{"id":4821,"date":"2019-10-07T14:02:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-07T12:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/?p=4821"},"modified":"2020-02-03T15:55:15","modified_gmt":"2020-02-03T14:55:15","slug":"zero-tolerance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/?p=4821","title":{"rendered":"Zero Tolerance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I am looking into my computer, trying to get some proofreading\ndone. I am having trouble concentrating, finding just about any reason possible\nto stop looking at my computer. This is perhaps because the average sentence length\nin the academic paper I\u2019m proofreading comes in around 89 words. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s an outside chance that my trouble concentrating is\ndue to the fact that my work email, my personal email, LinkedIn, Twitter, and\nFacebook are all open in my browser. The Office<\/em> is playing on the TV\nbehind me and the cat has decided that she wants to sit on my shoulder so that\nwe can pretend to be Greybeard the pirate and his cat, Smithers. Again.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I get up from my computer to check my phone and while I\u2019m there\nI check my email inbox, which I have been staring at in a tab on my computer\nfor the last ninety minutes. It\u2019s then I realize that I might have a problem. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

I shut everything down. Twenty-five seconds later I open Facebook\nand Twitter to make sure I\u2019m not missing anything. Appalled at myself, I decide\nto go for a walk. In nature. With no phone. I slip my notebook and a pen into the\npocket of my track pants and I walk out the door. I will not lie, I look back\nat my phone several times before I get out the door. I may or may hear it\ncalling to me as I close the door behind me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I am alarmed at how my technology has taken over aspects of\nmy life. My attention span is already so short it can be an Ewok in the next Star\nWars movie, and technology beats my productivity to death with a shovel. I have\nmade rules for myself. The primary of which is that when I do a writing session\nthere is no internet at all for me. This works because it is a zero tolerance\nsystem, much like the Czech drinking and driving policy. Which also works. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s when I allow myself some wiggle room that I am screwed\nin a big way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But that\u2019s not all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After half an hour of technology free time, my brain begins\nto form opinions and ideas of its own. What it finds there is scary.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I get very angry with my students when they look at their\nphones in class. I have often mentioned to them that they are half in the real\nworld and half in the virtual world the whole time. But so in the last meeting\nthat I was forced to suffer through, I posted four tweets and liked about\ntwelve Facebook posts. The trick is looking like you\u2019re taking notes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I can\u2019t blame my students really. They have never had the experience\nof not having a phone. They don\u2019t know what it\u2019s like to be unreachable for a\nperiod of time. When I tell students taking a test that they have to turn off\ntheir phones for 60 minutes, the looks of inconceivable fear and dawning horror\ntell a story in themselves. While they may not know any better, I do. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s not all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I look at my phone so often that I am convinced that a month\nafter the zombies come I\u2019ll still be doing Facebook update checks. I mean, if I\u2019m\nstill, you know\u2026. In any case, in the past forty minutes I have reached into an\nempty pocket to check a phone that is not there.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Action needs to be taken and I decide on a zero tolerance\npolicy. I will have two and a half hours in the day to stare longingly in the internet.\nAn hour in the morning and afternoon, and a half hour in the evening. That\nshould give me time to do everything I need to do and some extra time to go down\nsome Wikipedia rabbit holes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I get home, I feel that I have suffered enough and go\nto my phone as if it had gestated in a family member\u2019s uterus. It\u2019s amazing to\ncome home to check my messages, rather than just being available 100% of the\ntime at a click. I feel like it\u2019s 1990. Another thing the students will never\nunderstand.   <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am looking into my computer, trying to get some proofreading done. I am having trouble concentrating, finding just about any reason possible to stop looking at my computer. This is perhaps because the average sentence length in the academic paper I\u2019m proofreading comes in around 89 words. There\u2019s an outside chance that my trouble […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2583,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/damiengaleone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/monkey-mind.jpg?fit=247%2C265&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1EvEu-1fL","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4821"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4821\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4822,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4821\/revisions\/4822"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}