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3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
reflective
slow-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
damn am I a fascist to say I kinda hated this? Felt like … why did she write this? Why the cheeky title? What was that point other than to name drop some bird species, flex centeredness and newfound connectivity to the Bay Area… a brief moment of an encounter with a child student in Oakland area who she crumpled in the face of, having only lived there for 2 years and feeling she’s made no contribution to her community… not unrelatable or invalid experiences- just what does this have to do with an addiction to social media and the attention economy(which she barely taps into the fact that it is just an abstraction in fact of a real economy- attention economy is just another way of saying “an Economy”)She was definitely on a roll for a second but this could have been much better as an essay - or a referral to read braiding sweetgrass - or a referral to read merging strategy- or a referral to guides on birding in the Bay Area - or a diaristic account of understanding place in the face of globalization and the new versions of a 24/7 workforce. She used the book (for a sec) as an opportunity to talk about art, the thing that has been questioning and challenging our relationship to attention since its literal invention lol— as it’s literal invention one might even say. And as a tech-artist out of Silicon Valley, teaching art to Stanford kids who sound like they couldn’t give less of a fuck - she seems to feel the need to justify her musings with weird term coinage, check-the same old references to Benjamin and the Angel of history, check-same old references to indigenous wisdoms and methodologies without a real praxis toward them, check- self aware language without a vulnerable depiction of self. And the cherry, kind of just a confusing jab at a grabbing title. It bugs me. It isn’t inspiring or enlivening in the ways it discusses her having felt- it merely is an account of these feelings that are so difficult to access on a daily basis, that attention doesn’t necessarily do much aid to anymore. Like all failures of theory, IMO , I think it has very little to do with experiential honesty and everything to do with experiential wishfulness. We all know what we want from life and what feels correct and healthy and natural, to some degree, but she doesn’t tap into the things that inhibit us from going there, other than “an economy”, which to me is old, trite, burdening news. felt like very little accountability for how addiction is not just about structure around the implementation of an addictive substance, but of how our bodies are the machines designed to be seduced by them. so!
Quick edit- I have sympathy in the face of her having written this after the trump election- a time when the social media un-wellness bubble kind of exploded into a dewy dust from hell, then re-formed in 2020 when we needed the language for that same breed of mess again, its failures and seductions, and when we were all quarantined at home doing “nothing”… She’s young and tried something out before it went Pop, she’s in good faith, head is in the right place, but again it felt like her replacement for social media, not a resistance to it.
Quick edit- I have sympathy in the face of her having written this after the trump election- a time when the social media un-wellness bubble kind of exploded into a dewy dust from hell, then re-formed in 2020 when we needed the language for that same breed of mess again, its failures and seductions, and when we were all quarantined at home doing “nothing”… She’s young and tried something out before it went Pop, she’s in good faith, head is in the right place, but again it felt like her replacement for social media, not a resistance to it.
informative
medium-paced
I was pleasantly surprised when How to do Nothing became a more complex book than I originally expected. I cannot remember where I found her book or what the original personal goal was for reading it, but when I started I was hoping to get a glimpse into how we can practice "doing nothing." As you read though Jenny goes into a series of almost essay-like chapters that discuss the importance of disconnecting from our human-centric, technology-centric world and adjusting our focus to reconnecting with the natural world around us. Her research takes us back into ancient Greece, to the communes of the 1970s, to the 1930s during the Waterfront Strike in San Francisco, to the traditions of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, - among several others - and along the way she has brought new focus to the meaning of being a part of something more. What started to me as a cry for us to rip ourselves away from technology (and to a degree that is still the main thesis of the book), Jenny invites her readers to reaccuaint themselves with other areas of attention - to notice the world around us and, quite literally, to smell the roses.
I am very glad I read this book, if for nothing else this read has brought several new books to the forefront of my to-read list. Thank you Jenny for helping to reconnect us with our deeper roots.
I am very glad I read this book, if for nothing else this read has brought several new books to the forefront of my to-read list. Thank you Jenny for helping to reconnect us with our deeper roots.
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Despite its title this book is not about doing nothing and being lazy. It’s an interesting conversation about how to take back our attention from companies, content, and algorithms that demand we be constantly online and put that attention towards activities and movements that will better our lives individually or as a collective community.
Jenny Odell doesn’t have all the answers and she doesn’t pretend to. This isn’t a simple checklist of things you can do to “do nothing” and then move on. But it’s a journey with Jenny as she learns how to implement changes in her life.
It’s a meandering narrative that eventually finds its way back to the point Jenny was making in each chapter. This might sound like a complaint of the book but I think it’s part of the point. This book isn’t meant to be to the point. Jenny is asking you to give her your attention and not lose interest after five minutes. She’s asking us to focus on the book so we can learn to focus our attention on things other than social media, Amazon, and TikTok with their algorithms designed to keep us clicking and refreshing for another instant hit of satisfaction.
Jenny Odell doesn’t have all the answers and she doesn’t pretend to. This isn’t a simple checklist of things you can do to “do nothing” and then move on. But it’s a journey with Jenny as she learns how to implement changes in her life.
It’s a meandering narrative that eventually finds its way back to the point Jenny was making in each chapter. This might sound like a complaint of the book but I think it’s part of the point. This book isn’t meant to be to the point. Jenny is asking you to give her your attention and not lose interest after five minutes. She’s asking us to focus on the book so we can learn to focus our attention on things other than social media, Amazon, and TikTok with their algorithms designed to keep us clicking and refreshing for another instant hit of satisfaction.
informative
medium-paced
I find the topic interesting and I really wanted to like this book, but it was just all over the place.
hopeful
informative
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
Thoughtful meditation on how to, possibly, find moments of individual freedom, in a society constructed to undermine your ability to do so. Odell builds her case by stringing together reflective evidence from various art forms and personal experience to give us hope.
A fun and interesting read. Definitely not a scientific investigation into the pitfalls of the attention economy nor a self-help book guiding you through the 8 steps to reconnect with the physical world. This book is more of a collection of thoughts that’d typically be shared while meandering through the woods over a series of hikes.
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced