Bored to Distraction

Bored to Distraction PDF Author: Claudia Schaefer
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791486079
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description
Popular culture in the 1990s, especially cinema, can be considered a showcase for the accumulated hopes and fears of the twentieth century. From the promise of material goods to the profusion of despair, from devastating tragedy to exaggerated rapture, a dizzying array of images assaults the eye. Drawing on recent films from Mexico and Spain, Bored to Distraction navigates this visual terrain, from melodrama to horror, looking for what, if anything, might be excessive enough to rouse us from our comfortable everyday routines.

Bored to Distraction

Bored to Distraction PDF Author: Claudia Schaefer
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791486079
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description
Popular culture in the 1990s, especially cinema, can be considered a showcase for the accumulated hopes and fears of the twentieth century. From the promise of material goods to the profusion of despair, from devastating tragedy to exaggerated rapture, a dizzying array of images assaults the eye. Drawing on recent films from Mexico and Spain, Bored to Distraction navigates this visual terrain, from melodrama to horror, looking for what, if anything, might be excessive enough to rouse us from our comfortable everyday routines.

Dependent, Distracted, Bored

Dependent, Distracted, Bored PDF Author: Susanna Paasonen
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262045672
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 205

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Book Description
A new approach to understanding the culture of ubiquitous connectivity, arguing that our dependence on networked infrastructure does not equal addiction. In this book, Susanna Paasonen takes on a dominant narrative repeated in journalistic and academic accounts for more than a decade: that we are addicted to devices, apps, and sites designed to distract us, that drive us to boredom, with detrimental effect on our capacities to focus, relate, remember, and be. Paasonen argues instead that network connectivity is a matter of infrastructure and necessary for the operations of the everyday. Dependencies on it do not equal addiction but speak to the networks within which our agency can take shape.

Dependent, Distracted, Bored

Dependent, Distracted, Bored PDF Author: Susanna Paasonen
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262363372
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 205

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Book Description
A new approach to understanding the culture of ubiquitous connectivity, arguing that our dependence on networked infrastructure does not equal addiction. In this book, Susanna Paasonen takes on a dominant narrative repeated in journalistic and academic accounts for more than a decade: that we are addicted to devices, apps, and sites designed to distract us, that drive us to boredom, with detrimental effect on our capacities to focus, relate, remember, and be. Paasonen argues instead that network connectivity is a matter of infrastructure and necessary for the operations of the everyday. Dependencies on it do not equal addiction but speak to the networks within which our agency can take shape.

The Comfort Crisis

The Comfort Crisis PDF Author: Michael Easter
Publisher: Rodale Books
ISBN: 0593138775
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 292

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Book Description
“If you’ve been looking for something different to level up your health, fitness, and personal growth, this is it.”—Melissa Urban, Whole30 CEO and New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Boundaries “Michael Easter’s genius is that he puts data around the edges of what we intuitively believe. His work has inspired many to change their lives for the better.”—Dr. Peter Attia, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Outlive Discover the evolutionary mind and body benefits of living at the edges of your comfort zone and reconnecting with the wild—from the author of Scarcity Brain, coming in September! In many ways, we’re more comfortable than ever before. But could our sheltered, temperature-controlled, overfed, underchallenged lives actually be the leading cause of many our most urgent physical and mental health issues? In this gripping investigation, award-winning journalist Michael Easter seeks out off-the-grid visionaries, disruptive genius researchers, and mind-body conditioning trailblazers who are unlocking the life-enhancing secrets of a counterintuitive solution: discomfort. Easter’s journey to understand our evolutionary need to be challenged takes him to meet the NBA’s top exercise scientist, who uses an ancient Japanese practice to build championship athletes; to the mystical country of Bhutan, where an Oxford economist and Buddhist leader are showing the world what death can teach us about happiness; to the outdoor lab of a young neuroscientist who’s found that nature tests our physical and mental endurance in ways that expand creativity while taming burnout and anxiety; to the remote Alaskan backcountry on a demanding thirty-three-day hunting expedition to experience the rewilding secrets of one of the last rugged places on Earth; and more. Along the way, Easter uncovers a blueprint for leveraging the power of discomfort that will dramatically improve our health and happiness, and perhaps even help us understand what it means to be human. The Comfort Crisis is a bold call to break out of your comfort zone and explore the wild within yourself.

