Firstly, a huge THANK YOU to everyone who engaged with yesterday’s post about my floatation tank experience. My favourite one was:

“I really enjoyed this post & know where I’m taking my wife to next – I think we could both do with some time in a very salty egg.”

It ties in nicely with today’s theme which is on how we can bring some analogue relief to our digital world. If you ever feel at the mercy of your devices then read on!

Did you know that Billie Eilish has just released a limited run of her Barbie Soundtrack song ‘What Was I Made For?’ on cassette? Yes, you read that correctly – a cassette! That thing you have to put a pencil in to correctly wind it when it gets all chewed up by the machine (if you know, you know). You can look at it here but if you’re planning to buy one…it’s already sold out.

Receiving the promotional email today reminded me how much analogue technology and practices have their place and can bring us comfort in an overwhelming digital world where hyper-connectivity can leave us feeling lonely. So here’s a few things that I’ve found have worked for me:

Buying a newspaper

At some point during COVID I stopped buying physical newspapers. Near-daily images of Boris Johnson on the front cover is enough to make you puke on your cornflakes and the combination of my mother dying, my children missing out on so many crucial experiences and basic all-round awfulness convinced me that I didn’t need more doom on the dinner table. So I just stopped. And then had to buy fire lighters to get the wood burner going (I’ve got one. I don’t want to get into it right now but yes, I am a terrible human being for having one). This continued up until relatively recently when I was bored on a Sunday and I thought “Why don’t I give newspapers another try?”. And lo, I was brought back into the fold.

Since then, I’ve bought copies of The Observer and The Times at the weekend and I have LOVED having something printed that I can dip in and out of during the week. There are no “LOSE BELLY FAT FAST” or “THE ONE TRICK PENSIONERS IN DIDCOT NEED TO KNOW” ads. No paywall to infuriate you (I know you have to buy a physical newspaper but it just feels less aggressive than the blurring out of a single column that you wanted to read) and the joy of the crossword was reintroduced to my life. I grew up watching my dad attempt to deal with his dyslexia by sitting with The Sun crossword and a dictionary and it brings me comfort to participate in something that reminds me of him. What I don’t do is smoke a packet of Silk Cut while doing so I also feel less wound up by some of the articles that are only relevant to the elite (there was a doozy in The Times about the prep school that “celebs are queuing up to send their children to”) than I would by a single tweet. It feels easier to simply turn the page than have it burned into your eyes by a screen. Plus you’re spared the terror of HYS comments on the BBC website which itself seems to have turned into a roll call of the most upsetting and contentious stories available.

Deleting Twitter

Whilst part of me really hopes that La Musk is going to use DMX’s ‘X Gon’ Give It To Ya’ (listen to that absolute banger here) as the theme tune for his newly-renamed platform, I don’t have enough protective equipment to cope with the absolute sewer that it has become. I’m sad to leave behind the brilliant nature writers that I loved and the artists like Cold War Steve who so powerfully held a mirror to the current government but when you find yourself scowling more than smiling as you scroll it’s time to go. As for an analogue replacement, I’d recommend going to your local pub or coffee shop where you will also find people with views that you don’t necessarily agree with but at least they’ll be speaking publicly and with a modicum of respect for other people that seems to be missing from much of Twitter’s interactions.

Run Free

Do you really need your watch to tell you how far you’ve run? Or if you’re still breathing? Is it absolutely necessary to take a picture of your trainers covered in mud or those horses that are rolling around? Let me be the first to confess that I have shared videos of me running as a means to hold myself to account and help others who want motivation to exercise. And I have listened to podcasts or techno soundtracks to keep me going. And I have most certainly shared photos of horses. But I have decided, for now, to stop. A friend and legendary podcaster David McIntosh shared a post that spoke about how – if you’re trying to create – listening to other podcasts can distract you from your goals. Or, if you’re trying to think clearly, having someone else’s thoughts being piped directly into your ears may be counterproductive. And it’s true! So, for now, I’m leaving the phone at home. And when I next sharing a running picture you can totally call me out on it.

Choose Your Own Flow

I’ve written and podcasted about my experiences of yoga quite a lot (check out the bumper – sweary – podcast on that topic here) but what I haven’t done is really practise without instruction. You would think after years of following free videos from Yoga with Adriene and Yoga with Kassandra that I’d be some kind of guru but no. What I’ve done is pick a video based on the length of time and focus and treated it as a class. And it’s made me realise how perhaps I’m missing one of the points of listening to your body and finding your own flow. It was interesting to notice my inner dialogue wondering if I was “doing this right” when in most of the classes the emphasis is on finding what feels good in your body and responding to what it needs. I’ve done the basics a thousand times over so it’s time to try going with my own flow.

Get an Alarm Clock

“What do you mean you don’t have your phone in your bedroom?!” This was from a friend of mine who legitimately needs his phone within easy reach but me? I told him what I use to wake me up in the morning (and I felt ancient when I told him this) I use a….clock radio. Sounds like the sort of thing you’d win on an ’80s game show! But that’s what I’ve got.

Not having a phone in the bedroom means it remains a place that’s digitally decluttered (unless you’re going to hold the fact that the radio is DAB against me). Alongside it always being the way things are done around here the discipline of keeping phones out of the bedroom allowed me to draw a line in a very difficult situation. There was a point in my life where I was harassed by a family member and had to block their number. This, however, didn’t stop them from setting up accounts on Facebook and continuously messaging my public profile. At a time when I felt helpless in the face of their behaviour, choosing not to have a device in the bedroom felt like a degree of positive control.

Share Your Tips!

What have I missed? Got something you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it – please drop a comment below or in the comments section on the platform where you’re reading this.

Image credit: Photo by Daniel Schludi on Unsplash