Thoughts

I asked this last night on FB:

What’s the longest you’ve gone without email or phone access (in the modern world). Second question: Where would you go to make that happen?

The responses were intriguing.

Lucy: One of my favorite things about tubing or kayaking down a river is going for several hours without a phone.

Pam: Come to my house. Most nights limited cell phone service and no high speed internet available.

Jill: When we were in Lalibella, Ethiopia we were four days and three nights without. Trust me if we could have found Internet i would have.

Tami: Delhi [Iowa], one week, two years ago

Vasu: Sorry Frank…can’t remember the longest time because I would never subject myself to that kind of dark age lack of technology.

Dan: A week and a half fishing in Canada. Add no electricity and no running water to that equation as well.

Karen: We were just at Hilton Head for a week and most nights we did not have cell phone signal. Kinda nice if you ask me.

Susan: 5 days – Montego Bay, Jamaica two years ago in August…what a great escape – all inclusive resort, spa, beautiful beach and total relaxation – and I came back engaged…and was married a few days after that. Not bad for a world disconnect experience!

Darco: Nepal for a month. You learn very quickly what you can live without.

Chris: Hiking down to the bottom of the Grand Canyon was the longest stretch of being completely off the grid this past decade. Four days of no phone, no email….no beds or showers either, but that’s a whole different story. Wish it could have been longer, but a guy’s gotta make a living.

We live in such a wired world. Heck, it’s what makes this blog possible. But I wonder…when’s the last time you got a handwritten letter? When’s the last time you didn’t check your email? When’s the last time you went off the grid?

I wonder how work would be in the absence of social media. If people went back to talking. I’m not going all Luddite. I’m just wondering how the dynamic would change.

We use email and text now to communicate — but we also use it to slap people down. Or to toot our own horn. It would be interesting to look at the composite of a company’s email and see how many are:

1. CYA memos
2. Self promoting memos
3. Copy everyone on the list memos

In my next company I’m going to try a little experiment. I’m going to have an Unplugged Day once a week. Just one day. No email. No internet. No nothing except good old fashioned communication. You know…the talking kind.

Now I’m gonna think about going to the ends of the earth. Where would you go?

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