From the moment I get up, I face the screen 15 hours a day in the lab to work on my science project. Even when I am off duty, my fancy computer has to keep racking its powerful dual core brain and 2GB memory to run multi-programs.

As a self-claimed “super multi-task person”, my energy has to be evened out for many other tasks on my list. Papers, newsletters, reviews, reports…writing assignments keep coming one after another. Seeing my diary once again marked with dozens of deadlines, I sat before the screen with a sigh, began to crack piles of electronic files and rack my human head for work of words.

Months ago, my work didn’t require me to bind myself so tightly with a computer. I read books and material in hardcopy. I handwrote articles on notepad and then typed into a computer. I didn’t feel a bit inconvenience. Now, with the help of my super powerful computer designed to improve work efficiency, I was supposed to get a lot more done. But that wasn't exactly true.

In front of a screen, my inspiration was dried up again. When the current work was not going well, I couldn’t help checking out other tasks standing by on the screen. As working at a computer with an auto internet access, being distracted was only a click away. Continual bursts of information could so easily make me occupied. Streams of e-mails just kept flowing and all seemed to ask for my attention. I could feel my attention span shortened, not being able to focus on one particular task. Barely having accomplished anything for quite a few days, I suffered from extreme disappointment at myself, and very sadly to realize – even my blog hasn’t be updated for a long time…

Almost driven to the edge, I decided to stay away from my computer for some days. Switching off the screen, I walked out of lab with a backpack filled with books, printed papers and my dear notepad.

Sitting in a café on the first day, I was totally at a loss without a computer by my side. A guy beside me seemed to enjoy himself very much working at his laptop, and I was so bored. But after daydreaming for a while, I slowly put myself back together. I opened the heavy backpack I carried from 30-km away, took out the books and pencils and held them for a moment. I knew things would come together with my less modern tools.

I was right. During the first two hours, I read through the three challenging chapters that I should have finished days ago. In the next two hours, I finished writing a draft case study that I wasn’t able to get done for three days at my computer. I realized I hadn't felt so productive and also relaxed for so long because I had never given myself a chance to break my overly-tight bond with computer.

I was once worrying that I would miss a lot of things for being away from my computer. What if some urgent email requires my immediate reply? What if some oversea friends are calling me online? What if my article needs me to find some information on the internet? What if that simulation program asks for my monitoring ？

But it turns out that these are my obsessions. While I was not by my computer, those who really wanted to get in touch with me did so via other means, but my needing to reach them was cut down. Moreover, when I checked my e-mails three days later, very few of them were in need of an urgent response. (If so, they tried other means too). And during my reading and writing, I did sometimes need to search some further information, but when I put them down on a to-do list, the time I work at computer was much more fruitful.

At this moment, I thought of a friend of mine who persists in communicating with me via her handwritten letters for more than six years. Comparing with email, it was troublesome to handwrite tidily nice letters, pay for postage and head to the post office. However, it is such a pleasure to read her thoughts in her beautiful handwriting and I’m sure she enjoys doing so.  

And it also reminds me of another friend who always “evaporates” from our life and couldn’t be tracked down via any means. As a man very into the world of philosophy, he once told us that he was breaking the addiction to the modern media like Internet and TV so that he could be totally devoted to serious reading and thinking. When we doubted whether he could ever survive without these modern tools that have become daily necessities in our eyes, we were surprised to find that even “cell phone” was newly put onto his “bye-bye” list. However, when he comes back to normal life with his new works, we have to admit that his evaporation adventure was worthwhile.

For a break, I picked up a magazine in the café for a quick browse. It was like a hint of God when I came to an article written by an accomplished novelist named Stephen Elliott. In order to break the drowning Internet habits, he carried out a project of surviving one month without Internet. This is what his suggested as a routine for people who must spend their days in front of a computer and want to accomplish more:

 “Divide your day into online and offline. Studies have consistently shown that people with more screens open get less done. Multitasking slows down productivity. Dedicate at least half of your day to handling non-Internet tasks exclusively. Write a list of things you need to do when you do get online, so your Internet time will be more productive. If the main thing I was doing in my life was writing a novel, I would resolve not to be online at all. I know people who have moved "off the grid," to rural areas to escape any distractions to their work. But the reality is you don't need to go anywhere, you just need a computer without a Wi-Fi hookup. The urge to screw around is always strongest when the work's not going well. And if you work at a computer, screwing around is only a click away. But when the work's not going well is exactly the time to turn the Internet off.”

After reading this, I spent my last hour in the café handwriting my blog article on paper, for I do want to share this insight with you the first thing when I am back to computer again. Comparing with my struggling for word before the screen, I do enjoy the old-fashioned writing habit on paper when words flow so naturally under my pencil. The article was smoothly done at one go.

Through these days away from the screen, I’ve made some decisions about my computer usage habits. So, what about you?

posted on 2007-07-12 15:12 江晓弘 阅读(9835) 评论(31)  编辑  收藏 所属分类: 书海拾贝 、随想与杂谈 网摘收藏