Slow Blogging Part 2: A Rejection of Immediacy

As I am sure some of you may have noticed I have not had the opportunity to update this blog as regularly as usual over the last few weeks (I usually endeavour to update it 3-4 times a week, I don’t “do” weekends and I always celebrate Saint Monday!), some weeks I will have a theme that I develop over a series of blogs and therefore plan ahead and other weeks I just write whatever comes into my mind. Some weeks I prep ahead and write several entries in one go to post at later date, other weeks I just sit down each morning and after I have checked my emails etc, write down whatever comes into my mind. Some days I will have some idea straight away, other days I will not have a clue and have to refer to some notes or ideas I have scrawled in the past. Some times it can take me 5 minutes to write an entry, other days it can take all day. I am rubbish at proof reading and will often post entries with stupid mistakes!

As you can see, I am not what you call a “problogger”. I am “sloblogger” (thanks to Todd Sieling, who I got the term from, although after doing a bit of digging there are a lot of other “slobloggers” out there).

So what is the difference between a problogger and Slow Blogger?  Well, number one, is that Slow Bloggers reject the idea of immediacy as Tom Sieling dsays “It happenes when it happens”, rather than trying to write a blog entry each day, just for the sake of writing a blog entry. Carl Honore recently wrote in his blog about how most bloggers are usually a pretty fast bunch (click here to read it). We slobloggers write only when we have something to say, reflect on our writing and avoid the kneejerk reaction to post for the sake of posting or because we are expected to post, or because that is what we have been told we should do. We don’t “chase the news” and try and be the first to write about something, but consider, ponder, contemplate, research and offer (hopefully) a more measured (and interesting) entry.

(Not that I am saying traditional bloggers are in anyway substandard or that sloblogging is better than traditional blogging, it is just a different way of doing things! Some probloggers out there write excellent posts on a very regular basis! Can I stop digging now?!)

To illustrate how posting on a less regular basis works incredibly well, Tim Ferris, author of the “The 4-hour Work Week: Escape the 9-5, Live Anywhere and Join the New Rich” (I highly recommend it, if you haven’t read it already) writes a very successful blog and he does not update it regularly at all! See this entry of his to see his blogging strategy and listen to how he blows apart common myths about the need to blog regularly to be successful.

Remember Slow, in all its forms, is about Quality NOT Quantity.

I am working on a couple of themes that I started a while ago, but got waylaid on the that I will be running on here over the next few weeks: Slow Work and Mindfulness. Stay tuned!

SC

Slow News Friday

I have decided to do a new feature, every Friday (well, really, every Friday that I can) I am going to discuss any news story or stories that have come up this week that have a slow angle…

And as luck would have it, this story appeared in the newspaper just today:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/primaryeducation/5019030/School-cuts-lunch-hour-and-replaces-playtime.html

This utterly ridiculous and a symptom of the continued pressure place on on children and parent  (by whom?) to perform better.

Can’t children just left to be children for awhile?! The study reported here:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,482840,00.html

Suggested that this increased pressure on children at school has more negative effects than positive one.

Really. Is this pushing children so hard necessary? When I talk about the concept of “Slow Work” I often talk about how children rarely disguish between work and play and are quite happy to do what we would consider hard toil. And the key to a stress free working life is to regain that childlike attitude to work.

But, with these absurd new approaches children will have that (essential?) play taken away.

If you want a more measured and probably saver and productive way to bring up children I highly recommend you read Carl Honares book Under Pressure: Putting the Child Back In Childhood: Putting the Child Back into Childhood and Tom Hodgkinsons book The Idle Parent: Why Less Means More When Raising Kids.

Matt

Tempo Giusto

Morning. Wasn’t it dark and cold today? I really wanted to stay in bed, the problem is that one of my dogs, Dylan, is a morning dog (the other, more sensible, I think, Chloe, is more of a lie in dog), so he invariably starts whining at about 7 o’clock because he wants to go out (he is still only a puppy bless him). So I have to struggle out of bed. This is no way for an idler to act! Embracing Slow doesn’t mean you should do everything slowly, it means that you should everything at the right pace or speed, as Carl Honore put’s it “Tempo Giusto”, finding the correct timing.

And I am most definitely not a morning person. If you are, great, embrace that. But me? No way. I want to lounge around until at least 9 o’clock drinking tea (tea is an idlers drink, coffee is just too edgy) and stuff.

Anyway, I have no idea where I was going with this…

Oh, yes! I remember, continuing on from “Good Things About the Economic Downturn Part 1”. Did you do it? The exercise I suggested? If not, do it, it is essential to coping with this change in economic situation.

Intrinsic to embracing the Slow Philosophy, means living intelligently and recognising not only your own timing, but your own interests, needs and wants. How much do you do, spend and act because other people have told you to? Maybe not directly, but through suggestion, marketing and peer pressure (like those “2 for 1” offers in the supermarket, you would never have bought even the one if you hadn’t seen the offer! It can be that simple)? You feel the need to own a certain item because of outside influence? You need to start recognising, how much of your resources (time, money, energy, emotion) you use (waste?) on doing things because of outside influences…

That may sound a little vague or odd at the moment, but as you think about it and it sinks in you will start to notice when you think about doing something, or buying something really think hard about your motivations for doing it.

Then you can start cutting back in these areas to give you time and money to do what you want!

 SC