Rabbit Holes 🕳️ #90

From walking as inactivity to unsexy smartphones and why quests are better than goals

Hey all!

Today, I’m coming to you from my summer break/exploration journey – currently in South Tyrol – with a slightly shorter, but I believe nonetheless quite interesting rabbit holes issue. And in case you missed last week’s deep dive about falling in love with the process, check it out here. 😉

Enjoy and thanks for supporting my work!

THIS WEEK ↓ 
🕳️ Rabbit Holes: Walking As Inactivity // Unsexy Smartphones // Don't Have Goals, Have Quests 

Rabbit Holes 🕳️

As always, 3 perspective-shifting rabbit holes to rewild your mind:

#1 🚶‍➡️Walking As Inactivity

“The vital thing to understand- and the point that I want to stress the most- is that walking is not an activity. Or rather, it should not be conceptualised as and reduced to being a mere activity. It is much more than that because it is much less than that. Walking is one of the great forms of inactivity and in a world of striving and consumerism and grasping and impatience it is one of only very few potential forms of inactivity left. It is that makes it precious.

You see, when you walk slowly and with no real destination in mind you are not doing, you are just being. Such walking, such contemplation is the beginning of freedom, it is the necessary pre-condition for having your own thoughts and as such for truly living your own life. […]

Just as silences make music more beautiful and pauses make conversations richer in meaning, it is inactivity- that is the moving beyond doing into being- that makes life human. Responding to stimuli alone, satisfying needs as they arise alone makes life nothing more than a cycle of biological survival.

The beauty is in the gaps. Art and culture arise from the blank spaces (which may be why these vital spheres in particular seem to be diminishing in this time of always on, always available activity). […]

The luxury of the aimless walk is one of the most accessible and readily available blank spaces we have. It is no coincidence that such a stroll will all of itself produce ideas and insights and new observations. In the absence of a task the mind will begin to play. It will be free.”

» The Commonplace | Walking As Inactivity by Thomas J Bevan

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#2 📱 Unsexy Smartphones

“We all know our phones are destroying our attention spans, our dopamine reward systems, our relationships. We know they’re numbing our feelings and experiences. That’s all I’ll say about the general badness of phones and the internet.

But I want to talk about a very specific kind of badness: our phones are also killing our ability to feel sexy.

Feeling sexy is not frivolous. Getting in touch with our true desires is critical if we want to feel connected, happy, driven, and alive. But, like an old iPhone battery, the vital charge that used to fuel our lives is trending precipitously downwards. Our phones aren’t solely to blame for the lack of sexy vibes in the world, but they play a central role. Nothing about our phones is sexy—from the things they allow us to do, to how they feel to use, to what they ultimately symbolize. […]

The proliferation of devices surrounding us at all times may help us “get in touch” with other people, sure, but they impede our ability to get in touch with ourselves. A “touch” screen would indeed seem to promise something tactile and real, but they leave us cold, tepid, and listless. Something is deeply wrong when we sext the same way we order a sandwich. […]

Today, everyone and everything is always available, and there’s nothing less sexy than that. There’s no chase. Our phones don’t allow us time to dwell, and they don’t allow us time to yearn. […]

On a lighter note, aren’t we all so sick of looking stuff up? You know what, maybe I go to a restaurant and it’s bad. Maybe I don’t know what’s good on the menu before I get there. Maybe I throw caution to the wind and put something in the dishwasher without googling if it’s dishwasher safe. Maybe I get a flip phone and get comfortable saying, “I don't know.” While you’re looking down at Google Maps, the love of your life is walking past you on the street. To feel sexy, we need risk and spontaneity. Our phones kill both.”

» Catherine | Your phone is why you don’t feel sexy by Catherine Shannon

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#3 🐉 Don’t Have Goals, Have Quests

“Whereas “goal” has become a tired and bloodless descriptor for the (supposed) intention to do something great, the word quest instills the right mentality for achieving a real-life personal victory:

A quest is an adventure, and you expect it to be one. You expect a quest to take you into a new and unfamiliar landscape. You expect there to be puzzles, surprises, perils, and curious encounters. A bridge you counted on will be out. You’ll meet an interesting stranger on the path. You’ll hear wolves howling at night. This is all part of the fun. The goal mentality frames this stuff as setbacks, problems, pains – stuff in the way of the goal.

A quest changes you, not just your situation. Goals are practical attempts to change your circumstances. A quest is personally transformative – the endeavor itself shapes who you are, and what you’re capable of. It’s not only the reward that does this, it’s your inevitable encounters with the unfamiliar, and the new capabilities you gain as you handle these encounters. […]

A quest can change the world. Everything great ever achieved required someone to overcome an internal obstacle. Society is built from realized human aspirations. Your project may be humble, but the way it transforms you is a big deal. It will bring more capability into the world as a whole.”

» Raptitude | Do Quests, Not Goals by David Cain

That’s it for this week’s issue!

Thanks for supporting my work! 😊

Thomas