Storing Our Selves
Phyllis Tickle has written an excellent book called The Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why.
I’ll devote later posts to a more detailed discussion of the book, but for now I’ll highlight one idea gleaned from a cursory reading while still standing in line at the bookstore.
She teases an idea about To Do lists being respositories of our knowledge of what we need do next. Calculators become crutches used for running simple sums once run inside our own heads. Part of this, of course, is cultural. The speed at which life happens makes machines necessary for us to keep pace.
The result, as she says, is that “we are storing more of our selves outside ourselves and thereby creating a dependency that is, at the very least, unsettling.”
And yet, at the same time, David Allen, author of Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, advocates the very thing Phyllis seems to deride. We must, according to David, store things outside ourselves in a trusted system we can use to recall what it is we need to do at any given time.
To be fair to both writers, I may be comparing apples and oranges.
Are machines the issue? Does the same kind of disassociation occur in people using an analog system? (David Allen’s methodology does not hinge on an electronic medium. A pencil and a ream of newsprint will get you started using the GTD methodlogy.)
For me, though, an analog system is better. The physical act of writing things on paper enhances my memory and brings with it physical memory as well. An analog system is simpler. It is more elegant. It is more open to improvisation. Some say it’s slower, but I’m not so sure. Because it’s written–hand to pen to paper–it’s less removed than items entered and stored in an electronic system.
A compromise? Maybe. What do you think?
I like the analog system for a whole lot of things. But, I also like the convenience and speed of computers, for one, for writing, for keeping our bank accounts straight and accurate and balanced (it’s much easier for me to do and keep up with in Quicken).
So, maybe as you suggest – a compromise. That works best for me, I think.
Dee
Dee Andrews
October 18, 2008 at 4:20 pm
I once used an electronic system for almost everything: The Palm Pilot sychronized with the Palm Desktop. I found myself anchored to a computer, even if that computer was a hand-held device. When my Palm Pilot started getting old and replaced by newer and better and more expensive systems, I lost interest in keeping my life in an electronic system.
I’ve since gone to a more holistic notebook system. I find that I take notes on everything. One thing though: Those notes are notoriously unfinished.
So, I’m using blogging and a local wiki to move the notes from simple reminders to something a bit more substantial.
Analog is easiest for caputuring thoughts.
Electronic seems to be best for refining thoughts.
(I, like you, don’t know where’d I’d be without tax preparation software. A painful exercise suddenly becomes less painfree.)
Ray
October 20, 2008 at 10:35 am