We live in the future, and I hate the future
In many sci-fi novels set in an unclear future, the world is dark and it’s raining all the time (or not at all, because, well, the climate crisis). There are flying cars, robots living among us, and humans wear bizarre and unpractical clothes. We haven’t really solved any problem at all — not the big problems, like world hunger or poverty. Instead, we feed into a capitalist machine, save for a handful of rebels who are fighting to get our lives back. The present, right now, doesn’t feel much different.
In recent conversations with coworkers and friends, we weighted the pros and cons of technological innovation based on artificial intelligence; these are conversations you are probably having as well. Putting aside all ethical arguments against AI for a second — like: which voices are being silenced due to unconscious bias, what about the intellectual property of the materials used to train models, and why is it always easier to use AI rather than actually doing the work of inclusion and equity and paying underrepresented and underpaid people — there are still a bunch of thoughts I can’t get out of my head when I think about the issue at hand: I love the idea of unloading some of the grunt work to focus on the “important work that matters”, but are we heading down a slippery slope of forgetting what the “important work that matters” actually is?
What is time?
When I let my mind wander (and lately that happens rarely, to be honest) I have to stop it from thinking all these intrusive thoughts about all the things that need to get done. I used to just think thoughts, and now all my thoughts seem to be about systems, and optimisation, and productivity. I’m trying to push back as hard as I can, holding on to words and ideas from a book I read last year, while on a long train ride, at a moment where I had a long stretch of time ahead of me to think all the thoughts I wanted, read all the books I wanted. The book was Oliver Burkeman’s “Four thousand weeks”, and it talked about something that I instinctively learned about after having my first child and being “forced” to slow down: The importance of time.
The main lesson in the book, really, was about how we will never get it all done.
That’s it, that’s the lesson. All those books you want to read and movies you want to watch and things you want to design and write and see; all those trips you want to take: You will never have enough time. It’s freeing to think in this way, because that means that the only question we can ask ourselves at the end of every day is: Was it worth it? We exchange our time for money, or knowledge, or love. It’s a currency like any other, and so maybe sitting in that meeting may not have been fun, but for the sake of the money I make in that job, it might have been worth it. Was it worth it, though, to sit in that meeting, and make that amount of money, while missing out on [insert something important here]? Maybe. Maybe not.
Productivity vs. Optimisation
What the craze around AI is teaching me right now is that people are obsessed with optimisation, because it lets us believe that we are being productive. Sometimes, optimisation unlocks something good: Clearing a path for me to spend more time with my dog, or outside, or with my family; clearing a path for me to learn something good that I wanted to learn, or for me to do work that feels more important. Sometimes though, it clears a path for me to be even more productive and to work even faster, not even allowing me to take a minute or two to stop and think. Is it a coincidence that most of our best ideas come to us in the shower, or in that moment between wakefulness and being asleep?
Gentle maintenance
In a place where our minds are free to roam, we can unleash all that creative potential; most of us have a day-to-day that hardly allows us to look out of the window and daydream, so the next best thing left are tasks of what I like to call “gentle maintenance”.
I find it sad to be aiming for a world where I will not need to take care of my plants, because something or someone will water them on my behalf. I like that act of gentle maintenance of things that feel important to me. So, maybe, this is what we should make a point to remember: Some of those tasks that “need to be optimised” are good for us. There is something to be said about gentle maintenance; the act of doing something a little repetitive allows our thoughts to wander and it allows us to be slow, and kind, and grateful.
Gentle maintenance might not be the best currency in a capitalist society, but it’s something I value: Like tending to plants, shovelling snow in our driveway or mending an old garment; or, even, the gentle maintenance of parenthood.
Thank you to Tam, Oscar and Martin for the deep conversations that inspired this little post ♥