Synopses & Reviews
Technology helps us with our hardest work. It can also offer us endless distractions. Can technology enable us, as individuals and communities, to do our greatest possible work, the hard work of being a good person?
Jon Mitchell sets out to identify and explore the ways in which we can develop a more thoughtful relationship with technology. Rather than using technology as a medium for connecting with the world, he recommends we rethink our relationship with technology, using it as a resource that allows us to have a more intimate and personal relationship with the world around us, nature, and our loved ones. Mitchell offers concrete practices for the way we use technology in our daily lives.
With an accessible and conversational, easy-to-read style, Mitchell uses his years of experience as both a tech journalist and a mindfulness practitioner to propose a rethinking of both the design of technology and its use.
Review
"The particular mix of technologies you need and use for spiritual work will change. The contemporary state of technology will change, and the work you do will change. The foundation for a spiritual relationship with technology is not expertise in specific technologies. Rather, it's a methodology, or a practice if you prefer. It's a way of seeing, doing, and learning. It's a mindset."Jon Mitchell, In Real Life
Review
"Ideal for the non-specialist general reader with an interest in the role technology is able to play with respect to enhancing the quality of our lives and our communities, along with the potential hazards to both if abused or misused,
In Real Life: Searching for Connection in High-Tech Times is very highly recommended and would prove to be an enduringly popular addition to community library Self-Help/Self-Improvement collections."The Midwest Book Review
In Real Life is one of the best books Ive read about the meaning and use of technology. Its well-written, informed, humble, savvy, entertaining, direct, and useful.”Howard Rheingold, Net Smart and The Virtual Community
Can there be sacred technology? Jon Mitchell convinces us that it is possible in this provocative and deeply spiritual exploration of our high-tech times.”Rabbi David Wolpe, Why Faith Matters
"The rapid growth of the Burning Man community and the spread of its culture was made possible by the year-round connectivity that the Internet afforded us. This book shines a thoughtful light on the technologies that support the kind of global betterment that Burning Man is all about.” Will Chase, publisher, Burning Man
Synopsis
Technology can help us with some of our most difficult work. It can also offer us endless distractions. Can technology help us, as individuals and communities, in our most important task, that of being a good person?
Jon Mitchell sets out to identify and explore the ways in which we can develop a more thoughtful relationship with technology. Rather than only using our technological devices as a medium for connecting with the world, he recommends we rethink our relationship with technology, and see it as a resource that allows us to have a more intimate and personal relationship with ourselves and the world around us. Mitchell offers concrete practices for streamlining and improving the way we use technology in our daily lives.
Writing in a relatable, conversational, easy-to-read style, Mitchell draws on his years of experience as a tech journalist and mindfulness practitioner to propose a rethinking of both the design of technology and its use.
About the Author
Jon Mitchell is a graduate of Brown University, where he concentrated on Music and Mind. He worked as a journalist in online media for ReadWrite.com and several other magazines. He is a content strategist at Burning Man, and has recorded a rock album called Portal. He lives in Oakland, CA.
Table of Contents
TechnologyWhat is your work?
Defragmenting consciousness
Spiritual work, spiritual jobs
What is a technology?
Talking past each other
Jobs to be done
Tech people
Innovation
Spiritual jobs
MAGIC
Cosmos journaling
Reading
Writing
MEDITATION
Plans and places
Desk job: a guided meditation
How I wrote this book
The value of disconnection
PRAYER
Building temples
Conversations
In a relationship
Tech ideology
Managing
Now hiring
The interview
Doing your chores
Endnotes
Appendix