Dave's book review for Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life...

I wrote Finishing Things and Ascetic Computing before reading this book and Offline after. (And Less online reading, more book reading both before and after!) These have a lot of subject overlap…​ in a good way.

Digital Minimalism was published in 2019. Much of it is timeless, but the few things that are dated have only become _more_true.

For instance, I know some people still have Facebook accounts because misguided organizations still post important updates there and only there - which was true in 2019, but the reasons to avoid spending time on Facebook have multiplied a thousandfold like a bacteria. The reasons to use it have remained either diminished or static. The advice in DM around logging into an online service for whatever specific purpose it serve and then getting the hell out of there is more sage than ever.

(I just realized DM is short for both Digital Minimalism and Death Metal. Hell yeah.)

I completely agree with what I believe is the central tenant of this book: Your user of online services needs to be guided not by arbitrary rules or new year’s resolution-like abstention, but a personal philosophy.

Abstinence is all fine and well if you can arrange to go live a monastic life in a mountain cave somewhere. But most of us have to keep on carrying a damn cell phone and logging into a variety of thrice-damned online services in order to stay employed, have health insurance, or raise a child in a public school system.

Each technology should have a role and a purpose in your life. Your philosophy of use should help confine each separate "service" to its time-gated bin in your daily schedule. Use it and get out.

On that third point, I couldn’t agree more. It feels good to do what you intend to do with your time. It feels good to refrain from being led astray by flashy, unhealthy, useless garbage.

To help yourself stick to your philosophy, give yourself a procedure to follow, a set of rules for using technology. Give yourself clarity.

A good procedure isn’t vague like, "Log into Shitter to increase my social life." It’s specific like, "Log in. Check if anybody on my short list of actual friends has posted anything important. Log out."

There was lots of other good stuff this book.

Time alone is good! Give your self solitude. That’s when you can think.

Constant internet access = bad mental health. Boy, I’m feeling that one big time. I didn’t used to, but I do now.

Social media is no substitute for real-life interactions, but it certainly takes that same time away from your day. Online is easier, faster, and less energy (and risk, in some ways) than going out and seeing people. At least in the short term. "Join first …​ work out the other issues later."

I would like to join a local art group (like the urban sketching groups I’ve seen online) or book club eventually.

I really appreciate Newport’s emphasis on the importance of good leisure time. I’m really big on that too. Aristotle evidently extolled pursuits that provide a "source of inward joy." I think that’s extra important now that all of my favorite hobbies are being destroyed online. Neat.

Quoting Arnold Bennett, whose book, How to Live on Twenty-Four Hours a Day, you can read online right now here:

https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2274/pg2274-images.html

This has been my experience as well! I can put in a full day of programming at work and then come home and have a great time doing difficult mental projects. In fact, I feel better if I do. Expending energy in leisure actually energizes me.

Newport describing the philosophy of Matthew Crawford:

Wow, that hits like a ton of bricks in 2026, eh?

That’s why I’ve been spending more and more time offline, seeking what Crawford describes as "the infallible judgment of reality."