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In Real Life: Searching for Connection in High-Tech Times
Technology helps us with our hardest work. It can also offer us endless distractions. Can technology enable us, as individuals and communities, to do our greatest possible work, the hard work of being a good person?
Jon Mitchell sets out to identify and explore the ways in which we can develop a more thoughtful relationship with technology. Rather than using technology as a medium for connecting with the world, he recommends we rethink our relationship with technology, using it as a resource that allows us to have a more intimate and personal relationship with the world around us, nature, and our loved ones. Mitchell offers concrete practices for the way we use technology in our daily lives.
With an accessible and conversational, easy-to-read style, Mitchell uses his years of experience as both a tech journalist and a mindfulness practitioner to propose a rethinking of both the design of technology and its use.
Jon Mitchell sets out to identify and explore the ways in which we can develop a more thoughtful relationship with technology. Rather than using technology as a medium for connecting with the world, he recommends we rethink our relationship with technology, using it as a resource that allows us to have a more intimate and personal relationship with the world around us, nature, and our loved ones. Mitchell offers concrete practices for the way we use technology in our daily lives.
With an accessible and conversational, easy-to-read style, Mitchell uses his years of experience as both a tech journalist and a mindfulness practitioner to propose a rethinking of both the design of technology and its use.
224 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2014
4 people are currently reading
228 people want to read
About the author
Jon Mitchell
1 book8 followersJon Mitchell has been writing stories, singing songs, and drawing pictures ever since he was little. Since his parents brought home their first Mac, he's had a thing for computers. He was born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia, and he graduated from Brown University in 2009, completing an independent concentration in Music & Mind.
Mitchell was a tech reporter for ReadWrite and other online publications, but he left in 2013 to pursue more personal projects. He released Portal, his first record, in Feburary 2014. Now he's the publisher at Burning Man. His first book, In Real Life Searching for Connection in High-Tech Times, was published by Parallax Press on February 10, 2015.
Mitchell was a tech reporter for ReadWrite and other online publications, but he left in 2013 to pursue more personal projects. He released Portal, his first record, in Feburary 2014. Now he's the publisher at Burning Man. His first book, In Real Life Searching for Connection in High-Tech Times, was published by Parallax Press on February 10, 2015.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 12, 2015
I wasn't really sure what to expect from this book when I won a free copy from Goodreads. Turns out: it's a philosophy book. How do you think about technology, what IS technology anyway?, how does it affect your life, how SHOULD it affect your life? And let me spoil it for you: the answer to everything is meditation. I'm not bothered by that answer, but it was kind of annoying to come back over and over again that meditation is the cure for the problems the author has identified. Meditation and the philosophy of Burning Man. I didn't expect to learn a short history of Burning Man and its philosophy, and I didn't know much about it before, but it fit the book well. But if you hate "hippies" with a passion, this may not be a book for you.
This was a great thinking book, a way to change how we approach technology and how we interact with it. But whether you'll take the advice he prescribes depends on what you want after thinking about these issues.
This was a great thinking book, a way to change how we approach technology and how we interact with it. But whether you'll take the advice he prescribes depends on what you want after thinking about these issues.
April 14, 2015
Staying mindful in a wired world is a challenge. Jon MItchell has been exploring how to do that for several years and shares what he has discovered. A journalist who reported on the tech industry and a practicing meditator, he comes at the question with experience in both disciplines. Very timely.
January 23, 2015
Very helpful. This was well written, and eye opening. It allowed for a great self analisys of what I already do for communication and how I can improve.
June 29, 2016
I knew before reading this book that I had an unhealthy relationship with technology, but this book expanded my paradigm of how humans interact with technology. As a scientist I need technology to do my job (by definition), but too often I have found that certain technologies, namely social media, to be draining productivity in my personal life and my work life. Mr. Mitchell posits that mindful use of technology and meditation are the best course of remediation of the anxieties sown by an unhealthy use of technology-- and he does so convincingly. Peppered with brief accounts of the history of search engines, Burning Man, and start up culture, "In Real Life" makes for an absorbing read that prompts awareness and introspection.
Disclosure: my spouse is a friend of the author.
Disclosure: my spouse is a friend of the author.
June 5, 2016
This book was meh. A lot of it felt like rambling about the challenges without actually addressing them. The last chapter was good. I would recommend reading only that part and reflecting on how to better manage technology as the tool we hire for a job while using other tools for unwinding and connecting with others.
The book ends by randomly talking about children and technology on the last page as if to give it some greater meaning without having talked about how to manage technology with kids throughout the rest of the book.
The book ends by randomly talking about children and technology on the last page as if to give it some greater meaning without having talked about how to manage technology with kids throughout the rest of the book.
May 29, 2016
Technology should work for us not control us. Be mindful. It's hard. The author suggests disconnecting, meditation, journal writing and Burning Man. There are rich techies at Burning Man whose real world jobs are to make technology more addicting and control us more. Is this a contradiction? Think about that while you meditate next.
Now you don't have to read this book.
It was just ok, at best. Too much musing and personal self discovery for the author. Not enough explication or evidence. Writing this may have been cathartic but it's not worth a read, unless you are drowning in social media FOMO and really need a guide. If you feel like you have good balance in your life, skip.
Now you don't have to read this book.
It was just ok, at best. Too much musing and personal self discovery for the author. Not enough explication or evidence. Writing this may have been cathartic but it's not worth a read, unless you are drowning in social media FOMO and really need a guide. If you feel like you have good balance in your life, skip.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews