily.". Watched it today and I'm happy that my attention got my mind to learn more about the matter.
Thank you
I appreciate your perspective on the Gilles Deleuze quote. When I reflect on this quote, I interpret it in several ways. One interpretation is that when we reduce the noise around us and quiet our minds, we can truly listen and gain a deeper understanding. In this context, I believe the quote supports the idea that the voices of the silenced should be amplified, rather than those who seek to disrupt and create chaos.
oh the irony of this being on RUclips, always there to speak away the silence
Its gotten to the point where I am guilty of taking days off. And even when I'm on a holiday, I can't be present and think only of work and the future.
as palestinian poet marwan makhoul said : ''In order for me to write poetry that isn't political, I must listen to the birds, and in order to hear the birds, the warplanes must be silent"
I'm still only half-way through this video and I already love it. It's putting it all in words in such a great way. On the topic of contemplation, I wanted to add something, which is also related to the french cafes you mentioned. I have been working as a waitress at a cafe in Greece for almost a year now and we get all sorts of costumers, from very young to very old. To explain the situation a little better, you should know that the coffee culture in Greece is really relaxed. Going for a coffee is one of the most common ways to socialise and that's why we end up staying at the cafe for hours and hours on end. We love coffee, but it's not just about the coffee, it's about meeting up and catching up. In any case, what I have noticed while working there is younger or even middle-aged people will talk and talk and then, as if it was agreed upon, they will take a short break to check their phones and scroll a bit and then go back to talking etc. But older people are different. We get friends and couples who talk less and look at the street more. They just sit in silence, contemplating, and before, this struck me as strange in a way. I was wondering why they're not talking as much and what are they thinking looking at the street for so long. But now, I envy them. They're contemplating! It makes me happy to think about it like that. They live slower and they aren't as anxious to be doing something. I'm really going to try following their example more.
I get anxious over the people who expect me to pick up all the slack that the nonproductive people have left for me to do. Everyone tells me that they fall apart when I am gone because I can shoulder much of the burden on my own. It feels good to be appreciated and wanted, but I also feel like I should be training someone else to do what I do regularly to pick up where I slack off or forget. That reminds me of the Clifton’s StrengthFinder from Gallup I took, I can learn things super quickly and pick up new information easily. The struggle is executing my responsibility to develop someone else to take on the roles I have manually taken upon myself.
That noise pollution but spoke to me so much as an autistic person. The world is loud and it hurts.
These two poles of "doing nothing, therefore I must do more" vs. "doing too much, therefore I must do less" is rooted in confusing doing with being. "Doing nothing" and "resting" is still a form of "doing"
to me a more important concept than happiness for everyday life is contentedness/serenity coupled with the opportunity to experience awe and depth of feeling ("being moved" so to speak)
About "slowing down", I feel that there is a possibility of being very active while being non-productive. Because "productivity" is about the goal and the creation of value, we can still enjoy things in intense or fast ways without participating in the production of capitalist goods or services.
Contemplation is great, but a lot of the neurodivergent people I know struggle to engage in slow and non-stimulating activities like sitting on a bench, even in an active way. I think it is important to appreciate things we can do quickly or intensely yet without purpose : drawing a lot, writing all day, reading unrelated wikipedia pages for hours... These are not ought to be productivist, even though they are intense and long activities that can feel like labor.
Thank you for the great video, et commentaire pour l'algo
And that is the thing: WHAT is "slowing down"?
The best answer? NOBODY KNOWS!
There is not a "one-size-fits-all" description or solution - one like to slow down by smoking weed and looking at clouds, another like to slow down by solving Physics equations.
The thing we should be focused is in the "experience" of slowing down, not in trying to "find a perfect formula".
@@Jamhael1 Yes, I believe you are right. I am more the "wikipedia-reader" type, and some of my friends more the "clouds-gazers" you describe, different experiences! It's probably about the journey to find your own way to slow things as you desire and need.
@@wagenshu14 and unfortunately, the world out there are simply PUSHING for people to fit in "boxes" just because no one wants to deal with the fact that HUMANS ARE WEIRD!
I like to consciously observe myself consuming (social) media. As many people I'm using it to "wind down" and distract myself from my daily worries. I noticed that this does not help, however. I've noticed that from this point of view, my mind has two states: a state where I absorb information and impressions, and another state where I process them. And the processing is not being done while in the first state.
