SUNDAY SCROLL: Increase your health & happiness for nowt!
Something new to read, watch, look at, listen to and do to #bemorehuman.
Good Sunday, how’s your week been? I spent part of mine meeting people with no agenda and I found it very refreshing.
On Monday I had coffee with Julian Wong, co-founder of Rice Media who also writes the Treading Water Substack. He reached out to me through the platform because we both read and enjoy each others work. We traded creative war stories and he recommended more local Substackers to follow.
On Wednesday I met my friend Derek who, after four decades in IT, recently got his Masters in Creative Writing and is about to publish the second novel in his sci-fi series (the first is ‘You Will Be Their Nemesis’). He’s also put a band together and is developing a screenplay in the Philippines at 60!
Then I had beers with Tim, a journo friend who is writing a detective novel, and on Friday it was lunch with Nikki, a digital marketing guru who recently launched a successful series of workshops around the region.
None of these meetings, which happened at breakfast, lunch or dinner, disrupted my day but of all of them inspired me in some way. People are awesome, but even more so in person, make time to meet with no agenda and you’ll be amazed at what you find out. Nx
Read this…
It’s not just close friends and colleagues that you should be talking to by the way. According to numerous studies, including one from Harvard Business School:
The richer the mix of different relationships in people's daily conversations, the happier and more satisfied they felt. For example, someone who talks to lots of different kinds of people — strangers, acquaintances, friends, family, colleagues — in a day is likely to feel happier than someone who talks only to, say, colleagues and friends.
The goal of all technology is to increase efficiency not happiness but every time a cashier is replaced with a self-serve terminal or a waiter is replaced with a QR code we are increasing efficiency at the expense of humanity, which is also proven to increase risk of premature death!
Read more about how human connection is the key to better health and greater happiness in this NPR piece: Why a stranger's hello can do more than just brighten your day.
Watch this…
All this human connectivity reminded me of an amazing short film that came out 10 years ago but which remains relevant today, perhaps even more so. Shot entirely on a computer screen it illustrates the flitting attention span and lack of true connection in digital culture.
Look at this…
On Tuesdays (when I’m not watching short films online) I work from home, which is how I came to notice a couple of old-timers sitting in the baking sun outside my house, painting. In the spirit of human connection I took them down some cold drinks and CNY goodies and they turned out to be the artists Lee Choon Kee and Lim Thian Seng who had taken a liking to our fire escape. They let me take some pictures (with my fancy Fujifilm X100F), and then Lee then gave me a flyer for his upcoming exhibition opening 2nd March at Orchard Rendezvous Hotel if you fancy it. What a lovely, unexpected and deeply human encounter for a regular Tuesday! See the pics on my IG.
Listen to this…
It all started with a crazy idea to realise a hippie dream of building a “global consciousness”. The plan was to build a connected world, where everyone could access everyone and everything all the time; to overthrow the old gatekeepers and set information free.
But social media didn’t turn out that way. Instead of setting information free – a new digital elite conquered the world and turned themselves into the most powerful people on the planet.
Now, they get to decide what billions of us see every day. They can amplify you. They can delete you. Their platforms can be used to coordinate social movements and insurrections. A content moderator thousands of miles away can change your life. What does this mean for democracy – and our shared reality?
Journalist Jamie Bartlett traces the story of how and why social media have become the new information gatekeepers, and what the decisions they make mean for all of us.
Do this…
Simply make a point of talking to people this week. Your neighbour, the kopi aunty, the bus driver, the waiter, you don’t need to say much, just show a little interest, ask how their day is going, offer a kind word or a compliment and in so doing decrease the distance between you by a few centimetres.
Cheers, N