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Magical Life

Well, today is the last day of the infomagical challenge and I have to say, I am much more aware of the media I am consuming and really enjoying feeling like I am in control of that consumption. These challenges have forced me to re-evaluate who I am as a media consumer and allowed me to go back to the basics of communication.  

Below, I have listed some of the most important things I found throughout the week. 

1. Too many devices at once =OVERLOAD!!!

If I was on my computer doing schoolwork my phone was face up beside it, this meant that every time a notification set my phone off my attention was drawn to the phone instead of my computer. This happens a lot and each time I lost focus, I spent more time regaining it and then another notification would go off.

TIP: put the phone away! It helped me to set a timer of say 30 minutes of time 100% dedicated to my computer and then I could take a break and look at the notifications. I’m hoping that as I get used to doing this, the longer I will be able to without looking

 2. Simplicity is key!

Often when I’m working on something, especially online, I have multiple tabs open which does not help with the lack of focus I already have. If I tried my best to keep the screen I was looking at clean and clutter-free, it helped me to become more focused and productive. If you feel your mind start to wander, rather than opening a new tab and “saving it for later” (like I do) give yourself a break! The best kind of breaks also mean getting away from a screen.

3. Communication doesn’t have to be complicated.

One of the most impactful challenges was day 4 when I held a face-to-face conversation. I loved how open and sincere my peers were during this conversation and it really boiled down what communication has to be. We are so surrounded my media and people opinions, which are often passive aggressive and insincere, it was refreshing to see a more genuine side of my peers.

I had an awesome time challenging myself to keep up with the infomagical challenges and know that these lessons and skills will stick with me for a long time.

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Magical Connections

We seem so interconnected already through the constant grab of social media, so why not take that connection back to face to face rather than through screen’s. The goal was 7 minutes, because that’s the apparent magic number that can tell you if a conversation is going to be interesting or not. What has happened in our society today is that people don't seem to be willing to put in the 7 minutes, which is kind of mind blowing.The podcast mentions the fact that talking in person seems so hard because we have grown used to the the screening and filtering process our electronic conversation allow us, being face-to-face forces us to be more vulnerable than we are used to being. When I was listening to the podcast I wasn't convinced at how “life-changing”  this challenge was going to be, but I was going to give it my best shot. 

So, I picked a topic that I am writing a paper on, its an issue that sparks a fire in me and I enjoy talking to people about it. Since I was already researching this topic and was engaged with it, I went into the conversation feeling prepared and optimistic. It was more difficult than I expected, especially when I had so much pressure on the conversation being at least 7 minutes. Once I was able to let the pressure of the timing slide and ease into the conversation, it felt much easier and comfortable. I was speaking to my roommate in a common area where some of our friends were also working, and as the conversation went on more and more people wanted to jump in and contribute, which was so awesome! I mean, how often are all of my friends together talking about something, in this case some of the social injustices we saw in the world, and being present and raw. There was no filtering through screens and posts, and everyone’s opinion was met with respect even if there was some disagreements between statements. It was refreshing and empowering to be talking about something that wasn’t school, or something about ourselves . We were talking like change makers, focusing on something larger than ourselves and trying to comprehend why this was happening and what we could do about it.

In the beginning I was very apprehensive about my peers willingness to engage in a conversation with me, but I was so happy with the way my challenge for the day turned out. It wasn’t exactly what I expected it to be but it reiterated how important human connection is and how powerful peoples raw feelings and identities can be.

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Magical Brain

Off the top of my head, if I were to evaluate the kind of things I read throughout the day I think it would consist of required readings, research references, and the featured snap stories produced by news outlets. 

Regarding social media, I normally mindless scroll through people’s stories or flip through celebrity featured articles, not really paying attention to the things I am reading. 