Sure, Processing is being done sleeping at night, but I also noticed that if I'm not doing enough processing during the day (by something like quiet contemplation), I have trouble falling asleep because my mind is racing.
According to my phone, it took me 46 minutes to listen to this video and read some comments while prepping and eating breakfast.
Yesterday during my daily walk in the woods, I noticed that a bunch of red trilliums had popped up. I'd never seen red trilliums before so it was quite a treat.
I recently lissened to a radio interview from 1989, and it was so relaxed and slow. It almost had something meditative to it. I think my urge to get away from input and shutting my senses for an hour comes from the way media is right now.
Thank you for sharing your story with your grandmother in the care home and also my condolences. Slowing down had sent me on a spiral (the constant need to grind/be productive nagging at you) but what is the meaning of life if you can't stay still and smell the roses. I've started being intentional with what I consume and eliminating everything else that's taking up the finite resource that I have (myself).
0:50 We love scripts written in longhand! Go girl give us everything!
The purple shirt in the forest with purple flowers....
Why isn't every video creator thinking of filming in places like this?
It's so pleasing to watch and helps maybe encourage us to get outside instead of sorting in front screens 😊
I found the idea of not resting just to gain more productivity in our life in the book The Four Thousand Weeks as well
You are really on to something about pets! 👌
The fact that humans are so self-centered in our thinking means most people rarely consider such things.
But if you really put yourself into your pets "shoes" you would see that their life is incredibly depressing in 99% of cases.
Dogs regularly demonstrate separation anxiety and it's the whole reason they are so "happy" to see us.
Solitary confinement is considered one of the worst forms of torture, and yet we do that everyday for most of the day for most of our pets.
It's pretty horrific when you think about it...
But they get that gruel we call food from us, so....🤷♂️
Having just joined a company with 4-day workweek, I can see the point that this just promotes productivity even further. The thing is though - I do not mind, because I've grown tired of working at companies that expect productivity but at the same time require a lot of BS and pointless things, too. So having a place where both your work and personal time is valued makes me value my own work and personal time more, too. It's not the worst outcome in this productivity-driven game we're all in. :)
Man, does this hit home this week in particular! I do appreciate how you manage to use this platform that's often more given to hot takes to well thought out, perceptive arguments! Hope you're having a great week, Alice!
I practice buddhism and for me happiness is a destination, but it doesn't come from craving sensual pleasures but from contemplation, slowing down and accepting reality as it is
no because I WAS JUST thinking about this, so thank you.
I recommend meditation. Especially the Vipassana approach ("seeing things as they are"). It's been the ultimate cure against the attention economy for me. Basically: this leads you to live a life of creative decisions ("actions") instead of this constant reactionary mindset that pushes us around according to external influences, which is incentivized to attempt to monopolize our minds. In my experience, contemplation is insufficient. The minds roams on and on without aim, and this leads you right back into old habit patterns. Truly reconnecting with our bodies is a great way of accepting silence and boredom in their full realization.
I still thrive for happiness in everything i do, but its a kind of happiness that is different from how i for so long understood what happiness means. Happiness does not mean you are free from sadness and grief, happiness for me now simply means satisfaction and peacefulness despite what other’s thinks ! knowing that i did something because i really wanted to do it and not because what others thought will look cooler or worth revered!
I really like how you left in the clip of you stopping the filming each time. Its been nice to see how the video approach has evolved in subtle and lovely ways. You seem more comfortable, and the story about your grandmother relates to my experiences with her. I feel an urge to document it all, so that each visit is 'productive' in that sense - and at times it interferes with me actually being with her. She will be 90 in August.
I’ve been subscribed to you for a while now yet have never commented, but I want you to know that this is my favorite video of yours so far. Thank you for speaking up for the truth and (ever so gracefully) fighting the good fight.
100% my favorite philosophy channel. Thanks again, Alice.
This topic is very interesting to me for a few reasons. First, I am old enough to remember life before the internet, young enough to have experienced childhood during the early internet, and the rise of cell phones, etc. I also have ADHD, which was not diagnosed until I was an adult. I was also raised religious, and as such, had contemplation built in in the form of prayer.