Distracted

Distracted PDF Author: Maggie Jackson
Publisher: Prometheus Books
ISBN: 1615920005
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 327

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Book Description
This is an important book...a harrowing documentation of our modern world's descent into fragmentation, self alienation, and emptiness-brought on, to a large extent, by communication technologies that distract us, dislocate us, and destroy our inner lives.--Alan Lightman, author of the bestselling Einstein's Dreams and National Book Award finalist The Diagnosis and MIT professorThis fascinating book on America's collective ADD is a wake-up call to all of us to take back our lives, turn off the technology, and focus on paying attention to what makes us human and fulfilled.--Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Harvard Business School Professor and author of America the Principled and ConfidenceWe have oceans of information at our disposal, yet we increasingly seek knowledge in online headlines glimpsed on the run. We are networked as never before, but we connect with friends and family via e-mail and fleeting face-to-face moments that are rescheduled and interrupted a dozen times. Despite our wondrous technologies and scientific advances, we are nurturing a culture of diffusion, fragmentation, and detachment.In this new world, something crucial is missing: attention-the key to recapturing our ability to connect, reflect, and relax; the secret to coping with a mobile, multitasking, virtual world. How did we get to the point where we keep one eye on our Blackberry and one eye on our spouse-in bed? We can contact millions of people worldwide, so why is it hard to schedule a simple family supper? Most importantly, what can we do about it? Distracted vividly shows how day by day, our hyper-mobile, cyber-centric, interrupted lives erode our capacity for deep focus and awareness. The implications for a healthy society are stark.Attention is the building block of intimacy, wisdom, and cultural progress. Jackson makes it clear that if we squander our powers of attention, our technological age could ultimately slip into cultural decline. And yet we are just as capable of igniting a renaissance of attention by strengthening our skills of focus and perception, the keys to judgment, memory, morality, and happiness. Jackson reveals the astonishing scientific discoveries that can help us rekindle our powers of attention in a world of speed and overload. She offers us a wake-up call, and reasons for hope.Distracted is an original exposé of the multifaceted nature of attention, an engaging and often surprising portrait of postmodern life, and a compelling roadmap for cultivating sustained focus and nurturing a more enriched and literate society. More than ever, we cannot afford to let distraction become the marker of our time.Maggie Jackson (New York, NY) is an award-winning author and journalist who writes the popular Balancing Acts column in the Boston Globe. Her work also has appeared in The New York Times and on National Public Radio, among other national publications. Her acclaimed first book, What's Happening to Home? Balancing Work, Life and Refuge in the Information Age, examined the loss of home as a refuge.

The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace

The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace PDF Author: Adam S. Miller
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1474236995
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 137

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Book Description
The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace is the first book to explore key religious themes - from boredom to addiction, and distraction – in the work of one of America's most celebrated contemporary novelists. In a series of short, topic-focussed chapters, the book joins a selection of key scenes from Wallace's novels Infinite Jest and The Pale King with clear explanations of how they contribute to his overall account of what it means to be a human being in the 21st century. Adam Miller explores how Wallace's work masterfully investigates the nature of first-world boredom and shows, in the process, how easy it is to get addicted to distraction (chemical, electronic, or otherwise). Implicitly critiquing, excising, and repurposing elements of AA's Twelve Step program, Wallace suggests that the practice of prayer (regardless of belief in God), the patient application of attention to things that seem ordinary and boring, and the internalization of clichés may be the antidote to much of what ails us in the 21st century.

The Distracted Mind

The Distracted Mind PDF Author: Adam Gazzaley
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262534436
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 303

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Book Description
A “brilliant and practical” study of why our brains aren’t built for media multitasking—and how we can learn to live with technology in a more balanced way (Jack Kornfield, author of The Wise Heart) Most of us will freely admit that we are obsessed with our devices. We pride ourselves on our ability to multitask—read work email, reply to a text, check Facebook, watch a video clip. Talk on the phone, send a text, drive a car. Enjoy family dinner with a glowing smartphone next to our plates. We can do it all, 24/7! Never mind the errors in the email, the near-miss on the road, and the unheard conversation at the table. In The Distracted Mind, Adam Gazzaley and Larry Rosen—a neuroscientist and a psychologist—explain why our brains aren't built for multitasking, and suggest better ways to live in a high-tech world without giving up our modern technology. The authors explain that our brains are limited in their ability to pay attention. We don't really multitask but rather switch rapidly between tasks. Distractions and interruptions, often technology-related—referred to by the authors as “interference”—collide with our goal-setting abilities. We want to finish this paper/spreadsheet/sentence, but our phone signals an incoming message and we drop everything. Even without an alert, we decide that we “must” check in on social media immediately. Gazzaley and Rosen offer practical strategies, backed by science, to fight distraction. We can change our brains with meditation, video games, and physical exercise; we can change our behavior by planning our accessibility and recognizing our anxiety about being out of touch even briefly. They don't suggest that we give up our devices, but that we use them in a more balanced way.