Personally, I use snapchat as my most used kind of social media.  With the Featured Stories, it creates an easy and accessible way for users to simply click on a story and click though the headlines, and celebrity gossip for the day. This is where I caught myself going, almost as if on autopilot mode. I would scroll through the stories my friends had posted and then conveniently located were the promoted stories where I could keep mindlessly scrolling through as time went on. Even when I had to track my media usage, I was timing how long I spent consuming it but still was not fully aware of what I was consuming. Challenging myself to actually think before I clicked totally changed how I viewed my media experience.

Rather than just clicking I forced myself to think, how will this impact my day and will it have a lasting impact? Instead of just killing time, I made my time worthwhile by using it to access meaningful information. This challenge forced me to realized just how often I use media as a mind-numbing device rather than something of value that can enhance my life.

As dramatic as this sounds, its empowering to be in control of the information I am being surrounded by. Choosing to put on blinders and be conscious of the media that I am letting into my life is a totally new way of thinking and one I will keep working to apply in my life.

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Magical Phone

I cannot be the only one who treats organizing the apps on your phone as an art, and I personally hate when everything is grouped into folders, how can you find anything? But a challenge is a challenge for a reason. So organize I shall!

I have to admit I take great pride in the difference between the before and after pictures. At first I was skeptical that the way my phone is organized could bring me joy, but with a quick reshuffle and an update on a standard wallpaper, my phone feels completely new, and in some way, less overwhelming.

The podcast suggested turning off the numbered red dots that appear on the apps when you have a notification but I think I would just forget to check these things regularly so I put all the apps that have those kinds of notifications in the same folder. This way all it will only appear in one part of my phone. The apps I use most frequently are on the bottom of the screen for easy access and everything else is tucked away in an appropriate folder.

I also took this theory to my computer and cleared up my desktop. I had so many documents and folders that I don’t access frequently enough to have cluttering up my desktop. I already had a background that I loved and now I actually get to see it clearly. The only folders on my desktop are school related as I use each of them frequently. All of the folders and documents were flagged and grouped together, so they still exist but don't have a place on my desktop.

It makes such a difference to log into my computer and phone and be faced with  clear screens rather than the clutter I had accepted as normal. I really enjoyed this challenge today and I 

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Magical Day

Today’s task: no multitasking!

Okay so I have to admit I severely underestimated just how difficult today’s task was going to be. As humans, we aren’t wired to multitask so cutting it out *should* be in my nature, I quickly found this wasn't the case. As a student, there is always something I need to be working on, papers to be planning for, emails to be responding to, questions to keep track of… the list goes on and on and on. Even in my Media Diary log, there were multiple times where I was using  more than one kind of media. To actually sit down and put all of my effort and attention into one single task was a struggle. 

There were two main distractions I found reoccurring throughout the day:

It’s difficult to control my thoughts to focus on the task at hand rather than racing forward a million times faster than I can keep up with. 

The other major distraction was all the notifications. I didn’t really realize this before but every time something pops up in the right-hand corner of my computer screen or my phone screen lights up, my attention is being drawn, even if for a spilt second, away from my main focus.

Turns out it wasn’t so much multitasking that was the challenge but rather actually keeping my attention focused on one thing. It is so easy to open a new tab to fit whatever your most recent thought is. At one point I had 18 different tabs open on my browser! The podcast today also mentioned that distractions come from other people, whether in person or through messaging platforms. As true as it this is, I found it easier to flip my phone over and ignore the notifications (out of sight out of mind) than it was to control the rapid pace of my thoughts.

With day one complete, I came to realize just how important “single-tasking” it is for productivity and mental sanity. It’s okay to take the day one task at a time, and get to things when you have time to give it your full attention. 

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Infomagical Challenge

For the next 5 days, this blog will be dedicated to the theories suggested in the Infomagical media blog and challenges it sets for day-to day life. This series focuses on the importance of being aware of what you are consuming through the media. By taking steps to avoid the sometimes overwhelming feeling the constant presence of social media, we will all (hopefully) become mindful media users.