As an adult, I've found that the hyperattentive expectations of the workplace have had a very damaging effect on my wellbeing. I've received so much flak for refusing to answer emails after hours or on the weekends in order to manage that time. I've also long struggled with email because it's inexpensive nature causes me to be deluged with low-priority messages that could have and should have been on a flyer or in person.
As such, I've found contemplation very important. As you point out, though, contemplation has rarely been a happy time for me. Rather, it is often melancholy or at best, peaceful. But these times also form core memories for me: times sitting in the forest and listening to the wind and birds and bugs; or watching people at a cafe. I derive deep meaning, connection, and liveliness from these moments.
Contemplation feels like stealing time and attention back for myself. And I love it.
17:28 when you mentioned bombs my heart froze. I immediately remembered all this noise and uncertainty at sharp sounds that remind me of bombs or fear when I hear an air alarm. Only after hearing this and pause the video, I started thinking about how calm and relaxed I felt, since I did not hearing these sounds. However, as soon as I hear something similar to this, I immediately remember how I felt in Ukraine during this period. I immediately start to get scared and want to hide somewhere, sometimes I can start crying.
My idea of calmness was actually in no living in noisy house, and I never thought about social media or my life experience. The only outside noise that I thought was only this, and now after almost week of thinking I can see that there is much more.
Thank you for the video, love your content!
4:50 I’m in! Where are we going? I want out of this model of life. You are right, people in the US don’t hang out in cafes, we don’t hang out anymore. Restaurants want to turn over clientele to get more paying customers in those seats. In the past, people would hang out in coffee and tea houses; in US modern culture, we have Starbuck’s where we are overcharged for drinks (my latte is $6.25) and we are not encouraged to hang around. It was called a third place and we do not have third places anymore. Even with friends, it is deeply disrespectful to drop in and visit friends. You must announce your intention to visit, make plans ahead of time. Those unexpected, unplanned moments of joy doesn’t happen. I think people are highly stressed, they can’t relax so construct strict borders on private time, thus they miss those unexpected pleasureful times and connections that would actually recharge them. I’ve been thinking about this a lot. In the US, people have become obsessed with privacy. We have 4’-5’ walks around our patio areas in the complex where I live, but that is not enough and people build weird barriers to have privacy. It’s so strange. We are in a very weird situation right now.
It's incredibly interesting ! I found an article recently made by Design students and Designers in 2014 detailing the attention economy and the potential danger of social media. The most surprising part was that this was already identified as a problem 10 years ago when social media was very far from what it is now and algorithms were much less addictive and the interface of websites was much less refined.
I think that as detailed in your video, this problem is built into the foundation of what social media is. We can put limits and rules and regulations on it, but the core of the business model is 'user attention=revenue'. The quality and accuracy of information contained on social media is irrelevant to the business model, the only currency is attention therefore attention-grabbing information (true or not) is the goal. I doubt companies will accept any form of regulation because it will impact their revenue directly.
I think there needs to be a strong alternative to social media where revenue is derived from the quality of information
This made me think about what I´ve already observed in little children. As a teacher in kindergarten I see problem in the begining. The amount of stimuli children get is anormous. The way how toys have changed is crazy. We went from simple toys to toys which are super colourfull and each of them has mostly one purpose how to play with it. They are constructed the way, that children don´t have to think or create their own games. We just serve them everything and when they stay by themselves without any stimuli for a little while they don´t know what to do and are immediately bored. They wait for someone to entertain them. It changed really fast and I see it as something dangerous. Maybe I sound old but believe me I am really young teacher and I was raised in completely different conditions so maybe thanks to that I was allways naturaly searching "boredom" and doing nothing and just observe surroundings. I am trying to transfer this approach to kids but it´s hard when whole society is heading the other way.
Heck yes. My mental health ironically started to improve when I hit rock bottom and was no longer able to work, and it improved again recently when I accidentally started using my air conditioner as a white noise machine to blot out the traffic. Here in the American Empire, we're reaching a point where the minimum amount of energy required to engage with society is greater than a double-digit percentage of the populace has to spend, and so more and more people are falling through the cracks. If we can't get the government to do something about it sooner rather than later, I'm starting to worry we're going to have a quiet genocide via deprivation.
In 'Discipline and Punish' Foucault talks about surveillance and I think that plays a huge role in our ability, or rather inability, to disconnect. Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon showed that (in prisons specifically) the illusion or chance of being watched impacts behaviour. For those of us in cities, it seems that we are always under surveillance and being filmed any time we leave our homes (and sometimes in them.) I have no doubt that impacts how we interact with the world and fuels the internal "need" to be productive. It's sad that privacy and disconnection are becoming a privilege for many.
