My brain, like almost any brain in this dystopian era, has been hijacked by the Distraction Machine. I used to fancy myself a creative person, as this blog can attest, but my ideas dried out at some point. A hunch about the culprit led me to cutting back on social media use, which yielded an interesting observation: I still had germs of ideas, but whenever a new one seeped in, the urge to check a shiny screen for kernels of novelty took over, and thus the idea was promptly squashed.
Laying down new ideas requires time and effort. However, we leave our ideas to rot at the vine because we believe we are too busy and exhausted to do anything with them. And in any case, what good are they if they are not commercial grade. Only what is worth monetizing is worth pursuing, the Machine rules.
As such, the Distraction Machine keeps us convinced that our time outside of work is worthless. It acts as if it were scavenging bits of useless time, but what it actually does is find pockets of perfectly valuable free time and engulf them. However, the thing is, it doesn’t find them by itself—we offer our free time as tribute to it of our own accord.
I loathe the thought that I sacrificed so much of myself for so little. I loved my hobbies. They made me who I was. And I let go of them in exchange for what, entertainment? What’s more, I deemed myself unworthy of them because I could not turn them into reliable sources of revenue. I’m putting an end to all that nonsense now.
I hereby undertake to pursue my hobbies for no other purpose than to have fun, make good use of my time and possibly improve certain skills which I don’t intend to use to make a profit. My dilettantism shall be my act of resistance against the Distraction Machine.