My mind goes through phases of thought that shape the way I view everything for long periods of time. When I moved to Northern California my mind was stuck in the "I've just moved, this is great" mindset. This mindset encouraged me to change and to adjust to my surroundings. Activities such as buying new furniture, acquiring a bike for commuting, and searching out good places to eat were common. Now that I've settled in, a new mindset has come.

Several things have been going on in my personal life recently to lay the base for the mental shift. However, the crisis started when it was announced that I would be losing my nice office at work with a window, and would be moved to terrible soul-crushing cubicles. The problem wasn't so much that I was moving or that I really hated the look of the new cubes. Although these were certainly a factor. It was the organizational reasoning that called-for, nay, demanded the move. The reasoning didn't make sense. A higher up wanted to move all of their underlings in the area into one building (as opposed to being merely across the street). What merit could this possibly have? We had gotten along just fine without being the same building for years. As an international corporation we can never be in any one office anyways.

The crisis was and still is, I don't care to be apart of something that doesn't make sense. The problem with going down this line of thought is that when looked at carefully most activities we/I engage in don't make a lot of sense. At this same time, I had not had much to work on for some time. Again the problem was organizational, higher ups hadn't decided what they wanted us to work on. So our team was mostly floundering around. Being the way I am, having a whole day of nothing to do, while trapped at work does not mix well. So I decided I would read at work, among other projects.

I read "The four-hour work week" by Timothy Ferris, mostly at work, during work weeks that were likely less than four hours in terms of time spend on work. The book only aggravated and brought into focus the problem of work. In brief, the problem of work is that we assume as a culture that "work" means sitting around in an office for forty or more hours a week mostly pretending to accomplish something. Often performing tasks that get nothing accomplished. This "quiet life of desperation" becomes just that- an entire life spent doing nothing.

Mr. Ferris also points out how this pretending to be busy act intrudes upon all aspects of our lives. Most importantly, time spent absorbing information that does not enrich our lives (like reading this, but I write this for me not you). If we cannot act on the information right now and it does not help us accomplish our goals, then it likely hinders us instead of helping. We tend to get trapped in analysis paralysis with too much information or even worse we become passive observers. Being someone, who like many, would spend several hours a day following the news and technical articles, not to mention internet fluff, (mostly to fill the emptiness of work) found this shocking. Was it all unnecessary? I have since engaged in a "low-information" diet and found that it is. By "low-information" diet, I mean that I actively avoid mindlessly browsing around news sites and content aggregators. The keyword is mindlessly. Mindfully seeking out specific information or amusement is not the problem.

Anyways, I am beginning to lose the original point, which is that I find myself with a new mindset. A mindset that is searching for a new way of living.