I want to notice that the privilege to contemplation has historically been related to class and gender privilege, because the only moments in which one can contemplate is when you don't have to worry about anything or anyone else, and typically women are the ones that always need to worry about everything but themselves. A clear and silly example: in ancient Greese, philosohers could devote to contemplation (individually and in community) because they had their spouses and slaves that took care of the house, the kids and the food, so it's simply unfair to promote a life of contemplation when inequality is the backbone of modern society.
Only through contemplating alternatives can we ever expect to build something else.
So call it a privilege, that's not wrong, but it's the only way we will ever escape the things causing the disparity.
Plus, most people aren't only living lives of survival ALL THE TIME.
They go from work to plugging in to media.
They make a choice to do things other than contemplate.
This is why mindfulness has become all the rage.
We're saturated with media and content and have little room left for making new ideas.
I'm not saying you're totally wrong, but you should consider that we can't get to a society where equality is much more prevalent unless we learn to reconsider our values. And that only happens with contemplation.
Contemplate that for a bit 😉
I really like the path that your arguments took through quite different areas of human interaction. One thing that i found telling, albeit helpful, was your categorization of scrolling & contemplation into "passive & active", further cementing the unspoken ideal of remaining active
Find your way, detach from society,let the system crash. Go in nature get positive energy, stay less indoors. Walk, run, sports kill stress and negative energy, don't let depression absorb you. Don't give up. System want to use us till we crash.
Yes, but also return...
Enlightenment for oneself is selfish.
Better to be the bodhisatva that can return and help free others, kind of like you're found with this very comment.
But hopefully we can take it to another level so we have a society that actually serves most people rather than exploiting them
Love that you put yourself into spending time with your grandma. Speaks to the idea that meaningful experiences aren’t necessarily happy but create the kinds of raw emotion that makes us feel most human.❤
Manufactured freedom. Someone’s achievement and another’s shackles
I particularly enjoy the travel videos where the traveller only speaks through closed captioning or doesn't speak at all. During pandemic, I traveled so many places and felt so much less anxiety.
This combination of academic thought-provoking discussion and bits of french humor makes your channel an authentic treasure.
the editing, paper script, and fit make this vid just perfect
I think it’s important as well to see how capitalism and productivity culture has infected our perceptions of effective political action. It’s still possible to engage in contemplation while organizing, as opposed to measuring or judging the impact of political movements by their visibility and volume. Anxiety about the effectiveness of political action contributes to burnout as well, so we should be mindful.
By far one of my favorite youtube channels - keep doing what you're doing!!
Thanks for this video. It sparked the following thoughts and connections for me:
- Following the Sabbath is hyper radical.
- Roger Scruton in Why Beauty Matters says that "beauty transports us into contemplation". But he speaks of how beauty is useful precisely because it's purposeless.
- One definition of evil that is used in theology and philosophy is "meaninglessness" or "purposelessness". Even in situations like you described with your mother, we still find purpose in suffering well.
- It's so cool that the root word for contemplation is temple.
I’ve been reading and enjoying pretty much all of Han’s books lately (thanks to another reference to him in another of your videos, so I thank you for that!). Sure, one can quibble about his DWM references, but I don’t think that we should necessarily let that detract from his message. And yes, his politics isn’t overtly in your face on the surface of the text-it’s more implicit-so that can come off as de-politicized. However, that in itself seems in line with the form and content of his thinking. True confession: I probably find his works appealing because he draws on The Greatest Hits of continental theory that I read in grad school forty years ago, tempered by a Zen Buddhist/Taoist sensibility that I also find appealing (I’m a uni prof of Japanese history and culture).
Loving these videos. I've been thinking about this stuff for a while. I'm only a writer, cartoonist but I feel like I push myself to create just to justify me not working a "real job"
I truly enjoyed this video essay in several ways. I liked how you included both your likes and criticism of Han's book but also adjusted this video's editing to reflect the slow cuts you pointed out towards the end, which, in fact, encouraged me to focus more contemplatively rather than passively.