Deep Work

Deep Work PDF Author: Cal Newport
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
ISBN: 1455586668
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
AN AMAZON BEST BOOK OF 2O16 PICK IN BUSINESS & LEADERSHIP WALL STREET JOURNAL BUSINESS BESTSELLER A BUSINESS BOOK OF THE WEEK AT 800-CEO-READ Master one of our economy’s most rare skills and achieve groundbreaking results with this “exciting” book (Daniel H. Pink) from an “exceptional” author (New York Times Book Review). Deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task. It's a skill that allows you to quickly master complicated information and produce better results in less time. Deep Work will make you better at what you do and provide the sense of true fulfillment that comes from craftsmanship. In short, deep work is like a super power in our increasingly competitive twenty-first century economy. And yet, most people have lost the ability to go deep-spending their days instead in a frantic blur of e-mail and social media, not even realizing there's a better way. In Deep Work, author and professor Cal Newport flips the narrative on impact in a connected age. Instead of arguing distraction is bad, he instead celebrates the power of its opposite. Dividing this book into two parts, he first makes the case that in almost any profession, cultivating a deep work ethic will produce massive benefits. He then presents a rigorous training regimen, presented as a series of four "rules," for transforming your mind and habits to support this skill. 1. Work Deeply 2. Embrace Boredom 3. Quit Social Media 4. Drain the Shallows A mix of cultural criticism and actionable advice, Deep Work takes the reader on a journey through memorable stories-from Carl Jung building a stone tower in the woods to focus his mind, to a social media pioneer buying a round-trip business class ticket to Tokyo to write a book free from distraction in the air-and no-nonsense advice, such as the claim that most serious professionals should quit social media and that you should practice being bored. Deep Work is an indispensable guide to anyone seeking focused success in a distracted world.

Build for Tomorrow

Build for Tomorrow PDF Author: Jason Feifer
Publisher: Harmony
ISBN: 0593235398
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description
“Build for Tomorrow will change the way you think so you can overcome any obstacle and reach your full potential.”—Jim Kwik, New York Times bestselling author of Limitless The moments of greatest change can also be the moments of greatest opportunity. Adapt more quickly and use the power of change to your advantage with this guide from the editor in chief of Entrepreneur magazine and host of the Build for Tomorrow podcast. We experience change in four phases. The first is panic. Then we adapt. Then we find a new normal. And then, finally, we reach the phase we could not have imagined in the beginning, the moment when we realize that we wouldn’t go back. Build for Tomorrow is designed to accelerate that process—to help you lessen your panic, adapt faster, define the new normal, and thrive going forward. And it arrives as we all, in some way, have felt a shift in our lives. The pandemic forced a moment of collective change, and we are still being forced to make new plans and adjustments to our lives, families, and careers. Many of us will never go back, continuing to work from home, demanding higher wages, or starting new businesses. To help people along this journey, Entrepreneur magazine editor in chief Jason Feifer offers stories, lessons, and concrete exercises from the most potent sources of change in our world. He speaks to the world’s most successful changemakers—from global celebrities like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Maria Sharapova to innovative CEOs and Main Street heroes—to learn how they decide what to protect, what to discard, and how to move forward without fear. He also draws lessons from history, looking at how massive changes across time can help us better understand the opportunities of today. For example, he finds guidance for our post-pandemic realities inside the power shifts that occurred after the Bubonic Plague, and he reveals how the history of innovations like the elevator and even the teddy bear can teach anyone to be more forward-thinking. We cannot anticipate tomorrow’s needs, but it shouldn’t take a crisis to push us forward. This book will show you how to make change on your own terms.

Beyond Digital Distraction

Beyond Digital Distraction PDF Author: Kurt C. Schuett
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3031532155
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 145

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Book Description