Notes from Better Off

This book tells the tale of two successful city-dwellers, Eric and Mary Brende, who choose to live in an Amish-like community for 18 months. It goes pretty much as you’d expect: they struggle to get going but eventually love the lifestyle and decide to keep much of it.

One thing the book explored was something I’ve thought of quite a bit. When we have numerous possessions, much of our time, energy, and money is spent just keeping them going. One especially ascetic member of their community referred to this as “turning the machine”. What would our required workload be like if we didn’t need to keep lots of possessions fixed up, fueled up, and upgraded? What could we do instead?

I also enjoyed seeing how minimal technologies can be very powerful. A hand-cranked washing machine, for instance, took less time and energy than an automatic one and spun clothes dry enough to hang. A “yankee drill” made it onto my wishlist for its elegant manual drilling action that spins the bit as you push down on the handle.

Obviously, in a time of environmental and financial crisis, the book sparked lots of thoughts about how this sort of lifestyle could “save the world”. But a doubt that nagged me throughout was that this approach to saving the world doesn’t seem to scale. Alex Steffen [once wrote at his WorldChanging blog](http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/007073.html), “Don’t just be the change–mass-produce it”. I’m convinced that one of our world’s most pressing design needs is for ways to radically change the behavior of billions of people, and while I admire Eric and Mary’s courage and perseverance, their account doesn’t suggest a lifestyle that would be accepted voluntarily by most people living in developed countries.

But could it scale? I loved the title of the book: “Better off“. A double entendre about living better and shutting off machines, it suggests that people might enjoy their lives more by living this lifestyle–and that they might realize this through reading the book. I don’t think that this book is going to do that, but a similar approach that envisions a life made *better* by slowing down might.

That’s what I’m interested in designing, and while I do that I’ll continue to enjoy and be inspired by the ideas and strategies showcased in Better Off…many of which are listed below.

### Notes

An interesting perspective on work was that it was not something to be avoided, but rather a natural part of life that can build friendships and be fun.

> Certain Amish groups in the past went so far as to outlaw lightning rods, for fear of diminishing occasions of spontaneous barn raisings. To this day our neighbors forbade the purchase of insurance policies for similar reasons. (40)

They found a type of thought that you simply can’t get in a “normal” situation (reminds me of Anathem):

> In the modern university, with its rapid turnover of assignments and fast-paced technology, the human brain is treated as just another processing device and is expected to keep pace with electronic blips. but Adams’s thought, ponderous and discursive as it was, could not be summarily ingested…This was the secret: to grasp his meaning, you had to be living it. (67)

On enjoying the moment:

> In being slower, time is more capacious. The event is only in the moment. By speeding through life with technology, you reduce what any given moment can hold. By slowing down, you expand it. (67)

The strange ways we counterbalance our lopsided lifestyles:

> Computer users, cramped in a cubicle all day long, jogging around the block…captives of the technological environment fleeing for brief weekends to mountains, beaches, and rustic cabins. (67)

Technology’s antisocial tendencies:

> Cars, telephones, message machines, caller ID, and e-mail grant us unprecedented powers to associate with whom we want, when we want, to the degree we want, under the terms we want, finessing and filtering out those we don’t want–and thin out the possibilities of social growth accordingly. (80)

“Turning the machine”:

> Though his job gave him flexible hours, he inevitably worked overtime in order to buy more refined, processed foods. “I’ve noticed,” he said, “that’s generally the way it goes. Most of the work around here is just to turn the machine.” (126)

A conclusion Brende finds similar to Max Weber’s study “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”

> The means by which the spiritually reborn demonstrated their righteousness were threatening to become their ends. The outward tokens of salvation or self-worth were starting to stand in place of the inner reality. (126)

How taking your time leads to new conclusions, and why you can’t take shortcuts with creativity.

> In true leisure their is mastery. If the enemy of self-direction was passion and impulse, its ally was quiet repose, mindfulness, perceptivity. Yet the act of reflection transcended the rational; it followed a course that could not be entirely foreseen, yielding conclusions that could not be reached if too deliberately pursued. (133)

The elders carefully evaluated each technology, deciding whether it had on the balance more benefits or detriments for the community:

> Here were members of an obscure sect in a prayerful meeting–rationally evaluating the implications of a technology that the rest of us accept on faith. (134)

How less technology can make for a “lighter” life:

> The dynamics of mutual activity take on their own life and liberate a sense of common cause. There is also a real savings in maintenance on fuel-consuming mouths. Now that we have gotten our routine down, it is a good guess that Mary and I spend only about two or three hours a day on work necessary to our livelihood. (227)

Brende’s “principle of minimation”:

> Other things equal, it is better to find a non-technological solution than a technological one, or failing that, a less technological solution than a more technological one. (230)

The reasons for that:

> First, a modern automatic machine is…a complex fuel-consuming being with needs of its own. It gobbles up energy; it demands care and maintenance.

> [Second,] duplicating vital human capacities can have one of only two consequences: atrophying the capacities or creating competition between _Homo sapiens_ and machine.

> [Third,] a complex mechanical entity readily overwhelms or subverts the very purpose for which is was deployed. [think cars built for speed but sitting in traffic jams]

A bit of perspective, recognizing that he does use a tremendous amount of technology inherently:

> Merely by existing in a Western country, I have ready access to sanitary water, vaccines, plentiful food, many mass-manufactured goods, and select forms of automation..and with this degree of usage, I enjoy a balanced life, blending family and work and leaving amply amounts of leisure.

Recommended tool and book: a [Yankee drill](http://www.amazon.com/Stanley-03-043-Yankee-Push-Drill/dp/B0007PNNLQ) and [E.M. Forster’s The Machine Stops](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops)