What do women really want? Flowers? Chocolate? Doors opened for them? To be tied up on a train track and saved in the nick of time?

Honestly, I have no idea. I have a hard enough time figuring out what I want—let alone all women on earth!

So let’s talk about something I do know about: what you want. You, apparently, want to read a blog post called “What Women Really Want.” Furthermore, it’s likely that at least some of you want to read such a blog post not because, ten minutes ago, you were thinking to yourself, “The best use of my time right now would be to read a blog post about what women really want!”—but, rather, because you saw the title and felt mildly intrigued, while also feeling disinclined to do something more cognitively demanding than clicking a link.

In other words, it’s possible that some of this post’s readers—not you, of course!—fell for the clickbait I so slyly threw out there. But, trust me, they’re not alone! I succumb to clickbait all the time. I mean, it’s called “bait” because it lures us helplessly in! Moth to a flame! Nonetheless, however you ended up here, I’m genuinely glad you did, because I want to tell you about a great book called Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport.

Newport dedicates three separate chapters of the book to three different ways that we can spend the free time we will acquire if we stop mindlessly clicking around on the Internet. According to Newport, these three uses of time are essential to human health and happiness, and yet are often neglected in the digital age:

• Solitude
• Conversation
• Demanding activities

At this point, I’d like to share a passage from Newport’s book. It’s from his chapter on demanding activities, but, in my opinion, it applies to all three of his recommended uses of time:

“The value you receive from a pursuit is often proportional to the energy invested. We might tell ourselves there’s no greater reward after a hard day at the office than to have an evening entirely devoid of plans or commitments. But we then find ourselves, several hours of idle watching and screen tapping later, somehow more fatigued than when we began. . . . If you instead rouse the motivation to spend that same time actually doing something—even if it’s hard—you’ll likely end the night feeling better.”

Obviously, demanding activities are hard. (I’m trying to learn French at the moment, and facile isn’t exactly a word that applies.) But I would argue that solitude and conversation are also hard, at least for us moderns. With various technologies filling every waking moment, carving out time for solitude and conversation is hard to do. It’s also hard to learn how to enjoy being alone, or how to enjoy being social, if those aren’t activities that come naturally to you. But I agree with Newport that the hard work does pay off.

And if you have made it through this entire, 500-word blog post? Congratulations: that counts as a demanding activity! Will you also make time to be alone and to be social today?

I already knew, before beginning the book Digital Minimalism, that its author Cal Newport is no fan of social media. He argues against it regularly on his blog.

Yep, he draws a distinction between social media and blogging. For example, in his recent blog post On Blogs in the Social Media Age, he explains why popular blogs are more likely to have high-quality content than popular social media feeds.

What I didn’t see coming was Newport’s objection to the “Like” (sometimes called “Favorite”) buttons that are ubiquitous on modern social media platforms. In Digital Minimalism, he writes at length about what seems to be an innocent enough feature. And he makes a compelling argument for it being neither innocent nor harmless.

The “Like” button, Newport explains, is sleazy and harmful because it transforms a website from a “fun amusement” to a “digital slot machine.” In other words, social media companies use their “Like” buttons to addict people in the same way that slot machines are addictive. The difference is that slot machines take money directly, while social media sites get money from advertisers when many people spend lots of time clicking around. Logging in and seeing that red notification saying that someone “Liked” your post gives the brain a pleasureful ping—which we crave again and again.

So we lose time that we could spend otherwise. Newport describes many of the types of activities we are missing out on. One of the most important of these, ironically, is social interaction: the very thing social media is supposed to be providing us! He cites research studies that show that the more time people spend on social media, the lonelier they tend to be. Yikes! And here’s one of my favorite passages in the book, which neatly explains the difference between clicking “Like” and engaging in activities that prevent loneliness:

“Earlier, I cited extensive research that supports the claim that the human brain has evolved to process the flood of information generated by face-to-face interactions. To replace this rich flow with a single bit is the ultimate insult to our social processing machinery. To say it’s like driving a Ferrari under the speed limit is an understatement; the better simile is towing a Ferrari behind a mule.”