Moreover, this is exactly the kind of message I've been trying to tell my college students in my seminars in various different ways as hyperattention and achievement culture is absolutely *devouring* their mental health in every way imaginable---even if they can't quite envision another way to be in our industrialized, digitized, never-stop world.
Keep being you, Alice! 🙂
You are wise beyond your years (though admittedly, I have no idea how many that is)!
You have a great way of tying together modern human psychology with the system that we live within, and your personal perspectives add meaningfully to the discussion.
I think that we, as the most adaptable species ever, have found ourselves within many unhealthy processes that are more due to the system itself than any sort of human nature or character flaws.
We should actively be working to change that system, and then we can live in much better alignment with the part of us that finds meaning and happiness readily accessible.
Just curious, are you familiar with a resource based economy?
great video. as someone with ADHD I sometimes fear that I might have caused this but of course I can't take responsibility for the entire internet hustle culture especially as people who are of more sound mind and higher knowledge and energy than me have also fallen prey to it.
Many years ago I was listening to an old recording of a talk that Allan Watts gave and in it he spoke about how capatalism corrupted leasure. Giving a leasure/time off as a means to an end to as you say recharge and become more productive. I think I was too young or rather immature to really let that sink in and understand the message, it wasn't until I lived in the middle of nowhere, almost living a cottage core lifestyle until I understood what he meant.
I wonder how Chul Han would respond to a counterargument along the lines of: "while it is true that the focus seems to have shifted from direct external authoritarianism -- external agents who exert influence and pressure on agents to act x or y way -- to a more internalized authoritarianism -- the agent exerts pressure on themselves to seek self-actualization -- it seems perhaps more plausible that there is still more external influence at play than internal. That is, while there is greater headway for individualized choices and aims, these are still vastly chosen by the external pressures of our lives. Thus, as he points out, there is the illusion of choice. But these options we believe are 'free choice' are in fact residual choices from our historical contexts. Where before achievement came from agreeing with external authority and doing as it says, achievement is now in 'freely' doing what external authority says. This might be demonstrated in the simple concept of 'success' as you unpack at one point. People understand success in the same manners that they did when external pressure forced them to conform. Instead now, we live in the remains of that historical context and our understanding of success remains unchanged but our autonomy seems to have increased. So while we believe we no longer must do 'as the man says' (to use American colloquialisms), we in fact still must. We measure out self-actualization by the metrics of that external authority (as a society) and thus leverage our free choice to do what before required external influence. In short, Foucault's analysis is not overturned in the modern society, but lives on in a quietly pervasive manner that underpins our choices and freedoms. We act freely in the aim of appeasing external authority but believe it is to meet our internal needs."
I'm also a bit scandalized at making a form of inactivity be passive or active. it seems more realistic to call inactivity in all cases passive, but that there are forms of it which are more rejuvenating due to their natural role in our lives. it feels almost a contradiction to his points to call 'good' inactivity active as he is still relying on a need for value in that form of activity. "What is passive has no value, whereas what is active does" has been my experience in philosophical discussions. But it seems to me that inactivity is valuable simply for its passivity, for the openness and flexibility it offers. To try and make a dichotomy seems to obscure this in our obsession for having clean delineations of good and bad, whereas inactivity is both good and bad in its different forms. Some are good for the self and 'bad' for society (e.g., unproductive contemplation) and others are bad for the self and good for 'society' (e.g., scrolling). both are inactivity, but one offers better goods to the individual and is 'natural' inactivity (e.g., contemplation on an Aristotelean model).
:EDIT: I suppose you can make the claim that contemplation requires us to have 'chosen' something to contemplate but...I'm a bit dubious of that. anyway, a possible reason to make the split.
not super thought out as a response but one that seemed open to the way Chul Han constructed their argument (from your presentation of it). liked the video and your careful and thoughtful approach :)
15:00 I think this is spot on. As you said, some of us do not choose silence, in fact, they feel miserable inside because they want to keep talking, expressing, but from past experiences they had been part of some kind of recrimination or were ignored for doing this, until getting to a point they feel they can't say anything useful, that would attract the attention.
