How do you increase your level of thriving with on-line tools to serve you, rather than suck your time away? How much time do you spend on line? If you are anything like me, I suspect it is a lot. There is a philosophical debate about whether all this time with the internet is good or bad for us. I really like Howard Rheingold’s answer:
His book and blog, “Netsmart: How To Thrive Online” is his guide on how to do this. I haven’t read the book yet, but possibly I’ll create a future post with a review. If you decide to read it, please let me know what you think of it!
Here are a few of my tips on how to effectively use the internet as a servant for thriving:
– Time Limit: Decide on the amount of time you want (or need) to spend on line either searching for information, reading e-mail, perusing your Face Book friends’ status or just surfing for fun. Set your phone alarm and when it rings, move on.
– Plan Your Time: Once you plan for the amount of time, set specific times that you will read and respond to e-mail during the day. You can find a lot of time by blocking off your time rather than letting it expand to fill an open area on your calendar. “Never Read E-mail in the Morning” by Julie Morgenstern is a helpful book full of productivity tips on how you work.
– Focus: Keep your objective in mind and stick to it. For example, if you need to find a replacement water filter for your refrigerator then stay focused on this and don’t be tempted to go look at all the other fun stuff that is available on the first site you search (i.e. Amazon, which is not where I found mine, I found a better deal at discountfilters.com).
– Stretch: Stop and stand up and stretch periodically and look outside at nature if possible. Better yet, do some of your online work sitting outside!
– Be Mindful: If feelings of overwhelm arise, notice them, feel your feet on the ground, breath out and in a couple times and then re-center yourself. Possibly shift into a feelings of gratitude for something else if you can’t shake the feelings of too-much-information-how-can-I-make-sense-of-it-all?!
You can thrive with any tool if you deliberately decide how it will best serve you and then you are disciplined in how you use it.
Consider sharing in a comment: How do you effectively use the internet to serve you (so that we can all learn)?
Note on the photos: This is my wonderful great-nephew who is already quite adept at using his Dad’s i-pad, at two years old! He thrives with the i-pad games and video streaming and still spends most of his time physically running, climbing, and jumping. He spent a lot of time running with my computer bag when I visited last week…