Ha! No, let’s not waste our time towing luxury cars behind pack animals! Though I suppose it might be necessary in certain circumstances. Pack animals do travel rough, mountainous terrain better than sports cars. And the “Like” button can keep people in touch despite the rocky terrain of busy lives and far distances. Newport admits that social media can provide real benefits to individuals: it’s not all bad. His point is that we should think carefully about how we spend our time, and make darn sure that we aren’t replacing rich and real human interaction with the poorest sort of contact possible.

I chose the accompanying photo because I like that it can symbolize this post’s theme in two opposite ways. Does the computer represent the human brain and all its rich processing power, while the candle represents the “Like” button and its limited ability to illuminate? Or does the candle represent the real-world homeyness of sharing a space with someone, while the computer represents the coldness of machines?

Hello, book lovers! Today I’d like to share with you a hodgepodge of tips and reminders.

TIPS: Articles for Lifelong Learners

I am excited to announce that I have added a new page to my website called Tips. It’s in the navigation bar at the top of every page. Here I will offer various articles for lifelong learners. Because these articles are written for specific audiences, each of them may or may not be applicable to you. Thus, I will periodically share with you their existence as I write them, but I will not include them in their entirety in blog posts. That way, if the subject of a particular article interests you, you can click through and read it; but if it is not applicable to you, you will not be burdened by its appearance in your inbox. Here are the first two articles I have posted there:

• How to Comment on a Blog Post – Easy Instructions—This article is for blog readers who would like to comment on a blog post, but aren’t sure how. It contains easy, step-by-step instructions.
• Books to Read Before College – Prime Your Mind!—This article is for high school juniors, seniors, and graduates who plan to go to college. I offer a list of books that teens might read to prepare for university-level coursework.

TIPS: If Statements

Irene commented on my post If vs Whether: Grammar at Work that she would be interested to learn about “if statements” that are contrary to fact and “if statements” that use the subjunctive mood.

• “If statements” can be grammatically correct, and yet be false. For example, take the following sentence: If you decide to go to the theater tonight, (then) I will see you there. According to the sentence’s grammar, which is correct, I will definitely see you at the theater in the case that you decide to go. (The sentence says nothing about what will happen if you decide not to go.) Even though this sentence is grammatically correct, I could say this and yet have no intention of going anywhere near the theater tonight. The sentence could also be false in other ways—for example, we could both end up at the theater but not see each other.
• “If statements” often use the subjunctive mood. The subjunctive mood communicates that something is imaginary or unreal. For example, take the following sentence: If I were to adopt a dog, (then) I would walk my dog every day. This is the subjunctive mood because I am speaking hypothetically about adopting a dog; it is something I am imagining doing, but is not a reality. Once again, though this sentence is grammatically correct, I could be telling the truth, I could be lying, or I could be trying to tell the truth but actually be wrong. One interesting fact about the subjunctive mood in English is that some of its verb forms have fallen out of use over the centuries. People today often substitute was for the technically correct were in such sentences: If I was to adopt a dog . . . And take this famous Shakespeare line (the opening words of Twelfth Night): “If music be the food of love, play on.” Today we would use is instead of be, and that would be perfectly correct. Confusing, right?

REMINDER: Enter the Contest!

I once again invite you to enter the second contest of this blog! It ends one week from today, so you still have time to enter! Click here to see the contest details. Thank you so much for your support!

REMINDER: Daylight Savings Time

Don’t forget (if you live in certain areas of the world, including much of the U.S.) to move your clocks forward on Sunday!

I hope you enjoyed this little mélange of thoughts. Happy Friday!

I know, I know—we were in the middle of a series of posts about Émile Zola’s The Ladies’ Paradise, but I’d like to hit pause on that to share some exciting news with you all: I have acquired my first byline! So, apologies, but you will have to live in suspense as regards the nineteenth-century novel I was previewing—it’s a lot to ask, but I’m confident that you will find the strength to abide the delay—as I tell you about something really cool called Silent Book Club.

Unlike traditional book clubs, Silent Book Club has no assigned reading. You don’t have to read what other people are reading—although you can, if you want to. Like traditional book clubs, Silent Book Club brings book lovers together to talk about books and interesting ideas, make new friends, and hang out with old friends.

What do people do at a Silent Book Club meeting? Well, first, we bring whatever book we’re reading to the venue, and we order a drink; meetings are often held at places like bars, wine bars, breweries, and the like (though, of course, there’s no obligation to drink alcohol, and people order what they please). Then, we alternate between chatting informally about books and anything else we feel like yammering about, and reading in friendly silence.

