Doing One Thing

I recently became fixated on something uncomfortable: a gap between what I want to spend my time doing and what I actually spend my time doing. Reading is a good example. I've always valued reading for pleasure, but somewhere along the way I nearly stopped. Not because I decided to — it just happened. For boring logistical reasons, physical books aren't practical at the moment. So I read on screens. But when I sat down to read on my phone or tablet, I wasn't just holding a book. I was holding everything. And too often, everything else won.

The shift happened sideways, through my kid. They recently received an e-reader to expand their access to library books and, on occasion, I found myself using it to read to them at bedtime. But I noticed something: when I picked up the device, there was nothing else to do with it. No notifications. No apps. No pull toward something else.

The constraint became a point of curiosity and over the holidays I finally picked up an e-reader of my own.

Between December and the beginning of February, I've read six books. That's a meaningful uptick from close to zero in the months before. The e-reader worked not because of some special feature, but because there was no other option. The choice to focus wasn't a choice I had to keep making — it was made for me the moment I picked it up.

What I’m most drawn to isn't anti-technology. It's a different kind of technology — devices with serious tech behind them, built to do one thing well. E-readers, game consoles, musical instruments. They're not primitive. They're focused. Serious technology in service of a single purpose.

I want to find more examples. I haven't fully explored why this design philosophy resonates with me yet, but I'm paying attention to the pattern. There's something here about how we design tools and how those tools, in turn, shape what we do with our time.

It seems that sometimes the most useful thing a device can do is less.

Let’s see if it’s a short or long-term change. I’ve added a Reading section to the site to track my progress. It’s fairly basic but maybe it’ll be a meaningful way to see if this new curiosity grows into something more.