Kicking The Notifications Can
I seldom check my notifications first (or even second) thing in the morning.
The moment my mind registers new information is when it starts running laps through processing, connecting, worrying, or strategizing.
I think it's the same for the average modern person.
Not sure if we've collectively acknowledged this shared predicament or if we're all individually convinced we're uniquely scattered.
This is where systems thinking reveals its own trap. We can analyze feedback loops and emergent behaviors all day, but we miss the system we're actually embedded in: the attention economy.
Of course, if you need to stay informed on what's going on in this beautifully crazy world of ours, then kicking the proverbial can down the road becomes almost inevitable.
The world doesn't pause for your mental clarity.
Markets shift, crises unfold, opportunities emerge and vanish, all while you're trying to maintain some semblance of intentional thought.
This can aka our cognitive sovereignty (i.e, the ability to direct our own attention), gets kicked further down the road until we realize we've been operating on someone else's agenda for months.
In The Know
Jump to the end and travel back into the beginning.
Imagine looking back so far on this year. How much of what felt urgent actually mattered?
Reverse engineering puts the spotlight on something uncomfortable about our information diet.
Most of what captures our attention won't register in our year-end reflection, even though it may have consumed our most precious resource in real-time.
The people who seem most "in the know" about everything are sometimes the least capable of sustained deep work.
Meanwhile, if you're creating things that matter, you may have learned something counterintuitive, i.e strategic ignorance is a competitive advantage.
A keen observation that I always find interesting is how the most productive people seem to know less about daily news cycles but more about what actually moves the needle in their field.
Smart Money Finesse
I think also this is where the dumb money analogy becomes useful.
Many of us are day-trading our attention without any strategy for long-term cognitive wealth building, so to speak.
Think of near endlessly scrolling through a social media feed, jumping from a friend's vacation photos to a breaking news headline, then to a political debate, and finally landing on an ad for something you mildly considered buying.
Smart money in the attention economy operates differently.
Patient, selective, and focused on fundamental value rather than momentary volatility.
The difference between dumb money and smart money in the realm of cognition is recognition.
If you're lucky enough to understand that attention is your most valuable asset, you're already ahead of most people who are still giving it away for free.
But understanding isn't really enough, especially when you factor in the sheer momentum of these systems designed to capture and monetize your attention.
Unknown Liability
For myself, the main challenge is sustained implementation.
Such as maintaining awareness of what's genuinely important without always drowning in what's merely urgent.
At a surface level, an answer could be digital minimalism. Maybe, complete disconnection if that's your preference and circumstances allow.
Both definitely have their merits and limitations, the former can feel restrictive and unsustainable.
And for the latter, it could leave you genuinely out of touch with important developments that may affect you directly or indirectly.
I personally have set my eyes on developing what you might call "cognitive arbitrage," which can be defined as the ability to spot the difference between sets of information, and to consistently choose the information that serves your highest ideals.
A fundamental shift from reactive to intentional engagement is required here, and it's something that I've not managed to nail yet.
Both the challenge and the solution aren't whether you can afford to be selective with your attention.
It is whether you can afford not to be, because in an economy built on your mental real estate, unchecked attention is usually a liability.
Thanks for reading!! Share your thoughts below on the comments.
i also never check notifications unless the app is strong enough to show up on my phone, its survival of the fittest, a dawrinian notification theory
the most important notifications will find a way to youre attention
ALSO I was JUST reminding myself to go turn on FLASH notifications, meaning the LED camera FLASH on your phone LIGHTS up, and its weird that we dont all use this more. i was also thinking about some sort of meshtastic needing speakers, weird they dont have em built in
oh something else, something about flash notifications, its nice to see a flashing light for notifications
my ring doorbell is pretty nice, everyone should have one , its so nice watching all the people walk by your house at night in a list lol but u have to do a notification snooze every 24 hours or it always bothers you with notifications
lets make notifications become a DPOS upvote downvote system lol, make them compete,
peopel should be able to pay 0.1 hive to 1 hive to get a message shown from hive wallet to a noitification. pay to send
Right. I used to have a phone with those notification flashlights, the customization was rather limited compared to the range of colors it could emit. Had fun playing around with, in term of different apps having different notification lights.
Lol, having that list to observe would be really interesting, who are the new comers, who's getting into trouble, what type of people are the neighbors hanging around with?
I think the sound will be a real turn off for me, can be very distracting, especially when the comings and goings of people are not structured, which is usually the case.
That seems doable in theory, it could be a great filtering mechanism as there will be costs attached to sending(could also add opening/deciphering) a notification.
Thanks for stopping by :)
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