I first heard of Silent Book Club through an article in Poets & Writers magazine. Upon learning that the nearest club was farther from my home than I wanted to travel, I started my own local club. This was one of the best decisions I have ever made. I discovered that Silent Book Club is a great way to meet interesting, smart, and fun people. It’s also a great way to get some reading done.

I have been hosting Silent Book Club meetings for two years now, and our club has recently expanded from offering meetings every other week to offering meetings most weeks, at two different times and days so more people can participate. We also recently took a “field trip” to a bookstore / wine bar in a nearby town, which was great fun.

But back to my exciting news—I was invited to write a blog post for the Silent Book Club website, and it is now live! I invite you to read my article New Year’s Book Solutions, which is about tips for making time for reading. If you’ve ever struggled to find the time to read, or if you, like me, have made a New Year’s resolution to read books, you may find something useful in there. Click here to read the article!

I want to thank you all for reading my writing—it means a lot to me. I hope it helps you in some way. Our regularly scheduled programming will resume on Wednesday. Until then, stay safe, stay warm, and keep on reading, folks.

Another year’s end has snuck up on us: Happy New Year’s Eve! Let’s take a moment to reflect on the past and look ahead to the future. Let’s do it for old times’ sake! We do it every year; why break a good tradition now? . . . especially since it’s such a wise and valuable tradition.

New Year’s Resolutions

Have you made any resolutions for the upcoming year? If so, I’d love to hear what they are—tell me about them in the comments!

As for me, I’m pretty boring—that is, consistent and persistent and other positive adjectives like those—because I make the same resolution every year. My New Year’s resolution for 2019, as for every year, is to read 50 books. I only rarely achieve this goal, to tell the truth, but it’s good, I feel, to have high aspirations.

This year I read a total of 37 books. Gulp—that’s not nearly as close to 50 as I would have liked. However, I did, this year, read the 1079-page masterwork Infinite Jest, by David Foster Wallace, from start to finish. That must count for at least 10 or 20 books . . . right?

In any case, I am finding it more and more important, in the digital age, to stake out reading time for myself. Early in the morning and before bed seem to be the best reading times for me. I love, love, love reading—but, still, my phone calls to me softly. Softly, incessantly, it beckons; I have to resist, and to actively decide to read: as opposed to tap and scroll around aimlessly. Does anyone else struggle with this? Any tips?

More Opposites That Are the Same

While writing my post Shopping Cart Wisdom, I was delighted to stumble across another set of opposite words with the same meaning! (See my recent post These Two? Exactly the Same.)

Writing about the categorical imperative, a philosophy developed by Kant, made me wonder about the word categorical. Shouldn’t that, I thought, be uncategorical? The answer is no. Confusingly, the word categorical means “unconditional” or “unqualified.” We modern folk, however, often add -un and say uncategorical when we mean categorical. Technically, these two words are opposites; but in everyday usage, they have, mistakenly, come to have the same meaning. Check out the embarrassing malapropism in this video between 0:30 and 0:40 . . . oops.

This prefix confusion made me think of another duo of opposites! Inflammable means “capable of being set on fire; combustible.” It’s a relative of the word inflame. However, as this word is very important for safety reasons, people started using the word flammable to mean the same thing, fearing that people might mistakenly think that the prefix in- means “not.” And so we have two words that seem as if they could be opposites, but have the same meaning. (See dictionary.com’s Usage note for more info!)

What Is a Blog?

While we’re on the subject of word usage, let’s talk about the word blog. Its etymology is “web” + “log” = weblog, or blog for short. A blog is a log—that is, a diary or journal—that’s on the web. Nobody uses weblog anymore (did anyone ever?), but it’s a good mnemonic device: a blog is a web log containing many entries. Each individual entry is called a post. Admittedly, some dictionaries have a secondary definition indicating that one post can be referred to as a blog; but other dictionaries do not. I’d like to stand by my assertion that a blog is the entire collection, not just one item in the collection.

Auld Lang Syne

I’ll refrain from analyzing the etymology of auld lang syne, as doing so may try the patience of all of us! Besides, we have things to do, places to go, people to meet, and flammable and inflammable objects to ignite . . . or at least watch being ignited. Have a fabulous last day of 2018 and first day of 2019!