05:55 - "I'm french" wow, you don't say
just kidding, your accent is lovely
also - "the modern world" being basically capitalism-lite to avoid offending your customer base is something very, very obvious that I have never thought about until you mentioned it.
sort of similar to your grandma situation but also the opposite: My sibling just had a baby and sometimes I get to baby sit that baby and those days I usually get nothing done. Like cant even scroll on my phone cause this baby requires 24/7 holding but it is super rewarding and you get to ponder the nature of emotional intamacy and dependancy, and you get to watch someone learn how their body and the world works which is kind of baller. I say all this as someone who is decidedly child free but what I am getting at is that it is nice to do labor that isnt "productive"
There’s one superior reason that makes me addicted to this channel and I have rarely found anywhere else : honestly
a couple weeks ago I found myself bored (and off social media) and it made me realize what a pleasure and privilege it is. I feel like boredom is one of the most inspiring states to be in. to be itching to do or create something and have the TIME to do it while also not feeling anxious or guilty about the things I "should" be doing. I hadnt been boredom in years and man I loved it.
I cleaned in a care home during lockdown; I’d see some of them just sat about watching daytime tv and think ‘damn that must be dull’. But then I’d come home and sit in bed watching yt 😅, it motivated me to take really long walks out in the countryside tho. Loved the shot amongst the bluebells btw 💕
To come back to your point about contemplation not bringing happiness, I relate entirely. For me contemplation / meditation summon a feeling of peaceful acceptance. Knowing that the world is like that, that you don't have to avoid the anxiety and stress that come with everything happening around the world, and that it's in fact the first step toward changing things.
(En tout cas solide vidéo! Je m'abonne direct! )
I agree wholeheartedly. It's the way I have lived my life. But there are dangers to idleness. There is a whole culture of idleness in America, which is tolerable, but it tends to get tangled up in the drug trade. The clouds look more romantic when you're stoned.
Not wrong.
But it's more of a byproduct of going too far in one direction as a culture.
We spend most of our childhood stuck with productivity obsession and never really escape it until we actively choose to, at which point it's hard to know where the balance should be.
This is how we calibrate just about everything though.
Explore the extremes before finding where the optimal middle lies
destruction of dense city tissue due to industrialization in 18th-century lost of city fabric (tissue) due to fabrique French pun on sexual innuendo of French silk fabric) and in 20 century with automobilization logistics grew exponential so called city sprawl where no organic city tissue left.
Stendhal syndrome, or Florence syndrome is a psychosomatic condition involving rapid heartbeat, fainting, confusion, and even hallucinations.
We need be honest then we talking about old city center like Florence, Venice, Paris they are is a bit fake, because many narrow streets, passages, "petite" pedestrian bridges, antic book shops, stairways already rebuild and adapted for high flow tourism industry.
Very informative video Alice! The attention economy is definitely a major issue, people have lesser attention than they used too.
People are definitely chasing achievements to feel good about themselves, but once you achieve something, whats next, if one spends all their time chasing one goal, and when they get it, thats it.
Good video Alice!!
Before the industrial revolution, the life of ordinary people in rural areas or small town where full of quiet time. Naps, walks and nature where at hand. The sheperds work was so full of quietness and contemplation that was the inspiration for the bucholic poetry even. So contemplation was never a privilege of the rich until industrialization
We have all learned to run from any emotion that isn't happiness or be doomed to stay with misery. That's a bad lesson. Experiencing the expanse of emotions is an important thing to learn. Subdued emotions go unexamined and thus a part of yourself remains unknown to you.
I have my college entrance exams and here I'm watching a video uploaded 4 mins ago😭
I can very much relate to the description of mild anxiety when faced with inactivity - despite having consumed quite a bit of "toxic cottage core" and slow living media it hasn't really been able to break through my subconscious need to judge everything I do on a scale of "usefulness." I also appreciated your critique that the feeling one gets with contemplation is not necessarily happiness. For me on a good day I might have a sense of attention and calm, but it also makes quite a bit of space for other emotions that are otherwise stuffed down by hyperactivity to emerge. For example grief for me often comes up most powerfully days, weeks, or months later when I have a chance to slow down and allow difficult emotions some space to flower. I guess other than my own judgement on inactivity being useless, that could be another source of anxiety when contemplating -- that I might not find it so easy to avoid difficult emotions without distracting myself with a task and the dopamine hit of finishing some work or chore.
Interestingly I’ve heard once in a philosophy to series that according to a known philosopher there are 3 impossible jobs
If my mind mind serves me right they were policeman, teacher, doctor
Everything starts back at the beginning like it’s been on repeat continuously
Which can lead to burnout